On May 17th, 2022 President Joseph R. Biden Jr., and the Biden Administration announced that they will ease sanction restrictions upon the Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro, or what is often referred to as the Maduro Regime. As this announcement unfolds there is reaction from Senate elected officials, the political community, and anyone who desires to voice their views and opinions.
The Honorable Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla) released a statement in opposition to the Biden Administration Plan, where once again the concern spurs back to the idea of a corrupt and illegitimate regime. Amongst much more to urge colleagues to pass the “Preempting Misguided Appeasement and Financing of Destabilizing Regimes Act” (Rubio, 2022). Within this bill is the recommended use and production of American Oil, to also include notions of clean oil vs. Crude Oil from Venezuela.
While the discussion of natural gas, oil, and cleanliness can lead to the topics of climate conservations and protections within nations such as: Venezuela and the entire World; I took my focus back to the President Donald J. Trump era, the sanctions placed upon Venezuela, President Maduro, the Maduro Regime, and thought that maybe it was time to find some sort of balance?
For instance: the work that President Trump did do as President has been overshadowed. As the end of his Presidency was marked with the Capitol Riots, the establishing of the Capitol Riot Committee, and conversations associated with impeachment. I have written previously upon the topic (s) of consideration, and I know that the 45th Presidency was unique. Given the challenges of the Coronavirus Health Pandemic and the daily COVID briefing.
Nations such as China became critical of The United States of America and The President Trump Administration, especially because there were comments pointing to the origin of COVID from China. As spoken by US Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo who claimed that there was ‘ “enormous evidence’ to show that COVID-19 originated in a Wuhan laboratory” (Woon, 2021, p. 53). While the People’s Republic of China (PRC) felt that this was a type of Propaganda, further evidence does in-fact indicate that the Coronavirus health pandemic was first found in a Wuhan Supermarket: “the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), was first reported in four cases associated with a wholesale market in Wuhan, China on 29 December 2019 (Li, 2020).” (Kenneth et al., p. 20, 2021).
This is a very important point as the above quote establishes credibility to the words spoken by US Former Secratery of State Mike Pompeo and the Trump Administration, as associated within the contexts of this writing. And we are also led to believe that Chinas’ back-lashes were simply to destabilize the Republican Leadership?
In terms of the Venezuelan Sanctions: according to the “Charter of the Organization of American States (OAS), especially articles 19 and 20 of Chapter IV. They are also illegal under international human rights law, as well as treaties signed by the United States” (Weisbrot & Sachs, 2019, p. 303-304).
In general, my views and opinions here are not presenting a direct response to the Biden Administration’s announcement, but I do find points of balance between the Republican and Democratic views:
It was argued that the Venezuela sanctions were integral to National Security, however; at-present the interiority of Venezuela, the topical issues of emerging diseases, human migrations, climate conservations, should be of interest to surrounding countries, America and territories. The PRC response to America’s COVID-19 should not be based upon the idea of Partisan politics as this too was a National concern.
References:
Kenneth B. Yeh, Falgunee K. Parekh, Brooke Borgert, Gene G. Olinger & Jeanne M. Fair (2021) Global health security threats and related risks in Latin America, Global Security: Health, Science and Policy, 6:1, 18-25, DOI: 10.1080/23779497.2021.1917304
Mark Weisbrot & Jeffrey Sachs (2019) Punishing Civilians: U.S. Sanctions on Venezuela, Challenge, 62:5, 299-321,DOI: 10.1080/05775132.2019.1638094
Rubio, M. (2022, March 10). Rubio Leads Colleagues in Introducing Bill to Ban Oil and Natural Gas Imports from Iran and Venezuela. Marco Rubio US Senator for Florida. https://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2022/3/rubio-leads-colleagues-in-introducing-bill-to-ban-oil-and-natural-gas-imports-from-iran-and-venezuela
Woon, W. (2021). China and America: From Trade War to Race and Culture Confrontation. PRISM, 9 (2), 46–57. https://www.jstor.org/stable/27008975
Notes: These thoughts were originally hand-written on the morning of May 18th and published on May 19th 2022. Please note that all views and opinions are my own and are cited as per required. Thank you.
With Love & Kindness! 🇺🇸
{HEART'S, FOREVER!} 