The nearly indigent “free lunch fiend” was a recognized social type. An 1872 New York Times story about “loafers and free-lunch men” who “toil not, neither do they spin, yet they ‘get along’”, visiting saloons, trying to bum drinks from strangers: "Should this inexplicable lunch-fiend not happen to be called to drink, he devours whatever he can, and, while the bartender is occupied, tries to escape unnoticed.
Sure, but generally Venezuelan oil funds went to combatting regime change and color revolutions instead of enabling them. Taking Venezuela’s number one revenue source and inverting the force that it is exerting on society will collapse their society.
The funds will be used as a slush fund to “help the people of Venezuela” ie do regime change. Venezuela paying for their own regime change if they agree to this.
i did not realize anyone considered it offensive. I looked it up just now and I don’t see anyone really claiming it is offensive, but maybe i’m mistaken so i’ll edit it. It’s based off a real historical medieval Chinese finger torture device called the Zanzhi, or finger-crusher.
Do you have another example of an apt metaphor where the more one struggles to free oneself, the more entangled they become? “Back into a corner” is not what I’m trying to convey here, I’m pointing out that Americans managed to get the EU citizens into a position where the more Trump pisses them off and the more they “rebel” the more dependent they become on America.
and how would they do that? They are rotting, de-industrializing, have sky-high energy costs and all of their military systems are dependent on America. They would have to completely overhaul their entire militaries to get out of the American MIC ecosystem they are locked in. They can’t build their own military, and building up more American weaponry makes them more (not less) subservient to American imperialists
Yes, hence why I said citizens of the EU are fucked. They are complete idiots who got dogwalked into this because of their Russia hate and chauvinism and white supremacy, it blinded them to the actual costs they would incur and the compromising position the war would put them into. It blinds them to their own “ally” sabotaging their energy infrastructure and blowing up their economies. Not just the elites, this was a widespread popular warmongering movement with majority support and they will continue to pay the penalty for their arrogant ways.
He was arrested in an audacious raid by US special forces
Bootlicker to English translation: He was kidnapped in an illegal invasion by roided up fascist militants, murdering 80 people in order to reach him
America has the citizens of the EU in a snare trap. The harder they balk at Trump and get offended by him going after EU allies, the more they “increase their own military spending”, the more they purchase American weapon systems and fuel the American MIC, which makes them even more dependent on American systems.
Honestly, masterful stroke by American Imperialists. The war in Ukraine put all of the EU into warmonger mode, and now the only way the citizens there can think of “rebelling” against the US is to get more deeply involved with the US - since the actual alternatives, which are economic divestment and domestic weapons productions are off the table due to de-industrialization from increased energy prices.
The EU is now incapable of making their own militaries, they are incapable of allying with “evil” nations like Russia, China, Iran, etc. So that leaves them with America. You made your bed buckos, hope you sleep well
Love destroying humanity and the earth and all shared culture to generate gifs of Venezuelans partying on rooftops
Simply wait for your rocket launcher to lock on or your spartan laser to fully charge
Buy American weaponry to send to Ukraine, America’s proxy state, while lowering our own defenses to own the invading Americans
could be a “commercial drone” launched by spies or collaborators
it’s perfidious, which fits with the anglo MO - but yeah no evidence and one would think Maduro or his lawyer would mention this at the hearing. One more crime to tag onto the list of warcrimes after all
now that’s how you make a statement
Something overlooked and not mentioned by either side of the conflict in Venezuela is how much entangled interests there are between both sides. It’s got that awkward situation like the Russia-Ukraine war where both sides still do business (trading uranium, natural gas, gold, etc) and there are pipelines that neither side wants to see damaged.
We should really be looking into the specifics of the oil industry in Venezuela a bit more if we want to gain insight into how this might proceed. Chevron is already heavily involved with Venezuelan oil production if I recall correctly. They would like to maintain their monopoly, increase investments & not damage their infrastructure. The Americans will want to preserve and secure the ports, rails, pipelines and oil production facilities in their ongoing air strikes or operations or eventual invasion.
On the other hand, don’t be surprised if a deal is struck where America gets more access to Venezuelan oil but not all of it. Basically just increasing the exploitation Chevron is already doing there even further, at gunpoint.
Venezuela does have a card to play though in the very bad scenario of full invasion, which is to do what Nasser did when Israel invaded and tried to steal the Suez Canal from Egypt. Scuttle ships, block the canal for everyone. Venezuela could destroy the facilities rather than hand them over to the Americans, or at the very least threaten to/start to. Or fortify them as military outposts, forcing the Americans to risk damaging the facilities when attacking them and limiting the size of bombs they can realistically use. Then retreat into the jungles and rural areas for protracted war against the occupiers.
they actually thought they could just take the oil and push it over there
no way, maduro gives large son vibes
well his competition are fbi pencil necks and dea hot dogs
They literally had Elon Musk there pretending to be a colonel of space force doing epic starlink stuff
Weimar Germany was one of the most industrialized and developed parts of the entire world in the lead up to WW2. Of course they could militarize, using their own facilities and industry. That is no longer the case. Germany is no longer the most developed part of Earth, nor is anywhere in the EU. What little industry they do have remaining is highly specialized towards non-military production - things like luxury cars.
Hitler also inherited the German WW1 war machine and all of the military production therein. No such things exists today.