The FIFA Peace Prize just doesn’t mean what it used to.
Over the weekend, the president decided that America, with its extensive history of destabilizing foreign governments and then becoming hopelessly mired for years in the mess that follows—and then ultimately leaving the country (if not the entire region) in worse shape than before, was going to try country-runnin’ again, this time in Venezuela.
Because Venezuela has a lot of oil. And there are no Epstein files there.
Call it Operation Oily Epstein.
We know these are the reasons for the invasion and taking prisoner Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro, because the stated reason—that Maduro was operating a drug smuggling organization—is thoroughly and hopelessly unbelievable.
Oh, Maduro was most certainly part of such an organization. But the U.S. military had to literally fly over or past at least five other countries with such an organization before landing at Venezuela. Those other five, though, didn’t have oil.
Honestly, if you believe the stated reason for this U.S. intervention—and I want to put this as gently as possible—you are a moron.
First, Venezuela is not a major producer of the narcotics, such as fentanyl, that have killed record numbers of Americans over the last few years. Mexico is, and its cartels are the ones largely responsible for trafficking those drugs into America.
And what drugs Venezuela does produce, namely cocaine, flow mostly to Europe. What portion does find its way into America flows through—you want to guess?—the cartels in Mexico. Which we skipped over to get to Venezuela.
Second, Trump and Republicans are the same people who have done absolutely zero to curtail the sale of firearms in America, despite nearly 50,000 deaths annually from firearms in this country. Do you really think the same people who keep offering nothing more than thoughts and prayers when American classrooms are shot to hell are now kidnapping a foreign leader because they’ve suddenly become concerned about death tolls and the safety of the average American?
Please.
They just ended insurance subsidies and cut off millions of people’s access to drug treatment and rehab services. They’re going to kill more Americans in the coming years than Venezuelan cocaine ever did.
Finally, third, if Trump were truly concerned about foreign leaders pushing illegal drugs into America, he wouldn’t have pardoned former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez, a man convicted in a U.S. court of drug trafficking and weapons trafficking charges. Convicted.
This has zero to do with illegal drugs.
But such an explanation is one that allows our feckless Alabama congressional delegation, save for Democrats Terri Sewell and Shomari Figures, to laud Trump as “tough” and promote the whole thing as Trump and Republicans standing up for American citizens. One of these clowns actually referred to it as “courageous.”
My God.
We’ve lost the meaning of “tough” and “courageous.” We used to know it. But it’s been redefined over the past few years by a gang of silver-spoon juveniles who have never faced a hard decision in their lives, and who have applied a middle school-level definition that usually involves someone else with a gun jumping out of a helicopter in a dangerous place to do a wholly unnecessary thing.
That ain’t tough.
Oh, make no mistake, the man or woman at the other end of the orders is tough. They’re trained and brave. They’ve dedicated themselves to the protection of this country and they’re willing to do whatever it takes—and whatever they’re ordered—to defend America.
Those tough people have been abused and misused repeatedly by war mongering weasels who are all too happy to trot out someone else’s sons and daughters to do these things so they can proclaim “toughness” and puff out their chests in a phony display of courage and bravado.
Actual toughness, though, is doing the hard things the right way.
Following the laws. Following the constitution. Respecting international laws and working with our allies. Making damn sure that we do not put those dedicated men and women in harm’s way unless it’s necessary, and ensuring above all else that we never, ever ask them to participate in an action—particularly for the sole benefit of oil companies—that is illegal or unconstitutional.
The kidnapping of Maduro is likely both.
(Let me make one thing clear right here: Maduro is a bad guy. A very bad guy. And no one is losing a second of sleep over his plight. I have absolutely no issue with him being arrested and tried, as Hernandez was, in a U.S. court. But there are legitimate, sanctioned means for doing so. And we ignored all of them.)
Here we are again, though, with another Republican president going around Congress (it appears from statements Trump made that the administration had time to brief and work with major American oil companies but not with Congress) to commit the U.S. to “running” another foreign country. Has that ever, in the entire history of time, worked out? Even a little bit?
We know how this will go.
A handful of rich people will get richer. A bunch of poor people’s sons and daughters will die in a foreign land doing a job that no one can quite define, and certainly no one can tie directly to American safety or security. We’ll spend billions of taxpayer dollars. Some defense industry companies will do very well. And we’ll one day leave with the country somehow in a bigger mess than when we found it.
Just like in Iraq. Just like in Afghanistan. Just like in Vietnam. Just like throughout Central America.
But hey, no one’s talking about those Epstein files right now.
