Thanks, Socialism! The nation that Bernie Sanders once called the ‘real’ American dream in 2011vnow on the brink of complete collapse.
At least 38 countries have recognized Venezuela’s Constitutional removal of Maduro from power, to be replaced by interim leader Guaido — with Maduro getting ongoing support from countries like Russia, Iran, China, Cuba, Turkey — and of course, the NeverTrump Democrats.
Like every good dictator, when things go wrong, it’s never the fault of his government or his policies. He’s got someone to blame.
Maduro, without offering evidence, blamed the outage that started Thursday afternoon on the United States, calling it an “electricity war.” The blackout appears to have stemmed from a failure at the main hydroelectric plant in Venezuela, which has suffered from years of underinvestment. Guaidó claimed the outage knocked out power in 22 of the country’s 23 states.
Source: NPR
Now that the electrical system has collapsed and Caracas has been without power for 5 days now, Maduro is doing what everyone else always does — blaming Trump.
His dumpster fire of a political system is not to blame. Oh, no. It was a cyber-attack from the Great Satan that took him down.
Photo evidence points to a different probable cause… from the city that can’t even deliver clean water.
https://twitter.com/sotiridi/status/1105119743349063682
Furious Venezuelans lined up to buy water and fuel on Sunday as the country endured a fourth day of a nationwide blackout that has left already-scarce food rotting in shops, homes suffering for lack of water and cell phones without reception.
Authorities have managed to provide only patchy access to power since the outage began on Thursday in what President Nicolas Maduro called an act of U.S.-backed sabotage, but critics insist it is the result of incompetence and corruption.
The government on Sunday suspended school and business activities for the following day without providing any information on a likely time frame for resolving the situation, leaving many fretting that it could extend indefinitely.
The country’s worst-ever power outage comes as Maduro faces a hyperinflationary economic collapse and an unprecedented political crisis. Opposition leader Juan Guaido in January invoked the constitution to assume the presidency after declaring Maduro’s 2018 re-election a fraud.
Source: Reuters
Blackout in Caracas and the across much of the rest of Venezuela tonight. pic.twitter.com/vnuzZWWN33
— Patrick Oppmann CNN (@CNN_Oppmann) March 7, 2019
Internet access is down, too; which means most of them couldn’t even see his tweet blaming Trump for all his troubles.
Urgent: Real-time network data shows #Venezuela's connectivity falling to 12% amid reports of explosions in Caracas #SinLuz #Apagon #11Mar ⬇️https://t.co/8pljYDEYae pic.twitter.com/3WByxZX3Nr
— NetBlocks (@netblocks) March 11, 2019
The citizens have had enough.
Angry citizens backing opposition leader Juan Guaido have joined a series of street demonstrations in at least 60 working-class neighbourhoods in capital Caracas and other regions in recent weeks.
And commentators believe members of the poorest sections of Venezuelan society are set to team up with the opposition’s traditional upper-class base in today’s marches, reports The Guardian.
“These protests are remarkable. The fact that people are coming out to protest across class lines reveals one thing: just how widespread the level of utter disgust with Maduro is in Venezuela today,” said Geoff Ramsey, assistant director for Venezuela at the Washington Office on Latin America.
Source: The Week
Meanwhile, in America…
Sixteen Democratic lawmakers, among them rising star Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, on Thursday sent a joint letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo criticising what they described as “counterproductive” US strategy on crisis-hit Venezuela.
“We write to express our deep concern regarding the Trump Administration’s handling of relations with Venezuela, particularly its suggestions of military intervention, imposition of broad unilateral sanctions, and recent recognition of an opposition leader as interim president,” the legislators wrote. [Emphasis added] Source: DailyMail
