What the Left and Right get wrong about Venezuela

https://is1-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Podcasts221/v4/e8/a5/2f/e8a52f35-caae-e122-5866-85db68261807/mza_624280265734661138.jpg/600x600bb.jpg

The Deep Dive with Andy Heintz

Andy Heintz

20 episodes

1 week ago

The Deep Dive with Andy Heintz is a podcast about global politics that features news analysis, opinion and interviews with intellectuals, academics, civil-society leaders and activists in different countries. The Deep Dive seeks to center the lived experiences of people on the ground rather than solely focusing on great power geopolitical intrigue from above. It seeks to promote universalism, democracy, human rights and grassroots democracy from the below. The Deep Dive seeks to plumb the depths rather than skimming the surface of issues. It strives to embrace complexity with humility.

Politics

News

RSS

All content for The Deep Dive with Andy Heintz is the property of Andy Heintz and is served directly from their servers with no modification, redirects, or rehosting. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by Podjoint in any way.

Politics

News

https://d3t3ozftmdmh3i.cloudfront.net/staging/podcast_uploaded_nologo/41107793/41107793-1723325897126-f4f730285310c.jpg

What the Left and Right get wrong about Venezuela

The Deep Dive with Andy Heintz

48 minutes 51 seconds

12 months ago

What the Left and Right get wrong about Venezuela

In this episode of the Deep Divide with Andy Heintz, I talk with Simon Rodriguez-Porras. Simon is the author of "Why Did Chavismo Fail". He also is an editor at Venezuelan voices.org and a writer for the New Arab. In the episode Rodriguez discusses what the Left and Right get wrong when analyzing the overlapping economic, political, and human rights crises that have befallen Venezuela and caused about 8 million people to flee the country over the past decade. Rodriguez offers harsh criticism of the economic and political policies of Nicolas Maduro and his predecessor the late Hugo Chavez while also criticizing American foreign policy in Venezuela. My interview with Chavez was conducted on June 6, 2024, but I thought it was important to include after Maduro was fraudulently re-elected president on July 28, 2024. The government-controlled National Electoral Council declared Maduro the winner without publishing a detailed account of the results, which has been standard practice since the establishment of an electronic voting system in the country in 2004. Meanwhile, volunteers for the opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia collected over 80 percent of the ballots whose results were printed and published online. The tallies showed Gonzalez receiving about 7 million votes to Maduro's 3 million. Venezuelans contested the results by taking to the streets and engaging in large, spontaneous protests including in areas that used to be strongly supportive of Hugo Chavez. Maduro's government responded with harsh repression with more than 2,000 arrested-including more than a 100 children-and 25 people killed. Rodriguez penned an excellent article about the fraudulent elections in the New Arab. In this episode, he challenges the view that Maduro and Chavez were democratic socialists while also explaining why Venezuelan economy's unhealthy dependence on oil exports didn't start with Chavez and why no government has been able to steer the country away from its oil dependency since the resource was first discovered in the country.