Rubio's role in this invasion is sorriest surrender of all

He puts power over people and tells Venezuela to bow down to Trump because, well, that's what he's done.

- GUSTAVO ARELLANO COLUMNIST

SECRETARY OF STATE Marco Rubio joins President Trump to discuss the U.S. strike that captured Venezuela's president.

(JOE RAEDLE Getty Images)

By invading Venezuela, President Trump just lit America’s eternal exploding cigar.

For more than 175 years — ever since the United States conquered half of Mexico — nearly every president has messed with Latin America while telling the rest of the world to stay the hell out.

We helped depose democratically elected leaders and propped up murderous strongmen.

Trained death squads and offered bailouts to favored allies. Ran economic blockades and encouraged American companies to treat the region’s riches, and its workers, like a cookie jar.

From the Mexican-American War to the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Panama Canal to NAFTA, we've looked out only for ourselves in Latin America even while wrapping our actions in the banner of benevolence.

It’s rarely ended well for anyone involved — especially us. Many of the leaders we put into power became despots we tolerated until they ran their course, like Panama's Manuel Noriega. The political upheaval we helped create has led generations of Latin Americans to migrate to el Norte, fundamentally changing our country even as too many Americans think people like my family should have stayed in their ancestral homes.

So there Trump was at Mara-Lago on Saturday, insisting that the capture of Venezuela dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife by American troops was a military action as brilliant and consequential as D-Day. He also announced that the U.S. would “run the country” and practically jiggled out his weird “YMCA’ dance at the idea of making money from Venezuelan oil.