"At my direction, the United States Southern Command delivered a swift and lethal kinetic strike to successfully execute Niño Guerrero, the infamous leader of Tren De Aragua..."

"... one of the most bloodthirsty Terrorist Organizations on Planet Earth.... This action was coordinated closely with our friends in Venezuela, with whom we are working very well. As a result, Tren de Aragua terrorists no longer have safe haven in Venezuela or anywhere else and, under my leadership, we will find these vicious murderers and drugs lords anytime, anyplace, and send them to the depths of hell where they belong. GOD BLESS AMERICA! President DONALD J. TRUMP"

Writes Trump, at Truth Social.

"The White House will restore $187 million in cuts to law enforcement funding that would have devastated New York’s intelligence and counterterrorism operations..."

"... following a bipartisan effort to reinstate the funds, administration officials told The New York Times on Friday.The push, which included personal appeals from Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York, a Democrat, as well as several of the state’s Republican House members, has been underway since news of the cuts began trickling out over the weekend.The cuts, which represented the largest federal defunding of police operations in New York in decades, were made by the Department of Homeland Security, without the approval of President Trump, White House officials said...."

The NYT reports.

Without the approval of President Trump is interesting. 

The way it was done, it scared the hell out of New York, and then Trump got the advantage of being seen setting things right.

Here's the Althouse/Meade text conversation after I (blue) sent a link to the article (and Meade highlighted "without the approval of President Trump"):

"During Trump's 2017-2021 presidency, he considered terrorism designations for cartels but ultimately shelved the plans."

But now: "US declares Tren de Aragua, other cartels are global terrorist organizations" (Reuters)

Some top U.S. officials at the time had privately expressed misgivings that the measure could damage relations with Mexico.... Another concern was that the designations could make it easier for migrants to win U.S. asylum by claiming they were fleeing terrorism. Some analysts have said the terrorism designations could expose asylum seekers who pay cartels to be smuggled to the possibility of prosecution or being barred from the U.S....

"[T]hese criminal networks have extended their operations far beyond drug trafficking and human smuggling. They are now embedded in a wide swath of the legal economy..."

"... from avocado farming to the country’s billion-dollar tourism industry, making it hard to be absolutely sure that American companies are isolated from cartel activities. 'This has come up in previous administrations across the political spectrum and from members of Congress who have wanted to do it,' said Samantha Sultoon, a senior adviser on sanctions policy and threat finance in the Trump and Biden administrations. 'But no one has done it because they have looked at what the implications would be on trade, economic and financial relationships between Mexico and the United States.'..."

From "How Labeling Cartels ‘Terrorists’ Could Hurt the U.S. Economy Isolating U.S. companies from cartel activities could be almost impossible given that the criminal groups operate in sectors like agriculture and tourism, leaving some American businesses vulnerable to sanctions" (NYT).

"But no one has done it"... until Trump. I wonder how many of Trump's innovations are things the others have thought of but rejected. 

"Almost impossible" — that makes me think of this part of Trump's inaugural speech:

"Extremism researchers say they expect one immediate effect of Trump’s return to be a repeal of the culture shift Biden tried to bring about with his 2021 domestic terrorism strategy..."

"... which pledged more training and personnel to monitor violent far-right networks.... Academic researchers and community groups were awarded federal grants to study and prevent radicalization. That work, however, is not in line with the MAGA agenda. Trump-aligned Republicans have portrayed the stepped-up fight against domestic terrorism as a thought-police exercise that could infringe on First Amendment rights. Some Democrats and civil liberties groups also have expressed wariness of federal overreach...."

From "Trump could hobble renewed fight against domestic terrorism, analysts warn/Based on his first-term record, researchers expect the next Trump administration to shift the government’s focus from white supremacists and other far-right militants" (WaPo).

Yes, some Democrats and civil liberties groups are wary that it is a thought-police exercise that could infringe on First Amendment rights because it is a thought-police exercise that could infringe on First Amendment rights. Thanks to the Democrats and civil liberties groups that haven't lost their way.

Alex DiBranco, executive director of the Institute for Research on Male Supremacism, said some anti-fascist and gender-focused nonprofits are concerned again about the Trump administration seeking to discredit or even prosecute them by classifying them as far-left domestic terrorist groups....

So join the Trump-aligned Republicans and the Democrats and civil liberties groups who are wary of thought-police exercises that could infringe on First Amendment rights. The great thing about dedication to First Amendment rights is that they are there to protect your side when your side loses its grip on majoritarian power.

"President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia called President Trump on Sunday to thank him for a tip from American intelligence agencies that helped prevent a terrorist attack in Russia..."

"... the Kremlin said in a statement.... [T]he Federal Security Service, the main successor agency to the K.G.B., told Russian media it had detained two suspects preparing an attack on a crowded location in the northern city of St. Petersburg on New Year’s Eve....  Some of the terrorist groups tracked by the United States have also targeted Russia for years, among them the Islamic State. In 2015, the Islamic State claimed responsibility for blowing up a Russian airliner over Egypt, killing all 224 people aboard.... In 2011, the Federal Security Service warned the F.B.I. that an immigrant from Russia living in Boston, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, had associated with Islamist militants. The F.B.I. investigated the tip but closed the case after finding no proof. Two years later, Mr. Tsarnaev and his brother Dzhokhar detonated homemade bombs at the Boston Marathon."

The NYT reports.

"'It was on brand in the sense that Trump allowed his inner showman to make this a spectacle rather than a solemn moment of acknowledgment and a reflection — the way President Obama did'..."

"... said Ned Price, a CIA officer at the time of bin Laden’s death who later served as a spokesman for the National Security Council under Obama.... Obama spoke of the anguish of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, emphasized the nation’s resolve in recovering, and praised the skill of the intelligence experts who tracked bin Laden down and the courage of the Special Forces who killed him. He also took a measure of credit. 'I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice,' said a president who was routinely assailed by Republicans as weak and feckless on foreign affairs. He took no questions from reporters. By contrast, the Trump show on Baghdadi started with a tweet. 'Something very big has just happened!' the president posted on social media Saturday evening, and the White House media office quickly announced that Trump would make a 'major announcement' — 11 hours later at 9 a.m. Sunday. Critics speculated that the president was eager to upstage the Sunday morning political talk shows in a bid to drown out coverage of the House Democrats’ impeachment effort against him...."

From "In creating spectacle around Baghdadi’s death, Trump departs from Obama’s more measured tone on bin Laden" (WaPo).

In so many ways, Trump is not like Obama. But I presume that each man — on the success of a raid that killed a feared terrorist enemy — made a public display that he believed would advance American military interests and his own political interests. Obama chose to be circumspect and conventionally presidential. After hearing Trump, who was vividly emotional, I relistened to Obama's announcement, and I was struck by the restraint — the blandness. There was nothing about how bin Laden looked or acted as he faced his death. Obama seemed to want to inspire confidence that everything was done with precise correctness. Trump seemed to want us to experience the righteous anger and the vengeance and contempt. These are radically different choices from 2 very different men.

Remember that the Obama administration made a point of communicating with the world about the respectful treatment of bin Laden's corpse:

"Traditional procedures for Islamic burial was followed... The deceased's body was washed (ablution) then placed in a white sheet. The body was placed in a weighted bag. A military officer read prepared religious remarks, which were translated into Arabic by a native speaker. After the words were complete, the body was placed on a prepared flat board, tipped up, whereupon the deceased's body slid into the sea.''

And remember that Trump has openly talked about treating the enemy's bodies with outrageous disrespect:

"Study what General Pershing of the United States did to terrorists when caught. There was no more Radical Islamic Terror for 35 years!," he tweeted. That was after "The United States condemns the terror attack in Barcelona, Spain, and will do whatever is necessary to help. Be tough & strong, we love you!"...

"They were having terrorism problems [in the Philippines], just like we do," Trump said, according to a February 2016 account in the Washington Post. "And he caught 50 terrorists who did tremendous damage and killed many people. And he took the 50 terrorists, and he took 50 men and he dipped 50 bullets in pigs’ blood — you heard that, right? He took 50 bullets, and he dipped them in pigs’ blood. And he had his men load his rifles, and he lined up the 50 people, and they shot 49 of those people. And the 50th person, he said: You go back to your people, and you tell them what happened. And for 25 years, there wasn’t a problem. Okay? Twenty-five years, there wasn’t a problem."

That's quoted in a blog post of mine in August 2017. I commented:

[Trump] thinks its a good idea to let radical Muslim terrorists know we might mess with their dead bodies in a way that he (presumably) thinks they think will wreck their afterlife. He might think that threat will influence the terrorists, but not necessarily. He might just think that he had a cheeky tweet to entertain his fans and confound his MSM antagonists. 

"The Islamic State’s so-called caliphate has been defeated, a U.S.-backed force said Saturday..."

WaPo reports in "The Islamic State’s caliphate has been defeated, U.S.-backed forces say."

I celebrate this victory, but please forgive me if I look immediately turn to WaPo's treatment of President Trump. The first mention of him is in paragraph 4, and it's negative:

The militants switched gears as territorial defeat loomed, seeding sleeper cells across former strongholds as they prepared a new phase of insurgency. U.S. military officials have also warned that President Trump’s planned troop withdrawal — the shape of which remains unclear — has the potential to create a security vacuum within which the Islamic State could regroup.

Next we see that the dramatic success of the "caliphate" occurred under Obama:

The U.S.-led military campaign began in September 2014 after the Islamist militants rampaged through Iraq, seizing a third of its territory in the space of a week. They described the land that they seized as an Islamic State, and it often bore the hallmarks of a real one. Bureaucrats dealt with household bills and garbage collection. The group even minted its own coins.

Notice that Obama is not mentioned. But the next sentence refers to the current president and just calls him "the president," which I found disorienting because I saw "2014" and thought about Obama:

For the president, victory against the Islamic State marks the fulfillment of a campaign promise and as the battle ground toward its conclusion, Trump had repeatedly declared the group defeated.

So the horrible events that happened under Obama's watch are never tied to his name, and then Trump is not named next to the word "victory" — "For the president, victory" — but he is named later in the sentence where it's more negative — Trump "repeatedly declared" something that sounds wrong, that the group was "defeated" when that didn't happen until just now.

"'I don’t really,' Trump said when asked... whether white nationalists were a growing global threat. 'I think it’s a small group of people that have very, very serious problems. It’s certainly a terrible thing.'"

WaPo reports.

Trump said he had not seen a manifesto, purportedly from one of the attackers, that named him as an inspiration for white identity ideology.... The alleged shooter wrote that he was a supporter of Trump in one sense but not completely: “As a symbol of renewed white identity and common purpose? Sure. As a policymaker and leader? Dear god no.” In the document, the man also stated that he was following the example of notorious right-wing extremists, including Dylann Roof, who killed nine black churchgoers in Charleston, S.C., in 2015.

If this is a news story, why can I detect a point of view just looking at the headline and the photograph?

I'm looking at this in the NYT:



The artful photograph looks like a Madonna and Child. The woman is beautiful, serene, and intensely and spiritually maternal.

The headline tells us she's an Alabaman and she's being excluded from "Home."

Now, I'll read the text. I'm beginning at the beginning and will put an ellipsis when I make a cut:

President Trump said Wednesday the United States would not re-admit an American-born woman who traveled to Syria to join the Islamic State and now wants to come home. The woman, Hoda Muthana, does not qualify for citizenship and has no legal basis to return to the country, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said.

In 2014, Ms. Muthana, then a 20-year-old student in Alabama, traveled to Turkey, hiding her plans from her family....

Is she a citizen of Alabama or was she simply a student, temporarily in Alabama?

In fact she was smuggled into Syria, where she met up with the Islamic State and began urging attacks in the West. Now, with the militant group driven out of Syria, Ms. Muthana says she is deeply sorry, but American officials appeared intent on closing the door to her return.

She joined our military enemy, so is she asking to be prosecuted? I don't get how "deeply sorry" can work, especially coming only after the group's military defeat.

Mr. Trump said in a post on Twitter that he had directed the secretary of state “not to allow Hoda Muthana back into the Country!” Mr. Pompeo issued a statement declaring that she “is not a U.S. citizen and will not be admitted into the United States.” Mr. Pompeo said Ms. Muthana did not have “any legal basis, no valid U.S. passport, no right to a passport, nor any visa to travel to the United States.” Ms. Muthana says she applied for and received a United States passport before leaving for Turkey. And she was born in the United States — ordinarily a guarantee of citizenship....

She was born in the United States, but her father was here as a diplomat (from Yemen), and diplomats' children are an exception to the rule that those born here are citizens. Her lawyer, the article says, argues that she's not within the exception because she was born after her father lost his job as a diplomat. She was issued a U.S. passport:

After she joined the Islamic State, [her family's lawyer says], Ms. Muthana’s family received a letter indicating that her passport had been revoked. Her father sent the government evidence of his nondiplomatic status at the time of his daughter’s birth, but did not receive a response. 

After she joined the Islamic State... but was it because she joined the Islamic State? Was it that the issuing of the passport was a mistake, because she was never a U.S. citizen, or was it a consequence of her action, joining our military enemy?

Another lawyer who is advising the family says that she "is trying to turn herself in to federal authorities and face consequences for her actions."

And a former president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, David Leopold, says that if her passport is "legitimate," she has an "irrebuttable presumption of citizenship in this country." He says the government can revoke citizenship — a conviction for treason would be enough — but (in the words of the NYT) "taking an oath of allegiance to a terrorist group or committing a crime like providing one with material support would not be enough."

So, the article quotes 3 legal experts who are taking Muthana's side but no one who argues the other side. It does link to Secretary of State Pompeo's statement, which says:

Ms. Hoda Muthana is not a U.S. citizen and will not be admitted into the United States. She does not have any legal basis, no valid U.S. passport, no right to a passport, nor any visa to travel to the United States. We continue to strongly advise all U.S. citizens not to travel to Syria.

Based on the last sentence, I'm inclined to understand the U.S. government's position to be that Muthana was a citizen but lost her citizenship. So I'm simply guessing that the key question is when the government can revoke your citizenship, the point discussed by Leopold, above. Did the NYT seek out legal opinion from an expert who might take a different view?

"How about you just admit you hate the President, love war and have been wrong for the last twenty years on every part of foreign policy?"

Rand Paul put in a strong performance on "Face the Nation" this morning. Here's the full transcript. Excerpt:

MARGARET BRENNAN: You've been on a tweet storm this morning saying, President's decision to pull out of Syria and cut our troop presence in Afghanistan in half, you said "the entire foreign policy establishment of Washington, DC, who two years ago were swearing Trump was going to start multiple nuclear wars. Now they're mad because he is stopping two wars. How about you just admit you hate the President, love war and have been wrong for the last twenty years on every part of foreign policy?" Who are you referring to because the defense secretary and the top diplomat handling ISIS both resigned over these decisions?

SENATOR RAND PAUL: You know, I think that we should look at some of the statements of the people who are advocating that we stay in Afghanistan forever and that we also stay now in Syria with no sort of determined end. General Mattis, even General Mattis said that there's no military solution to Syria, and he's also said there's no military solution to Afghanistan. How do you think our young soldiers feel? I have members of my family that are going over there soon, how do you think they feel being sent to Afghanistan when your generals are saying there's no military solution? So I think the burden is really on Mattis and others who want perpetual war to explain why if there is no military solution we're sending more troops.... 

"Unlike my colleagues, I’ve been a bemused spectator during this week’s Syria follies."

Writes Andrew C. McCarthy at The National Review.

When ISIS arose and gobbled up territory, beheading some inhabitants and enslaving the rest, Obama began sending in small increments of troops to help our “moderate” allies fend them off. But the moderates are mostly impotent; they need the jihadists, whether they are fighting rival jihadists or Assad. Syria remains a multi-front conflict in which one “axis” of America’s enemies, Assad-Iran-Russia, is pitted against another cabal of America’s enemies, the Brotherhood and al-Qaeda factions; both sides flit between fighting against and attempting to co-opt ISIS, another U.S. enemy. The fighting may go on for years; the prize the winner gets is . . . Syria (if it’s the Russians, they’ll wish they were back in Afghanistan)....

If we stayed out of the way, America’s enemies would continue killing each other. That’s fine by me. I am not indifferent to collateral human suffering, but it is a staple of sharia-supremacist societies.... We should hit terrorist sanctuaries wherever we find them, but it is not necessary to have thousands of American troops on the ground everyplace such sanctuaries might take root....

When we look a little deeper, though, we see why Americans will no longer support Washington’s incoherent Middle East adventurism. When we made our arrangements with the Kurds, we knew the backbone of their fighting forces was the PKK, which the U.S. government has designated a terrorist organization....

I hold no brief for Trump on Syria... But I find it remarkable that... congressional critics never paused, ever so slightly, over the fact that the troops they want the president to keep in Syria were never authorized by Congress to be in Syria....  Obama did not seek congressional authorization for combat operations in Syria because Congress would have refused. And Congress does not want any president to ask for authorization because members do not want to be accountable — they want to go on cable TV and whine that whoever is president has been heedless, whether for going in or for pulling out....

ADDED: Here's "Good Riddance to America’s Syria Policy/As usual, Donald Trump has done the right thing in the wrong way" by Harvard international relations professor Stephen M. Walt (in Foreign Policy).

Instead of obsessing about who is supposedly “winning” and who is supposedly “losing,” the United States should start by identifying its core strategic interests....

What if the remnants of the Islamic State manage to reconstitute themselves, regain some territory, and sponsor new terrorist attacks abroad? Such a development is obviously undesirable, but the danger does not justify keeping U.S. troops in Syria for another one, two, or five years. The ideology of a group like the Islamic State is not eradicated by bombs, drones, artillery shells, or bullets, and the idea of violent resistance can live on even if every member alive today is killed or captured. The ultimate protection against such groups is not an open-ended American commitment but rather the creation of effective local governments and institutions. Legitimate and effective local authority is not something the United States can provide, however; its presence in such places may even be counterproductive. After all, the Islamic State’s ideological message rests in part on opposition to foreign interference, and it has long used the U.S. presence in the region as a recruiting tool. Getting out of Syria won’t neutralize that message right away, but it could make the group less persuasive over time.

Moreover, despite its fearsome image and the hype its brutal tactics have received, the Islamic State was never an existential threat to the United States....

"Turkey will delay a planned offensive against Kurdish forces in Syria's northeast, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday, citing talks with the U.S. president and other officials."

WaPo reports this morning.

“We decided last week to launch a military incursion into the east of the Euphrates River and shared that information with the public,” Erdogan said at a meeting of the Turkish Exporters Assembly in Istanbul.

“Our phone call with President Trump, along with contacts between our diplomats and security officials and statements by the United States, have led us to wait a little longer,” he said, referring to a phone call between the two leaders last Friday.

Still, he said, Turkey's military is planning to launch the offensive in several months, with the aim of “eliminating” both the Kurdish YPG, or People's Protection Units, and Islamic State remnants.

The front-page of the NYT right now shows the development of the framing of Trump's withdrawal from Syria.

You can click to make everything larger and clearer. This is the upper left side of the home page. I've blotted out the lower right corner of the image because it's not about Syria:



Notice that the oldest story is, "A Strategy of Retreat in Syria, With Echoes of Obama." Trump is like Obama. This isn't necessarily pro-Trump, since it suggests that Trump is betraying his own supporters and going back on some position he's emphasized in the past, but for pro-Obama readers, the feeling may be that Obama is vindicated — and perhaps a little relief that the Obama position was right and Trump is endorsing it, not doing anything disturbing, just seeing the best answer and going to the same place. Excerpt:

[E]ven Mr. Trump’s biggest critics, the Democrats, will have a hard time going after him on this decision. Mr. Trump’s view that American forces cannot alter the strategic balance in the Middle East, and should not be there, was fundamentally shared by his immediate predecessor, Barack Obama. It was Mr. Obama who, at almost the exact same moment in his presidency, announced the removal of America’s last troops in Iraq — fulfilling a campaign promise.

Mr. Obama’s strategy — rely on local partners on the ground, use American air power when necessary to defend American interests and celebrate a return of American troops for the holidays — sounds a lot like discussions inside Mr. Trump’s White House over the past several days. Which is exactly what grates on some of the more hawkish Republicans in Congress.

The other story at the bottom and the story over to the left went up 10 hours ago. These get much rougher on Trump: "U.S. Exit Seen as a Betrayal of the Kurds, and a Boon for ISIS" and — from the Board of Editors and with a crude illustration — "Trump’s Decision to Withdraw From Syria Is Alarming. Just Ask His Advisers/This isn’t the first time the president and his administration have sent mixed messages." The similarity between Trump's judgment and Obama's is out of the picture, the stress is on the better judgment of Trump's military advisers, and the Editors waft the most sinister motivation:

It’s hard not to wonder whether Mr. Trump is once again announcing a dramatic step as a way of deflecting attention from bad news, in this case a torrent of legal judgments that are tightening the legal noose around him. That would be the worst rationale for a commander in chief sworn to protect the nation and to honor the men and women who serve in uniform.

Well, not the most sinister motivation. The most sinister motivation would be that Trump is Putin's puppet, that he's acting for the benefit our enemy, the Russians.

And look at the newest story, which went up 10 minutes ago. In the upper left corner, "Vladimir Putin Welcomes U.S. Withdrawal From Syria." It's quite short, but it's the top story at the NYT right now:

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Thursday welcomed President Trump’s announcement of a withdrawal of American troops from Syria, calling it “the right decision.”... Speaking at his annual news conference, which typically runs for several hours, Mr. Putin said he broadly agreed that the Islamic State had been defeated in Syria. “Donald’s right, and I agree with him,” Mr. Putin said....

From the comments already collecting on that article: "Hey Trump: you're the puppet"/"Of course Mr. Putin welcomes it. He probably told Donald to do it"/"Of course he did...."

The photograph at the center of all this shows Putin — on stage and, vastly enlarged, on 2 video screens. It looks creepy and ominous, and the captions is "'Donald’s right, and I agree with him,' President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said of President Trump’s decision to withdraw American forces from Syria."

"We have defeated ISIS in Syria, my only reason for being there during the Trump Presidency."

Tweets Trump.

CNN:

Planning is underway for a "full" and "rapid" withdrawal of US troops from Syria, a US defense official told CNN Wednesday. The decision, which would be a reversal from previously stated US policy, was made by President Donald Trump, who has long signaled his desire to get out of Syria, the official added....

Even though the US will continue to maintain troops in Iraq with the capability of launching strikes into Syria, a US withdrawal of ground forces would fulfill a major goal of Syria, Iran and Russia and risks diminishing US influence in the region.

"America First!/The world is a very dangerous place!" — so begins Trump's "Statement... on Standing with Saudi Arabia."

At the White House website.

The country of Iran, as an example, is responsible for a bloody proxy war against Saudi Arabia in Yemen, trying to destabilize Iraq’s fragile attempt at democracy, supporting the terror group Hezbollah in Lebanon, propping up dictator Bashar Assad in Syria (who has killed millions of his own citizens), and much more. Likewise, the Iranians have killed many Americans and other innocent people throughout the Middle East. Iran states openly, and with great force, “Death to America!” and “Death to Israel!” Iran is considered “the world’s leading sponsor of terror.”

On the other hand, Saudi Arabia would gladly withdraw from Yemen if the Iranians would agree to leave. They would immediately provide desperately needed humanitarian assistance. Additionally, Saudi Arabia has agreed to spend billions of dollars in leading the fight against Radical Islamic Terrorism.

After my heavily negotiated trip to Saudi Arabia last year, the Kingdom agreed to spend and invest $450 billion in the United States. This is a record amount of money. It will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, tremendous economic development, and much additional wealth for the United States. Of the $450 billion, $110 billion will be spent on the purchase of military equipment from Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and many other great U.S. defense contractors. If we foolishly cancel these contracts, Russia and China would be the enormous beneficiaries – and very happy to acquire all of this newfound business. It would be a wonderful gift to them directly from the United States!

The crime against Jamal Khashoggi was a terrible one, and one that our country does not condone. Indeed, we have taken strong action against those already known to have participated in the murder. After great independent research, we now know many details of this horrible crime. We have already sanctioned 17 Saudis known to have been involved in the murder of Mr. Khashoggi, and the disposal of his body.

Representatives of Saudi Arabia say that Jamal Khashoggi was an “enemy of the state” and a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, but my decision is in no way based on that – this is an unacceptable and horrible crime. King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman vigorously deny any knowledge of the planning or execution of the murder of Mr. Khashoggi. Our intelligence agencies continue to assess all information, but it could very well be that the Crown Prince had knowledge of this tragic event – maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!

That being said, we may never know all of the facts surrounding the murder of Mr. Jamal Khashoggi. In any case, our relationship is with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. They have been a great ally in our very important fight against Iran. The United States intends to remain a steadfast partner of Saudi Arabia to ensure the interests of our country, Israel and all other partners in the region. It is our paramount goal to fully eliminate the threat of terrorism throughout the world!

I understand there are members of Congress who, for political or other reasons, would like to go in a different direction – and they are free to do so. I will consider whatever ideas are presented to me, but only if they are consistent with the absolute security and safety of America. After the United States, Saudi Arabia is the largest oil producing nation in the world. They have worked closely with us and have been very responsive to my requests to keeping oil prices at reasonable levels – so important for the world. As President of the United States I intend to ensure that, in a very dangerous world, America is pursuing its national interests and vigorously contesting countries that wish to do us harm. Very simply it is called America First!

Here's "Trump’s Statement on Saudi Arabia, Explained!/The president makes the case for the crown prince: Iran, arms sales and oil" by Julian Barnes in the NYT:

President Trump released an exclamation-point-filled statement on Tuesday about the assassination of the Saudi dissident Jamal Khashoggi.... The statement is a fascinating journey into the mind of the president. Mr. Trump, when he is not obfuscating, is sometimes startlingly transparent about why he makes decisions....

Actually, the NYT analysis is not as enlightening as I had hoped. I don't understand how Barnes thinks he's seeing a "startlingly transparent" view of Trump's decisionmaking process. I don't see Trump's statement as a revelation of what he's really thinking about. I would guess it's much more devious — an attempt to control and manipulate Saudi Arabia.

I think Scott Adams has a much better grip on what's really going on, but maybe Adams is more startlingly transparent than Barnes:

Is the "Circus in Washington... drowning out good economic news"?

I'm reading "There’s Never Been a President This Unpopular With an Economy This Good" (Bloomberg).

President Donald Trump’s unpopularity is unprecedented given the strength of the economy. That’s according to a Bloomberg analysis of polling data....

Is it possible that the polls are wrong? They were in 2016, when Trump blindsided everybody. I'm thinking maybe the polls are right, and it's really true that when asked, most people say they disapprove of Trump. But people disapprove of a lot of things that — when the time comes to decide what to do — they do. Drinking, eating dessert, looking at pornography. And they'll express approval of a lot of things they won't do: getting lots of sleep, eating piles of fresh vegetables, and following Jesus.

Another thing is, the economy is a pretty boring news topic compared to the "circus" of whatever bad thing Trump tweeted or what the latest Mr. Anonymous says Trump did and so forth. But the economy is always there in the background, affecting our lives. We look at the stock prices on our own, without Wolf Blitzer or whoever nudging us to look at today's statistics. Pile on Trump now, it's dangerous and fun, but when it comes time to vote, people may shrug off all the crazy stuff they've heard over the last 2 years, and vote based on the great old question "Are you better off now...?"



As we get close to Election Day, and there are debates and ads, Republicans should just make the old Reagan move and strongly prod people to look at the economy. In a few seconds, the positive news can be strongly conveyed. And the "circus" that's been cluttering up the TV shows may be hard even to remember. I'm sure Democratic Party candidates will urge voters to look at what a circus it's been and hope to blame Trump and not the media for the circus, but I'm picturing debates where the Republican candidate will easily say: My opponent is trying to distract you with the circus show you've been watching in the news all year so you won't look at one big obvious fact — the economy is doing great.

And one more thing, something even more drowned out than the economy. Trump defeated ISIS (NYT):

The last vestige of the Islamic State’s caliphate that straddled Syria and Iraq is under attack. Members of an American-backed coalition said Tuesday that they had begun a final push to oust the militants from Hajin, Syria, the remaining sliver of land under the group’s control in the region where it was born. The assault is the final chapter of a war that began more than four years ago after the Islamic State, also known as ISIS, seized vast tracts in Iraq and Syria and declared a caliphate. The group lost its last territory in Iraq last year.... 

"The Terrible Cost of Obama's Failure in Syria/The atrocities keep coming."

By Kathy Gilsinana in The Atlantic. (Yes, The Atlantic, which recently fired its newly hired conservative, Kevin D. Williamson, is highlighting Obama's failure as Syria gas-attacks its way onto the news front-burner this week.)

“We struck a deal where we got 100 percent of the chemical weapons out,” declared then-Secretary of State John Kerry on Meet the Press in 2014. ... But there were two important and deadly loopholes. The first was that Assad did not declare everything—a reality that Kerry acknowledged publicly, including in a farewell memo to staff, in which he wrote that “unfortunately other undeclared chemical weapons continue to be used ruthlessly against the Syrian people.” The second was that chlorine gas, which has legitimate civilian uses, was not part of the deal....

But, despite that surprising headline, the article doesn't accept Trump's blaming of Obama:

President Trump has labeled the [recent gassing] “an atrocity,” blaming the Obama administration for declining to enforce its declared “red line” against chemical weapons use in 2013. But if anything, until this morning it looked like the Trump administration was more interested in extricating itself from Syria entirely. The attacks follow a strange few days in Washington, as the president stated his desire to get out of Syria “very soon;” his advisers insisted the U.S. was staying to finish the job of defeating the Islamic State; and the White House tried to resolve the contradiction by insisting that American troops would stay in Syria until ISIS was gone, an outcome that was rapidly coming to pass.

The article doesn't say what should be done, and of course, I don't know. I'll just say that if Assad had civilians gassed just as Trump was saying let's get out of Syria soon and his advisers were contradicting him and saying we need to finish the job, Assad seems to be weighing in on the side of the advisers and saying Bring it on. Now, why would he do that?

Trump begins the new year of tweeting with shots at the leaders of Pakistan and Iran.

First, one hour ago:

The United States has foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years, and they have given us nothing but lies & deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools. They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan, with little help. No more!

Second, 45 minutes ago:

Iran is failing at every level despite the terrible deal made with them by the Obama Administration. The great Iranian people have been repressed for many years. They are hungry for food & for freedom. Along with human rights, the wealth of Iran is being looted. TIME FOR CHANGE!

No more... time for change...

"Allahu akbar. It’s Arabic for 'God is greatest.' Muslims, an eccentric tribe with over a billion members..."

"... say it several times in our five daily prayers. The phrase is also a convenient way to express just the right kind of gratitude in any situation. I say 'Allahu akbar' out loud more than 100 times a day.... A common, benign phrase used daily by Muslims, especially during prayer, is now understood as code for 'It was terrorism.' It’s easy to forget that language is often hijacked and weaponized by violent extremists. Some people yell 'Allahu akbar' and others chant 'heritage,' 'culture' and 'white pride.' The preferred slogans of a killer don’t make much difference to the people whose lives are lost or their loved ones, but they make all the difference in Americans’ collective understanding of a tragedy.... If only the hurricane that devastated Puerto Rico, leaving American citizens in desperate need of power, food or water, could have yelled, 'Allahu akbar,' triggering that kind of tough response. Perhaps our president would have been able to see the storm as evil. Perhaps he would have been energized by a 'them versus us' rage to insist on swift action to repair the damage."

From "I Want ‘Allahu Akbar’ Back," by playwright/lawyer Wajahat Alinov (NYT).

ADDED: If it were possible to fight a hurricane with a proactive military strike, we'd totally do that. And most of us don't particularly care about the enemy's ideology except as a way to figure out how and where it will attack so we can fight it better. We don't need to feel there is "evil." Understanding the religion behind Islamist terrorist attacks isn't that different from understanding the science of how a hurricane behaves. We want to protect our physical security. Most Americans — the vast majority, I think — prefer to let other people have their own religious beliefs. We're not about ferreting out heresy and blasphemy. The American values are freedom of religion, individual autonomy, and keeping government out of religion. Go enjoy your freedom and let us enjoy ours.

I'm absolutely not buying the argument that we care less about hurricanes than terrorist attacks and that the difference is some antipathy to Islam. We don't have a way to stop a hurricane. We can only clean up and make repairs after the disaster. The same is not true with terrorism, because human beings with minds that can be understood are plotting and planning and can be stopped before they strike. We don't just wait and then do an extra-good job of dealing with the destruction. There is evidence of what other people are thinking in part because they use words. It's sad that "Allahu akbar" is among the words that help us protect ourselves from attacks, and I'm glad Alinov cares enough to feel bad about the words he'd like only to feel good about.