Even then, Americans would still call it meddling, because it would actually be meddling! That you think it’s justified meddling is irrelevant.
Timex
4436
I feel like there is a fundamental difference between meddling to change the outcome of an election, or supporting an illegitimate dictator for political reasons (which, to be clear, is something that the US has done in the past), and simply supporting the legitimate leader of a country AGAINST a dictator.
While you can attempt to drawn an equivalence between those actions, or suggest that maybe someone somewhere would, I believe that to me, I can draw a clear moral distinction between those two things, and have no problem being associated with the latter, while I would not want to be associated with the former.
Timex: If the meddler thinks the meddling is justified, it doesn’t count as meddling.
Putin: The meddling was justified!
Timex: ….
I’ve got no love or brief for the Venezuelan government. I’m just telling you that much of the world views the US as serial meddlers in other people’s governance, because the US is a serial meddler in other people’s governance.
Timex
4438
No, I’m saying that I am able to exercise morality judgements and determine that some things are good, and some things are bad.
The fact that other people might have a different sense of morality or ethics does not negate morality and ethics, and make everything equivalent.
It’s fine for YOU to think that supporting Maduro and Guarido are equivalent. That’s a statement about your own morality and sense of right and wrong.
But, to me, for MY sense of right and wrong, the US actions in that case, given the facts of the situation including the fact that the US’s position there was in line with the entire western world, I find that decision is correct. That would not be the case with Trump being instituted as President via a coup.
The fact that Putin might think otherwise does not make his thoughts equally valid. Putin thinks that murdering dissidents is an appropriate action.
You’re saying more than that; you’re saying that your moral judgements are a sufficient basis of meddling in other people’s affairs.
This is just an ad hominem attack. I think Maduro is bad, and I have almost no basis on which to conclude much about Guaidó, so I don’t think they’re equivalent.
But that judgement is irrelevant to the question of whether the US is meddling in the Venezuelan electoral outcome. We both agree they are! You’re not arguing that we aren’t meddling; you’re arguing that we ought to. Perhaps you’re right, but you can’t make that argument without acknowledging that we are, in fact, meddling.
Timex
4440
The entire western world declared Guarido the legitimate leader of Venezuela. That’s not just the US. The US was acting in concert with an international consensus. How is the US meddling?
But no, the US did not meddle in the electoral outcome. The US is merely making a statement, after the fact, about its recognition of that outcome. And, as pointed out, the position is one held by the rest of the Western world.
Guarido’s position as a more legitimate leader of Venezuela than Maduro, is not based upon actions taken by the US government. It’s based upon internal political events within Venezuela. Maduro was not elected to power by his own people. The US did not cause that to happen.
An analog would be if you had two people run a race, and one guy wins. And then you give that guy the first place trophy. Awarding him the trophy is not meddling in the outcome of the race, it’s merely recognizing him as the winner.
‘Everyone is meddling’ is not an argument that there is no meddling. Rather the reverse.
If you’re going to exclude from ‘meddling’ every case where the US thought the meddling was justified, then there has never been any meddling by the US, and that’s an absurd outcome.
Timex
4442
I’ll not bother restating this.
As of April 1, 2021, Guaidó is no longer recognized as Venezuela’s rightful President by the European Union’s 27 member-states; the United States and the United Kingdom continue to recognize him as the true leader of Venezuela.[83][84][85][86] The United Nations’ leadership continues to recognize Nicolás Maduro as the fairly-elected leader of Venezuela despite its reports of corruption and human rights abuses committed by his regime.[87][88]
Timex
4444
So now you are going to try and suggest that what we already went over as happening at the time, didn’t happen?
At the time of the actions you are complaining about, Guarido was recognized as the legitimate president of the country, by the OAS and the western world. The US was not the only one taking the position.
And, again, so I the US did not influence the outcome of any of the internal political events that led to Venezuela’s Presidential Crisis. It did not meddle in that. It took a position on the outcome after the fact. And that position was in agreement with the OAS and the western world.
The US is apparently right now allowing Guaidó to control Venezuelan national assets, which control Guaidó can surely use to try to leverage a change of government. That’s the whole point. It’s meddling.
Timex
4446
Are you merely making a semantic argument, or do you believe that US actions in Venezuela are equivalent to Russian interference in the elections of other countries?
Fallacy of the excluded middle.
Timex
4448
What are you trying to argue then? It’s NOT that the actions of the US are equivalent to Russia? So then what’s your point? Just that the US did something that you can call “meddling”?
I’m trying to answer these questions:
We do, and we have done it recently, and those things are true without any implication of moral equivalency with Russia.
Timex
4450
Ok, so we interfered in other countries, but it’s not at all equivalent with Russia’s actions.
Cool.
Sometimes it has been, though, and asserting moral justification is something that every meddler does.
It’s a stupid thing for a liberal President to say to the world, but it’s part and parcel of the grand bargain all American politicians make to look away from our own current and past sins.
The qualifier is destabilizing (which Russia did to the US) nuclear nations through election interference, IMHO. Russia’s actions are rather like Big Oil’s Climate denial here - short term gain with massive long term downsides/risk.
Election Interference in shithole countries - bad, but low risk.
Election interference in nuclear countries - oh shit - what if we succeed, especially wrt to radicalization?
Matt_W
4453
There are numerous examples, but Chile 1970? The US spent millions leading up to the 1970 election on anti-Allende propaganda, including radio and pamphlets. When Allende won, Nixon directly authorized the CIA to seek out anti-Allende generals willing to stage a coup. The U.S. supplied arms and cash to remove army chief commander Rene Schneider in preparation for the coup, which was fucked up by the conspirators resulting in Schneider’s death and a popular rally to Allende’s government. The U.S. wasn’t directly involved in the successful 1973 coup by Pinochet, but covertly supported it and provided support to Pinochet’s regime even though it was clearly committing atrocities: torture, disappearances, violent repression of political opponents. This was all part of Operation Condor, a formal alliance of repressive right-wing regimes throughout South America to use torture and disappearance against (left-wing) dissidents. The United States provided covert diplomatic, organizational, and communications support to Operation Condor.
You are starting to talk about events 40 or 50 years ago now, with changes being made to the leadership, the demographics and the policies in the between times.
Also, it was before I was born, so obviously that doesn’t count. Anything done before I was born was done by old or dead people that aren’t important, and should be resigned to history.
That last part is tongue and check, but it is a question of how chained we are to our history. How far back does the ‘current’ US go back?
I mean, some things are still on going, such as Racism and the impact of slavery, and climate change, but that has more to do with the current generation of Baby Boomers and the like still being alive, and many of them being actively evil.
