More Deadly Than Iraq

When I was in Venezuela back in 1994 you had to be careful, but WOW it has really gotten bad if it is worse than Iraq or Mexico, both of which have been in a state of almost full blown war! In Venezuela the murder rate is 200 per 100,000 that just stunning. In Canada there was 594 murders in 2007 giving our rate at about 1.71 per 100,000 the US is around 10 per 100,000

More on Venezuela murders here.

I guess the Left wing love fest for Chavez is slowly being forgotten.

When nothing speaks volumes

What does a newspaper do when it’s is censored from printing news critical of the government, simple, blank spaces tell their story, something the censors can’t stop unless of course they burn down the newspaper or murder enough people. I can’t blame Chavez for all of Venezuela’s problems, a lot existed prior to him, but he is destroying what little that does work there. Columbia is going to look like a shining example of tolerance and progress compared to the cesspool that Venezuela is quickly becoming. No doubt the Chavez supporters will say we are blinded by US propaganda.

The seeds of a thousand dictators

Simon Bolivar was supposed to have uttered on his death bed; “I fear I have laid the seeds of a thousand dictators” Whether he said it or not, he did help create the conditions in South America for dictators to flourish. Now hopeful “President for Life” Hugo Chavez has decided to dig up Bolivar for what seems the bizarre hope to prove that Columbia poisoned him. No doubt in attempt to divert the Venezuelan people from the mere trifles of life like food shortages, soon to be followed by beer shortages. I predict that when Chavez destroys the only beer making company in Venezuela there will be revolution. I spent some time in there in the 90’s visiting my brother’s mining camp in the jungles and traveling around. Very different than other places in South America . The corruption was so intense you feared the police more than the crooks. Mind you while traveling with a bunch of Venezuelans we met what must have been the only honest cop there, he refused to take a bribe and handed the money back stating he did not take bribes, the locals were stunned, their jaws literal dropped and it’s all they could talk about. That cop created a glimmer of hope in those people that night, I hope he is still able to be honest in these hard times.
I also noticed that the country produced almost nothing except for Oil, Music and Women (stunning and amazingly beautiful women that is.)

More on the politics of digging up bodies here.

Police: Cost of Bribe Nearly Doubles

Picture courtesy of Mac Geek computer blog

Nothing like “market pressures” to influence the cost of doing business. Corruption is a chain that drags the economy down, I saw this in painful detail while visiting Venezuela. It is amazing how it can stifle life and small business. Be thankful we live in a country where corruption is not the norm, unlike Russia

The average bribe has nearly doubled from 23,000 rubles ($760) last year to 40,000 rubles ($1,320) in the first six months of 2010, the Interior Ministry said Tuesday.

Bribes have become more expensive because those engaged in the widespread practice are rejecting small bribes as too risky amid a Kremlin-led fight against corruption, the ministry said.


"The authorities are fighting corruption, and bribery has become more dangerous," said Albert Istomin, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry's department for fighting economic crimes, which released the new bribe figures.

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