Swap Meet

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Attribution: Trump And Putin Have A Deal by Malcolm McGookin, CagleCartoons.com

[Malc McGookin is a Brit/Australian whose cartoons are published all over the world. A former animator, amongst other projects, he worked on Danger Mouse, Count Duckula and The BFG feature movie He also directed and scripted series for Childrens Television Workshop (the Sesame Street people). He draws for the Sunday Mail in Brisbane; he’s drawn for Prospect and Private Eye as well as the now defunct News Of The World and many other Fleet Street papers.]

Swap meet:: an event in a public place where people sell or exchange their unwanted possessions

– Cambridge Dictionary –

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55 thoughts on “Swap Meet”

  1. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/06/

    Russia Once Offered U.S. Control of Venezuela for Free Rein in Ukraine
    The exchange offer was recounted at the time in congressional testimony by Fiona Hill, who ran Russian and European affairs on the National Security Council during the first Trump administration.

    Moscow’s mixed reaction to the U.S. intervention in Venezuela has stirred memories of a barter reportedly offered by Russia seven years ago, during another moment of heightened tension between Washington and Caracas.

    At the time, Russia signaled that it was willing to allow the United States to act as it pleased in Venezuela, in exchange for Washington giving the Kremlin a free hand in Ukraine, according to Congressional testimony from Fiona Hill, who ran Russian and European affairs on the National Security Council during the first Trump administration.

    The Russians “were signaling very strongly that they wanted to somehow make some very strange swap arrangement between Venezuela and Ukraine,” Ms. Hill told a Congressional hearing in October 2019, more than two years before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

    The proposals were informal, through commentators and newspaper articles, she said, but the gist was that if the United States wanted the freedom to maintain a sphere of influence over neighboring countries, then it ought to agree to Russia doing the same.

    “You want us out of your backyard,” said Ms. Hill in summarizing the Russian position. “We, you know, we have our own version of this. You’re in our backyard in Ukraine.”

    Ms. Hill said that she went to Moscow in person to reject the idea. The proposal came amid tensions between Caracas and Washington that prompted Moscow to deploy 100 military personnel and new weapons to shore up the rule of President Nicolás Maduro.

    Mr. Maduro’s removal marks the latest blow to a regime supported by Moscow, with President Bashar al-Assad of Syria toppled a little over a year ago.

    Officially, the Russian foreign ministry condemned the move as a violation of international law. But the main Russian priority is the war in Ukraine, where the Trump administration is trying to negotiate peace. The Kremlin is trying to strike a difficult balance, neither making any major concessions on Ukraine nor alienating the White House.

    Some senior Russian officials and commentators have expressed satisfaction that the United States seemed to be ditching international law in exchange for a policy of “might makes right,” an attitude hearkening back to an imperial era, more than a century ago, that both President Trump and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia have looked on fondly.

    “The law of the strongest is clearly stronger than ordinary justice,” Dmitri Medvedev, the formerly liberal president of Russia turned war hawk wrote on social media, while adding in an interview with the official Tass news agency that Washington now has “no grounds, even formally, to reproach our country.”

    — – by Neil MacFarquhar has been a Times reporter since 1995, writing about a range of topics from war to politics to the arts, both internationally and in the United States.

  2. also at
    https://newrepublic.com/ Brynn Tannehill’s

    DONROE DOCTRINE
    Trump Has Started Carving Up the World. Now It’s Putin and Xi’s Turn.

    The U.S. invasion of Venezuela late last Friday shocked the world for many reasons. It represents another fundamental departure from the post–World War II order supported by the United States for the last 50 years. It was also an unprovoked, naked act of aggression based on the flimsiest of pretexts. Congress was not consulted, and the executive branch has far exceeded the 60 days allowed by the 1973 War Powers Act to get congressional approval for ongoing military action.

    Far worse than these shattered norms are the horrifying possibilities this action raises. President Donald Trump and the GOP have laid bare their desires for hegemony, colonialism, and empire, and the dangerous global consequences of the United States pursuing these cannot be understated. Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro was an unpopular kleptocratic dictator, and this article should not be in any way interpreted as a defense of him; but it is a warning of what this invasion means, and what is to come.

    Perhaps the most blatant of all the recent acts is Trump’s own declaration that the U.S. will “take control” of Venezuela “for a while” to seize and exploit the oil resources of the country. He will undoubtedly place a right-wing dictator beholden to him in charge of the country, opening the door to yet another avenue for foreign money flowing to him. Similarly, oil companies will compete with one another for access to the seized assets, meaning more money being laundered to Trump, his family, and other supporters in this spoils-of-war system.

    It also sets the U.S. up to occupy a country that, while holding no love for Maduro, likely won’t be happy to exchange a left-wing dictator who bankrupted and impoverished them with a right-wing one who is doing the same. The U.S. has a long history of propping up unpopular despots with embedded troops, which hasn’t gone particularly well since Korea (where there was at least U.S. and U.N. support for the sovereignty of South Korea). Vietnam, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria have been fruitless fiascos, producing corrupt unstable dictatorships at best (Iraq), or leaving our enemies in charge at worst (Iran, Afghanistan, and Vietnam until the 1990s).

    Like so many of Trump’s militaristic foreign policy misadventures, there seems to be no long-term plan or strategy beyond executing lightning strikes in the hope that it produces desired results. While Iran is currently in turmoil, the world does not seem to be safer, more peaceful, or more orderly as a result.

    The same is true for Venezuela: Trump does not appear to have a coherent plan for how to take and maintain control. Instead, there seems to be a belief in the administration that Venezuela can either be bullied into surrender or that U.S. troops would be greeted as liberators even as U.S. oil companies seized its national resources. This despite the fact that Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, remains defiant and at large, and the military and security apparatuses of the regime remain largely intact. There are signs that Trump may allow Rodríguez to remain in place, so long as she continues moves to adopt a laissez-faire capitalist system that lets U.S. oil companies exploit Venezuelan resources.

    This act has also sent a chilling message to the world that the United States is beginning the process of carving up the world into spheres of influence run by dictatorships (namely the U.S., Russia, and China). Russia was Venezuela’s benefactor and ally but has been strangely quiet. Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Fiona Hill testified to Congress in 2019 that Russia was “signaling very strongly that they wanted to somehow make some very strange swap agreement between Venezuela and Ukraine.” In other words, the U.S. could have Venezuela if we let Russia have Ukraine. This strongly suggests that the price for letting the U.S. go after Venezuela without any protest was, and will be, Ukraine. It also suggests that Taiwan may already be on the table as a bargaining chip with China, in order to secure its acquiescence to further U.S. regional hegemony in the Americas.

    America’s 2025 National Security Strategy document has already put NATO and Europe on notice that they are the real enemy to Trump’s ambitions for empire and riches. In this seminal document, Russia was no longer portrayed as an adversary, and China was barely mentioned. Instead, the document focused on distancing the U.S. from NATO and the EU, treating them as adversaries rather than our closest allies. This further supports the notion that the globe is being carved up behind closed doors by nuclear-armed dictators intent on amassing wealth, building buffers to their empires, and securing their own backyards.

    Trump has signaled that the global order of the past 80 years means nothing, and the U.S. is back in the business of colonial empire building as if it was a pre–World War I great power. Canada and Greenland should be extremely alarmed by this. Both of these countries have been put on notice since the beginning of the second Trump administration that he intends to annex them, and this overt, over-the-top act of war against Venezuela confirms that there’s nothing stopping him from finding some pretextual casus belli to justify a U.S. annexation of Greenland. Denmark, Canada, and Greenland are all NATO members, and it appears the U.S. is barreling toward a confrontation with that organization.

    Members of the EU, NATO, and the countries being threatened here should have their eyes wide open to the implications of what is happening. They are not dealing with someone who can be appeased, any more than Ukraine could have appeased Russia in 2022 by any means other than complete capitulation.

    Leaders of democracies around the world need to understand this for what it likely is: the opening salvos of a broader campaign of modern Lebensraum and Anschluss. History teaches that the best time to say no in concrete terms is early, and not after despotic nations are deciding who gets to keep which parts of countries they invaded.


  3. Jon Stewart dives into the Trump administration’s abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Trump’s collusion with oil companies to exploit Venezuela’s resources, and the emergence of the “Donroe Doctrine” as Trump threatens more international takeovers.

  4. stephen’s take “those epstein files must be craaazzy…. bomb something! bomb anything!”


    President Trump may have decided to snatch Venezuela’s leader after being enraged by Nicholás Maduro’s defiant public dancing, Maduro’s VP is currently running the country, and there’s no question that the U.S. is seeking to control Venezuela’s oil riches.

  5. another bet “it’ll be Cuba” in our office pool of who’s next


    Jan 5, 2026
    MS NOW’s Lawrence O’Donnell explains why Donald Trump and Marco Rubio violated the law in their invasion of Venezuela and why it all could have been done in pursuit of Rubio’s dream to overthrow Cuba’s government.

    also in WAPO this morning
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/01/06/cuba-venezuela-regime-change-trump-rubio/

    Trump team puts a target on Cuba, with threats and oil blockade
    President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have made clear that the collapse of Cuba’s communist government is not only a likely side benefit of Maduro’s ouster but a goal.

    No place was hit harder than Cuba by the shock waves that Saturday morning’s U.S. military seizure of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro sent throughout Latin America and the world.

    Within hours of the operation — long before the government in Havana acknowledged it — phone calls and texts across the island spread the news that dozens of elite Cuban security forces had been killed guarding Maduro.

    But by the time it finally released a statement late Sunday saying that 32 of its military and security personnel were dead in Caracas, the Cuban government had bigger problems on its hands.

    Both President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio made clear over the weekend that the collapse of Cuba’s communist government was not only a likely side benefit of Maduro’s ouster but a goal.

    “I don’t think we need [to take] any action,” Trump said as he flew back to Washington from his extended Florida holiday break. Without Maduro and the oil supplies Venezuela provided, he said, “Cuba looks like it’s ready to fall.”

    Rubio went further, indicating that the United States might be willing to give it a push. “I’m not going to talk to you about what our future steps are going to be,” he told NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. But, he added, “If I lived in Havana and I was in the government, I’d be concerned.”

  6. meanwhile some good news: you’ve got more time before A.I. destroys you

    https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jan/06/

    Leading AI expert delays timeline for its possible destruction of humanity
    Former OpenAI employee Daniel Kokotajlo says progress to AGI is ‘somewhat slower’ than first predicted

    A leading artificial intelligence expert has rolled back his timeline for AI doom, saying it will take longer than he initially predicted for AI systems to be able to code autonomously and thus speed their own development toward superintelligence.
    Daniel Kokotajlo, a former employee of OpenAI, sparked an energetic debate in April by releasing AI 2027, a scenario that envisions unchecked AI development leading to the creation of a superintelligence, which – after outfoxing world leaders – destroys humanity.
    […]
    Kokotajlo and his team named 2027 as the year AI would achieve “fully autonomous coding” although they said that this was a “most likely” guess and some among them had longer timelines. Now, some doubts appear to be surfacing about the imminence of AGI, and whether the term is meaningful in the first place.
    “A lot of other people have been pushing their timelines further out in the past year, as they realise how jagged AI performance is,” said Malcolm Murray, an AI risk management expert and one of the authors of the International AI Safety Report.
    “For a scenario like AI 2027 to happen, [AI] would need a lot of more practical skills that are useful in real-world complexities. I think people are starting to realise the enormous inertia in the real world that will delay complete societal change.”
    […]
    “Things seem to be going somewhat slower than the AI 2027 scenario. Our timelines were longer than 2027 when we published and now they are a bit longer still,” wrote Kokotajlo in a post on X.
    Creating AIs that can do AI research is still firmly an aim of leading AI companies. The OpenAI CEO, Sam Altman, said in October that having an automated AI researcher by March 2028 was an “internal goal” of his company, but added: “We may totally fail at this goal.”
    Andrea Castagna, a Brussels-based AI policy researcher, said there were a number of complexities that dramatic AGI timelines do not address. “The fact that you have a superintelligent computer focused on military activity doesn’t mean you can integrate it into the strategic documents we have compiled for the last 20 years.
    “The more we develop AI, the more we see that the world is not science fiction. The world is a lot more complicated than that.”

  7. but while we’re still here, better watch out what you say about the current admin mess or they’ll demote you, dock your retirement, maybe hang you for treason …

    Jan 5, 2026 #DailyShow #MarkKelly #JonStewart
    “We have a right in our country to speak out about the government, to say things about the president. They can’t take that away from us.” Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona, who also served in the Navy as a captain and combat pilot, joins Jon Stewart after news broke that he was being censured by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth for telling U.S. service members to refuse illegal orders. They discuss the president’s “major ego problem,” why he stands by his message as the Trump administration continues to levy attacks against free speech, frustrations with Democratic leadership, and the importance of Democrats taking control of the House and the Senate to put President Trump in check.

  10. So this wasn’t regime change at all? The regime is going to stay? Only difference is they’ll agree to an oil deal. No wonder capturing Maduro seemed so easy. Somebody left the door unlocked for us.

  11. I’m surprised Machado isn’t there, given all of the stuff I’ve read about her being Mossad, and at least totally on BiBi’s side. How did she get that Nobel PP?

    Maduro’s “thumbs up” in shackles. Who does he want to believe that? Himself?

  12. Heavy gunfire was reported near the Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas on January 6, 2026. This occurred shortly after Delcy Rodriguez was sworn in as the interim leader of Venezuela. The gunfire was reportedly triggered by sightings of unidentified drones in the area.

    Details of the Gunfire

    Time and Duration: The gunfire began around 8 PM and lasted for approximately 45 minutes.
    Response: Security forces opened fire in response to the drone sightings. Witnesses reported that the gunfire was not as intense as previous incidents.

    Power Outages: Some parts of Caracas experienced power outages during the incident.

    Context of the Situation

    This incident follows the recent capture of former president Nicolás Maduro by U.S. forces, which has heightened tensions in the country. The U.S. government has denied involvement in the gunfire incident. The situation remains tense as fears of further military action and internal conflict persist.

    -Search assist summary

    *US denies involvement, but the US also caused widespread power outages the night they took Mr. & Mrs. Maduro.

  13. https://www.politico.com/news/2026/01/06/after-venezuela-trumps-cartel-threats-put-mexico-on-edge-00711703

    Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum is dismissing talk of a U.S. “invasion” of her country.

    Privately, some Mexican officials and business leaders are concerned that President Donald Trump’s threats may soon become reality. A worst-case scenario, some fear, is a U.S. strike that results in civilian casualties and throws the country into political and economic chaos.

  14. On CNN

    TAPPER: Can you rule out the US is going to take Greenland by force?

    MILLER: Greenland should be part of the US. By what right does Denmark assert control over Greenland? The US is the power of NATO

    T: So force is on the table?

    M: Nobody is gonna fight the US militarily over future of Greenland

  16. I’m with mcFaul on how different (and as he suggested to nicole wallace how almost joyful) the news would have been had Dodo at least recognized Machado legitimate election instead of dissing her.


    In his first press conference after the military operation in Venezuela, Trump mentioned the word “oil” more than a dozen times. He did not say the word “democracy” once.
    That imbalance must be corrected, before it’s too late.

  18. Five years ago I was in the office for the second day back after an extended Christmas/New years break avoiding exposure to folks with COVID symptoms and trying to buy KN95 masks and toilet paper and following news of the COVID-19 vaccine distribution.. Probably doing some posting here and trying to catch up on what had rolled in over the two weeks we were out. And I was starting to look forward two weeks to see Dumbass GTF out of the White House. Listening to MSNBC on the way home I heard about the J6 attack on the Capitol and spent the evening watching coverage of it.

  19. Thanks Pog. For those who don’t get in the chat I will read these “on air”.

    I watched the whole thing live on Right Side Broadcasting, starting with Trump’s speech and all the others.

  23. Just searched through Trailmix archive,
    The threads for 6years ago

    So Long Mitch

    Nazis In The Rotunda

    Some interesting highs and lows, The highs Georgia flipped Democrat on both of it’s Senate seats. They elected an African American and a Jew, something unheard of from this state solidly part of the old South.
    Then the day ended with a sitting President attempting to overturn the election he lost by force.
    We lived through it but even 6 years later it still seems surreal
    Jack

  24. Five years ago, I was at the office, blissfully unaware that Donald J. tRUMP was inciting his MAGAt cult to storm the halls of Congress to stop certification of the election.

    Pieces trickled in dribs and drabs, but it wasn’t until the hearings that I saw the scope of the attack.

    As much attention as I use to pay to the MSM, they did a poor job of covering it…that day and beyond.

  25. Turns out my memory is as bad as I thought it might be. I had a nagging feeling that I knew more about what was going on as it occurred than I thought so I went back and checked the archives for 1/6/21. I along with everyone else here was following the festivities online and commenting about them here. Went home and yelled at the TV with Mrs. P. Probably had chicken for dinner.

  26. Pogo – It’s not your fault. Attack the messenger…for insufficient messaging.

    Like, were the thinking Orange Adolf would pull it off, so they were filtering their coverage so as not to get on his vengeful side?

    I’d like to see what the three networks aired on the evening news.

  27. Will they cover it tonight as an anniversary of the insurrection? Ha!

    I wonder which country we’ll invade for oil 20 years from now? Will the Earth be carved up into three pieces?

  29. 5 years ago the worst person in history ever to be President tried to overthrow democracy. Somehow…that bastard is still President. Lawrence O’Donnell said Greenland is a smokescreen, Marco does not care about Venezuela, even though Stephen Miller actually laughed off the assumption he is in charge of Venezuela, as he said Rubio is.
    O’Donnell said Trump, Inc. may make a token invasion into Colombia, but this whole charade is a precursor to a full-blown, full takeover of Cuba. The Gusanos are wanting this badly.

  31. thanks, Jack, for linking the 1/6 thread. one of the comments I made that morning before the insurrection got underway was:

    this gets them where it hurts

    business insider:

    Top CEOs are considering cutting off funding to Republicans who have supported Trump’s election challenge, according to Yale’s Jeffrey Sonnenfeld

    now, 5 years later, wonder who, if any, actually followed through with their threat of “cutting off funding to Republicans who have supported Trump’s election challenge” and whether any eventually donated to his 2024 campaign, made and are making contributions to stuff like the ballroom, the trump kennedy center et al.

  34. “Five years later” has a different context for me. In some respect, time is frozen because of this day. The previous day had been the one-month marker following my daughter’s death by covid. That morning I heard there was something other than the peaceful transition of power afoot. Even before the Capitol riot began, in fact when the speeches started, it was a signal to turn off my tv. Grief was too fresh and too raw for me to subject myself to further outrage and horror. What was clear to me was that the maladministration, which had just cost my daughter her life by its malfeasance and incompetence, cared nothing for hers, ours, nor anyone’s else’s, including thousands dying from covid that very day, nor the Capitol officers, and certainly not the other young woman who died by their own actions that day. They committed treason that day and have lied about all of it ever since.

  36. 5 years since Jan 6. ⚠️ The data shows it wasn’t just a protest—it was a plan to stop certification. We’re re-examining the specific pressure put on the Vice President to disrupt the election results.

    Watch our J6: Five Years Later playlist here:

  38. we didn’t know what was going on at the Capitol on January 6 because mobs of rioters were physically intimidating journalists trying to cover it

    That’s why the camera footage we watched in the moment was from 200 yards away

  39. Dozens of January 6 supporters march through Washington five years after attack; brawl erupts as counter-protester is arrested – live

    *They’re baaack

  40. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jan/06/trump-us-taxpayers-oil-firms-venezuela-investment

    Donald Trump has suggested US taxpayers could reimburse energy companies for repairing Venezuelan infrastructure for extracting and shipping oil.

    Trump acknowledged that “a lot of money” would need to be spent to increase oil production in Venezuela after US forces ousted its leader, Nicolás Maduro, but suggested his government could pay oil companies to do the work.

    “A tremendous amount of money will have to be spent and the oil companies will spend it, and then they’ll get reimbursed by us or through revenue,” the president said.

    *It’s not their oil, but since they’ve sized it, maybe oil companies should recoup their investment as they sell the oil. Just spitballing here. FDT! and the oligarchs and grifters!

    ~The oil reimbursement will come with the tariff check and the DOGE check ~

  41. Mike Pence is by the evidence becoming more and more an actual American hero of democracy. There was real pressure being brought to bear on that pointy white head.
    He wouldn’t get in the car.
    And SS phone messages uh….disappeared so we don’t know if they were getting orders to “just stuff his ass in there and scram!” and the agents were afraid of man-handling the Vice President or not.
    Brad Raffensberger too.
    Lindsay Graham is just becoming more and more a toadying snivel-slime.

  42. maybe oil companies should recoup their investment as they sell the oil

    stop making sense

    we gave a mob boss the Treasury

    nice work, Trumpers!

  43. “We’ve lost the line”

    Footage shows a tense standoff as rioters surge forward, breaking into a building and scaling its walls. Police shouting on radio “We’ve lost the line”.

  48. Sturg – They’re too dense; they’d take it as a compliment.

    I have a Kamala pin (shape of a comma with “la” on it, since MAGAts pretended not to know how to pronounce her name), and it hands in a jacket in my closet. Even though I wasn’t sure anyone would get it, I was nervous that they would.

    By the way, mTg still mispronounces Kamala. She will be on The View tomorrow, freshly-pensioned with taxpayer dollars for life.

  49. Back To Epstein
    The “Transparency” Scam
    While the news cycles churn on other things, the DOJ just quietly filed a letter admitting the “Epstein Files Transparency Act” is effectively dead on arrival.
    We are going to dig into the full story tomorrow on ELEVEN TO NOON (11am ET), but I wanted to drop these numbers here first to get the conversation started.

    This isn’t a delay. It’s a cover-up by arithmetic.

    The Deadline: December 19, 2025 (Legally mandated).

    The Reality: Tomorrow marks Day 19 of non-compliance.

    The Math: They have released 12,000 pages but just “discovered” 2 million more. That means they have released 0.6% of the files.

    The Kicker: They are currently sitting on 99.4% of the evidence nearly three weeks after the law said “release it all.”

    See you in the chat tomorrow. We have work to do.

  50. By the way, mTg still mispronounces Kamala. She will be on The View tomorrow

    she’s our most prominent lib

  52. they are in their own “media ecosystem”, they don’t see or hear critical analyses and think everything is going great

    like they didn’t see that video of the woman he getting arrested on the sidewalk for nothing for instance

    and they’re so brainwashed by this point, if they did see it, they’d mock her

  53. News story tonight about ocean acidification killing off shell fish and how unless reversed the industry will no longer exist. Cause: fossil fuels.

    All of these wars for oil are poisoning the earth, but why worry this crop of billionaires will be dead before their grandchildren pay the price for their crimes.

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