Joe Biden

Subterms

    More stories

    • 138 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Dolly Parton turned down presidential medal of freedom twice from Trump

      by

      Dolly Parton twice turned down the highest US civilian honour when Donald Trump offered it – but isn’t sure she’ll accept the presidential medal of freedom from Joe Biden, because it might seem political to do so.“I couldn’t accept it because my husband was ill,” the country music star, 75, told NBC’s Today of Trump’s first offer, “and then they asked me again about it and I wouldn’t travel because of the Covid.”In April last year, Parton donated $1m to help research and development of the Moderna vaccine against Covid-19.Then, she told the BBC: “I’m sure many, many millions of dollars from many people went into that but I felt so proud to have been part of that little seed money that hopefully will grow into something great and help to heal this world. Lord knows we need it!”Speaking to NBC, she said she had heard from the Biden administration but added: “Now I feel like if I take it, I’ll be doing politics, so I’m not sure.“I don’t work for those awards. It’d be nice but I’m not sure that I even deserve it. But it’s a nice compliment for people to think that I might deserve it.”Parton’s charity work spreads far wider than the battle against Covid, including work to boost childhood literacy. She told Today she was “just happy that anything I do can help somebody else, and when I donated the money to the Covid fund, I just wanted it to do good. Evidently, it is.”Despite a troubled start to the US vaccination campaign the Moderna shot and another from Pfizer BioNTech are in circulation as Biden looks to tackle a problem bequeathed by Trump. As of Monday morning, the US had recorded nearly 26.3m coronavirus cases and more than 443,000 deaths. Biden has said the final death toll could reach 660,000.The presidential medal of freedom is the highest US civilian honour. Trump gave it to one musician, Elvis Presley, but made headlines late in his term by bestowing it on close political allies Devin Nunes and Jim Jordan, Republican congressmen who backed the president through impeachment and other scandals.In November, the CBS Late Show host, Stephen Colbert, asked former president Barack Obama, who honoured musicians including James Taylor, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder and Bruce Springsteen, “How does Dolly Parton not have a presidential medal of freedom?”Obama said: “That’s a mistake. I’m shocked. Actually, that was a screw-up, I’m surprised. I think I assumed that she’d already got one and that was incorrect. I’m surprised, she deserves one.”Obama said he would “call Biden”. It seems he did. More

    • 138 Shares189 Views

      in US Politics

      US to resume deporting asylum seekers after judge rejects Biden order

      by

      US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) is preparing to resume deportations of asylum seekers after a Trump-appointed Texas judge ruled against a 100-day suspension ordered by Joe Biden.The ruling, in response to a challenge from a leading figure in the Republican effort to overturn the election result, marks the first shot in a legal rearguard action by Trump loyalists intended to stymie the Biden administration’s agenda.Human rights activists said the resumption of flights also raised the question of whether Ice agents, who have been accused of systemic abuse of migrants and detainees, might seek to resist the new administration’s efforts to reform the agency.An Ice plane left San Antonio for Port-au-Prince on Monday morning carrying Haitians detained on the US-Mexican border and expelled under a highly controversial Ice interpretation of public health laws.“Deportation flight to Haiti on the first day of Black history month,” Guerline Jozef, co-founder of the Haitian Bridge Alliance, wrote in a text to the Guardian. “What a slap in the face.”According to activists, there are also 23 Africans facing deportation from an Ice holding facility in Alexandria, Louisiana, as early as Tuesday, including 11 Angolans, seven Cameroonians, two Congolese, and three others of unknown nationalities.Although the Haitian flight would probably have gone ahead even under the Biden moratorium, the expected African flight defies that order, as well as guidelines laid down by the acting homeland security secretary, David Pekoske, that came into effect on Monday. Pekoske called for deportations to be limited to suspected terrorists, convicted felons deemed a threat to public security, and undocumented people caught on the border after 1 November.At least some of the potential deportees have legal cases pending, and one of them was granted an emergency stay by an appeals court on Sunday evening. Others expected to be deported on Tuesday or Wednesday.Ice appears to be pushing ahead with the deportation flight despite reports that Cameroonians deported to their home country last October and November in the midst of a bloody civil conflict had been imprisoned, beaten, gone into hiding – or in some cases simply disappeared.“A lot of them were locked up in military prison, which is where they took a whole bunch of people that are arrested by the army,” said Mambo Tse, a Cameroonian community activist in the US. “It’s not safe.”Lauren Seibert, a Human Rights Watch researcher and advocate, said: “After scores of Cameroonians were denied asylum in the US and deported in recent months, Human Rights Watch has documented multiple cases of deportees facing imprisonment, abuse, criminal prosecution and threats by the Cameroonian authorities after their return. Some of their families have also been threatened and harassed.”On taking office on 20 January, the Biden administration ordered a 100-day halt to deportation flights, with certain limited exceptions, while Ice procedures were reviewed to “enable focusing the Department’s resources where they are most needed”.However, a federal judge in Texas, Drew Tipton, appointed by Donald Trump last June, ordered a stay, blocking the suspension, but not the new guidelines. Tipton’s nomination was opposed by Democrats over concerns over his lack of judicial experience and his support for the reinstatement of a Texas social worker fired for using a racial slur against a black colleague. He argued: “It certainly does not evidence a pattern of hostility against anyone or any people who are of a particular race.”The case against the moratorium was brought by the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, who played a leading role in the effort to overturn the 2020 election result.Paxton addressed Trump supporters in Washington on 6 January shortly before the storming of the Capitol.“We will not quit fighting. We’re Texans, we’re Americans, and the fight will go on,” he told the crowd, according to the Houston Chronicle.Paxton has been indicted for securities fraud allegedly committed before he took office. He has also been accused of abuse of office by seven whistleblowers and is being sued for retaliation after having the whistleblowers fired. He is reported to be under FBI investigation for the abuse of office allegations.Paxton’s lawyer, Philip Hilder, declined to comment on the reports of an FBI investigation.After Tipton’s ruling on deportations, Paxton declared “Victory” on his official Twitter account.“Texas is the FIRST state in the nation to bring a lawsuit against the Biden Admin,” he wrote. “AND WE WON.”VICTORY.Texas is the FIRST state in the nation to bring a lawsuit against the Biden Admin. AND WE WON.Within 6 days of Biden’s inauguration, Texas has HALTED his illegal deportation freeze. *This* was a seditious left-wing insurrection. And my team and I stopped it.— Attorney General Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) January 26, 2021
      Echoing the language widely used to denounce the ransacking of the Capitol, Paxton described the 100-day deportations moratorium as “a seditious left-wing insurrection” which he had stopped.In a statement to the Guardian on Monday, an Ice spokesperson said the agency “is in compliance with the temporary restraining order” issued by the Texas court.Justice department lawyers argued against the stay in Tipton’s court, the southern district of Texas, but it was unclear when or whether they would appeal against the ruling. A department spokesperson declined to comment.The American Civil Liberties Union is seeking to challenge the Texan ruling on behalf of immigrant rights groups.“There’s a legal aspect to it and there’s a practical aspect,” Cody Wofsy, an ACLU attorney, said. “Are individual Ice officers who may disagree with the new policies of the new administration going to carry out those policies, or are they going to attempt to carry out a more unforgiving immigration policy that they might prefer?” More

    • 100 Shares149 Views

      in World Politics

      The US Will Need Turkey to Counter Russia

      by

      When it comes to the already abysmal Turkish-American relations, Joe Biden’s presidency is being viewed as an ominous train wreck waiting to happen. The president-elect has previously signaled that his administration would “tame” Turkey for policies Ankara has pursued in Syria, Nagorno-Karabakh and the eastern Mediterranean. Moreover, in a sensational video that surfaced last summer, Biden hinted that his administration would provide all necessary tools (with the exception of military equipment) to the Turkish opposition in its endeavor to oust President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who went ballistic over the revelations.

      To make things worse for bilateral relations, in December 2020, Ankara was slapped with the Countering America’s Adversaries through Sanctions Act for the procurement of the Russian S-400 high-altitude defense system. However, there are mounting signs that the Biden administration will be reluctant to tighten its grip on Turkey, which would compel Washington to find ways to work with Ankara.   

      As Europe Weakens, Turkey Is on the Rise

      READ MORE

      Denouncing President Donald Trump’s denigration of the transatlantic alliance, Biden underscored NATO’s critical role in US national security, writing in Foreign Affairs last year: “To counter Russian aggression, we must keep the alliance’s military capabilities sharp. We must impose real costs on Russia for its violations of international norms.” The reality for the next administration is that Russia cannot be countered without Turkey being on board, given that its combat-proven military is considered to be a valuable NATO pillar and its unique geopolitical location has historically acted as a bulwark against Russia’s expansionist instincts.

      There is the perception that Turkey had drifted into the Russian orbit after the procurement of the S-400 system. However, due to having to frequently work with Moscow, Ankara has single-handedly developed capabilities and has taken steps in the Black Sea region, the South Caucasus and Syria that have proven to be effective in limiting Russian influence.  

      The Black Sea 

      The 2015 Maritime Doctrine of the Russian Federation clearly prioritizes the Black Sea as a pillar of Moscow’s power projection. In the last two decades, Russia has consolidated its Black Sea presence by annexing Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia region in 2008 and Ukraine’s Crimea, home to the Sevastopol naval base, in 2014. Other strategic locations include the Baltic Sea and the Alaska region of the North Pacific, where American and Russian militaries frequently come dangerously close to physically clashing.

      .custom-post-from {float:left; margin: 0 10px 10px; max-width: 50%; width: 100%; text-align: center; background: #000000; color: #ffffff; padding: 15px 0 30px; }
      .custom-post-from img { max-width: 85% !important; margin: 15px auto; filter: brightness(0) invert(1); }
      .custom-post-from .cpf-h4 { font-size: 18px; margin-bottom: 15px; }
      .custom-post-from .cpf-h5 { font-size: 14px; letter-spacing: 1px; line-height: 22px; margin-bottom: 15px; }
      .custom-post-from input[type=”email”] { font-size: 14px; color: #000 !important; width: 240px; margin: auto; height: 30px; box-shadow:none; border: none; padding: 0 10px; background-image: url(“https://www.fairobserver.com/wp-content/plugins/moosend_form/cpf-pen-icon.svg”); background-repeat: no-repeat; background-position: center right 14px; background-size:14px;}
      .custom-post-from input[type=”submit”] { font-weight: normal; margin: 15px auto; height: 30px; box-shadow: none; border: none; padding: 0 10px 0 35px; background-color: #1878f3; color: #ffffff; border-radius: 4px; display: inline-block; background-image: url(“https://www.fairobserver.com/wp-content/plugins/moosend_form/cpf-email-icon.svg”); background-repeat: no-repeat; background-position: 14px center; background-size: 14px; }

      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox { width: 90%; margin: auto; position: relative; display: flex; flex-wrap: wrap;}
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox label { text-align: left; display: block; padding-left: 32px; margin-bottom: 0; cursor: pointer; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px;
      -webkit-user-select: none;
      -moz-user-select: none;
      -ms-user-select: none;
      user-select: none;
      order: 1;
      color: #ffffff;
      font-weight: normal;}
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox label a { color: #ffffff; text-decoration: underline; }
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox input { position: absolute; opacity: 0; cursor: pointer; height: 100%; width: 24%; left: 0;
      right: 0; margin: 0; z-index: 3; order: 2;}
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox input ~ label:before { content: “f0c8”; font-family: Font Awesome 5 Free; color: #eee; font-size: 24px; position: absolute; left: 0; top: 0; line-height: 28px; color: #ffffff; width: 20px; height: 20px; margin-top: 5px; z-index: 2; }
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox input:checked ~ label:before { content: “f14a”; font-weight: 600; color: #2196F3; }
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox input:checked ~ label:after { content: “”; }
      .custom-post-from .cpf-checkbox input ~ label:after { position: absolute; left: 2px; width: 18px; height: 18px; margin-top: 10px; background: #ffffff; top: 10px; margin: auto; z-index: 1; }
      .custom-post-from .error{ display: block; color: #ff6461; order: 3 !important;}

      Last August, two Russian Su-27s intercepted a US Air Force B-52 strategic bomber over the Black Sea, about which General Jeff Harrigan, commander of US Air Forces in Europe and Africa, warned of possible future mid-air collisions. All things considered, Turkey has the means to limit Russian influence and has displayed resoluteness to not let the Black Sea be turned into “a Russian lake.” 

      In case of Russian aggression, Turkey’s support would be critical to any NATO or US response because of Turkish naval capabilities and responsibility for the straits under the Montreux Convention. The RAND Corporation’s 2018 Black Sea simulation suggests that effective deterrence will require a NATO Black Sea Center of Excellence to be established in Turkey alongside an active use of the Turkish straits. As Sweden’s former Prime Minister Carl Bildt succinctly puts it, “What happens on the Bosporus affects us all.” 

      Turkey has made moves in the Black Sea by establishing robust political and military cooperation with Ukraine. This particularly drew Moscow’s ire given the ongoing conflict between Russian-backed separatists in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. Last year, Turkish drone manufacturer Baykar Makina and the Ukrainian defense company Ukrspecexport signed an agreement involving the development and production of “sensitive technologies in defense and aerospace.” Furthermore, Ukraine is poised to purchase 50 Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 UAVs, which have a proven record of destroying sophisticated Russian-made arms such as S-300, Pantsir C1 and TOR-M.

      The success of the Turkish defense industry in the recent conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh has inspired experts to float the idea that the Ankara-Kyiv military cooperation may very well tip the balance in Donbas and Crimea in favor of Ukraine. Despite the potential of straining relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Erdogan has conveyed Turkey’s support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity, a rare area of mutual agreement between Washington and Ankara. Erdogan went so far as to support the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in its row against the Moscow Patriarchate. Finally, Ankara has expressed its full support for the admission in NATO of the Black Sea nation of Georgia, Turkey’s neighbor, a move Putin has declared as a “red line.” 

      Caucasus and Syria 

      Turkey’s explicit military and political support for Azerbaijan in its decisive victory against Armenia over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh at the end of last year has propelled Turkey to major-player status in the South Caucasus, traditionally Russia’s backyard. For the first time in more than a century — the last time being the Battle of Baku of 1918 — Turkish military is to be deployed to the South Caucasus after Ankara and Moscow agreed to monitor the ceasefire. The uncomfortable reality for Russia here is, at the end of the day, that soldiers from a NATO member country will be present in its “near abroad.” If Russia had been as strong in the region as it was once believed, it could have singlehandedly navigated the Azeri-Armenian conflict without having to concede to Turkey’s demands.  

      Even more disturbing for Moscow is Turkey’s acquisition of a physical route via Armenian territories to Azerbaijan, which is being dubbed as the Pan-Turkic superhighway, referring to Turkey’s uninterrupted physical link to its ethnic brethren in Azerbaijan and the Turkestan region in Central Asia —  another one of Russia’s post-Soviet satellites. Turkey has, since the fall of the Soviet Union, aspired to establish itself as the leader of the Turkic world. The last thing Moscow would want is to deal with is an ascendant Turkey in Turkestan. As the recent crisis in Kyrgyzstan has shown, Russia may be losing influence there.

      Turkey’s rising influence in the South Caucasus has also raised fears in Iran, home to some 30 million Azeri Turks whose secessionist feelings are now stronger than ever after Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh victory. With Turkey’s permanent presence in the South Caucasus, Russia and Iran will have to take Ankara more seriously in their regional calculations, particularly in Syria. All things considered, President Putin appears to have accepted Turkey’s broader role in the Caucasus. When asked about the topic on Russian television, he conceded: “What can I tell you. It’s a geopolitical fallout from the downfall of the Soviet Union.” 

      Embed from Getty Images

      In Syria, as in the Caucasus, Russia has found itself having to work with Ankara. Through a series of accords like the Sochi Agreements of 2018 and 2019, as well as the ongoing Astana Process launched in 2017, Moscow has had to agree (to a certain extent) to concede to Ankara’s demands. Most importantly, Ankara has been able to keep Russia from employing Grozny-style destruction of Idlib province, the last rebel stronghold along Turkey’s border that is home to some 4 million civilians. When 33 Turkish soldiers were killed in an assault by the forces of President Bashar al-Assad last February, Turkey did not hesitate to retaliate by killing hundreds of Russian-backed Syrian army soldiers and destroying countless Syrian tanks and weaponry, which prompted Putin’s plea for a ceasefire agreement with Turkey. 

      If President Biden is serious about containing Russia through reinvigorating NATO, he will need Turkey’s geopolitical standing as well as its military and political clout, both of which have grown exponentially in recent years. The Biden administration will soon have to decide whether US national interests dictate a perpetual punitive approach toward the second-largest NATO member or a better understanding of Turkey’s concerns, particularly when it comes to the Syrian YPG (the Kurdish People’s Protection Units) and the need for a high-altitude missile defense system.  

      Turkey under President Erdogan has grown to be more self-confident. Pushing Ankara away may result in the complete loss of a valuable NATO ally. As James Jeffrey, the former US envoy to Syria, stated, “We really can’t do the Middle East, the Caucuses, or the Black Sea without Turkey.  And, Turkey is a natural opponent of Russia and Iran.” Losing Iran in 1979 cost the United States a strategic foothold in the region. Losing Turkey altogether may cost it Eurasia, where Russia — in tandem with China — has already been steadily building up its standing in defiance of American hegemony.  

      The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

    • 163 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Biden more likely to bypass Republicans on Covid stimulus aid after lowball offer

      by

      Republicans senators made a lowball offer on Sunday to cooperate with the Biden administration on a new coronavirus relief package, increasing the likelihood that the White House will seek to bypass Republicans to fund its proposal.A group of 10 Republican senators led by Susan Collins of Maine pitched Joe Biden a sketch of a relief plan with a reported $600bn total price tag – less than a third of the $1.9tn stimulus package the Biden team has laid out over the last days.The yawning gap between the two numbers caused some observers to question whether Republicans were really trying to reach a deal – or instead were laying the groundwork for future accusations that Biden had not seriously pursued his promises to try to work with Republicans.Asked about the new Republican offer on the NBC News program Meet the Press, national economic council director Brian Deese said Biden is “open to ideas” but would not be stalled.“What he’s uncompromising about is the need to move with speed on a comprehensive approach here,” Deese said.“We have a virus crisis; we have an economic crisis. We have to get shots in people’s arms. We have to get the schools reopened so that parents can go back to work. And we need to provide direct relief to families and businesses across the country who are really struggling here.”One signatory of the Republican offer, senator Rob Portman of Ohio, who has announced his upcoming retirement, told CNN that the $1.9tn price tag was too high “at a time of unprecedented deficits and debts”.But moderate Democratic senator Jon Tester of Montana said the twin crises of the pandemic and record unemployment demanded decisive action. “I don’t think $1.9tn, even though it is a boatload of money, is too much money,” Tester told CNN. “I think now is not the time to starve the economy.”The US has just surpassed 26m confirmed Covid cases and 440,000 deaths. Unemployment insurance claims topped 1m last week and 30 million Americans reported suffering from food scarcity.Hoping for a break with the lockstep partisanship of the Donald Trump years, Biden has made working with Republicans a stated priority of his early presidency.But his advisers have also signaled that speed is important and that they will use a parliamentary measure known as budget reconciliation to fund their Covid relief bill if no Republicans come onboard.With a 50-member majority in the US Senate clinched by the vote of vice-president Kamala Harris, Democrats could advance the relief package alone – if they are able to craft a deal that does not lose centrists such as West Virginia senator Joe Manchin.“This is a unique crisis,” Deese told CNN. “It’s a unique health crisis, a unique economic crisis, and it’s one that calls on all of us to work together with the speed that we need to put a comprehensive response in place.”The Biden plan calls for $1,400 payments to individuals, enhanced unemployment benefits, a $15 minimum wage, support for schools to help them reopen safely, and money for vaccine distribution and administration.Republicans pointed out that Congress has already appropriated $4tn for coronavirus relief in the last year and that some of the $900bn allocated last month has not been spent.Portman said the proposal for $1,400 payouts to individuals in the Biden plan should be restricted based on income. Manchin has echoed that proposal, saying that families earning from $250,000-$300,000 should not necessarily qualify.The importance of keeping Manchin onboard was underscored when the senator reacted negatively to a surprise appearance by Harris on a local West Virginia television station calling for support for more Covid relief legislation. The move was received as an awkward effort to pressure Manchin.“I saw it, I couldn’t believe it,” Manchin said in a local news video. “No one called me. We’re going to try to find a bipartisan pathway forward, but we need to work together. That’s not a way of working together.”In a letter to Biden outlining their offer, the more moderate Republicans quoted his call in his inaugural address for bipartisan unity and said “we welcome the opportunity to work with you.”“We believe that this plan could be approved quickly by Congress with bipartisan support,” the letter said.The Republican proposal mirrored some provisions of the Biden plan, such as $160bn in new spending on vaccines, testing, treatment, and personal protective equipment. The Republicans said they would provide more details on Monday.But Democrats did not appear willing to wait for long to hear the Republican pitch. Senator Bernie Sanders, the incoming chairman of the budget committee, told ABC News’ This Week program: “We have got to act and we have got to act now”. More

    • 275 Shares179 Views

      in US Politics

      We can escape a zero-sum struggle between Iran and Saudi Arabia – if we act now | Abdulaziz Sager and Hossein Mousavian

      by

      Back in May 2019, we – an Iranian former diplomat and a Saudi chair of the Gulf Research Center – called for dialogue between our countries’ respective leaders. We warned that the alternative would increase tensions that could boil over into a catastrophic confrontation.Since then we have witnessed a string of attacks on Saudi and Iranian oil tankers in international waters; a major strike on Saudi Aramco facilities at Abqaiq and Khurais; a close brush with conflict between Iran and the United States in the aftermath of General Qassem Soleimani’s killing by a US drone; and then, late last year, the killing of a top nuclear scientist in Iran. While tempers seem to have cooled since then, we remain at the mercy of a single miscalculation that could turn the protracted cold war between our states hot, potentially ushering in disastrous consequences for the entire region. With the arrival of a new administration in Washington, the time has come to move from confrontation to dialogue.During the past four decades, relations between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran have oscillated between confrontation and competition but also cooperation. Today, we are at the bottom of a cycle. Yet we share a sense that while our governments stand at odds on a range of regional issues, there is nothing inevitable about this enmity – nor is it condemned to be permanent.The first step toward a tolerable modus vivendi would be for each side to recognise the other’s threat perceptions – real or imagined – and embrace a set of foundational principles upon which to build.Both Iran and Saudi Arabia perceive the other to be keen on dominating the region. Riyadh views Iran as intent on encircling the kingdom with its allied non-state actors; Tehran views Riyadh as a key facilitator of US efforts to contain and undermine the Islamic Republic. Each country believes that the other is determined to spread its own Islamic jurisprudence at the expense of the other. Riyadh considers Iran’s ballistic missiles arsenal to be a threat to its national security, especially its critical infrastructure. Tehran regards the Kingdom’s purchase of large quantities of sophisticated western arms as exacerbating the conventional weapons asymmetry in the region. Riyadh charges Iran with interfering in the internal affairs of sovereign states such as Yemen, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain and Iraq; Tehran sees Saudi Arabia doing the same in these very countries.To break this vicious cycle and move beyond the blame game, our leaders need to engage in direct discussions guided by the following fundamentals: i) conducting relations based on mutual respect, according to mutual interest and on an equal footing; ii) preserving and respecting sovereignty, territorial integrity, political independence and the inviolability of international boundaries of all states in the region; iii) non-interference in internal affairs of states; iv) rejecting the threat or use of force and committing to peaceful settlement of all disputes; v) rejecting the policy of supporting sectarian divisions, employing sectarianism for political objectives, and supporting and arming militias in the regional states; vi) respecting the Vienna convention on diplomatic relations, and in particular inviolability of diplomatic facilities; vii) strengthening Islamic solidarity and avoiding conflict, violence, extremism and sectarian tension; viii) full cooperation on counterterrorism measures; ix) treating the religious minority in the other’s country as citizens of that country, not primarily as co-religionists with transnational loyalties; x) rejecting the pursuit of hegemony by any state in the region; xi) ensuring freedom of navigation and the free flow of oil and other resources to and from the region, and the protection of critical infrastructure; and xii) prohibiting the development or procurement of all forms of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).Mutually acceptable guiding principles are a critical starting point. But action is needed to build confidence after decades of antagonism and mistrust. Diplomacy requires dialogue while direct discussions will require a roadmap, which includes a set of reciprocal confidence-building measures and pursues a clear vision for a mutually acceptable regional security arrangement. The United Nations can play an important role in leading or supporting such a regional dialogue process.All this may seem an impossible task for two governments apparently locked in an escalatory cycle. Yet it is important to recognise that both countries have successfully maintained quiet channels of cooperation and dialogue all along. Even amid escalating tensions, Iran and Saudi Arabia engaged in fruitful dialogue over facilitating Iranian Muslim participation in the hajj pilgrimage.Saudi Arabia and Iran have already taken actions that belie the notion of an inescapable, zero-sum struggle. Our two nations can and should build on these positive examples of tentative cooperation to reduce tensions in our volatile region at a time when any spark could set alight the entire region. Joe Biden’s presidency now offers an opportunity for a new beginning. But time is of the essence. Postponing de-escalation would be a grave mistake, as the region has proved time and again that on the rare occasion that opportunities for constructive dialogue present themselves, they must be grasped swiftly before they vanish.Abdulaziz Sager is the chair and founder of the Gulf Research Center. Hossein Mousavian, a former senior Iranian diplomat, is a Middle East security and nuclear specialist at Princeton University. More

    • 213 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Why Republicans won’t agree to Biden’s big plans and why he should ignore them | Robert Reich

      by

      If there were ever a time for bold government, it is now. Covid, joblessness, poverty, raging inequality and our last chance to preserve the planet are together creating an existential inflection point.Fortunately for America and the world, Donald Trump is gone, and Joe Biden has big plans for helping Americans survive Covid and then restructuring the economy, rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure and creating millions of green jobs.But Republicans in Congress don’t want to go along. Why not?Mitch McConnell and others say America can’t afford it. “We just passed a program with over $900bn in it,” groused Senator Mitt Romney, the most liberal of the bunch.Rubbish. We can’t afford not to. Fighting Covid will require far more money. People are hurting.Besides, with the economy in the doldrums it’s no time to worry about the national debt. The best way to reduce the debt as a share of the economy is to get the economy growing again.The real reason Republicans want to block Biden is they fear his plans will workRepairing ageing infrastructure and building a new energy-efficient one will make the economy grow even faster over the long term – further reducing the debt’s share.No one in their right mind should worry that public spending will “crowd out” private investment. If you hadn’t noticed, borrowing is especially cheap right now. Money is sloshing around the world, in search of borrowers.It’s hard to take Republican concerns about debt seriously when just four years ago they had zero qualms about enacting one of the largest tax cuts in history, largely for big corporations and the super-wealthy.If they really don’t want to add to the debt, there’s another alternative. They can support a tax on super-wealthy Americans.The total wealth of America’s 660 billionaires has grown by a staggering $1.1tn since the start of the pandemic, a 40% increase. They alone could finance almost all of Biden’s Covid relief package and still be as rich as they were before the pandemic. So why not a temporary emergency Covid wealth tax?The real reason Republicans want to block Biden is they fear his plans will work.It would be the Republican’s worst nightmare: all the anti-government claptrap they’ve been selling since Ronald Reagan will be revealed as nonsense.Government isn’t the problem and never was. Bad government is the problem, and Americans have just had four years of it. Biden’s success would put into sharp relief Trump and Republicans’ utter failures on Covid, jobs, poverty, inequality and climate change, and everything else.Biden and the Democrats would reap the political rewards in 2022 and beyond. Democrats might even capture the presidency and Congress for a generation. After FDR rescued America, the Republican party went dark for two decades.Trumpian Republicans in Congress have an even more diabolical motive for blocking Biden. They figure if Americans remain in perpetual crises and ever-deepening fear, they’ll lose faith in democracy itself.This would open the way for another strongman demagogue in 2024 – if not Trump, a Trump-impersonator like Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley or Donald Trump Jr.The worst-kept secret in Washington is Biden doesn’t really need RepublicansIf Biden is successful, Americans’ faith in democracy might begin to rebound – marking the end of the nation’s flirtation with fascism. If he helps build a new economy of green jobs with good wages, even Trump’s angry white working-class base might come around.The worst-kept secret in Washington is Biden doesn’t really need Republicans, anyway. With their razor-thin majorities in both houses of Congress, Democrats can enact Biden’s plans without a single Republican vote.The worry is Biden wants to demonstrate “bipartisan cooperation” and may try so hard to get some Republican votes that his plans get diluted to the point where Republicans get what they want: failure.Biden should forget bipartisanship. Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans didn’t give a hoot about bipartisanship when they and Trump were in power.If Republicans try to stonewall Biden’s Covid relief plan, Biden and the Democrats should go it alone through a maneuver called “reconciliation”, allowing a simple majority to pass budget legislation.If Republicans try to block anything else, Biden should scrap the filibuster – which now requires 60 senators to end debate. The filibuster isn’t in the constitution. It’s anti-democratic, giving a minority of senators the power to block the majority. It was rarely used for most of the nation’s history.The filibuster can be ended by a simple majority vote, meaning Democrats have the power to scrap it. Biden will have to twist the arms of a few recalcitrant Democrats, but that’s what presidential leadership often requires.The multiple crises engulfing America are huge. The window of opportunity for addressing them is small. If ever there was a time for boldness, it is now. More

    • 163 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Biden promised bold action. Will his efforts to compromise get in the way?

      by

      Sign up for the Guardian’s First Thing newsletterJoe Biden rose to power by promising bold action to confront the numerous crises facing the United States – namely the coronavirus pandemic, a struggling economy and the climate emergency. Over his first two weeks in office, the new president has signed a series of executive orders aimed at following through on those promises.Biden has already mandated mask-wearing on federal property and enacted stricter coronavirus testing requirements for those traveling into the United States. The president has also used the power of the executive pen to increase food stamp benefits and halt new oil and gas leases on public lands. Biden’s early actions have attracted praise from some of the most progressive members of the Democratic party, including the congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.But much of what Biden has promised, including a massive coronavirus relief package, cannot be done through executive action. Instead, Democrats will need to get their legislation through Congress, as the party clings to the slimmest of majorities in the House and the Senate.During his campaign, Biden promised to compromise with congressional Republicans in the spirit of bipartisan unity, but some of the president’s allies are already urging him to abandon that goal and instead advance his agenda by relying solely on Democratic support.Those Democrats argue that the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, has already made clear he intends to obstruct Biden’s agenda, and thus the new president should not waste precious time by trying to win over Republicans in Congress.Three progressive groups – Justice Democrats, the Sunrise Movement and New Deal Strategies – released a memo earlier this month entitled What To Do When Republicans Block Biden, which advised the president against watering down his $1.9tn coronavirus relief bill to attract bipartisan support.“We hope 10 Senate Republicans will support it, but are not holding our breath,” the groups said. “Biden has chosen to reject austerity politics. We hope that he will continue to stick to that approach, and go big always.”Hours after Biden was sworn in, McConnell signaled he intended to maximize Republicans’ power in the evenly divided Senate, where the vice-president, Kamala Harris, can provide a tie-breaking vote for Democrats. “The people intentionally entrusted both political parties with significant power to shape our nation’s direction,” McConnell said in a floor speech. “May we work together to honor that trust.”The filibusterMuch of the debate over Democrats’ strategy in the Senate comes down to the filibuster, a legislative mechanism that effectively allows the chamber’s minority to block bills unless they have the support of 60 members. With the filibuster in place, bills must have a supermajority level of support to make it through the Senate.A number of liberal commentators have pushed for the elimination of the filibuster, noting that it was not created by the framers of the constitution. The modern-day Senate filibuster came into existence in the early 20th century, and it was later embraced by segregationists to prevent the passage of civil rights legislation.“When the founders conceived of the Senate, they did imagine for it to be different from the House. It’s not clear that they imagined for it to have a supermajority requirement,” said Molly Reynolds, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution. “If they wanted it to have a supermajority requirement, they could have put one into place.”While eliminating the filibuster was previously rejected out of hand by Democratic leadership, some of the most prominent members of the party have come to champion the idea. Speaking at the funeral of the civil rights icon John Lewis last July, Barack Obama emphasized the need to strengthen voting rights, saying, “And if all this takes eliminating the filibuster, another Jim Crow relic, in order to secure the God-given rights of every American, then that’s what we should do.”We have a roadmap as to how [McConnell] has operated in the past, which is to be a one-man blockadeBut the new president is not among those Democrats who have called for eliminating the Senate filibuster. Biden said of the filibuster last summer, “I think it’s going to depend on how obstreperous [Republicans] become, and if they become that way.” He added, “I have not supported the elimination of the filibuster because it has been used as often to protect rights I care about as the other way around, but you’re going to have to take a look at it.”Asked last week about Biden’s view on the filibuster, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, told reporters that the president’s position “has not changed”. Two moderate Democrats in the Senate, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, have also signaled they do not support scrapping the filibuster.Some liberal strategists say Biden need not wait to see how McConnell will handle his presidency, given how the Republican leader oversaw the Senate when his party held the majority. After Democrats took control of the House in the 2018 elections, McConnell served as the self-proclaimed “Grim Reaper”, blocking any progressive legislation from being taken up in the Senate.“We have a roadmap as to how [McConnell] has operated in the past, which is to be a one-man blockade,” said Stephen Spaulding, a senior counsel at Common Cause, a liberal government reform group. “He will abuse the filibuster rule to demand supermajority votes on nearly every piece of the majority’s agenda. I think we can anticipate that.”With that in mind, some Democrats are pushing Biden and the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, to cut to the chase and eliminate the filibuster now. Given that the president’s party usually loses House seats in the midterm elections, Democrats may have just two years to enact major progressive policies before they lose full control of Congress.However, such a strategy could alienate some of the centrist voters who helped Biden win in November, particularly given the president’s repeated calls for unity and bipartisanship.“I think that Joe Biden has to make the effort. He ran on the idea that he was a unifier, so he needs to make the overtures,” said the conservative commentator Tara Setmayer. “But don’t get hung up because we already know that Mitch McConnell is about to dust off the playbook from the beginning of the Obama years, and all they did was obstruct.”Democrats have discussed the possibility of using a budgetary mechanism called reconciliation to advance their agenda, specifically a coronavirus relief bill. If Democrats use reconciliation, they can pass the relief bill with just 51 votes in the Senate. However, reconciliation would require Democrats to work within a very narrow framework to craft the bill, and it is possible some of the bill’s provisions would be thrown out as a result.“It’s a circuitous way to doing legislative business,” Spaulding said. “If you’re doing this just to do it via majority, frankly you should be looking at the Senate rules and not trying to necessarily go through this laborious process if you don’t have to.”As Washington grows increasingly pessimistic about the odds of Congress reaching a bipartisan agreement on a coronavirus relief bill, the elimination of the Senate filibuster seems more and more likely. The legislative mechanism may become a necessary casualty to provide aid to Americans suffering through a once-in-a-century crisis.“I don’t think the American people are going to have patience for that level of obstruction like we saw during Obama’s term,” Setmayer said. “The country is in too desperate of a position for those types of political squabbles.” More