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Thread: Venezuela: A Failure of Socialism?

  1. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by IMPress Polly View Post
    I don't think I've made any attempt to romanticize Venezuela's current regime, people. What I have presented is called a nuanced view. My critics, by contrast, seem to have very little to say on this subject, perhaps reflecting their small amount of knowledge thereof.



    That is a completely ridiculous view. All you have to do is compare Venezuela's position on the Human Development Index now and then to see that the average Venezuelan is, even now, far better off overall than before the nationalization of the country's oil sector in 1999.

    It's just as silly and baseless to claim that the condition of the country's oil rigs, rather than the drop in global oil prices in the last decade, is responsible for the country's current economic condition.
    Wow.

    We disagree.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Standing Wolf View Post
    Chris, all sorts of governments in the world today, and throughout history, have killed people in the streets. The repressive nature of a regime, the mistakes of its leaders and the crimes that they commit against their people, are not determined by economics.
    Of course they have, but I don't want to make the case for anarchism here, just the failure of socialism on the scale of Venezuela.

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    Quote Originally Posted by IMPress Polly View Post
    I don't think I've made any attempt to romanticize Venezuela's current regime, people. What I have presented is called a nuanced view. My critics, by contrast, seem to have very little to say on this subject, perhaps reflecting their small amount of knowledge thereof.



    That is a completely ridiculous view. All you have to do is compare Venezuela's position on the Human Development Index now and then to see that the average Venezuelan is, even now, far better off overall than before the nationalization of the country's oil sector in 1999.

    It's just as silly and baseless to claim that the condition of the country's oil rigs, rather than the drop in global oil prices in the last decade, is responsible for the country's current economic condition.


    I've addressed your "nuanced" view, polly, for years now. I'm waiting for a response.

    Both you and Chomsky seem to think true socialism is capable of developing a sustainable economy, on the scale of Venezuela, not some small commune. I ask how? And you know how must address the the basic economic calculation problem...that was argued from the 1920s untill the socialist conceded in the the 90s that socialism cannot solve it, and so turned let capitalism fund its agendas. See, for example, the socialist Robert Reich's The Answer Isn’t Socialism; It’s Capitalism that Better Spreads the Benefits of the Productivity Revolution.

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    Chris wrote:
    Both you and Chomsky seem to think true socialism is capable of developing a sustainable economy, on the scale of Venezuela, not some small commune. I ask how?
    Chomsky is some combination of a platformist and syndicalist, as I understand it. He embraces a federal structure of governance. As to me, I am unsure on the whole size-of-society issue. Networks of small-scale communes, as embraced in Rojava, may indeed be best. I'm not sure. Still investigating that topic.

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    Quote Originally Posted by IMPress Polly View Post
    Chomsky is some combination of a platformist and syndicalist, as I understand it. He embraces a federal structure of governance. As to me, I am unsure on the whole size-of-society issue. Networks of small-scale communes, as embraced in Rojava, may indeed be best. I'm not sure. Still investigating that topic.
    I think that is the future as we head into the debt-ridden collapse of the current system.

    And over time, we will centralize power again.

    It is a cycle.
    Last edited by Peter1469; 08-17-2017 at 02:24 PM.
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    Peter wrote:
    I think that is the future as we head into the debt-ridden collapse of the current system.

    Ad over time, we will centralize power again.

    It is a cycle.
    That's an interesting theory. I observe that, over time, nations are getting smaller while corporations are getting larger, to the point increasingly of outsizing nations. I believe that to be, on some level or other, a deliberate scheme to minimize the potential for government oversight and regulation of business.

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    Quote Originally Posted by IMPress Polly View Post
    Chomsky is some combination of a platformist and syndicalist, as I understand it. He embraces a federal structure of governance. As to me, I am unsure on the whole size-of-society issue. Networks of small-scale communes, as embraced in Rojava, may indeed be best. I'm not sure. Still investigating that topic.
    I've already convinced myself that localism is the right way to go. Bottom up like Rojava.

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  12. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by IMPress Polly View Post
    That's an interesting theory. I observe that, over time, nations are getting smaller while corporations are getting larger, to the point increasingly of outsizing nations. I believe that to be, on some level or other, a deliberate scheme to minimize the potential for government oversight and regulation of business.

    Yes. That is one possible future. Corporate rule exceeds nation-state authority. Even STRATFOR has talked about that. I don't think it is the most likely future. When the debt bubble bursts the corporations will have no power.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chris View Post
    I've already convinced myself that localism is the right way to go. Bottom up like Rojava.
    That was the intent of the Constitution.
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