Fire Hydrant of Freedom

The opposition has prepared a major demonstration in Caracas for today, September 1, 2016. It's not on the world news yet so I don't have English language links but for Spanish speakers...

Toma de Caracas

https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=toma+de+caracas&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&gfe_rd=cr&ei=gqjHV-WGH6TI8Aeyk4KgCA

Pictures of security forces supposedly on the alert

http://www.maduradas.com/culillo-a-mil-asi-esta-plaza-venezuela-a-pocas-horas-de-la-toma-de-caracas-fotos/

 

How do you say "Gulag" in Spanish?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulag

What would be the best thing to  happen to turn the situation around in Venezuela at this point?

Someone give me a magic wand and I redo Venezuela the way I like it. 


Pragmatists have to replace the idealists. The road back is very painful. Internally the country has to become more productive and only private enterprise can do that. But LatAm capitalists need to be firmly regulated. In one of my prior lives (1965-75) I was a management consultant with very high access at BoD level. It was capitalism run amuck in 9 out of 10 cases. Dismantling price controls is very painful because prices rise faster than wages. Externally, the country has to adapt to the world economy to trade effectively. What should happen without delay is cutting the oil subsidies Venezuela gives many neighbors starting with Cuba..

There are fantastic amounts of money in play, not just the exchange control scam and the commissions from all the government contracts but also from the drug trade. Presumably the Venezuelan military is the largest drug cartel in the world and prime conduit of cocaine from Colombia to Europe. They are not going to give that up easily.

Exchange controls should be dropped entirely or eased out over a period of a year or less.

I don't particularly care who runs the country provided whoever it is takes a pragmatic view. I don't see the current opposition as capable of much leadership. For the past 17 years they have been outfoxed at every turn.

Support for Chavismo has been drying up locally and internationally. The government is slowly realizing that they have to generate income and cut subsidies if they are to survive. They see the Arab OPEC members doing the same thing. They raised the price of gas but it is still ridiculously low, now it costs me about 20 cents to fill the gas tank of my Toyota Corolla instead of just half a cent. I don't use my ISP's mail service which yesterday exploded with SPAM, all paid ads. It seems like CANTV is selling SPAM space (or their filters broke down). There is a lot more merchandise on the street which seems to indicate fewer controls. There seem to be more ships in Puerto Cabello, the main entry point for imports. The government announced LOUDLY that they were paying the interest on PDVSA bonds. One recently named Minister of the Economy who is an academic economist with zero practical experience but lots of harebrained theories was replaced by a more pragmatic person.

This might sound strange but it would be advantageous for the opposition if Maduro stayed in power until 2019 and was forced to improve economic conditions by removing price and exchange controls. The anger would be directed at Maduro and his follower would have an easier time completing reforms.

Local analysis by The Devil (Miguel Octavio):


Maduro “Announces” New Emergency Powers Decree
May 15, 2016

Last Friday, President Maduro announced that he would extend the economic emergency powers decree (The same one that the National Assembly did not approve, but the Supreme Court said it did not matter) and announced that he would also decree a state of exception to “neutralize and defeat the external aggression against our country”

Now, you would think that given the importance of such a decree, the Government would have distributed a copy by now, but, no such luck, the details of the decree are unknown. Maduro will apparently issue it taking advantage of the Supreme Court’s ruling on the prior economic power decree, in which the “High” Court simply scratched part of the Constitution (Art. 339 of the Constitution, for example)  saying the Assembly did not have to approve the decree.

Some people are calling this a “coup”. I disagree. You can’t have a coup when you already staged one. I can’t even recall when this happened and one could argue when it was. It may have been when Chávez was never sworn in in Jan. 2013, as Chavismo suggested this was simply a “formality”. Or it may have been when Maduro took over from Chávez for the new term, despite the fact that the VP is named by the President and there is no proof that Chávez was even conscious at the time. Or it may have been when the Supreme Court twisted and violated the Constitution dozens of time, just to have the Government get its way.

So many coups and nobody has been counting them, but this was not it!

And the funny thing is that just last week, the Venezuelan Foreign Minister went to the UN to say there was no crisis in Venezuela, no emergency. Funny, no? the President not only extends the economic emergency decree, but also expands it to include a state of emergency.

And it just so happens that during a state of emergency, there can be no public gatherings like those the opposition has been promoting to protest the recurrent delays in the processing of the request for a recall referendum vote against none other than President Nicolas Maduro. Each step of the process has been delayed, over-interpreted and postponed, using vaporous interpretations by the Government-controlled Electoral Board. Which, of course has everything to do with trying to delay a recall vote until after Jan. 10th. 2017, when if Maduro is recalled, his personally-chosen active Vice-President would replace him and complete his term until Jan. 2019.

And thus, the threat is not from the outside, as Maduro wants you or someone to believe, but from the inside: the fear that the opposition will increasingly take to the streets to force a recall vote before the fateful date of Jan. 10th. 2017.

Thus, the guessing game begins as to who the VP will be in January. Opposition lore will have it be current VP Aristobulo Isturiz, “someone we can talk to”. Forget it! Aristobulo does not have the red credentials, nor the trust of Chavismo, precisely because the opposition can talk to him. It will likely be someone who is in the Cabinet, someone Maduro trusts. Perhaps Marco Torre, a loyal former military a perennial Cabinet member. Perhaps better a civilian, Jorge Rodriguez, loyal to Chávez and Nicolas. But who knows? There is still a lot of time before January and maybe not enough people will show up for a recall after that date*.

Stay tuned.

*Maybe I placed too much emphasis on who will replace him, but the more I think about it, the more I believe that there will not be much motivation to change Maduro for someone else. Remember that the opposition needs to get more votes to recall than Maduro got in his Presidential election.

There are lots of headlines but no real news about the killing.

https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=German+Mavare&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&gfe_rd=cr&ei=ZykxV-zbMoqw8webgrbYDA

I suspect that it is of little interest to the press outside the country and inside there is quite a bit of censorship to keep real news off the air. I know for certain that CANTV blocks certain IP addresses and with the frequent power cuts the local DNS service is extremely slow. About a month ago I reset the DNS IP addresses in my computer to stop using the local service and instead use a public DNS service in the USA. My Internet quality of service has improved and I can access Dollar Today, blocked by CANTV, directly, no problem: https://dolartoday.com

I signed the recall petition on April 29. The man on the street does not know who will replace Maduro if recalled and does not seem to care. If Maduro is recalled then the VP takes charge and that is another Chavista so there really is no change. I don't see what the opposition thinks it will gain with the recall.

There is a lot of discontent on the street but it does not go beyond a lot of muttering. People are busy trying to make ends meet. Strange as it may seem, life goes on. For over a quarter of a century no one dared increase the price of gas. The price I now pay has gone up over ten fold and nothing has happened. To me it feels like a lack of leadership. Despite the 2/3rd supermajority in the National Assembly (AN) the opposition is powerless. The supreme court is packed with Chavistas and it blocks the AN at every turn.

Queues, queues, queues, people stand in line for hours not to go to a show or buy an iPhone but to buy basic necessities that are in short supply. To make matters worse, the government has implemented various types of rationing which forces people to go shopping more often.

Two things the article does not mention: 1) scalpers, "bachaqueros." The bachaco is a large ant that can be seen carrying leaves and twigs bigger than they are to their nest. These scalpers become street vendors with customers who don't wish to waste their life in queues. They charge a very large markup because they are buying at ridiculously low controlled prices. 2) While there certainly are shortages, more every day, people willing and able to pay full price don't have to queue up. The queues are for controlled price items.

But clearly the people have spoken giving the opposition a 2/3 super-majority in the National Assembly. Belatedly the government is realizing that the situation is ready to blow up, not that they can do much about it having destroyed industry, having wasted and stollen fortunes, having ignored maintenance, and with oil at record low prices.


Are Venezuelans at the Breaking Point?
Foreign Policy Magazine By Daniel Lansberg-Rodríguez and Francisco Marquez Lara
February 18, 2016 5:14 PM

There was a time when the word “Venezuela” conjured up oil wealth, beauty queens, and baseball players. Today all those things are overshadowed by flag-themed tracksuits, histrionically ranting leaders, and, above all else, lines, lines, lines. The dramatic collapse of the economy, thanks to chronic mismanagement and plunging oil prices, has made queues — las colas, as they are locally known — the most visible symptom of the country’s failed revolution. And they’ve gotten far worse under President Nicolás Maduro.

Since coming under government control in 2014, Ultimas Noticias, one of Venezuela’s highest circulating national newspapers, has become a wellspring of rosy observations. Last week, it published an article that succinctly sums up the tragic surrealism of everyday life in what was once South America’s wealthiest country. Noting that waiting in long lines has become an unavoidable part of everyday life (“whatever the reason”), and duly asserting that “life wasn’t made solely to satisfy our tastes, wants and preferences,” the author offered a series of helpful tips to make the best of queue-standing:

“Try to stay cheerful, friendly, and make fun conversation with those next to you in line as well as behind and ahead; read; make sure to bring an umbrella and a snack; do breathing exercises; meditate and focus creative energy on the general good…”

And if those suggestions weren’t uplifting enough, the author added a bit of advice on how to improve one’s relationship with the supernatural: “For those who are religious or philosophical, it’s a marvelous moment to take stock and gauge the advancement of your spirituality.”

Venezuela’s vigorous manufacture of such banalities is, of course, nothing new. A few years back, a well known pro-government blog argued that waiting in line is actually beneficial, because it makes people value their goods and protects them against impulsive purchases. That the tone has since changed from extolling hidden opportunity to counseling weary patience is telling: the public’s rising frustration has become impossible for the government to shrug off.

That hasn’t kept it from trying, and high-ranking regime officials increasingly struggle to manage the citizens’ exasperations. Urban Agriculture Minister Lorena Freitez recently offered a reminder that “[before socialism] we had full supermarkets but empty refrigerators” — the implication being that current shortages must be a kind of progress, if everyone has an equally limited access to food. For any Venezuelans unmoved by such interpretations, Congresswoman Jacquelin Farías from the ruling United Socialist Party responds with a call to stoicism. “Just leave your house with your little bag, and you go buy what you need, then go home,” she declared recently. “That’s revolution, and it’s what our president has asked of us, so let’s just enjoy these exquisite lines.”

Readers may be forgiven for finding hints of Kafka in such statements, but for those who actually have to stand in the lines, the situation is more reminiscent of Dante. And it’s not just the lines — the most basic services that underpin any modern society have fundamentally broken down. Even in the coddled national capital, Caracas, trash collection has been severely limited, electricity and water are heavily rationed (and often unavailable), and food and medicine are increasingly difficult to find even for those who do brave the interminable queues. Every day, social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook are peppered with desperate pleas for help in acquiring medications: often from anguished parents for their children. (Needless to say, Health Minister Luisana Melo’s recent conjecture that Venezuelans “use more medicine than anywhere else in the world,” and that scarcity could readily be solved if Venezuelan were to curb their “irrational” lust for pharmaceuticals, has not been warmly received.)

Lissette García belongs to what was once the Caracas middle class. The 48-year-old single mother of two has a steady job, but she worries she may lose it given the amount of time she spends in line each week. “Sometimes you wait in line for many hours only to find they don’t have the products you need,” she says. “It’s humiliating.” Increasingly she’s been asking her mother, 77, to spell her in the queues — though she worries about her mom braving the tropical sun, not to mention the company. “It’s frightening,” Garcia says. “You’re massed together with strangers from every part of the city, at all hours, and anything can happen.” She doesn’t just mean those standing in line with her. Caracas is, after all, one of the world’s most crime-ridden cities, and citizens stuck in slow-moving lines that stretch for blocks sometimes prove sitting ducks for the city’s many motorcycles gangs.

Aracelis Ibarra, a 74-year-old cancer survivor from a low-income part of town, has become the person sent to brave the lines for her family. “[The authorities] don’t respect one’s age in most places, so you wait there like everyone else,” Ibarra says. She worries that as scarcity has become more acute, and lines longer, people have become more aggressive. “People sell their spaces to others,” she complains, referring to the new cottage industry of professional queuers that has cropped up. These entrepreneurs sometimes even advertise their services in local newspapers. “[Other times people] cut in line or attempt to buy all the products, and that’s when fights break out,” Ibarra says. In the chaos that results from such situations, businesses are sometimes sacked and would-be shoppers injured, interactions that are sometimes caught on cell phone cameras and uploaded to YouTube.

Such frustrations represent a dangerous prospect for the government. Back in 2014, the country saw a rash of larger public disturbances that paralyzed much of the capital but were nonetheless primarily contained to middle class areas. The last large-scale citywide civil strife, known as the Caracazo riots, took place in 1989, when public resentment of IMF-backed economic reforms exploded in a burst of anarchy and looting that lasted a week, and killed many hundreds. The current government’s mismanagement of the economy and country’s subsequent economic collapse have made new reforms, similar to those that preceded the Caracazo, appear increasingly unavoidable. Given the vast supply of grenades, Kalashnikovs, pro-government paramilitaries, and narco-trafficking gangs in today’s Caracas, the damage and death toll of a new outbreak of mass violence would likely be even worse.

Meanwhile, in some ways, the misery of standing in line — which afflicts both the middle and lower classes — is uniting Venezuelans against their government. Since a particularly sought-after good may become ephemerally available on short notice anywhere in the city, desperate shoppers are often forced far outside their familiar neighborhoods. In this way las colas are bringing people from different social classes like García and Ibarra together, both physically and in shared frustration. Polls taken just before December’s legislative elections, when Venezuela’s opposition gained a congressional supermajority, showed that “scarcities” and “lines” represented the first and third highest ranked “national problems” (sandwiching “crime”) among potential voters.

So despite the government’s herculean efforts to mollify Venezuela’s frustrated people and keep class divisions high, time spent waiting in lines — useful though it may be for improving one’s spirituality — may also be forging an ever stronger and more unified consensus against an inept ruling party on its last legs.


http://news.yahoo.com/venezuelans-breaking-point-221434859.html

Argentina used to be the leading economy in Latin America based on exports and industry until Peron and his wives ruined the country. Apparently economic sanity is returning to the country. Maybe to LatAm.


A morality tale in Argentina’s debt epiphany
A newly elected president is near a deal to end Argentina’s long debt woes. The country’s 15-year saga provides a lesson for a world awash in red ink.
Christian Science Monitor By the Monitor's Editorial Board
3 hours ago
 
One of the world’s longest sagas over a debt default may soon be coming to end. Argentina is nearing a final deal with foreign creditors – almost 15 years after it first defaulted on nearly $100 billion that it owed. A successful conclusion to the extended legal battle could offer a morality tale for a world awash in red ink.

What is the tale? It is that Argentines decided last year to elect a new president, Mauricio Macri, who, like a returned prodigal son, has quickly begun to shed many of the country’s profligate habits and plans to abide by the obligations of global financial rules.

“We have to be a predictable and trustworthy country,” he said. “Argentina wants to have a good relationship with the whole world.”

Largely cut off from world capital markets and foreign investments, Argentina’s economy has stagnated. Mr. Macri’s election was a turning point for the resource-rich South American nation, whose wealth per capita was once on par with Canada’s. While Argentina’s 43 million people have practical economic reasons to make good on the nation’s sovereign debts, the legal drama has also helped. Many of the creditors were able to convince a United States federal judge, Thomas Griesa, to impose tough restrictions on Argentina’s assets around the world.

It also helped that Judge Griesa labeled Argentina’s actions as “immoral.” In fact, Argentina’s snub of its creditors pushed the International Monetary Fund, which helps rescue countries in financial trouble, to stiffen its rules. “No More Argentinas” become a mantra at the IMF.

The issue of morality is often woven into today’s international struggles over debt collection or debt leniency. Since the 2008 financial crisis, the European Union has pushed Greece to curb its overspending and its lapsed tax collection before receiving loan bailouts. Greece is not alone in the EU. Many European banks remain saddled with nonperforming loans, which may total more than $1 trillion. And the official debts of Italy and Portugal are still at dangerous levels.

China could be dealing with the biggest case of moral hazard in financial obligations. The debt of its corporations, most of which are state-controlled, has risen to an estimated 140 percent of China’s gross domestic product. That is about double the debt-to-GDP ratio for US corporations. The possibility of massive debt defaults in China is a major reason for the global economic slowdown.

Argentina’s final solution to its debt may be unique but the uniqueness only shows that the legal and moral rules for debt resolution are not yet set in stone. The IMF has changed its rules in recent years as each financial crisis demands specific solutions. The IMF, for example, bent its rules to help Ukraine solve its debt woes despite the country’s apparent inability to pay. The action reflected the West’s concerns about Ukraine falling under Russian control.

This month, the IMF announced it had again reassessed its debt-rescue rules. This time the agency hoped to be able to send the proper signal to any country tempted to renege on debt obligations.

Debt is a necessary tool for individuals and countries to support each other. But it also is tied to virtues such as honor and respect. “There is a moral as well as a purely economic case for the global marketplace,” says Steven Weisman , author of a new book, “The Great Tradeoff: Confronting Moral Conflicts in the Era of Globalization.” To set rules for global commerce, he adds, requires the morality of global cooperation.

As Argentina returns to the fold of international credit markets, its story should elevate the search for the best legal – and moral – standards to honor debt obligation. It shouldn’t take a country some 15 years to figure out the right course.

http://news.yahoo.com/morality-tale-argentina-debt-epiphany-225837079--politics.html

This I got to see to believe. CAP was kicked out of office when he raised the price of gas. At $0.95 a liter at the new official rate of BsF 10 per dollar, filling the tank will cost between BsF 400 and a BsF 1000 compared to today's 4 to 10 range. Although it's certainly the right economic move I doubt it will help raise Maduro's popularity.

For comparison, a kilo of potatoes (2.2 pounds) costs BsF 500.



Venezuela imposes gasoline hike, currency devaluation
AFP
34 minutes ago

Caracas (AFP) - Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro said Wednesday he would raise the price of gasoline and devalue the bolivar currency, as he faced growing pressure to ease an economic crisis.

The socialist leader said he would raise the pump price of premium gasoline from its current super-low level of $0.01 per liter to the equivalent of $0.95 at the fixed official exchange rate.

The move risks sparking protests in a country where citizens are struggling with soaring inflation and shortages of basic foods and goods.

"This is a necessary action, for which I take responsibility," Maduro said in a televised address.

Venezuela has the biggest known oil reserves in the world, but has suffered from the plunge in world oil prices over the past year and a half.

With the previous subsidies, a Venezuelan could fill a car with gasoline for the equivalent of less than a dollar at the state-fixed exchange rate.

A similar gasoline price hike in 1989 sparked deadly riots in the volatile nation.

Maduro also said the government would "simplify" the country's complex exchange rate regime from Thursday.

The current three-tier system of exchange rates will be slimmed down.

From Thursday there will be just two rates: a protected official rate for food and medicine imports and a parallel "floating" rate for other transactions.

Under the rate for food and medicine, the bolivar will weaken by 37 percent from 6.3 to 10 bolivars to the dollar.

Analysts will be watching closely to see what levels the bolivar reaches against the dollar at the floating rate.

http://news.yahoo.com/venezuela-announces-first-gasoline-hike-20-years-224043881.html

Perhaps it is non of my business but why do you live in Venezuela?   

It's my country and a lovely place it is!


What are sailors saying about Venezuela? I stopped collecting these stories in 2008 because Chavismo had practically destroyed the cruising industry long with everything else. It seems we are getting our country back.

http://bahiaredonda.com/ip/cruising-logs-2008.php

The debate took place against the backdrop of more grim economic news as the International Monetary Fund predicted that inflation in Venezuela would more than double in 2016, reaching 720 percent.

Venezuela congress nixes Maduro request for emergency powers
Associated Press By HANNAH DREIER
January 22, 2016 5:58 PM

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela's opposition-led congress on Friday rejected President Nicolas Maduro's request for emergency powers amid a plunging national economy, the depths of which were dramatized by an IMF estimate that inflation this year will top 700 percent.

Ruling party and opposition lawmakers accused each other of trying to run the country into the ground in the first major congressional debate Venezuela has seen in more than a decade. Critics of the socialist revolution kicked off by late President Hugo Chavez took control of congress last month for the first time in 17 years.

Maduro had proposed an economic emergency decree that would give him expanded authority for 60 days. In the past, when it was dominated by first Chavez's and then Maduro's allies, congress made a habit of approving these kinds of exceptional powers.

The opposition argues that Maduro is responsible for raging inflation and chronic shortages dogging daily life here, and is promising to oust him within six months.

The debate took place against the backdrop of more grim economic news as the International Monetary Fund predicted that inflation in Venezuela would more than double in 2016, reaching 720 percent.

The South American nation already suffers from the world's highest inflation and a crushing recession. The IMF estimates that prices rose 275 percent last year in Venezuela, while the economy contracted by 10 percent.

Ahead of the final vote on his decree, Maduro announced he had approved a change that will allow the country's small export sector to use a more favorable currency exchange rate. He scolded opposition activists for "turning their back on the country."

"They're bent on the politics of sterile confrontation," he said as state television began promoting the slogan "irresponsible opposition."

Opposition leaders rejected the decree as a trap intended to make them look intransigent and unwilling to fix the economy.

"We're not closing any doors. On the contrary, today we opened the door to a serious discussion," majority leader Julio Borges said. "We're not looking to double down on the same policies that got us into this crisis. What we need is real change."

http://news.yahoo.com/imf-venezuela-inflation-surpass-700-percent-142019388--finance.html

I can live with a pragmatic socialist but clueless ideologues are dangerous.


Young socialist hardliner will lead Venezuela's economy
Associated Press By HANNAH DREIER
1 hour ago
 
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — President Nicolas Maduro is doubling down on his existing economic policies with the appointment of a young leftist hardliner to head the country's cratering economy, setting up a potential confrontation between the ruling socialist party and the newly powerful opposition.

Luis Salas, the new 39-year-old vice president for the economy, has scant administrative experience, but champions the same theories of price and currency controls that have defined Venezuela's leftist economic policy for 17 years.

Like Maduro, Salas says the country is suffering from the world's worst recession and triple-digit inflation because business interests are colluding with the U.S. to sabotage the economy.

He even goes further than Maduro in arguing that many of the country's problems are the result of being too capitalist.

A professor at the Bolivarian University, an institution created by the late president Hugo Chavez, Salas was relatively unknown before this week. But he has outlined his economic philosophy in a large collection of open letters and pamphlets.

"Inflation doesn't exist in real life," he wrote last year.

He added that prices go up not because of scarcity, but because of "capitalist economies that are driven by the desire for personal gain through the exploitation of others; by selfishness."

Along with shortages, inflation has become the No. 1 concern among Venezuelan voters, many of whom spend hours each week waiting in line for goods that are increasingly impossible to afford.

After the opposition swept Dec. 6 legislative elections, Salas wrote an open letter in which he attacked as "pragmatists" those people within the socialist camp who were floating the possibility of devaluation, a move that outside economists agree is a necessary first step for righting the economy.

Disbelief at the president's choice for a new economic czar echoed in opposition circles Wednesday night, with some speculating Maduro might be trying to drive the economy into the ground.

Since its landmark victory, the opposition coalition has been split between those who favor negotiation with the government and those who want to start to remove Maduro from office. The new appointment and the socialists' combative rhetoric since the new congress was seated Tuesday could silence opposition voices favoring dialogue.

Socialist supporters have supported appointment of the new economic czar. Some pro-government people rallied in downtown Thursday morning to protest the opposition leadership's removal of portraits of Chavez from the gold-domed capitol building.

Maduro named other hardliners to top spots Wednesday as part of a larger cabinet reshuffle he says is intended to protect the revolution during a new political era.

He also created a new urban agriculture ministry and announced that he and first lady Cilia Flores had taken up urban farming themselves.

"Cilia and I keep 50 chickens at our home. It's time to start building a new culture of production," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/young-socialist-hardliner-lead-venezuelas-economy-150648513.html
 

A Bright And Hopeful Day For Venezuela



Workers remove Chavez’ giant poster from National Assembly building


While I am far away, I could not help but be glued to the events in Caracas today. While it was certainly not a smooth day, it was a great day for Venezuela. A day of hope and possibilities, a bright day for the future of democracy in the country. A very important day for Venezuela’s history and the image above clearly shows that change is in the air. The statues have yet to fall, but it’s coming. The beginning is here, let’s see how long it takes to get to a good point.

I will start with the most important signs of the day:

More at:  http://devilexcrement.com/2016/01/06/a-bright-and-hopeful-day-for-venezuela/
 

Chavez was very much the product of the terrible mismanagement of our two old mainline parties AD and COPEI that ruled the country for half a century. Now they've elected an old combative ADECO to lead the opposition in the National Assembly. Big mistake.

The irony is that during all those years I voted for AD as the lesser evil. This old article of mine might be of interest:

August 6, 2006
Uslar Pietri, Venezuelan Democracy's Undertaker

Arturo Uslar Pietri was considered one of the leading Venezuelan intellectuals of the 20th century. He certainly was entertaining and educational on TV where he addressed his "invisible friends." He was also a failed politician who ran for president and lost badly. Carlos Andrés Perez (CAP) was of the opinion that, having failed to reach power via elections, Uslar Pietri was trying to reach a position of power through machination.

http://softwaretimes.com/files/uslar%20pietri,%20venezuelan%20d.html

Combative Venezuela opposition leader will head congress
Associated Press By HANNAH DREIER
10 hours ago
 
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — An outspoken opposition leader known for embracing confrontation was chosen Sunday to head Venezuela's new congress when it opens in two days as a counterweight to the socialist administration.

The newly elected opposition majority voted to make Henry Ramos Allup the president of the National Assembly when it is seated Tuesday. The new session will be the first time foes of the administration have had control of any government institution in more than a decade.

Ramos, 72, is a divisive figure that government supporters love to hate as much for his acerbic tongue as for his leadership in the once-hegemonic Democratic Action party that co-governed Venezuela for decades before the late President Hugo Chavez won power in 1998 and began his leftist program.

Ramos' rival for the legislative presidency was Julio Borges, 46, a member of the Justice First party, a newer, moderate movement that won the biggest bloc of opposition seats.

Although Ramos hasn't joined in street protests against the government, he won with the help of opposition hard-liners who favor such demonstrations and other confrontation with President Nicolas Maduro's administration. Borges' party advocates a focus on negotiation and elections.

Ramos said the new National Assembly will show Venezuelans a more democratic way forward.

"We ask the people to watch us, to demand more of us, and keep an eye on what we do to make sure that we honor our commitment," he said.

Ramos' supporters praise him as an experienced operative well-positioned to wrangle the dozens of parties that make up Venezuela's opposition coalition and stand up to what is sure to be an offensive by the administration.

Skeptics say Ramos is too prone to spouting off and plays into the government's attempts to paint the opposition as entitled snobs nostalgic for the days when elites ran Venezuela.

The opposition won a crucial two-thirds legislative "super-majority" by a single seat in the Dec. 6 elections and it will need to corral every lawmaker to get through the most dramatic policies.

But policy and strategy disagreements within the opposition will make it hard to get the most high-stakes votes through, said R. Evan Ellis, a professor of Latin American studies at the United States Army War College Strategic Studies Institute.

"I suspect that the government will also use a combination of personal inducements and legal intimidation to try to coopt some of the members of the new congress," he said.

The opposition has long been split between moderates and hard-liners, and the two sides have exchanged barbs since their coalition's landslide victory over the socialists.

Even as the scale of the victory was still settling after polls closed, some opposition members began talking jubilantly about taking steps to remove Maduro and rewrite the constitution while others cautioned that the voters wanted economic reforms rather than a political fight.

Justice First leader Henrique Capriles, a governor who narrowly lost to Maduro in the last presidential election in 2013, called the opposition's legislative victory a vindication of his party's focus on building electoral support district by district. His party won 33 of the opposition's 112 seats in the new congress.

In recent weeks, Capriles has lambasted opposition leaders who have advocated street activism, particularly a wave of protests that shut down parts of Venezuela in 2014 and resulted in dozens of deaths.

Carpriles said that if the opposition had continued to pursue open confrontation in the streets, the coalition would never have won congress. The street protest movement "must be named among our greatest national failures," he told the Venezuelan weekly Tal Cual.

Supporters of Capriles' chief rival, the imprisoned hardline opposition politician Leopoldo Lopez, angrily rejected that criticism. Lopez's father, Leopoldo Lopez Gil, tweeted that he was glad Capriles is a governor and doesn't have a seat in the "new, brave congress." He also backed Ramos' leadership bid.

Lopez has been sentenced to more than a decade in prison in connection with his leadership of the 2014 protests, and he consistently polls as one of the nation's most popular leaders along with Capriles.

The government has so far showed few signs of willingness to negotiate. The outgoing congress filled the Supreme Court with newly appointed judges, and the court last week barred three opposition lawmakers from being sworn in.

Ramos on Sunday reiterated the opposition's pledge that all 112 lawmakers would take their seats despite the ruling, setting the stage for a showdown. Both the opposition and supporters of the administration are promising to convene at the National Assembly building Tuesday.

http://news.yahoo.com/combative-venezuela-opposition-leader-head-congress-234439264.html

Same here...

Corruption, corruption everywhere.


Venezuela's soccer chief fighting extradition to US
Associated Press
2 hours ago

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela's longtime soccer chief is fighting his extradition to the U.S. from Switzerland and asking to be judged in his home country on charges of corruption at soccer's governing body.

Lawyers for Rafael Esquivel told Venezuelan newspaper El Universal Wednesday that they've asked prosecutors to request his extradition.

Esquivel was arrested in May in Zurich as part of the U.S. and Swiss investigations into corruption at FIFA. In seeking his extradition to Venezuela his lawyers may be betting that the 69-year-old could benefit from his political connections in the socialist administration of President Nicolas Maduro or receive a more lenient punishment such as home arrest if he pleads guilty.

Venezuela's soccer federation, which Esquivel led since 1988 until the time of his arrest, declined to comment.


http://news.yahoo.com/venezuelas-soccer-chief-fighting-extradition-us-235353831.html

Opposition Wins 2/3rds Supermajority

The number of seats is 167, not 165 as I reported earlier and 2/3rds of 167 is exactly 112. There are three levels of majority to approve different kinds of laws and appointments. Earlier the discussion was about wether maduro could stifle a simple majority by the opposition but the supermajority sweeps away those fears. Having the supermajority means that the opposition can start dismantling the rubber stamp supreme court which has been one of the enforcers of the Chavista dictatorship. The Chavista dictatorship tried hard to wear sheep's clothing and in many ways it succeeded. That is now over.

I worry when any party has absolute majority in all three powers, executive, legislative and judiciary. It's a recipe for extremism and abuse. Our democracy started to go wrong when AD controlled both the presidency and the legislature. Not only was it a rubber stamp congress but it went so far as to give the president powers to rule by decree thereby taking congress (themselves) out of the game. The result was a poor presidency that ended with Carlos Andres Perez (CAP) being removed on trumped up charges. From there to Chávez was just continual decline as people got fed up with the so called democrats who, by the way, were also socialists.

When Chávez got the National Assembly to give him the same powers congress had given CAP, the opposition cried foul. But the example had been set by the so called democratic powers decades earlier. In fact, many of the things Chávez did which the opposition criticized, had already been done during the democracy. My friends hated me for pointing this out.

I'm not defending Chávez in any way, I'm condemning democracy without working separation of powers. I love split governments, gridlock, it's safer that way.

The election and the aftermath has been very quiet. The Chavista thugs (Círculos Bolivarianos) didn't take to the street. Maduro recanted on his previous threat to take power by force if they lost the election. Evidently electoral fraud was minimal or non-existent. Yesterday I was talking to an ex-sergeant of the national guard who had been dismissed early in the Chávez years when Chávez was padding the military in his favor. He commented that someone must have put the fear of god into top government people for this to happen. I really don't know how things happen at those levels and rumors are as abundant as flies.

My hope is that many of the Chavista mismanagements, to give them a kinder name, will be reversed, like selling under-priced oil to other socialist governments, we can't afford it and we don't need to buy their votes at the UN or at the OAS. That was Chávez's motivation. But I also hope that it does not turn into a witch hunt. We all must live in the same house.

Julio Borges, the fellow pictured below, is a good candidate for president of the National Assembly. He ran for the presidency of the republic but he just does not have the public personality to create enough of a following.




Venezuela opposition wins supermajority in National Assembly

Associated Press   
JOSHUA GOODMAN
December 8, 2015


Opposition lawmaker Julio Borges, who was reelected to Congress, gives thumbs up as he arrives for a news conference in Caracas, Venezuela, Monday, Dec. 7, 2015, one day after congressional elections. Venezuela's opposition won control of the National Assembly by a landslide in Sunday's election, stunning the ruling party and altering the balance of power 17 years after the late Hugo Chávez was elected president. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)


CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela's opposition won a key two-thirds majority in the National Assembly in legislative voting, according to final results released Tuesday, dramatically strengthening its hand in any bid to wrest power from President Nicolas Maduro after 17 years of socialist rule.

More than 48 hours after polls closed, the National Electoral Council published the final tally on its website, confirming that the last two undecided races broke the opposition coalition's way, giving them 112 out of 167 seats in the National Assembly that's sworn in next month. The ruling socialist party and its allies got 55 seats.

The publication ends two days of suspense in which Maduro's opponents claimed a much-larger margin of victory than initially announced by electoral authorities, who were slow to tabulate and release results that gave a full picture of the magnitude of the Democratic Unity opposition alliance's landslide.

The outcome, better than any of the opposition's most-optimistic forecasts, gives the coalition an unprecedented strength in trying to rein in Maduro as well as the votes needed to sack Supreme Court justices and even remove Maduro from office by convoking an assembly to rewrite Hugo Chávez's 1999 constitution.

Although divided government should foster negotiations, Maduro in his first remarks following the results showed little sign of moderating the radical course that voters rejected.

Even while recognizing defeat, the former bus driver and union organizer blamed the "circumstantial" loss on a right-wing "counterrevolution" trying to sabotage Venezuela's oil-dependent economy and destabilize the government.

On Tuesday, Maduro visited Chávez's mausoleum in the 23 of January hillside slum where the government suffered a shock loss in Sunday's vote. Accompanied by members of his top military command, he accused his opponents of sowing discrimination and class hatred, cautioning workers who voted for the opposition that they would regret their decision to abandon support for the government.

"The bad guys won, like the bad guys always do, through lies and fraud," said Maduro. "Workers of the fatherland know that you have a president, a son of Chávez, who will protect you."

Hardliners in the notoriously fractious opposition seem similarly inflexible, preferring to talk about ending Maduro's rule before his term ends in 2019 rather than resolving Venezuela's triple-digit inflation, plunging currency and the widespread shortages expected to worsen in January as businesses close for the summer vacation.

Moderates however are calling for dialogue to give Maduro a chance to roll back policies they blame for the unprecedented economic crisis. But with most Venezuelans bracing for more hardship as oil prices, the lifeblood of the economy, hover near a seven-year low, even they recognize the window for change is small and closing fast.

"If Maduro doesn't change we'll have to change the government," Gov. Henrique Capriles, who lost to Maduro in 2013 presidential elections, told The Associated Press. "But the opposition's response to the economic crisis right now can't be more politics."

___

Joshua Goodman in on Twitter: twitter.com/apjoshgoodman. His work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/journalist/joshua-goodman


https://www.yahoo.com/news/venezuela-opposition-wins-supermajority-national-assembly-232112702.html

The National Assembly has 165 deputies and three levels of majority for approving different types of legislation. The opposition has gained absolute control. Maduro has conceded.

Total                   165 diputados
1/2 mayoría simple       83 diputados
3/5                      99 diputados
2/3 mayoría calificada  110 diputados

When the announcement was made the opposition had won 99 deputies, the Chavistas 46 and 20 were still undecided. The opposition estimates to have won a total of 113 which would give them absolute control of the legislature.

To tell the truth, I was not a believer in such a landslide victory.

Crafty:

I'm updating my previous post to keep it all together. Nothing much to report, really.

Venezuela On Edge On The Eve Of The December 6th.



Arrived only a few hours ago on Saturday and all I can say is that people are on the edge tonight wondering what will happen tomorrow. The cockiness of three weeks ago is not as blatant. Yes, the opposition will get a majority, but after 16 years of Chavismo people (and rumors) are rampant about possible tricks and maneuvers by the government.

This was not helped by the fact that there were Internet blackouts in many parts of the country today. The Head of Conatel, the telecom regulator denied this, but friends tell me that if you tried to call CANTV to report the problems, they were not even answering the phone.

The result is an atmosphere of mistrust and skepticism about what may or may not happen tomorrow. Or the day after, for that matter…

On the positive news front, the Electoral Board announced that witnesses for the opposition outnumbered those of Chavismo’s PSUV by 2,000, a clear indication of the inability of Chavismo to mobilize people like it used to. Many friends also reporting that numerous polling stations have seen no presence of pro-Government members, leading to the installation of the process without them.

Meanwhile, as the international media is harassed as they arrive in Venezuela and also as they try to cover the elections, Chavismo is selling it as a campaign against the country, even citing the number of positive (380), neutral (75) and positive (24) news items about the country. Which according to Chavismo, reflects this campaign and not reality.

Never mind that many reporters have had heir equipment confiscated at the airport and many have been told they can not take pictures of mundane events and their media has been erased.

Meanwhile visiting former Presidents managed to obtain a promise from the Government that political prisoners would be allowed to vote (They were not going to), while the opposition has created a parallel system of observation of the electoral process by foreign dignitaries, as well as social media tools to denounce problems tomorrow with the voting process.

Meanwhile, some pollsters claim to have seen a Maduro resurgence (!!!!), while others say that the result will depend on what Chavismo and now lukewarm Chavistas do. If the latter decide to stay home, the opposition will squeak by, but if they decide to go and express their unhappiness the opposition could enjoy a huge victory, even if short of the super majority.

I am sticking to my guns of a simple majority, roughly 55-58% of Deputies, hoping that former Chavistas are so disenchanted that they prove me wrong. I like the fact that Chavistas are outnumbered by the opposition witnesses and that they have been absent from the installations of the polling stations. But I just wonder if they will they be absent from voting too…

Abstention will be key and pollsters have little confidence that they have a handle on their number. Add proportionality, gerrymandering, fraud and tricks and numerical predictions are really hard to make.

I will do my usual scan throughout Caracas and report solid news, if such an animal exists before midnight tomorrow.

Best of luck to Venezuela from the Devil!

http://devilexcrement.com/2015/12/05/venezuela-on-edge-on-the-eve-of-the-september-6th-parliamentary-vote/

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3 Responses to “Venezuela On Edge On The Eve Of The December 6th. Parliamentary Vote”

Morpheous Says:

December 6, 2015 at 12:07 am
Here I quote some content from the link at the bottom:

But analysts said Venezuela’s vote on Sunday will be less decisive, and potentially volatile, since opposition parties have little in common beyond their disdain for Maduro.

His term as president runs until 2019, unless the opposition wins a big enough majority to force him out by constitutional means.

If the opposition wins a smaller majority, Maduro could manipulate the result in his favor or just rule by presidential decree, said analyst Luis Vicente Leon, head of Datanalisis.

“The assembly could seek to impeach the president, but he could try to dissolve the congress,” said Leon.

Another senior opposition figure, Henrique Capriles, warned opposition radicals against taking to the streets after Sunday’s vote.

“Venezuela is a bomb ready to explode,” he told AFP.

http://news.yahoo.com/oil-rich-cash-poor-venezuela-tense-election-015243351.html

Reply

IslandCanuck Says:

December 6, 2015 at 12:45 am
We lost CANTV ABA around 3.30 pm here in Isla Margarita but I just woke up and checked it and it’s working again (1 am).

It’s going to be a very interesting day and evening.
Everyone vote early and often.

Reply

Dean A Nash Says:

December 6, 2015 at 3:21 am
Stay safe and good luck. My two cents (worth much less) is that the cheating will be massive enough to be obvious, but not odorous enough to cause an outright breakdown of order. Backup prediction: Massive cheating so obvious it changes the winner and causes the breakdown of order (this would all be part of the plan) in order for the government to step in and restore order (i.e. take away more freedom.)

Six one way, half a dozen the other. The end result remains the same: a clueless dictatorship dragging the country further down the rabbit hole. Hope I’m wrong.

Reply

The discontent is palpable on the street, the queues when something arrives are endless, yet things aren't bad enough for people to take to the streets to protest. People still believe the election will produce some favorable change in the legislature. I'm not that sanguine, I believe the government will find ways to win by fraud. The OAS is not being allowed to monitor the election. What do they have to hide? Fraud, what else?

Those of us with dollars can buy stuff via Amazon. There is an old rule still in place that exempts packages under $100 from duties and VAT tax which can increase the cost by one third. Unbelievable as it may seem I've brought in deodorant, bath soap, face towels, socks, and briefs, everyday items you guy don't even have to think about. Fresh vegetables and fruit are plentiful and very inexpensive by US standards. It's the manufactured goods that are scarce. Two weeks ago eggs disappeared when they were regulated at half the going rate. Then, as if by magic, they reappeared yesterday and huge queues ensued for people to get them. With the election set for Sunday, one has to wonder...

Yesterday I had an acrylic filling replaced. Total cost $20.00 at free market rates. 10 to 15% of US rates. A decent haircut was 75 cents! It's the poor who are getting screwed.

Is the US finally turning the screws on Chavismo?



Venezuelan Officials Suspected of Turning Country into Global Cocaine Hub
U.S. probe targets No. 2 official Diosdado Cabello, several others, on suspicion of drug trafficking and money laundering
By JOSÉ DE CÓRDOBA and  JUAN FORERO
May 18, 2015 3:36 p.m. ET

U.S. prosecutors are investigating several high-ranking Venezuelan officials, including the president of the country’s congress, on suspicion that they have turned the country into a global hub for cocaine trafficking and money laundering, according to more than a dozen people familiar with the probes.

An elite unit of the Drug Enforcement Administration in Washington and federal prosecutors in New York and Miami are building cases using evidence provided by former cocaine traffickers, informants who were once close to top Venezuelan officials and defectors from the Venezuelan military, these people say.

A leading target, according to a Justice Department official and other American authorities, is National Assembly President Diosdado Cabello, considered the country’s second most-powerful man.

“There is extensive evidence to justify that he is one of the heads, if not the head, of the cartel,” said the Justice Department official, speaking of a group of military officers and top officials suspected of being involved in the drug trade. “He certainly is a main target.”

Representatives of Mr. Cabello and other officials didn’t return phone calls and emails requesting comment. In the past, Venezuelan authorities have rejected allegations of high-ranking involvement in the drug trade as an attempt by the U.S. to destabilize the leftist government in Caracas.

In an appearance on state television Wednesday, Mr. Cabello said he solicited a court-ordered travel ban on 22 executives and journalists from three Venezuelan news outlets that he has sued for publishing stories about the drug allegations earlier this year. “They accuse me of being a drug trafficker without a single piece of evidence and now I’m the bad guy,” Mr. Cabello said. “I feel offended, and none of them even said they’re sorry.”

The Obama administration isn’t directing or coordinating the investigations, which are being run by federal prosecutors who have wide leeway to target criminal suspects. But if the probes result in publicly disclosed indictments of Mr. Cabello and others, the resulting furor in Venezuela would likely plunge relations between the two countries into their most serious crisis since the late populist Hugo Chávez took office 16 years ago.

“It would be seismic,” said a U.S. official, of the expected Venezuelan reaction. “They will blame a vast right-wing conspiracy.”

U.S. authorities say they are far along in their investigations. But they say any indictments that may result might be sealed, making them secret until authorities can make arrests—something that would be difficult if not impossible unless the suspects travel abroad.

The investigations are a response to an explosion in drug trafficking in the oil-rich country, U.S. officials say. Under pressure in Colombia, where authorities aggressively battled the drug trade with $10 billion in U.S. aid since 2000, many Colombian traffickers moved operations to neighboring Venezuela, where U.S. law-enforcement officials say they found a government and military eager to permit and ultimately control cocaine smuggling through the country.

“Most of the high-end traffickers moved to Venezuela in that time,” said Joaquín Pérez, a Miami attorney who represents key Colombian traffickers who have acknowledged operating out of Venezuela.

Venezuela doesn’t produce coca, the leaf used to make cocaine, nor does it manufacture the drug. But the U.S. estimates that about 131 tons of cocaine, about half of the total cocaine produced in Colombia, moved through Venezuela in 2013, the last year for which data were available.

Prosecutors aren’t targeting President Nicolás Maduro, who has been in power since Mr. Chávez’s death two years ago. U.S. law-enforcement officials say they view several other Venezuelan officials and military officers as the de facto leaders of drug-trafficking organizations that use Venezuela as a launchpad for cocaine shipments to the U.S. as well as Europe.

‘A Criminal Organization’
“It is a criminal organization,” said the Justice Department official, referring to certain members of the upper echelons of the Venezuelan government and military.

Mildred Camero, who had been Mr. Chávez’s drug czar until being forced out abruptly in 2005, said Venezuela has “a government of narcotraffickers and money launderers.” She recently collaborated on a book, “Chavismo, Narcotrafficking and Militarism,” in which she alleged that drug-related corruption had penetrated the state, naming more than a dozen officials, including nine generals, who allegedly worked with smugglers.

Law-enforcement officials in the U.S. said that they have accelerated their investigations in the past two years, a period that has seen Venezuela’s economy worsen dramatically. Rampant crime has spiked, making Venezuela the continent’s most violent country and spurring people to emigrate.

The deepening crisis has made it easier for U.S. authorities to recruit informants, say those working to enlist people close to top Venezuelan officials. Colombian and Venezuelan drug traffickers have also arrived in the U.S., eager to provide information on Venezuelan officials in exchange for sentencing leniency and residency, U.S. officials say.

“Since the turmoil in Venezuela, we’ve had greater success in building these cases,” said a federal prosecutor from New York’s Eastern District who works on Venezuelan cases.

In January, U.S. investigators made a major catch when naval captain Leamsy Salazar defected and was brought to Washington. Mr. Salazar, who has said he headed Mr. Cabello’s security detail, told U.S. authorities that he witnessed Mr. Cabello supervise the launch of a large shipment of cocaine from Venezuela’s Paraguaná peninsula, people familiar with the case say.

Mr. Cabello has publicly railed against his former bodyguard, saying he didn’t head his security detail and calling him “an infiltrator” who has no proof of his involvement in drug trafficking. “Our conscience is totally clear,” he said in a radio interview.

Rafael Isea is another defector who has been talking to investigators, people familiar with the matter say. A former Venezuelan finance minister and governor of Aragua state, Mr. Isea fled Venezuela in 2013. People familiar with the case say Mr. Isea has told investigators that Walid Makled, a drug kingpin now in prison, paid off former Interior Minister Tarek El Aissami to get drug shipments through Venezuela.

Almost a year after leaving the country, Mr. Isea was accused of committing “financial irregularities” during his days as governor by Venezuela’s attorney general, and by Mr. El Aissami, who succeeded him as governor of Aragua.

“Today, Rafael Isea, that bandit and traitor, is a refugee in Washington where he has entered a program for protected witnesses in exchange for worthless information against Venezuela,” Mr. El Aissami said recently on Venezuelan television.

Mr. Isea has rejected the accusations as false, politically motivated and meant to discredit him.

In addition to Mr. El Aissami, other powerful officials under investigation include Hugo Carvajal, a former director of military intelligence; Nestor Reverol, the head of the National Guard; Jose David Cabello, Mr. Cabello’s brother, who is the industry minister and heads the country’s tax collection agency; and Gen. Luis Motta Dominguez, a National Guard general in charge of central Venezuela, say a half-dozen officials and people familiar with the investigations.

Calls and emails seeking comment from several government ministries as well as the president’s office went unanswered. Some officials have taken to social media to ridicule the U.S. investigations. A Twitter account in the name of Gen. Motta Dominguez earlier this year said: “We all know that whoever wants his green card and live in the US to visit Disney can just pick his leader and accuse him of being a narco. DEA tours will attend to them.”

Recruiting Defectors
To build cases, U.S. law-enforcement officials work with Venezuelan exiles and others to locate and recruit disaffected Venezuelans.

“We get people out of Venezuela, and we meet with them in Panama, Curaçao, Bogotá,” said a former intelligence operative who works with U.S. officials to recruit and debrief Venezuelans who have evidence of links between Venezuelan officials and the drug trade.

Former Venezuelan military officers and others living outside the country provide help by contacting their former comrades and urging them to defect, the recruiter said. If the defector can provide useful information, the recruiter said, he is flown to the U.S. and a new life.

“What does the U.S. want?” said the recruiter, who has been working Venezuelan cases since 2008. “The U.S. wants proof, evidence of relations between politicians, military officers and functionaries with drug traffickers and terrorist groups.”

Recently, at Washington’s posh Capital Grille restaurant, a few blocks from Congress, a Venezuelan operative working with a U.S. law enforcement agency took a call from a middleman for a high-level official in Caracas seeking to trade information for favorable treatment from the U.S.

“Tell him I’ll meet him in Panama next week,” said the operative, interrupting a lunch of oysters and steak.

The biggest target is 52-year-old Mr. Cabello, a former army lieutenant who forged a close link in the military academy with Mr. Chávez when the two played on the same baseball team. When Mr. Chávez launched an unsuccessful 1992 coup, Mr. Cabello led a four-tank column that attacked the presidential palace in downtown Caracas.

Mr. Cabello has been minister of public works and housing, which also gave him control of the airports and ports, as well as minister of the interior and vice president. He was also president for a few hours in April 2002 when Mr. Chávez was briefly ousted in a failed coup.

Many analysts and politicians in Venezuela say they believe Mr. Cabello’s power rivals that of Mr. Maduro and is rooted in his influence among Venezuela’s generals.

Julio Rodriguez, a retired colonel who knows Mr. Cabello from their days at Venezuela’s military academy, says that of 96 lieutenant colonels commanding battalions in Venezuela today, Mr. Cabello has close ties to 46.

The stocky and bull-necked Mr. Cabello, who often sports the standard Chavista uniform of red shirt and tri-color windbreaker in the red, yellow and blue of the Venezuelan flag, is host of a television program, “Hitting With the Sledge Hammer,” on state television, in which he uses telephone intercepts of opponents to attack and embarrass them. Mr. Rodriguez said he believes Mr. Cabello will never make any kind of a deal with the U.S. “Diosdado is a kamikaze,” he said. “He will never surrender.”

U.S. investigators have painstakingly built cases against Venezuelan officials by using information gathered from criminal cases brought in the U.S. In Miami, people familiar with the matter say a key building block in the investigations involved a drug-smuggling ring run by Roberto Mendez Hurtado. A Colombian, Mr. Mendez Hurtado moved cocaine into Apure state in western Venezuela and, according to those familiar with his case, had met with high-ranking Venezuelan officials. The cocaine was then taken by boat or flown directly to islands in the Caribbean before reaching American shores.

Mr. Mendez Hurtado pleaded guilty in Miami federal court and received a 19-year prison term in 2014. People close to that investigation say that Mr. Mendez Hurtado and his fellow traffickers wouldn’t have been able to operate without paying off a string of top military officers and government officials.

“The involvement of top officials in the National Guard and in the government of Venezuela in drug trafficking is very clear,” said a former Venezuelan National Guard officer who served in intelligence and in anti-narcotics and left the country last year frightened by the overwhelming corruption he saw daily.

“Everyone feels pressured,” he said. “Sooner or later everyone surrenders to drug trafficking.”

In another case, in Brooklyn, prosecutors have learned about the intricacies of the drug trade in Venezuela after breaking up a cocaine-smuggling ring led by Luis Frank Tello, who pleaded guilty, court documents show. The cocaine was brought in across the border from Colombia and, with the help of National Guard officers, shipped north, sometimes from the airport in Venezuela’s second-largest city, Maracaibo.

The U.S. investigations of Venezuelan officials have been going on for years, though investigators have sometimes been thwarted by politics.

In 2008, the U.S. Treasury Department put three top aides to then-President Chávez on a blacklist and froze any assets they might have in the U.S. Among the three was Mr. Carvajal, known as “El Pollo,” or the Chicken, then the head of military intelligence. The U.S. acted after extensive evidence surfaced earlier that year in the computers of a dead Colombian guerrilla commander of burgeoning cocaine-for-arms exchanges between the rebels and top Venezuelan generals and officials, according to the U.S. and Colombian governments.

In 2010, Manhattan prosecutors unsealed the indictment of Mr. Makled, the Venezuelan drug dealer accused of shipping tons of cocaine to the U.S. through the country’s main seaport of Puerto Cabello, which he allegedly controlled. Mr. Makled, who had been captured in Colombia, boasted of having 40 Venezuelan generals on his payroll.

“All my business associates are generals,” Mr. Makled said then to an associate in correspondence seen by The Wall Street Journal. “I’m telling you we dispatched 300,000 kilos of coke. I couldn’t have done it without the top of the government.”

DEA agents interviewed Mr. Makled in a Colombian prison as they prepared to extradite him to New York. But instead, Colombia extradited him in 2011 to Venezuela, where he was convicted of drug trafficking. This February, he was sentenced to 14 years and six months in jail.

Last July, American counter-drug officials nearly nabbed Mr. Carvajal, who had been indicted in Miami and New York on drug charges and detained in Aruba at the American government’s behest. But Dutch authorities released him to Venezuela, arguing that he had diplomatic immunity.

Upon Mr. Carvajal’s release, President Maduro praised the former intelligence chief as a dedicated anti-drug fighter who had set a worlds’ record capturing drug capos.

The U.S. is also gathering information from bankers and financiers who handle the money for top Venezuelan officials. Since last year, people familiar with the matter say the U.S. government has revoked the visas of at least 56 Venezuelans, including bankers and financiers whose identities haven’t been made public. Some have sought to cooperate with investigators in order to regain access to the U.S.

“They are flipping all these money brokers,” said a lawyer who is representing two Venezuelan financiers who have had their visas revoked. “The information is coming in very rapidly.”

—Christopher M. Matthews in New York contributed to this article.

Write to José de Córdoba at jose.decordoba@wsj.com and Juan Forero at Juan.Forero@wsj.com


Venezuelan Officials Suspected of Turning Country into Global Cocaine Hub

The first thing to know is how and why Maduro came to power. My background as a management consultant helped me figure out local power structures. Often owners trust certain people more than they trust checks and balances which results in trusted but not necessarily competent people in key posts. I saw it often in business.

Maduro was the most harmless lackey Chavez could find to fill the post of vice president. When Chavez died Maduro took his place. For the next election there was a lot of strange maneuvering, probably some of it illegal, to make Maduro the official candidate. During the campaign I heard loyal Chavistas declare that Maduro would be a total failure. Maduro is imitating Chavez but he does not have his organizing skills. In any case, it is hard to know where power really sits, most likely in Havana. But while Cuba is opening up the the US, Maduro is sticking with anti-imperialism as his political motif.

The other thing to consider is that drug running is big business which does not benefit the country but it sure enriches the drug barons. These are the people running the country. The US would be a big help in defusing the world's problems if they abandoned the totally useless, worse, counterproductive, war on drugs.

The next election coming up is for the National Assembly and it's supposed to be this year but the dates have not been announced. The consensus is for the opposition to win a majority but my prediction is the opposite, not based on the vote count but on fraud. In any case, amazing as it may seem, Chavismo still has a lot of popular support because the official propaganda has been able to pin the failure on capitalist greed. If economists don't understand economics, what can you expect of ordinary people?

The rate at which the bolivar is falling is unprecedented. Today the parallel market is quoted at Bs 423.39 to the dollar is down in just a week from 285 or so. That's a 33% drop in a week or ten days. This is getting really scary!


Currency tumbles as Venezuelans look to offload bolivars
Associated Press By HANNAH DREIER
3 hours ago

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — A staggering plunge in the free market value of Venezuelan currency sent people scrambling to sell off their depreciating bolivars Friday.

The widely followed website DolarToday, which tracks exchanges along the Colombian border, reported that the South American country's currency lost a quarter of its value over the last eight days.

The site's app has become so ubiquitous that everyone in smartphone-obsessed Caracas seemed to find out about the crash through 400 to the dollar at the same instant, as DolarToday sent out a series of alerts announcing the new numbers under the headline "hyperinflation!"

Venezuelan currency was trading at 415 bolivars per dollar Friday, according to the site. That's down from 300 bolivars per dollar on May 14. It stood at 173 when the year started.

While many black market dealers paused transactions until the rate stabilizes, some Venezuelans said they had changed money at the 400 bolivar rate Friday.

It was not immediately clear what prompted the sudden drop, though a Barclay Capital Inc. report issued Friday described the underlying cause as government expansion of the money supply.

"We do not see any signal of change from the authorities but these risks should make them reconsider their policies," it said.

Barclays projected the Bolivar could dip as low as 600 to the dollar this year.

The administration of President Nicolas Maduro keeps tight control over the legal exchange of bolivars, using a byzantine three-tier system. It is meant to subsidize crucial imports, but has led to widespread corruption and speculation.

The strongest rate is 6.3 bolivars per dollar. The weakest official rate, which was billed as an alternative to the black market when it was rolled out earlier their year, has inched up to 200 bolivars per dollar. The fact many are willing to pay double that price for black-market dollars indicates the supply is limited.

The Maduro administration has been hoarding dollars as it grapples with falling oil prices. That has contributed to shortages and other economic distortions.

DolarToday is openly hostile to the socialist government and carries news stories attacking it. But the site insists its exchange rate reports are based on actual trades at exchange houses on the Colombian side of the border and are not manipulated to undercut the government.

In April, Maduro repeated his assertion that the site's shadowy managers, whose identities are not public, are collaborating with the speculators and opposition leaders he blames for the country's problems. He accused them of purposely sowing chaos and promised to have them arrested.

"We're going to put those people at DolarToday who are waging an economic war against Venezuela behind bars, sooner rather than later" he said.

The site, which is sometimes blocked within Venezuela, responded with a cheeky video documenting its popularity set to the club hit "Turn Down for What."


http://news.yahoo.com/currency-tumbles-venezuelans-look-offload-bolivars-161058938.html

Thanks for asking. Let's start with the basics:

African saying: When elephants fight the grass gets trampled. At the OPEC meeting Saudi Arabia and its Sunni allies carried the day.

Nicholas Maduro is a bus driver and you can expect bus driver wisdom from him.

Oil prices are set at the margin but that is not the price at which the bulk of oil is sold. Spot is the speculators' price. Most real buyers and sellers have hedged their trades. Notice that the Fox article correctly talks about average selling price.

The Daily Caller article is a political commentator doing his job, speculating on worst case scenarios.

The power play: The purpose of cartels is to exert control, in the case of OPEC to control oil prices. The power to do so comes from the capacity to flood the market. For decades the Saudi's had that power specially with full OPEC backing. Iran is an OPEC member but Russia is not. For all practical purposes, while an important player, Russia is not and has not been a key player. That role belonged to OPEC and within OPEC to Saudi Arabia. I use the past tense because fracking upset the equilibrium.

On a side note: I have been advocating American energy independence for years and when fracking came online I predicted both the recovery of the American economy and a lessening of the power of the oil exporters (without predicting any details). When everyone was predicting the demise of the US dollar, my position was that if the dollar failed the whole world would plunge into chaos (for a while). I also commented that trying to replace the dollar as the world's reserve currency would have dire consequences. Saddam Hussein wanted to sell oil in euros, he ended, soon after, hung. Coincidence? Maybe.

The current situation, as I see it, is that Saudi Arabia and its Sunni OPEC allies are trying to give US frackers a "good sweating" to use a Rockefeller phrase. It is important to note that while the Arab oil producers are monarchies the US producers operate in a free market where collusion is illegal. It's not equal combat, the Arabs stand as a block, the Americans as a swarm. the outcome will be interesting! In any case, Russia and Venezuela are bit players of little consequence despite their large output. Should the Arabs win, the situation goes back to the previous state. Should the Arab "good sweating" fail, it will be the US frackers, turn to give the Arabs a "good sweating." That could break OPEC's power. I'm not making any predictions except to say that in price wars the "arms suppliers" and the consumers are the beneficiaries. Economists will worry about deflation but it is good deflation.

------------------------------------

The question was about Venezuela.

First, during Chavismo Venezuela has not received the full price for its oil. The discounts and special deals with Cuba and PetroCaribe to buy international votes is well known. What special concessions the Chinese got is less well known. Chavismo has a slogan:  "Venezuela es de todos" referring to the oligarchy. In truth now  "Venezuela es de los nica, de los cubanos y de todos los amigos del chavismo."

Second, at the current black market exchange rate it costs 3 US cents to fill the tank of my Toyota Corolla, tip included. Some Chavista factions wanted to raise the price of gas as part of the crisis management. Maduro nixed it. He is a bus driver, not an economist.

Third, from Black Friday, February 18, 1983, to Maduro, the bolivar/dollar exchange rate increase by 30 to 35% annually. Over the past 5 or 6 months it doubled! Inflation is presumably running at 70%.

A Short Note On My Hyperinflated Arepa Index



Two weeks ago, as I left Caracas on Nov. 22nd. to be precise, I wrote about the cost of a breakfast which I found expensive for Venezuelans, which included cheese arepas. As I returned to Caracas two short weeks later, I went to have a single cheese arepa at the same place. Imagine my surprise when I found that the Bs. 120 cheese arepa of fifteen days ago, now costs Bs. 156.

That is a 30% increase in two weeks. A year ago I would eat two for Bs. 120.

Thus, I will keep reporting on the hyperinflated arepa in the future.

BTW, they are still delicious…

http://devilsexcrement.com/2014/12/07/a-short-note-on-my-hyperinflated-arepa-index/

Fourth, in Chavista ideology, small farmers are good while industrialists (capitalists) are bad. This has consequences. Fresh fruit and farm produce including fresh eggs are abundantly available but packaged good are not, specially price controlled ones. While rice is price controlled and nowhere to be seen but you can buy parboiled or flavored varieties at several times the controlled price. Pasta you can generally find both price controlled and market priced varieties. Price controlled cleaning products are scarce and there are no "fancy" ones. But you can buy them from scalpers (black market) at four times the controlled price.

All sorts of things appear and disappear: toilette paper, car batteries, roasted coffee, medicines, spare parts as price controls and dollar availability cause scarcity and crisis management by Maduro temporarily solves the problems.

Fifth, The above is what you can see on the street. What happens inside Chavismo and the balance of powers in government I'm not privy to. But you get some glances: A drug dealer is named ambassador or something to Aruba, the US tries to get him but the Dutch let him go home.

Netherlands Says Venezuelan Detained in Aruba Has Immunity

http://interamericansecuritywatch.com/netherlands-says-venezuelan-detained-in-aruba-has-immunity/

Then Hugo Carvajal is rumored dead, the government denies it:

http://noticiasvenezuela.org/2014/09/alcaldesa-de-cedeno-desmiente-muerte-de-hugo-carvajal/

Since then Carvajal has dropped out of the news. On to the next crisis.

Cuba and North Korea are just two example that show that economic collapse does not mean the government must fall, that depends on the ruthlessness of the government. I have often said that Venezuela is a democracy by the consent of the military. The military is entrenched in Venezuela and they are given free rain to run drugs or any other money making scheme or scam. That was partly the basis of Hugo's hold on power.

Venezuela has a serious cash flow problem which will be made worse by the falling oil prices. Maduro's envoy to China begging for more loans was sent packing. In fact, the Chinese are pissed off that Venezuela is giving other loans preference over the Chinese debt. Venezuela started selling PetroCaribe bonds to Goldman Sachs at half par value. But with a bus driver in charge, who can tell what foolishness will follow?

Beer is back! Hurrah!

Denny Schlesinger

DDF:

American "intrusion" is both welcome and not welcome, depending on what it is and depending on who minds and who does not mind.  In any case, The US is losing LatAm with Obama's extreme "flexibility."


One day's Yahoo Latin-America headlines:

Japanese PM opens LatAm tour with Mexico energy deals

Chinese president ends regional tour in cradle of Cuban Revolution

Chinese leader signs accords, wraps up Cuba visit

Chinese president backs Cuba's economic reforms

China, Venezuela deepen economic ties during visit

Cuba hopes for more investment as Chinese president arrives

China, Russia leaders seek South American inroads

Chinese leader woos Latin America with deals

Brazil, China sign several trade, business deals

Russia set to reopen Soviet-era spy post on Cuba: source

China seeks to build railways in Brazil to ship out commodities

BRICS meet South American leaders after bank deal

Putin, Kirchner seek 'multipolarity' in Argentina visit

China's leader Xi departs for South America tour

Putin signs nuclear energy deal with Argentina

Putin in Argentina, building Russian ties

Putin in Cuba, Nicaragua to rekindle Latin America ties

BRICS to launch bank, tighten Latin America ties

Putin kicks off Latin America tour with Cuba stop

Putin pledges to help Cuba explore for offshore oil

Putin in Cuba to rekindle Latin America ties

http://news.yahoo.com/latin-america/