Seriously, how is commiting war crimes and possibly attacking a country a distraction. This is worse than he possibly did with epstein.
At some point you've got to stop with the automatic 'distraction' response and see all the fuckery he's actually currently doing and stand up against that.
Straight up, no sugar coating, no pretexts, blood for oil. No codewords. Bald faced, our oil companies spent money in Venezuela and we want to steal it back for them. Christ, we thought the Bush people were obvious.
How much do you want to bet that however things turn out in Venezuela, we're going to go in and 'help' neighboring Guyana 'protect' their massive, newly-discovered reserves of light sweet crude - the kind that's more valuable than Venezuela's heavy crude - in the disputed Essequibo region.
The situation is different in Guyana. Namely that international oil companies are already heavily involved (Chevron and Exxon especially) and the government of Guyana has allowed them to operate and has shown no signs it wants to nationalize the oil industry and kick everyone out. Plus Guyana doesn’t share the same ideology as Venezuela.
What Trump is doing in Venezuela is wrong but the risk of them doing it also in Guyana seems low.
America already has plenty of its own light sweet crude from the Permian I think around 12 million barrels/day and they also buy some from the Saudis. Light sweet grades are refined mostly for gasoline.
Many of their refineries though are tuned for the heavy sour mostly used for diesel, asphalt and other industrial uses.
Canada sends the US almost 4 million barrels per day of heavy sour from the oil sands and they used to get around 3 million from Venezuela.
Their other option for more heavy sour is Russia, their Urals blend. China buys a lot of it as does India.
Trump could have done this without directly threatening Venezuela and it could have been spun as "protecting the peace" instead of this murdering potentially innocent people in boats and threatening to invade a sovereign nation - it would have been a great note on his Noble Peace Prize application...
My theory is that Trump was a partner. The same level as Epstein or just below. And trump wanted more but Epstein didn't want to give up control and that was their falling out
There’s evidence of that Epstein knew he was a threat to his security and had evidence withheld to use as collateral compliance. A demon recognizes game and acts accordingly till cameras get shut off
they probably started out as equal partners, then trump tried to spin off his own pedo ring, and then got real mad when his failed (like everything he does) and epstein started "recruiting" children (because they are children not women!) from trump properties
You know shit is fucked when the whole thing can be summed up as "I wanted to rape and torture ALL the underage girls but he had to steal some from me!"
I don’t know .. I don’t want to go down a disgusting rabbit hole contemplating… Epstein files need to be released (with only victims names redacted) and all pedophiles need naming, arresting and jail time. No matter now wealthy or powerful.
It’s cute that anyone thinks Trump would release the files without scrubbing them first
This isn’t about the Epstein files. The nationalist freaks in this Administration want to do colonialism, and they want to do it to one or the only regimes in our hemisphere to snub their noses at us. It’s happening now because between Trump’s collapsing support, the upcoming midterm season and the fact that he’s decaying before our eyes, it’s pretty much now or never. These people are nationalistic supremacists. And once you believe in national supremacy, mugging other nations for their things is the only logical endpoint. We’re more important than everyone else, so if we want something, we should take it. The whole reason people have said that Nationalism is bad since the World Wars is that it always ends this way.
That’s what’s happening here. The Epstein files are not a silver bullet that will take Trump down. People need to disregard the illusion that Friday is going to save us.
Honestly as a non-American, I dont believe there is anything that can "take him down" at this point.
He's a symbol of the extreme right wing of the country AND has the backing of the billionairre ruling class. He could eat a screaming baby on live television and millions of Americans would say "thats the most patriotic thing I ever saw", mainstream media would follow it up with stories about how eating babies is actually good for your health and the economy, and pastors would hold Sunday sermons on how babies that get eaten go straight to heaven.
Trump is just a symptom of the illness, not the cause. With the Republicans gutting your country to enrich themselves and the Democrats seemingly toothless and unwilling to fight back in any meaningful way, I dont see how you guys pull yourselves out of the quagmire.
People would still vote for him even if he was dead. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was the first dead person elected president. It will just be a gold framed picture of him, placed on a chair. With speakers, so you can hear him talking, from heaven.
Honestly as a non-American, I dont believe there is anything that can "take him down" at this point.
People said this last time.
There's been some subtle shifting over the past few months that have given me hope. The Republican coalition is fracturing over a number of issues. I think he's bungled the economy too badly to get away with any "cancel elections" type shenanigans. And he's completely alienated the military and institutional actors he'd have needed for that.
I think the midterms will go forward, and they'll be a catastrophe for Republicans. A historic one. Once he loses Congress, there's a great deal more that we can do to push back on him. And on top of the fact that he's speed running his way to lame duck status, I also think there's a really strong possibility he doesn't live to see the end of his term (which, again, I think is another reason they're pressing forward with this while they still can).
He really does seem to be going downhill mentally, too. He's less and less able to sound coherent for any length of time, can't stay awake through a meeting, and his impulse control seems to be loosening.
Ok, but hear me out: if he turns around tomorrow and cancels the elections, who stops him?
His party wont, it benefits them.
The supreme court MIGHT say "this is unconstitutional", but who enforces the ruling? The military that his party just spent time purging of leadership critical of him? There will be a schism in the armed forces.
The people will protest, but with the threat of losing their livlihoods and all their benefits tied to their jobs, that cant last.
I truly believe that we're looking at an unprecedented situation where a US president may try and turn himself into a dictator, and it'll just be "allowed" to happen because the mechanisms to prevent it either wont be enforced or will be willfully supressed.
He openly attempted to overthrow the government and the people gave him unchecked power. Now we have masked men kidnapping citizens off the street.
Every single part of the constitution has been discarded and you are like "Some of the Republicans are infighting so maybe he will lose in midterms."
He hasn't alienated the military. They literally illegally went to California and started arresting US citizens. They are currently running patrols in multiple states. They are blowing up random boats and have waged war against another country.
There are zero parts of that which indicates they won't do whatever he says.
This doesn't just magically go away. Every single "this will finally do it." Moment is arrived and sailed by.
But sure, he totally can't get away with canceling the elections. No way people would allow that. Wearing masks and kidnapping citizens? That's acceptable. Blatantly accepting bribes from other countries? That's cool. Using the military against US citizens? Okay, thats something he can get away with.
By canceling an election? No possible way he could do that!
Yeah he heard someone tell him that that oil actually belongs to the US. Who knows exactly what they said but he heard that and it fit with what he wanted to believe. I can't wait for the stories to come out from ex-cabinet members in a few years (months?).
My big conspiracy theory is that Stephen Miller is functionally the President of the United States. They let Trump go to sports games, build his little ballroom, decorate the White House and accept his bribes. And Miller is actually the one running the country on a day to day basis. Invading Venezuela has been one of his hobby horses for years, and he’s using Trump’s legitimacy to make it happen.
Thing is, Trump isn't the brains behind all this. Trump exiting the stage isn't magically going to make everything alright again. Trump is just the distraction keeping attention away from his puppet masters. After Trump comes Vance. He has the same mindset, except he isn't a demented old man. Still a puppet, but a much more coherent one...
Trump exiting the stage isn't magically going to make everything alright again.
It won't, but I really don't think any of these cretins has what it takes to tap into the combination of populism and entertainment that were Trump's secret sauce with the electorate.
There is nothing to be the brains of. This isn't some secret hidden operation. It's all being done in the public.
There isn't a special plan that needs clever people to pull off. In fact, gross incompetence is a primary trait.
And Vance can't pull this off. He's not a demented old man. Remember when Desantis tried to be the "smart" version of Trump? Putting immigrants on busses and shipping them to blue states?
And when the debates came around everyone was meh on him. Despite losing the election, there was no candidate that stood a chance to replace him. It's specifically this incompetent, unhinged asshole incapable of finishing a sentence that they want. Nobody can step up and fill those shoes. If he dies, they will immediately change face and pretend like they were not party of the whole thing.
You guys could be marched to an extermination camp and you'd be saying "Wow I can't believe what he's doing to distract from the Epstein files."
Sometimes greedy fuckers are just greedy fuckers. And I honestly don't think he's all that concerned about the Epstein files. His base of deplorables has proven time and again how little they care about it.
For anyone not understanding this, this is Trump being full 'mask off'.
Way back when, Venezuela nationalised their oil industry and booted out the American companies who were exploiting it.
When Trump says "They took all of our oil and we want it back. They illegally took it." The "our" he's talking about isn't the American people, it's the American companies and rich fuckers who were benefiting. He even says as such later on when he says "They took our oil rights, we had a lot of oil there. As you know, they threw our companies out. and we want it back."
American citizens - prepare yourselves for yet another war over oil reserves, where your sons and daughters will be sent off to die in a foreign land, not to protect you, but to enrich some already obscenely wealthy bastards.
I also think it's about deliberately manufacturing a crisis as a means of uniting supporters and gaining more political power. A war with Venezuala could be an excuse to use more emergency powers and take even more drastic actions against immigrants and minorities. Worst case scenario would be trying to suspend elections.
Another aspect is the US dropping support for Ukraine and NATO. If the US wanted to pivot away from Europe to focus on China I could to an extent understand and originally that was part of the messaging. But instead we are abandoning Ukraine and alienating all of our NATO partners just to continue backing Israel and now potentially launch a totally needless war in Venezuela.
He will 100% try to cancel elections if he sees impending loses coming. He knows that an impeachment is coming in early '27 if the House and Senate get flipped, and don't doubt that he will do ANYTHING to keep that from happening. Including nukes. He DOES NOT CARE.
He was desperate for a war in his first presidential run too, he just couldn't find anyone. He seems to think its important to his legacy.
He tried N.Korea and China slapped him down. Tried Iran and was told it would be absolute hell. Pivoted this way and that, looking for a war, but the world was fairly well balanced and everywhere he turned someone shot him down.
Now the world isn't and he's gonna get his war one way or another. I though it was gonna be over the Suez Canal and Panama Canal, but he's shifted away from that now. My big fear is that it's going to be supporting Putin's expansion into Eastern Europe, so NATO and Europe are too afraid to get involved. Although he currently seems to have agreed to split the world East / West with Putin and Xi, and the US won't concern itself militarily with that side.
As a random guy (who has decided just now that you need something other than a flag, perhaps a diorama of some kind? To indicate that you own a land), I can assure you that I now have legal ownership of your suspiciously boot-shaped peninsula, regardless of whatever the godless natives say.
Ummmm… I have ancestors from 300 years ago, who were wealthy and didn’t hand down anything to me. I guess I’d better track down some cousins 20th removed and demand what I think is my share. Our President is on to something.
I’m legitimately asking, like is he on a massive recreational dose of mind-altering substances?
Because the only other possibility here is he’s just making word-sounds with his mouth-hole while having no idea what they mean, and in that case the 25th Amendment should be invoked because JD “The Couch Fucker” Vance can’t possibly be worse.
When Venezuelan nationalized their oil reserves in 1976 they cut out US companies like Exxon, Gulf, and Mobile that had invested in, and were profiting from, the Venezuelan oil market. The “our” Trump is referring to is the corporations, not the citizens of the US.
Come on bro. There are enough things to actually complain about that you don't need to create a fake narrative. For example, he talked about moving on a married woman like bitch. She was a regular citizen of the US.
At best, someone told him they stole it and they were talking about the nationalization of oil as a resource which prevented US companies from buying it. I do not know exactly how the legality of that works, it is a different country after all.
That is the absolute strongest case there is for Venezuela "stealing" it, over 50 years ago. So basically bullshit.
It is every country’s right to nationalize any which company or resource, recognize under the un charter as permanent sovereignty over natural resources
In August 1971, under the presidency of Rafael Caldera, a law was passed that nationalized the country's natural gas industry. Also in 1971 the law of reversion was passed which stated that all the assets, plant, and equipment belonging to concessionaires within or outside the concession areas would revert to the nation without compensation upon the expiration of the concession.[7] The movement towards nationalism was experienced once again under decree 832. Decree 832 stipulated that all exploration, production, refining, and sales programs of the oil companies had to be approved in advance by the Ministry of Mines and Hydrocarbons.[7] Led by finance minister Luis Enrique Oberto, nationalization led to the Venezuelan economy reaching an average growth of 5% between 1970 and 1973.[18]
Nationalization became official when the presidency of Carlos Andrés Pérez, whose economic plan, "La Gran Venezuela", called for the nationalization of the oil industry and diversification of the economy via import substitution. The country officially nationalized its oil industry on 1 January 1976 at the site of Zumaque oilwell 1 (Mene Grande), and along with it came the birth of Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) which is the Venezuelan state-owned petroleum company. All foreign oil companies that once did business in Venezuela were replaced by Venezuelan companies.
US Fascism 101. A foreign country who wants their independence and protects its natural resources is either invaded or it government overthrown. See Vietnam, Cambodia, Chile..
This is the same bullshit the US called on Cuba! They took all the gambling casinos. This is just more cash for the oil companies if this goes through. Just how much cash Trump in Trumpcoins did the oil companies put out for this bullshit!
Private companies invested in an area with political risk and got burned. It’s not americas oil. It’s the companies oil. It’s not the taxpayers jobs to do anything about it. Fuck Trump.
I feel like there’s a lot of responses in this thread similar to where I am in, what makes this “our oil”? If we’re seriously going back to 1976 to justify it, where does this end?
He's just the US personified without a filter, this is what America has always been. Instead of blaming him personally fight the system he defends and the violence he helps to bring abroad to other countries. This didn't start at Venezuela, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya were all before now and they also suffered needlessly for ceaseless greed of the American appetite for oil, gold and murder.
Oh how convenient that one of the most oil rich countries gave us cause to forcefully take all their oil. You’re really ucking stupid if you believe Trump.
This sums up why the United States is one of the most hated nations globally. You cant be the self-procliamed heros and villains at the same time. The USA is nothing but a villain. Full stop.
He's probably referring to them nationalizing the oil companies.
Until 1976 British, Dutch, and American companies controlled Venezuelan oil, although they never owned it in situ.
Unsurprisingly, this was a parasitic relationship: not having their own capacity to extract, refine, or distribute the oil, these companies controlled not only the resource but the price of it--obviously favoring the importers and limiting Venezuela's profits.
Ideally, the nationalization should have given Venezuela the opportunity to compete with middle eastern suppliers and rapidly develop sovereign wealth.
Unfortunately, what followed were decades of incompetence, corruption, and quite likely CIA sabotage.
Trump isn't a student of history or anything else.
He doesn't understand what happened, if he even knows about it.
He probably thinks everything with the word "America" on it is a subsidiary of the United States, so Venezuela--a country in South America--having their own oil is like a waiter taking home silverware from Mar-a-Lago.
tl;dr: Bully used to steal kid's lunch money until kid stood up for himself, bully now thinks the lunch money was his to begin with and is going to start stealing it again.
I find baffling and unsettling the fact that we do not limit the age at which someone can become president. It's pure insanity. 65 tops. Non-negotiable.
Donald J. Trump is a child rapist and felon. Repeat it a thousand times. The entire internet should just be posting this until he's gone from this earth.
Not really. US oil companies were exploiting Venezuelan oil reserves until 1976, when Venezuela nationalized the resource, kicked the US companies out, and started their own oil company to benefit their own country.
Thailand took my flip flops. I'm not sure if somebody stole them, or I just left them on the beach while drunk. Either way, I want them back, Thailand!
Was Venezuela covertly drilling in Texas? Fracking in North Dakota? Siphoning off of the Alaska pipeline? A pirate bucket brigade stealing oil from a tanker in the Port of NY & NJ? A raid of a off-shore oil platform off of the Louisiana coast?
This man is full blown out of his mind and there is absolutely zero justification or hiding it anymore. Fucking enough. No more of this shit. It is inexcusable.
The question here isn't whether Trump is a corrupt self-absorbed fool running the country like some orange Don Corleone. But who in the US political sphere is going to finally put an end to this nightmare and stand up for what's right?
Oh wow all this Venezuela shit is all about oil had no idea really surprised
Well, that and distracting from other things.
Seems a popular theme amongst US presidents, polls are looking bad, let’s start a war to distract the people…
Even though we're just coming out of a 25 year war that most Americans stopped paying attention to after the first 2 or 3 years.
Seriously, how is commiting war crimes and possibly attacking a country a distraction. This is worse than he possibly did with epstein.
At some point you've got to stop with the automatic 'distraction' response and see all the fuckery he's actually currently doing and stand up against that.
We all knew. At least the pretense is over with and people can stop pretending this was ever about "narco terrorists" while Dumpy pardons drug lords.
Straight up, no sugar coating, no pretexts, blood for oil. No codewords. Bald faced, our oil companies spent money in Venezuela and we want to steal it back for them. Christ, we thought the Bush people were obvious.
This isn't Bush-level obvious, it's Saddam Hussein "the Kuwaitis are stealing our oil with slant drilling" obvious, and yet also less plausible.
They were drinking his milkshake
DRAAAAINAGE!
I. DRINK. YOUR. MILKSHAKE. I DRINK IT UP!
Don't bully me, u/MaitoMike!
DID YOU THINK YOUR SONG AND DANCE AND SUPERSTITION WOULD HELP YOU?
I’VE ABANDONDED MY CHILD!
They should have put you in a glass jaaar on the mantelpiece!
is this the milkshake that symbolizes oil or the one that symbolizes butts
Both. It's about the oily butts.
There will be Oil
“I’m finished!”
It’s called drainage
South Park really did nail it. This guy is just white Saddam.
FTFY
I always thought of it like a candy coating. But instead of chocolate it's pure shit.
Like the Simpsons?
https://youtu.be/VBP1MCXjqgw
Even that was more conceivable, since Kuwait and Iraq are neighbors, Venezuela would need REALLY long oilpipes to drill under American soil.
He's complaining about Venezuela nationalizing Exxon propertied under Chavez.
But the Kuwaitis actually were stealing Iraq's oil.
How much do you want to bet that however things turn out in Venezuela, we're going to go in and 'help' neighboring Guyana 'protect' their massive, newly-discovered reserves of light sweet crude - the kind that's more valuable than Venezuela's heavy crude - in the disputed Essequibo region.
The situation is different in Guyana. Namely that international oil companies are already heavily involved (Chevron and Exxon especially) and the government of Guyana has allowed them to operate and has shown no signs it wants to nationalize the oil industry and kick everyone out. Plus Guyana doesn’t share the same ideology as Venezuela.
What Trump is doing in Venezuela is wrong but the risk of them doing it also in Guyana seems low.
Also the Texas refinaries are for heavy oil,
Ameruzzia gets 70% of its import heavy oil from Canada, AFAIK
Take Venezuelan oil and cut Canadian imports.
The seven sisters are happy.
America already has plenty of its own light sweet crude from the Permian I think around 12 million barrels/day and they also buy some from the Saudis. Light sweet grades are refined mostly for gasoline.
Many of their refineries though are tuned for the heavy sour mostly used for diesel, asphalt and other industrial uses.
Canada sends the US almost 4 million barrels per day of heavy sour from the oil sands and they used to get around 3 million from Venezuela.
Their other option for more heavy sour is Russia, their Urals blend. China buys a lot of it as does India.
Trump could have done this without directly threatening Venezuela and it could have been spun as "protecting the peace" instead of this murdering potentially innocent people in boats and threatening to invade a sovereign nation - it would have been a great note on his Noble Peace Prize application...
He could have, but he's a bully and a moron, so he didn't
It was only a matter of time until it was going to be out in the open.
Well Bush was handpicked by the heritage foundation and followed their playbook as well.
He even killed ev subsidies, went after california, and boosted the oil industry and the big 3 went back to gas guzzlers within 3 years.
You're not wrong, but the Heritage Foundation was very different then than it has been since the MAGA takeover.
Not really, they were fascists during bush and reagan. Reagan's whole term was planned by them too
Gee, I wonder what else might be happening tomorrow that needs to be kept out of the headlines.
Its gonna turn out he owned the Island himself. That is maybe sarcasm but who knows with this degenerate.
He (Epstein) took all of my girls and I want them back. He illegally took them.
My theory about why they had a "falling out" is that Trump was the recruiter. He got girls from Mar a Lago and Trump's pagents.
But then Trump wanted more.
He wanted to be the Pimp and not just the recruiter finding the girls, and you can't have 2 international sex trafficking blackmail empires.
My theory is that Trump was a partner. The same level as Epstein or just below. And trump wanted more but Epstein didn't want to give up control and that was their falling out
There’s evidence of that Epstein knew he was a threat to his security and had evidence withheld to use as collateral compliance. A demon recognizes game and acts accordingly till cameras get shut off
My theory was that Trump viewed themselves in direct competition, and when he saw that girls liked Epstein more than him he threw a tantrum.
Which is a really fucked up thing to say but being a pedophile and independently a monster is something
they probably started out as equal partners, then trump tried to spin off his own pedo ring, and then got real mad when his failed (like everything he does) and epstein started "recruiting" children (because they are children not women!) from trump properties
You know shit is fucked when the whole thing can be summed up as "I wanted to rape and torture ALL the underage girls but he had to steal some from me!"
Trump had hotels, casinos, condos. Locations.
I don’t know .. I don’t want to go down a disgusting rabbit hole contemplating… Epstein files need to be released (with only victims names redacted) and all pedophiles need naming, arresting and jail time. No matter now wealthy or powerful.
No matter now wealthy or powerful, or what political party they are/were involved with
His model agency to traffick girls was inspiration for Epstein to start his own agency and traffick girls. He says as much in some of the letters.
Wasn't there something in the emails about trump being pissed Epstein took a massage girl from mara logo? He's pretending Venezuela is Epstein.
It wasn’t in emails, Trump told reporters that. It’s on video.
It’s cute that anyone thinks Trump would release the files without scrubbing them first
This isn’t about the Epstein files. The nationalist freaks in this Administration want to do colonialism, and they want to do it to one or the only regimes in our hemisphere to snub their noses at us. It’s happening now because between Trump’s collapsing support, the upcoming midterm season and the fact that he’s decaying before our eyes, it’s pretty much now or never. These people are nationalistic supremacists. And once you believe in national supremacy, mugging other nations for their things is the only logical endpoint. We’re more important than everyone else, so if we want something, we should take it. The whole reason people have said that Nationalism is bad since the World Wars is that it always ends this way.
That’s what’s happening here. The Epstein files are not a silver bullet that will take Trump down. People need to disregard the illusion that Friday is going to save us.
Honestly as a non-American, I dont believe there is anything that can "take him down" at this point.
He's a symbol of the extreme right wing of the country AND has the backing of the billionairre ruling class. He could eat a screaming baby on live television and millions of Americans would say "thats the most patriotic thing I ever saw", mainstream media would follow it up with stories about how eating babies is actually good for your health and the economy, and pastors would hold Sunday sermons on how babies that get eaten go straight to heaven.
Trump is just a symptom of the illness, not the cause. With the Republicans gutting your country to enrich themselves and the Democrats seemingly toothless and unwilling to fight back in any meaningful way, I dont see how you guys pull yourselves out of the quagmire.
Him eating 10 big macs for each meal will more than likely take him down. That fattys a walking heart attack waiting to happen.
People would still vote for him even if he was dead. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was the first dead person elected president. It will just be a gold framed picture of him, placed on a chair. With speakers, so you can hear him talking, from heaven.
AI Trump
People said this last time.
There's been some subtle shifting over the past few months that have given me hope. The Republican coalition is fracturing over a number of issues. I think he's bungled the economy too badly to get away with any "cancel elections" type shenanigans. And he's completely alienated the military and institutional actors he'd have needed for that.
I think the midterms will go forward, and they'll be a catastrophe for Republicans. A historic one. Once he loses Congress, there's a great deal more that we can do to push back on him. And on top of the fact that he's speed running his way to lame duck status, I also think there's a really strong possibility he doesn't live to see the end of his term (which, again, I think is another reason they're pressing forward with this while they still can).
He really does seem to be going downhill mentally, too. He's less and less able to sound coherent for any length of time, can't stay awake through a meeting, and his impulse control seems to be loosening.
Are you watching him right now? He's crashing out on national television as we speak lol
I don't watch or listen to that man any more than I absolutely have to!
Ok, but hear me out: if he turns around tomorrow and cancels the elections, who stops him?
His party wont, it benefits them.
The supreme court MIGHT say "this is unconstitutional", but who enforces the ruling? The military that his party just spent time purging of leadership critical of him? There will be a schism in the armed forces.
The people will protest, but with the threat of losing their livlihoods and all their benefits tied to their jobs, that cant last.
I truly believe that we're looking at an unprecedented situation where a US president may try and turn himself into a dictator, and it'll just be "allowed" to happen because the mechanisms to prevent it either wont be enforced or will be willfully supressed.
He was already constitutionally ineligible for committing insurrection. And they just let him steal his way back into power.
And he didn't get taken down.
He openly attempted to overthrow the government and the people gave him unchecked power. Now we have masked men kidnapping citizens off the street.
Every single part of the constitution has been discarded and you are like "Some of the Republicans are infighting so maybe he will lose in midterms."
He hasn't alienated the military. They literally illegally went to California and started arresting US citizens. They are currently running patrols in multiple states. They are blowing up random boats and have waged war against another country.
There are zero parts of that which indicates they won't do whatever he says.
This doesn't just magically go away. Every single "this will finally do it." Moment is arrived and sailed by.
But sure, he totally can't get away with canceling the elections. No way people would allow that. Wearing masks and kidnapping citizens? That's acceptable. Blatantly accepting bribes from other countries? That's cool. Using the military against US citizens? Okay, thats something he can get away with.
By canceling an election? No possible way he could do that!
Yeah he heard someone tell him that that oil actually belongs to the US. Who knows exactly what they said but he heard that and it fit with what he wanted to believe. I can't wait for the stories to come out from ex-cabinet members in a few years (months?).
We don’t have to speculate who told him that or what they said. It was Stephen Miller, and he tweeted it out this afternoon.
My big conspiracy theory is that Stephen Miller is functionally the President of the United States. They let Trump go to sports games, build his little ballroom, decorate the White House and accept his bribes. And Miller is actually the one running the country on a day to day basis. Invading Venezuela has been one of his hobby horses for years, and he’s using Trump’s legitimacy to make it happen.
Vomit. I think that's my fill of news for a couple of days.
Wormtongue if Théoden were Denethor.
And Palantir is the Palantir.
MTG can play Gollum/Smeagol so long as she dies at the end after the change of heart.
Thing is, Trump isn't the brains behind all this. Trump exiting the stage isn't magically going to make everything alright again. Trump is just the distraction keeping attention away from his puppet masters. After Trump comes Vance. He has the same mindset, except he isn't a demented old man. Still a puppet, but a much more coherent one...
It won't, but I really don't think any of these cretins has what it takes to tap into the combination of populism and entertainment that were Trump's secret sauce with the electorate.
There is nothing to be the brains of. This isn't some secret hidden operation. It's all being done in the public.
There isn't a special plan that needs clever people to pull off. In fact, gross incompetence is a primary trait.
And Vance can't pull this off. He's not a demented old man. Remember when Desantis tried to be the "smart" version of Trump? Putting immigrants on busses and shipping them to blue states?
And when the debates came around everyone was meh on him. Despite losing the election, there was no candidate that stood a chance to replace him. It's specifically this incompetent, unhinged asshole incapable of finishing a sentence that they want. Nobody can step up and fill those shoes. If he dies, they will immediately change face and pretend like they were not party of the whole thing.
You guys could be marched to an extermination camp and you'd be saying "Wow I can't believe what he's doing to distract from the Epstein files."
Sometimes greedy fuckers are just greedy fuckers. And I honestly don't think he's all that concerned about the Epstein files. His base of deplorables has proven time and again how little they care about it.
[deleted]
the president of peace
The president of pees.
What's the difference between a chickpea and a lentil?
Putin doesn't have video of a lentil on Trump's face
tf is this a punch line or a fact??
He renamed the "U.S. Institute of Peace" to "Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace", so it must be true.
Settle down, FIFA
President of Piece of shit
What was advertised:
The reality:
In other news, Italy stole all our wine, France all our cheese, and Egypt stole most of the Nile AND the Aswan Dam to boot.
You laugh but Trump is actively working to get the Panama Canal back.
Can’t spell canal without anal!
Well, time for Britain to come back for their tea.
De Nile isn't just a river in Africa.
South Korea took our fucking kimchi!
For anyone not understanding this, this is Trump being full 'mask off'.
Way back when, Venezuela nationalised their oil industry and booted out the American companies who were exploiting it.
When Trump says "They took all of our oil and we want it back. They illegally took it." The "our" he's talking about isn't the American people, it's the American companies and rich fuckers who were benefiting. He even says as such later on when he says "They took our oil rights, we had a lot of oil there. As you know, they threw our companies out. and we want it back."
American citizens - prepare yourselves for yet another war over oil reserves, where your sons and daughters will be sent off to die in a foreign land, not to protect you, but to enrich some already obscenely wealthy bastards.
I also think it's about deliberately manufacturing a crisis as a means of uniting supporters and gaining more political power. A war with Venezuala could be an excuse to use more emergency powers and take even more drastic actions against immigrants and minorities. Worst case scenario would be trying to suspend elections.
Another aspect is the US dropping support for Ukraine and NATO. If the US wanted to pivot away from Europe to focus on China I could to an extent understand and originally that was part of the messaging. But instead we are abandoning Ukraine and alienating all of our NATO partners just to continue backing Israel and now potentially launch a totally needless war in Venezuela.
Wag the Dog
He will 100% try to cancel elections if he sees impending loses coming. He knows that an impeachment is coming in early '27 if the House and Senate get flipped, and don't doubt that he will do ANYTHING to keep that from happening. Including nukes. He DOES NOT CARE.
He was desperate for a war in his first presidential run too, he just couldn't find anyone. He seems to think its important to his legacy.
He tried N.Korea and China slapped him down. Tried Iran and was told it would be absolute hell. Pivoted this way and that, looking for a war, but the world was fairly well balanced and everywhere he turned someone shot him down.
Now the world isn't and he's gonna get his war one way or another. I though it was gonna be over the Suez Canal and Panama Canal, but he's shifted away from that now. My big fear is that it's going to be supporting Putin's expansion into Eastern Europe, so NATO and Europe are too afraid to get involved. Although he currently seems to have agreed to split the world East / West with Putin and Xi, and the US won't concern itself militarily with that side.
As a representative of the king of England, you illegally took things from us , we want them back
Not so fast, as a descendant of the Italian peninsula, all of England belongs to Rome, and therefore Italy.
It was yours, then you left voluntarily to beat up on some poor Germans. que sera, sera (that is Latin , right?)
As a random guy (who has decided just now that you need something other than a flag, perhaps a diorama of some kind? To indicate that you own a land), I can assure you that I now have legal ownership of your suspiciously boot-shaped peninsula, regardless of whatever the godless natives say.
No flag, no country, you can't have one.
As I have established, flags are insufficient. It's a diorama game now.
Sorry, I already have the Italy NFT, so Italy belongs to me.
📸
Bet you feel stupid now huh?
Yeah, I think the Celts have a better claim on England than the Romans, since Rome chose to leave.
Stop your horses, according to Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) north America and most of the south including Venezuela belongs to Spain.
Egypt has entered the chat
Ummmm… I have ancestors from 300 years ago, who were wealthy and didn’t hand down anything to me. I guess I’d better track down some cousins 20th removed and demand what I think is my share. Our President is on to something.
You probably own Ireland and Portugal. Better get on it.
They “took” “our” oil?
Is . . . . Is he high?
I’m legitimately asking, like is he on a massive recreational dose of mind-altering substances?
Because the only other possibility here is he’s just making word-sounds with his mouth-hole while having no idea what they mean, and in that case the 25th Amendment should be invoked because JD “The Couch Fucker” Vance can’t possibly be worse.
When Venezuelan nationalized their oil reserves in 1976 they cut out US companies like Exxon, Gulf, and Mobile that had invested in, and were profiting from, the Venezuelan oil market. The “our” Trump is referring to is the corporations, not the citizens of the US.
When does he ever refer to regular citizens of the US?
Come on bro. There are enough things to actually complain about that you don't need to create a fake narrative. For example, he talked about moving on a married woman like bitch. She was a regular citizen of the US.
Mostly when he’s telling us to buy fewer dolls and pencils
When he said he loves the poorly educated
"They're eating the dogs. They're eating the cats."
In 1976. Bunch of butt hurt boomers
At best, someone told him they stole it and they were talking about the nationalization of oil as a resource which prevented US companies from buying it. I do not know exactly how the legality of that works, it is a different country after all.
That is the absolute strongest case there is for Venezuela "stealing" it, over 50 years ago. So basically bullshit.
That's pretty much the reason for the Cuban embargo.
It is every country’s right to nationalize any which company or resource, recognize under the un charter as permanent sovereignty over natural resources
The "stealing" was in 2007, Venezuela apparently owes ConocoPhillips ~$10B
https://www.offshore-technology.com/news/conocophillips-us-licences-venezuela/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_U.S._involvement_in_Venezuela%27s_petroleum_industry#2007_Expropriations
Obviously a military operation that will end up costing ten times as much that's owed is the most logical answer here.
You wish it’ll be that cheap.
cool, they can deal with it themselves then. Corporations shouldn't have control over the military.
In August 1971, under the presidency of Rafael Caldera, a law was passed that nationalized the country's natural gas industry. Also in 1971 the law of reversion was passed which stated that all the assets, plant, and equipment belonging to concessionaires within or outside the concession areas would revert to the nation without compensation upon the expiration of the concession.[7] The movement towards nationalism was experienced once again under decree 832. Decree 832 stipulated that all exploration, production, refining, and sales programs of the oil companies had to be approved in advance by the Ministry of Mines and Hydrocarbons.[7] Led by finance minister Luis Enrique Oberto, nationalization led to the Venezuelan economy reaching an average growth of 5% between 1970 and 1973.[18]
Nationalization became official when the presidency of Carlos Andrés Pérez, whose economic plan, "La Gran Venezuela", called for the nationalization of the oil industry and diversification of the economy via import substitution. The country officially nationalized its oil industry on 1 January 1976 at the site of Zumaque oilwell 1 (Mene Grande), and along with it came the birth of Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) which is the Venezuelan state-owned petroleum company. All foreign oil companies that once did business in Venezuela were replaced by Venezuelan companies.
Yeah! They stole it and they hid it. But we found it!!! It was in the ground!!!
In the video he is talking about oil/land rights. So I think he is referring to contractual issues regarding the extraction of oil.
This from the same guy that broke NAFTA replaced it with CUSMA got back in and then broke CUSMA.
If hypocrisy was matter he’d generate enough to collapse us into a blackhole.
“It was a terrible deal, who would’ve made such a deal?”
He's literally insane.
He’s evil. And not even subtle about it. The older he gets, the worse he is at hiding it.
No, your country is evil. Trump is just a symptom, but there are many, many, name enablers, and many more who simply don't mind or care.
US Fascism 101. A foreign country who wants their independence and protects its natural resources is either invaded or it government overthrown. See Vietnam, Cambodia, Chile..
we are the baddies
Nothing new, CIA been destroying countries since the 50’s
Fuck this corrupt piece of shit.
This is the same bullshit the US called on Cuba! They took all the gambling casinos. This is just more cash for the oil companies if this goes through. Just how much cash Trump in Trumpcoins did the oil companies put out for this bullshit!
Private companies invested in an area with political risk and got burned. It’s not americas oil. It’s the companies oil. It’s not the taxpayers jobs to do anything about it. Fuck Trump.
Your children are going to die so the oil companies can make a profit. The US Military, is in control of the corporations. Just how fucked up is that?
I feel like there’s a lot of responses in this thread similar to where I am in, what makes this “our oil”? If we’re seriously going back to 1976 to justify it, where does this end?
And next we’ll have to invade Italy for stealing our Rocky Mountains. They took them illegally!!
Lol oil is on the fucking floor. Ain't nobody drilling at $55 a barrel. What a fuckin clown.
Starting a war will increase the oil prices.
Get this idiot out of office.
What a complete national disgrace this man has become.
Become? He’s been one for the majority of his life.
He's just the US personified without a filter, this is what America has always been. Instead of blaming him personally fight the system he defends and the violence he helps to bring abroad to other countries. This didn't start at Venezuela, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya were all before now and they also suffered needlessly for ceaseless greed of the American appetite for oil, gold and murder.
More lies and distractions from the pedo in chief
lol wtf. Is this fucking dude even talking about. We don’t need to take anyone’s oil… we have the largest proven reserves.
So... Trump is now for slavery reparations, right? Right?
Imagine if he thought through the implications of his words, but that will never happen.
He only cares for reparations when it concerns his rich friends, so he'd more likely demand reparations for the plantations
He is an idiot and his followers are bigger idiots.
My i recomend a book called confessions of a economic hitman.
Oh so it was about oil. I am shocked, truly.
Also... stole it? Did Venezuela illegally cross our borders, pump oil illegally and smuggle it back home?
Oh how convenient that one of the most oil rich countries gave us cause to forcefully take all their oil. You’re really ucking stupid if you believe Trump.
Did you forget about Epstein yet?
This sums up why the United States is one of the most hated nations globally. You cant be the self-procliamed heros and villains at the same time. The USA is nothing but a villain. Full stop.
Who is this? Seems like some kind of stupid doofus.
Did they drink our milkshake?
So where does he go from here I wonder with so much of his term still left, can't top all the ridiculous nonsense he's already said, can he!?
/s
dey took err ohlll
amerikkka is a hostile nation and the UN needs to step in and stop this horrible country from invading YET another country to steal their resources.
What happened to the anti-war people who voted for trump? Where are you?
Oh, look, a distraction from the Epstien files. Right on cue.
How did Venezuela "take" oil from the US, in Venezuela? Make this make sense.
Fucking WHAT?
what the fuck is this motherfucker talking about?
we have trump on camera asking oil executives for a billion dollars for his campaign
it’s time for paying back it seems
Did they drink our milkshake?!!
Trump is so fucking drugged up for that speech. Speed, Adderall, numbing agents, and a strong teleprompter, some say the strongest.
That's not his normal state any more.
Guys guys ignore the prices on everything else and let’s just focus on the savings on 20 cents per gallon on gas
I didn’t realize the entire Earth’s oil was earmarked for Trump. It’s a shame the world community won’t stand up to the bag of milk.
Interesting. Where are the Epstein files?
Ladies and gentlemen, the representative and living embodiment of the people of the United States of America.
He's probably referring to them nationalizing the oil companies.
Until 1976 British, Dutch, and American companies controlled Venezuelan oil, although they never owned it in situ.
Unsurprisingly, this was a parasitic relationship: not having their own capacity to extract, refine, or distribute the oil, these companies controlled not only the resource but the price of it--obviously favoring the importers and limiting Venezuela's profits.
Ideally, the nationalization should have given Venezuela the opportunity to compete with middle eastern suppliers and rapidly develop sovereign wealth.
Unfortunately, what followed were decades of incompetence, corruption, and quite likely CIA sabotage.
Trump isn't a student of history or anything else.
He doesn't understand what happened, if he even knows about it.
He probably thinks everything with the word "America" on it is a subsidiary of the United States, so Venezuela--a country in South America--having their own oil is like a waiter taking home silverware from Mar-a-Lago.
tl;dr: Bully used to steal kid's lunch money until kid stood up for himself, bully now thinks the lunch money was his to begin with and is going to start stealing it again.
I find baffling and unsettling the fact that we do not limit the age at which someone can become president. It's pure insanity. 65 tops. Non-negotiable.
Donald J. Trump is a child rapist and felon. Repeat it a thousand times. The entire internet should just be posting this until he's gone from this earth.
Just doing the math, trying to understand
Venezuela has oil, the USA has oil, both countries sell oil and because of that Venezuela is stealing oil from the USA?
Is that right?
50 years ago they nationalized some assets belonging to US oil companies is the closest I can get to figuring what this is about
Not really. US oil companies were exploiting Venezuelan oil reserves until 1976, when Venezuela nationalized the resource, kicked the US companies out, and started their own oil company to benefit their own country.
Venezuela taking a page out of Mr Burns and started slant drilling
There is no “our” oil. We don’t have a socialized oil industry. What the hell is he talking about?
“They drink our milkshake!”
Damn Venezuelan straws, drinking the USAmerican milkshake. Drinking. It. Up.
Unfortunately, there will be blood.
All the oil companies want back in by force bahaha instead of just looking at electric batteries and evs
Oil companies were a bit more clandestine back in the Iraq and Libya days. I wonder if any of the OPEC nations will react to these actions.
So, like, they took it from Texas? And nobody saw them?
Seems like someone needs a distraction from the Epstein files.
Thailand took my flip flops. I'm not sure if somebody stole them, or I just left them on the beach while drunk. Either way, I want them back, Thailand!
Are they releasing more photos tomorrow?
Finally, there's the admission.
The oomph loompa is going to get us all killed.
President of Peace everyone, or so i was told, which was always obvious 💩, but an awful lot of people liked to keep eating it i guess.
Why doesn't this surprise me.
And yesterday it was about drugs. Mmmkay.
Was Venezuela covertly drilling in Texas? Fracking in North Dakota? Siphoning off of the Alaska pipeline? A pirate bucket brigade stealing oil from a tanker in the Port of NY & NJ? A raid of a off-shore oil platform off of the Louisiana coast?
How did they steal our oil?
The math ain’t mathin
This man is full blown out of his mind and there is absolutely zero justification or hiding it anymore. Fucking enough. No more of this shit. It is inexcusable.
The question here isn't whether Trump is a corrupt self-absorbed fool running the country like some orange Don Corleone. But who in the US political sphere is going to finally put an end to this nightmare and stand up for what's right?
Trump supporters, serious question: do you all actually buy this shit?
I guess we just forget about murdering people on boats now and move onto bombing stuff inland?
America finally took its mask off and showed their true colours
there should be a national annual veiwing day for the movie "idiocracy" and make sure it's not labeled as "instructions manual"
Ah there it is. Oil. So it wasn't about drugs