Friends, this week's Newsmaker Show with me and Brian O'Neil focuses on questions of war and peace. President Trump has come under heavy (media) fire for taking U.S. troops out of northeastern Syria. This sets up a clash potentially involving Kurdish, Syrian, Turkish, and Russian forces. The press says that Trump has precipitated a humanitarian disaster, but the truth is that the U.S. has overstayed its welcome in Syria. It's time to let local forces determine the country's destiny, and to acknowledge that we don't "own" other people's land. Discretion is sometimes the better part of valor, and the longer we stay in Syria, the greater the risks. I say: well done, President Trump!
Brian and I also talk about the feuding between the Bidens and the Trumps, the impeachment saga and the machinations of "Shifty" Adam Schiff, and the question of whether Mike Bloomberg, left-leaning know-it-all and billionaire, will insert himself into the Presidential race.
It's all pure gold, so listen in!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6-ttYRjVJg&feature=youtu.be
Dr.Waddy: So the leftists and their MSM are concerned about our ostensible "abandonment of allies", ehhh? They sacrificed any credibility on that in '75, thank you.
ReplyDeleteAin't that the truth!!! They have moxie, those lefties. Obama's withdrawal from Iraq also seems to have been entirely forgotten.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy: The Kurds remind me of the Finns; a gutsy little nation in constant danger from larger powers.The Finns had to make a pact with the Devil (Germany) in WWII to keep Stalin at bay. The Kurds may be doing the same with Syria; Turkey MAY be capable of mass murder; they did it to the Armenians in the early 20th century.
ReplyDeleteWe need to get shut of the Middle East and as much of its endlessly complicated antipathies as possible. We don't need them as an oil source and our other vital interest there, Israel, is probably capable of defending itself. Should it need our aid, we have an outstanding ability to quickly project power at and from the sea. We beat the ISIS subsociopaths, we got Saddam and Bin Laden. Enough is enough.
Dr. Waddy: It could be, under this President, that we may well be a much more restrained and mature kind of ally. We worked with the Kurds and beat ISIS (to whom every people in its path was marked for complete submission and a return to the 8th century or for consummate savagery). Ok, that is done; we can reasonably say to all parties there, "we are obligated for no more than that; now defend yourselves as you will". The Kurds may well be able to do so.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy: I completely support your view that the Crocodile Tears of the MSM over the Kurds is just a way to attack our President. They were probably rooting for ISIS. Check it out (all readers), if you have not before: David Horowitz's Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left. The MSM is the tool of the American left and as such sympathizes with Islamist hatred of the West.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy: A Bloomberg campaign? What the hell is Bloomberg anyway? "I continued Guiliani's anticrime campaign and the results were obvious. But then, I rode the subways with 'the people' and I'm against anyone (except one with bodyguards) carrying the "Great Equalizer", here, upstate, anywhere in America. What would I stand for if elected? Ah dunno."
ReplyDeleteJack, your perspective on Syria (and the Middle East) is very sensible. You are wise to raise the issue of Israel. If the entire DC establishment thinks we ought to stay in Syria indefinitely, I'm guessing that's because the Israel lobby thinks so too. They should be careful what they wish for, though. I'd say they were better off when Assad and Saddam Hussein held sway in Syria and Iraq. Stability is in Israel's interests...and a battlefield crowded with Syrians, Kurds, Turks, Iranians, and Russians is NOT stable.
ReplyDeleteI concur with your contempt for Bloomberg. As a funder of left-wing attack ads, he's formidable. As a presidential candidate, he'd be a bad joke. I'm actually thinking of penning an article about the outsize role played by billionaires in American politics, and why right-thinking billionaires better get behind Trump before it's too late. Warren would not be their friend!
I love that word 'Moxie', smiles. Well said both of you. Just going to add my two cents, I think perhaps, one has not seen the last of Mrs. Clinton. Just saying...
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy and Linda: Some nations and some peoples are possessed of visceral courage and faith in their ways of life. They have moxie, as you say. (I had a college friend named Moxim and we called him Moxie and he did have it). I'd include the Kurds,the Finns, the Brits and especially the Israelis.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion Israel is a transcendent moral issue for the U.S. and all the world. Israel embodies perhaps the most courageous world view ever. They have historically and still do, faced and face the most concentrated and vicious racial and cultural antipathy of all. Though much of the world persists in this shameful oppression, the U.S. and all truly civilized nations must stand against it. If Israel ever falls then "chaos (in its anciently understood meaning) is come again". Perhaps I am hyperbolic in saying this but when I look at Israel's accomplishments in turning a hellish desert into a habitable home, when I consider the oppression the Jewish people have survived, when I consider their reverence for learning, for the elderly and experienced, for family,for their monumental faith, for positive values from which all civilizations can learn, then I think their support to be an obligation for any modern,creditable society, the rejection of which is a condemnation of the disdainful. That is why I consider it a vital U.S. interest, were it located within the Arctic Circle.
Oh Gads, Linda, I hope you are not right about Hillary. When, oh when, will our nation be free of the disgrace, the taint, of that "couple"?
Oh, Linda -- your words sent chills up my spine... Ha ha. Frankly, I'd love it if Hillary joined the fray. What a joke she's become.
ReplyDeleteJack, you wax positively lyrical on the subject of Israel! Of course, many Americans feel just the same. The good news is that Israel is in no danger of disappearing. The bad news is that, in my humble opinion, the Israelis are not always ideal stewards of their own security. They are, for whatever reason, convinced that maximum U.S. intervention in the Middle East is always in their interests. I'm not talking about individual Israelis, naturally, but the government. I'd like to suggest to Israel, and to the DC elite, that sometimes leaving the Middle East well enough alone is the best course of action.
Dr.Waddy: Believe me, I praise Israel as I do only because I think history has proven thatit is definitively positive civilization, an exemplary culture. I do not mean to suggest that they should not be criticized and your comments are considered and plausible. We COULD leave that benighted region alone, knowing we could come to Israel's aid if necessary. Naturally, of course, in their own existential interest (and what nation has squarely faced actual extermination as has Israel?)Israel would like to see of us a more forward defense but as long as we are administered by an executive obviously favorable to Israel(emphatically unlike his predecessor and I'm certain the canny Israelis know this) then the Jewish state knows we will go to the wall for it, as we did in 1974.That would all change if a definitively anti Semitic Dem were to be elected President.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I freely admit, for what it is worth: my Christian faith leads me to think that the Covenant between our Lord and the Jewish people is a very actual thing and that that people was credited and enjoined so in order to show humanity just how a positive life should be conducted.
Indeed Jack, smiles.
DeleteDr. Waddy: I'd follow that up by saying that since our nation is ( in my opinion) proven Christian in its foundation and its declaration of its principles, that a people credited by our Creator should be of prime concern to us. And to those who would decry my emphasis on our essentially Christian culture, I would say, go to almost ANY small town in America and note the most substantial structures - schools (if they are there in this increasingly centralized, even unto statewide level, educational bureaucracy) but also and always, Christian churches. This is, without doubt, a Christian nation and the Jewish faith is inseparable from it.And though I decline to be apologetic in saying it, other faiths are welcome, inasmuch as they reject future forced dominance, BECAUSE we are a nation embued with the experientially and regretfully but willingly reformed , Christian faith.
ReplyDeleteWell said, Jack. Far be it from me to question America's Judeo-Christian foundation. It's the foundation on which we stand -- and the weakening of that foundation explains most of our plight, I might add. Nor do I propose leaving the Middle East. I'm a...shall we say "Trumpian" isolationist? I want us to minimize our involvement in other people's conflicts, but I fully recognize that there are places where our stabilizing influence and protecting hand are needed. I would count Iraq as one of those places. Probably Afghanistan. Definitely the Gulf. The key, I think, is that most of the time we ought to be able to protect our interests without fighting on the ground ourselves. American blood should, by contrast, only be spilled when ABSOLUTELY necessary.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy: Fully agree that we should avoid going in on the ground unless its our superlative special forces or brief, get the job done and leave amphibious efforts. We have by FAR the strongest amphibious forces and carrier based air forces in the world.
ReplyDelete