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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on April 3, 2020 at 12:05 am
“When trouble comes up anywhere in the world, they don’t call Beijing. They don’t call Moscow. They call us.”
So spoke President Barack Obama on the September 28, 2014 edition of 60 Minutes.
And, according to former CIA agent Michael Scheuer, that’s the problem: America can’t learn to mind its own business.
Scheuer is a 20-year CIA veteran—as well as an author, historian, foreign policy critic and political analyst.
Michael Scheuer
From 1996 to 1999 he headed Alec Station, the CIA’s unit assigned to track Osama bin Laden at the agency’s Counterterrorism Center.
He has served as an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s Center for Peace and Security Studies.
He is best-known as the author of two seminal works on America’s fight against terrorism: Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror (2003) and Marching Toward Hell: America and Islam after Iraq (2008).
Scheuer says that Islamics don’t hate Americans because of “our way of life”—with its—freedoms of speech and worship and its highly secular, commercialized culture.
Instead, Islamic hatred toward the United States stems from America’s six longstanding policies in the Middle East:
- U.S. support for apostate, corrupt, and tyrannical Muslim governments
- U.S. and other Western troops on the Arabian Peninsula
- U.S. support for Israel that keeps Palestinians in the Israelis’ thrall
- U.S. pressure on Arab energy producers to keep oil prices low
- U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan
- U.S. support for Russia, India, and China against their Muslim militants
Scheuer contends that no amount of American propaganda will win “the hearts and minds” of Islamics who can “see, hear, experience, and hate” these policies firsthand.
But there is another danger facing America, says Scheuer, one that threatens “the core of our social and civil institutions.”
And in Marching Toward Hell he bluntly indicts that threat: The “profound and willful ignorance” of America’s “bipartisan governing elite.”
Scheuer defines this elite as “the inbred set of individuals who have influenced…drafted and conducted U.S. foreign policy” since 1973.
Within that group are:
- politicians
- journalists
- academics
- preachers
- civil servants
- military officers
- philanthropists.
“Some are Republicans, others Democrats; some are evangelicals, others atheists; some are militarists, others pacifists; some are purveyors of Western civilization, others are multiculturalists,” writes Scheuer.
But for all their political and/or philosophical differences, the members of this governing elite share one belief in common.
According to Scheuer, that belief is “an unquenchable ardor to have the United States intervene in all places, situations and times.”
And he warns that this “bipartisan governing elite” must radically change its policies–such as unconditional support for Israel and corrupt, tyrannical Muslim governments.
Otherwise, Americans will be locked in an endless “hot war” with the Islamic world.
During his September 28, 2014 appearance on 60 Minutes, President Obama admitted that the mostly Sunni-Muslim Iraqi army had refused to combat the Sunni army of ISIS.
Then followed this exchange:
Steve Kroft: What happens if the Iraqis don’t fight or can’t fight?
President Obama: Well….
Steve Kroft: What’s the end game?
President Obama: I’m not going to speculate on failure at the moment. We’re just getting started. Let’s see how they do.
It was precisely such a mindset that led the United States, step by step, into the Vietnam quagmire.
As in the case of Vietnam, the United States lacks:
- Real or worthwhile allies in Iraq or Syria;
- A working knowledge of the peoples it wants to influence in either country;
- Clearly-defined goals that it seeks to accomplish in that region.
America rushed to disaster in Vietnam because its foreign policy elite felt it had to “do something” to fight Communism anywhere in the world.
In December, 2012, Kayla Mueller, an idealistic 24-year-old American woman, arrived in Syria to assist Syrians caught up in their own civil war. And on August 4, 2013, she had been kidnapped and held for ransom. In 2015, she had been killed—whether by her terrorist kidnappers or Jordanian airstrikes remains unclear.
On February 23, 2015, Carl Mueller appeared on the “Today” show, Carl Mueller to protest the refusal of the United States Government to pay ransom demands to terrorist kidnappers.
“How many mistakes have we all made in life that were naïve and didn’t get caught at? Kayla was just in a place that was more dangerous than most. And she couldn’t help herself. She had to go in there and had to help.”
But did she?
Kayla Mueller
There were thousands of communities within the United States desperate for the help of a caring social activist. And thousands of organizations—such as Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), Habitat for Humanity and Catholic Relief Services—that would have been thrilled to enlist her services.
And she could have made lives better without constantly facing the dangers of kidnapping by Islamics determined to humiliate and slaughter Americans.
Michael Sheuer is right: The United States should learn to mind its own business and quit intervening in the affairs of Middle Eastern governments and peoples.
Kayla Mueller is proof of the rightness of that assertion.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on April 2, 2020 at 12:05 am
As the United States braces for the loss of as many as 200,000 of its citizens, President Donald Trump continues to attack anything he dislikes as a “hoax”—and to attack anyone who dares pose legitimate questions to him.
On March 27, this exchange occurred between Trump and ABC News reporter Jonathan Karl.
Karl asked Trump what the President could do to assure “these states, these hospitals, that everybody who needs a ventilator will get a ventilator.”
TRUMP: “I think we’re in really good shape. This is a pandemic, the likes of which nobody’s seen before.”
KARL: “But everybody who needs one will be able to get a ventilator?”
TRUMP: “Look, don’t be a cutie pie, okay? Nobody’s done what we’ve been able to do.”
One week earlier, on March 20, Trump had blown up when NBC reporter Peter Alexander dared to pose a question about Coronavirus that the President didn’t want to answer.
After citing the latest pandemic statistics showing that thousands of Americans are now infected and millions are scared, Alexander asked, “What do you say to Americans who are scared?”
TRUMP: “I say that you’re a terrible reporter. That’s what I say. I think it’s a very nasty question, and I think it’s a very bad signal that you’re putting out to the American people. You’re doing sensationalism. And the same with NBC and Comcast [the parent company of NBC]. I don’t call it Comcast. I call it ‘Con-Cast. Let me just tell you something. That’s really bad reporting. And you ought to get back to reporting instead of sensationalism.”
Alexander said in a statement: “The bottom line is, this is a president whose experiences in life are very different than most Americans across this country right now. Not a person who likely worries about finances or had, not a person who in the course of his life is worried about his future.
“Not a person who is worried about where to find a paycheck for his bills or for his rent and as evidenced by the president suggesting that an opportunity to provide for American some reassurance about how they should feel right now, the president instead took it out on me.”
That’s why this is a good time to remember the closing remarks of Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) before the House of Representatives turned over its Articles of Impeachment against Trump to the United States Senate.
Schiff was addressing the unwillingness of Trump—and his defenders—to accept any evidence, no matter how damning, against him.
ADAM SCHIFF: “Anyone watching these proceedings, anyone reading the deposition transcripts would have the same impression that you evidently had from hearing my colleagues talk about the Russia hoax, that the whole idea that Russia had gotten involved in the 2016 election was a hoax put out by the Democrats.
“And of course, they’re not alone in pushing out this idea; it is trumpeted by no one other than the President of the United States who, almost on a daily basis at times, would comment and tweet and propagate the idea that Russia’s interference in our election was a hoax….
“The impression they would have you take from ‘It’s all hearsay’ is, because we in this committee were not in that Ward Room with you, Dr. Hill, we were not in that meeting earlier with Dr. Bolton, that because we’re not in the room, it’s all hearsay.
Adam Schiff
“After all, you’re relating what you heard, and you’re saying it, so it must be hearsay, and therefore, we don’t really have to think about it, do we? We don’t have to consider that you have direct evidence that this meeting in the White House was being withheld because the president wanted these meetings, these investigations. We can’t accept that.
“Well, if that were true, you could never present any evidence in court unless the jury was also in the Ward Room. That’s absurd. They don’t accept the documentary evidence, all the text messages about quid pro quos, and ‘Are we really saying,’ and ‘That’s crazy,’ and ‘My worst nightmare is the Russians will get it, and I’ll quit.’
“…But apparently, it’s all hearsay. Even when you actually hear the president, Mr. Holmes, that’s hearsay. We can’t rely on people saying what the president said. Apparently, we can only rely on what the president says, and there, we shouldn’t even rely on that either.
“We shouldn’t really rely on what the president said in the call record. We should imagine he said something else. We should imagine he said something about actually fighting corruption, instead of what he actually said, which was, “’I want you to do us a favor, though. I want you to look into this 2016 CrowdStrike conspiracy theory, and I want you to look into the Bidens.’”
For those who want to understand Trump’s behavior—and to predict how he will react the next time he’s faced with truths he doesn’t want to acknowledge—the key lies in seeing how he had reacted to bad tidings in the past.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on April 1, 2020 at 12:21 am
On June 22, 1941, German Fuhrer Adolf Hitler sent three million soldiers smashing into the Soviet Union. During the first six months—June to December, 1941—German armies lured huge Soviet forces into gigantic “cauldron battles,” surrounding and exterminating them.
An estimated 5.7 million prisoners of war (POWs) fell into German hands. The Germans found themselves surprised and overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of them. But their mandate demanded that they keep marching forward—ever forward.
So they simply imprisoned their captives behind barbed wire and wasted no food or medical care on them. Between starvation, illness and the brutal Russian cold, at least 3.5 million POWs died in custody.
Soviet POW’s
Republicans have learned a serious lesson from this. If you simply deprive those you detest of food, clothing and shelter, you don’t need gas chambers or firing squads.
That has been their chief reason for opposing Social Security since President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it into law in 1935.
That is why they opposed President Lyndon B. Johnson when he pushed Medicare through Congress in 1965.
And that is why they have fervently tried to overturn the Affordable Care Act—better known as Obamacare—since it went into effect in 2010.
Of course, Republicans will never admit this. Their mantra has always been they fear such programs will bankrupt the country.
That claim might have credibility—if they didn’t recklessly plunge into budget-busting wars like the 2003 Iraq war started by President George W. Bush. Not a single Republican opposed this needless, bloody conflict—which has cost the United States more than $1.1 trillion.
But the best evidence of Republicans’ desire to use illness as a weapon against those Americans they hate comes from President Donald J. Trump.
Donald Trump
On March 26, during an interview on Fox News, Trump blamed the failures of his administration’s response to Coronavirus on Democratic state governors like Andrew Cuomo (NY), Jay Inslee (WA), and Gretchen Whitmer (MI).
On March 27, during his press briefing, Trump said he told Vice President Mike Pence—who’s officially in charge of the White House’s response effort—to not call Inslee and Whitmer because they weren’t “appreciative” enough of his efforts.
Trump said this even as hospitals in each of their states were being overwhelmed with Coronavirus patients.
“I tell him—I mean I’m a different type of person— I say, ‘Mike, don’t call the governor in Washington, you’re wasting your time with him. Don’t call the woman in Michigan,’” Trump said. “If they don’t treat you right, I don’t call.”
Trump said that when people criticized him, they were criticizing the federal government: “When they’re not appreciative to me, they’re not appreciative to the Army Corps, they’re not appreciative to FEMA. It’s not right.”
Trump also attacked Whitmer on Right-wing Fox News’ “Sean Hannity Show”: “I don’t know if she knows what’s going on, but all she does is sit there and blame the federal government.”
That same day—March 27—Whitmer told a Michigan radio station: “What I’ve gotten back is that vendors with whom we’ve procured contracts—they’re being told not to send stuff to Michigan. It’s really concerning. I reached out to the White House last night and asked for a phone call with the president, ironically at the time this stuff was going on.”
Gretchen Whitmer
Julia Pickett / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)
A March 29 story in the Washington Monthly sheds light on what lay behind Whitmer’s inability to secure desperately-needed ventilators from her longtime vendors. Its headline ran: “What If Trump Decides to Save Republicans But Not Democrats?”
And it was followed by a sub-headline: “He’s providing vital resources to red states and ignoring blue states.”
Florida submitted a request to the Federal Emergency Management Agency on March 11 for 430,000 surgical masks, 180,000 N95 respirators, 82,000 face shields and 238,000 gloves—and received a shipment with everything three days later.
It received an identical shipment on March 23, and is awaiting a third.
In 2019, Trump demanded a “favor” from the embattled Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky—“dirt” on Democratic Presidential candidate Joe Biden—in return for releasing military aid Ukraine needed to combat an increasingly aggressive Russia.
Now he is apparently demanding Democratic governors praise him and blame themselves if they want their citizens to receive desperately-needed medical supplies.
On Fox News, Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, bluntly told governors: “Take the blame when you have to. When you play with your boss, sometimes it’s better when you don’t win the golf game. He’s the boss, he’s got all the resources.”
This is precisely the dictatorial arrogance of which Republicans falsely accused President Barack Obama.
The Washington Monthly story concludes on an ominous note: “What if the White House simply gives all the masks and ventilators to red states and counties, leaving blue ones to struggle? What mechanisms of accountability are left?
“U.S. democracy wasn’t set up to deal with a president openly behaving like a James Bond villain while being protected by a political party behaving more like a mafia than a civic institution.”
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on March 31, 2020 at 12:09 am
“Capitalism Kills” could have been a headline in Pravda, the official “newspaper” of the former Soviet Union.
Instead, it’s billionaires themselves who are responsible for such a sentiment. They are doing their level best to persuade workers: “I regret that I have only one life to give for my CEO.”
Richard Kovacevich is the former CEO of Norwest Bank (1966 – 1998) and Wells Fargo (1998 – 2007). He wants healthy people under age 55 to return to work in late April if the outbreak is contained enough.
There are two major problems with this:
- There aren’t enough test kits to screen everyone for possible signs of the Coronavirus.
- Many of those who carry the virus show no signs of infection.
“We’ll gradually bring those people back and see what happens. Some of them will get sick, some may even die. I don’t know,” said Kovacevich.
He might just as well have added: “I don’t care.”
“Do you want to suffer more economically or take some risk that you’ll get flu-like symptoms and a flu-like experience? Do you want to take an economic risk or a health risk? You get to choose.”
If President Donald Trump gets to choose, the nationwide social distancing practices that health professionals say are essential to saving lives during the Coronavirus outbreak will end on April 30.
He originally chose Easter as a pretext for doing this: “You’ll have packed churches all over our country. I think it would be a beautiful time.”
The real reason: He wants to return to return to holding his mass public rallies—which some have compared to the Nuremberg rallies hosted by Adolf Hitler. There he can spew hatred at everyone he dislikes and bask in the worshipful glow of his fanatical base.
Fortunately, the rising tide of COVID-19 cases forced him to abandon his original April 12 date.
And many highly-paid executives in American corporations are itching to put their employees back at work—and on the Coronavirus firing line.
“The damages of keeping the economy closed as it is could be worse than losing a few more people,” Tom Golisano, the founder and chairman of the payroll processor Paychex Inc. told Bloomberg. “I have a very large concern that if businesses keep going along the way they’re going then so many of them will have to fold.”
Forbes estimates Golisano’s net worth to be $3 billion.
Like Richard Kovacevich, he wants states that haven’t been hit hard by the virus to return to normalcy.
Tom Golisano
Penale52 / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)
Lloyd Blankfein, the former head of Goldman Sachs, wrote on Twitter: “Crushing the economy, jobs and morale is also a health issue—and beyond. Within a very few weeks let those with a lower risk to the disease return to work.”
There’s no question that keeping businesses closed across the country—as scientists and health professionals are urging—will inflict large-scale economic damage.
But rushing people back to work would prolong the outbreak and overwhelm the healthcare system. And it would certainly increase—perhaps exponentially—the number of dead and infected casualties of the pandemic. Economists from Northwestern University calculated that keeping social distancing practices in place until cases decline could save 600,000 lives nationwide.
Meanwhile, Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, warns that the United States could experience 100,000 deaths and millions of viral infections from the Coronavirus pandemic.
Ignoring these facts is Right-wing TV and radio host Glenn Beck, who, according to Forbes, was worth $90 million in 2014.
“I would rather have my children stay home and all of us who are over 50 go in and keep this economy going and working. Even if we all get sick, I’d rather die than kill the country,” Beck, 56, said on his show “The Blaze.”
Of course, Beck works alone in his own studio—and is thus highly unlikely to come in contact with an infected carrier.
Glenn Beck
George Skidmore photo
Like Beck, millionaires and billionaires can afford to socially distance themselves from others and still accumulate huge piles of wealth.
“I think what we are doing with the shutdown is good but in a few weeks people will need to be around people,” said billionaire Tilman Fertitta, owner of a casino, hotel and restaurant empire.
He certainly needs “people to be around people.” His businesses depend heavily on huge numbers of customers willing to spend money.
And, in this case, to risk their lives doing so.
Adds Fertotta: “Otherwise you are going to go into an economic crisis that is going to take us years to dig ourselves out of.”
Fertitta’s income is estimated at $4.4 billion, according to Forbes.
For men like Richard Kovacevich, Tom Golisano, Lloyd Blankfein, Glenn Beck and Tilman Fertitta,, the words of President Franklin D. Roosevelt have no meaning: “The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have little.”
For Republicans and their wealthy benefactors, “pro-life” means strictly anti-abortion. Any other form of life—the elderly, the ill, victims of pollution, those slaughtered with military-style weaponry used by criminals—are totally expendable.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on September 27, 2019 at 12:08 am
On August 30, 2017, an article in Salon examined why Donald Trump’s base supports him so fanatically: “Most Americans Strongly Dislike Trump, But the Angry Minority That Adores Him Controls Our Politics.”
It described these voters as representing about one-third of the Republican party:
“These are older and more conservative white people, for the most part, who believe he should not listen to other Republicans and should follow his own instincts….
“They like Trump’s coarse personality, and approve of the fact that he treats women like his personal playthings. They enjoy it when he expresses sympathy for neo-Nazis and neo-Confederate white supremacists.
“They cheer when he declares his love for torture, tells the police to rough up suspects and vows to mandate the death penalty for certain crimes. (Which of course the president cannot do.)
“…This cohort of the Republican party didn’t vote for Trump because of his supposed policies on trade or his threat to withdraw from NATO. They voted for him because he said out loud what they were thinking. A petty, sophomoric, crude bully is apparently what they want as a leader.”
Supporters giving the Nazi “Sieg Heil” salute to Trump
According to an August 29, 2017 survey by the Pew Research Center, they only comprise 16% of the population. That leaves 65% of Republicans who are revolted by Trump’s personality and behavior. But they are being advised by GOP political consultants to vigorously support him.
“Your heart tells you that he’s bad for the country,” one anonymous consultant told the Salon reporter. “Your head looks at polling data among Republican primary voters and sees how popular he is.”
It’s precisely these hard-core Fascists who come out in mid-term elections—and they’re scaring the remaining 65% who make up the GOP establishment.
Donald Trump
That’s one reason why the vast majority of Republicans continue to fanatically support Trump: They fear he will turn his hate-filled base on them.
But there’s a second reason why Republicans back Trump. And it has a historical basis.
While the Nazi Party ruled Germany from 1933 to 1945, its influence over all aspects of Germans’ lives was suffocating.
“Censorship prevailed, education was undermined, family life was idealized, but children were encouraged to turn in disloyal parents,” reads the back cover of Richard Grunberger’s classic 1971 book, The 12-Year Reich.
“‘Volk’ festivals, party rallies, awards, uniforms, pageantry all played a part in the massive effort to shape the mind of a nation.”
And yet, after the Reich surrendered unconditionally to the Allies on May 8, 1945, a strange thing happened: Virtually no German admitted to having been a Nazi—or having even known one.
In short: Adolf Hitler had lost the war he started—making him a loser nobody wanted to be identified with.
In the decades since, the “loser” tag has continued to stick with those who once served the Third Reich. Mel Brooks has repeatedly turned German soldiers—once the pride of the battlefield—into idiotic comic foils.
Even the fearsome Gestapo was spoofed for laughs on the long-running TV comedy, “Hogan’s Heroes.”
“Hogan’s Heroes”
“Americans love a winner,” George C. Scott as George S. Patton says at the outset of the classic 1970 movie. “And will not tolerate a loser.”
And that is why Republicans have stuck so closely with President Donald J. Trump.
Republicans don’t fear that Trump will destroy the institutions that Americans have long cherished—such as:
- An independent judiciary
- A free press
- An incorruptible Justice Department
- Intelligence agencies (such as the FBI and CIA) charged with protecting the country against subversion.
Trump has furiously attacked all of these—and Republicans have either said nothing or rushed to his defense.
- Republicans don’t care that he has all but destroyed decades of solid relations between the United States and longtime allies, such as Canada and Great Britain.
- Republicans don’t care that he will sell out the Nation to Russian president Vladimir Putin—whom he has never criticized and has defended against the FBI and CIA.
- Republicans don’t even care that he tried to pressure the president of Ukraine to slander former Vice President Joe Biden, his rival in the upcoming 2020 election—and then tried to cover it up.
What Republicans fear is that if Democrats can impeach Trump, they will lose their own hold on nearly absolute power in Congress and the White House.
If Trump is impeached and possibly indicted, he will become a man no one any longer fears. He will be a figure held up to ridicule and condemnation.
Like Adolf Hitler. Like Richard M. Nixon.
And his Congressional supporters will be branded as losers along with him.
Republicans vividly remember what happened after Nixon was forced to resign in disgrace on August 9, 1974: Democrats, riding a wave of reform fever, swept Republicans out of the House and Senate—and Jimmy Carter into the White House.
If Republicans are conflicted about supporting Trump, their dilemma boils down to this:
- Can I hold onto my power—and all the privileges that go with it—by supporting Trump? Or:
- Can I hold onto my power—and privileges—by deserting him?
This is how Republicans define morality today.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Politics, Social commentary on August 12, 2019 at 12:06 am
On September 30, 2015, during an appearance on Fox News Network, Kevin McCarthy proved that your best friends can sometimes be your worst enemies.
McCarthy, the Republican member of the House of Representatives from Bakersfield, California, was feeling relaxed. He was, after all, not being grilled by such “enemies” of the Right as The New York Times or MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow.
Instead, he was being interviewed by Sean Hannity—a Right-wing political commentator and the author of such books as Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama’s Radical Agenda and Deliver Us From Evil: Defeating Terrorism, Despotism, and Liberalism.
Sean Hannity
John Boehner had recently announced he would resign as Republican Speaker of the House and leave Congress in November. So Hannity asked: What would happen when the next Republican Speaker took office?
And McCarthy—who was in the running for the position—replied: “What you’re going to see is a conservative Speaker, that takes a conservative Congress, that puts a strategy to fight and win.
“And let me give you one example. Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right?
Kevin McCarthy
“But we put together a Benghazi special committee. A select committee. What are her [poll] numbers today? Her numbers are dropping. Why? Because she’s untrustable. But no one would have known that any of that had happened had we not fought to make that happen.”
In 51 words, McCarthy revealed that:
- The House Select Committee on Benghazi was not a legitimate investigative body.
- Its purpose was not to investigate the 2012 deaths of four American diplomats during a terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya.
- Its real purpose was to destroy the Presidential candidacy of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
- To accomplish this, its members spent 17 months and wasted more than $4.5 million of American taxpayers’ funds.
But now McCarthy is singing a different tune.
On August 5, Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-TX) tweeted out a list of 44 San Antonio donors to President Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign for re-election: “Sad to see so many San Antonians as of 2019 maximum donors to Donald Trump. Their contributions are fueling a campaign of hate that labels Hispanic immigrants as ‘invaders.’”
Joaquin Castro
On the morning of August 3, 2019, a lone gunman had killed 22 people and injured 24 others in El Paso, Texas. The killer—Patrick Wood Crusius—reportedly targeted Latinos.
Just 27 minutes before the massacre, Crusius had posted an online manifesto warning about a “Hispanic invasion.” Its language was similar to that used by President Trump.
It was the third-deadliest mass shooting in Texas history and the seventh deadliest in modern United States history.
According to ABC News, when police arrested Crusius, he said that he wanted to shoot as many Mexicans as possible.
That was when Rep. Joaquin Castro—whose brother, Julián, is running for President—decided to fight fire with fire.
He decided to “out” 44 San Antonio donors who had contributed the maximum amount under federal law to Trump in 2019.
Trump has aggressively tried to shame his critics. Castro obviously sought to do the same with Trump’s supporters.
Predictably, Republicans were outraged. They claimed it spotlighted Trump donors and potentially endangered them by publicizing their names and professions.
One of these critics was House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who blamed the shooting on video games.
“Targeting and harassing Americans because of their political beliefs is shameful and dangerous.” tweeted McCarthy. “What happened to ‘When they go low, we go high?’ Or does that no longer matter when your brother is polling at 1%? Americans deserve better.”
But Castro refused to back down. He pointed out that his information came from publicly-available records at the Federal Election Commission.
“No one was targeted or harassed in my post. You know that,” Castro tweeted to McCarthy. “All that info is routinely published.”
“What happened to ‘When they go low, we go high?’” must rank among the all-time statements of political hypocrisy. McCarthy was the man who unintentionally admitted the real purpose of the “Benghazi Committee.”
And from the late 1940s to the mid-1950s, Republicans unhesitatingly hauled prominent and ordinary citizens before House and Senate subcommittees. The purpose: To force them to confess to past membership in the Communist Party or inform on those they knew to have been or be members.
And as a Presidential candidate and President, Trump has repeatedly used Twitter to personally attack hundreds of Americans—especially blacks, Hispanics, women and members of the media.
Perhaps Castro remembered what happened the last time Democrats—in the words of Michelle Obama—waged a “when they go low, we go high” campaign.
Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton proved no match for
- Russian Internet trolls and
- The hacking of state election offices and American voting machine makers by Russian military Intelligence.
And since Trump took office in 2017, he and his Republican Congressional allies have fiercely resisted all Democratic efforts to tighten election security.
Many Democrats still refuse to “get into the gutter” with Trump by using his own tactics against him.
But some—like Joaquin Castro—have clearly decided that when your opponent is aiming below the belt, you only lose by sticking to Marquis of Queensberry.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on August 5, 2019 at 1:00 am
On February 14, 2018, 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz slaughtered two faculty members and 15 students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
His weapon of choice: An AR-15 assault rifle, often favored by gun massacre killers.
Eight days later, on February 22, Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the National Rifle Association, attacked those he held responsible for the series of massacres plaguing American schools.
And it wasn’t crazed gunmen armed with automatic weapons designed for military use.
Wayne LaPierre
With funerals still being planned for some of the victims, LaPierre blamed “the elites,” “saboteurs” and “new European-style socialists” for this and other gun massacres.
He did so at the Conservative Political Action Conference (C-PAC) in National Harbor, Maryland.
“They hate the NRA, they hate the Second Amendment. They hate individual freedom. In the rush of calls for more government, they have also revealed…their true selves.
“The elites do not care about America’s schoolchildren. If they truly cared, they would protect them. For them, it is not a safety issue. It is a political issue.
“Their goal is to eliminate the Second Amendment and our firearms freedoms, so they can eradicate all individual freedoms.”
His C-PAC congregation gave him a wild ovation.
And he accused the Democratic party of being “infested with saboteurs who do not believe in capitalism, do not believe in the Constitution, do not believe in our freedom, and do not believe in America as we know it.”
These “saboteurs” were “new European-style socialists.”
Which was ironic: In 2016, the NRA spent $30 million to elect Donald Trump—who fiercely defends Russian Communist dictator Vladimir Putin against the FBI, NSA and CIA.
He then outlined his solution for protecting America’s schoolchildren: Turning schools into virtual concentration camps patrolled by heavily-armed security guards.
The highlight of LaPierre’s speech came at its close: “And there is no greater personal, individual freedom than the right to keep and bear arms, the right to protect yourself, and the right to survive.
“It is not bestowed by man, but granted by God to all Americans as our American birthright.”
Anyone who’s seen the 1970 sci-fi movie, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, remembers the final scene: Where seemingly normal underground dwellers strip off their human face masks and reveal themselves to be radiation-scarred mutants.
They wear white robes, and stand silently during a sermon or shout “Amen!” in what is clearly a dark parody of a religious service. It’s immediately clear what they are worshiping: An atomic bomb standing upright.
And they pay tribute to the engine of obliteration that has destroyed human civilization and brought about a world ruled by apes.
Their leader, Mendez, chants:
“Glory be to the Bomb, and to the Holy Fallout. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be. World without end. Amen.
“His sound has gone out to all lands, and his light unto the end of the world.
“Almighty and everlasting Bomb, who came down among us to make Heaven under Earth. Lighten our darkness. O instrument of God—grant us thy peace!”
Reading Wayne LaPierre’s eulogy to the Gun and his passionate invoking of God, it’s easy to re-imagine his giving a slightly altered version of the sermon offered in Beneath the Planet of the Apes. It’s also easy to imagine this taking place during an NRA convention.
WAYNE LAPIERRE: The heavens declare the Glory of the Gun. And the body-count showeth His handiwork.
NRA CONGREGATION: His sound is gone out to all lands; and his Light unto the end of the world.
WAYNE LAPIEREE: He descendeth from the outermost part of Heaven; and there is nothing hid from the lead thereof. There is neither speech nor language after His voice is heard among them.
NRA CONGREGATION: Praise Him! Praise Him! My Strength and my Redeemer!
WAYNE LAPIERRE: Glory be to the Gun, and to the Holy Bodycount! As it was in the Beginning, is now and ever shall be, massacres without end. Amen!
NRA CHORUS: Amen! Amen! Amen! Amen!
WAYNE LAPIERRE: Almighty and Everlasting Gun, who came down among us to make Heaven unto Earth. Lighten our darkness with your muzzle flashes. O instrument of God, grant us They peace.
NRA CHOIR: Almighty Gun, who destroyed all men—to create corpses! Behold His glory!
WAYNE LAPIERRE: Behold that Truth that abides in us. To reveal that Truth unto that Maker.
WAYNE LAPIERRE AND NRA CONGREGATION: I reveal my inmost self unto my God.
NRA CHORUS (singing): Unto my God!
NRA CONGREGATION (singing):
All guns bright and beautiful. All creatures dead with lead.
The good Gun makes us what we are!
He takes out eyes to see with, and lips that might yet speak. How great the Gun Almighty, who has made all things dead. Amen!
WAYNE LAPIERRE: May the Blessing of the Gun Almighty and the fellowship of the Holy Bodycount descend on us all, this night and forevermore!
* * * * * *
On December 14, 2012, a psychotic gunman using military firepower slaughtered 20 first-graders and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Since then, at least 2,189 mass shootings have erupted nationwide, with at least 2,475 killed and 9,137 wounded.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on October 12, 2018 at 1:06 am
Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern political science, wrote that there are three periods of danger in a conspiracy:
- Dangers in organizing the plot
- Dangers in executing the conspiracy
- Dangers following the execution of the plot.
The first two were covered in Part Two of this series. Now, as to the third:
Dangers following the Execution of the Conspiracy: There is really but one—someone is left who will avenge the murdered prince. These can be brothers, sons or other relatives, who have been spared by negligence or for other reasons.
But of all the perils that follow the execution of a conspiracy, the most certain and fearful is the attachment of the people to the murdered prince. There is no remedy against this, for the conspirators can never secure themselves against a whole people.
An example of this occurred in the case of Julius Caesar, who, being beloved by the people, was avenged by them.
Julius Caesar
Machiavelli closes his chapter “Of Conspiracies” with advice to rulers on how they should act when they find a conspiracy has been formed against them.
If they discover that a conspiracy exists against them, they must, before punishing its authors, strive to learn its nature and extent. And they must measure the danger posed by the conspirators against their own strength.
And if they find it powerful and alarming, they must not expose it until they have amassed sufficient force to crush it. Otherwise, they will only speed their own destruction. They should try to pretend ignorance of it. If the conspirators find themselves discovered, they will be forced by necessity to act without consideration.
Niccolo Machiavelli
The foregoing was taken from Book Three, Chapter Six, of Machiavelli’s masterwork, The Discourses on Livy, which was published posthumously in 1531. But elsewhere in this volume, he notes how important it is for rulers to make themselves loved—or at least respected—by their fellow citizens:
Note how much more praise those Emperors merited who, after Rome became an empire, conformed to her laws like good princes, than those who took the opposite course.
Titus, Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus and Marcus Auelius did not require the Praetorians nor the multitudinous legions to defend them, because they were protected by their own good conduct, the good will of the people, and by the love of the Senate.
On the other hand, neither the Eastern nor the Western armies saved Caligula, Nero, Vitellius and so many other wicked Emperors from the enemies which their bad conduct and evil lives had raised up against them.
In his better-known work, The Prince, he warns rulers who—like Donald Trump–are inclined to rule by fear:
A prince should make himself feared in such a way that if he does not gain love, he at any rate avoids hatred: for fear and the absence of hatred may well go together.
Donald Trump
* * * * *
If Trump is aware of Machiavelli’s warnings, he has shown no signs of it.
Most Presidents have sought to make themselves seem friendly and caring toward their fellow Americans.
This held true even for Richard M. Nixon, when he made an impromptu visit to the Lincoln Memorial and engaged in a rambling dialogue with Vietnam war protesters.
The encounter happened around 4 a.m. on May 9, 1970, shortly after the invasion of Cambodia. Nationwide outrage had exploded on college campuses, climaxing in the killing of four students at Kent State University on May 4.
So young Vietnam antiwar protesters who had descended on Washington, D.C. were startled when Nixon suddenly appeared in their midst.
Even more startling: He had come with only a small number of Secret Service agents and his devoted White House valet, Manolo Sanchez.
Nixon, in his awkward way of trying to establish rapport, asked some of the students where they were from. When they said they attended Syracuse University, Nixon replied that it had a great football team.
But Nixon and the protesters were separated by too many differences–in their views on sexuality, civil rights, dissent and war—to find common cause.
Still, Nixon at least made an effort to understand and reach an accommodation with his critics.
Since taking office on January 20, Donald Trump has made none.
Instead, he has:
- Held a series of “victory rallies” with his Right-wing followers—which comedian Bill Mahrer calls “hillbilly Nurembergs.”
- Attacked the integrity of Federal judges who struck down his travel ban on Muslims.
- Called the nation’s most prestigious news media “the enemy of the American people.”
- Slandered truthful stories about his staffers’ ties to Russian Intelligence agents as “fake news.”
- Falsely accused his predecessor, President Barack Obama, of wiretapping him.
These and other infamous actions have led to only 45% of Americans approving of his performance—while 52% disapprove.
By Machiavelli’s standards, Trump has made himself the perfect target for a conspiracy: “When a prince becomes universally hated, it is likely that he’s harmed some individuals—who thus seek revenge. This desire is increased by seeing that the prince is widely loathed.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on October 11, 2018 at 12:19 am
More than 500 years ago, Niccolo Machiavelli, the Florentine statesman, authored The Discourses on Livy, a work of political history and philosophy. In it, he outlined how citizens of a republic can maintain their freedoms.
One of the longest chapters—Book Three, Chapter Six—covers “Of Conspiracies.” In it, those who wish to conspire against a ruler will find highly useful advice.
And so will those who wish to foil such a conspiracy.
Niccolo Machiavelli
Writes Machiavelli:
For conspirators, there are three ways their efforts can be foiled:
- Discovery through denunciation;
- Discovery through incautiousness;
- Discovery through writings.
Discovery through Denunciation: This occurs through treachery or lack of prudence among one or more conspirators.
Treachery is so common that you can safely tell your plans to only your most trusted friends who are willing to risk their lives for your sake. You may find that you have only one or two of these.
But as you are bring more people into the conspiracy, the chances of discovery greatly increase. It’s impossible to find many who can be completely trusted: For their devotion to you must be greater than their sense of danger and fear of punishment.
Discovery through Carelessness: This happens when one of the conspirators speaks incautiously, so that a third person overhears it Or it may occur from thoughtlessness, when a conspirator tells the secret to his wife or child, or to some other indiscreet person.
When a conspiracy has more than three or four members, its discovery is almost certain, either through treason, imprudence or carelessness.
If more than one conspirator is arrested, the whole plot is discovered, for it will be impossible for any two to agree perfectly as to all their statements.
If only one is arrested, he may—through courage and stubbornness—be able to conceal the names of his accomplices. But then the others, to remain safe, must not panic and flee, since this is certain to be discovered.
If one of them becomes fearful—whether it’s the one who was arrested or is still at liberty—discovery of the conspiracy is certain.
The best way to avoid such detection is to confide your project to your intended fellow conspirators at the moment of execution—and not sooner.
A classic example of this occurred in ancient Persia: A group of nobles assembled to discuss overthrowing a usurper to the throne. The last one to arrive was Darius.
When one of the conspirators asked, “When should we strike?” Darius replied: “We must either go now at this very moment and carry it into execution, or I shall go and denounce you all. For I will not give any of you time to denounce me.”
At that, they went directly to the palace, assassinated the usurper and proclaimed Darius their new king.
Discovery through Writings: You may talk freely with anyone man about everything, for unless you have committed yourself in writing, the “Yes” of one man is worth as much as the “No” of another.
Thus, you should guard most carefully against writing, as against a dangerous rock, for nothing will convict you quicker than your own handwriting.
You may escape, then, from the accusation of a single individual, unless you are convicted by some writing or other pledge, which you should be careful never to give.
If you are denounced, there are means of escaping punishment:
- By denying the accusation and claiming that the person making it hates you; or
- Claiming that your accuser was tortured or coerced into giving false testimony against you.
But the most prudent course is to not tell your intentions to anyone, and to carry out the attempt yourself.
Even if you’re not discovered before you carry out your attack, there are still two dangers facing a conspirator:
Dangers in Execution: These result from:
- An unexpected change in the routine of the intended target;
- The lack of courage among the conspirators; or
- An error on their part, such as leaving some of those alive whom the conspirators intended to kill.
Adolf Hitler, who claimed to have a sixth-sense for danger, was famous for changing his routine at the last minute.
Adolf Hitler
On November 9, 1939, this instinct saved his life. He had been scheduled to give a long speech at a Munich beer hall before the “Old Fighters” of his storm troopers.
But that evening he cut short his speech and left the beer hall. Forty-five minutes later, a bomb exploded inside a pillar—before which Hitler had been speaking.
Conspirators can also be doomed by their good intentions.
In 44 B.C., Gaius Cassius, Marcus Brutus and other Roman senators decided to assassinate Julius Caesar, whose dictatorial ambitions they feared.
Cassius also intended to murder Mark Anthony, Caesar’s strongest ally. But Brutus objected, fearing the plotters would look like butchers, not saviors. Even worse, he allowed Anthony to deliver a eulogy at Caesar’s funeral.
This proved so inflammatory that the mourners rioted, driving the conspirators out of Rome. Soon afterward, they were defeated in a battle with the legions of Anthony and Octavian Caesar—and forced to commit suicide to avoid capture and execution.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on October 10, 2018 at 12:01 am
In the 1973 movie, The Day of the Jackal, a methodical assassin devises an ingenious plan to kill French President Charles de Gaulle.
Despite the best efforts of French security forces to entrap him, he eludes them time and again—and comes within an ace of assassinating de Gaulle.
The Day of the Jackal is fiction, based on a 1971 novel by Frederick Forsythe. In real life, most would-be political assassins lack the skills and sophistication of Forsythe’s anti-hero.
Take the case of the man who, on March 18, 2017, jumped over a bicycle rack outside the security perimeter of the White House. Within two minutes, agents of the U.S. Secret Service had tackled and arrested him.
Then, hours later, a motorist drove up to a White House checkpoint and claimed to have a bomb. Secret Service agents immediately arrested him and seized the stolen 2017 Chevrolet Impala. After a careful search, no explosives were found.
Both men will face criminal prosecution—and probably years in prison.
Even if they had been armed, President Donald J. Trump would not have faced any danger.
For the fifth time since taking office on January 20, he was in Florida, vacationing at his Mar-a-Lago resort.
That does not mean, of course, that future assassins will prove so inept.
More than 500 years ago, Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern political science, offered sound advice for would-be conspirators—and for rulers seeking to thwart conspiracies.
Niccolo Machiavellil
Niccolo Machiavelli: When a prince becomes universally hated, it is likely that he’s harmed some individuals—who thus seek revenge. This desire is increased by seeing the prince is widely loathed.
A prince, then, should avoid incurring such universal hatred….
By doing this, he protects himself from such vengeance-seekers. There are two reasons for this:
(1) Men rarely risk danger to avenge a wrong; and
(2) Even if they want to avenge a wrong, they know they will face almost universal condemnation because the prince is held in such high esteem.
So much for Machiavelli.
Now consider some of the tweets of “White House Staffer,” a self-proclaimed member of the Trump administration who claims 160,000 Twitter followers.
Since January 27, 2017, he has blasted a series of short, information-crammed tweets about daily life in the Executive Mansion.
[NOTE: Although I can’t confirm the legitimacy of his status or his tweets, I believe they are real. They contain too many small, intimate secrets of life in a paranoia-laced White House to not be genuine.]
March 1, 2017: Well the good times didn’t last long here. POTUS is back to flipping out on us.
March 13: POTUS [President of the United States] is thinking about suspending daily press briefings until the media “learn to be nice.” [Steve] Bannon [a top Trump adviser] is pushing for it.
March 16: Sean Hannity was asked to be Press Secretary last week. He turned it down because he didn’t want to take the pay cut. [Sean] Spicer survives.
Donald Trump
Niccolo Machiavelli: He who is threatened, and decides to avenge himself on the prince, becomes a truly dangerous man.
Anger is most likely aroused by injury to a a man’s property or honor. A prince should carefully avoid injuring either, for such a victim will always desire vengeance.
White House Staffer – February 25, 2017: The President keeps saying we’re a finely tuned machine. If that’s true why has he been fricking screaming at us all week? He’s losing it.
February 27: [Steve] Bannon is the scariest person here. He’s broken so much White House stuff by throwing it in anger. Plates, phones, chairs, etc.
February 27: It’s one thing to swear but [Steve] Bannon does it in front of the women here. C**t this, c**t that. He can’t finish a sentence without it.
Machiavelli draws a distinction between plots and conspiracies. A plot may be formed by a single individual or by many. The first isn’t a conspiracy, since that would involve at least two participants.
A single plotter avoids the danger faced by two or more conspirators: Since no one knows his intention, he can’t be betrayed by an accomplice.
Anyone may form a plot, whether he is prominent or insignificant, because everyone is at some time allowed to speak to the prince. And he can use this opportunity to satisfy his desire for revenge.
On the other hand, says Machiavelli, the dangers of assassination by a trusted intimate are slight: Few people dare to assault a prince. Of those who do, few or none escapes being killed in the attempt, or immediately afterward. As a result, only a small number of people are willing to incur such certain death.
Those who take part in a conspiracy against a ruler are “the great men of the state, or those on terms of familiar intercourse with the prince.”
These are men who have access to him. Julius Caesar, for example, was stabbed to death by members of the Roman Senate, who feared his assuming dictatorial powers.
And Adolf Hitler was conspired against by colonels and generals of the German Army. He was in fact holding a war conference when a briefcase bomb exploded, killing three officers and a stenographer, but leaving Hitler only slightly injured.
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AMERICA NEEDS TO MIND ITS OWN BUSINESS
In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on April 3, 2020 at 12:05 am“When trouble comes up anywhere in the world, they don’t call Beijing. They don’t call Moscow. They call us.”
So spoke President Barack Obama on the September 28, 2014 edition of 60 Minutes.
And, according to former CIA agent Michael Scheuer, that’s the problem: America can’t learn to mind its own business.
Scheuer is a 20-year CIA veteran—as well as an author, historian, foreign policy critic and political analyst.
Michael Scheuer
From 1996 to 1999 he headed Alec Station, the CIA’s unit assigned to track Osama bin Laden at the agency’s Counterterrorism Center.
He has served as an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s Center for Peace and Security Studies.
He is best-known as the author of two seminal works on America’s fight against terrorism: Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror (2003) and Marching Toward Hell: America and Islam after Iraq (2008).
Scheuer says that Islamics don’t hate Americans because of “our way of life”—with its—freedoms of speech and worship and its highly secular, commercialized culture.
Instead, Islamic hatred toward the United States stems from America’s six longstanding policies in the Middle East:
Scheuer contends that no amount of American propaganda will win “the hearts and minds” of Islamics who can “see, hear, experience, and hate” these policies firsthand.
But there is another danger facing America, says Scheuer, one that threatens “the core of our social and civil institutions.”
And in Marching Toward Hell he bluntly indicts that threat: The “profound and willful ignorance” of America’s “bipartisan governing elite.”
Scheuer defines this elite as “the inbred set of individuals who have influenced…drafted and conducted U.S. foreign policy” since 1973.
Within that group are:
“Some are Republicans, others Democrats; some are evangelicals, others atheists; some are militarists, others pacifists; some are purveyors of Western civilization, others are multiculturalists,” writes Scheuer.
But for all their political and/or philosophical differences, the members of this governing elite share one belief in common.
According to Scheuer, that belief is “an unquenchable ardor to have the United States intervene in all places, situations and times.”
And he warns that this “bipartisan governing elite” must radically change its policies–such as unconditional support for Israel and corrupt, tyrannical Muslim governments.
Otherwise, Americans will be locked in an endless “hot war” with the Islamic world.
During his September 28, 2014 appearance on 60 Minutes, President Obama admitted that the mostly Sunni-Muslim Iraqi army had refused to combat the Sunni army of ISIS.
Then followed this exchange:
Steve Kroft: What happens if the Iraqis don’t fight or can’t fight?
President Obama: Well….
Steve Kroft: What’s the end game?
President Obama: I’m not going to speculate on failure at the moment. We’re just getting started. Let’s see how they do.
It was precisely such a mindset that led the United States, step by step, into the Vietnam quagmire.
As in the case of Vietnam, the United States lacks:
America rushed to disaster in Vietnam because its foreign policy elite felt it had to “do something” to fight Communism anywhere in the world.
In December, 2012, Kayla Mueller, an idealistic 24-year-old American woman, arrived in Syria to assist Syrians caught up in their own civil war. And on August 4, 2013, she had been kidnapped and held for ransom. In 2015, she had been killed—whether by her terrorist kidnappers or Jordanian airstrikes remains unclear.
On February 23, 2015, Carl Mueller appeared on the “Today” show, Carl Mueller to protest the refusal of the United States Government to pay ransom demands to terrorist kidnappers.
“How many mistakes have we all made in life that were naïve and didn’t get caught at? Kayla was just in a place that was more dangerous than most. And she couldn’t help herself. She had to go in there and had to help.”
But did she?
Kayla Mueller
There were thousands of communities within the United States desperate for the help of a caring social activist. And thousands of organizations—such as Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA), Habitat for Humanity and Catholic Relief Services—that would have been thrilled to enlist her services.
And she could have made lives better without constantly facing the dangers of kidnapping by Islamics determined to humiliate and slaughter Americans.
Michael Sheuer is right: The United States should learn to mind its own business and quit intervening in the affairs of Middle Eastern governments and peoples.
Kayla Mueller is proof of the rightness of that assertion.
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