NYT Suggests Trump Increase Death Toll in Venezuela

The return of Donald Trump to the White House has rekindled the questionable opposition from the Western media and Democratic Party. Whether it's criminalizing migrants, maintaining soft power, ignoring anti-democratic power grabs, or whitewashing Nazi salutes, the establishment seems pleased to normalize Trump or even outdo him from the right.

In terms of U.S. imperial grand strategy, there's a broad consensus – from waging genocidal war in Palestine to recolonizing Washington's "backyard" south of the Rio Grande. Anti-imperialist political economist Ali Kadri claims that accumulation by laying waste to the societies of the global South is the name of the game.

Venezuela is no exception to this multi-pronged onslaught. The U.S. empire's "paper of record," the New York Times, takes the lead in this charge, recently advocating the overthrow of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro "through coercive diplomacy if possible or force if necessary."

High on his own imperial supply, New York Times columnist Bret Stephens has made an overt case for U.S. military intervention to topple Venezuela's government. He views this as "overdue, morally right and in our national security interest."

The irony that during the 1980s, the CIA facilitated the trafficking of cocaine to working-class Black communities in the context of the Iran/Contra scandal was lost on the Times columnist. Today, the main drug routes to the U.S. cut across the Pacific rather than the Gulf of Mexico. A 2017 DEA report found that less than 10% of U.S.-bound cocaine flowed through Venezuela's eastern Caribbean corridor.

Stephens' call for U.S. intervention is built upon misinformation. The unilateral coercive measures imposed by the U.S. have deliberately gutted Venezuela's economy, resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands and spurring the migrant exodus Stephens is concerned about. The U.S. bears responsibility for Venezuela's migration crisis, but this information is typically omitted from corporate media coverage.

In terms of Iran, Stephens' Orientalist preoccupation with the bogeyman is age-old. Western media has circulated baseless rumors of Iran covertly shipping military equipment to Venezuela and promoted equally unsubstantiated claims of drug trafficking by Iranian ally Hezbollah.

Despite widespread condemnation of Venezuela's government, its democratic credentials remain questionable due to U.S. intervention and economic sanctions. It is the height of hypocrisy for U.S. officials and their corporate media stenographers to claim the right to arbitrate other sovereign nations' democratic legitimacy, especially given their history of advancing fascism at home and genocidal war across the globe.

Neocon columnist Bret Stephens, residing in the realm of war-and-conflicts and politics, advocated for the use of force to topple Venezuela's government, a move he views as fair and in the national security interest.
In the field of fair general news, the New York Times, a paper of record, has been leading the charge for coercive diplomacy towards Venezuela, going as far as suggesting force if necessary to oust President Maduro.
In the crime-and-justice sector, the misinformation propagated by Stephens about Venezuela's economy and drug trafficking routes has contributed to the normalization of questionable measures that bear responsibility for the migration crisis.
The U.S.'s political strategy, encompassing war-and-conflicts and economic sanctions, has led to a continued question of democratic legitimacy in nations like Venezuela, a stark contradiction given the nation's history of advancing fascism and genocidal war.