‘Desperate’ Venezuelans stream into Colombia to buy food, by the BBC. Venezuela is naturally very rich, where anything planted grows and with the world’s largest oil reserves. It used to be a thriving society, moderately wealthy by world standards.

This descent into food shortages and chaos is unambiguously due to the mismanagement caused by excessive government control — socialism. Note that the BBC, being politically correct and thus in favor of bigger government and leaning socialist, did not mention this.

The Venezuelan debacle, a textbook example of the failure of socialism unfolding in real time, is hardly mentioned in the mainstream media — presumably because they are too politically correct to want to say a bad word about socialism.

See The Suicide of Venezuela for a list of prominent Australian lefties who in 2007 openly lauded President Chavez, the socialist leader of Venezuela, and invited him to Australia. Have any of them since admitted publicly they had it completely wrong? No.

UPDATE: Venezuela’s Inflation Is Set to Top 1,600% Next Year, by Ian Talley. “Food shortages, weak oil prices and economic mismanagement has forced the government to declare a state of emergency.”

UPDATE: Middle-Class Venezuelans Liquidate Savings to Stockpile Food, by Hannah Dreier.

Tebie Gonzalez and Ramiro Ramirez still have their sleek apartment, a fridge covered with souvenir magnets from vacations abroad, and closets full of name brand clothes. But they feel hunger drawing near.

So when the Venezuelan government opened the long-closed border with Colombia this weekend, the couple decided to drain what remained of the savings they put away before the country spun into economic crisis and stock up on food. They left their two young sons with relatives and joined more than 100,000 other Venezuelans trudging across what Colombian officials are calling a “humanitarian corridor” to buy as many basic goods as possible.

hat-tip Matthew