There is a scandal here: undermining the president's constitutional prerogative to establish foreign policy. Americans voted for trump in part because they wanted an end to confrontation militarism ala Hillary. But the ziocons who run foreign policy will not have it.
"Trump has only been in office a few months, and he has already ruined intelligence relationships forged over decades." This is a conclusion without evidence. Putin said he would provide transcripts. Why not get the facts? Maybe this is fake news. Does anyone take Israel's kvetching seriously?
"But Trump’s concrete policies and those of Obama with regard to Syria seem to show a great deal of continuity." Is this true? The US backed jihadis including offshoots of al quaeda before and after the failure to bomb SyrIa in 2013. The US looked the other way while ISIS grew. As Kerry said the plan was to get ISIS and the jihadis to do the regime change work for the US. So there is significant discontinuity in policy.
here's real news. Israel and netanyahu interfere in plain sight in US politics and try to sway elections. that's what comey should be investigating. all political actors are on the take in DC, from Israel, from defense contractors, from anyone with money.
manafort's connections with fat cats is not news. it is an attempted coup by the CIA and the permanent government to unseat Trump.
Sure Trump lies with impunity and Breitbart et alia are fraudsters. But the reason i think some people give trump a pass for his real news parody act is that they are sick of being lied to by the "serious" media. The serious media have lied us into serial wars, from Iraq to Libya etc.
As to the hagiography of Obama: didn't he rearm Israel when they were massacring the children Gaza? Didn't he drop over 26000 bombs on 7 poor defenseless Muslim countries last year? Didn't he unleash a drone assassination program across the Mideast? And what about the policy of letting Isis have at it in Syria and arming Al Quaeda?
Yes Trump gang is terrible but so was the Obama gang. Corporate media and Obama have one advantage they are more presentable, they hide the ugly empire's sins better.
Obama would not have carried out the raid. Idle gossip. So Obama is a good killer and Trump a bad killer. This is the kind of fake news that makes you sympathetic to Trump.
All true. But what is the alternative? Hillary's support for violence, aggression and regime change from Iraq to Libya to Syria is a matter of record. Now she wants another no fly zone in Syria and to counter the "evil" Putin in Ukraine. Isn't that a more proximate threat from a certified war criminal?
Anyone the US doesn't like is "illegitimate," so we get to bomb them. Americans get to make these these ex cathedra judgements because we rule the world. You would think that Americans might tone down the righteous indignation, given our track record.
Hillary's suport of a no fly zone was disingenuous. It is now established that she was after regime change. This shows catastrophic bad judgement in light of what regime change and intervention in civil wars in the middle east has wrought. The rise of Isil is a direct result of the mainstream neocon policies that she is a champion of.
"Both are therefore way less hawkish than most of the Republican candidates." Not so. Hillary backed Iraq, a war based on lies (Trump and Paul didn't), spearheaded the bombing Libya based on lies, backs drone strikes and asked for a no fly zone over Syria--shades of Libya--which could have resulted in a war with the new Hitler Putin. Hillary is a bona fide mass murderer, so far Cruz and Rubio are only wannabees.
trump twit is brilliant:
Hillary Clinton said that it is O.K. to ban Muslims from Israel by building a WALL, but not O.K. to do so in the U.S. We must be vigilant!
I disagree. Muslims in the Middle East might well be happy to have Trump. Trump says that our policy in the Middle East of bombings, invasions, and occupations is wrong. So he is sounding an anti-interventionist note. Wouldn't a Middle Easterner like that as opposed to HiIllary's militarism. Also, people in the Middle East know what Americans think of them. Would the Obama assist Saudi Arabia bombing Yemen, if instead of the Yemenese, the victims were Israelis? In other words, they know that Muslim lives don't matter. So Hillary is more polite. Not worth much in my book.
Michael Nouri--he's about 68-- who has been a big star (Flashdance, Damages) for years is the son of a father born in Bagdahd, who went to the Jesuit High School there and then immigrated to the US and went to Georgetown University. Nouri has a charity for devoted to Middle East understanding.
brian williams might also have owned up to his lie. admitted he lied. explained he lied to pretend to an unearned heroism. let us also include hillary in this lying fest. remember her running for cover when being under fire at an airport.
So the Hillary wins in 2016. Let's see, she voted for the Iraq
War, appointed neocons like Victoria Nuland to key State Dept jobs, promoted the Libyan war, called Putin Hitler, and supports settlements in the West Bank. Does it get any better than this?
but is fox any less biased or respectable than the ny times? the times played a big role in promulgating the lies that got us into iraq. a poll last year showed that >80% of americans thought iran had nukes. where did they get these ideas? ans: ny times, msnbc, wapo, etc. because the times is okay on social issues, it gets labelled "liberal." i don't think so. the times, in fact, is worse than fox because it allows "liberals" to bask in the glow of rectitude.
i thought barry's encomium to the sargeant who was castastrophically injured after his 10th deployment was offensive: exploiting the the misfortune of a soldier in order to provide a few feel good moments, the purpose i suppose was to assuage our guilt and drop the failed war down the memory hole. A moment of cheap grace for the folks.
blaming gates, blaming betrayus, blaming the generals serves to take the blame from where it belongs, barry manalo obama. he was responsible and he called the shots. he has lied to the american people serially. remember his statement on the campaign trail,"i will sign no healthcare bill that doesn't include the public option. you can take that to the bank." remember his pledge to the palestinians that there would be a halt to settlement construction prior to peace negotiations. the betrayer in chief is barry manalo obama. this meme that barry is a victim of insubordinates strategems is nauseating. gates did not betray barry. barry betrayed the american people.
Nice sentiments, but Obamacare is a cruel hoax. It keeps in place a dysfunctional and unaffordable insurance system. Most will buy high deductible plans. What this means is that if an insured gets sick, s/he is likely to go bankrupt from deductibles and copays, about %9500 per individual and $12,500 per family of 4 making <$95,000/year. (The experience in Massachusetts is virtually no reduction in bankruptcies due to medical insurance which account for one half of all bankruptcies). The upside with Obamacare is that at least you will have a doctor and healthcare network to access, however inadequate. The downside, you can't afford to use it. In sum, Obamacare is a rube goldberg plan designed by neoliberals to insure rentier income to the 1%.
you list these items as bad outcomes:
4. Communist China took advantage of the crisis to push for a de-Americanized world
5. China renewed its push to dump the US dollar as the international reserve currency. That step would cost the US economy enormously.
6. The US ability to sanction Iran and Syria was weakened
aren't these good outcomes? wouldn't the world be better off with multipolarity? and wouldn't the end of dollar hegemony hasten that end? news to me that you are for sanctioning iran and depriving children of medicine.
when running for president obama said that he would sign no healthcare law that didn't have a pubic option, adding "you can take that to the bank." when he got into office the first thing he did was to hire an health insurance company lawyer, get the insurance companies and drug companies together, and write a law that is a bailout for insurance companies. 33% of america's healthcare dollar goes to g and a. that won't change. healthcare costs rising won't change. bankruptcies because of healthcare costs will not change (see Massachusetts). Obama had the people behind him for a public option--70%--he had a mandate. He sold out the american people. the new healthcare bill has something like 7 agencies that access your private information--equifax or one of the credit companies (owned by the crowns?)--is one of them as is homeland security, social security. is this progressive? no, it's plutocrats throwing a crumb to the masses, enabliing them to by insurance they can't afford from insurance companies whose ceos make millions a year. we need medicare for all. supporting this kind of a bill promotes the cult of obama and is counter productive.
i find the opprobrium against the GOP self indulgent righteousness. the reality is that both parties are nearly identical. my guess is that obama is going to use the GOP cacaphony as cover for a grand bargain in which he cuts social security and medicare. the good cop--dems and obie--will have to --sadly--make a deal because of the GOP crazies. nice storyline to sell to liberal professors and do gooders. but i think the fix has been in since clinton turned the democratic party into republican party lite.
Rather odd of Dr Cole not to address Putin's most compelling argument--the need for international law and the consequences to world order when it is not followed. Also, the fact that the US by not adhering to international law has destabilized the the world. Finally, to say that disagreeing with the US's take on the chemical weapons attacks is succumb crackpot conspiracy theories, is, given what we know, a big stretch.
well, i'm sorry but this is pretty sad. celebrating "window dressing achievements" is pitiful. fact is obama has continued to bush regime on steroids, has sucked up to the plutocracy and bailed out the super rich while scheming to cut the social safety net and instigating liberal fascism.
lily ledbetter notwithstanding, there are few blacks better off than 4 years ago. blacks like everyone else are being sold down the river.
the cult of personality is i suppose part of the authoritarian mindset.
Too much apologizing:
"he was stymied when Kadima Party leader Tzippi Livni failed to attract enough coalition partners to form a government";
"he was boxed in" by Petreus.
Obama as victim: a hard sell.
A tad hypocritical? Extolling the rule of law and denouncing violence while the US has undermined the rule of law with its violent, lawless invasions and occupations of Muslim countries. How can Obama say these things with a straight face? Is he utterly out of touch with reality? Or is he just a more effectively evil politician than most?
juan--i think you are minimizing the widespread rage in the middle east toward the u.s. and it's malignant policies and persistent meddling in their affairs. there is a larger pattern here that you refuse to acknowledge, whether it is the aghan soldiers killing americans or these demonstrations; the middle east wants the yankee--the great satan-- to go home. the middle east has had it with america's humanitarian campaigns that result in murder, division, and de-development in the region.
There is a scandal here: undermining the president's constitutional prerogative to establish foreign policy. Americans voted for trump in part because they wanted an end to confrontation militarism ala Hillary. But the ziocons who run foreign policy will not have it.
"Trump has only been in office a few months, and he has already ruined intelligence relationships forged over decades." This is a conclusion without evidence. Putin said he would provide transcripts. Why not get the facts? Maybe this is fake news. Does anyone take Israel's kvetching seriously?
Assad is an opthalmologist. That is he is a physician.
"But Trump’s concrete policies and those of Obama with regard to Syria seem to show a great deal of continuity." Is this true? The US backed jihadis including offshoots of al quaeda before and after the failure to bomb SyrIa in 2013. The US looked the other way while ISIS grew. As Kerry said the plan was to get ISIS and the jihadis to do the regime change work for the US. So there is significant discontinuity in policy.
here's real news. Israel and netanyahu interfere in plain sight in US politics and try to sway elections. that's what comey should be investigating. all political actors are on the take in DC, from Israel, from defense contractors, from anyone with money.
manafort's connections with fat cats is not news. it is an attempted coup by the CIA and the permanent government to unseat Trump.
Sure Trump lies with impunity and Breitbart et alia are fraudsters. But the reason i think some people give trump a pass for his real news parody act is that they are sick of being lied to by the "serious" media. The serious media have lied us into serial wars, from Iraq to Libya etc.
As to the hagiography of Obama: didn't he rearm Israel when they were massacring the children Gaza? Didn't he drop over 26000 bombs on 7 poor defenseless Muslim countries last year? Didn't he unleash a drone assassination program across the Mideast? And what about the policy of letting Isis have at it in Syria and arming Al Quaeda?
Yes Trump gang is terrible but so was the Obama gang. Corporate media and Obama have one advantage they are more presentable, they hide the ugly empire's sins better.
Obama would not have carried out the raid. Idle gossip. So Obama is a good killer and Trump a bad killer. This is the kind of fake news that makes you sympathetic to Trump.
All true. But what is the alternative? Hillary's support for violence, aggression and regime change from Iraq to Libya to Syria is a matter of record. Now she wants another no fly zone in Syria and to counter the "evil" Putin in Ukraine. Isn't that a more proximate threat from a certified war criminal?
Isil is going down but son of Isil is on its way. American criminal policy of mass murder in the Middle East incubates the next horror.
Anyone the US doesn't like is "illegitimate," so we get to bomb them. Americans get to make these these ex cathedra judgements because we rule the world. You would think that Americans might tone down the righteous indignation, given our track record.
Hillary's suport of a no fly zone was disingenuous. It is now established that she was after regime change. This shows catastrophic bad judgement in light of what regime change and intervention in civil wars in the middle east has wrought. The rise of Isil is a direct result of the mainstream neocon policies that she is a champion of.
"Both are therefore way less hawkish than most of the Republican candidates." Not so. Hillary backed Iraq, a war based on lies (Trump and Paul didn't), spearheaded the bombing Libya based on lies, backs drone strikes and asked for a no fly zone over Syria--shades of Libya--which could have resulted in a war with the new Hitler Putin. Hillary is a bona fide mass murderer, so far Cruz and Rubio are only wannabees.
trump twit is brilliant:
Hillary Clinton said that it is O.K. to ban Muslims from Israel by building a WALL, but not O.K. to do so in the U.S. We must be vigilant!
I disagree. Muslims in the Middle East might well be happy to have Trump. Trump says that our policy in the Middle East of bombings, invasions, and occupations is wrong. So he is sounding an anti-interventionist note. Wouldn't a Middle Easterner like that as opposed to HiIllary's militarism. Also, people in the Middle East know what Americans think of them. Would the Obama assist Saudi Arabia bombing Yemen, if instead of the Yemenese, the victims were Israelis? In other words, they know that Muslim lives don't matter. So Hillary is more polite. Not worth much in my book.
Michael Nouri--he's about 68-- who has been a big star (Flashdance, Damages) for years is the son of a father born in Bagdahd, who went to the Jesuit High School there and then immigrated to the US and went to Georgetown University. Nouri has a charity for devoted to Middle East understanding.
brian williams might also have owned up to his lie. admitted he lied. explained he lied to pretend to an unearned heroism. let us also include hillary in this lying fest. remember her running for cover when being under fire at an airport.
So the Hillary wins in 2016. Let's see, she voted for the Iraq
War, appointed neocons like Victoria Nuland to key State Dept jobs, promoted the Libyan war, called Putin Hitler, and supports settlements in the West Bank. Does it get any better than this?
but is fox any less biased or respectable than the ny times? the times played a big role in promulgating the lies that got us into iraq. a poll last year showed that >80% of americans thought iran had nukes. where did they get these ideas? ans: ny times, msnbc, wapo, etc. because the times is okay on social issues, it gets labelled "liberal." i don't think so. the times, in fact, is worse than fox because it allows "liberals" to bask in the glow of rectitude.
i thought barry's encomium to the sargeant who was castastrophically injured after his 10th deployment was offensive: exploiting the the misfortune of a soldier in order to provide a few feel good moments, the purpose i suppose was to assuage our guilt and drop the failed war down the memory hole. A moment of cheap grace for the folks.
blaming gates, blaming betrayus, blaming the generals serves to take the blame from where it belongs, barry manalo obama. he was responsible and he called the shots. he has lied to the american people serially. remember his statement on the campaign trail,"i will sign no healthcare bill that doesn't include the public option. you can take that to the bank." remember his pledge to the palestinians that there would be a halt to settlement construction prior to peace negotiations. the betrayer in chief is barry manalo obama. this meme that barry is a victim of insubordinates strategems is nauseating. gates did not betray barry. barry betrayed the american people.
Nice sentiments, but Obamacare is a cruel hoax. It keeps in place a dysfunctional and unaffordable insurance system. Most will buy high deductible plans. What this means is that if an insured gets sick, s/he is likely to go bankrupt from deductibles and copays, about %9500 per individual and $12,500 per family of 4 making <$95,000/year. (The experience in Massachusetts is virtually no reduction in bankruptcies due to medical insurance which account for one half of all bankruptcies). The upside with Obamacare is that at least you will have a doctor and healthcare network to access, however inadequate. The downside, you can't afford to use it. In sum, Obamacare is a rube goldberg plan designed by neoliberals to insure rentier income to the 1%.
you list these items as bad outcomes:
4. Communist China took advantage of the crisis to push for a de-Americanized world
5. China renewed its push to dump the US dollar as the international reserve currency. That step would cost the US economy enormously.
6. The US ability to sanction Iran and Syria was weakened
aren't these good outcomes? wouldn't the world be better off with multipolarity? and wouldn't the end of dollar hegemony hasten that end? news to me that you are for sanctioning iran and depriving children of medicine.
when running for president obama said that he would sign no healthcare law that didn't have a pubic option, adding "you can take that to the bank." when he got into office the first thing he did was to hire an health insurance company lawyer, get the insurance companies and drug companies together, and write a law that is a bailout for insurance companies. 33% of america's healthcare dollar goes to g and a. that won't change. healthcare costs rising won't change. bankruptcies because of healthcare costs will not change (see Massachusetts). Obama had the people behind him for a public option--70%--he had a mandate. He sold out the american people. the new healthcare bill has something like 7 agencies that access your private information--equifax or one of the credit companies (owned by the crowns?)--is one of them as is homeland security, social security. is this progressive? no, it's plutocrats throwing a crumb to the masses, enabliing them to by insurance they can't afford from insurance companies whose ceos make millions a year. we need medicare for all. supporting this kind of a bill promotes the cult of obama and is counter productive.
i find the opprobrium against the GOP self indulgent righteousness. the reality is that both parties are nearly identical. my guess is that obama is going to use the GOP cacaphony as cover for a grand bargain in which he cuts social security and medicare. the good cop--dems and obie--will have to --sadly--make a deal because of the GOP crazies. nice storyline to sell to liberal professors and do gooders. but i think the fix has been in since clinton turned the democratic party into republican party lite.
Rather odd of Dr Cole not to address Putin's most compelling argument--the need for international law and the consequences to world order when it is not followed. Also, the fact that the US by not adhering to international law has destabilized the the world. Finally, to say that disagreeing with the US's take on the chemical weapons attacks is succumb crackpot conspiracy theories, is, given what we know, a big stretch.
well, i'm sorry but this is pretty sad. celebrating "window dressing achievements" is pitiful. fact is obama has continued to bush regime on steroids, has sucked up to the plutocracy and bailed out the super rich while scheming to cut the social safety net and instigating liberal fascism.
lily ledbetter notwithstanding, there are few blacks better off than 4 years ago. blacks like everyone else are being sold down the river.
the cult of personality is i suppose part of the authoritarian mindset.
Too much apologizing:
"he was stymied when Kadima Party leader Tzippi Livni failed to attract enough coalition partners to form a government";
"he was boxed in" by Petreus.
Obama as victim: a hard sell.
A tad hypocritical? Extolling the rule of law and denouncing violence while the US has undermined the rule of law with its violent, lawless invasions and occupations of Muslim countries. How can Obama say these things with a straight face? Is he utterly out of touch with reality? Or is he just a more effectively evil politician than most?
juan--i think you are minimizing the widespread rage in the middle east toward the u.s. and it's malignant policies and persistent meddling in their affairs. there is a larger pattern here that you refuse to acknowledge, whether it is the aghan soldiers killing americans or these demonstrations; the middle east wants the yankee--the great satan-- to go home. the middle east has had it with america's humanitarian campaigns that result in murder, division, and de-development in the region.