By Clodovaldo Hernandez

August 27, 2019 "Information Clearing House" -   Who are the bosses and allies of the Venezuelan opposition in the world? We should be asking and repeating this question frequently because it is a very revealing piece of information. In politics, as the saying goes, a man is known by the company he keeps.

This question should be asked by Chavistas of course because it is essential to identify in detail ones political adversaries and their supporters. But it should also be asked by opponents themselves because many of them could be supporting in good faith their own executioners. Independents should also be asking this question, those who are tired of the two sides and identify as being apolitical. There is no way to keep out of this with a situation so acute like Venezuela’s in 2019.

Well then, let’s start with the bosses. Perhaps this will sound like the motto of a pamphlet but this is an observable fact; Venezuela’s opposition is headed by the radical right within the United States Republican Party, which is not a minor detail. Politically speaking, Donald Trump and his gang are ultra-conservative, white supremacist, imperialist in the strict sense of the word. From an economic perspective, they are tools of large corporations; the military- industrial complex that nowadays is also financial and cultural interrelated with the media.

It may be comprehensible that such a political class could be seen with admiration and obedience by its local equivalents in Venezuela —or those who desire to be like them. This is why traditional far right leaders in Venezuela use them as valid reference points. It is also comprehensible that groups trained precisely in ideological schools created by the U.S. are so openly pawns and feel so validated by playing the role of national agents for the United States ruling elite.

It may be also comprehensible that middle class sectors blindly believe that such an entourage (among them mass killers and psychopaths such as Elliott Abrams, John Bolton and Mike Pompeo) may be considered a democracy and human rights example. It may be comprehensible because capitalism has been building an implacable cultural, educational, media hegemony for years. These days it controls social media to impose its ideas there too. The fact that Trump is the President of the United States and Jair Bolsonaro the President of Brazil is a clear evidence of such cyber projects.