Michael Tracey delivers a scathing, unconventional critique of the escalating diplomatic rupture between the United States and Colombia, framing the conflict not as a clash of ideologies but as a collision between the brute force of unilateral American sanctions and the performative, often incoherent rhetoric of a left-wing head of state. The piece is notable for its refusal to treat the imposition of sanctions on a sitting foreign president as a standard diplomatic tool, instead presenting it as a historical anomaly that exposes the fragility of international law when pitted against American hegemony.
The Mechanics of Unilateral Power
Tracey begins by dissecting the sheer scope of the executive branch's ability to punish foreign leaders without congressional oversight or international consensus. He notes that while sanctions are theoretically reserved for United Nations Security Council authorization, the United States has long treated them as a routine instrument of foreign policy. "Radical and limitless use of sanctions has become such a commonplace feature of US governance that hardly anyone bats an eye about it anymore," Tracey writes, highlighting how this normalization has turned a legal outlier into a standard operating procedure. This observation is crucial for understanding the current crisis: the power to freeze a foreign leader's assets and revoke their visa is wielded with such casualness that it bypasses the usual checks and balances of diplomacy.
The author argues that this dynamic reveals the hollowness of "international law" when a superpower decides to act alone. "By the letter of 'international law,' sanctions are only supposed to be applied when the UN Security Council authorizes them, otherwise they are rogue 'unilateral' sanctions," he explains. Yet, the reality is that the United States acts as an "untrammeled global hegemon," imposing its will through financial coercion rather than legal consensus. This framing forces the reader to confront a stark truth: the rules of the global order are often secondary to the capacity for enforcement.
"Yet another example of why invoking 'international law' is almost always a silly red herring, with little or no practical import, and mostly functions as a pointless thought-experiment for people devoid of power to busy themselves with."
Critics might argue that Tracey underestimates the normative power of international law, which still constrains state behavior even when violated. However, his point stands that in a direct confrontation between the US Treasury and a smaller nation, legal theory offers little protection against economic strangulation. The Colombian banking system, for instance, has already frozen President Gustavo Petro's assets, not out of legal obligation to international norms, but out of fear of being cut off from the US-dominated financial system.
The Spectacle of Revolutionary Rhetoric
The commentary then shifts to a vivid, almost satirical account of President Petro's speech at the NYC Society for Ethical Culture, where Tracey portrays the Colombian leader as a figure of "slipshod revolutionary fervor." Tracey describes a ninety-minute address that meandered from the war in Gaza to Hegelian dialectics and a confused reference to a Hungarian philosopher, whom Petro apparently misremembered as the author of "The Assault Against Reason" rather than György Lukács' The Destruction of Reason. "The speech was winding and unstructured," Tracey observes, noting that the audience, composed mostly of left-wing New Yorkers, remained "idly enraptured" despite the lack of logical coherence.
Tracey is particularly critical of Petro's attempt to link the struggle in Gaza with Colombian identity through a convoluted theory of "Arab blood." He writes that Petro claimed "the first non-natives who 'set foot on American soil were Arabs,'" a historical assertion that Tracey finds both factually dubious and rhetorically confusing. This section of the piece serves to undermine the moral authority of Petro's call for a new international military bloc to liberate Gaza. "The time for revolution has come," Petro announced, according to Tracey, yet the proposed solution—a declaration of war on Israel and the United States—seems detached from geopolitical reality.
"Some might have wondered if this plan was slightly impractical. The presumed causal connection between 'winning' in Gaza and 'winning' against 'climate change' was apparently something that required no further elaboration in the context of a pro-Palestine gathering."
Tracey does not shy away from the human cost of these grandiose plans, noting the irony of Petro calling for an "army of humanity" to cool the oceans while the region faces imminent military escalation. He points out that the "genocide" Petro decried was already halted by a deal brokered by the administration, rendering Petro's call for war moot. "Evidently, no 'revolution' was required to bring about the cessation in hostilities that Trump and his emissaries wound up brokering just a few weeks later," Tracey notes, suggesting that the activist rhetoric is out of step with the actual diplomatic outcomes.
The Human Cost of Escalation
Perhaps the most sobering part of Tracey's analysis is his description of the military buildup in the Caribbean and the administration's campaign against "narco-terrorists." He details a "maritime killing spree" where boatmen are being bombed without meaningful disclosure of incriminating evidence or congressional authorization. "The body theoretically vested with war-declaring powers, known as the US House of Representatives, is indefinitely adjourned anyway on a weeks-long 'government shutdown' — the basis for which no one seems to quite understand," he writes, highlighting the democratic deficit in these military actions.
This section grounds the abstract debate over sanctions and rhetoric in the grim reality of civilian casualties. Tracey describes the administration's actions as a "bombing hapless boatmen to smithereens," a phrase that carries the weight of human suffering often lost in policy discussions. He questions the narrative of fighting "narco-terrorists," suggesting the true goal is coercing regime change in Venezuela. "And which anyone with two brain cells knows is really about coercing regime change in Venezuela, not some drop-in-the-bucket effort at drug interdiction," he asserts.
"Should he be confronted anytime soon with the barrel of an American gun, I will always be humbled that at least for that one glorious evening, I may have borne witness to the slipshod revolutionary fervor of President Gustavo Petro."
A counterargument worth considering is that Tracey's portrayal of Petro as irrational may overlook the genuine grievances of a leader facing a powerful adversary. However, the piece effectively argues that the administration's response—personalized sanctions against a head of state and his family—is equally extreme and potentially destabilizing. The accusation that Petro has allied with the "narco-terrorist regime of Nicolas Maduro" serves as a pretext for broader military intervention, raising the specter of a wider conflict in the region.
Bottom Line
Tracey's strongest argument lies in his exposure of the unchecked power of the executive branch to wage economic and military warfare without legal or democratic constraints. His biggest vulnerability is a tone that occasionally veers into mockery of Petro's intellectual failings, which risks distracting from the more serious implications of the administration's aggressive posture. The reader should watch for how this escalation plays out: whether the sanctions will force a diplomatic resolution or precipitate a military confrontation that leaves civilians in the Caribbean and Venezuela bearing the brunt of the conflict.