Trump’s Monroe Doctrine: Threaten Greenland, Canada, Mexico, Colombia and Brazil But Support Argentina, Chile, El Salvador, Honduras and Ecuador Whose Authoritarian Leaders Like Him and Keep on Maduro’s VP While Spurning the Nobel Prize-Winning Leader of Venezuela’s Opposition
We begin with the seizure of Venezuela’s Maduro and his wife, hauled out of bed in the early hours of Saturday by U.S. special forces and now in a Manhattan Federal prison facing a 2020 indictment from the SDNY on drugs and weapons charges. Joining us to discuss Trump’s boast that “we will run Venezuela” is David Smilde, a Professor of Human Relations and senior associate at the Center for Inter-American Policy and Research at Tulane University. He has published five books on Venezuela and studied the country for over 33 years, living there most of that time, and he is the co-author of the new book, The Paradox of Violence in Venezuela: Revolution, Crime and Policing during Chavismo. He is the author of the Substack Venezuela and United States and we look into the Trump version of the Monroe Doctrine he calls the “Donroe Docrtrine” which has him threatening Greenland, Canada, Panama, Mexico, Colombia and Brazil while supporting right wing authoritarian governments in Argentina, El Salvador, Honduras, Chile and Ecuador whose leaders like him, while spurning the Nobel Prize-winning leader of Venezuela’s opposition in favor of keeping on Maduro’s Vice President to do his bidding, assuming she agrees.
Trump’s Venezuela Oil Grab to Recover “Stolen” U.S. Oil and Then Pump Baby Pump
Then we assess the Trump oil grab of the world’s greatest known reserves which he crowed about at his press conference on Saturday promising the Venezuelan people would benefit from a bonanza of investments from U.S. oil giants who will recover their “stolen” property and then pump baby pump. Joining us is Francisco Monaldi, the fellow in Latin American energy policy at the Center for Energy Studies in the Mexico Center and the Latin America Initiative at the Baker Institute as well as a lecturer in energy economics at Rice University. He is also the founding director and a professor at the Center for Energy and the Environment at IESA in Venezuela and previously was a professor of political economy at Universidad Católica Andrés Bello in Caracas.
“Locked And Loaded”: Trump Vows to Rescue Iranian Demonstrators From a Brutal Government Whose Economy is Cratering From U.S. Sanctions
Then finally we speak with Nader Hashemi, the Director of the Alwaleed Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding and a Professor of Middle East and Islamic Politics at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. A Non-Resident Fellow at DAWN, he is the author of The People Reloaded: The Green Movement and the Struggle for Iran’s Future and Sectarianization: Mapping the New Politics of the Middle East and we discuss Trump’s threat that he is “locked and loaded” to rescue Iranian demonstrator from their brutal government as the country’s economy craters under a crippling new round of U.S.- backed sanctions.