Another blatant smear for the benefit of the author's corporate paymaster!
I will grant you that it looks like blah blah capitalist ideology versus blah blah socialist ideology with your usual helping of US backyard imperialism and Latin American defiance thrown into the mix.
I support wealth distribution in Venezuela. I feel for the people of Venezuela. At the same time I am forced to recognise that the ideals of the regime in Caracas are not translating into a robust economy even though I wish they were.
If the level and rate of increase of inflation is as bad as it is being claimed then I really feel for the average person in Venezuela. I have never lived through times of rampant inflation and I hope I never will.
I am not an economist but as far as I can tell the only way to generate inflation is buy cranking the printing presses. And I guess that is what is happening in Venezuela. Unless there is some kind of hidden outside pressure that would force the Central Bank to do this? Is that even possible? I thought it might be the case with Zimbabwe, an act of covert economic warfare by the West, but I know of no mechanism.
What about prior to 1999? The people running Venezuela had many decades and centuries to create a "robust economy" in Venezuela. I wasn't seeing constant US headlines about how Venezuelan leaders were mismanaging the economy in those times.
Venezuela is being hurt by the same thing hurting every oil producing state - low oil prices.
Those in Venezuela who wanted to create a "robust economy" had decades to do so. As soon as power falls from their hands, everything becomes a crisis, they suddenly notice Venezuela lacks a "robust economy".
The PSUV has been continually reelected since 1999, they must be doing something right, the people of Venezuela keep putting them into power.
Remembering the New York Times editorial page celebrating the coup d'etat against Chavez's elected government, by the head of the Venezuelan business council, who, surrounded by the heads of the military, abolished the parliament, I'm slightly skeptical of the concern of the owners of US media outlets for the economic well-being of the average Venezuelan.
Venezuela is being hurt by the same thing hurting every oil producing state - low oil prices.
Those in Venezuela who wanted to create a "robust economy" had decades to do so. As soon as power falls from their hands, everything becomes a crisis, they suddenly notice Venezuela lacks a "robust economy".
So it's okay for the economy to be mismanaged now, because it was mismanaged before 1999, as long as the people doing the mismanagement are different? We shouldn't criticize the current leadership and wish for something new because the previous one was also bad?
The people running Venezuela now have had over a decade in power with the highest oil windfall in its history, you'd expect things to be better or at least the same as before 1999, not far far worse, as they are now.
The PSUV has been continually reelected since 1999, they must be doing something right, the people of Venezuela keep putting them into power.
They must be doing something right to keep getting elected, which is not the same as doing something right to improve social conditions and the lives of Venezuelans for today and in the future.
Remembering the New York Times editorial page celebrating the coup d'etat against Chavez's elected government, by the head of the Venezuelan business council, who, surrounded by the heads of the military, abolished the parliament, I'm slightly skeptical of the concern of the owners of US media outlets for the economic well-being of the average Venezuelan.
The fact that US media outlets are not concerned about the well-being of the average Venezuelan does not mean that the rampant crime, sky-high murder rate, shortages, inflation, lack of disaster prevention in poor areas prone to flooding, government-promoted homophobia, government control of the media, gross environmental mismanagement, use of state funds to promote the ruling party, pervasive corruption, lack of medicines and medical supplies, etc. don't exist.
Really wasn't sure if you were talking about Venezuela or the U.S. for a moment there.
Please tell me it's Yankee Imperialism. It's always our fault.
> Every time I wrote that Chavez was in fact direly mismanaging the economy, diverting investment funds that were needed to maintain oil output into social spending, I knew that I could look forward to receiving angry e-mails and comments accusing me of trying to sabotage his achievements for the benefit of my corporatist paymaster. And in fairness (though without minimizing his appalling authoritarianism), those policies undoubtedly did improve the lives of some incredibly poor people.
The problem here is that there's nothing to enlighten anyone not already in the know about who this "paymaster" is. As near as I can tell this is some libertarian journalist publishing an "I told you so" article ("This was predictable. Indeed, many people predicted it, including me [...]").
I assumed that the respondents were saying there was some big, obvious conflict of interest, like a stake in the money made off of their oil. However, Google could not enlighten me as to what that might be and her bio on Wikipedia only lists her working for media outlets, so I'm left in the dark here. I probably wouldn't ever read Bloomberg if it had not appeared on HN.
Someone made a comment just like those emails.
Pretty simple.
It's already a reference, no reason to assume it's a deeper reference.
Sorry about this, guys. I messed up.
I've read Megan McArdle off-and-on for years. I am familiar with her writing. So when I read the part that said "angry e-mails ... my corporatist paymaster", I thought "well, of course you will get those". And that was the end of it. My brain was thinking of the messed up situation in Venezuela, and probably just set aside the "paymaster" remarks.
And then Ted remarked on exactly those words. My brain wasn't thinking of Megan's lament, it was thinking about Venezuela. That's why Ted's comment seemed out of the blue for me.
In retrospect I should have re-read the article to see if I missed anything before I replied to Ted.
Once again, sorry.