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marmar
marmar's Journal
marmar's Journal
November 5, 2014
By Juan Cole
The midterm elections in a president’s second term have historically been a time when the president’s party lost seats in both houses of Congress. Only a little over a third of the electorate typically votes in these elections, and they are disproportionately white, wealthy and elderly. In short, a different country voted in 2014 than had voted in 2012, a deep red country. It is not surprising, then, that the GOP gained control of the Senate.
How could the change affect foreign policy? The president has wide latitude in making foreign policy and even in making war. Nevertheless, Congress is not helpless in that realm. It controls the purse strings via the budget and can forbid the president to spend money on some enterprise (that is how the GOP House blocked the closure of the Guantanamo facility). The Republican majority now does not have to negotiate with Democratic senators in crafting bills, and it can easily attach riders to key pieces of legislation, making it difficult for the president to veto them. That was how Congress made the Obama administration implement the financial blockade of Iran’s petroleum sales, by attaching it to the Defense Bill.
A Republican Congress can also put pressure on the president by allying with powerful lobbies in Washington. Bill Clinton’s 1998 attack on Iraq (Operation Desert Fox) was provoked in part by the Project for a New American Century (mostly made up of out-of-government Neoconservatives and former Reagan-Bush aides) and its Republican allies in Congress. The latter produced the “Iraq Liberation Act”. Clinton may have thought that the 1998 attack was a small bit of propitiation. But the president made the UN weapons inspectors leave Iraq so that he could bomb it, and they never went back in.
Once the West was thus blinded, the Neoconservatives could use their journalists such as Judith Miller to begin planting a narrative of renewed Iraqi unconventional weapons research and development programs. These programs did not exist, but the UN inspectors weren’t on the ground any more to contradict the ridiculous Neocon fairy tales about an imminent Iraqi nuclear bomb or biological weapons labs on Winnebagos on Iraq’s pot-holed streets. In short, by provoking Clinton to even a limited bombing run, the Neoconservatives severed this country from key intelligence that could contradict their war propaganda and so they paved the way to the 2003 war. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.juancole.com/2014/11/republican-congress-entangle.html
Juan Cole: How a Republican Congress could Entangle the US further in the Middle East
By Juan Cole
The midterm elections in a president’s second term have historically been a time when the president’s party lost seats in both houses of Congress. Only a little over a third of the electorate typically votes in these elections, and they are disproportionately white, wealthy and elderly. In short, a different country voted in 2014 than had voted in 2012, a deep red country. It is not surprising, then, that the GOP gained control of the Senate.
How could the change affect foreign policy? The president has wide latitude in making foreign policy and even in making war. Nevertheless, Congress is not helpless in that realm. It controls the purse strings via the budget and can forbid the president to spend money on some enterprise (that is how the GOP House blocked the closure of the Guantanamo facility). The Republican majority now does not have to negotiate with Democratic senators in crafting bills, and it can easily attach riders to key pieces of legislation, making it difficult for the president to veto them. That was how Congress made the Obama administration implement the financial blockade of Iran’s petroleum sales, by attaching it to the Defense Bill.
A Republican Congress can also put pressure on the president by allying with powerful lobbies in Washington. Bill Clinton’s 1998 attack on Iraq (Operation Desert Fox) was provoked in part by the Project for a New American Century (mostly made up of out-of-government Neoconservatives and former Reagan-Bush aides) and its Republican allies in Congress. The latter produced the “Iraq Liberation Act”. Clinton may have thought that the 1998 attack was a small bit of propitiation. But the president made the UN weapons inspectors leave Iraq so that he could bomb it, and they never went back in.
Once the West was thus blinded, the Neoconservatives could use their journalists such as Judith Miller to begin planting a narrative of renewed Iraqi unconventional weapons research and development programs. These programs did not exist, but the UN inspectors weren’t on the ground any more to contradict the ridiculous Neocon fairy tales about an imminent Iraqi nuclear bomb or biological weapons labs on Winnebagos on Iraq’s pot-holed streets. In short, by provoking Clinton to even a limited bombing run, the Neoconservatives severed this country from key intelligence that could contradict their war propaganda and so they paved the way to the 2003 war. .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.juancole.com/2014/11/republican-congress-entangle.html
November 5, 2014
...... And having a Jack and Coke.
Netherlands or Bust !!!!!
Ugh. Turned off election coverage. Watching Law and Order reruns.................
...... And having a Jack and Coke.
Netherlands or Bust !!!!!
November 4, 2014
By Juan Cole
In a big setback for the Obama administration’s Syria policy, the al-Qaeda affiliate Succor Front (Jabhat al-Nusra) took the town of Deir Sunbul and its environs this weekend away from the Syria Revolutionaries Front, a relatively secular-minded group viewed as “moderates” by the United States. Deir Sunbul lies in the Jabal al-Zawiya region of the northwestern province of Idlib. The pan-Arab London daily al-Quds al-Arabi (Arab Jerusalem) says that the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Damascus is rubbing its hands with glee at the prospect of the rebels fighting one another to exhaustion.
Not only did Syria Revolutionaries Front leader Jamal Marouf have to flee his hometown, but some of his fighters actually turned on him and joined the Succor Front.
The Succor Front launched its attack with an armored convoy coming from the eastern desert and deployed tanks and armored vehicles against Deir Sunbul’s pitiful little machine gun batteries. This operation raises the question of why the US did not bomb the convoy.
Jamal Marouf pledged to return to the region of Jabal al-Zawiya. The Succor Front/ Nusra directed a broadside at him, on hearing of this intention, saying: “Jamal, you were a revolutionary fighter. But you deviated from that path and entered the wastelands of politics and were tempted by money and arms. Today you consider us infidels and you accuse us of being agents and being foreigners. The holy warriors of the Succor Front who battle you, however, are in fact the inhabitants of Jabal Zawiya, and they fight in the ranks of the brigades and the people there. It is not the Succor Front alone that fights you.” .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.juancole.com/2014/11/moderate-stronghold-extremists.html
US Dilemma in Syria: Moderate Stronghold Falls to al-Qaeda, Fighters desert to Extremists
By Juan Cole
In a big setback for the Obama administration’s Syria policy, the al-Qaeda affiliate Succor Front (Jabhat al-Nusra) took the town of Deir Sunbul and its environs this weekend away from the Syria Revolutionaries Front, a relatively secular-minded group viewed as “moderates” by the United States. Deir Sunbul lies in the Jabal al-Zawiya region of the northwestern province of Idlib. The pan-Arab London daily al-Quds al-Arabi (Arab Jerusalem) says that the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Damascus is rubbing its hands with glee at the prospect of the rebels fighting one another to exhaustion.
Not only did Syria Revolutionaries Front leader Jamal Marouf have to flee his hometown, but some of his fighters actually turned on him and joined the Succor Front.
The Succor Front launched its attack with an armored convoy coming from the eastern desert and deployed tanks and armored vehicles against Deir Sunbul’s pitiful little machine gun batteries. This operation raises the question of why the US did not bomb the convoy.
Jamal Marouf pledged to return to the region of Jabal al-Zawiya. The Succor Front/ Nusra directed a broadside at him, on hearing of this intention, saying: “Jamal, you were a revolutionary fighter. But you deviated from that path and entered the wastelands of politics and were tempted by money and arms. Today you consider us infidels and you accuse us of being agents and being foreigners. The holy warriors of the Succor Front who battle you, however, are in fact the inhabitants of Jabal Zawiya, and they fight in the ranks of the brigades and the people there. It is not the Succor Front alone that fights you.” .................(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.juancole.com/2014/11/moderate-stronghold-extremists.html
November 4, 2014
....... and I'll be canvassing and helping people find ways to get to the polls all afternoon and evening.
Snyder has to go.
Took the day off, about to go vote ...............
....... and I'll be canvassing and helping people find ways to get to the polls all afternoon and evening.
Snyder has to go.
November 4, 2014
Same for you Wisconsinites, Pennsylvanians, Floridians, Mainers etc etc...........
Michiganders, it's time for us to take out the trash........
Same for you Wisconsinites, Pennsylvanians, Floridians, Mainers etc etc...........
November 3, 2014
(NYT) Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo gets strong marks for his aggressive response to the Ebola virus. But some voters are unsettled by what they view as his back-room, bullying style and by a federal investigation into an anti-corruption commission he established.
Few New Yorkers say the governor inspires them in the way that the mere mention of his father, former Gov. Mario M. Cuomo, still does. At least, they say, Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, has not embarrassed the office, unlike his immediate predecessors.
New Yorkers have had four years to size up the policies, personality and governing tendencies of Mr. Cuomo, a 56-year-old former state attorney general and Clinton administration housing secretary. And by all measures, they appear ready to give him a comfortable re-election victory on Tuesday over his Republican challenger, Rob Astorino, the Westchester County executive.
Still, New Yorkers’ relationship with their governor is hardly warm or enthusiastic, despite broad agreement with his policies, according to more than three dozen interviews conducted over the past week in New York City and on Long Island. ............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/03/nyregion/a-tepid-thumbs-up-is-the-best-many-can-muster-for-cuomo.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=b-lede-package-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
A Tepid Thumbs Up Is the Best Many Can Muster for Cuomo
(NYT) Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo gets strong marks for his aggressive response to the Ebola virus. But some voters are unsettled by what they view as his back-room, bullying style and by a federal investigation into an anti-corruption commission he established.
Few New Yorkers say the governor inspires them in the way that the mere mention of his father, former Gov. Mario M. Cuomo, still does. At least, they say, Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, has not embarrassed the office, unlike his immediate predecessors.
New Yorkers have had four years to size up the policies, personality and governing tendencies of Mr. Cuomo, a 56-year-old former state attorney general and Clinton administration housing secretary. And by all measures, they appear ready to give him a comfortable re-election victory on Tuesday over his Republican challenger, Rob Astorino, the Westchester County executive.
Still, New Yorkers’ relationship with their governor is hardly warm or enthusiastic, despite broad agreement with his policies, according to more than three dozen interviews conducted over the past week in New York City and on Long Island. ............(more)
The complete piece is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/03/nyregion/a-tepid-thumbs-up-is-the-best-many-can-muster-for-cuomo.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=b-lede-package-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
November 3, 2014
Published on Nov 1, 2014
Journalist Chris Hedges and political philosopher Sheldon Wolin continue their discussion of the threats faced by democratic institutions
Chris Hedges & Sheldon Wolin: Can Capitalism & Democracy Coexist ? (pts 5 and 6 of 8)
Published on Nov 1, 2014
Journalist Chris Hedges and political philosopher Sheldon Wolin continue their discussion of the threats faced by democratic institutions
November 3, 2014
..... when you go the Freep home page a giant Snyder video ad takes over the screen and starts playing. Irritating as hell.
Is Tricky Ricky trying to annoy people into voting for him? ......
..... when you go the Freep home page a giant Snyder video ad takes over the screen and starts playing. Irritating as hell.
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