 So, Democratic Senator Chris Murphy decided to give us a rundown of what he refers to as diplomatic malpractice, basically referring to Donald Trump's attempt to stage a coup in Venezuela. Now, he's not necessarily angry with Trump because Trump staged the coup in the first place. He's mad that Donald Trump was not successful at said coup. And as a result, he is revealing the details of that coup and where he thinks Donald Trump went wrong and why it should have been differently. So this is what he tweets out. Today, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee holds a hearing on the Trump administration's Venezuela policy. Short story, it's been a case study in diplomatic malpractice and I want to tell you the quick story of how Trump's bungling has empowered a brutal dictator. In early 2019, an opportunity presented itself. Maduro's re-election was a fraud and the world knew it. The charismatic opposition leader Juan Guaidó stood ready to capitalize and restore democracy to the nation, that's rich. The winning play was right in front of us, bring together all of Latin America behind a transition or new free elections and take the time to work with or neutralize Maduro's patrons, Russia, Cuba, and to a lesser extent, China. But Trump couldn't talk to Cuba because Obama, Putin, had Trump wrapped around his finger and all Trump wanted to talk to China about was the trade deal. So he made no meaningful effort to move them and all three stood solidly behind Maduro. Then Trump and his Latin America hawks got itchy. He recognized Guaidó as the leader of the nation thinking that would propel Venezuelans and Maduro friendly military leaders to Guaidó's side. In fact, the opposite happened. By putting Elliot Abrams, the symbol of American imperialism in Latin America in charge of Venezuela and by acting largely alone, Trump helped Maduro rally the military and much of the country against America and cast Guaidó as a U.S. pawn, accurate. Then it got real embarrassing. In April 2019, we tried to organize a kind of coup, but it became a debacle. Everyone who told us they'd rally to Guaidó got cold feet and the plan failed publicly and spectacularly, making America look foolish and weak. Since then, it's been a running comedy of errors. For instance, Bolton scuttled promising transition talks led by Norway in August 2019, saying the time for negotiations is over. Then this March, Pompeo unveiled a transition plan that is a carbon copy of the one we killed. Now, having wasted a year trying to work on a transition plan, Guaidó is boycotting the upcoming legislative elections. So what then? Keep recognizing Guaidó as the nation's leader, even if he doesn't control the military, government, or even hold office. It's a total disaster. After a year and a half, Maduro is stronger, American influence is weaker, and there is no viable path to restore democracy in Venezuela, a case study in international relations malpractice. So there is quite a bit to unpack there, but first and foremost, I have to point out the obvious contradiction that I'm sure you spotted as well. In response to what the world viewed as a fraudulent election, the way that they tried to right that wrong and restore democracy to Venezuela was by installing a puppet who was not democratically elected. So you care about democracy, and the way that you bring democracy to Venezuela is by staging a coup and putting someone in power who wasn't actually elected by the people. I mean, the contradiction is obvious. You sound like a fool, and you don't even realize it. Now, in the second tweet, he initially stated that his concern was for democracy, but by tweet number seven, he admitted that they were outright trying to stage a coup, which by definition is not democratic, mind you. So I mean, he starts off with the assumption that, you know, this was all done for altruistic reasons. We care about democracy in Venezuela. We care about the people of Venezuela, and we just want to bring them democracy. But the solutions that you apply to that situation, to right the wrongs of authoritarianism, you introduce more authoritarianism. I mean, it's just it's ridiculous, and I'm curious because he's concerned about Maduro being a brutal dictator, but why aren't you concerned about other dictatorships, Saudi Arabia? They literally behead people in public for being atheists, Robert Duterte of the Philippines. He is extrajudicially killing his own civilians. The Rohingya in Myanmar being systematically repressed. I mean, what is happening is tantamount to genocide. The same could be true for the Uyghurs in China, they're being locked in concentration camps. So I mean, I'm wondering why it's the case that we seem to only be concerned with the human rights of citizens, if the country that they're living in or the brutal dictator that we're talking about is overseeing a country with a lot of natural resources. In the case of Venezuela, they have the number one oil reserve in the world. So I mean, let's be honest here, we don't care about the people of Venezuela. We do not care about human rights. If we cared about human rights, we'd recognize Palestine as a state. But what we care about is having access to Venezuela's oil reserves. And of course, Juan Guaido would have granted the United States access to said oil because if we help him get to power, of course he's going to pay it forward and let us in and get some of that sweet, sweet oil. Like it's disgusting. And the way that he flippantly admits that the United States government was trying to stage a coup in another country, I mean, there's no consequences like international organizations aren't going to look into this. What about the UN? Oh, wait, no, because we have veto power and we can control the UN effectively. I mean, the situation is so disgusting. And like let's assume for a moment that even if altruistically speaking, we genuinely wanted to liberate Venezuela, even if we weren't concerned with the oil, if you let the US military into another country, do you honestly believe that it's competent enough to not make matters worse? I mean, we're not going to help them out. I can assure you that if we were to enter to bring democracy to Venezuela, we're going to make matters worse. And if you don't believe me, ask the people of Iraq, ask the people of Afghanistan, ask the people of Syria, whether or not we're helping to liberate them. I think they'd have a very different answer than you if you reside in America. He then put American imperialism in quotes as if, you know, it's not about American imperialism. It's not about oil resources. It's just about, you know, us wanting to save democracy and definitely not trying to steal their oil. And he made it seem as if it's bad that the people of Venezuela woke up to the reality that Juan Guaido was, in fact, a pawn of the United States, which he was. I mean, this isn't the first time that the United States has installed puppet dictators around the world. We did this to Iran. That's why Iran hates us now. We installed the Shah. We overthrew their democratically elected government and installed the Shah. I mean, you have to understand that with America, whenever we start talking about human rights, we're not serious. We don't care about human rights. If we cared about human rights, we wouldn't be droning people in Pakistan, in Yemen, in Somalia. But really, when we're talking about human rights within the context of U.S. foreign policy, what we're really talking about is wanting to invade war because we only cite human rights concerns if that country is some sort of interest to the United States military. And the fact that a Democratic senator just admitted this is despicable. The correct stance here is not to be angry at Donald Trump because he bungled this coup. The correct and appropriate response from an opposition party worth a damn is to scream at him, yell at him, expose him for trying this coup in the first place. But Chris Murphy isn't doing that because he wanted this coup. Both parties were involved at the State of the Union this year. If you'll recall, when Donald Trump referenced Juan Guaidó, Nancy Pelosi stood up and cheered. Nancy Pelosi, I believe, if I'm remembering correctly, I think that was this year, held a press conference with Juan Guaidó. So both parties are in complete agreement here that they want into Venezuela. So this is honestly despicable. This should make everyone feel disgusted with the state of American politics where both parties are in lockstep when it comes to overthrowing another country. I don't care if you think that Maduro is a dictator. Stay out of their business. Stop meddling in other countries' affairs, because while you complain about Russian meddling, we're meddling everywhere around the world. We have drone strikes going on. We have hundreds of military bases across the world. And we're the ones concerned about meddling. How about we stop meddling in other countries' affairs? How about we stop being imperialistic? But we can't do that. And to even say what I'm saying, in America, it's controversial. Like, to say that our country is actually the aggressors, to say that we're the ones destabilizing the world, you know, we're the biggest threat to international peace and stability, that's actually controversial. Mainstream media wouldn't bring anyone on to say what I'm saying right now. And if they do, it's rare. So, I mean, you know, the U.S. Empire is completely out of control. What we're doing in other countries has to stop, but it's not. I mean, we've been at war with Iraq and Afghanistan for how long now? People who were born on 9-11 are now old enough to fight in the wars that were started over 9-11. It's just our priorities are so out of whack. Meanwhile, we have an eviction crisis facing the United States of America. A hundred and almost 60,000 Americans dead due to COVID-19. People dying every single year. Thousands of people dying because they don't have health care. And this is what we care about. Invading Venezuela, staging a coup in Venezuela because we want their oil, just to say it. I mean, I'm not being conspiratorial. I'm not speculating by saying that we want their oil because John Bolton admitted that they want the oil on Fox News. He said the quiet part out loud. He said, wouldn't it be nice if U.S. oil companies were able to get in there? It'd be great for U.S. oil companies. It'd be great for Venezuelan oil companies. We know exactly what this is all about. So, you know, the fact that we don't have an opposition party trying to stop this from happening really is the most disturbing part because I expect this type of warmongering from Republicans. But we're supposed to expect better from Democrats. But they've shifted, you know, so far to the right on foreign policy that to even bring this up is blasphemy to them.