” … the USA is $23 Trillion in debt and in 2024 will enter a phase in which it will begin paying only interest on the debt.” And that’s only sovereign debt, i.e., debt of the Federal government. Debt to the GDP is now 105%. But it gets a lot worse than this.

U.S. non-financial corporate debt hit a post-crisis high of 72% of GDP: At around $14.5 trillion in 2017, non-financial corporate sector debt was $810 billion higher than it was a year ago, with 60% of the rise stemming from new bank loan creation. At present, bond financing accounts for 43% of outstanding debt with an average maturity of 15 years vs. the average maturity of 2.1 years for U.S. business loans. This implies roughly around $3.8 trillion of loan repayment per year. Against this backdrop, rising interest rates will add pressure on corporates with large refinancing needs.

There are also three alarming points in this paragraph
.
First, corporate debt is now 72% of GDP. That’s in addition to the government debt that is approaching (or has passed depending on how you count debt) 100% of GDP and household debt at 77% of GDP.

Add in 81% financial sector debt, and the U.S. combined debt-to-GDP ratio is near 330%.

Of course this is never going to be repaid, so the get out will be 1) Outright default, or 2) Inflation. This is going to be Weimar Germany on steroids.

The majority of popular leaders of the Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD), the opposition’s main electoral alliance, and other members of the opposition could not apply for the elections because of administrative and legal procedures and were disqualified from participating in the presidential elections by the government. This included Henrique Capriles (candidate in the 2012 and 2013 elections), Leopoldo López (sentenced to almost 14 years of prison during the 2014 protests), Antonio Ledezma (arrested in 2015 and later placed under house arrest), Freddy Guevara (whose parliamentary immunity was removed and fled to the residence of the Chilean ambassador), and David Smolansky (currently in exile), as well as María Corina Machado and Miguel Rodríguez Torres, former defense minister and dissident chavista, also incarcerated.
Consequently the election was widely boycotted – the turnout was only 46%, the lowest in Venezuela’s democratic history. Compare with turnout of 80% in the 2012 election.
Most international observers did not endorse the election results, including the Lima group (Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, and Saint Lucia). Of course a few countries did, including North Korea.
It was not just Washington that said the elections were rigged, it was the overwhelming majority of countries. All this can be checked on several non-US news sources.

Very true, but the real debt is about $250 trillion.

No, Maduro didn’t rig the last election. He was democratically elected in a free and fair election endorsed as such by many independent international observers from different creditable election monitoring groups. The voting system in Venezuela is much superior to that in most countries in the world (and that certainly includes the USA), and cannot be tampered with. That idiot Pence was complaining about “ballot stuffing,” impossible in Venezuela, which has sophisticated electronic voting machines. Any election that produces a result Washington doesn’t like, whether it’s in Venezuela, Iran, Palestine, Russia, or anywhere else, is automatically “rigged”, “illegitimate”, “stolen”, “null and void.” Strangely, though, this concern for “democracy” does not extend to Shady Wahabia or any of the Gulf Dictatorships, where no elections, rigged or otherwise, are ever held, and anybody who asks for one is beheaded and/ or crucified.

Gweedo and his buddies refused to take part in this and previous elections, following instructions from their paymasters in Washington. It was obvious to all concerned they hadn’t a hope of winning. Instead, for years they have tried and failed to seize power through violence, staging riots where people are killed and burned to death and public buildings torched, through a failed assassination attempt against Maduro, pimping for an invasion of the country and escalating economic strangulation by the Yew Ess Ayy, and trying without much success to stage various coups which invariably rapidly degenerate into broad farce.

These people will never gain power democratically. They form a small comprador elite who worship at the altar of all things American. You can find similar people in most of Latin America and across the world, characters who are ready and eager to act as Washington’s local satraps in the looting of their own countries, so long as they get a share of the spoils.

Venezuela must be the only country in the world where you can stage violent street riots with many people killed, attempt to murder the president, travel to a hostile neighbouring country to solicit a military invasion and war, and try to incite a military mutiny to overthrow the government. Some dictatorship. Try pulling the same stunts in the Yew Ess Ayy or the Yew Kay and your feet won’t touch the ground.

Where can ordinary people find the truth about events like the Venezuela embassy standoff? Where are responsible journalists?
Venezuela seems to be a complicated issue. Yes, the US government, with typical arrogance, has greatly worsened the situation in Venezuela and is trying to impose its will on the country. On the other hand, it does seem that Maduro rigged the last election, and a number of South American countries agree. I read a lot of sources and I have no real idea what the reality is on the ground in Venezuela.

Beyond the writing of Alfred McCoy and Chris Hedges, which claim the USA is in the late stage of Empire–the USA is $23 Trillion in debt and in 2024 will enter a phase in which it will begin paying only interest on the debt.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-05-01/minsky-moment-starting-2024-all-us-debt-issuance-will-be-used-pay-interest-debt

If the USA can steal Venezuela’s oil and gain income by placing tariffs on imports–that may help the USA stay afloat before the critical 2024 timeline of interest only payments begins…

So, this is becoming a pattern–not a one-time event.