As long as there's no global police to enforce it, the term international law is mostly a misnomer. But international norms matter. Soft power matters. When the US behaves as she did with Maduro, she undermines the norms that she herself built over the past 80 years.

The US is trying to overthrow Chavismo and replace it with Trumpismo. The twist is that both suffer from the same authoritarian impulse, the same predilection for corruption & a similar disdain for science & free markets. In the end, Trumpismo, like Chavismo, is a road to ruin.

Pedro Domingos and its historic willingness to, more often than not, uphold a system of international law that the united states itself established after world war ii. of course, that can change.

The preponderance of conventional military power around precision strikes (including raids) creates a strategic culture that favors quick tactical fixes—ostensibly low-cost but inherently very high-risk—over long-term strategic planning and execution. This institutional bias

Lex Mutatio Ben Hunt The win win already exists. The US has military bases and everything else it needs in Greenland. The only thing to gain is to show that America became bigger which is the cheapest of breads and circuses.

Maybe Europe should impose personal sanctions on high-ranking members of the US regime, like members of the Trump organization.😀

Heideggerian existentialism in action.

Armand Domalewski Hard to overstate how awful Chavez was and how much he benefited from high oil prices. He was like a pitcher with an ERA of 7.0 having the 1927 Yankees behind him and people thinking he's good because he got wins.

I really have trouble following this. How is the US supposed to run Venezuela, when the Chavista regime is still running it? Do they think that the regime won't try to renege on its commitments when it sees the opportunity to do so?

As much as I am appalled by ICE's behavior over the last few months, asking for its abolition doesn't make sense substantively and it's a bad idea politically. Ask for reform and proper oversight, do not repeat the "Abolish the Police" mistake.

Eric Levitz We are watching the video multiple times in slow motion. In reality everything happened in a split second. IMO that's a panicked agent, perhaps a hothead with bad training & the incident is a byproduct of the Trump administration's decision to deploy ICE in an antagonistic way.

What's underrated in the incident is the way the ICE officers immediately escalated. No attempt to assess the situation or communicate & deescalate with the driver. Off the bat, they ask her to get out of the car, they try to open the door & forcibly remove her.

Trump lost a year only to find out what Russian observers knew from day 1.

ian bremmer It's a pretty shitty bluff when you say you want the country in order to protect it- and your interests- from Russian & Chinese encroaching, only to make it more vulnerable to them by removing Intel sharing, security guarantees and NATO membership.

ian bremmer Bullying should be a means to an end. With Trump, it’s just an itch to be scratched, with a state’s weakness determining whether it’s deployed.

This man spoke plainly, coherently, and matter-of-factly. He showed integrity and steely determination. In doing so, he cut through the avalanche of lies and incoherent nonsense we’ve been drowning in.