That’s why I said business partner, not trade partner. China is our largest creditor, and certainly invest on a huge scale in the United States.
In addition to being one of our largest import/export partners.
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https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/03/11/the-path-to-climate-justice-passes-through-caracas/
“It is critical to understand how blocking the regime change agenda with respect to Venezuela is integrally connected to confronting the challenge of climate change.”
Elliot Abrams (war criminal from Reagan era)/Pompeo/Bolton/Trump and their puppet Guaido on one side, a future for the Bolivarian Revolution on the other, what is your choice?
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I’ve decided to bail on this conversation for my mental health.
I would reiterate to anyone reading, watch The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, maybe listen to some podcasts like Revolutionary Left Radio and Proles of the Roundtable, and take care of yourself.
This world is going to be gaslit to a char until capitalism is destroyed and its tendrils in our epistemology rooted out and burned.
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So I found this blog entry which suggested at least one person did attend as an observer and took their responsibility very seriously.
https://www.united-church.ca/blogs/round-table/election-observation-venezuela-sacred-responsibility
And these people apparently wrote a letter protesting the EU characterisation of the elections. I am aware the source appears to be a Chavismo advocate.
This article suggests one might take a different point of view.
But this seems the most persuasive election observer report I have seen. Who doesn’t believe Canadian teachers? Even lefty pinko ones?
You were absolutely right about the Carter Center. The last time they said anything positive about Venezuelan elections was in 2012, where they were quite positive about the voter machine system and its anonymity.
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This piece seemed a bit silly to me?
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Yes turnout fell, cos a major opposition party refused to take place. Its pretty much arithmetically inevitable. However 46% is still significantly higher than the turnout for the European parliament elections in the UK. If 46% turnout with one party pulling out is prima facie evidence of illegitimacy what is 36%.
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Pulling out, is not evidence of election irregularities in itself. It can also reflect an understanding that they were going to lose. Like they did the vote before.
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If anything was evidence of election irregularities it is the 90% turnout figures from the 1960s to 1975. Thats rather striking isnt it? Amazing that all those brown Venezuelans always elected a white Venezuelan President for so many years and with such amazingly high levels of turnout for 15 years.
What do you think accounts for that?
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Not just the sanctions. We also meddle with Venezuela in a million other ways.
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I missed it, thank you. However that’s not really enough to convince me of the existence of death squads.
There is a lot of space between “armed faction” and “paramilitary death squad”
And FWIW, I share @anon15383236’s apprehension towards citing Wikipedia as a primary source for issues which are subject to massive disinformation campaigns. Colectivos have problems, for sure. That wiki is chock full of politically loaded language and relies on too few sources for many of its claims.
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That’s such a misleading article. They claim the 2018 elections were fair by using quotes from 2005, 2006 and 2012.
And now Pompeo is threatening to assassinate Maduro if he attempts to fly out of the country…
Like seriously, wtf
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Kind of hard for Colombia to fight an outside war when it is in the middle of a civil war.
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Not enough to make a distinction between good guys and bad guys in a situation like this – organisations like this are bad news no matter which side they’re on. Obviously the Wikipedia entry has a lot of biased sources, but it also has some reputable ones that alone paint an ugly picture. Maduro is just the sort of preening incompetent who’d use these organisations in the absence of his predecessor’s charisma.
And again, I have little doubt that Guaido would build a similar apparatus to defend his interests (and of course those of his biggest American fans, who have extensive experience in setting up armed factions and death squads in Central and South America).
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You can blame my paraphrasing. That wasn’t what she was saying to me. She wasn’t worried about refuges (as far as I could tell). Her concern was about armies both local and from foreign governments fighting and what that brings. She said to me the regular Venezuelans will be the ones to suffer and die no matter who wins. And if the fight spills over the boarder then she will be in the same situation as they are. She has no resources. No extra money. No where to run to with her son.
We haven’t spoken about politics before. Sometimes we need google translate to communicate. If she is xenophobic it isn’t something I have detected and I sure do not personally approve of.
My heart breaks for everyone in the region that is suffering.
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Quite frankly, this just doesn’t even capture at all what the colectivos are or how they function.
As they are prone to do, the private media have invented a new thing. In both English and Spanish, they are calling it the colectivos .
They are meant to be irrational, cruel, grotesque armed motorbike riders who “enforce” the revolution in Venezuela and are responsible for most of the violence afflicting the South American nation, which has left more than 30 people dead since February.
The opposition barricaders are presented as the innocent victims of these collectivos, who apparently work with the National Guard and have the support of President Nicolas Maduro’s government.
The private media use the concept to demonise the real collectives in Venezuela ― feminist collectives, community groups, environment and education collectives, cultural groups, mural painters and so on. With the government of Hugo Chavez and now Maduro, these have grown, multiplied, and united around general support for the Bolivarian revolution.
ETA: there problems within some colectivos. But a far bigger problem is to characterize them as some monolith. Colectivos form around all sorts of community functions. Security is only one of many.
Further, not all colectivos support Maduro per se or in actuality, but generally the colectivos 
back the revolution, and as such will oppose Guaidó regardless.
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Hopefully it’s soon over and we stop having Venezuela in our news cycle. Venezuela is like the new HRC for the conservatives.
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No, but it captures an aspect that I and many other liberals and progressives find unacceptable – to say that there are “problems” with some colectivos understates things, especially since many of the peaceful ones don’t disavow their uglier comrades and their actions.
I’m still going to go with Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the UN OHCHR that there are violent thugs and criminals in addition to the peaceful mural painters, feminists, etc. Incidents of political violence in support of Maduro or his party (he himself certainly currently draws no distinction between the two) as opposed to mere “security” have also been reported by numerous reputable news outlets like the Guardian.
Just because we don’t trust Guaido (for good reason, given those backing him) it doesn’t mean we need to make excuses for Maduro or his more violent supporters. A socialist revolutionary party run by an authoritarian and corrupt thug isn’t one worth defending (see also Daniel Ortega, currently), no matter how awful the so-called “freedom fighters” opposing him are or were and no matter how rapacious the monied interests backing them are.
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But haven’t the leftovers of FARC been pretty much on the ropes as of late?
Thank you for finding the PDF, that’s a great read. I find it strange that so many superpowers delegitimized the vote, without describing why it wasn’t legitimate. And finding out their voting machines have 7 records to prevent tampering (including memory dumps and paper trails), as well as their fingerprint system to understand duplicate / false votes… it’s extremely robust. That letter to the EU is pretty damning… I’d love to know if there’s a press release as to why the Carter Center didn’t go.
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Yes there is. They were unhappy at the Maduro government/regimes actions in 2014 and 2015 regarding a bunch of things. Its on their website.
Dont get me wrong. I have family in Vene and was just chatting to a family friend about investing money. Housing has dropped 60% from its highs in Puerto Ordaz, an industrial town cos everyone with property wants to leave. Maduro support is now very low. I estimate 30% or so. But one has to remember there were a lot of very very poor people Chavismo helped. They wont stop supporting him. And as my old family friend pointed out, right now, if you need money, you have to be a friend of the government, cos they are the only entity left which still has buying power. He would support a new government but he would never say in case it affected his business. Some of the opponents of the regime are very comfortable and have plenty of money outside of the country. They dont care who sees them oppose Maduro. Which tells you that it really isn’t very repressive. More incompetent and corrupt.
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It never ceases to amaze me how the countries most in need of an airdrop of democracy all happen to have massive oil reserves, and not be doing what the US and Europe want with those reserves.
I mean, what are the odds?
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What, exactly, are they doing with their oil reserves that the US and Europe don’t want them to do?
