January 6, 2026
"Some of the rules, some of the unthinkables, some of the things that we wouldn't have previously imagined being part of the operation are now on the table as options."
"What I think is clear is that we're entering a new phase of great power competition."
Said Ryan C. Berg, the director of the Americas Program and head of the Future of Venezuela Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, quoted in "How could Trump's move against Venezuela impact China, Russia, Iran and Cuba?" (CBS News).
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113 comments:
"What I think is clear is that we're entering a new phase of great power competition." Said Ryan C. Berg
Competition is a refreshing change from Capitulation.
There is simply zero reason for the United States to allow a communist dictatorship 90 miles off our coast. It is a national security risk.
Donald Trump should free the Cuban people, forcing the Nobel Committee to once again not give him a Peace Prize so we can show what a bullshit operation that is.
There is no competition. There is only 1 great power. The new phase is that that great power currently has a leader who is not ashamed to be powerful AND doesn't hate liberal democracy or western Enlightenment-based civilization.
"Some of the rules, some of the unthinkables, some of the things that we wouldn't have previously imagined being part of the operation are now on the table as options"
I certainly hope so. We don't need to repeat mistakes like some kind of leftists neocons.
Sounds like we are now unburdened from what has been!
WK FTW
There is no competition. There is only 1 great power. The new phase is that that great power currently has a leader who is not ashamed to be powerful AND doesn't hate liberal democracy or western Enlightenment-based civilization.
What exactly is Trump doing that demonstrates his commitment to "liberal democracy"? He is refusing to consult or seek the approval of Congress for his reckless actions, has threatened a NATO ally with war, etc. How is leaving the current government in Venezuela in place while dismissing and humiliating the true winners of the last election?
"we're entering a new phase of great power competition" Only in the sense that the greatest power is now more actively competing, esp. against its main rival, China, and not taking BS from smaller rogue states, e.g. Iran, Venezuela. But though US looks aggressive, it is in fact adapting to a relatively weaker position.
I can easily imagine that sometime a few months ago Trump and his military advisors were sitting around the table discussing what could be done to get rid of Maduro and all the military guys were drawing up huge shock and awe invasions and someone at the table, possibly Trump himself, spoke and said, "Why don't we just go in and arrest the guy and spirit him out of Venezuela?"
We shouldn't be circling back to the "sole superpower" euphoria of the Clinton-Bush years -- or to the hubris of the Kennedy-Johnson era.
Poor Fredo, spinning so fast he is going to fly apart.
After what we did to the Russian and Chinese air defenses and the power grid in Caracas, I'm not sure "competition" is the word to use any more. "Accommodation" seems to fit.
Trump didn't just kick a pestiferous local troublemaker in the balls last week, he also:
- cut off Cuba from its #1 patron, hastening the counter-revolution
- assured that oil prices will get even cheaper, depriving Russia of its major source of funding for the Ukraine war.
- provided inspiration for regime change to the people of Iran and Cuba
- torpedoed the sanctions-busting 3-way arrangement whereby light Iranian oil was mixed with the heavy, viscous Venezuelan oil and sold at a discount price to China.
- humiliated the Chinese and Russian arms industries
- demonstrated cyberwarfare capabilities comparable to Stuxnet,
and
- secured resumed supplies of the heavy Venezuelan oil for which American refineries are uniquely tailored and suitable.
Seldom has any American president rolled the dice in such a high-stakes gamble with such a lucrative financial and geopolitical payoff on so many fronts.
Trump is making a bid to be the most consequential president since Lincoln, and so far he's coming up roses. His name will be spoken ten thousand years from now.
Everything old is new again.
Donald Trump should free the Cuban people, forcing the Nobel Committee to once again not give him a Peace Prize so we can show what a bullshit operation that is.
Just as in Venezuela, no invasion is needed. What is needed is a Berlin Airlift-style operation to air-drop hundreds of thousands of firearms and ammunition to the civilians of each country, with encouragement to hunt down and slaughter every Communist.
A bloodbath of twenty or thirty thousand commie regime apparatchiks in each country would not only set the people of those nations free, but be richly deserved, and a salutary example for communist lice all over the world of what is in store for them if they try to take over any other countries.
By no means least of all, it would be a sharp lesson for our own home-grown commies like Mamdani and Bernie and AOC.
Are you not entertained!
If we liberate Cuba we should create a mixed drink to celebrate. Maybe rum and Coke? Still working on the name…
Poor Fredo, spinning so fast he is going to fly apart.
You are tiresome. How about you try to respond to my point instead of just insulting me?
Well, those ruskiees and chinks are gonin' think twice about messing with 'muerica. Yeehaw!
We can rediscover our past!
Freder Frederson said...How is leaving the current government in Venezuela in place while dismissing and humiliating the true winners of the last election?
Are you really complaining that Trump didn't engage in regime change!?
Miss lindsey has already given Trump his list of countries we need to invade: Russia, Mexico, Iran, Cuba, Columbia, and Paraguay. The last one may be surprising, but its the key to south america and full of rare minerals. We cant let the chinese control it. If we dont, we'll fighting them on the beaches of South Texas!
A buddy sent me a text: the 82nd Airborne is outside of Habana.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/cubas-security-state-colonization-americas-proven-delta-force-killing-32-intel-agents
Love how all the neo-cons and warmongers effortlessly switch from fake outrage moralism "OMG, Dictator Putin has invaded Ukraine. He's an international outlaw!" to might makes right tough-guy: "Gazan children need to die. Go shed your tears somewhere else". "We took Venezuela - we dont care about your namby-pamby international law".
Dumb americans may not notice, but the rest of the world does. The USA has zero moral credibility. Everyone knows the talk about "freedom and democracy" is just a cover for USA imperialism. Next time the USA starts blathering about international law = the world will laugh.
Im skeptical because since dulles they have yanked our chain
Csis was saudi sponsored in the bad ole days of the 80s as emerson had reminded us
Stanley Hoffman authored an influential book in 1978, "Primacy or World Order: American Foreign Policy Since the Cold War." Trump is asserting the power of "and."
If world “order” is to be achieved, any hope of American primacy must be abandoned. Hoffmann thus proposes a retreat: an end to any meaningful ideological confrontation with totalitarianism (with the exception of those weak tyrannies of the Right which he particularly dislikes, and over which we can exercise leverage); an end to the use of economic leverage vis-à-vis the Soviet Union; an end to resisting anti-American movements around the world, even in Western Europe and Latin America. We should trust in diversity, encourage the new nationalist forces (particularly in Africa), and prepare for some unpleasantries. Above all, we should not permit our own feelings (or such outmoded concepts as the “national interest”) to cloud our vision because when we do, we just create havoc. America may not have much influence over the future of the world, but “our power, when it is misguided, has for all its limits a vast capacity for harm.” This capacity must be curbed.
The forces of US decline within our own intelligentsia are intentional, and always have been.
A buddy sent me a text: the 82nd Airborne is outside of Habana.
The same full-of-shit buddy who told you they were in Venezuela on September 26?
Freder wants to know:
What exactly is Trump doing that demonstrates his commitment to "liberal democracy"?
Nothing, that's what. And that's exactly what I voted for.
We don't live in a democracy, moron, and even if we did we're not going to let you liberal pussies run us.
Fuck all the way off.
That's what he's doing.
Miss Lindsey, that odious little troll, his nose so far up this administration's butt. They should be keeping that treacherous creep at arm's length, if not further.
I realize this is a 'high' moment, and not to dampen it, but Venezuela is going to be a tough slog, made tougher because we have to provide the latittude for them to sort out their domestic problems. They've come through 25 years of outright looting, an established sophisticated kleptocracy that started with the foreign governments, moved into the foreign corporations, then onto their citizenry, eventually distilling them down to the remaining victims, literally starving them. First thing to do is feed the people, then elections, then supporting the process of removing the criminal class, which out of necessity makes up a substantial portion of its citizens. This will not be an easy process, restoring a society, while being careful not to stir Yanqui resentments.
Are you really complaining that Trump didn't engage in regime change!?
Other than the unconstitutional and illegal operation, I assume this half-assed fiasco will come back to haunt Trump and us.
So it's complete world domination or US decline, those are the options? I am afraid that yes, those are the only options on the table.
Obviously every other country that doesn't take orders from the US is a totalitarian abuser of their own population. If we don't stand up for the worlds downtrodden by taking war to the furthest corners of the globe, who will? The next guy! That's who.
It's called Structural Realism, and plainly they are right, we will either succeed in knocking off Russia and China without a nuclear war, or collapse economically because the rest of the world will have a choice whether to take our fiat dollars.
Economic Collapse
WWIII
There is no third option.
Hoffman was rather clueless even then, order requires a hegemon willing to impose force
We don't live in a democracy, moron, and even if we did we're not going to let you liberal pussies run us.
So you think we should throw out the Constitution and appoint a dictator. It is funny (not really) how you all have shifted from the Constitution is sacrosanct to Fuck it, let's just have a dictator.
The war between the West and Russia has been going on for 400 years, or so. The Swedes, Napoleon, The Brits (Crimean War, does that sound familiar?) Hitler. There is a reason, it's a deeper dynamic than any simple argument over "good and evil" it's about Russia is just too big, and left to its own devices, size alone will lead it to dominate Europe. Has nothing to do with Putin.
Freder Frederson said...
Are you really complaining that Trump didn't engage in regime change!?
Other than the unconstitutional and illegal operation, I assume this half-assed fiasco will come back to haunt Trump and us.
The only thing you care about is gaining power and taking our stuff. You never bring up any of these arguments when you supported barrack Obama murdering people at weddings or bombing Libya until it turns into an open air slave market.
You are not here in good faith and you are a traitor in this country. There is no reason to argue on your grounds. Your points are dishonest and you don’t really care about them or believe them.
"You are tiresome. How about you try to respond to my point instead of just insulting me?"
Your point, Fredo, is that Trump got rid of Maduro and you seem deeply displeased that he didn't get the U.S. bogged down in a regime change quagmire like happened to Bush Jr. in Iraq/Afghanistan. Indeed, having read lots of comments from the Left the last 3 days, that seems to be the major complaint- Trump didn't repeat Bush Jr.'s mistake yet.
But hoffman didnt consider islamist power blocs which were dormant in 78, well the isi and general intel was finding their sea legs
The former through colonel sultan was recruiting who would become the mujahadeen
"order requires a hegemon willing to impose force"
Shakespeare had a little speech about it that maybe people should read today:
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows; each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy. The bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe;
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead;
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong—
Between whose endless jar justice resides—
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then everything includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. - Troilus and Cressida
In this case "degree" means hierarchy"
"Hegemon" means "guide" in Greek.
I don't buy it, I think that we have enough to do to keep order and prosperity at home, but that star is in retrograde, or whatever the metaphor is.
Brezinski and for that matter allen after him were playing tidly winks by comparison
Your point, Fredo, is that Trump got rid of Maduro and you seem deeply displeased that he didn't get the U.S. bogged down in a regime change quagmire like happened to Bush Jr. in Iraq/Afghanistan.
He did get the U.S. bogged down in regime change, it just hasn't sunk in yet. That fiasco will occur when his brain trust tries to impose its will on Venezuela (and apparently Denmark, Cuba, and Columbia). Although mercifully he seems to have dropped the dreams of annexing Canada as the 51st state.
Shakespeare was talking about his island, of course, but we are in the middle of the entire globe's version of the Hundred Years War, or maybe the War of the Roses is a better analogy, IDK, but I do believe that WWIII is underway, and keeping it from going hot is going to be quite a trick.
Because of that we tried to rear scorpions and we know how that ended
And if the Venezuelans hold elections this year and the opposition parties win a massive mandate, what will you write then, Fredo?
To be fair, it will take a while (a year?) to significantly increase Venezuelan production capacity. Assuming everyone cooperates.
During the Obama reign, the great and the good were dancing around reciting "multipolar world, multipolar world." And when they didn't think anyone important was listening, they talked about "managing American decline."
So Trump is acknowledging it's a multipolar world, just that his pole is bigger. And America's not declining.
And the left goes bonkers.
Which means the American Decline was the only part that meant anything to them. CC, JSM
Remember when we elected Obama because the Republicans were war mongers, and he set in train the wars in Ukraine and Syria?
The people don't get to vote for peace.
"hegemon" may be more aptly and simply translated as "leader"
Its the English usage thats got all the other baggage.
Fredo: "Other than the unconstitutional and illegal operation, I assume this half-assed fiasco will come back to haunt Trump and us."
Narrator: Nothing that Trump has done in his second term has come back to haunt him or the country despite predictions from the traitorous Left.
"So Trump is acknowledging it's a multipolar world, just that his pole is bigger"
I am not sure of that one, I just think that he is abandoning a failed strategy, not the goal.
One interesting outcome of DOGE was that the USAID money dried up, and there had been a civil war brewing in Bosnia and Herzegovina, there was a referendum being pushed which would have split the country, and there were constant street protests, and had the referendum passed, there would have been civil war, and this civil war. would have dragged in Serbia and Croatia (A NATO member) as well as Russia, opening a second front on Russia's border. This is how these people work.
After the DOGE money dried up, the street protests stopped, the demand for a referendum splitting the country went away, and one politician said "It's amazing how the political tension has all gone away since Trump was elected."
Trump should get the Peace Prize for that, but the Peace Prize is a bauble that the neocons own, it isn't what we think it is.
"The war between the West and Russia"
Is a sob-story drunken Russians tell each other when they are feeling sorry for themselves. Everyone in Europe fought each other at one time or another. And Russia mostly was invading, not the invadee (thats not a word, probably). We can get into cases, in detail.
OK, Napoleon.
The Mongols
Sweden
There isnt a Russian border on Bosnia, Serbia or Croatia.
The Russians will have to cross all of Ukraine to start. Good luck with that. And then Hungary or Moldavia/Romania.
Yeah russia ventured south into the caucasus and east until it ran into the japanese
So then how do you categorize the westward expansion of the United States, nation after nation subjugated or outright extinguished?
Also persia tried to slip into india
Well, I got that one wrong. I not only am forced to admit, but I willingly admit. I probably filled in part of that story, which I still believe to be true, with a wrong assumption.
"Also persia tried to slip into india"
That's not Europe.
Germany (Prussia), 1756-63
Italy and Switzerland, 1799
Moldavia, 1768 (my Turkish ancestor was killed in the defense of Bender)
Poland and Lithuania - countless
Finland 1808-09
etc.
"This ain't no party, this ain't no disco, this ain't no foolin' around."
Regional squabbles they went west we went east across the pacific
"So then how do you categorize the westward expansion of the United States, nation after nation subjugated or outright extinguished?"
As had happened thousands of times before on the American continent, a stronger tribe conquered weaker ones. A tribe strong enough to render the weaker tribes permanently unable to constitute independent polities.
so the Seven Years War, where England came out on a course to be master of the globe?
We are arguing about Russia trying to capture India, but there is no issue with England turning India into its private colony, and in that same war, England ended up in control of most of North America, the parts that were settled by Europeans, anyway?
But England is not a dangerous and reckless and aggressive power?
"As had happened thousands of times before on the American continent"
My point is that Russia's eastward expansion was the same, and in the same time period, how does this add up to an aggressive power that is a threat to Europe?
Russia's threat to Europe is its size and existence. This is Structural Realism, and I can argue until I am blue in the face, it won't change the calculus. It has nothing to do with Russia's leaders, or form of government, which the Russians learned when they abandoned communism, and still the West would not agree to peaceful coexistence.
The next war was Russia fighting to expel French forces from Switzerland.
"Russia entered the coalition largely at the urging of Austria and Britain."
More perfidious Albion. Russia then withdrew from the coalition fighting the French, leaving Europe to its own devices, which didn't work out for Russia very well, since it led to Napoleon's rise.
"so the Seven Years War, where England came out on a course to be master of the globe?
We are arguing about Russia trying to capture India, but there is no issue with England turning India into its private colony, and in that same war, England ended up in control of most of North America, the parts that were settled by Europeans, anyway?
But England is not a dangerous and reckless and aggressive power?"
Plenty of people said England was. England had the power to win, and did win, so their opinions were rendered irrelevant. An opinion without power to defend it from those who would disregard it may come back in the mists of the future, but it will lose in the present every time.
Freder Frederson said...
How is leaving the current government in Venezuela in place while dismissing and humiliating the true winners of the last election?
The last I checked Maduro is gone and the Venezuelan Supreme Court ruled that the current VP should take over pending elections to be held within 90 days per the Venezuelan Constitution. (I thought you liked courts making decisions about who should rule a country.) Yes, the opposition is pushing for the winner of the 2024 election, Urrutia, to be named interim President and there is precedent for it but the path forward to new elections will be essentially the same either way. Why are you demanding Trump install somebody just so you can call them his puppet? I noticed your butt buddy Lefty Mark was intimating that about María Corina Machado in the first thread.
In common with Yancy, I find that you're just filling your diaper because Trump is not acting in ways that would give your tired talking points any traction.
They took it from the french and then they were stuck with for nearly two hundred years
So Moldavia, an Orthodox Christian country was occupied by the Muslim Ottoman Empire, this was not a war against Moldavia, but the Ottoman Empire.
"Plenty of people said England was. England had the power to win, and did win, so their opinions were rendered irrelevant"
Thank you! This is why I don't mind buwaya's take on things, even as I argue with him, I learn a lot, and correct my own misunderstandings as I go, he doesn't moralize about this being a war between "good America and evil Russia" like a certain poster here does.
Well stated Christopher B at 12:38.
Has Althouse been invaded by sock-puppets? LOL
Well said, Rcocean! Exactly correct.
Thank you Rcocean for being on this blog.
In WWI the English elites dragged their country into a war against Germany allied with France, but not by telling the British people that that was their plan, but by claiming that they needed to defend poor defenseless little Belgium against "the Hun!" Belgium had 7 million people. Scores of millions have died, untold scores of millions, as a result of WWI and the mission to defend those 7 million Belgians, who already spoke two languages, from having to learn a third.
Why? Because Germany had decided to build a navy, Bismarck told them not to, but they did, and this made them an existential threat to the island nation of Britain. It is unlikely that a German fleet would fail the way the Spanish Armada did.
Did Germany threaten Britain? No. But Great Britain couldn't brook the existence of such a threat. Which brings us back to why war with Russia is inevitable, not because Russia is evil, but because they are big and they are powerful, and cannot be let get more powerful.
Most of the analysis above comes from the book The Guns of August.
Fredder:
I forgot all of those times Obama and Biden got congressional approval for their various foreign incursions, you know, like bombing weddings in Afghanistan and such. Maybe you can refresh my memory.
Why do we hate Obama and Biden, but then LOVE---and I mean love ❤️❤️❤️ it!---when Trump acts as evil as Obama and Biden?
"Did Germany threaten Britain? No."
Germany threatened the European balance of power that had been English/British policy to maintain for three centuries. Britain as the premier European naval power, a British-led coalition (or potential coalition) of nations equal on land to the premier European land power. London was fine with very strong land powers existing in Europe. So long as they didn't try to conquer Europe, directly or indirectly, and so long as they didn't try to elbow it out of its lion's share of trade. It took Britain a century, more or less, to end Habsburg Spanish dreams of European hegemony. Then another century to do the same to France. After that there was a century of peace in Western Europe. Then Germany arose to have its try at achieving hegemony. It was Wilhelm II's policy of trying to make Germany that hegemon of Europe that threatened Britain, as Louis XIV/XV's policy as Kings of France did, as the Phillipses/Charleses policies as Habsburg Kings of Spain did.
Belgian neutrality and borders were guaranteed by treaty with Britain. Germany invaded Belgium. That is why Britain declared war. The British public was not dragged into war by propaganda about Belgian babies spitted on German helmet spikes. They were as enthusiastic for war as everyone else was in August 1914: very.
Yes, the opposition is pushing for the winner of the 2024 election, Urrutia, to be named interim President and there is precedent for it but the path forward to new elections will be essentially the same either way.
He should be referred to as González, not Urrutia. Urrutia is his mother's surname (apellido materno) and comes after the father's surname in the Hispanic tradition. The father's surname is the correct one to use if you're referring to him by surname only.
Legally and formally, he is named Edmundo González Urrutia.
This can be abbreviated to Edmundo González U. (especially in a context where there is a potential for confusion with another Edmundo González from a different family.)
Informally, he is Edmundo González or just González.
In fact, we think Trump's behavior is so bad, we are finally compelled to agree to the truth about Obama and Joe's terrible behavior, just to make a point about how much worse we think Trump is.....
"Why do we hate Obama and Biden, but then LOVE---and I mean love ❤️❤️❤️ it!---when Trump acts as evil as Obama and Biden?"
If Trump does so, the question will arise then.
The Center for Strategic and International Studies is and always has been an anti-American entity that is slightly to the left of Karl Marx; so, whatever they write about Trump must be taken with a couple of pounds of salt.
No very establishment as i mentioned earlier
Venezuelan oil and mining is not the only industry that will need to be re capitalized and restarted. Venezuela was of course the capital of money laundering for Iran in service of Gaza, Hezbollah, and Russia will need a new financial center. Even though the Venezuelan oil industry was weak it offered plenty of opportunity for hiding the flow of cash from cartels and countries under sanctions. All it takes is for officials to fake a manifest on an oil tanker cargo and drug money can be routed through multiple shell corporations and become terrorist capital or sit in Swiss banks as retirement money for crooks. All this will have to be reproduced somewhere else.
Now the Euroweenies are whining that if we take Greenland it will mean the end of NATO. Sounds like a twofer to me.
’The same full-of-shit buddy who told you they were in Venezuela on September 26?’
You’re making this way too easy, Fredo.
This was never about stopping narc-terrorism, because we all know that the vast majority of fentanyl, heroin, and methamphetamine comes from China and Mexico, not Venezuela, and Trump sure as hell isn't going to bomb them or capture their leaders, because he is at heart a coward. This is all about Trump and his billionaire buddies doing the Neocon regime change thing, only this time it's to make his oil buddies into trillionaires, not just billionaires. It's all about oil, money, and power. If you have been watching the series Landman, this is what is going on with steroids, only this time time the greed, corruption, and power grabs are happening in Valenzuela, not West Texas.
"...If you have been watching the series Landman, this is what is going on with steroids, ....."
Yeah, that fits like a glove. My wife started watching this show last week, and I see snippets on the way to the kitchen and back. It's the most unrealistic portrayal of the O&G business one could imagine, coming from over 40 years in the business, working domestically and internationally. It's a dramatic absurdity, for a professional - nothing about it makes sense, much less being in any way accurate. So it figures somebody would use a contrived West Texas drama as an example to illustrate Venezuela, and think it was smart. Tell us more.
Its an entertaining show but as with much of sheridans offerings its too much mawkish melodrama
And weve been blowing up boats in the pacific
The border crackdown may also have had a significant effect on drug smuggling from Mexico. At least something has changed at the "street" level in CA, as I have (in part) seen for myself. It will take a year or more to get drug overdose statistics to confirm it unfortunately.
LJ says:
"Trump and his billionaire buddies doing the Neocon regime change thing, only this time it's to make his oil buddies into trillionaires, not just billionaires. "
So, you have heavily invested in oil stock?
Trump didn't just kick a pestiferous local troublemaker in the balls last week, he also: didn't get permission from Freder to do so.
How about you try to respond to my point instead of just insulting me?
I'll answer for him. Because you don't have any points. You spew bullshit, argue against your own strawmen and take the side of America's enemies anytime - and every time - something happens.
It was a waste of time to engage in your shit more than 20 years ago back at Right Wing News and it's an even bigger waste of time now.
Do fuck off.
A buddy sent me a text: the 82nd Airborne is outside of Habana.
Oh, now you've gone and done it.
"Hello. FBI? This is Freder Frederson. I want to report a crime."
'Outside of Habana' covers quite a bit of geography, if you want to be technical and pernickety about it.
The urge to play God is an ancient urge.
And the urge to rule the world is an ancient urge.
The E.U. and the U.N. are suspicious initials because these people want to rule everyone. The unelected dictators of the EU want to rule all of Europe! And anybody who follows the dictators of the UN is a madman.
The alleged "diplomats" of the left seek to acquire power via lies and subterfuge. Communism has zero interest in ordinary people and is all about ruling the world.
Trump is a blunt and open vision of what liberals try to do in secret. They hate him because he's like a mirror of their inner demons. They see themselves in him and are repulsed at what they see.
(I don't actually think Trump wants to rule the world, but I'm sure he has days where he thinks that would be a great idea).
Jaq said...
Remember when we elected Obama because the Republicans were war mongers, and he set in train the wars in Ukraine and Syria?
The people don't get to vote for peace.
How do you vote for peace?
There is only one way to achieve peace. Eventually the way Venezuela was being run would have led to a war one way or another.
Over 8 million Venezuelans were forced out by the Maduro/Chavez regime. People in the country were starving and invading their neighbors. The only way to make money was to ship drugs to Britain.
What Trump did was the most peaceful option available.
Saint Croix said...
The urge to play God is an ancient urge.
And the urge to rule the world is an ancient urge.
The E.U. and the U.N. are suspicious initials because these people want to rule everyone. The unelected dictators of the EU want to rule all of Europe! And anybody who follows the dictators of the UN is a madman.
The alleged "diplomats" of the left seek to acquire power via lies and subterfuge. Communism has zero interest in ordinary people and is all about ruling the world.
The people who push communism don't actually believe in communism.
Marxism is just cover for theft and murder. Marxism can only exist after something has been built and there is something to steal.
Trump is a blunt and open vision of what liberals try to do in secret. They hate him because he's like a mirror of their inner demons. They see themselves in him and are repulsed at what they see.
(I don't actually think Trump wants to rule the world, but I'm sure he has days where he thinks that would be a great idea).
You can easily tell the difference between a builder like Trump and most of the bureaucrats/marxists.
’Hello. FBI? This is Freder Frederson. I want to report a crime.’
The bad news is that I cancelled all my plans waiting for that scary knock on my door!! Such a disappointment.
Per Tucker Carlson bringing down Maduro is some kind of Zionist-globohomo plot. Because it will bring gay marriage to Venezuela. Probably also because it makes Putin unhappy.
I would think 82 airborne are more kinetic for the task of course he might be tdyed under oga
Like michael weston
If China comes out of it as the new ruler in East Asia, where most of the growth will happen in this century -- then the Donroe Doctrine will be the blunder of the century.
As if on cue. Lone justice arrives.
"Director of the Americas Program; Head of the Future of Venezuela Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies"
Who dreamed up that job title? I wonder how many graduate degrees are required, and whether the tax payers are footing the bill.
Venezuela to Give U.S. Up to 50 Million Barrels of Oil, Trump Says ~ WSJ
'Figure would represent a significant amount of all the oil the country produces annually'
The real question is how long until the Maduro regime runs out of money to pay its capos and foot soldiers and what do they need to do for the Trump administration to allow them more oil revenues. If the Maduro regime waits too long to cooperate, there may be less oil revenue to go around and the greater the likelihood of unrest as regime elements go rogue to survive.
Trump owns that potential problem now, including all others.
“ If China comes out of it as the new ruler in East Asia, where most of the growth will happen in this century -- then the Donroe Doctrine will be the blunder of the century”
I understand. The left here has been allied with China since the fall of the Soviet Union. Just look at how Antifa changed its allegiances. Never clear though how much was Chinese manipulation and bribery (Bidens, of course, staying bought, as he did with Ukraine). And how much was because the left hates America and The Dream. And just ally with China for convenience.
But China is looking pretty ricketed right now. It’s facing demographic collapse, with its population likely collapsing to half its previous size over the next half century or less. Economically, it is also verging on collapse. Their half billion or so middle class is in catastrophic collapse. It put its money in the one safe place, given the general corruption in other investments in China, and that investment is collapsing, beggaring their middle class, which is now finding so many of its members now unemployed. With nowhere to go - they came from the rice paddies, and can’t go back. Traditionally, they should have gone upmarket as their economy matured. But haven’t been able to, given their endemic corruption and lack of nimbleness, resulting from their central planning. And the bigger the problems get, the more they try to get out of them with central planning. They were on the right track, economically, until their political elites saw their power slipping away, but then panicked and catastrophically reversed course.
They are short on critical resources, esp petroleum. Its allies, Russia, Iran, and Venezuela, all with sizable oil reserves, were supposed to fill this gap. Instead, with the fall of Venezuela, pressure on Iran, and Russia at war with Ukraine, that hasn’t happened. Instead, I think a war with Russia, over Siberia, etc is looking ever more probable, esp as Russia continues to squander its military assets in Ukraine.
It should be quite interesting.
And now Trump knocks out a central peg in their strategy, by grabbing Maduro.
Aggie @4:31. Completely agree. Wife and I watched it over the holiday break. Near the end of season 1, I just couldn’t handle the BS drama. Forget the drug gangs, M-Tex would have been shutdown by OSHA and EPA. Those are the federal agencies that would be crawling all over the place.
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