Smart move. In a collapsing country, their value as hostages increases by the day.
The U.S. is withdrawing its remaining diplomatic personnel from the embassy in Venezuela, citing the “deteriorating situation” given days of blackouts, increased water shortages and the threat of further protests.
The decision also comes amid growing concern that American diplomats could become a pawn in the battle with President Nicolas Maduro as the U.S. tries to push him from power.
Despite Maduro’s calls for their expulsion, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo vowed to keep American personnel there to support Juan Guaido, the president of the National Assembly who has been recognized as the country’s interim president by the U.S. and over 50 other countries.
But the sudden reversal was announced late Monday night in a statement where Pompeo called embassy staff’s presence a “constraint on U.S. policy.”
“Decisions you make are always encumbered by the fact that you know there’s real risk to your own people, people that you’ve sent into harm’s way,” Pompeo added Tuesday. “We wanted to get them out of the country so that we could move forward in a way that provided that opportunity.”
No value in staying behind in a country evil leftist socialists have destroyed!
Well, I imagine it is kinda hard to maintain residence when there is no electricity and no water.
Informative twitter thread here: https://twitter.com/AKurmanaev/status/1104961409731960832
I have a friend in Venezeula. The country is worse than any 3rd world country in Africa. She is a civil engineer making $4 a month. She frequently goes hungry and is desperate to find food. They have had very little electricity, internet, fresh water, hospitals are closed because of the lack of electricity, there is very little medicine, store shelves are empty and a country rich in oil, she can’t find out for her car
But the fat socialist leaders sit in their luxury houses and apartments, mostly living off stolen money.
This is socialism and Venezuela history should be taught to high school kids about the evils of socialism.
MJM,
I knew people who fled the country in late 1990s as the evil leftist socialists were taking control.
They owned a restaurant and left it all behind because they knew the demonic leftist socialists would take it and possibly arrest, torture and kill them.
Liberalism is a sick, coveting, criminal, mental disease.
I just talked to my friend and she says in her city, they are rioting, looted all the stores and she is very afraid.
Come liberals, defend Venezeula. It’s your baby.
@Mar…
Indeed: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-13/in-the-great-blackout-caracas-steakhouses-are-busier-than-ever
Steal from the poor to feed the rich.
And let us remind our leftists friends on this board – who are strangely quiet on this subject – that Venezuela is a Democratic Socialist state. You know, the same sick philosophy which Ocassional-Cortex and her corrupt gang proudly proclaim allegiance to while attempting to sell it here.
Not to mention our own Phony nEvers.
Thanks MjM for the link. They don’t get much news, but they just got this.
And let us remind MjM that the world is complex and that careful analysis might reveal significant differences between all the things you would prefer to lump together.
>And let us remind MjM that the world is complex and that careful analysis might reveal significant differences between all the things you would prefer to lump together.
Says the potato head who spent countless posts trying to backtrack this complex and carefully analyzed statement… “A higher minimum wage means less welfare. “.
I notice you ran away from that thread really quick. Perhaps it’s time to move to more friendly pastures. The HuffPost brain vacuum might fit your tastes better.
Jason, oh deep thinker of funny names, what would it be like for you and others to have a simple conversation about the minimum wage? Where you might even realize that we agree about parts of it? That we both agree that if someone earned more, they can improve their lot? I’m stuck in this world, too. I didn’t make the USA. I inherited what we have because I was born here. I recognize it’s not free-market to have the government set a wage floor. I can try to understand why it was created, why it’s maintained, when it should change and how. Can you?
Jiffy pounces: “… the world is complex and that careful analysis might reveal significant differences….”
So, go ahead Mr. Potato Head. Begin.
Grace us with your “careful analysis” of the significant philosophical differences between Occasional-Cortex, et. al., and Nicolás Maduro.
We await with sour cream and chive breath.
Oh, you go first. Tell me how they’re all exactly the same.
>what would it be like for you and others to have a simple conversation about the minimum wage?
It would require you to not try to prop up your view point with factless statements such as “A higher minimum wage means less welfare.”
Since you’re incapable of doing that, the simple conversation will never happen. You have an idealistic view of how to raise minimum wage and you have a circular argument that you use to support it. Both rubbish.
> Tell me how they’re all exactly the same
Potato Head is throwing out another Straw Man… what a surprise.
Jiffy chickens out: Oh, you go first.
Stellar “careful analysis” there, bub. About what we’d expect, but less.
BWAKbucbucbucbuc
You most certainly are of the French Fingerling variety of Potato Heads; pinkish skin and yellow inside.
What does a Straw Man prefer to be called now that gender fluidity is all the rage among our puddin’ headed, woefully confused, lefty friends? I’m just asking for a friend.
ZeStraw.
He is a French Fingerling, after all.
MjM, you’re the one who asserted they’re all the same, so you get to go first.
Jason, in your own words, tell me why my statement is wrong.
>Jason, in your own words, tell me why my statement is wrong.
We’re back to this? Defend it first, like I asked you repeatedly to do in the other discussion.. you know, the one that you completely chickened out from? Yeah that one. You made the statement as a supporting fact to prop it up… prove it.
You’re the one claiming I was owned. Who had the best argument against me? I said if people earn more, there will be less of a need for welfare.
You’re the one that feels owned, and you’re the one who has yet to defend your statement, which I’ve quoted numerous times, and which you are trying to modify again.
You and Kevin were arguing and you support your argument you stated what you think is a fact. I called you out asking for proof, you have yet to do so.
You’re full of shit.
OK, here’s a summary of a paper that says “raising the federal minimum wage to $12 per hour by 2020 would reduce public assistance expenditures by $17 billion annually.”
Jiffy chickens out II: “ so you get to go first.”
BAAWWWAAAAAKbucbucbuc. bucbucbuc bucbucbucbuc bucbuc
Jjf,
Your argument smacks of entitlement.
Why should the lazy, unmotivated, those lacking in job skill, get rewarded by public welfare, or reaching into my pocket to mandate I pay them more.
I’d rather not train or help the lazy, unmotivated, lacking in job skill. at that point.
You have this disgusting liberal notion that just existing deserves reward….are you 2 years old?
Yeah see, I was hoping for something more than opinion. Like “Here’s the historical rate of federal assistance” overlaid with the “here’s the historical rate of minimum wage”. Surely those stats are out there somewhere. And surely the minimum wage has only gone up from day 1…
You know, concrete, real world, historical driven facts?
The article even references a model simulated in 2007 and then never follows up on details on what happened to Federal Assistance spending when the minimum wage was raised from 2007 levels. I wonder why that is? Since you’re a potato head, I’ll tell you… bias. The author is biased and is using only “facts” that support their bias.
As I’ve stated a number of times, I fully recognize the argument against the minimum wage from the standpoint of evil government jackboot mandates distorting the Holy Free Market. Because we all must keep our blinders on tight, and pretend the USA has a free market, and that all those other evil government jackboot distortions and protections don’t matter to the employers. I have been washed in the blood of the free market lamb many times before.
So Kevin, I think you’ve got a wonderful start on convincing the nation’s elected that they should repeal the minimum wage, so you can get back to the task of “train[ing] or help[ing] the lazy, unmotivated, lacking in job skill.” Hire a consultant, start a think tank! Someone get Brian Fraley on the phone! They’re going to love the way you call people disgusting ogres.
Jason, I could point you to a study funded by the Koch brothers that, mirabile dictu, decided that raising the minimum would have no effect on welfare. How will you pick, how can you decide? Just use your bias to decide which one is right?
You could, but it would likely be just as biased the other way.
However after three days of back and forth you still haven’t proven your statement “A higher minimum wage means less welfare.”
That’s why you’re a potato head and that’s why , going forward, I and many others here will take everything you say with a grain of “More bullshit from Mr Potato Head”. Just like we do with LeRoy and all his bullshit.
Don’t just run for schoolyard insults, Jason. Show your work. What sort of “proof” do you need here?
You think this Koch-funded paper is biased “the other way”? That the truth is somewhere in the middle? Issues are complex and need more examination? You don’t say.
Ok, I’m done with this. I’m quite sure the discerning readers here were aware of your proclivity to speak “facts” without actual facts – but without a doubt you’ve cemented it now.
This is the entire reason I spend the last three days bantering with you. Thanks!
Jiffy boofs; OK, here’s a summary of a paper that says
Fat, drunk, and citing leftist orgs which are 40% funded by labor unions is no way to go through life, son.
Then there is real life:
“Researchers at the University of Washington*, who were commissioned by the city*, found that when wages went up to $13 in 2016, low-wage workers saw their hours drop by 9%. Workers ultimately made $125 less each month, on average, the report found. – CNN 6/26/2017
(* an uber-liberal college study funded by a uber-liberal city)
“One chain axing jobs is Red Robin, which hopes to save about $8 million this year by eliminating busboys at each of its 570 restaurants, the company said Monday…. ‘We need to do that to address the labor increases we’ve seen,’ ” -NY Post, 1/28/2018
“In a survey conducted by New York City Hospitality Alliance late last year, about 75 percent of the more than 300 respondents operating full-service restaurants reported they’ll reduce employee hours this year because of the new wage increases, while 47 percent said they’ll eliminate jobs.” – Eater New York, Feb 19, 2019 (VOX)
Whole Foods cuts workers’ hours after Amazon introduces minimum wage – The Guardian 3/6/2019
And that’s just some of bigger outfits.
For a nice look at the bloody killing field of Middle America, browse here.
You can add Obamacare to the list. Obamacare killed part time workers who didn’t need insurance and those worked over 27 hours a week. With Obamacare, part time workers and many full time workers had their hours and income slashed, including mine.
I never respected/trusted any liberal since then
Liberals tend to not care much for numbers (aside from those they can stuff in their pockets), reject moral authority not granted by the state, and ignore the realities of human behavior, so its no wonder they never pause to consider the possible consequences of their various “progressive” public policy agendas. The failures of their myopic good intentions are blamed on others and simply replaced with new and improved myopic good intentions. Conscience never comes into play.
Merlin, and conservatives are somehow better at measuring the effects of their policies, and are the party of responsibility?