Two Calls Regarding Iran. Heavyweight Vs. Lightweight. Amity Shlaes' New Book.

My Australian "cousin" obviously did not like it:  https://youtu.be/1sLUUTlWunY
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More beauty from Sedona by my photographer  friend.
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I saw the new version of "Midway" yesterday and it reminded me Iran remains a near term threat/irritant  and China a longer one. (See 1 and 1a below.)

I seriously doubt provocations from Iran will become an excuse response from Netanyahu and Trump but one never knows for sure.

I do, however,  believe as the riots and protests in Iran increase in fervor, the bellicosity from Iran will increase.
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Collins versus Schiff, round 15. Heavy weight against a light weight.  Most unusual fight.  (See 2 below.)
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Salena discusses her book's implications for 2020 election. (See 3 below.)
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After I posted I saw "Midway" a dear friend and fellow memo reader sent this. (See 4 below.)
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Our Grandson from LA  leaves tomorrow so today we took him around Savannah and to Scad to see the SCAD STORY. It was outstanding and truly gave insight into what a creative school it is.  The video was unbelievably brilliant and it is a must see.

Also, went to Shaver's book store and I bought Amity Shlaes' new book about The Failure of The Great Society. I posted the review several memos ago. She writes a history as if it is a novel.
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DORIS
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1) Trump and Netanyahu discuss ‘threat from Iran’ in second call in weeks

Terse statement from White House says leaders also talk about ‘other critical bilateral and regional issues,’ but gives no details

By TOI staff and Agencies

US President Donald Trump spoke Sunday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with the two leaders focusing talks on “the threat from Iran,” the White House said.

“The leaders discussed the threat from Iran, as well as other critical bilateral and regional issues,” a terse statement said late Sunday.

There was no immediate readout on the call from Israel.

The two last spoke on November 19, when Netanyahu thanked the president for Washington’s decision to repudiate a State Department legal opinion that said West Bank settlements were illegal.

Though Netanyahu and Trump were once close allies who touted their friendship to their respective bases, ties between the two have been seen as cooling in recent months as the Israeli premier has struggled to cling to power.

Netanyahu has also reportedly become uneasy with what he perceives as Trump’s unwillingness to stand up to Iranian aggression.

The two leaders will both be in London later this week at a NATO summit. While Netanyahu is reportedly planning on meeting several European heads of state, no plans for a sit down with Trump have been announced.

The call came hours after Netanyahu lambasted European nations for seeking to circumvent US sanctions on Iran.

“While the Iranian regime is killing its own people, European countries rush to support that very murderous regime,” Netanyahu said in a video released Sunday, castigating the six new European members of the INSTEX barter mechanism.

In a separate statement, Israel’s Foreign Ministry said “Belgium, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden could not have picked worse timing. The hundreds of innocent Iranians murdered during the latest round of protests are rolling in their graves.”

Protests broke out across sanctions-hit Iran on November 15, hours after a sharp fuel price hike was announced.

Iraqi anti-government protesters burn an Iranian flag during protests in Baghdad, Iraq, November 29, 2019. (AP Photo/Hadi Mizban)

Reports of deaths and arrests emerged as security forces were deployed to rein in demonstrations which turned violent in some areas, with dozens of banks, gas stations and police stations torched.

The London-based human rights group Amnesty International has said that 161 demonstrators were killed.

Late Sunday, the New York Times reported that Guards forces had massacred up to 100 people hiding in a marsh in a single incident.

A 2015 international agreement set out restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of Western sanctions. The deal was opposed by Israel, which argued that Iran’s regime would find ways to violate the agreement, and would use the breathing room to expand its ballistic missile program and support for terror groups throughout the region.

Last year, the US unilaterally withdrew from the deal and reinstated crippling sanctions against Tehran. The INSTEX system is designed to sidestep the sanctions and keep the deal afloat.

Aman exchanges Iranian Rials for US Dollars at an exchange shop in the Iranian capital, Tehran, on August 8, 2018. (AFP Photo/Atta Kenare/File)

Israel has praised the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign against the Islamic Republic. But Netanyahu lamented on Sunday that European nations were in a “rush to appease” Tehran.

Pointing to mass protests against Iran-backed regimes and groups throughout the region, from Iraq to Lebanon to Iran itself, Netanyahu said the people of the region were “fed up. They’re fed up with corruption. They’re fed up with failing economies. They’re fed [up] with the siphoning off of their treasure and their lives to Iran’s wars of aggression in the region.

“And while the people of the Middle East bravely stand up to Iran and its henchmen, here’s the absurd thing: While all of this is happening, countries in Europe are working to bypass US sanctions against Iran…. While Iran bombs Saudi Arabia’s oil installations, while Iran rushes to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons, European countries rush to appease Iran with even more concessions.”

In an apparent reference to World War II, the Israeli leader added: “These European countries should be ashamed of themselves. Have they learned nothing from history? Well, apparently not.

“They are enabling a fanatic terrorist state to develop nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, thereby bringing disaster to themselves and upon everyone else.”

The Paris-based INSTEX functions as a clearing house allowing Iran to continue to sell oil and import other products or services in exchange. The system has not yet enabled any transactions.

Iran has gradually increased enrichment and the stockpiling of nuclear material in contravention of the 2005 agreement, as a means of pressuring Europe to bolster the INSTEX system. European countries have expressed alarm at Iran’s moves, but say they remain committed to the nuclear accord.

The accession of the six new members “further strengthens INSTEX and demonstrates European efforts to facilitate legitimate trade between Europe and Iran,” France, Germany, and Britain said.

It represents “a clear expression of our continuing commitment to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” — the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal — the trio added.

They insisted Iran must return to full compliance with its commitments under the deal “without delay.”

1a) Iranian general: Our missiles are aimed at 21 US bases in the region

Allahnoor Noorollahi declares the Islamic Republic prepared to fight its ‘greatest enemy,’ recalls Khamenei’s vow to ‘raze’ Tel Aviv

By TOI staff

An Iranian general has warned that Iran’s missile arsenals are aimed at 21 American military bases in the Middle East and the country is prepared for “the greatest war against the greatest enemy.”

In a November 29 speech, at an event in the southern city of Bushehr commemorating 40 years since the establishment of the Basij paramilitary force, Gen. Allahnoor Noorollahi also said that Iran had the ability to raze Haifa and Tel Aviv to the ground.

Noorollahi serves as a top adviser to the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Officers College. His speech was broadcast on Bushehr TV, and was reported on and translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute.

 “Iran is the world’s fourth [strongest] missile power after the US, Russia, and China,” he boasted in his comments, which were translated Sunday by the MEMRI watchdog group.

Noorollahi claimed the NATO military alliance had purportedly warned that Iran could launch as many as 20,000 missiles per day, but that the number could actually be higher in a future conflict with the United States.

A Shahab-3 surface-to-surface missile is on display next to a portrait of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at an exhibition by Iran’s army and paramilitary Revolutionary Guard celebrating “Sacred Defense Week” marking the 39th anniversary of the start of 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, at Baharestan Square in downtown Tehran, Iran, September 25, 2019. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

“Unfortunately, some Gulf countries have become a military camp for our enemy. I must say this, 21 of their bases constitute targets for our missiles. NATO itself announced that Iran’s 110 missile bases and launching sites are capable of launching 20,000 missiles per day. This is what the enemy says. They only acknowledge part [of our capability]. When a country reveals not only its underground missile bases but also its missile ‘cities’ to the enemy – this reflects readiness and capabilities.

“It means that we have capability to confront the greatest enemy,” he added, a reference to the US, which the regime has long characterized as its arch-foe and calls the “Great Satan.”

He said America’s regional allies were not Iran’s enemies, and reiterated the claim by the regime’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei that the Islamic Republic was capable of “razing” Tel Aviv and Haifa to the ground.

“Saudi Arabia and the region’s countries are neither on our level nor are they our enemies. Our enemy is the [country] that came to Kuwait and built six large bases there. This enemy knows that if it transgresses… We do not want to cause harm to our neighbors unless we are forced to,” he said.

The aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, left, the air-defense destroyer HMS Defender and the guided-missile destroyer USS Farragut transit the Strait of Hormuz with the guided-missile cruiser USS Leyte Gulf, provided on November 19, 2019. (Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Zachary Pearson/US Navy via AP)

Noorollahi’s comments came just days after the Revolutionary Guard’s top commander, Gen. Hossein Salami, threatened to destroy Israel, the US and other countries, as he addressed a pro-government demonstration denouncing last month’s violent protests over a fuel price hike.

Salami accused the US, Britain, Israel and Saudi Arabia of stoking the unrest.

“If you cross our red line, we will destroy you,” he said. “We will not leave any move unanswered.”

“We have shown restraint … we have shown patience towards the hostile moves of America, the Zionist regime (Israel), and Saudi Arabia against the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Salami added, according to Reuters.

In this undated photo released by Sepahnews, the website of the Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Gen. Hossein Salami speaks in a meeting in Tehran, Iran. (Sepahnews via AP)

He said if Iran decides to respond, “the enemy will not have security anywhere,” adding that “our patience has a limit.”

Iran has accused the US, Israel and Saudi Arabia of engineering large protests sparked by a 200 percent jump in the price of gasoline.

Officials said the demonstrations turned violent because of the intervention of “thugs,” backed by royalists and Iran’s arch-enemies.

At a pro-government rally last Monday, which state TV referred to as the “Rise of the people of Tehran against riots,” protesters carried signs bearing traditional anti-US slogans.

But speakers also criticized President Hassan Rouhani’s administration for the way the fuel price hike was implemented, even as they called for capital punishment for rioters and further restrictions on social media platforms.

Iraqi demonstrators gather as flames start consuming Iran’s consulate in the southern Iraqi Shiite holy city of Najaf on November 27, 2019, two months into the country’s most serious social crisis in decades. (AFP)

During the violence, dozens of banks, gas pumps and police stations were torched across the Islamic Republic. The United Nations said it feared that dozens died, while Amnesty International said more than 100 were believed to have been killed.

Iran has been gripped by an economic crisis since the US restored painful sanctions after withdrawing from the 2015 nuclear deal.

At a meeting Monday with family members of a security officer who was killed in the violence, Salami vowed that Iran will “take revenge for the security defenders on the US, the UK, Israel and their mercenaries inside Iran,” the official IRNA news agency reported

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2)

Doug Collins Slaps Adam Schiff With a Reality: Here's Why We're Calling You For the Impeachment Hearings

By Jim Hayek

House Republicans have continually pushed back against Democrats and their impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump’s call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. One of the biggest issues the GOP had with this entire saga – besides the fact that the saga is entirely partisan and a witch hunt based on emotions, not fact – is the lack of due process. Democrats started this impeachment process without allowing Republicans to have any say in what was taking place. Republicans couldn’t call witnesses or issue subpoenas.

The Democrats finally decided to allow Republicans to issue subpoenas and interrogatories, although House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NJ) has to approve them. And we know how that will work.

According to House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Doug Collins (R-GA) told Fox News’ Chris Wallace that they will definitely call witnesses. And the very first person will be Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA).

“First and foremost, the first person that needs to testify is Adam Schiff,” Collins said. “Adam Schiff is the author of this report. Adam Schiff is the author of many things, a lot of them found to be false the past couple years. But he knew the author of this report. He’s compared himself to a special counsel in the past. This is what he said he was doing.”

“When we go back to Clinton and even Nixon, Ken Starr was a special counsel, he presented a report that we’re going to get in the Judiciary [Committee]. He came and sat and testified under oath and took questions from all sides, including the White House,” Collins explained. “My first and foremost witness is Adam Schiff.”

According to Collins, Schiff has “put himself in the position” he’s in, which is why he needs to come before the various Committees to testify and be cross-examined.

“If [Schiff] chooses not to, the only question is veracity and what he’s putting in his report. I question his motives and why he’s doing this,” the Judiciary Committee’s Ranking Member explained. “It’s easy to hide behind a report. It’s easy to hide behind a gavel in Intelligence Committee’s behind closed-door hearings but it’s going to be another thing to get up and have to answer questions about what his staff knew, how he knew, what he knew about the whistleblower report, his interactions that he’s had with the Ukraine… and also why he has not released documents to our Committee and reports to our Committee that we need to actually proceed in our Committee, the Judiciary Committee, which is the Committee of impeachment.”

Collins brought up one other point: if the Democrats truly believe they have found Trump committed impeachable offenses, why won’t Schiff and Intelligence Democrats hand that information over to the Judiciary Committee?

“Give us all the materials and don’t let Jerry Nadler write a crazy letter that says on the sixth let us. know who your witnesses are,” Collins said. “We don’t even have the information from the Intel Committee yet. That’s why this is a problematic exercise and a made-for-tv event coming on Wednesday.”

Democrats want to be able to say they gave Republicans the ability to call witnesses and issue subpoenas yet they refuse to hand over the very documents their counterparts need in order to issue said subpoenas.

The Democrats botched this process from the beginning. We knew it was going to be a mess when they launched their inquiry before Trump released the transcript of his call. They doubled down when the Democrats voted, along party lines, weeks down the road to officially begin the process that they had already started.

Buckle up, folks. This is just another bumpy ride on the impeachment train.
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3)

dispatches from

         the middle of somewhere 

By Salena Zito

Great Revolt is now out in paperback with a detailed and comprehensive afterword to understand not just what happened in 2018 and what that means about this new coalition, but what to really expect in 2020. 

The perfect holiday gift whether your friends and family supported the president or are looking to understand the new conservative, populist republican coalition our book makes the perfect gift for them or yourself as we head into 2020.


NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY FOREIGN AFFAIRS • “Unlike most retellings of the 2016 election, The Great Revolt provides a cohesive, non-wild-eyed argument about where the Republican Party could be headed.”—The Atlantic

Political experts were wrong about the 2016 election and they continue to blow it, predicting the coming demise of the president without pausing to consider the durability of the winds that swept him into office.

My co-author Brad Todd and I traveled over 27,000 miles of country roads to interview more than three hundred Trump voters in ten swing counties. What emerges is a portrait of a group of citizens who span job descriptions, income brackets, education levels, and party allegiances, united by their desire to be part of a movement larger than themselves. They want to put pragmatism before ideology and localism before globalism, and demand the respect they deserve from Washington. 

The 2016 election signaled a realignment in American politics that will outlast any one president. Zito and Todd reframe the discussion of the “Trump voter” to answer the question,  What’s next?

Click here for the full story

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4 ) May we  never forget!!

Not only is the pictures awesome, but so are   the statistics!

During the 3-1/2 years of World War II that started with the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor in December of 1941 and ended with the surrender of Germany and Japan in 1945, "We the People of the U.S.A." produced the following:

            22 aircraft carriers

              8 battleships

            48 cruisers

          349 destroyers

          420 destroyer escorts

          203 submarines

            34 million tons of merchant ships

   100,000 fighter aircraft

     98,000 bombers

     24,000 transport aircraft

     58,000 training aircraft

     93,000 tanks

   257,000 artillery pieces

   105,000 mortars

3,000,000 machine guns and

2,500,000 military trucks

We put 16.1 million men in uniform in the various armed services, invaded Africa, invaded Sicily and Italy, won the battle for the Atlantic, planned and executed D-Day, marched across the Pacific and Europe, developed the atomic bomb and, ultimately, conquered Japan and Germany.

It’s amazing what America did in those days

Many of you already know the story, here is the update.

THE FINAL TOAST

The text below references the movie “Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo.”

There is a second film made in 1944 that details the “show” trials of the 11 airmen

that were captured & tortured by the Japanese titled “The Purple Heart.”

Three were executed as war criminals, a fourth died in captivity.

The  FINAL TOAST! They bombed Tokyo 78 years ago.

They once were among the most universally admired and revered men in the United States . There were 80 of the Raiders in April 1942, when they carried out one of the most courageous and heart-stirring military operations in this nation's history. The mere mention of their unit's name, in those years, would bring tears to the eyes of grateful Americans. Now only four survive

  After Japan 's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor,

with the United States reeling and wounded,

something dramatic was needed to turn the war effort around.

 Even though there were no friendly airfields close enough to Japan

for the United States to launch a retaliation, a daring plan was devised.

Sixteen B-25s were modified so that they could take off from the deck of an aircraft carrier.

This had never before been tried -- sending such big, heavy bombers from a carrier.

The 16 five-man crews, under the command of Lt. Col. James Doolittle,

who himself flew the lead plane off the USS Hornet,

knew that they would not be able to return to the carrier.

They would have to hit Japan and then hope to make it to China for a safe landing.

But on the day of the raid, the Japanese military caught wind of the plan.

The Raiders were told that they would have to take off from much farther out

in the Pacific Ocean than they had counted on.

They were told that because of this they would not have enough fuel to make it to safety.
And those men went anyway.

They bombed Tokyo and then flew as far as they could.

Four planes crash-landed; 11 more crews bailed out, and three of the Raiders died.

Eight more were captured; three were executed.

Another died of starvation in a Japanese prison camp. One crew made it to Russia .

The Doolittle Raiders sent a message from the United States to its enemies,

and to the rest of the world: We will fight. And, no matter what it takes, we will win.

Of the 80 Raiders, 62 survived the war. They were celebrated as national heroes, models of bravery.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer produced a motion picture based on the raid; "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo ,"

starring Spencer Tracy and Van Johnson, was a patriotic and emotional box-office hit,

and the phrase became part of the national lexicon.

In the movie-theater previews for the film, MGM proclaimed that it was presenting the story........

"with supreme pride."

Beginning in 1946, the surviving Raiders have held a reunion each April,

to commemorate the mission. The reunion is in a different city each year.

In 1959, the city of Tucson , Arizona , as a gesture of respect and gratitude,

presented the Doolittle Raiders with a set of 80 silver goblets.

Each goblet was engraved with the name of a Raider.

Every year, a wooden display case bearing all 80 goblets is transported to the reunion city.

Each time a Raider passes away, his goblet is turned upside down in the case at the next reunion,

as his old friends bear solemn witness.

Also in the wooden case is a bottle of 1896 Hennessy Very Special cognac.

The year is not happenstance: 1896 was when Jimmy Doolittle was born.

There has always been a plan: When there are only two surviving Raiders,

they would open the bottle, at last drink from it,

and toast their comrades who preceded them in death.

As 2013 began, there were five living Raiders; then, in February,

Tom Griffin passed away at age 96.

What a man he was. After bailing out of his plane

Over a mountainous Chinese forest after the Tokyo raid, he became ill with malaria,

and almost died. When he recovered, he was sent to Europe to fly more combat missions.

He was shot down, captured, and spent 22 months in a German prisoner of war camp.

The selflessness of these men, the sheer guts ... There was a passage in

the Cincinnati Enquirer obituary for Mr. Griffin that, on the surface,

had nothing to do with the war, but that was emblematic of the depth

of his sense of duty and devotion:

"When his wife became ill and needed to go into a nursing home, he visited her every day.

He walked from his house to the nursing home, fed his wife,

and at the end of the day brought home her clothes. At night, he washed and ironed her clothes.

Then he walked them up to her room the next morning.

He did that for three years until her death in 2005."

So now, out of the original 80, only four Raiders remain:

Dick Cole (Doolittle's co-pilot on the Tokyo raid),

Robert Hite, Edward Saylor and David Thatcher. All are in their 90s.

They have decided that there are too few of them for the public reunions to continue.

The events in Fort Walton Beach marked the end. It has come full circle;

Florida 's nearby Eglin Field was where the Raiders trained in secrecy for the Tokyo mission.

The town planned to do all it can to honor the men: a six-day celebration of their valor,

including luncheons, a dinner and a parade.

Do the men ever wonder if those of us for whom they helped save the country

have tended to it in a way that is worthy of their sacrifice?

They don't talk about that, at least not around other people.

But if you find yourself near Fort Walton Beach this week,

and if you should encounter any of the Raiders,

you might want to offer them a word of thanks.

I can tell you from first hand observation that they appreciate hearing that they are remembered.

The men have decided that after this final public reunion they will wait until a later date --

sometime this year -- to get together once more, informally and in absolute privacy.

That is when they will open the bottle of brandy. The years are flowing by too swiftly now;

they are not going to wait until there are only two of them.

They will fill the four remaining upturned goblets. And raise them in a toast to those who are gone.

Their 70th Anniversary Photo

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