Hopefully, everyone has had a wonderful Christmas season and a great New Years. Actually, the Christmas season does not abruptly end after December 25th, but continues through Epiphany on Jan. 6th, and comes to a more natural, sensible conclusion at the remembrance of Jesus's Baptism on Jan. 12th.

The removal of Maduro from power in Venezuela, and the contrasting protests against this removal, calls for a clarification of terms and definitions:

Colonialism is the existence of smaller nations or territories that are the legal property of, and subject to the direct control and jurisdiction of a larger, more powerful nation, in all areas of its society.

Regime Change is the work of an outside country removing or overthrowing the leadership of another country and helping to install another leader or form of government, separate from and independently of the country's own cooperation or internal democratic process.

Nation building is the outside work of one country to build or rebuild various aspects of the society, infrastructure or private sector of another country.

The removal of Maduro from power in Venezuela and the subsequent oversight / transition effort does not fit any of these descriptions, because it is simply the execution of a long-standing arrest warrant, and a facilitation of the country's own existing democratic system, involving the will of its own people who had already voted him out. These oversight/transition efforts do not involve any aspect of its society, infrastructure or private sector, except for the removal of people and entities that comprised or helped power the regime - of which there are many! Thus it is Maduro himself and his regime who acted irrespective of the country's own system, not the United States, when he chose to cling to power despite the will of his own people.

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