Topic: Venezuela - page 3. (Read 2137 times)

He is in the UK as far as I can tell, not in the US, so really he doesn't know as much as he thinks he does about either party here. Artemis called your comments infantile because as you sit enjoying your own comforts telling a man there on the ground living thru this horror, "No your version of reality is incorrect I know what caused the horrible problems in your own country from thousands of miles away as I enjoy this cuppa." Meanwhile he is risking his freedom and possibly his life to tell you what he thinks is going on, but you insist on lecturing to him about his own nation from afar while you enjoy the comforts of a market economy (for now). He called you infantile because you care more about pushing your political ideology than what is actually happening there.

The sanctions were put into place AFTER Chavez nationalized a bunch of private assets. The sanctions resulted DIRECTLY from Socialist policies of snatching up private infrastructure and nationalizing it. Then they mismanaged it and it rotted into disrepair. Do you think countries should be able to just take international assets as they please without consequence? It is not like the president just woke up one day and said "fuck Venezuela", this was done for good reason. Removing sanctions just makes it that much easier for China to slide in and do what they want. You talk about pillaging, wait until China gets control.

I haven't ever said that Maduro is good. I have said that Venezuela should be given the chance to elect its own government for recovery. Gauido will pillage Venezuela, and will be far worse than Maduro. Just look at the results of previous regime changes orchestrated by Washington. Theresa May is obviously taking orders from the Committee 300 which is based in the City of London. It was founded by Cecil Rhodes, and it is no coincidence that Clinton was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University.

It is a difficult problem for Venezuela. Maduro has obviously not been good for the people of Venezuela. Washington's control will be far worse, and China will claim land in payment for defaulted debts, and that will probably be used to set up military bases. I don't know what the answer is, but the removal of sanctions and military threats might enable some sort of basic stability to be restored.

I don't care where Guaidó was schooled, i don't even like his political party, because they are also socialists, just of a different kind (yes they are in the international, go find it). But given the current situation, ANYONE that frees the economy and puts a stop to crime would do for now; later after some breathing i can think in choosing a proper candidate, probably from the only party close to classic liberalism...

When power goes out everything goes out. Thanks to a socialist (central planned) economy, at some point they also fixated battery prices. Guess what happened next? No batteries, and the few that remained were stolen. Few cell tower have working batteries anymore. I clearly remember years ago still having signal during blackouts, but that is a thing of the past...

If the new gov happens to be friendly with the US, i don't mind. You might think your government is the worst in the world, but it isn't, even with Trump. One reason: you still have food, water, electricity and a place to live, and that says a lot.

I wonder why your friend left this country...

I don't think referring to my comments as "infantile" is helpful. We know that Washington is determined to force regime change in many countries, and that Guaido was schooled in the George Washington school for regime change activists. We also have the comments from the Washington politicians who confirm their actions in the name of the US. It is also generally accepted that Maduro has not been the best president for Venezuela. The major factor in all this is that the sanctions by Washington, and their covert actions have made it very difficult for the population of Venezuela.

I've just received a brief message from my fiend in Venezuela, and it seems that she managed to leave the country before the power outage. I'll try to see if I can get some more information from here, although she has had some difficulties in contacting her family.

The reason for the blackout has been a decade of negligence, the worst started when Maduro took power after Chávez death in 2013. Under Chávez there was corruption, but the influx of money was so big the quality of life was adequate, and not enough people cared. In 2009 Chávez ordered renewing the electric grid and increase generation, so that hydro dam that currently provides 80% of electricity could go completely offline and leave the country powered on. 80,000 million USD and 10 years later, all of this is gone.

Do not bring your infantile accusations against the USA, the CIA did not install Maduro, he and his own people stole everything on their own, no sanctions. President Interim Guaidó is supported by the majority of the people, never forget that. There is no "split" anymore (there was under Chávez), everyone want Maduro gone; poor and what few "rich" might remain that did not make their fortune the last 5 to 15 years thanks to corruption.

Overgrown foliage inside one of the key substations near the dam caught fire, as vegetation in the area periodically do every couple of years or so.



Normally the fault would have been fixed within hours, but "something", probably lack of skill, made the situation worse. Maduro blamed "hackers", until people who previously worked in the dam revealed all operations in the hydro plant are still done using air gapped analog systems designed in the 60ies, leaving their lies exposed. I personally believe there is/was a Scada system for monitoring the transmission line, but not the Guri hydro dam. In any case they made a mess trying to restore things "manually", with most professionals who formerly worked there gone after a complete nationalization done in 2009 joined generation, transmission and delivery nationwide. This used to be separate in three levels, under various companies, some state owned, some private).

There is electricity here right now, but we haven't got any tap water for 8 days since the blackout started. It is much much worse in the countryside, at least in the major cities there is electricity and Internet when it doesn't go out, which is rather frequently. The reason is the same, all State owned companies (all services were nationalized under Chávez) have been neglected and are in terrible shape, and with the miserable wages few want to work in them anyway, and those who still do, are not exactly the best, but simply the most loyal to Maduro specially in managerial positions.

Today another substation had transformers blow up and catch fire in the city of Maracaibo, leaving it without power. No, there are no cia agents or civil contractors doing secret ops, its 50 year old transformers that couldn't take the load or so frequent on/off cycles and power fluctuations.



Before that, this substation in Caracas also went in flames for the same reason, they replaced the transformer(s) and restored service a few days later, but portions of the city still go out of power at random, because they are doing "manual load management" an euphemism for rationing without telling anyone in advance, because who cares if people lose their electrical appliances in a country where the average wage is no more than 10 USD a month...

Here is another video of someone explaining Venezuela's situation. Main reason you don't get more in depth quality and prompt explanations, is because this is a Spanish speaking country and good information in English language is scarce and often inaccurate. Also the de-facto government extinguished all opposition media, its mostly on internet alone where dissidents express themselves, and are often detained and incarcerated just like journalists, foreigners and nationals for asking "improper" questions or daring to criticize someone in power. For now Guaidó remains free because there are clear signs Maduro is genuinely scared of the US reaction should he be detained, but until recently anyone like him was put behind bars, like it happened in 2014 to opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez; of Guaidó's political party, which was declared "illegal" by the regime last year among many others before the facade "elections" done against whats written in the constitution, because they installed a supra-legal entity called "National Constituent Assembly" that was declared by themselves above the constitution and is ruling by decree whatever Maduro and his cronies want.


Venezuela Collapse Explained

It is really difficult for "outsiders" to understand the situation in Venezuela. What is certain is that Washington ( not the US ) has a policy of illegal sequestration against Venezuela., and that sanctions have weakened the country. Objective consideration of reports, and manipulated images, lead me to believe that sabotage by Washington, or its agents, was the reason for the electrical outage. The country seems to be split at the moment between the wealthy and the rest of the population, and this makes it difficult to gain an accurate picture of the situation. There are so many vested interests involved that is difficult to see a way forward. I believe that the sanctions should be removed, and the country should be allowed to regain some form of peaceful stability. At that point, it should be possible to allow the people to decide on a government for their future.

Does anyone know what happened to the cypto launched by Venezuela?

So, it still can get worse huh? I've been seeing these blackout incidents in my feed recently. How are public hospitals faring?

I mean, I read somewhere that the infrastructure in Venezuela has deteriorated to the point that they don't refine oil anymore. Would suck to not have oil to run generators. Reminds me of my own country's blackout plagues in the early 90s.

@Artemis3 Hope you stay safe. Don't make your house a target for looters.

Maduro didn't personally cut the power with a big-ass circuit breaker. The whole country is falling apart after years of incompetent and corrupt rule.

If I were a dictator, I would not cut the power, because that creates chaos and angry people near me.
If I were a country trying to invade other, I would cut the power off to make it weaker.

You know nothing about war.

Now that my electricity and internet came back (after 40+ hours of MORE blackout) I'll take the chance to say that in the middle of this chaos some people started taking USD bills directly. There is few or no Venezuelan currency in cash available anymore (and you need 7 of the (rare) highest bills to reach 1 USD), commerce basically halted for most people since they don't have USD.


(1 USD for 10 mins charge your smarphone/tablet; 9 USD 1 kg of meat. Note avg monthly wage is 10 USD, NOT paid in USD or cash, but wire transfer to your bank, so most people use debit cards due to physical fiat scarcity, which doesn't work without electricity).

There were some lootings and repression from authorities to people having days without food and water. Water in Caracas stops without electricity, because its source of water is at a lower elevation and the system uses electric pumps...


Similar situation occurred across other major cities such as Maracaibo, and Merida, here they looted a State owned bank...

...But they didn't care for the money, just the computers and other valuables.

Since last week we have been several hours without electricity, 70+. After restoring power, many transformers blew up either by lack of maintenance or incompetence and several locations ended in blackout again. This should show you how fragile this country really is, there was no intervention, just apparently a forest fire out of control and people without the expertise to protect and control their own SCADA air-gapped network.


Insinuating that this was an US aggression is stupid at best, but that's your typical socialist rhetoric: Always blame capitalists of everything we are unable to do properly.

Looters take to Venezuela's streets as blackout enters its FIFTH day killing 15 kidney patients as under-pressure president Maduro claims the power cut was caused by an 'imperialist' electromagnetic attack from the US

And yes we are expecting even more blackouts, they are rationing while hiding the facts to the people, no one believes them but no one can do anything, that's how it works when they own the guns.



Where is that hypocrite Max Blumenthal now?



Venezuela blackout: 'Like living in the apocalypse' - BBC News

got this one today

venezuela becoming uninhabitable

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2019/03/12/venezuela-is-quickly-becoming-uninhabitable/?utm_source=quora&utm_medium=referral#1091e9797a03

since no one wants their oil anyway, we can expect there will be no real solution anytime soon

dont expect any help from bitcoin, or dash if you are in venezuela

Holy shit, you finally admitted China has self interest in this situation, and the real reason why the USA has interest. This is about protecting the US from China, not taking over Venezuela. The US did offer investment, then Chavez nationalized all of it an without the corporations there to manage it, it degraded into what it is today, especially after Maduro. The USA will not tolerate Chinese military presence in South America, and I am not sure it should. It is just too bad you seem to think the USA is more of a threat than Communist China which has literal concentration camps and is run by a dictator for life. One question for you. How free of influence from China do you think the EU and UK will remain if they take down the USA?

it doesnt matter who runs the venezuela ico, weather maduro nor gordanio or whatever his name is. its still same prinzinple there is someone who prints money and many others who are supposed to be the money earning cattle for it.

I don't think anybody considers Maduro to be the perfect president, but he is the democratically elected leader, and the elections were supervised by an international committee. The aggressive military actions by Washington are not helping Venezuela or the Venezuelan people. China has been investing heavily, and we know they like to create debt, and then convert this into potential military bases. Obviously Washington doesn't want this, but they aren't using the correct tactics to prevent it. Then there is the issue of publicly stating that they want Venezuelan oil to preserve the oi interests of the Koch brothers, this will help to turn world opinion against America. Very few people seem to realise that Washington and America are effectively different countries now.

Washington should remove sanctions, and try to heal the rift between the US and Venezuela by offering commercial investment and aid. Neither country can afford a war, especially as it will create more suffering in both the US and South America. Once this has been started, then the possibility of installing a new democratically elected government will be created. Washington should have learnt its lesson in Syria - Assad is a much stronger and capable leader, and he has managed to resist the same failed tactics of Washington.

If anybody wants to know the most recent status of the petro (though it seems to hardly be relevant any more except for its association with cryptocurrency), chances are high it doesn't actually exist.

Somebody recently uncovered an account with a huge negative balance (equivalent to about $21 million), suggesting it doesn't use a blockchain at all.



Too bad for all the Venezuelans that got caught up investing in it, though it couldn't have been very many, and I suspect most investors were run-of-the-mill crypto people, some of them from this forum.

I think Maduro has bigger problems to worry about the moment.

Minutes after writing that post above, lights went out again. It just came back, who knows for how long.

The usurper de-facto gov is hiding facts as usual. Information from a professional from the college of engineers of Venezuela told Union Radio news that Caracas is in fact rationing power, due to lack of energy coming from the dam in the south of the country.

Actual capacity near the city is around 700mw from 3 smaller fuel power plants, but the city is currently demanding 2000mw. Other parts of the country are faring much worse, many places having 72+ hours without electric service.

Yes, this darkness is the direct result of economic socialist policy and socialist thinking and managing of the country. There is no point hiding it.

• 'A city of shadows': fear as Venezuela's crippling blackout enters day four
• Rotting food and endangered patients: How Venezuelans are faring during continuing nationwide power outages
• Guaido says will ask Venezuela legislature to respond to blackout
• Nerves fray, tempers flare as Venezuela blackout hits fourth day

PS: Because there was a thread split and i was asked to move back the messages, the post time in my previous posts doesn't reflect the actual time when they were made.

Minutes after writing my previous post internet went out, and later electricity, for nearly 24 hours more. We had another whole night in darkness...

The ineptitude of those usurping power "in the name of socialism" is the only reason this is occurring. Not any "evil" imperialist action. If the US actually engaged their cyber division, it would be combined with something else...

As i have wrote before in other posts, they have have let all State owned companies rot, mostly because of their same failed economic policies.

Someone related to the State company wrote some numbers:

• Venezuela depends 80% from the single Guri hydroelectric dam
• Over 70% of the transformers nationwide are past their due lifetime
• 48% of the workers have quit, and left the country (due to the miserable wages)

There is a LONG transmission line from the south of the country where this dam is to the north where most of the population lives. Chávez himself noted this weakness in 2010 (when a similar blackout incident occurred for a few hours) and spent countless millions purchasing and building a backup system using natural gas, but all of this is gone under Maduro...

Within this transmission line, a critical substation (Malena) near the dam has been neglected any maintenance, the foliage grew up so much it shutdown two 765 kW lines and a third by overload. This is to give you an example of the truth behind "imperialist US attacks", and the kind of trustworthiness Maduro has.

It never ceases to amaze me how many times people from former Communist nations and current Socialist collapsing states will tell you Marxism and its child ideologies are a tumor on society, and yet you continue to defend it.

The blackout was the operation.  Marco Rubio was accidentally the first person to report on this by tweeting a comprehensive summary just 3 minutes after it began.  
https://twitter.com/marcorubio/status/1103782022537977857

There is no way someone could find out about all of that, fact check it, and then type up the tweet in 3 minutes. He could be a really sloppy co-conspirator or at worst, just a really irresponsible tweeter.   Either way, you shouldn't believe anything he says.

Also this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003

I guess Canada's healthcare system caused this blackout.