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In Venezuela First They Came For The Toilet Paper; Then They Came For The News Paper...

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Bidet sales across Venezuela are set to soar as just months after running out of toilet paper, AP reports that Venezuela's oldest newspaper is shutting down due to falling advertising, mounting inflation and a lack of basic materials. In addition, at least nine Venezuelan regional newspapers have stopped circulation because of the shortages. Of course, this is likely great news for President Maduro who can now manage his people's minds direct from his Twitter feed... welcome to socialist utopia.

As AP reports,

Venezuela's oldest newspaper is shutting down because of a lack of newsprint and a difficult economic climate as the country grapples with chronic shortages.

 

El Impulso announced Wednesday that it will stop circulation because of falling advertising, mounting inflation and a lack of basic materials. The daily has reported on the western city of Barquisimeto for 110 years.

 

Venezuelan newspapers have long been beset by currency controls that make it difficult to import supplies. In recent months, large newspapers have reduced pages, while smaller publications have closed down.

 

At least nine Venezuelan regional newspapers have stopped circulation because of the shortages, according to journalism watchdog Public Space.

 

Meanwhile, the share of independent media has fallen, with opaque or government-friendly buyers taking over outlets and softening their editorial line.

*  *  *
We suspect the last resort will be to use the Bolivar notes for basic cleanliness...

Artist's conception of what the country's TP (single-ply) may soon
look like: all it would take are a few more sequential devaluations.

 

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Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:33 | 5209354 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

No doubt some still have money to buy bidets.  As usual, the currency crisis will hit some harder than others.  But the reason for this crisis, per ZH/Drudge, is socialism.  Clearly the IMF and globalist oil companies and other oligarchs were trying to help the poor.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:45 | 5209403 El Oregonian
El Oregonian's picture

They'll really be up the crapper if they brought in the U.S. Dollar paper...

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:48 | 5209409 So Close
So Close's picture

They will need more zeros.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:09 | 5209447 Richard Chesler
Richard Chesler's picture

Just wait until 1 Obozobuck = $1,000

Ugliest homosexual face you'll ever see on a bill by the way.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:47 | 5209540 7.62x54r
7.62x54r's picture

The problem with using busted fiat is that the cheap ink will color your ass.

Zimbabwe finally gave up when they figured out that they were lowering the value of the paper they bought by printing on it. Their mint could get more for it simply by trading the uncut sheets for stuff.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:35 | 5209377 Slave
Slave's picture

You're trying to leave, but just can't stay away.

Am I right?

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:40 | 5209391 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

Every now and then when I see an article like this where the Tylers don't even try to explain the broader issues and instead throw red meat for click bait, I can't help myself.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:37 | 5209379 Tortfeasor
Tortfeasor's picture

Glad I was able to give you the first of many down arrows on this comment. 

This is how socialism always ends. Not with a hang, but with shit stains in your shorts.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:48 | 5209388 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

"As an EHM (Economic Hit Man), Perkins’s job was to convince Third World countries to accept enormous loans for infrastructure development—loans that were much larger than needed—and to guarantee that the development projects were contracted to U.S. corporations like Halliburton and Bechtel.

Once these countries were saddled with huge debts, the U.S. government and the international aid agencies allied with it were able to control these economies and to ensure that oil and other resources were channeled to serve the interests of building a global empire."  http://allisonkilkenny.com/2012/01/former-economic-hitman-john-perkins/

Perhaps this is how socialism always ends.  Certainly it is also how oligarchic/banking empires always end.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 04:02 | 5209803 Central Bankster
Central Bankster's picture

Socialism/fascism = crony capitalism

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 07:11 | 5209904 Dungholio
Dungholio's picture

I wasn't sure whether or not to down arrow this comment but I decided to down arrow it because you appear to be an asshole.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 17:57 | 5212361 sun tzu
sun tzu's picture

Collapse of the USSR was the bankers fault too!

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:49 | 5209542 7.62x54r
7.62x54r's picture

A friend was stationed in Croatia during Clinton's war there ... they had to watch the damned latrines to prevent the Croats from stealing all their buttwipe.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:40 | 5209390 joego1
joego1's picture

" Clearly the IMF and globalist oil companies and other oligarchs were trying to help the poor."

These guys represent capitalisim?

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:42 | 5209395 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

The kind that exists in the real world, yes.  For your version, there's a certain dead author who wrote fiction novels that some people here seem to like.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:08 | 5209583 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

Oh.

KISSINGER'S DEAD? I hadn't heard...

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 06:22 | 5209872 Calmyourself
Calmyourself's picture

You bet Rand, if only the right people were implementing the system it would work. 

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 11:51 | 5210842 RSloane
RSloane's picture

Maduro Reassures Venezuelans: "I'm A Socialist And I Know What I Am Doing"

 

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-01-18/maduro-reassures-venezuelans-im-socialist-and-i-know-what-i-am-doing

 

Venezuelans might be getting ass-rot but at least they have Maduro working for them! Hurrah!

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 17:58 | 5212366 sun tzu
sun tzu's picture

It's Drudge's fault they ran out of toilet paper. It couldn't be because the government took over the market and set prices so low that retailers were losing money by selling basic necessities and could no longer afford to sell them.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:31 | 5209358 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

VBS: Venezuelan Bidet Scrip

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:50 | 5209549 7.62x54r
7.62x54r's picture

That will leave purple and pink stains on your ass.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:11 | 5209593 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

I can't see so well anymore.

I get confused when trying to make sense of abbreviations.

Did this poster mean VBS, or UBS? THREE-LETTER AGENCIES; whatever...

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:33 | 5209370 himaroid
himaroid's picture

J Buffet, I not so sure that come monday it'll be alright, but it feelis good bliev'n it.

such a young jimmy b.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0---Q97pG4

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:22 | 5209605 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

Jimmy Buffet was a radical partier and stoner.

They (WE) used to call him 'a stoner with a boner'.

WHEN he was 'popular', I preferred the likes of Gordon Lightfoot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgI8bta-7aw

Gordon speaks of a true event, and Jimmy makes shit up.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 22:39 | 5209380 NoDebt
NoDebt's picture

I worked at Xerox in the mid-late 90s.  There were accounting "irregularities" cropping up.  First it was Asia, then South America.  Management was "shocked" that such malfeasance was going on in their subsidiaries.  Swore it wasn't happening elsewhere.  Then Central America.  Then Mexico.  Still, they were denying any knowlege or involvement.  Finally, the US was shown to be doing EXACTLY the same thing.

A few heads rolled (they aren't bankers after all) and then the company collapsed.  Didn't go out of business, but it was clear they were done.  The days of $60/share Xerox stock where LONG gone, cratering to about $4 before modestly recovering.  No sustained improvement since then.

The creeping "yeah, but it's not happening here" theme is ALWAYS bullshit.  If it's happening at the periphery, it's happening twice as bad at the core.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:32 | 5209501 Kirk2NCC1701
Kirk2NCC1701's picture

First they came for the TP (Toilet Paper)?  No problem.  Still got Newspaper to use in its place (works well, is cheaper).

Then they came for the Newspaper?  Oh SHIT!

What's next... Agent Orange, to take away leaves?

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:51 | 5209551 7.62x54r
7.62x54r's picture

You'll use your hand and this bucket of water, and like it!

Unless we sell that bucket.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:05 | 5209577 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

AIRCRAP.ORG.

Newspaper leaves ink stains on Uranus.

 

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:48 | 5209523 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

FOR THE RECORD:

My grandfather was stationed in Panama as an officer in the USMC during the time when Smedley Butler penned the book 'War Is A Racket'. After he repatriated (before the WWII thing), my father; then a young boy, had to re-learn English before he could excel in the 'States schools'. Grandpa went on to Quantico Flight Training School as a higher officer, training USMC pilots during the War (Dad used to describe the times when he used to go to the beach and watch the German U-boats torpedoing our ships right off the coast, during what the Kriegsmarine used to call the 'Happy Times'). His younger brother (my uncle) became a 'consciensious objector' ('draft-dodger') and went to Canada during the Vietnam thing.

The operations within the Fed-run CONUS that expanded our 'global influence' during the 1930's included Argentina, Venezuela, and Panama and Uruguay. Chile fell in to line fairly easily, back then, but we didn't really want the scum-dropping inhabitants in Mexico. SERIOUSLY.

MADURO is a PUSSY. (Well, so's Obama,  but who's counting?) He'll give and give and give until the illuminated bankers decide that he's prime for the taking; and THEN they'll REALLY fuck him. WATCH...

I remember 'Xerox'. They made their moves in the ability and technology regarding 'FAXES' ('facsimilies'). For a while, the 'plebe-speak' used to call copies of documents 'Xeroxes'; or 'Xerox copies'. That was back when 'Commodore' came out with their first 'internet' computers for the masses, and they relied upon audible signals to connect. You had to put the phone reciever in to a 'modem' device after the 'squeal' started. They bragged about the 'next-generation' ability of 64 KILOBITS...

MY first computer was an '8088'. It doesn't matter that I decried these machines after being recruited to write BASIC so that me and my friends could play Chess. I grew to hate this stuff, and withdrew early on.

There's nothing like awaiting a teletype...

 

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:51 | 5209550 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

SHIT!

I posted this less than 5 minutes ago, and see a 'downarrow' appear as I edit spelling!

I up-arrowed 'just because'.

WHO could get this and see and read in 'real-time' and then 'downarrow' my comment SO FUCKING FAST?

(scratching chin, and wondering...)

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:53 | 5209555 7.62x54r
7.62x54r's picture

If you don't get at least one down arrow, you aren't doing it right.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:58 | 5209563 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

Commandment #13:

THOU shalt NOT piss off the POPE.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 01:25 | 5209683 HardlyZero
HardlyZero's picture

Q uerious human.

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:54 | 5209557 MontgomeryScott
MontgomeryScott's picture

If: Every time I post, I get a 'reddie', how many 'reddies' does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie-pop? THE WORLD MAY NEVER KNOW.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 11:09 | 5210629 Kirk2NCC1701
Kirk2NCC1701's picture

I can relate.  Some of us have Stalkers, who have nothing better to do with their worthless lives than to track and junk us.  Fuck 'em!

Thu, 09/11/2014 - 23:50 | 5209546 Sinnedi
Sinnedi's picture

I CAN'T WAIT TILL THIS HAPPENS TO American NEWSPAPERS WE WON'T HAVE TO SUFFER FROM FEAR PORN BEING BLASTED 24/7

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QJNgm4kM24s

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:05 | 5209573 sylviasays
sylviasays's picture

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has lately been accused of hypocrisy for seeking enhanced powers to rule by decree so that he can tackle the corruption that rots Venezuela's political institutions.

The accusation is fitting. Maduro is finally admitting that the Venezuela he inherited from the late Hugo Chavez is wracked by corruption, just five months after he famously claimed, “There is no corruption, for the first time in the history of Venezuela, in 180 years.” Plus, after 14 years in power, Maduro's own Chavistas -- as Chavez's political allies are known -- have a well-documented struggle with graft.

An Aug. 20 editorial in Tal Cual, an opposition-leaning newspaper, discussed the outrage: “How can Maduro demand an enabling law? The pretext that he needs it to fight corruption is immoral. The country doesn’t need more laws to fight corruption because it already has them. What the country demands is that these are enforced.”

Perhaps the most worrying part of Maduro’s search for “special powers” is what it says about his country's broken democracy. This presidential endeavor is not a new one. On four different occasions during his tenure, Chavez received an enabling law from a Chavista-controlled legislature, which he used to pass more than 200 laws without parliamentary approval.

The continuation of this trend shows that the Chavista movement -- both its politicians and the large segment of the population that supports them -- has grown accustomed to allowing the president unchecked power to bypass Congress and pass laws he wants enacted quickly. In a country where billions of dollars in oil revenue are controlled by the presidency, having a majority in Congress and exercising control over the supreme court, the attorney general’s office, the comptroller general and the courts is somehow not enough for the party in power. It wants to rule with no checks and balances -- which, of course, will probably only breed more corruption.

The irony is not lost on some Venezuelans. Alberto Barrera Tyszka, a columnist for El Nacional newspaper, one of the remaining outlets critical of the government, discussed the controversy in an Aug. 18 column: “A government cannot declare itself in a state of emergency against the government. It’s too ridiculous, scandalously incoherent.…It makes no sense. The absurd has become an ideology.”

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2013-08-23/in-venezuela-absolute-p...

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 02:29 | 5209736 TheSecondLaw
TheSecondLaw's picture

Sounds like the USA.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:16 | 5209599 q99x2
q99x2's picture

Nice colors.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 00:39 | 5209621 OhNo
OhNo's picture

No paper but free cocain for everyone!!yeepee

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 01:32 | 5209690 franciscopendergrass
franciscopendergrass's picture

two points:

1) not enough toilet paper, use the smallest denominated paper currency unit for toilet paper

2) one way to control the newspaper is to not allow them to have paper to print the newspaper.

 

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 07:11 | 5209902 jarana
jarana's picture

That's the socialist utopia.

By controling the physical means of production, there's no place for freedom. You never know where IT will be shown first.

Fucking reality does not accept to conform with their theory. Stubborn...

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 03:55 | 5209800 Cacete de Ouro
Cacete de Ouro's picture

That dude on the 1000 looks like a contestant in the Whacky Races, possibly a cross between Dick Dastardly and Peter Perfect, half nice guy, half schemer.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 06:18 | 5209867 Moe Howard
Moe Howard's picture

What will they wrap fish in?

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 08:25 | 5210022 XitSam
XitSam's picture

Paper money.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 07:19 | 5209911 Grimaldus
Grimaldus's picture

Ahhhh a true PROGRESSIVE paradise Venezuela is! Why do the progressive criminals infesting the USA not emigrate to progressive paradise Venezuela in droves? Half of hollyweird should have moved there by now.

Grimaldus

 

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 07:52 | 5209944 RazvanM
RazvanM's picture

It's somebody else fault.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 07:38 | 5209927 New American Re...
New American Revolution's picture

Sounds like America, only they got there first.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 07:41 | 5209930 NEOSERF
NEOSERF's picture

Boy that is lucky, no newspapers right as the economy heads for the toilets and the political climate heads back to dictatorship...phew

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 08:24 | 5210015 earnulf
earnulf's picture

The problems in Venzuela have many sources, but the fact that there are problems, is evident to anyone with sight.   Solutions will not come from outside the country, but from within.    Maduro should have said "Let them have TP" from his balcony instead of "Let me have absolute power!".

Ruling isn't that hard, keeping your head on, now that's a challenge.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 08:25 | 5210017 XitSam
XitSam's picture

My parents told of using Montgomery Wards or Sears catalogs in the outhouse growing up.  Tear off a page, crumple it up to make it a little softer and use.  I'm saving old phone books.  Cheap.  Just in case.

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 09:03 | 5210168 franciscopendergrass
franciscopendergrass's picture

What is a phone book

- Millennial

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 12:01 | 5210922 XitSam
XitSam's picture

Obamaphone

Fri, 09/12/2014 - 10:37 | 5210481 detached.amusement
detached.amusement's picture

  I keep a stack of phone books for palm training, but hey, if things get that bad, it should last me quite a while.  I still have toilet paper from when that bitch moved out a year ago, and she took half of it when she left.  I guess that's because I dont have a massive sloppy vagina that needs 5 arm lengths for every wipe...

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