The End of Chavismo in Venezuela? -- American Thinker, Frank Friday

[bsteadman]

The End of Chavismo in Venezuela?

American Thinker
Frank Friday
3/21/2014

Excerpt:

President Obama is so busy doing nothing about Crimea and Ukraine, he has no time to make a show of doing nothing about the crisis in Venezuela. That may be just as well, since it appears the end may finally be coming for the “Chavista” rulers put in power by the late Hugo Chavez. With the most recent violence, even regime supporters are bailing out.

Related to that, it’s also nice to see Sen. Marco Rubio taking my advice from last year to forget immigration reform and concentrate on opposing the tyranny in Cuba and Venezuela. Rubio is uniquely positioned to lead American opinion here, because of his own family’s experience; the intelligent, Reagan-like passion he brings to the cause of freedom; and his Spanish fluency, which immediately gives him a global audience. (Unfortunately Ted Cruz, like a lot of American Hispanics, doesn’t habla Espanol)

The rats in Venezuela are also leaving the ship, that is, the Castro Cubans are looking to Brazil or some other sugar daddy, as it appears Venezuela is running out of petro-dollars. Roger Noriega believes the Venezuelan central bank is now literally broke as virtually all of its remaining liquid assets are pledged to Red China to cover oil deals. Venezuela has seen its oil exports decline with the collapse of its petroleum sector due to socialist mismanagement and competition for Gulf refineries from North American sources. The only outlet left is China, which is expensive to ship to because of the distance.

Most tyrannies rely on a combination of violence and rewards to keep their people in check. Some like the demonic North Koreans are all about fear and violence, as they have almost nothing to give out in the way of rewards. But unless a regime has gone past the point of no return, like Syria, where the Sunni vs. non-Sunni bloodshed has made politics simply a genocidal fight to the death, a healthy level of benefits must be showered on government supporters to maintain power.

A lot of the conventional Venezuela analysis tends to dwell on the fact that perhaps 50% of the country still supports the current regime, but forgets this is a cash-and-carry constituency. The goodies are about to end, the currency is collapsing and there may soon be nothing even to eat. Bereft of hand-outs, the adoring crowds will lose interest and the rent-a-thugs will vanish.
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View the complete article at:

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/...venezuela.html

[bsteadman]

Power slipping from Maduro's grasp

DW
Marc Koch
3/16/2014

Excerpt:

For the past month students have been protesting against the government in Venezuela. It has resorted to violence in an attempt to stop them, but President Nicolas Maduro's days seem to be numbered.

One by one, the Venezuelan regime's supporters are deserting it. And now even German Heinz Dieterich, the left-wing political analyst who was the main ideologue to late President Hugo Chavez, says the days of the government in Caracas are numbered: President Nicolas Maduro has at most a couple of weeks left - so incapable was the regime at solving the country's problems.

Only the number of victims changes

But for the time being, Maduro is still holding the rains, however loosely. After more than a month of protests and their violent suppression, the only thing that changes from one day to the next in Venezuela is the numbers of dead, injured and arrested, which is rising steadily. And the tone is becoming sharper: The president celebrates his bellicose, if shopworn, far-left rhetoric, while opposition students venture onto the streets of major cities to risk their lives every day.

But for now, there is no chance of dialogue with government supporters. The 24-year-old football coach Jacksy Silva is typical. She says "if they were demonstrators, they would have slogans and banners, and would draw attention to themselves with their voices alone. And they would not be rampaging through the streets, beating people. These are not students, but a pack of vandals that wants to destroy our revolution."

On the other hand, more and more students say the Maduro government has lost its legitimacy and want to continue the protests - until the end. "We are fighting here," student Vanessa Eissig says, "because we want to work here. Because we want to have children here. In Venezuela, there are many capable people. People like us. We fight for the country, because we believe in it."

What comes after the conflict?

Maduro has rejected most mediation offers as "interference in Venezuela's internal affairs." He considers the Organization of American States (OAS) in particular a lackey of the United States. Now the foreign ministers of the South American UNASUR countries, which are broadly sympathetic to Chavism, have started a dialogue - an enormous foreign policy success for Maduro. At the same time he shows how the conflict in Venezuela has split the continent into countries that have expressed their solidarity with the regime in Caracas, and those calling for an end to the conflict and state repression.

But no one currently seems to have a clear idea what is to come after that. Even the opposition hardly trusts anyone to unite and rebuild the deeply divided country. Nevertheless, changes are inevitable, says Diego Moya Ocampos, Latin America analyst at the US economic information service IHS: "A perfect storm is brewing in Venezuela. What we are seeing in Venezuela is a political vacuum left unfilled since Chavez's death, escalating pro and anti-government protests and a further contraction of the economy in 2014 and 2015, with record high inflation levels and shortages of food and basic goods, including medicines. It's a perfect storm that could lead to big changes in the country."

The solution must come from within

But even the US, which now openly criticizes the Maduro regime with harsh words, doesn't seem to have a plan for the post-Maduro era, the MacMillan Center for International Studies at Yale University says. "The US has a long history of supporting subversive movements that after reaching power had disastrous long-term effects on the country," Steve Ellner wrote on its .

So a solution for the country must probably come from within. Although the Maduro government is still trying to take a hard line against the protests, it is falling apart behind the scenes. Even diehard Chavists in high office now oppose state violence and repression of the protests. And the discontent with the president and his policies is even growing among those who actually support the government's policies. If the protests of the urban, middle-class neighborhoods spread to the Chavist strongholds in the slums, further instability looms.
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View the complete article at:

http://www.dw.de/power-slipping-from...asp/a-17499662