Ñangaras in the mist

There are no new news in Venezuela. It is all a repeat performance, each time running lower in its theatrics.  Take for example the talk of the week, that three zeroes are going to be chopped off the currency reading because, well, some web pages cannot handle anymore the full extent of digits in large financial sums.  It would be funny if it were not so sad and dépassé. After all we did that in 2008 (I think). There you have your measure of chavismo fiasco, in ten years the currency has lost 99,9% of its value...

Thus ignoring that 1 Bolivar of 1998 is equal to 1.000.000 Bolivar of June 2018 let's see if there is something else worth talking about.  Worthy of discourse are lack of food and medicine and hospitals and security and cash and...  but nobody really cares. Except those protesting that are swiftly repressed while state TV says we are in the best of all possible worlds. No point discussing that again, I guess.

We are going somewhere

But we do not where, nor do we/I care much, to tell you the truth.

Yes, it is time for a quickie survey on how close to the abyss we stand. I shall be brief. Promise.

Chavismo is trying to make the coronation of Maduro palatable.

Idiots in NYC: or how Falcon sunk his presidencial run

Last post was hard to write, and the whirlwind of political news too hard to write about comprehensively. Thankfully procrastination does pay and today's picture from the UN plaza in NYC was worth the wait.  An epic photo-fail if ever.

From left to right, a kebab from hell:
Samuel Moncada, regime's ambassador to the UN and vice minister for foreign affairs;
Henri Falcon wanna-be Maduro successor; Felipe Mujica head of the near extinct weather vane MAS;
some hired help; and Pedro Pablo Fernandez, son of wanna-be foreign secretary to Falcon Eduardo Fernandez,
and probably aiming himself for some crumbs somewhere as no one in the MUD would be caught dead with him.

In this historic pose you can see how Henri Falcon sunk any chance he may have had to be elected president next May 20. By posing in front of the United Nations accompanied by the ambassador of Venezuela there, the much reviled and insufferable Samuel Moncada, Henri Falcon admits that his presidential candidature is wanted by the regime, and that he is in agreement with it.  That is, Henri Falcon and the scattered losers that support him are complicit with the regime in the fraudulent elections coming May 20.

PERIOD.

These people had the chutzpah to try to get a meeting with high members of the UN so as to force this one to send an observation team to validate the election of May 20.  That a serious observation requires at the very least 3 months of observation and more before for mere preparation is not computing with them.  Then again whoever low key UN member that received them ("the UN is under obligation to help Venezuela" was said by the traveling show)  had probably already read that.

There are some damage controls that are beyond reach.  A picture is indeed worth a thousand words.

It is all about humiliation

The world is starting to notice how Venezuela is collapsing. What did the trick is the flow of refugees crossing the borders, travelling by bus all the way to Argentina, drowning in front of Curazao, or simply picking up their one way ticket at the airport.

There are so many reasons to leave the country and yet the one that I growing is our daily humiliations, something that is, no doubt, a welcome side effect for the regime.  Like any totalitarian system, the more so if tutored by Cuba, one way to control people is to humiliate them so they get grateful when the level of humiliation relents.  Leaving because you are hungry, or your health is threatened, or because you know that you are in the list for an upcoming middle of the night arrest is a clear decision. Leaving because you are humiliated is not a clear decision. Leaving because you are humiliated is what the dictator wants. When you leave your country because you cannot endure humiliation anymore becomes your own acknowledgement of failure. You lost, the dictator won. For the dictator it is the sweeter because the memories of your humiliation may haunt you forever and bar you from returning home, not wanting to walk where so many perceived personal failings will taunt you back.

I live daily such small failures, mine or the ones I see.

Something shifted somewhere under someone's feet

Three things happened today that tells us something is brewing inside chavismo.

My important/favorite is defense minister Padrino announcing  that he is against armed colectivos.  You know, those colectivos which are nothing else but paramilitary thugs wearing red shirts and working for the regime. Chavismo version of storm troopers.

The reason was certainly the damaging video out of this weekend maneuvers that went viral and that I tweeted below (I am more active on Twitter than on Blog, the more so that it is easier now to make micro posts in Twitter)

A paramilitary group this week end in Caracas. It does not matter wether you underatand Spanish: the theatrics of violence, hate, intimidation and abuse are crystal clear.
Venezuela as the novel totalitarian state. https://t.co/XTLzRJqEsl

— daniel duquenal (@danielduquenal) February 26, 2018