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Joe Biden has poured out a ton of the time and treasure of the United States into the defense of Ukraine in its war with Russia.

 

Indeed, it seems like it’s the one thing that “shall not be questioned” in the Biden Administration in terms of funding: money for Ukraine. Not the defense of our border, mind you. Just Ukraine, with no clear end in sight.

 

However, despite all that, it appears that Joe Biden might have been willing to play appeasement games with Vladimir Putin, according to a report from the Swiss newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ). NZZ said CIA director William Burns went to Moscow on a secret trip and offered Russia 20 percent of Ukraine to end the war. 20 percent of Ukraine would be about the size of the Donbas region that Russia claims. The Washington Post reported that last month, Burns had met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv. Supposedly the deal was submitted in January.

 

The offer didn’t go over well with either Ukraine or Russia. One would imagine that Ukraine was not too happy with being sideswiped by the deal.

 

Kyiv reportedly shut down the proposal “because they are not willing to have their territory divided” while Russian officials said they “will win the war in the long run anyway,” reported NZZ, which has been described as the Swiss newspaper of record.

 

Sean Savett, the deputy spokesperson for the National Security Council said the report was “not accurate.” That’s an interesting remark because they didn’t say “completely untrue” — not accurate can mean there’s one part of the report that isn’t true but the rest is substantially true. If the WaPo report is to be believed, why then did Burns go to meet with Zelensky if there wasn’t something afoot?

 

{snip}

 

Let’s remember how (and maybe why) this all started and the signals that seemingly being cool with “minor incursions” can give.

 

 

https://redstate.com/nick-arama/2023/02/05/report-did-biden-offer-putin-a-secret-deal-on-ukraine-n699030

 

https://www.newsweek.com/joe-biden-vladimir-putin-ukraine-territory-end-war-nzz-report-1778526

 

 

 

Posted

 

AND NOW, THE AWARENESS GAP

 

President Biden sat down for an interview with PBS’s Judy Woodruff yesterday. Students of ancient history may recall the “credibility gap” whose power was deemed to have brought down a president or two. I would like to seize on Pentagon bureaucratese to declare that we have an “awareness gap” in the Biden administration from the top down. In one of the video clips of Woodruff’s interview with Biden below, the president shows no awareness of a proper response to the exposure of the Chinese spy balloon last week.

 

Biden thinks that the relationship between China and the United States should remain a thing of beauty. The CCP regime paid good money for it and Biden means to deliver good value.

 

Biden’s first response is to state falsely that he spoke with Xi himself to support the proposition that everything is beautiful. But why? Someone must wake the president up.

Biden was obviously misleading about his alleged chat with Xi last week, as becomes evident within a few seconds. He does not seem to be aware that some more compelling response than his own somnolence is called for. What we have coming into plain view here is the credibility gap superimposed on the awareness gap. It should be a lethal combination.

 

https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/02/and-now-the-awareness-gap.php

Posted

 

 

US foreign policy reduced to an afterthought

Joe Biden’s State of the Union speech skipped foreign policy for a reason.

By Marwan Bishara

 

US President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night was quite upbeat. It was long on domestic affairs and short on foreign policy. It skimmed through the challenges posed by Russia and China and skipped the rest of the world altogether.

 

It is a first for a US president to reduce the United States’ global role to an afterthought, no less a president who considers himself an authority on foreign policy, or for a commander-in-chief, who has spent so much time, effort and political capital confronting Russia in Ukraine and containing China in Asia. This, therefore, begs the question: Why has Biden chosen to ignore entire continents and countless hot spots where America is directly involved?

 

According to one theory, Americans are not terribly interested in the rest of the world and foreign policy is an unaffordable luxury at a time of economic hardships and culture wars. Even the elites with greater overseas interests realise that costly investment in foreign policy is becoming a hard sell for the public in the absence of direct national security threats.

 

Biden understands that, which is why when he first took office, he vowed to end the “forever wars” and promised a “foreign policy for the middle class” – one that serves Americans at large.

 

But that has proven easier said than done, as Washington has channelled billions of dollars to Ukraine to fight a war that may last years amid warnings from populist Republicans about high inflation, the high cost of living, and high national debt.

 

Hence the president, who seems keen on pursuing a second term, dialed down the costly global bravado in his speech and instead focused on “made in America” growth and prosperity. His call on Congress to tax billionaires and big corporations and lower the costs of drugs – aligning him with the “progressive left” led by Senator Bernie Sanders – may prove more popular among working and middle-class families than, say, restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

 

According to another theory, however, there is not much to celebrate in US foreign policy, which is why the president decided to skip the subject altogether. 

 

The two theories are not mutually exclusive.

 

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/2/8/us-foreign-policy-reduced-to-an-afterthought

 

 

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Posted

 

 

Getting results.

 

 

 

Biden Diplomats Trying to Block U.K. Plan to Designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as Terror Group

by Jeff Zymeri

 

Biden administration diplomats are trying to block a U.K. plan that would see Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) designated as a terror group, despite the fact that the U.S. took similar steps during the Trump administration.

 

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/biden-diplomats-trying-to-block-u-k-plan-to-designate-iran-militia-as-terror-group/

 

 

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Posted
14 minutes ago, B-Man said:

 

 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken pledges another $444 million to Yemen

money-furnace-burn.jpg

 

https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2023/02/27/secretary-of-state-antony-blinken-pledges-another-444-million-to-yemen/

A humanitarian crisis brought to you by major US arms purchaser Saudi Arabia.  Blinken's announcement is in keeping with the State Department's primary mission to help blow things up and then fix them.

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

 

 

 

More "results"

 

 

MAYBE IT WAS A BAD IDEA FOR BIDEN TO CALL THEM A PARIAH STATE: 

 

Saudi Arabia joins the new Axis of Evil.

 

The biggest story breaking on Friday was clearly the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and the existential threat that may pose to America’s economy and possibly the global marketplace as well. But as the New York Post pointed out yesterday, the downfall of SVB may not carry the same long-term impact as another story that received far less attention. Friday was also the day that Saudi Arabia announced that it has restored its diplomatic ties with Iran. Making the announcement even more worrying is the fact that the deal was brokered by China. The possible upside to the story is that such an agreement may mark an end to (or at least a significant decrease in) the ongoing proxy war that the two nations have been fighting in Yemen. The obvious downside is that the Saudis will be pulled more closely into the Axis of Evil that has grown around China and Russia.

 

 

https://hotair.com/jazz-shaw/2023/03/12/saudi-arabia-joins-the-new-axis-of-evil-n536497

 

 

 

I was told that the Biden Administration would return us to smooth diplomacy and happy allies.

 

 

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...
Posted
16 minutes ago, JDHillFan said:

America is back!

SAUDI ARABIA TO CUT OIL OUTPUT BY 500,000 BARRELS/DAY FROM MAY

KUWAIT TO CUT OIL PRODUCTION BY 128,000 BARRELS/DAY

UAE TO REDUCE OIL PRODUCTION BY 144,000 BARRELS/DAY FROM MAY

KAZAKHSTAN TO CUT 78K B/D TO OPEC+ OUTPUT CUT

IRAQ TO CUT 211,000 B/D OF OIL OUTPUT FROM MAY

ALGERIA TO CUT 48K B/D OF OIL OUTPUT FROM MAY TO END 2023

OMAN TO CONTRIBUTE 40K B/D TO OPEC+ PRODUCTION CUT

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