Not to get political

Mental Illness

If you’re Kevin Hart or LeBron James, why are you doing Draft Kings commercials? I don’t know what either of them are worth, but I’m sure they’re each in the hundreds of millions of dollars in wealth. So could they really being selling their souls for a few more million? They’re better than that right?

So does that mean that they each believe that they should be using their celebrity status to promote online gambling? One of the most addictive addictions of all the addictions. In states that have legalized online gambling calls to help lines have increased 400 - 700 percent. So it couldn’t be that either right? So what are they doing? This is the question I ask myself every time I see a wealthy celebrity endorsing a substance or activity or food that clearly is contributes to illness and despair.

It’s the question I asked myself when I saw Tom Brady, Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and others, doing a Dunkin’ Donuts commercial during the Super Bowl. Arguably the best football player to ever grace the field and two mega actors endorsing one of the biggest sugar dealers in the world (I don’t know who’s worse, them or Starbucks). Sugar, an addictive substance which has been directly implicated in the increasing rates of obesity and metabolic disease, leading to an increased prevalence of chronic disease.

Or when I’ve watched Reggie Miller endorse Wendy’s during basketball games, giving the impression to young viewers that Wendy’s was part of his path to becoming one of the greatest basketball players in history.

How often do you think Tom frequented Dunkin during his career, or Reggie Wendys?

How much money would it take for any one of these people to not promote something that’s detrimental to society? What would it take for them to not only not promote addictive habits, foods, and substances, but promote the opposite. To take out an ad spot talking about all the things they’ve done to get to the level of success they have achieved. To talk about what kind of food and beverages you should consume if you want to be an athlete. The kinds of habits and discipline it takes to achieve your dreams. To invest their time and money and take out a 30 second ad during the Super Bowl to talk about why these foods, substances, and habits, are killing us?

It’s a mental illness really. This tenacious quest for more. More money, more fame, more status, more houses, more cars. And in the end all we get is more illness.

Everyone says they want better for the people. More for the people. And yet when it comes time to show it, they act in direct contrast to their words. It’s an illness that has been allowed to penetrate through all of society, and promoted by those with the power to end it.

Maduro Bounty

At this moment in history, out of all the people I could think of that the US could place a bounty on, including more than one war criminal, President Maduro of Venezuela is not one of them.

The US alleges that for over 20 years Maduro and his government have collaborated with a Colombian rebel group to smuggle cocaine into America, causing devastation throughout the country. If that was true, and the government was actually concerned with pervasive drug, then the Sackler family, owners of Perdue Pharma, should find out what their bounty is soon. I’d expect it to be many multiples of the one place on President Maduro.

I mean, Perdue Pharma is responsible for not one but two drug epidemics in this country. The first was valium which they began selling in the 1960s. Under false claims that overstated its benefits and understated its risks, mainly its addictive properties, valium quickly became a number one selling drug in the country. Then, in the 90’s, following the exact same script, they shot OxyContin to the top of the charts, and while OxyContin sales may have faded since then, the widespread use of opioid drugs has not. Claiming hundreds of thousands of lives, and ruining many more. Communities were ravaged but the effects of OxyContin and subsequent drugs that filled the void left by tighter restrictions placed on prescription opioids.

Not only was there never a bounty out for any one of them, and there never will be, those criminals walk free amongst us. Punished only monetarily, forced to pay fines that are completely disproportionate to the hell they caused and the wealth they gained off of other people’s misery.

So what is the bounty on President Maduro really all about then? The answer is oil and not getting what the US wants. Venezuela is home to the largest oil reserve in the world. And the US has been after control of that oil for nearly a decade. Starting in 2017 the US began placing financial sanctions on Venezuela. In 2019 and 2020 they implemented sanctions on Venezuela’s ability to sell oil internationally. Oil accounts for more than half of its fiscal revenue. So its no surprise that the sanctions crippled Venezuela’s economy, which is the impact the US was hoping for.

Only it didn’t cause the change they were after.

While the goal of the sanctions was to put pressure on Maduro and other leaders who the US deemed as illegitimate, the effects, as are typical of sanctions, was only felt by the people. The crippled economy caused a humanitarian crisis. But rather than topple the government and force change at the top, many Venezuelans decided to flee. Many ended up here in America. Who could blame them?

Struggling to survive and with little hope for the future if they stayed in Venezuela, what other choice did they have?

So after nearly a decade of economic strangulation failed to create the change they wanted, they pivoted to plan B. Directly and openly remove him from office.

This is a move that the US had turned to time and time again throughout its history. They’ve used it all over the world, but perhaps most frequently in South America. When the US doesn’t get what it wants, it forces change at the top. First it tries with economic sanctions, seizure of assets, and embargoes on a country’s main exports. And when that doesn’t work, they try by force.

They did it in 1954 in Guatemala. After the democratically elected president announced a plan to redistribute land acquired illegally by American owned United Fruit Company, the CIA backed and funded a coup to remove him. [read: The Fish That Ate the Whale]

They did it in the 50s and 60s in Cuba. First with an embargo on sugar, it’s main export, then with the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. While they intended to remove Fidel Castro from power, it only led to a firmer grip on the nation, and a tighter relationship between Cuba and the Soviet Union. [read: Cuba: An American History]

Throughout much of the 1900s the US interfered repeatedly with the coffee trade in Latina America in an attempt to keep prices down. [read: Uncommon Grounds]

And it seems like just for shits in the 2000s the US helped block a raise in Haiti that would have raised the minimum wage to 62 cents per hour.

So no this is not about cocaine. This is about the US government once again putting their hands where they don’t belong, and once again ignoring the real issues at home. This is about oil, but its also about placing blame. About finding a scapegoat for the drug epidemic in this country. And who better than the president of a Latin American country.

Time, attention, and resources that should be used to fix problems at home and implement solutions, are instead sent abroad. As things get worse around the world, it should be of little surprise that they collapse here as well, and perhaps deservedly so. We can’t escape the despair we sow abroad. Eventually it has to come home to roost.