With Russian oil temporarily out of reach, the US (via its Exxon CEO Secretary of State) sets its sights on extracting Venezuela’s oil wealth. So goes the long attempt to bring down the democratically elected socialist government. It is situations like the the policy parroting against first Chavez and now Maduro that demonstrates the bias of the corporate media. In this time when there is a real threat from a demagogic administration in Washington — one that calls the part of the corporate media that does not sing its praises “fake news” — that pointing out the corporate bias of the mainstream media (MSM) has fallen out of sight. This loss of a critical perspective of the MSM is as serious a long term threat to the claiming of true American democracy as Trump’s maniacal white nationalism is in the short term. When we most need nuanced navigation through troubled waters, we are faced with a public which has seemingly largely lost the capacity for critical thought, and a “progressive” media that is either unwilling or unable to take a stand. I admit that I feel daunted by trying to shine a light through this morass.

Let me digress slightly to give one example, out of many possible, of the dilemma we face. I do believe that Russia intervened in the 2016 election with the aim of first, destabilizing the US government, and second, bringing Trump to the presidency. However, I also know that the US (and NATO under guidance of same) have been provocative and a true threat to the sovereignty and stability of Russia. I fully support the right of Russia and its people to stand as full partners in the league of nations. However, they are not (currently) friends of the United States. So when FBI Director James Comey showed exceedingly bad judgement in his role in destabilizing those same elections, it would be warranted (in my opinion) to ask him to step down from his position. However, Trump fired him to disrupt (and hopefully end) the FBI investigation into the Russian intervention and the possible Trump campaign cooperation, in those elections. Hence, one ends up supporting Comey. Similarly with AG Jeff Sessions, who anyone who supports civil rights would fight (and did fight) to keep out of that office, ends up being supported to stay in office against Trump’s efforts to remove him to stop the same investigation. It is diabolical. Which brings us back to the MSM that on one hand is doing a semi-credible job on keeping Trump’s world threatening actions in front of the public, yet is no less corporate-interested and anti-liberty when dealing with all matters international. With all that said, it is a relief to share Paul Street’s excellent discussion of the events in Venezuela as the MSM has taken its position to assist in overthrowing the Venezuelan government.