President Trump’s reference to the collapse of once-prosperous Venezuela in his State of the Union address and his vow that America will never become a socialist nation recalls a claim by the late dictator Hugo Chavez.
Like so many advocates of socialism who insist they have unique insights and abilities, Chavez insisted after his election in 1999 that his path to utopia would avoid the “mistakes” made by Russia in the early 20th century.
Hot Air blogger John Sexton found a video from a 2008 documentary in which Chavez is shown apparently admitting that Russia’s path to socialism turned into tyranny.
Two decades later, as Sexton writes, Venezuela “continues to collapse into a totalitarian nightmare, complete with state-run media, starvation and government death squads.”
Chavez was speaking to members of the international media about the benefits of socialism, which he described as a democratic form of government in contrast to capitalism’s “dictatorship of the elite.”
“Everything I’ve said about socialism in the last two years is a concept,” Chavez said. “It’s not like I carry a catechism. Over there in Russia during the early 1900s when a group of intellectuals wrote down a catechism, a communist catechism.
“No, we’re not going to fall into those same mistakes. Those mistakes that dogmatized that proposal and at the end of the Stalin era even tyrannized it. We are calling on everyone, I am calling everyone. I am calling to all Venezuelans to contribute to the debate for the construction of the Venezuelan path to socialism.”
Sexton observed that the statement is Chavez’ “version of the old trope: Real socialism has never failed because it has never been tried.”
Immediately after he was sworn into office in 1999, Chavez issued a decree calling for a referendum on a constituent assembly to rewrite the Venezuela constitution, overriding the existing legal order.
Eventually, the socialist party packed the Supreme Court with loyalists and took over the National Assembly, refusing to allow a referendum to hold elections.
“They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions,” Sexton wrote. “That certainly seems to be the pattern with democratic socialism. It would be a good thing for America if more people would learn from these mistakes rather than assuming, as Chavez did, that next time will be different.”
Trump: ‘We are alarmed’
President Trump on Tuesday night said, “We are alarmed by the new calls to adopt socialism in our country,” drawing some boos.
“America was founded on liberty and independence and not government coercion, domination and control,” he said.
“We are born free and we will stay free!” prompting chants of “USA! USA!”
A television camera focused on a scowling Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and images were published of Democratic darling Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., looking nonplussed.
“Tonight we renew our resolve that America will never be a socialist country!” Trump said, drawing a standing ovation.
