Reply #25: And yet their economy is shrinking...

[Fearless]

As oil prices continue to slide, so will it. Venezuela has nationalized numerous formerly corporate interests in the past three years as well as raise their minimum wage. This is their bail out. The only difference between ours and theirs is that they took total control of these industries while we only took incidental control by means of bailing out Wall St.

Likewise, you state many vague things in your second paragraph and no comparison to other nations or even a mean by which the world has functioned, so saying things like "pretty successfully", "diversify", and "work to" are meaningless phrases used in replacement for actual numbers and facts. If you have specifics, I will argue them. But I won't deal in generalizations.

And, even though oil is over $70 a barrel, why is their economy shrinking? Not stabilizing mind you, but shrinking?