I think many of the people celebrating are also, perhaps, a little too fond of the “great man” theory of history.

Maduro is a piece of shit. But removing Maduro doesn’t change a damn thing. Maduro’s government, the Chavismo movement, is still in power and cracking down even harder on dissent - and Trump doesn’t care, because as long as whoever’s in charge is frightened enough of Trump to give him their oil, they can kill and torture and extort Venezuelans all day long and Trump won’t give a shit.

I mean, there’s not a strong government in Venezuela. It’s not like they say in the United States, “you can’t fight city hall”. The people who actually hold power are an ugly coalition of government security forces, corrupt officials, colectivos (government aligned paramilitaries) and other local militias, foreign militias like ELN and FARC using Venezuela as a base of operations, local gangs, foreign gangs, and so on, all holding as much territory as their soldiers and guns can control and extorting and abusing the Venezuelans living under their authority. And they can and do fight City Hall, and each other, all the time, but are also united by the common interest of keeping the corrupt-as-fuck Chavismos in power.

Maduro was at the top of the government section of that messy pyramid, because the army answered to him and he had the most force to deploy. Which made him, in some respects, the kingpin of Venezuela. Trump took out Maduro, replacing him with his VP Rodriguez. And Rodriguez, it appears, is going to answer to Trump or be replaced in turn.

All those gangs and paramilitaries and foreign terrorist organizations, who did what Maduro wanted in exchange for guns and money and freedom to act in their own territories, are now doing the same for Rodriguez. And Rodriguez answers to Trump, the new kingpin of Venezuela.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

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