Socialism in Action. Sorry about the whole water and lights thing…
Venezuela’s President Chavez has been so busy redistributing the wealth and “appropriating the assets of large companies” in his effort to create a socialist utopia with himself benevolent leader for life (the same leader the Left leaning portions of the developed western world gave a standing ovation in Copenhagen) that he seems to have forgotten to meet the basic needs of his people. Water rationing was already in effect when on the first day of the year President Chavez has instituted rationing of electricity as well.
For some reason Mr Chavez forgot to pay the water and light bills in the form of enhancing the infrastructure, storage and capacity of the system as the demand rose in his country. There is some sort of common misunderstanding as to the cause of the recent water issues and the hydro-generation capacity in country, with Chevez getting to blame the world boogeyman of Climate Change for his recent difficulties as the story is that drought is the culprit. Well lets take a look at that claim and the time frames involved and see if we can possibly see where things went awry.
Drought is not new to this South American country, with the current drought conditions were experienced in 1947, long before climate change could possible be a factor. The country has seasonal rainfall and should have been prepared for the re-occurrence of such a condition, it is not a new and undocumented issue. There has been no appreciable investment in either system to meet the needs of the population even though the country is awash in oil wealth which is used to provide every manner of social program known to the left.
If Chavez, who has been the leader for the last 11 years, had simply thought ahead (a serious problem for lefty leaders who can only react not plan*) he would have diverted some of the billions of dollars he has poured into housing and other noble socialist policies into improving his countries infrastructure which is a favorite place to scrimp in lefty governments. A simple look at the state of infrastructure in the old Soviet Union era tells the tale, where everyone is made to suffer the same in true social justice fashion, except for the leaders.
The real problem is no contractors are willing to provide the technologies or expertise to the country because of the socialist policy of “appropriating” anything that President Chavez deems to be in the nation’s interest, and fears of not being paid as the socialist system bleeds the economy by forcing out any commercial interests. We will see how long his popularity lasts and when he will have to return to his military coup roots to maintain power as the socialists he leads get fed up with no water or power.
The real take away is this; the power rationing and water rationing has already taken root here in North America as the lefty agenda moves ahead, with all the money being spent on social programs and heavy regulation of the utility sector combined with the pushing of SmartGrid and other technologies to assist in forced rationing instead of finding sources of limitless energy we could be heading down the same road.
* Chavez plans to use Cloud Seeding Technology to Solve Water Crisis. Does that sound like reacting or planning?
Sources:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.227e6a4e11ba39c08630e5729d693330.9e1&show_article=1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Chavez
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/12/17/in_copenhagen_a_standing_ovation_for_chavez_226420.html
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