Trump recognizes Venezuela opposition leader as interim president amid mass protests against Maduro

[Tigerace117]

I doubt it would work very well. But a nicely-placed shot from a high caliber deer rifle will certainly work to take down fascistic gendarmes wearing kevlar riot gear. And it would certainly work against logistics personnel working to fuel those tanks in the field.

If one wishes to become a corpse shortly thereafter, that is.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

But a change of leadership which frees up the economy, and re-instituting rule of law rather than rule by popular dictatorship one of the only foreseeable ways that things can improve.

On this one point I must disagree because in Latin America, regime change not in the direction of socialism has always involved something to do with "The Chicago Boys", which is a sure fire recipe for endless debt and the curtailment of individual freedoms, not to mention appalling inequalities of which legend is made down in a place like that.

"Democracy" is way too important to leave to the proles.

 

[Felis Leo]

On this one point I must disagree because in Latin America, regime change not in the direction of socialism has always involved something to do with "The Chicago Boys", which is a sure fire recipe for endless debt and the curtailment of individual freedoms, not to mention appalling inequalities of which legend is made down in a place like that.

Well, I certainly do not advocate for a quasi-fascist junta like that of Chile. Just the government ending its policy of economic planning and once again allowing the market to actually function.

"Democracy" is way too important to leave to the proles.

Well, where there is no rule of law or checks and balances on the power of various government branches, democracy is of no value whatsoever. It is simply rule of unchecked power, with absolute power going to whoever garnered the most votes. You end up with Putin's Russia, or Erdogan's Turkey, or, in this case, Maduro's Venezuela. These governments were indeed democratically-elected, but to them that means they have the popular mandate (nay, the duty) to repress and crush anyone and everyone not in agreement with the majority.

 

[Kal'Stang]

Try shooting at an Abrams or a Apache with your deer rifle.

Let us know how that works out for you :lamo

What one man can build, another can tear down.

If it ever came down to a war between civilians and the government do you really think that civilians would be limited to deer rifles?

Tell me...just how is that war on terrorism going?

 

[jmotivator]

Try shooting at an Abrams or a Apache with your deer rifle.

Let us know how that works out for you :lamo

See: "Asymmetric Warfare"

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

Well, I certainly do not advocate for a quasi-fascist junta like that of Chile. Just the government ending its policy of economic planning and once again allowing the market to actually function.



Well, where there is no rule of law or checks and balances on the power of various government branches, democracy is of no value whatsoever. You end up with Putin's Russia, or Erdogan's Turkey, or, in this case, Maduro's Venezuela. These governments were indeed democratically-elected, but to them that means they have the popular mandate (nay, the duty) to repress and crush anyone and everyone not in agreement with the majority.

Oh come on, I am not talking about pure democracy, no one uses pure democracy.
I was talking about representative democracy, which again I argue, is clearly too important to leave to us mere peasants.
It's why WE have gerrymandering and Citizens United, and just to prove I am not a radical, notice that I did not mention the Electoral College, which if not for the existence of those other items, would be mostly benign.

 

[Felis Leo]

Oh come on, I am not talking about pure democracy, no one uses pure democracy.
I was talking about representative democracy, which again I argue, is clearly too important to leave to us mere peasants.
It's why WE have gerrymandering and Citizens United, and just to prove I am not a radical, notice that I did not mention the Electoral College, which if not for the existence of those other items, would be mostly benign.

I hear you, Checkerboard Strangler. I disagree that gerrymandering and Citizens United are as huge a problem as they are made out to be, as they are generally only used as post hoc rationalizations to excuse losses and de-legitimize victory by the opposition. But again, there are many representative democracies where there are in effect no checks and balances and the exercise of governmental power. Neither Russia, nor Turkey, nor Venezuela are pure democracies. They are representative republics with popularly-elected legislatures. But, again, there are no effective checks and balances on the exercise of governmental power, nor is there any constitutionally-guaranteed rule of law, and so the people may as well be electing a King, or a Czar or a Sultan for the amount of power that the government has over them.

 

[Mycroft]

Do you folks purposely forget basic civics in order to construct ignorant snark?

He's Canadian.

I'm not sure he has ever been given a basic US civics education.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

I hear you, Checkerboard Strangler. I disagree that gerrymandering and Citizens United are as huge a problem as they are made out to be, as they are generally only used as post hoc rationalizations to excuse losses and de-legitimize victory by the opposition. But again, there are many representative democracies where there are in effect no checks and balances and the exercise of governmental power. Neither Russia, nor Turkey, nor Venezuela are pure democracies. They are representative republics with popularly-elected legislatures. But there is no effective checks and balances on the exercise of governmental power, and so the people may as well be electing a King, or a Czar or a Sultan for the amount of power that the government has over them.

Count me as the guy who is going to give you a friendly piece of advice out of my respect for you, which is considerable, by the way. You may have already witnessed internal palace coups firsthand, it wouldn't surprise me.
Get ready to witness another, but not the way one might think.
This time it's the palace instigating the coup, because it is becoming quite clear that we don't have sufficient checks and balances either.
A constitutional "crisis of fidelity" will expose the rotting timbers in short order.

PS: There is no way I can muster up an adequate explanation of gerrymandering here in the last five election cycles but I urge you to peruse some of the case histories. Not just POTUS elections, ALL elections.

 

[Mycroft]

The big potential loser here is China.

They have a lot of money invested in Maduro. And, especially in their oil. This "coup" or whatever you want to call it will have a big economic impact on China when they least need it since their own economy is slowing down.

When you get right down to it, it's always about money.

 

[Tigerace117]

What one man can build, another can tear down.

If it ever came down to a war between civilians and the government do you really think that civilians would be limited to deer rifles?

Tell me...just how is that war on terrorism going?

What I think is that Americans have a lot of masturbatory fantasies about guerrilla warfare and the ease thereof.

No Americans in at least fifty years have had to fight without total superiority in air power, artillery, tanks, etc.

But it’s more than that.

Guerrilla warfare is all about being able to endure.

About being able to take colossal casualties and staying in the fight.

There is zero evidence the American people are capable of any such thing.

Well, according to your president ISIS has been crushed and the Taliban have taken immense casualties.

That doesn’t sound like a great guerrilla track record to me.

 

[Tigerace117]

See: "Asymmetric Warfare"

See: Americans losing heart and pulling out of Somalia after an incident with about a hundred total casualties......

 

[Kal'Stang]

What I think is that Americans have a lot of masturbatory fantasies about guerrilla warfare and the ease thereof.

No Americans in at least fifty years have had to fight without total superiority in air power, artillery, tanks, etc.

But it’s more than that.

Guerrilla warfare is all about being able to endure.

About being able to take colossal casualties and staying in the fight.

There is zero evidence the American people are capable of any such thing.

Well, according to your president ISIS has been crushed and the Taliban have taken immense casualties.

That doesn’t sound like a great guerrilla track record to me.

And I think that you under estimate the American People.

And while your President has said those things, no one really believes it.

 

[jmotivator]

See: Americans losing heart and pulling out of Somalia after an incident with about a hundred total casualties......

See: You kicking the ball into your own net.

 

[maxparrish]

Maduro does need to go, but what Trump has done here is wrong. Lets put it this way.. how would you feel if countries started to recognize Pelosi or Clinton as the rightful leader of the US?

Also this guy who now claims he is the new president.. instantly lost legitimacy in the country. The US is toxic in the country and Trump is double toxic.

People forget that Maduro is democratically elected and does have a lot of backing in the country.

He is "democratically elected" only in the sense that most left totalitarian regimes hold "elections" that are either rigged or ignored, as necessary. No one who is both sane and informed would characterize the one-party state of the Venezuelan government as either a democracy or a republican government, not anymore than Germany after Hitler's legal appointment as chancellor was.

And yes, he does have some backing: from party loyalists sharing in the ration packages, and the Chavez/Maduro hand picked corrupt military, perhaps 1/4 of the country at best.

Democratic posturing for authoritarian and totalitarian one party states (be they Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, Cuba or Venezuela) is not new, nor are their fellow traveling transmission belts of propaganda - as you apparently are.

 

[slick]

This may come as a shock to you but an awfully large number of tyrannical dictators get there through the electoral processes of their countries. The only other commonly available methods are violent coup d'etat, which is somewhat less reliable and often very expensive and thus far too risky, or through the dynastic process, which is generally unavailable to most Western countries.

Reread what I posted you're seconding my point, thanx. The fatal flaw of democracy in multicultural nations. Amy Chua:

Markets concentrate wealth in the hands of a capable ethnic minority. Democracy empires the ethnic majority. When the latter begin
to share a larger share of the wealth tyrannical dictators arise to meet those demands. Chavez's swept into power winning the
trust and favor of the primarily poor and destitute & the future of the country has since tended for the most part downward reaching
the tragic situation which confronts that country now. Venezuela is the canary in the coal mine it may be the harbinger of what is to
come with the rise of third world America!

 

[HumblePi]

It's about that time....Next Maduro will use military force to end the "insurrection". This is what eventually happens when you allow your government to disarm you.

It also happens when you allow a man to be elected to the office of president illegitimately, particularly one that's a populist dictator-type.

 

[HumblePi]

If it's possible to take your eyes off the shutdown, the wall and the looming threat of withdrawal of the U.S. from NATO, I strongly suggest that we keep our eyes and ears out for news of Venezuela. There's going to be a mess over there very soon. Once the U.S. orders our diplomats out of Venezuela, expect something bad to happen. Russia is already a presence in Venezuela. Just last month, two of Russia's Tu-160 nuclear jets landed in Venezuela, flying over the Caribbean Sea on route. Putin has invested many millions of rubles to procure the election of Maduro, and he expects his five pieces of gold in return. As he did in the U.S. election, Putin poured resources and money into influencing the election for Maduro. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the opposition to Nicolás Maduro was becoming “pawns in someone else’s very dirty and criminal game".

So what's their objective? What could possibly be worth straining the foundations of the government in Vzla by punishing the citizens by starving them and depriving them of basic things like toilet paper? 'Oil baby, Oil'. Venezuela's offshore oil reserves are purported to be vaster than the oil reserves of Saudi Arabia and Russia combined. I'd say that's motivation for foreign entities to try to get hold of.

I have a friend that was born and raised in Venezuela and left 3 years ago, a year or two after Maduro was elected. The severity of the shortages has led to the largest refugee crisis ever recorded in the Americas. My son lives in Colombia which shares a border with Venezuela. Both Colombia and Bolivia are experiencing massive increases of refugees seeking asylum from Venezuela's harsh conditions. There are shortages of milk, meat, coffee, rice, oil, precooked flour, butter, toilet paper, personal hygiene products and medicines. Just about everything people need to exist are not available to them, and people cannot eat or drink oil.

If we witness something like the U.S. ordering all diplomats and U.S. citizens out of Venezuela, then you can bet there's going to be a horrible human crisis that is about to happen. Something else to consider here, last May, Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos announced that his country will be entering the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) as a "global partner." President Maduro of Venezuela was not pleased.

This is his statement:
"Venezuela denounces once more before the international community the intention of Colombian authorities to lend themselves to introduce, in Latin America and the Caribbean, a foreign military alliance with nuclear capacity, which in every way constitutes a serious threat for peace and regional stability." Let's put facts out, Colombia is a NATO partner, Venezuela and Russia are not NATO members or supporters.

Does anyone else see a powder keg here?

 

[JustHanging]

Guaido is as socialist as the rest of them. This isn't an improvement for Venezuala. The new boss is just as socialist the old boss.

The thing is, more "socialist" western nations tend to be a lot better places to live than the USA. More freedoms, better education, better healthcare, less hatred. The list goes on and on. Maybe you should try to look at things for yourself?

 

[Carjosse]

Does he? As far as I know the legislative does not elect the President..the people do.

Sent from my Honor 8X using Tapatalk

He is only acting president until new elections are held for a legitimate president.

 

[apdst]

The thing is, more "socialist" western nations tend to be a lot better places to live than the USA. More freedoms, better education, better healthcare, less hatred. The list goes on and on. Maybe you should try to look at things for yourself?

Like Venezuala? Move there, if it's so great.

 

[Tigerace117]

See: You kicking the ball into your own net.

Americans not having the stomach to stay the course is evidence of Americans being good at asymmetrical warfare?


You do realize how made casualties the Somalis took.....right?

 

[Tigerace117]

And I think that you under estimate the American People.

And while your President has said those things, no one really believes it.

Wishful thinking is not evidence.

All one has to do is look at casualty lists to see what a thin skin Americans have for them.

That doesn’t work out well when you want to conduct guerrilla warfare

 

[Rogue Valley]

I think the Brass got a bit nervous....

Russia Sent Warplanes To Venezuela And The Pentagon Isn't Having It

 

[Kal'Stang]

It also happens when you allow a man to be elected to the office of president illegitimately, particularly one that's a populist dictator-type.

Why do I get the feeling that you're not talking about Maduro here?