LATE-STAGE SOCIALISM: Venezuela’s dead are not spared as theft increases in cemeteries.

Thieves have broken into some of the vaults and coffins in El Cuadrado cemetery since late last year, stealing ornaments and sometimes items from corpses as the country sinks to new depths of deprivation.

“Starting eight months ago, they even took the gold teeth of the dead,” said José Antonio Ferrer, who is in charge of the cemetery, where a prominent doctor, a university director and other local luminaries are buried.

Much of Venezuela is in a state of decay and abandonment, brought on by shortages of things that people need the most: cash, food, water, medicine, power, gasoline.

Some of the most acute misery plays out every day on the streets of Maracaibo, Venezuela’s second-largest city and a hub of the once-booming oil industry.

A quick look at Texas will show you that this is a great time to be in an oil industry, but it’s never a great time to implement socialism.