Consider the size of the US budget for covert operations. And consider that Venezuela was declared a “threat to national security ” by President Obama in 2015.
How much of the situation in Venezuela can be blamed on the US is open to debate. But there can be no doubt that we are involved. If covert operations cannot be used against “threats to national security” when can you use them?
Of course, Venezuela was never a threat to us. The order that Obama signed was so Orwellian and so divorced from reality that even Trump likes it. It’s about the only Obama policy Trump hasn’t tried to overturn.
Please share widely!
Yes. Everything that happens is the fault of the United States. If we do not intervene, it is the fault of the United States. If we do intervene, it is the fault of the United States. If we stay out of Syria, it is the fault of the United States. If we intervene in Syria to defeat a group involved in outrageous human rights violations upon women, children, lgbtq folks, and anything whatsoever happens short of a conflict magically ending, it is the fault of the United States
And yet, I never hear people who take this position criticizing the populist demagogues around the world, or the murdering dictatorships with the same passion.
It’s refreshing to occasionally be reminded that liberals are often far more rational, reasonable, and more caring for all people of all nations regardless of sovereignty than myopic quasi-isolationist progressives.
I’ll take Hillary Clinton, Barbara Lee, Jimmy Carter, and Nancy Pelosi (who valiantly fought the good fight for sanctions on a certain large Asian nation over their appalling human rights record for years) over Jill Stein, Ralph Nader, and the rest of the isolationist left any day.
Unthinking and reflexive reaction based on virtually no facts is always suspect. It is no less so here in the case of Venezuela.
I personally know many Venezuelans who are center-left people and social democrats who have been completely shut out, shut down, and oppressed by the horrendous, totally corrupt government there.
Have you spoken to such people?
Venezuela is not starving because of the United States. Venezuela still sells oil through Citgo to the United States TODAY. Venezuela is starving today because of the anti-constitutional populism of a character named Hugo Chavez and his repressive successor.
I didn’t mean to sound harsh, but what concerns me about reflexively assuming that the US is always at fault is that when the US actually is at fault, and we point it out (case in point- the lead-up to the second Gulf War when George W. Bush was repeatedly warned by foreign policy experts that it would be far from a “cake walk” as Kenneth Adelman famously claimed), fewer people listen to us. I was in those demonstrations in Washington against invading Iraq. We were largely ignored as just the predictable reflexive peaceniks.
When a regime like the one in Venezuela is given carte blanche to stage rigged elections, and to ignore rulings of its supreme court and then gut and replace the court, it is a disservice to democrats in that country.
I’m not sure we want to have a dog in that race so long as we remain paralyzed by our own rigged elections, impotent legislature, and stuffed Supreme Court.
I’m not really arguing one side or the other regarding the situation in Venezuela. I’m instead suggesting that we might perhaps focus whatever energy we have on putting out our own Reichstag Fire before sending our fire brigades somewhere else.
As I said, how much blame belongs to the US is debatable, but it is beyond dispute that we have played some role. That is that the US has interfered.
I think we can all agree that Saddam was much worse than Maduro. I would argue that the US interference in Venezuela’s internal affairs is much plainer.
I share Terry’s concerns about all anti war activity being smeared as reflexively anti-American. But I don’t see any logic in attacking dissenters to the Trump policy . Does that really make you more credible?
And I don’t get how a post about Trump and Obama can be construed as an attack on Barbara Lee. Only on BMG.
I certainly don’t think the US is always at fault. My foreign policy preferences are a combination of Presidents Wilson and Carter – make the world safe for democracy and place a strong emphasis on human rights. I also strongly prefer multilateralism to unilateralism whenever possible. I believe my philosophy is often called “liberal internationalist” or “liberal interventionist”. I believe we should intervene when there are egregious humanitarian concerns or when one country tried to conquer another. I don’t believe we should intervene to overturn the results of a free and fair election we don’t like, nor try to influence the outcome of the election in the first place.