No Me Importa

 The Baffler

on january 7, Colombian President Gustavo Petro and Donald Trump shared an amicable phone call, after which Trump declared that he would “look forward to meeting him in the near future” in Washington. 

Somebody less demented than the U.S. president might perceive an obstacle to his offer: in September, the Department of State announced on X that it would be revoking Petro’s visa “due to his reckless and incendiary actions,” which entailed denouncing the U.S.-backed Israeli genocide in the Gaza Strip while in New York City for the United Nations General Assembly meeting. 

Objectively speaking, the campaign to flatten Gaza would seem rather more “incendiary”: an action that has officially produced seventy-one thousand dead, although some experts believe the toll to be as much as ten times higher. Among other remarks, Petro had taken it upon himself to critique the U.S. leader’s participation in the carnage: “If Mr. Trump continues to be complicit in genocide as he has been to date, he deserves nothing more than prison, and his army should not obey him.” READ MORE AT THE BAFFLER.

Europe cannot condemn colonialism à la carte

 Al Jazeera English

On Tuesday, French President Emmanuel Macron appeared before the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland – the annual Alpine gathering of the global elite – to declare that now is “not a time for new imperialism or new colonialism”.

This, of course, was a reference to the current ambitions of Macron’s counterpart in the United States, Donald Trump, who, in addition to recently kidnapping the president of Venezuela and repeatedly threatening to seize the Panama Canal, has made a great deal of noise about taking over the self-governing Danish territory of Greenland. . . .

Indeed, Trump’s designs on the island have got Europe’s panties in a bunch, and the European Parliament has announced its unequivocal condemnation of “the statements made by the Trump administration regarding Greenland, which constitute a blatant challenge to international law, to the principles of the United Nations Charter and to the sovereignty and territorial integrity of a NATO ally”. . . .

Now, it goes without saying that the categorically demented Trump should by no means be encouraged in his predatory international endeavours. But it bears pointing out that, when it comes to colonialism and imperialism, Europe is hardly one to talk. READ MORE AT AL JAZEERA ENGLISH.

Trump’s neo-con turn on Iran

 Al Jazeera English

On Saturday, just under two weeks into the protests that are now sweeping Iran, United States President Donald Trump took to his social media platform of choice to post a message of support: “Iran is looking at FREEDOM, perhaps like never before. The USA stands ready to help!!! President DONALD J. TRUMP.”

As usual, Trump’s random capitalisation scheme and excessive use of exclamation points would better befit an elementary schoolchild than the leader of the global superpower. But the promise of American help is also problematic in far more significant ways. 

For starters, “help” is not exactly a specialty of the US – and particularly not under the guidance of the man who bombed Iran just last summer, right after returning to power on a pledge to keep the US out of foreign wars. . . .

With his recent promises of assistance, one can’t help but wonder if Trump isn’t taking a page from the old playbook of former US President George W Bush, the ex-“war on terror” chief and the face of an administration that was dedicated to propagating the very neo-conservative ideology to which Trump has long ostensibly been so vehemently opposed. READ MORE AT AL JAZZERA ENGLISH.

Thomas Pain: Thirty years of Thomas Friedman

The Baffler

It is a sign of the extent to which Thomas Friedman has become simply another fact of life that 2025 passed with hardly any acknowledgement that it was his thirtieth anniversary as foreign affairs columnist at the New York Times. In his 2005 bestselling ode to corporate globalization, The World Is Flat, the three-time Pulitzer Prize winner boasted with uncharacteristic prescience and characteristic incoherence of his own immunity from the disruptive effects of the economic system he devoted his career to championing: “There will be no outsourcing for me—even if some of my readers wish my column could be shipped off to North Korea.”

Now, twenty years after the publication of Friedman’s defining tome and three decades into his star columnist position, the United States’ newspaper of record has not yet found it necessary to replace him with someone who makes sense on a regular basis. Indeed, it seems Friedman’s devoted service as a mouthpiece for empire and capital has ensured his institutionalization at the paper, despite his relentless self-contradictions, failed prophecies, and inescapable cascade of gibberish.  READ MORE AT THE BAFFLER.

Venezuela: American regime change with a Trumpian twist

Al Jazeera English

United States President Donald Trump has kicked off the new year with a typically deranged bang by conducting massive air strikes on Venezuela and reportedly capturing the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro, who has apparently been spirited off to an undisclosed location.

The attack does not come entirely as a surprise, given Trump’s track record of doing whatever the hell he wants with no regard for the law – or for his own promise to, you know, stop waging war abroad.

Indeed, Trump has been chattering for months about the possibility of enhanced US military action against Venezuela, as the US has gone about bombing boats willy-nilly off the country’s coast, supposedly in the name of combatting drug trafficking.

This has entailed numerous extrajudicial killings and rampant accusations of war crimes. But, hey, it’s all in a day’s work for an administration that couldn’t care less about legal justification for its behaviour, much less human rights and other such silly concepts. READ MORE AT AL JAZEERA ENGLISH.