Venezuela: no fence to sit on

2 Feb

In a footnote to my post of January 27 I wrote:

Fence-sitting and having it both ways cascade through liberal media. As Guardian and Observer are vital to Chomsky’s “sophisticated system of propaganda”, so too are house leftists like Owen Jones and George Monbiot vital to the Guardian. Both damn Bashar Assad to Hell and back – and do the same with those experts, from Mother Agnes to Scott Ritter and Ted Postul, critical of Empire-serving claims against him – but preserve their reputations by winding up lamely opposed to military interventions they do so much to give cover to.

Today, apropos Venezuela, the irrepressible Caitlin Johnstone makes the same point. Under the header, I Oppose Interventionism, But … she begins:

In a recent interview with The Corbett Report, the Ron Paul Institute‘s Daniel McAdams spoke disdainfully of those ostensibly anti-interventionist libertarians who picked this moment of all times to loudly and aggressively condemn Venezuela’s president Maduro, just as the US power establishment is ramping up its campaign to topple the Venezuelan government.

“All of a sudden now there are millions of Venezuela experts in America, and many of them could not point Venezuela out on a map five days ago,” McAdams said. “And everyone has to have this disclaimer, ‘Well, I know it’s probably worse than North Korea, but the US government shouldn’t get involved.’ It’s cowardice, because once the war starts, they can say ‘Hey I never called for US intervention!’ No, but you’re a conveyor belt for propaganda. You’re a conveyor belt to get the machine ginned up for war. And so you’ve got to stand up and take responsibility.”

McAdams has for years consistently operated in the hub of one of America’s most forceful and effective branches of opposition to US interventionism, and he is absolutely correct here. On both sides of America’s political divide, the primary objections you will see to this administration’s campaign to delegitimize and topple the Venezuelan government are prefaced with a strong condemnation of Maduro followed by some feeble equivocations voicing vague objections to Trump’s actions, if that.

Even more often, what you will see is excuses made for the US government’s aggressive attempts …

Read Caitlin in full here.

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