Plaza Francia Caracas 18:15 pic.twitter.com/1Pp7Dr5AOT
— daniel duquenal (@danielduquenal) November 15, 2015
It had to be opposition mayors that had a gathering in support of France after the Paris attacks. In addition of the Embassy top brass, the mayors of Chacao and El Hatillo attended (Muchacho and Smolanski). As far as I know no chavista mayor did shit. But they are too busy trying to save their electoral skins and covering up for the first family drug deals.
Incidentally, most head of states or government have sent personal messages of support to France from their tweeter account. On @nicolasmaduro you will find a simple re-tweet of the foreign ministry which is as lame as possible a communique, but dozens and dozens of electoral re-tweets, many or all of them violating campaign rules.
Then again the regime has been a faithful ally of Assad and of the kind of good and bad terrorist. So I should not be surprised.....
Also I am in shock reading that some in Venezuela disqualify support for France as there are as many victims on a single week end crime spree in Caracas. We are really a fucked up society here.
There was a minute silenced across Europe an hour ago (11 AM) in support of France and its people. There is real solidarity in Europe: we know that it could be London next. Everyone knows that what these terrorists want is to divide us and destroy our countries, and we won't let that happen. The French are leading the way in this.
ReplyDeleteIt is absurd to compare this with the situation in Venezuela, bad as it is. No external force is trying to destroy the country. Excessive common crime there is a result of bad governance and corrupt people in power.
Antonio
No Antonio, you are wrong, very wrong. Venezuelan lives count just as much as those being gunned down sitting in an outdoor cafe on a street corner in Paris. The human carnage that is 'allowed' to take place in each and every major city in Venezuela is purposeful, and with intent. It is to keep any opposition off-balance and fearful of gathering in protest. The death toll on any given weekend in Venezuela is truly shocking, and should give everyone pause. It is barbarism on a massive scale, initiated by those in political power. Frightening, and just as heinous as anything undertaken by ISIS.
DeleteDr Faustus, every thread here brings this horrific subject up. Out of curiosity, not that it would solve anything, but do you know what the gun laws are in Venezuela?
DeleteYou say that people are gunned down, do citizens have guns (or can have guns?) or only criminals get them?
I think the Cubanization of Venezuela could count as an external force trying to destroy Venezuela.
ReplyDeleteI disagree. We let them in. We became their allies and partners in all matters of state.
DeleteI disagree Carolina, don't say "we"... say "they"
DeleteI agree you Daniel. I should add:
ReplyDeleteThe world is failing to sympathize with Lebanon. They were also victims of a brutal attack the day before Paris, the worst in 25 years. 43 people were killed by ISIS.
Regarding the Venezuelan government, the only thing I read was the minister of agriculture blaming "capitalism" for the attacks. Not even in a moment like this they can stop their stupid propaganda.
About the reactions of many Venezuelans comparing the situations: it's only proving how self-centered our society is, "all about me" kind of society (and I know I'm going to get some reactions about this that I'm writing). I sometimes blame it at the isolation that the country suffers due to the hegemony, but sometimes I just blame it to simple malcriadez.
The deaths in Venezuela are undeniable, that's true, but they are ours. They are the result of our own failure as a country, not a war, not an attack of a foreign country, not an attack by religious extremists, and WE are the ones that have to deal with this problem and solve it. Nobody else.
I like your emphasis on personal responsibility for the solution of the crime problem.
DeleteAntonio
Venezuela has strong gun laws in place. I read that private citizens cannot own or buy firearms of any kind or ammunition for them in Venezuela. The gun law was passed in an attempt to reduce the number of murders. But what it actually did was make the government feel safer by disarming the regular law abiding population. The criminals kept their guns and probably the gun law helped them purchase more guns inexpensively from private citizens getting rid of the guns. As crime rates increased, there were more people who wanted to be criminals and needed guns but didn't have the money or connections to get them. Some of those people appear to have murdered policemen in order to steal their guns.
ReplyDeleteOne of the interesting things about gun control laws is that in some cases, after strict gun control laws are enacted, crime rates appear to become lower. In other cases, they become higher or remain unchanged. The main conclusion is that gun control laws are probably not the cause of the change in crime rates. Rather, if crime rates are increasing, the authorities may pass gun control laws but if they don't effectively address the reason for the increased crime, the gun control law will have little impact.
What I dislike about gun control when crime is increasing is it causes ordinary citizens to be defenseless. If every adult in Venezuela who has no criminal record was allowed to carry a gun, many believe this would cause chaos. But would it?
In Texas, most everyone who has no criminal record has a gun. Most have several guns. But there is a low murder rate in Texas. The main area of murders is within certain neighborhoods where drugs are sold. And those who are doing the shooting are not usually legally able to have weapons. Excluding murders by criminals against other criminals (gang war) in the regular population, the murder rate is one of the lowest in the world. Even including the criminals, the murder rate is about 4 per 100,000. One of the reasons for this is that criminals are scared of the normal civilian population. Any person without a criminal record could be carrying a concealed weapon perfectly legally. If the same thing were true in Venezuela, I imagine crime would decline quite a bit within a year.
Hey thanks for the reply to my question.
DeleteWho passed the gun laws in Venezuela, was it Chavez or was it a previous government.
@ Anonymous - No offense but can't you simply look up what are the gun laws and who put them in place?
DeleteLet's not forget that in Venezuela the so called law is behind much of the crime and the bad gangs were armed by Chavez and given motorcycles.
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=88&v=IicI_9Kfe5U
ReplyDelete