Venezuela is an example of how badly radical governments can function. Democracy is not returning to this impoverished country governed by dictator Nicolás Maduro.
Unfortunately for Venezuelans of good faith, the nation that can most influence the opposition that can overthrow him is busy, very busy.
The United States of America has its own presidential election coming up.
The ruling Democratic Party is hoping that Kamala Harris will win the race on November 5 against Donald Trump, the controversial candidate of the Republican Party.
She’s doing well. Yesterday, The financial The poll found that Harris has ended Donald Trump’s lead in seven states that typically define elections in the neighboring country, as she takes advantage of a wave of enthusiasm among young, African-American and Latino voters, according to the latest Bloomberg News/Morning Consult survey.
Harris was backed by 48 percent of voters to Trump’s 47 percent in those key states.
That doesn’t mean Harris is risk-free. People are returning from their holidays and the first thing they see when they return is the gas pump..
The price of gasoline in the United States this week is the equivalent of 18.20 pesos per liter, or 3.48 dollars per gallon, but it was as high as 4.96 dollars or 23 pesos two years ago. Fifty-five percent of its price, equivalent to 10 pesos, comes from the cost of oil, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency. To that are added the cost of refining, distribution and taxes.
The price of gasoline is low because the price of crude oil has also fallen from $120 on some days in 2022 to $75 yesterday for Texas WTI.
?What could happen if President Joe Biden answers the calls for help coming from Venezuela in the face of Maduro’s obvious abuse?
It is an oil-poor country, with a meager oil production of less than a million barrels a day. This is even lower than Pemex’s fading production of 1.7 million barrels a day and very small compared to the 13.3 million produced by the world’s largest producer, the United States.
But in the end, this production also counts in a market of 100 million barrels a day, and its huge South American reserves, coveted by the whole world, particularly by the Chinese and Russians, count even more. Its production remains low, even after the lifting of US sanctions on oil exports.
But any decision that destabilizes the government of Nicolás Maduro can break the balance between supply and demand for this raw material, causing an almost immediate impact on gasoline.
US President Joe Biden He cannot knock down the first domino in that market without affecting the campaign of his vice president and candidate. Democrat Kamala Harris, who her opponents blame for the major inflation problem facing Americans.
Here’s an example: Yesterday, the newspaper Washington Post published an article revealing how American workers, in some cases employed, are forced to live in their cars or on the streets due to their inability to pay rent.
One case involves an Amazon employee in Louisville, Kentucky, who earns about $4,000 a month in a city where rent for a small home costs $2,000 a month. Paying that plus housing expenses would leave him without enough money to pay for food and gas for himself and his mother, with whom he lives in a minivan.
Voters tend not to pay attention to details such as the fact that during Donald Trump’s presidency and the current Biden presidency, both governments managed the indiscriminate printing of dollars to distribute $300 a week to each inhabitant of that country during the pandemic.
The abundance of dollars devalued them against other currencies and generated a rise in prices that continues to this day.
Mexicans are well aware of gasoline price hikes and their impact on election results. Biden could influence Venezuela. But would he do it even at the cost of a ‘gasoline tax’ in the middle of an election campaign? It seems unlikely.
