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Speaker 1: Al Zone Media, Welcome back to it could happen here,

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Speaker 1: a podcast about it happening well in various places, and

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Speaker 1: given the nature of our digital, interconnected society, it is

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Speaker 1: happening here all the time.

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Speaker 2: But if you're even casually aware of what's going on

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Speaker 2: in the world right now, it is particularly happening in

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Speaker 2: Venezuela right now. And joining me to talk about the

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Speaker 2: US led and executed kidnapping of a world leader is

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Speaker 2: my two favorite kidnappers, Mia Wong and James Stout.

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Speaker 3: Glad to be Hererobit, joining you to discuss kidnapping, one

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Speaker 3: of my favorite topics.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, my lawyers have advised me not to respond to

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Speaker 4: the statement.

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Speaker 2: Now, given all the people you both kidnapped, how are

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Speaker 2: you just rating this on a technical level as kidnappings go,

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Speaker 2: you know, on a level from let's say the while,

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Speaker 2: if I remember the name of that guy with the plane,

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Speaker 2: would have been a funnier joke. I forgot his name though, No, no, no,

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Speaker 2: he was on a plane, didn't have a plane.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a reverse kidnapper. He kidnapped, He did on

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Speaker 4: kidnap himself, everyone on the plane.

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Speaker 2: I was talking about Lindberg. Charles Lindberg. But the jokes,

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Speaker 2: the joke's over. So let's talk about the international crimes

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Speaker 2: our government's doing. Ye did, did and doing.

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Speaker 3: I'm drinking a white claw, so I've got about the

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Speaker 3: same legal jurisdiction as they have because there is no

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Speaker 3: lawyeh when you're drinking white wall yeah, which I think

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Speaker 3: is the legal argument.

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Speaker 2: I mean, yeah. So what happened is, while most of

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Speaker 2: us were asleep last Saturday night, the United States, using

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Speaker 2: a mix of special forces like Tier one operators this

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Speaker 2: was like adulta force operation, primarily a whole bunch of

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Speaker 2: helicopters that looked like a mix of Blackhawks and Chinooks,

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Speaker 2: carried out a series of airstrikes on Caracas and kidnapped

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Speaker 2: the president of Venezuela, Nicholas Maduro, and his wife, killing

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Speaker 2: a significant chunk of their security detail, including thirty two

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Speaker 2: Cubans who are acting as essentially like military advisors slash

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Speaker 2: security for Maduro. Yeah, he has been taken back to

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Speaker 2: the United States. He's been arraigned in New York. They're

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Speaker 2: charging him with a variety of drug and gun related crimes,

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Speaker 2: including some weird shit like possession of a machine gun

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Speaker 2: under US law, which is really weird. I guess they're

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Speaker 2: arguing that his control of the Venezuelan military counted as

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Speaker 2: a legal possession of an automatic weapon. Yeah, it's weird.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, And guessing it involves using the machine gun in

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Speaker 3: the furtherance of another crime, because there are specific charges

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Speaker 3: for like NFA violations related to drug things. Sure, but

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Speaker 3: it still seems very weird to tag that on there.

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Speaker 3: Like when what you're doing is kidnapping a world leader,

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Speaker 3: you can't just also be like, oh, and he's got

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Speaker 3: a gun, like when he come on the forces of

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Speaker 3: a country. It's very strange, right.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: This also, I think pins into what's really really weird

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Speaker 4: about this. There's two aspects of this that are just

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Speaker 4: what the fuck. One of them is that the legal justification,

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Speaker 4: this is given to Mike Lee from Secretary of State

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Speaker 4: Marco Rubio, was that the reason that there were air

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Speaker 4: strikes in the legal justification was protecting US soldiers carrying.

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Speaker 2: Out the US law enforcement. The military was needed to

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Speaker 2: protect the DEA agents who are actually conducting the arrest, right,

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Speaker 2: is the legal justification.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, the chances of some kind of due process violation

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Speaker 3: are hot. This all hinges on you thinking that the

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Speaker 3: law is a fixed thing, right, not an instrument of

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Speaker 3: the state and an instrument of power. And I think

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Speaker 3: that a more plausible analysis here is that the law

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Speaker 3: is not a fixed thing. But like in this instance, right,

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Speaker 3: if we go with that line, like the DA people

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Speaker 3: were there to ensure you process and to make the

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Speaker 3: arrest right and in theory I've read that they literally

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Speaker 3: had someone mirandize him, right.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, which, okay, I want to I do want to

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Speaker 4: put seth the thing curetaux. And this is something that CNN,

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Speaker 4: like when they were reporting on this point. So this

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Speaker 4: is insane because this implies that US law applies in Venezuela.

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Speaker 2: Right, which it doesn't.

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Speaker 3: Absolutely does.

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Speaker 4: That's literally the point. The point of a state is

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Speaker 4: that your law applies inside of your board.

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Speaker 2: The argument that they are making because Trump directly and

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Speaker 2: and prior to this had called into relevance the Monroe doctrine, right,

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Speaker 2: which is basically stating that everything happening in the Americas

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Speaker 2: is the purview of the United States. So this was

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Speaker 2: initially uh and they're still arguing that it is kind

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Speaker 2: of a a what President Monroe was using as an

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Speaker 2: excuse for intervening in situations where foreign colonizers were attempting

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Speaker 2: to exert power and colonies they own owned in the

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Speaker 2: Americas or had owned in the Americas, right, And the

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Speaker 2: US is basically saying, fuck you, this is our backyard. Right.

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Speaker 2: And I think the the argument that they're making now

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Speaker 2: is that that's relevant because Iran and Russia and Cuba

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Speaker 2: all have political and business interests in Venezuela, particularly Cuba.

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Speaker 2: But in a more broad sense, they're making the argument,

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Speaker 2: and Stephen Miller has made this very directly, that the

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Speaker 2: Americas are all kind of our property and we're perfectly

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Speaker 2: justified in intervening to take resources that we want because

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Speaker 2: we shouldn't have to just accept that a foreign country

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Speaker 2: has different opinions on how those resources should be used

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Speaker 2: in the United States, and that we have no moral

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Speaker 2: responsibility to listen to what other people want in our hemisphere.

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Speaker 2: It's our hemisphere, and we, meaning the Trump administration, should

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Speaker 2: do whatever we want.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, And I think there's two kinds of legal effective

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Speaker 4: here things that are important.

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Speaker 2: One.

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Speaker 4: I think there's that one, which is, yeah, the American

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Speaker 4: Empire is just saying we are an empire and we

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Speaker 4: could do whatever we want. But then there's also the

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Speaker 4: does the president have the power to do this unilaterally

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Speaker 4: piece of it, which no, he no, like just does

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Speaker 4: not like this. This is objectively an act of war,

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Speaker 4: right and previously right, A lot of administrations have done

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Speaker 4: things kind of like this, yeah, right, but like everything

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Speaker 4: has been under the fig leaf of the AUMF, right,

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Speaker 4: the two thousand and one Authorization of Use a Military Force,

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Speaker 4: which if you go back and read the document, the

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Speaker 4: actual like AUMF, it's very clear that it's anyone who's

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Speaker 4: related to nine to eleven. Yeah, yeah, and so this

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Speaker 4: has been used to do interventions in like places. There

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Speaker 4: are things that have nothing to do with this, right,

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Speaker 4: But this is not even that. This is just the

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Speaker 4: president claiming that he can do acts of war.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, And I guess the justification that they gave was

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Speaker 3: the example they cited was Nat Diego right in eighty

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Speaker 3: nine Panama, Right, But that was that was a war

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Speaker 3: that was operation, like American soldiers died, right. No, Diego

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Speaker 3: went to the Vatican embassy and eventually, I believe you

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Speaker 3: surrounded him. They've like blasted you two him, which is

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Speaker 3: obviously a war crime. And he eventually left the embassy

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Speaker 3: around negotiated his exit, I guess, but that's a completely

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Speaker 3: different thing to just bouncing into the residence of the

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Speaker 3: president of another country at night black backg.

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Speaker 2: Like that's also debatably legal, But yes, it was a

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Speaker 2: different Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Very very much. Yeah, it's also wrong, like.

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Speaker 2: We're not defending what was done there. I know, this

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Speaker 2: is even more blatant, right, It's like, it's not defending

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Speaker 2: what George W. Bush did in Iraq to be like,

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Speaker 2: at least they bothered to pretend there was a justificate,

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Speaker 2: Like they spent some time really cooking up a justification

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Speaker 2: and some effort, and there's none of that here. They

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Speaker 2: just don't give a shit anymore. Right. That's that you're

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Speaker 2: not being like an means it was okay with Bush. It,

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Speaker 2: you're just pointing out it's even more mask off now, right.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: Well, and I think it is different in that, like

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Speaker 4: the invasion of a rock involved Congress, this is just

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Speaker 4: Trump going I can do this, right, And that's really

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Speaker 4: fucking alarming. Yeah that he just is like, yeah, fuck it,

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Speaker 4: I can just do a war now completely by myself.

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Speaker 4: None of you have any fucking power war for me.

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Speaker 4: I can just declare war a thing that is explicitly

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Speaker 4: in the Constitution, like supposed to be Congress's job. And

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Speaker 4: I think that's really that's another very allowering part of this,

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Speaker 4: because this is I think, by far the most just Trump,

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Speaker 4: pure dictatorshit that we've seen so far, and it's not

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Speaker 4: being treated like that. Yeah, because a lot of sort

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Speaker 4: of like I don't know that there's a lot of

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Speaker 4: people who wanted this something like this to happen, and

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Speaker 4: so they're kind of just not looking at the fact

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Speaker 4: that this is just this is just pure dictatorship shit.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. I think a lot of people, because they didn't

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Speaker 3: like Maduro, they're waiting to look aside from the means

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Speaker 3: as long as they get the ends they want. But

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Speaker 3: the means are extremely serious here.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think we should acknowledge, like stop for

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Speaker 2: a second to talk about the Maduro of it all,

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Speaker 2: because my stance is that his legitimacy as president, his

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Speaker 2: personal legitimacy, whether or not he's committed crimes are all

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Speaker 2: completely irrelevant. Right. I have not, in any of my

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Speaker 2: public facing statements I've been in the past years ago,

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Speaker 2: talked about how I wish the protests had worked to

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Speaker 2: remove him from office within sort of like the context

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Speaker 2: of Venezuelan's actually having their way, kicking him out and

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Speaker 2: replacing him with something better. But I have not brought

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Speaker 2: up any of that in the context of what's happened

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Speaker 2: recently because it doesn't matter, right, Like, fundamentally, it doesn't

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Speaker 2: matter if Maduro is like completely legitimately elected and the

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Speaker 2: people's hero or a complete fraud and an authoritarian. That

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Speaker 2: has nothing to do with whether or not the US

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Speaker 2: has any illegal or moral justification for coming in arresting

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Speaker 2: this guy and then saying we own the country and

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Speaker 2: we don't. It's dictator shit, it's fascist, it's deeply wrong,

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Speaker 2: it's bad. Like, there's nothing else to say if you

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Speaker 2: find anyone getting caught in starting to be like, well,

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Speaker 2: but you know, Maduro did this, Maduro did that. That

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Speaker 2: is either a person who is acting in bad faith

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Speaker 2: or a person who has themselves been tricked, right, because

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Speaker 2: you don't need to discuss any of that. None of

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Speaker 2: that is relevant to what we're talking about here, which

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Speaker 2: is that the US, like this is a violation of

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Speaker 2: international law and all of the kinds of norms that

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Speaker 2: we attempted to put in place after World War two

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Speaker 2: to stop another catastrophe like that from happening, and it

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Speaker 2: is only going to embolden the worst instincts of both

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Speaker 2: the people running the United States right now. They will

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Speaker 2: continue to try to do shit like this, and it's

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Speaker 2: going to embolden the worst instincts of other leaders around

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Speaker 2: the world. It is comprehensively bad for everyone.

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Speaker 4: The comprehensive result of this is again the US has

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Speaker 4: annexed I guess Venezuela that Trump is claiming that he

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Speaker 4: personally and his Secretary of State and his Council of

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Speaker 4: advisors are not like now, control and run a country.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: This is so evil.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's very unclear who's going to be doing

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Speaker 2: Because Trump made those that statement, Rubio walked it back

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Speaker 2: a little bit and said that, like, well, we'll be

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Speaker 2: working with the administration in place, which is, by the way,

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Speaker 2: just the same administration that existed before, merely with the

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Speaker 2: vice president taking on the role of president.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, we should talk about it a little bit.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. After that backtracked a little bit too, to try

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Speaker 2: and be more in line with the Boss. But it's

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Speaker 2: very unclear what they actually intend and what they mean

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Speaker 2: by saying we're running it, because from what I've read,

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Speaker 2: it doesn't look like Rubio is actually going to be

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Speaker 2: mannered like while he's been the guy taking point on

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Speaker 2: justifying this, I don't think he's going to actually be

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Speaker 2: managed any of this on a day to day basis.

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Speaker 2: He's got a lot on his plate already. Stephen Miller

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Speaker 2: seems to be the guy who is trying to position

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Speaker 2: himself to actually be the Paul Brimmer in this situation.

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Speaker 2: Who was the guy that the Bush administration put in

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Speaker 2: charge of dealing with of like running a rack after

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Speaker 2: it was taken over.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, the viceroy.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's unclear what is Miller going to get

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Speaker 2: that job? Will Rubio wind up doing it. It's looking

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Speaker 2: more like Miller right now, But also to what extent

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Speaker 2: will that job actually be running things? And you know,

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Speaker 2: we'll talk about that in a little bit, I'm sure.

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Speaker 2: But the kind of cliffs notes of the situation is

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Speaker 2: that there is evidence that came out right after the

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Speaker 2: kidnapping that Baduro's vice president had reached out to the

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Speaker 2: United States previously, like before the kidnapping, to talk about

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Speaker 2: the possibility of taking over the country after giving madear

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Speaker 2: up or him having a managed exile all of that

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Speaker 2: was discussed, and at least per the reporting on it,

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Speaker 2: she was turned down by the United States because they

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Speaker 2: thought they had a better option, and that option seems

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Speaker 2: to have fallen through largely because the quote unquote democratically

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Speaker 2: elected opposition leader who won a Nobel prize pissed off Trump.

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Speaker 2: It's unclear how accurate that is that by you know,

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Speaker 2: by winning the prompt by accepting the Nobel prize, did

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Speaker 2: she get Eric kick herself out of the job. That's

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Speaker 2: what some reporting has suggested. It's unclear to me how

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Speaker 2: true that actually is. It seems possible, surely, But at

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Speaker 2: the end of the day, there was this offer made

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Speaker 2: by Maduro's VP that was turned down by the US.

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Speaker 2: And now it seems like, although we don't actually know

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Speaker 2: what's happened to the background, it seems like she's who

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Speaker 2: were working with. So either they came back and said,

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Speaker 2: you know, it will take the deal, or something else

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Speaker 2: is going on. But she has both made this statements

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Speaker 2: publicly that like, this is illegal, the United States is

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Speaker 2: run by a group of criminals and extremists, and also

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Speaker 2: but we'll work with them. So it does kind of

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Speaker 2: seem to me like she made in fact, be very

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Speaker 2: much in bed with the Trump administration and just trying

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Speaker 2: to like massage this for her public, you know, because

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Speaker 2: there's only so much you can get away with. I

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Speaker 2: don't know.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, just to be clear on the timeline, Robert, Yeah,

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Speaker 3: the first reporting of that, like Rodriguez option, we want

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Speaker 3: to call it that. Yeah, they call it as well,

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Speaker 3: was in October. That was out before the strike happened, right,

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Speaker 3: and at least in the Miami Herald story they suggested

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Speaker 3: that he had been part of that, so this could

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Speaker 3: be a different thing, but that he had offered to

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Speaker 3: step down over years, right.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so I say it looked like there was a

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Speaker 2: period of time where he was talking about like a

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Speaker 2: managed exit, Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Going to Kato or Turkey or something like that. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: now Rodriguez to Nina, But what would you expect Dlsea.

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Speaker 2: Rodriguez And yeah, it's unclear. Again, we don't really know.

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Speaker 2: Did they just remove Maduro without having a plan and

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Speaker 2: hadn't really finished talking with her or worked something out.

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Speaker 2: It was the last thing she heard from them, them

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Speaker 2: saying nah, we won't take this option, right, and then

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Speaker 2: Maduro gets kidnapped. Did they work out a separate deal?

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Speaker 2: That just hasn't been reported on. We actually don't know,

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Speaker 2: And I could totally see her being a stooge for

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Speaker 2: US action here because it keeps her in power and

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Speaker 2: it keeps her safe because Trump very recently threatened her,

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Speaker 2: like after she made statements calling his team a bunch

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Speaker 2: of extremists, she backpedaled and said, actually, if we're where,

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Speaker 2: we'll go in to work with the US, because Trump said,

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Speaker 2: I'll do something worse to you than I did to him. Like,

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Speaker 2: we don't know if they actually ironed out a set

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Speaker 2: of responsibilities and obligations in back channels, or if we

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Speaker 2: just removed Maduro and are like, all right, well, if

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Speaker 2: we have to kill her, we'll kill her too, Like

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Speaker 2: it's unclear what actually happened there.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, So we should also mention so this is

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Speaker 4: being recorded on the night of Monday, January fifth. You're right,

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Speaker 4: every kind of six or eight hours, new conflicting information

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Speaker 4: from the Truck Administration about what their plan is comes

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Speaker 4: out right, which which leads me to suspect they don't

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Speaker 4: have a plan at all, because it keeps changing every

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Speaker 4: couple of hours. So I don't know. But but in case,

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Speaker 4: by the time this comes out. There is some kind

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Speaker 4: of public deal that's been worked out. That's what's going on.

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Speaker 4: This is all changing extremely rapidly.

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Speaker 2: Yeah right, and you know what else changes rapidly, the

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Speaker 2: economics of podcasting. Yeah, here's some of that.

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Speaker 3: These white coats working fowl.

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Speaker 2: And we're back. James is drinking a bad white claw,

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Speaker 2: which is really I think the information our audience is

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Speaker 2: most interested in. You know, invasions of Venezuela come and go.

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Speaker 2: The US kidnaps people all the time. But James drinking

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Speaker 2: a bad white claw. Let's let's let's actually really check it. James,

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Speaker 2: what's the flavor you're you're experiencing right now?

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Speaker 3: Let me getting updated to that, bro. But that is

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Speaker 3: green apple?

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Speaker 2: Green apple?

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Speaker 3: M oh boy, Yeah, yeah, it's it's foul. I wouldn't

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Speaker 3: recommend it. You're in the.

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Speaker 2: Market, Yeah that sounds awful.

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Speaker 3: Don't do it to yourself.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really the having Delta force kidnap you from

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Speaker 2: your house of beverage.

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Speaker 3: Yeah absolutely, Uh, that's how they market Actually sweet, that's

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Speaker 3: that's on the can right right. They must have got

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Speaker 3: advance warning, like the time.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, what did they know and when did they know it?

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Speaker 2: We'll never know, so let's keep talking about Venezuela. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: we should talk about who Rodriguezz.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Soguez was vice president and now she is president

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Speaker 3: or will be sworny in its president. I believe she

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Speaker 3: may have already been sworn him by the time you

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Speaker 3: hear this.

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Speaker 2: She was sworn in I think like a couple hours ago.

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Speaker 2: For the last article I.

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Speaker 3: Read, So her father was a Marxist gorilla. Her father

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Speaker 3: kidnapped an American businessman, was arrested and then murdered, like

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Speaker 3: torture to death. Yeah, as part of the quote unquie

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Speaker 3: investigation into that. Right, her and her brother are kind

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Speaker 3: of like a power block in Venezuelan politic. She has

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Speaker 3: really become more relevant, I guess nationally since MyD Like,

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Speaker 3: she did do some stuff with Chaves early on, but

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Speaker 3: like clashed with him personally and I guess allegedly, I

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Speaker 3: mean I wasn't there, but Chaves didn't like that she

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Speaker 3: wasn't deferential to him, and at one point send her

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Speaker 3: home from I think they were in Russia and he

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Speaker 3: sent her home from a a sort of mission that

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Speaker 3: they were doing their diplomatic mission. Since then, she is

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Speaker 3: assuming a number of roles in Venezuelan government from since

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Speaker 3: twenty thirteen right when Mondora came to power, to include

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Speaker 3: overseeing intelligence at some time, and she has now become

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Speaker 3: obviously president. Right, she has previously worked with like the

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Speaker 3: Venezuelan I guess the analogy would be like Chamber of Commerce,

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Speaker 3: which had previously been seen by like Chubby small as

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Speaker 3: like a bourgeois enter di I either enemy. Right, she

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Speaker 3: has shown willingness to work with business, So I do

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Speaker 3: wonder if that factors into the US analysis that, like,

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Speaker 3: if she's willing to work with what it looks like

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Speaker 3: the oil companies that they want her to work with,

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Speaker 3: then then they can overlook a whole lot of other stuff, right,

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Speaker 3: which has historically been how the US has approached places

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Speaker 3: with oil. But Yeah, in terms of this, I think

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Speaker 3: that's probably the sort of TLDR on her career. And

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Speaker 3: I think it is possible that she's willing to do

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Speaker 3: some kind of chuvis more like you know whatever we're

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Speaker 3: going to call this and have us extractive capitalism exists

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Speaker 3: so long as the regime continues to exist. But the

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Speaker 3: way that would work is still something that like I

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Speaker 3: can't really get my head around for a regime which

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Speaker 3: has made so much of its rhetorical legitimacy for so

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Speaker 3: long attacking the United States.

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Speaker 2: Right right, Yeah, And that's kind of I mean, that

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Speaker 2: seems to be the quandary Delsea finds herself in is

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Speaker 2: she both has to refer to what's happened accurately as

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Speaker 2: kidnapping and the actions of an illegitimate and deeply corrupt regime.

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Speaker 2: And also she can't act that way if what we

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Speaker 2: all think is accurate and she's basically acting as a

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Speaker 2: negotiated buppet of the United States. She can only go

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Speaker 2: so far. And I feel like she's trapped in kind

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Speaker 2: of a doomed situation, which may be part of what

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Speaker 2: our administration intends is for her to be fundamentally doomed

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Speaker 2: and fail and get coued herself, or you know, we

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Speaker 2: can replace her when there's protests against legitimacy. Like, I

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Speaker 2: don't know what exactly the game is here, but I

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Speaker 2: think that maybe something that was baked into the equation

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Speaker 2: that like, this is not a functional situation for her,

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Speaker 2: and when she gets forced out, that's something we can

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Speaker 2: take advantage of.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's the reason of analysis, I think. I mean,

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Speaker 3: we yeah, we should talk about the oil, right because

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Speaker 3: Trump has been talking about the oil, right yeah, yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 3: oh yeah, yeah, I know you said you wanted to

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Speaker 3: mention stuff about like it's not what it might seem

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Speaker 3: on the face of it, right, There aren't giant lakes

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Speaker 3: of oil in Venezuela you can just slurp up and sell.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: So okay, it's sort of difficult to explain this all

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Speaker 4: without really getting into the weeds of like how oil

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Speaker 4: production works. But there's different like qualities of crude oil.

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Speaker 4: And most of the Venezuelan stuff is extremely sour. It's

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Speaker 4: really really shit. It's extremely low quality. And when you

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Speaker 4: have oil that's this shit, you can't like refine it

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Speaker 4: into being good, right like that that's just like not

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Speaker 4: how the process works. It just sucks and so it

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Speaker 4: burns badly. But there is a lot of it. And

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Speaker 4: this also gets back to Okay, so the way that

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Speaker 4: Trump thinks this is going to work is that a

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Speaker 4: bunch of oil companies are going to come in, They're

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Speaker 4: going to do a bunch of like infrastructure development or whatever.

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Speaker 4: They're going to sell the oil and they're going to

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Speaker 4: make one hundred billion dollars that's not really how this works,

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Speaker 4: as it is something that James has pointed out too.

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Speaker 4: But like, the actual value here is less from actually

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Speaker 4: extracting the oil and more from a having all of

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Speaker 4: these oil deposits on your balance sheet and B there's

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Speaker 4: a lot of value in just having.

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Speaker 3: Power over it.

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Speaker 4: Yeah so okay, So oil prices are kind of they're

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Speaker 4: set by a few things, like the price of oil

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Speaker 4: is set by the bottom of the market.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 4: Part of your profit comes from how how much more

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Speaker 4: cheaply can you refine and extract your oil relative to

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Speaker 4: whoever's doing it the most expensively, like whoever's doing the

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Speaker 4: shittiest job of it. But that a lot of it

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Speaker 4: also is just power. That's what OPEC is, right, And

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Speaker 4: OPEC's ability to raise oil prices has to do with

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Speaker 4: its ability to have all of their member states controlling

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Speaker 4: their oil and controlling the sort of flow and distribution

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Speaker 4: of it. Redistributing who is in power into OPEC is

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Speaker 4: actually a massive deal. Even if the actual oil here

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Speaker 4: isn't very good, the power over the oil is extremely important.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 4: So this doesn't work in the way that Trump wants

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Speaker 4: it to work, which is like you know, you take

437
00:23:38,440 --> 00:23:40,399
Speaker 4: the oil wells and you pump the oil out of

438
00:23:40,440 --> 00:23:44,679
Speaker 4: the ground and suddenly you have money. But it is

439
00:23:45,400 --> 00:23:48,080
Speaker 4: good for the oil companies that would take over the oil.

440
00:23:48,359 --> 00:23:48,719
Speaker 2: Yeah.

441
00:23:48,880 --> 00:23:53,080
Speaker 3: He consistently confuses stock price for like the economy slash

442
00:23:53,119 --> 00:23:55,800
Speaker 3: it business success slash I'm saying, right.

443
00:23:55,760 --> 00:23:57,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess one way to think about it is

444
00:23:57,840 --> 00:23:59,760
Speaker 4: that like taking control of this oil, you're not really

445
00:23:59,800 --> 00:24:01,720
Speaker 4: make the money off of this oil. You're making the

446
00:24:01,720 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 4: money off of the impact controlling this oil has on

447
00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:05,399
Speaker 4: the rest of the oil you produce.

448
00:24:05,960 --> 00:24:09,840
Speaker 3: Yeah. Maybe if you're someone who sees international relations in

449
00:24:09,960 --> 00:24:12,600
Speaker 3: terms of great power competition, you're trying to put things

450
00:24:12,640 --> 00:24:15,399
Speaker 3: in the Russia China bucket or the America bucket.

451
00:24:15,560 --> 00:24:18,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, And someone who sees trade, is this like zero

452
00:24:18,920 --> 00:24:22,680
Speaker 2: sum game where one person wins and another person loses. Yeah, yeah,

453
00:24:22,800 --> 00:24:24,439
Speaker 2: you know, like as Trump does.

454
00:24:24,720 --> 00:24:25,000
Speaker 3: Yes.

455
00:24:25,400 --> 00:24:28,120
Speaker 4: And also it is worth mentioning that like a lot

456
00:24:28,160 --> 00:24:31,040
Speaker 4: of this oil goes to Cuba, yeah, which is really

457
00:24:31,080 --> 00:24:33,840
Speaker 4: really important for the Cuban economy, which sort of can't

458
00:24:33,880 --> 00:24:38,680
Speaker 4: function without the stock of Venezuelan oil. Like getting access

459
00:24:38,680 --> 00:24:41,400
Speaker 4: to Venezuelan oil is one of the things that originally

460
00:24:41,440 --> 00:24:44,400
Speaker 4: pulled Cuba out of the just hideous economic crisis they

461
00:24:44,480 --> 00:24:46,600
Speaker 4: were in in the nineties after so eation collapsed.

462
00:24:46,760 --> 00:24:50,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it's why thirty two, it seems like a

463
00:24:50,880 --> 00:24:54,640
Speaker 2: majority or at least half of the security forces who

464
00:24:54,720 --> 00:24:58,600
Speaker 2: died fighting the US and this kidnapping attempt were Cuban

465
00:24:58,760 --> 00:25:02,119
Speaker 2: because ac to Venezuela oil is an existential issue for

466
00:25:02,160 --> 00:25:04,919
Speaker 2: the Cuban government. And it's also why Trump stated, unfortunately,

467
00:25:04,960 --> 00:25:09,000
Speaker 2: probably accurately, that they're not looking at regime change in

468
00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:11,000
Speaker 2: Cuba because they think that the regime is going to

469
00:25:11,040 --> 00:25:15,080
Speaker 2: collapse on its own, which it might like, this is

470
00:25:15,119 --> 00:25:17,640
Speaker 2: an existential problem for the Cuban regime.

471
00:25:17,960 --> 00:25:19,880
Speaker 3: But people who aren't aware. I spent a good amount

472
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:22,679
Speaker 3: of time in Caracas when I was much younger in

473
00:25:22,800 --> 00:25:26,520
Speaker 3: Jerrem my undergraduate years at university, and I remember the

474
00:25:26,560 --> 00:25:29,199
Speaker 3: only medical professionals I ever saw being because people have

475
00:25:29,320 --> 00:25:32,439
Speaker 3: left right after Chinese mol the only medical professionals I

476
00:25:32,440 --> 00:25:35,479
Speaker 3: ever saw were Cuban and clear, Cuban doctors are all

477
00:25:35,520 --> 00:25:38,080
Speaker 3: over the world. One a Cuba's biggest sex words is doctors.

478
00:25:38,600 --> 00:25:41,480
Speaker 3: But like it was very clear at that time that

479
00:25:41,560 --> 00:25:44,040
Speaker 3: like the two states were intermessed. You know that the

480
00:25:44,119 --> 00:25:46,960
Speaker 3: Venezuela needs things that Cuba has, like those special military

481
00:25:47,000 --> 00:25:50,119
Speaker 3: advisors and those doctors, and Cuba needs things to Menezuela have,

482
00:25:50,200 --> 00:25:50,680
Speaker 3: like that oil.

483
00:25:51,119 --> 00:25:54,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, and breaking that the way people do norbally see

484
00:25:54,000 --> 00:25:56,960
Speaker 4: oil as oil is just like liquid cash, and that's

485
00:25:57,160 --> 00:26:00,400
Speaker 4: not true. It matters the actual materiality of the oil

486
00:26:00,440 --> 00:26:02,280
Speaker 4: and how it works in the extraction process, and what

487
00:26:02,359 --> 00:26:04,439
Speaker 4: kind of oil is matters a lot. And this is

488
00:26:04,440 --> 00:26:09,440
Speaker 4: a scenario where where the oil is going and who

489
00:26:09,560 --> 00:26:12,960
Speaker 4: has control over it matters more than who's able to

490
00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:17,200
Speaker 4: sell it, which is very weird, but is how this works.

491
00:26:17,240 --> 00:26:20,159
Speaker 4: And Trump doesn't understand any of this. Maybe some of

492
00:26:20,200 --> 00:26:23,840
Speaker 4: the people around him understand this, but Trump really just

493
00:26:24,040 --> 00:26:27,280
Speaker 4: is in pure empire brain. They stole our stuff, which

494
00:26:27,320 --> 00:26:30,400
Speaker 4: I assume someone who wanted this told him, Oh yeah,

495
00:26:30,400 --> 00:26:33,359
Speaker 4: they stole a bunch of American oil and land. And

496
00:26:33,400 --> 00:26:35,639
Speaker 4: now he's in just full empire mode.

497
00:26:36,080 --> 00:26:38,320
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think that seemings someone has told him at

498
00:26:38,359 --> 00:26:39,480
Speaker 3: some point they stold us toff.

499
00:26:40,280 --> 00:26:43,560
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, and this is after the revolution. A bunch

500
00:26:43,640 --> 00:26:47,080
Speaker 2: of what was like the property of US and foreign

501
00:26:47,080 --> 00:26:51,520
Speaker 2: oil companies was nationalized, right, Yeah, because these companies had

502
00:26:51,560 --> 00:26:56,320
Speaker 2: made deals with the corrupt previous regime and it was

503
00:26:56,359 --> 00:27:00,560
Speaker 2: not really benefiting Venezuelan's Obviously that oil money has gone

504
00:27:00,600 --> 00:27:03,520
Speaker 2: on to fit the current corrupt regime and still not

505
00:27:03,560 --> 00:27:06,960
Speaker 2: benefited Venezuelan's much. But there was a period of time

506
00:27:07,680 --> 00:27:11,680
Speaker 2: under Schabz in which, like there were actual social benefits

507
00:27:11,720 --> 00:27:15,119
Speaker 2: and a powerful state I was providing people with things,

508
00:27:15,200 --> 00:27:17,640
Speaker 2: which is not to say it didn't have its flaws,

509
00:27:17,680 --> 00:27:19,880
Speaker 2: but like there was a period of time in which

510
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:22,480
Speaker 2: there was a benefit to the average Venezuelan from the

511
00:27:22,520 --> 00:27:25,919
Speaker 2: fact that their country was so oil rich. And nothing

512
00:27:26,280 --> 00:27:28,760
Speaker 2: about the current situation is going to change positively for

513
00:27:28,800 --> 00:27:31,280
Speaker 2: the average Venezuelan. The profits are going to go from

514
00:27:31,280 --> 00:27:34,760
Speaker 2: being siphoned from one group to another, but neither of

515
00:27:34,760 --> 00:27:36,720
Speaker 2: those groups are regular Venezuelans.

516
00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:41,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think sometimes I will hear this. I have

517
00:27:41,440 --> 00:27:45,000
Speaker 3: conservatively interviewed hundreds in not thousands of Venezuelan people in

518
00:27:45,000 --> 00:27:47,480
Speaker 3: the last three or four years, right at the border

519
00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:51,160
Speaker 3: in the Darien Gap in the US remotely by telephony,

520
00:27:51,160 --> 00:27:54,360
Speaker 3: et cetera. And like, sometimes you'll hear that like Chabas

521
00:27:54,440 --> 00:27:56,879
Speaker 3: was trying to do something good and it went bad,

522
00:27:57,119 --> 00:28:00,159
Speaker 3: or that like it was okay forbid under chavas and

523
00:28:00,200 --> 00:28:03,919
Speaker 3: then the corruption got out of control. Or even if

524
00:28:03,920 --> 00:28:05,639
Speaker 3: it was okay until my daughter took parent out, it

525
00:28:05,680 --> 00:28:08,399
Speaker 3: was bad. That it doesn't matter, right, it's bad now.

526
00:28:09,040 --> 00:28:12,400
Speaker 3: But like the things that the poverty I hear about

527
00:28:12,440 --> 00:28:16,639
Speaker 3: from Venezuelan people is grinding and it is so upsetting.

528
00:28:16,720 --> 00:28:19,160
Speaker 3: Like I have a great one noess for Venezuelan people.

529
00:28:19,160 --> 00:28:22,399
Speaker 3: I've made a whole podcast thing about this. But the

530
00:28:23,400 --> 00:28:27,720
Speaker 3: difficulty they encounter in every aspect of their lives because

531
00:28:27,880 --> 00:28:30,879
Speaker 3: of sanctions, because of corruption, because of hyperinflation, because of

532
00:28:30,920 --> 00:28:33,840
Speaker 3: the glow oil price, like a lot of things. Right,

533
00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:38,800
Speaker 3: their lives are miserable and this isn't going to change that.

534
00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:41,400
Speaker 3: They're scared. Right when I speak to people in Venezuela

535
00:28:41,400 --> 00:28:44,040
Speaker 3: and people with family in Venezuela this week, since this happened,

536
00:28:44,480 --> 00:28:46,920
Speaker 3: what are they doing. They are not contrary to what

537
00:28:46,960 --> 00:28:49,040
Speaker 3: an AI video might have made you believe out in

538
00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:52,680
Speaker 3: the streets celebrating. Now, they're trying to get enough food

539
00:28:52,760 --> 00:28:54,479
Speaker 3: to make it through the next couple of weeks in

540
00:28:54,480 --> 00:28:56,360
Speaker 3: case they have to hunker down in their home right,

541
00:28:56,360 --> 00:28:57,960
Speaker 3: and it is hard to get any food at the

542
00:28:57,960 --> 00:28:59,280
Speaker 3: best of times for these people.

543
00:28:59,360 --> 00:29:02,760
Speaker 2: In case they're bombed in place, the roads are bombed

544
00:29:02,880 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 2: in case, they're occupied, like they're they're making preparations for

545
00:29:07,720 --> 00:29:09,760
Speaker 2: being in a situation like Gazans have been in for

546
00:29:09,840 --> 00:29:12,120
Speaker 2: much of the last several years. Right, yeah, and that's

547
00:29:12,160 --> 00:29:14,920
Speaker 2: not an unreasonable like who knows what will happen. I

548
00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:17,400
Speaker 2: hope it's not that, but it's not an unreasonable thing

549
00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:18,400
Speaker 2: to prepare for.

550
00:29:18,960 --> 00:29:21,120
Speaker 3: No, it's not. Our friends when Memo and Robert and

551
00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:22,640
Speaker 3: I have been a few people in Memo, that's what

552
00:29:22,680 --> 00:29:24,480
Speaker 3: they said they did after the coup as well, because

553
00:29:24,480 --> 00:29:25,760
Speaker 3: they didn't know what was going to happen, and they

554
00:29:25,760 --> 00:29:28,600
Speaker 3: figured they need to be able to sit somewhere safe

555
00:29:28,640 --> 00:29:32,239
Speaker 3: and stay there. And so yeah, this is not a

556
00:29:32,320 --> 00:29:35,040
Speaker 3: liberation like I sor Jared Polis of all people being like,

557
00:29:35,040 --> 00:29:40,480
Speaker 3: oh yeah, liberation. Also using the word liberation generally, Simon Bolivard,

558
00:29:40,520 --> 00:29:44,200
Speaker 3: who is like the sort of bounding hero of Venezuela,

559
00:29:44,240 --> 00:29:46,440
Speaker 3: is referred to as the liberator. So using that phrase

560
00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:50,240
Speaker 3: about the extra judicial kidnapping the head of state, Right,

561
00:29:51,040 --> 00:29:52,920
Speaker 3: you don't understand the revenant of that word in Spanish,

562
00:29:52,960 --> 00:29:55,600
Speaker 3: that's fine, you don't speak Spanish, don't use it. Yeah,

563
00:29:55,640 --> 00:29:58,160
Speaker 3: but if you're going to use it, especially in this context,

564
00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:01,960
Speaker 3: like it is crap in the extreme right to see

565
00:30:01,960 --> 00:30:03,400
Speaker 3: that's the American politician.

566
00:30:04,280 --> 00:30:06,720
Speaker 4: So the other I think aspect of this is that, like,

567
00:30:07,080 --> 00:30:08,800
Speaker 4: you know, if you look at this in a historical tale,

568
00:30:08,840 --> 00:30:12,520
Speaker 4: the reason Boulevard succeeded was that, like the Haitian Republic

569
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:16,040
Speaker 4: gave a whole bunch of people a whole bunch of

570
00:30:16,040 --> 00:30:19,280
Speaker 4: weapons the go liberate Latin America from the Spanish Empire.

571
00:30:19,840 --> 00:30:21,640
Speaker 4: And then you know, if you look at what, like

572
00:30:21,680 --> 00:30:26,320
Speaker 4: what is the US's relation to the closest thing I've

573
00:30:26,320 --> 00:30:28,760
Speaker 4: been able to So I've been like racking my brain

574
00:30:28,840 --> 00:30:32,920
Speaker 4: trying to find anything in history that looks like this

575
00:30:33,760 --> 00:30:35,760
Speaker 4: that the US has done. And we've done a lot

576
00:30:35,760 --> 00:30:38,280
Speaker 4: of bad things, but the closest thing I can find

577
00:30:38,400 --> 00:30:41,000
Speaker 4: to just we sent the army into kidnap a guy

578
00:30:41,040 --> 00:30:45,120
Speaker 4: and deposed him was what we did to Aristide, who

579
00:30:45,160 --> 00:30:50,240
Speaker 4: was the former leftist president now former leftist president of Haiti,

580
00:30:50,240 --> 00:30:53,200
Speaker 4: who we did in fact send in special forces with

581
00:30:53,240 --> 00:30:56,600
Speaker 4: Canada to just like sort of force onto a plane

582
00:30:56,640 --> 00:31:02,080
Speaker 4: at gunpoints and remove from power. So that situation was

583
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:05,800
Speaker 4: a little different in that at that point most of

584
00:31:05,840 --> 00:31:08,040
Speaker 4: the country of Haiti was under the control of a

585
00:31:08,040 --> 00:31:10,680
Speaker 4: bunch of like dust squad rubble groups. Yeah, which was

586
00:31:10,720 --> 00:31:14,480
Speaker 4: the US justification. And this is just we just ran

587
00:31:14,560 --> 00:31:16,720
Speaker 4: into a country and cook them. But I don't know

588
00:31:16,720 --> 00:31:23,040
Speaker 4: the historical resonances of that are bleak. Yeah, and Jesus Christ,

589
00:31:23,120 --> 00:31:28,840
Speaker 4: don't call it the liberation, good Lord of liberations.

590
00:31:29,200 --> 00:31:33,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's liberate our audience from having money that they

591
00:31:33,600 --> 00:31:47,640
Speaker 2: can spend on these products. All right, we're back. I

592
00:31:47,680 --> 00:31:50,560
Speaker 2: guess there's a couple of things I wanted to talk about.

593
00:31:50,800 --> 00:31:53,240
Speaker 2: One of them is I'm seeing a lot of people

594
00:31:53,240 --> 00:31:56,920
Speaker 2: respond to this by pointing out folks like Matt Walsh

595
00:31:57,040 --> 00:31:59,760
Speaker 2: or other guys on the right who made statements about

596
00:32:00,240 --> 00:32:04,280
Speaker 2: Trump being a candidate for peace and all these military interventions.

597
00:32:04,320 --> 00:32:07,120
Speaker 2: We're getting into being bad and are now celebrating what

598
00:32:07,120 --> 00:32:10,280
Speaker 2: we're doing and openly celebrating like colonialism as a good thing.

599
00:32:10,720 --> 00:32:14,560
Speaker 2: And I'm seeing a lot of folks trying to dunk

600
00:32:14,680 --> 00:32:18,400
Speaker 2: on these people for being inconsistent. And I can't imagine

601
00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:21,520
Speaker 2: a bigger waste of your time, none of these people.

602
00:32:21,640 --> 00:32:24,760
Speaker 2: You have to get it out from the habit of

603
00:32:24,760 --> 00:32:29,240
Speaker 2: thinking that truth matters. All that matters to these people

604
00:32:29,400 --> 00:32:32,040
Speaker 2: is power, and they have it, and they have the guns.

605
00:32:32,720 --> 00:32:35,960
Speaker 2: And you pointing out that they lied to get there,

606
00:32:36,080 --> 00:32:38,880
Speaker 2: and that they're not honest, they don't care. They're rich

607
00:32:39,080 --> 00:32:41,520
Speaker 2: and they're getting richer, and they're powerful and they're getting

608
00:32:41,520 --> 00:32:46,920
Speaker 2: more power. None of this is about principles. It's about winning,

609
00:32:47,440 --> 00:32:50,040
Speaker 2: and you just have to understand that if you want

610
00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:52,800
Speaker 2: to have any hope of beating them, because pretending that

611
00:32:52,800 --> 00:32:54,480
Speaker 2: they're playing any other game than the one that they're

612
00:32:54,480 --> 00:33:00,800
Speaker 2: playing is really dangerous. I don't think there's any profit

613
00:33:01,360 --> 00:33:05,600
Speaker 2: in debating these people directly or confronting them directly about

614
00:33:05,640 --> 00:33:10,040
Speaker 2: the inconsistencies of their belief system. I do think it's

615
00:33:10,080 --> 00:33:14,400
Speaker 2: deeply profitable to talk about the fact that they lied

616
00:33:14,560 --> 00:33:16,800
Speaker 2: in our liars and are dragging us into another war

617
00:33:17,280 --> 00:33:20,680
Speaker 2: two regular Americans. And the evidence suggests that this is

618
00:33:20,720 --> 00:33:23,440
Speaker 2: incredibly unpopular in a way that the Iraq War was it.

619
00:33:23,600 --> 00:33:27,000
Speaker 2: People talk a lot about how massive the anti war

620
00:33:27,040 --> 00:33:30,080
Speaker 2: protests were and how much anti war sentiment there was,

621
00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:34,640
Speaker 2: but a majority of Americans were broadly supportive of what

622
00:33:34,720 --> 00:33:37,880
Speaker 2: the Bush administration did in Afghanistan and Iraq at the

623
00:33:37,920 --> 00:33:41,640
Speaker 2: time that they started doing it. Right, that doesn't mean

624
00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:44,360
Speaker 2: that the protests weren't real. It doesn't mean that it's

625
00:33:44,400 --> 00:33:48,600
Speaker 2: not significant that those massive protests happened. But most Americans

626
00:33:48,640 --> 00:33:52,400
Speaker 2: were broadly supportive of what the government was doing. That's

627
00:33:52,560 --> 00:33:55,480
Speaker 2: not the case with what we're seeing in regards to

628
00:33:55,480 --> 00:33:58,360
Speaker 2: public opinion over what's happening in Venezuela. There was a

629
00:33:58,440 --> 00:34:02,719
Speaker 2: two day Reuters IPSO survey that concluded Monday, basically immediately

630
00:34:02,760 --> 00:34:06,520
Speaker 2: after was announced what you know we did in Venezuela,

631
00:34:06,760 --> 00:34:09,360
Speaker 2: and seventy two percent of Americans who responded said they

632
00:34:09,400 --> 00:34:11,960
Speaker 2: are concerned that the US might get too involved in Venezuela.

633
00:34:12,080 --> 00:34:14,800
Speaker 2: Only twenty five percent said that they don't share that concern.

634
00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:18,120
Speaker 2: Ninety percent of Democrats shared that concern as well, seventy

635
00:34:18,160 --> 00:34:21,319
Speaker 2: four percent of Independence even fifty four percent of Republicans.

636
00:34:21,480 --> 00:34:24,080
Speaker 2: Only forty five percent of Republicans said that they were

637
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:26,040
Speaker 2: not worried about the US getting overly involved in only

638
00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:31,160
Speaker 2: nineteen percent of other voters. So this is really unpopular,

639
00:34:31,480 --> 00:34:34,919
Speaker 2: historically unpopular for a military intervention. And the entire bet

640
00:34:34,960 --> 00:34:38,279
Speaker 2: that the Trump administration is making is that because they're

641
00:34:38,280 --> 00:34:41,440
Speaker 2: not doing what Bush did in Iraq, they're not knocking

642
00:34:41,520 --> 00:34:44,400
Speaker 2: out the whole government in debathifying it. They're just kicking

643
00:34:44,400 --> 00:34:48,640
Speaker 2: out one guy and basically keeping his regime intact. They're

644
00:34:48,680 --> 00:34:51,840
Speaker 2: just making that regime swear feeldy to the United States.

645
00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:55,799
Speaker 2: And their bet is that this will work, right, that

646
00:34:56,719 --> 00:35:00,600
Speaker 2: the Venezuelan regime will continue to keep the country functioning

647
00:35:00,719 --> 00:35:03,000
Speaker 2: as well as it was functioning before, which is not

648
00:35:03,200 --> 00:35:07,800
Speaker 2: great but was not total collapse, and they can start

649
00:35:07,840 --> 00:35:11,959
Speaker 2: extracting value. And honestly, I feel like that is that's

650
00:35:12,000 --> 00:35:15,040
Speaker 2: a major motivation for a lot of people supporting Trump,

651
00:35:15,080 --> 00:35:17,040
Speaker 2: for a lot of people in his administration who have

652
00:35:17,120 --> 00:35:21,239
Speaker 2: financial interests. For obviously the oil and gas companies he's

653
00:35:21,239 --> 00:35:24,280
Speaker 2: trying to get on board. But I don't think money

654
00:35:24,400 --> 00:35:27,760
Speaker 2: is even Trump's pry, And this is maybe an unpopular opinion.

655
00:35:27,840 --> 00:35:30,360
Speaker 2: I think the primarys in Trump is doing this is

656
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:33,840
Speaker 2: that he wants number one, to show everybody, look, I

657
00:35:33,840 --> 00:35:36,120
Speaker 2: did what Bush did, but it worked. I did it better.

658
00:35:36,600 --> 00:35:38,719
Speaker 2: And number two, he wants to show everybody, look, I

659
00:35:38,760 --> 00:35:41,520
Speaker 2: did what Obama did and took out a big bad guy. Right.

660
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:43,800
Speaker 2: That's where they're trying to craft Madeiro is this major

661
00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:47,880
Speaker 2: enemy of the United States, this architect of the opiate crisis,

662
00:35:47,920 --> 00:35:49,799
Speaker 2: this guy who's worse than beIN Laden in a lot

663
00:35:50,160 --> 00:35:52,200
Speaker 2: of ways, because Trump is still jealous of the fact

664
00:35:52,239 --> 00:35:55,600
Speaker 2: that Obama got to take out bin Laden right as

665
00:35:55,640 --> 00:35:57,759
Speaker 2: he sees it, and he wants his own version of that.

666
00:35:58,440 --> 00:36:02,719
Speaker 2: Trump is doing this, I think primarily for vanity purposes, right.

667
00:36:02,760 --> 00:36:04,919
Speaker 2: I know that seems shallow and silly, but I really

668
00:36:04,920 --> 00:36:07,160
Speaker 2: think that's most of what's going on for him. And

669
00:36:07,200 --> 00:36:09,880
Speaker 2: I think if the end result of this is that

670
00:36:09,920 --> 00:36:11,960
Speaker 2: things in Venezuela more or less continue the way they

671
00:36:12,000 --> 00:36:14,520
Speaker 2: were before, he will call it a win and a

672
00:36:14,560 --> 00:36:16,799
Speaker 2: lot of people might believe him. And I don't know,

673
00:36:16,840 --> 00:36:19,319
Speaker 2: it doesn't even necessarily matter if any money actually comes

674
00:36:19,360 --> 00:36:22,319
Speaker 2: into the United States over this. They'll just lie about it.

675
00:36:22,400 --> 00:36:26,160
Speaker 2: You know, some individual Americans will make money, and I

676
00:36:26,160 --> 00:36:29,279
Speaker 2: think that'll probably be enough for Trump to feel like

677
00:36:29,360 --> 00:36:32,000
Speaker 2: he got a win and for his pr apparatus to

678
00:36:32,800 --> 00:36:34,560
Speaker 2: notch this up as a win. And I think that's

679
00:36:34,560 --> 00:36:37,520
Speaker 2: all he really cares about. And so I do think

680
00:36:37,560 --> 00:36:41,200
Speaker 2: it's worth really hitting how criminal this is and how

681
00:36:41,239 --> 00:36:44,520
Speaker 2: harmful this is. But ultimately, what's going to determine whether

682
00:36:44,600 --> 00:36:47,200
Speaker 2: or not Americans see this as a calamity or not

683
00:36:48,239 --> 00:36:51,880
Speaker 2: is how well this all works out in the long run.

684
00:36:52,000 --> 00:36:55,600
Speaker 2: And that's a really tough thing to even think about

685
00:36:55,640 --> 00:36:59,200
Speaker 2: because you don't want it to work well because it

686
00:36:59,239 --> 00:37:02,880
Speaker 2: will embolden Trump to keep doing this and the global

687
00:37:02,880 --> 00:37:05,399
Speaker 2: harm will be greater. On the other hand, I don't

688
00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:10,319
Speaker 2: want civil life in Venezuela to collapse, right, So it's

689
00:37:10,440 --> 00:37:11,400
Speaker 2: it's tough.

690
00:37:11,280 --> 00:37:14,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, yeah, I don't people to suffer any I

691
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:17,200
Speaker 3: mean just around the world too, when like I heard

692
00:37:17,280 --> 00:37:20,480
Speaker 3: Min online called a meeting in Mihandma when he heard

693
00:37:20,520 --> 00:37:24,120
Speaker 3: about this because he was worried, right, Like, the paranoia

694
00:37:24,480 --> 00:37:27,200
Speaker 3: of dictators is about to go through the ceiling, and

695
00:37:27,239 --> 00:37:29,680
Speaker 3: that's going to result in people being tortured and killed.

696
00:37:29,760 --> 00:37:31,520
Speaker 2: It's going to result in people torture, and it's going

697
00:37:31,520 --> 00:37:35,160
Speaker 2: to result in more countries seeking to get nuclear weapons

698
00:37:35,200 --> 00:37:38,839
Speaker 2: because they will accurately recognize that that is the only

699
00:37:38,960 --> 00:37:45,360
Speaker 2: security anyone has. It is understated how much more dangerous

700
00:37:45,400 --> 00:37:47,759
Speaker 2: what Bush did in Iraq made the world because of

701
00:37:47,840 --> 00:37:50,200
Speaker 2: how it's made different leaders around the world think about

702
00:37:50,200 --> 00:37:54,319
Speaker 2: the possession of nuclear weapons. Right, Iran is fundamentally right

703
00:37:54,440 --> 00:37:57,239
Speaker 2: in its calculus that getting a nuke will make the

704
00:37:57,280 --> 00:37:59,880
Speaker 2: regime safer because it might be the only thing that

705
00:38:00,120 --> 00:38:02,439
Speaker 2: can protect them now. Things in Iran are not looking

706
00:38:02,520 --> 00:38:05,320
Speaker 2: very stable right now either. Again, this is another situation

707
00:38:05,400 --> 00:38:09,160
Speaker 2: where just decades of protest and the weakness of the

708
00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:12,319
Speaker 2: regime might wind up working in Trump's favor because things

709
00:38:12,360 --> 00:38:15,759
Speaker 2: are looking pretty gnarly for the Iranian regime right now,

710
00:38:16,120 --> 00:38:20,480
Speaker 2: and maybe Trump Trump has made some statements since kidnapping

711
00:38:20,520 --> 00:38:23,719
Speaker 2: Maduro about going into Iran. They very well may do that,

712
00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:25,120
Speaker 2: but they also may not need to.

713
00:38:25,840 --> 00:38:28,239
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's some most sense suggesting that they at least

714
00:38:28,239 --> 00:38:32,480
Speaker 3: have preparations in place for doing something in Iran, right,

715
00:38:32,600 --> 00:38:34,560
Speaker 3: which may or they need to do right to obviously

716
00:38:34,640 --> 00:38:38,160
Speaker 3: move things to point towards Iran, right, But that is

717
00:38:38,200 --> 00:38:39,520
Speaker 3: an action in itself.

718
00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:42,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, that really. I mean, there's a lot that worries

719
00:38:42,400 --> 00:38:46,200
Speaker 2: me there. But I think they're going to keep fucking

720
00:38:46,239 --> 00:38:48,920
Speaker 2: around like this as long as they feel like it

721
00:38:48,960 --> 00:38:51,799
Speaker 2: will benefit them, And right now this feels like a

722
00:38:51,840 --> 00:38:54,760
Speaker 2: win to them. Yeah, So this is going to function

723
00:38:54,920 --> 00:38:57,080
Speaker 2: like a drug. They're going to start looking for another

724
00:38:57,200 --> 00:39:00,000
Speaker 2: hit as soon as the high from this fase.

725
00:39:00,920 --> 00:39:03,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, and as soon as they need a domestic distraction.

726
00:39:03,360 --> 00:39:05,880
Speaker 2: Right right. A lot of this stuff and the evidence

727
00:39:05,920 --> 00:39:08,560
Speaker 2: we have so far suggests that people fucking hate this,

728
00:39:09,600 --> 00:39:13,319
Speaker 2: and we'll probably keep hating this. But it depends on

729
00:39:13,320 --> 00:39:15,279
Speaker 2: whether or not this all fades out, and if the

730
00:39:15,320 --> 00:39:17,959
Speaker 2: news is covered is actually maybe it worked right, which

731
00:39:17,960 --> 00:39:21,080
Speaker 2: will probably be based on really dogshit journalism.

732
00:39:21,360 --> 00:39:24,400
Speaker 3: The Washington Post did a preferential offed already.

733
00:39:24,440 --> 00:39:27,960
Speaker 2: I think, oh good, Yeah, I'm glad they're helping out

734
00:39:28,440 --> 00:39:33,040
Speaker 2: our democracy die in darkness. They're going to keep chasing

735
00:39:33,080 --> 00:39:38,160
Speaker 2: this high and it will wind up collapsing on them eventually.

736
00:39:38,200 --> 00:39:40,480
Speaker 2: The question is how many countries will have to pay

737
00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:42,879
Speaker 2: the price beforehand and how much worse will things get?

738
00:39:42,880 --> 00:39:43,640
Speaker 2: In the United States?

739
00:39:43,680 --> 00:39:47,279
Speaker 3: Obviously, yeah, will the price be right when they lose

740
00:39:47,360 --> 00:39:48,960
Speaker 3: a higher SF team.

741
00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:52,440
Speaker 2: Or cash right when Delta Force gets wiped out? When

742
00:39:52,480 --> 00:39:54,719
Speaker 2: we have a bunch of helicopters down a bunch of Americans?

743
00:39:54,719 --> 00:39:57,680
Speaker 2: Caption what does Trump do? Then? Do we get a panic?

744
00:39:58,280 --> 00:39:59,960
Speaker 2: This is kind of where I see like the potential,

745
00:40:00,360 --> 00:40:03,040
Speaker 2: the scary potential for something like a nuclear January sixth,

746
00:40:03,040 --> 00:40:06,720
Speaker 2: where like, do we get a panic response that leads

747
00:40:06,719 --> 00:40:12,200
Speaker 2: to a horrific loss of life? Because Trump sees himself

748
00:40:12,239 --> 00:40:14,399
Speaker 2: as being embarrassed? Oh my God, they killed a whole team,

749
00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:16,360
Speaker 2: Like I have no option but to kill a shitload

750
00:40:16,360 --> 00:40:18,759
Speaker 2: of people to distract from the fact that I failed here, right,

751
00:40:19,719 --> 00:40:21,560
Speaker 2: that that does really concern me too.

752
00:40:21,960 --> 00:40:23,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, if that happens, you know, there was even if

753
00:40:23,960 --> 00:40:27,400
Speaker 3: it's not nuclear, right, even it's just conventional weapons on cities.

754
00:40:27,320 --> 00:40:30,000
Speaker 2: Right right, right, And yeah, new guy, I shouldn't even

755
00:40:30,040 --> 00:40:33,040
Speaker 2: bring up the nuclear thing, but like it does concern me.

756
00:40:34,200 --> 00:40:37,080
Speaker 3: Nuclear football, right, He's the one who gets right choice right.

757
00:40:37,239 --> 00:40:39,680
Speaker 2: This is going to just get more. This is going

758
00:40:39,680 --> 00:40:42,560
Speaker 2: to become integral to his sense of like self worth

759
00:40:42,800 --> 00:40:45,400
Speaker 2: that like, no, I did this and it worked in there,

760
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:49,400
Speaker 2: and if all his guys get wiped out failing at

761
00:40:49,400 --> 00:40:51,680
Speaker 2: one of these things, that's not going to go well

762
00:40:51,719 --> 00:40:52,480
Speaker 2: for anybody.

763
00:40:52,680 --> 00:40:53,200
Speaker 3: No, it's not.

764
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:55,440
Speaker 2: We'll have a fun couple hours on Twitter, but it's

765
00:40:55,440 --> 00:40:57,080
Speaker 2: going to be really bad, really fast.

766
00:40:57,239 --> 00:41:01,239
Speaker 3: Yeah. I told very briefly about a couple of implications domestically.

767
00:41:01,480 --> 00:41:01,719
Speaker 2: Sure.

768
00:41:02,000 --> 00:41:05,399
Speaker 3: The main one is that the DOJ has already fared

769
00:41:05,440 --> 00:41:09,000
Speaker 3: fro an extension in the case which Judge Bosberg is

770
00:41:09,040 --> 00:41:13,560
Speaker 3: overseeing regarding the Alien Enemies Act. Right, Yeah, what this

771
00:41:13,640 --> 00:41:18,279
Speaker 3: will mean for Venezuelan nationals in the United States. It

772
00:41:18,360 --> 00:41:20,279
Speaker 3: is unlikely that this will mean something good.

773
00:41:20,520 --> 00:41:20,680
Speaker 2: Right.

774
00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:22,640
Speaker 3: It is unlikely that they will have a country that

775
00:41:22,640 --> 00:41:25,040
Speaker 3: they would want to return to, and it's possible that

776
00:41:25,080 --> 00:41:27,360
Speaker 3: it's going to be used to force them to return

777
00:41:27,400 --> 00:41:31,400
Speaker 3: to it anyway, to a country which is extremely paranoid

778
00:41:31,440 --> 00:41:35,760
Speaker 3: about US buys. Because someone in Maduro's very close entourage

779
00:41:35,840 --> 00:41:39,440
Speaker 3: leaked the entire plan that Trump. Many presidents would not

780
00:41:39,440 --> 00:41:41,040
Speaker 3: have set this to the press, but Trump did right

781
00:41:41,080 --> 00:41:43,560
Speaker 3: that they had the entire plans for his house and

782
00:41:43,600 --> 00:41:45,759
Speaker 3: that they built a replica of it to include They

783
00:41:45,840 --> 00:41:47,479
Speaker 3: knew he had a safe room, they knew it was steel,

784
00:41:47,480 --> 00:41:49,680
Speaker 3: and they knew they could cut into it with cutting torches.

785
00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:53,919
Speaker 3: Someone leaked that information. That means that people coming back

786
00:41:53,960 --> 00:41:56,960
Speaker 3: from the United States are going to be under scrutiny, right,

787
00:41:57,800 --> 00:42:00,520
Speaker 3: and that is not good for them. I don't see

788
00:42:00,560 --> 00:42:04,040
Speaker 3: this regime stopping sending people back because they're not an

789
00:42:04,080 --> 00:42:07,040
Speaker 3: alien element anymore. I don't see that, and I can

790
00:42:07,200 --> 00:42:09,640
Speaker 3: I can see the regime if it does manage when

791
00:42:09,719 --> 00:42:12,759
Speaker 3: saw Rodriguez at something of a puppet leaning on Rodriguez

792
00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:16,799
Speaker 3: to accept people removed from the United States, Right, that

793
00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:21,080
Speaker 3: is extremely concerning and it's not being reported on right

794
00:42:21,120 --> 00:42:24,520
Speaker 3: because migrants are not front and center where a lot

795
00:42:24,560 --> 00:42:27,400
Speaker 3: of American newspapers think about things. But I think for

796
00:42:27,480 --> 00:42:31,440
Speaker 3: those people, this is petrifying, right the country that you

797
00:42:31,480 --> 00:42:33,280
Speaker 3: came to to be safe is they're bombing the country

798
00:42:33,280 --> 00:42:36,239
Speaker 3: that you came from. It's also trying to kick you out,

799
00:42:36,280 --> 00:42:38,520
Speaker 3: like you are stuck in the middle of this game,

800
00:42:39,280 --> 00:42:41,440
Speaker 3: and all you wanted was a place to raise your

801
00:42:41,520 --> 00:42:44,000
Speaker 3: kids where you know they might have a fair crack

802
00:42:44,040 --> 00:42:47,160
Speaker 3: at a decent life. It's it's heartbreaking for those people.

803
00:42:47,680 --> 00:42:50,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think that's probably all we've got to

804
00:42:50,320 --> 00:42:53,320
Speaker 2: say for now. I mean, I guess I'll address briefly

805
00:42:53,320 --> 00:42:56,400
Speaker 2: because people have asked, do you see this as like

806
00:42:56,520 --> 00:43:00,440
Speaker 2: an annexa an Angelus, you know, the annexation of or

807
00:43:00,480 --> 00:43:02,839
Speaker 2: of Czechoslovakia of that kind of moment, or is this

808
00:43:02,920 --> 00:43:06,640
Speaker 2: more like the invasion of Poland? And I guess my

809
00:43:06,719 --> 00:43:10,360
Speaker 2: answer is is its own thing. It doesn't directly graph

810
00:43:10,360 --> 00:43:12,120
Speaker 2: on any of those other than that where it does

811
00:43:12,440 --> 00:43:15,520
Speaker 2: very directly graph. And what is relevant in comparing it

812
00:43:15,560 --> 00:43:20,280
Speaker 2: to is what happened to the Nazis and to Hitler

813
00:43:20,320 --> 00:43:26,000
Speaker 2: personally as they started seeing success taking things militarily, they

814
00:43:26,080 --> 00:43:28,880
Speaker 2: made some big gambles that were not known. One thing

815
00:43:28,920 --> 00:43:32,239
Speaker 2: that gets underdiscussed when talking about what Germany was doing

816
00:43:32,280 --> 00:43:35,560
Speaker 2: in that period of time is how many military leaders

817
00:43:35,600 --> 00:43:39,759
Speaker 2: within Germany thought that the annexation of particularly Czechoslovakia was

818
00:43:39,800 --> 00:43:42,279
Speaker 2: a horrible idea because in a head to head fight,

819
00:43:42,360 --> 00:43:45,960
Speaker 2: it was not clear whatsoever that the Wehrmacht could defeat

820
00:43:46,000 --> 00:43:49,000
Speaker 2: the Czech military and their defenses. That was very much

821
00:43:49,200 --> 00:43:53,000
Speaker 2: in debate, and a lot of Hitler's advisors thought it

822
00:43:53,040 --> 00:43:55,120
Speaker 2: was a terrible idea because they didn't think they could win,

823
00:43:55,520 --> 00:43:58,040
Speaker 2: and it wound up not really being a factor because

824
00:43:58,120 --> 00:44:00,800
Speaker 2: everyone caved and nobody wanted to fight. Which is the

825
00:44:00,840 --> 00:44:02,800
Speaker 2: problem that we're having right now, right is that nobody

826
00:44:02,800 --> 00:44:06,360
Speaker 2: actually wants to confront these people. The Democrats are himming

827
00:44:06,360 --> 00:44:08,840
Speaker 2: and ahio whether or not the try for impeachment again

828
00:44:09,040 --> 00:44:13,640
Speaker 2: or you know, there's this this fear of actually directly

829
00:44:13,680 --> 00:44:16,920
Speaker 2: confronting these people. That is part of what's emboldening them

830
00:44:16,920 --> 00:44:19,640
Speaker 2: to keep trying shit like this. And what's very relevant

831
00:44:19,640 --> 00:44:23,239
Speaker 2: to the Nazis is that if this works, and we're

832
00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:26,000
Speaker 2: talking if this works not in the long run, because

833
00:44:26,000 --> 00:44:27,560
Speaker 2: they're not going to wait twenty years to see if

834
00:44:27,560 --> 00:44:29,239
Speaker 2: this was a good idea. They're going to wait a

835
00:44:29,239 --> 00:44:32,160
Speaker 2: couple of weeks, you know, maybe a few months, and

836
00:44:32,200 --> 00:44:35,319
Speaker 2: if it seems like, hey, it worked, the Venezuela's not

837
00:44:35,520 --> 00:44:38,400
Speaker 2: falling apart, you know, we've got we actually got what

838
00:44:38,440 --> 00:44:39,959
Speaker 2: we think is a good pr out of it. They'll

839
00:44:39,960 --> 00:44:43,520
Speaker 2: try again, and they'll try again. And the Nazis tried

840
00:44:43,600 --> 00:44:46,640
Speaker 2: again and again until they started making checks that their

841
00:44:46,640 --> 00:44:50,240
Speaker 2: asses couldn't cash, right, And that is the thing that's relevant,

842
00:44:50,280 --> 00:44:53,560
Speaker 2: because that is something all fascists have in common, is

843
00:44:54,400 --> 00:44:57,879
Speaker 2: this confidence that gets them very far in a lot

844
00:44:57,880 --> 00:45:01,279
Speaker 2: of ways, because if they're willing to gamble and the

845
00:45:01,320 --> 00:45:04,880
Speaker 2: other people aren't willing to confront them or fight or

846
00:45:04,960 --> 00:45:09,000
Speaker 2: gamble themselves, then they'll win by default. But when that

847
00:45:09,160 --> 00:45:13,400
Speaker 2: stops and people start confronting them, the shortcomings of the

848
00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:16,239
Speaker 2: state that they've built and of the militaries that they

849
00:45:16,360 --> 00:45:20,840
Speaker 2: built become increasingly evident. And I do think that's the

850
00:45:20,960 --> 00:45:23,440
Speaker 2: road that we're on. I don't know where it'll end.

851
00:45:23,840 --> 00:45:25,759
Speaker 2: I don't know, if you know, Trump could die of

852
00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:28,080
Speaker 2: a heart attack tomorrow, and maybe whoever takes over will

853
00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:30,800
Speaker 2: be more cautious. I don't know what's going to happen,

854
00:45:31,000 --> 00:45:33,479
Speaker 2: but I know that we've started down that road.

855
00:45:34,120 --> 00:45:35,919
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's not a good thing.

856
00:45:36,280 --> 00:45:36,680
Speaker 2: Nope.

857
00:45:37,160 --> 00:45:39,080
Speaker 3: I guess we should just say because people will be

858
00:45:39,120 --> 00:45:42,040
Speaker 3: incredibly annoying on the internet. Like saying that it is

859
00:45:42,080 --> 00:45:44,480
Speaker 3: illegal and wrong to kidnap Madua does not mean that

860
00:45:44,520 --> 00:45:46,839
Speaker 3: we think Maduro is great, just in the same way

861
00:45:46,880 --> 00:45:48,600
Speaker 3: as saying the Iraq war is wrong doesn't mean we

862
00:45:48,640 --> 00:45:52,000
Speaker 3: love Sadam Passayin like no, two things can be bad.

863
00:45:52,480 --> 00:45:54,239
Speaker 3: People tell you abough, I should grow up.

864
00:45:54,640 --> 00:45:56,319
Speaker 2: Like I said at the start, I don't think you

865
00:45:56,560 --> 00:45:58,359
Speaker 2: have to. I don't think anyone owes you. And if

866
00:45:58,360 --> 00:46:00,799
Speaker 2: someone is saying, like, hey, you have to answer for

867
00:46:00,920 --> 00:46:03,759
Speaker 2: these bad things Maduro did when critiquing the US for this,

868
00:46:03,840 --> 00:46:05,359
Speaker 2: I think that's bullshit and I think you should tell

869
00:46:05,400 --> 00:46:06,120
Speaker 2: them to fuck off.

870
00:46:06,200 --> 00:46:07,719
Speaker 3: Right, it's not the issue AT's take care.

871
00:46:08,120 --> 00:46:13,680
Speaker 2: Maduro's personal qualities are irrelevant, as is always the case

872
00:46:13,719 --> 00:46:17,040
Speaker 2: with this. What we're doing is illegal and bad.

873
00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:20,400
Speaker 3: It could happen.

874
00:46:20,440 --> 00:46:22,799
Speaker 5: Here is a production of cool Zone Media. For more

875
00:46:22,840 --> 00:46:26,320
Speaker 5: podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool Zonemedia

876
00:46:26,360 --> 00:46:29,160
Speaker 5: dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app.

877
00:46:29,239 --> 00:46:31,239
Speaker 4: Apple Podcasts, or wherever.

878
00:46:30,960 --> 00:46:33,759
Speaker 5: You listen to podcasts, you can now find sources for

879
00:46:33,800 --> 00:46:36,960
Speaker 5: it could happen here, listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks

880
00:46:36,960 --> 00:46:37,520
Speaker 5: for listening.