Confirming the closure (cloture?) of pot-luck tabs ...
When American officials address the Iranian people in such an eloquent and dignified manner, it instills a sense of pride and kinship with America.@marcorubio is absolutely right: there is no country where the regime and the people are so vastly different.
— Navid Mohebbi نوید محبی (@navidmohebbi) January 15, 2025
America is back.❤️🥰 pic.twitter.com/g1Ny5DGKKj
Ed: Marco Rubio's confirmation hearing didn't make a lot of news today, and that's because Rubio is so well prepared for his new job. Also, because he's a fellow member of The Club of Clubs, of course. But he did offer a couple of observations that are worth noting, even though he's going to get overwhelming support for his appointment as Secretary of State.
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WATCH
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) January 15, 2025
Marco Rubio: “How can any nation-state on the planet coexist side by side with a group of savages like Hamxs?” pic.twitter.com/uFVR7PEtIY
Ed: That's the message the US should have sent with as much focus as possible since the October 7 massacre. I can't wait for the Rubio Era to eclipse the Blinken Era at State. And hopefully the Senate won't wait long to ensure its quick transition.
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Sen. Kaine says he'll support Rubio
— Burgess Everett (@burgessev) January 15, 2025
"While we do not agree on everything, I’m proud to support his nomination, and I believe he will make an excellent Secretary of State."
Ed: I'd be surprised if there are 10 votes against Rubio in the Senate. It might end up being unanimous.
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Tammy Duckworth to Rubio: "When I first got to Senate I was pregnant with my daughter and trying to change Senate rules so I could bring her onto the floor so I could do my job and vote...not accessible to wheelchairs...You came running down to me 'I'm with you! I support you!" pic.twitter.com/z7rdGGLOfS
— Howard Mortman (@HowardMortman) January 15, 2025
Ed: This is a keeper!
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The response of the Israeli public will, by contrast, be fragmented. While the vast majority will celebrate the homecoming, their joy will be tempered by the unspeakable tortures the hostages suffered and their long, if not endless, road to recovery.
While 33 hostages will be released in the first stage, dozens—alive and dead—will remain in Gaza, prolonging their families’ suffering. The relatives of those killed by the Palestinian terrorists now going free will also be shattered. So, too, will the Israelis who still see soldiers dying in Gaza almost daily while Hamas rocket fire continues. What were all of Israel’s sacrifices for, they will ask. As with previous deals, this one will only encourage further terror and hostage-taking, they’ll warn, and set the stage for a future attack, like October 7.
Perhaps this outcome was unavoidable from the beginning. Perhaps the deal is the only way of reconciling Israel’s mutually exclusive goals of annihilating Hamas and repatriating the hostages. Perhaps, despite Israel’s subsequent military triumph, this is the price for the failures of October 7.
Ed: This is from Dr. Michael Oren, a former ambassador to the US from Israel and one of the clearest thinkers around on the Middle East. Be sure to click the link and read the whole essay.
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"At long last, I can announce a ceasefire and hostage deal has been reached between Israel and Hamas."
— CBS News (@CBSNews) January 15, 2025
President Biden outlines the deal, which has been structured in three phrases, with phase one including the release of hostages held by Hamas. "I'm proud to say that Americans… pic.twitter.com/VKgDyZs2fL
"I'm proud to say that Americans will be part of that hostage release," Biden says.
Ed: Is he? Perhaps this would be a good time for the American media to demand an answer as to why Biden didn't make that a condition of the first cease-fire and exchange 14 months ago, a deal for which Biden has claimed authorship. It's shameful that American news orgs have ignored the fact that Biden allowed Hamas to keep the Americans hostage while cutting that deal.
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Where wisdom lies on either front rests mainly in the details. (I would favor nearly any plausible deal with Saudi Arabia and oppose nearly any likely one with Tehran.) But the larger point is this: Trump is going to scramble traditional foreign-policy assumptions, left or right. Liberals who think Trump’s second term will be one of unbridled bellicosity may be surprised. Conservatives who hope it will bring some overdue toughness on our enemies may be disappointed.
Donald Trump may have the soul of a bully, but he also has the instincts of a dealmaker — and a yearning for acclaim, including the Nobel Peace Prize he thinks he was denied for the Abraham Accords. Whatever else his next four years in power bring, it won’t conform to ideological type. Somewhere out there, the spirit of Richard Milhous Nixon is smiling.
Ed: Trump will lean toward conflict defusion in probably every case except Iran. Nixon had that focus too, seeing the Soviet Union as the focal opponent on the world stage and engaging everyone else around them. For Trump, that will likely be Iran, although it could be China + Iran.
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Today, I voted NO on categorically banning transgender girls from school sports.
— Rep. Pramila Jayapal (@RepJayapal) January 14, 2025
How do you verify “reproductive biology?” By subjecting every high school girl to examinations? I don’t think so. This invasive legislation harms ALL girls. pic.twitter.com/TK974fNgZ1
Ed: Sheer idiocy. Schools have access to birth certificates, genius. David wrote about this earlier, but I'd like to point out that high school athletes are usually required to get a comprehensive physical, which includes examination of reproductive organs. I had to turn my head and cough a few times in middle and high school, Pramila.
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Joe ceded the spotlight to Harris. And Jill, now with something even bigger to hold together, hit the campaign trail for the vice president. She made nine stops across Georgia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina in the final days of the Harris campaign, kicking off last-minute canvasses and dropping off snacks for volunteers. Jill barely mentioned her husband by name. Praise for his administration showed up as a rhetorical question: “Are we better off than we were four years ago? Yes!” Instead, she tried to humanize Harris like she’d done for Joe all those years.
The first lady — the grudge holder in chief — had balked at Harris as a potential running mate in 2020, still smarting from a punch the then-senator had landed on Joe during a 2019 Democratic presidential debate, according to journalists Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns. But Jill “had long moved on from the debate in 2019” by the time Harris was chosen, says the first lady’s spokesperson, Vanessa Valdivia, adding that the two women “have a warm, loving relationship.” Part of Joe’s legacy would be his decision to choose Harris again, as his successor, upon exiting the race — and whether the vice president could deliver a fatal blow to Trump’s presidential prospects.
Ed: I don't buy a single word of this Jill Biden tongue-bath in the WaPo today, except that Jill is the Holder of Grudges for Biden Inc. But this passage is what I disbelieve most. The hostility between Jill and Kamala is so apparent in public as to make this ludicrous propaganda.
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