Trump the neocon pulls trigger on regime change in Venezuela, and now all of that nation's problems are our problems

He ran on a platform of ending the nation-building exploits of the globalists, but now Donald J. Trump has outed himself as the quintessential globalist neocon. Will Iran be next?

Here we are just three days into 2026 and the theme has been set. War, war, and more war. Venezuela today, Iran tomorrow? What about Greenland? Columbia? Cuba?

This will be just the beginning of a long and bloody year of chaos under a lawless administration that’s trying to reclaim American dominance in the world but going about it in all the wrong ways. It’s my opinion (are we still allowed to have opinions that go against the powers in Washington?) that this is all going to blow up in our faces in terms of lost credibility, lost respect, and heightened anger against America and Americans.

In fact, if you’re an American, I would advise you to put off that long-planned dream vacation to Europe or some other luxurious foreign hot spot.

Now is not the time. I know Fox News is showing video of people celebrating the downfall of the Venezuelan dictator. But that’s just part of the propaganda narrative being crafted for the ignorant American masses.

The reality is not going to be quite so joyous and exuberant. Not when our president just kidnapped the head of a sovereign nation and promises to submit him to “the full force of American justice.” This sets a dangerous precedent for future operations.

Whether Maduro is a good guy or a bad guy is irrelevant. Does America have the right, the legal authority, to arrest, detain and prosecute foreign leaders it doesn’t like? Just because it can? Just because it’s the biggest bully on the block?

If that’s the case, what happens when we are no longer able to maintain top-dog status? What happens when China or Russia, or the two teamed up together, decide to challenge us militarily and, God forbid, defeat us in war? Will they haul our leaders off to face “justice” in Moscow or Beijing? That’s a legitimate long-term concern that nobody wants to discuss. After all, they tell us we are “exceptional.” But does that make us invincible?

From a purely military perspective, this mission in Venezuela was brilliantly carried out. They took their orders and they executed the plan to perfection. That’s what military forces are trained to do and ours are some of the best.

They are not hired to question the wisdom of the plan, or whether or not the plan was in our strategic national interests over the short, medium and long term.

So, I have no argument with the military here.

On the moral, ethical and long-term geopolitical side of the equation, there is much to question about the wisdom of this type of aggressive behavior from Washington.

The message sent to Moscow and Beijing is pretty clear: If you act militarily in your geographic “sphere of influence,” there’s really not much the U.S. can say or do to stop you. We have given up the moral high ground.

And if we’re honest, we gave up that moral high ground years ago when we intervened in Vietnam, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Somalia, Syria, Libya, and the list goes on. Did the lives of the people in any of these countries improve after American intervention? No, and in many cases it got worse, especially for Christians.

Nation building never works out as they say it will, and Trump was elected on the promise that he would end the nation-building adventures that enrich the Western elites but impoverish the middle class. He has now fully outed himself as a fraud. Trump was always a neocon in disguise who was very much in favor of foreign adventurism on the taxpayer’s dime. This is what got us into the $38 trillion debt and it’s not going to stop or even slow down under Trump. Judging by the way 2026 has started, the president has placed his militarized foreign policy into warp-speed mode.

Relinquishing the moral high ground

But back to the moral question. Trump is offering the world yet another fresh example, a reminder of sorts, of why they hate us. Decades of do as we say, not as we do, starts to wear thin.

We just did in Venezuela what we accuse Russia of doing in Ukraine and are warning China not to do in Taiwan. We get to act on what we say is our vital national interests but other sovereign states are judged by a different set of rules.

Nations, like people, lead by example. When one’s words don’t match their example, questions arise. Questions give way to problems.

If the leaders of other nations look at Trump’s actions, what conclusions will be drawn?

Chinese President Xi could land his special ops forces in Taiwan tomorrow, take out the current governmental leadership of that island and install a Beijing-friendly puppet regime. Putin could send his forces into Kiev, kidnap Zelensky and put him on trial in Moscow for the many crimes the Ukrainian dictator has committed against the Russian people.

But my guess is that neither Xi nor Putin will join in the fray and start kidnapping heads of state in countries they see as adversaries. They’re too smart for that.

My hunch is they will give the U.S. just enough rope to hang itself. They will step up their war with the U.S. both economically and perhaps through proxies on the ground in various flashpoints, but they will refrain from any direct military confrontation. They will wait until the majority of the world’s nations come around to their side. And that day will come. Maybe sooner than we think.

And when it does, things will not end well for Trump or the U.S.

You can’t indefinitely play the role of hypocrite. You can’t go on bullying other nations and tell them what they can and can’t do, while doing those very things you say are forbidden.

History is littered with empires that based their power on military bullying abroad while ignoring problems at home. Such empires don’t last.

Oh, but America is “exceptional,” they will say.

Ask the Romans how the idea of exceptionalism worked out for them. Ask the Britons how it worked out for them. Will Americans be the next ones to trip over their own pride and fall on the ash heap of history?

Veterans are living under U.S. bridges, American families can’t afford groceries, car insurance or healthcare, but Trump is going after Maduro and thumping his chest in the process.

Trump said of Maduro:

“The gangs that they sent raped, tortured, and murdered American women and children… they were sent by Maduro to terrorize our people, and now, Maduro will never again be able to threaten an American citizen or anybody from Venezuela.”

Wars are not fought for such things. Wars are fought over things like oil, resources and who controls key shipping lanes. This one is no different. It has nothing to do with drugs, raping or torturing. That’s all a lie.

Trump added that “Maduro and his wife will feel the full force of American justice on U.S. soil.”

If it’s truly about raping and torturing, then any American with even a single fully-functioning brain cell will ask why this American “justice” hasn’t been applied to Epstein’s cohorts, the Clintons, Bill Gates, or any of Trump’s other friends who cavorted with Epstein. Didn’t they specializ in that sort of deviant behavior?

People who support this operation, and you will hear many of them popping off on social media in the days ahead, likely have one thing in common. They have given their allegiance to one man, Donald J. Trump, not to the U.S. Constitution, U.S. law, or America’s best interests.

This policy of making America a rogue state, an international bully that violates other countries’ sovereignty at will, should never be confused with being pro-American. It’s certainly not America first. We now own Venezuela. It’s problems are now our problems.

Trump even said in an interview Fox News, “We’re going to make sure the country is run properly.”

We can’t even fix our own problems but we’re eager to take on those of Venezuela? Insane.

The post-World War II rules-based order has been exposed as a sham. Actions like the one taken this morning in Venezuela say that America doesn’t follow any laws, whether American laws like the 1973 War Powers Act, or international laws. We follow “rules” because we can make those up as we go based on the whim of the man in the White House and his financial backers.

Trump has become an imperial president. He’s claiming uncheck power answerable to no one. Those who try to hold him accountable get attacked and driven out of Congress. They’re all afraid of him.

When America turns from global policeman to global gangster, a country that just takes what it wants by force, the world wakes up. And gangs up. And when that happens, it won’t be pretty. It’s lights out on the late-great American empire.

Or maybe they’ll just stand back and watch us implode from within.