Biden's Dilemma

[asylumseeker]

Biden's Dilemma
By Dr Selwyn R. Cudjoe, Trinidad and Tobago News Blog

On Monday night I tuned into CNN to listen to the results of the Democratic caucus that had taken place in Iowa earlier in the day. By one am on Tuesday morning the Iowa Democratic Party (I.D.P.) had issued no results although some of the candidates made their speeches and headed off to New Hampshire to continue their quest to become the Democratic presidential nominee for the 2020 election.

The I.D.P. offered many reasons for its inability to produce the results of the election in a timely fashion. Many candidates hoping to use the result of the caucus to fire up the next leg of their campaign were disappointed. Joe Biden, the favorite in the race and the person who portrayed himself as the candidate best equipped to defeat President Trump, finished in a disappointing fourth place.

Paradoxically, the inability to name a winner that evening benefited Biden, the former vice president, who had the most to lose by not finishing among the top three winners. He was lucky. Katie Glueck, Jonathan Martin and Thomas Kaplan explained: “The slow drip of vote totals in Iowa—and a swirl of other major news events—may blunt the attention of Mr. Biden’s challenges. Iowa is an overwhelmingly white state, while Mr. Biden’s political strength is with black voters, who he is counting on for support in later-voting, more diverse states.”

Although Biden promotes himself as the candidate that is most likely to defeat Trump, he was unsuccessful in his previous quests (1984, 1988 and 2008) to be the Democratic presidential nominee. Barack Obama rescued Biden’s political career when he chose him as his vice president.

Biden has always been too early or too late in his quest for the presidency. He has also said some unfortunate things and taken some controversial positions that offended many of his constituents. Now, he argues that he should be given his party’s nomination because of the length of time he has served as a senator and vice president. I am not sure this approach is sufficient to warrant his nomination.

In 1836 Richard M. Johnson was Martin Van Buren’s running mate in the presidential election. Van Buren won the election with 170 electoral votes. Virginia rejected Johnson and the state’s 23 electoral votes went to William Smith of Alabama. Johnson needed 148 electoral votes to become the VP but only received 147, one less than the number required to elect him to that position.

What was Johnson’s sin?

He fathered two children with Julia Chinn, a mixed-race woman. The U.S. Telegraph proclaimed that no American would place “in the chair of the Vice Presidency a man who has for more than twenty years lived in open connection with a negro slave—who has recognized her offspring as his children, educated them, and endeavored to force them upon society, as in all respects equal to those of his free white neighbors, and now boasts that his black or yellow daughters, are as accomplished girls as any in the immediate vicinity.”

The Senate using its powers under the Twelfth Amendment selected Johnson. This led to “the dubious distinction of his being the only vice-president elected, not by the electoral college, but by the Senate of the United States” (Robert Bolt, “Vice President Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky.”

Things have changed. Now that the white voters of Iowa have deserted Biden, he needs the black vote to be successful which makes him particularly concerned with what black voters do in South Carolina and other states.

Can Biden convince black voters that he is worthy of their support? Can he come up with a program that attacks the persistent inequality and discrimination under which African-Americans find themselves? Can he close the increasing wealth gap between black and white America?

Obama elevated Biden to the vice presidency and allowed him to partially achieve his presidential ambitions. Biden thanked Obama for his confidence in him. There is no doubt that Biden’s presence on the presidential ballot contributed to Obama’s election.

Biden needs the black vote and the Obama’s connection to see him through. But will these connections be enough to see Biden through? Professor Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor of Princeton University argues that blacks supported Obama in spite of his troubling record with regards to black people.

She writes: “Mr. Biden continues to frame his own candidacy as an extension of the Obama administration. It’s unclear what that means. Will it be a continuation of Obama’s financial policies that benefited the richest Americans….Or, his dreadful immigration policies?…Will it be the same kind of reluctance to take on issues of racial inequality for fear of being pigeonholed as beholden to black interests?”

Unless Biden can answer these questions in a forthright manner, the black vote may not save him. The Senate saved Johnson even though he had a black mistress. Given how the Republicans pummeled Biden in the Senate last week, one wonders if he can survive the negative publicity that has dogged him from that quarter.

Let’s hope he can up his game and come up with an inspiring program and a message that inspire black people. Trump, it seems, is trying to cut into the black vote. It will neither be a free pass for Biden nor any other Democrat who is nominated to run against Trump.

The Senate saved Vice President Johnson in 1837. African Americans may come through for Biden in the forthcoming caucuses and primaries. If Biden is unsuccessful this time around I wonder if history will record that the Senate and the black vote as being responsible for his failure.

(Click on the title to access the original article).

[asylumseeker]

Message from Zanny Minton Beddoes, Editor of The Economist:
    
This week [February 27, 2020 edition] we have two covers.

In the United States we look at the growing chances of Bernie Sanders running against Donald Trump in November.

Moderate Democrats worry that nominating Mr Sanders would cost them the election. We worry that forcing Americans to decide between him and Mr Trump would have no good outcome.

It will surprise nobody that we disagree with a self-described democratic socialist over economics, but that is just the start.

Mr Sanders is so convinced he is morally right that he has a dangerous tendency to put ends before means.

And, in a country where Mr Trump has whipped up politics into a frenzy of loathing, Mr Sanders’s election would feed the hatred.

A corrupt, right-wing populist, who scorns the rule of law and the constitution, and a sanctimonious, left-wing populist, who blames a cabal of billionaires and businesses for everything that is wrong with the world: it is hard to think of a worse choice.

[lefty]

Biden has Dementia, Sanders wants the help the working class, but then US has a habit of deposing leaders that try to help their working class even if that help involves being supposedly unfair to the upper classes. Venezuela would have been just fine today without crippling sanctions and OPEC/Saudi Arabian rigging the oil and gas prices by flooding the market.

[asylumseeker]

Biden has Dementia, Sanders wants the help the working class, but then US has a habit of deposing leaders that try to help their working class even if that help involves being supposedly unfair to the upper classes. Venezuela would have been just fine today without crippling sanctions and OPEC/Saudi Arabian rigging the oil and gas prices by flooding the market.

Biden's mental capacity should have been on the table, front and center,  but the political dynamics of the remaining pool of candidates essentially gave Biden a pass at the last hurdle entering South Carolina. Biden has been a singularly poor candidate and it is unfortunate that his longevity has been buffeted by the African-American vote. He better be en route to choosing one heck of a compelling VP candidate to join him.

(Venezuela wouldn't be just fine but for economic sanctions  ... but I will leave that topic for another day. There would still be economic mismanagement, plundering of state resources and a formalization of military actors as influential decision-makers and brokers in decreasing the quality of life since Chavez's departure. Sanctions are not the key driving factor in Venezuela being a failed state.)

[asylumseeker]

In the present dispensation, carving a path to the presidency should no longer be a dilemma for Joe Biden, but despite having a calculating simpleton and coward as an opponent, it's still far from certain that Biden will emerge the victor. If the Democrats can't get their ducks in a row and overcome yet another less than stellar candidate selection process, they are not capable of swimming in low tide with favorable currents.

[ABTrini]

. ...... no Republicans !!! 
Reminds me of something we had here in TnT before

Biden should consider Michelle Obama as a vice Candidate

[soccerman]

. ...... no Republicans !!! 
Reminds me of something we had here in TnT before

Biden should consider Michelle Obama as a vice Candidate

Michelle Obama said she isn't interested. Not sure if the recent developments will change her mind since the country is in dire need of leaders who can unite.

The Mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms, stock rose over the past week. She's looking like she can be a competent candidate for VP.

[asylumseeker]

. ...... no Republicans !!! 
Reminds me of something we had here in TnT before

Biden should consider Michelle Obama as a vice Candidate

Michelle Obama said she isn't interested. Not sure if the recent developments will change her mind since the country is in dire need of leaders who can unite.

The Mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms, stock rose over the past week. She's looking like she can be a competent candidate for VP.

She got flak on the ground when she went to the streets today. Doubts.

[asylumseeker]

Trump has exposed himself as a naked bigot,  but he's also demonstrated Biden as a less than compelling candidate.

Saw an interview in which Jill Biden described Joe as either delivering energy or delivering excitement or as energetic or exciting. He's far from any of those things. I'm not convinced that even Jill believes that about Joe,  but she's been around politics long enough to know the script required of her.

Of his proxy speakers, Biden's grandchildren have been among the most convincing articulators of "why Biden". Roll them out. 

Looking down the pike,  Democrats need charismatic candidacies to emerge because Nikki Haley is waiting on the other side of this Trump debacle and grinning.

[Sando prince]

We will see what will happen tonight!

[asylumseeker]

We Waited in Vain for a Repudiation That Never Came
By Jamelle Bouie, The New York Times

Trump may well end up losing to Biden, but Trumpism remains a viable political strategy.

The liberal hope for the 2020 presidential election was a decisive repudiation of Donald Trump and the Republican Party. This is no longer on the table. A Joe Biden win, if it happens, will be as narrow an Electoral College win as Trump’s was in 2016. Biden won the national popular vote — which matters for popular legitimacy, even if it doesn’t weigh on the outcome — but Trump outperformed his job approval, winning more total votes than any Republican presidential nominee in history.

In spite of everything, the president expanded his support, most likely saving the Republican Senate majority in the process. A Trump loss is still possible — perhaps even probable, since Biden holds a lead in states totaling 270 electoral votes — but there’s every reason to think Trumpism will survive as a viable strategy for winning national elections.

And what is Trumpism? It is a performance, or rather, a series of performances.

It is a performance of nationalism, one that triangulates between open chauvinism in favor of the dominant ethnic group and narrow appeals to inclusion, with the promise of material gain for anyone who joins his coalition. It is a performance, on the same score, of success, projecting an image of wealth and power and urging the public to embrace it as its own — a version of “The Apprentice” in which the contestants are the American people. It is also the performance of an aggressive and aggrieved masculinity centered on the bullying and domination of others.

Even without policy to match the populist persona — the Trump administration has been as generous to the wealthy and connected as it has been stingy with the poor and the working class — Trumpism appeals to tens of millions of voters, from the large majority of white Americans to many people in traditionally Democratic constituencies.

That, if anything, is the surprise of this election. Although it is still too early to make any definitive statement about the shape of the electorate (broad white support for Trump notwithstanding), it is clear that the president made modest inroads with Black and Hispanic voters, especially men. This is most apparent in the states of Florida, Georgia and Texas, where Trump outperformed his 2016 totals in several areas where Hispanic voters make up a majority.

We don’t yet know why Trump made those gains — although the aforementioned performances, which figured prominently in his outreach to those groups, may have something to do with it — but this shift is a useful reminder that politics does not move along a linear path. For all of our data, the political world is still a fundamentally unpredictable place.

A decade ago, for example, Democrats believed that demographic change — the shift from a “majority white” country to a “majority minority” one — would give the party an almost unbreakable lock on national politics; that a growing population of Asian and Hispanic Americans would inevitably redound to liberal benefit. At the time, I wrote that this was unlikely, that while it was a seductive theory, there was not much evidence to support the vision of an enduring Democratic majority. Racial and ethnic identity, I argued, were too fluid, and there was no guarantee that future members of those groups would think of themselves as “minorities” in the way that has been historically true of Black Americans. Changing conditions — greater assimilation and upward mobility — could make them as volatile in partisan politics as European ethnic groups were in the 20th century.

If the Hispanic shift is as large as it appears to be, then we are living in that reality. What I didn’t expect is that it would come heralded by a Republican like Trump. But this only speaks to the diversity, ideological and otherwise, of the Hispanic electorate, which is as varied in racial background and national origin as most other groups of Americans. To extend an earlier analogy, it is probably as useful to speak of “Hispanics” in 2020 as it was to speak of “Europeans” in 1950. The category is just too broad, obscuring (in electoral politics, at least) far more than it illuminates.

Again, it is too early to say that there’s been a permanent realignment, although some trends — like the rising partisan significance of gender and education — are clear. It’s true, though, that the possibilities for change and transformation are wide open. Perhaps a future Republican, one with the same or similar fame and charisma, will build a real majority from the foundation laid over the last four years. Perhaps a future Democrat will turn the party’s consistent voting majority into a greater share of electoral votes and congressional seats. Perhaps we see neither and are in for another decade of fierce partisan competition between two equal and evenly-matched sides.

The 2020 election, in other words, will have an outcome. But it won’t be conclusive. It will be an uncertain result for an uncertain time in American life. Political trench warfare will continue. Total victory, whether in politics or anywhere else, is not on the immediate horizon. The future remains unwritten and is perhaps even more unknowable than before.

[asylumseeker]

The so-called moral outrage around Trump’s presidency did not produce any substantive shift in his Republican support,” tweeted Eddie Glaude, a professor at Princeton University and author of Democracy in Black. “In fact, he expanded his base among white voters. Trump continues to flourish in the intersection of greed, selfishness and racism.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/04/trumpism-us-presidential-election

[soccerman]

I noticed in Kamala's victory speech with Biden she acknowledged her husband, sister, nieces and deceased mother....no mention of her living father. Is it bad like that?

[Deeks]

I noticed in Kamala's victory speech with Biden she acknowledged her husband, sister, nieces and deceased mother....no mention of her living father. Is it bad like that?

Maybe it bad like that. It is what it is. That is the luck of the draw when parents split and there is no type of connection between siblings. We don't know the whole story with her father. He was not in their life and that is just it. She almost parallels Barak situation with his father.

[soccerman]

I noticed in Kamala's victory speech with Biden she acknowledged her husband, sister, nieces and deceased mother....no mention of her living father. Is it bad like that?

Maybe it bad like that. It is what it is. That is the luck of the draw when parents split and there is no type of connection between siblings. We don't know the whole story with her father. He was not in their life and that is just it. She almost parallels Barak situation with his father.

You're right. I wasn't trying to speculate and didn't know the situation, was just surprised when he wasn't mentioned.

[Flex]

Tough times ahead for T&T as Biden takes charge in the USA
By Professor Anthony Bryan (T&T Guardian)

Caribbean countries must prepare for the eventual end of oil and gas as sources of power generation.

Professor Anthony T. Bryan, a member of the Caribbean Policy Consortium(CPC) told the Business Guardian that although President-elect Joe Biden’s energy plan will preserve a role for natural gas and LNG in the short run as a transition fuel, the long-term plan would invest heavily in renewable energy.

CPC is an expert group based in the Caribbean and North America.

Byran’s comments comes in wake of democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden’s ambitious energy plan.

Biden intends to launch a US $1.7 trillion ‘clean energy revolution’ and implement his vision for tackling climate change.

But if Caribbean countries do not prepare, the result, Byran explained, would be a difficult weaning process including for T&T which depends on natural gas and LNG for power generation.

Byran believes that the problem is that in the long run gas may prove to be economically and environmentally untenable within the power sector which is a key market for producers.

Even today LNG is still a dominant fuel source, but it is less competitive against renewables than it used to be, Byran said, adding that solar and wind are now cheaper than LNG power in two thirds of the world.

“And the proper combination of renewable energy policies could push gas out of the power mix by 2035 or earlier,” he added.

Bryan explained that once a global decision is made to place limits on greenhouse gas emissions from power-plants it would be harder for gas to compete against wind solar and other renewables.

“It is going to be much harder for natural gas and LNG to survive the push for decarbonization.

“The adverse implications for energy production and export for T&T and the Caribbean countries that depend on natural gas and oil for export is obvious. We can expect that eventually all electric power utilities will shift to renewables as their source of power generation,” Bryan advised.

A Biden energy plan also calls for a sharp increase in wind and solar generation and a drop in coal fired and nuclear power generation.

Bryan added the US needs low carbon power options to meet more challenging decarbonization goals.

President Biden has committed to re-join the Paris Accord immediately upon taking office.

This, Bryan said, will signal that the United States wants to take the lead on climate change as it will invest $2 trillion in renewable power electric energy upgrades and green building initiatives and other clean energy initiatives.

This will eventually displace fossil fuels.

While fossil fuels will still be around for several more decades they will gradually be replaced by various types of renewables as power generating sources, Bryan noted.

Impact on global energy markets

Global oil and gas companies are preparing for a drastic change in energy consumption.

This will be in line with Biden’s initiatives to put the US on a net-zero carbon emissions goal by 2050.

Bryan noted two reasons for the rapid advance toward renewables; firstly the oil and gas business has been a disaster for investors during 2020 regardless of the slight increases in the price of oil and COVID-19 accelerated this trend.

Secondly, faster growth in renewable energy jobs is being recorded now and expected to increase rapidly.

Less support for fracking?

Fracking — short for hydraulic fracturing — is a process for extracting natural gas by drilling thousands of feet into the ground and injecting a solution of water and chemicals through the earth’s crust to break up horizontal layers of shale rock.

Critics of the fossil fuel extraction method say its harmful impact on the environment outweighs its benefits.

Forbes recently reported that a Biden presidency is expected to follow through on his promises to ban hydraulic fracturing on federal lands and waters.

Bryan said Biden does not support new fracking projects but he can only ban new permits on federal land.

“That makes up less than 10 per cent of total land use for oil and gas production. Even so fracking will die a natural death in the US with the gradual transition away from oil and gas,’ Bryan added.

He said eventually, a total ban on drilling by fracking would cut oil output in the US by 1.6 million barrels per day.

Difficult years ahead

Energy and strategic advisor Anthony Paul who is now based in Africa explained that generally, after the transition, Biden may have two difficult years for converting his policies into legislation, unless the Democrats can win the Senate with the Georgia run-offs.

If they don’t, Paul said, the Republicans in the Senate can stonewall him at every turn, rendering Biden to perhaps depend on executive orders.

“These have different levels of impact than do laws, so the extent to which he may be able to implement will be determined by his ability to get legislation passed,” Paul said, noting that Biden’s plans are to rejoin the Paris Agreement, reduce greenhouse gases and accelerate America’s embrace of and conversion to renewable technologies.

“America has a lot of installed old-generation infrastructure that is owned by these big firms and which are in the ‘harvest’ phase of their life cycle. In other words, the capital is paid off and now to reap the rewards. As with the mobile phone technology, some major American telecom companies persisted with less efficient CDMA system for many years, even as the rest of the world and technology moved on with GSM.

“In the same vein, don’t expect power plants running on coal, oil or gas to be retired far before their profitable life ends. Nor refineries, petrochemical plants, manufacturing with plastics and other petroleum derived products,” Paul said.

Noting that oil and gas make super profits, Paul said “big and powerful oil lobby” will not likely give that up too easily.

However, he said there are ways that Biden can slow the progress of oil and gas and promote renewables including limiting or halting the release of federal lands and waters for oil and gas exploration, changing the rules (as for flaring of natural gas) in others.

“The US’s share of gas flaring has increased tremendously in recent years with the production of gas associated with fractured oil reservoirs. A lot of these fields are remote from gas markets of pipelines, so producers choose to flare. These measures can push up oil and gas prices in the short term,”Paul explained.

He advised what must also be keep in mind that much of the fractured reservoir production comes from private or State owned (as opposed to federal owned) lands, which the President does not control.

Much of these lands are in States whose legislatures are controlled by the Republicans.

In response to Biden’s measures, oil producers can invest in the pipeline infrastructure and/or small scale conversion technologies to capture and sell/use much of this gas, Paul said.

Oil and gas prices

Low oil and gas prices have dramatically driven down the cost of oilfield services and equipment, Paul noted, adding that major companies have invested heavily in fractured reservoir production late in the game.

With their deep pockets and penchant for major projects, the majors have the potential of capturing that gas to feed power plants and export, Paul said.

“In so doing, they will also increase oil production and put pressure on prices. Both oil and gas exports will increase,” he explained.

Paul also advised that cheap and abundant gas availability will serve to support the conversion of existing power plants from coal or fuel oil to natural gas, thus preserving major infrastructure and capital.

“At the same time, Mr Biden can claim to have reduced GHGs. The impact on global oil and LNG prices could be dire,” Paul said.

On the foreign policy front, things are more interesting.

Paul said a key motivator of President Trump’s embargoes on Iran and Venezuela was keeping their oil off the market to create the space for American entry and domination of the global marketplace for oil and gas.

“With Saudi Arabia in their back pocket, President Trump saw it as a slam dunk. In spite of all the rhetoric, I would be surprised to see President Biden significantly roll back some of those aspects of Trump foreign policy, given the power of the oil and gas lobby in Washington. I hope I am wrong on this one,” Paul said, noting that he expects there to be major rolling back on the Cuban embargo.

“For the same reasons, the Iran nuclear deal will be revisited, but I’m sceptical that all the previous provisions will be quickly re-introduced. Look out for a slower release of oil on the market and investments in natural gas by the likes of French company Total.

“The measure of this will be the extent to which President Biden feels he has to assuage the angst the EU must be feeling.

I suspect he will propose policies that go further than the current Paris Agreement and landscape suggests. For instance, I suspect he will turn his attention to factors other than changing the sources of fuel, such as reducing the demand for fuel.

For instance, he may address the food supply chain, which is a big contributor to GHGs,” Paul added.

He suggested Biden could also redress some of the imbalances in the subsidy regime for ethanol, by giving incentives to farmers in the south where sugar cane can be grown and can also affect black communities much more than the corn subsidies further north.

Paul said in spite of its potential, he does not foresee the Caribbean status quo changing by becoming shapers of its own destiny and slowing climate change through its own initiatives and active participation, but rather by being the collateral beneficiary of policy changes to the north.

The biggest potential impact on the region could come from changes in foreign policy, Paul added.

[Deeks]

I don't think Biden will try to sanction TT, but I don't think he will lift sanctions on Ven. immediately. We should wait and see what kind of approach is made to Maduro.

[Flex]

Venezuelans in Trinidad and Tobago worried for future after Biden victory
GREVIC ALVARADO (T&T NEWSDAY).

For Venezuelans in T&T, the election of Democrat Joe Biden as president of the US has caused more doubts over their future and the unrest in their country.

The harsh economic sanctions and rumours of invasion by the Republican administration had led some to hope for the exit of the government of Nicolás Maduro. But Biden will bring a change in ideology .

Manuel González, a former Venezuelan politician who is a refugee in T&T, believes Biden's diplomatic approach is likely to lead to a long wait for a solution.

"With Biden we are going to see a shift towards diplomacy, which would be a point in Maduro's favour, because it would give him more time, maybe another year or two, to organise his ideas," he said.

He believes the Biden administration will hold extensive discussions with the UN and other multilateral organisations on neutralising the Maduro regime.

But he said, "I think that sooner or later Biden will push his own agenda for Venezuela, and if he has the right information, it will be quite effective."

Dennys Hernández is another Venezuelan political leader who is in TT. He believes Biden's victory will not stop the US government acting against the Maduro regime.

"It is possible that Joe Biden is not going to confront, but to negotiate Nicolás Maduro's departure with him. I am convinced that there will be no lifting of sanctions, but an opening of talks," said Hernández.

Against this background, the hopes of exiled Venezuelans of returning home soon are fading.

Isis Villalobos said, “The government cannot close the doors for whoever wants to return to Venezuela, but it will be very difficult to go back. It is impossible to go back and work for US$5
a month and without basic services. The US must follow a process and the world will see that Donald Trump was right."

Venezuelan ambassador to T&T Carlos Amador Pérez echoed the congratulations of the Venezuelan government to the people of the US and the winners of the election.

Pérez said, “Venezuela has always been open to talking with the governments of the US (but) the sanctions applied by the current government have severely compromised the people of Venezuela. The important thing is to wait and see what will happen, but always for the positive, not only for the government but for the population in general."

[asylumseeker]

I don't think Biden will try to sanction TT, but I don't think he will lift sanctions on Ven. immediately. We should wait and see what kind of approach is made to Maduro.

I concur as to your assessment regarding sanctions. Aside from that, it's not clear that Biden "knows" how to engage or prioritize Venezuela. When he provided an extensive rendition regarding foreign policy prescriptions post-Trump (See Foreign Affairs from March/April this year), he made token reference to Venezuela (he mentioned the word once). Somewhat stunning in an election year in which the displacement of Venezuelans, authoritarianism and Florida were on the table.

Maduro shouldn't be a blind spot for anyone (well aside from the purveyors of Trinidad and Tobago's foreign policy vis-à-vis Caracas).

EDIT: link provided.

[Deeks]

I don't think Biden will try to sanction TT, but I don't think he will lift sanctions on Ven. immediately. We should wait and see what kind of approach is made to Maduro.

I concur as to your assessment regarding sanctions. Aside from that, it's not clear that Biden "knows" how to engage or prioritize Venezuela. When he provided an extensive rendition regarding foreign policy prescriptions post-Trump (See Foreign Affairs from March/April this year), he made token reference to Venezuela (he mentioned the word once). Somewhat stunning in an election year in which the displacement of Venezuelans, authoritarianism and Florida were on the table.

Maduro shouldn't be a blind spot for anyone (well aside from the purveyors of Trinidad and Tobago's foreign policy vis-à-vis Caracas).

If Vens. were entering the US by the thousands, then that would have played in this past election much more. TT, Colombia, Panama, Brazil, Perus, Ecuador absorbed most of the Vens.  But Biden already has a full plate of Covid, Economy, Police Issues, Euro, etc. Ven. and Caricom will be there, but not as prominently.