Bernie Sanders acknowledges 'economy is a disaster' in Venezuela, as Omar accuses Trump of coup effort

Vermont Independent and self-described Democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders acknowledged on Thursday that the "economy is a disaster" in Venezuela -- but he cautioned against U.S. involvement in that county's affairs and condemned what he called "inappropriate" past interventions.
Meanwhile, far-left Minnesota Democratic freshman Rep. Ilhan Omar tweeted Thursday, without evidence, that President Trump has personally engaged in "efforts to install a far right opposition [that] will only incite violence and further destabilize the region" and that "a US backed coup in Venezuela is not a solution to the dire issues they face."
Sanders, a fierce advocate for progressive proposals like Medicare for All and boosting both corporate tax rates and the federal minimum wage, made the comments in a statement and a series of social media posts as Venezuela, a socialist nation, continued its descent Thursday into political and economic turmoil.
OMAR ALLEGES LINDSEY GRAHAM HAS BEEN COMPROMISED, OFFERS NO EVIDENCE
Venezuela's government -- which in recent years has limited citizens' access to foreign currency, implemented substantial subsidies and price controls on food and other items, and fallen victim to sweeping corruption -- effectively collapsed this week. Some analysts have placed the principal blame on the country's socialist policies, while others have pointed to fallen oil prices and mismanagement.
Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido declared he was temporarily assuming presidential powers in a bid to unseat Nicolas Maduro, whose powerful loyalists went on the offensive Thursday in support of the embattled leader.
"The Maduro government has waged a violent crackdown on Venezuelan civil society, violated the constitution by dissolving the National Assembly and was re-elected last year in an election many observers said was fraudulent," Sanders wrote. "The economy is a disaster and millions are migrating."

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro salutes as he arrives to the Supreme Court for an annual ceremony that marks the start of the judicial year in Caracas, Venezuela, Thursday, Jan. 24, 2019. Venezuelans are heading into uncharted political waters after the young leader of a newly united opposition claimed Wednesday to hold the presidency and Maduro dug in for a fight with the Trump administration. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Sanders continued, "The United States should support the rule of law, fair elections and self-determination for the Venezuelan people. We must condemn the use of violence against unarmed protesters and the suppression of dissent."
Sanders then seemingly responded to suggestions that the U.S. might military intervene in the county. President Trump reportedly considered a military strike in Venezuela last summer, and top Republicans have refused to rule out an armed response to the current crisis.
Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio said this week that if Maduro harms any U.S. diplomats, the consequences will be "swift and decisive."
As for Sanders, he wrote: "We must learn the lessons of the past and not be in the business of regime change or supporting coups—as we have in Chile, Guatemala, Brazil & the DR. The US has a long history of inappropriately intervening in Latin American nations; we must not go down that road again."
Guaido has disappeared from view since swearing before tens of thousands of cheering supporters to uphold the constitution and rid Venezuela of Maduro's dictatorship, and his whereabouts remained shrouded in mystery on Thursday.
A defiant Maduro, meanwhile, called home all Venezuelan diplomats from the United States and closed its embassy, a day after ordering all U.S. diplomats out of the country by the weekend. Washington has refused to comply, but ordered its non-essential staff to leave the tumultuous country, citing security concerns.
The Trump administration says Maduro's order isn't legal because the U.S. no longer recognizes him as Venezuela's legitimate leader.
Tensions soared between the U.S. and Venezuela after Trump recognized Guaido's leadership. Attention has been on the military, a traditional arbiter of political disputes in Venezuela, as a critical indicator of whether the opposition will succeed in establishing a new government.
WATCH: LINDSEY GRAHAM SAYS OCASIO-CORTEZ 'HELL-BENT' ON MAKING US LIKE VENEZUELA
Venezuela's top military brass pledged unwavering support to Maduro, delivering vows of loyalty earlier Thursday before rows of green-uniformed officers on state television.

A supporter of Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro carries a "Yankee Go Home" sign in Caracas on Wednesday. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

A half-dozen generals belonging largely to district commands and with direct control over thousands of troops joined Maduro in accusing the United States of meddling in Venezuela's affairs and said they would uphold the socialist leader's rule.
Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, a key Maduro ally, later delivered his own proclamation, dismissing efforts to install a "de-facto parallel government" as tantamount to a coup.
Speaking at the White House on Thursday, Trump said officials were closely monitoring the situation in Venezuela -- and he took a swipe at a proposal by another high-profile Democratic socialist in the U.S., New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, to implement a 70 percent marginal tax rate on the rich.

Anti-government protesters tear off razor wire from a wall surrounding a vacant lot, to make a barricade during clashes against the Venezuelan Bolivarian National Guard in Caracas. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)

"We’re looking at Venezuela, it’s a very sad situation," Trump told reporters. "That was the richest state in all of that area, that's a big beautiful area, and by far the richest -- and now it's one of the poorest places in the world. That's what socialism gets you, when they want to raise your taxes to 70 percent."
The president's comments mirrored those of South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who charged on Thursday that Ocasio-Cortez  "and her new socialist colleagues seem hell-bent on making sure that our last 12 years will be spent as Venezuelan socialists, not Americans" -- a reference to Ocasio-Cortez's claim that the world will end in 12 years due to climate change.
Much of the international community is rallying behind Guaido, with the U.S., Canada and numerous Latin American and European countries announcing that they recognized his claim to the presidency. Trump has promised to use the "full weight" of U.S. economic and diplomatic power to push for the restoration of Venezuela's democracy.
Meanwhile, Russia, China, Iran, Syria, Cuba and Turkey have voiced their backing for Maduro's government.
China's Foreign Ministry called on the United States to stay out of the crisis, while Russia's deputy foreign minister warned the U.S. against any military intervention in Venezuela.
Russia has been propping up Maduro with arms deliveries and loans. Maduro visited Moscow in December, seeking Russia's political and financial support. Over the last decade, China has given Venezuela $65 billion in loans, cash and investment. Venezuela owes more than $20 billion.

Liberal Media Cartoons

Media use unnamed sources to trash Giuliani over missteps

The knives are out for Rudy Giuliani.
In classic Washington fashion, the press is now using anonymous sources to trash Donald Trump's lawyer, to suggest that the president and top aides are fed up with him, even to intimate that he has a drinking problem.
It's the dark side of D.C., the art of character assassination.
Now it's true that Giuliani's recent performances have been anything but smooth. He keeps stumbling and having to backtrack. And that, to be sure, is fair game for scrutiny and criticism.
But instead, it's being turned into a "Game of Thrones."
I smelled this coming on Tuesday when a single paragraph in a New York Times story indicated that some in the White House were getting fed up with Giuliani.
Things reached fever pitch yesterday, with Politico declaring: "Rudy Giuliani has a growing list of enemies in the White House — which now includes his boss, President Donald Trump."
Now they're enemies?
The potshots against the former New York mayor continued:
"Trump was apoplectic after a pair of weekend media interviews by his personal lawyer, in which Giuliani said that the president had been involved in discussions to build a Trump Tower in Moscow through the end of the 2016 campaign — a statement that enraged Trump because it contradicted his own public position, according to two sources close to the president. Trump spent much of Sunday and Monday fuming to aides and friends about his lawyer's missteps."
So Trump is mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore?
Not according to Maggie Haberman, the New York Times White House correspondent, who said on CNN: "He's generally happy with what Giuliani has done. Giuliani has served as something of an extension of his client's id over the last several months. That might make other people unhappy but not the president."
And here's the killer blind quote in Politico about who is handling Giuliani, from an unnamed White House aide: "Handling Rudy's f---ups takes more than one man."
The AP is in the same camp, saying Giuliani's latest blitz "agitated President Donald Trump and some of his allies, who have raised the possibility that the outspoken presidential lawyer be at least temporarily sidelined from televised interviews.
"Trump was frustrated with Giuliani, according to three White House officials and Republicans close to the White House who were not authorized to speak publicly about private conversations."
Trump is said to believe (justifiably) that the Rudy-generated controversies stepped on a positive story for the president, Robert Mueller's partial knockdown of the BuzzFeed piece saying he encouraged Michael Cohen to commit perjury.
Over the weekend, Giuliani told "Meet the Press" and the Times that the president had informed him he discussed the Russian Trump Tower project with Cohen throughout the election, telling the Times the discussions were "going on from the day I announced to the day I won." But afterward, he put out a statement saying he had been speaking hypothetically.
There was another head-slapper in an interview with The New Yorker. Asked how he knew the BuzzFeed story was wrong, Giuliani said, "Because I have been through all the tapes, I have been through all the texts, I have been through all the e-mails ... "
Uh, reporter Isaac Chotiner asked, what tapes?
"I shouldn't have said tapes," Rudy said.
Politico, to its credit, interviewed the onetime prosecutor, who said he has a good grip of the facts, that Trump hasn't complained to him, "and nobody in the White House would complain to me. They just do it behind my back." He blamed the media for the confusion over some of his comments, saying they don't understand the legal technique of arguing in the alternative.
But there was one part of the Politico piece that shouldn't have been published:
"Some of Trump's allies have suggested that Giuliani be barred from evening interviews because of concerns that he was going on TV after drinking, according to three Republicans close to the White House."
Sorry, but you can't accuse the president's lawyer of being sloshed on the air without someone willing to go on the record or some evidence of inebriation.
Giuliani is a veteran pol who knows full well that he's getting scuffed up. He had a pungent response when The New Yorker asked if his current performance would tarnish his legacy:
"I am afraid it will be on my gravestone. 'Rudy Giuliani: He lied for Trump.' Somehow, I don't think that will be it. But, if it is, so what do I care? I'll be dead. I figure I can explain it to St. Peter."
Now that's taking the long view.

National Shrine confirms report that Native American activist allegedly tried to disrupt Mass

Officials at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday confirmed earlier reports that a Native American rights activist led several dozen people in an attempt to enter the shrine during a Saturday evening Mass.
In a statement to Fox News on Wednesday, basilica officials said a Mass was being celebrated at 7 p.m. when Nathan Phillips and his group “attempted to enter the building while chanting and hitting drums.”
“At this time, Mass was being celebrated in the upper church where the individuals attempted to enter,” the statement read. “In respect and reverence for the Mass, the individuals were not permitted to enter the Basilica due to the disruption it would have caused during the solemn Mass. The individuals were asked to leave the property after it was determined they did not intend to share in the celebration of Mass.”
The group assembled across the street from the shrine, the Catholic News Agency reported. Video footage showed one demonstrator telling other protesters that they had been ordered off the property by police, according to CNA.
Phillips, 64, was thrust into the national spotlight over the weekend when video of an encounter with a group of students from Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky went viral. He was seen singing and playing a drum near the Lincoln Memorial as he stood face-to-face with Covington student Nick Sandmann while other students were standing behind Sandmann.
Other footage revealed the teens were being taunted by a third group nearby, leading to criticism of the media for a so-called rush to judgment.

Laura Ingraham rips Trump’s decision to postpone State of the Union

Laura Ingraham, the host of Fox News’ "The Ingraham Angle," called out President Trump for delaying his State of the Union address until after the partial government shutdown is over.
She called Trump's move a "bad decision" and said that she would give a series of three speeches as an alternative. She said she’d give the first speech in Detroit, the second at the border and a third at Ellis Island.
"Bad decision by @potus," she tweeted. "Go to America and give the nation a #SOTU. Sent the written form to petty Pelosi."
DOUG SCHOEN: PELOSI SHOULDN'T BLOCK TRUMP FROM DELIVERING SPEECH
Trump announced on Twitter late Wednesday that he will deliver a "great" State of the Union address after the partial government shutdown is over, ending a tense day in Washington where Republicans criticized House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for blocking the president from giving the speech.
Pelosi told Trump that the House won’t approve a resolution allowing him to come to Capitol Hill until the government reopens.
Trump said he is not going to look for an alternative venue due to the long tradition of the speech being delivered in the chamber of the House of Representatives.
Pelosi responded to Trump's announcement with a tweet of her own. She said she hopes that "the near future" means that he is willing to support the "House-passed package" to end the shutdown that is affecting about 800,000 federal workers.

Trump says he will give State of the Union after shutdown is over

President Trump announced on Twitter late Wednesday that he will deliver a "great" State of the Union address after the partial government shutdown is over, ending a tense day in Washington where Republicans criticized House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for blocking the president from giving the speech.
Pelosi told Trump that the House won’t approve a resolution allowing him to come to Capitol Hill until the government reopens.
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a close Trump ally, said Pelosi’s action “sets a new low for American politics.” He called Pelosi’s decision “absurd, petty and shameful,” adding: “The judgment of history will not be kind.”
Trump said he is not going to look for an alternative venue due to the long tradition of the speech being delivered in the chamber of the House of Representatives.
Pelosi told Trump in a letter Wednesday that the Democratic-controlled House would turn down a measure for him to deliver the speech. Trump slammed Pelosi and called the decision a "great blotch on the country that we all love."
White House officials told Fox News they were preparing for two tracks for next week's speech. The preferred track is an address at the Capitol. The second track is a backup plan for a speech outside of Washington, D.C.
“There is no venue that can compete with the history, tradition and importance of the House Chamber,” he tweeted. “I look forward to giving a “great” State of the Union Address in the near future!”
Pelosi responded to Trump's announcement with a tweet of her own. She said she hopes that "the near future" means that he is willing to support the "House-passed package" to end the shutdown that is affecting about 800,000 federal workers.
"Please accept this proposal so we can re-open government, repay our federal workers and then negotiate our differences," she wrote.
House Democrats were prepared to possibly give Trump the $5.7 billion he wanted for security measures at the border with one caveat: The funds were not for a wall, The New York Times reported.
This year's State of the Union address had been scheduled for Jan. 29.

Stupid Media Cartoons

Anti-Trump social media mobs value ‘rapidity and extremism’: Victor Davis Hanson

Hoover Institute senior fellow Victor Davis Hanson weighed in on the “electronic lynch mob” that took place targeting the students of Kentucky's Covington Catholic High School after their confrontation with Native American elder Nathan Phillips that went viral last weekend.
In his appearance on Tuesday's "The Ingraham Angle," with Fox News' Laura Ingraham, Hanson began by accusing social media giants Facebook and Twitter of being “on the side of the mob,” so that members of the mob don’t see the “downside” in their rhetoric since they won’t be censored or punished.
MEDIA TREATMENT OF COVINGTON STUDENTS 'WAY WORSE' THAN KAVANAUGH COVERAGE, CRITIC SAYS
“When it was released that these were young, innocent kids, they’re not gonna be ready to fight back and they had MAGA hats on and they were white and they were Catholic, that was a turkey shoot for all of these bullies,” Hanson said. “And when you look at the upside, when you combined the electronic mechanism with the hate Trump, the result is two values; rapidity and extremism. So there was a race, like a dog race, almost. Who can get out first and virtue-signal, ‘I was the first one to attack these kids’? And the next incident was, Who can be the most extreme? ‘I said beat them up,’ ‘No, I said shoot them,’ No, I said burn them up.’… It was a race to the bottom.”
He told Laura Ingraham that there was “no downside” for the media to learn anything from the misreporting that took place early on.
“You see what’s happened is when you have Silicon Valley and you have the great fortunes in America -- whether the Bloomberg or Apple or Google -- all of that great money, and foundations and Hollywood and the media and the universities, this story starts out -- It’s a force-multiplying effect and it permeates our entire society,” Hanson continued. “And when you look at the other side, we don’t have those resources. And when Trump, our conservative ranks, are bifurcated, there were people in the Never Trump side that joined in because felt this was the magic key that will unlock my analysis of Trump.”