Why wouldn’t there be? There’s no mechanism in the law for states to just not hold elections.
Did you finish reading my sentence?
Eta: there’s a lot of mechanisms being ignored or created to justify whatever the hell Trump wants at this point.
I’ve also heard that Canada has drugs. That was the whole basis for tariffing them ahead of Colombia.
And likewise, I’m aware that Trump has pardoned the proven guilty former president of Honduras for sending drugs into the USA, The founder of Silk Road, the head of Binance for not taking efforts to prevent money laundering in the drug trade, and Jean Pinkard.
There’s more evidence that Trump is applying Mussolini’s idea of cartels - where the central leader picks who gets to run a particular industry, in return for political support - than that he gives a rat’s ass about drugs.
Where does Trump’s military adventurism stop? Well the next stop seems to be Greenland,
They absolutely do not. You (and by extension the rest of us) are fucked.
Unsurprisingly, TFG doesn’t understand anything about the Monroe Doctrine. The US had no ability to actually enforce it when it was declared in 1823. Britannia still ruled the waves in those days, and it was enforced by the Royal Navy because it served the UK’s interests as well - and the UK got to enforce its own interests in the Western Hemisphere without any quibbling from the US.
The first time the US enforced the Monroe Doctrine on its own was in 1865. In 1861, France, the UK and Spain sent military forces to Mexico to forcibly collect the monetary debt that Mexico owed them. The UK and Spain left once they had gotten their money, but Napoleon III decided it was a perfect opportunity to add Mexico to the French empire while the US was busy with the Civil War. It was only after the Civil War ended that the US pressured France into leaving by means of having Sheridan deployed to Texas with 50,000 soldiers and ‘misplaced’ 30,000 now surplus rifles in places that the Mexican rebels could ‘accidentally’ stumble upon them that the Monroe Doctrine was something the US actually enforced on its own. And the UK had made it perfectly clear to Napolean III that he was on his own when he decided to make the ‘temporary’ occupation to collect debts a more permanent affair. To quote Seward:
By 1867, Seward shifted American policy from thinly veiled sympathy for the republican government of Juárez to open threat of war to induce a French withdrawal. Seward stated in 1868, “The Monroe Doctrine, which eight years ago was merely a theory, is now an irreversible fact.”
And none of us, Trump included, understand the Donroe Document.
Further thought: It’s easy to get worked up about what Trump will do next once he does one thing.
Example: Sending troops in to occupy cities. Result: A big fizzle, and Trump recently obeyed a court order to get them all out. Purpose: Trolling. Always trolling.
The Maduro capture is the kind of thing that any recent president, Democrat or Republican, could plausibly have done (which is different from saying that any of them would have done it; just that it wasn’t particularly Trumpian or Republican). That doesn’t mean it was right or prudent (I think it was more or less right but also imprudent). So that action was not trolling per se, but that doesn’t stop Trump from trolling based on it: “Maybe I’ll do this now, maybe I’ll do that.”
Trump trolls for many reasons. He likes to be unpredictable, thereby keeping his perceived enemies off-balance, and, since he’s the ultimate narcissist, he like to keep the conversation constantly about himself.
So Trump will undoubtedly keep doing “things” until he is incapacitated or deceased, and such a time seems not to lie too far in the future. But does he have some sort of coherent plan for domestic or foreign policy? Of course not!
Wrt foreign policy, Rubio, Hegseth, and other stooges around Trump no doubt have ideas, though I doubt they add up to much of a whole. They may well have another idea that Trump plans to act on soon. I just don’t think it will be anything all that monumental.
I think the only stooge with ideas of his own right now is Stephen Miller. This whole “Donroe Doctrine” has his lizard tongue prints all over it. He’s the one who’s figured out how to get Donnie’s attention and do the things he wants. Rubio and Hegseth are clearly only taking orders from Donnie at this point, based on how much stupid shit they’re doing/saying. Not an ounce of backbone between the two of them.
You are quite likely correct!
Also, here is a nice little article on the thread topic:
While I don’t disagree with that, I think that there are quite a few things that are feeding into this particular action.
- Trump had to back down on the Trade War and take a loss, due to our deficiency on rare earth supplies. Consequently, we backed away from trying to stop the De-Dollarization movement, allowed China to institute export bans on rare earths, we left any nation in Africa supplying minerals or other resources to China, we’re tariffing India more than China, we’re allowing Binance and other Chinese crypto banks to funnel fentanyl money back to China without oversight, and we’ve backed away from global interests for hemispherical ones. Hitting Venezuela counts as a strike back against China, but it also grants a blessing to China to invade Taiwan and pressure South Korea to leave the American fold.
- It’s a large enough controversy to distract from Epstein.
- Binance isn’t the only crypto gang in town. You release the former president of Honduras under a pledge to sell drugs to the US, funneling money through Trump’s crypto companies, push Venezuela to do likewise, force Exxon to use construction crews with ties to Trump’s business partners, etc. and the whole deal becomes good for #1.
If you are saying that Trump and his advisors have no coherent strategy and therefore a lot of things are happening that are contrary to US interests, I would wholeheartedly agree. What I don’t know is to what degree each of the above is actually happening and to what degree they are recognized or intended by the Trump Regime. Explain, though, how invading Venezuela counts as a “strike” against China. (Not saying you’re wrong on most of it, though I don’t know enough to comment in any detail.)
That’s true, but it’s not clear if the timing was for that reason. Going forward, however, as Trump does anything of any significant level of impact, it will be unclear what is and isn’t timed to distract from Epstein, since that shit ain’t going away.
This is more like CT type stuff, but with Trump, who knows? He is clearly corrupt and using the presidency to “earn” money every which way but loose, including through his coin biz.
It’s hard to agree or disagree with what you wrote above because Trump combines a wide variety of corrupt, erratic, stupid, and random “ideas” and “initiatives” with rapidly advancing dementia, turning his entire regime into an incoherent, incompetent, and definitely unhealthful stew. Too many cooks spoil such a dish, and Trump’s got all of them rattling around in his noggin right now.
My read would be that we’re on the backfoot and losing the Trade War. Trump has had to accept a large number of conditions in order to avoid Chinese acts of retribution that would cost him his position.
Venezuela has the largest oil reserves on the planet and was acting as a significant supplier to China.
If we view Trump’s new “It’s Our Hemisphere” statement in the same light as a kid who lost a fight going back to hang out near his parents (where he’s safe from retribution) and then smash the other kid’s toy that he was successfully able to sneak off with; it’s both an act of revenge and an admission of defeat.
I’m sure it hurts, but it’s a small win in an ocean of loss.
Sounds plausible!
Links regarding all of the other things that the US has backed down on since the Truce:
(More discussion in this podcast)
(Compare list to the one here)
And that’s now officially been said out loud:
Six European allies have rallied to support Denmark following renewed insistence by the US that it must have control over Greenland.
“Greenland belongs to its people, and only Denmark and Greenland can decide on matters concerning their relations,” the leaders of the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, and Denmark said in a joint statement.
On Sunday, Donald Trump said the US “needed” Greenland - a semi-autonomous region of fellow Nato member Denmark - for security reasons.
He has refused to rule out the use of force to take control of the territory, and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen warned on Monday that an attack by the US would spell the end of Nato.
It’s my understanding that China was creating stronger ties with Venezuela as part of its general attempt to increase it’s worldwide influence. I’ve seen people say that Maduro being kidnapped puts this in jeopardy (although what they were supposed to do to stop it without so much as a military base there is unclear to me).
Personally I suspect it will long term have the opposite effect, and encourage less powerful nations to ask for a Chinese military presence to discourage American attack.
Perhaps. But China being to do that with any level of substance is many years away. There really is only one military superpower right now.
Unless they station nukes there.
One way or another the world in general is going to have to nuclearize, and aim them at the US. Whether it’s their own nukes or those of a patron or ally, they need them if they want to continue to exist.
Pretty much any countries that could use them, have them. The bigger powers don’t want a bunch of small countries with nukes (i.e., nonproliferation). That includes Russia, China, etc.