U.S. & Venezuela Thread - Trump: "We're going to run the place"

[Ron_Artest 2,609]

1 minute ago, Horseman said:

Not news. Exactly why they didn't inform congress.  Liberals are traitors.  

Got any more revelations Nostradamus? 

If it leaked it's not a liberal you idiot.

[HellToupee 2,329]

 I give her credit for this

 

( @realDonaldTrump - Truth Social Post )
( Donald J. Trump - Jan 03 2026, 6:59 PM ET )

"Democrat lawmaker Wasserman Schultz comes out in support of Trump's operation in Venezuela:"

Many Democrats in Congress have come out against the strikes that led to Maduro's capture.

ep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., came out in support of President Trump's military operation in Venezuela that led to the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.

Many Democrats in Congress have come out against the strikes that led to Maduro's capture.

"The capture of the brutal, illegitimate ruler of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, who oppressed Venezuela's people is welcome news for my friends and neighbors who fled his violent, lawless, and disastrous rule. However, cutting off the head of a snake is fruitless if it just regrows," Wasserman Schultz wrote on X.

"Venezuelans deserve the promise of democracy and the rule of law, not a state of endless violence and spiraling disorder. My hope is it offers a passage to true democracy and liberation. This action offers beleaguered Venezuelans a chance to seat their true, democratically elected president, Edmundo González," she added...

[FrancieFootball 308]

18 minutes ago, Hardcore troubadour said:

62 year old multiple times banned poster forced to make believe he’s a tranny in order to cling to the only place he has a chance of interacting with others.  A sad state.

SOCKFOCKER!

 

[Hardcore troubadour 16,138]

We’re at war? 

[FrancieFootball 308]

3 minutes ago, Ron_Artest said:

If it leaked it's not a liberal you idiot.

He must be into the moonshine phase of his binge drinking tonight.

[Horseman 2,799]

4 minutes ago, FrancieFootball said:

He must be into the moonshine phase of his binge drinking tonight.

14 minutes ago, Horseman said:

How come you played Bob Enright in your play instead of Violet?   

Broadway phags everywhere need to know?!?!?! 

[FrancieFootball 308]

1 minute ago, Horseman said:

Broadway phags everywhere need to know?!?!?! 

Y'all do?

[Horseman 2,799]

3 minutes ago, FrancieFootball said:

Y'all do?

They do. 

And we all want to know why you hang out at a place you've been ask to leave and never come back numerous times.  Pretending to be a women explains some of it but....

[squistion 2,689]

4 minutes ago, HellToupee said:

 I give her credit for this

"Democrat lawmaker Wasserman Schultz comes out in support of Trump's operation in Venezuela:"

 "The capture of the brutal, illegitimate ruler of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, who oppressed Venezuela's people is welcome news for my friends and neighbors who fled his violent, lawless, and disastrous rule. However, cutting off the head of a snake is fruitless if it just regrows," Wasserman Schultz wrote on X.

Context is everything...

Yes she said this is "welcome news" but she also said:

https://floridapolitics.com/archives/771531-debbie-wasserman-schultz-wants-opposition-leaders-installed-to-replace-nicolas-maduro-in-venezuela/

Debbie Wasserman Schultz wants opposition leaders installed to replace Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela

U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz says she’s happy to see Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in custody for his crimes. But she expressed anger and alarm that President Donald Trump offered no plan to install democratically elected leaders there.

“I am really glad that Maduro has been arrested, that he’s going to be held accountable for his crimes, which include crimes against humanity as well as narco-trafficking crimes, so I’m not shedding any tears that his reign of terror is over,” Wasserman Schultz said. “But to replace one unelected regime with another, which apparently Donald Trump has decided is him, is wildly inappropriate.”

The Weston Democrat wants an immediate transfer of power to Edmundo Gonzaléz, the opposition party candidate who faced Maduro in an election in 2024.

Most political observers agree Gonzalez received more votes in that contest. Yet Maduro remained in power, sworn into another term last year. The election followed Maduro threatening the arrest of other political opposition, including María Corina Machado, a political party leader removed from the ballot.

“The Venezuelan people voted to elect Edmundo Gonzalez as president and supported their political party overwhelmingly, with nearly 70% of the vote,” Wasserman Schultz said. “Donald Trump today said in his press conference that, I mean, he had the audacity to say that Maria Corina Machado is a nice woman, but has no support in the country. That is an inexplicable thing to say that is not reflective of the truth.” 

[SaintsInDome2006 837]

1 hour ago, shadrap said:

So Bad guy out but regime still in place.  OMG-the HORROR.  Trump bad man for doing it, now bad man for not going all the way.

TDS.  TDS. TDS.

if it floats your boat I'm good with it.  some people need a boogeyman.  Trump is yours regardless of what he does.

good luck with that.

 

I do wish you guys would not revert to this emotionalism so often. There’s no need for it. It’s a legitimate point about Biden. The normal thing would be compare this to what happened in Honduras with Hernandez (almost no one cared), but we know how that ends don’t we. 

[HellToupee 2,329]

Anyone remember when Obama and Clinton killed the president of Libya without congressional approval?

 

"We came, He saw, He died."

[Hardcore troubadour 16,138]

1 minute ago, HellToupee said:

Anyone remember when Obama and Clinton killed the president of Libya without congressional approval?

 

"We came, He saw, He died."

They have slaves in Libya now. You can go buy a human. 

[Maximum Overkill 2,676]

39 minutes ago, FrancieFootball said:

Y'all do?

Ok Ron 

[Horseman 2,799]

Emotionalism?

[TimHauck 3,503]

1 hour ago, squistion said:

“Donald Trump today said in his press conference that, I mean, he had the audacity to say that Maria Corina Machado is a nice woman, but has no support in the country. That is an inexplicable thing to say that is not reflective of the truth.” 

Maybe he’s mad she won the Nobel Peace Prize over him?

[Frozenbeernuts 2,492]

2 hours ago, Horseman said:

Lolololol

You don't need to play dumb too to pile on top of it.  

 

One of their great prides is in being dumb

[Maximum Overkill 2,676]

Trump is parading Maduro around NYC like a freak show on Mamdani's streets 

[dogcows 1,356]

1 hour ago, TimHauck said:

Maybe he’s mad she won the Nobel Peace Prize over him?

She has 72% approval there, almost the same as his disapproval here.

[squistion 2,689]

 

[seafoam1 3,556]

10 hours ago, Maximum Overkill said:

Trump is parading Maduro around NYC like a freak show on Mamdani's streets 

[SaintsInDome2006 837]

9 hours ago, dogcows said:

She has 72% approval there, almost the same as his disapproval here.

This stuff is so complicated. We also have just boosted the Chavista regime & Rodriguez. In every country people will rally to the flag. Same is true in Iran, they hate the Mullahs but they sure as hell won’t sell out to us after we bombed them. It’s all so twisted.

[SaintsInDome2006 837]

10 hours ago, Maximum Overkill said:

Trump is parading Maduro around NYC like a freak show on Mamdani's streets 

Even if he didn’t go down Broadway & declare 6 days of games at MSG, It’s getting a little fin de Roman Empire here. 

[seafoam1 3,556]

2 minutes ago, SaintsInDome2006 said:

Even if he didn’t go down Broadway & declare 6 days of games at MSG, It’s getting a little fin de Roman Empire here. 

I hope he was in a cage pulled by horses and thinking he was the Dragon Reborn. False Dragon...

[SaintsInDome2006 837]

Palate cleanser.

 

 

[SaintsInDome2006 837]

2 minutes ago, seafoam1 said:

I hope he was in a cage pulled by horses and thinking he was the Dragon Reborn. False Dragon...

Until Trump goes blood eagle he’s not being serious.

[Maximum Overkill 2,676]

President Donald Trump pledged a U.S. return to Venezuela’s oil industry following the stunning predawn capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, accusing the country’s socialist government of seizing American energy assets and dismantling an industry built with U.S. investment.

"We built Venezuela’s oil industry with American talent, drive and skill, and the socialist regime stole it from us," Trump said during a news conference at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida.

"Venezuela unilaterally seized and sold American oil, American assets and American platforms, costing us billions and billions of dollars," he added. "They took all of our property."

Trump pledges US return to Venezuela oil industry after Maduro's capture | Fox Business https://share.google/4RuQuP6EnC7oiwSjQ

[MDC 8,173]

Trump’s new focus on Venezuelan oil reinforces claim action was never about ‘war on drugs’

Tiago Rogero

 

Hailing the US military operation to capture Nicolás Maduro as spectacular, extraordinary, and “an assault not seen since World War II”, Donald Trump surprised many by making Venezuela’s oil the central focus of his hour-long press conference on Saturday.

The US president made little mention of the “war on drugs” that for months had been his main justification for the military build-up and the strikes on boats that have killed 116 people, instead referring to oil more than a dozen times, even when questions made no reference to it.

Trump’s insistence ended up reinforcing a claim repeatedly made by Venezuela since the escalation began: that Trump was ultimately seeking to topple Maduro and seize the country’s vast natural reserves.

As he did weeks earlier when announcing a “total blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers, Trump said that Venezuela, which holds the world’s largest reserves, had “stolen” oil from the US and that it would now be taken back.

“We built Venezuela’s oil industry with American talent, drive and skill, and the socialist regime stole it from us during those previous administrations. And they stole it through force. This constituted one of the largest thefts of American property in the history of our country,” Trump said, echoing almost word for word a post on X by his homeland security adviser, Stephen Miller, in mid-December.

Yet while analysts can trace the origins of Trump’s claim – decisions by previous Venezuelan governments to nationalise production – they argue that the US has no legal claim to Venezuela’s oil.

José Ignacio Hernández, a legal scholar and researcher of Venezuela’s oil industry who works with the consultancy Aurora Macro Strategies, said: “Even if a past government illegitimately expropriated the oil assets of US companies without fair compensation, Venezuela did not steal any oil from the US.”

Other analysts note that US companies never owned the oil or the land in Venezuela; they held exploration concessions, which confer temporary operating rights, not permanent ownership. Under international law and the UN principle of permanent sovereignty over natural resources established in 1962, sovereign states have the inherent right to control and dispose of resources within their territory.

US companies have drilled for oil in Venezuela since the early 1900s, and over the past century, firms from other countries joined them, including Italy, France, Spain, China, Russia, the Netherlands and the UK.

In 1943, Venezuela mandated that 50% of profits go to the state, and in 1976 the centre-left president Carlos Andrés Pérez nationalised the industry, creating the state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA).

US companies such as Exxon and Mobil, which merged in 1999, and Gulf Oil, now part of Chevron, suffered losses estimated at $5bn but were compensated about $1bn each.

In 2007, Maduro’s predecessor and mentor, Hugo Chávez, took control of the remaining oil operations still run under private arrangements. ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips rejected the new contractual terms and had their assets expropriated. Chevron agreed to remain.

Francisco J Monaldi, the director of the Latin America Energy Program at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy, said: “ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil left, went into international arbitration and won. In the case of ConocoPhillips, they are still owed more than $10bn. So the company is likely to be a key actor in any negotiation to recover that money, probably in part by returning to the country.”

Even so, returning is far from straightforward.

Analysts point out that there has never been an independent audit, made impossible by years of Chavista authoritarianism, to establish precisely how large Venezuela’s reserves are. And after years of mismanagement and corruption under the Chávez and Maduro regimes, compounded by severe damage from US sanctions, Venezuela’s oil production falls far short of its potential. Moreover, much of its reserves are “heavy sour” crude, which is harder and more expensive to extract.

The country is now a marginal player, accounting for less than 1% of global production. Monaldi estimates that Venezuela’s current output of just under 1m barrels a day could rise to 4m or even 5m – but doing so would require about $100bn in investment and at least a decade.

“I’m not sure whether they [US companies] will be willing to go back,” he said.

Despite Trump’s claims of oil “theft”, Chevron still holds about 25% of operations in Venezuela. PDVSA controls roughly 50%, with about 10% in joint ventures led by China, another 10% by Russia and 5% by European companies.

During Trump’s first term, the US imposed sanctions banning imports of Venezuelan oil. Joe Biden eased those restrictions in the hope that Maduro would allow a democratic transition after Venezuela’s 2024 election. That election is now widely believed to have been stolen and Trump has reinstated the sanctions. Some analysts argue that the sanctions contributed to preventing Venezuelafrom paying compensation owed to ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips.

Even during sanctions, Chevron never fully suspended its operations, maintaining them at sharply reduced levels. Trump briefly revoked the company’s licence but reversed course in July, ordering that royalties be used not by Maduro’s regime but to cover operating costs and pay down Venezuela’s long-standing debt to the company.

“If a transition of power is consolidated and sanctions are lifted, the company that will benefit most is Chevron because it is already on the ground,” Monaldi said. “But that will require substantial investment, because the Venezuelan state companies are effectively broken and have very limited capacity at this point.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jan/04/trump-new-focus-venezuelan-oil-war-on-drugs

[Hardcore troubadour 16,138]

lol. No one read that. And neither did you. Just post the headline. Thats as far as you got.  

[Ron_Artest 2,609]

Marco Rubio clarified some things this morning on meet the press.

We're not running Venezuela like Trump said, Rodriguez is.

There is no plan for the future of Venezuela other than hoping that Rodriguez does what the US wants.

He refused to say much about the oil other than it shouldn't go to countries not in our hemisphere.

Just like everything with this admin, this wasn't really thought out.  Shocker.

[dogcows 1,356]

6 minutes ago, Ron_Artest said:

Marco Rubio clarified some things this morning on meet the press.

We're not running Venezuela like Trump said, Rodriguez is.

There is no plan for the future of Venezuela other than hoping that Rodriguez does what the US wants.

He refused to say much about the oil other than it shouldn't go to countries not in our hemisphere.

Just like everything with this admin, this wasn't really thought out.  Shocker.

Also, they are NOT good on OPSEC. Some news outlets found out about the attack before it happened. But they held back their reporting at the request of the government.

Media complicit with the administration; I could have sworn that was something right-wingers were very opposed to. You know, like their opposition to regime change?

[squistion 2,689]

12 hours ago, HellToupee said:

Anyone remember when Obama and Clinton killed the president of Libya without congressional approval?

Yes, and that wasn't right either.

[Ron_Artest 2,609]

3 minutes ago, squistion said:

Yes, and that wasn't right either.

Magas using Obama as an example of doing something right lol

[seafoam1 3,556]

Great. obama. This country's biggest racist. 

[dogcows 1,356]

Rubio got raked over the coals by a reporter for leaving most of the regime in place and declaring victory.

Then made a bunch of BS excuses that it would have been too hard to remove them.  

https://www.threads.com/@aaron.rupar/post/DTGC_X_CRAb

[SaintsInDome2006 837]

3 minutes ago, dogcows said:

Rubio got raked over the coals by a reporter for leaving most of the regime in place and declaring victory.

Then made a bunch of BS excuses that it would have been too hard to remove them.  

https://www.threads.com/@aaron.rupar/post/DTGC_X_CRAb

This is so crazy.

[dogcows 1,356]

 

[Reality 3,150]

Liberal, TDS suffering life losers, mad.

Venezuelans, happy. 

You can call all go on about your Sunday now. 

You're welcome.

[Hardcore troubadour 16,138]

51 minutes ago, dogcows said:

Also, they are NOT good on OPSEC. Some news outlets found out about the attack before it happened. But they held back their reporting at the request of the government.

Media complicit with the administration; I could have sworn that was something right-wingers were very opposed to. You know, like their opposition to regime change?

So they should have reported it prior to the flawless mission? 

[MDC 8,173]

Trump admin saying the costs of running Venezuela are going to come from their oil — same arguments Wolfowitz et al made for invading Iraq.  

[Ron_Artest 2,609]

4 minutes ago, MDC said:

Trump admin saying the costs of running Venezuela are going to come from their oil — same arguments Wolfowitz et al made for invading Iraq.  

The similarities to Iraq are obvious.  We argued Iraq here 20 years ago.  I remember debating with you and torrid, I was pro invasion, I turned out to be wrong.  I believed the lies.  You and torrid were right.

I won't be on the wrong side of this again.