Maduro’s Socialist Regime Destroyed Venezuela - Daniel Di Martino

0:01 I came from Venezuela years ago and when I came here, I came here in large part seeking freedom, right? Because Venezuela had been destroyed from a democracy, from a wealthy nation to a really poor and and totalitarian state. Its peak point economically was the 1950s and early 60s. That's when my grandparents also immigrated to Venezuela in 1956. And back then it was the fourth richest country in terms of GDP per capita, that is production, income per person on average. Um, you know, you can find data on how wages in Venezuela were relatively similar to wages for workers in the US. That's why people immigrated to Venezuela, right?

0:38 And that was really squandered beginning in the 70s when the democratically elected governments began nationalizing the oil industry. Uh, the government kept growing. You know, it was this populist fight between the two main political parties over who was going to give away more welfare to people from the oil money. >> Let's stop for a second and just hone in on that moment. So, um, you've got this wealthy, successful society. That's a big transformation to have the government start taking over industries.

1:09 And I know that that was something that was h that wasn't hap happening in isolation in Venezuela. But why do you understand that even happened? Because if you've got a good thing going, why would you rock the boat and make such profound changes in your society? >> Well, for a very simple reason. The biggest industry in Venezuela is the oil industry. Remember, Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the country, in the world. Um, and that means that the government was feeling like, you know, the tax revenue from what the oil companies were producing was not enough.

1:39 Why can't we just take over the whole profits of oil companies and use it to distribute things for the poor? Right? That's great in the short run, but what ends up happening is the government takes it. They use the profits to give away as welfare, also for a lot of corruption, of course. But why would you invest in maintenance or capital uh expenditures when you can just give more money to the poor? And so eventually oil production it starts falling and falling during the democratic period. Um what ends up happening is by the 90s Venezuela is in a deep crisis. Uh there's more inflation. Uh banks are going bust. Um and the government walks back those things. There's an oil opening. Private investment is allowed again. the regulation, >> but I think it was too late by then.

2:27 Venezuela's GDP per capita had stagnated for 20 years, and it was still the richest country in Latin America. That's how far ahead we were. Uh, Colombians were still immigrating to Venezuela by the millions. And Chavis gets elected in 1998, uh, a month before I was born, actually. And that's when he just goes full socialism. We're not just going to take over the oil industry like we had it before. We're going to take cement, banks, uh, grocery stores. We're going to take land from the farmers. We're going to take uh even stores in the streets. Everything you can imagine. One of my best friends, his grandma had a bookstore in downtown Karacas. Chavez was walking on the street, pointed at the bookstore, and took it from her like that.

3:07 >> So, just a I mean, it just sounds like just straight up thugy. Just like, oh, I like that. I'm taking it. >> That's exactly a pirate. Like a pirate man. generals of the Venezuelan army would walk into Coca-Cola facilities and drink their coke and and laugh about the what they were stealing. Exactly like that. >> Um, [sighs and gasps] so what was the what was the justification being given for this by uh Yugos Chavez? I understand. Is it um there's there is it Bolivar? There's there's some references to big figures in South American history. You know what what was he relying on to stir people up to support such this kind of idea?

3:53 >> Yeah, it was really class warfare. Uh it was the rich are rich because the poor are poor and uh we need to take the money from the people who are stealing from you and we're going to give power to the workers again. And so when he was taking over private companies, he was really saying we're going to give it to the workers. uh what ends up happening is that the government controls it. But the workers actually organized within those companies to try to organize production and obviously didn't work uh because the workers didn't have the knowledge that the uh you know owners did and and eventually all the companies that the government took went bankrupt.

4:29 Uh farms stopped producing the ones that they took. There were big signs on the road that said made in socialism on the street. Big hearts made in socialism. Chavis put his signature on buildings uh the public housing uh because it didn't it wasn't just about taking over companies. It was about massive welfare right free college of course free healthcare like most really developed countries even have like tax financed but this time with the oil money. Uh we're also going to um give you free electricity, free water services, free food. We're going to give you free gasoline. You know we we're the world's largest uh oil reserve. So, why can't we just give free gasoline to to everyone pumping gas in their car? Uh, we're going to give free gas in your utilities for for heating, free homes, right? Free cars uh that we bring from China and um eventually the money runs out even in the country. Think about this. If socialism couldn't work in the country where money literally grows from the ground in oil, how is it going to work anywhere else? The thing is that Chavez came and he killed the the goose that laid the the golden eggs, right? Uh which was the oil industry. I'll tell you, I remember every single uh actor, college professor, an American elite who went to Venezuela to whitewash Hugo Chavez. And I think every Venezuelan remembers and we will not forget. I can assure you that people will be held accountable because a lot of these people were bribed. Uh, a lot of these people got money to support Chavez. I mean, Chavez, you know, he had a lot of money to to do these things. That's part of what he used the oil money to buy goodwill around the world, buy votes at the United Nations, at the Organization of American States, uh, buy spies from Cuba that he sent free oil to, um, politicians and lobbyists in America, too. Um, and so, you know, there's people convicted. There's an American professor in the University of Miami who was taken by the FBI not a few years ago because he was receiving money from the Venezuelan government. This is a dictatorship, right, that you're supporting.

6:36 >> Chavez gives way to Maduro. What has happened? So, walk us up to the present. So, you have Chavez who comes in with this populist socialist redistribution thing. There's still some wealth to be extracted from the society, but then Maduro follows. And how did that change the character or what's being done to the country? >> Well, it only changed really who was in charge. It changed from being an autocratic regime in the sense that there's only one person in charge. That was Hugo Chavez. Now it's a really an oligarchy of several people in charge.

7:11 It's Cavejo. It's Jorge Rodriguez and his sister Deli Rodriguez. They're the two Rodriguez siblings who, by the way, are the children of a convicted killer in Venezuela from the 90s. Um, they've always been resentful uh about this. Um, uh, it's several people and and these are people that became a drug cartel later on. Chavez was involved from the start. But I think a lot of people make the mistake of saying that after Chavez passed, Maduro is the one who destroyed Venezuela because Chavez happened to pass in the moment right around when the economy was fully collapsing. And that was just a coincidence. Uh it was not that there was a change of policies.

7:53 Chavis is the one who imposed price controls. Chavis is the one who took over private companies. Chavis is the one who printed money from the central bank to pay for spending and and ignited inflation. Maduro didn't change a thing. Um I I remember the moment Chavez died, I was in school and we get the news that he dies and school is immediately dismissed. All the parents come pick up their kids because you don't know what's going to happen. We were pretty happy.

8:17 >> Uh I was pretty happy. >> Um yes, because he died, but really because we hoped that the moment would be a change for the country, right? When many other dictators have died, regimes have changed. Unfortunately, that's not what happened. Uh I think also a lot of people underestimated Maduro. Maduro came into power sounding like a really ignorant stupid man, right? Who confused words, uh who made many mistakes that that seemed like he was really, you know, one of the stupidest people in the country.

8:52 Everybody mocked that he was a bus driver. Uh like it was jokes all about him. over 10 years in power, more years in power than Chavez himself at the start before his death, cheating in the elections, control over everything in the country. So I think we underestimated him and perhaps it was all for show really. One of the um stories that our kids are being told, especially your classmates in Colombia, [laughter] Columbia University, is that the real problem is colonialism and imperialism. That the reason why Venezuela got poor from being rich isn't socialism or Ugo Chavez. It's because of US sanctions and the US basically not allowing any of its trading partners to do business with Venezuela and that colonialism and the like shadow of Spanish rule. This has left these deep scars not just in Venezuela but in South America more broadly. And so really it's western European Anglo capitalist elite power that is the oppressive force and that's who we should be blaming for what's gone wrong.

10:14 How do you respond to that? And do you think that's a fair characterization of the critic? >> Oh that's absolutely a fair characterization. I mean Chavez even blamed our blackouts on Iguana sitting cables and Marco Rubio hacking our electric system from Miami. Uh that's, you know, we all laughed about that. Um you know, >> he's got those small hands, so he [laughter] he can really get in there and wire it, >> you know. Yeah. They'll blame sanctions.

10:38 They'll blame colonialism. It's a myth by the far left who wants to blame everything that happens in Venezuelan external reasons. You know what is a US- ccentric, you know, imperialist view? To think that everything that happens around the world has something to do with America. >> Yeah, that's the truth. People around the world have agency too and they make mistakes and they are bad and they're good people too. >> One of the things that's always been so strange about that mindset is that Marxism is a German and French philosophy. It is an export philosophy of Western European elites. It is not an inherent South American or global southern philosophy.

11:23 It's something that was maybe the most ideologically imperialist force in all of human history exporting communism. I mean, how do you understand the role of the Soviet Union influencing the ideology um explicitly in South America? >> Well, they did it when they took over Cuba, right? Uh after they took over Cuba, Cuba was the one in charge of exporting it to the rest of Latin America. Um, most Americans don't know that Cuba actually tried to militarily invade Venezuela in the 1960s. Uh, it was the Makuto incident. Um, it's one of the main reasons Cuba was expelled from many international organizations. It was not because of the CIA or America. It was because of Venezuela.

12:07 >> Um, and and Venezuela had always been on the forefront of the fight against the communism before it became itself as an aligned nation with with Cuba. And for Cuba, it was very important to take over Venezuela in the 1990s when they did with Chavez because the Soviet Union had fo had fallen and they were under what was called the special period, right? They were starving because they had no more subsidies from the Soviets. When Chavis gets elected, the special period ends in Cuba.

12:36 >> So we describe what this means, a special period. What does that mean? 1991, the Soviet Union falls, and Russia doesn't send any more subsidies to nations like Cuba around the world, and a substantial portion of the revenues from the of the Cuban government that they used to maintain their their regime were from Russia's Russian subsidies. When those subsidies end, there's a new immigration wave to the US in the 90s as mini Mariel, I think it's called, after the Marlift. Um, what happens is people begin starving to death in Cuba. Uh, and more people leave and and there's no medicine, everything. And Fidel sees that opportunity to take over Venezuela with Chavez, finances his campaign, supports him. Chavez goes to Cuba many times before being elected. And when he takes power, Venezuela starts sending full oil tankers at no cost to Cuba that then Cuba resells on the international market. And that's how Cuba has been maintaining its island since 1999.

13:40 >> The thing that is so strange to me about so many elements of that is is the Soviet Union was basically a petrol state just that's basically >> they replace one petrol state for another >> and then you have Venezuela is a petrol state. So you have a global left who claims to be about justice. And now the latest version of this is the climate. We need to have global communism so that we can control industrial production in the name of climate change. But the entire ideology globally seems to have been subsidized by pumping oil out of the ground to fund dictators. Is that is that >> that's very funny, >> right? I mean, am I am I missing something here?

14:23 >> No, no, no. It's absolutely true. Um, but you know, interestingly, that's it's become much harder for Venezuela now because the socialists are not good at managing anything, right? and that included the oil company and now Venezuela is not producing very much oil at all. And so the way these regimes are now financed is actually through through drug trafficking. Uh the Venezuelan regime is led all the leaders are part of what's called the cartel of the sons.

14:47 Uh they uh make the drugs cocaine mainly in Colombia but also in Venezuela and they use Venezuelan airplanes to fly it on on boats to fly it all over Central America, the Caribbean. It gets to Mexico and then from Mexico comes to the United States. uh the nephews of Maduro himself were arrested by the DEA in Haiti several years ago I think in 2015 and they were imprisoned in New York where we are and uh Joe Biden released them back to Venezuela. We had the two nephews of the dictator who were themselves trafficking like a ton of cocaine to the US. I um remember a few years back seeing that one of um Fidel Castro's I think nephews was taking selfies on yachts.

15:31 >> Oh yeah. >> Um that's the other piece of the puzzle that seems to be pretty common which is these uh like how much was Yugos Chavez worth at the time of his death? >> Probably billions of dollars. And it's funny because there are videos of Chavis saying being rich is bad with a Rolex on his wrist. It's as if they're mocking you with what they're saying. But in every socialist dictatorship, the dictator has become a rich man, right?

16:01 And you know, but people will tell you, you know, imagine, let's try to steal my argument. They will tell you that, well, it's because they did it wrong. If I was the socialist dictator, I would be a good dictator. would be a benevolent dictator as we say in economics when you have a benevolent central planner. Uh the reality is that even if you were even if you were a benevolent dictator and assuming that you will always have a benevolent dictator which obviously you can't guarantee this system still doesn't work because you don't have all the information to manage the economy that people individually do. If you manage where people go to school, where people eat, what they buy from the from the store, what people produce, you don't know people's preferences. That's why the Soviet Union always had these uh problems where they had too much of one thing, too little of another. Um >> persistent shortages.

16:53 >> Yes. So So these kinds of things, right? They they don't think that because they are they're not profit maximizing. So, what are some of the most shocking things that an American high school student would find would would learn if they could be taken safely to Venezuela and spend spend a week living there like like an average Venezuelan citizen? >> Uh, it would be the utilities probably. That would be one of the first and most shocking things, right? No electricity at random times. uh sometimes for a very long time, no water. Um, another big thing would be that everything is so expensive and people really make very little money. What an average person makes a month in Venezuela now is about $100. So, how are you going to feed yourself? And that's assuming you have a house, right? If you don't have a house, you're likely going to be on the street or you're likely going to have to collect trash or or steal or or eat really from the garbage to to survive, which is what many Venezuelans are.

17:57 >> One of the things um what's the current state of malnutrition? Because one of the numbers I've seen is that and it's like it's hard to argue with this. This is like the most basic human thriving question is that um people have shrunk. They they're they're they're starving. So what what's that? What what how do you understand what's happening to like basic like calories available for Venezuelan people? >> You know how Venezuelans call that the the thinning of the population? The Majura diet.

18:31 >> And it's funny because Majora has only gotten fatter. >> Um >> it's like a visual. There was even a time when he was on national TV where he didn't know that the camera turned on and he was literally getting an empanada out of his desk and eating it on TV. >> You know, these are the kinds of incident these are the kinds of incidents that that happened in our TV. It really kept us entertained at least.

18:52 Uh he could also show up on on your TV whenever he wanted. By the way, uh that that was part of the telecommunications law. Uh, >> wait, wait. So, you're in your living room with periodic power and could he turn the TVs on? >> No. No. No. We're not that that technologically advanced, but yeah, if you were watching something, he would appear in your TV. >> Eating eating an empanada. >> Yeah. Great. >> And sometimes, one time at least that I remember, there was a blackout in the middle of the of the TV uh streaming in the place where he was streaming from, not in our house. So the the streaming suddenly ended and he was so mad about that you know because they couldn't even keep the lights on for themselves. But you know you you me asked about malnutrition.

19:38 So yes they call it the majuro diet and uh I can tell you my aunt was a preschool teacher in Venezuela until she left and she would have kids that would faint in class in the middle of class because they hadn't had dinner or breakfast. They only ate once a day and she would try to bring as much food as she could to help some of the kids. It was extremely sad >> for the student and for the parent frankly who who hears what's happened and says, "Okay, fair enough.

20:12 Socialism, communism, this sort of state control in the name of equality hasn't worked out in practice, but it's great in theory. What's your response to that? >> Well, it's not great in theory. Uh, I think a lot of even conservatives and, you know, classical liberals make that mistake of saying, "Oh, it's great in theory, but not in practice." No, it's not great in theory. >> Why? >> We are not all equal uh in result. Like, I don't want us all to be equal. I don't want the government to decide where I'm going to work, where I'm going to study.

20:46 Uh I don't think that the government even in an ideal state works better than we do in the practical way. Um I I don't think that um you know people should be equalized. Uh like you Chavez and and Maduro and his ministers used to say that people should make the same amount of money regardless of their work. Uh I I don't think that that's okay. But that's what really essentially socialism is is to to eat according to his need uh and and his ability. And I don't think that's the case. I don't think that if you work harder, you should be rewarded the same as somebody who works less hard than you. Does that mean that some people are naturally better at some things? Yes. I'm not a good singer and I am not a, you know, big athlete that runs and be will be an Olympic medalist, right? We're all naturally different and the government can't fix that. Some people are born without parents. Some people are born uh with physical defects. Some people are born incredibly smart in one thing and incredibly dumb in another. Uh and that's just the cards that were dealt. And there is no way the government can fix that because first the government can't observe it and second it might actually make it worse in practice. So, I'm of the philosophy where I want everybody to be as prosperous as possible. And the question is how to get there. And I tend to always lie on the on the on the solutions that are actually people are better getting there with the government getting out of their way. And there's a lot of barriers that the governments imposed that just makes people poorer.

22:18 And that's the case in Venezuela, but it's also the case in the United States. And when people say socialism could work here in theory, where do we have socialism in the US? We have government healthcare for the veterans and we have government mail, USPS. These are the worst places that people have. How is USPS relative to FedEx? How is the VA healthcare relative to privately run hospitals? I think, you know, the results show for themselves in a country that you don't say politicians here are drug dealers like in Venezuela, right?

22:49 It's not like they have bad intentions. You could say, "Oh, you know, who knows?" But they're certainly not like Venezuela. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> So, fair enough. Why is it still worse? >> Fain praise. >> Yeah, I don't know. Maybe you know something. I don't know. [laughter] >> If you like this clip, you should check out the full video and all the other great content we've got at Dad Saves America. So, be sure to hit the like button, subscribe, and ring that bell so you won't miss our new stuff as it drops each week.