Due to government corruption, there are "two Venezuelas," one where the poor are having their electricity and food rationed by the government, causing civil unrest and bringing the country to the brink of civil war, but the other "country within the country" is living high drinking champagne and vodka, eating Belgian chocolates and lobster, wearing brand name clothes, and dining in exclusive restaurants.
Via Telesur, a man by the name of Agustin Otxotorena, a Basque executive living in Caracas, grew tired of constant calls from friends and relatives in Spain telling him that there was no food in Venezuela, so on May 20 he began publishing photos on Facebook of supermarkets in upscale sectors of Caracas filled with goods.
Translated by Google, hence the grammatical errors in the quote below:
And this was precisely the claim Otxotorena that accompanied the news that yesterday, Sunday, a reporter from ABC decided to publish. However, soon after, this means clearing the information on its website. His trail is still active Internet searches, but when we tried to access the news is no longer available.
In other words, it was reported then taken down.
COMPARE AND CONTRAST
Stores for the poor in Venezuela show empty shelves, where people can shop only on designated days and are limited to what they can buy, with some having to undergo fingerprinting scanning to prove their identity.
Compare images above to the images Mr. Otxotorena has been posting on his photo page.
In addition to showing evidence of an abundance of food stuffs, Otxotorena also analyzed the situation. He concluded that there are two countries in Venezuela—one where "there are many people having a hard time, who don’t have the money to live,” and another where there is "an upper class that has a living standard higher than Europe."
Via Telesur - "If you have money there is champagne … vodka, Belgian chocolates … lobster, brand-name clothes, exclusive restaurants … nightclubs, beaches … yachts, golf clubs—a whole country within a country where there are no poor, women and children are blond, go to exclusive schools, exclusive universities, and vacation, where Blacks or poor are the waiters … ,” he posted on his Facebook page.
While many would criticize the "rich" and lament over how they don't care at all for the poor, what we are looking at in reality is socialist government corruption in its purest form, as explained by Otxotorena.
In his analysis he stated that the phenomenon stems from corruption in import processes, subsidies by the government, and the existence of buying, re-selling and smuggling of subsidized essential goods by "bachaqueros", linked to Colombian paramilitary groups.
During the great famine of China caused by insane communist party policies, tens of millions starved to death while party members and the ruling elite lived in luxury and abundance. The same was true during the famines of Communist Russia under the terror reign of Joseph Stalin. During Hitler’s rule, when hyper-inflation had people going to the bakery with wheelbarrows full of cash, party members and the wealthy class, again, had access to anything they needed or wanted.
Two other salient points emerge from this story, the first being that basic preparedness for economic collapse and social unrest is a wise move for any modern person, and secondly that the media plays a key part in crafting reality.
I would add a third point to that, which is how so many think this could not happen right here in America, yet government "benefits" being paid out to Americans are unsustainable and much larger in scope than most understand.
Roughly one in five Americans receives government assistance each month, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau.
"Approximately 52.2 million (or 21.3 percent) people in the U.S. participated in major means-tested government assistance programs each month in 2012," said a report issued by the Census Bureau.
Means-tested programs include Medicaid; the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps; Supplemental Security Income (SSI); Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF); and General Assistance (GA).
Participation in the programs has increased significantly over the last decade: in 2004, there were almost 42 million monthly recipients, an increase by 24.9 percent in the intervening years.
The report found that participation rates were highest for Medicaid (15.3 percent) and SNAP (13.4 percent). Participation rates were lowest for housing assistance (4.2 percent), SSI (3.0 percent) and TANF, which includes GA (1 percent).
BOTTOM LINE QUESTION
What happens when America can no longer pay out their benefits and the poor are rioting in the streets as the "elite" thrive? The scenes from Venezuela below show a sample of what the U.S. will look like.
