Ayn Rand Called the Collapse in Venezuela 60 Years Ago

Is anyone surprised by these disasters?

CARACAS (Dow Jones)--A deadly crash involving a government-run airliner Monday in Venezuela was just the latest in a string of major incidents involving the nation's state-run companies. Over the past six days, there have also been several huge, costly fires at oil facilities operated by state-owned energy firm Petroleos de Venezuela, or PDVSA.

It appears that all of the major incidents over the past week have been mere accidents. But critics of firebrand leftist President Hugo Chavez, who has nationalized dozens of companies and created sundry state-owned firms during his 11 years in power, charge that underinvestment and poor management at state-run firms have created dangerous operating conditions in which such accidents are likely.

Chavez alleges that some smaller incidents in recent weeks involving explosions at state-run electricity-generation plants were suspicious in nature. He said sabotage may have been involved as part of a plan to destabilize the country and discredit the ruling party ahead of important congressional elections Sept. 26.

Fifteen people were killed when an ATR-42 plane operated by state-run airline Conviasa crashed Monday morning in eastern Venezuela after the pilot radioed that he was unable to maintain control of the aircraft. The plane was carrying 51 people, and about three dozen survived, though many are critically injured. The exact cause of the crash remains unknown.

That tragedy follows a raging inferno that broke out last Wednesday at PDVSA's BOPEC oil storage facility on the Caribbean island of Bonaire when lightning struck during a storm. The fire raged for two days, burning off all the petrochemical naphtha that was in a giant tank, which itself melted away.

Chavez rails against a middle class that has the technical know how to run things and demonizes capital as some type of nefarious Yankee plot so the general decay in society these events represent is hardly surprising. As for Rand, readers of Atlas will easily recognize the how quickly things fall apart when thugs run the show.