Andrew Sage

It's a guy named David Abdullah, and he has been part of this assembly of Caribbean people.

who have been signing and issuing a declaration, reasserting our desire for peace.

And that has been signed by various progressive organizations, social movements, and figures across the Caribbean.

And there was also an effort last week, Thursday, that's October 16th, to organize a region-wide day of action in defense of the Caribbean.

And so different actions were taking place all over in 15 countries.

We had press conferences, we had state months, and we had pickets at certain U.S.

embassies and public demonstrations.

It was kind of in the middle of the day on a Thursday.

So there wasn't that big of a turnout from what I saw when I had gone, but it shows that there is.

And from the, at least anecdotal experience, there is a desire to keep the us out of the situation.

You know, despite the issues with the Venezuelan government, despite the issues with our own governments, we don't want intervention, you know, and

Right now, all we can really levy is our voices, you know, our words.

And all we can really do, I think, besides protest what is going on is prepare for the worst to ensure that we have, you know, certain support systems in place in case, you know, push comes to shove.

Yeah, that's pretty bleak.

Michael, do you have anything to add on like how people can be in solidarity with the people of Venezuela currently?

Well, I've been calling for people broadly throughout the world to have solidarity more with people than with states, and certainly with the Venezuelan people as opposed to the Venezuelan state.

I wrote something for the Center for International Policy about this, and listen, it's not my place to police the left, so to speak, but as someone, speaking personally, who

comes from the labor movement you know comes from the bernie allied uh left so to speak you know i do think it's been a little bit uncomfortable to observe how certain elements of the global left have have stood up for the maduro regime or the very least been uh the criticism of it has been taboo um and i think a lot of that is the legacy of chavez chavez having this strong personal charisma um

but also that he was willing to confront the United States, the, the Bush administration at a time of the Iraq war, you know, especially low point in the U S is, uh, global reputation.

Also Venezuela's oil rents at the time, which were financing, uh, a lot of, not just social programs, Venezuela, but a lot of, uh, financial largesse to, uh, to allied States and movements, uh, around, uh, around the region.