Showing posts with label Israel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Israel. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 12, 2024

Opening remarks of Florida Senator Marco Rubio, Vice Chair of U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence during Comm.'s annual Worldwide Threats Assessment hearing. Also have video of entire hearing. #China #Iran #Putin #Russia #TikTok #Xi #ByteDance


NB: Full hearing of U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on worldwide threats is at bottom of page!

https://www.rubio.senate.gov/rubio-delivers-opening-remarks-at-worldwide-threats-hearing-2/

Press Release via Senator Marco Rubio's Office
RUBIO DELIVERS OPENING REMARKS AT WORLDWIDE THREATS HEARING
MARCH 11, 2024

Vice Chairman Marco Rubio (R-FL) of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence delivered opening remarks during the annual Worldwide Threats Assessment hearing.

“I still think America, by every measure you can imagine – economically, culturally, militarily – remains the world’s strongest nation and should remain that way for the foreseeable future if we make the right choices. But that order that I just described is being challenged. It’s being challenged by nation-states that don’t like the way the world looks now. At least, they think it benefits America and hurts them. And they want to [sideline] America and our democratic allies with an alternative, if not a replacement.” – Senator Rubio


“Thank you all for coming here today. I also extend my thanks to the men and women who work underneath you that do the important work of keeping our country safe at what I think you could describe as one of those pivot moments in history, where what life will be like for a generation is being determined by what’s happening now and in the near future.

“While events are changing perhaps faster than any other time in human history, I think we have to remind ourselves of the why – the bigger outlined picture of why things are happening the way they are happening. Because I do think that they are all interrelated.

“From the end of the Cold War to the late 2000s, we lived in a unipolar world. The United States was basically the only country in the world that could project power everywhere at every time. And we were called upon to do many things in regard to that. But other nation states progressed during that stage.

“I still think America, by every measure you can imagine – economically, culturally, militarily – remains the world’s strongest nation and should remain that way for the foreseeable future if we make the right choices. But that order that I just described is being challenged. It’s being challenged by nation states that don’t like the way the world looks now. At least, they think it benefits America and hurts them. And they want to [sideline] America and our democratic allies with an alternative, if not a replacement.

“The Chinese believe we’re in inevitable decline and that their rise is inevitable. They don’t like the rules of the world as they believe were written by America and our allies, and so they increasingly are taking it upon themselves, at every opportunity, to challenge them in every domain. They steal our ideas on innovation and so forth, so that their companies can do the things that we do, but do it cheaper and flood markets with those products.

“I don’t need to tell this panel or the members of this committee and the general public that they’re expanding their military capabilities in an extraordinary way to include, not simply projecting power in the Indo-Pacific, but around the world. By the way, they manipulate loopholes in our laws and in our systems in this country to buy up land, buy up companies, gain strategic advantage in industries, and undermine our industries in return.

“They are a major part of flooding this country with deadly drugs that are destroying communities and ravaging entire families. And they’ve also gotten very good at hiring lobbyists and even deputizing corporate America to come up here and lobby us for things that are beneficial to Chinese goals at the expense of this country, long term.

“I think it’s important to mention here today, they also happen to control [ByteDance]. Anybody who says they don’t doesn’t know what they’re talking about, because every company in China is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. They happen to control a company that owns one of the world’s best artificial intelligence algorithms. It’s the one that’s used in this country by TikTok, and it uses the data of Americans to basically read your mind and predict what videos you want to see.

“The reason why TikTok is so successful, the reason why it’s so attractive, is because it knows you better than you know yourself, and the more you use it, the more it learns. The problem is not TikTok or the videos. The problem is the algorithm that powers it is controlled by a company in China that must do whatever the Chinese Communist Party tells them to do.

“And the only way that that algorithm works is if that company in China, under the control of the Chinese government, is given access to the data that TikTok collects. TikTok does not work without that algorithm. And that algorithm is controlled by a company that’s controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, under the law of China.

“In the case of Putin, he also sees America as decadent and in decline. He views China and Russia as resilient. They view themselves as great powers. And he believes that great powers have a right to buffer states. He believes that great powers have a right, not just to have their own borders, but to control the countries around their borders as buffer states. They already have that in Belarus. It is one of the reasons why he invaded Ukraine.

“In the case of Iran, they want to export their Shia Islamic revolution to the entire Middle East. The problem with this is, two things stand in their way – the state of Israel and the United States of America. That is why they have proxy groups in places like Syria, in Iraq, in Lebanon, in Yemen, in Gaza, whom they use for their purposes.

“One of their purposes is to use these groups to attack Americans, so that we will say, ‘It’s not worth the trouble. We need to get out of there.’ And once we leave, then they’ll move on to Jordan and Bahrain. Then they’ll make Israel an unlivable place. Ultimately, their ambitions are the entire region and most of the Gulf kingdoms.

“That’s why I think it’s a mistake to view the horrific events of October 7th as simply the latest iteration of a longstanding Israeli-Palestinian problem. It is deeply tied to the head of this snake, and the head of this snake is in Iran and in Tehran.

“Add to these three countries North Korea. We haven’t heard a lot about it yet, but they have become increasingly aggressive. In fact, I would argue that we perhaps are closer to some armed hostilities than we’ve been in a decade or longer.

“Why have they become so aggressive? They feel empowered. They feel empowered because Putin is buying things from them and helping them to break their international isolation. And also because – I don’t know what percentage of their economy is powered by ransomware attacks and cyber hacking, but it’s substantial. They generate a lot of money from that.

“Then add to this parade of horribles the fact that terror is still a threat. Iran, as has been publicly reported, is still trying to kill former government officials that live in the United States of America. There are former government officials in this country, no longer in office, who require 24 hours a day security because Iran is trying to kill them inside the United States.

“Hezbollah, an agent of Iran, is also looking for ways to conduct terrorist attacks against American interests and Israeli and Jewish interests all over the world and here in the homeland as well. By the way, ISIS and al Qaeda are not out of business. They are still involved with Al-Shabab. They also want to kill Americans. If they could do it in the homeland, they would love that.

“And all of that is happening at a time in which perhaps the single largest, most eventful migration corridor in history is operating right off of our border.

“I think it’s a mistake sometimes to divide all of these problems geographically, because in some ways, they’re all interrelated. Yes, these individual states all have different ambitions, but they share a common goal. And the common goal is a world friendlier and better for them and their interests and a world in which America is weakened and less able to act.

“All of these crises begin to interlock in a way that helps them. For example, the Chinese and the Russians see great benefit in what’s happening in the Middle East, because they figure every dollar and every second of our attention that’s paid there is not paid to what’s happening with Ukraine or the Indo-Pacific. The Chinese see great benefit in Ukraine as well, because they view it as the more time and money we spend there, the less time and money and focus we have on them.

“In fact, I know the Chinese hope for one of two things – we deplete ourselves in Ukraine and/or the Middle East, particularly Ukraine, or we cut and run. Then they can go around the world and say, ‘See, I told you, America’s weak. I told you America is unreliable.’ They have a plan for either outcome, which makes it challenging for us as we decide what to do here.

“These things all come together…. The goals that Russia has, the goals that Iran has, the goals that North Korea has, the goals that the Chinese have, may be different goals, but one of the real developments that threatens the security of our country is that they are increasingly partnering with one another. It’s not a NATO alliance, not the sort of formal alliance that’s written out. But they are increasingly partnering with each other.

“It’s on selected topics, and it’s on selected opportunities, because they all share one goal, and that is, they want to weaken America, weaken our alliances, weaken our standing and our capability and our will. Because it helps them to achieve the world as they envision it, the world that they want. But it comes at our expense and at the expense of all that’s been built over the last 20 or 30 years.

“I think that one of the greatest dangers we face is the inability to see how all these things are interconnected. And I think one of the greatest challenges we face is to deal with them as if they are interconnected. I think that what life will be like on this planet for the next generation will be determined very much by what we do or fail to do here, over the next two to three years, with the issues that are before us today.”


Full hearing is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJHQ18Wx8RM

2 hours, 27 minutes, 25 seconds





Dave

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Obama's bad foreign policy from the start shows little sign of improving, as Washington Post Editorial Board lashes out Sunday : "Mr. Kerry’s empty words on Syria": "So what does the Obama administration propose to do to stop this barbarism? The simple answer is: nothing, other than issue strongly worded statements..."; #stonecoldfacts, @washingtonpost

Obama's bad foreign policy from the start shows little sign of improving, as Washington Post Editorial Board lashes out Sunday : "Mr. Kerry’s empty words on Syria" 
In case you were still on your summer hibernation when this happened a few weeks ago, the only time that President Obama has brought the country together this year on a policy is when nearly the entire country stood-up in opposition to his ill-considered ideas, plans and policies over Syria, one of his major weaknesses since coming into office in January of 2009.
That hasn't changed.
Think about that for a minute.

The Washington Post
Washington Post Editorial: Mr. Kerry’s empty words on Syria
By Editorial Board
Published October 28, 2013
ACCORDING TO Secretary of State John F. Kerry, Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad now is waging “a war of starvation” against his own people. In a robustly worded op-ed column posted Friday on ForeignPolicy.com, Mr. Kerry denounced what he said was “the systematic denial of medical assistance, food supplies and other humanitarian aid to huge proportions of the population.” The regime’s tactics, he said, “threaten to take a humanitarian disaster into the abyss.” They are “intolerable,” and “the world must act quickly.”
So what does the Obama administration propose to do to stop this barbarism? The simple answer is: nothing, other than issue strongly worded statements. 
Read the rest of the editorial at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/mr-kerrys-empty-words-on-syria/2013/10/28/d422b6c4-3feb-11e3-a624-41d661b0bb78_story.html

Friday, August 30, 2013

Syria: Plain and True, Fact and Fantasy, Past and Present, but ever since it's artificial creation by the French and the British, it's always been an artificial 'Line in the Sand'. For President Obama, though, it's now 'a red line' in the sand




Awesome Sean Lee @humanprovince! "An open letter on Syria to Western narcissists."
http://humanprovince.wordpress.com/2013/08/29/an-open-letter-on-syria-to-western-narcissists/">http://humanprovince.wordpress.com/2013/08/29/an-open-letter-on-syria-to-western-narcissists/</a>





















































































Wednesday, October 3, 2012

In honor of espionage and the Season Two premiere of SHOWTIME's Emmy Award winning HOMELAND getting a 60% increase in viewers over last year's premiere, I present some amazing video that needs to be seen to be believed: VICE News videos - Hezbollah's Propaganda War; Morena Baccarin @missmorenab


An inside look at Season Two with the creators and stars of SHOWTIME's espionage drama HOMELAND, the best show on American television. 
http://www.sho.com/sho/video/titles/17717/behind-the-scenes-homeland-season-2


SHOWTIME video: Season Two, Episode One: An asset from Carrie's old life comes in from the cold. Uploaded September 30, 2012. http://youtu.be/-xtJ5lLkW70
In honor of espionage and the Season Two premiere of SHOWTIME's Emmy Award winning HOMELAND getting a 60% increase in viewers over last year's premiere, I present some amazing video that needs to be seen to be believed: VICE News videos - Hezbollah's Propaganda War; Morena Baccarin @missmorenab
Have already watched the new episode on TV twice. Plus, watched the DVD-RW I made looking for hidden clues, so I guess that makes thrice!

More HOMELAND clips are at SHOWTIME's YouTube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/show/homeland/

http://www.sho.com/sho/homeland/home

http://ithitshome.com/

Dana's Unfiltered blog: http://danaunfiltered.com/

Ratings: 'Homeland,' 'Dexter' Score Big for Showtime
http://www.thewrap.com/tv/column-post/ratings-homeland-dexter-score-big-showtime-58666
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"Hezbollah has built a multi-million dollar theme park celebrating its military victories over Israel. It's the latest PR offensive from the Iranian-funded Shia Muslim militia its followers call the "Party of God." Host Ryan Duffy heads to Lebanon to visit this bizarre tourist site to learn how this group that started as a ragtag militia in the 1980s has skillfully used propaganda to transform itself into a military and political force to be reckoned with, and how anti-Hezbollah groups are trying to compete in this war of words." September 2012.


http://www.vice.com/vice-news/hezbollahs-propaganda-war-part-1
http://www.vice.com/vice-news/hezbollahs-propaganda-war-part-1#ooid=tuNjhvNTqb2dIf_zU1QRpOrNm1A1pGyx



http://www.vice.com/vice-news/hezbollahs-propaganda-war-part-2
http://www.vice.com/vice-news/hezbollahs-propaganda-war-part-2#ooid=A0cXVsNTp8c_QoL8UCnCs0K8Uwy3jVSG

Meanwhile, back in Los Angeles... paparazzi cameras go off by themselves when HOMELAND star Morena Baccarin walked the red carpet two weeks ago...


http://youtu.be/3CRtkyxIVvM

And the week before that there was...

Esquire Magazine
WOMEN WE LOVE
Morena Baccarin Is a Woman We Love
And today, she is also the most beautiful woman in the world
By Tom Chiarella
September 10, 2012, 12:00 AM
http://www.esquire.com/women/women-we-love/morena-baccarin-1012

Morena Baccarin @missmorenab https://twitter.com/missmorenab

Special bonus: photo of Morena Baccarin AND Laura Vandervoort together in one photo. Seriously, you might want to sit down first so the double-dose of beauty doesn't make you faint dead away after you click this link: http://twitter.com/Vandiekins22/status/245715759555289088/photo/1

You're welcome!

Monday, July 30, 2012

Wow! Hallandale Beach is in The Washington Post: WaPo's Jason Horowitz ponders Jewish-American voters' feelings towards Mitt Romney and President Obama's treatment of Israel thru the prism of Hallandale Beach. HB's Sage Bagel as the NEW poor man's Algonquin Round Table!



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Above, looking east from in front of the RK Sage Plaza retail strip at Hallandale Beach Blvd. (State Road 858) and S.E. 8th Avenue in Hallandale Beach, FL, home of Sage Bagel and Deli. In the distance is one of the three condo towers from The Related Group's The Beach Club on the beach and State Road A1A. Google Maps' Street View, circa 2011.
Wow! Hallandale Beach is in The Washington Post: WaPo's Jason Horowitz ponders Jewish-American voters' feelings towards Mitt Romney and President Obama's treatment of Israel thru the prism of Hallandale Beach. HB's Sage Bagel as the NEW poor man's Algonquin Round Table!
The Washington Post
Jewish voters ponder Romney
By Jason Horowitz
July 30, 8:57 PM
HALLANDALE BEACH. Fla. — Moments after Mitt Romney completed his ode to Israel in front of Jerusalem’s old stone walls on Sunday, reporters asked Sheldon Adelson, the casino mogul and a financial rabbi for the presidential campaign, whether the speech would convince Jewish voters back home to vote for the Republican.
“If they hear it,” answered Adelson, who was with Romney in Israel and has pledged tens of millions of dollars to pro-Romney super PACs. “Yes, for sure.”
Read the rest of the article at:

Hmm-m... could our very own Sage Bagel become the new Versailles, the "The World's Most Famous Cuban Restaurant" on Calle Ocho and the place where all U.S. presidential candidates and state-wide candidates are required to visit when they campaign for the first time in South Florida, for a press op, drinking café con leche?

Yes, more powerful than any law, it's a South Florida political and media tradition!
The mind reels at the possibilities!

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Sage Bagel and Deli
800 E. Hallandale Beach Blvd.
Hallandale Beach, FL 33009 
(954) 456-7499

View Larger Map

Versailles Restaurant
3555 S.W. 8th Street,
Miami, FL 33135 
(305) 444-0240

Thursday, August 11, 2011

"Next year in Jerusalem" is right now for FL-17 Rep. Frederica Wilson, courtesy of AIPAC. But that's bad news for Americans, esp. her constituents


"Next year in Jerusalem" is right now for FL-17 Rep. Frederica Wilson, courtesy of AIPAC. But that's bad news for Americans, esp. her constituents.

The very constituents that she ought to be meeting with in-person right now during the summer recess. In places like ocean-side Hallandale Beach, for instance.
A city in the FL-17 CD that she never had a public event at before last August's primary.

Some of you out there in the South Florida part of the blogosphere may've seen this telling little bombshell in the Sun-Sentinel's Broward Politics blog earlier in the week:

South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Broward Politics blog
Congresswoman Frederica Wilson in Israel
By Anthony Man August 8, 2011 01:25 PM

Notice what it doesn't say?

Correct, who's paying for Wilson's trip.
Only THE most obvious and important question one could ask.

Somehow, and for whatever reason, THAT answer didn't seem important enough for Anthony Man to include in the small post, that over 72 hours later, still has not drawn a single reader comment.

Assuming he didn't first find out about it from a press release from her office, which is entirely likely given how rarely Rep. Wilson's name ever appears in the Broward Politics blog, this is par for the course here in South Florida as far as the press digging for information goes, and Man in particular.

Actually, her own press release about the trip neglects to mention AIPAC also:

Somehow I have a strong feeling that the source of the trip's funding would've come up in the blog post if it had something to do with an oil company PAC for instance, or one representing almost any other corporate interest.

(For the record, I disregard almost everything Anthony Man writes, in large part because over the years I've found so much of what he has written or said on public policy TV shows to be factually incorrect, lacking crucial context, completely unpersuasive, or, as if that wasn't enough, when it comes to the dreaded Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, he's seemed like her trained pet poodle.
Her Boswell.

What Man has written about this FL-20 House member -who has never run in a non-gerrymandered CD and never faced a competitive opponent in a general election, a most-charmed situation!- seems so over-the-top that it was embarrassing to read.
Not unlike Alex Leary's recent story in the St. Pete Times that I commented on recently.)

I first learned about the departure of nearly one-fifth of the U.S. Congress for Israel in The Washington Post on Tuesday and wondered how in the world that could possibly be a good idea for either American public policy, esp. foreign policy, or, their own constituents suffering the slings and arrows of Obama's economic malaise.

Does Rep. Wilson really think going to Israel for the first time is more important than meeting with her constituents?
"Asked and answered, your honor."

Washington Post
House members travel to Israel, courtesy of AIPAC lobby, not taxpayers
By Al Kamen
Published: August 9, 2011

A record 81 House members, about a fifth of the chamber, are spending a week in Israel this month, courtesy of a foundation set up by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a pro-Israel lobby.
Read the rest of the article at

I hadn't had time to read the Broward Politics blog on Monday due to being so busy, but even if I had, which article tells you more?
The Post didn't neglect to discover the source of the funding, they put it right there in the headline so nobody could miss it.
As I have here, too.

The next day, my daily Morning Brief email from Foreign Policy magazine arrived and one of the posts there made all the points I made in my head and planned on sharing here -better than me.


Foreign Policy
How the World Is Really Run blog
The congress is in session, it turns out … in Israel
Posted By David Rothkopf
Wednesday, August 10, 2011 - 11:44 AM

This week's reports that 20 percent of the U.S. Congress will be visiting Israel this month are stunning. Eighty-one members of Congress -- two thirds of them Republicans, 47 of them freshmen -- apparently think it is more important to be visiting Israel than it is to be at home dealing with the worst economic crisis in modern memory. America's economy is in flames and these guys are taking lobbyist-funded trips to what, watch Israelis take to the streets to protest the high-cost of living in that country?

Read the rest of the post at:


I acknowledge that it sounds petty but I'd love for someone with a TV camera rolling to ask Rep. Wilson what she thinks of the success or failure so far of Operation New Dawn.

No, it's true, I don't think very highly of Rep. Wilson, and I don't think this cipher in Congress that represents the people in my part of Hallandale Beach would know what that operation is, that is, without prompting.
But it hardly matters.

Frederica Wilson will fight tooth-and-nail over the next year to make sure that she can keep this cushy, no heavy-lifting (or thinking) job of hers that pays $174k a year, and will do anything she can to make sure that the FL-17 congressional district remains nice and gerrymandered so that she NEVER has to run against a competitive candidate in a general election and can stay in office as long as SHE wants.

More soon on what's happening with congressional redistricting and whom I'd love to see run against Wilson next year in a new, more logically-drawn CD that more accurately represents the interests of this area of south Broward and northeast Miami-Dade counties.

And while I'm at it, let me just state that it sure would be nice if a single legitimate reporter or columnist in South Florida reported on what group former City of Miami City Manager Tony Crapp, Jr. is working for now in the redistricting battle on behalf of his new bosses at
Why is nobody asking or reporting on this?

I feel like I'm pulling teeth sometimes.

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See also:
Foreign Policy magazine: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/

The Crespo-Gram Report: http://www.crespogram.com/

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Ben Stein: "Arab Spring" is a fraud; David Rothkopf: Obamamandias: the great shrinking superpower in the Middle East



CBS News Sunday Morning video- Ben Stein: "Arab Spring" is a fraud. May 15, 2011.
"Arab Spring" is a fraud. Says street movements in Middle East mean U.S. is losing valuable allies - and Iran is reaping a "gigantic regional coup"
-----

Did you happen to catch Ben Stein's spot=on comments on Sunday's CBS News 'Sunday Morning' TV program?
It's long been a personal favorite of mine from the day it started due to its smart, lengthy essays on subjects and people that often received little public notice, but who were doing some very interesting things.
If you didn't catch it, the video above will correct that situation toute-de-suite.

Stein is largely right that President Obama's bewildering and feckless Mid-East policy seems to constantly profit Iran at the West's expense, and Israel in particular, as he channels Prof. Obama and lectures everyone, issuing threats to Libya and Syria to change their methods or consider leaving, threats that are completely ignored but which would've been mocked by the U.S. Mainstream Media if Bush 43 had made them.

The very same condescending crowd in the news media, academe and the foreign policy desk of Comedy Central who said that Bush & Co.'s contention that democracy would work in Iraq after the U.S. invasion, were crazy, but who now play the role of Obama sycophants and valets for his bewildering policies that never seem to quite result in anything positive or tangible for the people.
Or did you forget how quiet Obama was when there were genuine street protests for reform, democratic institutions and fair elections in Iran two years ago, and everyone, esp. The American Left, wanted to know why it took Obama so long to recognize what was happening and say something of substance?
I haven't.

Not that I was ever a fan of former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, per se, but he's undeniably a very, very smart and savvy guy who knows how to handle himself.
(I mean he wasn't a federal judge for nothing.)
Well, he's bailing out as Obama's Mid-East policy czar, trouble-shooter and general explainer of things that make no sense coming out of C Street, the U.S. State Dept.
Who's his replacement?

Don't expect to get that answer soon or even any educated guesses anytime soon in the Herald or Sun-Sentinel.

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Foreign Policy magazine blog
Obamamandias: the great shrinking superpower in the Middle East
Posted by David Rothkopf Wednesday, May 18, 2011 - 4:06 PM


Foreign Policy magazine blog
Another major policy speech on the Middle East? Yawn
Posted by Stephen M. Walt Thursday, May 19, 2011 - 10:44 AM


Foreign Policy magazine
Discord in the Rebel Capital
Benghazi may seem like an island in the storm, but beneath the surface lies confusion and disharmony.
By Portia Walker
May 18, 2011




New York Times video: New York Times Op-Ed columnist Roger Cohen's hopes for President Obama's Middle East peace efforts.