Two weeks ago, Obama made a bizarre announcement that Venezuela is an “extraordinary threat” to US national security and that he is “deeply concerned” about its human rights abuses – a declaration necessary to justify a new round of harsh sanctions.
The measure comes on the heels of another round of US sanctions against the Venezuelan government, allegedly for violating protesters rights during demonstrations last year.
In this episode of Media Roots Radio, Abby Martin talks to Mark Weisbrot, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research and president of Just Foreign Policy about the hidden agenda behind this latest move of aggression and why the country really poses a threat to the US establishment.
US vs. Venezeula: Regime Change and Resilience
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In fact, the US has never stopped trying to undermine the Bolivarian Revolution. Eva Golinger, author of the Chavez Code, talks about the Western backed coup happening in real time in the form of paid opposition forces, propaganda and economic warfare.
Why the CIA Won’t Give Up on Venezeula
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Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has launched a global signature-gathering campaign to pressure Obama to repeal the sanctions. The letter reads “sanctions, blockades and armed aggressions are no substitute for genuine dialogue.”
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
Abby Martin | @AbbyMartin
Photo by flickr user Dan Brickley
You can’t right off oil as being a factor in the Venezuela conflict at all. Venezuela is an “extraordinary threat” to US national security by not allowing our oil sector in to not only profit from but to secure the US has access to those resources as the reality of Peak Oil is becoming obvious.
I know you remember Michael Rupert. He and many other Peak Oil “Alarmest” are spot on and I’d like to point out just a few things to back up their/my Theses.
While there is a glut of oil on the world market now, thanks mostly to China’s economy going South (ours went South for good in 2008 reducing demand, remember?), that doesn’t change the fact that the US wants to control as much of the worlds oil as possible. In fact, you can look at practically every global conflict that we, or our allies, are involved in and find oil or natural gas at the root of it. (Possibly other natural resources we need as well but oil is the Master Resource.)
The US DOD has warned that Peak Oil is a reality and the US is making Geo-Political moves to protect “The American Way of Life.” i.e. gluttonous over-consumption—for now. (http://www.theguardian.com/business/2010/apr/11/peak-oil-production-supply) You can look at the conflicts in Ukraine, Palestine, Iraq, Iran, even Cuba, just to name a few, and find our desire to control their fossil carbon, or at the very least block other competitors like Russia or China from getting access to them, as a primary motivator. I can go on and on about any of these but I think you get the message.
You do such a great job at finding and reporting the truth about so many critical things going on in the world I truly wish you step back and look at them with Peak Oil filtered glasses on. You’d be amazed how dots start getting connected.
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The fracking “Boom” is over due to the above mentioned glut and the strong dollar pressuring prices down but primarily because it was about to be done anyway. (see The Post Carbon Institue’s shalebubble.org/) The falling prices for oil has massive Geo-Political advantages for the US. Countries like Russia, Venezuela, Iran (anyone with oil we want’t to control) are finding themselves circling the drain internally. This puts the US at an advantage.
What you are not hearing as much about is there have been massive layoffs in the US oil sector as of late all due to falling prices for oil causing a loosing industry to simply give up. ( “Mass layoffs complicate oil industry’s long-term plans” http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/13/oil-employment-graduates-kemp-idUSL5N0VN2ZN20150213 )
The fracking industry may say it can extract at $70-60 even $50 per barrel that simply isn’t true. The US fracking industry needs prices well over $100 just to break even and that doesn’t really cover the external cost we the tax payers get stuck with. Costs like infrastructure damage and pollution. Regardless, Fracking is currently the over financialized bubble about to pop. ( http://www.postcarbon.org/books_and_reports/)
Ukraine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFpKwEm43n0
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101669271 “Ukraine gas producer appoints Biden’s son to board”
Palestine
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/earth-insight/2014/jul/09/israel-war-gaza-palestine-natural-gas-energy-crisis
Cuba
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/putin-promises-to-assist-cuba-with-offshore-oil-exploration/503332.html “Developing new blocks on Cuba’s offshore shelf is [expected] in the very near future,” Putin said.