Relations between Washington and Berlin have gotten cool in recent years, and yesterday Berlin had to assert it's independence from the U.S.

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...

The Washington political establishment appears to be ready to do something that can't be undone. Once you sanction your allies either they fold, or they stop being allies.

Venezuela only has one big export - oil - and almost no one willing to risk American sanctions in order to buy it. Europe won't defy us, and neither will much of Latin America.

But one nation you probably don't think about will dare to risk sanctions.

This is the exact situation any sane politician/diplomat will have wanted to avoid.
You never want to be in a position of sanctioning your allies, but that's what happens when you ignore them.

In September Turkey decided to buy a Russian S-400 missile system in defiance of U.S. sanction threats.
The threats remain, but the sanctions never happened.

It appears that India is falling out of Washington's sphere of influence.

When it comes to being smart about picking fights, the Trump Administration fails in spectacular fashion.

On September 13, U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry threatened to impose sanctions on our ally over the construction of an underwater natural-gas pipeline between Russia and Germany, known as Nord Stream 2.

Back in 2017, the U.S. and our allies imposed "sanctions against entities supporting or investing in Russia's oil and gas pipeline networks."
The sanctions were intended to delay and hamper Russia's ability to develop various energy projects.

With that in mind, let's look at headlines from just this week.