Claire, thank you for your response. I agree that you have stated your view of Trump as utterly unsuited to be president. Many times.
My point is a tactical one; if we don’t want Trump to win ( and yes, I do recognize that we agree on that point), we need to mute our critiques of Biden and not allow our (I.e. your) legitimate critiques of his shortcomings be used as ammo to weaken him on Election Day.
I am not convince that WWIII has begun. I have long believed that most of us will never know when it has begun because we will not live long enough for that realization to dawn on us before we are vaporized. However that is a quibble; whether Ukraine is Prologue or Chapter One of that sad saga remains to be seen.
The interesting thing here isn't Biden v Trump. The interesting thing is that what you are proposing, in substance, is that we prepare in earnest for an immediate four-front world war. Your own despair about the ignorance of the citizenry and the prospects of making deterrence meaningful strongly suggest that we actually need to be prepared for (1) unambiguous support for Israel in the eviction of the Palestinians from Gaza, (2) U.S. boots on the ground in Iran (and since it is a big geography and 86 million people, many of whom may want to be rid of the mullahs but will have views on national pride that excoriate a perceived invader, we had better be prepared for a couple of million men at least at first and a very long occupation), (3) readiness for the defense of Ukraine on the basis of indifference to a possible Russian nuclear threat and the seemingly inevitable outcome of U.S. boots on the ground as if Ukraine were already in NATO and (4) a much larger naval presence in the South China Sea and in and around Taiwan, coupled with a clear communication that Taiwan is under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. If this is an unfair caricature of the policy you are recommending, then please explain what, alternatively, you ARE proposing. It is in my view entirely fair to make these proposals (which essentially require moving the economy to a war footing, a tripling of defense spending as a percentage of GDP and conscription to address manpower shortages in the armed forces - again, if you think this is an unfair characterization, I stand to be corrected). But if this is what Biden should be doing in order not to appear weak and incompetent, and what any presidential candidate of any party needs to be doing in order to be competent in foreign affairs, I think you should say so plainly. Now, instinctively I sort-of sympathize with this viewpoint. But advocates of it have to specifically grapple, via persuasion strategies, not lamentation, that none of the four theatres described above, if the relevant issues were determined adversely to the U.S., presents a direct security threat to business as usual (as opposed to theoretical maximum international freedom of action) in the 50 U.S. states or, for the most part, to our traditional pre-1991 western European allies or even Japan or South Korea. Also to address (1) why America should be prepared to shed blood on a basis not seen since World War II (hint - deterrence isn't an answer - regime change in Iran requires U.S. boots on the ground, and maybe so does the eviction of the Russians from Donetsk and Yuhkansk) in the current threat environment and (2) why, after Iraq, the American public should believe we have anywhere close to the ability to do any of this. And the main obstacle to defense spending at 10% of annual GDP for a sustained period isn't dopes who don't know who their governors are, it is rich people who are voting for Trump, or a river rock, to keep their taxes low, and have clocked that an aggressive/deterrence 1950s-style foreign policy requires 1950s-level taxes. How do you propose to get around that problem? Honestly, not trying to be snarky - just trying to figure out how all this transcends into action given current American political realities.
Very interesting, but I will still be voting Trump not Biden.
I agree with much of what you say about Trump, but I have two problems with your approach here. First of all, much of the weight of this essay rests on a single historical analogy (and it happens to be the one used all the time to inspire visceral fears about Trump). I think historical analogies are always very dubious and tricky. Using the term "World War III" for what we are in now as compared to "World War II" then, Biden now for Baldwin then, etc., slides over the enormous differences between the two eras, the two United States, the two international contexts and crises, the two presidents.
Secondly, you do not have much to say about the many aspects of the Biden administration that most worry me and that lead me to see him AND HIS PARTY IN GENERAL as a dire threat to us all. His acceptance and embrace of the erosion of education (both higher and K-12) under the onslaughts of profoundly anti-intellectual DEI-shaped ideologies, ideologies that work against the instilling of intelligent and committed patriotism. His erosion of our fossil fuel-based energy independence and promotion of green technologies based on an insane exaggeration of the actual findings of climate science (which heightens our dependence on China as well). His indifference to the looming debt crisis we face. ALL of these things directly undercut our nation's ability to lead internationally. I fully realize Trump is a gamble. I do not think voting for Biden and what he facilitates at this point is a gamble.
Jonathan, the rate at which glaciers are disappearing is high and has accelerated. No matter what you have read on the subject of climate science ( and I hasten to say that I am never a climatologist nor an enviro-activist type guy), this fact alone should give you pause: each year the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets lose 420 Billion tons of water due to ocean warming. Surely you do not believe this doesn’t have serious long-term impacts on our climate and sea levels (chttps://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/ice-sheets/?intent=121#:~:text=Key%20Takeaway%3A,adding%20to%20sea%20level%20rise).
We are past the point of being able to stop the warming, at best we can only slow it down and buy time for mitigation efforts.
Before Trump, I was a lifelong Republican. I still believe in most conservative principles, and if this was an election between a normal Republican and Biden. I'd likely be voting Republican. But it is not. Presidents have much less power than the public believes on most domestic issues, but are basically king on foreign policy. Trump's foreign policy as Claire demonstrates is dangerous.
Education: Only 8% of education spending is spent by the federal government. That's consistent with conservative principles of local government. Do you think DEI has gone too far? I agree. However, neither Biden nor Trump can do much about it. Harvard and Yale are private; the president, the board of trustees, and the alumni decide the policy. State universities are primarily controlled by Trustees, governors, and state legislators. A. The President controls a modest amount of funding, but any big changes like Title IX require congressional approval.
Deficit spending: This century Republican have been as bad as Democrat regarding spending. Trump doesn't even pay lip service to reducing spending. The deficit was bigger under Biden than Trump
Energy: First, fossil fuel production is at record under Biden. The US is the largest oil producer in the world, and the 4th largest exporter. We'll agree to disagree about climate change. But, we don't need more fossil fuel production. we need more renewable energy production, not just for the environment but to save Americans and American business money!
Ten years ago, I put a Solar PV system on my house, spent $12,000, and got an early Tesla. Since then, my combined gasoline and electricity have been $25-$50 monthly, and since I got a Model 3, it has been $25/month, which is the minimum. I don't care how many oil and gas wells we drill; we are not getting to a $25/month energy bill without renewables. But we need to make an investment today to save Americans money in the future.
Clif, you reference America’s indebtedness, which has risen dramatically in both dollars and as percent of GDP. Discussing all the pros and cons of deficit spending is too complex for a non economist to expound on in this forum, so I’m going to save us both some eye strain and just say that imho there are few things more dear to a politician’s heart than public works projects, but that should not be taken as meaning that they or the debt they incur are necessarily boondoggles. There is “good debt” just as there are good investments. Is Joe Biden’s infrastructure spending a good investment? Only time will tell.
I do not find this very convincing. The percentage of federal education spending is not a true measure of the impact of the Biden Education Department's embrace of DEI and affirmative action and the hideous distortion of Title IX's original purpose. Also, its uncritical embrace of the teachers' unions that disgraced themselves especially with their exploitation of COVID to make ridiculous demands, keep schools open destructively and divert billions of funds, all the while presiding over assaults on merit that are reflected in America's abysmal test scores. The Ed budget percentage does not measure the degree to which this administration has failed to challenge the triumph of ideology over academic rigor in the most elite of our universities, as well as the deepening influence of Qatar, China, and other adversaries in distorting campus culture. These are ALL things vital to the restoration of American success internationally.
As to the deficits, yes, Republicans have not been any real check, but the gobs of trillions of spending under Biden have radically increased the looming crisis. Interest payments on the debt recently surpassed spending on defense and Medicare, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. I see NO prospect of turning this around if Biden and or his successor Democrats retain power.
As to energy, the increases in fossil fuel production are due to significant technological improvements, and are in spite of restrictions of drilling, etc. As to renewables, I am glad you personally have benefited from the enormous subsidizing of wind and solar and the key role China plays in supplying us with panels and with all the minerals we will never mine ourselves for EV batteries. But you are dead wrong if you think solar and wind will save America money overall. Intermittency means they impose ADDED pressure on fossil fuel-based backup production and that is nothing now as compared with what will be needed if the US actually tries to achieve the rapid transition Biden's people envision. Solar and wind for all that subsidizing have not reduced fossil fuel dependency. And Germany is a good warning of how unlikely it is that it ever will. In any case, if the US were to go to absolute zero greenhouse gas emissions, its impact on warming by the IPCC's own ways of estimating this would be infinitesimally small (in the hundredths or thousandths of a degree) given the way China is building coal fired plants and along with India and much of the poorer nations who are not likely to impoverish themselves further to achieve the reductions the energy rich nations pretend to want. Meanwhile the billions subsidizing Biden's green delusions do NOT create jobs or add to US production since they are in fact a diversion and substitution resulting in reduced production elsewhere. All of this restricts US ability to lead in a dangerous world.
In conclusion, I go with the gamble that Trump will do better. Will he? I wouldn't bet much on that, but I will bet enough on it, and we will see.
He wants to violate the Posse Comitatus Act to go door to door to put at least 11 million people in detention camps. He has directly and personally engineered a world in which women having miscarriages will be subject to police investigations, treatment for ectopic pregnancies will be unavailable in most states and contraception will cease to be freely available. He will engineer a further series of judicial appointments which will in effect repeal the 20th century on its way to eviscerating the robust protection of minority rights, which, perhaps paradoxically, is the greatest achievement of our democratic republic in its evolution since the Great Depression and the Second World War. This is before we get to the core question of national security which ought to be at the heart of what you are driving at, viz., who is the most responsible custodian of America's 1800 immediately launchable (and 3700 additional short-term launchable) nuclear warheads. Even a weak man with conventional views is immeasurably better than an outer-borough insult comedian who fantasizes he is a mob boss. The case of Fritz Thyssen is interesting and illustrative for those who do not think they are personally at risk in a second (indefinite?) Trump regime.
Ok, I renewed my subscription after reading this piece, which is excellent, although I remain unconvinced that a second Trump term would be worse than Biden's first. Biden has proven to be incompetent in both his foreign and domestic policy, to the extent that he has coherent policies at all. As for re-electing Biden, I think many of the people who voted for him feel deceived - they thought they were getting a centrist politician who would avoid the erratic nuttiness and rancor that characterized Trump's first term. Instead we got an unprincipled toady of the left masquerading as your nice Uncle Joe. So It appears we will have two candidates on the ballot this November: really bad and even worse than that. Take your pick as to who is who.
Thank you for renewing your subscription. Thank you very much.
For some reason, writing this particular essay caused me to sweat blood. I don't know why. Sometimes it's easy for me to write very fluently without overmuch effort. Some of my best-known essays (like the one about #MeToo) are not much more than indignant Facebook posts that I dashed off without thinking twice about them. But sometimes, I labor over a paragraph for days, never feeling that I've quite got it, resolving every morning to get the thing sorted out but feeling, by the day's end, that everything I've written is stupid. It puts me in a terrible mood. This essay was the latter kind. Perhaps it's because I find the topic so deeply painful.
So I'm very, very glad that you thought this was worthwhile. Even after I pressed "send," I was still unsure. This one was unusually hard. It left me kind of wrung out and depressed to write it, because by the time I'd finished, I'd thought about it carefully enough to be pretty sure I'm right--we're in a world of trouble with no relief in sight.
It was a good article, particularly the excerpts showing how little the American public knows American history. I once had a secretary who supported the Democratic Party because, she insisted, they freed the slaves.
When I hear someone talk about the war here and the war there and the war somewhere else, I am reminded of the scene in "The Exorcist" when the old priest (the exorcist) first shows up, and the young priest (the psychiatrist) starts to say something like, "I've observed three different personalities . . ." and the old priest cuts him off and says, "There is only one personality," to wit, the Devil's.
Similarly, I don't see a war here and a war there and a war somewhere else. I see one war: the war on Western civilization.
And by Western civilization, I don't mean Greco-Roman / Judeo-Christian, as it tended to be used when I was growing up. That would preclude South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and a few others. No, I mean a civilization based largely on Enlightenment values: democracy, individual freedoms, separation of church and state, and so on.
Not that I think Russia, China, Iran, North Korea have anything like a pact, but they do all have—in Zbigniew Brzezinski's words—complimentary grievances against the west in general, and the U.S. in particular.
Of them all, I view Russia as the most dangerous (see: "The Foundations of Geopolitics: The Geopolitical Future of Russia"). Both China and Iran have centuries-old civilizations, and that counts for something. But Russia, somewhat like Saudi Arabia, is a relatively new kid on the block with few appreciable qualities except a warped sense of self and huge assets underground.
More than anything else, Russia must be beaten. Donald Trump is not the person to do that. Joe Biden, for all his flaws, is the better choice here.
Apart from your main point here, I do find this statement somewhat amusing:
"But Russia, somewhat like Saudi Arabia, is a relatively new kid on the block with few appreciable qualities except a warped sense of self and huge assets underground."
For a "new kid on the block," Russia was in its 14th year of the reign of Catherine the Great when the U.S. was born, and her Romanov line had taken over from the Rurikids in 1613 before the Mayflower sailed. The Rurikids began their rule in 862. So, who's the new kid, eh?
You made a neat riposte to Rick’s off the cuff “ new kid” assertion.That tells me you take an interest in history, which makes it all the more puzzling that you conclude that a second Trump administration would not be a disaster for America and the world.
A nicely written piece. I do think that you're underrating the current generation of Americans (and/or overrating previous generations), though. It's easy to get frustrated by people making irrational choices and believing in bizarre fictions about the world, but we know from extensive published research (not to mention from reading history) that this is essentially how the human mind works - we are not rational creatures, we are social creatures wired to mostly make decisions and buy into narratives that bring us favour/status within our social group(s). The rational bit mostly comes afterwards if justification is required. We can all see this when others do it, but seeing it in oneself, let alone learning to break out of the pattern, is one of the hardest things that a normally socialised human can do. In a society where the divisions are as strong as they are currently in the US (and many other parts of the world, unfortunately), it becomes even harder.
The comparison with inter-war Britain is interesting. Even from this distance it's not completely clear whether Baldwin did the right thing - could more lives have been saved had he been firmer earlier (I doubt war could have been completely avoided), or would it merely have encouraged anti-war sentiment and ushered in an alternative government that would have done even less? I have always believed that Biden has been too weak in his support for Ukraine, but I sympathise with his position - like Baldwin he's looking for the least worst path to follow, and very afraid of getting it wrong. It's also worth remembering that even Churchill wasn't completely sure that the British public had the stomach for a long war.
When it comes to Israel/Palestine it seems like the US' administration's options, in order of preference, are:
1 - Do and say nothing;
2 - Affirm in word and funds that Israel has the right to defend itself;
3 - Engage in talks about things like the Two State Solution, which is essentially doing nothing but with sound and motion, while doubling down on option 2.
Those are the three options. I can't see any others.
Speaking of bribes: imo what the Iranian regime wants, even more than killing people, is to be unthreatened from abroad and for the country to be prosperous (so that they're unthreatened from within). Both of these lie within the US' power to give (or rather to stop denying) but I don't think the US is able to do so due to its own domestic politics. Actually occupying Iran doesn't seem feasible. So that leaves 'do nothing', which is a pity. It's been more than forty years since the Islamic Revolution and the hostage crisis (and 60 years since coup that returned the Shah to power) but these events still seem to rule how the US and Iran perceive and deal with each other.
Claire suggests that it’s a gross exaggeration to say that Trump would be far better for Israel than Biden has been. Surprisingly she neglects to mention that in his first term Trump recognized West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, he personally visited the Western Wall, he recognized the Golan Heights as a sovereign part of Israel and he defunded the UNRWA and the Palestinian Authority. Prior to Trump’s election, all of this was considered so heretical as to be taboo. Trump was right; the type of establishment politician that Claire yearns for were proven wrong.
Trump also produced a detailed plan for a two-state solution. No American President had ever done that. Trump even convinced a very reluctant Bibi Netanyahu to agree to negotiate on the basis of the plan produced by his son-in-law. The Palestinians not only refused to negotiate using the plan as a starting point, they cut off all communications with the United States.
In concluding that Biden would be better for Israel than Trump would (ostensibly because Biden would be better for the United States than Trump) Claire completely ignored the fact that the Trump Administration did more for Israel than any Administration since Harry Truman was President. She also refused to acknowledge that the Trump Administration was more entrepreneurial when it came to the Middle East than any administration in the past 50 years with the possible exception of the Clinton Administration.
It’s a bit arrogant for Claire to think that she’s better enlightened about what’s good for Israel than the Israelis themselves are. The vast majority of Israelis from the Prime Minister on down would far prefer that Trump is elected than Biden. Do you really think you’re in a better position, Claire, than Israelis are to decide which American President would be better for them?
In her essay, Claire also mentions the fact that Trump refused to come to the defense of Saudi Arabia when they were bombed by Iran. She’s right about that. But despite this, MBS despises Joe Biden. The American President relentlessly criticized the Saudi ruler when he was running for President and during the first two years of his Presidency. MBS had an excellent relationship with Trump and if press reports are accurate, had a genuine friendship with Trump’s son in law. That would be the same son in law who was widely ridiculed by the Democratic foreign policy establishment that accomplished little to nothing over the previous 16 years.
Claire, do you think you have a better idea about what’s good for the Saudis than the Saudi ruler does? Who do you think MBS hopes will win the next American election, Joe Biden or Donald Trump?
There's much to say in response, but I'll let others do it. I'll just address one point.
"It’s a bit arrogant for Claire to think that she’s better enlightened about what’s good for Israel than the Israelis themselves are. The vast majority of Israelis from the Prime Minister on down would far prefer that Trump is elected than Biden. Do you really think you’re in a better position, Claire, than Israelis are to decide which American President would be better for them?"
This is false. No poll I've seen shows a "vast majority"of Israelis "far preferring" Trump to Biden. The polling tends to vary widely, but here are some recent reports. I've not closely looked at the sample size or methodology, and none assessed the intensity of the preference:
July 11, 2022: https://www.jns.org/plurality-of-israelis-say-interests-better-served-by-trump-than-biden/ ... "Overall, 37% said a Trump presidency would be better for the Jewish state, compared to 29% for a second term for President Joe Biden. Among Jewish Israelis, 42.5% prefer Trump versus 32% for Biden. Among Arab Israelis, a large majority (68%) said there was no difference between the two, 13% preferred Trump and 14% said Biden would be better. There were sharp divisions across the political lines, with those on the left heavily favoring Biden (9% to 78%), the center somewhat supporting him (23% to 48%) and the right heavily favoring Trump (61% to 13%)."
December 23, 2023: https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-major-shift-survey-finds-israelis-prefer-biden-to-trump-as-next-us-president/ ... "Forty percent of Jewish Israelis want US President Joe Biden to be reelected in the 2024 presidential election, compared to just 26.2% who back Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, a poll conducted on Wednesday found. The results of the poll indicated a massive swing in Israelis’ support for the current president, who has made a series of gestures to the Jewish state since the Hamas onslaught of October 7 while his predecessor has spent time at rallies mocking the intelligence failure that led to the devastating attack and criticizing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. ... The results appeared to represent an extremely rare instance — the first in at least two decades — in which the Israeli public favors a Democratic presidential candidate over a Republican."
March 13, 2024 https://allisrael.com/poll-44-30-israelis-want-trump-over-biden-as-next-us-president ... In Israel, 44% of poll respondents said they prefer Trump to defeat Biden while 33% prefer Biden and 26% replied they were unsure. The margin soared polling current Israeli government supporters versus those in opposition. Among the respondents who voted for the government, 72% said they prefer Trump over Biden, while only 8% want Biden to win. Among voters opposing Netanyahu's government, 55% want Biden and 23% prefer Trump.
In no poll does Trump receive a majority, let alone a vast one. The majority, in all polls, say "Biden" or "not sure."
But assuming you'd been correct and a "vast majority" of Israelis "far preferred" Trump, it would not be arrogant for me to believe I'm in a better position than most Israelis to decide which American President would be better for them: It would be entirely reasonable. Although some Israelis speak excellent English, only 15 percent have high-level proficiency: Israel is a "low proficiency" country, according to TOEFL rankings, on par with Ethiopia and Nepal. Some 30 percent of the country is unable to carry out even a basic conversation in English. Probably 75 percent have no idea how the US government works or what US presidents do and don't have the power to do. I, on the other hand, am a fluent, native English speaker who grew up in the US. I have a very deep knowledge of US foreign policy. I also have a doctorate from Oxford on the *very subject* of US foreign policy formation toward Israel and its adversaries. Assessing American presidents' policies toward Israel is my academic speciality--I've spent more of my life studying this, I assume, than all but a handful of Israelis. I've been aware of Trump since the 1980s--and I've always been able to understand every word he says--and I've been *very* closely following the details of Donald Trump's official and unofficial foreign policy statements and achievements since he first took office: That's my day job. I do it all day long.
So no, I don't think it's arrogant for me to assume that I have a *much* better grasp on the way American presidents are apt to behave toward Israel than most Israelis do, given that most Israelis have day jobs and families. It would be exceedingly strange if I didn't.
The polls that you cited show a significant edge for Trump. Maybe “vast” is an exaggeration but it is clear from the surveys that you mentioned that far more Israelis prefer Trump to Biden.
Are you really suggesting that Israelis don’t know what’s good for them because most are not fluent in English? What could be more arrogant than that? As you know, Israelis are amongst the most literate people in the world. Per capita, they place near the top in terms of book purchases. I suspect they’re pretty good at figuring out where their bread is buttered.
As for the Oxford degree you’ve achieved that’s pretty impressive I guess. The reality is that educated elites are responsible for many of the problems we are facing in the world. In fact, a significant cadre of American foreign policy experts have credentials almost as impressive as yours. Look at what a mess they’ve made of the world.
A big reason for the turn towards populism in the United States is that the economic system favored by highly educated people has turned out to be disastrous for working class people.
Americans are not turning against globalism or a muscular American approach to world affairs. They are turning against the neoliberal economic policies that most globalists cling to.
Would you like to make a small wager, WigWag? Come up with a list of ten factual questions about what Biden and Trump have done and said in the past decade that would be relevant to Israelis as they seek to assess which president would better serve their interests. I'll let you choose the questions. Then let's find ten random Israelis on the Internet--ideally, we'd do this as "random people on the street," but that's not possible, so we'll choose ten Israelis from some random, non-political Facebook group, like "Israeli knitting enthusiasts."
See how they do. I'll bet you a small sum that you'll come away from the experience thinking, "I must concede that Claire understands who Trump and Biden are quite a bit better than the average Israeli."
Sounds like fun as long as you do most of the work. I’ll come up with the ten questions if you figure out who the ten random subjects are.
I’m no Oxford Ph.D. so I can’t comment on whether this sample size is statistically significant or whether the survey has any predictive power. There’s also the issue of whether Facebook or any social media site can truly produce a random target audience. The 15 percent of the Israeli population that’s ultra-Orthodox will be mostly excluded because most won’t use social media. But who cares, let’s throw caution to the wind.
It’s Memorial Day weekend and I’m on grill patrol today and tomorrow so it may take me a day or so to come up with the questions. You’ll be glad to know that most of my friends and family will be voting for Biden. We don’t talk politics at our barbecues because I’ve always thought that working to enhance the relationship was more important than striving to win the argument.
How about if I give you the questions right here no later than the beginning of next week.
If you win, I’ll buy a CG guest membership for one of your readers. If I win, you just have to publicly announce that I was right and nominate me for a doctorate from Oxford honoras causa.
(1) Which American Administration was more supportive of Israel, the Obama/Biden Administration or the Trump/Pence Administration?
(2) Which American Administration was more supportive of Israel, the Trump/Pence Administration or the Biden/Harris Administration?
(3) In 2017, reversing decades of American policy, President Trump recognized Jerusalem as the Capital of Israel. Do you support this decision? Do you think that it is a decision Biden would have made had he been President at the time?
(4) In December 2016, about one month before Trump was inaugurated, the Obama/Biden Administration failed to veto Security Council Resolution 2334 which condemned Israeli settlements in both the West Bank and Jerusalem. This major rebuke of Israel and its settlement policy was unprecedented and because of the U.S. abstention, the resolution passed 14-0. Do you support the decision of the Obama/Biden Administration to abstain and do you think Trump would have vetoed the resolution?
(5) In March, 2019, President Trump issued a proclamation that recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. Was this a good decision or a bad decision? Do you believe that President Biden would have made the same decision had he been President in 2019?
(6) In January, 2020, President Trump ordered the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the Commander of the Iranian Quds Force. Do you believe that President Trump’s decision was wise and do you think Joe Biden would have made the same decision had he been President at the time?
(7) Which American Ambassador to Israel was more supportive of Israel, David Friedman, the Ambassador appointed by President Trump or Jack Lew, the current American Ambassador to Israel appointed by President Biden?
(8) President Obama’s Secretary of State, John Kerry, negotiated the JCPOA with Iran. In return for Iranian nuclear concessions the agreement provided Iran with substantial sanctions relief. Trump abrogated the agreement and imposed severe sanctions on Iran. President Biden loosened the sanctions regime which resulted in billions of dollars flowing to Iran. Credible claims have been made that Iran spent some of these funds on supporting Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Was Biden right or wrong to loosen the Trump sanctions?
(9) In response to Israel’s decision to seek the destruction of Hamas by attacking Rafah, President Biden has paused the sale of specific military hardware to Israel. Was this a good decision or a bad decision? Do you believe President Trump would have made the same decision had he been the current American President?
(10) In the wake of the war in Gaza initiated by Hamas on October 7th, President Biden is pressuring Israel to take steps towards affirming the creation of a Palestinian State. Do you support or oppose this approach at the current time? Do you think President Trump would be pressuring Israel under these circumstances?
Bonus question for extra credit: Both Joe Biden and Donald Trump have Jewish grandchildren. One of them has a granddaughter who will be celebrating her bat mitzvah next year and a grandson who will be celebrating his bar mitzvah in 2027. Is that candidate Joe Biden or Donald Trump?
Claire, let me propose new terms for our friendly wager. If you win, I will purchase a gift subscription for the reader of your choice. If I win, I can’t have you writing to the head of Oxford suggesting that he grant a doctorate honoris causa to some guy named WigWag. You would look too silly.
Instead, try this on for size. If I win, you agree to write and publish at CG an essay on the topic of my choice. To be honest, all of the talk about Ukraine, Israel and the upcoming election is getting a bit boring. It puts me in mind of the old adage “everything has been said, but not everyone has said it.”
I fondly remember the old days where you regaled your loyal readers with essays on topics as diverse as COVID, the wonders of the French healthcare system and even the impact of social media on brain waves (that was Adam Garfinkle).
If I win, the topic I will ask you to write about is the following: “Is the impact of the many manifestations of modern feminism a net positive or a net negative for American women. Is it a net positive or a net negative for contemporary American society.
"It’s Memorial Day weekend and I’m on grill patrol today and tomorrow so it may take me a day or so to come up with the questions. You’ll be glad to know that most of my friends and family will be voting for Biden. We don’t talk politics at our barbecues because I’ve always thought that working to enhance the relationship was more important than striving to win the argument."
Well stated throughout your paragraph - but its final sentence is, appropriately, < chef's kiss >!
In her entirely accurate enumeration of the options for dealing with the Iranian nuclear program Claire says,
“Recall, too, that Iran has seeded Europe and the US with its terrorist operatives. We should firmly expect that this strategy would be extremely costly.”
That’s true, but Claire neglects to mention something extremely important. Many, perhaps even most, of those Iranian sleeper cells awaiting their orders from Tehran entered the United States through a porous southern border that was mostly closed under President Trump but for the past three years has been wide open. Iranian terrorists, Chinese spies, Russian operatives, narcotics merchants have all been able to enter the United States unimpeded because Biden opened the border that Trump closed.
If there’s ever a terrorist attack in the United States inspired by Iran, it will likely be attributable to terrorists who entered our country because of the policies of Joe Biden.
Isn’t it delusional to think that Biden has been a better President than Trump was?
Hey Wig Wag did you go to the Trump rally in the South Bronx near where you live with gangsta rappers Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow. What do you think Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow's opinion of the Israeli Palestinian conflict is? Are going to join the 8 Trey Crips gang or are you only interested in the smaller affiliated 9 Ways gang? Have you found out if new members of the gang get a complementary golden semi automatic rifle or do the only get a golden handgun?
I watched some of the rally on YouTube. I noticed the same thing that several reporters who covered the event noticed; it was remarkably diverse. It was multiethnic and multiracial. The event was attended by numerous Asians, Hispanics, African Americans and Whites.
Typically, the only thing more segregated than church attendance in the United States are political rallies. If you look at Biden rallies (to the extent that he can inspire more than 100 people to show up) the crowd is usually all White or all Black. Trump rallies are more racially diverse but not especially racially diverse. The South Bronx rally was an exception.
This shouldn’t be surprising. All of the polling data shows Blacks and Hispanics abandoning Biden in droves. It won’t be enough to turn New York from blue to red, but it just might be enough to turn Pennsylvania from purple to red depending on the turnout in Philadelphia. The same thing is true in Georgia and Nevada.
The Blacks and Hispanics abandoning Biden in favor of Trump are not Republicans and they never will be; they’re MAGA. Like tens of millions of working class people, they understand that Trump’s policies are better for them than Biden’s policies.
Claire constantly bemoans the rise of MAGA in the United States and similar movements in Europe (and India) but she doesn’t appear curious enough to try and understand why this is happening.
The obvious answer is that the type of politician (whether Democratic or Republican) that she supports has favored neo-liberal economic policies that have eviscerated the financial security of the working class while enriching college educated elites. These same establishment politicians are interventionist-globalists. In fact, their neo-liberal economic policies are intricately and intimately intertwined with their globalism.
Claire is wrong to believe that most Americans have become isolationists. The reality is that most Americans just don’t care about foreign policy one way or the other. American voters of all races and ethnicities who are abandoning establishment Democrats and Republicans in favor of Trump aren’t doing so because they hate American interventionism, they’re doing so because they hate rampant illegal immigration, rampant inflation and a rampant attack on their social values. I’m not educated enough to know whether the same phenomenon is relevant to Europe, but it wouldn’t surprise me if in some form, it was.
As for the rappers you asked me about, Tim, I don’t know how they feel about Israel or the war in Gaza. But its not just Black musicians who are supporting Trump. Lawrence Taylor, the famous retired linebacker of the New York Giants announced his support for Trump. Taylor is probably the most famous football player in New York history. He’s an icon. Mariano Rivera, an Hispanic baseball player who was the most successful relief pitcher in history also endorsed Trump.
But if you look at the entertainment industry as a whole, Biden is winning with that crowd hands down. Jeffrey Katzenberg, the billionaire co-founder of DreamWorks Studios is a bundler for Biden. So is Steven Spielberg. So was Haim Saban, although as an Israeli-American he was angry at Biden’s decision to delay arms shipments to Israel.
If Hollywood was the only constituent that mattered, Biden would win hands down. Why wouldn’t he? The neoliberal policies supported by his ilk have made them all much richer while making everyone else poorer.
The best metaphor for what’s happening in the United States today actually comes right out of Hollywood. You remember the line in the movie “Network,” don’t you Tim? It went “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore.”
Working people in the United States are turning MAGA because they’re mad as hell and voting for Trump is the only outlet for their justifiable anger. Whether this is enough to insure a Trump victory remains to be seen. The Uniparty has lined up all of its resources including the press, the judiciary and all the cultural elites it can muster to try and stem the onslaught. My guess is that they have a good chance of succeeding.
When the rabble (the deplorables, the gun-slinger/religion clingers and the lazy 47 percent) show up at the palace gates with pitchforks, more often than not, they are routed.
I have one question, Claire: Why did you write this? Virtually everyone on the planet is much less interesting than Winston Churchill. Biden is very, very unlikely to go down as a great President. I'm cautiously optimistic that he'll be considered above average. But America doesn't need great leaders to survive, we just need to avoid disasters like Trump. Churchill, famously said America will always do the right thing only after exhausting all other options, but Churchill never met Donald Trump.
I think anything published between now and the election that reinforces the narrative that Biden is weak and ineffectual helps Trump get elected.
Robert Gates, one of our finest SecDef, said in his memoirs Joe Biden has been wrong about every major foreign policy decision. But Gates been praising Biden recently, and I think Gates is right both times. In Israel, Biden is in an impossible situation. Bibi wants to 1.. Stay in Power. 2. Destroy Hamas. 3. Doesn't really care about Palestinian deaths. 4 Wants Trump to Win. Israel is far less dependent on America than most people realize. Except for airplanes , precision munitions and some electronics, they are militarily self-sufficient. This is by design. Short of siding with Hamas, there is very little the US could do that would have much impact. I think anyone who claims that have "the answer" to what we should do in the Middle East is delusional. There is a reason "peace in the Middle East" is a punchline in so many jokes: it is at least as hard as commercially viable Fusion power.
I very much agree with you on Biden and Ukraine his lack of commitment and unfounded fear of Russian escalation. This has prevented us from providing Ukraine with the weapons needed to win the war. His indecisiveness is maddening and depressing. Still, it is important to give him credit where it is due. His decision to share intelligence with Ukraine and the world was both brave and required a level of confidence and institutional knowledge that probably only Bush 41, former CIA head, could have pulled off. I'm sure that the decision to share intelligence had thousands of CIA, NSA, and DIA staffers screaming bloody murder, that doing so was compromising sources and methods. I can't imagine Obama, Bush 43, or Clinton have the balls and knowledge to over rule them. Without the US screaming , "the Russians are coming," I'm not sure Kharkov or even Kyiv would still be under Ukrainian control.
Claire, with respect, I believe Clif’s main point was that making pointed criticisms of Biden admin foreign policy is a distraction from the real issue — barring some unforeseen circumstances, our choices for President are fixed, we get either Biden or Trump. There can be no straddling, “ on the one hand but on the other hand”-isms. If you present arguments that weaken support for Biden you are in so doing strengthening Trump’s chances of regaining power, a result which you obviously do not support.
While your desire to assess each man’s performance even-handedly is creditable in an academic and journalistic sense, of the two candidates, Trump is the greater existential threat to America and the world, so why air more reasons for people to waver in supporting Biden ( even if you believe he is just the least worst” of the two)?
I've made it perfectly clear that I think voting for Trump would be insane. Rare is the day when I fail to express the view that Trump's election would come with too-high odds of ending the American experiment at home and a near-certainty losing everything for which Americans fought, died, and sacrificed--for generations--abroad. Only someone with a severe reading comprehension problem could understand my criticism of Biden as an endorsement of Trump. I can't say, "Don't under any circumstances vote for Donald Trump" more clearly than I have. If someone is determined to read the opposite into what I've written, I can't do anything about it.
Biden is the only choice we have this time around. But it would be immoral for me to refrain from using whatever small amount of influence I have to point out the danger of Biden's policies. I sincerely believe they are *very* dangerous--to us and to the world--and costing the lives of our allies. I think they're making escalation and a wider war more likely, not less. This is *by far* the most important issue Americans face right now, and key decisions are being made now, not next November. The outcome of what we can call World War III will shape the world for generations. The world you live in and the one your kids grow up in will be determined by it. Biden is, right now, making decisions that will determine whether your kids are drafted to fight and die in the kind of war we hoped never again to see in the world. If I have any influence at all (and usually I don't, but you never know what will happen when you write something and send it out into the world) it would be immoral for me to fail to use it.
Biden's national security team needs this criticism. They're not getting it from the places administrations usually get it. Because Trump is so ridiculously unfit, the people around him are such grifters, and the GOP has become a personality cult, I'm sure the Administration simply dismisses any criticism from the GOP as partisan lunacy (and rightly so). Because the election is so desperately critical, people within his own party are refraining from criticizing them for exactly the reason you suggest: They fear helping Trump. Likewise, our allies are terrified of criticizing them, for the same reason.
Usually, an administration making decisions this way would see an unending torrent of negative news coverage. It would be extremely clear to them that people in the US and abroad have noticed their decision-making patterns and are saying, loudly, "Something needs to change." Under normal circumstances, the criticism would have long ago been so loud that we'd probably, at least, have seen a big shakeup at the NSC. But all of these feedback mechanisms have been deranged by Trump's candidacy and by a grossly irresponsible American media that has all but ceased to report on events overseas unless Israel is involved, in which case they report things that just aren't true.
This publication has a mission. What's the point of it if I don't fulfill it?
Claire, you undoubtedly are more plugged into the political and national security establishment than most of us ( readers of CG I mean), so here’s a thought: offer a few critical but friendly comments to whoever you can think of in Biden’s circle of advisors. Like pitching a story to a Hollywood producer — mention a successful policy that Biden had enacted, suggest that your idea could be the next blockbuster policy win, and sketch an outline of the main features. Once you’ve made your point, mention that you could be prepared to clear your calendar and take a zoom call (haha, just kidding).
A final reflection: Waging war against Iran does not necessarily require the invasion and occupation of that country. War, as Clausewitz noted, is “a real political instrument”—which is to say that the political objective determines the character of the war. For instance, the US could undermine the Iranian regime by imposing a blockade, by seizing certain key areas along Iran’s Persian Gulf coast, by launching precision air and missile attacks against important military facilities. In short, the US could prosecute a war against Iran by leveraging its technological military superiority, inflicting pain on the regime while demonstrating its impotence against the Great Satan.
Reading on, I would remind Claire thy while her indictment of American public opinion is not without validity, there are green shoots. Polling has consistently shown that a robust majority of Americans support Israel in the current crisis. This suggest to me that when the issue is made plain enough, Americans will make the right choice.
Claire I think that if any part of Biden’s Israel policy has to do with appeasing Iran, and if you understand that appeasing Iran provoked October 7th, then it’s not an exaggeration to say Iran is at least…sortaaaa… Biden’s client state. And I think we’ve agreed on this blog that Biden’s backchannel talks with Russia through the CIA director Burns made Russia a client state. Remember those weird Dangers of Russian Disorder articles in Foreign Affairs? If geopolitics is zero sum, then efforts to appease enemies while halting weapons to allies, i would say makes enemies client states. And though I’m not a Trump supporter and I’m not stupid enough to say Trump’s policies would be a net positive— I’m actually planning on writing an article on how Trump cannot constitutionally do better than Biden because they are so similar and weak-willed war-phobic, self-congratulating and risk averse—I think Biden roundly deserves the full bottom of the barrel for his appeasing, even self-flagellating, foreign policy. So let’s say Iran and Russia are client states in this administration, if deals are so important and also gas prices and guaranteeing our allies cannot wage war with conditions on Ukraine’s weapons use, weapons deliveries and red lines in Rafah, sanctions on settlers and arms embargoes. I don’t think i have to tell you that my alternative is to bomb the daylights out of Iran’s nukes and oil infrastructure, annihilate the Houthis at least and liberate maritime traffic, help Ukraine strike inside Russia, sanction China for fueling Russia’s war machine by sanctioning China’s banks and state owned companies. If the only law of geopolitics is coercive power then your enemies are automatically your clients if you’re not punishing them for their aggression let alone trying to force your allies to negotiate with your enemies and wind down wars, talking about a two-state solution while Gaza is in rubble and invading Rafah to defeat Hamas who is Palestine’s governement is a redline that Israel has to back away from? What? Like all that money in south korean banks biden donated to iran for humanitarian purposes precipitating it What?. It’s perverse. Biden shares intelligence with Iran and Russia on ISIS-K when they are open sponsors of terror for Christ’s sakes. It doesn’t get more appeasing and conciliatory than that. Iran and Russia are virtually client states in this administration. Maybe not technically. But that is fair in polemical writing and it’s necessary. Teddy roosevelt and churchill would agree.
Claire, thank you for your response. I agree that you have stated your view of Trump as utterly unsuited to be president. Many times.
My point is a tactical one; if we don’t want Trump to win ( and yes, I do recognize that we agree on that point), we need to mute our critiques of Biden and not allow our (I.e. your) legitimate critiques of his shortcomings be used as ammo to weaken him on Election Day.
I am not convince that WWIII has begun. I have long believed that most of us will never know when it has begun because we will not live long enough for that realization to dawn on us before we are vaporized. However that is a quibble; whether Ukraine is Prologue or Chapter One of that sad saga remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, best wishes.
The interesting thing here isn't Biden v Trump. The interesting thing is that what you are proposing, in substance, is that we prepare in earnest for an immediate four-front world war. Your own despair about the ignorance of the citizenry and the prospects of making deterrence meaningful strongly suggest that we actually need to be prepared for (1) unambiguous support for Israel in the eviction of the Palestinians from Gaza, (2) U.S. boots on the ground in Iran (and since it is a big geography and 86 million people, many of whom may want to be rid of the mullahs but will have views on national pride that excoriate a perceived invader, we had better be prepared for a couple of million men at least at first and a very long occupation), (3) readiness for the defense of Ukraine on the basis of indifference to a possible Russian nuclear threat and the seemingly inevitable outcome of U.S. boots on the ground as if Ukraine were already in NATO and (4) a much larger naval presence in the South China Sea and in and around Taiwan, coupled with a clear communication that Taiwan is under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. If this is an unfair caricature of the policy you are recommending, then please explain what, alternatively, you ARE proposing. It is in my view entirely fair to make these proposals (which essentially require moving the economy to a war footing, a tripling of defense spending as a percentage of GDP and conscription to address manpower shortages in the armed forces - again, if you think this is an unfair characterization, I stand to be corrected). But if this is what Biden should be doing in order not to appear weak and incompetent, and what any presidential candidate of any party needs to be doing in order to be competent in foreign affairs, I think you should say so plainly. Now, instinctively I sort-of sympathize with this viewpoint. But advocates of it have to specifically grapple, via persuasion strategies, not lamentation, that none of the four theatres described above, if the relevant issues were determined adversely to the U.S., presents a direct security threat to business as usual (as opposed to theoretical maximum international freedom of action) in the 50 U.S. states or, for the most part, to our traditional pre-1991 western European allies or even Japan or South Korea. Also to address (1) why America should be prepared to shed blood on a basis not seen since World War II (hint - deterrence isn't an answer - regime change in Iran requires U.S. boots on the ground, and maybe so does the eviction of the Russians from Donetsk and Yuhkansk) in the current threat environment and (2) why, after Iraq, the American public should believe we have anywhere close to the ability to do any of this. And the main obstacle to defense spending at 10% of annual GDP for a sustained period isn't dopes who don't know who their governors are, it is rich people who are voting for Trump, or a river rock, to keep their taxes low, and have clocked that an aggressive/deterrence 1950s-style foreign policy requires 1950s-level taxes. How do you propose to get around that problem? Honestly, not trying to be snarky - just trying to figure out how all this transcends into action given current American political realities.
Very interesting, but I will still be voting Trump not Biden.
I agree with much of what you say about Trump, but I have two problems with your approach here. First of all, much of the weight of this essay rests on a single historical analogy (and it happens to be the one used all the time to inspire visceral fears about Trump). I think historical analogies are always very dubious and tricky. Using the term "World War III" for what we are in now as compared to "World War II" then, Biden now for Baldwin then, etc., slides over the enormous differences between the two eras, the two United States, the two international contexts and crises, the two presidents.
Secondly, you do not have much to say about the many aspects of the Biden administration that most worry me and that lead me to see him AND HIS PARTY IN GENERAL as a dire threat to us all. His acceptance and embrace of the erosion of education (both higher and K-12) under the onslaughts of profoundly anti-intellectual DEI-shaped ideologies, ideologies that work against the instilling of intelligent and committed patriotism. His erosion of our fossil fuel-based energy independence and promotion of green technologies based on an insane exaggeration of the actual findings of climate science (which heightens our dependence on China as well). His indifference to the looming debt crisis we face. ALL of these things directly undercut our nation's ability to lead internationally. I fully realize Trump is a gamble. I do not think voting for Biden and what he facilitates at this point is a gamble.
Jonathan, the rate at which glaciers are disappearing is high and has accelerated. No matter what you have read on the subject of climate science ( and I hasten to say that I am never a climatologist nor an enviro-activist type guy), this fact alone should give you pause: each year the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets lose 420 Billion tons of water due to ocean warming. Surely you do not believe this doesn’t have serious long-term impacts on our climate and sea levels (chttps://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/ice-sheets/?intent=121#:~:text=Key%20Takeaway%3A,adding%20to%20sea%20level%20rise).
We are past the point of being able to stop the warming, at best we can only slow it down and buy time for mitigation efforts.
Before Trump, I was a lifelong Republican. I still believe in most conservative principles, and if this was an election between a normal Republican and Biden. I'd likely be voting Republican. But it is not. Presidents have much less power than the public believes on most domestic issues, but are basically king on foreign policy. Trump's foreign policy as Claire demonstrates is dangerous.
Education: Only 8% of education spending is spent by the federal government. That's consistent with conservative principles of local government. Do you think DEI has gone too far? I agree. However, neither Biden nor Trump can do much about it. Harvard and Yale are private; the president, the board of trustees, and the alumni decide the policy. State universities are primarily controlled by Trustees, governors, and state legislators. A. The President controls a modest amount of funding, but any big changes like Title IX require congressional approval.
Deficit spending: This century Republican have been as bad as Democrat regarding spending. Trump doesn't even pay lip service to reducing spending. The deficit was bigger under Biden than Trump
Energy: First, fossil fuel production is at record under Biden. The US is the largest oil producer in the world, and the 4th largest exporter. We'll agree to disagree about climate change. But, we don't need more fossil fuel production. we need more renewable energy production, not just for the environment but to save Americans and American business money!
Ten years ago, I put a Solar PV system on my house, spent $12,000, and got an early Tesla. Since then, my combined gasoline and electricity have been $25-$50 monthly, and since I got a Model 3, it has been $25/month, which is the minimum. I don't care how many oil and gas wells we drill; we are not getting to a $25/month energy bill without renewables. But we need to make an investment today to save Americans money in the future.
Clif, you reference America’s indebtedness, which has risen dramatically in both dollars and as percent of GDP. Discussing all the pros and cons of deficit spending is too complex for a non economist to expound on in this forum, so I’m going to save us both some eye strain and just say that imho there are few things more dear to a politician’s heart than public works projects, but that should not be taken as meaning that they or the debt they incur are necessarily boondoggles. There is “good debt” just as there are good investments. Is Joe Biden’s infrastructure spending a good investment? Only time will tell.
I do not find this very convincing. The percentage of federal education spending is not a true measure of the impact of the Biden Education Department's embrace of DEI and affirmative action and the hideous distortion of Title IX's original purpose. Also, its uncritical embrace of the teachers' unions that disgraced themselves especially with their exploitation of COVID to make ridiculous demands, keep schools open destructively and divert billions of funds, all the while presiding over assaults on merit that are reflected in America's abysmal test scores. The Ed budget percentage does not measure the degree to which this administration has failed to challenge the triumph of ideology over academic rigor in the most elite of our universities, as well as the deepening influence of Qatar, China, and other adversaries in distorting campus culture. These are ALL things vital to the restoration of American success internationally.
As to the deficits, yes, Republicans have not been any real check, but the gobs of trillions of spending under Biden have radically increased the looming crisis. Interest payments on the debt recently surpassed spending on defense and Medicare, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. I see NO prospect of turning this around if Biden and or his successor Democrats retain power.
As to energy, the increases in fossil fuel production are due to significant technological improvements, and are in spite of restrictions of drilling, etc. As to renewables, I am glad you personally have benefited from the enormous subsidizing of wind and solar and the key role China plays in supplying us with panels and with all the minerals we will never mine ourselves for EV batteries. But you are dead wrong if you think solar and wind will save America money overall. Intermittency means they impose ADDED pressure on fossil fuel-based backup production and that is nothing now as compared with what will be needed if the US actually tries to achieve the rapid transition Biden's people envision. Solar and wind for all that subsidizing have not reduced fossil fuel dependency. And Germany is a good warning of how unlikely it is that it ever will. In any case, if the US were to go to absolute zero greenhouse gas emissions, its impact on warming by the IPCC's own ways of estimating this would be infinitesimally small (in the hundredths or thousandths of a degree) given the way China is building coal fired plants and along with India and much of the poorer nations who are not likely to impoverish themselves further to achieve the reductions the energy rich nations pretend to want. Meanwhile the billions subsidizing Biden's green delusions do NOT create jobs or add to US production since they are in fact a diversion and substitution resulting in reduced production elsewhere. All of this restricts US ability to lead in a dangerous world.
In conclusion, I go with the gamble that Trump will do better. Will he? I wouldn't bet much on that, but I will bet enough on it, and we will see.
He wants to violate the Posse Comitatus Act to go door to door to put at least 11 million people in detention camps. He has directly and personally engineered a world in which women having miscarriages will be subject to police investigations, treatment for ectopic pregnancies will be unavailable in most states and contraception will cease to be freely available. He will engineer a further series of judicial appointments which will in effect repeal the 20th century on its way to eviscerating the robust protection of minority rights, which, perhaps paradoxically, is the greatest achievement of our democratic republic in its evolution since the Great Depression and the Second World War. This is before we get to the core question of national security which ought to be at the heart of what you are driving at, viz., who is the most responsible custodian of America's 1800 immediately launchable (and 3700 additional short-term launchable) nuclear warheads. Even a weak man with conventional views is immeasurably better than an outer-borough insult comedian who fantasizes he is a mob boss. The case of Fritz Thyssen is interesting and illustrative for those who do not think they are personally at risk in a second (indefinite?) Trump regime.
Additional Footnotes: https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-was-good-for-americas-alliances-c23e4638
Footnotes: https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-and-ukraine-dont-listen-to-mainstream-media-predictions-on-second-term-0a7589cd?st=0rkexkt64obanrr
Safe in the knowledge that they are protected by two large oceans, people are much more concerned with domestic issues, not foreign policy.
Ok, I renewed my subscription after reading this piece, which is excellent, although I remain unconvinced that a second Trump term would be worse than Biden's first. Biden has proven to be incompetent in both his foreign and domestic policy, to the extent that he has coherent policies at all. As for re-electing Biden, I think many of the people who voted for him feel deceived - they thought they were getting a centrist politician who would avoid the erratic nuttiness and rancor that characterized Trump's first term. Instead we got an unprincipled toady of the left masquerading as your nice Uncle Joe. So It appears we will have two candidates on the ballot this November: really bad and even worse than that. Take your pick as to who is who.
Thank you for renewing your subscription. Thank you very much.
For some reason, writing this particular essay caused me to sweat blood. I don't know why. Sometimes it's easy for me to write very fluently without overmuch effort. Some of my best-known essays (like the one about #MeToo) are not much more than indignant Facebook posts that I dashed off without thinking twice about them. But sometimes, I labor over a paragraph for days, never feeling that I've quite got it, resolving every morning to get the thing sorted out but feeling, by the day's end, that everything I've written is stupid. It puts me in a terrible mood. This essay was the latter kind. Perhaps it's because I find the topic so deeply painful.
So I'm very, very glad that you thought this was worthwhile. Even after I pressed "send," I was still unsure. This one was unusually hard. It left me kind of wrung out and depressed to write it, because by the time I'd finished, I'd thought about it carefully enough to be pretty sure I'm right--we're in a world of trouble with no relief in sight.
It was a good article, particularly the excerpts showing how little the American public knows American history. I once had a secretary who supported the Democratic Party because, she insisted, they freed the slaves.
When I hear someone talk about the war here and the war there and the war somewhere else, I am reminded of the scene in "The Exorcist" when the old priest (the exorcist) first shows up, and the young priest (the psychiatrist) starts to say something like, "I've observed three different personalities . . ." and the old priest cuts him off and says, "There is only one personality," to wit, the Devil's.
Similarly, I don't see a war here and a war there and a war somewhere else. I see one war: the war on Western civilization.
And by Western civilization, I don't mean Greco-Roman / Judeo-Christian, as it tended to be used when I was growing up. That would preclude South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and a few others. No, I mean a civilization based largely on Enlightenment values: democracy, individual freedoms, separation of church and state, and so on.
Not that I think Russia, China, Iran, North Korea have anything like a pact, but they do all have—in Zbigniew Brzezinski's words—complimentary grievances against the west in general, and the U.S. in particular.
Of them all, I view Russia as the most dangerous (see: "The Foundations of Geopolitics: The Geopolitical Future of Russia"). Both China and Iran have centuries-old civilizations, and that counts for something. But Russia, somewhat like Saudi Arabia, is a relatively new kid on the block with few appreciable qualities except a warped sense of self and huge assets underground.
More than anything else, Russia must be beaten. Donald Trump is not the person to do that. Joe Biden, for all his flaws, is the better choice here.
Apart from your main point here, I do find this statement somewhat amusing:
"But Russia, somewhat like Saudi Arabia, is a relatively new kid on the block with few appreciable qualities except a warped sense of self and huge assets underground."
For a "new kid on the block," Russia was in its 14th year of the reign of Catherine the Great when the U.S. was born, and her Romanov line had taken over from the Rurikids in 1613 before the Mayflower sailed. The Rurikids began their rule in 862. So, who's the new kid, eh?
You made a neat riposte to Rick’s off the cuff “ new kid” assertion.That tells me you take an interest in history, which makes it all the more puzzling that you conclude that a second Trump administration would not be a disaster for America and the world.
A nicely written piece. I do think that you're underrating the current generation of Americans (and/or overrating previous generations), though. It's easy to get frustrated by people making irrational choices and believing in bizarre fictions about the world, but we know from extensive published research (not to mention from reading history) that this is essentially how the human mind works - we are not rational creatures, we are social creatures wired to mostly make decisions and buy into narratives that bring us favour/status within our social group(s). The rational bit mostly comes afterwards if justification is required. We can all see this when others do it, but seeing it in oneself, let alone learning to break out of the pattern, is one of the hardest things that a normally socialised human can do. In a society where the divisions are as strong as they are currently in the US (and many other parts of the world, unfortunately), it becomes even harder.
The comparison with inter-war Britain is interesting. Even from this distance it's not completely clear whether Baldwin did the right thing - could more lives have been saved had he been firmer earlier (I doubt war could have been completely avoided), or would it merely have encouraged anti-war sentiment and ushered in an alternative government that would have done even less? I have always believed that Biden has been too weak in his support for Ukraine, but I sympathise with his position - like Baldwin he's looking for the least worst path to follow, and very afraid of getting it wrong. It's also worth remembering that even Churchill wasn't completely sure that the British public had the stomach for a long war.
When it comes to Israel/Palestine it seems like the US' administration's options, in order of preference, are:
1 - Do and say nothing;
2 - Affirm in word and funds that Israel has the right to defend itself;
3 - Engage in talks about things like the Two State Solution, which is essentially doing nothing but with sound and motion, while doubling down on option 2.
Those are the three options. I can't see any others.
Speaking of bribes: imo what the Iranian regime wants, even more than killing people, is to be unthreatened from abroad and for the country to be prosperous (so that they're unthreatened from within). Both of these lie within the US' power to give (or rather to stop denying) but I don't think the US is able to do so due to its own domestic politics. Actually occupying Iran doesn't seem feasible. So that leaves 'do nothing', which is a pity. It's been more than forty years since the Islamic Revolution and the hostage crisis (and 60 years since coup that returned the Shah to power) but these events still seem to rule how the US and Iran perceive and deal with each other.
Claire suggests that it’s a gross exaggeration to say that Trump would be far better for Israel than Biden has been. Surprisingly she neglects to mention that in his first term Trump recognized West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, he personally visited the Western Wall, he recognized the Golan Heights as a sovereign part of Israel and he defunded the UNRWA and the Palestinian Authority. Prior to Trump’s election, all of this was considered so heretical as to be taboo. Trump was right; the type of establishment politician that Claire yearns for were proven wrong.
Trump also produced a detailed plan for a two-state solution. No American President had ever done that. Trump even convinced a very reluctant Bibi Netanyahu to agree to negotiate on the basis of the plan produced by his son-in-law. The Palestinians not only refused to negotiate using the plan as a starting point, they cut off all communications with the United States.
In concluding that Biden would be better for Israel than Trump would (ostensibly because Biden would be better for the United States than Trump) Claire completely ignored the fact that the Trump Administration did more for Israel than any Administration since Harry Truman was President. She also refused to acknowledge that the Trump Administration was more entrepreneurial when it came to the Middle East than any administration in the past 50 years with the possible exception of the Clinton Administration.
It’s a bit arrogant for Claire to think that she’s better enlightened about what’s good for Israel than the Israelis themselves are. The vast majority of Israelis from the Prime Minister on down would far prefer that Trump is elected than Biden. Do you really think you’re in a better position, Claire, than Israelis are to decide which American President would be better for them?
In her essay, Claire also mentions the fact that Trump refused to come to the defense of Saudi Arabia when they were bombed by Iran. She’s right about that. But despite this, MBS despises Joe Biden. The American President relentlessly criticized the Saudi ruler when he was running for President and during the first two years of his Presidency. MBS had an excellent relationship with Trump and if press reports are accurate, had a genuine friendship with Trump’s son in law. That would be the same son in law who was widely ridiculed by the Democratic foreign policy establishment that accomplished little to nothing over the previous 16 years.
Claire, do you think you have a better idea about what’s good for the Saudis than the Saudi ruler does? Who do you think MBS hopes will win the next American election, Joe Biden or Donald Trump?
There's much to say in response, but I'll let others do it. I'll just address one point.
"It’s a bit arrogant for Claire to think that she’s better enlightened about what’s good for Israel than the Israelis themselves are. The vast majority of Israelis from the Prime Minister on down would far prefer that Trump is elected than Biden. Do you really think you’re in a better position, Claire, than Israelis are to decide which American President would be better for them?"
This is false. No poll I've seen shows a "vast majority"of Israelis "far preferring" Trump to Biden. The polling tends to vary widely, but here are some recent reports. I've not closely looked at the sample size or methodology, and none assessed the intensity of the preference:
July 11, 2022: https://www.jns.org/plurality-of-israelis-say-interests-better-served-by-trump-than-biden/ ... "Overall, 37% said a Trump presidency would be better for the Jewish state, compared to 29% for a second term for President Joe Biden. Among Jewish Israelis, 42.5% prefer Trump versus 32% for Biden. Among Arab Israelis, a large majority (68%) said there was no difference between the two, 13% preferred Trump and 14% said Biden would be better. There were sharp divisions across the political lines, with those on the left heavily favoring Biden (9% to 78%), the center somewhat supporting him (23% to 48%) and the right heavily favoring Trump (61% to 13%)."
December 23, 2023: https://www.timesofisrael.com/in-major-shift-survey-finds-israelis-prefer-biden-to-trump-as-next-us-president/ ... "Forty percent of Jewish Israelis want US President Joe Biden to be reelected in the 2024 presidential election, compared to just 26.2% who back Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, a poll conducted on Wednesday found. The results of the poll indicated a massive swing in Israelis’ support for the current president, who has made a series of gestures to the Jewish state since the Hamas onslaught of October 7 while his predecessor has spent time at rallies mocking the intelligence failure that led to the devastating attack and criticizing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. ... The results appeared to represent an extremely rare instance — the first in at least two decades — in which the Israeli public favors a Democratic presidential candidate over a Republican."
March 13, 2024 https://allisrael.com/poll-44-30-israelis-want-trump-over-biden-as-next-us-president ... In Israel, 44% of poll respondents said they prefer Trump to defeat Biden while 33% prefer Biden and 26% replied they were unsure. The margin soared polling current Israeli government supporters versus those in opposition. Among the respondents who voted for the government, 72% said they prefer Trump over Biden, while only 8% want Biden to win. Among voters opposing Netanyahu's government, 55% want Biden and 23% prefer Trump.
In no poll does Trump receive a majority, let alone a vast one. The majority, in all polls, say "Biden" or "not sure."
But assuming you'd been correct and a "vast majority" of Israelis "far preferred" Trump, it would not be arrogant for me to believe I'm in a better position than most Israelis to decide which American President would be better for them: It would be entirely reasonable. Although some Israelis speak excellent English, only 15 percent have high-level proficiency: Israel is a "low proficiency" country, according to TOEFL rankings, on par with Ethiopia and Nepal. Some 30 percent of the country is unable to carry out even a basic conversation in English. Probably 75 percent have no idea how the US government works or what US presidents do and don't have the power to do. I, on the other hand, am a fluent, native English speaker who grew up in the US. I have a very deep knowledge of US foreign policy. I also have a doctorate from Oxford on the *very subject* of US foreign policy formation toward Israel and its adversaries. Assessing American presidents' policies toward Israel is my academic speciality--I've spent more of my life studying this, I assume, than all but a handful of Israelis. I've been aware of Trump since the 1980s--and I've always been able to understand every word he says--and I've been *very* closely following the details of Donald Trump's official and unofficial foreign policy statements and achievements since he first took office: That's my day job. I do it all day long.
So no, I don't think it's arrogant for me to assume that I have a *much* better grasp on the way American presidents are apt to behave toward Israel than most Israelis do, given that most Israelis have day jobs and families. It would be exceedingly strange if I didn't.
But of course, this is assuming you'd been right.
The polls that you cited show a significant edge for Trump. Maybe “vast” is an exaggeration but it is clear from the surveys that you mentioned that far more Israelis prefer Trump to Biden.
Are you really suggesting that Israelis don’t know what’s good for them because most are not fluent in English? What could be more arrogant than that? As you know, Israelis are amongst the most literate people in the world. Per capita, they place near the top in terms of book purchases. I suspect they’re pretty good at figuring out where their bread is buttered.
As for the Oxford degree you’ve achieved that’s pretty impressive I guess. The reality is that educated elites are responsible for many of the problems we are facing in the world. In fact, a significant cadre of American foreign policy experts have credentials almost as impressive as yours. Look at what a mess they’ve made of the world.
A big reason for the turn towards populism in the United States is that the economic system favored by highly educated people has turned out to be disastrous for working class people.
Americans are not turning against globalism or a muscular American approach to world affairs. They are turning against the neoliberal economic policies that most globalists cling to.
Would you like to make a small wager, WigWag? Come up with a list of ten factual questions about what Biden and Trump have done and said in the past decade that would be relevant to Israelis as they seek to assess which president would better serve their interests. I'll let you choose the questions. Then let's find ten random Israelis on the Internet--ideally, we'd do this as "random people on the street," but that's not possible, so we'll choose ten Israelis from some random, non-political Facebook group, like "Israeli knitting enthusiasts."
See how they do. I'll bet you a small sum that you'll come away from the experience thinking, "I must concede that Claire understands who Trump and Biden are quite a bit better than the average Israeli."
Sounds like fun as long as you do most of the work. I’ll come up with the ten questions if you figure out who the ten random subjects are.
I’m no Oxford Ph.D. so I can’t comment on whether this sample size is statistically significant or whether the survey has any predictive power. There’s also the issue of whether Facebook or any social media site can truly produce a random target audience. The 15 percent of the Israeli population that’s ultra-Orthodox will be mostly excluded because most won’t use social media. But who cares, let’s throw caution to the wind.
It’s Memorial Day weekend and I’m on grill patrol today and tomorrow so it may take me a day or so to come up with the questions. You’ll be glad to know that most of my friends and family will be voting for Biden. We don’t talk politics at our barbecues because I’ve always thought that working to enhance the relationship was more important than striving to win the argument.
How about if I give you the questions right here no later than the beginning of next week.
If you win, I’ll buy a CG guest membership for one of your readers. If I win, you just have to publicly announce that I was right and nominate me for a doctorate from Oxford honoras causa.
Deal?
It's a deal.
Drum roll please; here are the questions.
(1) Which American Administration was more supportive of Israel, the Obama/Biden Administration or the Trump/Pence Administration?
(2) Which American Administration was more supportive of Israel, the Trump/Pence Administration or the Biden/Harris Administration?
(3) In 2017, reversing decades of American policy, President Trump recognized Jerusalem as the Capital of Israel. Do you support this decision? Do you think that it is a decision Biden would have made had he been President at the time?
(4) In December 2016, about one month before Trump was inaugurated, the Obama/Biden Administration failed to veto Security Council Resolution 2334 which condemned Israeli settlements in both the West Bank and Jerusalem. This major rebuke of Israel and its settlement policy was unprecedented and because of the U.S. abstention, the resolution passed 14-0. Do you support the decision of the Obama/Biden Administration to abstain and do you think Trump would have vetoed the resolution?
(5) In March, 2019, President Trump issued a proclamation that recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights. Was this a good decision or a bad decision? Do you believe that President Biden would have made the same decision had he been President in 2019?
(6) In January, 2020, President Trump ordered the assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the Commander of the Iranian Quds Force. Do you believe that President Trump’s decision was wise and do you think Joe Biden would have made the same decision had he been President at the time?
(7) Which American Ambassador to Israel was more supportive of Israel, David Friedman, the Ambassador appointed by President Trump or Jack Lew, the current American Ambassador to Israel appointed by President Biden?
(8) President Obama’s Secretary of State, John Kerry, negotiated the JCPOA with Iran. In return for Iranian nuclear concessions the agreement provided Iran with substantial sanctions relief. Trump abrogated the agreement and imposed severe sanctions on Iran. President Biden loosened the sanctions regime which resulted in billions of dollars flowing to Iran. Credible claims have been made that Iran spent some of these funds on supporting Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad. Was Biden right or wrong to loosen the Trump sanctions?
(9) In response to Israel’s decision to seek the destruction of Hamas by attacking Rafah, President Biden has paused the sale of specific military hardware to Israel. Was this a good decision or a bad decision? Do you believe President Trump would have made the same decision had he been the current American President?
(10) In the wake of the war in Gaza initiated by Hamas on October 7th, President Biden is pressuring Israel to take steps towards affirming the creation of a Palestinian State. Do you support or oppose this approach at the current time? Do you think President Trump would be pressuring Israel under these circumstances?
Bonus question for extra credit: Both Joe Biden and Donald Trump have Jewish grandchildren. One of them has a granddaughter who will be celebrating her bat mitzvah next year and a grandson who will be celebrating his bar mitzvah in 2027. Is that candidate Joe Biden or Donald Trump?
Claire, let me propose new terms for our friendly wager. If you win, I will purchase a gift subscription for the reader of your choice. If I win, I can’t have you writing to the head of Oxford suggesting that he grant a doctorate honoris causa to some guy named WigWag. You would look too silly.
Instead, try this on for size. If I win, you agree to write and publish at CG an essay on the topic of my choice. To be honest, all of the talk about Ukraine, Israel and the upcoming election is getting a bit boring. It puts me in mind of the old adage “everything has been said, but not everyone has said it.”
I fondly remember the old days where you regaled your loyal readers with essays on topics as diverse as COVID, the wonders of the French healthcare system and even the impact of social media on brain waves (that was Adam Garfinkle).
If I win, the topic I will ask you to write about is the following: “Is the impact of the many manifestations of modern feminism a net positive or a net negative for American women. Is it a net positive or a net negative for contemporary American society.
How do these terms sound to you?
My questions will arrive soon.
It's a deal.
"It’s Memorial Day weekend and I’m on grill patrol today and tomorrow so it may take me a day or so to come up with the questions. You’ll be glad to know that most of my friends and family will be voting for Biden. We don’t talk politics at our barbecues because I’ve always thought that working to enhance the relationship was more important than striving to win the argument."
Well stated throughout your paragraph - but its final sentence is, appropriately, < chef's kiss >!
Thanks, David.
In her entirely accurate enumeration of the options for dealing with the Iranian nuclear program Claire says,
“Recall, too, that Iran has seeded Europe and the US with its terrorist operatives. We should firmly expect that this strategy would be extremely costly.”
That’s true, but Claire neglects to mention something extremely important. Many, perhaps even most, of those Iranian sleeper cells awaiting their orders from Tehran entered the United States through a porous southern border that was mostly closed under President Trump but for the past three years has been wide open. Iranian terrorists, Chinese spies, Russian operatives, narcotics merchants have all been able to enter the United States unimpeded because Biden opened the border that Trump closed.
If there’s ever a terrorist attack in the United States inspired by Iran, it will likely be attributable to terrorists who entered our country because of the policies of Joe Biden.
Isn’t it delusional to think that Biden has been a better President than Trump was?
Hey Wig Wag did you go to the Trump rally in the South Bronx near where you live with gangsta rappers Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow. What do you think Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow's opinion of the Israeli Palestinian conflict is? Are going to join the 8 Trey Crips gang or are you only interested in the smaller affiliated 9 Ways gang? Have you found out if new members of the gang get a complementary golden semi automatic rifle or do the only get a golden handgun?
https://media.nbcnewyork.com/2022/03/Gun-bust-Bronx.jpg?quality=85&strip=all
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJQPpTioxbg
I watched some of the rally on YouTube. I noticed the same thing that several reporters who covered the event noticed; it was remarkably diverse. It was multiethnic and multiracial. The event was attended by numerous Asians, Hispanics, African Americans and Whites.
Typically, the only thing more segregated than church attendance in the United States are political rallies. If you look at Biden rallies (to the extent that he can inspire more than 100 people to show up) the crowd is usually all White or all Black. Trump rallies are more racially diverse but not especially racially diverse. The South Bronx rally was an exception.
This shouldn’t be surprising. All of the polling data shows Blacks and Hispanics abandoning Biden in droves. It won’t be enough to turn New York from blue to red, but it just might be enough to turn Pennsylvania from purple to red depending on the turnout in Philadelphia. The same thing is true in Georgia and Nevada.
The Blacks and Hispanics abandoning Biden in favor of Trump are not Republicans and they never will be; they’re MAGA. Like tens of millions of working class people, they understand that Trump’s policies are better for them than Biden’s policies.
Claire constantly bemoans the rise of MAGA in the United States and similar movements in Europe (and India) but she doesn’t appear curious enough to try and understand why this is happening.
The obvious answer is that the type of politician (whether Democratic or Republican) that she supports has favored neo-liberal economic policies that have eviscerated the financial security of the working class while enriching college educated elites. These same establishment politicians are interventionist-globalists. In fact, their neo-liberal economic policies are intricately and intimately intertwined with their globalism.
Claire is wrong to believe that most Americans have become isolationists. The reality is that most Americans just don’t care about foreign policy one way or the other. American voters of all races and ethnicities who are abandoning establishment Democrats and Republicans in favor of Trump aren’t doing so because they hate American interventionism, they’re doing so because they hate rampant illegal immigration, rampant inflation and a rampant attack on their social values. I’m not educated enough to know whether the same phenomenon is relevant to Europe, but it wouldn’t surprise me if in some form, it was.
As for the rappers you asked me about, Tim, I don’t know how they feel about Israel or the war in Gaza. But its not just Black musicians who are supporting Trump. Lawrence Taylor, the famous retired linebacker of the New York Giants announced his support for Trump. Taylor is probably the most famous football player in New York history. He’s an icon. Mariano Rivera, an Hispanic baseball player who was the most successful relief pitcher in history also endorsed Trump.
But if you look at the entertainment industry as a whole, Biden is winning with that crowd hands down. Jeffrey Katzenberg, the billionaire co-founder of DreamWorks Studios is a bundler for Biden. So is Steven Spielberg. So was Haim Saban, although as an Israeli-American he was angry at Biden’s decision to delay arms shipments to Israel.
If Hollywood was the only constituent that mattered, Biden would win hands down. Why wouldn’t he? The neoliberal policies supported by his ilk have made them all much richer while making everyone else poorer.
The best metaphor for what’s happening in the United States today actually comes right out of Hollywood. You remember the line in the movie “Network,” don’t you Tim? It went “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore.”
Working people in the United States are turning MAGA because they’re mad as hell and voting for Trump is the only outlet for their justifiable anger. Whether this is enough to insure a Trump victory remains to be seen. The Uniparty has lined up all of its resources including the press, the judiciary and all the cultural elites it can muster to try and stem the onslaught. My guess is that they have a good chance of succeeding.
When the rabble (the deplorables, the gun-slinger/religion clingers and the lazy 47 percent) show up at the palace gates with pitchforks, more often than not, they are routed.
I have one question, Claire: Why did you write this? Virtually everyone on the planet is much less interesting than Winston Churchill. Biden is very, very unlikely to go down as a great President. I'm cautiously optimistic that he'll be considered above average. But America doesn't need great leaders to survive, we just need to avoid disasters like Trump. Churchill, famously said America will always do the right thing only after exhausting all other options, but Churchill never met Donald Trump.
I think anything published between now and the election that reinforces the narrative that Biden is weak and ineffectual helps Trump get elected.
Robert Gates, one of our finest SecDef, said in his memoirs Joe Biden has been wrong about every major foreign policy decision. But Gates been praising Biden recently, and I think Gates is right both times. In Israel, Biden is in an impossible situation. Bibi wants to 1.. Stay in Power. 2. Destroy Hamas. 3. Doesn't really care about Palestinian deaths. 4 Wants Trump to Win. Israel is far less dependent on America than most people realize. Except for airplanes , precision munitions and some electronics, they are militarily self-sufficient. This is by design. Short of siding with Hamas, there is very little the US could do that would have much impact. I think anyone who claims that have "the answer" to what we should do in the Middle East is delusional. There is a reason "peace in the Middle East" is a punchline in so many jokes: it is at least as hard as commercially viable Fusion power.
I very much agree with you on Biden and Ukraine his lack of commitment and unfounded fear of Russian escalation. This has prevented us from providing Ukraine with the weapons needed to win the war. His indecisiveness is maddening and depressing. Still, it is important to give him credit where it is due. His decision to share intelligence with Ukraine and the world was both brave and required a level of confidence and institutional knowledge that probably only Bush 41, former CIA head, could have pulled off. I'm sure that the decision to share intelligence had thousands of CIA, NSA, and DIA staffers screaming bloody murder, that doing so was compromising sources and methods. I can't imagine Obama, Bush 43, or Clinton have the balls and knowledge to over rule them. Without the US screaming , "the Russians are coming," I'm not sure Kharkov or even Kyiv would still be under Ukrainian control.
Why did I write it? Because I thought it was true.
Claire, with respect, I believe Clif’s main point was that making pointed criticisms of Biden admin foreign policy is a distraction from the real issue — barring some unforeseen circumstances, our choices for President are fixed, we get either Biden or Trump. There can be no straddling, “ on the one hand but on the other hand”-isms. If you present arguments that weaken support for Biden you are in so doing strengthening Trump’s chances of regaining power, a result which you obviously do not support.
While your desire to assess each man’s performance even-handedly is creditable in an academic and journalistic sense, of the two candidates, Trump is the greater existential threat to America and the world, so why air more reasons for people to waver in supporting Biden ( even if you believe he is just the least worst” of the two)?
I've made it perfectly clear that I think voting for Trump would be insane. Rare is the day when I fail to express the view that Trump's election would come with too-high odds of ending the American experiment at home and a near-certainty losing everything for which Americans fought, died, and sacrificed--for generations--abroad. Only someone with a severe reading comprehension problem could understand my criticism of Biden as an endorsement of Trump. I can't say, "Don't under any circumstances vote for Donald Trump" more clearly than I have. If someone is determined to read the opposite into what I've written, I can't do anything about it.
Biden is the only choice we have this time around. But it would be immoral for me to refrain from using whatever small amount of influence I have to point out the danger of Biden's policies. I sincerely believe they are *very* dangerous--to us and to the world--and costing the lives of our allies. I think they're making escalation and a wider war more likely, not less. This is *by far* the most important issue Americans face right now, and key decisions are being made now, not next November. The outcome of what we can call World War III will shape the world for generations. The world you live in and the one your kids grow up in will be determined by it. Biden is, right now, making decisions that will determine whether your kids are drafted to fight and die in the kind of war we hoped never again to see in the world. If I have any influence at all (and usually I don't, but you never know what will happen when you write something and send it out into the world) it would be immoral for me to fail to use it.
Biden's national security team needs this criticism. They're not getting it from the places administrations usually get it. Because Trump is so ridiculously unfit, the people around him are such grifters, and the GOP has become a personality cult, I'm sure the Administration simply dismisses any criticism from the GOP as partisan lunacy (and rightly so). Because the election is so desperately critical, people within his own party are refraining from criticizing them for exactly the reason you suggest: They fear helping Trump. Likewise, our allies are terrified of criticizing them, for the same reason.
Usually, an administration making decisions this way would see an unending torrent of negative news coverage. It would be extremely clear to them that people in the US and abroad have noticed their decision-making patterns and are saying, loudly, "Something needs to change." Under normal circumstances, the criticism would have long ago been so loud that we'd probably, at least, have seen a big shakeup at the NSC. But all of these feedback mechanisms have been deranged by Trump's candidacy and by a grossly irresponsible American media that has all but ceased to report on events overseas unless Israel is involved, in which case they report things that just aren't true.
This publication has a mission. What's the point of it if I don't fulfill it?
Claire, you undoubtedly are more plugged into the political and national security establishment than most of us ( readers of CG I mean), so here’s a thought: offer a few critical but friendly comments to whoever you can think of in Biden’s circle of advisors. Like pitching a story to a Hollywood producer — mention a successful policy that Biden had enacted, suggest that your idea could be the next blockbuster policy win, and sketch an outline of the main features. Once you’ve made your point, mention that you could be prepared to clear your calendar and take a zoom call (haha, just kidding).
A final reflection: Waging war against Iran does not necessarily require the invasion and occupation of that country. War, as Clausewitz noted, is “a real political instrument”—which is to say that the political objective determines the character of the war. For instance, the US could undermine the Iranian regime by imposing a blockade, by seizing certain key areas along Iran’s Persian Gulf coast, by launching precision air and missile attacks against important military facilities. In short, the US could prosecute a war against Iran by leveraging its technological military superiority, inflicting pain on the regime while demonstrating its impotence against the Great Satan.
Reading on, I would remind Claire thy while her indictment of American public opinion is not without validity, there are green shoots. Polling has consistently shown that a robust majority of Americans support Israel in the current crisis. This suggest to me that when the issue is made plain enough, Americans will make the right choice.
Claire I think that if any part of Biden’s Israel policy has to do with appeasing Iran, and if you understand that appeasing Iran provoked October 7th, then it’s not an exaggeration to say Iran is at least…sortaaaa… Biden’s client state. And I think we’ve agreed on this blog that Biden’s backchannel talks with Russia through the CIA director Burns made Russia a client state. Remember those weird Dangers of Russian Disorder articles in Foreign Affairs? If geopolitics is zero sum, then efforts to appease enemies while halting weapons to allies, i would say makes enemies client states. And though I’m not a Trump supporter and I’m not stupid enough to say Trump’s policies would be a net positive— I’m actually planning on writing an article on how Trump cannot constitutionally do better than Biden because they are so similar and weak-willed war-phobic, self-congratulating and risk averse—I think Biden roundly deserves the full bottom of the barrel for his appeasing, even self-flagellating, foreign policy. So let’s say Iran and Russia are client states in this administration, if deals are so important and also gas prices and guaranteeing our allies cannot wage war with conditions on Ukraine’s weapons use, weapons deliveries and red lines in Rafah, sanctions on settlers and arms embargoes. I don’t think i have to tell you that my alternative is to bomb the daylights out of Iran’s nukes and oil infrastructure, annihilate the Houthis at least and liberate maritime traffic, help Ukraine strike inside Russia, sanction China for fueling Russia’s war machine by sanctioning China’s banks and state owned companies. If the only law of geopolitics is coercive power then your enemies are automatically your clients if you’re not punishing them for their aggression let alone trying to force your allies to negotiate with your enemies and wind down wars, talking about a two-state solution while Gaza is in rubble and invading Rafah to defeat Hamas who is Palestine’s governement is a redline that Israel has to back away from? What? Like all that money in south korean banks biden donated to iran for humanitarian purposes precipitating it What?. It’s perverse. Biden shares intelligence with Iran and Russia on ISIS-K when they are open sponsors of terror for Christ’s sakes. It doesn’t get more appeasing and conciliatory than that. Iran and Russia are virtually client states in this administration. Maybe not technically. But that is fair in polemical writing and it’s necessary. Teddy roosevelt and churchill would agree.