Venezuela, a country with only $10 billionย leftย in reserves to run on, is in trouble. As the currency hyperinflates to new record lows against the dollar…

 

James Holbrooks points out that the people areย starving. The government has gone full-onย authoritarian, and now desperate human beings are dying in the streets. From an Associated Press report on Friday:

โ€œAuthorities in Venezuela say 12 people were killed overnight following looting and violence in the South American nationโ€™s capital amid a spiraling political crisis.โ€

Continuing, the report further highlighted the gravity of the situation:

โ€œMost of the deaths took place in El Valle, where opposition leaders say 13 people were hit with an electrical current while trying to loot a bakery protected by an electric fence.โ€

These are people without options, forced to turn to thievery to stay alive. And they died because of it.

On April 6, The Economistย reported that over the past year, 74 percent of Venezuelans lost an average of 20 pounds. Venezuela, incidentally, has toppedBloombergโ€™s Economic Misery Index for the past three years.

The country began its slide downward into chaos with the election of President Nicolas Maduro, who immediately began implementing socialist programs and has since taken extreme measures to secure his position.

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At the end of March, for instance, Maduro effectively shut down Venezuelaโ€™s congress โ€” his primary political opposition โ€” and gave those legislative duties to his puppet Supreme Court.

The latest news coming out of the South American nation โ€” aside from the deaths of people trying to steal bread to live โ€” is that General Motors, whose Venezuelan production facility was overtaken by local authorities, has now ceasedย all operations in the country.

To put that in perspective, consider that in 2016, only 3,000 vehicles were sold in Venezuela, a country of 30 million people.

The U.S. Southern Commandย has floated the idea of using the United Statesโ€™ military to contain unrest in Venezuela, though historically American intervention in South America is both widely unpopular in the region and wildly unsuccessful.

As we look on at the continuing horrors in the Middle East and what seems, at the moment, to be the makings of World War III in Asia, letโ€™s not lose sight of the fact that right now, the people of Venezuela are in pain.

This article appeared at ZeroHedge.com at: ย http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-23/venezuela-verge-revolution-hyperinflated-currency-crashes-new-record-low