4.7 • 6.8K Ratings
🗓️ 11 January 2019
⏱️ 5 minutes
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0:00.0 | Once there was a South American country with a promising future, it had a functioning democracy, a rapidly developing economy, and a growing middle class. |
0:10.0 | All the important indicators, including education, healthcare, and foreign investment, were pointed in the right direction. |
0:17.0 | It was far from perfect, but the mood was hopeful and with good reason. |
0:22.0 | But now all that promise is gone. The country is a failed state, a hollowed-out shell of its former self. |
0:29.0 | Services like power and water are sporadic. The most basic consumer goods from bread to toilet paper are in chronically short supply. |
0:38.0 | Crime has skyrocketed. Freedom of the press is almost nonexistent. Democracy has been replaced by a virtual dictatorship. |
0:46.0 | The country is, I'm sorry to say, my beloved Venezuela, a place in which my family has deep roots. |
0:55.0 | I can tell you what happened to it in one word, socialism. |
1:00.0 | In 1999, then candidate for president Hugo Chavez promised to lead the people of Venezuela to a socialist paradise. |
1:08.0 | His theme was Esperanza Gambio, hope and change. |
1:12.0 | Venezuela is a nation of great wealth. Chavez said, but it's being stolen from its citizens by the evil capitalist and evil corporations. |
1:22.0 | This wrong would be righted, he assured the voters, if they elected him. |
1:26.0 | And they did. To their everlasting regret. |
1:29.0 | Chavez drew inspiration from his mentor, Fidel Castro. |
1:33.0 | Like his mentor, he enjoyed giving speeches that sometimes lasted as many as seven hours. |
1:38.0 | He even gave himself his own weekly television show, where he would spontaneously break into song. |
1:44.0 | Here's a rule. |
1:46.0 | When your nation's leader starts singing on national television, you're in trouble. |
1:51.0 | Under Chavez, the government of Venezuela took over industry after industry. |
1:56.0 | The government, he assured everyone, would run these businesses better than private enterprise. |
2:01.0 | And the profits would be shared by the people. With great fanfare, he tore up contracts with multinational oil and gas companies |
2:10.0 | and demanded that they pay much higher royalties. When they refused, he told them to leave. |
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