The Trump/Sanders Show: Shades of Hugo Chavez

about Donald Trump, but about the late Hugo Chavez of Venezuela — tribune of the people and scourge of the establishment. Looking back at him now he seems a perfect laboratory mixture of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. He died of cancer before witnessing the ruin he brought down on Venezuela. His handpicked successor, Nicolas Maduro, is presiding over that train wreck now.

The Trump half of Chavez is the skilled showman. During his presidency, Chavez used television to maintain his magnetic hold on his followers. He was the host, star and main performer on a weekly program called “Alo Presidente.” The show was his platform to preach, to rage, to cajole, and, above all, to entertain. During his term, he hired and fired more than 130 Cabinet members. It was a bit like “The Apprentice.” He would drag a minister onto the program and demand, before a large audience, that the official account for land use, or imports or lagging social services. The hapless minister would then often be berated by the president and sometimes fired for his poor performance. Nothing that went wrong in Venezuela was the responsibility of the president, but of a trail of incompetent hirelings. Off with their heads!

The Bernie side of Chavez lies in his economics. Chavez loathed capitalism and promised a “Bolivarian revolution” in Venezuela. “We must be aware of consumerism! That’s our tendency. It’s the capitalistic curse that we were poisoned with. We should spend only what is necessary . ... This is a real revolution!”

Bernie Sanders couldn’t agree more. He too preaches “revolution” and condemns consumerism. “You don’t necessarily need a choice of 23 underarm spray deodorants,” he said, “when children are hungry in this country” — as if one had anything to do with the other. He denounces Verizon and other “greedy” corporations. “Over the years,” Sanders fulminates, “Verizon has made billions of dollars in profit but in a given year has not paid a nickel in taxes.” Note the lawyerly “in a given year.” What year? According to a spokesman, Verizon paid $5.3 billion in income taxes in 2015.

Like Chavez, Sanders singles out individual businesses to stoke the resentment of the crowds. The Walton family, owners of Wal-Mart, pays its workers so poorly that many are forced to accept food stamps. Maybe Sanders, who wants a national minimum wage of $15 per hour, should pay his interns at least that much. According to Snopes.com, he pays interns only $12 per hour.

Venezuela’s voters indulged their hatreds and voted for Chavez. Today, reports The Washington Post, the oil-rich nation is on the verge of economic collapse.

Chavismo sure stuck it to the man. It was a good show — until it brought down the house.