Yep. I guess soccer spray has bowed out, but the reason I mentioned “socialism” coming to Venezuela in the mid 70’s in response to his post is that the people did well until the late 90’s, when an autocratic demagogue was elected, consolidated power in the executive, and dismantled all institutions and killed democracy, ultimately leaving them in a famine. Trump is following tha playbook to the letter. Yet people like soccer spray think it’s “socialism” that is the problem Oh and their prosperity continued for another 12 to 15 years after Chavez came to power. He didn’t siphon money into his personal coffers like most autocrats but is family and inner circle were worth between 15 and 30B when he died. Venezuela GDP was around 550 B in 2013 when it crashed and around 260 when he died.
The more I think about I think this is going to go pretty smoothly in terms of power transfer. All the right people in the remaining govt as well as the opposition, and the military have been bought off in the past several weeks. The US “contractors” are going to use taxpayer money to rebuild the infrastructure and get the oil flowing. The new ruling class in Venezuela will get rich, TrumpCo will get richer. The Venezuelan people may see a little bump from subsistence but their lives won’t be much different (and it’s the best case scenario for them)
If he was asked to take less money to stay and or told to expect less playing time, he could easily spin that as staying being “out of his control” It’s the new reality. These guys are all mercenaries
Forget the fact that the sole motivation for this coup is to further enrich Trump and his cronies, this is going to cost US taxpayers around a trillion dollars, and the only material change in Venezuela itself is the country’s wealth will flow to the US oligarchs rather than Russia and China.
Yep. The idea of sovereign nations with borders defined by international law is now firmly out the window. Back to might makes right. Thanks a lot Obama.
This is naked imperialism with a clear “what are you gonna do about it?” to the rest of the world. I guess we will see what the rest of the world does about it, but whatever that is I think it’s going to cost the American taxpayer a shitload of new debt
The US is absolutely the reason China has not invaded Taiwan yet, and to imply it is not because of the impotence of the UN etc is just stupid. This action by the moron in chief clearly signals the US has no moral or ethical issues with such a move going forward. Hell there may even be an unofficial official quid pro quo here. Couple this with the regime’s posturing about leaving NATO high and dry and shit could go sideways quickly.