Dying For Montenegro

The question floating around the media lately is "should American soldiers die for Montenegro?"  It's a variation on a much older question that the republic has pondered since we won the Revolutionary War and gained our independence from Britain, namely "should American form alliances with foreign nations?"

Today, this sounds like a silly question, but in the 18th century, it was a big deal.  George Washington left sincere and sound advice that the United States should avoid foreign alliances.Washington did not want the USA brought into the seemingly endless wars that the European powers fought.  He wanted America's focus to be here at home.  He did not want us to waste our men or our wealth on foreign adventures.

Washington's view was held by the USA for a long time.  As the nation got bigger, we expanded our presence in the world.  We fought wars with other countries (and within ourself), but we didn't enter into foreign alliances for over a century.  When World War I began in Europe (mainly due to the existence of alliances that dragged the major powers into the conflict), America stayed out.  One of the biggest arguments against our entry into the war was that we should avoid foreign alliances.  When that war ended, we stayed out of the League of Nations (which was the idea of our then president Woodrow Wilson) because the senators would not approve an international alliance, even for peace.

World War II changed that.  The USA was in an alliance and that never ended.  The reticence to engage in such alliances was broken.  After the war, there was NATO, SEATO, CENTO and a bunch of other defense pacts.  The USA changed from isolationism to internationalism.  We fought the Cold War on the basis of our alliances.

The question of Montenegro, however, is different.  The issue is not whether or not we should engage in alliances.  That has been pretty much settled.  The question with Montenegro is the proper extent of those alliances.  Remember, Montenegro is a country that used to be part of the old Yugoslavia.  Does having America agree to treat an attack on Montenegro as one on the USA really help American security?  Why should we give a guarantee to this tiny country.  What is the national interest that is served by that treaty?  (To be clear, Montenegro would become part of NATO; it is not entering into a separate treaty with the USA.) 

 

Insanity and Lies -- It Seems To Be Everywhere

In the NY Post this morning, there's an article under a headline that says that the Secretary of Homeland Security refused to "denounce" the white supremacist involved in the Charlottesville murder last year.  That murder, of course, took place when a guy in a car ran down one of the counter-protesters who showed up to oppose the tiny white supremacist rally being held in that town.  There were other violent confrontations between the two sides, particularly between the Antifa group and the core white supremacist group.

I had thought that this story was over, so I read the article to see what the Secretary had said.  Here's what I found.  Secretary Nielsen told a crowd in Aspen that it wasn't that one side was right and one was wrong.  Rather, she said, it was that we have to work to stop any group advocating violence.

Isn't that exactly correct?  If Nazis or white supremacists or fascists or Antifa come to town and start bashing people in the head for whatever reason, shouldn't we work to stop that?  Shouldn't violent protests or political statements of any sort be prohibited?  I certainly think so.  We can't have the mob censoring speech no matter what that speech is.   That's called the American way.  We have free speech here.

So Secretary Nielsen actually condemned both sides in Charlottesville.  They both engaged in violence.  It's insane to write an article with a dishonest headline like the one in the Post.

Oh Come On!

There was a rather small group of people who assembled outside the Los Angeles office of congresswoman Maxine Waters that stomped on and then burned an American flag.  These were supporters of Waters.  So how did the AP portray this news?  The AP actually blamed a group called the Oathkeepers.  This is a "right wing" group according to the AP that had supposedly said it was going to come to Water's office in LA to protest, but then never showed up.  That's right, the AP blamed the flag burning on a group that wasn't there.  Indeed, the AP blamed the flag burning on a group that was NEVER there.

Now I know that in the world of Fake News, there are a lot of tenuous links that get emphasized by the mainstream media to make things appear to be other than they actually are.  Still, it is an all-timer for the Fake News writers at the AP to blame a group that was never there for a demonstration.

I know very little about the Oathkeepers.  Supposedly, they are former police and military who hold far right wing views.  I'm not sure if that is even remotely accurate.  Blaming this group for something that happened when they WERE NOT present, however, is a new low in media honesty.

Here's Some Real News

So did the Russians hack the DNC in 2016?  Did President Trump accept that view of the intelligence agencies?  Did Trump change his mind?  Did he tell Putin to stop the hacking?  Did he ignore the subject in Helsinki?  Does anyone other than the media really care about this?  I mean will it change the life of even one American if Trump said something to Putin on the subject that has not been accurately reported?  Or is this just the latest installment of the media game "Let's Attack Trump"?

The truth is that there really were things accomplished in Helsinki by Trump and Putin, but none of them get any coverage.  One area of agreement was in Syria.  The USA and Russia agreed in Helsinki that in southwest Syria, there should be a return to the rules that governed under the 1974 cease-fire accord (which went into place after the 1973 war between Syria and Israel.  This means that the region will be under the control of the Syrian government but there will be no foreign troops deployed in the area at all.  It may not sound like much, but it may have averted some serious fighting that could have led to an even bigger war in the area.

Let me explain.  For the last year or so, as the Assad regime has been winning the civil war, Iran has been trying to install its forces along the Israeli border.  For its part, Israel has been making clear that it will not accept the deployment of Iranian forces near its border.  Israel does not want another hostile military force along that border, particularly not one from Iran.  The Iranians have been moving troops into the area, and the Israelis have responded with attacks on Iranian installations in the entire western half of Syria.  The USA has supported the moves against Iran and the Russians have remained silent about them.  In Helsinki, however, the USA and Russia blessed the idea that there will be no Iranians in the region.  Iran has a sizeable force in Syria, but it would not take a position there directly contrary to the wishes of both the USA and Russia.

This morning in Syria, a surrender agreement was announced under which the Sunni rebels in the area are ceding control of the region to the Assad regime.  Meanwhile it seems as if the Iranians are going to be limited to getting no closer to the border than Damascus (which is about 40 miles away.) 

This should end the Iranian efforts designed to install substantial forces along the border and it should also end the Israeli attacks designed to keep those forces from the border.  In a bigger sense, it also means that the likelihood of a major Iranian - Israeli confrontation in Syria has just been drastically reduced.  That's some very good news.  But hey, unless it deals with what Trump did or didn't say about something that happened years ago which won't change anything, the media doesn't care. 

Blooming Idiot

Senator Blumenthal said on TV today that we are in a 9-11 style attack at the moment by Russia because of the way President Trump handled the Helsinki summit meeting.  Bloomie said that it is a national emergency.

Someone ought to explain to the senator what it means to be under attack.  Clearly he doesn't get it.  He did claim to have served in the military in Vietnam years ago, but that turned out to be just another lie, so Blumenthal has never actually experienced an attack.

The funny thing about all this is that nothing has changed due to Helsinki.  No one has died or been injured.  No property has been damaged.  No options available to the USA were taken away because of Helsinki.  All that happened is that President Trump met with the leader of the world's other pre-eminent nuclear power and the meeting was cordial.  Oh, the horror of it all!

I don't mind if Blumenthal wants to criticize Trump's position on something or other related to our relationship with Russia.  It's just bizarre for the senator to try to turn this into a national emergency.  It's not. 

 

An Amazing Difference in Perspective

E.J.Dionne is an uber-lefty.  No matter what happens, he always sees the Democrats as correct and the Republicans as wrong.  He makes it plain that he hates President Trump.  Nevertheless, he writes often in the mainstream media and people take him seriously.  Today, for example, he's out with a column predicting that the "blue wave" for Democrats in November is going to start in New Jersey.  Dionne is predicting big things for the Democrats in the garden state.

That's odd to me.  Dionne is predicting a big sweep in Jersey just days after recent polling shows that the supposedly safe Democrat candidate for the senate, Bob Menendez is running only 2% ahead of his little known GOP opponent.  That's terrible news for Menendez and the Democrats.  And since there's no election for governor, it will be the senate race that will be at the top of the ticket.  A GOP win in the senate race could easily swing House races to the GOP as well.  Dionne just ignores all this and predicts a big Democrat win.

I never know how much of what someone like Dionne says is just lying and how much is a true difference in perspective.  We all let our biases affect our expectations somewhat; it's human nature.  Still, it seems hard to believe that reasonable people could come to the conclusions that Dionne is spouting. 

I guess it's not too long until November.  We will find out soon enough who is correct.

In What World Are They Living?

Yahoo News is running a story at the moment reporting that the members of President Trump's cabinet are all distressed by serving in the administration but none of them are at the point yet of resigning.  Get it?  This is the latest installment of "chaos" in everything Trump.  If you recall, the mainstream media told us that the Trump campaign for the Republican nomination was in chaos and that he could not possibly get the nomination.  Then the mainstream media reported that the GOP convention in 2016 was going to be chaotic and it would be a colossal failure.  Then the Trump campaign against Hillary Clinton was in chaos according to the media.  They told us that Trump could never beat Hillary and the campaign was so chaotic that the question was whether many Republicans could hold on to their seats in Congress.  Of course, Trump won and the Republicans took both houses of Congress.  Then came the transition.  There were literally hundreds of stories about how the transition was in chaos and that Trump would be lucky if he could just pick a few members of his cabinet.  That didn't pan out, but it didn't stop the media.  Once Trump took office, the mainstream media told us that the White House was in chaos.  It was a constant mess and nothing would ever get done.  After a year and a half of a great many achievements, nothing matters to the media.  They are still telling us that the Trump White House is in chaos.  Today's target is the cabinet.  They are all disgusted and ready to quit according to the media.  More chaos on the way.

Sometimes I wonder in what world the members of the media live.  It can't be the real world.  I mean think back over the last decade.  We never got reports of chaos in the Obama administration, but, of course, nothing was ever accomplished by Obama after his first year in office.  Trump has gotten more done in a year and a half than Obama did in eight years.  Maybe the media is so used to nothing happening other than people talking that they confuse action for chaos.  That's probably giving the media too much credit.  I doubt the media is confused; I think that they are, rather, lying.  They understand that there is no chaos, but it doesn't matter.  Someone somewhere decided years ago that everything Trump did would be called chaotic.  That would be the story that would get sold over and over in the hopes that it would finally stick.  That may sound ridiculous, but remember, the media and the Democrats working together actually convinced a majority of Americans that tax cuts were actually tax increases.  Anything is possible if you use the big lie technique currently being employed by the media.