In 2016 we were assured that Hillary was the most-qualified, smartest, bestest possible choice for President in the entire history of the United States. Yes sir. Her resume speaks for itself!
Even Barack Obama talked up Hillary’s resume as if she was head and shoulders above him. Which, to be fair, isn’t saying a whole hell of a lot. Even Jimmy Carter was head and shoulders above Barack.
Yup. In 2016, they couldn’t shut up about how accomplished and qualified she was. Hillary Clinton’s resume is so impressive that only a slack-jawed dummy wouldn’t vote for her.
So it is rather surprising that when providing convention-viewers (all twelve of them) with a snapshot of Hillary’s so-called impressive resume, this is what the DNC flashed on the stage during her pissing and moaning, still not over it speech last night.
She lost to Donald Trump.
She used her husband as a springboard for her own political career.
And she gave a speech in 1995.
Wow! How impressive!
Just how thin is Hillary’s resume that these are the highlights the DNC chose?
When her single greatest accomplishment is losing in 2016, maybe we can all stop pretending Hillary Clinton is the greatest thing since sliced bread.
But it was the last item that made me laugh out loud. Because it isn’t just the DNC that thinks giving a speech in 1995 was some impressive accomplishment; Hillary does too.
During the final debate in 2016 Hillary attempted to make the case for herself over Donald Trump by going decade-by-decade comparing her alleged impressive resume to that of her opponent.
For the 1990s, Hillary said:
“In the 1992, I went to Beijing and I said women’s rights are human rights. He insulted former Miss Universe, Alicia Machado, and called her an eating machine.”
I laughed so hard when I heard that I made that embarrassing snorting sound that causes everyone to turn and stare. So the next day, I wrote a column titled “Hillary’s idea of an accomplishment is making a speech” in which I wrote:
For the whole of the 1990s that is the only thing Donald Trump accomplished? Really Hillary?
That probably comes as a surprise to all the people he employed during that decade. Sure, he fell on hard times in the early 1990s, but he turned it around in a matter of years. By 1995, even the New York Times was referring to him as “Comeback kid.”
So which is the greater accomplishment? Turning around a financial failure into a huge success? Or making a speech in Beijing?
Only a Liberal Democrat would believe making a speech is the greater accomplishment.
Democrats are all talk and no action.
In fact, I remember someone once said of Barack Obama that all he does is offer “smooth speeches” that do not amount to solutions.
Does anybody remember who said that?
Oh, yeah. Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Yet Hillary wants us to be impressed that the one accomplishment she made in the 1990s was reading a speech in Beijing that included the line “women’s rights are human rights.”
Now, I don’t mean to pick nits. But since women are human, isn’t it logical to say women’s rights are human rights? Is that really such an earth-shattering discovery?
I mean it isn’t like women’s rights are weasels’ rights.
Hillary wants kudos for pointing out the obvious in a speech she read in the 1990s.
Come on! It’s funny!
Knowing what we know now, thanks to WikiLeaks, why should we be impressed that in the 1990s Hillary Clinton flew to Beijing and read a speech written by committee and loaded into a teleprompter?
If all this woman has by way of an accomplishment is reading a speech, doesn’t that mean she really didn’t accomplish anything in the 1990s?
I mean other than ruining the lives of women who accused her husband of sexual assault. Firing the travel office staff and replacing them with her cronies. Bungling Hillarycare and making an idiot of herself. Absconding with FBI files on the Clintons’ enemies. Renting out the Lincoln Bedroom.
Come to think of it, given all her shady, incompetent behavior in the 1990s, I guess successfully reading a speech in Beijing is the best she can come up with.
That’s pathetic.
This is why when I saw that screen capture on Twitter last night I howled laughing.
66% of Hillary’s resume is giving a speech twenty-five years ago and losing to Donald Trump.
Come on! It’s hilarious! I’m still laughing as I type this.
This poor, bitter old broad probably spontaneously combusted when she saw that. By now, I imagine she’s sleeping off a three-wine-box binge.
Senator Rubio, acting chairman of the Senate Intel Committee, announced their finding yesterday on what everyone’s known for years: “the Committee found absolutely no evidence that then-candidate Donald Trump or his campaign colluded with the Russian government … and we discovered deeply troubling actions taken by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, particularly their acceptance and willingness to rely on the ‘Steele Dossier’ without verifying its methodology or sourcing.” The bipartisan report is “nearly 1,000 pages, was the product of more than 200 witness interviews and nearly a million documents” and has been ongoing for years.
NBC somehow refers to the same report as a “partisan account of how the Trump campaign embraced Russia’s intelligence operation in 2016 designed to hurt Democrat Hillary Clinton and help Trump.” This is the opposite of Rubio tweeted (“Absolutely no evidence”) and nothing in their article supports it.
Professional liar John Brennan tweeted back to Rubio, “You are dead wrong, Senator. The report shows extensive evidence of collusion between between the Trump campaign & the Russians,” but once again, Brennan was incapable of articulating this evidence. Brennan previously had lied to Congress under oath about the “Dossier,” saying it played no role in the Obama administration’s Intelligence Community Assessment. Before that he lied under oath to the Senate about having spied on them. Victor Davis Hanson cataloged his record of lying here and it looks like Brennan’s word is all we have to support the Russian collusion: if that can teach us anything it’s that there was no Russian collusion. There’s nothing to disprove, so I’ll give the reasons I think the FBI’s actions were troubling. This is not a detail of the Senate’s report but a review of what’s happened and why it was wrong.
Mueller and Wiseman’s tinfoil investigation found almost nothing but process crimes, and in Manafort’s case, there were also tax violations and bank fraud that had nothing to do with Russia’s supposed election interference. In Michael Flynn’s case, FBI officials Strzok and Page had to alter a document, the 302 form which *was* the record of their interview, in order to charge him with lying in that interview. This is not only a felony, it’s a more serious crime than the one Flynn was charged with, and the Flynn charge was based on these falsified records.
These FBI agents committed a litany of violations in the process (how soon the 302 has to be submitted, who can look at it, who can write it), and threatened Flynn’s son in order to coerce him into pleading guilty. Did he lie in the first place? We don’t know, because the original Pientka-written 302 form (the one that Strzok and Page didn’t falsify) has disappeared. Furthermore, a handwritten note from their supervisor Bill Priestap has been found, plotting to trick Flynn into lying or pressure him to plead guilty under the obscure, unconstitutional and never-once-prosecuted Logan Act:
What’s our goal? Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired? If we get him to admit to breaking the Logan Act, give facts to DOJ & have them decide. Or, if he initially lies, then we present him [redacted] & he admits it, document for DOJ, & let them decide how to address it.”
Prominent conservative lawyers to this day, mystifyingly (and publicly), are saying that Flynn did lie, and not acknowledging that this is based on the falsified 302 or on his admission which came under coercion. “It doesn’t matter that he lied, but he did,” they say, and they’re wrong.
Roger Stone made some dumb comment about a judge and they swatted him and his wife on live TV, in coordination with CNN; the whole while portraying the raid as part of a crackdown on foreign influence. George Papadopoulos was given $10,000 cash in Israel and arrested in the US on arrival, by FBI who were waiting for him at the airport. How did they know? He’d wisely left the cash with an attorney, otherwise I’m sure he’d have faced more serious charges.
Then there’s Carter Page, who’s visits with Russian operatives were ruled by the FISA Court to be sufficient grounds to open a warrant on him. On the third renewal, they wanted their lawyer to ask the CIA if Page was theirs. The CIA said he was, by attaching documents showing his history at the agency, and the FBI lawyer altered the email to say no.
The central problem with the Mueller and Wiseman Show (or maybe the Wiseman and Mueller) is that rather than investigating what happened, they tried to set people up to promote their own version of it. They never found that crime they were searching for.
In the Trump Tower Meeting, Don Jr. was set up by “Natalia Veselnitskaya, who employed Glenn Simpson of Fusion GPS and dined with him the nights before and after the Trump Tower meeting.” Glenn Simpson in turn employed Christopher Steele who compiled the stories. Funding for this came from Hillary’s campaign and the DNC, while the FBI and Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska also paid Steele, who was working for the FBI “on a special program to recruit Russian oligarchs.” Deripaska says Steele offered him visa help as a pretext to recruit him.
There’s no reason to think they saw Deripaska as a collusion suspect since he’s never been accused, but Steele’s involvement suggests the FBI would use the Russian oligarchs on the surveillance of Trump associates. Maybe the FBI planned on paying them with Hillary Clinton’s campaign money to make false accusations for Steele to compile, and the FBI to use against Candidate Trump.
Steve Bannon busted in a fitting fall for the man who tried to ride Trump's coattails
by Tiana Lowe, Commentary Writer • August 20, 2020 11:36 AM
Even the greatest grifters eventually have their crimes catch up to them. In the case of Steve Bannon, the alleged crimes are literal, including one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, per indictments revealed by the Justice Department on Thursday morning. The source of the scheme? One of the more lucrative GoFundMe campaigns in the crowd-sourcing site's history, an alleged sham campaign claiming to fundraise to build President Trump's wall on the southern border.
For Bannon, who built his entire career riding on the coattails of men more powerful than him, this is a fitting fall. Bannon spent his early career as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs and then sold his own boutique firm to French firm Societe Generale. He then rebranded himself as an anti-globalist everyman, transforming Breitbart after the death of the eponymous founder from a firebrand conservative news site into what he called "the platform of the alt-right." Bannon then forayed the (since tempered) radicalization of Breitbart into a top spot in the Trump campaign, setting the stage to soft-pedal his own demographic grievances while reportedly undermining the White House through a coordinated series of clandestine leaks to alt-right journalists.
Luckily, Trump finally gave Sloppy Steve the boot, with ties between the two severely worsened after Bannon leaked like a sieve to serial fabulist Michael Wolff.
It's safe to say that no tears will be shed in the Oval Office today. The only shocking thing about this story is not that it happened but why it took so long. The whole "Build the Wall" crowd-funding thing looked like a scam from the start. This is how I described the GoFundMe two years ago:
It's safe to say that no tears will be shed in the Oval Office today, writes @TianatheFirst.
The only shocking thing about Steve Bannon's indictment is not that it happened, but why it took so long. https://t.co/lbVezOw5wq
The funds raised, of course, will never actually pay for a wall. Even assuming that the organizer, Brian Kolfage, fully intends on sending a check to the federal government, he has no idea how to actually do that.
"We have contacted the Trump Administration to secure a point of contact where all the funds will go upon completion," wrote Kolfage in the original campaign description. "When we get this information secured we will update. We have many very high level contacts already helping."
Sounds promising! The contact may find a contact one day, but go fund me now!
Kolfage also promises to "refund every single penny" if he doesn't reach "or come significantly close" to the stated goal, whatever that means. The goal itself is $1 billion. The most successful GoFundMe of 2018 raised $22 million.
Of course, Bannon, Kolfage, and fellow defendants Andrew Badolato and Timothy Shea tempted fate with this one, sparring not just with local governments but with the GoFundMe site itself, which warned the grifter gang that they were required to return the funds to the donors.
May this sordid failure be Bannon's final one in public life.
OAN Newsroom
UPDATED 7:09 AM PT – Thursday, August 20, 2020
Activists from the ‘Bikers for Trump‘ movement surrounded the security perimeter of the Democrat National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
On
Wednesday, hundreds of bikers descended on the DNC where they stated
that they had come to show support for the ‘America First’ agenda of
President Trump.
The group said they were leading a “patriotic crusade” against Democrat
corruption and big-government control. “Bikers for Trump’ also said they
are fighting to protect American liberties from Democrat encroachment.
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When we see that justice is measured, not by due process, but by compulsion; when we see that in order to invoke our right to due process, we need to obtain permission from those who rebuke the constitution; when we see that justice is determined by those who leverage, not in law, but in politics; when we see that representatives get power over individual liberty by graft and by scheme, and our representatives don’t protect us against them, but protect them against us; when we see corruption holding influence and individual liberty so easily dispatched and nullified; we may well know that our freedom too is soon to perish….
WATCH:
As we bear witness, anyone trying to convince us this entire assembly of our union is headed in the right direction, well, they might want to revisit their proximity to the 2020 election ballpark. Because they’re not just out of the city – they’re also out of the same state the election ballpark is located in….. Then again, the media know that.
David Mamet had a famous saying, essentially: …‘in order for democrats, liberals, progressives et al to continue their illogical belief systems they have to pretend not to know a lot of things’… By pretending ‘not to know’ there is no guilt, no actual connection to conscience. Denial of truth allows easier trespass.
This hate-filled and manipulative Democrat ideology relies on our willingness to accept their lies, falsehoods, and scripted presentations; and then demand we grant benefit amid their seeds of doubt.
There’s a level of anger far deeper and more consequential than expressed rage or visible behavior, it’s called Cold Anger.
Cold Anger does not need to go to violence. For those who carry it, no conversation is needed when we meet. You cannot poll or measure it; specifically because most who carry it avoid discussion… And that decision has nothing whatsoever to do with any form of correctness.
We watched the passage of Obamacare at 1:38am on the day before Christmas Eve in 2009. We watched the Senate, then the House attempt passing Amnesty in 2014. We know exactly how it passed, and we know exactly why it passed. We don’t need to stand around talking about it….
We know what lies hidden behind “cloture” and the UniParty schemes.
We watched the 2009 $900+ billion Stimulus Bill being spent each year, every year, for seven consecutive years. Omnibus, Porkulous, QE1, QE2, Bailouts, Crony-Capitalism. We know exactly how this works, and we know exactly why this ruse is maintained. We don’t need to stand around talking about it…. We’re beyond talking.
We accept that the entire Senate voted to block President Trump’s ability to use recess appointments in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020. Every.Single.Democrat.And.Republican.
Cold Anger absorbs betrayal silently, often prudently.
We’ve waited each year, every year, for twelve years, to see a federal budget, only to be given another Omnibus spending bill by “CONservative” politicians.
We’ve watched the ridiculing of cops, the riots, and the lack of support for laws, or their enforcement. We’ve been absorbing all that. We’ve been exposed to violence upon us by paid operatives of the organized DNC machine. We know; the media trying to hide it doesn’t change our level of information.
Cold Anger is not hatred, it is far more purposeful.
We watched in 2012 as the Democrat party thrice denied God during their convention. The doors to evil enterprise opened by official proclamation and request.
Cold Anger takes notice of the liars, even from a great distance – seemingly invisible to the mob. Cold Anger will still hold open the door for the riot goer. Mannerly.
We’ve watched our borders being intentionally unsecured.
We’ve watched Islamic Terrorists slaughter Americans as our politicians proclaim their uncertainty of motive. We know exactly who they are, and why they are doing it. We do not need to stand around discussing it…. we’re clear-eyed.
Cold Anger evidenced is more severe because it is more strategic, and more purposeful. Eric Cantor’s defeat, Matt Bevin’s victory, Brexit, Donald Trump’s highest vote tally in the history of presidential primaries or President Trump’s victory might aide your understanding.
Cold Anger does not gloat; it absorbs consistent vilification and ridicule as fuel. This sensibility does not want to exist, it is forced to exist in otherwise unwilling hosts – we also refuse to be destabilized by it.
Transgender bathrooms are more important than border security.
Illicit trade schemes, employment and the standard of living in Vietnam and Southeast Asia are more important to Wall Street and DC lobbyists, than the financial security of Youngstown Ohio.
We get it. We understand. We didn’t create that reality, we are simply responding to it.
The intelligence apparatus of our nation was weaponized against our candidate by those who controlled the levers of government. Now, with sanctimonious declarations they dismiss accountability.
Deliberate intent and prudence ensures we avoid failure. The course is thoughtful vigilance; it is a strategy devoid of emotion. The media can call us anything they want, it really doesn’t matter…. we’re far beyond the place where labels matter.
Foolishness and betrayal of our nation have served to reveal dangers within our present condition. Misplaced corrective action, regardless of intent, is neither safe nor wise. We know exactly who Donald Trump is, and we also know what he is not.
He is exactly what we need at this moment.
He is a necessary, defiant and glorious fighter.
He is our weapon.
Cold Anger is not driven to act in spite of itself; it drives a reckoning.
When the well attired leave the checkout line carrying steaks and shrimp using an EBT card, the door is still held open; yet notations necessarily embed.
When the U.S. flags lay gleefully undefended, they do not lay unnoticed. When the stars and stripes are controversial, yet a foreign flag is honored – we are paying attention.
When millionaire football players kneel down rather than honor our fallen soldiers and stand proud of our country, we see that. Check the NFL TV ratings – take note.
When a school community cannot openly pray, it does not mean the prayerful were absent.
When a liar seems to win, it is not without observation. Many – more than the minority would like to admit – know the difference between science, clocks and political agendas.
Cold Anger perceives deception the way the long-term battered absorb a blow in the hours prior to the pre-planned exit; with purpose.
A shield, or cry of micro-aggression will provide no benefit, nor quarter. Delicate sensibilities are dispatched like a feather in a hurricane.
We are patient, but also purposeful. Pushed far enough, decisions are reached.
[…] On the drive to and from the East Coast, I paid attention to the billboards and bumper-stickers. Folks, the people in “Fly over” country are PISSED, from the guy that guides hunters, to the mayors of towns and cities, to state senators congressmen and Governors who are voting to arrest and imprison federal law enforcement officials for enforcing federal gun laws that don’t agree with state law … The political pendulum has never, in the history of humanity, stayed on one side of a swing. The back lash from over reach has always been proportionate to how far off center it went before coming back … right now we’re staring at a whole hell of a lot of the country (about 80-90% of the land mass, as well as about 50+% of the population) that is FED UP. You really don’t want those guys to decide that the only way to fix it is to burn it down and start over… (more)
It’s too late…
This man has faced opposition that would overwhelm any other President. Our chosen President is constantly attacked by those holding a corrupt, conniving and Godless leftist ideology. It is our job now to stand with him, firm on his behalf.
To respond we must engage as an insurgency. We must modify our disposition to think like an insurgent. Insurgencies have nothing to lose. If insurgents are not victorious the system, which controls the dynamic, wins. However, if insurgents do nothing, the same system, which controls the dynamic, also wins.
Do nothing and we lose. Go to the mattresses, and we might win. The choice is ours.
The awakened American middle-class insurgency, led by Donald Trump, is an existential threat to the professional political class and every entity who lives in/around the professional political class. Their entire political apparatus is threatened by our insurgency. The political industry, all of corrupt governance, is threatened by our support through Donald Trump.
Decision time.
You know why the entire apparatus is united against President Trump. You know why the corrupt Wall Street financial apparatus is united against President Trump. You know why every institutional department, every lobbyist, every K-Street dweller, every career legislative member, staffer, and the various downstream economic benefactors, including the corporate media, all of it – all the above, are united against Donald Trump.
Donald Trump is an existential threat to the existence of a corrupt DC system we have exposed to his disinfecting sunlight. Donald Trump is the existential threat to every entity and institution who benefits from that corrupt and vile system.
They too have nothing to lose; their desperation becomes visible within their apoplexy; and they’re damn sure displaying it.
Do not look away.
Throw aside the sense of discomfort and bear witness to the evil we oppose. Do not turn your eyes from the hatred focused in our direction. Stand firm amid the solace of our number and resolve to the task at hand.
Leftists who oppose our efforts hold positions that are weak, push back against them. They rely on fear…. they relish misery and despair… do not give it to them. Let them stare into the Cold Anger furnace.
An estimated 30 people have died after supposedly “peaceful” protests erupted across the nation after George Floyd’s death on May 25. What started as civil protests and marches to address police brutality, condemn racism, and support Black Lives Matter, quickly turned into violence unmatched since the Civil Rights Movement.
Despite claims by politicians and corporate media that these protests were “mostly peaceful” and safe to do amidst a pandemic because racism is also a public health crisis, US cities were quickly plagued with looting, violence, arson, vandalism, and damage to public property.
It was this mayhem that proved fatal for some. Protestors and bystanders, ranging in age from 14 to 77, lost their lives in the chaos that media outlets labeled as a “peaceful demonstration intensified.”
Victims of the violence included a police captain, a former football player, a federal officer, a photographer, business owners, teens, and others. A majority of their deaths were caused by shootings, but a select few were caused by being hit or dragged by cars. One news report documented that a body was found burned to death in the remains of a Minneapolis pawn shop set on fire by rioters.
Chris Beaty, 38, who played football for Indiana University, was shot and killed on the street during an Indianapolis protest on May 30. Beaty’s family says they were told he was helping two women being mugged when he was shot.
Another life taken away.. just a week ago we spoke and just In a snap of a finger to hear that you not with us because you got your life taken away no reasons. I’m for the protesting but the violence got stop in both parties and this killing is breaking family and friends heart. pic.twitter.com/eYCM5RddmD
Only some of those responsible for these deaths have been found and charged.
“Many of the people killed were African Americans, compounding the tragedy for black families,” the Associated Press reported.
While the media circus ran circles around the issue of these riots and deaths, others spoke out, calling for the cessation of violence to shield people from further injury and death.
In June, Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best spoke out against the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ) after a series of fatal shootings, violence, and tensions between CHAZ members and police broke out in the area.
“Enough is enough,” she said, calling for CHAZ’s dispersal. “Two African American men are dead at a place where they claim to be working for Black Lives Matter.”
“We have had multiple other instances of assaults, rape, robbery, shootings, and this is something that is going to need to change,” she added.
Attorney General William Barr called out the violence stating that it was causing “senseless havoc and destruction on innocent victims.”
“In the wake of George Floyd’s death, violent rioters and anarchists have hijacked legitimate protests to wreak senseless havoc and destruction on innocent victims,” Barr wrote.
“To state what should be obvious, peaceful protesters do not throw explosives into federal courthouses, tear down plywood with crowbars, or launch fecal matter at federal officers. Such acts are in fact federal crimes under statutes enacted by this Congress,” he added.
Barr also pledged to take legal action against those causing this destruction.
“We’ve had scores of indictments so far for such things as arson, destruction of federal property,” Barr said. “We have right now about 500 investigations underway, so it’s picking up pace. We are committed to holding accountable the people who engaged in this.”
President Trump tweeted that there must be law and order where violence is rampant. He also honored one of the victims of the riots, David Dorn, “a Great Police Captain from St. Louis” who died after being shot by looters at his friend’s pawn shop in St. Louis.
Our highest respect to the family of David Dorn, a Great Police Captain from St. Louis, who was viciously shot and killed by despicable looters last night. We honor our police officers, perhaps more than ever before. Thank you! pic.twitter.com/0ouUpoJEQ4
In addition to the deaths and injuries caused by the riots, cities around the United States are suffering from some of their most fatal and violent weeks in years. According to a report released by the Anderson Economic Group, looting costs in America’s 20 largest metropolitan areas exceeded $400 million in just the first weekend of rioting.
Israel's Abraham Accord agreement with the United Arab Emirates marks a substantial achievement for the mission of peace and stability in the Middle East.
August 13, 2020 will go down as one of the most significant days in world history, especially in the long history of the Middle East. This past Thursday, the world woke up to a joint announcement from the United States, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates, declaring Israel and the UAE would establish formal diplomatic ties.
Although Israel had previously signed diplomatic agreements with Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994, the agreement with the UAE marks a substantial achievement for the mission of peace and stability in the Middle East. The diplomatic agreement, called the Abraham Accord, means Israel and the UAE can exchange ambassadors and establish embassies in each other’s nations. Furthermore, the accord allows direct trans-national flights and opens new opportunities for bilateral cooperation, particularly in health care and trade.
Despite the historic nature of this agreement, the Abraham Accord hasn’t received the kind of coverage it deserves. While there are numerous explanations for this — none of them satisfactory or justified — the lack of attention is most likely due to the reluctance of the corporate media to give President Trump, his senior adviser and son-in-law Jarred Kushner, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu any credit for advancing peace in the Middle East.
Signposts for Peace
In recent years, concerns about Iran’s nuclear weapon program and its state-sponsored terrorism in the region have brought Israel and select Gulf nations closer. Compared to its other Arab neighbors, however, the UAE has made the most concrete efforts toward normalizing relations with Israel.
Early signs of increasingly warm relations between Israel and the UAE were seen in 2019, when the UAE launched its “Year of Tolerance.” As part of the initiative, the UAE invited Pope Francis to speak, hosted interfaith meetings with religious leaders worldwide, announced the construction of an interfaith center in Abu Dhabi — to house a Jewish synagogue, a Christian church, and an Islamic mosque — and invited Israel to attend the 2020 World EXPO in Dubai.
Inspired by these efforts, a Jewish resident in the UAE opened the first kosher eatery in the Gulf region. This year, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, two cargo flights from the UAE equipped with medical aid landed in Israel.
Then, on June 12, Youssef Al Otaiba, UAE’s ambassador to the United States, made history by publishing an op-ed in Hebrew in Israel’s largest newspaper, Yediot Ahronot Daily. In the article, Youssef warned against Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu’s annexation plan of the West Bank, and offered a possibility for improving relations between the two nations, stating: “With the region’s two most capable militaries, common concerns about terrorism and aggression, and a deep and long relationship with the United States, the UAE, and Israel could form closer and more effective security cooperation.”
With the Trump administration’s involvement, Netanyahu halted the annexation of the West Bank, a compromise that sealed his nation’s historic agreement with the UAE this month. Across the political left, center, and right, the agreement left many Israelis stunned. As the longest-serving prime minister in Israel’s history and the head of the conservative Likud Party, Netanyahu is known for his tough and uncompromising rhetoric of defending Israel’s sovereignty and has never hesitated to deploy Israel’s military to stop terror attacks and rocket launches by the state-sponsored terrorist group Hamas.
Vindication for Netanyahu
Last year, Netanyahu was embroiled in a corruption investigation and charged with “bribery, fraud, and breach of trust” in three separate cases. Then, quite remarkably and to the dismay of his opponents, Netanyahu survived three inconclusive general elections in less than a year. Even though Netanyahu failed to win a majority in the most recent election, he and his main political rival, Benny Gantz, decided to work together to steer Israel out of the pandemic and the resulting economic recession.
Until this June, Netanyahu was still seeking the full annexation of the West Bank, a call that was criticized by Arab nations and the European Union, and made him deeply unpopular among Israel’s center and left factions. The fact that such a hardliner who has been dogged by scandals and criminal charges managed to deliver a historic peace accord with an Arab nation is truly remarkable.
Vivian Bercovici, who served as Canada’s ambassador to Israel from 2014 to 2016 and is an outspoken critic of Netanyahu, compared the accord to a “good atomic bomb,” calling Netanyahu a “magician” who “pulled off the impossible” while being “sliced and diced six ways to Sunday by local scandal and subterfuge.” Furthermore, Bercovici wrote, “With Bibi (a nickname for Netanyahu), there simply is no Act V–no denouement. We are stuck in Act III, where the hero is unstoppable. Where his brilliance and unsurpassed triumphs continue, mere human frailties notwithstanding.”
While the Israeli media are gracious enough to give Netanyahu at least somecredit where credit is due, the corporate media in the United States have refused to give President Trump and his team any credit for this historic achievement and like to criticize Trump’s foreign policies as chaotic, inconsistent, and isolationist. It especially bothers them that Trump relies on his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, as a key foreign policy adviser even though Kushner is a newcomer to negotiating diplomatic relations between foreign nations.
The Corporate Media’s Conspicuous Silence
When the Trump administration rolled out its Israeli-Palestine peace deal in April, mainstream media dismissed it as “Kushner’s deal.” They claimed the deal was a nonstarter because of its nontraditional approach, such as establishing “Jerusalem as Israel’s ‘undivided’ capital, with a potential Palestinian capital to the east and north of the city.”
When Palestinian representatives rejected the deal outright, corporate media and its pundits cheered as if to say “I told you so.” The general feeling has been that achieving peace in the Middle East is beyond the abilities of both Trump and Kushner since so many more experienced diplomats and politicians have failed to achieve any success in the past. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who was running for president then, said she would depose the plan once she became the president of the United States.
The critics of the president’s plan failed to mention that several Arab nations, including the UAE, Egypt, Oman, and Qatar, all endorsed Trump’s plan, which laid the foundation for the UAE and Israel’s peace accord several months later. The same critics also ignored that previous U.S. administrations had devoted tremendous resources in an attempt to bring peace in the Middle East, repeating the same conventional approaches and getting the same failure in return. It is obvious that the media simply can’t bring themselves to admit the Trump’s unconventional approach is working.
Comparing the Israel-UAE accord to a “geopolitical earthquake,” pundits like The New York Times’s Thomas L. Friedman have painstakingly avoided giving Trump, Kusher, or Netanyahu any credit for what Friedman recently called a “HUGE breakthrough.” One can almost feel Friedman’s agony — how he wished this breakthrough was accomplished by anyone other than the trio he seems to loathe so deeply.
Most democrats in the U.S. Congress remained silent about the accord. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) called the deal a “sham.” Rather than giving this historic deal wall-to-wall coverage, the corporate media spent the weekend blaming Trump for a new conspiracy regarding the U.S. Postal Service, claiming Trump would shut down the USPS to steal the 2020 election.
Implementing New Strategy in the Middle East
Contrary to assertions that the Trump administration has no coherent strategic plan in the Middle East, Ilan Berman, senior vice president of the American Foreign Policy Council, wrote that he believes the Trump administration has a clear and ambitious plan for the region, comprised of three distinct yet closely connected components.
First, there is a noticeable focus on Iran. The administration withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal and has been applying maximum political and economic pressure to get Iran back to the negotiation table. Berman believes the approach has been “broadly successful, dramatically reversing the Iranian regime’s economic fortunes and generating renewed internal dissent against clerical rule.”
The second piece of the strategy is the Middle East Strategic Alliance, or what some would call an “Arab NATO,” a group consisting of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Jordan, and the UAE. Since 2017, the alliance has worked closely with the Trump administration,with the goals of “confronting extremism, terrorism, and achieving peace, stability, and development” in the region.
The third piece is the Israeli-Palestinian peace deal. Even Friedman now urges the Palestinians to come back to the negotiation table in light of the Israel-UAE deal, because they will “find a lot of support from Trump, the Europeans and the Arabs for that position.”
All three pieces build on one another’s success. As Brian Hook, the U.S. State Department’s special envoy for Iran, said: “Peace between the Arabs and the Israelis is Iran’s worst nightmare.” Many in the administration, including the president, are hopeful that the Israel-UAE agreement will inspire other Arab nations to follow suit.
Thankfully, further positive developments on that front may already be underway. For example, Netanyahu visited Oman in 2018. In July 2019, the United States hosted a meeting in Washington between the foreign ministers of Bahrain and Israel.
If Trump is reelected this November, the world may indeed witness a few more peace agreements out of the Middle East. With this unconventional president, his fresh approach, and his tendency not to rely on career officials, anything is possible.
There is a palpable lack of voter enthusiasm among the Democrat base. It’s hard not to notice that.
I mean, when Gallup finds that 52% of Democrats are unsatisfied with their nominee and wish someone else was leading the ticket, that is going to tamp down enthusiasm among the Democrat base.
You’d think the DNC would be gearing their convention toward those dissatisfied Democrat voters in hopes of firing them up.
But no, not the DNC.
Instead, they are trotting out a conga line of has-been RINO Republicans like John Kasich, Colin Powell, Christine Todd Whitman and Cindy McCain. For crying out loud, those people couldn’t fire up Republican voters.
Does the DNC actually think they will light a fire under the dissatisfied Democrat base?
Donald Trump holds a 96% approval rating among Republican voters. But for some reason, the DNC is putting more time and effort into winning over the 4% who don’t approve than they are narrowing the enthusiasm gap among their own voters.
Is there a single actual Republican outside of the DC/NYC bubble who sees John Kasich at the Democrat Convention and thinks, “You know, I was on the Trump Train, but then I saw John Kasich standing at a crossroads and now I’m on the Biden Jalopy!”
More to the point, is there any unenthusiastic Democrat voter still struggling to find a single reason to get fired up for Joe who saw Colin Powell last night and thought, “Boy, I just wasn’t excited about Biden. Then I saw the guy who lied about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and got us into a needless war where thousands of Americans died, and now I can’t WAIT to vote for Joe!!!”
I think it’s more likely that a large segment of the Democrat base was furious that Colin Powell got so much time to speak when their Queen AOC only got sixty seconds.
Is it that the DNC can’t see the enthusiasm gap as wide as the Grand Canyon existing within their own base?
Or is it, as I suggested yesterday, that the Democrat Party truly believes that Trump Hatred alone will be enough to drag Joe into the White House?
Now, to be fair, not all Democrats are lacking in enthusiasm. Many of them are excited about voting for Trump in November.
There are even die-hard Liberals who, though maybe not excited, are still walking away from the Democrat Party in favor of Trump – including well-known independent journalist Tim Pool.
I doubt watching Colin Powell or Cindy McCain is going to entice Tim Pool back into the fold.
What is motivating the Democrat Party to make such idiotic decisions?
It’s insanely stupid, but I think the DNC has fallen for the Lincoln Project grift so completely they actually think the key to Joe Biden winning is ignoring the Democrat base and targeting the four percent of Republicans who don’t support Trump.
Sure, the Lincoln Project gets a lot of attention on Twitter. But Twitter is not a barometer of what’s happening in real life. The Democrats making convention choices based on Twitter trends and retweets, will do absolutely nothing to appeal to the Democrat base out here on Planet Earth.
Retweets don’t translate into actual human people going to the polls and voting for their guy.
What is the Democrat ground game? The Trump campaign has actual bodies knocking on doors, registering voters, making phone calls.
The Democrat Party has Twitter and Cindy McCain.
Does the DNC think that somehow Joe Biden, the man 52% of Democrats wish wasn’t their nominee, will singlehandedly close that enthusiasm gap just by giving his acceptance speech tonight?
If they do, that’s expecting an awful lot from a guy who can’t make it through a carefully-managed TV interview without shoving his foot into his mouth.
Meanwhile, Democrat-led cities are devolving into Beirut, Marxist Leftists are pushing the Democrat Party ever further to the Left, and Democrat-run states are treating COVID as an opportunity to get their Tyranny on.
But don’t worry, nervous Democrat voters. The Democratic National Convention scored Cindy McCain!
