Friends, Trump yesterday urged college presidents to be tougher on students protesting the war in Gaza, calling them “raging lunatics.” He continued: “To every college president, I say remove the encampments immediately. Vanquish the radicals and take back our campuses for all of the normal students.”
Because Bibi is itching to bomb Iran and other countries where Hamas hides. If he does, oil prices will sky rocket. When gas prices soar, everything gets more expensive, especially food due to fertilizer and trucking costs. Consumers would be more angry. Biden knows that if gas prices soar before the election, voters will blame him.
Bibi knows this too. Bibi would love to have Trump in office because Trump will never defend human rights or a two state solution.
Biden is in a very difficult position. He must handle Bibi with kid gloves and appease him.
Biden also knows that if he comes down hard on Bibi that AIPAC could swing the election. AIPAC has already vowed to attack the squad for questioning Bibi. But the squad is pretty safe because of their districts' demographics. However, the White House and the House will be decided by more competitive districts than the squad's seats. Biden is on this ice, not the squad.
Sadly, dark money can swing elections. Our democracy is in peril because of our weak campaign finance laws. Citizens United and other pro-corporate campaign finance laws have weakened our Democracy to the breaking point. We knew it would be bad, but we didn't know how bad it would get. The top 5 Senate races cost more than $200 million dollars with PA costing over a third of a BILLION dollars. Yes, it's rigged for big money.
It's not Biden; it's the game. As someone cooler than me once said, "Don't hate the player; hate the game."
I don't have a solution. But we need to focus on the swing districts in play by educating voters and demand the media covers issues like climate change, labor, health care, women's rights, education, social security, jobs and the infrastructure investment that Biden has done to build the economy.
The Climate Hawks reached out to Editors to start a dialog about climate change to get coverage. A coalition for sustainability and justice needs to do the same in OH, MI, WI, AZ, GA, NC, NV and so on.
Information must top misinformation. Sanity must top insanity. Biden's and Trump's character will matter to the level-headed Independents. If that's not who you're talking to, you're probably wasting your time.
But people need to care first to understand!Few Americans are deep thinkers. Therein lies the problem. Long gone is the mantra, “ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”. Now it’s I want something for nothing and I just don’t want to have to think too hard.
I just can't get over how many people just don't understand or care about character. It should be so basic. Unfortunately, it says a lot about modern American society. Win at all costs.
People over time have also wanted a person who seems fairly smart to them. Not intellectual or book smart. Just smart. They don't want to elevate some brute to lead the tribe who they think is a dumb ass. I mean, it's not all about mean and strong.
Correct John, the lack of deep thinkers is quite apparent on the left as it is on the right. The left is caught up in self righteousness and jumps, without thinking on bandwagons, and are easily manipulated by reverse psychology.
In total agreement. I lived through the left during the Vietnam war on the University of Wisconsin campus. Got pepper gassed while just waiting for a bus when the rocks flew, had activists try and stop me from going to class during my senior year and lived through ther bombing of Sterling Hall. So no, that crowd has no credibility in my mind. Just as bad as the MAGA crowd.
Today I consider myself a progressive on many, but not all issues, some issues are bonkers and counter productive, but apparently someoone or someones have constructed a menu of what is not and what is progressive. I say fuck the menu, I think for myself and have critical reasoning skills, and am a chess player and think 10 moves ahead, and try to foresee he unintended as well as the logical consequences.
During the VN war I was an E-5, deployed to Vietnam, I enlisted in 1957, was not a draftee, I was also conservative. The names of my team are etched on The Wall, in the space reserved for Sep 1967. When I came back I saw that the whole affair was a waste of life and money, and now that I can buy a McDonalds in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh city) and Exxon has a sole contract with the government to drill oil in the Gulf of Tonkin, I am confirmed.
What the campus idiots and the Chicago 7 actually achieved was to prolong the war and cause more deaths, because of the reaction they incurred among the public, the same reaction that Campus idiots are causing today.
What stopped the war was not demonstrations or Kent State, but the over 50,000 body bags what were flow into Travis AFB, and the photos and video's of the C141's unloading and the photos and videos of military funerals. It was middleAmerica,rural America burying their sons, fathers, brothers,uncles that had Nixon backing out of Vietnam.
Nixon to win the election, committed Treason, and behind LBJ's back, told President Thieu of VN, to back out of the Paris Treaty, because he would give him a better deal,and his better deal was to betray Vietnam.
The male brain is not fully developed until about age 25, campus idiots are age 18-24.
It's all about the damn money and nothing more. They continue to put the demented tangerine toddler high on a pedestal and promote his violent and ignorant rhetoric. Back in the Walter Cronkite days, we weren't subjected to this trash reporting that supports a dangerous madman. We got the news straight and there is no way in hell they would be promoting someone like Trump. Most voters and people in general wouldn't have accepted his treasonous, dishonest, felonious, mob boss platform.
The soft underbelly of democracy. Our uncritical application of freedom of speech allowed the camel (Putin and other bad actors) to put their nose under the tent, infect much of the population with nonsense, and now we all pay the price.
And we collectively let the 4th estate cash cow atrophy by getting sold off or monopolized like other industries. Now we in a pickle.
Every person that I can educate or share what I know is important. Sometimes I change minds when I point things out, that are not commonly aired in MSM. If that means one less vote for tfg, it is never " wasting my time!"!
Thank you, Paula B. Patrick Putman: There are other, less civil interpretations . I like to avoid typing his name as often as is practicable. I see it too many times in media.
You might think so, Peter, because media propaganda insists that is the truth. But is it? Do young people feel attached to a leader who thinks they should be thrown in jail for exercising their constitutional rights? Is Trump all strong and vigorous? Nope. My hope is first, that the shepherd is stricken so that the sheep scatter. If Trump is jailed for any length of time without cell phones and television, etc. he will lose his power to corrupt the sheep. They will begin to scatter on their own. Why else would the Supreme Court step in to help him delay the inevitable? After that, I agree 100% with everything Robert posted.
P.S. If you had any idea what it is to face down a category five hurricane, you'd be a climate hawk too.
Question is, if/when Trump goes to jail, who is waiting in the wings to take up the mantle? MTG? No, Trump the martyr falls, and the real devil might appear, a Ross Perot with horns and tail.
I doubt it. Cokehead McSniffles (Don Jr.) will step up to carry the mantle, spouting "my father" again and again and again, and the sheep will sacrifice themselves to the effigy.
@Peter. That's what Putin wants you to say. Last night I was on a Hopium call. At worst, all polls are within the margin of error. The opponent is self destructing. Plus, we have the capacity to expand our base, especially in swing states and Republicans can only lose support based on trend lines, we have guerilla tactics.
Here in Baghdad By the Sea, yesterday abortion was all over the local news...except for the Miami Herald, Spanish language El Herald and las noticias.
In honor of the event, FB6, Fadems and partner groups sent 100,000 texts to nonregistered Floridians re abortion.
FT 6 has added Florida to its targeted states. Besides abortion, marijuana is on the ballot. FT 6 has a dedicated database and uses every outreach method possible (phone and text, postcard, email and targeted ad, and in-person too), to target new Democratic voters will make the most impact – in the most flippable states and districts.
Daniel- you are right in evoking the devil (Putin), as I believe that Putin was behind the timing of the Hamas arrack, with the intent to further divide America upon itself, as Putin knows that he cannot defeat the U.S. military, but he can divide and conquer.
Biden’s success with Johnson proved to me that Biden has been the best possible President we could have had during this time of destructive Social Media algorithms. However the November elections represent an event horizon not just for democracy, but for civilization, as Global Climate Change is accelerating at an alarming pace,
Unfortunately, Biden has lost the primary ace that he had up his sleeve- being able to contrast the era of political violence under Trump with the relative calm under Biden. My concern is that with that loss, so goes the election.
Regardless, it will get down to reinventing the Democratic Convention for the new era of AI.
I propound the Democratic Convention should be choreographed to be an AI enhanced media presentation of the very real problems facing the world today, while providing a means for the public to vote on possible solutions- not unlike how Robert Reich does it, and in this way expose the complexity of the nuances that must be considered, and thereby celebrate democracy, and provide a stark contract to the vigilante violence of the Reds.
To maximize the audience, Biden should offer to step aside if there is consensus that anyone else would be better suited to save democracy and civilization.
Regardless of whether Biden actually steps aside, Al Gore for President and Robert Reich for Vice President should be seriously considered, as a way for them both to present their messages, as they both have been remarkably prophetic of the problems that we now face. Both were also part of the administration that provided the longest period of economic growth in history that was destroyed by the greed of tax cuts for the rich, financial deregulation, and a meaningless war, resulting in the 2008 crash. All of which contributed to the demise of the American Middle Class.
Obama created a perfectly balanced recovery, which balance Trump destroyed by putting it on steroids, eliminating the control mechanism of interest rates as reigns on the economy, and spurring the inflation that Biden tamed, all while Putin has been hard at work on his plans for world conquest, with Trump, Tucker, and Fox becoming Putin’s American cheerleaders.
In short, there will be a window for the truth to be told, and it may be our last.
Daniel, 🎯 Repeating what the Putin trolls put out there doesn’t seem to be obvious to people like Peter.. but then again I am suspect of those comments being par of trolling. They are deeply desperate and pouring it on. Those kind of statements make the taking points of Peter sound MAGA - like in the blindness to anything but what they want to hear rather than an extensive list of facts.
Yes, and remind them that Trump lies and flip-flops, and in times of crisis, as during the pandemic, he does not know what to do. He is the swamp personified.
Laurie, by "he" you undoubtedly mean Trump. He did indeed undermine Governor Whitmer's efforts to contain the virus. How soon we forget that Trump is responsible for thousands of needless death because of his malice and incompetence!
I’ve signed up to attend Countering Disinformation Online for Social Ambassadors with Building Bridges for America Action Fund on Thursday, May 2, 2024.
FT6 is a powerful way to reach out … We need many …
HEADLINES are extremely powerful, too, and they’re critically important {journalists know, sadly, that more people read headlines alone and form opinions on issues through what headlines convey than actually read substantive news reports}. Headlines are also click-bait, trying to pull someone into a story, but the headline itself is often all that gets through to a reader.
I hope FT6 has some REALLY talented headline writers …
Problem is, Danny, you can command the media until the cows come home to no avail - they aren't in it for the news - they're in it for the profit. This is not the media we had from 1930's until the early 2000's when the HONEST news was a public service and their entertainment programs paid the bills and salaries.
Thank you Danny for the behind the curtain pieces that I suspected - but you gave the specifics that helped me understand better. I've been appalled that the US couldn't just condition the aid to only be for humanitarian aid - if Netanyahu would not adjust his wholesale swath killing spree. This helps me more of the nuances.
I do want to add that unfortunately - helping people understand the consequences of voting for someone without consideration of their policies is harder these days.
1) basic civics was cut from many school curriculum's for a generation or more. People can believe a crazy guy if they don't know how government works - or that they believe what the former guy was doing or is seeking to do if re-elected is okay for democracy. It's a 911 five alarm fire for democracy and he's criminally sought to damage it already including attempting an illegal coup.
2) If giving the public basic formation or giving people factual details changed perceptions -boy... we would have a different world. However, the GOP has been "out-messaging" the dems in many ways for a long time.
They've played a big con-using language like "trickle down", or we need to go to war in IRAQ because of WMD's or my favorite "entitlements" especially the way that Mitch McConnelle says it - is infuriating. These are PROTECTIONS - THAT YOU EARNED FOR YOURSELF - we need to start by first - not repeating or defending by using words that change the way it's been framed by the GOP.
Dems need to re-learn how to not be defensive - by responding to the various republican accusations not by defending how democrats protected America - but responding instead by saying 2020 WAS THE SAFEST AND MOST SECURE ELECTION IN OUR HISTORY over and over and over and over per these ___ #s of agencies that measure these things. Rather than repeating "we did NOT STEAL an election. Don lost 2020 and joe won it - fair and square. It's taken years - but the dems are now fighting back hard and with more than their pencil for the knife fight.
It's time to be badass about this! Declare we are going to win the Presidency, the house, and the senate to get BFD stuff DONE and lead our country to a better future for everyone. Tell people why it matters to them. Declare yes Democracy is at risk - but make it personal... heres what a loss of a real democracy will mean for you. Yo
3) LEAD not just what has been started and accomplished in the last four 3.5 years - but shout out what the future will be. Get people excited about what there will be more or -and what rights will be restored and improved. Women's rights, right to make choices for your own body and healthcare, voting, addressing climate, increasing opportunities, safe affordable housing.. and on and on...
4) We can also work to get the corrupting levers of money out of politics. It's time to reframe how capitalism and our economy can work for all of us and protect our planets' future and build a big healthy economy for everyone without working 3 jobs to pay the mortgage. Many corporations and then with Citizens United meant that those companies and rich donors took over. They liked all the goodies that the republican process of capitalism accomplished. Greed and growth for their companies persuaded them to go for saving taxes, increasing their wealth, and that it was OK to pollute, avoid various regulations, or just not care about the climate they are going to leave their kids. Somehow incentivize these companies to recognize that a healthy thriving middle class benefits all of us - and that values and creating a positive thriving workforce means more than money.
Well said, Danny. What I would like to add is that back in 2020 Biden had the non-inspiring slogan Build Back Better. Had it not been for Trump's failed leadership during the pandemic Biden would have lost. Slogans matter, and right now Biden has none that I know of. MAGA is a powerful slogan, and Biden must show convincingly how Trump failed, and has indeed dishonored that slogan. "This is how I intend to keep America great," is what he must tell us. "This is not who we are," Biden has said, but Governor Sununu replied that is who we are: see the polls. Prices, low and order, abortion are likely to figure large in November. Can Biden deliver? The Gaza tragedy makes Biden look weak. The Constitution is at stake.
This is probably one of the more nuanced takes I have seen in a while. But regarding Bibi wanting to attack Iran - couldn’t Biden just stop that, by denying any more weapons to Israel? Since Isreal is very depended on weapons from
USA, which makes up something like 65% percent of all weapons sold to Isreal
(Germany makes up about 30% I think, at the last 5% of weapons sold to Isreal is spread among the rest of Europes countries)
Bibi doesn't want to attack Iran until after Trump is elected. When Iran sent all its drones against Israel (and got them shot down) and said it would send more if Israel retaliated, Israel simply bombed Iran's defense radar site, showing the Ayatollah it can do whatever it wants to Iran. So, Iran, Hezbollah, et al. became quiet, without admitting they were scared to react
1) ‘More’ is never the same as ‘as much as one can want’.
2) until (oil) demand is zero due to a surfeit of a better alternative (fusion/fisson/green), OR a surfeit of (oil) supply (never), supply and demand for a global resource will be affected by ALL supply/sources and ALL demands.
3) Not all fossil fuel is the same, or able to serve all purposes.
4) It is in our strategic interests to be able to offer oil security to EU & other nations being held hostage by a few oil rich countries like Russia & OPEC, so we need more than WE need, see #1).
I understand part of that but it still doesn't help me understand why our gas prices go up because other countries are cutting production. Help me understand.
Jan, (Assuming you are continuing the assumption that U.S. production exactly meets U.S. demand, and asking why should U.S. prices be affected by a drop in international supply?)
When there is less to share (abroad), some people (abroad) will pay a bit more to get closer to what they need, (since there is some degree of ‘price elasticity’ for oil).
Then, when the price on the global market goes up, US oil companies would prefer to make bigger profits by selling some of the U.S. production abroad, so they do.
This reduces supply at home, raising demand and prices until there is a balance point for U.S. companies between selling at home and abroad.
So long as U.S. oil companies are commercial entities (ie, not nationalized, not charities, and not prohibited from selling to the highest global bidder - which would be very hard to regulate thru congress, since U.S. congress is owned by big oil), any change in global supply or global demand (ie, any global price change) WILL affect U.S. supply, and therefore US’ cost at the pump, long run.
Principle: “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.
(rest of that fine meditation you know:)… any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” John Donne, 1623
The second part of the quote relates less directly to your question; I just love it; it makes me oddly happy to know someone 400 years ago already knew how to solve today’s econ and humanitarian problems. It only requires our will to do the right thing.
Thank you, that does help me understand. I don't want a government that requires me to sell my product at a certain price and yet I do. I guess I want the other people to be like my neighbor who looks out for the best for him and for me.
I question anyone who would read anything by Bill Kristol, much less linking it on a public forum. But hey, this is America, where embarrassing oneself in the public policy realm is commonplace.
Because the situation in Gaza is not occurring in a vacuum. Protesters (who I agree with about war crimes) are missing what would likely happen if the US withdrew all aid from Israel. It’s a tinder box in the Middle East. Israel and Iran have already used drones to attack each other. Yemen and the Houthis have been attacking shipping. The US abandoning Israel would signal to a multitude of actors in the region that would likely turn an already unstable situation into an all-out regional war. And we know Israel has nuclear weapons. We also know that other countries/actors in the area would likely be able to get ahold of them. I don’t see the US pulling aid as being helpful for the Gazans or the region. I think Netanyahu would continue his crimes and open a war on another front. It’s a fucking disaster.
Yep, but all of this talk about war crimes, obscures the war crimes of he who started it all,
Yahya Sinwar of HAMAS.
While campus idiots, tools of Saudi and Emirate money, kvetch ab out Israeli war cimes, while South Africa and other nations charge Israel, there is deafening silence about the crimes of HAMAS, especially using civilians as human shields.
There’d be a cease-fire immediately if Hamas surrendered and released the hostages. Until then, Israel has no choice but to defeat this terrorist group that is sworn to its destruction.
US classified intelligence on Israeli military operations -> Trump -> Russia -> Hamas -> barbaric attack on Israel (on Putin's birthday) reminiscent of Russia's brutal attack on Ukraine -> Israeli invasion of Gaza -> social unrest in US
Results: international attention on Russia's invasion of Ukraine is diverted; international support for Ukraine declines; tide of war turns in favor of Russia; support among key groups for Biden diminishes; chances of Trump winning election enhanced.
Whom do these results benefit? Putin, Trump & the GOP. Who is wily & motivated enough to conceive of such a scheme? Putin
Why so much concern for & emotion over the Palestinians & not Kurds, Uyghurs, Chechens, Sudanese, etc., even Ukrainians locked in an existential battle not of their choosing, the most crucial conflict since WWII for the West & democratic forces to win?
Why this issue & not the ones that youth have claimed (& I agree) to be their most pressing issues: climate disruption, reproductive rights, wealth & power disparity & inequality, the survival of democracy, etc.?
When these campus idiots and their Muslim friends help elect Trump, and Trump starts deporting Arab and Hispanics, it will be too late to say, "Geez I screwed up"
The arrogance of people whose brains are not yet fully developed and who lack critical thinking skills, that they believe they can change policy by blocking traffic, chanting slogans and camping on campus.
Not going to happen, what they are doing is pissing off the very people that they think they are trying to influence.. the people who have to work for a living, and aren't living on their parents dime.
I think the answer to why this issue is that it resonates with people. There are a lot of people in the US with ties to the Middle East (including me, but then I also have ties to Ukraine). And there's the religious issue. I'm not saying Putin didn't orchestrate this because I think he and Netanyahu did. But I think they both know how emotional that area is for Americans.
This conflict has flared up repeatedly throughout my life & beyond. I'm so sick of it! When it broke out, I knew it was trouble & would ruin things not only for Israel & Palestinians but also Ukraine & Biden, who was placed in an impossible spot, & the Democratic Party. And most of the participants have behaved in an unhelpful way. But Putin & Trump are basking in the chaos.
I think I've been banned entirely from posting on Robert Reich's Substack for reasons unknown to me, but my posts no longer appear and so I guess that's that. I will miss the opportunity to "sound off" now and then, but so it goes.
Perhaps not the Hamas ideology (although Naziism was largely defeated when Germany lost the war), but at the least all tunnels, weapons manufacturing and weapons caches would be destroyed and the smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Israel shuttered completely.
I know I’ve said it before, but Hamas took the hostages so they could stretch the war out as long as Russia and Iran needed to stretch it out in order to put who they want in office. They are out these hostages at their pace in order to keep the war going Until the election. I believe that most of the strife in the US and on campuses is not coming from the US and the campuses. Russia and other actors are doing what we are starting to do in Georgia; create civil unrest, and weaken the nation.
Let us not forget the wealth and power of AIPAC to do tremendous damage to any candidate who goes against their wishes. In many ways, for Democrats, AIPAC is the (much quieter and more stealthy) equivalent of MAGA for Republicans.
I'll repeat what I've said before, Netanyahu and his cabal or radical right wing rabbis, who seem motivated by an obsessive hunger to reclaim the area included in the Kingdom of Solomon from 3,000 years ago, in order to prove these old men have still "got it," need to pay attention to the very short life of that Kingdom and it's very rapid demise. Since they believe that God is totally in control and responsible for all things, perhaps they should take that as an indication that the end of the Kingdom of Solomon was God's will, and equally so, the reality that God has never brought it back to life in the past 3,000 years.
The ancient nation of Israel destroyed itself in creating Solomon's kingdom. It is not wise for Israel now to be repeating exactly the same mistakes.
Biden seems to be on a tightrope. He continues to maintain protection of Israel of a future where it will have to defend itself from others who resist Israel's ongoing attempts to occupy other's lands while abiding by his own humanist aspirations. Huge predicament. I believe it would be best for him to verbalize this message. It might help all of us in understanding more clearly his stance and reduce levels of violence around the conflict in our own country.
Because he wants Gaza controlled by the IOF and the 2-state solution is just something liberals say to make it seem like they don't want the genocide they are paying for.
In one hundred percent agreement. I think he’s afraid to tick off some who have influence, both monetarily and vocally. What keeps getting pushed under the rug, is, none of this had to happen. Israeli intelligence knew when and where the Hamas attack would occur and chose to ignore their own intelligence. Having assets in place is not that difficult. The present Israeli government is corrupt, so what else should we expect? We’ve come to their aid on numerous occasions and I’d ask, what have we gotten in return? How many times have we caught them giving the Chinese’s our nuclear secrets over the decades? What kind of “ally” would do that?
Totally agree. I analogize Oct 7 to Sep 11th, 2001 as follows.
Bush and Bibi knew something was in the works, and knew they could use it for their own political purposes. What they didn't know was the details, the extent of it all, the targets, but once you loose the hounds, there is no telling what they will do.
Bibi and his right wing coalition are not only corrupt, but insane with religious fervor and in that they are matched by HAMAS, Hezbollah, Iran.
The other mid east states are pragmatic, realistic and restrained and actually want nothing to do with HAMAS, Hezbollah and Iran.
Iran, Hezbollah and the Assad Regime are Shia Islam and as such are competitors and enemies of Sunni Islam, which is the Kngdom, Jordan, Kuwait, and UAE, Yemin is Sunni, but the Houthi's are Shia.
Iran sent a suicide Squad into Mecca during the 1987Haj. There is a 1400 year old war between Shia and Sunni Islam over who is the rightful successor of Muhammad, and of course those in the west are totally ignorant, and ignorant of how important it is to the Shia.
It is official Iranian position is that the Jewish state shall not exist, to further their cause, and make inroads into Sunni armed groups, they have allied with, backed, trained, equipped,mentored and helped plan the Oct 7th attack.
There are Shia in Saudi Arabia, which is an official ahhabiyyah State, the Shia however are second class citizens, and are used as manual labor, and it is they that are the workers in the oil fields.
The Shia sect of Zaydi is the largest denomination in Yemen, and is the religion of the Houti tribe,
Yemen has no functioning central government with full control over its territory, and any state institutions that continue to operate are controlled by unelected officials and armed groups. The Hadi government is largely dependent on its foreign patrons, particularly Saudi Arabia and the UAE, which also have parallel relationships with other anti-Houthi groups. The Houthis receive at least support from Iran..
Yemen has been a proxy war between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran.
Iran was controlled by the Sunni tribe of Saddams, until Bush destabilized it, now it is an ally of Iran as the people are majority Shia, and the Sunni are a minority. The Iran Republican Guard now operates in, and has bases in Iraq and have been attacking U.S. Bases with Missiles and mortars.
The Assad regime is Alawite, a Shia sect like the Yemen Zydis, but the people are majority Sunni, so we have Shia minority ruling over a majority Sunni, and the Sunni's have risen up against the Assad regime many times. the City of Homs was wiped off the map by Haffez al Assad, the father of Bashar al Assad the President, and has been wiped off the map again.
Russia has intervened in Syria on the side of the ruling Shia Class, and is allied with Shia Iran., which is supporting and equipping the Shia Houti's and has equipped, trained and mentored HAMAS, which has the same goal as Shia Hezbollah of Lebanon, which is the major political force in that country.
Sunni Islam, in the form of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and in Lebanon The Islamic Group is one of Lebanon's main Sunni factions but has kept a low profile politically over the years. It has one member in Lebanon's 128-seat legislature. Elections within the group in 2022 brought its leadership closer to Hamas.
I mention here that Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, and Jordan will not accept any Palestinian refugees and if caught they are deported back to Palestine.
Exactly! As long as Biden continues to funnel weapons into Israel, the atrocities will continue. Is Biden actually interested in reelection? It seems more and more as if he’s paving the way for trump. Already there are proto fascist goon squads attacking students and professors on at least one campus.
Birtue. There can not be a two state solution. The Arabs will have no part of it. HAMAS, by their own words, is dedicated to the total obliteration of Israel, and that means genocide..
The Right wing Israeli's are motivated by not only Zionist ideology, but by the existential threat of a Palestinian state on their border.
Perhaps because there is no way to have a 2 state solution since neither side has been in favor of it for 30 or more years. If the Arab peace keeping force can be assembled, perhaps there is a possibility, but the logistics difficulties of having neither Palestine nor Israel cut in half.
A two state solution is a pipe dream. What seems to elude those in the west, is that this is a religious war, and Islam declared war on the Jews 1400 years ago when Muhammad beheaded, six at a time, the entire membership, 600 of them, of the Jewish tribe the Quaryza in the market place of Medina.
srael will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it" (The Martyr, Imam Hassan al-Banna, of blessed memory).
"The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (evidently a certain kind of tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews." (related by al-Bukhari and Moslem). verses 1295/1296 Book 56, haddith 139 al Bukhari.
The Day of Judgement is the Islamic end times,and it won't come about until all of the Jews are killed.
To the Muslim mind, a Jewish state on sacred Arab soil is an abomination. The soil was, in their mind, sanctified with the Dome of the Rock, built around a rock with the imprint of a dinosaurs foot, when the Muslim's believe, because the Quran say so, was left by the chimera beast that carried Muhammad from Medina to the 7 levels of heaven to bargain with Al Lihah, over how many times a day they should pray.
Once a land is Muslim it is forever Muslim, according to Islamic thought, and a Jewish state, the hated Jews of all things, on "sacred" Muslim soil cannot tand and must be eradicated.
The west is idiots, especially America, they think in terms of politics and secularism. Democracy and Islam are not compatible..
Democracy is not defined by voting. Hungary, Russia are not democracies and they vote.
Aside from his greater empathy for Jews and Israel after Oct. 7, Biden probably also placed a greater value on retaining or gaining the support of pro Israel groups and moveable centrist voters than groups in the Democratic base sympathetic to the Palestinians. Donors and social networks and connections almost certainly played a role too. I think Biden was blind to the possibility that Israel's conduct of the war in Gaza - now widely viewed as ethnic cleansing or possible genocide - would accelerate a shift in American views on Israel and the Palestinians. Biden of course enabled the Israeli over retaliation with his early open ended support, and part ownership of any Israeli war crimes will be his legacy.
tRUMP'S legacy is that he convinced Netanyahu to move the Capital of Israel to the Holy Land: thus inflaming further, the angers and hatred of Palestinians.
Thank you Prof. Reich for pointing out the infantile behavior of Donald Trump. The challenge, so much of our media is promoting such infantile behavior with hardly a note that what ?Trump is doing and proposing is toddleresque and not what respectful leaders do and say. Beyond a few journalists and commentators, Trump's whining, complaining, insulting, and ignoring of the facts are just a normal way of running for office. They cover Trump more than Biden/Harris and call Trump's trial in New York "a hush money trial." In reality it is a "cooking the books for personal and electoral gain" trial. For years, the folks who attend Trump's rallies have demonstrated that they do not hear what Trump says. They react to Trump's bluster, a few code words, and the idea that Trump is strong. When interviewed even right after the rally, they can't state one specific thing that Trump stands for, or if they happen to come up with something it is superficial, like he hates immigration. Last week, the Supreme Court conservatives talked as though they thought Trump had a case for immunity for his crimes and tried to justify such a ridiculous position with gobbledygook that was supposed to sound scholarly but really sounded stupid and toddleresque (what would a future president do if they thought they could be prosecuted after leaving office for something he did in office?). Yo Mr. Alito, maybe he would not commit the crimes he could be prosecuted for. Oh wait, that might just bee too difficult for Alito to comprehend. I guess it's not 17th century enough for his stuck brain. I don't know how to wake this nation up before we lose what we have. Over the centuries, states have proven over and over, they do not care much for people's rights if those rights get in the way of the few rich white men in charge. Up until now, during my lifetime, when it comes to rights, I would go with the federal government over most state governments, and our state governments prove I am right over and over, almost daily. We need our federal government stepping in more often to curb the bad state legislative and judicial behavior.
Daniel, you are so right, but alas, people's memories are so short, by choice. The current Trumpers and Trumpettes don't even hear him anymore. They don't care about what Trump likes or doesn't like. They do think he will do favors for them should he regain the presidency. They have no evidence of that, but they BELIEVE it. What anyone knows who pays attention is that Trump cares for no one but himself. His closest connections know that (not sure he even has real friends), but they expect that constantly kissing his *** will get them something they want. If he were to gain more power, he might drop a few rays of sunshine their way, but nothing that would mean anything because as a man with dementia, he won't remember who did what for him and his handlers won't care because helping others might mean less for them. Gag!!
You said, "that might just bee too difficult for Alito to comprehend. I guess it's not 17th century enough for his stuck brain". Thanks for the laugh. I enjoyed it.
I don’t understand why the world at large doesn’t pressure Hamas to ceasefire and return hostages. The terroristic political group is not the victim here. They have victimized and martyred their people and will not negotiate. So we accept this and expect Israel to be responsible instead. Hamas will not quit until they destroy Israel. Why do we accept this?
well over a century of genocide against the Holy Land, apartheid, child abuse rape, starvation but that's OK ... a genocidal holocaust of babies, children, mothers, doctors, nurses, journalists, UN Aid workers, whole families every school, churches 1800 1700 1600 years old Christian saints shrines, cemeteries bulldozed defiled and you have so little humanity left you accuse me rhetoric?
The International Court of Justice has officially ordered the genocide stopped. so no the murderers here are not hamas according to international law. That's not rhetoric, not opinion, not speculation. The law is stop the genocide.
so stop it.
if you are so bereft of humanity so godless that you cannot will not say no to genocide, than god help you: god has already judged you. just like Pharoah
"I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them. But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD."..."The LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt" exodus 14
and so the pharaoh and all their power might and best chariots all drowned in the sea wrapped in their egos and godlessness...
you *do not* commit genocidal holocaust on the Holy Land: god cannot forgive, cannot forget and those that cannot say no to genocide already know god's punishment because a mortal sin starts with killing your own humanity first and your children's as we see in the cruelty and inhumanity of IDF and the whole of the zionist open confession quoting scripture as their aim
quote the prime minister of Israel who vowed to " Kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys." 1 Samuel 15:3
the bigot is not the people killed ... the bigot is the people committing promoting supporting propagating approving celebrating genocidal holocaust in contempt of scripture, humanitarian law, geneva convention and contempt of the International Court of Justice.
yes i support humanity, the international humanitarian law, the law of Moses and US law without prejudice, everywhere and am opposed to turning the Holy Land into the killing fields because of a real estate deal or oil ... that's the very definition of mortal sin and I took an oath at the height of the Cuba crisis to defend the constitution of the US which vow I've never broken.
Tell it to the Arab Druze serving voluntarily in the Israeli army. Tell it to the many members of the Arab Party within Israel. Tell it to the Arab members of the Knesset. Tell it to the many Christian Arabs who know that Hamas/Islamic Jihad etc. has the same thing in store for them that they did on Oct. 7. Tell it to the Arab doctors, lawyers, etc. who live and work peaceably inside Israel. Tell it to the families of Gazans who were "liquidated" by Hamas. Here's the history. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/05/gaza-palestinians-tortured-summarily-killed-by-hamas-forces-during-2014-conflict/
Genocide requires intent, per article II of the UN Convention on Prevention of Genocide.
So here is intent
1988 HAMAS Covenant, never repudiated btw.
Preamble: Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it" (The Martyr, Imam Hassan al-Banna, of blessed memory).
"The Islamic world is on fire. Each of us should pour some water, no matter how little, to extinguish whatever one can without waiting for the others." (Sheikh Amjad al-Zahawi, of blessed memory).
Para 7, Art 7: "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (evidently a certain kind of tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews." (related by al-Bukhari and Moslem).
The last verbatim from Islamic sacred text, the haddith of al Bukhari.
Islam has been at a religious war with Judaism since Muhammad had the 600 members of the Jewish Quaryza tribe, beheaded, six at a time, in Medina.
Sun Tzu and Clausewitz: Know that enemy. You my friend choose ignorance instead.
So many of these Democrats, Reich followers, are too close minded to see internationally seen widely seen truths. Just as closed minded and reactionary, just as impenetrable by truths as Trumpian.
Isa, so many on here are just reactionary, they don't know how to think to research to explore beyond their narrow tribe...It speaks to American education more than anything else. Even highly educated American's who call themselves liberal minded are tribal.
True Glen, and anyone familiar with the comments on RR when it comes to the subject of Israel, and anyone who has paid attention to the campus idiots who are trying to shut down the nation, for a peoples who would oppress them in their own country of origin, could see the tribal mentality at work.
Democrats are just as vulnerable and victim to spins-to conspiracy theories as Republicans who they don't have the will to see, to look to see beyond their narrow and distant versions of the truth. The facts on the ground show genocide and that is the truth. Biden and Congress are breaking American law in sending military aide to a nation that uses it to cause famine on its opponent.
Isa, are you familiar with Erich Fromm. If Americans took the time to read it His 1941 book Escape From Freedom, they would see how the American project has been an escape from freedom.
I believe America as it is must fully fail before it has any chances of rebuilding...into a democratic more social-more sane-more fair seeing and fair sharing society. If that is possible.
Trump is a by-product of a really sick society...Biden in all his "decency" mostly will sustain that sickness. The patient must get worse and go through the process before he starts to recover-if he recovers.
Poor you, demonized, dehumanized. actually the UN did not order Israel to stop the genocide,because there is no genocide.
I can make the case for ethnic cleansing though, but won't because the Arabs started this vicious cycle when in Nov 1948 they tried and failed to genocide the Jews, having failed again, the tried again in 1956, 1968. 1973, 2006, 2024 and the blood of every dead Gazan lies on the head of HAMAS who could care less about their people, but use them as human shields, just as they tried to use Jewish hostages as human shields.
Muslim don't mourn the dead killed by Jews, they celebrate them as martyr's, infants and grown men alike. Yahya Sinwar said the quiet part out loud, they (Islam) are a nation of martyrs and will keep comng back again and again, until the Jews are obliterated and that is genocidal intention.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) investigates and, where warranted, tries individuals charged with the gravest crimes of concern to the international community: genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of aggression. https://www.icc-cpi.int/about/the-court
Yes, if you just read the words of Trump's social media posts, even without attaching a name to them, how can any rational person think this person is fit to be president?
I wish Reich would have pointed out the almost-psychopathic behavior of Biden in supporting genocide and encouraging authorities' violent crackdowns on peaceful protesters.
Peter, Whoa! Where is the evidence or did you just make that up to support your untenable position? Remember that "state" thing when states take care of things that happen in their own space unless they ask the feds? Oh wait, I guess that doesn't matter, of course!
So many of these Democrats, Reich followers, are too close minded to see what is seen widely internationally. Biden is funding-arming a state engaged in genocide. Many Democrats are as closed minded and reactionary, just as impenetrable by truths as MEGA followers.
Ruth - you rock. It's incredible to see what we have lost in our "lifetimes"! My mother's and grandmother's generation saw a world that increased rights and acceptance for a bigger more evolved humanity. But now 26 or so Red states are hijacking the core principles of our constitution and the plans of the 2025 project... subverting so many decades of federal advances - by taking them apart state by state. Thanks Ruth!
This morning as I scrolled through the news feed, there was an article about how President Biden was becoming more pronounced with his attacks on trump. Naturally, in the comments section, the far-right nutters were screaming how horrible President Biden was for attacking trump. Seriously, I had to laugh!! My mom use to tell my sisters and me, "Don't dish it out if you can't take what comes back!" I do not want to hear my president making caustic remarks, but when trump dishes it out, President Biden has every right to address it. I know that in the coming months as the election nears, there will be more and more stupid polls, more and more hateful rhetoric, more and more misinformation, lies and propaganda. I feel my role is to continue to get the message out, encourage people to vote, and continue to tout President Biden's many accomplishments. I have quite a bit of useful information from this substack that helps me when talking to people about our president. We cannot get discouraged. We must ignore this media blizzard and keep our eyes on the prize so to speak. Vote Blue, America!!!
It is so discouraging to talk, civilly, to otherwise intelligent, nice people who just don't get it. They like Trump "because he says it like it is..." exactly the way they CAN'T or they will lose their jobs and their health insurance. At the same time that they love his theatrics they don't actually believe what he's saying. And the past is always rosier...because you did survive...and your kids were so cute then but now they're turning into pubescent loudmouths and you were slimmer snd your knee didn't click. The idea of rounding up illegal immigrants who are polluting our blood and deporting them to concentration camps doesn't cause any alarms to go off...because I'm not an illegal immigrant.....
My message to the Biden Campaign would be to tell the truth about Trump's ideas: Trump is a coward. His isolationist policies exhibit his fear about engaging with other nations diplomatically. He is weak. He is unwilling to confront a difficult situation. He wants to hide his head in the sand, just like Neville Chamberlain. What do you think the Republicans would be saying if they hadn't turned into lackeys for Trump. They'd be shouting from the rooftops to give huge amounts of aid to Israeel, maybe even send troops, to "get those Commie terrorists".
Biden's nuanced approach is the way to deal with the problem. Humanitarian aid is also part of the package. But the Campaign doesn't have to sell that. They need to point out Trump's way of handling anything that doesn't directly benefit him, i.e., ignore it and make up excuses for ignoring it. He would deal with this knotty problem just like handled the Covid Pandemic.
William, Yes, but speaking truth to power has its consequences. For those who speak truth, such as Robert Reich, we should be prepared to see some consequences of his actions and be ready to support him should that happen.
William, that is the way it has been for some time, but it seems to me the media have to be called out on that and challenged at every turn. I get it that money is the driving force, but maybe the money needs to be put on the media that actually value facts, understanding, and respect for the truth. But, then, people will actually have to pay attention to what is being said and I do wonder if most people want to do that. I am thinking they'd rather be scrolling for sensation, cat videos, and influencers. Yeah, we are in trouble!
One would think that after 30,000+ documented lies and half truths by tfg, it would be in itself enough not to vote for him.. No it did not., but the one lie that has kept him. afloat is that the 2020 election was stolen by the Democrats. That Big Lie empowered him to destabilize our democratic norms and institutions by undermining.our trust in out free and fair elections. Putin, Orban and Netanyahu are no doubt pleased to see this dangerous wannabe dictator back in the Oval Office. Birds of a feather flock together. Biden Is desperately trying to get a cease fire, but the tide is turning against him he has to stand up to Netanyahu . Netanyahu is throwing Israel under the bus to save his own corrupt skin, just like Trump is throwing our democracy under the bus to save his own corrupt skin. If you want to live in the real world where truth, facts and character matters do not take anything for granted. work anyway you can to defeat tfg at the ballot box
The media used to make money just fine but still had morals. That is no longer true. They are a reflection of our society--short attention spans, selfish, ignorant in spite of lots of "facts".
The almost non-existent news coverage of Israel building New Settlements on bombed out Palestinian villages seems Conspicuous to me . Yes the attack by Hamas was Horrendous, yet it doesn't justify the killing of thousands of Palestinian civilians ,nor the blatant land grabs by Bibi's corrupt cronies.
If anything, the campus protests are being provoked and funded by right-wing billionaires, such as the Koch network, the Mercers, Uhleins, Mellons, Rickettses and Clarence Thomas’s sugar daddy, Crow, who desperately want Trump back in the White House to look after their interests, and think they can hang blame for the unrest around President Biden’s neck.
As “Deep Throat” counseled in the movie, “All the President’s Men” (it’s not in Woodward and Bernstein’s book), “Follow the money.”
Avie,do you have Any factual information to back up your claims? I would suggest as many of us as possible get onto the campuses and find out what’s really happening rather than to sit back and simply conjecture.
I wish I had hard evidence. I began my entry with the words “if anything”; in colloquial English that conveys a suspicion, and is not meant to be taken as an assertion of fact.
But, you want to know what’s really going on? Two things.
One: In a society in which less and less is decided based on things’ actual merits, and more and more on what is and isn’t “cool,” as well as by self-appointed “influencers” who, like the aforementioned agents provocateurs, are driven to post their likes and dislikes as a consequence of how much money can be passed to them sub rosa, a great deal of the “outrage” currently being displayed on behalf of Palestinians is because it has become FASHIONABLE. It’s just the most recent manifestation of the “radical chic” that came of age in the 1960s.
The second, and far more important, aspect is that what is going on in Gaza is a consequence of societies giving over control of their citizens’ lives to those who have, to simplify it, children’s minds in adult bodies. People who have attained political power to satisfy personal ambition, but who neither understand nor care that the words and actions have terrible consequences for those they govern. Who understand only what lower forms of life do, what they want, and what they’re afraid of.
Did Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition not understand that years’-long abuse of Palestinians, and bottling up millions of them in the immense ghetto of Gaza would not one day erupt into violence vastly exceeding the standard rock-throwing Intifada?
Did Yahya Sinwar and Hamas not understand that unleashing 1200 terrorists into Israel to kill, maim, rape and kidnap would make it inevitable that the Israel Defense Forces would descend on Gaza and kill 10, 20, 50 Gazans for every Israeli who was murdered?
Of course they knew, both sides knew, BUT THEY DIDN’T CARE how many Israelis or Gazans dies, as long as the leaders’ political power was maintained. Under the pretense of protecting and serving the interests of the populations they lead, they invited mass slaughter they KNEW was inevitable.
As such, there is NO functional difference between Sinwar and his Hamas thugs, and Netanyahu and his band on thugs. None. And it’s entirely a consequence of the people handing control of their respective societies over to these people who are, as noted above, children’s minds in adult bodies.
It’s a phenomenon as old as civilization.
And there is no greater exemplar of that than Trump. We handed over our society to him for four long years, and now there are forces arrayed and deployed who want to do it again, which will bring about nothing less than the destruction of American delocracy.
THAT’S what all sides on college campuses, the media and the pundits have so far missed and MUST be made to understand: that these are elements of a single phenomenon smd movement that threatens all of civilization.
Children tend to be innocent and kind, unless led otherwise. A more accurate description is “demons in human bodies.” That is in fact the ancient view: men like trump, putin, netanyahu would be seen as possessed by evil spirits.
“Demon” is too…subjective. The immaturity of the actors involved should be unquestioned and unquestionable, but at what point does that immaturity cross the line into malignancy? With Trump, via his statements and acts, there can be no doubt as to his venality and conscious desire to injure, but in the others, Sinwar and Netanyahu, it may not be as cut-and-dried.
When you say 'People who have attained political power to satisfy personal ambition, but who neither understand nor care that the words and actions have terrible consequences for those they govern' are you referring to Netanyahu and his crew or to Joe Biden and his crew?
This is nonsense. The protesters are students who are disgusted by Israel's long record of war crimes, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, military occupation, and US-backed genocide. It's not complicated, it's as plain as day.
Avie, there's nothing more worthless than making wild claims that you cannot factually support. In educated circles, it's called promoting a conspiracy theory.
You know, maybe the next step for the evolution of western society is to take a long hard look at our so-called social media companies. Their power to launder illusory truths coupled with their conflict and emotion amplifying algoritms have certainly primed our society for these moments. I'm not sure how you'd build it into anti-trust legislation, but if we want to revive civil discourse, we need to break up the hold these companies have over society.
Not just "social media", but the entire Internet itself. The more time people spend on the Internet for any reason, the less time they have for "pre-Internet" people-to-people in-person conversations. Myself included.
It’s time For The Adults To Run The Government ; The Ranting Of Children Margie Taylor Green, The Orange Jesus trumpet 🎺 Are Needed Back in The Nursery…
The Democrats Will Support Speaker of The House Mike Johnson and Begin the End The MAGA Cult of Lies of Deception and FALSE Claims of the Theft of the Last Presidential Election Biden Won Fair And Square …. The Formal End Of The MAGA IS ENDED…
The New Make Jail Great Again MJGA Movement has begun!!!
Part of the problem President Biden faces is so many people don't see what is happening behind the scenes, yet they criticize the efforts offered on both sides without knowing everything involved. So quick to find fault with what they don't understand.
Killing and starving over 34,000 civilians is what people are reacting to. We don't have to know what is going on behind the scenes to be outraged over senseless slaughter.
I wish Biden were putting maximum pressure on Netanyahu to achieve a cease fire in Gaza, but he isn't. He got Netanyahu to move on admitting more humanitarian aid to Gaza by suggesting he might consider not sending offensive weaponry to Israel; now's the time for him to flat-out tell Netanyahu that he will not send Israel offensive weaponry unless Netanyahu agrees to:
1. a ceasefire
2. negotiations to end the war
3. a guaranteed roadmap to a 2-state solution
Of course, he must communicate to Hamas that they must also agree to
1. release the hostages
2. negotiations to end the war
3. a guaranteed roadmap to a 2-state solution
or he will continue to send Israel offensive weapons.
If he did these things and made them stick, he would look a lot stronger than Trump (right now, Netanyahu revels in making him look weak) and unbiased (right now, he appears very biased in favor of Israel). That would not only help him win the election, it would help him win back more respect for the US in the Global South, where he is seen as hypocritical when it comes to human rights.
Think about it: Bibi is itching to bomb Iran and other countries where Hamas hides. If he does, oil prices will sky rocket. When gas prices soar, everything gets more expensive, especially food due to fertilizer and trucking costs. Consumers would be more angry. Biden knows that if gas prices soar before the election, voters will blame him.
Bibi knows this too. Bibi would love to have Trump in office because Trump will never defend human rights or a two state solution.
Biden is in a very difficult position. He must handle Bibi with kid gloves and appease him.
Biden also knows that if he comes down hard on Bibi that AIPAC could swing the election. AIPAC has already vowed to attack the squad for questioning Bibi. But the squad is pretty safe because of their districts' demographics. However, the White House and the House will be decided by districts more competitive than the squad's seats. Biden is on this ice, not the squad.
Sadly, dark money can swing elections. Our democracy is in peril because of our weak campaign finance laws. Citizens United and other pro-corporate campaign finance laws have weakened our Democracy to the breaking point. We knew it would be bad, but we didn't know how bad it would get.
Well, it's worse than we imagined.The top 5 Senate races cost more than $200 million dollars with PA (Frdderman) costing over $350 BILLION dollars. Yes, it's rigged for big money.
It's not Biden; it's the game. As someone cooler than me once said, "Don't hate the player; hate the game."
You'll note that Netanyahu didn't escalate the direct conflict with Iran. He knew if he did, the US, the UK, and Jordan might not fly protection for Israel. If he'd escalated it, he'd also risk a full-scale Middle-Eastern war, which, without the protection of its allies, Israel would not be likely to survive.
However, I totally agree with you about US campaign finance laws.
Maureen, I wholeheartedly agree with points one and two. Although a two state solution sounds like a solution, we may have to look for more creative ways for tribes that have been in a blood feud for centuries to be able to coexist peacefully.
Unfortunately, I believe there is no way that we have any influence over decision-making in the Hamas movement.
If Biden can get the Israeli government to agree to the three points (which is doubtful--especially point 3), I suspect Hamas will go along. On May 1st, 2017, Khaled Meshaal, then head of Hamas, held a press conference at the Sheraton Hotel in Doha to formally announce that Hamas would accept a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. He also distinguished between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, saying that Hamas’s conflict “is with the Zionist project, not with the Jews because of their religion”. (Hamas’s proposal, which was in line with international law and UN resolutions, was rejected out of hand by Israel and the US.)
The only way that you can say that the Jews and the Palestinians have been in a blood feud for centuries is by reference to Devarim (Deuteronomy) 20: 16-17:
16. However, of these peoples' cities, which the Lord, your God, gives you as an inheritance, you shall not allow any soul to live.
17. Rather, you shall utterly destroy them: The Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivvites, and the Jebusites, as the Lord, your God, has commanded you.
DNA evidence from Canaanite graves shows that Palestinian (and Jewish, BTW) DNA is over 50% Canaanite, so it might be said that the Jewish Israelis (20% of Israelis are Palestinian) are still trying to carry out that command.
Otherwise, most of the time, the remaining Jews and the Palestinians got along pretty well after the Diaspora of 70 CE until the early 20th century.
Not all Jews left Israel after 70 AD. Some of their descendants who remained in Palestine are among the ancestors of today’s Palestinian Jews. Others of their descendants converted to Christianity and are among the ancestors of today’s Palestinian Christians. Many more later converted to Islam and are among the ancestors of today’s Palestinian Muslims whom Israelis call “Arabs” (though the only Palestinians of actual Arab ancestry are the Bedouin and the Druze, who make up about 3% of Palestinians). At least a third of the Palestinians are descended from Jewish families who converted to Islam.
As late as the 17th century, Hebron was a Jewish majority city. Ever since the Rambam (Maimonides), who ruled that converting to Islam did not constitute apostasy, since Islam, like Judaism, and unlike Pre-Reformation Christianity, was not an idolatrous religion. Jewish residents of Palestine had been gradually converting to Islam since the 16th century. There was a massive wave of conversion following the societal collapse that Judaism experienced following the conversion of False Messiah Shabbtai Tzvi to Islam in the 17th century. Until the 17th century, at least a third of the population of The Land of Israel (aka Palestine) was Jewish, some sources put the figure at just under half. by the end of the 18th century this number had gone down to just over 10%. Since there was no wave of emigration, the only answer is conversion.
As I have heard it put, the Jews are those who left the land but kept the religion, while the Palestinians are those who kept the land but left the religion. Both claim the land on the basis of what they kept and consider what they didn't keep irrelevant.
Maureen, thank you for this interesting information. Muslims consider the Bible to be a holy book, and the book Leviticus states that all land on Earth belongs to God/Yahweh, Allah. If we don't share it, we may be doomed.
Interesting and informative comment. If Hamas ever achieves its "one state" solution, a Palestine state with no Israel, will Jews be allowed to live there like Arabs are allowed to live in Israel? I don't think so.
I think it's far more likely that Israel will get its one-state solution--and I have doubts about how the Palestinian citizens of Israel will be allowed to stay after that.
BTW: read Diana Buttu's NYT article, "The Myth of Coexistence in Israel" to see on what terms Palestinian Israeli citizens are allowed to live there.
Then you can look at how well the Ashkenazi Jews have treated the Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews (which is improving) and how they all treat the Ethiopian Jews.
None of us knows exactly what is going on behind the scenes. As Prof. Reich says, that is Biden's strength--actual governing. We must watch, wait, and pray.
Well maybe if people weren't so drugged up most of the time they could follow things more carefully and understand what's going on.
Here's my question, how can Trump be leading in the polls? And if he wins, where are we all going to move to, if we aren't dragged off to the Gulag first?
Well. Trump has very, very few friends or allies other than the like of Bannon and Stone. So, when Trump wins, which he is poised to do, he will find he has no support from within the institutions of the country. Actually, it will be very interesting. You will see that the man has no real contacts or friends. He will not be able to do much at all. And with idiot Biden "supporting Israel" people are not going to take it. This is the United States of America supporting the senseless killing of thousands of people. I think people will not stand for this. So, I think they will go and vote for Trump. You will be okay, though because he is plain stupid. He will not be able to do much. There will be some violence in some places, so do not go to those places. OK?
Jacob, I hope you are being sarcastic on this one. Biden does not rule Israel despite what a lot of folks think and whatever he does or does not do will at best only slow the conflict. Putting Trump in office because Biden didn't fix things in Israel/Gaza is nuts. Trump is stupid, actually has dementia, but he will have plenty of sycophantic "friends" if he is elected. They will come out of the woodwork to suck up to get any largess Trump by then is able to drip on their little heads. If you are not sure of that, just look at the Republicans in Congress, on the Supreme Court, and in the state legislatures all over this nation. I personally don't want to take the chance of a puppet being in our presidency with the Steves and Stone pulling the strings.
Biden only has to make one phone call saying no more weapons or funding until you accept a ceasefire and withdraw from Gaza. It may take a few days, but it would happen.
Well as for that, "They" the Congressional investigators (of whichever party it was) tried hard to prove Putin was directly involved in the election of Trump. They found nothing like that so I will wait before believing you on this. If Putin ran Trump, I think that would be a scandal, yes. I tend not to believe this. Putin runs his own little society; he does not have the experience to interact with American social mechanisms. Tump's sycophants would relay Putin's calls? How exactly does this work, in your "solitary" view?
Trump stated that he will be a dictator for one day only. That will be enough time to declare a state of emergency, and that will give him almost unlimited power. There is no such thing as "dictator for one day only."
I absolutely don't believe T.Rump is "poised to win," Jacob. There's no evidence to support that assertion. If anything, he's losing voters. Polls, schmolls.
Don’t plan on moving to Canada. They have plenty of their own extremist right wingers, one of whom will be running against Trudeau next year. Most premiers are conservative and some are extreme right. Trying to dismantle provincial health care among other things.
Biden has failed to delay or stop any of Israel's actions. People are frustrated with this failure.
If Biden was working behind the scenes to stop Israel, we did not see it. There is no way to sugarcoat this, Israel ignored Biden and it makes him look complicit and weak.
If he really wanted to stop the genocide, the slaughter of innocent civilians — mostly women and children — all he had to do was stop the flow of arms to Israel and condemn their actions.
Does nothing ever substantially change? Do we really never learn from our mistakes? In Imani Perry's biography of Lorraine Hansberry, she describes the blatant racism that she encountered as a student at UW Madison in the early '50's. Then she mentions that anti-Semitism at the time was "thinly veiled" in the prevailing sentiment that there were "too many New Yorkers" at the school. When I was an undergraduate there in the late '60's, it was announced sometime in a spring semester that fall semester tuition for out of state students would DOUBLE from $500 a term to $1,000. What was that! My entire undergraduate years were absorbed in student protest against the US participation in the war in Vietnam. Media promoted the idea that "outside agitators" were responsible. All of the students I knew were genuinely disturbed by the war, the crazy arbitrary birthday draft lottery, chemical warfare, and unabashed corporate energy to create those chemical weapons. These many decades later, I am still bewildered by the hypocrisy of a mega-research university that produced best practices in all of the fields of communication, psychology, arbitration, counseling, social work, but when confronted with a perfect opportunity to show the world how meaningful it all was, the authorities called in the police and then the National Guard in riot gear with clubs and tear gas to extinguish any possibility of a dialogue. A plethora of academic disciplines offered effective models of conflict resolution including those evidenced in political science, philosophy, history, educational policy studies to name a few. This "publish or perish" institution did not put any of the source of it's pride to use. Why does nothing change? Why do we not learn from our mistakes?
What should Biden do? He should stop libeling as antisemitic people who disagree with him -- meaning his policies that are directly responsible for Gazan decimation.
Netanyahu intentionally partnered with radically right racist settler parties who were forcibly removing Palestinians at the threat of gun point from their land for nearly a decade.
These settlor parties aligned with Netanyahu were picked by Netanyahu precisely because their publicly stated goal was the obliteration of Gaza.
Despite this and despite significant internal opposition to this approach by many a Jew in the Israeli electorate, Netanyahu's call to racists to bolster his election chances were approved (barely) by Israeli voters.
You reap what you sow.
Literally, during campaigning Netanyahu cabinet members all but called for genocide in Gaza.
You can't TELL Netanyahu anything.
YOU HAVE TO MAKE HIM DO IT by CHANGING THE POLITICAL CALCULUS IF ISRAEL STILL WANTS U.S. MILITARY AID.
The Hague ruled against Israel and said it must stop targeting civilians. Biden essentially responded: Those who don't support Israel in the manner proscribed by him (very despotic by the way) don’t remember the Nazi Holocaust against Jews.
Really?
Israel's staunchest defenders will cry antisemitism to most (if not all) who call for a permanent ceasefire even as there is a growing opposition by a vocal plurality of Israeli citizens to Israeli Defense Force attacks.
There are Jews in Israel against clear civilian targeting of Gazans.
Are they anti-Semites? Have they forgotten The Holocaust. Of course not.
The Israeli judiciary has ruled that ISRAEL MUST FOLLOW THE HAGUE'S FOURTH CONVENTIONS THAT FORBID TARGETING CIVILIANS EVEN THOUGH EVERY ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER HAS REFUSED TO DO SO.
ISRAEL'S OWN COURTS HAVE RULED IN PALESTINIAN FAVOR STATING THAT ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCES ARE OBLIGATED TO NOT TARGET CITIZENS AND NOT ENGAGE TACTICS THAT EXCUSE TARGETING CIVILIANS BECAUSE MILITARY TARGETS EXIST AMONGS THEM.
Didn't Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu literally try to get rid of the entire part of the judiciary akin to the U.S. Supreme Court?
He is a despot.
What does Biden love about this guy.
He used the word love to describe his relationship with Bibi. Literally L...O...V...E.
What doesn't Biden get here?
Netanyahu does not listen to anyone but himself. WORDS DON'T MATTER TO BIBI. TAKE AWAY HIS HALF-TON POUND BOMBS THAT WERE SO BRUTAL MOTHERS COULD NOT RECOGNIZE THE FACE OF THEIR CHILDREN WHOSE FACES WERE BURNED OFF AND UNIDENTIFIABLE.
ISRAEL DROPPED THOUSAND POUND U.S. BOMBS ON A HOSPITAL THEY SAID WAS A HAVEN FOR HAMAS.
JOURNALISTS INVESTIGATED.
THERE WAS NO HAVEN.
NO ONE HIDING BENEATH THE HOSPITAL.
THIS IS INTENTIONAL TARGETING OF MOTHERS AND BABIES TO ROOT OUT MILITARY TARGETS.
THAT...
IS...
ILLEGAL...
PERIOD.
A sizable American majority does not support Biden’s continued myopia on Israeli obliteration of Gazans. Israel's own stats say 70% of the 32,000 dead are civilians.
By the way, that means Israel is counting every male death as a death of a soldier, which is patently ridiculously a lie, but, who cares, right?
It's Israel.
We are the U.S.
Biden is leader of the "free world."
As world leader, what he says goes.
If Israel believes every Gaza man obliterated by Israel is a soldier or terrorist...
...then Biden says, "Amen to that" by signaling that those who support the Hague are Holocaust deniers.
That is a clear message to Bibi.
And to the American electorate: "Don't question me. Can't you see every man targeted in Gaza deserves their death. Those who speak otherwise are Holocaust deniers."
Powerful hypocrisy right there. And it works against Americans like me who don't agree with Biden and whom he wants to shut down via his perch atop the bully pulpit that is the American presidency.
Unlike Biden's words to Americans who disagree with him, Biden's words don't work against Bibi and racist settler parties who literally used Hamas tactics (before the war by the way) and targeted with gun violence Palestinians whose families histories dated back centuries if not millennia.
At gun point, they marched Palestinians off land they owned.
And no. That does not justify Hamas brutality and hatred that targeted innocent Jews for summary execution and kidnapping.
But let's get all the facts on record.
Words by Biden don't matter here.
They are vacuous and empty when people who speak for the president intimates that those who support the Hague decision don't remember the Holocaust.
Biden's actions, however, will matter, and can change history. He won't stop aid to racists in Israel in settlor parties whose cabinet level positions dictate the Israeli Defense Force response that is obliterating a people in Gaza by a tactical war whose stated goal before the last Israeli elections was all but saying outright they wanted to wipe Gazans off the map.
Congratulations, Israel and Netanyahu and Biden and Harris.
Due to Hamas' unquestionable antisemitic hatred, brutality, and idiocy, you walked into the trap and the world is now against you.
Great move!
Biden continues to add billions of military aid to Israel. He intimates if not says outright that folks who don't support Israel don't remember the Holocaust. There exist conservative rabbis in Israel that don't agree with him. Holocaust deniers? I. DON'T. THINK. SO.
That is bull puck-y. (And that's a fact!)
Though I am Black and Biden's Vice President is Black, I will write in Rashida Tlaib as my President and Ilhan Omar as my Vice President.
[I live in NY State where my vote for President doesn't matter anyway.]
I have thought that Biden’s approach in continuing the support for Israel despite Netanyahu’s egregious actions was to appease those people/ politicians in the moderate camp who long supported Israel. That perhaps he reasoned if he was tough on Israel he would come across as too progressive.
I have to say Beverly that anyone who can see the sheer destruction and death rate in Gaza and not be moved to say Enough, is not in any sense a moderate. Other US presidents have said, stop you're going too far. These so called moderates aren't pressuring Biden to call a halt. Stopping a massacre is not too progressive, it's being human!
This is one of the best explanations for Trump's continuing appeal that I have read. Trump's special ability is to read emotion, to trigger it, and to exploit it. Reagan was good at this as well. And we live in a media environment that thrives on triggering anger, rage, resentment. Biden demonstrates his strength by resisting this approach- by continuing to be deliberative, rational, and goal-directed. We're at a terrible crossroads here- those of us not caught up in the chaos see clearly the great danger posed by Trump. But we can't give up hope.
Yes, Trump's "special ability" (I like that term) is to, as you say, read and exploit emotions. He does it in a mean, vicious, self-serving and nasty way. He is a morally reprehensible individual.
Trump is a predator, and his favorite food are the gullible, because they are so easy to catch--all you have to do is tell them that you will empower them. It's like the fox telling the birdie how much it admires her plumage. Will you follow me, the fox says?
David, over this weekend i’m planning to attend one of these student protests to find out firsthand what are their motivations and how to best address their stated concerns. We are getting our information regarding the students and their protests secondhand through a slanted news media. I believe it’s a good idea for those of us who are near one of the active campuses to go on campus or get as close to the action as possible and see for ourselves what is on the students minds. If we cannot get the straight story through MSM, there’s nothing to stop us from finding out firsthand and sharing it here on Robert’s Substack.
Arizona State University. I hope there is still some action going on when I get there. Certainly some sort of demonstrations should be going on at Many schools across the country even during the summer. I think for those who live near a university, it would be a good idea to occasionally hang out with any students that are protesting ask questions and provide support.
I have been thinking about showing up with a backpack full of water bottles and protein bars as my way to support and to start conversations. Possibly, I should also hand out bagels!
It’s easy to Talk War but it’s a whole nother thing to fight in a war go battle each other in the Mideast and leave us out of your plans for conquest and Glory…. Glory is short lived and Elusive…
What I don’t understand is why Biden doesn’t make aid to Israel conditional to pursuing a cease fire and two state solution
Because Bibi is itching to bomb Iran and other countries where Hamas hides. If he does, oil prices will sky rocket. When gas prices soar, everything gets more expensive, especially food due to fertilizer and trucking costs. Consumers would be more angry. Biden knows that if gas prices soar before the election, voters will blame him.
Bibi knows this too. Bibi would love to have Trump in office because Trump will never defend human rights or a two state solution.
Biden is in a very difficult position. He must handle Bibi with kid gloves and appease him.
Biden also knows that if he comes down hard on Bibi that AIPAC could swing the election. AIPAC has already vowed to attack the squad for questioning Bibi. But the squad is pretty safe because of their districts' demographics. However, the White House and the House will be decided by more competitive districts than the squad's seats. Biden is on this ice, not the squad.
Sadly, dark money can swing elections. Our democracy is in peril because of our weak campaign finance laws. Citizens United and other pro-corporate campaign finance laws have weakened our Democracy to the breaking point. We knew it would be bad, but we didn't know how bad it would get. The top 5 Senate races cost more than $200 million dollars with PA costing over a third of a BILLION dollars. Yes, it's rigged for big money.
It's not Biden; it's the game. As someone cooler than me once said, "Don't hate the player; hate the game."
I don't have a solution. But we need to focus on the swing districts in play by educating voters and demand the media covers issues like climate change, labor, health care, women's rights, education, social security, jobs and the infrastructure investment that Biden has done to build the economy.
The Climate Hawks reached out to Editors to start a dialog about climate change to get coverage. A coalition for sustainability and justice needs to do the same in OH, MI, WI, AZ, GA, NC, NV and so on.
Information must top misinformation. Sanity must top insanity. Biden's and Trump's character will matter to the level-headed Independents. If that's not who you're talking to, you're probably wasting your time.
part of the solution is to register and educate people on elections.
There are organizations like League of Women Voters who are looking for volunteers to help do this work.
Mass media is selling out democracy just to sell stuff and make money.
But people need to care first to understand!Few Americans are deep thinkers. Therein lies the problem. Long gone is the mantra, “ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”. Now it’s I want something for nothing and I just don’t want to have to think too hard.
I just can't get over how many people just don't understand or care about character. It should be so basic. Unfortunately, it says a lot about modern American society. Win at all costs.
Don, it's tribalism in action. The chieftain must be mean and strong when dealing with outsiders.
People over time have also wanted a person who seems fairly smart to them. Not intellectual or book smart. Just smart. They don't want to elevate some brute to lead the tribe who they think is a dumb ass. I mean, it's not all about mean and strong.
Yeah, it's a real shame and a sad reality.
Correct John, the lack of deep thinkers is quite apparent on the left as it is on the right. The left is caught up in self righteousness and jumps, without thinking on bandwagons, and are easily manipulated by reverse psychology.
In total agreement. I lived through the left during the Vietnam war on the University of Wisconsin campus. Got pepper gassed while just waiting for a bus when the rocks flew, had activists try and stop me from going to class during my senior year and lived through ther bombing of Sterling Hall. So no, that crowd has no credibility in my mind. Just as bad as the MAGA crowd.
Today I consider myself a progressive on many, but not all issues, some issues are bonkers and counter productive, but apparently someoone or someones have constructed a menu of what is not and what is progressive. I say fuck the menu, I think for myself and have critical reasoning skills, and am a chess player and think 10 moves ahead, and try to foresee he unintended as well as the logical consequences.
During the VN war I was an E-5, deployed to Vietnam, I enlisted in 1957, was not a draftee, I was also conservative. The names of my team are etched on The Wall, in the space reserved for Sep 1967. When I came back I saw that the whole affair was a waste of life and money, and now that I can buy a McDonalds in Saigon (Ho Chi Minh city) and Exxon has a sole contract with the government to drill oil in the Gulf of Tonkin, I am confirmed.
What the campus idiots and the Chicago 7 actually achieved was to prolong the war and cause more deaths, because of the reaction they incurred among the public, the same reaction that Campus idiots are causing today.
What stopped the war was not demonstrations or Kent State, but the over 50,000 body bags what were flow into Travis AFB, and the photos and video's of the C141's unloading and the photos and videos of military funerals. It was middleAmerica,rural America burying their sons, fathers, brothers,uncles that had Nixon backing out of Vietnam.
Nixon to win the election, committed Treason, and behind LBJ's back, told President Thieu of VN, to back out of the Paris Treaty, because he would give him a better deal,and his better deal was to betray Vietnam.
The male brain is not fully developed until about age 25, campus idiots are age 18-24.
And idiocy is contagious it seems.
Just as bad, John? The MAGA crowd does not care for the Constitution. Do you?
Except that crowd doesn't have an orange leader who's vowed to throw away the Constitution. But they're close.
Education? You're skipping DEPROGRAMMING?
First Do No Harm
Stop the Lying 🤥
"Don't Sweat It" is a lie: Exercise and Exposure Therapy are mandatory and both cause sweat 😁
Don't subscribe for details 😁 unless you are ready to serve on our Focus Group 😁
It's all about the damn money and nothing more. They continue to put the demented tangerine toddler high on a pedestal and promote his violent and ignorant rhetoric. Back in the Walter Cronkite days, we weren't subjected to this trash reporting that supports a dangerous madman. We got the news straight and there is no way in hell they would be promoting someone like Trump. Most voters and people in general wouldn't have accepted his treasonous, dishonest, felonious, mob boss platform.
You may Ike to see the new documentary "Bad Faith" ( Amazon, Apple platform). It shows how we got here. And it started years ago...
Now we need voices of reason and democracy to sound louder...
There is also “The Occupation of the American Mind” on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmoYoiMgpWU
"terror not territory"
Thank you Ewa. I'll be checking that out.
The soft underbelly of democracy. Our uncritical application of freedom of speech allowed the camel (Putin and other bad actors) to put their nose under the tent, infect much of the population with nonsense, and now we all pay the price.
And we collectively let the 4th estate cash cow atrophy by getting sold off or monopolized like other industries. Now we in a pickle.
I fear they are not just out for money - look at ownership of the major media outlets, and they are the big money. They may already have won.
Good news from Missouri. Wait for it.
also, see if your school board will require schools to offer voter registration opportunities for eligible students.
Every person that I can educate or share what I know is important. Sometimes I change minds when I point things out, that are not commonly aired in MSM. If that means one less vote for tfg, it is never " wasting my time!"!
What is tfg?
Or ... That F---ing Grifter.
The former guy = tfg.
Thank you, Paula B. Patrick Putman: There are other, less civil interpretations . I like to avoid typing his name as often as is practicable. I see it too many times in media.
Interesting points. Thanks for laying this out.
I think Biden has already lost the election, but he keeps doubling down.
You might think so, Peter, because media propaganda insists that is the truth. But is it? Do young people feel attached to a leader who thinks they should be thrown in jail for exercising their constitutional rights? Is Trump all strong and vigorous? Nope. My hope is first, that the shepherd is stricken so that the sheep scatter. If Trump is jailed for any length of time without cell phones and television, etc. he will lose his power to corrupt the sheep. They will begin to scatter on their own. Why else would the Supreme Court step in to help him delay the inevitable? After that, I agree 100% with everything Robert posted.
P.S. If you had any idea what it is to face down a category five hurricane, you'd be a climate hawk too.
Question is, if/when Trump goes to jail, who is waiting in the wings to take up the mantle? MTG? No, Trump the martyr falls, and the real devil might appear, a Ross Perot with horns and tail.
He'll still rabble rouse from prison. The real question is, what will happen when he dies? My husband thinks MAGA will fall apart.
Paula B. : That would be truly great!
I doubt it. Cokehead McSniffles (Don Jr.) will step up to carry the mantle, spouting "my father" again and again and again, and the sheep will sacrifice themselves to the effigy.
@Peter. That's what Putin wants you to say. Last night I was on a Hopium call. At worst, all polls are within the margin of error. The opponent is self destructing. Plus, we have the capacity to expand our base, especially in swing states and Republicans can only lose support based on trend lines, we have guerilla tactics.
Here in Baghdad By the Sea, yesterday abortion was all over the local news...except for the Miami Herald, Spanish language El Herald and las noticias.
In honor of the event, FB6, Fadems and partner groups sent 100,000 texts to nonregistered Floridians re abortion.
FT 6 has added Florida to its targeted states. Besides abortion, marijuana is on the ballot. FT 6 has a dedicated database and uses every outreach method possible (phone and text, postcard, email and targeted ad, and in-person too), to target new Democratic voters will make the most impact – in the most flippable states and districts.
https://www.fieldteam6.org/
Daniel- you are right in evoking the devil (Putin), as I believe that Putin was behind the timing of the Hamas arrack, with the intent to further divide America upon itself, as Putin knows that he cannot defeat the U.S. military, but he can divide and conquer.
Biden’s success with Johnson proved to me that Biden has been the best possible President we could have had during this time of destructive Social Media algorithms. However the November elections represent an event horizon not just for democracy, but for civilization, as Global Climate Change is accelerating at an alarming pace,
Unfortunately, Biden has lost the primary ace that he had up his sleeve- being able to contrast the era of political violence under Trump with the relative calm under Biden. My concern is that with that loss, so goes the election.
Regardless, it will get down to reinventing the Democratic Convention for the new era of AI.
I propound the Democratic Convention should be choreographed to be an AI enhanced media presentation of the very real problems facing the world today, while providing a means for the public to vote on possible solutions- not unlike how Robert Reich does it, and in this way expose the complexity of the nuances that must be considered, and thereby celebrate democracy, and provide a stark contract to the vigilante violence of the Reds.
To maximize the audience, Biden should offer to step aside if there is consensus that anyone else would be better suited to save democracy and civilization.
Regardless of whether Biden actually steps aside, Al Gore for President and Robert Reich for Vice President should be seriously considered, as a way for them both to present their messages, as they both have been remarkably prophetic of the problems that we now face. Both were also part of the administration that provided the longest period of economic growth in history that was destroyed by the greed of tax cuts for the rich, financial deregulation, and a meaningless war, resulting in the 2008 crash. All of which contributed to the demise of the American Middle Class.
Obama created a perfectly balanced recovery, which balance Trump destroyed by putting it on steroids, eliminating the control mechanism of interest rates as reigns on the economy, and spurring the inflation that Biden tamed, all while Putin has been hard at work on his plans for world conquest, with Trump, Tucker, and Fox becoming Putin’s American cheerleaders.
In short, there will be a window for the truth to be told, and it may be our last.
Daniel, 🎯 Repeating what the Putin trolls put out there doesn’t seem to be obvious to people like Peter.. but then again I am suspect of those comments being par of trolling. They are deeply desperate and pouring it on. Those kind of statements make the taking points of Peter sound MAGA - like in the blindness to anything but what they want to hear rather than an extensive list of facts.
Yes, and remind them that Trump lies and flip-flops, and in times of crisis, as during the pandemic, he does not know what to do. He is the swamp personified.
He withheld needed Covid treatments to states like Michgan. Because he was angry at the Governor. Because she would not do as he wanted her to do.
Laurie, by "he" you undoubtedly mean Trump. He did indeed undermine Governor Whitmer's efforts to contain the virus. How soon we forget that Trump is responsible for thousands of needless death because of his malice and incompetence!
I hope people READ emails. They get sent. I hope they get read {I know there are metrics to figure out if they’re being opened … }.
Sometimes they reply. In Florida, can tell whether someone has registered. We use several methods to follow-up.
Some people thank us.
I’ve signed up to attend Countering Disinformation Online for Social Ambassadors with Building Bridges for America Action Fund on Thursday, May 2, 2024.
Use this link to sign up: https://mobilize.us/s/EucTg6
FT6 is a powerful way to reach out … We need many …
HEADLINES are extremely powerful, too, and they’re critically important {journalists know, sadly, that more people read headlines alone and form opinions on issues through what headlines convey than actually read substantive news reports}. Headlines are also click-bait, trying to pull someone into a story, but the headline itself is often all that gets through to a reader.
I hope FT6 has some REALLY talented headline writers …
Almost right!
Trump is on his way out.
Amen. The sooner the better.
I'm giving Mr. T a 40% chance of winning. Pulled that out of my hat.
Problem is, Danny, you can command the media until the cows come home to no avail - they aren't in it for the news - they're in it for the profit. This is not the media we had from 1930's until the early 2000's when the HONEST news was a public service and their entertainment programs paid the bills and salaries.
Thank you Danny for the behind the curtain pieces that I suspected - but you gave the specifics that helped me understand better. I've been appalled that the US couldn't just condition the aid to only be for humanitarian aid - if Netanyahu would not adjust his wholesale swath killing spree. This helps me more of the nuances.
I do want to add that unfortunately - helping people understand the consequences of voting for someone without consideration of their policies is harder these days.
1) basic civics was cut from many school curriculum's for a generation or more. People can believe a crazy guy if they don't know how government works - or that they believe what the former guy was doing or is seeking to do if re-elected is okay for democracy. It's a 911 five alarm fire for democracy and he's criminally sought to damage it already including attempting an illegal coup.
2) If giving the public basic formation or giving people factual details changed perceptions -boy... we would have a different world. However, the GOP has been "out-messaging" the dems in many ways for a long time.
They've played a big con-using language like "trickle down", or we need to go to war in IRAQ because of WMD's or my favorite "entitlements" especially the way that Mitch McConnelle says it - is infuriating. These are PROTECTIONS - THAT YOU EARNED FOR YOURSELF - we need to start by first - not repeating or defending by using words that change the way it's been framed by the GOP.
Dems need to re-learn how to not be defensive - by responding to the various republican accusations not by defending how democrats protected America - but responding instead by saying 2020 WAS THE SAFEST AND MOST SECURE ELECTION IN OUR HISTORY over and over and over and over per these ___ #s of agencies that measure these things. Rather than repeating "we did NOT STEAL an election. Don lost 2020 and joe won it - fair and square. It's taken years - but the dems are now fighting back hard and with more than their pencil for the knife fight.
It's time to be badass about this! Declare we are going to win the Presidency, the house, and the senate to get BFD stuff DONE and lead our country to a better future for everyone. Tell people why it matters to them. Declare yes Democracy is at risk - but make it personal... heres what a loss of a real democracy will mean for you. Yo
3) LEAD not just what has been started and accomplished in the last four 3.5 years - but shout out what the future will be. Get people excited about what there will be more or -and what rights will be restored and improved. Women's rights, right to make choices for your own body and healthcare, voting, addressing climate, increasing opportunities, safe affordable housing.. and on and on...
4) We can also work to get the corrupting levers of money out of politics. It's time to reframe how capitalism and our economy can work for all of us and protect our planets' future and build a big healthy economy for everyone without working 3 jobs to pay the mortgage. Many corporations and then with Citizens United meant that those companies and rich donors took over. They liked all the goodies that the republican process of capitalism accomplished. Greed and growth for their companies persuaded them to go for saving taxes, increasing their wealth, and that it was OK to pollute, avoid various regulations, or just not care about the climate they are going to leave their kids. Somehow incentivize these companies to recognize that a healthy thriving middle class benefits all of us - and that values and creating a positive thriving workforce means more than money.
Go Magic!!! (MSU grad here...)😏
Well said, Danny. What I would like to add is that back in 2020 Biden had the non-inspiring slogan Build Back Better. Had it not been for Trump's failed leadership during the pandemic Biden would have lost. Slogans matter, and right now Biden has none that I know of. MAGA is a powerful slogan, and Biden must show convincingly how Trump failed, and has indeed dishonored that slogan. "This is how I intend to keep America great," is what he must tell us. "This is not who we are," Biden has said, but Governor Sununu replied that is who we are: see the polls. Prices, low and order, abortion are likely to figure large in November. Can Biden deliver? The Gaza tragedy makes Biden look weak. The Constitution is at stake.
This is probably one of the more nuanced takes I have seen in a while. But regarding Bibi wanting to attack Iran - couldn’t Biden just stop that, by denying any more weapons to Israel? Since Isreal is very depended on weapons from
USA, which makes up something like 65% percent of all weapons sold to Isreal
(Germany makes up about 30% I think, at the last 5% of weapons sold to Isreal is spread among the rest of Europes countries)
Bibi doesn't want to attack Iran until after Trump is elected. When Iran sent all its drones against Israel (and got them shot down) and said it would send more if Israel retaliated, Israel simply bombed Iran's defense radar site, showing the Ayatollah it can do whatever it wants to Iran. So, Iran, Hezbollah, et al. became quiet, without admitting they were scared to react
Well said, Danny Piper.
I don't understand if the USA produces more oil than any other country, why do our gas prices go up at the whims of other countries?
1) ‘More’ is never the same as ‘as much as one can want’.
2) until (oil) demand is zero due to a surfeit of a better alternative (fusion/fisson/green), OR a surfeit of (oil) supply (never), supply and demand for a global resource will be affected by ALL supply/sources and ALL demands.
3) Not all fossil fuel is the same, or able to serve all purposes.
4) It is in our strategic interests to be able to offer oil security to EU & other nations being held hostage by a few oil rich countries like Russia & OPEC, so we need more than WE need, see #1).
I understand part of that but it still doesn't help me understand why our gas prices go up because other countries are cutting production. Help me understand.
It’s called the law of the supply and demand… and pricing. When supply goes down, demand goes up.
When demand goes up, prices also go up - until demand goes down (because prices went up) enough to match (‘correctly price’) the lower supply.
Part 2
Jan, (Assuming you are continuing the assumption that U.S. production exactly meets U.S. demand, and asking why should U.S. prices be affected by a drop in international supply?)
When there is less to share (abroad), some people (abroad) will pay a bit more to get closer to what they need, (since there is some degree of ‘price elasticity’ for oil).
Then, when the price on the global market goes up, US oil companies would prefer to make bigger profits by selling some of the U.S. production abroad, so they do.
This reduces supply at home, raising demand and prices until there is a balance point for U.S. companies between selling at home and abroad.
So long as U.S. oil companies are commercial entities (ie, not nationalized, not charities, and not prohibited from selling to the highest global bidder - which would be very hard to regulate thru congress, since U.S. congress is owned by big oil), any change in global supply or global demand (ie, any global price change) WILL affect U.S. supply, and therefore US’ cost at the pump, long run.
Principle: “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.
(rest of that fine meditation you know:)… any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” John Donne, 1623
The second part of the quote relates less directly to your question; I just love it; it makes me oddly happy to know someone 400 years ago already knew how to solve today’s econ and humanitarian problems. It only requires our will to do the right thing.
Thank you, that does help me understand. I don't want a government that requires me to sell my product at a certain price and yet I do. I guess I want the other people to be like my neighbor who looks out for the best for him and for me.
I agree, living in a market-social democracy would a fair bit more humane than living in our laissez-faire capitalist one!
And therein lies the horse shoe, where the extreme right and extreme left meet, they join in hands with Fuck Biden. https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-f-joe-biden-horseshoe
I question anyone who would read anything by Bill Kristol, much less linking it on a public forum. But hey, this is America, where embarrassing oneself in the public policy realm is commonplace.
That's your opinion and welcomed to it. I don't care what you do or do not question. We are just one of 333.3 million people..
As for embarrassing oneself in public. Take your own advice Tom.
I do take my own advice. That’s why I’d never link Kristol.
How about the other link to Mona Charen,didn't read that one did you. Truly you are no different than the deplorable MAGAts.
It does seem that the extreme left and extreme right do meet.
Because the situation in Gaza is not occurring in a vacuum. Protesters (who I agree with about war crimes) are missing what would likely happen if the US withdrew all aid from Israel. It’s a tinder box in the Middle East. Israel and Iran have already used drones to attack each other. Yemen and the Houthis have been attacking shipping. The US abandoning Israel would signal to a multitude of actors in the region that would likely turn an already unstable situation into an all-out regional war. And we know Israel has nuclear weapons. We also know that other countries/actors in the area would likely be able to get ahold of them. I don’t see the US pulling aid as being helpful for the Gazans or the region. I think Netanyahu would continue his crimes and open a war on another front. It’s a fucking disaster.
Yep, but all of this talk about war crimes, obscures the war crimes of he who started it all,
Yahya Sinwar of HAMAS.
While campus idiots, tools of Saudi and Emirate money, kvetch ab out Israeli war cimes, while South Africa and other nations charge Israel, there is deafening silence about the crimes of HAMAS, especially using civilians as human shields.
That is a serious war crime, but crickets.
There’d be a cease-fire immediately if Hamas surrendered and released the hostages. Until then, Israel has no choice but to defeat this terrorist group that is sworn to its destruction.
US classified intelligence on Israeli military operations -> Trump -> Russia -> Hamas -> barbaric attack on Israel (on Putin's birthday) reminiscent of Russia's brutal attack on Ukraine -> Israeli invasion of Gaza -> social unrest in US
Results: international attention on Russia's invasion of Ukraine is diverted; international support for Ukraine declines; tide of war turns in favor of Russia; support among key groups for Biden diminishes; chances of Trump winning election enhanced.
Whom do these results benefit? Putin, Trump & the GOP. Who is wily & motivated enough to conceive of such a scheme? Putin
Why so much concern for & emotion over the Palestinians & not Kurds, Uyghurs, Chechens, Sudanese, etc., even Ukrainians locked in an existential battle not of their choosing, the most crucial conflict since WWII for the West & democratic forces to win?
Why this issue & not the ones that youth have claimed (& I agree) to be their most pressing issues: climate disruption, reproductive rights, wealth & power disparity & inequality, the survival of democracy, etc.?
Great post Jaime, to the point, concise.
And to validate it here is todays Morning Shots from the Bulwark.
The Islamic triumphalists, MAGAts and campus idiots unite in a horshoe chanting
"Fuck Joe Biden"
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-f-joe-biden-horseshoe
When these campus idiots and their Muslim friends help elect Trump, and Trump starts deporting Arab and Hispanics, it will be too late to say, "Geez I screwed up"
The arrogance of people whose brains are not yet fully developed and who lack critical thinking skills, that they believe they can change policy by blocking traffic, chanting slogans and camping on campus.
Not going to happen, what they are doing is pissing off the very people that they think they are trying to influence.. the people who have to work for a living, and aren't living on their parents dime.
I think the answer to why this issue is that it resonates with people. There are a lot of people in the US with ties to the Middle East (including me, but then I also have ties to Ukraine). And there's the religious issue. I'm not saying Putin didn't orchestrate this because I think he and Netanyahu did. But I think they both know how emotional that area is for Americans.
This conflict has flared up repeatedly throughout my life & beyond. I'm so sick of it! When it broke out, I knew it was trouble & would ruin things not only for Israel & Palestinians but also Ukraine & Biden, who was placed in an impossible spot, & the Democratic Party. And most of the participants have behaved in an unhelpful way. But Putin & Trump are basking in the chaos.
The Abraham Accords are a huge ray of hope. Also Saudi and Jordan helping shoot down Iran’s missiles.
Totally agree. It is beyond sickening. Nothing ever changes. People don't learn anything.
100 "hearts" for this, Jaime Ramirez,100 hearts.
Thanks, Annie!
I think I've been banned entirely from posting on Robert Reich's Substack for reasons unknown to me, but my posts no longer appear and so I guess that's that. I will miss the opportunity to "sound off" now and then, but so it goes.
I certainly hope not. You're among my favorites on this site & have some of the best posts.
I sometimes lose my posts somehow. Anyway, your message came to my inbox.
Agreed!!
But Richard, they will never defeat Hamas. And even if they could, what about Iran and the other terrorist groups? It's an impossible goal.
Perhaps not the Hamas ideology (although Naziism was largely defeated when Germany lost the war), but at the least all tunnels, weapons manufacturing and weapons caches would be destroyed and the smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Israel shuttered completely.
I know I’ve said it before, but Hamas took the hostages so they could stretch the war out as long as Russia and Iran needed to stretch it out in order to put who they want in office. They are out these hostages at their pace in order to keep the war going Until the election. I believe that most of the strife in the US and on campuses is not coming from the US and the campuses. Russia and other actors are doing what we are starting to do in Georgia; create civil unrest, and weaken the nation.
Totally agree, but you will get serious objections from the Islamophilic, HAMAS philes and Jew haters.
One thing that this "war" has achieved, is that it has enabled the Jew haters to come out of the closet.
Let us not forget the wealth and power of AIPAC to do tremendous damage to any candidate who goes against their wishes. In many ways, for Democrats, AIPAC is the (much quieter and more stealthy) equivalent of MAGA for Republicans.
I'll repeat what I've said before, Netanyahu and his cabal or radical right wing rabbis, who seem motivated by an obsessive hunger to reclaim the area included in the Kingdom of Solomon from 3,000 years ago, in order to prove these old men have still "got it," need to pay attention to the very short life of that Kingdom and it's very rapid demise. Since they believe that God is totally in control and responsible for all things, perhaps they should take that as an indication that the end of the Kingdom of Solomon was God's will, and equally so, the reality that God has never brought it back to life in the past 3,000 years.
The ancient nation of Israel destroyed itself in creating Solomon's kingdom. It is not wise for Israel now to be repeating exactly the same mistakes.
Since 2016, we’ve heard a lot about Russian interference in US elections. What we haven’t heard so much about is Israeli interference in US elections.
Agreed!
Biden seems to be on a tightrope. He continues to maintain protection of Israel of a future where it will have to defend itself from others who resist Israel's ongoing attempts to occupy other's lands while abiding by his own humanist aspirations. Huge predicament. I believe it would be best for him to verbalize this message. It might help all of us in understanding more clearly his stance and reduce levels of violence around the conflict in our own country.
Because he wants Gaza controlled by the IOF and the 2-state solution is just something liberals say to make it seem like they don't want the genocide they are paying for.
In one hundred percent agreement. I think he’s afraid to tick off some who have influence, both monetarily and vocally. What keeps getting pushed under the rug, is, none of this had to happen. Israeli intelligence knew when and where the Hamas attack would occur and chose to ignore their own intelligence. Having assets in place is not that difficult. The present Israeli government is corrupt, so what else should we expect? We’ve come to their aid on numerous occasions and I’d ask, what have we gotten in return? How many times have we caught them giving the Chinese’s our nuclear secrets over the decades? What kind of “ally” would do that?
Totally agree. I analogize Oct 7 to Sep 11th, 2001 as follows.
Bush and Bibi knew something was in the works, and knew they could use it for their own political purposes. What they didn't know was the details, the extent of it all, the targets, but once you loose the hounds, there is no telling what they will do.
Bibi and his right wing coalition are not only corrupt, but insane with religious fervor and in that they are matched by HAMAS, Hezbollah, Iran.
The other mid east states are pragmatic, realistic and restrained and actually want nothing to do with HAMAS, Hezbollah and Iran.
Iran, Hezbollah and the Assad Regime are Shia Islam and as such are competitors and enemies of Sunni Islam, which is the Kngdom, Jordan, Kuwait, and UAE, Yemin is Sunni, but the Houthi's are Shia.
Iran sent a suicide Squad into Mecca during the 1987Haj. There is a 1400 year old war between Shia and Sunni Islam over who is the rightful successor of Muhammad, and of course those in the west are totally ignorant, and ignorant of how important it is to the Shia.
Iran, however, is pragmatic.
After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Iran severed all diplomatic and commercial ties with Israel, and its theocratic government does not recognize the legitimacy of Israel as a state. The turn from cold peace to open hostility began in the early 1990s, shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran%E2%80%93Israel_relations#:~:text=After%20the%201979%20Islamic%20Revolution,of%20Israel%20as%20a%20state.
It is official Iranian position is that the Jewish state shall not exist, to further their cause, and make inroads into Sunni armed groups, they have allied with, backed, trained, equipped,mentored and helped plan the Oct 7th attack.
There are Shia in Saudi Arabia, which is an official ahhabiyyah State, the Shia however are second class citizens, and are used as manual labor, and it is they that are the workers in the oil fields.
The Shia sect of Zaydi is the largest denomination in Yemen, and is the religion of the Houti tribe,
Yemen has no functioning central government with full control over its territory, and any state institutions that continue to operate are controlled by unelected officials and armed groups. The Hadi government is largely dependent on its foreign patrons, particularly Saudi Arabia and the UAE, which also have parallel relationships with other anti-Houthi groups. The Houthis receive at least support from Iran..
Yemen has been a proxy war between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran.
Iran was controlled by the Sunni tribe of Saddams, until Bush destabilized it, now it is an ally of Iran as the people are majority Shia, and the Sunni are a minority. The Iran Republican Guard now operates in, and has bases in Iraq and have been attacking U.S. Bases with Missiles and mortars.
The Assad regime is Alawite, a Shia sect like the Yemen Zydis, but the people are majority Sunni, so we have Shia minority ruling over a majority Sunni, and the Sunni's have risen up against the Assad regime many times. the City of Homs was wiped off the map by Haffez al Assad, the father of Bashar al Assad the President, and has been wiped off the map again.
Russia has intervened in Syria on the side of the ruling Shia Class, and is allied with Shia Iran., which is supporting and equipping the Shia Houti's and has equipped, trained and mentored HAMAS, which has the same goal as Shia Hezbollah of Lebanon, which is the major political force in that country.
Sunni Islam, in the form of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and in Lebanon The Islamic Group is one of Lebanon's main Sunni factions but has kept a low profile politically over the years. It has one member in Lebanon's 128-seat legislature. Elections within the group in 2022 brought its leadership closer to Hamas.
I mention here that Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, and Jordan will not accept any Palestinian refugees and if caught they are deported back to Palestine.
Netanyahu has no intention of having a two state solution.
Maybe he has a hidden agenda behind his moves? Birute, what do you think can they be?
Exactly! As long as Biden continues to funnel weapons into Israel, the atrocities will continue. Is Biden actually interested in reelection? It seems more and more as if he’s paving the way for trump. Already there are proto fascist goon squads attacking students and professors on at least one campus.
That should have been his first move, IMO, Birute.
Birtue. There can not be a two state solution. The Arabs will have no part of it. HAMAS, by their own words, is dedicated to the total obliteration of Israel, and that means genocide..
The Right wing Israeli's are motivated by not only Zionist ideology, but by the existential threat of a Palestinian state on their border.
Perhaps because there is no way to have a 2 state solution since neither side has been in favor of it for 30 or more years. If the Arab peace keeping force can be assembled, perhaps there is a possibility, but the logistics difficulties of having neither Palestine nor Israel cut in half.
A two state solution is a pipe dream. What seems to elude those in the west, is that this is a religious war, and Islam declared war on the Jews 1400 years ago when Muhammad beheaded, six at a time, the entire membership, 600 of them, of the Jewish tribe the Quaryza in the market place of Medina.
srael will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it" (The Martyr, Imam Hassan al-Banna, of blessed memory).
"The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (evidently a certain kind of tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews." (related by al-Bukhari and Moslem). verses 1295/1296 Book 56, haddith 139 al Bukhari.
The Day of Judgement is the Islamic end times,and it won't come about until all of the Jews are killed.
To the Muslim mind, a Jewish state on sacred Arab soil is an abomination. The soil was, in their mind, sanctified with the Dome of the Rock, built around a rock with the imprint of a dinosaurs foot, when the Muslim's believe, because the Quran say so, was left by the chimera beast that carried Muhammad from Medina to the 7 levels of heaven to bargain with Al Lihah, over how many times a day they should pray.
Once a land is Muslim it is forever Muslim, according to Islamic thought, and a Jewish state, the hated Jews of all things, on "sacred" Muslim soil cannot tand and must be eradicated.
The west is idiots, especially America, they think in terms of politics and secularism. Democracy and Islam are not compatible..
Democracy is not defined by voting. Hungary, Russia are not democracies and they vote.
Aside from his greater empathy for Jews and Israel after Oct. 7, Biden probably also placed a greater value on retaining or gaining the support of pro Israel groups and moveable centrist voters than groups in the Democratic base sympathetic to the Palestinians. Donors and social networks and connections almost certainly played a role too. I think Biden was blind to the possibility that Israel's conduct of the war in Gaza - now widely viewed as ethnic cleansing or possible genocide - would accelerate a shift in American views on Israel and the Palestinians. Biden of course enabled the Israeli over retaliation with his early open ended support, and part ownership of any Israeli war crimes will be his legacy.
tRUMP'S legacy is that he convinced Netanyahu to move the Capital of Israel to the Holy Land: thus inflaming further, the angers and hatred of Palestinians.
Thank you Prof. Reich for pointing out the infantile behavior of Donald Trump. The challenge, so much of our media is promoting such infantile behavior with hardly a note that what ?Trump is doing and proposing is toddleresque and not what respectful leaders do and say. Beyond a few journalists and commentators, Trump's whining, complaining, insulting, and ignoring of the facts are just a normal way of running for office. They cover Trump more than Biden/Harris and call Trump's trial in New York "a hush money trial." In reality it is a "cooking the books for personal and electoral gain" trial. For years, the folks who attend Trump's rallies have demonstrated that they do not hear what Trump says. They react to Trump's bluster, a few code words, and the idea that Trump is strong. When interviewed even right after the rally, they can't state one specific thing that Trump stands for, or if they happen to come up with something it is superficial, like he hates immigration. Last week, the Supreme Court conservatives talked as though they thought Trump had a case for immunity for his crimes and tried to justify such a ridiculous position with gobbledygook that was supposed to sound scholarly but really sounded stupid and toddleresque (what would a future president do if they thought they could be prosecuted after leaving office for something he did in office?). Yo Mr. Alito, maybe he would not commit the crimes he could be prosecuted for. Oh wait, that might just bee too difficult for Alito to comprehend. I guess it's not 17th century enough for his stuck brain. I don't know how to wake this nation up before we lose what we have. Over the centuries, states have proven over and over, they do not care much for people's rights if those rights get in the way of the few rich white men in charge. Up until now, during my lifetime, when it comes to rights, I would go with the federal government over most state governments, and our state governments prove I am right over and over, almost daily. We need our federal government stepping in more often to curb the bad state legislative and judicial behavior.
@ Ruth. I say again: Trump is a symptom. For many MAGATs (enough) it's all visceral.
1. "Trump hates dogs" works, especially at dog parks. According to Ivana Trump, he provoked growls from her dog, Chappy, a poodle. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/05/opinion/trump-military-dog.html
2. "Trump stole from kids with cancer." https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2019/donald-j-trump-pays-court-ordered-2-million-illegally-using-trump-foundation
3. For veterans "Not suckers or losers."
4. For people on SSI, "Slit your own throat."
Here's some proof. https://rvat.org/
Daniel, you are so right, but alas, people's memories are so short, by choice. The current Trumpers and Trumpettes don't even hear him anymore. They don't care about what Trump likes or doesn't like. They do think he will do favors for them should he regain the presidency. They have no evidence of that, but they BELIEVE it. What anyone knows who pays attention is that Trump cares for no one but himself. His closest connections know that (not sure he even has real friends), but they expect that constantly kissing his *** will get them something they want. If he were to gain more power, he might drop a few rays of sunshine their way, but nothing that would mean anything because as a man with dementia, he won't remember who did what for him and his handlers won't care because helping others might mean less for them. Gag!!
You said, "that might just bee too difficult for Alito to comprehend. I guess it's not 17th century enough for his stuck brain". Thanks for the laugh. I enjoyed it.
The International Court of Justice ordered the genocide stopped. end of story
anything else is war crime
the US is now in contempt of court and in a position of command and control of genocide.
What else matters?
Stop the genocide.
@ Isa. Tell it to Hamas. Protest Qatar, any country that protects Hamas murderers. .
YOU inflame the situation with your rhetoric.
I don’t understand why the world at large doesn’t pressure Hamas to ceasefire and return hostages. The terroristic political group is not the victim here. They have victimized and martyred their people and will not negotiate. So we accept this and expect Israel to be responsible instead. Hamas will not quit until they destroy Israel. Why do we accept this?
Hamas is a group of radical Muslims who live to kill Jews. That's why.
Hamas wants a "one state" solution. A Palestine state with no Israel. They will not give up until they accomplish this or die.
A salient fact overlooked by the bleeding heart nincompoops.
Because they are terrorists?
Just because Palestinians voted Hamas into their government doesn't mean Hamas wants to, will, or even can govern.
The Hamas leaders are billionaires living a luxurious lifestyle in Qatar while the people of Gaza suffer! Disgusting!
Professor, you can’t blame only the media for giving the public what they want. The public likes an entertaining news cycle.
This has been a trend since news became entertainment. Trump knows this and his presentations with insults, etc is entertaining.
Biden should include in his presentations the kind of sound bites he had at the Correspondents Dinner.
We can create some of our own entertainment about the makeup wearing candidate who is napping in court.
IMHO Trump is the butt of the best comedy on TV.
" Today Trump put his head where the sun don't shine yet again." Attacked Cassidy Hutchinson.
"You've heard of 'Sleeping Beauty'? We've got 'sleeping ugly.'https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1tPoa4fVs8
Yes! Also the rhetoric he showed in the State of the Union.
well over a century of genocide against the Holy Land, apartheid, child abuse rape, starvation but that's OK ... a genocidal holocaust of babies, children, mothers, doctors, nurses, journalists, UN Aid workers, whole families every school, churches 1800 1700 1600 years old Christian saints shrines, cemeteries bulldozed defiled and you have so little humanity left you accuse me rhetoric?
The International Court of Justice has officially ordered the genocide stopped. so no the murderers here are not hamas according to international law. That's not rhetoric, not opinion, not speculation. The law is stop the genocide.
so stop it.
if you are so bereft of humanity so godless that you cannot will not say no to genocide, than god help you: god has already judged you. just like Pharoah
"I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and he will pursue them. But I will gain glory for myself through Pharaoh and all his army, and the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD."..."The LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt" exodus 14
and so the pharaoh and all their power might and best chariots all drowned in the sea wrapped in their egos and godlessness...
you *do not* commit genocidal holocaust on the Holy Land: god cannot forgive, cannot forget and those that cannot say no to genocide already know god's punishment because a mortal sin starts with killing your own humanity first and your children's as we see in the cruelty and inhumanity of IDF and the whole of the zionist open confession quoting scripture as their aim
quote the prime minister of Israel who vowed to " Kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys." 1 Samuel 15:3
Thanks for implicating yourself. Bigot!
the bigot is not the people killed ... the bigot is the people committing promoting supporting propagating approving celebrating genocidal holocaust in contempt of scripture, humanitarian law, geneva convention and contempt of the International Court of Justice.
yes i support humanity, the international humanitarian law, the law of Moses and US law without prejudice, everywhere and am opposed to turning the Holy Land into the killing fields because of a real estate deal or oil ... that's the very definition of mortal sin and I took an oath at the height of the Cuba crisis to defend the constitution of the US which vow I've never broken.
Tell it to the Arab Druze serving voluntarily in the Israeli army. Tell it to the many members of the Arab Party within Israel. Tell it to the Arab members of the Knesset. Tell it to the many Christian Arabs who know that Hamas/Islamic Jihad etc. has the same thing in store for them that they did on Oct. 7. Tell it to the Arab doctors, lawyers, etc. who live and work peaceably inside Israel. Tell it to the families of Gazans who were "liquidated" by Hamas. Here's the history. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2015/05/gaza-palestinians-tortured-summarily-killed-by-hamas-forces-during-2014-conflict/
Genocide requires intent, per article II of the UN Convention on Prevention of Genocide.
So here is intent
1988 HAMAS Covenant, never repudiated btw.
Preamble: Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it" (The Martyr, Imam Hassan al-Banna, of blessed memory).
"The Islamic world is on fire. Each of us should pour some water, no matter how little, to extinguish whatever one can without waiting for the others." (Sheikh Amjad al-Zahawi, of blessed memory).
Para 7, Art 7: "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (evidently a certain kind of tree) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews." (related by al-Bukhari and Moslem).
The last verbatim from Islamic sacred text, the haddith of al Bukhari.
Islam has been at a religious war with Judaism since Muhammad had the 600 members of the Jewish Quaryza tribe, beheaded, six at a time, in Medina.
Sun Tzu and Clausewitz: Know that enemy. You my friend choose ignorance instead.
So many of these Democrats, Reich followers, are too close minded to see internationally seen widely seen truths. Just as closed minded and reactionary, just as impenetrable by truths as Trumpian.
simply stating the fact that the Internatıonal Court of Justice ordered the genocide to stop gets me dehumanızed demonızed and called names
imagine what they'd say if I were to document the genocide instead of engag'ng in name calling
Isa, so many on here are just reactionary, they don't know how to think to research to explore beyond their narrow tribe...It speaks to American education more than anything else. Even highly educated American's who call themselves liberal minded are tribal.
True Glen, and anyone familiar with the comments on RR when it comes to the subject of Israel, and anyone who has paid attention to the campus idiots who are trying to shut down the nation, for a peoples who would oppress them in their own country of origin, could see the tribal mentality at work.
Democrats are just as vulnerable and victim to spins-to conspiracy theories as Republicans who they don't have the will to see, to look to see beyond their narrow and distant versions of the truth. The facts on the ground show genocide and that is the truth. Biden and Congress are breaking American law in sending military aide to a nation that uses it to cause famine on its opponent.
unfortunately it is the people of US which will pay: karma is a bitch ... the rich will get rich but pay in their own way dehumanizing themselves
Isa, are you familiar with Erich Fromm. If Americans took the time to read it His 1941 book Escape From Freedom, they would see how the American project has been an escape from freedom.
I believe America as it is must fully fail before it has any chances of rebuilding...into a democratic more social-more sane-more fair seeing and fair sharing society. If that is possible.
Trump is a by-product of a really sick society...Biden in all his "decency" mostly will sustain that sickness. The patient must get worse and go through the process before he starts to recover-if he recovers.
Poor you, demonized, dehumanized. actually the UN did not order Israel to stop the genocide,because there is no genocide.
I can make the case for ethnic cleansing though, but won't because the Arabs started this vicious cycle when in Nov 1948 they tried and failed to genocide the Jews, having failed again, the tried again in 1956, 1968. 1973, 2006, 2024 and the blood of every dead Gazan lies on the head of HAMAS who could care less about their people, but use them as human shields, just as they tried to use Jewish hostages as human shields.
Muslim don't mourn the dead killed by Jews, they celebrate them as martyr's, infants and grown men alike. Yahya Sinwar said the quiet part out loud, they (Islam) are a nation of martyrs and will keep comng back again and again, until the Jews are obliterated and that is genocidal intention.
Huuur Bothsides
The ICC has no say in this matter.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) investigates and, where warranted, tries individuals charged with the gravest crimes of concern to the international community: genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of aggression. https://www.icc-cpi.int/about/the-court
the International Court of Justice has the final say in this matter under International law
https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/192/192-20240405-ord-01-00-en.pdf
read it
The ICC is irrelevant.
Yes, if you just read the words of Trump's social media posts, even without attaching a name to them, how can any rational person think this person is fit to be president?
I wish Reich would have pointed out the almost-psychopathic behavior of Biden in supporting genocide and encouraging authorities' violent crackdowns on peaceful protesters.
Says Putin.
Peter, Whoa! Where is the evidence or did you just make that up to support your untenable position? Remember that "state" thing when states take care of things that happen in their own space unless they ask the feds? Oh wait, I guess that doesn't matter, of course!
So many of these Democrats, Reich followers, are too close minded to see what is seen widely internationally. Biden is funding-arming a state engaged in genocide. Many Democrats are as closed minded and reactionary, just as impenetrable by truths as MEGA followers.
Glen, nonsense! I'd use another word, but nonsense works.
Ruth - you rock. It's incredible to see what we have lost in our "lifetimes"! My mother's and grandmother's generation saw a world that increased rights and acceptance for a bigger more evolved humanity. But now 26 or so Red states are hijacking the core principles of our constitution and the plans of the 2025 project... subverting so many decades of federal advances - by taking them apart state by state. Thanks Ruth!
And that's an insult to toddlers. Toddlers are doing what they instinctively do...
Well said, Ruth! 100% agree!
This morning as I scrolled through the news feed, there was an article about how President Biden was becoming more pronounced with his attacks on trump. Naturally, in the comments section, the far-right nutters were screaming how horrible President Biden was for attacking trump. Seriously, I had to laugh!! My mom use to tell my sisters and me, "Don't dish it out if you can't take what comes back!" I do not want to hear my president making caustic remarks, but when trump dishes it out, President Biden has every right to address it. I know that in the coming months as the election nears, there will be more and more stupid polls, more and more hateful rhetoric, more and more misinformation, lies and propaganda. I feel my role is to continue to get the message out, encourage people to vote, and continue to tout President Biden's many accomplishments. I have quite a bit of useful information from this substack that helps me when talking to people about our president. We cannot get discouraged. We must ignore this media blizzard and keep our eyes on the prize so to speak. Vote Blue, America!!!
You have even more of a contrast to point to now, thanks to Time Magazine interviews with Trump:
How Far Trump Would Go
https://time.com/6972021/donald-trump-2024-election-interview/
Skip the phony framing ("I let them quit because I have a heart....")
and cut to the violence and cruelty:
- let red states monitor women’s pregnancies and prosecute those who violate abortion bans.
- put people in detention camps, deport 11 million others
- at his personal discretion, withhold funds appropriated by Congress
- gut the U.S. civil service,
- deploy the National Guard to American cities as he sees fit,
- close the White House pandemic-preparedness office
It is so discouraging to talk, civilly, to otherwise intelligent, nice people who just don't get it. They like Trump "because he says it like it is..." exactly the way they CAN'T or they will lose their jobs and their health insurance. At the same time that they love his theatrics they don't actually believe what he's saying. And the past is always rosier...because you did survive...and your kids were so cute then but now they're turning into pubescent loudmouths and you were slimmer snd your knee didn't click. The idea of rounding up illegal immigrants who are polluting our blood and deporting them to concentration camps doesn't cause any alarms to go off...because I'm not an illegal immigrant.....
You go, girl! Many are with you!
My message to the Biden Campaign would be to tell the truth about Trump's ideas: Trump is a coward. His isolationist policies exhibit his fear about engaging with other nations diplomatically. He is weak. He is unwilling to confront a difficult situation. He wants to hide his head in the sand, just like Neville Chamberlain. What do you think the Republicans would be saying if they hadn't turned into lackeys for Trump. They'd be shouting from the rooftops to give huge amounts of aid to Israeel, maybe even send troops, to "get those Commie terrorists".
Biden's nuanced approach is the way to deal with the problem. Humanitarian aid is also part of the package. But the Campaign doesn't have to sell that. They need to point out Trump's way of handling anything that doesn't directly benefit him, i.e., ignore it and make up excuses for ignoring it. He would deal with this knotty problem just like handled the Covid Pandemic.
Very good point, Charles!
Remember: ...
The purpose of The #Media is to MAKE MONEY. And close political races make by far the most.
So the media MAKE THEM CLOSE ARTIFICIALLY, e.g. 2016, protecting scumbag Trump and relentlessly attacking Hillary.
Truth rarely makes a profit.
William, Yes, but speaking truth to power has its consequences. For those who speak truth, such as Robert Reich, we should be prepared to see some consequences of his actions and be ready to support him should that happen.
Yes, but unless Robert can afford to sue the media, it will make no difference. The super-rich control the media now, and their truth is not ours
William, that is the way it has been for some time, but it seems to me the media have to be called out on that and challenged at every turn. I get it that money is the driving force, but maybe the money needs to be put on the media that actually value facts, understanding, and respect for the truth. But, then, people will actually have to pay attention to what is being said and I do wonder if most people want to do that. I am thinking they'd rather be scrolling for sensation, cat videos, and influencers. Yeah, we are in trouble!
One would think that after 30,000+ documented lies and half truths by tfg, it would be in itself enough not to vote for him.. No it did not., but the one lie that has kept him. afloat is that the 2020 election was stolen by the Democrats. That Big Lie empowered him to destabilize our democratic norms and institutions by undermining.our trust in out free and fair elections. Putin, Orban and Netanyahu are no doubt pleased to see this dangerous wannabe dictator back in the Oval Office. Birds of a feather flock together. Biden Is desperately trying to get a cease fire, but the tide is turning against him he has to stand up to Netanyahu . Netanyahu is throwing Israel under the bus to save his own corrupt skin, just like Trump is throwing our democracy under the bus to save his own corrupt skin. If you want to live in the real world where truth, facts and character matters do not take anything for granted. work anyway you can to defeat tfg at the ballot box
The media used to make money just fine but still had morals. That is no longer true. They are a reflection of our society--short attention spans, selfish, ignorant in spite of lots of "facts".
Again, news divisions used to be separate from entertainment. They are now identical.
A better way to say this would be, money at all costs over country.
The almost non-existent news coverage of Israel building New Settlements on bombed out Palestinian villages seems Conspicuous to me . Yes the attack by Hamas was Horrendous, yet it doesn't justify the killing of thousands of Palestinian civilians ,nor the blatant land grabs by Bibi's corrupt cronies.
Speaking of bullshit.
If anything, the campus protests are being provoked and funded by right-wing billionaires, such as the Koch network, the Mercers, Uhleins, Mellons, Rickettses and Clarence Thomas’s sugar daddy, Crow, who desperately want Trump back in the White House to look after their interests, and think they can hang blame for the unrest around President Biden’s neck.
As “Deep Throat” counseled in the movie, “All the President’s Men” (it’s not in Woodward and Bernstein’s book), “Follow the money.”
Avie,do you have Any factual information to back up your claims? I would suggest as many of us as possible get onto the campuses and find out what’s really happening rather than to sit back and simply conjecture.
I wish I had hard evidence. I began my entry with the words “if anything”; in colloquial English that conveys a suspicion, and is not meant to be taken as an assertion of fact.
But, you want to know what’s really going on? Two things.
One: In a society in which less and less is decided based on things’ actual merits, and more and more on what is and isn’t “cool,” as well as by self-appointed “influencers” who, like the aforementioned agents provocateurs, are driven to post their likes and dislikes as a consequence of how much money can be passed to them sub rosa, a great deal of the “outrage” currently being displayed on behalf of Palestinians is because it has become FASHIONABLE. It’s just the most recent manifestation of the “radical chic” that came of age in the 1960s.
The second, and far more important, aspect is that what is going on in Gaza is a consequence of societies giving over control of their citizens’ lives to those who have, to simplify it, children’s minds in adult bodies. People who have attained political power to satisfy personal ambition, but who neither understand nor care that the words and actions have terrible consequences for those they govern. Who understand only what lower forms of life do, what they want, and what they’re afraid of.
Did Netanyahu and his right-wing coalition not understand that years’-long abuse of Palestinians, and bottling up millions of them in the immense ghetto of Gaza would not one day erupt into violence vastly exceeding the standard rock-throwing Intifada?
Did Yahya Sinwar and Hamas not understand that unleashing 1200 terrorists into Israel to kill, maim, rape and kidnap would make it inevitable that the Israel Defense Forces would descend on Gaza and kill 10, 20, 50 Gazans for every Israeli who was murdered?
Of course they knew, both sides knew, BUT THEY DIDN’T CARE how many Israelis or Gazans dies, as long as the leaders’ political power was maintained. Under the pretense of protecting and serving the interests of the populations they lead, they invited mass slaughter they KNEW was inevitable.
As such, there is NO functional difference between Sinwar and his Hamas thugs, and Netanyahu and his band on thugs. None. And it’s entirely a consequence of the people handing control of their respective societies over to these people who are, as noted above, children’s minds in adult bodies.
It’s a phenomenon as old as civilization.
And there is no greater exemplar of that than Trump. We handed over our society to him for four long years, and now there are forces arrayed and deployed who want to do it again, which will bring about nothing less than the destruction of American delocracy.
THAT’S what all sides on college campuses, the media and the pundits have so far missed and MUST be made to understand: that these are elements of a single phenomenon smd movement that threatens all of civilization.
Children tend to be innocent and kind, unless led otherwise. A more accurate description is “demons in human bodies.” That is in fact the ancient view: men like trump, putin, netanyahu would be seen as possessed by evil spirits.
Maybe they had it right?
“Demon” is too…subjective. The immaturity of the actors involved should be unquestioned and unquestionable, but at what point does that immaturity cross the line into malignancy? With Trump, via his statements and acts, there can be no doubt as to his venality and conscious desire to injure, but in the others, Sinwar and Netanyahu, it may not be as cut-and-dried.
When you say 'People who have attained political power to satisfy personal ambition, but who neither understand nor care that the words and actions have terrible consequences for those they govern' are you referring to Netanyahu and his crew or to Joe Biden and his crew?
This is nonsense. The protesters are students who are disgusted by Israel's long record of war crimes, ethnic cleansing, apartheid, military occupation, and US-backed genocide. It's not complicated, it's as plain as day.
There is nothing on this earth more worthless than conventional wisdom.
Peter is a troll.
I suppose fewer bridges won’t result in fewer trolls to dwell under them.
Avie, there's nothing more worthless than making wild claims that you cannot factually support. In educated circles, it's called promoting a conspiracy theory.
There is nothing on this earth more worthless than conventional wisdom.
2 things we know right now
1. Not all of the protestors are students
2. This helps trump ( and Authoritarianism) to win in November.
The truth must be revealed as to who else is involved as fast as possible.
Seth Abrahamson here on Substack just put out a long post supporting that theory with evidence
I highly doubt the right is fumding the protests directly, but clearly they see an opportunity to use them to split the Dems.
You know, maybe the next step for the evolution of western society is to take a long hard look at our so-called social media companies. Their power to launder illusory truths coupled with their conflict and emotion amplifying algoritms have certainly primed our society for these moments. I'm not sure how you'd build it into anti-trust legislation, but if we want to revive civil discourse, we need to break up the hold these companies have over society.
As ever,
A morbidly facinated Canadian
Not just "social media", but the entire Internet itself. The more time people spend on the Internet for any reason, the less time they have for "pre-Internet" people-to-people in-person conversations. Myself included.
It’s time For The Adults To Run The Government ; The Ranting Of Children Margie Taylor Green, The Orange Jesus trumpet 🎺 Are Needed Back in The Nursery…
The Democrats Will Support Speaker of The House Mike Johnson and Begin the End The MAGA Cult of Lies of Deception and FALSE Claims of the Theft of the Last Presidential Election Biden Won Fair And Square …. The Formal End Of The MAGA IS ENDED…
The New Make Jail Great Again MJGA Movement has begun!!!
MJGA is trumpets American Legacy
I enjoyed your use of the words "Children" and "Nursery" as places for MTG and OJ.
How would MJGA be pronounced, 'em jugga' (like jug) as MAGA is 'magah" (like maggots) ?
Yes! Yes! Yes!
Part of the problem President Biden faces is so many people don't see what is happening behind the scenes, yet they criticize the efforts offered on both sides without knowing everything involved. So quick to find fault with what they don't understand.
Killing and starving over 34,000 civilians is what people are reacting to. We don't have to know what is going on behind the scenes to be outraged over senseless slaughter.
Very nice sense of perspective. Thanks.
Gloria, you nailed it
I wish Biden were putting maximum pressure on Netanyahu to achieve a cease fire in Gaza, but he isn't. He got Netanyahu to move on admitting more humanitarian aid to Gaza by suggesting he might consider not sending offensive weaponry to Israel; now's the time for him to flat-out tell Netanyahu that he will not send Israel offensive weaponry unless Netanyahu agrees to:
1. a ceasefire
2. negotiations to end the war
3. a guaranteed roadmap to a 2-state solution
Of course, he must communicate to Hamas that they must also agree to
1. release the hostages
2. negotiations to end the war
3. a guaranteed roadmap to a 2-state solution
or he will continue to send Israel offensive weapons.
If he did these things and made them stick, he would look a lot stronger than Trump (right now, Netanyahu revels in making him look weak) and unbiased (right now, he appears very biased in favor of Israel). That would not only help him win the election, it would help him win back more respect for the US in the Global South, where he is seen as hypocritical when it comes to human rights.
Think about it: Bibi is itching to bomb Iran and other countries where Hamas hides. If he does, oil prices will sky rocket. When gas prices soar, everything gets more expensive, especially food due to fertilizer and trucking costs. Consumers would be more angry. Biden knows that if gas prices soar before the election, voters will blame him.
Bibi knows this too. Bibi would love to have Trump in office because Trump will never defend human rights or a two state solution.
Biden is in a very difficult position. He must handle Bibi with kid gloves and appease him.
Biden also knows that if he comes down hard on Bibi that AIPAC could swing the election. AIPAC has already vowed to attack the squad for questioning Bibi. But the squad is pretty safe because of their districts' demographics. However, the White House and the House will be decided by districts more competitive than the squad's seats. Biden is on this ice, not the squad.
Sadly, dark money can swing elections. Our democracy is in peril because of our weak campaign finance laws. Citizens United and other pro-corporate campaign finance laws have weakened our Democracy to the breaking point. We knew it would be bad, but we didn't know how bad it would get.
Well, it's worse than we imagined.The top 5 Senate races cost more than $200 million dollars with PA (Frdderman) costing over $350 BILLION dollars. Yes, it's rigged for big money.
It's not Biden; it's the game. As someone cooler than me once said, "Don't hate the player; hate the game."
You'll note that Netanyahu didn't escalate the direct conflict with Iran. He knew if he did, the US, the UK, and Jordan might not fly protection for Israel. If he'd escalated it, he'd also risk a full-scale Middle-Eastern war, which, without the protection of its allies, Israel would not be likely to survive.
However, I totally agree with you about US campaign finance laws.
Could there be another Democrat who could win this game this time?
If so, it's too late to change unless something happens to Biden that makes him step down before the Dem convention.
Panache did NOT cost 350B
PA is Pennsylvania
Maureen, I wholeheartedly agree with points one and two. Although a two state solution sounds like a solution, we may have to look for more creative ways for tribes that have been in a blood feud for centuries to be able to coexist peacefully.
Unfortunately, I believe there is no way that we have any influence over decision-making in the Hamas movement.
If Biden can get the Israeli government to agree to the three points (which is doubtful--especially point 3), I suspect Hamas will go along. On May 1st, 2017, Khaled Meshaal, then head of Hamas, held a press conference at the Sheraton Hotel in Doha to formally announce that Hamas would accept a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. He also distinguished between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism, saying that Hamas’s conflict “is with the Zionist project, not with the Jews because of their religion”. (Hamas’s proposal, which was in line with international law and UN resolutions, was rejected out of hand by Israel and the US.)
The only way that you can say that the Jews and the Palestinians have been in a blood feud for centuries is by reference to Devarim (Deuteronomy) 20: 16-17:
16. However, of these peoples' cities, which the Lord, your God, gives you as an inheritance, you shall not allow any soul to live.
17. Rather, you shall utterly destroy them: The Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivvites, and the Jebusites, as the Lord, your God, has commanded you.
DNA evidence from Canaanite graves shows that Palestinian (and Jewish, BTW) DNA is over 50% Canaanite, so it might be said that the Jewish Israelis (20% of Israelis are Palestinian) are still trying to carry out that command.
Otherwise, most of the time, the remaining Jews and the Palestinians got along pretty well after the Diaspora of 70 CE until the early 20th century.
Not all Jews left Israel after 70 AD. Some of their descendants who remained in Palestine are among the ancestors of today’s Palestinian Jews. Others of their descendants converted to Christianity and are among the ancestors of today’s Palestinian Christians. Many more later converted to Islam and are among the ancestors of today’s Palestinian Muslims whom Israelis call “Arabs” (though the only Palestinians of actual Arab ancestry are the Bedouin and the Druze, who make up about 3% of Palestinians). At least a third of the Palestinians are descended from Jewish families who converted to Islam.
As late as the 17th century, Hebron was a Jewish majority city. Ever since the Rambam (Maimonides), who ruled that converting to Islam did not constitute apostasy, since Islam, like Judaism, and unlike Pre-Reformation Christianity, was not an idolatrous religion. Jewish residents of Palestine had been gradually converting to Islam since the 16th century. There was a massive wave of conversion following the societal collapse that Judaism experienced following the conversion of False Messiah Shabbtai Tzvi to Islam in the 17th century. Until the 17th century, at least a third of the population of The Land of Israel (aka Palestine) was Jewish, some sources put the figure at just under half. by the end of the 18th century this number had gone down to just over 10%. Since there was no wave of emigration, the only answer is conversion.
As I have heard it put, the Jews are those who left the land but kept the religion, while the Palestinians are those who kept the land but left the religion. Both claim the land on the basis of what they kept and consider what they didn't keep irrelevant.
Maureen, thank you for this interesting information. Muslims consider the Bible to be a holy book, and the book Leviticus states that all land on Earth belongs to God/Yahweh, Allah. If we don't share it, we may be doomed.
Interesting and informative comment. If Hamas ever achieves its "one state" solution, a Palestine state with no Israel, will Jews be allowed to live there like Arabs are allowed to live in Israel? I don't think so.
I think it's far more likely that Israel will get its one-state solution--and I have doubts about how the Palestinian citizens of Israel will be allowed to stay after that.
BTW: read Diana Buttu's NYT article, "The Myth of Coexistence in Israel" to see on what terms Palestinian Israeli citizens are allowed to live there.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/25/opinion/israel-palestinian-citizens-racism-discrimination.html
Then you can look at how well the Ashkenazi Jews have treated the Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews (which is improving) and how they all treat the Ethiopian Jews.
None of us knows exactly what is going on behind the scenes. As Prof. Reich says, that is Biden's strength--actual governing. We must watch, wait, and pray.
David, in this instance prayer is not enough. Don't as your god to do for you what you can do for your country.
Well maybe if people weren't so drugged up most of the time they could follow things more carefully and understand what's going on.
Here's my question, how can Trump be leading in the polls? And if he wins, where are we all going to move to, if we aren't dragged off to the Gulag first?
1. Polls don’t vote, people do.
2.American people are not drugged up, they’re uneducated.
3.If for some godforsaken reason, Malignant Mango Mussolini, aka Cadet Bone Spurs, wins, I am staying here and fighting like hell for my country.
Yes, Rose!!
Ty
I don’t have a choice but to stay. Too old and too broke to leave. But I think about it every day.
Well. Trump has very, very few friends or allies other than the like of Bannon and Stone. So, when Trump wins, which he is poised to do, he will find he has no support from within the institutions of the country. Actually, it will be very interesting. You will see that the man has no real contacts or friends. He will not be able to do much at all. And with idiot Biden "supporting Israel" people are not going to take it. This is the United States of America supporting the senseless killing of thousands of people. I think people will not stand for this. So, I think they will go and vote for Trump. You will be okay, though because he is plain stupid. He will not be able to do much. There will be some violence in some places, so do not go to those places. OK?
Jacob, I hope you are being sarcastic on this one. Biden does not rule Israel despite what a lot of folks think and whatever he does or does not do will at best only slow the conflict. Putting Trump in office because Biden didn't fix things in Israel/Gaza is nuts. Trump is stupid, actually has dementia, but he will have plenty of sycophantic "friends" if he is elected. They will come out of the woodwork to suck up to get any largess Trump by then is able to drip on their little heads. If you are not sure of that, just look at the Republicans in Congress, on the Supreme Court, and in the state legislatures all over this nation. I personally don't want to take the chance of a puppet being in our presidency with the Steves and Stone pulling the strings.
Biden only has to make one phone call saying no more weapons or funding until you accept a ceasefire and withdraw from Gaza. It may take a few days, but it would happen.
Of course, you are right.
Agree completely, Jim. Biden doesn't rule Israel, but he does hold the keys to the store.
Well Trump is stupid, I agree, but I dont think he's running his party or campaign, Putin is. And Putin is not stupid.
Putin is running the party indirectly, through Putin-sycophant Trump.
I think it's silly to blame Putin — the ignorance and disgust of people is a natural feeding ground for people like Trump, as they've shown for years.
Well as for that, "They" the Congressional investigators (of whichever party it was) tried hard to prove Putin was directly involved in the election of Trump. They found nothing like that so I will wait before believing you on this. If Putin ran Trump, I think that would be a scandal, yes. I tend not to believe this. Putin runs his own little society; he does not have the experience to interact with American social mechanisms. Tump's sycophants would relay Putin's calls? How exactly does this work, in your "solitary" view?
Trump doesn't need friends. What he wants, and what he would get if elected are sycophants, of which there would be many such slimeballs.
Trump stated that he will be a dictator for one day only. That will be enough time to declare a state of emergency, and that will give him almost unlimited power. There is no such thing as "dictator for one day only."
I absolutely don't believe T.Rump is "poised to win," Jacob. There's no evidence to support that assertion. If anything, he's losing voters. Polls, schmolls.
Don’t plan on moving to Canada. They have plenty of their own extremist right wingers, one of whom will be running against Trudeau next year. Most premiers are conservative and some are extreme right. Trying to dismantle provincial health care among other things.
Biden has failed to delay or stop any of Israel's actions. People are frustrated with this failure.
If Biden was working behind the scenes to stop Israel, we did not see it. There is no way to sugarcoat this, Israel ignored Biden and it makes him look complicit and weak.
Biden is complicit and weak.
If he really wanted to stop the genocide, the slaughter of innocent civilians — mostly women and children — all he had to do was stop the flow of arms to Israel and condemn their actions.
Yes, Biden is complicit but not necessarily "weak" if what he is doing is exactly what he wants to do, and is proud of it. Possibly?
Does nothing ever substantially change? Do we really never learn from our mistakes? In Imani Perry's biography of Lorraine Hansberry, she describes the blatant racism that she encountered as a student at UW Madison in the early '50's. Then she mentions that anti-Semitism at the time was "thinly veiled" in the prevailing sentiment that there were "too many New Yorkers" at the school. When I was an undergraduate there in the late '60's, it was announced sometime in a spring semester that fall semester tuition for out of state students would DOUBLE from $500 a term to $1,000. What was that! My entire undergraduate years were absorbed in student protest against the US participation in the war in Vietnam. Media promoted the idea that "outside agitators" were responsible. All of the students I knew were genuinely disturbed by the war, the crazy arbitrary birthday draft lottery, chemical warfare, and unabashed corporate energy to create those chemical weapons. These many decades later, I am still bewildered by the hypocrisy of a mega-research university that produced best practices in all of the fields of communication, psychology, arbitration, counseling, social work, but when confronted with a perfect opportunity to show the world how meaningful it all was, the authorities called in the police and then the National Guard in riot gear with clubs and tear gas to extinguish any possibility of a dialogue. A plethora of academic disciplines offered effective models of conflict resolution including those evidenced in political science, philosophy, history, educational policy studies to name a few. This "publish or perish" institution did not put any of the source of it's pride to use. Why does nothing change? Why do we not learn from our mistakes?
Good question.
What should Biden do? He should stop libeling as antisemitic people who disagree with him -- meaning his policies that are directly responsible for Gazan decimation.
Netanyahu intentionally partnered with radically right racist settler parties who were forcibly removing Palestinians at the threat of gun point from their land for nearly a decade.
These settlor parties aligned with Netanyahu were picked by Netanyahu precisely because their publicly stated goal was the obliteration of Gaza.
Despite this and despite significant internal opposition to this approach by many a Jew in the Israeli electorate, Netanyahu's call to racists to bolster his election chances were approved (barely) by Israeli voters.
You reap what you sow.
Literally, during campaigning Netanyahu cabinet members all but called for genocide in Gaza.
You can't TELL Netanyahu anything.
YOU HAVE TO MAKE HIM DO IT by CHANGING THE POLITICAL CALCULUS IF ISRAEL STILL WANTS U.S. MILITARY AID.
The Hague ruled against Israel and said it must stop targeting civilians. Biden essentially responded: Those who don't support Israel in the manner proscribed by him (very despotic by the way) don’t remember the Nazi Holocaust against Jews.
Really?
Israel's staunchest defenders will cry antisemitism to most (if not all) who call for a permanent ceasefire even as there is a growing opposition by a vocal plurality of Israeli citizens to Israeli Defense Force attacks.
There are Jews in Israel against clear civilian targeting of Gazans.
Are they anti-Semites? Have they forgotten The Holocaust. Of course not.
The Israeli judiciary has ruled that ISRAEL MUST FOLLOW THE HAGUE'S FOURTH CONVENTIONS THAT FORBID TARGETING CIVILIANS EVEN THOUGH EVERY ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER HAS REFUSED TO DO SO.
ISRAEL'S OWN COURTS HAVE RULED IN PALESTINIAN FAVOR STATING THAT ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCES ARE OBLIGATED TO NOT TARGET CITIZENS AND NOT ENGAGE TACTICS THAT EXCUSE TARGETING CIVILIANS BECAUSE MILITARY TARGETS EXIST AMONGS THEM.
Didn't Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu literally try to get rid of the entire part of the judiciary akin to the U.S. Supreme Court?
He is a despot.
What does Biden love about this guy.
He used the word love to describe his relationship with Bibi. Literally L...O...V...E.
What doesn't Biden get here?
Netanyahu does not listen to anyone but himself. WORDS DON'T MATTER TO BIBI. TAKE AWAY HIS HALF-TON POUND BOMBS THAT WERE SO BRUTAL MOTHERS COULD NOT RECOGNIZE THE FACE OF THEIR CHILDREN WHOSE FACES WERE BURNED OFF AND UNIDENTIFIABLE.
ISRAEL DROPPED THOUSAND POUND U.S. BOMBS ON A HOSPITAL THEY SAID WAS A HAVEN FOR HAMAS.
JOURNALISTS INVESTIGATED.
THERE WAS NO HAVEN.
NO ONE HIDING BENEATH THE HOSPITAL.
THIS IS INTENTIONAL TARGETING OF MOTHERS AND BABIES TO ROOT OUT MILITARY TARGETS.
THAT...
IS...
ILLEGAL...
PERIOD.
A sizable American majority does not support Biden’s continued myopia on Israeli obliteration of Gazans. Israel's own stats say 70% of the 32,000 dead are civilians.
By the way, that means Israel is counting every male death as a death of a soldier, which is patently ridiculously a lie, but, who cares, right?
It's Israel.
We are the U.S.
Biden is leader of the "free world."
As world leader, what he says goes.
If Israel believes every Gaza man obliterated by Israel is a soldier or terrorist...
...then Biden says, "Amen to that" by signaling that those who support the Hague are Holocaust deniers.
That is a clear message to Bibi.
And to the American electorate: "Don't question me. Can't you see every man targeted in Gaza deserves their death. Those who speak otherwise are Holocaust deniers."
Powerful hypocrisy right there. And it works against Americans like me who don't agree with Biden and whom he wants to shut down via his perch atop the bully pulpit that is the American presidency.
Unlike Biden's words to Americans who disagree with him, Biden's words don't work against Bibi and racist settler parties who literally used Hamas tactics (before the war by the way) and targeted with gun violence Palestinians whose families histories dated back centuries if not millennia.
At gun point, they marched Palestinians off land they owned.
And no. That does not justify Hamas brutality and hatred that targeted innocent Jews for summary execution and kidnapping.
But let's get all the facts on record.
Words by Biden don't matter here.
They are vacuous and empty when people who speak for the president intimates that those who support the Hague decision don't remember the Holocaust.
Biden's actions, however, will matter, and can change history. He won't stop aid to racists in Israel in settlor parties whose cabinet level positions dictate the Israeli Defense Force response that is obliterating a people in Gaza by a tactical war whose stated goal before the last Israeli elections was all but saying outright they wanted to wipe Gazans off the map.
Congratulations, Israel and Netanyahu and Biden and Harris.
Due to Hamas' unquestionable antisemitic hatred, brutality, and idiocy, you walked into the trap and the world is now against you.
Great move!
Biden continues to add billions of military aid to Israel. He intimates if not says outright that folks who don't support Israel don't remember the Holocaust. There exist conservative rabbis in Israel that don't agree with him. Holocaust deniers? I. DON'T. THINK. SO.
That is bull puck-y. (And that's a fact!)
Though I am Black and Biden's Vice President is Black, I will write in Rashida Tlaib as my President and Ilhan Omar as my Vice President.
[I live in NY State where my vote for President doesn't matter anyway.]
I have thought that Biden’s approach in continuing the support for Israel despite Netanyahu’s egregious actions was to appease those people/ politicians in the moderate camp who long supported Israel. That perhaps he reasoned if he was tough on Israel he would come across as too progressive.
I have to say Beverly that anyone who can see the sheer destruction and death rate in Gaza and not be moved to say Enough, is not in any sense a moderate. Other US presidents have said, stop you're going too far. These so called moderates aren't pressuring Biden to call a halt. Stopping a massacre is not too progressive, it's being human!
This is one of the best explanations for Trump's continuing appeal that I have read. Trump's special ability is to read emotion, to trigger it, and to exploit it. Reagan was good at this as well. And we live in a media environment that thrives on triggering anger, rage, resentment. Biden demonstrates his strength by resisting this approach- by continuing to be deliberative, rational, and goal-directed. We're at a terrible crossroads here- those of us not caught up in the chaos see clearly the great danger posed by Trump. But we can't give up hope.
Yes, Trump's "special ability" (I like that term) is to, as you say, read and exploit emotions. He does it in a mean, vicious, self-serving and nasty way. He is a morally reprehensible individual.
Trump is a predator, and his favorite food are the gullible, because they are so easy to catch--all you have to do is tell them that you will empower them. It's like the fox telling the birdie how much it admires her plumage. Will you follow me, the fox says?
"The conflict is fueling Trump, who yesterday urged college presidents to be tougher on the protesters."
I'm surprised he's not calling for the college presidents to "just shoot 'em in the legs."
David, over this weekend i’m planning to attend one of these student protests to find out firsthand what are their motivations and how to best address their stated concerns. We are getting our information regarding the students and their protests secondhand through a slanted news media. I believe it’s a good idea for those of us who are near one of the active campuses to go on campus or get as close to the action as possible and see for ourselves what is on the students minds. If we cannot get the straight story through MSM, there’s nothing to stop us from finding out firsthand and sharing it here on Robert’s Substack.
Where would that be? It seems they've all been shut down now.
Arizona State University. I hope there is still some action going on when I get there. Certainly some sort of demonstrations should be going on at Many schools across the country even during the summer. I think for those who live near a university, it would be a good idea to occasionally hang out with any students that are protesting ask questions and provide support.
I have been thinking about showing up with a backpack full of water bottles and protein bars as my way to support and to start conversations. Possibly, I should also hand out bagels!
Marc Nevas, excellent idea! Bravo, there is nothing like a first- hand account to support or refute the prevailing info.
Sane grown up. But Biden needs to stop saying shit like “student protesters are anti-Semitic”. He needs to STOP THIS WAR NOW!!
The War In The Mideast is Coming To our Universities… That Needs To Stop 🛑.
If You want kill Israel get on a plane ✈️ and fly to the conflict and become a Solider for Those Guys.
If you want to kill Palestinians get on a plane and become a Solider for Netanyahu .
Leave the USA Fight until victory for your side leave America Alone…
It’s easy to Talk War but it’s a whole nother thing to fight in a war go battle each other in the Mideast and leave us out of your plans for conquest and Glory…. Glory is short lived and Elusive…