Mick Hartley

Terry Glavin on Trump and Venezuela:

Most of the coverage of President Trump’s Caracas caper has been pretty superficial and muddled by shallow and partisan American coverage. Don’t be led astray. Here’s how I put it in the Post:

“If you’re not careful you’ll end up believing that Trump is primarily intent upon regime change and the restoration of democracy in Venezuela. He isn’t. He’s sidelined and humiliated Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, referring to her only as a “nice lady” who doesn’t enjoy the respect of Venezuelans.“

The scandalous fact is that the White House has now officially broken with the rest of the free world, specifically the European Parliament and Canada and several Latin American democracies that properly support Machado’s proxy, Edmundo González Urrutia. Gonzalez won the 2024 Venezuelan presidential election by at least 67 per cent of the vote. Maduro refused to relinquish power and Gonzalez, fearing for his life, fled to Spain.

The Venezuelan pretender the Trump administration recognizes as president is Bolivarian hardliner and regime fixture Delcy Rodríguez, who Trump describes as “gracious.” She’s going to the most extreme lengths to distance herself publicly from her newfound backers in Washington, giving every appearance of having had the reins of power forced into her unwilling hands.

More from Glavin on the Iran_Venezuela link, and, yes, it really is all about the oil.