Full Speed Ahead to Another Lunatic Secret War

There is virtually no opposition within the US political establishment to the Trump administration’s reckless provocations. On the contrary, the corporate media was full of stories expressing shock that Maduro would use tear gas at the border and ban border crossings. There was no mention that the Venezuelan military’s tactics against right-wing thugs storming its borders resembled the methods used by the US border patrol against defenseless women and children seeking to exercise their right to apply for asylum.

Most telling is the response of the self-styled “left wing” of the Democratic Party, which has lent legitimacy to Trump’s threats. Senator Bernie Sanders, who announced his candidacy for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination last week, tweeted Saturday: “The people of Venezuela are enduring a serious humanitarian crisis. The Maduro government must put the needs of its people first, allow humanitarian aid into the country and refrain from violence against protesters.”

New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who told reporter Max Blumenthal in early February that she was “working on a response” to US war threats against Venezuela, has not issued a public statement since then.

Eric London, "US imperialism stages provocation on Venezuela’s borders"

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Thwarted at the border, the opposition began rallying around the banner of foreign action to topple Mr. Maduro. Ahead of the meeting with Mr. Pence and other regional leaders in Bogotá on Monday, Mr. Guaidó wrote on Twitter that “we must keep all options open for the liberation of our homeland.” Julio Borges, another opposition leader, said he would ask for the use of force at that meeting.

President Trump has raised some hopes for such an intervention, saying that “the twilight hour of socialism” has arrived in the Western Hemisphere.

Nicholas Casey and Albinson Linares, "With Aid Blocked at Border, What’s Next Move for Venezuela’s Opposition?"

The coup plotters had a bad weekend. Their "Live Aid" invasion of Venezuela was a bust. What was supposed to be a pacific display of courage conjuring up the historic March from Selma to Montgomery turned into an opposition rock and bottle melee. Not even The New York Times could gussy it up:

At a pedestrian footbridge farther south, cheers erupted as aid trucks began to approach the border, with hundreds of young Venezuelans sitting atop the shipments.

But then Venezuelan national guard soldiers fired tear gas canisters toward the cars. Many of the protesters stepped off the trucks and rushed the soldiers, throwing stones. Soon, large crowds were tossing rocks up to the stone throwers on the bridge, as opposition activists and Colombian national police officers watched on.

Bernie Sanders had a bad weekend too. He tweeted his support of the Trump-led coup. Sanders will now lose the essential peace wing of party. It will cost him dearly.

There is only one path forward for the coup: a foreign military intervention. The Lima Group meets today. Additional sanctions will likely be announced, hurting the very people whose welfare purportedly is the prime motivation of the coup clown Guaidó. But as we have learned from a number of other examples -- Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Syria -- sanctions do nothing to actually change the leadership of a regime.

No, it is full speed ahead to another lunatic secret war.