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      in US Politics

      Ivanka Trump asked to cooperate with Capitol attack committee

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      Ivanka Trump asked to cooperate with Capitol attack committeeInvestigators seek testimony from former first daughter, with panel increasingly focused on Donald Trump’s inner circle The House select committee investigating the Capitol attack is asking Ivanka Trump, the daughter of the former president, to appear for a voluntary deposition to answer questions about Donald Trump’s efforts to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory.Biden warns Russia will ‘pay a heavy price’ if Putin launches Ukraine invasion – liveRead moreThe move by the panel marks an aggressive new phase in its inquiry into the 6 January insurrection, as House investigators seek for the first time testimony from a member of the Trump family about potential criminality on the part of the former president.Congressman Bennie Thompson, the chair of the select committee, said in an 11-page letter to Ivanka Trump that the panel wanted to ask about Trump’s plan to stop the certification, and his response to the Capitol attack, including delays to deploying the national guard.Ivanka Trump was a senior adviser to her father during her presidency, as was her husband Jared Kushner. The two were seen as a power couple very close to the inner workings of the Trump White House.The questions to Ivanka appear directed at a key issue: whether her father oversaw a criminal conspiracy on 6 January that also involved obstructing a congressional proceeding – a crime.The letter said that the panel first wanted to question Ivanka Trump about what she recalled of a heated Oval Office meeting on the morning of the 6 January insurrection when the former president was trying to co-opt Mike Pence into rejecting Biden’s win.The former president was on the phone with the then vice-president in an Oval Office meeting with Ivanka and Keith Kellogg, a top Pence aide, the letter said. When Pence demurred on the former president’s repeated request, Ivanka turned to Kellogg and said Pence was “a good man”.Thompson said in the letter that the panel wanted to learn more about that exchange with Pence she heard, as well as other conversations about impeding the electoral count at the joint session of Congress on 6 January that she may have witnessed or participated in.“The committee has information suggesting that President Trump’s White House counsel may have concluded that the actions President Trump directed Vice-President Pence to take would … otherwise be illegal. Did you discuss these issues?” the letter said.Thompson added House investigators had additional questions about whether Trump could shed light on whether the former president had been told that such an action might be unlawful, and yet nonetheless persisted in pressuring Pence to reinstall him for a second term.The letter said the select committee was also interested in learning more from Trump about her father’s response to the Capitol attack on 6 January, and discussions inside the White House about the former president’s tweet castigating Pence for not adopting his plan.Thompson said the nagging question for Ivanka Trump – who White House aides thought had the best chance of having the former president condemn the rioters – was what she did about the situation and why her father did not call off the rioters in a White House address.The select committee said in the letter that they also wanted to ask her about what she knew with regard to the long delay in deploying the national guard to the Capitol, which allowed the insurrection to overwhelm law enforcement into the afternoon of 6 January.Thompson said that House investigators were curious why there appeared to have been no evidence that Trump issued any order to request the national guard, or called the justice department to request the deployment of personnel to the Capitol.Speaking to the Guardian and a small group of reporters on Thursday, the chairman of the select committee said that the immediate focus for the investigation was on the former president’s daughter and not subpoenas to Republican members of Congress.Thompson said the panel would be “inviting some people to come and talk to us. Not lawmakers right now. Ivanka Trump.”The letter comes after the US supreme court, in another blow to the former president, late on Wednesday rejected his request to block the release of more than 700 of the most sensitive of White House documents he had tried to hide from the select committee.The former president’s defeat means those documents – including presidential diaries, notes and memos from the files of top aides including the former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows – that could shed light on the Capitol attack can now be transferred to Congress.TopicsUS Capitol attackIvanka TrumpUS politicsDonald TrumpHouse of RepresentativesnewsReuse this content More

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      in US Politics

      The not-surprising, very bad defeat of Biden’s attempt to protect voting | The fight to vote

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      The not-surprising, very bad defeat of Biden’s attempt to protect votingThe reason it failed is simple: 50 Republicans didn’t support the proposals and two Democrats opposed changing the filibuster Hello, and happy Thursday,It’s difficult to figure out what to say about the kind-of-surprising-yet- not-really-surprising-at-all collapse of Democrats’ effort to pass sweeping voting rights legislation.Get the latest updates on voting rights in the Guardian’s Fight to vote newsletterYes, the defeat is a major blow to Joe Biden, who spent significant political capital over the last few weeks, pushing the bill. Yes, the defeat makes Democrats, who pledged to protect voting rights when they took control of the US Senate last year, look incapable of governing. Yes, it’s disturbing to see just one Republican – Lisa Murkowski of Alaska – voice any kind of support for sweeping protections to support the right to vote. Yes, it’s astonishing to see two moderate Democrats block the bill because of their unflinching support for an arcane Senate rule.Yes, the defeat comes at a uniquely dangerous moment for democracy.There are plenty of takes to go around about why this push didn’t succeed – and I expect there will be more in the coming days. Biden should have pushed harder on voting rights sooner. Democrats were too ambitious in their proposal. Democrats should have focused on a narrower fix to the Electoral Count Act.Some of this thinking falls into what Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth, calls the “green lantern theory” of the presidency – a belief that the president can do anything, persuade anyone, if they try hard enough. In the end, the reason the voting rights bills failed was simple – 50 Republicans didn’t support the proposals and two Democrats didn’t support changing the filibuster. After watching the fight in Washington play out over the last few weeks, I’m not sure there’s anything Chuck Schumer or Biden could have done to change that. Maybe I’m wrong.That doesn’t mean that the 50 Republicans who blocked the bill should evade scrutiny. As others have noted, 16 current GOP senators voted to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act in 2006, but oppose the current bill, which would update the most powerful part of the law. Republicans have said Congress has no constitutional role in elections, ignoring a provision in Article I that explicitly authorizes Congress to set federal election rules.But the thing that’s stuck with me the most over the last week is an idea that undergirded the entire voting rights debate, sometimes spoken out loud and sometimes unsaid – the idea that voter suppression just isn’t that bad right now.I saw it a few months ago when an unnamed White House adviser told the Atlantic Democrats would figure out how to out-organize new voter restrictions (“show us what the rules are and we will figure out a way to educate our voters and make sure they understand how they can vote and we will get them out to vote”). Biden made a similar comment on Wednesday afternoon, saying “no matter how hard they make it for minorities to vote, I think you’re going to see them willing to stand in line and defy the attempt to keep them from being able to vote.”I saw it when Republican senators consistently touted that 94% of Americans said it was easy to vote in 2020 and that turnout was higher than ever.And I saw it on Tuesday, when Joe Manchin, one of two key Democratic holdouts on the filibuster said no one was going to be blocked from voting. “The laws are there, and the rules are there, and basically the government, the government will stand behind them and give them the right to vote,” Manchin said. “We act like we are going to obstruct people from voting; that is not going to happen.”Of course, there’s a mountain of evidence that cuts against all this. Election officials in Texas are rejecting an astronomically high number of absentee ballot requests after the state imposed new restrictions. After Georgia enacted new limits on the availability of drop boxes, the number of voters who used them dropped significantly.Republican lawmakers across the country are also redrawing electoral districts in a way that weakens the influence of Black, Hispanic, and Asian voters, especially in rapidly diversifying places. It’s an invisible form of voter suppression, but perhaps the most powerful, because the votes of those affected will matter less.I had this in mind when Senator Kyrsten Sinema, another Democratic holdout, argued on the Senate floor that passing voting rights legislation would not get at the underlying ills of political division in the US. It was a good line in her speech that just didn’t match up with reality. A provision in the Democratic voting rights bill prohibits severe partisan gerrymandering – something that would go a long way towards fostering more bipartisan compromise.At almost the same time the voting rights bill was taking place on Wednesday, the election board in Lincoln county, a rural and heavily GOP Georgia county near Augusta, was meeting to vote on a plan to close six of seven polling locations. Residents there have been organizing for weeks to block the move, saying that many in the county lack transportation and would have to drive far to get to the single polling location. The county says closing the polling places will save money and make it easier to administer elections. The plan stalled Wednesday evening, but it’s the type of thing that the federal government would have more oversight over if Democrats were able to pass their bill.“If it happens here and they’re successful, maybe we’re the pilot,” said the Rev Denise Freeman, a longtime resident who has been fighting the closures. “Maybe we’re the showcase for the rest of the world to disenfranchise voters so select people can stay in power.”Also worth watching …
      I interviewed Martin Luther King III and his daughter Yolanda about what comes next in the fight for voting rights.
      Governor Ron DeSantis is proposing a massive new state agency to investigate election crimes, even though there’s little evidence of fraud in Florida.
      Preparations for the upcoming Texas primary are a bit of a mess as officials struggle to implement the state’s new voting restrictions. Officials have reported rejecting high percentages of mail-in ballot applications.
      The Ohio supreme court struck down GOP-drawn maps for both the state legislature and Congress, saying they were so partisan they violated the state constitution.
      Republicans in Virginia and Arizona have introduced a slew of new voter restrictions.
      TopicsUS voting rightsThe fight to voteUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More

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      in World Politics

      Welcome to the Metaverse: The Peril and Potential of Governance

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      The final chapter of Don DeLillo’s epic 1997 novel “Underworld” has proven a prescient warning of the dangers of the digitized life and culture into which we’ve communally plunged headfirst. Yet no sentiment, no open question posed in his 800-page opus rings as ominously, or remains as unsettling today, as this: “Is cyberspace a thing within the world or is it the other way around? Which contains the other, and how can you tell for sure?”

      Facebook Rebrands Itself After a Fictional Dystopia

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      Regrettably, people’s opinions on the metaverse currently depend on whether they view owning and operating a “digital self” through the lens of dystopia (“The Matrix”) or harmless fun (“Fortnite”). It is additionally unfortunate that an innovative space as dynamic and potentially revolutionary as the metaverse has become, in the public’s imagination, the intellectual property of one company.

      But the fact that future users so readily associate the metaverse with Facebook is a temporary result of PR and a wave of talent migration, and will be replaced by firsthand experiences gained through our exposure to the metaverse itself, and not a single firm’s vision for it.

      Meta Power

      So, what does this all mean? How will the metaverse shape the way we do business, the way we live our lives, the way we govern ourselves? Who owns the metaverse? Why do we need it? Who will be in charge?

      Taking a lead from this stellar primer, if we simply replace the word “metaverse” with the word “internet” wherever we see it, all of a sudden, its application and significance become easier to grasp. It also becomes clear that Facebook’s rebranding as Meta is not as much a reference to the creation of the metaverse but more in line with the company’s desire to become this new territory’s most enthusiastic homesteaders. Facebook is not so much creating the metaverse as it is hoping — like every other firm and government should hope — that it won’t be left behind in this new world.

      Embed from Getty Images

      As far as the metaverse’s impact, its political implications might end up being its least transformative. In the United States, for instance, the digitization of political campaigning has carved a meandering path to the present that is too simplistically summed up thus: Howard Dean crawled so that Barack Obama could walk so that Donald Trump could run so that Joe Biden could drop us all off at No Malarkey Station.

      Where this train goes next, both in the United States and globally, will be a function of individual candidates’ goals, and the all-seeing eye of algorithm-driven voter outreach. But the bottom line is that there will be campaign advertisements in the metaverse because, well, there are campaign advertisements everywhere, all the time.

      More interesting to consider is how leaders will engage the metaverse once in power. Encouragingly, from the governmental side, capabilities and opportunities abound to redefine the manner in which citizens reach their representatives and participate in their own governance. Early public sector adopters of metaversal development have but scratched the surface of these possibilities.

      For starters, the tiny island nation of Barbados has staked out the first metaversal embassy. This openness to embracing technology and a renewed focus on citizen interaction evidenced in this move are laudable and demonstrate the metaverse’s democratic value as a means for increased transparency in government and truly borderless global engagement. Though novel, Barbados’ digital embassy is no gimmick. You can be sure that additional diplomatic missions will soon follow suit in establishing their presence in the metaverse and will perhaps wish they had thought to do so earlier.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Another happy marriage of innovation and democracy is underway in South Korea. Its capital city has taken the mission of digitizing democracy a step further by setting the ambitious goal of creating a Metaverse Seoul by 2023 for the express purpose of transforming its citizenry’s access to municipal government. Things like virtual public hearings, a virtually accessible mayor’s office, virtual tourism, virtual conventions, markets and events will all be on the table as one of the world’s most economically and culturally rich metropolises opens its digital doors to all who wish to step inside.

      Digital Twinning

      Any time technology is employed in the service of empowering people and holding governments more accountable, such advancements should be celebrated. The metaverse can and must become a vehicle for freedom. It need not provide a tired, easy analog to Don DeLillo’s ominous underworld.

      But then there’s China. While some of its cities and state-run firms are making plans to embrace what functionality is afforded via metaversal innovation, there can be no question that the government in Beijing will have a tremendous say in what development, access and behavior is and isn’t permitted in any Chinese iterations of the metaverse. It is hard to imagine, for instance, certain digital assets, products or symbols making their way past the same level of censorship beneath which China already blankets its corner of cyberspace.

      Yet China’s most intriguing metaverse-related trend involves the spike in interest in digital property ownership occurring while its real-world real estate market continues to sputter. Such a considerable reallocation of resources away from physical assets into digital ones mirrors the increasing popularity of cryptocurrency as a safe haven from the risk of inflation. Call it a technological inevitability or a societal symptom of COVID-fueled pessimism, but the digital world now appears (to some) to present fewer risks and more forward-looking stability than the physical.   

      Unique Insights from 2,500+ Contributors in 90+ Countries

      China may be an extreme example, but the need to balance transparency, openness and prosperity with safety and control will exist for all governments in the metaverse just as it does in non-virtual reality. Real-world governmental issues will not find easy answers in the metaverse, but they might find useful twins. And as is the case in the industry, the digital twinning of democracy will give its willing practitioners the chance to experiment, to struggle, to build and rebuild, and to fail fast and often enough to eventually get some things right.

      Championing commendable applications of this new technology in government and business will position the metaverse as a useful thing within the real world, something that enriches real lives, that serves real people — not the other way around.

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

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      in World Politics

      The Pentagon’s Latest Glorious Failure

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      For centuries, the idea prevailed in our competitive civilization that when someone fails a fundamental qualifying test, it means they should return to their studies and keep a low profile until they felt ready to prove their capacity to pass the test. Someone who fails a driving test will be given a chance to come back a second or even third time. But most people who fail three or four times will simply give up trying to swallow their pride and accept their permanent dependence on public transport, family and friends. The same holds true for law school graduates seeking to pass the bar or indeed students in any school who repeatedly fails an examination.

      In the world of Silicon Valley, an entrepreneur whose first startup fails gets up, dusts off and returns to the race. The venture capitalists will often look at a second effort after the first one fails as proof of courage and resilience. Three- or four-time losers, however, will usually get the message that it may not be worth trying again. In the meantime, the venture capitalist will have removed them from their files.

      Amy Wax and the Breakdown of America’s Intellectual Culture

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      Some privileged people and institutions exist who appear to be spared the indignity of having to retreat after a pattern of failure. The Afghanistan Papers revealed how the repeated mistakes of US military leaders over decades not only did not require them to return to their studies, but duly rewarded them for their service.

      Then there is the US Department of Defense itself. In November 2021, Reuters offered this startling headline: “U.S. Pentagon fails fourth audit but sees steady progress.” Since 1990, Congress has obliged all government institutions to conduct a thorough audit. The Pentagon got a late start but they are already at their fourth audit. And they have consistently failed. But like a backward pupil in an elementary school class, the authorities note that despite consistent failure, they should be encouraged for making progress. Will they prove to be better at failing the next time?

      The Reuters article reveals the source of the government’s hope. It isn’t about performance. Like everything else in our society of spectacle, it’s all about favorability ratings. Our civilization has elevated the notion of ratings to the ultimate measure of virtue. Mike McCord, the Pentagon’s CFO, explains why, despite the failure, there is no need to worry. “The department continues to make steady progress toward achieving a favorable audit opinion.”

      Our Weekly Devil’s Dictionary definition:

      Audit opinion:

      The rigorous standard by which the most sacred part of the US government, the only one that has achieved the status of an object of worship, will be judged by

      Contextual Note

      Opinion is famously fickle, never more so than in the hyperreal world of politics. Like the wind, it can change direction at a moment’s notice. Political professionals have become adept at forcing it to change. That is what political marketers are paid to do. And they measure their success by shifts in the largely unstable numbers that appear in the ratings. Everything becomes focused on the numbers produced by surveys of opinion.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Concerning the Pentagon’s audit, McCord did mention some impressive numbers that went beyond registering opinion alone. The results of the failed audit revealed “more than $3.2 trillion in assets and $3 trillion in liabilities.” Learning that the Pentagon’s balance sheet is $200 billion in the black can only be encouraging. Any entrepreneur knows what that means. In case of forced liquidation, there would be a valuable stockpile of usable weapons to be sold to the highest bidder and still money left over to pay off all the debts. Or, more likely, the whole operation could be profitably sold to a competitor, say, Canada, Mexico, France or Israel at an even higher valuation. China would be excluded from consideration because of the feat, perhaps at the UN, that such a merger would produce a global monopoly.

      Reuters reassures us that optimism is in the air: “As the audits mature and testing expands, Department of Defense leaders expect findings to increase in number and complexity.” They underline the encouraging thought that “successive sweeps could expose more profound problems.” Even the idea of exposing “more profound problems” is promising. It means we may one day understand what’s behind the discovery that the DoD — according to a previous audit — left $21 trillion of expenditure unaccounted for over the past two decades.

      The commentator Jonathan Cohn highlighted an obvious fact that should resonate with the public in light of recent haggling in Congress over President Joe Biden’s agenda. “None of the ‘centrist’ Democrats or Republicans who complained about the cost of the Build Back Better Act,” Cohn notes, “have said a peep about the ever-growing Pentagon budget — and the fact that it is somehow still growing even despite the Afghanistan pullout. It has grown about 25% in size over the past five years, even though the Pentagon just failed its fourth audit last month.”

      In his book, “War is a Racket,”, the most decorated senior military officer of his time, Smedley Butler, explained the underlying logic that still holds true nearly a century later. “The normal profits of a business concern in the United States,” Butler wrote, “are six, eight, ten, and sometimes twelve percent. But war-time profits — ah! that is another matter — twenty, sixty, one hundred, three hundred, and even eighteen hundred per cent — the sky is the limit. All that traffic will bear. Uncle Sam has the money. Let’s get it.”

      Unique Insights from 2,500+ Contributors in 90+ Countries

      A lot of corporations — with names like, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Halliburton and Northrup — have managed to “get it.” Those corporations are very careful with their own audits because they know that failing an audit, even once, let alone four times, would cancel their ability to keep milking the Pentagon’s cash cow. Luckily, the Pentagon doesn’t have to worry about losing its relationship with those corporations simply on the grounds that it failed yet another audit.

      Historical Note

      Ratings, and more particularly favorability ratings, are numbers with no stable meaning. Instead of reflecting reality, they merely register the state of shifting opinions about reality. And yet, ratings have become a dominant force in 21st-century US culture. This is perhaps the most significant sign of a fatal decline of democracy itself.

      The idea of democracy first launched in Athens nearly three millennia ago aimed at spreading the responsibility for government among the population at large. Inspired by the Athenian example, the founders of the United States and drafters of the US Constitution realized that what worked reasonably well for the governance of a city-state could not be directly applied to a nation composed of 13 disparate British colonies. Drawing on England’s parliamentary tradition, the founders substituted representative democracy for Athenian direct democracy.

      Instead of sharing the responsibility of governance with the general population, the new republic offered the people a simple tool: the vote. It was accompanied by the idea that any (male) citizen could seek to stand for election. The founders hadn’t fully appreciated the fact that this might lead to the constitution of a separate ruling class, an elite group of people who could compete amongst themselves to use the tools of governance to their partisan ends.

      Nor did they anticipate the consequences of industrialization of the Western world that was about to unfold over the next two centuries. It would not only consolidate the notion of political organization focused on partisan ends, it would ultimately spawn the “science” of electoral marketing. With the birth of technology-based mass media in the 20th century, that science would focus exclusively on opinion, branding and ratings, leaving governance as an afterthought.

      Embed from Getty Images

      By the 21st century, politics became totally dominated by the race for popularity and the cultivation of strategies to that end. The emergence of television in the second half of the 20th century, coupled with the presence of telephones in every home, sealed the deal. The science of polling was born. Once that occurred, everything in public life became subject to ratings. In the world of politics, the needs of “we the people” were fatally subordinated to a focus on the shifting and increasingly manipulable opinions of those same people. The science of electoral marketing definitively replaced the idea of public service and the quality of governance as the dominant force in political culture.

      The only trace of uncertainty left is the famous “margin of error” attributed to polls, usually estimated at around 3%. In contrast, the Pentagon’s margin of error is measured in multiple trillions of dollars.

      *[In the age of Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, another American wit, the journalist Ambrose Bierce, produced a series of satirical definitions of commonly used terms, throwing light on their hidden meanings in real discourse. Bierce eventually collected and published them as a book, The Devil’s Dictionary, in 1911. We have shamelessly appropriated his title in the interest of continuing his wholesome pedagogical effort to enlighten generations of readers of the news. Read more of The Weekly Devil’s Dictionary on Fair Observer.]

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

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      in World Politics

      After Kazakhstan, What’s Next for the CSTO?

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      In early January, protests erupted in western Kazakhstan over increased gas prices, quickly spreading to other parts of the country. The demonstrations increasingly took on a political thrust and were directed in particular against former President Nursultan Nazarbayev, who had become a symbol of stagnation.

      Although Nazarbayev had stepped down in 2019, he retained the chairmanship of the National Security Council, continuing to play a major role in shaping political events in the country. When protests turned violent, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev finally dismissed Nazarbayev from his post and called in troops from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), whose membership Kazakhstan shares with Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, for support.

      A Momentous Decision

      In the course of the escalating street violence that originated from unknown actors, stores were looted and government buildings set on fire. Rumors spread that members of the security forces had abandoned their posts or even switched sides. President Tokayev, who had initially tried to contain the protests by offering dialogue, had obviously lost control and felt compelled to ask the CSTO for help, citing a supposed threat from “bandits and terrorists,” both local and foreign.

      This decision has far-reaching consequences for Kazakhstan’s relations with Russia, with Moscow now likely to see its role as an ally and guarantor of security strengthened. This increase in importance comes at a critical time. Tensions between Russia and the West have already made it difficult to maintain the foreign policy balance that the government has always advocated, and the equilibrium is now likely to shift further. It cannot be ruled out that Russia will demand something in return for its military support, such as a reduction in Kazakhstan’s military cooperation with the United States or recognition of the annexation of Crimea.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Closer ties to Russia are particularly problematic in terms of domestic politics. During the 30 years of Kazakhstan’s independence, a generation has grown up that no longer has any biographical connections to the Soviet empire and is increasingly questioning Russian influence on identity politics in Kazakhstan. Against this backdrop, Tokayev’s request for support also signals a political positioning in favor of Russia that is unlikely to benefit his popularity in Kazakhstan and could lead to a more authoritarian political style.

      Beyond the bilateral relationship with Kazakhstan, the CSTO’s military intervention represents an opportunity for Moscow to position itself as the most important security actor in Central Asia. Following its economic expansion, China has also broadened its security cooperation with the Central Asian states in recent years, thus undermining one of the most important pillars of Russia’s great power policy. The deployment in Kazakhstan could now rebalance Russia’s weight in the region vis-à-vis China.

      A secondary effect is that Moscow can also demonstrate to the United States and NATO that it is determined — and has the necessary capabilities — to assert its interests militarily if necessary. This increases the pressure of Russia’s coercive diplomacy vis-à-vis the West.

      New role for the CSTO

      The deployment of the Russian-led CSTO military alliance continues the trend toward the militarization of Russia’s foreign policy. What is new is the set of instruments that Moscow is now using. For the first time, the Collective Peacekeeping Forces, which are part of the CSTO’s military structure, are being deployed. Moscow is not concerned with burden-sharing; the alliance relies heavily on Russian personnel, equipment and command structures. This was demonstrated during the deployment in Kazakhstan, where other member states supplied smaller contingents. The CSTO mandate primarily serves to provide Moscow with multilateral legitimacy for the de facto Russian military mission.

      The fact that the CSTO’s first deployment has taken place in connection with anti-government protests in Kazakhstan shows that there is only one common threat perception within the alliance that is shared by the leaderships of all member states: the concern about a threat to authoritarian stability, which is always portrayed as being fomented from abroad. The security concept underlying the military alliance is thus one that equates national security with regime security.

      Unique Insights from 2,500+ Contributors in 90+ Countries

      The mission in Kazakhstan could thus serve as a model for further CSTO interventions. Russian President Vladimir Putin has already stated at the extraordinary CSTO Council meeting on January 10 that the unrest in the Central Asian country is not the first — and will not be the last — external attempt to intervene in the internal affairs of allies. Against this background, it is to be expected that CSTO members will in the future cooperate even more closely with regard to the elaboration and coordination of repressive measures against the opposition and civil society and their possible links with foreign actors. For authoritarian rulers who find themselves under pressure from large protests, appealing to the alliance may also be an attractive option.

      However, since the deployment of the CSTO also gives Russia the opportunity to exert influence, it is now important for Moscow to present itself as a reliable security partner for the authoritarian rulers in the post-Soviet space and to dispel concerns about the use of the CSTO as a hegemonic instrument. It is therefore only logical that the alliance has now completed its withdrawal from Kazakhstan: The impression that the deployment of CSTO troops would be accompanied by a longer-term Russian troop presence unwanted by Kazakhstan would be counterproductive for Moscow in the long term.

      In the medium term, Russia made gains by establishing a model for military intervention in alliance states — and possibly also in other former Soviet republics — with the multilateral legitimization of the CSTO.

      *[This article was originally published by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), which advises the German government and Bundestag on all questions related to foreign and security policy.]

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

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      in US Politics

      Biden marks a year as president and says he has ‘probably outperformed’ – live

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      Key events

      Show

      4.29pm EST

      16:29

      Biden expresses confidence in passing ‘big chunks’ of Build Back Better

      4.21pm EST

      16:21

      Biden: ‘I didn’t overpromise. I have probably outperformed’

      4.05pm EST

      16:05

      Biden holds press conference to mark one year in office

      3.48pm EST

      15:48

      Manchin’s filibuster speech set to clash with Biden’s press conference

      1.00pm EST

      13:00

      Today so far

      11.30am EST

      11:30

      Biden to hold press conference amid struggles to pass voting rights bill

      10.25am EST

      10:25

      Manchin to deliver floor speech on voting rights and filibuster reform

      Live feed

      Show

      Show key events only

      4.47pm EST

      16:47

      Joe Biden confirmed the Build Back Better Act will likely have to be separated into multiple bills in order to get some of its components passed.
      “It’s clear to me that we’re going to have to probably break it up,” the president said.
      Biden noted that Joe Manchin, who announced his opposition to the spending package last month, supports some of the bill’s key provisions, such as establishing universal access to free prekindergarten.
      “I think we can break the package up, get as much as we can now and come back and fight for the rest later,” Biden said.

      4.37pm EST

      16:37

      Joe Biden was asked whether he believes the threatened sanctions against Russia will be enough to prevent Vladimir Putin from approving an invasion of Ukraine, when such economic measures have not proven effective with the Russian president in the past.
      “He’s never seen sanctions like the ones I’ve promised will be imposed if he moves,” the president replied.
      Biden noted he has had “frank discussions” with Putin in recent weeks, as fears have intensified over a potential invasion of Ukraine.
      The US president said that, if Putin moves forward with a full-scale invasion, it will be a “disaster” for the Russian economy.
      “Russia will be held accountable if it invades,” Biden said.

      4.29pm EST

      16:29

      Biden expresses confidence in passing ‘big chunks’ of Build Back Better

      A reporter asked Joe Biden whether he needed to be more realistic in his legislative goals and and scale down his priorities in order to get something passed.
      The president said he did not believe he needed to scale down his goals, arguing his agenda is largely popular with the American people.
      “We just have to make the case of what we’re for and what the other team’s not for,” Biden said, underscoring the need for Democrats to contrast their priorities with those of Republicans.
      However, in response to a follow-up question, Biden seemed to acknowledge that the Build Back Better Act may need to be broken up into several pieces to get passed.
      “I’m confident we can get pieces, big chunks of the Build Back Better law signed into law,” Biden said.
      Joe Manchin announced last month that he would not support the $1.75tn spending package, which represents the centerpiece of Biden’s economic agenda.
      But the president and Democratic congressional leaders have indicated they are not giving up on the proposal.

      4.21pm EST

      16:21

      Biden: ‘I didn’t overpromise. I have probably outperformed’

      Joe Biden is now taking questions from reporters, after delivering some prepared remarks about the coronavirus pandemic and the US economy.
      A journalist asked the president whether he believes he promised too much to voters, considering Democrats’ failure to pass a voting rights bill or the Build Back Better Act since he took office.
      “I didn’t overpromise. I have probably outperformed what anybody thought would happen,” Biden replied.
      The president insisted his administration had made “enormous progress” over the past year, but he acknowledged that the year had not seen much bipartisanship.
      Condemning the obstructionist tactics of the opposing party, Biden said he had not succeeded in convincing “my Republican friends to get in the game”.

      Updated
      at 4.50pm EST

      4.16pm EST

      16:16

      Joe Biden said coronavirus will not disappear anytime soon, but he expressed confidence that the situation in the US will continue to improve in the months ahead.

      CBS News
      (@CBSNews)
      President Biden: “COVID-19 is not going to give up and it’s not gonna go away immediately. But I’m not going to give up and accept things as they are now. Some people may call what’s happening now the ‘new normal.’ I call it a job not yet finished. It will get better.” pic.twitter.com/4MqDerL3H4

      January 19, 2022

      “I’m not going to give up and accept things as they are now. Some people may call what’s happening now the ‘new normal.’ I call it a job not yet finished,” Biden said.
      “It will get better. We’re moving toward a time when Covid-19 won’t disrupt our daily lives, where Covid-19 won’t be a crisis but something to protect against and a threat. Look, we’re not there yet, but we will get there.”
      Biden’s remarks come as the Omicron variant causes a surge in cases of coronavirus in the US, putting more pressure on hospitals and resulting in high demand for tests.

      4.10pm EST

      16:10

      While touting the successes of his first year in office, Joe Biden acknowledged that many Americans remain unhappy with the state of the nation.
      “For all this progress, I know there’s a lot of frustration and fatigue in this country. And we know why: Covid-19,” Biden said.
      The president said he understood Americans are tired nearly two years into the pandemic, but he emphasized the US now has the tools to save lives and keep the economy open — vaccines, tests and masks.
      Nodding to criticism that the White House should have made coronavirus tests more widely available sooner, Biden said, “Should we have done more testing earlier? Yes. But we’re doing more now.”

      4.05pm EST

      16:05

      Biden holds press conference to mark one year in office

      Joe Biden has now appeared at the podium to kick off his press conference, which comes on the eve of the one-year anniversary of his inauguration.
      “It’s been a year of challenges, but it’s also been a year of enormous progress,” the president said.
      Biden touted his administration’s success in boosting coronavirus vaccination rates and lowering the US unemployment rate, despite widespread criticism of Democrats’ failure to pass a voting rights bill or their Build Back Better Act.
      Biden is expected to deliver prepared remarks for about 10 minutes before taking questions from reporters. Stay tuned.

      3.48pm EST

      15:48

      Manchin’s filibuster speech set to clash with Biden’s press conference

      Joe Manchin will deliver his Senate floor speech on voting rights and filibuster reform at 4.30pm ET, his office just confirmed in a statement.
      Given that timing, it is quite likely that Manchin will be speaking as Joe Biden holds his press conference, which is scheduled to begin at 4pm ET.
      So while Biden is trying to tout the successes of his first year in office, Manchin will simultaneously be taking the podium on the Senate floor and likely eliminating any hope of passing voting rights legislation in the near future.
      It should be an eventful afternoon, to say the least. Stay tuned.

      3.36pm EST

      15:36

      Tim Scott, a Republican of South Carolina, criticized Joe Biden for comparing the voting restrictions enacted in the past year to the racist policies of the Jim Crow era.
      Scott, the only Black Republican member of the Senate, said the issue of voting rights is “really important to all Americans but specifically important to Americans from the Deep South who happen to look like me”.
      “As I listened to the president talk about the importance of stopping what he characterized as ‘Jim Crow 2.0’, I felt frustration and irritation rising in my soul,” Scott said. “I am so thankful, thankful that we are not living in those days.”

      CSPAN
      (@cspan)
      Sen. @CoryBooker: “Don’t lecture me about Jim Crow. I know this is not 1965. That’s what makes me so outraged. It’s 2022. And they’re blatantly removing polling places from the counties where Blacks and Latinos are overrepresented. I’m not making that up. That is a fact.” pic.twitter.com/JtwxQMZtpE

      January 19, 2022

      After Scott spoke, Cory Booker, another one of the three Black members of the Senate, stepped up to the podium to denounce the voting restrictions and their disproportionate impact on minority voters.
      “Don’t lecture me about Jim Crow. I know this is not 1965. That’s what makes me so outraged. It’s 2022,” said Booker, a Democrat of New Jersey.
      “And they’re blatantly removing more polling places from the counties where Blacks and Latinos are overrepresented. I’m not making that up. That is a fact.”

      3.09pm EST

      15:09

      The Senate debate over voting rights and filibuster reform has been going on for hours now, and the chamber may not wrap up its work today until 9pm or 10pm ET, per PBS NewsHour.

      Lisa Desjardins
      (@LisaDNews)
      For Senate watchers, consensus in talking with Dem senators and Dem leadership sources is that tonight is heading toward a 9p/10p end time. (As always it’s fluid, who knows, etc.)

      January 19, 2022

      2.46pm EST

      14:46

      The Senate debate over Democrats’ voting rights bill and their suggested changes to the filibuster continues, with Republicans denouncing their colleagues’ proposals.
      Thom Tillis, a Republican of North Carolina, pledged that he would leave the Senate if his party ever amended the filibuster — or rather the legislative filibuster, as Republicans already eliminated the filibuster for supreme court nominees.

      CSPAN
      (@cspan)
      .@SenThomTillis: “The day that Republicans change the rules for the filibuster is the day I resign from the Senate.” pic.twitter.com/f38byD2vqE

      January 19, 2022

      “The day that Republicans change the rues for the filibuster is the day I resign from the Senate,” Tillis said.
      “And I believe that I have a number of members on my side of the aisle that would never do it. So you don’t have to worry about the argument, ‘If you don’t change it now, they’ll just change it when they hit the trifecta.’ It’s not going to happen.”
      It will be interesting to see if those comments ever come back to haunt Tillis.

      2.22pm EST

      14:22

      Joe Biden held a virtual meeting today with some of the senators who traveled to Ukraine over the weekend to meet with the country’s president and discuss concerns over a potential Russian invasion.
      “President Biden and the senators exchanged views on the best ways the United States can continue to work closely with our allies and partners in support of Ukraine, including both ongoing diplomacy to try to resolve the current crisis and deterrence measures,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in a statement.
      “President Biden commended the strong history of support for Ukraine from both sides of the aisle, and agreed to keep working closely with Congress as the Administration prepares to impose significant consequences in response to further Russian aggression against Ukraine.”
      Secretary of state Antony Blinken is also in Ukraine today, meeting with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy before traveling to Geneva for talks with Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, on Friday.
      Blinken has warned that Russia could take “further aggressive action” against Ukraine “at any moment,” the Guardian’s Luke Harding and Andrew Roth report:

      2.04pm EST

      14:04

      Joanna Walters

      The US Supreme Court has issued a very unusual statement. Not about any of the high-stakes cases the bench is considering, however, but about coronavirus, masks – the wearing of – and a report of a disagreement between liberal-leaning Sonia Sotomayor and conservative-leaning Neil Gorsuch over what can be a life-or-death issue. More

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      New York attorney general alleges Trump firm misled banks and tax officials

      by

      New York attorney general alleges Trump firm misled banks and tax officialsCourt filing says investigators are seeking to question Donald Trump and his two eldest children The New York attorney general’s office has told a court that its investigators have uncovered evidence that Donald Trump’s company used “fraudulent or misleading” asset valuations to get loans and tax benefits.The court filing late on Tuesday said state authorities had not yet decided whether to bring a civil lawsuit in connection with the allegations, but that investigators needed to question Trump and his two eldest children as part of their inquiries.The former US president and his lawyers say the investigation is politically motivated.In the court documents, the office of the attorney general, Letitia James, gave its most detailed accounting yet of its investigation into allegations that Trump’s company repeatedly misstated the value of assets to get favourable loan terms or reduce its tax burden.Using personal financial statements from 2004 to 2020 that were filed by Trump’s accounting firm, Mazars, the attorney general’s office said the Trump Organization overstated the value of land donations made in New York and California on paperwork submitted to the IRS to justify several million dollars in tax deductions.New York attorney general subpoenas Donald Trump Jr and Ivanka Trump – reportRead moreThe company misreported the size of Trump’s Manhattan penthouse, saying it was nearly three times its actual size – a difference in value of about $200m (£147m), James’s office alleged, citing deposition testimony from Trump’s longtime financial chief Allen Weisselberg, who was charged last year with tax fraud in a parallel criminal investigation.Valuations of Trump golf clubs in Westchester county, New York and Scotland were inflated, the attorney general’s office says, with the Trump Organization claiming that multiple, ultimately nonexistent mansions worth millions of dollars had been built on the family’s family estate. The company also claimed that there were $150,000 initiation fees into Trump’s Westchester golf course that were never collected.Citing this new additional evidence that Trump and the Trump Organization made fraudulent and misleading asset valuations to boost their appearance to potential lenders and investors, James’ office detailed its findings in a court motion seeking to force Trump, his daughter Ivanka Trump and his son Donald Trump Jr to comply with subpoenas seeking their testimony.Messages seeking comment were left with lawyers for the Trumps.Trump’s legal team has sought to block the subpoenas, calling them “an unprecedented and unconstitutional manoeuvre”. They say James is improperly attempting to obtain testimony that could then be used in the parallel criminal investigation, being overseen by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg.Trump sued James in federal court last month, seeking to put an end to her investigation. In the suit, his lawyers claimed the attorney general, a Democrat, had violated the Republican’s constitutional rights in a “thinly veiled effort to publicly malign Trump and his associates”.In the past, the Republican ex-president has decried James’s and Bragg’s investigations as part of a “witch-hunt”.In a statement late on Tuesday, James’s office said it had not decided whether the evidence outlined in the court papers merited legal action, but the investigation should proceed unimpeded.How Trump’s $50m golf club became $1.4m when it came time to pay taxRead more“For more than two years, the Trump Organization has used delay tactics and litigation in an attempt to thwart a legitimate investigation into its financial dealings,” James said.“No one in this country can pick and choose if and how the law applies to them. We will not be deterred in our efforts to continue this investigation and ensure that no one is above the law.”Although James’s civil investigation is separate from the criminal investigation, her office has been involved in both, sending several lawyers to work side by side with prosecutors from the Manhattan DA’s office.One judge has previously sided with James on other matters relating to the investigation, including making another Trump son, the Trump Organization executive Eric Trump, testify after his lawyers abruptly cancelled a scheduled deposition.Last year, the Manhattan district attorney brought tax fraud charges against the Trump Organization and Weisselberg. Weisselberg pleaded not guilty to charges alleging he and the company evaded taxes on lucrative fringe benefits paid to executives.Both investigations are at least partly related to allegations made in news reports and by Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen that Trump had a history of misrepresenting the value of assets. Associated Press contributed to this reportTopicsDonald TrumpUS taxationNew YorkUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Attack, attack, attack: Republicans drive to make Biden the bogeyman

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      Attack, attack, attack: Republicans drive to make Biden the bogeyman The president has had to withstand a barrage from rightwingers – and for Republicans the formula might be workingIt seemed that Joe Biden would be bad for business in “Make America great again” world.In theory, the US president, a white man with working-class roots and moderate policy positions, was a more elusive target for Donald Trump’s increasingly extreme support base than other prominent Democrats.But after his first year in office, it transpires that Biden is not too boring to be a rightwing boogeyman after all.“He’s our best salesperson,” said Ronald Solomon, a merchandiser who sells a $21.99 T-shirt depicting the president with an Adolf Hitler-style mustache and the slogan “Not My Dictator”. “Sales for Trump stuff and anti-Biden merchandise is the highest it’s been except for the three months leading up to the 2020 election.”The demonization of Biden as a Hitler, Stalin or anti-white racist bears no relation to reality. But for many Republican voters it appears to stick, the product of relentless conservative media attacks, the president’s own missteps, and seething frustration during a seemingly never-ending pandemic.At first Biden did excite less animus than Barack Obama, the first Black president who was subjected to conspiracy theories about his birthplace and the rise of the populist Tea Party movement. Biden never had to go through the misogyny endured by Hillary Clinton.His policy record was also non-incendiary. When Trump supporters gathered at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference under the banner “America vs socialism”, the biggest hate figures were Senator Bernie Sanders, a democratic socialist from Vermont, and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a liberal Latina from New York.Since moving into the White House, however, Biden has granted Sanders a prominent voice in shaping his policy agenda. The unexpected scale of the president’s ambition to spend trillions of dollars on coronavirus relief, the social safety net and the climate crisis has fed into a Republican narrative that he is a puppet of the radical left.And although Biden’s identity as a white man neutralised other “isms”, he cannot escape ageism. At 79, he is the oldest American president in history, his every verbal slip seized upon as cause to doubt his mental fitness. Last May, Fox News host Sean Hannity displayed a sippy cup with the presidential seal on it, floating the nickname “Sippy Cup Joe”.In August, Tucker Carlson told viewers of the same network: “Maybe the most important thing we’ve learned is that Joe Biden is not capable of running the country. Joe Biden is senile.” (Such commentators rarely note that Mitch McConnell, Republican minority leader in the Senate, is also 79.)Another popular line of attack is to compare Biden to Jimmy Carter, whose presidency in the 1970s ended in failure after one term. “Joe Biden Is Jimmy Carter 2.0,” said one such press release from the Republican National Committee. “On Joe Biden’s watch, America is grappling with a gas crisis, record-breaking inflation, weak leadership abroad, and Americans trapped behind enemy lines, all reminiscent of the Jimmy Carter years.”But there is no greater symbol of anti-Biden sentiment than “Let’s go Brandon”, a phrase that originated at a Nascar race in Alabama in October. Brandon Brown, a 28-year-old driver, had won his first Xfinity Series and was being interviewed by an NBC Sports reporter.The crowd behind him was chanting something that at first was hard to hear. The reporter suggested they were saying “Let’s go, Brandon!” to support the driver. But it became increasingly clear they were chanting, “Fuck Joe Biden!” So it was that “Let’s go, Brandon” became conservative code for insulting the president and went viral.On a Southwest flight from Houston to Albuquerque, the pilot signed off his greeting over the public address system with the phrase, leaving some passengers aghast. On Christmas Eve, when Biden fielded a few phone calls to the Norad Santa Tracker, Jared Schmeck, a Trump supporter from Oregon, said: “Merry Christmas and let’s go, Brandon!”Speaking from Las Vegas, Solomon, president of the Maga Mall, said he has a line of “Let’s go, Brandon” merchandise including banners, buttons, T-shirts for men and women and hats in four different colors. “One, it’s an attack on the mainstream media: this gal from NBC Sports immediately tried to make it like they were saying something that they weren’t,” he explained.“Two, it’s a way for Republicans that don’t want to use a four-letter word to have a chance to say something that attacks the president of the United States, who they can’t stand any more.”In a nod to the Trump base, Republican senator Ted Cruz posed with a “Let’s go, Brandon” sign at baseball’s World Series. McConnell’s press secretary retweeted a photo of the phrase on a construction sign in Virginia. Congressman Jeff Duncan of South Carolina wore a “Let’s go, Brandon” face mask at the US Capitol. Jim Lamon, a Senate candidate from Arizona, used the slogan a TV campaign ad.Critics point out that goading, provoking and outraging their opponents, known as “owning the libs”, has become the defining principle of a Republican party that lacks a coherent ideology of its own. McConnell reportedly told donors last month that he would not be putting forward a legislative agenda for November’s midterm elections because he was content to merely hammer away at Democrats.But with Biden’s approval rating hovering in the low 40s, and his Build Back Better agenda stalled in Congress, the Republican formula might be working.John Zogby, a pollster and author, said: “They have made significant inroads into demonizing him. In the beginning, of course, it was hard. He was a softer target, he was Uncle Joe, he had a high favorability rating and he’d been around a long time.“But definitely in the second half of this first year, the almost-mantras of the Republican party have gained hold: he’s too old, he’s a socialist, and then this whole ‘Let’s go, Brandon’ thing. Plus the fact that they’ve been able to successfully block the bigger initiatives so not only a socialist, but a socialist who can’t succeed, is the message.”Barbs and brickbats aimed at a Democratic president are hardly new. Before Obama there was Bill Clinton, who drew his share of rancor, vitriol and baseless conspiracy theories. In today’s hyper-polarized Washington, inflamed by social media, the incumbent can expect to have everything but the kitchen sink thrown at them.Allan Lichtman, a distinguished history professor at American University in Washington, said: “As long as you have the capital D as your political designation, you are a target for the Republicans. It doesn’t matter if you are a leftwing or moderate Democrat – it makes absolutely no difference.“Bill Clinton was a centrist. He was the head of the Democratic Leadership Council, dedicated to moving the Democrats to the centre, and yet they relentlessly attacked him, even impeached him. Republicans will oppose essentially anything that a Democratic president proposes and relentlessly attack them.”Others argue that Biden has done Republicans’ work for them with a botched Afghanistan withdrawal, a crisis at the southern border, the highest inflation for 40 years and an inability to curb the pandemic. The president’s newly aggressive stance on voting rights and safeguarding democracy has also rallied Republicans against him.Frank Luntz, a Republican pollster and strategist, said: “Incredibly, Joe Biden has a worse approval rating at this point than Donald Trump did and it’s not because of Republican critiques. It’s because of Biden’s failures.“He’s failed to communicate effectively. He’s failed to try to bridge the gap; in fact, he’s been promoting greater division. He’s promised too much on Covid and hasn’t delivered. And nothing bothers people more than rising prices because that affects everyone, whether you are working class, middle class or somewhat affluent.”TopicsUS newsRepublicansUS politicsJoe BidenfeaturesReuse this content More