Barack Obama

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Last week, while everyone was busy looking at that nice picture of Obama and Trudeau amiably chatting it up in Little Burgundy, the government dropped Canada’s new “deliberately ambitious” National Defense Strategy. This includes a 73% increase of the military defense budget over the next ten years and replacement of the CF-18 fleet with 88 advanced fighter aircraft (instead of the 65 planes promised by the Conservatives).

Among all the usual reasons presented by the government for this rather dramatic hike, two stood out: the need to respond to NATO pressure and the need to assume more of a leading role on the international stage in response to the Trump administration’s isolationism.

Barack Obama and Justin Trudeau dining at Liverpool House in Little Burgundy last Tuesday

NATO requests that member states devote 2% of their GDP to national defense and Canada spends little more than half of that. By 2027, Canada’s defense spending will have jumped from $18.9 Billion to $32.7 Billion, which will be 1.4% of the GDP – still too little for NATO, but enough to significantly improve its status.

To be fair, in 2016, only five of the 28 members (The UK, the US, Greece, Poland and Estonia) actually reached NATO’s target. To be quite clear, the pressure to increase spending is coming from the US in particular. Donald Trump scolded NATO leaders last month for not committing more funds.

On the other hand, Trump’s unpredictable behaviour on diplomatic matters is a factor in and of itself.

“The fact that our friend and ally has come to question the very worth of its mantle of global leadership, puts into sharper focus the need for the rest of us to set our own clear and sovereign course,” said the minister of Foreign Affairs Chrystia Freeland.

On Tuesday, while Obama was speaking in Montreal, Freeland presented the new policy to the House of Commons. And just like Obama spoke for an hour and a half about everything wrong with Trump without mentioning him, the Minister clearly depicted Canada’s new defense strategy as a countermeasure to Trump’s unreliability without saying so. This brilliantly written part of her discourse is a perfect example:

“Imagine a Canadian view that says we are safe on our continent, and we have things to do at home, so let’s turn inward. Let’s say Canada first. Here’s why that would be wrong…”

Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland

She then went on to argue that Canada is facing many threats on the international front, mentioning climate change, but also, the dictatorship in North Korea, “crimes against humanity in Syria, the monstrous extremists of Daesh, and Russian military adventurism.”

Freeland also warned that relying on the umbrella of protection provided by the US would turn us into a client state.

Foreign and security policy analyst Srdjan Vucetic believes Canada increasing its defense spending is inevitable.

“While the demand for spending precedes Trump-induced uncertainties,” he argued, “the latter amplifies, especially in light of Freeland’s speech on Tuesday.”

Vucetic rather liked hearing Freeland admit “that the world is different now that there are no adults in the White House.”

Selling military spending to the Left

The Liberals aren’t forgetting the votes they got on the left of the spectrum in this rightward shift towards militarism. That’s why they’re packaging it as a soft criticism of the Trump Administration, something that is hard for progressives not to support.

Freeland also talked a fair amount about another popular topic on the left: fighting climate change, taking the opportunity to say that “Canada is deeply disappointed by the decision by the US Federal Government to withdraw from the Paris Agreement on climate.”

It’s logical that increased military spending will improve Canada’s pull on the diplomatic world which is necessary to influence the fight against climate change. However, the Liberal government has given us no reason to believe that they would ever use it to that effect. Despite talking a big game about the environment, they have done just as much for it as the Conservatives.

It wasn’t the only part of the Minister’s discourse that seemed like a diversion tactic meant to appease the Left.

“Now, it is clearly not our role to impose our values around the world. No one appointed us the world’s policeman,” Freeland assured the House of Commons, preemptively echoing potential critics. The statement is a little bit at odds with the very first paragraph of the official policy document praising Canadian military for “working tirelessly to (…) promote Canadian values and interests abroad” and the fact that her own discourse cares to point out how good and honorable Canadian values are.

While “impose” and “promote” are two distinct concepts, they have a way of blending in this particular context, considering no one actually fears Canada “imposing” its values through some sort of coercive force. All this to say that, as nicely as this statement plays to popular criticism, it is again devoid of actual significance.

The Liberals won the elections by playing up the contrast between them and the Conservatives. Instead of acting on that contrast, it looks like they’ve decided to play up their differences with Trump instead.

* Featured image: Canadian CF-18 via WikiMedia Commons

AudioFTB WeekendsPodcast

In a Sud Ouest Special, panelists Andrew MacDonald and David DesBaillets discuss FolkFest, the changing face of SouthWest Montreal, Barack Obama’s visit and more with host Jason C. McLean. Plus News Roundup, Community Calendar, Lat Night’s Weather and Predictions!

News Roundup Topics: UK Elections, New Conservative Leader, RIP Adam West

Panelists:

Andrew MacDonald: Musician, Sud Ouest resident
David DesBaillets: Legal student, political pundit, former Sud Ouest resident

Host: Jason C. McLean

Producers: Hannah Besseau (audio), Enzo Sabbagha (video)

Production Assistant: Xavier Thomas

Matt Large/FolkFest interview by Hannah Besseau

Recorded June 11, 2017 in Montreal, Quebec

LISTEN:

WATCH:

Microphone image: Ernest Duffoo / Flickr Creative Commons

NewsPoliticsQueer

Chelsea Manning, the American soldier jailed in 2010 for leaking information to Wikileaks, is finally free after serving seven years out of her 35 years sentence.

Barack Obama had announced the shortening of her sentence back in January after years of campaigning by multiple civil rights defense groups, including the ACLU and Amnesty International. This Wednesday, Manning’s legal team confirmed that she was safely released from the US military prison in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

“After another anxious four months of waiting, the day has finally arrived. I am looking forward to so much! Whatever is ahead of me, is far more important than the past. I’m figuring things out right now–which is exciting awkward, fun, and all new for me.” Manning said in a press release.

Manning leaked more than 700 000 documents to Wikileaks, revealing various instances of misconduct by the US in the Middle East. Among the most shocking leaks was an infamous video of two American soldiers bantering about perpetrating an airstrike that killed 12 people, including two Reuters journalists, as well as evidence that the US military summarily executed a number of Iraqis and deliberately concealed the true civilian death toll of its attacks.

At the time, Chelsea Manning was only 23. She had not yet come out as transgender and she was working as an intelligence analyst in Baghdad, under the name of Bradley Manning. She was sentenced to 35 years in prison, the longest sentence ever given to an American whistleblower.

Manning was detained with the male prisoners in a military jail and denied hormone therapy and treatment for gender dysphoria. The impacts on her were devastating and she had to be put on suicide watch. Four months ago, Obama commuted this sentence to time served plus 120 days in one of his last significant decisions as president.

While advocates for transparency and for LGBTQ+ rights rejoiced, others fumed, calling her a traitor who put US lives at risk. Then President-Elect Donald Trump was quick to tweet his displeasure:

(For those wondering, he was referring to a column in which she argued that the Obama administration should stop compromising their progressive stances)

According to the Obama administration, the four months delay between the announcement of a commutation and its effect is meant to allow detainees to prepare for life outside. Manning’s entourage started the “Chelsea Manning Welcome Home fund” for the same reason. Within three months, the GoFundMe campaign raised more than $163 000 US.

Surprisingly, Manning is still a member of the US army “on active duty”  until her criminal appeal is over. The Army Court of Criminal Appeals and the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces both have to issue an official decision on her dishonourable discharge before it can take effect. Until then, she is on “involuntary excess leave” which means she is on unpaid leave, but subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

*Featured Image: Torbak Hopper under creative commons.

BooksCultureLawPolitics

In February of 1990, Barack Obama was the first black person elected to head the Harvard Law Review. The presidency of the Review is considered the highest student position at Harvard Law School.

It’s therefore fitting that in his final days as the first black person to hold the highest office in the United States, Barack Obama has gone back to his roots by publishing a piece in the Harvard Law Review. His essay is called The President’s Role in Advancing Criminal Justice Reform and was published on January 5, 2017.

The article is many things. It’s well written and it’s footnoted so you never have any doubts as to where Obama is getting his facts from or whether he’s making them up. It puts faith in you as a reader because there’s never a word wasted. On the other hand it also requires you to do some visual acrobatics because his sources are cited within the text, requiring you to skip over the citations to read the rest of what he’s saying.

His piece is also a little self-aggrandizing, but unlike the incoming president, all the things Obama says are substantiated by facts. He highlights his tackling of racial profiling as a legislator in Illinois and all sources indicate that he did just that.

In 1999 he proposed a bill against racial profiling after hearing that police were pulling over drivers simply for being black. When the bill failed, he revised and reintroduced it over and over again until it passed in 2003, making a point of publicly saying that “race and ethnicity is not an indicator of criminal activity.”

He also mentioned pushing for the videotaping of police interrogations as a requirement for interrogations and confessions in all capital cases. A measure he helped to pass in Illinois.

Chart from the Harvard Law Review essay

As President, he used his power of clemency to pardon or reduce the sentences of 231 people, many of whom had been punished for minor, non-violent drug crimes under tough anti-drug laws. The impact of this gesture is huge, for unlike other pardons, presidential ones wipe away the legal consequences of previous criminal convictions.

Obama hints at his frustrations battling a Republican Congress determined to undermine him during his presidency. Though he successfully passed the Fair Sentencing Act in 2010 which eliminated mandatory minimum sentences for simple possession of crack cocaine thus reducing excessive punishments imposed on people of colour, he had no such luck with the Smarter Sentencing Act.

The Smarter Sentencing Act was a bipartisan – meaning supported by both Democrats and Republicans – bill that would have reduced mandatory minimum sentences for some nonviolent drug offenses from twenty years to ten, and given judges greater discretion regarding whether or not to impose said sentences.

Despite support across party lines, many Republicans were skeptical of the bill and it never made it to the floor of Congress. The same happened with the Sentencing Reform and Corrections Act, a law that would have reduced more mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent drug offenses and offered credits to prisoners who participate in rehabilitation programs. The Republicans tabled that one to death in November 2015.

Despite Obama’s frustrations with Congress in his attempts to pass progressive criminal justice reform, he constantly highlights his respect and faith in the American people and the rule of law.

In a none-too-subtle warning to the incoming president, Obama writes that the President “does not and should not decide who or what to investigate or prosecute.” He praises red states like Georgia, Texas and Alabama for reducing sentences and investing the money saved on incarceration in other public safety programs that help those affected by mental illness and substance abuse, many of whom had previously ended up in jail.

At the same time Obama highlights all the problems with the American Justice System: the systemic racism, overly harsh penalties for non-violent offenses, the excessive use of solitary confinement, and the economic problems caused by the US’ excessive use of incarceration. He points out that the US incarcerates 25% of its population and that the cost of maintaining so many prisons and the people within it is both “unnecessary and unsustainable.”

Though Democrats are widely accused of being fiscally irresponsible, it’s Republicans that always seem to be pushing for harsher penalties that increase the American prison population, thus straining state and national budgets regardless of whether or not it makes people safer. Obama quotes Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates who pointed out in November 2016 that every dollar spent on excessive sentences is “a dollar we don’t have for investigating emerging threats, from hackers to home grown terrorists,” a point that is especially relevant amidst widespread acknowledgement that the Russian government hacked the election to get an orange bigot into office.

Obama’s article reflects his awareness of the higher standard he was constantly being held to. In America people still seem to expect women and visible and sexual minorities and younger people to perform worse than middle aged white men at the same jobs, no matter how despicable and lazy individuals of the latter are.

Though the United States has less unemployment, a decreased federal prison population, and more people with health care due to Obama’s efforts, entitled rich white men are still questioning whether or not he was a good president. Obama clearly knows that he had to be beyond reproach during his time in office and while he did not achieve all he had promised – Guantanamo Bay has yet to be closed, for example – as a president he came pretty close despite all obstacles.

Regardless of what Barack Obama did or did not achieve, the one thing to take from his article is a warning that all the good that he did in his attempt to do right by the American people is in danger of being undone when a racist misogynist Russian puppet takes office on January 20, 2017.

NewsPolitics

The three North-American leaders are meeting this week in Ottawa for the Three Amigos Summit. It’s the first summit in almost three years, and the last one for US President Barack Obama. This is relevant because both major party presumptive nominees Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have recently claimed to be against the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and lean towards protectionism.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau greeted his Mexican counterpart Enrique Nieto this morning. Obama is expected to join them to start the negotiations. Here’s what is on the table (and what is conspicuously absent).

A Hope for Climate Action

Climate action is expected to dominate the talks this week. The leaders will discuss how to reduce methane emissions and encourage carbon markets and renewable energy.

The most important thing, both for the environment and the Canadian economy, is Mexico and the US’s commitment to get 50% of electricity from renewable sources by 2025.

It is a remarkably ambitious target; currently, only 13% of US electricity and around 22% of Mexico’s is from renewable sources. Hydro-electricity puts Canada at a great advantage by providing almost 60% of its energy (other sources like wind and solar provide 3%).

The leaders have yet to decide whether to include nuclear energy as an acceptable source. Nuclear energy produces very little greenhouse gas, but it produces radioactive waste that we don’t know how to get rid of.

Including it would mean little to Mexico, because it represents only 3% of its electricity, but would be significant for the U.S, where 19% of electricity is from nuclear energy. For Canada, it means that around 80% of its electricity would be considered clean.

Leaders are expected to discuss how to facilitate the movement of all this clean power across borders. Whether nuclear energy is accepted or not, this would be a tremendous trade opportunity for Canada.

US and Canada have also committed to reduce their methane emissions by 40 to 45% by 2030 and are pressing Mexico to do the same.

Strengthening Relationships

Canada’s relationship with its continental partners has been strained under the conservative government. Last year’s Three Amigos summit was cancelled partially due to Harper’s quarrel with Obama over Keystone XL.

Trudeau’s election drastically changed the situation, as was clearly demonstrated when he visited Washington in March. It was the first official visit in nearly 20 years and it went along so warmly that Trudobama bromance quickly became a trending hashtag.

It is doubtful that the negotiations will go as smoothly with the next President of the United States. While a good relationship with a Hillary Clinton presidency is conceivable, the rising protectionist streak in the U.S will be harder to work around. Trudeau has expressed, as openly as he could, that a Trump presidency would be quite undesirable. Canada and Mexico are thus eager to get the maximum out of this last summit with Obama.

The relationship between Trudeau and Nieto has not had much chance to develop. But if this photo of them jogging together is any indication, it started off on a pretty friendly path:

trudeau nieto jogging three amigos summit

Trudeau’s promise to lift restrictions on Mexican visas to Canada certainly goes a long way towards that.

Human Rights

Mexico and Canada want to sign an agreement on Indigenous rights. They will officially commit to sharing information about best practices for protecting indigenous people from violence, social isolation and exploitation.

This very vague promise is the only concrete human rights issue on the summit’s agenda.

The Three Amigos Summit should be an opportunity to focus on human rights issues above all, argues Amnesty International in an open letter. The NGO is calling on the leaders of all three countries to stop putting illegal refugee and migrant children behind bars.

There are also considerable concerns over the civil rights in Mexico. 27 000 Mexicans have disappeared since the country started its famous war on drugs in 2006.

The absence of Mexico’s civil rights as an issue at the summit is especially conspicuous, considering six people were recently killed in violent clashes between protesters and the police in southern Mexico. The teachers from the radical National Coordinator of Education Workers (CNTE) are blocking roads and train tracks to protest against the education reform and the arrests of union leaders. Footage shows police officers firing on civilians.

Activists are also pushing the Canadian Prime Minister to address women’s rights in the Southern state. An appealing study revealed that a majority of detained women were sexually abused while in custody.

CultureFood & DrunkNewsPolitics

What do the 2016 US Presidential candidates eat? What do their gastronomic ways say about their presidential personality?

Though it only lasted five months, our own federal election in Canada gave us enough time to find out what out candidates ate, and what it said (or didn’t say) about their leadership style.

Bernie Sanders

Sanders is the Tom Mulcair of candidates south of the border. Just not in the way you might think.

Each has pulled his party in the polar opposite direction. Yet they share a gruff gastronomic asceticism on the campaign trail.

If you recall, Forget the Box was the first outlet to uncover the bombshell news: Mulcair’s organs are made of bricks and wool. Our investigative report disclosed that this Prime Minister hopeful had never been seen partaking in food, even when hiking on Mont-Royal, stumping in small towns, or Schwartz-ing with jovial peers.

    

Now Sanders’ food choices remain equally opaque, leaving us up here to surmise that he survives on his healthy diet of finger wagging. Even the hearty US press corps, with its fifteen months of research, has come up mostly empty trying to paint the “lifestyle” profile of loveable Uncle Bern.

In candidate surveys, the best they could come up with was “scrambled eggs for breakfast.” This sounds like it was filled in by some campaign intern. Though it’s not really an answer, we’ll assume they’re unsalted, devoid of condiments.

To be fair, Sanders has this slight edge over Mulcair. The latter was never even seen sipping coffee, whether in meetins or at pictoresque rural working class diners. Sanders, on the other hand, was definitively ID-ed sipping Vermont craft beer. It seems suspicious, sort of a photo-op setup.

Yet I believe it. He is drinking the hoppiest beer in a state known for very hoppy delights, which seems to fit with his enjoyably bitter personal brand.

Ted Cruz

You might recall the eponymous #GuacGate, spurred by the NYT’s suggestion of peas in traditional Mexican-American versions of guac.

We saw then that guacamole was a deeply divisive political issue, and this was before the immigration debate gathered full steam. Yet it also united party leaders in unexpected ways, such as Jeb and Obama’s ardent disavowel of this French intrusion into an already-perfect dish.

Fittingly, one of the only dissenters, even in a moment of bipartisan fun, was divisive Senator Ted Cruz. The Texas senator came up on the wrong side as his colleagues as usual, claiming his distaste not only for guacamole, but for avocadoes full stop.

Fitting consistent with his Texas image, Cruz picks enchiladas (the legal kind) over any other dish.

Donald Trump

Now to the frontrunners. We’ll save Clinton to the end, because her food preferences, like Harper’s in my original article, somehow leave me most unsettled.

This is a surprise in itself, because in this unprecedented US primary spectacle, you’d think Trump would reign supreme generating gastronomic headlines. Yet despite him criticizing Kasich for his hearty four-course Italian meal at a New York market food stand, he has been criticized for eating pizza with forks and generally unhealthy food preferences. This might be exciting for another candidate, though for Trump’s grand style, his diet lands up surprisingly boring, even unworthy of mention.

He claims he eats light and healthy on the trail, sans alcohol. He does, of course, mention that he indulges in his favourite dish once in awhile: US steak. This is helpful, given the cartons of unsold Trump Steaks likely sitting in some warehouse.

Hillary Clinton

Remember Obama’s epic stops at Ray’s & In n Out burger, photos of juicy burgers joyously shared with Senator Joe? They swarmed over social media, part of his fresh new image that helped launch him to the win.

Source: WaPo

Clinton, on the other hand, is ever the milquetoast frontrunner. In ways eerily similar to Harper who, lest we forget, was once touted to regain his majority reign, she avoids unplanned ops or stops or any real insight into her soul. So the first similarity is their over-advised inhuman personas: it’s hard to discern if they have any real passions or preferences at all.

Yet the second is spicy. We revealed Harper’s “secret obsession” with deathly strong hot-sauce (he supposedly kept a special pantry of it at Sussex Drive, if you recall). Clinton, too, has been said to carry hardcore hot sauce in her purse, a “confession” corroborated by aides.

Now, some criticized this as blatant pandering, since this detail unsurprisingly slipped out during one of her Southern campaign stops. It’s possible that Clinton’s hot sauce obsession is as manufactured as her Southern accent.

Like her true views on society, policy and values, one thing’s safe to say: we’ll never know the truth.

—–

What dirt have you uncovered on the Presidential candidates eating habits?

UPDATE: Press time: Carly Fiorina just announced her VP run with Cruz. We’re curious if the Cruz team vetted her dietary preferences before the presser.

‘I always used to eat Milk-Bones as a kid’: Carly Fiorina snacks on dog treats and tells puppies to vote Republican because ‘Obama ate your cousin’ in bizarre video – Daily Mail, 15 Dec. 2015

Souce: Daily Mail
LawNewsPolitics

On Wednesday March 16, 2016, Barack Obama named Judge Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court of the United States of America (SCOTUS). The nomination came after a month of nail biting by Democrats and whining and begging by Republicans who were both expecting the nomination process to be a political fist fight between the parties.

Journalists and self-proclaimed legal experts – myself included – threw out names left and right trying to predict who would be chosen to fill the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat. Republican candidate and known racist misogynist Donald Trump begged the mostly Republican Senate to “delay, delay, delay,” in an attempt to make sure Obama wouldn’t pick a liberal judge to fill the vacancy. Everyone was expecting Obama to choose a liberal minded justice from a visible minority.

President Obama surprised us all.

He chose to nominate Judge Merrick Garland, Chief Judge of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.

From a superficial perspective, Garland is everything even the most backward uneducated racist Republican could hope for. He’s visibly white, male, and he’s old – sixty-three years old to be exact. He’s got silver hair, glasses, and in an age where business attire is becoming more casual, he wears a suit and tie and looks comfortable and polished in both.

Politically, he should be a Republican’s dream, because he’s not that liberal. Most sources on Garland identify him as a moderate, an old-school idealist who dropped a very lucrative career with Arnold & Porter, one of the most respected law firms in the US, to become a public prosecutor. When asked why he did it, Garland said that as a prosecutor you don’t have to take every case; you make your best judgment and “only go forward if you believe the defendant is guilty.”

Garland’s CV is nothing short of impressive.

He worked for the Justice Department during the Carter Administration and after a brief stint in private practice, returned to the Department at age forty as a top official in the Criminal Division of the Clinton Administration. He eventually became second in command to the Deputy Attorney General as a key member of Janet Reno’s team.

He’s got tons of experience in anti-terrorism and was the chief investigator in the Oklahoma City bombing case. He has a history of breaking with liberal judges and fits the career pattern of most of the current justices of the Supreme Court.

If staunch conservative Republicans have any doubts about Garland, they need only look at the fact that Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah – a man who is anti-abortion and voted against adding sexual orientation to the legal definition of hate crimes – once called Judge Garland “a fine man.”

In spite of this, Republicans seem determined to keep Judge Garland off the Supreme Court. They are currently refusing to confirm the nomination, prompting the Obama Administration to create the social media hashtag #DoYourJob.

The reason for the block may surprise you.

It’s not because Garland is Jewish. Even the staunchest racists tend to trust Jewish lawyers and judges.

It’s not just because Obama likes him. Despite what the media will have us believe, Republicans and Democrats can be friends and even agree on something once in a while.

It’s not just because the President of Planned Parenthood Cecile Richards said Judge Garland seems like a “responsible and qualified nominee.”

The most likely reason Republicans are shunning Garland is a judicial decision he published last July regarding a federal ban on federal contractors making federal campaign contributions. In Wendy E. Wagner et al v. The Federal Election Commission, Judge Garland maintained the ban and refused the appeal, which had been argued on First Amendment grounds and on the basis of equality rights.

The First Amendment of the US Constitution guarantees freedom of speech, religion, and the press. In the opening paragraph of the decision, Judge Garland stated that the concerns that prompted the ban – concerns regarding corruption – “remain as important today as when the statute was enacted.”

This undoubtedly hit a nerve with Republicans who rely on contributions from a variety of sources – many with vested interests in policy-making – to fund expensive political campaigns. The nerve is especially raw in this circus the US calls an election year.

The only Republican presidential candidate to show any pragmatism about the nomination is John Kasich, the current governor of Ohio. He criticized the Republican Senate’s arbitrary block of Judge Garland, saying that the Senate should at least meet the guy before deciding one way or the other. Kasich even went insofar as to say that he might name Garland to SCOTUS himself if elected president, a statement he later withdrew undoubtedly after receiving a barrage of criticism from fellow Republicans for refusing to tow the party line.

Judge Garland is liked by just about everyone in Congress and the legal community, and those who don’t like him at the very least respect him. He’s everything a realistic Republican could want: white, male, not too young, not too liberal, and tough on crime and terrorism.

So what’s the holdup? It’s time the American people nag their Senators into doing what they are constitutionally mandated to do.

Their JOBS.

NewsPolitics

It wasn’t long after news of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s passing hit social media on Saturday that we got an idea of what the Republicans were planning, courtesy of Conn Carroll, Communications Director for Senator Mike Lee of Utah:

This sentiment was echoed in much more nuanced terms by GOP Presidential hopeful Ted Cruz:

It is clear that the Republicans, who now control the US Senate, plan to block any Supreme Court nominations current President Barack Obama makes to replace Scalia on the bench. Their motivations are clear and it is possible for them to achieve this goal, with a little over a year to go before the next President is sworn in.

But if they do succeed in carrying out this plan, they may have wished they hadn’t. Nobody knows who the next President will be or which party will have a majority on the Senate.

Republican Dream Scenario is Just a Dream

The GOP is clearly hoping one of their own moves into the White House and nominates a right-leaning candidate which the Senate, still controlled by Republicans, quickly confirms. Now, I know that you have to approach an election with the attitude that you are going to win, but even GOP strategists must realize that their dream scenario is a bit of a longshot.

It’s extremely likely, thanks largely to gerrymandering, that the Republicans will still form the majority in the US House of Representatives, a body that has nothing to do with Supreme Court nominations. They have a likely, though not definite, chance of retaining control of the Senate, too, so there is a decent chance they will retain control of the confirmation process if they succeed in delaying.

When it comes to winning the Presidency, the odds are not in their favour. When a two-term President is still popular at the end of his second mandate, there’s a good chance his party will keep the Oval Office, for at least another term.

George W. Bush was extremely unpopular across the board when he left office, to the point that John McCain didn’t really want him helping out during the campaign. Obama is still loved or at least respected by most of those who voted for him and the people who hate him now hated him in 2008, too.

Also, the Democrats have narrowed their options to two and the debate is pretty much centered on how much to the left of Obama the party should go. The Republican field, on the other hand, is still wide open.

Factor this all in and the possibility of a Republican being able to nominate the next Supreme Court Justice, while not an impossible scenario, is not the likely scenario. So the question becomes: Why would the GOP gamble everything on a bet they very well may lose?

Irrational Fear of Obama or Playing to the Bigoted Base?

Despite all the rhetoric the right throws at him, President Obama is a solid practitioner of incrementalism. Anyone he nominates to the Supreme Court, though perhaps harboring a liberal bias on some issues, would be, by and large, a moderate. Not just that, but someone specifically selected to pass through confirmation by a majority Republican Senate.

us supreme court

FTB’s legal columnist Samantha Gold listed some of Obama’s potential choices. These are all qualified jurists who really don’t scream anything close to radical activist. One of them, David Jeremiah Barron, even once wrote a legal memo justifying drone strikes against US citizens. While this horrifies me, I don’t see why law and order “kill the terrorists at all costs” Republicans would have a problem.

What may make the GOP nervous about confirming some of these names? Could it be the names themselves? Sri Srinavasan and Jacqueline Hong-Ngoc Nguyen both have the qualifications to justify being on the SCOTUS, but they also both have names that don’t sound white, because they’re not. They also both weren’t born in the US.

None of this should matter, but it may matter to the more racist elements of the Republican base. We’re talking about people who care less about the fact that Srinavasan graduated from Stanford Law than the fact that he swore his oath to the circuit court on the Baghavad Gita instead of a Bible.

Now, of course the Republican Party can’t come out and say that racism played a role in their decision to force a delay in the nomination. What they can do, once it becomes widely known that the Thurmond Rule (what they are using currently to justify pushing the nomination to the next President) is not an actual rule and also doesn’t even apply until the last six months of a President’s term, is play the fear and hatred of Obama card.

It’s something they have mastered. Irrational paranoia over a moderate incrementalist. In this case, though, it may give them a result that will make approving an Obama nominee seem like the safe bet.

What Could Happen

Let’s look at a few hypothetical situations that could arise after the Senate Republicans delay filling Scalia’s seat until the next US President is sworn in:

  1. Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders is the next President and the Republicans still control the Senate: The list of potential nominees would be similar, though maybe not that drone supporter guy in the case of a Sanders presidency. All the Republicans accomplished was leaving the court deadlocked for a year with no purpose behind it.
  2. Clinton becomes President and the Democrats take control of the Senate: She could nominate some of these people but would be free to go with a judge decidedly more liberal.
  3. Sanders becomes President and the Democrats take control of the Senate: The Republicans freak out, call a lame duck session and try with all their waning power to confirm Obama’s nominee because they know Bernie won’t pick a moderate or even close!

Never mind the fact that the current Republican course of action has them completely and deliberately ignoring their constitutional responsibility to promote an illogical fear of Obama and appease the more racist elements of their base, it also has them throwing everything behind a bet there is a good chance they won’t win.

NewsPolitics

President Bernie Sanders. Something that a few months ago only seemed possible to progressives sitting around in a bar after a few pints. Everyone else either thought his candidacy was a joke or something that could, at best, move the discourse more to the left.

Now, after rallies attended in the thousands, celebrity endorsements from, among others, Neil Young and Sarah Silverman and a social media love affair reminiscent of an Obama campaign, it’s looking more and more like a possibility. American politics may #feelthebern in 2016.

Donald Trump Makes it Possible

Sanders announced his campaign with a brief preceeding statement explaining that he wanted to keep it short because he had “things to do.” This afterthought approach along with the candidate’s unkempt hair blowing in the wind was comedic fodder for Jon Stewart and others at the time. It also made it clear that Sanders wasn’t a conventional presidential candidate.

With Jeb Bush looking to take the Republican nomination, a conventional Democrat seemed the likely choice to put forward as an opponent. But strange things tend to happen in American politics. Now Bush is running second to a man who is equally as unlikely a choice for President as Sanders but has much worse hair: Donald Trump.

You want to beat a Bush, run a Clinton. You want to beat a bragging uber-capitalist with white supremacist supporters, run a no-frills socialist who marched with Dr. King. It’s the logical choice.

Neither candidate can be bought, but Trump already sold out years ago, or rather became who politicians sell out to.

But it’s Hillary’s Turn!

Photograph by Keith Kissel
Photograph by Keith Kissel via Flickr Creative Commons

Hillary Clinton running as the Democratic candidate has seemed like a foregone conclusion since Obama’s re-election and still does in many ways. The mainstream media still thinks it will be her and you’d better believe party heavyweights and their financial backers still hope it’ll be her as well.

It’s her turn, after all. But then again, it was supposed to be her turn in 2008.

But that’s when a young upstart named Barack Obama came out of nowhere, won the nomination and routed the Republicans in the general election. So the Dems don’t mind backing another horse if that’s where the winds are blowing. But is popular support this time enough for them to deny Hillary a second time?

Winning is One Thing…

Barack Obama offered Hope and Change, which the Dems were fine with. That’s primarily because his change didn’t include changing where the money comes from.

While Obama’s donors included (and Clinton’s include) all the usual suspects from Wall Street, Sanders has unions and individuals supporting him financially. This is one of the reasons true progressives are drawn to him, but it’s also why Democratic Party power brokers will probably shy away.

Photograph by Marc Nozell vie Flickr Creative Commons
Photograph by Marc Nozell vie Flickr Creative Commons

Not only that, he is a democratic socialist and proud to be one. No matter how much Tea Party idiots want to believe it, Obama wasn’t. He’s from the Chicago School of Economics.

So the real question is, can the Democratic establishment put aside their vested financial interests and back a candidate who can win, but on his own terms? Or will they back Hillary at all costs?

Not #RonPaul2016

It may be easy to draw some parallels between Sanders and former upstart candidate Ron Paul. Both decided to run on major party tickets even though they didn’t really fit the party mould, both were hashtag-ready candidacies championed by the internet and both wanted to scale back the US military. Other than that, though, they couldn’t be farther apart.

Sanders isn’t an unconventional Democrat the way Paul was an unconventional Republican. He’s an independent, and has sat in the US House of Representatives and then the US Sentate as one since 1991. But instead of running for President as such like Ralph Nader did, he’s setting himself up to get major party backing and guarantee himself a spot in televised presidential debates.

Photograph by Gage Skidmore via Flickr Creative Commons
Photograph by Gage Skidmore via Flickr Creative Commons

It’s an upstart grassroots campaign amplified online, but with the intelligence of a seasoned pro and a way to win. If the powers-that-be in the Democratic Party don’t want him, just make sure enough independents register as democrats and vote in the primaries. Think of it as people using the Democratic Party as a means to an end instead of corporate donors doing exactly the same thing.

Mix popular appeal, intelligence, a bit of luck, and a horrid opponent together and we may have all the ingredients necessary for Bernie Sanders to become the next President of the United States.

AudioPodcast

Panelists Jerry Gabriel, Cem Ertekin and Drew Bell discuss Just for Laughs and the concept of comedy, a week that could define Barack Obama’s presidency and what it means to be Canadian. Plus the Community Calendar and an interview with Gilbert Gottfried

Host: Jason C. McLean
Producer: Hannah Besseau

 

Panelists

Cem Ertekin: FTB news editor

Jerry Gabriel: FTB contributor

Drew Bell: FTB contributor

Gilbert Gottfried interview by Jerry Gabriel (FULL INTERVIEW AVAILABLE)

FTB PODCAST #7: Gilbert Gottfried, Obama, and O Canada by Forget The Box on Mixcloud

Host: Jason C. McLean
Producer Hannah Besseau

Microphone image: Ernest Duffoo / Flickr Creative Commons

CultureFood & Drunk

We all know Québecers love Florida. But do Miami and Montréal in particular have any kind of bond? A week ago, I would have said no.

But sometimes it pays to rent a car and follow your stomach. The first stop on my namesake quest took me to Schwartz of Miami, a surprising discovery which I discussed last week.

Here’s the rest of the rundown.

Copacabana

IMG_3430

How odd. Here I am in Spring Break Central, a town where 70% of the local population is Spanish-speaking, and a local Google search for Copacabana yields nothing. Meanwhile, I am reminded of the near-legendary status of Montréal’s booty-shaking venue de Maisonneuve Blvd.

I persist. And with some effort, I uncover Boteco Copacabana, a newish Brazilian resto with mixed reviews online. I track it down on foot, landing smack in the middle of Miami Beach’s less-glamorous, tourist-trappy pedestrian street, Espanola Way.

I approach with caution. Visions of our own flamboyant, booming Copa quickly recede as I spot a lonely man played guitar in a front window—Boteco Copacabana’s sole indoor patron.

Sad guitar playing manAnd while the streetside has customers, the food looks sad and the prices outrageous. As much as I’d love to waste $30 of my hard-earned dollars for a lousy plate of chicken, I need to save up for the journey.

Grumpys

Montréal’s Grumpys is a cozy and cavernous joint whose vibe—intentional irony?—is so good-natured that I always stay too long. There’s no Grumpys in Miami, but there is a long-lost-brother: Gramps.

IMG_3529Crusty on the exterior while remaining honest, loveable and addictively fun inside, Gramps is a last remnant of grunge in Miami’s quickly-gentrifying Design District. The city’s de facto dive bar radiates screeching guitars, is housed in a crumbling warehouse, and is even guarded by ZZ Top’s eldest grandson.

Casa del Popolo

It seems like a safe bet: generic Spanish name and all. So imagine my joy when, after a hot thirty minutes on South 22nd Street, I spot Casa Felipe. My joy turnes to disappointment when (instead of a café I could compare with our own) I realize I am approaching a cigar emporium. But then I turn the corner and suddenly, it was all worth it. Thanks, Obama.

Obama smokes a stogie in Miami

Le Cheese Truck

Just outside Gramps, I stumbled upon a southern sibling of Le Cheese Truck. I almost did a double-take! It was called Ms. Cheezious.

IMG_3521Even the down-to-earth dudes who ran it mirror the sweet, bubbly proprietors of Le Cheese. They are super nice and obviously have a loyal following. Sandwiches such as grilled blue and bacon, apple-pulled pork, all sounded tantalizing—if a bit unoriginal to me. Sadly, they are not up to par with our own boys’ endeavour. My “Shaved tavern ham” with spiced apple and sharp cheddar with tomato on sourdough was sloppily satisfying—great for après-bar. But frankly, I was struggling to see why anyone would pay $10 for that when the same price would yield something much more flavourful and original chez Le Truck (such as the chili with cheese curds or their fabulous mac n cheese).

Varadero

In rush-hour-induced moment of contemplation on our two towns, I was struck with the fact that throngs of Montréalers escape to Varadero on a whim while Miamians—whose roots extend far deeper into the country than, uh, Sunwing—have no such luck themselves.

To make up for it, they have places like Varadero II, a run-of-the-mill Cuban bakery somewhere near nowheresville, (I later learn it’s called Tamiami).

IMG_3252

Handing my fate over to the lady behind Varadero‘s counter, I am summarily presented with a pastellito de guyaba. What a revelation. The flaky, unsweetened exterior gives way to muted, silky cheese. All fine and good. But then: the sweetish aftertaste of that mild queso suddenly bleeds—miraculously—into a gooey, ultra-sweet guava jam. Insane! At 75 cents, my blood sugar will be thankful that I won’t be able to find this in Montréal.

But I include this anecdote only to conclude that, subtle bonds aside, Montréal needs more Cuban food. While my stop at this and this Cuban cafeteria were both exceptional, it was that tiny bakery on SW 8th Street that truly tipped the scales.

More Cuban flavours on our frigid streets can only make this a warmer, happier, healthier place.

 

News

I admit it, I don’t know enough about the conflict in Syria to be able to come up with a solution. Neither does Barack Obama.

Sure, his administration has vast resources that can give him a very clear picture of what’s going on, but that still doesn’t mean he knows how to solve the problem. He admits this but is acting anyways, provided congress lets him.

Let’s assume for a second that John Kerry is telling us the truth and Bashar al-Assad did in fact use chemical weapons on his own people (not saying he did). Obama’s proposed surgical strike of his chemical facilities is still an ineffective move that only makes things worse.

Obama Syria 1_0

Imagine your neighbour gets drunk one night and starts beating his wife. You could call the cops, or maybe go and confront him yourself, bang on his door, hit him if you have to and try and get his wife out of the abusive relationship.

All of those are courses of action that may make things better. What Obama is proposing to do in Syria is akin to doing nothing in the moment and then stealing the guy’s beer the next day when he’s unlocking his door.

I think Obama knows this and doesn’t care. This isn’t, after all, about Syria. It’s about the US and his presidency.

Why else would he make such a big deal out of going to congress for approval? It’s something he’s supposed to do anyways and is pretty much a rubber stamp.

He wants everyone to know he’s doing this because he wants people to see that he can get congress to support him on something, anything. He’s dangling the military intervention carrot that will make arms industry funded Republicans swallow their pride and support the President.

He’ll get his war, or rather his limited intervention. Once again, America will flex its military muscle to the world and nothing good will be accomplished.

Syria’s dictator will still be in place and continue to kill. In fact, he’ll probably be even angrier and emboldened after a US attack. The rebels, peaceful protestors at first and now apparently backed by Al Qaida, will fight on and continue to kill as well.

navy syria obama

This situation was brutal before anyone floated the idea of chemical weapons. Taking out the supposed facilities that produce them won’t change that, just like taking away your abusive neighbour’s beer will only piss him off more.

Do I think that a full-scale invasion like what happened in Iraq is the answer? Absolutely not, I was against that war and not out of any love for Saddam.

Going to war and claiming it’s for humanitarian reasons is only justifiable if you do so every time a similar set of circumstances arises and not just when your oil and business interests permit it. There are horrible things happening in Egypt right now, too, sure it’s a very complicated situation, but so is Syria.

On the world stage, the US likes to act like a teacher who punishes schoolyard bullies. Problem is they leave the bullies whose parents donate to the school alone and sometimes even befriend them.

Another problem is they’re not actually a teacher, but rather a bully themselves and have proved this on several occasions. They went through their drunken cowboy phase, learned some big words and like to think of themselves as enlightened, but they’re still the same person.

Whenever another bully moves in on their turf or outdoes their dickishness, they have to put them in their place. This time, though, two other bullies, Russia and China, are friends with the dude America wants to school.

Things could get ugly in the schoolyard of international relations, but things are already ugly on the ground in Syria and can only get worse. If people would think of that first and not the theatre of the schoolyard, then at the very least we wouldn’t make things worse.

NewsPolitics

In Washington and Ottawa, signs of political unwillingness and inaction for Syrian intervention are beginning to show. All signs suggest a concerted misleading effort to end Syria’s civil war are nothing more than empty rhetoric and political shadowboxing.

Following recent UN reports alleging use of chemical warfare in Syria, UN investigator Carla del Ponte claimed the Syrian opposition is likely behind the deadly use of sarin gas. The Obama administration sees it differently. Jay Carney, White House Press Secretary said:

“We are highly skeptical of suggestions that the opposition could have or did use chemical weapons,” he said. “We find it highly likely that any chemical weapon use that has taken place in Syria was done by the Assad regime. And that remains our position.”

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Idol images of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad

It would seem unlikely that del Ponte, a former Chief Prosecutor of the UN War Crimes Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, would cast serious warrantless accusations against the free Syrian army. While moderate opposition factions reject committing atrocities Al-Qaeda operatives in arms with the rebels are  more willingly capable.

Moreover, the situation on the ground is overly exaggerated. Assad is not universally unpopular in Syria as certain secular groups, Alawite and Christians minorities support Assad’s regime, which has protected them from the Suuni majority.

The consternation is that reversing the tide in Syria without a strongman to hold factions together would unleash the floodgate of religious sectarian violence, like in Iraq. Many fear brutal persecution and repression under the Muslim Brotherhood like in Egypt.

Despite contending intelligence, the US remains unwavering in its support for the Syrian rebels. US interests necessitate greater regional alliance following the Arab Spring and decades of US backed dictatorships. Syria, among others, continues to be a US proxy between China, Russia and Iran that are supporting Assad’s regime.

Tehran represents a second Mecca for Shiite Muslims and rising Shiite regional hegemon. Iran’s strategic alliance with Assad, Lebanon, Iraq and other states consolidates an adversarial Shiite Crescent against the Brotherhood’s predominately Sunni centre.

It is unlikely Israel’s air strikes on Syrian targets will bring their American allies into a four-front war to curtail Shiite regional hegemony.

Syrian rebels with a captured Army tank. Image via Freedom House.

Proponents for intervention should err on the side of caution and not expect substantial US involvement. Provided Obama’s past Syrian effort has proven feeble. Particularly last year’s inactivity after discovering mass graves in Aleppo. The atrocity alone constitutes a crime against humanity and justified outside intervention.

Nevertheless, after Obama’s statements, Canada’s Parliament convened yesterday in an emergency session to debate Syria’s situation. In subdued atmosphere, MPs shared few consensus on courses of action. Deepak Obhrai, Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Secretary called for exercising caution and waiting for the civil war to stop before rushing into building Syrian civil society.

NDP Foreign Affairs critic Ève Péclet warned that inaction and undefined action is dangerous for Syrians and blamed Harper’s Government of not renewing support for the UN mission after voting for it. She also remarked that Harper’s failure to secure a seat in the Security Council does not help the situation nor does cutting Canada’s funding to rights and democratic development organizations. She continued to accuse Harper of emphasizing trade with China and Russia over pressuring them to end the Syrian conflict.

Paul Dewar, NDP Foreign Affairs critic, reported that in addition to town-to-town torture, women are being systematically gang raped by a Syrian militia that “insert[s] a live mouse into the woman to destroy any sense of dignity that might have been left for this woman.”

Péclet further explained that rape is used to demoralize Syria’s community and prevent Syrians from speaking out.

Syrian children inherit this trauma. UNICEF now reports 2 million displaced Syrian child refugees. According to Dewar, Damascus has targeted bombs at schools containing children.

Such reports to Ottawa would likely have also been received in Washington. All signs indicate a concerted effort from the Obama-Harper governments to mislead the public into believing that they intend to help end Syria’s civil war.

Péclet words perhaps best summed up last night and two years of political inactivity in Syria: “It is absurd to talk here about Syria without actually doing anything.”

Whatever Washington and Ottawa’s intentions for Syria one should not expect the cat to weep for the dead mice.

NewsPoliticsQuiet Mikes MumblingsSubcategories

This post originally appeared on QuietMike.org and is republished with permission of the author.

Mr. Speaker, the President of the United States

After the familiar introduction, Congress and the American people got a dose of how President Barack Obama intends to govern over the next four years. The president began his second term with a mostly bi-partisan State of the Union Address that liberals should have enjoyed… More or less.

Obama started off by giving examples of how much progress the country has made since he first took office back in 2008. He mentioned the decade of war that is grinding toward its finish, the six million jobs that business has created, the stabilizing housing market and the reduced dependence on foreign oil.

The President went on to talk very little about the recovering economy and the middle class’s role in it, but instead dedicated more of his speech to address the national debt. Referring to the sequester, he made it quite clear that a balanced approach was needed, cuts to Medicare by having the wealthiest seniors pay more, cuts to taxpayer subsidies to prescription drug companies, etc. He also made mention again of raising hundreds of billions of dollars by cutting tax loop holes for the extremely wealthy.

“The greatest nation on Earth cannot keep conducting its business by drifting from one manufactured crisis to the next”

The economic share of his speech was driven by the need for better infrastructure, better schools and the need to invest in high tech jobs. He spoke of the need to push research and development levels to where they were back during the space race. He gave an example of the importance of R & D by saying that every dollar we invested to map the human genome returned $140 to our economy.

Desiline-Victor
102 year old voter Desiline Victor

I would say the most bold (and impressive) part of the economic portion was his desire to raise the minimum wage to $9.00/HR. It would raise the incomes of millions of working families, take families off of federal aid and for businesses it would mean customers with money in their pockets. He even went so far as to say that the minimum wage should be tied to the cost of living.

Obama’s foreign policy serving was shorter than in the past as he mentioned Al Qaeda only briefly. Instead he devoted more time to nuclear proliferation with North Korea testing a nuclear weapon just one day earlier. He also mentioned a national security subject I’ve never heard bought up before as he spoke about cyber security.

“We also know that progress in the most impoverished parts of our world enriches us all. In many places, people live on little more than a dollar a day. So the United States will join with our allies to eradicate such extreme poverty in the next two decades”

Other noteworthy mentions in his speech were a call to have nationwide pre-schools available to all. He spoke about voting rights saying that “we are betraying our ideals” when people are force to wait up to eight hours to vote. Later on he mentioned Desiline Victor, a 102 year old Floridian woman who waited in line for six hours to vote.

The State of the Union is not normally known for drama, but Obama saved the best for last when he spoke about gun violence. Having victims of Newtown, Aurora, even several politicians who’ve been shot present in the gallery, Obama didn’t push his gun views or demand action. Instead, Obama simply asked for democracy, pleading with those in the Senate and the House of Representatives to put each of his gun control laws to a vote.

“Gabby Giffords deserves a vote. The families of Newtown deserve a vote. The families of Aurora deserve a vote. The families of Oak Creek, and Tucson, and Blacksburg, and the countless other communities ripped open by gun violence – they deserve a simple vote.”

Marco Rubio
Marco Rubio

An of observation I had while watching the speech amused me a little. Since Gabby Giffords was shot a couple years ago, the gallery no longer has Republicans sitting on one side and Democrats on the other. Both parties now sit as couples side by side. So when Obama received a standing ovation only from Democrats, the galley looked like a 3-D checker board.

I had it mind to write more in depth about the Republican rebuttal from Conservative up and comer Marco Rubio, but his speech sounded like it was written by a child a couple of years ago. His rebuttal was simply a reaffirmation of conservative on economic ideology, gun control and big government.

Rubio spent parts of his speech talking about how government programs have helped his family. Medicare for his parents, government loans for his schooling, etc. but he then went on to tell us how bad big government is. The talking contradiction attacked President Obama more than his policies and offered nothing new in terms of ideas. The highlight of the rebuttal was him taking a water break.

You can watch the whole 2013 State of the Union speech enhanced by graphics on the White House’s YouTube Channel as well as the Rubio’s Republican response and the Tea Party response on YouTube

NewsPoliticsQuiet Mikes Mumblings

Last Thursday, US President Barack Obama gave a stirring speech on the “Arab Spring” and America’s policies toward it. Unfortunately the only part of it that made headlines was his comment calling for any peace deal between Israel and Palestine to be based on the 1967 borders. His annotations angered Zionists, Republicans, right wing Jews and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

What Obama said however was nothing new; negotiations based on the lines of 1967 have been going on since the 1970s, in fact Bill Clinton pushed for such a deal at Camp David eleven years ago. The idea of land swaps also mentioned in Obama’s speech is again nothing new, but it seemed to be lost on everyone.

Land swaps are the key to any deal of course; the West Bank has been dotted with so many Israeli settlements  over the years that Israel has made it virtually impossible for any deal to be made based solely on the 1967 borders.  No Palestinian would agree to exchange a big meaty steak for only the fat in return. That means any deal would not only include the same amount of land, but the same amount of fertile land.

I believe, as do many, that Obama’s comments regarding the Palestinian/Israeli issue had more than one objective. While Obama was trying to restart peace negotiations, he was also trying to dissuade Palestinian officials led by President Mahmoud Abbas from going to the United Nations in September to seek statehood. Statehood was promised to the Palestinians by the UN back in 1947 when the Palestine territory was partitioned to make way for the state of Israel alongside it.

1967 borders and the borders of today

The day after Obama’s Arab Spring speech, Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that “A peace based on illusions will crash upon the rocks of Middle Eastern reality… I think for peace the Palestinians will have to accept some basic realities.” He said that a return to those borders was impossible because the region had seen “demographic changes”. He argued the 1967 borders were “indefensible.”

Netanyahu’s statement completely destroyed Obama’s second intention. The following day, Nabil Shaath, an aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said “Of course we will go to the United Nations, especially after Netanyahu used the old pretext that he needs ‘defensible borders’ to keep stealing our land, control the Jordan Valley and create demographic facts on the ground.”

On Sunday, Speaking to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (America’s largest pro-Israel lobby) Obama said that while U.S. support for Israel remains ironclad, we cannot afford to wait decades to achieve peace. The President gave this speech only hours after Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak had approved the construction of 294 new homes in the occupied West Bank and construction began on two thousand others.

Obama was quick to mention Israel faced the threat of attack from Hamas rockets launched from Gaza and that a recent agreement between Hamas and Fatah “poses an enormous obstacle to peace.” Of course he failed to mention the main reason that peace talks are lifeless in the first place: the continued construction of settlements on occupied land.

I liked Obama’s speeches and was in fair agreement with them, but it remains my opinion that the United States will never be able to successfully broker a peace agreement so long as the President remains under the influence of the Pro-Israeli Lobby. A successful negotiator must be able to talk tough and act tough to both sides otherwise no one listens.

Follow Quiet Mike on Twitter: MWeishar

PoliticsQuiet Mikes Mumblings

The overall results of this past Tuesday’s US midterm elections were no shocker to anyone. The Republicans were expected to win back the House of Representatives by a wide margin and they did just that. It was the largest Republican gain of seats since FDR in 1938 (they gained 70), even more than Bill Clinton lost after his first two years in office (about 60). The Democrats were also expected to lose ground in the senate, but retain their majority; they did just that as well. To find the real news, we must dig a little deeper.

The Bad

Let’s start with the bad news. Given my position as a progressive, I find there are more things awful that’s come out of these elections than anything. Barrack Obama’s first two years in office were two of the busiest legislative years in several generations, still voters were unhappy. Conservatives believed he did way too much, liberals think he did too little. With the republican policy of filibuster anything (or “no you can’t”) I’m surprised Democrats got as much done as they did.

John Boehner: House Majority Leader & spokesman for orange faced people everywhere

However, now that the Democrats have lost control of the House of Representatives, I think it’s going to be next to impossible for Obama to get anything done, short of cutting taxes of course. House speaker-in-waiting Rep. John Boehner said the day after the election that Republicans will use their new majority to seek a “smaller, less costly and more accountable government,” He also vowed to repeal Barrack Obama’s health care bill that passed this past year. So Obama’s aim to move forward on gay rights, re-taxing the rich, environmental issues and other important legislation will no doubt be halted by the Republican’s uncompromising goal of turning back time. Somehow I imagine they’ll meet somewhere in the middle with nothing getting done at all.

Money played an important roll on Tuesday thanks to the Supreme Court’s landmark “Citizen United” decision. Out of the 74 contests in which power changed hands, outside spending profited the winner in 58 races. In fact, winning candidates received on average $764,326 compared to $273,268 for the losing candidates, proving once again that elections can be bought. Even worse, about 60 percent of the outside funds in this election came from undisclosed sources. In other words, we have no idea who bought the elections. With results like these, you can bet it’s going to get much worse in elections to come.

One other note on the bad/sad side was the defeat of Proposition 19, a law that would have brought the legalization and taxation of marijuana in California. Looks like the kids were too stoned to get to the voting booths.

The Ugly

Tea Party candidates were successful in winning about thirty seats in the House of Representatives and a few in the Senate as well. The worst of which is Michele Bachmann, the gay hating, global warming denying, mamma grizzly/dragon lady congresswoman from Minnesota. The scary thing is, if you compare her policies to that of the other 30+ Tea Party winners, there is not much difference.

Russ Feingold. The only man to vote against the Patriot Act

The ugliest loss on Tuesday in my opinion was that of Wisconsin Democrat incumbent Russ Feingold. Feingold was probably the most liberal progressive senator in the senate. He was one of only 28 senators to vote against President Bush’s Iraq War and the only senator out of a hundred that voted against the USA Patriot Act. Feingold was defeated by Republican Ron Johnson, a Tea Party associate who thinks global warming is “lunacy”, opposes gay marriage, abortion and stem cell research. In addition, he was disappointed that the Obama administration went after BP following the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Feingold lost by almost 5% of the vote.

The Good

Believe it or not, there were a lot of positives that came out of Tuesday’s Democrat thrashing. The first being the victory of senate majority leader Harry Reid over Tea Bagger and Sarah Palin puppy Sharron Angle in Nevada, a contest that was predicted to go the other way. Another bright spot was the burning of the witch, Delaware Republican Senate nominee Christine O’Donnell was burned alive by Democrat Chris Coons who won by about 20% of the vote. Actually, I think O’Donnell burned herself about a day after the campaign started.

The Former WWE CEO with her Employees in the Background

Then there is good old Republican Linda McMahon of Connecticut, the former CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment who got pile driven into the ground by Richard Blumenthal. McMahon spent about 50 million dollars of her own money for her campaign and still lost big. To be honest, I secretly followed her campaign in hopes of seeing someone smash a chair over her head. Maybe, had that happened she might have won.

In all seriousness, the biggest blessing in disguise for poor Obama is ironically the Democrats mass defeat. Just like Bill Clinton and FDR, every time the democrats receive a thumping of this magnitude the unexpected always seems to happen… they get re-elected!