The Coup Attempt in Venezuela

So, Juan Guaido has declared himself the President of Venezuela. (He wasn’t elected as such.)

The US and Canada have recognized him, along with Brazil, Argentina, and Peru, among others. (Freeland, the Canadian Foreign Minister did so while on stage with Brazil’s Bolsonaro, who won an election after his main opposition was locked up. The person responsible for that is now his Minister of Justice.)

All perfectly above board, I guess.

I’ve never been a huge fan of the Bolivaran revolution, mostly because it was mismanaged. But this is clearly a foreign-supported coup against an elected leader. Venezuela’s election was no more compromised than, say, the 2000 US election–or many other elections.

It’s probably just a coincidence that Venezuela has the world’s largest oil reserves.

The Venezuelan situation is complicated, but there appears to be no question that the opposition forces (pale, middle, and upper class) have done everything they could to sandbag the government, up to and including destroying consumer goods so they could enhance shortages. Meanwhile, Maduro has generally had the support of the darker-skinned, lower classes descended from Indians.

Meanwhile, the US, of course, has punitive sanctions on Venezuela.

The Bolivaran revolution has not been well managed, but the criticism that “socialism always fails, because the US always makes it fail” is looking more and more valid.

The US has said “all options” are possible if Maduro crushes the opposition, which is code for using military force.

Maduro, of course, is perfectly within his rights to use force to capture someone declaring themselves President without being elected.

This has been coming for some time.

So far, despite his various failings, Trump has not been as bad as Obama simply because he has not started a war. (Yes, yes, he has been nastier to various people in the US rather than people who live in other countries.)

If he starts a war here, this will no longer be the case.

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