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Opinion: Why Progressives Should Support Intervention in Syria

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This is going to prove hugely provocative, but it needs to be said anyways; we should be applauding President Trump’s authorization of military strikes against the murderous regime of Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad. Given the commander-in-chief’s inability to command anything, it is hard to write those words, but it is also necessary. Yet buried deep within the cacophony of noise from the punditry and the bloodsport take no prisoner social media contests over the last 48 hours, there is a signal waiting to be found. 

What is the signal? Before we journey to find it, we’ll have to decipher some of the complex realities which govern normative international relations theory. However, before we get to that, I can simply say: You cannot massacre your own people with chemical weapons. 

For those who are taking full advantage of the first real spring weekend in the Commonwealth (or the Action Patrol reunion gigs) and might have missed the headlines, here is a quick recap.  

At around 8:30 PM on Friday evening with support from British and French allies, the US military launched a multi-axis attack on chemical weapons facilities inside of Syria. According to the Pentagon briefing on Saturday morning, 105 missiles were launched in a combined naval and air campaign – from the Red Sea, North Arabian Gulf, and Eastern Mediterranean. The briefings also suggested that all assets landed on their intended locations and targeted research and storage facilities that produce and store chemical weapons. 

This strike was in response to a chemical attack launched by the regime on April 11 in Douma, a Damascus suburb, which killed 70 people and wounded over 500. Yet this was not the first chemical attack by the regime. There is documented evidence that the regime first started using these weapons against their population as far back as December 2012. Then in August 2013, there was a sarin gas attack that left an estimated 1,400 people dead. 

Video image by the Syrian Civil Defense (White Helmets) of the April 11, Chemical Attack.

Time for some of that tediously boring international relations theory: All foreign policy is a calculated long game, one that must effectively balance hard (military) and soft (diplomatic and economic) power over the course of multiple years – sometimes even decades. When then President Obama failed to enforce his “red-lines” on the usage of chemical weapons in August 2013, he opened up a vacuum (like nature, international relations also abhors a vacuum). This vacuum was filled by bad-actors such as Russia and Iran who have a strategic long-game and are not afraid to use all means available to them – chemical weapons included – to achieve their goals and objectives. 

Most foreign policy professionals will agree that the failure to enforce the Obama “red-lines” was a disastrous decision for our emerging strategy in Syria. Former Secretary of State John Kerry even went so far as to say publicly in 2016 that “it cost us significantly” in terms of resolving the conflict. Unfortunately, the problem is that without the threat of force, the Syrian regime never really had any incentive to dismantle their chemical weapons programs. 

Where does that leave us now in 2018? Let’s circle back to the signal buried in the noise. 

The coalition strikes against the chemical facilities of the Syrian regime had to happen, the same way they should have happened in 2013 after the sarin gas attack. There are prohibitions against the usage of chemical weapons going back to 1925, commonly referred to as the Geneva Protocol. Why? Because the extensive use of these agents during WW1 led to the deaths of an estimated 100,00 combatants and wounded up to a million more. This international convention was reintroduced in 1997 as the Chemical Weapons Convention, which prohibits “the large-scale use, development, production, stockpiling and transfer of chemical weapons” – the Syrian regime is in violation of most if not all of these conventions. 

Soldiers in WW1 where chemical weapons were used extensively

So the problem is less about the righteousness of taking out chemical weapons facilities, but having to reconcile it against the entire Trump presidency. He actually said, “mission accomplished” in a tweet in a bout of mind-mumblingly cliched braggadocio. Anyone remember George Bush saying the same thing about the Iraq War? Anyone else wanna comment on how that turned out? 

The first thing to remember is that chemical weapons deployment is a method of waging war which cannot be normalized or accepted by the community of nations. Yes, countries will continue to wage war and yes, the methods in which they wage war will still end with countless civilian lives lost in the process. But there is a difference, which is the reason why we also have prohibitions against the use of biological and nuclear weapons. 

Chemical weapons and their capacity to kill civilians at a disproportionately higher rate is what separates them from other conventional weapons. According to an analysis by the Carnegie Endowment for Peace, “Under ideal conditions 1 ton of Sarin dropped from an airplane could produce 3,000 to 8,000 deaths”. They are also indiscriminate in their usage, given the inability to control the agent once it has been dispersed, making them not only a weapon of mass destruction, but also a weapon of mass terror. The same analysis also cited a UN report which claimed, “a chemical weapon of 15 tons might kill 50 percent of the people in a 60 square kilometer area.” Then there is the long-term effect of the chemical agents, such as visual impairment, chronic dermatological conditions, long-term respiratory problems, and cancer. 

To assume that “red-lines” on chemical weapons should not be enforced, would be to assume that the very same “red-lines” on biological and nuclear weapons should also not be enforced – should that terrifying scenario ever come to pass. Is this something we’re willing to negotiate on as the world becomes more complex and dangerous? That is the conundrum we’re facing and the reason why we cannot allow chemical weapons attacks to go unanswered -Trump or no Trump. 

Pentagon Press Briefing, Saturday Morning

There is no strategy for Syria (not under Obama, not under Trump) and this strike, like the US strike in April last year, was only a tactical pin-prick meant to degrade capabilities not end the conflict. That does not mean we have to let Syrian civilians be killed with weapons of mass terror by a murderous regime that has wholesale slaughtered its own people since 2011. 

Trump is a reckless, loutish president, but in authorizing the Pentagon’s strikes on Syria he was justified. Our feelings on foreign policy should not be conflated with our feelings about the president – remember the long game. Nonetheless, there is a bitter irony to all of this. The man who said there were a “few good people” in Charlottesville and the man who demonized refugees is also the same man who can intervene to save civilian lives from chemical attacks. 

Regardless of the reasoning, the net result can still be the same: countless lives have potentially been saved by destroying facilities used to make weapons of mass destruction. If ever there was a reason for the awesome power of the US military apparatus to be applied, this is surely it. Progressives who are committed to cooperation among allies and internationalism, as a means of supporting human rights can support this kind of intervention without supporting the president. These two things can exist simultaneously. 

Fingers crossed this kind of attack won’t happen again, but recent history has shown us that without consequence there is little hope that we won’t have a repeat of it. 

Virginia Joins other States in Calling for a Ban on Offshore Drilling 

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Attorney General Mark Herring has joined with attorneys general from eleven other states in calling for a ban on offshore drilling. In a letter addressed to Secretary of the Interior, Ryan Zinke, the lawmakers expressed “opposition” to the Department of Interior’s 2019-2024 National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Draft Proposed Program. The letter goes on to state that if the program is not terminated by March the consortium of attorneys general will file formal comments that address, “legal insufficiencies and the many harms that it would inflict on our states.”

As of April 2017, President Trump signed an executive order green-lighting the “energy innovation, exploration, and production” of the outer continental shelf, which would include the Hampton Roads area of Virginia. Trump reiterated his support for domestic energy exploration and exploitation in his State of the Union address this past Tuesday night saying, “We have ended the war on American energy.” The letter to Zinke, however, highlighted the potentially disastrous problems offshore drilling would cause, not only to the environment, but to the “three million jobs across America [that] depend on the ocean and coastal economy, which generated more than $350 billion in gross domestic product in 2014 alone.”

In the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s 2017 report on the US Ocean and Great Lakes Economy, Virginia’s ocean economy “employed 118,760 people and generated $5.1 billion in wages and $8.2 billion in gross domestic product.”

The report went on to find, “The ocean economy accounted for 3.2 percent of Virginia’s employment, 2.6 percent of its wages, and 1.8 percent of its gross domestic product.”

Coastal Virginia is also home to Naval Station Norfolk, one of the largest military installations in the world. The station supports 80,000 active duty service men and women, 112,000 family members, 30,000 civilian employees and accounts for 30 percent of the overall population of Hampton Roads, making it one of the largest economic engines in the Commonwealth. Yet according to a Department of Defense memo from 2010, offshore oil and gas exploration is not compatible with the “operations and training” mission of the Navy in Hampton Roads. Should oil and gas exploration be given the go-ahead, this would put the relationship with the Navy would in serious jeopardy.

None of this even takes into account the safety concerns surrounding offshore oil and gas exploration. Most of which came to light in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster that left eleven people dead and spilled over three-million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. According to the attorneys general letter, the risks from drilling in the Atlantic are even higher than elsewhere given there is minimal “spill response infrastructure or capacity” in the region.

Florida is so far the only state which has been granted an exemption to Trump’s aggressive plans to expand offshore oil and gas exploration. The letter goes so far as to say, “Indeed, the Department has not described in any detail the reasoning for the apparent exemption granted to waters off the coast of Florida, nor for the failure to exempt areas off the coasts of other states.” Interestingly, Trump’s golf club Mar-a-Lago sits off the coast of Eastern Florida.

 

Virginia Politics Sponsored by F.W. Sullivans

 

Opinion: State of the Union — Which Union?

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So many old white dudes on parade.

That was my first thought as the cabinet filed into the Senate chamber Tuesday night for President Trump’s State of the Union address. Their presence certainly set the tone for all of the things old white dudes love to hear in the State of the Union: patriotism, nationalism, populism, militarism, and naturally a fear of black and brown people.

In fact, the entire pomp and circumstance surrounding the State of the Union were perfectly set for a political charlatan like Trump. Which, once again, is great for old white dudes. What was lacking last night was anything that would have resonated with young people, people of color, women, innovators, the LGBTQ community, and social entrepreneurs. Anything that represents what American modernity actually looks like.

So what did we learn from the State of the Union last night? Nothing new. But a quick look at some of the most obvious points will help us focus on the meaning behind the meaning – there were many – which is important in understanding our current political age defined by Trump.

Racist Cues 

From digs at Colin Kaepernick to referring to people as “citizens” instead of Americans (more on this later), there were many things to unpack. According to FiveThirtyEight, Trump’s approval rating is at 39 percent – the lowest for any first-year president. His speech, therefore, needed to reassure that 39 percent, or else he risks losing his only real support base. Who is that base? Older white people who believe that Trump is “Making America Great Again” by referring to African countries as “shit-holes.”

The most obvious cue was linking the community work of Preston Sharp, a 12-year-old boy from California who gained recognition for placing flags on soldiers’ graves, to the advocacy of NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick. Trump connected the two by saying, “Young patriots like Preston teach all of us about our civic duty as Americans…reminds us why we salute our flag, why we put our hands on our hearts for the Pledge of Allegiance, and why we proudly stand for the national anthem.” Platitudes like this are not about patriotism or nationalism, nor do they celebrate the military or law enforcement. They are used to undermine the symbol of modern social justice, embodied by Colin Kaepernick — a black man fighting against police brutality.

Even the Washington Post interpreted this line to suggest that “black men, adults who say they have experienced racial discrimination for decades, need to take lessons on what it means to be an American from a white child.”

Is it surprising then that over a dozen lawmakers decided to boycott Trump’s speech last night? I spoke with Congressman Donald McEachin about this last night, before the speech. When I asked him if he was going to boycott, he said, “I am going. I believe that I should confront racism, confront hatred, confront bigotry, and so I am going to do that by being there.”

The Economy 

The commitment to the American economic past is alarming. What’s more, success in the stock-market is not a bellwether for the every day success of American families. How many people are buying stock in Exxon at $86 a share? Speaking of Exxon, Trump lauded them by saying, “We have ended the war on American energy, and we have ended the war on beautiful, clean coal,” followed by an announcement that Exxon will invest 50 billion in the US. The very same company our Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, used to be CEO of… something something about corporate cronyism.

(As an aside, I used to work for Royal Dutch Shell. Oil company jobs are not really available for hard-working blue-collar Americans, unless you have an advanced degree in chemical engineering.)

Absent in his economic discussion was any mention of how climate change was going to impact the economy, or how this is going to drive the next generation of innovation, technology, and research and development — all of the things millennials and young people need to be successful in the 21st Century economic landscape. Instead, we have an adherence to the economy of our grandparents, driven by coal, oil, and car manufacturing. China, the world’s largest creator of solar panels, is laughing at us. There is a reason why MIT has detailed the growing US innovation deficit in stark terms.

Just to plug irony (my favorite literary device), Trump also took credit for the lowest unemployment rate for black people ever, going so far as to say, “African-American unemployment stands at the lowest rate ever recorded, and Hispanic-American unemployment has also reached the lowest levels in history.” Cut camera to the Congressional Black Caucus; deadpan, stone-faced, and entirely unimpressed. Why? Because there is nothing more obvious than a man known for his deep racism taking credit for black success.

Immigration

“Citizens.” This was the loaded word of the night, and one used to stir the worst kinds of nationalist, us vs. them sentiments. It dehumanizes immigrants, migrants, and refugee populations in the worst way, by making them “the other,” while at the same time preparing the American public for increased deportations and arrests. This is the rhetorical preference of every strongman to ever hold power, those who need populist resentment to fuel their policies.

There is obviously nothing wrong with debating the merits of legal vs. illegal immigration. According to the President, however, “citizens” are about to be abducted, murdered, and brutalized by marauding immigrant gangs like MS-13 at any moment. Yet according to the human rights group WOLA, MS-13 was actually created in America, and their membership only totals around one percent of all active gangs in the US — making Trump’s policy ideas more about fear-mongering than actual security.

During my conversation with McEachin, I asked him what else people needed to know about Trump’s immigrant policy. “It is not only about the Dreamers,” he said. “It is also an attack on legal immigration,” – one of the strongest American virtues.

That was obvious in Trump’s announcement of his four-pillar immigration plan, which will now focus on a pathway to citizenship, border security (including the wall), ending the visa lottery, and an end to chain migration — allowing family members to join other family members in the US. While the pathway to citizenship for 1.8 million immigrants is a nod to the Democrats, Democrats will now have to determine how to negotiate around this point, which includes the Dreamers.

What Was Most Scary? 

Most concerning, though — beyond Trump’s call for a nuclear arms race — was something that could have gone unnoticed if not for the obvious authoritarian overtone to it. Midway through the speech he said, “I call on the congress to empower every Cabinet secretary with the authority to reward good workers — and to remove federal employees who undermine the public trust or fail the American people.”

Could anything be more autocratic and less democratic than a call to action, which would see government employees purged for “undermining the public trust”? Because we have already established that the “American people” look very different to Trump and his 39 percent support base than to the rest of us. And as the Russia investigation ramps up amid rumors of the President trying to remove the special council, it is entirely ambiguous as to what “removing federal employees” really means… but I think we can all guess.

Didn’t Fight the Good Fight at Thanksgiving Dinner? Try the Game, “Push Trump off a Cliff Again”

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For those who survived Thanksgiving with conservative parents, racist uncles and aunts, and the all-around political calamity that comes with bringing disparate generations together in close proximity, we give you Push Trump off a Cliff Again. The web-based game is an emotional solution for those lingering thoughts, feelings, and concepts you wish you would have brought up around the dinner table, but didn’t have the gumption or family wherewithal to do so.

Sick of hearing your uncle telling you that Colin Kaepernick, the NFL quarterback fighting for social justice, is un-American? Well, now you can push President Trump off a ledge into a volcano bristling with liquid hot magma. Sick of hearing your father tell you that every poll in America is lying about the president’s popularity and that Trump is just telling America what it needs to hear? Well, now you can make Trump run, jump, and disappear into a New York City manhole. Sick of hearing your aunt tell you that privilege is not a thing because she’s worked her entire life? Well, now you can walk Trump through a majestic forest, and into the waiting mouth of a Tyrannosaurus Rex.

As Trump plummets to whatever end he might meet, he can be heard shouting, “ahh,” “bye,” and “duh, who put the lights out.” Glorious indignation.

The game, released earlier this year, was the creation of Justin Hook, a former writer for the animated series Bob’s Burgers on Fox. To date, the game has sent Trump to his mythical fate 9, 948, 692 times and climbing. In a tweet, Hook said, “If you’ve ever felt like pushing Trump off a cliff, then this Zen game I built is for you.” The game’s popularity has also been bolstered by Rosie O’Donnell, who tweeted out support for the game earlier this year. Nonetheless, as you start preparing your arguments for Christmas dinner, let Push Trump off a Cliff Again be that political stress relief that gets you through any contentious holiday season.

Opinion: Never Underestimate Virginia Republicans

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Ed Gillespie, the Republican candidate for Governor, could not have imagined a worse time for the Mueller indictments to come down. Special prosecutor Robert Mueller hit Trump’s campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and his business partner, Rick Gates, with 12 different indictments. One of the most headline-grabbing of those charges was “Conspiracy against the United States.” As a result, one might wonder if the arrest of Republican operatives for crimes against America would make the election of Democrat Ralph Northam for Governor that much easier.

However, Virginians are never that predictable.

Republicans and President Trump have tried to distance themselves from Manafort, the campaign, and the election.  They are sticking to the talking points that Manafort’s crimes happened long before he joined the campaign and that he only served as Trump’s campaign chairman from June-August 2016, leaving the campaign after his past history with the Ukraine and Russia was revealed. Rick Gates, a protege of Paul Manafort, was around much longer, however. Gates, a Richmond resident, actually stayed with the campaign, and then went on to facilitate the transition after Trump was settling into the White House.

While the core base of Trump’s supporters remain with the president, Republicans across the country are starting to lose faith in their national party. Not only is it embarrassing for them to see the behavior coming out of the White House, but the Republican-held Congress has yet to pass any of the major legislation that they have promised to the rank and file.

Nonetheless, citizens know how to separate national politics from their state and local politics. This presents a challenge for Democrats in our gubernatorial race.

Just as an anecdotal example, I recently had a conversation with a friend that has been a conservative his entire life. He refused to vote for Trump, yet when I asked him whom he is voting for in the gubernatorial election, he came back with a quick “Gillespie.”  I then proceeded to inquire why he made that decision in the current climate and he boiled it down to one simple statement:

“He’s the Republican.”

With Mueller charging GOP operatives with a potentially wide range of crimes against America, one could imagine that Northam’s momentum and minimal lead in the polls would continue to grow. Regardless, if there is one thing we have learned throughout the years, it is never to underestimate Virginia Republicans.

In the 2014 Senate race between the incumbent Mark Warner and Republican Ed Gillespie, Warner was dominating Gillespie in the polls. The final RealClearPolitics average had Warner ahead by 9.7 percent, and polls as late as that September had the incumbent up by more than 20 points. But what ended up happening? Gillespie lost to Warner by less than 1 point – only a 17,000 vote difference with over 2 million votes being cast.

Northam is also fighting his own political blunder with an ad being released showing minority children running away from a truck that sported an Ed Gillespie sticker.  The ad was removed Tuesday after a terrorist attack in New York City was carried out by a pickup truck.

Northam addressed the ad the next day in an on-air interview, where he said, “This group that put out this ad – it was not from our campaign – I wouldn’t have put that ad out, but the ads that Mr. Gillespie has put out have provoked this hate and fear mongering, and so these individuals have responded, and they did it in a way that perhaps wasn’t what I would do, but it certainly provoked fear in them.”

Over the course of the election, Gillespie has been trying to equate Northam to a gang sympathizer and a supporter of sanctuary cities. Nor has he missed a chance to point out that Northam was the tie-breaking vote in the Virginia Senate on the sanctuary cities bill. These messaging strategies clearly piggy-back off of the president’s hateful rhetoric as a means of invoking fear in Virginians – the very same methods that Trump used in the presidential election.

Gillespie has tried to keep the president at arm’s length, even with Trump sending out random tweets showing his support of Gillespie. On October 26, the president tweeted: “Ed Gillespie will turn the really bad Virginia economy #’s around, and fast. Strong on crime, he might even save our great statues/heritage!“

Gillespie, the former Republican National Committee chairman has always pushed for more outreach to minorities from the GOP.  Now it seems that he is abandoning those values in order to stay competitive in the election. Yet Robert Mueller’s investigation is moving faster than expected, and that has potential unintended consequences for Gillespie and Virginia Republicans.

The White House is in a state of fear. A Republican-controlled Congress has failed to move any of the major legislation that they have been promising for eight years. The indictments handed down by Mueller have GOP leadership rightfully frightened that they could lose their majority in the House at midterms. How that matters to Virginians on election day remains to be seen. One thing is for sure – Gillespie will compete until the final vote is counted.

President Trump Tweets in Support of Ed Gillespie, Again

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Earlier this morning President Trump tweeted in support of the Republican candidate for Governor, Ed Gillespie. In the first tweet Trump claims that Gillespie will “save our great statues/heritage.” This was preceded by a declaration that Gillespie will fix the economy and is “strong on crime,” a nod to Gillespie’s campaign message that his Democratic opponent, Lt. Governor Ralph Northam, is weak on crime by supporting sanctuary cities and the gang MS-13. There is no evidence to support this claim, and Northam has consistently refuted it.

In the second tweet, Trump says, “Ed Gillespie will be a great Governor of Virginia,” which was followed by “His opponent doesn’t even show up to meetings/work,” which is another talking point from the Gillespie campaign and was featured prominently in an early campaign video.

Gillespie has had an uneasy relationship with Trump, and has not been particularly active in seeking the president’s support. Nonetheless, his campaign content has taken on a decisively negative tone and is reflective of Trump’s overall messaging strategy. Given the closeness in the polls, the last of which had both opponents within the margin of error, along with all of the big names being pulled out on both sides, from Obama to Biden to Pence, a tweet from the president might have the ability to swing the vote one way or the other.

 

Virginia Politics Sponsored by F.W. Sullivans