Just when does Venezuela need to build a wall?

An interesting little point is that the Berlin Wall has now ceased to exist for longer than it did exist. But we shouldn't forget it nor its lesson. One that Venezuela is going to have to think about:

Venezuela’s neighbours are tightening their borders, alarmed by the exodus of hundreds of thousands of desperate refugees fleeing hunger, hyperinflation and a spiralling political crisis.

Brazil and Colombia are sending extra troops to patrol frontier regions where Venezuelans have arrived in record numbers over recent months.

Colombia, which officially took in more than half a million Venezuelans over the last six months of 2017, also plans to make it harder to cross the frontier or stay illegally in Colombia. Brazil said it will shift refugees from regions near the border where social services are badly strained.

The economic crisis and food shortages which have driven so many from their homes show no signs of easing.

The International Monetary Fund forecasts hyperinflation in Venezuela will hit 13,000% this year, so most salaries are now worth the equivalent of just a few British pounds a month.

So, when do they start to build a wall restricting the number who can flee from the joys and pleasures of socialism?

Note well how such walls and barriers are built - the machine guns face inwards, to stop the people leaving, not outward to prevent invasion.

So, enough with the snide jeering already and to the important point. This is showing that greatest of democratic freedoms, the ability to vote with one's feet. The very thing which hte global imposition of any system denies for in a truly global system of governance there is no where to go to flee from it. Or as we might put it, competition among systems and structures of governance improves matters just as much as similar competition between supermarkets, car suppliers or phone companies improves our experience of those things.