@EyeRound

The night before Juan Guaidó declared himself interim president of Venezuela, the opposition leader received a phone call from Vice President Mike Pence.

Mr. Pence pledged that the U.S. would back Mr. Guaidó if he seized the reins of government from Nicolás Maduro .
. .

That's all I can paste, and can only see a tiny bit more than that.

I gleaned this from under a video:

From the beginning of the Trump administration, critics have chided President Trump for not working more closely with allies. But right now the U.S. is working with allies in Venezuela. WSJ's Gerald F. Seib explains.

::
Emphasis mine.

I guess the article actually makes the connection between the well organized caravans/wall debate with neither "team" budging, and the shutdown being purposely done in order to provide cover for our meddling in yet another Latin American country, that also happens to have natural resources we want. We have almost always meddled down there.

My point is, where is the supposed connection?

#3 True that, Deja! Thank you for your comment.

What's new about this particular government-engineered smoke screen, IMO, is that he (Trump) took the government itself hostage and brought on such misery to so many of his own constituents, in order to make the smoke screen. (Misery being brought to "furners" is just foreign policy, right?)

Did anything in the last 33 days bother Wall Street in the least? Doesn't look that way.

But "ordinary" people got the stuffing knocked out of them by their pres, just so that he could have cover.

(Are the low-income folks who lost paychecks ever going to be made whole after this debacle?)

@Bisbonian

Right?

SMDH!

#3 , (on FB), a handy little (well, not so little) chart of US interventions in Latin America going back to 1890.

@divineorder I'm glad Russia and other countries are opposing.

The notion that western countries can just demand a new election in some country is just ridiculous.

#6

-----
gjponsit could be right

This may just be some very shitty saber rattling on top of all the millions funding/ covert action. We will see.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/u-s-calls-on-world...

By overcoming opposition to holding the U.N. meeting on Saturday, Washington successfully put the global spotlight on Venezuela as a Security Council problem. However, any council action to address the crisis would be blocked by veto-powers Russia and China, diplomats said.

Britain, Germany, France and Spain all said on Saturday they would recognize Guaido if Maduro failed to call fresh elections in eight days, an ultimatum Russia said was “absurd” and the Venezuelan foreign minister called “childlike.”

“Europe is giving us eight days? Where do you get that you have the power to establish a deadline or an ultimatum to a sovereign people?” Venezuela’s Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza told the Security Council.

Russia also said military intervention in Venezuela should be avoided at any cost, while Caracas reiterated that its offer of dialogue with President Donald Trump’s government was still on the table despite his administration’s two-year campaign against Maduro.

“If President Trump, like other presidents of the United States, is in search of war to show he can govern and to stimulate the economy, he won’t get that war in Venezuela,” Arreaza told reporters later.

A Sputnik history lesson that tweeter hasn't censored. Yet.

US meddling in Libya led to catastrophe.

US meddling in Syria led to catastrophe.

US meddling in Ukraine led to catastrophe.

But sure... US meddling in Venezuela is totally going to lead to freedom, democracy, cupcakes and cinnabons. https://t.co/dpbQKovmo6

— Sarah Abdallah (@sahouraxo) January 26, 2019

@snoopydawg @EyeRound Trump got rid of SOS Tilerston since this was evidently the plan all along, just waiting for a stooge to come along so disaster capitalism could spring in to further action.

Putin? Heh, how about the Russian people?

They must be like many of us, scared shtless that we will end up in a nuclear war. They are fighting for their survival fo sho, so seems to me their only option these days is to get in US's face. A dangerous game that I don't support.

Tough day to be a Democratic Party hack — Trump is attempting regime change in the country that Obama officially deemed to be a “national security threat” https://t.co/KhvTbr0CSY

— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) January 23, 2019

#6 Hi gjohnsit and divineorder. Thank you for great comments and for classic video!

I hope you are right about this being saber-rattling, and of course it's bizarre to try to think that Putin may be doing the "right" thing. That's a stretch, there's always his interest in VZ oil.

I don't remember this kind of smoke screen before W's attempted coup against Chavez. Don't doubt that the action was covert, tho.

I just think Trump is taking the cover-up thing one awful step further by holding his own country hostage by way of deflecting attention away from foreign policy.

Would treason be the right word for it?

#6.1

But we might get another country to do it for us. Remember that article I posted in the EBs last week about how we're going to be ramping up action in those areas? I'll post it again if anyone wants to read it.

Not only catastrophes, but catastrophic damages. I can't begin to imagine why people who support the troops think that this is okay.

@EyeRound bizarre that Putin can do the right thing.

And Russia has its own oil.

#6 Hi gjohnsit and divineorder. Thank you for great comments and for classic video!

I hope you are right about this being saber-rattling, and of course it's bizarre to try to think that Putin may be doing the "right" thing. That's a stretch, there's always his interest in VZ oil.

I don't remember this kind of smoke screen before W's attempted coup against Chavez. Don't doubt that the action was covert, tho.

I just think Trump is taking the cover-up thing one awful step further by holding his own country hostage by way of deflecting attention away from foreign policy.

Would treason be the right word for it?

@Pluto's Republic

remembers the Iran-Contra scandal and subsequent investigation, but if he WERE to be considered credible, shouldn't the fact that he's not coming up with evidence of collusion, in fact came out against the most recent Buzzfeed story claiming to have another smoking gun, and is probably not going to supply sufficient evidence to impeach anybody--well, in short, if he's credible, shouldn't all these facts matter?

#7

But, she's actually dumb. It's not so shocking that she falls for the national bullshit (I thought she was an insider, guess not). But she makes a public statement to display her ignorance to her colleagues, the media, and the American people. She still thinks Mueller is credible. Wow.

@EyeRound Lets them off the hook. Nancy P. is a master at taking things off the table. She and The Turtle confound me. Why do they keep getting elected when all they do is back up the sad sick status quo our government is mired in? It's so strange to watch the in the bag media and the political duopoly kabuki show now that I'm no longer engaged by what passes for politics. I get a lot of grief as somehow it's my and other dropouts fault if we refuse to participate in the sick, false game at hand.

'Foreign policy' wise there is not a lick of difference between the two party's. Venezuela has been in their cross hairs since they voted out the Big Oil crowd and went slightly socialistic. It's a real grind to listen to dueling pols both D's and R's who are all bent and in the bag pretend they are going to 'investigate' whatever. Who gives a fuck what Bernie or Tulsi say they are part and parcel of the problem. Progressives? I doubt it. What an insult to the men and women who in our past history actually did fight for progress. As for Trump he's just handy dandy to the rest of the psycho killers in power who needed a foil, a scary clown to scare and divert ordinary people of good spirit so they can move forward unimpeded and implement their mutual agenda on the world and here in the USA,USA,USA!

#7 Indeed, Pricknick!

Nancy and Chuck just sat there smiling at criminal actions from the government they're supposed to be part of!

@dfarrah
Here, he goes out of his way to endorse bogus neo--lib talking points before he agrees that regime change should not be our policy. I'm similarly distressed about Bernie signing up with the Russia did it crowd.
I was a big Bernie supporter until he signed on with HRC. I do have some reservations about Tulsi, but on balance she's my choice so far.

#9 what is your point about Bernie?

He is certainly not advocating regime change, and he is talking about conditions.

@Pluto's Republic

i'd just noted this alignment to juliania at the café, so i forgot to say here: also, besides bolsonaro, colombia is now in Nato, having amerikan bases and ports, ecuador has a military alliance w/ the US now (and the hope of a huge IMF loan, to boot), etc.

stars aligned, blocking of VZ's ports has been touted by the moustached mafiosa one, iirc.

#12

This fukkery, as you say, has actively destroyed Venezuela's economy using US sanctions, blockades, and other dirty actions for quite some time. At least since we last toppled Brazil's government during Obama's first term. We've been tormenting and collectively punishing the Venezuelan people for quite a while, building up to a overt overthrow.

@EyeRound

sorry to have been so cryptic last night, but i plead exhaustion, as i'd been commenting from Davos. ; )

allow me to further use tony cartalucci's words to document why 'it's not necessarily all about US access to oil, but controlling of the oil':

“The US doesn't necessarily need this oil in terms of energy - but in terms of maintaining a US-led unipolar international order - controlling or crippling nations with large amounts of hydrocarbons prevents the emergence of a multipolar world nations across the developing world seek, led by reemerging global power - Russia - and newly emerging global power - China.

A Venezuela governed by a stable political order able to produce wealth from its massive oil reserves - and dedicated to a multipolar alternative to Washington's current international order is intolerable for Wall Street and Washington and explains the vast amount of time, energy, money, and resources the US has invested in destabilizing and overthrowing first President Hugo Chavez - with a coup attempt in 2002 - and now President Maduro.”

“ The UK Independent in a recent article titled, "Venezuela military chief declares loyalty to Maduro and warns US not to intervene," would admit (emphasis added):
The US has a long history of interfering with democratically elected governments in Latin America and in Venezuela it has sought to weaken the elected governments of both Mr Maduro and Mr Chavez.

Some of the effort has been in distributing funds to opposition groups through organisations such as the National Endowment for Democracy, while some has been in the form of simple propaganda.

Mark Weisbrot, co-director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, said that for the past 20 years it had been US policy to seek a change of government in Caracas. Mr Trump’s recognition of Mr Guaido was the most obvious effort to undermine the government.”

#12 Hi wd! I agree--this ain't no little thing and it has been brewing for quite some time.

Thank you for your comment and previous/ongoing work on this and on Assange!