American Conservative critique of Sanctions on Venezuela

Daniel Larison's writing on Venezuela may have been discussed here previously and I may have missed the discussion, but I just want to point to the humane nature of conservative communities we can relate to.

From our friends at The American Conservative:

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/larison/our-venezuela-policy-tos...

Our Venezuela Policy: Tossing a Drowning Man an Anchor
By DANIEL LARISON • March 10, 2019

… Sanctions are guaranteed to make economic conditions in Venezuela even worse than they were, and they are designed to do just that. When our government slaps crippling sanctions on another country, it does so knowing full well what that means for the civilian population.

… The people of Venezuela are struggling to stay afloat, and our government’s policy is to toss them an anchor. It is bad enough that administration policy is aimed at regime change, but the fact that it is inflicting more pain on an already suffering population makes it even worse.

(and from the Comments)

TomG says:
March 11, 2019 at 10:13 am
I think it’s a bit hard to accept the idea that the electric supply problem going into day 5 is deferred maintenance. Some disruption–sure, but these prolonged outages are just a bit too convenient. I’m sure the DC cheerleaders are diabolically grinning and tee-heeing with every news report showing growing despair of their own making.

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Steven D's picture

wing of the conservatives.

And it makes sense.

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

have no problem with battering an already fucked citizenry at home, blabbering on about how social programs cause our debt, but hey, a stopped clock can be right twice a day, right?

Sorry, but seeing the latest obscenity from the moron in chief about gutting social programs to hand money to our robber baron "defense" contractors is making my ass hurt today so I'm a bit snarky on the "conservatives" who vote consistently for just that.

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

@lizzyh7
Isn't this part of our nation's problem, though?

The Federal government continues abusing force and authority to strip away its citizen's rights, across the board for many things, such as asset forfeiture, shooting down unarmed citizens with impunity, similar tactics against OWS protestors, and the Dakota Pipeline. We still have an immense population that realizes the true problem, yet still hold varying differences in other facets of law and governance -- labeled as conservatives, libertarians, liberals, etc. Yet we still overwhelmingly face a singular, most pressing problem: The U.S. Federal Government.

The Corporate.gov we now have, strips much wealth, prosperity and opportunity from an enormous number of people, and blithely slips that wealth into the hands of a super-minority elite of their networked club of "owners." (see Carlin for an explanation, as it appears quite apt)

I still see quite often, that if an article like this, or some action by an "other," such as conservatives, or libertarians, or ???, the thinking goes akin to, "well, they like guns, so fuck 'em!" "They want us all to die with no Social Security." I think that is the self-defeating strategy, dooming us to ultimate failure to overcome; if we don't put aside the superfluous differences, and unite on our common ground, "we" are doomed.

I posit that if they, "like guns," or, "want to crush Social Security and Medicare .gov programs," is the least of the problems and can be safely ignored for the time being; the real problem is wresting control away from the tap that sucks everyone's wealth from their pockets and homes, into the MIC/Pharm/Financial/Prison corpo-complex and politician's pork projects they legislate themselves. We band together and turn that off, we find ourselves with much more wealth and opportunity that certainly many like-minded people can then turn around and devise some off-grid strategies to deal with the tangential problems. Because most of those problems are still derived from the Corporate.gov vampiric siphoning.

Just a thought...

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@ChezJfrey @ChezJfrey

wrest control of the tap from the cold dead fingers of the 1%

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we have for two years been inundated with propaganda about how RUSSIA!!! was going to sabotage our power grid. Coincidence?

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On to Biden since 1973

dystopian's picture

There has always been a non-interventionist right. Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul both often author op-ed pieces insisting on getting the heck out of everywhere. Something you never hear from 90% of Democrats, certainly not the neolib establishemnt centrists. It is one of the issues why Bernie says we have more in common with them then we think. In ways certainly more in common with them than centrist neolibs and neocons of any color.

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We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein

TheOtherMaven's picture

@dystopian

It developed out of the Republican Party, not the Democratic Party. Then as now, the Democrats were the Fatcat Party and couldn't be bothered.

Think history might repeat, or at least rhyme?

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There is no justice. There can be no peace.

wendy davis's picture

while it's far milder version than marco rubio, john bolton and guaido, still this is the tell:

"Venezuela has also been suffering from massive blackouts over the last several days. While the blackouts themselves have most likely been caused by poor maintenance, sanctions are making it more difficult for Venezuelans to cope with them..."

no no, it couldn't be sabotage, hacking the software that runs the hydro-plant at guri dam; nor could it be the long plan to make the economy scream, nor could it be from the VZ (electrical?) trade unions guaido had met with, then promised close to: bad stuff's comin' your way soon, you usurper!

sorry, linda wood, it must be that you and the commenters srsly have no idea about this next part of the coup, since the feb. 23 deadline ('let the aid convoys in' one) failed.

best to you,
wd

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