The article seems very anti-socialist:

> ... making life tolerable—if not always easy—in the midst of a socialist hell.

I have no idea how it is in Venezuela, but as a citizen of former socialist / now capitalist republic I take such articles with a grain of salt.

One could also argue that they are basically stealing the (heavily subsidized) energy from other citizens of Venezuela. In capitalism such thing would be normal, but in socialism it is far from it.

No. In (idea) capitalism it would be normal for the energy to be sold and a price emerging from the supply and demand.

They are not 'stealing' the energy 'from other citizens' they are using the energy that the bad repressive government of Venezuela provides. Its the governments prorogative to subsidize energy, and they have to deal with the consequences.

I however agree that 'in the midst of a socialist hell' is not an apportierte way to write an article.

At this point it's not about capitalism or socialism really, it's mostly years of terrible administration, creating money black holes.

> The article seems very anti-socialist:

Is that bad?

For a website billing itself as "reason.com", it seems very unreasonable to be saying that Venezuela, which suffered many economic problems and still does, without any worker control of the MoP, is "Socialist".

The only reasonable thing about free markets is that they bring home the bacon from the exploitation of the proles. How wonderfully "free", to be forced to sell your labour and be treated as any other commodity.