On the one hand, the restrictions are so easy to get around its not even "getting around" anything. It is the US government saying you can go with a "good" reason, *wink wink*.
On the other hand, the fact that our political discourse is so childish that our government cannot outright tell people its okay to go as a tourist to Cuba really ticks me off. The Cold War is over, Cubans are people too, going over to Cuba to see nice people and experience their culture is not a matter of national interest in any sense.
Whatever, I'm going to Cuba on an educational tour to learn what 50 years of inept US foreign policy can achieve.
On the one hand, the restrictions are so easy to get around its not even "getting around" anything. It is the US government saying you can go with a "good" reason, *wink wink*.
On the other hand, the fact that our political discourse is so childish that our government cannot outright tell people its okay to go as a tourist to Cuba really ticks me off. The Cold War is over, Cubans are people too, going over to Cuba to see nice people and experience their culture is not a matter of national interest in any sense.
Whatever, I'm going to Cuba on an educational tour to learn what 50 years of inept US foreign policy can achieve.
a lot of it has to do with Congress getting off its wrinkled old ass and revoking the embargo. Presidential orders can only do so much.
On the one hand, the restrictions are so easy to get around its not even "getting around" anything. It is the US government saying you can go with a "good" reason, *wink wink*.
On the other hand, the fact that our political discourse is so childish that our government cannot outright tell people its okay to go as a tourist to Cuba really ticks me off. The Cold War is over, Cubans are people too, going over to Cuba to see nice people and experience their culture is not a matter of national interest in any sense.
Whatever, I'm going to Cuba on an educational tour to learn what 50 years of inept US foreign policy can achieve.
a lot of it has to do with Congress getting off its wrinkled old ass and revoking the embargo. Presidential orders can only do so much.
You're right. And to be fair, in the context of everything else, it is a pretty huge step forward.
Still, I am unreasonably excited at the prospect of visiting Cuba.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
The US State Department has recommended removing Cuba from the state sponsor of terror list and Obama and Castro are expected to meet at the OAS summit (which begins tomorrow).
Cruz has spoken out against it and the Florida House has voted in favor of a statement condemning the administrations actions regarding Cuba.
Captain Marcusnow arrives the hour of actionRegistered Userregular
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
The presidents met briefly yesterday and are expected to have "substantive talks" sometime today.
I really want Cuba to be a hot button issue for the republican debates. Make each and every one of the morons opposing this step forward and eat shit for trying to maintain this needless cold war relic.
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Given the US's relations with regimes whose human rights violations far exceed any of the Venezuelan government's, I am skeptical of that rationale, as I generally am when the US claims to be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of humanitarian concerns. It strikes me as fairly similar to the arguments for continuing the embargo: the Cuban/Venezuelan government is repressive, so we should engage in economic warfare against it. The embargo is not the same as sanctions against specific individuals, but I view both as manifestations of the approach the US has taken to Latin America generally - opposing left-wing/socialist governments and empowering right wing/capitalist ones.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
Their explanation of the "national security threat" language also pretty questionable. From a Huffington Post article:
Adam Isacson, senior associate for regional security policy at the human rights nonprofit Washington Office on Latin America, explained that under U.S. law, the executive has to declare a national emergency that threatens national security in order to freeze a foreigner’s assets by executive order.
The administration seems to have taken this very literally, and interpreted it mean that the actual existence or nonexistence of a national security threat is irrelevant. As long as the President officially declares that they are a threat, these sanctions can be imposed on that basis, even if his officials admit that they are not a threat. Kind of disingenuous.
edit - none of this is meant to extoll the virtues of the Venezuelan government
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Given the US's relations with regimes whose human rights violations far exceed any of the Venezuelan government's, I am skeptical of that rationale, as I generally am when the US claims to be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of humanitarian concerns. It strikes me as fairly similar to the arguments for continuing the embargo: the Cuban/Venezuelan government is repressive, so we should engage in economic warfare against it. The embargo is not the same as sanctions against specific individuals, but I view both as manifestations of the approach the US has taken to Latin America generally - opposing left-wing/socialist governments and empowering right wing/capitalist ones.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Given the US's relations with regimes whose human rights violations far exceed any of the Venezuelan government's, I am skeptical of that rationale, as I generally am when the US claims to be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of humanitarian concerns. It strikes me as fairly similar to the arguments for continuing the embargo: the Cuban/Venezuelan government is repressive, so we should engage in economic warfare against it. The embargo is not the same as sanctions against specific individuals, but I view both as manifestations of the approach the US has taken to Latin America generally - opposing left-wing/socialist governments and empowering right wing/capitalist ones.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
This seems awfully random for that.
I don't see how it's random. The US has been opposed to the Venezuelan government since Hugo Chavez took power. And as I mentioned previously, the US has long maintained a policy of opposition or outright hostility toward socialist/left-wing governments in Latin America.
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Given the US's relations with regimes whose human rights violations far exceed any of the Venezuelan government's, I am skeptical of that rationale, as I generally am when the US claims to be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of humanitarian concerns. It strikes me as fairly similar to the arguments for continuing the embargo: the Cuban/Venezuelan government is repressive, so we should engage in economic warfare against it. The embargo is not the same as sanctions against specific individuals, but I view both as manifestations of the approach the US has taken to Latin America generally - opposing left-wing/socialist governments and empowering right wing/capitalist ones.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
Their explanation of the "national security threat" language also pretty questionable. From a Huffington Post article:
Adam Isacson, senior associate for regional security policy at the human rights nonprofit Washington Office on Latin America, explained that under U.S. law, the executive has to declare a national emergency that threatens national security in order to freeze a foreigner’s assets by executive order.
The administration seems to have taken this very literally, and interpreted it mean that the actual existence or nonexistence of a national security threat is irrelevant. As long as the President officially declares that they are a threat, these sanctions can be imposed on that basis, even if his officials admit that they are not a threat. Kind of disingenuous.
edit - none of this is meant to extoll the virtues of the Venezuelan government
Personally I agree with the executive order. The text from the executive order states "I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, find that the situation in Venezuela, including the Government of Venezuela's erosion of human rights guarantees, persecution of political opponents, curtailment of press freedoms, use of violence and human rights violations and abuses in response to antigovernment protests, and arbitrary arrest and detention of antigovernment protestors, as well as the exacerbating presence of significant public corruption, constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States, and I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat."
The situation in Venezuela IS a threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Directly? No. Venezuela is not sending warships up the Chesapeake.
Their economy on the other hand requires a certain economic good to be a certain price. That shit ain't happening for a while. Deal with Iran goes through, that becomes a damn long while.
You put these things together and maybe you get a government collapse. Depending on how that turns out... Well Kaputa, you know how thosethingscanturnout.
And having a place like that in your hemisphere, or anywhere near you, is a threat. You don't want a completely failed chaotic hell-hole of a society in your backyard. Or frontyard. Or anywhere near you. Ask Kenya how they feel about living next to Somalia.
And what's one of the things that turns government problems into collapse and real violent chaos? Repressive assholes locking down the protesters by force. If you make it so the only way people can express their discontent is violence. They will still express it.
So yeah. I do view the situation in Venezuela as a actual threat to America. Directly? No. Indirectly? If this shit goes downhill.... oh yeah.
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Given the US's relations with regimes whose human rights violations far exceed any of the Venezuelan government's, I am skeptical of that rationale, as I generally am when the US claims to be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of humanitarian concerns. It strikes me as fairly similar to the arguments for continuing the embargo: the Cuban/Venezuelan government is repressive, so we should engage in economic warfare against it. The embargo is not the same as sanctions against specific individuals, but I view both as manifestations of the approach the US has taken to Latin America generally - opposing left-wing/socialist governments and empowering right wing/capitalist ones.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
This seems awfully random for that.
I don't see how it's random. The US has been opposed to the Venezuelan government since Hugo Chavez took power. And as I mentioned previously, the US has long maintained a policy of opposition or outright hostility toward socialist/left-wing governments in Latin America.
Yes, the US has a long standing already existing policy about this shit. The sudden shift seems rather random from that framing.
I don't see how it's random. The US has been opposed to the Venezuelan government since Hugo Chavez took power. And as I mentioned previously, the US has long maintained a policy of opposition or outright hostility toward socialist/left-wing governments in Latin America.
El Presidente has a habit of beating journalists and locking up dissidents when la Revolucion succeeds, and that's a no-no. The fact that the revolution was instigated and supplied by the Soviets also probably had something to do with it. If Saudi Arabia funded an Islamist revolution in Central America you bet your ass we'd intervene.
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jmcdonaldI voted, did you?DC(ish)Registered Userregular
Long overdue. They haven't been a real state sponsor of terrorism (Castro riding a tank in Africa-style) since the Berlin Wall fell. I think they still maintain contact with FARC, but every lefty banana republic south of the border does. Hell, Venezuela paid them with uranium to kill people who opposed Hugo Chavez and Ecuador tried to establish normal relations with them, so the Castros calling FARC up to chat every once and a while isn't that much in the grand scheme of things. I wish we could stick Venezuela and Ecuador on there as long as we're messing with that list, though. FARC is a nasty piece of work.
Looks like some in the Obama administration agree with you. They recently declared Venezuela to be a national security threat in order to pass sanctions on some government officials. When questioned about how Venezuela could possibly be considered a security threat, they explained that it is not, but that such language is "pro forma" when imposing sanctions.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Given the US's relations with regimes whose human rights violations far exceed any of the Venezuelan government's, I am skeptical of that rationale, as I generally am when the US claims to be making foreign policy decisions on the basis of humanitarian concerns. It strikes me as fairly similar to the arguments for continuing the embargo: the Cuban/Venezuelan government is repressive, so we should engage in economic warfare against it. The embargo is not the same as sanctions against specific individuals, but I view both as manifestations of the approach the US has taken to Latin America generally - opposing left-wing/socialist governments and empowering right wing/capitalist ones.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
Their explanation of the "national security threat" language also pretty questionable. From a Huffington Post article:
Adam Isacson, senior associate for regional security policy at the human rights nonprofit Washington Office on Latin America, explained that under U.S. law, the executive has to declare a national emergency that threatens national security in order to freeze a foreigner’s assets by executive order.
The administration seems to have taken this very literally, and interpreted it mean that the actual existence or nonexistence of a national security threat is irrelevant. As long as the President officially declares that they are a threat, these sanctions can be imposed on that basis, even if his officials admit that they are not a threat. Kind of disingenuous.
edit - none of this is meant to extoll the virtues of the Venezuelan government
Personally I agree with the executive order. The text from the executive order states "I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, find that the situation in Venezuela, including the Government of Venezuela's erosion of human rights guarantees, persecution of political opponents, curtailment of press freedoms, use of violence and human rights violations and abuses in response to antigovernment protests, and arbitrary arrest and detention of antigovernment protestors, as well as the exacerbating presence of significant public corruption, constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States, and I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat."
The situation in Venezuela IS a threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Directly. No. Venezuela is not sending warships up the Chesapeake.
Their economy on the other hand requires a certain economic good to be a certain price. That shit ain't happening for a while. Deal with Iran goes through, that becomes a damn long while.
You put these things together and maybe you get a government collapse. Depending on how that turns out... Well Kaputa, you know how thosethingscanturnout.
And having a place like that in your hemisphere, or anywhere near you, is a threat. You don't want a completely failed chaotic hell-hole of a society in your backyard. Or frontyard. Or anywhere near you. Ask Kenya how they feel about living next to Somalia.
And what's one of the things that turns government problems into collapse and real violent chaos? Repressive assholes locking down the protesters by force. If you make it so the only way people can express their discontent is violence. They will still express it.
So yeah. I do view the situation in Venezuela as a actual threat to America. Directly? No. Indirectly? If this shit goes downhill.... oh yeah.
this post deserves more than the one awesome i can give it.
Our interventions in South America have been about as effective as our interventions in the Middle East.
With the possible exception of FDR's good neighbor policy, almost all of South America's improvements have come along thanks to us neglecting them.
Another way to phrase it would be that positive development in South America has been achieved despite our best efforts
What about the Panama Canal?
I know we were doing that for ourselves. But did it help?
But yeah, I do have to agree, pretty checkered past in South America.
Like seriously, is there anywhere we've intervened and it's worked out? Besides WWII (WWI doesn't count for how cleanly it set up the sequel), and even then we had to open Pandora's box before wrapping it up.
Our interventions in South America have been about as effective as our interventions in the Middle East.
With the possible exception of FDR's good neighbor policy, almost all of South America's improvements have come along thanks to us neglecting them.
Another way to phrase it would be that positive development in South America has been achieved despite our best efforts
What about the Panama Canal?
I know we were doing that for ourselves. But did it help?
But yeah, I do have to agree, pretty checkered past in South America.
Like seriously, is there anywhere we've intervened and it's worked out? Besides WWII (WWI doesn't count for how cleanly it set up the sequel), and even then we had to open Pandora's box before wrapping it up.
I wouldn't be so quick to wrap up WW2 in a nice package like that, as there was a lot of fuckery with the middle east afterwards that lead to a lot of problems.
Our interventions in South America have been about as effective as our interventions in the Middle East.
With the possible exception of FDR's good neighbor policy, almost all of South America's improvements have come along thanks to us neglecting them.
Another way to phrase it would be that positive development in South America has been achieved despite our best efforts
What about the Panama Canal?
I know we were doing that for ourselves. But did it help?
But yeah, I do have to agree, pretty checkered past in South America.
Like seriously, is there anywhere we've intervened and it's worked out? Besides WWII (WWI doesn't count for how cleanly it set up the sequel), and even then we had to open Pandora's box before wrapping it up.
I wouldn't be so quick to wrap up WW2 in a nice package like that, as there was a lot of fuckery with the middle east afterwards that lead to a lot of problems.
You could probably trace that back to the Napoleonic Wars.
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MrMisterJesus dying on the cross in pain? Morally better than us. One has to go "all in".Registered Userregular
The situation in Venezuela IS a threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Directly? No. Venezuela is not sending warships up the Chesapeake.
An "unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security?" It seems, rather, quite usual and utterly ordinary for a country to curtail press freedoms and jail anti-government activists. Presumably, whoever wrote it into the law that a national emergency is required before the president can freeze foreign assets did not intend the designation to be so trivial.
Besides which, I have no idea why we should think that aggressive foreign policy toward Venezuela makes state collapse less likely. Sanctioning senior officials doesn't stabilize a country.
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
Our interventions in South America have been about as effective as our interventions in the Middle East.
With the possible exception of FDR's good neighbor policy, almost all of South America's improvements have come along thanks to us neglecting them.
Another way to phrase it would be that positive development in South America has been achieved despite our best efforts
What about the Panama Canal?
I know we were doing that for ourselves. But did it help?
But yeah, I do have to agree, pretty checkered past in South America.
Like seriously, is there anywhere we've intervened and it's worked out? Besides WWII (WWI doesn't count for how cleanly it set up the sequel), and even then we had to open Pandora's box before wrapping it up.
I wouldn't be so quick to wrap up WW2 in a nice package like that, as there was a lot of fuckery with the middle east afterwards that lead to a lot of problems.
You could probably trace that back to the Napoleonic Wars.
European colonialism as well.
Didn't the US recommend against the treaty of Versailles, anyway? I remember reading up on it that the US government figured that punishing Germany to the point of total collapse wasn't going to make anything better.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
Congressional republicans hated Wilson is the basic reasoning
Wilson had kept America out of the war because everyone thought it was going to be a quick war over in a year and change, and then America would be the neutral party that came up with a compromise to please all parties.
But of course the war went on for a very long time and America only really got involved when it became unclear which side was going to prevail and American business and government had become financially tied to Allied success, because all the loans they were handing out wouldn't get repaid if the Allies lost.
So while America entering the war was the game-changer needed to break the stalemate, America wasn't perceived as having sacrificed enough in comparison to all the involved European countries. So Wilson's lauded Fourteen Points that were designed to bring a golden age of peace to the world and prevent another war of this magnitude from occurring again were rejected. Well I mean, they weren't all rejected - a couple of new Europoean countries were formed for large ethnic populations like he wanted to occur - but everything else he wanted was denied.
Wilson still tried to present himself as savior of the world, but wasn't able to sell the idea to the Senate or to the American people. Congress never ratified the Treaty of Versailles and Wilson's attempt at securing a legacy for himself turned into an albatross around his neck.
EDIT: Besides Wilson not delivering on what he was promising the American people, he also didn't bring any Republicans along with him to the conference, which made it really easy for them to all vote against the treaty, because of course if they'd been along they could have gotten better terms!
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As long as she doesn't make me use an embargo. It just doesn't feel as good and I can't get my boat people to launch.
Not sure if Frank Underwood is exactly the sort of image we want to be sending to Cuba...
On the other hand, the fact that our political discourse is so childish that our government cannot outright tell people its okay to go as a tourist to Cuba really ticks me off. The Cold War is over, Cubans are people too, going over to Cuba to see nice people and experience their culture is not a matter of national interest in any sense.
Whatever, I'm going to Cuba on an educational tour to learn what 50 years of inept US foreign policy can achieve.
PSN: ShinyRedKnight Xbox Live: ShinyRedKnight
a lot of it has to do with Congress getting off its wrinkled old ass and revoking the embargo. Presidential orders can only do so much.
You're right. And to be fair, in the context of everything else, it is a pretty huge step forward.
Still, I am unreasonably excited at the prospect of visiting Cuba.
PSN: ShinyRedKnight Xbox Live: ShinyRedKnight
Cruz has spoken out against it and the Florida House has voted in favor of a statement condemning the administrations actions regarding Cuba.
The presidents met briefly yesterday and are expected to have "substantive talks" sometime today.
Pretty disappointing to see the Obama administration follow up an unexpected and praiseworthy policy shift toward Cuba with a regressive shift in the opposite direction toward Venezuela.
edit- I guess it's questionable how much of a "shift" this is, since the US is generally hostile to Venezuela. But it does seem to be an escalation in hostility.
They are saying it's about human rights violations, which is at least plausible given the shit that's been going down in Venezuela. So it doesn't seem that bad to me.
Latin American countries have unanimously condemned the decision, and international organizations like the Union of South American Nations have demanded its reversal. It is seen by many - rightly, in my opinion - as a display of imperialism, or a step toward a policy of regime change.
Their explanation of the "national security threat" language also pretty questionable. From a Huffington Post article:
The administration seems to have taken this very literally, and interpreted it mean that the actual existence or nonexistence of a national security threat is irrelevant. As long as the President officially declares that they are a threat, these sanctions can be imposed on that basis, even if his officials admit that they are not a threat. Kind of disingenuous.
edit - none of this is meant to extoll the virtues of the Venezuelan government
This seems awfully random for that.
Personally I agree with the executive order. The text from the executive order states "I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, find that the situation in Venezuela, including the Government of Venezuela's erosion of human rights guarantees, persecution of political opponents, curtailment of press freedoms, use of violence and human rights violations and abuses in response to antigovernment protests, and arbitrary arrest and detention of antigovernment protestors, as well as the exacerbating presence of significant public corruption, constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States, and I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat."
The situation in Venezuela IS a threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Directly? No. Venezuela is not sending warships up the Chesapeake.
Their economy on the other hand requires a certain economic good to be a certain price. That shit ain't happening for a while. Deal with Iran goes through, that becomes a damn long while.
And Maduro ain't the politician that Chavez was. He don't poll as well and the old supporters don't come out so much.
You put these things together and maybe you get a government collapse. Depending on how that turns out... Well Kaputa, you know how those things can turn out.
And having a place like that in your hemisphere, or anywhere near you, is a threat. You don't want a completely failed chaotic hell-hole of a society in your backyard. Or frontyard. Or anywhere near you. Ask Kenya how they feel about living next to Somalia.
And what's one of the things that turns government problems into collapse and real violent chaos? Repressive assholes locking down the protesters by force. If you make it so the only way people can express their discontent is violence. They will still express it.
So yeah. I do view the situation in Venezuela as a actual threat to America. Directly? No. Indirectly? If this shit goes downhill.... oh yeah.
Edit: For Grammar !
Yes, the US has a long standing already existing policy about this shit. The sudden shift seems rather random from that framing.
Held his own.
El Presidente has a habit of beating journalists and locking up dissidents when la Revolucion succeeds, and that's a no-no. The fact that the revolution was instigated and supplied by the Soviets also probably had something to do with it. If Saudi Arabia funded an Islamist revolution in Central America you bet your ass we'd intervene.
this post deserves more than the one awesome i can give it.
well said sir!
With the possible exception of FDR's good neighbor policy, almost all of South America's improvements have come along thanks to us neglecting them.
Another way to phrase it would be that positive development in South America has been achieved despite our best efforts
What about the Panama Canal?
I know we were doing that for ourselves. But did it help?
But yeah, I do have to agree, pretty checkered past in South America.
Like seriously, is there anywhere we've intervened and it's worked out? Besides WWII (WWI doesn't count for how cleanly it set up the sequel), and even then we had to open Pandora's box before wrapping it up.
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I wouldn't be so quick to wrap up WW2 in a nice package like that, as there was a lot of fuckery with the middle east afterwards that lead to a lot of problems.
You could probably trace that back to the Napoleonic Wars.
An "unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security?" It seems, rather, quite usual and utterly ordinary for a country to curtail press freedoms and jail anti-government activists. Presumably, whoever wrote it into the law that a national emergency is required before the president can freeze foreign assets did not intend the designation to be so trivial.
Besides which, I have no idea why we should think that aggressive foreign policy toward Venezuela makes state collapse less likely. Sanctioning senior officials doesn't stabilize a country.
European colonialism as well.
Didn't the US recommend against the treaty of Versailles, anyway? I remember reading up on it that the US government figured that punishing Germany to the point of total collapse wasn't going to make anything better.
But of course the war went on for a very long time and America only really got involved when it became unclear which side was going to prevail and American business and government had become financially tied to Allied success, because all the loans they were handing out wouldn't get repaid if the Allies lost.
So while America entering the war was the game-changer needed to break the stalemate, America wasn't perceived as having sacrificed enough in comparison to all the involved European countries. So Wilson's lauded Fourteen Points that were designed to bring a golden age of peace to the world and prevent another war of this magnitude from occurring again were rejected. Well I mean, they weren't all rejected - a couple of new Europoean countries were formed for large ethnic populations like he wanted to occur - but everything else he wanted was denied.
Wilson still tried to present himself as savior of the world, but wasn't able to sell the idea to the Senate or to the American people. Congress never ratified the Treaty of Versailles and Wilson's attempt at securing a legacy for himself turned into an albatross around his neck.
EDIT: Besides Wilson not delivering on what he was promising the American people, he also didn't bring any Republicans along with him to the conference, which made it really easy for them to all vote against the treaty, because of course if they'd been along they could have gotten better terms!
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You know, I'd ask for Congress to not fuck this up, but I'd have more success wishing for a unicorn.
Me I'm excited because one of the mariner pitchers is a cuban exile and I'm sure he'd love to see his family without fear of being arrested.
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Why can't the family leave Cuba and take a vacation in Brazil for the Olympics and he meets them there?
Maybe they can? I dunno it would just be nice for him to be able to go home, stabilizing our countries relations will help him do just that.
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