Venezuela to adopt forced farm labor for citizens

United States with the highest incarceration rate in developed countries, and it is about 0.76%. Soviet Union in the Great Purge era, on the other hand...
... in most years of Stalin's rule had it lower.
 
Guys... I know I'm a bit of threadjacker myself, but this thread is about Venezuela! If we want to compare or draw analogies between Bolivarian policies and Soviet ones that's of course totally valid, but otherwise lets try to limit Stalin vs USA (and Ireland vs Ulster!!) discussions.

Some interesting points to discuss / debate:

-How loyal the Armed Forces are to Maduro;
-Likelihood a major refugee crisis if the food situation doesn't improve and the Army blocks the constitutional ousting of Maduro;
-How other countries in the region (esp. Colombia and Brazil) would react to the aforementioned refugee crisis.
 
How is the food/economic situation for the elite and the army? No matter how loyal an army, if it is not fed there will be a mutiny.
 
How is the food/economic situation for the elite and the army? No matter how loyal an army, if it is not fed there will be a mutiny.

I think Venezuela still generates enough oil money to at least feed the Armed Forces and political elites. But no doubt many in the Army are feeling quite dissatisfied, as their money becomes worthless and the rest of their families plunges into abject poverty. I can see some small scale mutinies in the horizon.

I think if it was not for the purges that followed the 2002 attempted coup ion Venezuela, the Army would be at the very least telling Maduro to behave and not interfere in the recall attempts. But as it stands pretty much all officers in the Armed forces are committed Bolivarians, at least in theory (and for the senior officers in practice too, since Chávez promoted his buddies who participated in his attempted coup in the 1990's).

I'm really curious if they'll allow the recall referendum to go forward. Obviously if the people are allowed to vote freely some 80% will vote for his deposition. So will they be allowed to vote freely, or vote at all?
 
That's always been kind of the problem with luizism - a failure to recognize how heterogeneous the "left" really is, even if at various points a bunch of leftists supported or even still support Chavez and Maduro. Chavez is not Corbyn, who is not Sanders, who is not Tsipras, and none of these people are Stalinists, Trotskyists, or Maoists. Although Maduro's forced farm labor thing is a rather Maoist thing to do, it's being done because he has mismanaged his nation into starvation rather than because it's a direct part of his ideology.

I think you're misunderstanding his point. He's not saying all socialists are the same. What he is saying is that at some point 1 of 2 things always happens:

1) A demagogue takes control of all the power the socialists centralized and lots of people die.

or

2) The country is mismanaged after the government has made the vast majority of its citizens dependent on the government for their own survival and lots of people die.

You're far better off supporting systems of government that allows people to be independent and not have to depend on the government for their own survival. When catastrophes happen if the citizens are able to be independent they are far better off and it makes it extremely difficult for a demagogue to come to power because there isn't a big central command and control structure along with millions of people who are forced to be complicit if they want to eat.
 
whoa thanks for that link bruh wasn't sure what it was
 
I think Venezuela still generates enough oil money to at least feed the Armed Forces and political elites. But no doubt many in the Army are feeling quite dissatisfied, as their money becomes worthless and the rest of their families plunges into abject poverty. I can see some small scale mutinies in the horizon.

Well, maybe the army gets paid in something else than Venezuelan legal tender. At this point, I wouldn't be surprised the army gets paid in US Dollars or a commodity like salt.
 
Well, maybe the army gets paid in something else than Venezuelan legal tender. At this point, I wouldn't be surprised the army gets paid in US Dollars or a commodity like salt.

I dont think that would help Vebezuela is the 10th most corrupt country in the world, right next to Haiti and Libya. Corruption seems to be embedded into the culture and people.
It seems that unemployment is set to hit 20% and inflation 1600% within the next year. Unless the course is reversed by action and it wont be easy
 
As I feared, the Venezuelan government does not seem likely to allow its ousting by legal means.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0105ba40-5e72-11e6-a72a-bd4bf1198c63.html#axzz4GjB8Hdh3

Basically, they will block the recall referendum this year, which would push it to the second half of Maduro's term. So instead of triggering new elections, his defeat would only mean he gets to appoint a new President and steps down. In other words, it means nothing. Polls suggest over 80% of Venezuelans want Maduro gone. Which is not surprising, given a GDP that is expected to collapse by 10% this year, widespread food shortages, sky rocketing inflation and a murder rate worse than most war zones.
 
Polls suggest over 80% of Venezuelans want Maduro gone.

Were they also polled on whether they had access to guns?
 
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