María Corina Machado: The great humiliation

We all keep neighborhood trophies, from back when we won a little contest at the end-of-year party or our children received a swimming badge. They are intimate treasures gathering dust in drawers at home, proof of a life punctuated by flashes of joy greater than any lottery win. Not that they were small steps for the individual and giant leaps for humanity, quite the opposite: they are insignificant to others, but represent pure unadulterated joy for the personal stories of the people we love.

None of this resembles a Nobel Peace Prize, that’s true, but we would defend it tooth and nail in any case. Woe to any aliens who might want to invade us. That’s why the humiliation of María Corina Machado is so grotesque, as we watched her handing over her award to the emperor of this new absolutist regime, bowing down in exchange for a pittance, or for nothing at all.

And this isn’t an award winner generously parting with the trophy to dedicate it to the victims she is fighting for; no, this is vassalage, surrendering to the autocrat who will dictate Venezuela’s future. It’s called flattery, bribery, indecency.

No one is spared in this display of collective humiliation, in this public auction at the bazaar called the White House in exchange for favors. Far more valuable than an award, Delcy Rodríguez has handed over President Maduro to Trump (ex ante or ex post) and, above all, millions of barrels of oil that will flow into bank accounts that have nothing to do with Venezuela. A gold-plated medal can hardly compete with such a bounty.

The opposition, democrats worldwide, and all of us who long for freedom in Venezuela have been completely baffled. Let’s get this straight: for Trump to turn against Delcy Rodríguez, all we have to do is promote a Nobel Peace Prize for the acting president of Venezuela. That’s the only way the autocrat will become enraged and, perhaps then, find another jail cell for her in New York. And here’s a lesson for everyone: the class clown, the one we laughed at for humiliating himself to the point of degradation, is the one who wins in today’s world. A world of ICE brutes, new gladiators at the service of Trump’s cruelty, the world of Elon Musk’s arbitrary actions, and the power of tech companies allied with the new autocracy that wants to crush the weak. The law of the strongest is back, and whoever bribes the best wins.

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