John Bolton’s Islamophobic FakeNews
‘…one role that has received relatively little scrutiny is [John Bolton’s] work as chair of the Gatestone Institute, a nonprofit that focuses largely on publishing original commentary and news related to the threat Islam poses to Western society. He has served in that role since 2013.
[….] Just this week, the Gatestone Institute published stories claiming that the “mostly Muslim male migrants from Africa, Asia and the Middle East” in Germany are fueling a “migrant rape crisis” and that “Muslim mass-rape gangs” are transforming the United Kingdom into “an Islamist Colony.”
The website routinely portrays Muslim migrants and refugees as an existential threat to Europe and the United States, claiming that immigrants bring “highly infectious diseases,” genital mutilation practices, and terror to any nation that accepts them. The site spent years sharply criticizing the Obama administration for having a “traditional Muslim bias” against Christians…’
– https://theintercept.com/
Aidan O’Brien: Europe is Pregnant
‘…If the 21st Century doesn’t kick them away it’ll drown too. If the 21st Century wants to be born it must reject them. And it is doing so.
The immigrants and the elections are doing so. Because they’re the midwife to the new European child – whatever it is. Make no doubt about it though: the immigrants are civilizing Europe. And the elections are undermining Europe.
The bulk of the European 20th Century was shaped by the Communists, the Fascists and the Christian Democrats. They’re all gone now and in the vacuum there’s nothing but farce. But there’s the outline of something different.
The Europeans are pushing against liberalism and its neoliberal progeny. Never mind the fact that the new or alternative political parties they vote for are failing to live up to their critical manifestos. The point is that probably 50% or more of the Europeans have had enough of liberal capitalism. And this means that they have had enough of the EU. How this plays out though is anyone’s guess…’
– CounterPunch
MP3: Sharing ‘Mandela’s Way’ In Fifteen Lessons
via NPR
Stephen M. Walt: ‘Welcome to the Dick Cheney Administration’
‘…Let me be clear: Bolton’s appointment is on par with most of Trump’s personnel choices, which is to say that it’s likely to be a disaster. His views on foreign policy are crude and bellicose, and his track record as a policy advocate and pundit do not, to put it politely, inspire confidence. Nor does he seem to have learned a thing from his past mistakes. And where McMaster and Tillerson did what they could to limit the damage that Trump has done to America’s international reputation and critical alliance partnerships, Bolton’s particular skill as a diplomat seems to have been finding creative new ways to offend America’s friends.
[….] whether Trump knows it or not, putting Bolton, Pompeo, and Haspel in key positions looks more like a return to “Cheneyism,” by which I mean a foreign policy that inflates threats, dismisses serious diplomacy, thinks allies are mostly a burden, is contemptuous of institutions, believes that the United States is so powerful that it can just issue ultimatums and expect others to cave, and believes that a lot of thorny foreign-policy problems can be solved by just blowing something up…’
– foreignpolicy.com
