Subject: Re: As Albaby says...
Not nothing. But again, the above is my opinion. What's in the text above that is *your* opinion.

Fair enough. I wanted to see if you had any explanation for why these things would have any significant impact on China, rather than just labeling them "not nothing."

Personally, I don't see how China suffers anything more than a paper cut from, say, having to pay a few dollars more for a tiny slice of their oil, or from having that tiny fraction of oil now be on ships that somewhat easier to find, just like all the oil that they import from Canada (and Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and the U.S. and Iraq and the UAE and a host of other countries) with no ill effect on their national security posture. It's not nothing, but it's close enough to nothing that I genuinely don't understand why you think it matters at all - other than your allusions to the notions that big things start with very tiny things. I was wondering if there was more than that.

Anyway, as you say, we'll see. Trump met with Machado today, but his Administration saw fit to reiterate his assessment that she lacks the ability to lead Venezuela - and that he didn't have anything that he intended to accomplish in the meeting, but it was a meeting he was willing to have. She did present her Nobel medal as a gift, though. But I don't think that will change anything, and the regime will stay in charge.