-Stella in cap and gown.
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Trump has a Middle East Doctrine.
The next unorthodox move Trump should make is to get us out of the U.N. until such time as it democratizes itself. (See 1 below.)
The next unorthodox move Trump should make is to get us out of the U.N. until such time as it democratizes itself. (See 1 below.)
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I have not read the over 500 page IG report regarding how the FBI and Justice Department handled the Clinton e mail investigation/scandal but I did listen to FBI Director Wray's press conference.
This is my impression:
a) In typical government bureaucratic double speak he said he took the report seriously and implementation of various aspects of the report had already begun.
b) Then, in the next sentence, he denied anything happened regarding bias but The FBI was going to emphasize, in their training, how to avoid bias.
c) We know the FBI, supported by The Justice Department, continues to stiff various Congressional oversight committees' request for documents and when they do release them they are heavily redacted.
It is clear, many references to redacted initials obviously suggest Obama was involved and knew what was going on etc.
d) Director Wray says that all those who violated FBI protocol will be severely dealt with.
e) He also cited statistics demonstrating the FBI continues to hire more agents beyond annual retirement levels so this monster grows bigger and bigger in proportion to America's overall population growth. Big Brother is amoebic.
Anyone who does not try to work for the Federal Government is a damn fool.
e) There is enough serious response, on the part of Director Wray, to give comfort to the unwashed there will be changes in The FBI but, I will bet dollars to donuts, very little will actually change because The Deep State never does. It grows like Topsy, intrudes more and more as it crushes our freedoms, spies without spying, intimidates and thus, continues along its merry way.
Call me cynical and distrusting but I have learned not to believe most of what I hear. Again I recite the story W.C Fields loved to tell as follows:
W.C goes to the doctor and the doc says WC better quit drinking, it will destroy your hearing. WC replies doc, stuff I drink is better than what I hear.
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Off to Atlanta to attend a wedding and start drinking!!!
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When history finally looks back it will conclude Angela Merkel proved to be an autocratic disaster.
She ain't no Maggie Thatcher. (See 2 below.)
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Dick
I have not read the over 500 page IG report regarding how the FBI and Justice Department handled the Clinton e mail investigation/scandal but I did listen to FBI Director Wray's press conference.
This is my impression:
a) In typical government bureaucratic double speak he said he took the report seriously and implementation of various aspects of the report had already begun.
b) Then, in the next sentence, he denied anything happened regarding bias but The FBI was going to emphasize, in their training, how to avoid bias.
c) We know the FBI, supported by The Justice Department, continues to stiff various Congressional oversight committees' request for documents and when they do release them they are heavily redacted.
It is clear, many references to redacted initials obviously suggest Obama was involved and knew what was going on etc.
d) Director Wray says that all those who violated FBI protocol will be severely dealt with.
e) He also cited statistics demonstrating the FBI continues to hire more agents beyond annual retirement levels so this monster grows bigger and bigger in proportion to America's overall population growth. Big Brother is amoebic.
Anyone who does not try to work for the Federal Government is a damn fool.
e) There is enough serious response, on the part of Director Wray, to give comfort to the unwashed there will be changes in The FBI but, I will bet dollars to donuts, very little will actually change because The Deep State never does. It grows like Topsy, intrudes more and more as it crushes our freedoms, spies without spying, intimidates and thus, continues along its merry way.
Call me cynical and distrusting but I have learned not to believe most of what I hear. Again I recite the story W.C Fields loved to tell as follows:
W.C goes to the doctor and the doc says WC better quit drinking, it will destroy your hearing. WC replies doc, stuff I drink is better than what I hear.
++++++++++++++++++++++++
Off to Atlanta to attend a wedding and start drinking!!!
+++++++++++++++++++++++
When history finally looks back it will conclude Angela Merkel proved to be an autocratic disaster.
She ain't no Maggie Thatcher. (See 2 below.)
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Dick
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1)The “Trump Doctrine” for the Middle East
Trump has shown the strength of the United States and restored its credibility in a region where strength and force determine credibility.
Trump more broadly laid the foundation for a new alliance of the United States with the Sunni Arab world, but he put two conditions on it: a cessation of all Sunni Arab support for Islamic terrorism and an openness to the prospect of a regional peace that included Israel.
Secretary of State Pompeo spoke of the “Palestinians”, not of the Palestinian Authority, as in Iran, possibly to emphasize the distinction between the people and their leadership, and that the leadership in both situations, may no longer be part of the solution. Hamas, for the US, is clearly not part of any solution.
Netanyahu rightly said that Palestinian leaders, whoever they may be, do not want peace with Israel, but “peace without Israel”. What instead could take place would be peace without the Palestinian leaders. What could also take place would be peace without the Iranian mullahs.
After three successive American Presidents had used a six-month waiver to defer moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem for more than two decades, President Donald J. Trump decided not to wait any longer. On December 7, 2017, he declared that the United States recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel; the official embassy transfer took place on May 14th, the day of Israel's 70th anniversary.
From the moment of Trump's declaration, leaders of the Muslim world expressed anger and announced major trouble. An Islamic summit conference was convened in Istanbul a week later, and ended with statements about a “crime against Palestine”. Western European leaders followed suit. Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel said that President Trump's decision was a “serious mistake” and could have huge “consequences”. French President Emmanuel Macron, going further, declared that the decision could provoke a “war”.
Despite these ominous predictions, trouble remained largely absent. The Istanbul statement remained a statement. The “war” anticipated by Macron did not break out.
The Islamic terrorist organization Hamas sent masses of rioters from Gaza to tear down Israel's border fence and cross over, to force Israeli soldiers to fire, thereby allowing Hamas to have bodies of “martyrs” to show to the cameras. So far, Hamas has sent 62 of its own people to their death. Fifty of them were, by Hamas's own admission, members of Hamas.
Palestinian terrorist groups fired rockets into southern Israel; Israeli jets retaliated with airstrikes. Hamas sent kites, attached to incendiary devices and explosives, over the border to Israel. So far, 200 of the fire-kites that Hamas sent have destroyed 6,200 acresof Israeli forests and farmland.
Pundits who predicted more violent reactions have been surprised by the relatively quiet reaction of the Palestinian and Muslim communities. The reason might be called the “Trump Doctrine for the Middle East”.
One element of it consisted of crushing the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. President Trump had promised quickly to clear the world of what had become a main backbone of Islamic terrorism. He kept his promise in less than a year, and without a massive deployment of American troops. Trump has shown the strength of the United States and restored its credibility in a region where strength and force determine credibility.
Another element of it was put in place during President Trump's trip to Saudi Arabia in May 2017. President Trump renewed ties which had seriously deteriorated during the previous 8 years. Trump more broadly laid the foundation for a new alliance of the United States with the Sunni Arab world, but he put two conditions on it: a cessation of all Sunni Arab support for Islamic terrorism and an openness to the prospect of a regional peace that included Israel.
Both conditions are being gradually fulfilled. In June 2017, Saudi Arabia's King Salman chose his son Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) as heir to the throne. MBS started an internal revolution to impose new directions on the kingdom. The Islamic Military Counter Terrorism Coalition, created on December 15, 2015, was endorsed by the United States; it held its inaugural meeting on November 26, 2017. In addition, links between Israeli and Saudi security services were strengthened and coordination between the Israeli and Egyptian militaries intensified.
An alliance between Israel and the main countries of the Sunni Arab world to contain Iran also slowly and unofficially began taking shape. MBS, calling called Hamas a terrorist organization, saying that it must “be destroyed”. He told representatives of Jewish organizations in New York that Palestinian leaders need to “take the [American] proposals or shut up.”
Pictured: President Donald Trump hosts Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House on March 20, 2018, in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch-Pool/Getty Images)
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Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas was summoned to Riyadh twice — in November and December 2017; and it appears he was “asked” to keep quiet. Never has the distance between Palestinian organizations, and Saudi Arabia and the Sunni Arab world, seemed so far. The only Sunni Arab country to have maintained ties with Hamas is Qatar, but the current Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim ben Hamad Al Thani, has been under pressure to change his stance.
Immediately after President Trump left Riyadh, a third element emerged. The US presidential plane went directly from Riyadh to in Israel: for the first time, a direct flight between Saudi Arabia and Israel took place. President Trump went to Jerusalem, where he became the first sitting US President to visit the Western Wall, the only historical remains of a retaining wall from the ancient Temple of King Solomon. During his campaign, Trump had referred to Jerusalem as “the eternal capital of the Jewish people”, implicitly acknowledging that the Jews have had their roots there for 3,000 years.
After his visit to the Wall, President Trump went to Bethlehem and told Mahmoud Abbas what no American President had ever said: that Abbas is a liar and that he is personally responsible for the incitement to violence and terror. In the days that followed, the US Congress demanded that the Palestinian Authority renounce incentivizing terrorism by paying cash to imprisoned Palestinian terrorists and families of terrorists killed while carrying out attacks. President Trump's Middle East negotiators, Jared Kushner and Jason Greenblatt made it clear to Palestinian leaders that US aid to the Palestinian Authority could end if the US demand was not met. Nikki Haley told the United Nations that the US could stop funding UNWRA if Palestinian leaders refused to negotiate and accept what the US is asking for. Since it was founded in 1994, the Palestinian Authority has never been subjected to such intense American pressure.
The fourth element was President Trump's decision to leave the Iran nuclear deal. President Trump immediately announced he would restore “the harshest, strongest, most stringent sanctions” to suffocate the mullahs' regime. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has since presented to Iran a list of 12 “basic requirements” for a new agreement.
President Trump's decision came in a context where the Iran regime has just suffered a series of heavy blows: the Israeli Mossad'sseizure in Tehran of highly confidential documents showing that Iran has not ceased to lie about its nuclear program; the revelation by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of the Mossad operation, and the Israeli army's decisive response to an Iranian rocket barrage launched from Syrian territory. By it, Israel showed its determination not to allow Russia to support Iran when Iran uses its bases to attack Israel.
Netanyahu was invited by Russian President Vladimir Putin to Moscow on May 9 to commemorate the Soviet victory over Germany in 1945; during that visit, Putin seems to have promised Netanyahu neutrality if Israel were attacked by Iranian forces in Syria. Putin, eager to preserve his Russian bases in Syria, clearly views Israel as a force for stability in the Middle East and Iran as a force for instability — too big a risk for Russian support.
In recent months, the Iranian regime has become, along with Erdogan's Turkey, one of the main financial supporters of the “Palestinian cause” and Hamas's main backer. It seems that Iran asked Hamas to organize the marches and riots along the Gaza-Israel border. When the violence from Gaza became more intense, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was summoned to Cairo by Egypt's intelligence chief, who told him that if violence does not stop, the Israel military would carry out drastic actions, and Egypt would be silent. It could become difficult for Iran to incite Palestinian organizations to widespread violence in the near future.
It could become extremely difficult for Iran to continue financially to support the “Palestinian cause” in the coming months. It could soon become financially unbearable for Iran to maintain its presence in Syria and provide sophisticated weapons to Hezbollah. Turkish President Erdogan speaks loudly, but he seems to know what lines not to cross.
Protests in Iran have become less intense since January, but the discontent and frustrations of the population persist and could get worse.
The Trump administration undoubtedly realizes that the Iranian regime will not accept the requirements presented by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and that the harsh new sanctions might lead to new major uprisings in Iran, and the fall of the regime. Ambassador John Bolton, now National Security Advisor, mentioned in January that the “strategic interest of the United States” is to see the regime overthrown.
Referring recently to the situation in the Middle East and the need to achieve peace, Pompeo spoke of the “Palestinians”, not of the Palestinian Authority, as in Iran, possibly to emphasize the distinction between the people and their leadership, and that the leadership in both situations, may no longer be part of the solution. Hamas, for the US, is clearly not part of any solution.
No one knows exactly what the peace plan to be presented by the Trump administration will contain, but it seems certain that it will not include the “right of return” of so-called “Palestinian refugees” and will not propose East Jerusalem as the “capital of a Palestinian state”. The plan will no doubt be rejected by both the Palestinian Authority and Hamas; it already has been, sight unseen.
Netanyahu rightly said that Palestinian leaders, whoever they may be, do not want peace with Israel, but “peace without Israel”. What instead could take place would be peace without the Palestinian leaders. What could also take place would be peace without the Iran's mullahs.
It should be noted that on December 7, 2017, when Donald Trump announced the transfer of the United States Embassy to Jerusalem, the leaders of the Muslim world who protested were mostly Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Iran's Hassan Rouhani. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Oman did not send representatives to the Islamic summit conference in Istanbul. When the US embassy in Jerusalem opened its doors on May 14, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the Gulf emirates were quiet.
On that day, Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron repeated what they had said on December 7, 2017: that the embassies ofGermany and France in Israel would remain in Tel Aviv. Macron condemned the “heinous acts” committed by the Israeli military on the Gaza border but not aggression of Hamas in urging its people, and even paying them, to storm Gaza's border with Israel.
If current trends continue, Macron and Merkel could be among the last supporters of the “Palestinian cause.” They sound as if they will do just about anything to save the corrupt Palestinian Authority.
They are also doing everything to save the moribund Iran “nuclear deal,” and are deferential to the mullahs' regime. During aEuropean summit held in Sofia, Bulgaria, on May 16, the Trump administration was harshly criticized by the European heads of state who argued that Europe will “find a way around” US sanctions and “resist” President Trump. European companies are already leavingIran in droves, evidently convinced that they will be better off cutting their losses and keeping good relations with the United States.
On June 3-5, Benjamin Netanyahu went to Europe to try to persuade Merkel, Macron and British Prime Minister Theresa May to give up backing the Iran nuclear deal. He failed, predictably, but at least had the opportunity to explain the Iranian danger to Europeans and the need to act.
As Iran's nuclear ties to North Korea have intensified in the last two years — Iran seems to have relied on North Korea to advance its own nuclear projects — the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula that might have begun with the Donald Trump-Kim Jong-Unmeeting in Singapore on June 12, clearly will not strengthen the Iranian position.
European leaders seem not to want to see that a page is turning in the Middle East. They seem not to want to see that, regardless of their mercenary immorality, of their behavior staying on the page of yesterday, is only preventing them from understanding the future
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2) Angela Merkel’s political near-death experience in Bavarian brawl
BERLIN — After years of cautious sparring, Angela Merkel’s standoff with her party’s Bavarian partners over refugee policy escalated into a bare-knuckled brawl on Thursday, threatening both the stability of Germany’s grand coalition and the conservative bloc that has been the bedrock of its political establishment for decades.
2) Angela Merkel’s political near-death experience in Bavarian brawl
BERLIN — After years of cautious sparring, Angela Merkel’s standoff with her party’s Bavarian partners over refugee policy escalated into a bare-knuckled brawl on Thursday, threatening both the stability of Germany’s grand coalition and the conservative bloc that has been the bedrock of its political establishment for decades.
Merkel’s refusal to endorse a plan by her Bavarian interior minister to turn back some refugees at the German border set the stage for a showdown that, barring a last-minute compromise, could bring down her government.
“I consider illegal immigration to be one of the biggest challenges for the European Union and think that we therefore should not act unilaterally, without consultation and at the expense of third parties,” Merkel said Thursday at the end of a day packed with crisis meetings.
The dispute ostensibly revolves around the question of whether Germany should turn back refugees who have applied for asylum in other EU countries. Merkel opposes the policy on the grounds it could hasten the collapse of Europe’s system of open frontiers by forcing Germany’s neighbors to re-impose border controls.
The root of the dispute has less to do with that narrow question, however, than with Merkel’s broader refugee policy, which the CSU has resisted from the beginning.
The dispute has exposed deep fissures within the center-right bloc that will be difficult to repair as long as Merkel remains chancellor.
After a day of dramatic political theater, which included a rare suspension of a Bundestag session to allow the fractious coalition parties to regroup, the chancellor appeared to have secured the allegiance of her own Christian Democrats (CDU) in parliament. That came after a lengthy closed-door session that included an appeal from Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble, a longtime Merkel ally, on her behalf.
The sudden ferocity of the clash caught even Merkel’s own backbenchers by surprise. Though a number of them agree with the CSU’s position on asylum, they circled the wagons around the chancellor as soon as she looked threatened. Out of 50 MPs who spoke during the CDU meeting Thursday, only a handful criticized her.
Even as Merkel vowed to stand her ground, the leaders of the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) dug in their own heels. Underscoring the deepening estrangement: The two parties, which normally caucus together, convened separately.
Given the high stakes, a collapse of the government remains unlikely. That said, even if the two groups manage to cobble together a compromise, the dispute has exposed deep fissures within the center-right bloc that will be difficult to repair as long as Merkel remains chancellor.
On the frontline
Bavaria, Germany’s southernmost state, has been the point of entry for most of the refugees who arrived in the country in recent years. As the influx intensified, CSU leaders prodded Merkel to enforce stricter border controls, going as far as threatening to petition Germany’s constitutional court to force her hand.
In the end, Merkel acquiesced, but the bad blood between the chancellor and CSU leader Horst Seehofer, who once called Merkel’s refugee policy a “capitulation,” remained.
Seehofer, who is now interior minister, demanded an “upper limit” on the number of refugees coming into Germany, a step Merkel long opposed. In order to secure the CSU’s backing for a grand coalition with the Social Democrats in February, Merkel again backed down, accepting a soft limit of about 200,000.
Though refugee arrivals to Germany have fallen sharply — only 64,000 came through April — the CSU is once again asking for further concessions. That’s because the party, which has ruled Bavaria almost without interruption since the war, faces a difficult state election in October, with polls predicting the CSU will lose its absolute majority.
Many Bavarians are frustrated with the federal government’s course on migration and have defected to the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD).
Even outside of Bavaria, many Germans don’t trust Merkel to fix the refugee system. Though 64 percent of Germans approve of Merkel’s overall job performance, 53 percent say she hasn’t managed the refugee influx well, according to a poll released by German public television last week.
The poll data appear to have emboldened the CSU to pursue a direct confrontation with the chancellor.
Meanwhile about two-thirds of Germans agree with the CSU’s position on turning away refugees at the border, according to a separate poll released Thursday.
Though the CSU has consistently taken a harder line than Merkel’s CDU on refugee issues, it hasn’t escaped criticism for what opponents in Bavaria perceive to be an open-door policy on migration. The recent discovery of suspected corruption at a refugee center in Bremen and the alleged murder of a 14-year-old German girl at the hands of an Iraqi refugee last month have further inflamed passions.
Those cases and the poll data appear to have emboldened the CSU to pursue a direct confrontation with the chancellor.
Through it all, Merkel has insisted that the only real solution to the refugee question is a broader European approach, a call she repeated in a television interview on Sunday. But after three years of waiting for an EU solution to materialize, Seehofer has refused to back down.
Last Tuesday, Seehofer planned to unveil a “masterplan” to overhaul Germany’s asylum system. The blueprint includes 63 measures, including the option of turning back refugees at the border. Merkel refused to let him present the plan, arguing Berlin needed to await the outcome of the upcoming European summit at the end of June, where the asylum question will be on the agenda.
Merkel has insisted that the only real solution to the refugee question is a broader European approach | Hayoung Jeon/EPA
In an effort to defuse the tensions Thursday, Merkel offered a compromise: Until a European asylum system is in place, she would seek to conclude bilateral agreements with Italy and Greece to send back refugees who arrive in Germany.
Again, Seehofer and his party declined to back down, threatening to push forward with the policy after a CSU party vote on Monday. Such a course could leave Merkel with no choice but to fire Seehofer, a step that would almost certainly bring down the government.
“We have think about our own population and not just Europe,” Markus Söder, the powerful Bavarian premier, said on Thursday.
In rejecting Merkel’s call on the CSU to await the results of the EU summit, Söder argued that the best way to move the rest of Europe was for Germany to take the initiative.
“We have no trust or confidence that something can be achieved in two weeks that hasn’t been possible for three years,” he said.
What many observers see in the CSU’s hard line is a fairly transparent attempt to show its independence to Bavarian voters ahead of a state election in October.
If so, the tactic isn’t without risk.
If it relinquishes its link to the CDU, the CSU would lose a key aspect of its appeal in Bavaria, especially amongst centrist voters.
By openly challenging Merkel’s authority on a key policy, the CSU tacitly signaled a willingness to sacrifice both its longstanding alliance with the CDU and the grand coalition itself.
Despite recurring tensions and threats of divorce, the two conservative parties, collectively known as the “Union” in German, have collaborated without interruption throughout the postwar period. In the Bundestag, they form a single parliamentary group.
Though the CSU is a regional party, its partnership with the CDU gives it influence over national politics that a party its size wouldn’t normally enjoy. It accounted for less than one-fifth of the conservative bloc’s total vote in last year’s election. Together, the parties won 33 percent of the electorate.
If it relinquishes its link to the CDU, the CSU would lose a key aspect of its appeal in Bavaria, especially amongst centrist voters. The CDU could also retaliate by entering Bavarian politics with its own candidates, further sapping the CSU’s hold on power there.
That threat to the CSU’s relevance is what some in the CDU believe will pull the party’s leadership back from the brink. If the CSU was to pull the plug on the coalition, possibly triggering a new election, it would expose itself to accusations of thrusting the country into political chaos. Germans just voted in September and it took about six months of difficult negotiations to form a government. Another trip to the polls is the last thing the population wants.
CSU leader Host Seehofer, who is now interior minister, demanded an “upper limit” on the number of refugees coming into Germany | Sean Gallup/Getty Images
Given the number of refugees has dwindled, the principle the CSU is fighting for — the right to turn back some asylum seekers at the border — is largely academic.
For one, the policy may only kick in once the 200,000 threshold was crossed. Even then, it would only apply to those refugees who had applied for asylum in another EU country, currently about 15 percent of the total.
In other words, in the current environment, the numbers are modest.
Malu Dreyer, the Social Democratic premier of Rhineland-Pfalz, called the CSU’s tactics “scandalous” in a television interview on Thursday.
“The CSU is risking a lot, namely the stability of this government,” she said.
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