Socialism gets a bad wrap for the havoc it has wreaked across the globe. Maybe that's due to the fact that we only hear about the failures of socialism, and turn a blind eye to evidence of its success.
Venezuela, for example, is often cited as a disaster wrought by socialism. The corporate media, however, rarely reports on instances of how socialism is succeeding in delivering progressive gains to the embattled nation.
Fortunately, the Associated Press has decided to buck the capitalist establishment by delivering this nugget of good news. Thanks to the progressive leadership of President Nicolas Maduro, homicides in Venezuela have declined as much as 20 percent over the last three years, according to the Venezuelan Observatory of Violence.
Gun violence is down, thanks in large part to Maduro's pro-inflation economic policies. Firearms have become prohibitively expensive. The cost of bullets has soared to $1 a piece. "If you empty your clip, you're shooting off $15," said El Negrito, a street gangster from Caracas, in an interview with the Associated Press. "You lose your pistol or the police take it and you're throwing away $800."
Maduro's ambitious reforms have also succeeded in reducing the number of armed assaults by ensuring that ordinary citizens have less money to steal. Robert Briceño, director of the Venezuelan Observatory of Violence, attributed the decline in homicides to Maduro's remarkable efforts to eliminate income inequality. "These days, nobody is doing well—not honest citizens who produce wealth or the criminals who prey on them," he said.
As a result, the AP reports that many of the country's criminals are considering abandoning their violent ways, or leaving the country to seek honest work elsewhere. Violent, gun-related crime in Venezuela is gradually being replaced by more progressive criminal behavior such as copper wire theft and livestock pilfering.
Something to keep in mind amid the steady stream of propaganda from our Maduro-bashing media.