Tag: Trump making America less safe

Palestinian Authority cuts security ties with US, Israel following Trump peace plan announcement

The Hill logoThe Palestinian Authority on Saturday severed security ties with the United States and Israel following the introduction of President Trump‘s Middle East peace plan earlier in the week.

“We’ve informed the Israeli side…that there will be no relations at all with them and the United States including security ties,” Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told a group of Arab foreign ministers in Cairo, Reuters reports.

The Palestinian president was in Cairo to address the Arab league, a group that has backed the Palestinians’ rejection of President Trump’s peace plan. Abbas has described the plan as “nonsense.” Continue reading.

How Trump and the right are waging war on reality and empirical truth

AlterNet logoWords have actual definitions. Conspiracies do in fact exist.

A conspiracy consists of two or more people acting in private to advance their own interests against and contrary to those of other people.

Donald Trump and his agents’ bribery and extortion plot to withhold congressionally approved military aid to force the government of Ukraine to “investigate” Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, with the goal of helping Trump win the 2020 presidential election, is a textbook example of a very real conspiracy.

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‘Everybody wants to make a deal’: Struggling to negotiate, Trump often claims countries are eager to talk

Washington Post logoThe Debrief: An occasional series offering a reporter’s insights

In President Trump’s telling, everyone he’s negotiating with has something in common: They’re all dying to make a deal with him.

Whether it’s Iran, China, Japan, Russia or the Taliban — Trump claims there’s a mad rush by foreign friends and foes alike to sit at the table with him and negotiate on his terms. He has repeated the same boastful talking point even as he’s struggled to finalize major deals.

“Let me tell you, the China trade deal is dependent on one thing: Do I want to make it?” Trump said Tuesday during a summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization alliance in London. The Chinese, he added, “want to make a deal now.”

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House Intelligence report says Trump abused power

The Hill logoDemocrats on the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday unveiled the much-awaited findings of their weeks-long impeachment investigation, laying out in blow-by-blow detail the basis for their allegations that President Trump abused the power of his office.

The 300-page report does not recommend specific articles of impeachment — leaving those decisions to the Judiciary Committee — but it paints a damning portrait of Trump’s dealings with Ukraine and all but asserts that those actions warrant his removal from office.

Most of the narrative outlined in the report was previously known, revealed during weeks of interviews with more than a dozen administration officials with a window into Trump’s dealings with Kyiv.

Continue reading here.

The Pentagon faces a massive purge after the Gallagher affair

AlterNet logoThere are two misconceptions about President Donald Trump. First, that he runs a totally chaotic administration and there’s no method to his madness. Second, that he is a great supporter of the military. He himself frequently brags that the U.S. military has been rebuilt and is the strongest it has ever been.

The reality is different — and far darker. Trump is degrading and dishonoring the U.S. military. What’s more, he is doing so in a deliberate and systematic way.

That is why the news about Trump intervening in the case of convicted Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher, overriding his commanding officers and ordering the Pentagon to let him keep his SEAL Trident, the Special Warfare insignia, is so important. What Trump is really signaling with this move goes far beyond pardoning a war criminal.

View the complete November 29 article by Alexei Bayer from The Globalist on the AlterNet website here.

Pompeo says Trump’s debunked Ukraine conspiracy theory is worth looking into

Washington Post logoSecretary of State Mike Pompeo said Tuesday that a debunked conspiracy theory pursued by President Trump accusing Ukraine, not Russia, of interfering in the 2016 presidential election by hacking the network of the Democratic National Committee is a worthy subject of investigation.

In a news conference at the State Department, Pompeo was asked if the United States and Ukraine should investigate the conspiracy theory, which several former senior Trump officials have called a “fictional narrative” with “no validity.”

“Anytime there is information that indicates that any country has messed with American elections, we not only have a right but a duty to make sure we chase that down,” Pompeo told reporters.

View the complete November 26 article by John Hudson on The Washington Post website here.

Russia and Turkey reach deal to push Kurdish forces out of zone in northern Syria

Washington Post logoISTANBUL — Russia and Turkey agreed Tuesday on a plan to push Syrian Kurdish fighters from a wide swath of territory just south of Turkey’s border, cementing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s preeminent role in Syria as U.S. troops depart and America’s influence wanes.

The agreement, reached after an hours-long meeting between Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Black Sea resort town of Sochi, will leave Turkey and Russia in control of territory formerly held by Kurdish forces once allied with the United States.

More important, though, the deal bolstered Russia’s preferred endgame in Syria’s civil war by allowing its ally, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, to regain control over more of his country’s territory. Russia is also prodding states in the region to recognize, either explicitly or tacitly, the Syrian government’s authority, analysts said.

View the complete October 22 article by Kareem Fahim, Karen DeYoung and Missy Ryan on The Washington Post website here.

Trump interrupted Pentagon briefing about America’s commitment to the world with bizarre rant about himself: report

AlterNet logoPresident Donald Trump interrupted his very first Pentagon briefing on America’s commitment to the world with a bizarre rant about himself.

Former Defense Secretary James Mattis had prepared meticulously for the July 20, 2017, meeting, and his former speechwriter Guy Snodgrass said the retired U.S. Marine Corps general appeared extremely nervous about briefing the new president for the first time, according to a new Politico feature.

“As the seconds ticked down, Mattis’ nervous energy had been palpable,” Snodgrass wrote in the article. “Unusually so. Normally stoic and deliberate with his movements, this morning he was electrified.”

View the complete October 21 article by Travis Gettys from Raw Story on the AlterNet website here.