"The lies peddled about Venezuela’s past make US aggression against it possible in the present. It is worth summing up some of these key lies: Venezuela was once prosperous and ruined by socialism. In fact, Venezuela was an unequal country in which most people were poor despite the country’s oil wealth, which had generated huge export revenues since the 1920s. Venezuela was a democracy before Chavismo. In fact, Venezuela’s democracy was a gravely flawed system in which politicians alternated holding power according to an undemocratic agreement, and rammed austerity down the throats of Venezuela’s poor by committing massacres, such as the Caracazo...Chávez... came to power through an election in 1998, and afterward made changes through extensive democratic processes."