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It's more than just the oil. Follow the Petrodollar.

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Scott Baker
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Inside Venezuela: Locals speak out after Maduro taken into US custody by Trump U.S. President Donald Trump says the seizure of Venezuelan leader Nicola's Maduro should serve as a warning to the rest of the ...
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/>Unfortunately, the U.S. coup in Venezuela is much deeper, scarier and sicker than even "it's about the oil." The first layer of lies - that it was about drugs" was so weak that no one but the most credulous or maybe anti-drug supporters would accept it, even partially.

The MSM blew that apart instantly, but then got complacent on part lie #2: "it's about the oil." Yes, Venezuela has the heavy oil that our Gulf coast refineries need, it would take billions to rebuild them or others to process heavy oil to process what we have in America: light, sweet crude. Heavy crude used to come from Canada, but they are tariffed (and terrified) and almost an enemy now. Also, tellingly, the heavy stuff is what gets made into jet fuel for you know, just in case there's going to be long range bombing missions. And the Paul Singer angle is definitely a factor. Trump is paying back his megadonor.

But the 3rd layer is where the real payback happens: the Petrodollar. Maduro was bypassing sanctions by selling oil to China for Yuan, not dollars. This threatened the hegemony of the petrodollar, already slipping due to decades of sanctions from both parties, the rise of China and BRICS - BRICS+ is now nearly 30 nations, a loose organization comprising 40% of world trade, dollar-free. Look what happened to Qaddafi when he dared to create an alternate gold dinar, or Hussein when he sold oil to the EU for Euros. The importance of the Petrodollar goes back to Kissinger but now that we barely manufacture, or even grow anything exportable, only our military maintains U.S. power. As Paul Krugman has pointed out, China is richer than the U.S. on a PPP basis. The U.S. can't turn this around quickly, if at all. But both parties feel defending the Petrodollar is worth almost any price. That's why you hear mostly muted concern or nothing at all from the Democratic side. This will ramp up once it becomes clear what a costly quagmire Trump has gotten us into. But by then, he'll be after Greenland in a serious way.

There's even a 4th layer of motive where few have gone, but it's documented: a book preceding Trump, believed by Musk, who had dinner with Trump shortly after the kidnapping of Maduro. It may be crazy, but the Tech billionaires are getting away with it: the Technate. This is a region of north South America, all of North and Central America, and Greenland, imagined as the new American sphere of influence. Popular liberal commentator Kyle Kalinsky talked about it at the end of his video: tu.be/1ODTrRGLbbs?si=uAEfYtWeveTku-9V&t=881. It's wild, but aren't we there?

The geo-strategist Peter Zeihan recently described how Canada MIGHT become part of America, province by province, without firing a shot by the U.S., with Alberta voting to secede and join America as state 51 to bypass the oil tariffs' Alberta and Saskatchewan actually trade more with America than with the rest of Canada and they resent environmental and tax restrictions made by the eastern government. Once they fall, Zeihan's theory goes, the rest of a divided Canada would be too weak - and demographically too old - to hold together. The referendum failed this past fall, but it could be brought up again under heavier pressure now. If Canada, or parts of it, feel the only choice is "join or die" they might just choose a province by province join, which would at least bias Congress more in their favor against future American dominance. Oh, and Zeihan says a decision by the Canadian supreme court over French Quebec says that a province can peacefully secede without violating their Constitution. How very Canadian! The U.S. had a Civil War over that sort of thing. tu.be/jSkgLNSLaYg?si=TCADmWSpHWtLa1NP

The old New World Order - never well defined - is over. What comes next is unclear, even to Trump. But it will be more unstable, more like the old gunboat diplomacy of the early 19th century, but with air power and coordinated special forces strikes and 3 major spheres of influence. Europe is in trouble, but they grew complacent on American support, which is mostly over. Canada too (sorry, but it's true). The U.N. is almost irrelevant and that's partly their fault for foisting the most corrupt countries to the heads of human rights committees etc.

Good luck to us all!

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Scott Baker is a Managing Editor & The Economics Editor at Opednews, and a former blogger for Huffington Post, Daily Kos, and Global Economic Intersection.

His anthology of updated Opednews articles "America is Not Broke" was published by Tayen Lane Publishing (March, 2015) and may be found here:
http://www.americaisnotbroke.net/

Scott is a former and current President of Common Ground-NY (http://commongroundnyc.org/), a Geoist/Georgist activist group. He has written dozens of (more...)
 

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