Of course, war psychosis, LGBTQ propaganda, critical race theory and mass immigration do. But none of these are really American core values. Because the most fundamental American value, according to the principles and intentions of the founding fathers, is meritocracy. The fact that if someone is talented, hardworking, persistent, who has merit, society rewards and values him in some way. From which capitalism also sprang up. And the democracy invented by the ancient Greeks was also institutionalized and perfected there. Which, of course, is also distorted, but the founding fathers can’t do anything about that either.
So we are very often critical of America these days – rightly so.
We take the latter, the complete distortion of democracy, especially from them. We don’t like the Russian or Chinese system in the least, and especially we don’t want to live in either type of system. We want to live in our own, which is clearly similar to the American one. But our expectations of America are also much higher.
And how much better the world is, despite all the distortions and wild drives, where not only the American political mentality, but also American economic methods, and even American companies themselves are prominently present, is an excellent example of the comparison of two Latin American countries. These two countries are: Chile and Venezuela.
Let’s start with the bad example!
All of South America was once, especially after the Second World War, the promised land. We are still before the Marshall Aid, and compared to bombed and destroyed Europe, its future was bright.
Venezuela in particular: the country has the largest oil reserves in the world. According to international industry estimates, they still have 300 billion barrels of oil underground.
(Saudi Arabia is in second place with around 270, Iran is third with 200.) But how did the fate of this country, which is rich in natural resources and also has beautiful, sandy beaches, abundant tropical rivers, dense primeval forests and snowy mountain peaks, turn out to be in the last eighty years?
In 1948, the Acción Democrática (roughly social democratic) party led by writer-turned-president Rómulo Gallegos was overthrown by a military coup led by military officer Marcos Pérez Jiménez, whose right-wing dictatorship lasted until 1958. It was then that the first big rise in oil prices took place, with which Pérez financed significant state investments, achieved great economic growth and an increase in the standard of living.
Another coup came in 1958, this time led by naval officer Wolfgang Larrazábal, and Jiménez fled to Dominica. Although the USA initially viewed Larrazábal as an ally and massive investments came to the country, the industry was outraged when the tax on oil revenues was raised from 46 to 60 percent. After a transitional period, an election was held in November, where Larrazábal, who was friends with Fidel Castro and secretly supported by the Soviet Union, was defeated by his opponent, Rómulo Betancourt, running in the colors of Acción Democrática, who was already president between 1945 and ’48. He is considered the father of Venezuelan democracy. The third candidate, Rafael Caldera, the founder of the largely Christian socialist party COPEI, lost, but was elected president later in 1969.
After the period laden with coups, Venezuela was the most stable democracy in the Latin American region for decades.
Venezuela has become a classic two-party democracy, on the American model. And according to many, that was precisely the problem: it was a corrupt democracy. The elites of the two parties agreed with each other, the huge fortunes from the prosperous oil business remained in a narrow circle, and although a fragile middle class was formed, mainly in the capital, Caracas, and the center of oil extraction, Maracaibo, economic growth almost did not seep into the wider, poorer sections of the population. juice.
According to analysts, the consequence of this was the rise to power of Hugo Chávez, who had already tried once in 1992, but was defeated and Chávez was imprisoned. After two years, however, he was released, founded the Party of the Fifth Republic (later, with the merger of several parties, it became the United Socialist Party of Venezuela), in 1999 he won the election in its colors. And this is where the ruin of the country began…
Chávez nationalized major industries, including, of course, oil. At first, he started various social programs from the high revenues, but the drop in oil prices and the state’s planned economic management soon brought the Venetian economy to the ground. There was a shortage in stores, for which Chávez called the “rich” scapegoats and specifically declared economic war on the well-to-do. The excellent communist thought caused a deeper and deeper crisis, which continues to this day. Since Chávez’s death in 2012, Nicolás Maduro, a former bus driver, has been the president, but since 2000, Chávez’s second victory, the elections have practically only functioned as a farce. However, they managed to build a dictatorial system and an army of Cuban-trained leaders to support it, which practically cemented them in power.
Over the past twenty years or so, the disintegration of the economy and infrastructure, and the continuous deterioration of public conditions, can be seen. The only exception is public safety: while Caracas was for a long time one of the most dangerous cities in the world, by the 2010s it has become even more so than before, but today it has become surprisingly safe. However, this is only a partial result: the reason is that hundreds of thousands of criminals went to America. Where, thanks to the Biden administration’s lenient immigration policy (because border security is a “racist thing”), these criminal gangs spread fentanyl amid applause from liberals, and their members rape and occasionally kill a female student while running.
Today, Venezuela maintains that its state-owned oil refinery on the neighboring island of Curacao had to be sold to the Chinese in order to plug the gaping hole in state revenues.
And even though they have a lot of oil, they have to import the processed products that can actually be used! For this reason, the country with the world’s largest oil reserves has a concrete shortage of gasoline, with huge queues at every gas station that is open.
They always proudly said that South American, especially Venezuelan communism was different! Because it is national, not cosmopolitan. It can be – but it just doesn’t work.
And what happened in the meantime in Chile? Well, the fact is that they got communism earlier – but luckily for them they quickly got over it. Salvador Allende, the first democratically elected, declared Marxist leader in Latin America, came in 1970 during the democratic elections held every six (now four) years in the politically stable system. (And pretty much all over the world.) And as Marxist leaders always do, he quickly set about destroying his country. Nationalizations began, first in copper mining and the banking sector, followed by 150 percent inflation and ideological indoctrination in schools and state administration.
It was lucky that the Christian Democrats remained in the majority in the congress, so Allende could not establish absolute power. But the parliament could not end his rampage anyway, a military coup was needed. Allende committed suicide, and power fell into the hands of Augusto Pinochet, where he remained until 1989.
Pinochet’s judgment is undoubtedly controversial. In the international press, he is clearly portrayed as a fascist villain, but on the anniversary of his death, hundreds of thousands come to commemorate him with “Gracias” signs. The free helicopter rides over the stadiums for the communists were indeed not very elegant (because the passengers always flew out of them), but the Chilean economy was an outstanding performer in the region. A huge amount of American capital arrived in the country, and not only the elite benefited from the wealth, but also a broad middle class was formed.
Free elections were held again in 1989, and not only democracy, but also the Chilean economy has been stable ever since. The country is almost showing first-world features, even if it cannot be confused with Western Europe. (Let’s say Western Europe is becoming more and more like the Middle East, but that’s another story…)
In the majority of Latin American countries, there are also dominant favelas (called ranchos in Venezuela), slums that are usually built on hillsides and consist of structures that can hardly be called houses, and mostly use stolen electricity, but there are far fewer of them than in neighboring countries. The vast majority of the population, however, lives in normal conditions. The capital city, Santiago, or the coastal towns of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar also have quite a good cityscape. With parks, good public transport, full of shops and restaurants, not least local warehouses of American companies.
Chile has a meritocracy. He was killed in Venezuela.
American-style capitalism apparently works in South America too – if they let it. American political and economic methods are still better than anything else.
Based on this, at the same time, taking into account national characteristics, each country can develop its own governmental and economic organization system. But adventurers driven by ideology acting “in the name of the people” should not be allowed to lead countries. This is Latin America’s main lesson for us as well.
Source: magyarnemzet.hu
