In my article last October, I pointed out a certain possibility that Venezuela would enter a Stagflation period, I quote a fragment of said article:

(...) as a consequence when our government sets itself for a reduction in liquidity by withdrawing money from the market, selling bonds, reducing wages or reducing public spending, it will be contributing directly to the speculation from business owners and traders of the moment, it will be halting any possible increase in GDP and it will be leaning towards an economic contraction with unpredictable consequences for low income consumers.

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The new manifestation of Chavecist's paranoia and their fear to any idea that opposes their totalitarian plans is a small Venezuelan think-tank that groups some of the few free-market friendly people in Venezuela:  CEDICE. The free-market think tank was celebrating its 25th anniversary a couple of weeks ago.  This was, according to evil people such as Eva Golinger, nothing more than a conspiracy of the international ultra right wing financed by the CIA and determined to bring down the pretty revolution’s great achievements.

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Since the spicy blog ¡No me digas, Teodoro!, stopped throwing darts against Teodoro Petkoff, it had been a while since I had fun with the absurd and nonsense of this “good” Venezuelan socialist. For that I must thank Jose Luis Rivas, of Gohstbar for bringing to my attention this hilarious video of Tal Cual newspaper’s editor.

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The Commission for the Administration of Foreign Exchange (CADIVI) announced last week that the amounts of dollars available to be sent abroad as “family remittances” will be cut to 900 dollars a month. Foreigners might or might not know that Venezuelans are not free to as they please with their hard-earned money. When they want to sent money abroad, they have first to ask for authorization from a bunch of corrupt bureaucrats known as CADIVI.

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When we talk about nationalization, the President of the “Empire” and the supreme leader of the “pretty revolution” have  little differences between them. Barack Obama and Hugo Chavez love to nationalize industries, or at least they’re fine with it, which is pretty much the same from an economic stand.

According to the Obama's plan for General Motors bankruptcy, the US government will now own 60% of GM’s corpse.

¡Ah, gringo capitalism! That which is so feared by Eva Golinger and company, does not differ in essence to the model imposed by Chavez in Venezuela. Styles and form change, but ideologically every state ends up  driving in the same direction every time: totalitarian socialism, in one or another variety. 

The problem , of course, is not Chavez, nor Obama. The problem is the State.

 Economics, International

How would an anarchocapitalist society deal with a potential pandemic that menaces the very existence of human race? This is an interesting question that surfaces from the recent mania that the porcine flu outbreak in Mexico and the US has caused. The WHO tells us that the flu is not porcine and the poor and discredited little pigs are not to blame. The official name of the supposedly lethal virus is influenza A H1N1. But in any case the governments of the world have made sure to increase their power once again taking advantage of collective hysteria encouraged by the sensationalism of the media.

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I must confess that I've been watching with particular pleasure the recent power grabs that President Hugo Chavez has perpetrated. While the media has worried about the fate of the former "leader" of the "opposition" who is now in exile, the president has continued to confiscate property, for example at Aragua, Caraboo and most recently at the Amazonas state. Remember, the more they get close to the collectivization of land; the closer they will be to famine (also see Ukrainian genocide at the hands of the soviets). Not that the famine of others causes me pleasure. But if the prospect of starving to death doesn't make the Venezuelan people wake up from their lethargic attitude and oppose communism definitely, then nothing will.

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Former Finance Minister, Nelson Merentes, was confirmed last month by the National Assembly as the president of the Central Bank. As we all know, the previous president of the central bank, the late Gaston Parra Luzardo, was an inflationist head to toe while he was in charge of the monopoly of creating Venezuelan money.

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The fact that Latin American democracies are receding is not the issue. The appearence of new socialist governments, with idem dictators, or aspiring to be so, will be a notorious fact.

Reviewing the why or how of this phenomena, we find that it is through math forgery; using the method of "Absolutism of Majorities", they have "convinced" the electoral minority, that half plus one, in the universe that effectively enforces vote, ends up being one hundred percent of the total electoral universe. While that same half minus one, for that same minority now absolute majority, equals zero.

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It's a sign of times that one of the governors most opposed to Chavez's government, is begging the president to, please, please, keep spending money, that he shouldn't cut the budget for any reason in the world and that he should continues to send his well deserved "constitutional situado" (grants from the central government to the states). It is none other than the supposedly ultra right-winger Carabobo governor, Henrique Salas Feo, who throws a fit over "his" reales, in a new display of what we have been stating for several years now: choosing between chavism and the wrongly called opposition is the same as choosing between two equally lethal poisons: vociferous socialism (like Chavez's) and disguised socialism (like Salas Feo's and the rest of the opposition).

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