It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship • Hacker News Board

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#51

Post by NetStrikeForce » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:38 AM UTC

joncrane wrote: post #35

Kenji wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly doubt that liberty & equality (before law) lead to dictatorship. Unless you mean liberty that goes as far as harming others. But that would infringe on other people's liberty.

There's something to be said for the statement of "the tyranny of democracy." Put more power into the hands of the common people and you end up with someone like Trump as a nominee. Don't you think in a weaker country with more classism like Venezuela, that if a Trump were elected, that you'd end up with something like this?

I believe it is the tyranny of the majority, hence why legal frameworks like a constitution are so important.

The majority can turn a democracy into a dictatorship.

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#52

Post by SomeStupidPoint » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:38 AM UTC

Kenji wrote: post #18

jackcosgrove wrote: post #11

Unrestrained equality leads to dictatorship. Unrestrained liberty leads to dictatorship. Democracy requires a balance between equality and liberty, and the political pluralism that is inherent in the vying for power. Partisan fanatics who breathlessly wait for the total victory of their side would do well to remember this.

I strongly doubt that liberty & equality (before law) lead to dictatorship. Unless you mean liberty that goes as far as harming others. But that would infringe on other people's liberty.

The thought, so far as it goes:

In many "classless", free-market capitalistic societies (and a bunch of similar ones), society ends up approximating social class by the logarithm of the wealth of the person. In these cases "liberty and equality" really mean "lack of government interference in use of wealth", which ultimately translates to government restraint on social status to influence society for your own benefit.

In cases where there's no special laws targeting the wealthy, you essentially have a feudalistic society without any formalized duty of or decorum from the higher classes to the lower classes, which ultimately leads to an exploitative and abusive relationship.

As with many cases in politics, the lack of an explicit structure merely means a more abusive invisible structure.

The further argument is that this is why we should have laws which target the wealthy to provide civic funding/service, eg, higher taxes above say, $250k/yr. That allowing the dynamic class assignment of free-market economies, but formalizing the duty of the higher classes to provide for those under them, provides for the strongest and most resilient societies. Which is generally speaking what the data shows.

Similar arguments can be made about why you should have laws which provide damages if you buy a newspaper and lie about your business rivals molesting kids.

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#53

Post by tptacek » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:39 AM UTC

NetStrikeForce wrote: post #51

joncrane wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's something to be said for the statement of "the tyranny of democracy." Put more power into the hands of the common people and you end up with someone like Trump as a nominee. Don't you think in a weaker country with more classism like Venezuela, that if a Trump were elected, that you'd end up with something like this?

I believe it is the tyranny of the majority, hence why legal frameworks like a constitution are so important. The majority can turn a democracy into a dictatorship.

Venezuela had a constitution. The author of this piece is mourning its ineffectiveness. What's important is the continuity of the constitution.

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#54

Post by jackcosgrove » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:41 AM UTC

SomeStupidPoint wrote: post #52

Kenji wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly doubt that liberty & equality (before law) lead to dictatorship. Unless you mean liberty that goes as far as harming others. But that would infringe on other people's liberty.

The thought, so far as it goes: In many "classless", free-market capitalistic societies (and a bunch of similar ones), society ends up approximating social class by the logarithm of the wealth of the person. In these cases "liberty and equality" really mean "lack of government interference in use of wealth", which ultimately translates to government restraint on social status to influence society for your own benefit…

Liberty and equality are at loggerheads. Liberty is the animating principle of the modern right, and equality is the animating principle of the modern left.

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#55

Post by jessaustin » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:41 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #15

andrenth wrote: post #14

Where is the worldwide leftist intelligentsia that supported this totalitarian regime from the beginning with wet dreams of "21st century socialism"? They are all quiet now and will surely soon claim that things went wrong there and misrepresent the original intents of the "revolution". It's time to recognize that, once again, socialism resulted in the same results that it has always achieved: hunger, death, lost fre…

Hopefully in the same place as the worldwide right-wing intelligentsia that so actively supported death squads in central America just a few years prior to Chavismo.

Last I heard, Ollie was on Fox Business Channel?

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#56

Post by argonaut » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:41 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #49

robk wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When a democracy transitions to a dictatorship in a decade how do you not hood the electorate responsible? They made the choices continually to allow this.

What does it even mean to "hold an electorate responsible"?

Something like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_collective_guilt? (obviously what is happening in Venezuela is substantially less tragic and not directly comparable)

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#57

Post by robotresearcher » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:41 AM UTC

DominikR wrote: post #36

robotresearcher wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a population of homeless people hunting dogs and cats on the streets in order to not starve to death - only possible with Socialism. Or the United States in the early 20th Century. Grapes of Wrath and all that.

The United States was an extremely wealthy country with exceptional freedom up until the Great Depression. And this was only a short episode in US history.

Sure. The US had been rich since about 1850, and was broke like everyone else for a short time in the 1930s. But the grandparent said this kind of disaster is 'only possible with socialism', which the Great Depression proves is not true by counterexample.

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#58

Post by Crito » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:42 AM UTC

Rapzid wrote: post #20

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #5

Venezuela'a foreign exchange reserves stand at less than $12 billion [1]. They pay over 15% of that this month to bond holders [2]. This makes no sense until one considers that the bond holders might be regime insiders. Venezuela is a state structured to maximise the transfer of wealth from the many to the few. Shockingly, as recently as 2004 Venezuela boasted fair elections [3]. The degree to which Venezuelans are t…

It's all just one poorly elected candidate away I guess. Look at what's happening in the Philippines with Duterte for a taste of why people are so concerned about Trump(regardless of whether the concern would end up founded or not).

Isn't Duterte significantly more popular than Trump?

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#59

Post by tptacek » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:42 AM UTC

jessaustin wrote: post #55

tptacek wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hopefully in the same place as the worldwide right-wing intelligentsia that so actively supported death squads in central America just a few years prior to Chavismo.

Last I heard, Ollie was on Fox Business Channel?

So, only the second ring of hell. I'd have pushed them further in, but, whatever.

Re: It’s official: Venezuela is a dictatorship

#60

Post by CptJamesCook » Sat, Oct 22, 2016, 1:43 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #48

CptJamesCook wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 2005, Time magazine named Moore one of the world's 100 most influential people. So, not exactly just a dude. Michael Moore represents a growing anti-capitalist ideology in America, and when their socialist experiments fail it should be noted.

Again not clear on why I'm meant to care what the Ann Coulter of the left thinks about Venezuela. He has lots of nice things to say about Fidel Castro era Cuba as well.

One reason is that Bernie Sanders, who was not that far off from winning the presidency, takes him very seriously.

From Michael Moore's website: "I first endorsed Bernie Sanders for public office in 1990 when he, as mayor of Burlington, VT, asked me to come up there and hold a rally for him in his run to become Vermont’s congressman."