WEBVTT - Executive Disorder: White House Weekly #46 0:00:01.800 --> 0:00:08.560 Also media. All right, I'm doing the intro. 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:10.760 What are crackers and crack ats? 0:00:11.240 --> 0:00:12.840 Is that good? Perfect? 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:14.600 Can we say that? I think? 0:00:14.640 --> 0:00:14.680 So? 0:00:15.120 --> 0:00:15.920 Okay, do you have. 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:18.320 A non binary cracks crack thems? I think. 0:00:18.520 --> 0:00:24.880 I think I'm definitionly not a cracker. 0:00:26.520 --> 0:00:28.640 I just wanted to use the word crack ats. Yeah, 0:00:28.800 --> 0:00:30.400 I understand it's not appropriate. 0:00:30.600 --> 0:00:31.440 That's reasonable. 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:32.560 Welcome to ed. 0:00:33.720 --> 0:00:38.320 Yeah, we should just we should old. Sorry, James, So 0:00:38.520 --> 0:00:39.479 let's just keep doing it. 0:00:39.640 --> 0:00:40.280 Do the intro. 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:42.040 This is it could happen. 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:45.360 Here Executive Disorder, our weekly newscast covering what is happening 0:00:45.360 --> 0:00:47.680 in the White House, the crumbling of our world, and 0:00:47.720 --> 0:00:50.320 what this means to you. I am James Stout and 0:00:50.360 --> 0:00:55.680 I'm joined today by Robert Evans and Mia Wong and Sophie. 0:00:55.960 --> 0:00:57.000 Sophie is also here. 0:00:57.680 --> 0:01:00.680 And this episode we are covering the week of December 0:01:00.760 --> 0:01:05.399 eleventh to December seventeenth, a week before the week that 0:01:05.520 --> 0:01:06.200 is Christmas. 0:01:06.560 --> 0:01:09.280 That's right, baby. So I hope you've done your shopping. 0:01:09.360 --> 0:01:11.960 I hope you've got me a gift. Because I pay 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:14.480 attention to which of our listeners do and do not 0:01:14.640 --> 0:01:19.160 buy me presents? Yeah, so do I you will never 0:01:19.240 --> 0:01:20.920 find me and you shouldn't try. 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:21.720 That's right. 0:01:22.040 --> 0:01:24.920 And it's currently Honkkah, happy honkah. 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:28.959 Happy hony, right, yes, oh yeah, happy honekah. All the 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:34.480 holidays have a yeah, quasi Kwanza, have a solemn, dignified tet. 0:01:34.680 --> 0:01:36.720 All the holidays have a good one of them. 0:01:36.800 --> 0:01:38.360 Happy Winter Solstice, which is. 0:01:38.400 --> 0:01:43.520 Happy Solstice more unhappy Solstice. It's kind of a bittersweet holiday. Yeah, 0:01:43.959 --> 0:01:51.800 super Saturnalia. You know, it's a good one. So holidays 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:54.080 are nice, but we're going to talk about some things 0:01:54.200 --> 0:01:58.400 that are less nice today. The government, Yes, the government, 0:01:58.480 --> 0:02:02.680 and specific parts of the Let's start with some headlines. 0:02:03.080 --> 0:02:06.360 Garthamis has obtained information about ICE being able to enter 0:02:06.400 --> 0:02:09.680 private parts of New York City shelters without a judicial 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:13.320 warrant or being able to obtain private information about residents, 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:17.040 despite both of these, in theory being prohibited by sanctuary 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:19.920 city laws in New York. Right, thiss happened at least 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:20.800 five times. 0:02:20.919 --> 0:02:24.880 The way Gothamis found this is by making a public 0:02:24.919 --> 0:02:28.040 records request for incident reports, which is a clever use 0:02:28.080 --> 0:02:32.040 of public record law nice one. The city has already 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:35.160 aware of both jail and police officers violating these laws, 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:37.799 and I think this is a good example of how 0:02:38.040 --> 0:02:43.040 people think of sanctuary city laws as inassailable, but in fact, 0:02:43.120 --> 0:02:47.000 sanctuary laws be the city, state, whatever jurisdiction, are very 0:02:47.040 --> 0:02:49.960 often violated, and it's good to see that being reported 0:02:50.000 --> 0:02:53.240 on more. Last week, we talked about Faustino Pablo Pablo, right, 0:02:53.280 --> 0:02:56.000 the guy who had been sent to Guatemala despite the 0:02:56.000 --> 0:02:58.760 fact that he had protections under the Convention against Torture 0:02:59.000 --> 0:03:01.920 for being returned there. The government has returned him to 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:03.359 the US, which is good. 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:10.680 That is a rare, good immigration story. It did really 0:03:10.720 --> 0:03:13.359 bum me out to see that, Like, there were dozens 0:03:13.360 --> 0:03:15.640 of articles on him being sent there, right, and I 0:03:15.639 --> 0:03:19.519 couldn't find anything any reporting on him being returned, which 0:03:19.560 --> 0:03:21.440 is kind of like, we should be happy for these people. 0:03:21.480 --> 0:03:21.880 We should. 0:03:22.240 --> 0:03:25.519 Yeah, we don't get many wins and we should take them. 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:27.560 Yeah, we should be happy that this guy is not 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:29.639 being likely to be tortured. 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:32.000 At least it is still possible for them to remove 0:03:32.080 --> 0:03:35.280 him to a third country, right, that is not outside 0:03:35.320 --> 0:03:37.440 the realm of possibility. But right now he's not in 0:03:37.480 --> 0:03:39.920 a place where a gidge A judicated he was likely 0:03:39.920 --> 0:03:41.040 to be tortured, and that is good. 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:44.840 Good. And Trump has designated fentanel as a weapon of 0:03:44.920 --> 0:03:50.600 mass destruction, which is great. What are we doing here? 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:53.960 Like, I. 0:03:55.480 --> 0:03:57.880 Am trained as a historian, and I probably should remind 0:03:57.880 --> 0:04:01.400 you that we have been down this road before with 0:04:01.480 --> 0:04:05.280 the weapons of mass destruction, and I hope this is 0:04:05.320 --> 0:04:09.960 not leading where it did last time, but I am 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:11.160 very worried that it might. 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:16.400 Yeah. Yeah, it's one of those things. I'm both We'll see, 0:04:16.640 --> 0:04:19.960 we'll know before this episode ends whether or not I'm wrong. 0:04:20.120 --> 0:04:22.720 Tucker Carlson stated recently that a source has told him 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:27.040 the presidential announcement coming up is Trump declaring war, right that, like, 0:04:27.120 --> 0:04:30.120 we're doing a war with Venezuela full on, not just 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:33.280 some like air strikes and stuff, just not to minimize 0:04:34.000 --> 0:04:37.480 a legal air strike in the sea or on Venezuela 0:04:37.600 --> 0:04:40.559 or soil. I don't know if I think that that's 0:04:40.680 --> 0:04:46.080 the likeliest thing. It just seems like such a huge jump. 0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:50.000 But also at this point there's a whole armada blocking 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:52.520 off Venezuela from the rest of the world. And Trump 0:04:52.600 --> 0:04:55.039 put out a statement saying that their oil is our 0:04:55.080 --> 0:04:59.680 oil and belongs rightly to American companies. So very very 0:05:00.600 --> 0:05:03.160 very possible when we're about to go to war with them. 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:06.479 I'm certainly not a I don't know what's gonna happen, y'all. 0:05:06.640 --> 0:05:09.559 I'm white knuckling it like everybody else. Yeah, that fucking sucks. 0:05:09.560 --> 0:05:10.920 I didn't know the thing about that oil. 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:12.320 It's amazing. 0:05:12.440 --> 0:05:15.120 I'll read the exact quote to you, James. This is 0:05:15.160 --> 0:05:18.360 from a trump a Truth social post which has twelve 0:05:18.400 --> 0:05:22.520 point four thousand retruths and forty seven thousand likes. Venezuela 0:05:22.560 --> 0:05:25.280 is completely surrounded by the largest armada ever assembled in 0:05:25.320 --> 0:05:27.479 the history of South America. It will only get bigger, 0:05:27.480 --> 0:05:29.000 and the shock to then will be like nothing they 0:05:29.000 --> 0:05:31.279 have ever seen before until such time as they returned 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:33.760 to the United States of America all of the oil, land, 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:37.000 and other assets that they previously stole from US. The 0:05:37.040 --> 0:05:40.160 illegitimate Maduro regime is using oil from these stolen oil 0:05:40.200 --> 0:05:44.359 fields to finance themselves, drug terrorism, human trafficking, murder and kidnapping. 0:05:44.360 --> 0:05:46.200 For the theft of our assets and many other reasons 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:49.559 including terrorism, drug smuggling, and human trafficking, the Venezuelan regime 0:05:49.560 --> 0:05:52.960 has been designated a foreign terrorist organization. Therefore, today I'm 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:55.400 ordering a total and complete blockade of all sanctioned oil 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:58.160 tankers going into and out of Venezuela. The illegal aliens 0:05:58.160 --> 0:06:00.279 and criminals that the Madeira regime has sent the United 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:03.159 States during the weekend and Biden administration are being returned 0:06:03.160 --> 0:06:06.320 to Venezuela at a rapid pace. YadA, YadA, YadA. Yeah, 0:06:06.360 --> 0:06:08.560 all of our oil, land and other assets have to 0:06:08.560 --> 0:06:11.680 be returned to the United States, which, like he's talking 0:06:11.720 --> 0:06:15.240 about oil that American companies have had at points like 0:06:15.279 --> 0:06:18.720 contracts to exploit. Yeah, but he's phrasing it is like 0:06:18.839 --> 0:06:20.719 their land and oil is our land and oil. 0:06:20.839 --> 0:06:24.160 Which yeah, that's a very colonial way of phrasing like 0:06:24.240 --> 0:06:25.000 a contract. 0:06:26.200 --> 0:06:26.520 Again. 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:29.560 A lot of times, you know, I would be like, Okay, well, 0:06:29.600 --> 0:06:31.680 I don't know if war is the most reasonable thing 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:34.680 to expect. When the president's posting shit like that, it's 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:36.960 very reasonable to be like, I think we might go 0:06:37.000 --> 0:06:40.200 to war. I think he might be about to invade Venezuela. 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:42.920 I don't know what's going to happen, but it's you're 0:06:42.960 --> 0:06:47.640 no longer being like a kooky conspiracy theorist to be like, well, 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:50.560 maybe he's about to try to take over Venezuela, and 0:06:50.600 --> 0:06:51.680 maybe that is what's coming. 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:55.359 Yeah, I don't understand how in that instance they would 0:06:55.360 --> 0:06:58.760 continue to get Venezuela to accept people. It's the US 0:06:58.920 --> 0:07:02.800 is removing the sticking points that I see. 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:05.359 Maybe he's found a third country, right that they've they've 0:07:05.640 --> 0:07:09.960 been very fond of finding third countries. I guess I 0:07:10.040 --> 0:07:15.000 should explain a little bit about oil leaving Venezuela, just 0:07:15.040 --> 0:07:16.480 so like people are aware of that. 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:21.239 So like Robert read the truth something someone says in church, 0:07:21.320 --> 0:07:25.160 doesn't it? Yeah, yeah, here we are. So they're talking 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:29.800 about like blockading sanctioned oil tankers. Not necessarily every tanker 0:07:29.880 --> 0:07:32.560 that enters Venezuela is sanctioned, Like I believe Chevron has 0:07:32.600 --> 0:07:33.720 some contracts with Chevron. 0:07:33.960 --> 0:07:35.880 Tankers should be cruising. 0:07:35.960 --> 0:07:37.200 Yeah, there's a lot of chevroll. 0:07:37.360 --> 0:07:39.320 Yeah, that shouldn't be an issue, right, they should be 0:07:39.320 --> 0:07:40.920 able to go back and forth. They're not sanctioned. 0:07:41.640 --> 0:07:44.840 It's the Venezuelan State Oil Company, which in English, I 0:07:44.840 --> 0:07:52.400 guess you would say pdvsavasavasay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, what Venezuela 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:54.720 has done previously, And this is not by any means 0:07:54.800 --> 0:07:58.840 unique to Venezuela, but this is generally how many of 0:07:58.880 --> 0:08:00.960 these regimes that are kind kind of in the ambit 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:03.920 of Venezuela. I'm talking about Iran and Russia here have 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:08.240 avoided sanctions and sanctioned entities so far as by using 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:10.080 what are called ghost ships. 0:08:10.240 --> 0:08:12.440 I will link to an explainer on this. 0:08:13.600 --> 0:08:16.640 What they will do is use the names and identify 0:08:16.640 --> 0:08:19.480 as the vessels that have been scrapped. They will change 0:08:19.480 --> 0:08:23.280 the flags of vessels, often to these small island nations, 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.600 for whom allowing ships to use their flag as kind 0:08:26.600 --> 0:08:30.480 of a source of income. Right, And they will often 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:34.360 use these to go out into international waters and then 0:08:34.520 --> 0:08:36.880 offload cargo, in this case oil. 0:08:36.960 --> 0:08:37.040 Right. 0:08:37.080 --> 0:08:40.240 So it just happens pretty frequently with Venezuelan vessels. That 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:43.160 was one it was one such vessel called the Skipper 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:46.520 that the US Coast Guard boarded I think last week 0:08:46.559 --> 0:08:49.880 as we're recording this. Yeah, sure, that is how Venezuela 0:08:49.920 --> 0:08:53.360 has previously been evading these sanctions, right, And Iran does 0:08:53.400 --> 0:08:53.800 this too. 0:08:54.600 --> 0:08:55.600 Russia does this too. 0:08:56.000 --> 0:08:58.280 They also do things like spoof their location or turn 0:08:58.360 --> 0:09:01.280 off their They have like a locate to beacon the 0:09:01.320 --> 0:09:05.120 ship they're supposed to use a transponder. Yeah, yeah, so 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:08.040 this is fairly common practice. But Obviously, the way to 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:10.320 stop that is a physical blockade, right, Like, that's not 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:13.400 going to be possible if these if the US is 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:18.000 effectively like inspecting ships leaving Venezuela, right or sort of 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:21.280 keeping a very close eye on them, So that will end, 0:09:21.320 --> 0:09:24.440 and with that will end a very important source of 0:09:24.440 --> 0:09:26.960 income for the Maduta regime if they keep doing this. 0:09:27.920 --> 0:09:28.479 Yeah. 0:09:28.679 --> 0:09:31.120 Now, obviously one of the sort of issues we're trying 0:09:31.160 --> 0:09:32.920 to work out what is going to happen here, especially 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:36.080 before whatever speech Trump is about to give, is that 0:09:36.200 --> 0:09:40.160 we're trying to figure out state policy from Trump posting. Right, Yeah, 0:09:40.400 --> 0:09:42.599 and there's a lot of this that is enormously incoherent. 0:09:42.720 --> 0:09:46.400 So Okay, the thing about designating the government of Venezuela 0:09:46.480 --> 0:09:50.400 as a foreign terrorist organization is one of the weirdest 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:54.400 things I've ever seen. And this was also unhinged. The 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:57.480 closest thing we've ever really gotten to that, I guess 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:01.360 was the IERGC. Yeah, and maybe you could go back 0:10:01.360 --> 0:10:05.200 and say the Khmer Rouge, but like, they weren't really 0:10:05.240 --> 0:10:09.120 a government by that point, so this is not This 0:10:09.200 --> 0:10:11.000 is not a designation that has ever been given to 0:10:11.280 --> 0:10:14.120 a government before. Right, it doesn't make any sense to 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:16.160 give it to a government. It doesn't make sense to 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:17.960 give to this government. I mean, you know, even if 0:10:18.000 --> 0:10:20.280 you're working with in the logic of counter terrorism, which 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:24.240 is just you know, unhinged, murderous imperialism to begin with. 0:10:24.880 --> 0:10:27.400 But all of the reporting on this has been assuming 0:10:27.880 --> 0:10:31.240 that the blockade will be of you know, like of 0:10:31.280 --> 0:10:36.320 these specifically sanctioned oil tankers. However, come The thing about 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:40.040 the Foreign Terrorist Organization designation is that it does things. 0:10:40.120 --> 0:10:43.000 And one of the things that that Foreign Terrorist Organization 0:10:43.960 --> 0:10:46.480 designation does is that if you do business with a 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:49.960 with a foreign terrorist organization, you are now immediately on 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:54.920 the line from material support of terrorism charges like chef run. So, yes, 0:10:55.240 --> 0:10:57.920 there are lots of countries like Facebook. 0:10:58.200 --> 0:11:01.280 Does this fine with the US military carrying out air 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:05.880 strikes on Chevron executives and their property, Let's be clear 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:08.920 about that. I would I would salute the red, white, 0:11:08.920 --> 0:11:11.000 and Blue if we dropped some hell fires on that 0:11:11.160 --> 0:11:12.080 C suite. 0:11:13.840 --> 0:11:14.920 Yeah. I don't know. 0:11:15.200 --> 0:11:18.000 This is all very weird. My understanding of the FTO 0:11:18.040 --> 0:11:21.080 designation process is that, well, how it's supposed to work 0:11:21.120 --> 0:11:24.080 is that the President proposes it and then the Secretary 0:11:24.080 --> 0:11:27.320 of State and Sectuary of the Treasurer, I think have 0:11:27.400 --> 0:11:30.160 to improve it, and then there's a seven day period 0:11:30.200 --> 0:11:34.280 where Congress has it an opportunity to say no, and 0:11:34.320 --> 0:11:36.880 then it goes up. So right now we should be 0:11:37.160 --> 0:11:39.559 theoretically in the seven day window, but it's also really 0:11:39.640 --> 0:11:43.360 unclear what the illustration has actually been doing because again 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:46.360 we're being governed by post. 0:11:46.960 --> 0:11:47.240 Yeah. 0:11:47.320 --> 0:11:50.400 Like it's so it's not announced as an executive action 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:53.679 on White House dot gov, and I think normally it 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:58.760 goes there and then the seven day congressional period commences. 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:01.640 Then it's not in the federal right to either. Right now, 0:12:01.760 --> 0:12:03.720 all we have is a truth. 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:06.480 So like, yeah, and like and this is this is 0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:07.960 the problem is that this is this is sort of 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:11.679 the Calvin Ball War in that they're using they're using 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:15.360 the names of actual legal categories and things that have 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:18.280 material effects in the world, but they're just posts. And 0:12:18.320 --> 0:12:20.520 I want to be very clear about this. Even just 0:12:21.320 --> 0:12:25.959 doing a blockade on these sanctioned vessels is an active war. Yeah, 0:12:26.000 --> 0:12:28.840 like that that's an that's very deliberately an active war. 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:32.360 It is an active imperial aggression. It is morally wrong. 0:12:32.600 --> 0:12:36.920 It is also unbelievably illegal under the War Powers Act. 0:12:37.000 --> 0:12:39.040 And this this is this has actually gotten a response 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:43.679 from Democrats in Congress. There's been a few measures. CBS 0:12:43.760 --> 0:12:45.120 is reporting this has been if there's been a few 0:12:45.160 --> 0:12:49.079 measures to stop the president from starting a war. Here, 0:12:49.600 --> 0:12:53.080 I'm going to quote CBS. A second measure from Democratic Rep. 0:12:53.160 --> 0:12:57.200 Jim mcgovernor in Massachusetts would remove the armed forces quote 0:12:57.360 --> 0:13:00.160 from hostilities with or against Venezuela that have not been 0:13:00.160 --> 0:13:04.840 authorized by Congress. McGovern's resolution could face the best chance 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:08.040 of potential adoption since it has three gop CO sponsors. 0:13:08.880 --> 0:13:12.240 Rep's Marjory Taylor Green of Georgia, Thomas Massey of Kentucky, 0:13:12.240 --> 0:13:15.080 and Don Bacon of Nebraska. Bacon says he would also 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:17.240 vote and f he or Meeks his measure. Bacon's taking 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:20.959 a very weird line here of Keen's congressional approval, and 0:13:21.000 --> 0:13:22.520 also I support him doing this. 0:13:23.400 --> 0:13:25.760 So purely a procedural objection. 0:13:26.280 --> 0:13:28.680 Yeah, it's a I want my board, but I want 0:13:28.720 --> 0:13:30.600 Congress to have a little shred of power. 0:13:30.760 --> 0:13:32.439 Yeah. 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:35.280 So I think it's alcial work. Noting what exactly is 0:13:35.320 --> 0:13:38.320 going on here. I'm someone who's on the record as 0:13:38.840 --> 0:13:42.680 talking about how political economy in Latin America and American 0:13:42.640 --> 0:13:45.400 imperialism is usually slightly more complicated than they just want 0:13:45.400 --> 0:13:47.840 to resource, but they just want a resource here. 0:13:48.360 --> 0:13:50.920 Yeah, this one, this one really is yeah. 0:13:51.040 --> 0:13:54.040 No, like so it's only like like like Bolivia, for example, 0:13:54.040 --> 0:13:56.360 every everyone thinks that that that the whole coup Oblivia 0:13:56.960 --> 0:13:59.959 was about lithium and it yes, I'm very mad about this, 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:01.760 it was not. If you look at the people of 0:14:01.760 --> 0:14:03.080 you look at Camato, if you look at people who 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:06.120 were actually running that coup, they were all Bolivian agrobarons. 0:14:06.440 --> 0:14:08.040 Because a huge part of what was going on there 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:10.920 was a rebellion by the sort of agro business like 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:14.800 agricultural elite who joined with parts of like a reactionary 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:15.520 every middle class. 0:14:15.520 --> 0:14:16.920 Okay, but this is not that. 0:14:17.480 --> 0:14:21.440 Venezuela has the world's largest oil preserves, but there were 0:14:21.480 --> 0:14:24.720 significant problems extracting the oil right. Many of these problems 0:14:24.720 --> 0:14:26.760 stem from the two thousand and two to two thousand 0:14:26.760 --> 0:14:30.200 and three opposition general strike. This is back after Hugo 0:14:30.280 --> 0:14:33.720 Chaves was elected. So in two thousand and two there 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:36.960 was a coup against Chaves that failed and was sort 0:14:36.960 --> 0:14:41.280 of overturned famously. But later that year there was also 0:14:41.600 --> 0:14:44.280 a sort of opposition general strike that lasted from late 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:47.120 two thousand and two to early two thousand and three, 0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:49.720 and a huge part of that general strike was oil 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:52.880 workers specifically, and it was very specifically. One of the 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:54.640 things about the structure of oil production is that there 0:14:54.640 --> 0:14:57.520 were a bunch of very very highly paid and highly 0:14:57.560 --> 0:15:01.120 skilled technical workers who are are very very loyal to 0:15:01.200 --> 0:15:03.680 the oil companies themselves and who are very loyal to 0:15:03.920 --> 0:15:05.680 who are sort of tend to be very right wing. 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:09.160 These people went on strike and sort of got fired 0:15:09.200 --> 0:15:12.440 on mass. Oil production requires both a huge amount of 0:15:12.440 --> 0:15:14.600 heavy capital and a bunch of highly skilled workers, and 0:15:14.600 --> 0:15:17.600 if you don't have both of those things, then you 0:15:17.680 --> 0:15:20.640 can't do oil extraction. And this has sort of been 0:15:20.960 --> 0:15:23.400 a recurring problem for the entire time both sort of 0:15:23.440 --> 0:15:26.160 fugual Srofics and Majuro has been in office, is that 0:15:26.200 --> 0:15:29.320 they haven't had the capacity to actually extract a bunch 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:31.800 of the oil, and also they've refused to turn the 0:15:31.880 --> 0:15:34.960 oil over to more American companies that have already been contracted. 0:15:35.320 --> 0:15:37.680 And it's also worth noting there's a lot of talk 0:15:37.680 --> 0:15:41.520 about like Venezuela having the world's largest reserves, and a 0:15:41.640 --> 0:15:45.760 lot of that is like them jinking the numbers by 0:15:45.840 --> 0:15:48.520 including a lot of like tire sands, that would be 0:15:48.640 --> 0:15:53.360 that no one's going to try to get extract fuel 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:55.320 from because it's too expensive and too much of a 0:15:55.360 --> 0:15:56.040 pain in the ass. 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:58.120 It's just not worth it anyway. 0:15:58.440 --> 0:16:00.920 And also that claims to reserves not actually part of 0:16:01.000 --> 0:16:01.920 Venezuela at this. 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:06.040 Time, right right, Like we're not working with exact with 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:07.239 accurate information. 0:16:07.760 --> 0:16:10.520 Yeah, it's it's messy. And it's also worth noting that 0:16:10.600 --> 0:16:13.640 like the oil numbers, I mean, obviously all oil numbers 0:16:13.640 --> 0:16:16.440 are political, but the oil numbers here are extraordinarily political, 0:16:16.480 --> 0:16:18.800 because these are numbers that are basically used as a 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:22.160 pitch by sort of like the opposition to try to 0:16:22.200 --> 0:16:25.680 get a US backed too. And it's also sort of 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:27.600 word noting that the other thing that's happening here, and 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:30.960 the reason this is all going to probably cause really 0:16:30.960 --> 0:16:34.440 significant economic problems and probably humanitarian disaster, both in Venezuela 0:16:34.520 --> 0:16:38.840 and probably also in Cuba, which extensively relies on Venezuelan 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:42.360 oil to have their economy function, is that the Venezuelan 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:47.280 economy has been really structured around oil in a way 0:16:47.320 --> 0:16:50.680 that they failed to transition out of multiple times. The 0:16:50.720 --> 0:16:52.800 first big one I've done in a different episode about 0:16:52.800 --> 0:16:55.560 this in the Neolipical List series a bunch of years ago. 0:16:55.600 --> 0:16:57.400 But you know, there was a whole bunch of delivery 0:16:57.400 --> 0:16:59.960 sabotage by American car companies over the attempt to build 0:16:59.960 --> 0:17:03.160 it car industry. There's a long sort of history of this. 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:05.320 But it means that both of these countries' economies are 0:17:05.359 --> 0:17:09.119 desperately reliant on oil. And the more of this is 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:11.240 just that is cut off, the more fucked it's going 0:17:11.280 --> 0:17:13.160 to get for just everyone in Venezuela. 0:17:13.280 --> 0:17:16.080 Yeah. Yeah, And you can already see how much worse 0:17:16.160 --> 0:17:20.520 it's got from the time I went to Venezuela to 0:17:20.520 --> 0:17:23.080 to now. Like, they're very vulnerable to changes in crude 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:27.680 oil prices, right, and that has, along with corruption in 0:17:28.119 --> 0:17:30.040 a government which doesn't really give a shit about the 0:17:30.119 --> 0:17:34.480 material welfare of these people, has already made things unsustainably 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:36.760 hard for people in Venezuela, and that will only get worse. 0:17:37.200 --> 0:17:41.400 Yeah, So I want to conclude, basically on a couple 0:17:41.480 --> 0:17:43.800 of things. Wonders that too, this is going to cause 0:17:44.040 --> 0:17:49.120 more waves of migration and refugees fleeing the country, both 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:52.080 from potential realist military strikes and for the economic damage. 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:55.520 There's been some moves in the international stage, with China 0:17:55.560 --> 0:17:59.360 and Mexico expressing support for the Venezuelan government. Shine Bomb 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:03.560 in Mexico is offered to facilitate negotiations and media negotiations 0:18:03.560 --> 0:18:06.440 between the US and Venezuela. It's also kind of word 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:09.280 noting that right before this whole thing, there was a 0:18:09.320 --> 0:18:14.160 giant Vanity Fair interview with Susie Wiles, who's Trump's chief 0:18:14.200 --> 0:18:14.760 of staff. 0:18:15.200 --> 0:18:17.080 Who oh boy, this. 0:18:17.119 --> 0:18:19.639 Is for Roysberry Dubbs this week Coller here. 0:18:19.560 --> 0:18:23.200 God said Trump quote wants to keep blowing up boats 0:18:23.240 --> 0:18:26.720 until Maduro Chris's uncle, which is one of the most 0:18:26.760 --> 0:18:32.480 hideous things I've ever heard. Yeah, it's gangsters, it's literally terrorism. 0:18:32.600 --> 0:18:33.880 It's it's a highway. 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:37.840 Yeah yeah, it is in Australia structurally, unless you resign, 0:18:37.960 --> 0:18:40.960 we are going to keep killing civilians. But it's hatless 0:18:41.000 --> 0:18:41.520 taker ship. 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:44.960 Yeah yeah. It's also a fundamental misunderstanding of how the 0:18:44.960 --> 0:18:45.880 regime operates. 0:18:45.880 --> 0:18:47.800 If that is the case. So because they don't care 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:49.160 if their people kept dying. 0:18:49.480 --> 0:18:53.480 I have seen Venezuelan people die in the Darian gap, 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:57.760 right because in part the government is incapable of providing 0:18:57.800 --> 0:19:01.159 for their material needs. They don't care like killing some 0:19:01.280 --> 0:19:03.919 other people with boats is not going to fundamentally change 0:19:03.960 --> 0:19:06.040 the way that government works, because there's any one way 0:19:06.080 --> 0:19:06.840 it can work. 0:19:07.600 --> 0:19:09.520 Yeah, and I think there's the one last thing I 0:19:09.520 --> 0:19:11.919 want to say about this before we head out slash, 0:19:12.000 --> 0:19:14.439 before whatever giant update comes after the speech. 0:19:14.520 --> 0:19:16.840 Yeah, yeah, I've got one after you finish here. 0:19:17.080 --> 0:19:18.639 One of the big problems here is if people in 0:19:18.680 --> 0:19:21.880 the administration really do believe this, they actually do think 0:19:21.880 --> 0:19:23.920 that you can knock off the governments with air strikes, 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:26.000 and no you can't, No, you can't. They thought this 0:19:26.119 --> 0:19:29.920 about the Huthies too. It's wrong, It's never been right. 0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:30.960 It's hideous. 0:19:31.440 --> 0:19:34.760 We just finished doing like a five parter on bastards 0:19:34.920 --> 0:19:37.840 about like the nuclear doom state device that also dealt 0:19:37.880 --> 0:19:41.840 heavily with the work of that Italian Air Force General Duhey, 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:44.280 who was the first guy in nineteen twenty one to 0:19:44.280 --> 0:19:47.159 be like, oh, you need are bombers. Nothing else is 0:19:47.240 --> 0:19:50.400 necessary in militaries. Now it's nothing but bombers from here. 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:51.919 And if you have enough bombers, no one will ever 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:55.159 attack you. And this logic has always been wrong. And 0:19:55.200 --> 0:19:59.960 it's also every new generation of like military leaders, especially 0:20:00.200 --> 0:20:03.480 in the air power field, are like all we need 0:20:03.560 --> 0:20:05.960 is air strikes. You don't need to send in ground. 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:08.399 You can accomplish all of your goals, all of your 0:20:08.400 --> 0:20:12.400 power projection, just by bombing people or shooting missiles at them, 0:20:12.640 --> 0:20:13.840