This genius gloated about Venezuela's successes; this didn't age well

Received from Tom Woods today:

You foolish libertarians: Venezuela is doing great, contrary to your doom-and-gloom predictions!

So said economist (yes, economist!) Mark Weisbrot in 2013.

Here's Weisbrot, who couldn't have been happier to rub this alleged socialist success story in our faces:

For more than a decade people opposed to the government of Venezuela have argued that its economy would implode. Like communists in the 1930s rooting for the final crisis of capitalism, they saw economic collapse just around the corner. How frustrating it has been for them to witness only two recessions: one directly caused by the opposition's oil strike (December 2002-May 2003) and one brought on by the world recession (2009 and the first half of 2010). However, the government got control of the national oil company in 2003, and the whole decade's economic performance turned out quite well, with average annual growth of real income per person of 2.7% and poverty reduced by over half, and large gains for the majority in employment, access to health care, pensions and education.

We then read that a brief burst of inflation was caused by an odd set of circumstances, and that Venezuela has no serious problems that it lacks the policy tools to handle.

Then:

Meanwhile, the poverty rate dropped by 20% in Venezuela last year – almost certainly the largest decline in poverty in the Americas for 2012, and one of the largest – if not the largest – in the world. 

A national survey in 2017 found that nearly two-thirds of Venezuelans had lost about 25 pounds each over the course of the previous year.

Not to mention the monetary inflation, the shortages, the chaos, and the suffering.

Weisbrot has tried to salvage all this by claiming that, after all, leftist policy "did pretty well until 2014." (A policy of keeping warm by setting your furniture on fire also has a certain effectiveness for a little while.)

It's really the fault of exchange rate system, oil prices -- whatever, anything except left-wing economics.

When Bernie Sanders was asked during the 2016 campaign about Venezuela and whether its fate gave him pause about his own proposals, he replied: "No comment."

He was smarter than Mark Weisbrot.