Chavez and Dems agree: If you're poor, blame the rich

Venezuela under Chavez offers a textbook case of how a charismatic thug can cruise to power by demonizing "the rich" and promising the poor all sorts of "free" treats--mainly subsidized food and gasoline. The poor dutifully vote him into power--and he decides to stay there.

Like most socialist thugs, Chavez claims that all the problems experienced by the poor are caused by the rich. As far as I know the exact mechanism has never been explained, but the broad theory goes something like this: That man over there has a LOT more than you do. That's just not fair. So I propose to take some of what he has and give it to you.

That's about all the argument it takes to get most poor people to sign up with your cause.

So...how well does Chavez's socialist paradise work? Well, despite being a huge exporter of oil, the country is barely solvent. More significant to the average citizen, last year the country had 14,000 acknowledged murders--in a country of 27 million people.

That's the 4th highest murder rate in the world, and about seven and a half times higher than the U.S. And this figure doesn't include around 4000 mysterious deaths that were never officially ruled as murder.

Gee, wonder why all those peaceful socialists are killing each other at such a staggering rate?

But not to worry: I hear the NY Times is investigating the connection between dictatorships and murder rate, and will publish a front-page story--just as soon as a Republican wins the presidency.