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Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay account for 76% of world exports of soybean meal and 68% of exports of soybean oil. But as with other natural resources, the source of these riches—the technological advances contained in the seeds—remains out of reach.
Venezuela isn’t a cheesy soft-porn novel. The international community has to realize there are no shades of gray in Venezuela anymore. For all its flaws, one side is democratic; the other is just plain autocratic.
Yes, I get the comparison in terms of their rhetorical styles. But the caricature of Chávez as just an uncouth blowhard is downright insulting to Venezuelans who now live with his toxic legacy.
So this is what the Pendejo Sin Frontera defense of the revolution has come to: sure, things in Venezuela are bad, but it’s not cataclysmic. That’s what passes for regime propaganda abroad these days.
For a moment, it looked like Venezuela’s beleaguered opposition had a powerful new ally in Buenos Aires. But it didn’t take long for principles to give way to big politics.
The international community is trying to encourage the Venezuelan government and the opposition to sit down to a dialogue. But democratic dialogue requires commitment to principles, and the government has never shown—nor is showing now—any willingness to commit to those values.
The new majority in the National Assembly has failed in offering economic alternatives and in confronting Venezuela’s political crisis. Despite being a lousy opposition, though, they are still important.
Venezuela is, once again, in the throes of a full-blown electricity crisis. Citizens complain of unannounced blackouts are shutting down factories, forcing shopping malls to close early, and otherwise wreaking havoc on an already-sputtering economy.
Venezuela will have to default. The only question is when.
For the first time in the 17 years since the late Hugo Chávez swept into power, the opposition has firm control of one of the branches of government. This proved too much for the chavista legislators to handle, and their walkout foreshadows the tensions ahead.