What rhymes with Putin?

I don’t know Ukrainian, but I’m sure Ukrainians have their zingers.

In English, Zero clued in works.

Rasputin stand-in does the job.

This frivolous Putin query comes as we approach the anniversary of a madman’s attempt to rewrite world history. On February 24th, 2022, Putin let loose the power of the Russian military – with a destructive force not seen in Europe since World War 2 – on a peaceable neighbor, Ukraine. There was nothing frivolous about Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine.

What rhymes with madman?

Con man.

Convinced I can.

Bad man.

Putin thought he was invincible.

What rhymes with invincible?

Despicable.

Unpredictable.

Unthinkable.

This time last year, Putin was on top of the world, about to rewrite Russian history; he imagined himself emulating Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst, also known as Catherine the Great, once Empress of Russia, his long dead and gone heroine.

What rhymes with Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst?

I have no idea.

I do know what rhymes with Putin’s attempt to rewrite history.

Dark night.

Quenched light.

Instead of imposing his will on the populace of Ukraine, approximately 44 million souls, or about the populations of Florida and New York State combined, or even Ohio, Michigan, North Carolina, New Hampshire and Georgia combined, Putin became the first easily identifiable despot of our new century, shockingly pushed back to where he came from by the pure force of Ukrainian willpower.

What rhymes with despot?

Guess what?

Crackpot.

On February 24th, 2022, Putin lent his name to a mega invasion of a nonbelligerent neighbor on an international level never imagined. The consequences were disastrous.

In November, 2022, mere months ago and just months after Putin’s initial decision to ‘take’ Ukraine, the BBC reported that the most senior US general, Gen Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, estimated that 100,000 Russian and 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or injured in the war in Ukraine so far. Gen Milley added that at least 40,000 civilians had died by November of last year.

Thanks to our zero clued in, Rasputin stand-in, demented man in Moscow, epicenter of Putin’s mythical former USSR, innocent lives are being lost on a daily basis in Ukraine in numbers that are nothing short of abominable.

What rhymes with abominable?

Dishonorable.

Unconscionable.

And what rhymes with demented?

Disoriented.

Unbefriended.

Dented  – big time where it counts, in Putin’s internal psyche.

Lest we get suckered into a Putin-defined cesspit and bogged down in the mindset of an autocrat, I was inspired by one of the catchiest songs of 2023 so far, the brilliant Colombian Shakira’s take-down of her ex, to imagine how Putin might deserve his own rhyming put-down.

In a hugely publicized 2022 breakup, the former Barcelona football player Gerard Piqué left Shakira, his wife of 12 years and the mother of his 2 children, for a new paramour, a much younger woman called Clara Chía.

Shakira is resilient if anything. She is no push-over. On Jan 11th, she released a masterpiece, a blockbuster hit with the enigmatic title of SHAKIRA || BZRP Music Sessions #53.

Even though sung in Spanish, the title shot to the top of Apple’s iTunes charts in the U.S. on release. Many, so many of us it would seem, can resonate with revenge. The song’s video, with English subtitles, went viral. The song is not only catchy, bitching and biting, but cathartic. It broke YouTube records, registering more than 64 million views within 24 hours. Lord, does Ukraine need revenge!

Think about it for a minute. Millions upon millions of us can resonate with what is happening to Shakira. Millions more of us around the world identify with what is happening to Ukraine. Billions of us have reasons to get angry with Putin over Ukraine daily. The man seems unaccountable.

What rhymes with unaccountable?

Incomprehensible.

Unfathomable.

Shakira is a genius at rhyming. In her Spanish lyrics for SHAKIRA || BZRP Music Sessions #53, she found a way to connect her philandering ex, Piqué, to mortification, (te mortifique), chewing up (mastique), and a host of other rhymes and homonyms that might be enough reason for any year-abroad undergraduate or graduate student to want to learn Spanish. Shakira doesn’t let go. The video has already had 288,109,016 views on YouTube as of this writing. It’s averaging more than 5 million new views daily.

Imagine if Shakira took on Putin?

Imagine how she, stand-in for Ukraine, could destroy this pseudo Westerner, this false Russian prophet, this wannabe Catharine the Great, this Putin, with just a few rhymes and words.

Shakira can do that. She has that power. She is, after all, the reigning queen of World Cup Soccer anthems. Her Waka Waka video from the 2010 World Cup has had more than 3,472,939,423 (3 billion!) views.

Shakira knows how to garner world attention. Sorry Piqué. Maybe she’s right. Maybe you did choose a Twingo over a Ferrari, just as Putin fell into his own Twingo hell with his decision to try to absorb Urkaine into a mythical Russia.

Here’s how Shakira might put Putin – our present-day world pariah – in his place. And here, too, is how that very same Putin might feel, shamed, hearing himself belittled in a song where billions more than the billions that have watched Shakira’s Waka Waka see him as a wuss.

Just imagine Shakira’s singing these rhymes as she does on SHAKIRA || BZRP Music Sessions #53, but addressed to Putin, and here we go:

Putin?

Zero clued in

Rasputin stand-in

Madman?

Con man.

Convinced I can.

Bad man.

Invincible?

Despicable.

Unpredictable.

Unthinkable.

Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst?

History rewrite?

Dark night.

Quenched light.

Despot?

Guess what.

Crackpot.

Abominable.

Dishonorable.

Unconscionable.

Demented.

Disoriented.

Unbefriended.

Dented

Unaccountable?

Incomprehensible.

Unfathomable.

Despicable.

Unpredictable.

Unthinkable.

Abominable.

Dishonorable.

Unconscionable.

The post Shakira nails Putin appeared first on Occasional Planet.

In 1959, Chuck Berry had a hit with a song called Back in the USA, a rock ‘n roll propelled love anthem to America. The lyrics went:

Oh well, oh well, I feel so good today
We touched ground on an international runway

… New York, Los Angeles, oh, how I yearned for you
Detroit, Chicago, Chattanooga, Baton Rouge
Let alone just to be at my home back in ol’ St. Lou

.… Well, I’m so glad I’m livin’ in the U.S.A.
Yes, I’m so glad I’m livin’ in the U.S.A.
Anything you want, we got right here in the U.S.A.

Just about a decade later, in November 1968, the Beatles led off their White Album with a tongue-in-cheek riff on the East-West divide going on at the time, a track called Back in the USSR, a shout-out to Chuck Berry.

The Beatles lyrics went:

… back in the USSR
You don’t know how lucky you are, boy

Back in the US
Back in the US
Back in the USSR

Then the Beatles segued into a spoof of the Beach Boys – California Girls:

… Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out
They leave the west behind
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout

And then back to:

… I’m back in the USSR
You don’t know how lucky you are, boys
Back in the USSR

The Beatles brought many new Russian fans on board with Back in the USSR, among them a certain Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, the very same thug now directing genocide against the people of Ukraine. But the Beatles were just messing around. Back in the USSR was not a love anthem to the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union had just invaded Czechoslovakia in August of that same year, 1968, and the Beatles were well aware of that. The song had its base in irony.

In a changed world, Paul McCartney later sang the song at a concert in Moscow’s Red Square in 2003, and Putin was in attendance. At that Red Square concert, everywhere you looked Moscovites were rockin’ and rollin,’ happy as hell that they were being acknowledged by McCartney. Putin was deadpan, perhaps already fixated on how he might recreate the empire that the Beatles had satirized and that McCartney was now flaunting right in front of him in Moscow. Putin was not amused by the irony.

All water under the bridge now that Comrade Vlad has directed his military might to invade and attempt to choke off life in Ukraine.

Despite the passage of time, inter-connected world economies, the acceptance of Russia as a partner, glasnost, the internet, Facebook, TikTok, Telegram and Twitter, here we are looking at an East-West divide, the likes of which we never imagined possible at the beginning of the third decade of the 21st century.

And what the fu .. why (expletive removed)?

Well, just maybe because Putin, going about his daily life as a dictator par excellence in Russia in 2022, has an ego even greater than Trump’s. Putin is mega-egotistical, eager for a mention in history equal to that of his heroine Catherine the Great, paranoiac in the extreme and, unfortunately for the rest of us, someone with a uniquely manhood-threatened view of civilization. He has his finger on a nuclear trigger, something that Stalin and Hitler never had. His mention in history, if the there ever is a history after this, is sure to be in the column of the latter.

Once, we might have imagined, in our innocence, that Paul McCartney knew what he was doing, penning a guitar-driven rock song that the world – Russia included – could twist-and-shout to.

Oh, how silly we were.

All the while, our real future was being decided in Comrade Putin’s mind.

Here in the USA, we were dutifully electing a new President every four years. Back in the USSR of his dreams, the de facto ruler of Russia since December 1999, according to Wikipedia, Putin was upending the last 22 years of history, consolidating power, readying his new Russia for the moment when he might recreate some semblance of his lost Soviet empire.

Soviet, you might just reasonably ask, What is that exactly?

Basically, Soviet is a synonym for Communist, an elected community council that makes decisions for a society, a country, no dissension allowed.

It’s a world vision that went out of favor in 1991 when the Soviet Union was dissolved, an empire that consisted of none other than Russia, but also Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

In the world at large, we may have thought Soviet was forever gone from our reality, a thing of the past.

In 1991, the Soviet Union was replaced by something called the Commonwealth of Independent States. The Bush Administration at the time quickly recognized the independence of Ukraine and other former Soviet republics. And some of those newly independent states immediately understood their opportunity. Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, fast aligned themselves with Europe and the West, and over a relatively short period of time became NATO members.

And so Soviet was gone from the world stage, or so we wished ourselves into thinking.

Except, Soviet was not gone. Soviet had one major shareholder remaining.

That major USSR shareholder was not at all discouraged, put off or disheartened by past Soviet setbacks or failures, but in a cockeyed view of world politics, found himself not only the President of Russia, but capable of invading a previous ally to inflict unprecedented death, pain and destruction on Ukraine.

That shareholder’s name is Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.

His goal?

To drag us all back to a pre-McCartney, pre-Beatles era, to a psuedo-utopia, a ghost empire that he has convinced himself he can regroup called the USSR?

What a blockhead, what a fu..-up (expletive again removed.)

Pardon my French.

The post Back in the USSR appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Trump’s former consigliere, Michael Cohen, is reported to be writing a tell-all book. Whether he’ll be writing in in a jail cell or at home is still not clear, as his pandemic-related release from prison was suddenly, unceremoniously, and suspiciously rescinded just days after it was announced in late April 2020.  One thing is certain, though: He’s got the goods on Trump and his circle.

This article first appeared on this site in 2018, just after to the FBI raided Trump fixer Michael Cohen’s office, home and hotel room,  where they found and seized a cache of old cell phones—sixteen cell phones, to be precise.  The parody song at the end of this post could be the theme song for his new book.

You have to wonder why Cohen held onto all of the phones. It is possible, after all, to transfer one’s contacts to a new phone. It’s possible, too, to destroy a phone and its memory, if it contains things you don’t want discovered. One could speculate that he kept them for sentimental reasons, or because he thought that someday a Blackberry would be a valuable collectors’ item. Not likely, though. A more plausible explanation would be that Cohen hung onto his old phones because they house, in their micro-memories, some important things that didn’t transfer over to the next generation of mobile phone. And what might those things be? Could they be saved voice mails and “taped” conversations with people Michael Cohen worked with? Cohen is known to record conversations—perhaps to retain them to play back in the future as embarrassing evidence or leverage, perhaps to use them as gossip fodder, or perhaps to play them for the merriment of his friends.

Whatever his reasons, the seized cell phones are now in the hands of the special master appointed to evaluate the attorney-client privilege-ness of what they and other documents contain. Are they the 21^st century equivalent of the incriminating Nixon tapes? We may never know. Suffice it to say, though, that Cohen is probably sweating—as are all the people he may have talked to over 16-phones-worth of conversations.

So, in honor of the 16-phone seizure, I’ve composed a parody of Tennesse Ernie Ford’s, “16 Tons.

Here is the original 1955 hit. My lyrics follow:

Okay, now you’ve got the melody. Here goes

“16 Phones: A Michael Cohen sing-along”

Some people say my ethics are stuck in the mud,

 I never had to worry: I had Trump as my bud.

I said I’d take the bullet if it came down to just us,

But I’m getting run over by Donald Trump’s bus.

You load 16 phones, and what do you get?

A lot of old recordings and a lot of new sweat.

Mr. Mueller don’t ya call me, and don’t harass,

I’m holed up at home tryin’ to save my own ass.

I was born a fixer, and I’m good at the game.

Bully and Sleazeball are my middle names.

The Boss trusted me with the nastiest jobs,

And I’m consigliere to the Trump family mob.

You load 16 phones, and what do you get?

A lot of old recordings and a lot of new sweat.

Mr. Mueller don’t ya call me, and don’t ask for more:

I’ve sold my soul to the Trump-any store.

I was born on Long Island, just a privileged kid,

I’m working for Trump now, and you know what I did.

I paid off some women and threatened the rest,

And now I’ve been raided, and I’m facing arrest.

You save 16 phones, and what do you get?

A lot of old recordings and a lot of new sweat.

Mr. Mueller don’t ya call me, and don’t harass:

I’m holed up at home tryin’ to save my own ass.

Some people say I’ll flip and just tell it all,

Listen, you assholes, I’m not takin’ the fall.

Shut up for a change, and try to be wise,

‘Cuz I’ve got the goods on all of you guys.

You save 16 phones, and what do you get?

A ton of old recordings and a lot of new sweat.

Mr. Mueller don’t ya call me, and don’t harass:

I’m holed up at home, tryin’ to save my own ass.

Parody lyrics, Copyright 2018, Gloria Shur Bilchik

The post 16 phones: Theme song for Michael Cohen’s tell-all book on Trump and Company appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Last week, Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that the House of Representatives would launch a formal impeachment inquiry in response to allegations that President Trump pressured Ukraine into investigating Joe Biden’s son in what appears to be an attempt to influence the 2020 election. Whether Hunter Biden’s behavior was ethically dubious is a fair question (it was) or if President Trump’s actions were an abuse of power (they were) is a discussion for a different day. Yesterday according to most whip counts, the House has the votes to impeach the President of the United States and it looks like they will. So, what might come next?

1. The House votes to impeach and Majority Leader McConnell refuses to hold a trial in the senate.
   • As of the writing, there are reportedly 221 members of the House who are prepared to vote for impeachment which is a couple votes more than the majority that the constitution requires. The transcript and the whistleblower report don’t look good for the President. In fact, everything looks very bad and probably worse than the Mueller report because these new documents actually make a value judgement about the President’s behavior. We should not be shocked if the House votes to impeach because this is likely as close to a smoking gun that Congress is going to get. This charge is particularly damaging because we already litigated this issue and we already decided that foreign election interference is bad. It would still be a historic move for the House to vote to impeach the President, it’s only happened once every century, but this kind of corruption is historic. But of course, that’s not the end of the impeachment process, the Senate also plays a role and they are meant to hold a trial. If these were normal times then we’d expect it to happen without question, but after Majority Leader McConnell held the Supreme Court hostage in 2016 then we really have no reason to expect McConnell to respect constitutional norms. Although McConnell has said that he will follow Senate rules if impeachment makes its way to the Senate, trusting Mitch McConnell has never been a well-reasoned decision. It’s easy to imagine McConnell just refusing to hold a trial but it’s unclear if that would actually be beneficial to Republicans. President Trump would not be able to claim he had been acquitted because he literally wouldn’t be, he’d just be in some state of impeachment limbo. Furthermore, impeachment is polling a lot better than it was a few weeks ago and the imagery of Republicans refusing to even acknowledge their constitutional duty probably wouldn’t play well with voters. That doesn’t mean it still won’t happen, McConnell has continued to gamble with the constitution, and he continues to win so maybe he can win again.
2. The House fails to impeach because some moderates change their votes
   • It took around 80 days for the House to decide to launch an impeachment inquiry to actually voting for Impeachment in 1998. If we assume that we’re looking at a similar timeframe for President Trump, then we should expect a vote sometime in December. A lot could happen between now and then and given the chickenshit like nature of some Democrats I don’t have too much confidence in our caucus. I’m especially concerned about the New Democrat Coalition, which is made up of moderates, centrists, and your assorted third-way types. Many of these members come from purple districts and are rightly concerned with their electoral prospects. As a very likely hypothetical, let’s say that by December Elizabeth Warren is leading in the polls in the Democratic primary and is followed by Bernie Sanders while Joe Biden has slipped to a distant third. What is going to go through the minds of members like Sharice Davids of Kansas or Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey or any of the newly elected Orange County Democrats? Many of them have made clear that they’d rather Biden were the nominee. Will they feel like they’ll be able to run as a moderate with a progressive or a leftist at the top of the ticket and vote for impeachment? I think it’s an open question.
3. The House votes to impeach and the Senate acquits the President without Republican defections
   • Maybe the Democrats will impeach the President. It’s been a long time coming and we’ve probably crossed the Rubicon on impeachment. The evidence against the President is pretty damning and the timeline of events shows a pattern of corruption that is hard to ignore. Well actually it may be very easy to ignore if you’re a Republican senator and live in a perpetual state of fear because of your constituents cult like devotion to the President. Donald Trump has an approval rating among Republicans that is probably in the high 80s which means something. The President in the past has successfully rallied his supporters to oust incumbent members of Congress and there are a number of elected officials who if not for Donald Trump would not be in Washington. Also relevant is that the GOP lacks any ideological mooring and seems to exist solely for promoting the interests of corporations, Christians, and caucasians. This has produced some senators who are genuinely from the Republican base and are not rational actors and may actually believe that the President is acting in good faith. Josh Hawley, Marsha Blackburn, and Cindy Hyde-Smith come to mind but there are certainly others. Then of course there are the so-called “profile in courage” Republicans that liberals love. I’m talking about Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and Rob Portman. These are the Republicans who are always “deeply concerned” about the President’s behavior and are “reluctantly” voting for some evil multi-billion-dollar legislation to torture immigrant children. They’ll go on MSNBC, they’ll furrow their brows, and they may even cobble together a joint editorial and send it to the Washington Post. Then they’ll vote not to convict because they are cowards.
4. The House votes to impeach and the Senate acquits the President with several Republican defections
   • We’ve established that the Democrats are going to impeach the President and that Republicans are cowards. However, this time may actually be different because there are a lot of Senators who are still waiting to go on the record and haven’t instinctively jumped to Trump’s defense. Of course sycophants like Josh Hawley have but his senior counterpart Roy Blunt has not. That’s notable because for several reasons. First, Blunt was only narrowly re-elected in 2016 (underperforming Trump by 15.7 points) and likely would’ve lost if not for Trump’s landslide victory in Missouri. Second, Blunt played an integral role during the 2017 inauguration and commenced the ceremony. Finally, Blunt is the number four Republican on the Senate Leadership team. If anyone was going to defend Trump immediately it was going to be Blunt, yet he’s still “waiting and seeing”. If Blunt is a barometer for other Republicans, then maybe we can expect some Republicans to actually vote for impeachment which isn’t to say that Blunt won’t in the end vote to acquit. There are a lot of Republicans who have made clear their distaste for the President and although the votes to remove him from office likely aren’t there (Joe Manchin and Doug Jones are Democrats who might vote to acquit), we may still be looking at as many as a dozen Republican defections. If I had to guess who might vote to impeach, I’d look at retiring senators and Bush Republicans like Lamar Alexander (retiring), Pat Roberts (retiring), Mitt Romney, Ben Sasse, and Lisa Murkowski.
5. The President is impeached and removed from office
   • This is the least likely outcome. I would sooner expect an Andrew Yang nomination than a Trump conviction. But it could happen, we may still be missing a piece of the puzzle. Donald Rumsfeld famously said “there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don’t know we don’t know”. There is almost certainly an unknown unknown out there and it could be one that is so repugnant and disturbing to the conscious of the nation that Republicans will literally have no choice but to impeach. I was tempted to lay out an addendum to this scenario because perhaps the Republicans could convince the President to resign in a similar fashion to what happened to Nixon. But we know Donald Trump and we know in our heart of hearts that he is not going to resign. Unlike other politicians who can be compelled to act by fear or shame or threat to their future in the party, Trump exists outside of conventional norms and he knows it. Trump has captured the racist zeitgeist and will have millions of followers no matter what happens next and that’s enough for him. The only way the President is leaving the White House is through impeachment or at the end of his term, whether that’s 2021 or 2025. There may come a point when Republicans begin to ask themselves, “Is this worth it? Could we achieve the same ends with Mike Pence?” and then the President will be in trouble.

There’s also a number of wild card scenarios that we should be prepared for because the moment we’re in is very fluid and it’s hard to predict anything anymore.

1. Clarence Thomas resigns or some other Supreme Court Vacancy
   • It’s probably time we stopped pretending that the Supreme Court isn’t partisan. It is. We don’t select justices based on merit, we select them based on reading their rulings, so we understand their judicial philosophy and ideology. There’s a reason that liberal and conservative groups create lists of preferred nominees, it’s because they know where they stand on the issues. The Supreme Court is a broken institution and it can be manipulated for partisan purposes. Enter Clarence Thomas, who has a very conservative world view and witnessed first-hand the kind of mobilizing force a Supreme Court vacancy can have on an election (see 2016 and to a lesser extent 2018). Clarence Thomas has served on the Court for nearly 30 years and hasn’t exactly hidden his conservative leanings, his wife Virginia worked for the Heritage foundation and currently contributes to Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller. He may just decide to announce his resignation at the end of the 2020 SCOTUS term and that would probably be enough for Republicans to circle the horses around President Trump. If the worst should happen, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg or Stephen Breyer (or both) should die, then we’d be faced with a more significant realignment of the Supreme Court that actually would likely mean the realization of many conservative goals like outlawing abortion and same-sex marriage. That would almost certainly mean either impeachment would be completely abandoned by Democrats or Republicans would engage in some historically ugly campaigning.
2. President Trump Resigns from Office and then continues to run for re-election

• • Donald Trump did not win the Republican nomination because he had institutional support from the party. He won in spite of it because he was what Republican voters wanted, an anti-establishment figure who was willing to be unorthodox and dress down an elite that they loathe. If he needed to, he could probably do it again and if impeachment looks likely then that’d probably be a viable path forward. Would Mike Pence be willing to lead a caretaker government while Trump campaigned for President? He might have to because his choices are pretty limited. Would Pence defeat Trump in a Republican primary? Doubtful because even with the unlimited resources of the RNC, Trump is still Trump (ask Jeb how far $140 million will get you). Does Pence want a future in Republican politics? Probably, and he’s tied his fortunes to Trump and needs to stay in his good graces and for Trump to remain popular. That’s the thing about Faustian bargains, the Devil always gets the better end of the deal. Trump may well reason that he’d have a better chance of staying in power by giving it up. Trump appreciates a good story and the populist president who promised change is stymied by the Washington Establishment and is running an insurgent campaign on behalf of the people…that’s pretty good.

I don’t know what’s going to happen next, but we shouldn’t be surprised if it’s something we don’t expect. I wouldn’t hold my breath for the more outlandish scenarios that involve “President Pelosi” or “Hillary Clinton 3.0” but there’s a lot that could happen in the coming days and weeks. The President probably abused his office and attempted to have a foreign power influence our elections. That’s serious not just for President Trump but for our democracy. It’s time to see the full extent of the Article One powers in the Constitution.

The post 7 Paths Forward for Impeachment appeared first on Occasional Planet.

In November 2016, then-Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos signed peace agreements with the FARC (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia,) Colombia’s largest guerrilla group at the time. It was a moment that promised more than 50 million Colombians the tantalizing prospect of a new life without the daily fear that 50-plus years of violence had imposed on the country. That same year, Juan Manuel Santos was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, “for his resolute efforts to bring the country’s more than 50-year-long civil war to an end, a war that has cost the lives of at least 220,000 Colombians and displaced close to six million people.”

 One of the most controversial provisions of the peace accords was the establishment of a parallel system of justice, the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, commonly called the JEP. The JEP functions alongside but completely independent from the the Colombian Attorney General’s Office. The peace treaties specify that:

The Special Jurisdiction for Peace will exercise judicial functions, and will fulfill the duty of the Colombian state to investigate, prosecute and sanction crimes committed in the context of and due to the armed conflict, and in particular, the most serious and representative.

If a crime was committed by the FARC, by their paramilitary counterparts or by their legal Colombian military contemporaries prior to the signing of the peace agreements, the JEP’s jurisdiction is clear. The JEP’s objectives are outlined in the accords as these:

Contribute toward the historical clarification of what happened. Promote and contribute to the recognition of the victims; of responsibility for those that were involved directly or indirectly in the armed conflict; and of the society as a whole for what happened. Promote coexistence across the country.

Guilt? Retribution? Punishment?

Not a lot of emphasis is placed on guilt, retribution or punishment. And many Colombians felt, and still feel today, that the JEP’s mission was, and is, way too compassionate on guerrillas who bombed, maimed, kidnapped, terrorized and killed their families and fellow citizens for over half a century. According to the Colombian National Center for Historical Memory, 220,000 people died in the conflict between 1958 and 2013, most of them civilians, and more than 5 million civilians were forced from their homes between 1985 – 2012.  And the conflict didn’t end in 2012.

What many Colombians focused on in the peace agreements saw was this:

…that those who decisively participated in the most serious and representative crimes and recognize their responsibility, will receive a sanction containing an effective restriction of their liberty for 5 to 8 years, in addition to the obligation to carry out public works and reparation efforts in the affected communities.”

The 5 to 8 years stipulation addled many. Public works? A sanction equal to a restriction of liberty? These questions gave many in Colombia pause. In fact, a majority of Colombians voted against the Peace Accords when given the opportunity to do so in a referendum on October 2, 2016. The accords later found a way to ratification through Santos’s congressional initiatives, some might say manipulation. Santos’s Nobel Peace Prize had already been announced.

The Santrich Affair

Under the peace agreements, ten former-guerrilla leaders were given guaranteed seats in the Colombian House of Representatives, no election required. The FARC got to choose the nominees for these ten. And the FARC chose Seuxis Paucias Hernández Solarte, generally known by his wartime alias — Jesús Santrich — and one of the key negotiators in the peace process, for one of those seats. The FARC was now a legitimate political party.

Already on April 10, 2018, the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York had announced that Jesús Santrich and 3 others had been arrested in Colombia and accused of “conspiring and attempting to import cocaine into the United States.” Colombia and the United States have a drug trafficking extradition treaty in place that goes back decades.

 The Southern District of New York’s evidence indicated that Santrich’s involvement in drug dealing occurred after the signing of the Peace Agreements and that he was therefore excluded from protection under the JEP’s judicial oversight.

“As alleged, the defendants conspired to ship cocaine from Colombia to the streets of the US. Thanks to the investigative work of the DEA, they are now under arrest and face significant criminal charges,” US Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman said in a statement. The 4 arrested were charged with plotting to import ten tons of cocaine to the US, a shipment with an estimated street value of $320 million.

Marlon Marín, a nephew of another former FARC leader, Iván Márquez, was one of those arrested with Santrich. His uncle, Iván Márquez was again a FARC nominee for a no-vote-needed seat in Congress. After Santrich’s arrest, Márquez went into hiding. In late May of this year, Rodrigo Londoño, alias Timochenko, former head of the aforementioned guerrilla group FARC, chief negotiator for the FARC in the peace meetings in Havana and more recently a candidate for President of Colombia, distanced himself from Iván Márquez. He said that Márquez’s pronouncement, that it was a mistake for the FARC to have given up their arms, was wrong.

Upon his arrest, Marlon Marín offered to cooperate in the Santrich investigation, and following meetings with the DEA in Bogotá, his extradition order was rescinded and he was flown to the US as a protected witness.

Santrich remained in jail, pending extradition.

Colombia held presidential elections in 2018. Santos left office on August 6 of that year, and on August 7, his successor, Iván Duque Márquez, became President of Colombia. Duque had run on a platform emphasizing a reexamination of the terms of the mandate of the JEP.

As president, Duque insisted on his reforms to the decrees underlining the legitimacy of the JEP. His appeal went to the Senate and Congress. The results were indecisive. And Duque refused to sign off on the regulation of the basic legal structure of the peace agreements.

In the meantime, Santrich appealed his case to the JEP.

The JEP heard Santrich’s objections to his extradition. And on May 15 of this year, the JEP decided that Santrich should be freed and be immune from extradition to the United States. The decision was unprecedented in Colombian-American cooperation. One quick result of this decision was that videos of Santrich negotiating with Mexican drug cartel members began to appear on line, associating him through popular social media in drug dealing. Colombians were stunned.

And immediately upon his release, Santrich was rearrested by the Colombian Attorney General’s Office, based on new evidence that implicated him once again in illegal drug trafficking after the signing of the peace agreements.

What’s going on here? Who’s in control?

Apparently, the Supreme Court of Colombia. The Supreme Court of Colombia stepped in and announced on May 29 that Santrich should indeed be freed. The Supreme Court has jurisdiction over cases of wrongdoing by any Congressman or Senator. Even though Santrich had never taken an oath of office, the Supreme Court accepted that this was not of his volition; as he was under arrest at the time, he was unable to participate in a signing-in ceremony.

President Duque’s response was immediate and decisive. Duque called Santrich a mafioso, a term that in Colombia encompasses all those who are not guerrillas but who are underworld actors.

Santrich was freed on May 30.

But the Supreme Court wasn’t finished. On the same day, May 29, that they ordered the release of Santrich, the Supreme Court had a second pronouncement. The Court ruled that in the Senate and Congress a majority had indeed voted to deny President Duque’s objections to the underlying legal structure of the JEP and ordered the President to sign the statutory laws governing the JEP. On June 6^, Duque signed off on the structural laws guaranteeing the legitimacy of the JEP.  It would not be a stretch to say to say that he did this willingly.

The Supreme Court has assumed control of the Santrich affair and affirmed its jurisdiction over his case. A huge power shift has taken place in the country. Does evidence implicate Santrich in drug dealing before or after the signing of the peace agreement, or indicate any involvement at all? The US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York is convinced. They want Santrich extradited.

In Colombia, the Supreme Court will decide.

On June 6, the Supreme Court of Colombia announced that it had initiated an investigation of Santrich’s involvement in drug trafficking. They invited Marlon Marín, now a protected witness and a person under US custody to give evidence. The nitty-gritty of his evidence is proving bureaucratic to even get started. Permissions from the US Justice Department are now needed for Marlon Marín’s appearance, even video-appearance in Colombia. A date for his appearance has yet to be set.

On June 11, Santrich was officially signed in as a Representative in the Colombian Congress, and on June 12, he took possession of his congressional seat.

Right now, the Santrich affair is what Colombians wake up to the morning and go to sleep with at night. The process of peace in Colombia, the promotion of coexistence across the country as iterated in the mandate of the JEP, is proving hard to even get off the ground.

 The JEP has a ten-year mandate. Will the historical clarification of what happened in Colombia ever see the light of day? Colombians are at this moment in time, in all honesty, unsure.

The post The complicated, ever-evolving, nitty-gritty of peace in Colombia appeared first on Occasional Planet.

How did it happen? Susan Collins, a seemingly sensitive person who is pro-choice on abortion rights, disses Christine Blasey-Ford’s a contention that she was sexually abused by Brett Kavanaugh. Is Collins (a) insensitive to the history of women not being believed when men say something contrary, (b) simply a poor judge of character (who could not see Kavanaugh as a bully), or (c) just a Republican who has a very different way of looking at life from the way others do?

Not too many years ago, there was a great deal written about the Republican Brain. In fact, Chris Mooney, now a Washington Post reporter, wrote a book in 2012 called The Republican Brain. Six years earlier, he wrote a book called The Republican War on Science.

It’s not as if in recent times the importance of party affiliation has been ignored. More and more commentators are saying that political party reflects the greatest fissures in our society – more so than gender, race, educational levels, economic levels, or anything else. It’s my team vs. your team. All that matters is winning. In the case of Republicans, that may be at all costs; Democrats may have a few reservations about a cut-throat victory.

There are calls for bi-partisanship, but they are generally at the level of kumbaya. Dems and Repubs can share a softball diamond (actually the baseball field at Nationals Park) and play ball without dirty plays at 2^nd base or home plate. They can work together to grovel for pork in their home districts or states. But can they actually share a meal? Perhaps more significantly, can they even share a joke?

This last question may provide a window into the differences between Democrats and Republicans. It strikes me that humor for progressives is often self-deprecating. For Republicans, it seems to be harsh and mean. I don’t have the empirical evidence for this, but that’s my point. There is so much that needs to be studied.

I have tried to communicate with the Washington Post’s Chris Mooney, but to no avail. He is a dogged environmental reporter and certainly in the era of Donald Trump and Scott Pruitt and others, his plate is full. But he brought a very scholarly and conversational approach to what makes Republicans different and unique. If he does not want to carry on that torch, then someone else needs to.

Here are a few questions that I think need to be addressed:

1. Why is it that so many Republican women were more likely to believe Brett Kavanaugh than Christine Blasey-Ford?
2. Why did the likes of seemingly mild-mannered people like Jeff Flake and Susan Collins say that if they were in Kavanaugh’s position, they too would be angry? Or, in other words, why did they base these statements on a “given” that “being in his position” means being falsely accused? Does it even register to them that Dr. Blasey-Ford may be telling the truth and Kavanaugh is more than a bully; he is an abuser.
3. Why was Lindsey Graham’s anger considered so becoming?
4. Why is Donald Trump’s outrage considered charming?
5. Why do so many Republicans so fervently support family values when they promote policies that break up families?
6. Why is it that Republicans oppose regulations on campaign finance when it adds to their personal misery of having to spend endless hours raising money?
7. Why is it that Republicans favor lowering taxes for the wealthy in order to provide less revenue to fund programs for the non-wealthy?
8. What is it about science that Republicans don’t like?
9. Why are Republicans so anti-regulation and at the same time so anti-choice?
10. Why do most political scandals involve Republicans (e.g. Watergate, Trumpgate, etc.)?

If I was more of an academic person, I would try to provide answers to these questions supported with  substantiation. Right now, there are thousands, probably tens of thousands of academics who are working on studies that will be of little interest to anyone and that will not do much to improve the quality of life for anyone.

I’m happy to keep providing questions. So are many more. But we need answers, even approximations, now so that those who are not Republicans can gain greater insight into why Republicans are the way they are.

I don’t even know if Republicans have this kind of curiosity about Democrats; put that on the list of questions.

Please let us know if you want to help us find some answers to these often vexing questions about Republicans.

The post We Need Help – Understanding the Republican Brain appeared first on Occasional Planet.

At his made-for-tv bipartisan meeting with Senators and Congressional representatives, Donald Trump said that, unlike others in the room, he isn’t “afraid of the NRA.”  I call BS.

At the meeting, Trump “proposed” gun-control “policies” that sounded like those favored by Sandy-Hook-school-massacre parents [also prompting Democrats Dianne Feinstein and Amy Klobuchar to burst out laughing.] Less than 24 hours later, he meets with the NRA and changes his “mind” on gun laws, due process, everything gun-related.

Let’s see: NRA spends $30 million to help Trump get elected in 2016. In 2018, the NRA objects to something he says. So, having spent $30 mil on him, they have bought instant access, and can call him up, demand an immediate meeting, walk right in and get what they want.

I’m not saying that what Trump initially said during the meeting came from any kind of belief or conviction or thought. He just wanted to seem leader-ish and agreeable for the tv audience. He was riffing, ad libbing, certain that he was killing it. It was another example of him agreeing with the last person he talked to.

That being said, the whole affair offers yet another object lesson on what campaign money buys. Perhaps, too, it may parallel the effect of Trump’s probable—but not yet documented—financial indebtedness to Russia and explain why he consistently kisses Putin’s ass.

The post Trump says he’s not afraid of the NRA. Yeah, right appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Well, yes, it’s not the clearest photo of all time, but that’s because it’s taken from a television screen. But if you wanted a poster for what is wrong with money and politics, this picture will do it.

In the center, and at the podium, is J.B. Pritzker, a candidate running for the Democratic nomination for governor in Illinois. Why is that a problem, after all, shouldn’t anyone who meets the legal requirements to run for office be allowed to?

Absolutely. And the fact that according to Forbes, Pritzker is worth 3.5 billion, nor that his family owns the Hyatt hotel chain. America should be safe for anyone to run for office, regardless of how wealthy they are.

If Pritzker was just a wealthy man who has an interest in politics (he majored in political science at Duke University), there would not be a problem. It wouldn’t necessarily be a problem that his list of friends includes former President Barack Obama or even former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich.

Here’s where it gets tricky, or maybe just plain disgusting. His friendships are littered with favors being asked and favors being granted. When that happens in politics, it is politely called conflict of interest. In other circles, it is called corrupt.

Shortly after Barack Obama was elected president, the question of filling his Senate seat became a topic of conversation. There would not be an immediate special election, instead the governor of the state, Rod Blagojevich at the time, would make an appointment.

It turned out that Blagojevich’s efforts to “sell” the seat became cause for him to become another Illinois governor to be sent to prison. But J.B. Pritzker was right in the middle of the dealing. According to FBI wiretaps obtained by the Chicago Tribune, the following took place:

J.B. Pritzker, a billionaire businessman with political ambitions, told Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich he was “really not that interested” in the U.S. Senate seat the governor was dealing in late 2008.

Instead, Pritzker offered his own idea: Would Blagojevich make him Illinois treasurer?

“Ooh, interesting,” Blagojevich said during a November 2008 phone call with Pritzker. “Let’s think about that. You interested in that?”

“Yeah,” Pritzker answered, “that’s the one I would want.”

So, Pritzker is not some paragon of virtue running for office who happens to be a billionaire. He is tightly intertwined with politicians and others who make the levers of government move.

The photo shows Illinois Senator Dick Durbin standing next to Pritzker. Durbin has made a name for himself as a liberal, if not progressive, who can work effectively with Republicans. He has been one of the leaders to achieve a bi-partisan solution to immigration issues, and would probably be hailed as a very effective deal-maker if it was not for Donald Trump scuttling his work.

But when it comes to supporting Pritzker against other Democrats running for the gubernatorial nomination, Durbin is tainted. Pritzker has donated at least $25,000 to Durbin campaigns, and it could be far more.

Also next to Pritzker is Illinois’ other Democratic Senator, Tammy Duckworth. She too is a recipient of Pritzker largesse.

Pritzker money is all over Illinois politics, particularly among Democrats and including to a large extent Barack Obama. J.B.’s sister, Penny Pritzker, became Obama’s Secretary of Commerce.

So regardless of what ideas J.B. Pritzker has (he says that he supports a public option for health insurance for Illinois, but the state is virtually bankrupt), this man is not who Democrats who we can respect should be supporting. That’s what’s wrong with the picture, and unfortunately, all over America there are similar photos of “pay-to-play” endorsements.

What can we do? At the very least, express our outrage and consider withholding support.

The post What’s wrong with this picture? appeared first on Occasional Planet.

President Trump began his Presidency by falsely asserting that his Inaugural crowd was larger than Obama’s, a claim easily refuted by comparing aerial photographs of the two groups. Trump’s ridiculous claim was the first step in his goal of reconfiguring our fractured political stage into a tragic farce. Instead of one “Big Lie,” he bludgeons us with non-stop fraud that generates disorientation, demoralization, and dangerous polarization.

One might think that Trump’s blatant contempt for obvious facts would undermine his legitimacy, but systemic lying is a very effective tool for consolidating political power.

Lies enable a leader to quickly assess the political landscape. Supporters demonstrate their fealty by ignoring their senses, attacking those who maintain the truth. Opponents gleefully seize upon apparent blunders, revealing the nature and extent of their opposition. Their bewildered outrage polarizes the populace even more, facilitating the elite’s enduring strategy of “divide and conquer.” Many in the so-called middle lie low, out of indifference, ambivalence about both sides, or knowing that any public expression entangles them in an increasingly disgusting culture.

In other words, systemic dishonesty serves as a political sorting hat, similar to the magic hat that assigned new students to the appropriate house in the Harry Potter novels.

This sorting extends far beyond the three basic political categories of support, opposition, and quietude. Lies enable the leader to more easily determine particular roles for supporters. Some are aware of the deceptions, but suppress any reaction because honesty interferes with their ideological goals and personal ambitions. Because they also are not very interested in the truth, they can easily adapt when the leader redefines reality in another direction. The ends justify the means.

These people are extremely important, because they are in contact with reality but consider it subordinate to other purposes. A select few may be permitted to join the leader in laughter about the masses’ gullibility.   Aside from everything else, the leader and his coterie get pleasure out of manipulating the masses, watching the populace totally defer not only to beliefs but also to facts.

When the leader acts badly, it is easy for the fervent to not only tolerate the leader’s dishonesty but also to lie in support.  They have already compromised themselves by accepting so much nonsense. For example, some Republicans have promoted a seemingly irrelevant, arcane distinction between “shithole” and “shithouse,” as if labeling struggling countries as “shithouses” would somehow exonerate the President from charges of racism and boorish behavior. Others use euphemisms, such as “strong language,” thereby propping up Trump’s image of weird virility.

Another group remains deferential because they want more hierarchy than currently exists and/or they prefer some of the leader’s policies more than competing alternatives. Senator Lindsey Graham revealed insufficient devotion by telling the truth and even criticizing the President for the “shithole” remark. He probably won’t be golfing with Trump for quite a while, where Trump compulsively reasserts his dominance by openly cheating. Meanwhile, the inner circle of courtiers will mock Graham for his naiveté.

Many other followers believe almost every lie. They are useful idiots (pardon the cliché, but it has enduring value). They virulently turn on anyone who doubts any aspect of the leader’s vision. After all, they have made a quasi-religious leap of faith by allowing their leader to define a reality that transcends facts. They keep the movement’s doubters and hustlers in line while intimidating opponents with their fanaticism.

Others just don’t care, so long as their leader protects their interests. They believe they will do better than those who lie low or remain in opposition. Many oligarchs gleefully support an authoritarian who enriches them until they are suddenly thrown in jail for “corruption.”

Overall, institutionalized lying reinforces rigid hierarchy by converting political movements into quasi-religious cults of personality. The leader is a god-like figure who has overcome history. Lying turns the inherently tribal nature of partisan politics into a cauldron of mutual contempt and intolerance. Followers despise opponents for lack of respect. The opposition considers the supporters to be craven, deranged, or stupid.

While it would be profoundly inaccurate to claim moral equivalence between the two major Parties, it is important to observe that the Democratic Party has a different cluster of mandatory narratives. But at least so far, that Party’s moral failings typify politics within any democratic regime. Democratic leaders break promises, misdirect people, create their own set of “politically correct” litmus tests, and suppress important facts. But they don’t base their positions on facts that can be so easily refuted.

People will always disagree about predictions (What are the human effects on climate chaos?), opinions (Is Trump racist?), and policies (Should poor children receive health care or wealthy people more tax cuts?).  But when there is no common understanding about the factual world we share, there is far less likelihood of creating the necessary common ground for political understanding and even compromise. Quite frankly, I don’t know how to talk to someone who still` believes Trump had a larger crowd than Obama or that Obama is a Muslim. And that is just the way Trump and his elite supporters want it.

The post Leaders Who Lie: The Sorting Hat appeared first on Occasional Planet.

One of the refreshing things about going to Tom Steyer’s “Need to Impeach” web site is that there is no “DONATE” button. He wants your name, e-mail address and zip code, if you are so inclined to support his movement to build public support to consider impeaching President Donald Trump.

Granted, Steyer is a billionaire, so the cost of mounting this on-line campaign is pocket change to him. But when was the last time that you remember a well-heeled candidate or organization mount a political campaign without asking for money?

We have long-since reached a point where the viability of a political candidate or movement is measured in terms of money raised. This is why your inbox gets deluged with requests for political donations at the end of every month, and more so at the end of every fiscal quarter. The candidates want your money for two basic reasons. First, they want income to cover the expenses of campaigning. Regrettably, much of this money goes to buying media time which often involves either distorting their own record or that of their opponents.

Second, they want the bragging rights of having raised ‘x’ amount of money, particularly when ‘x’ is greater than that of their opponents. The political handicappers then get behind them and say that they are the candidates to beat.

The first problem with this approach is that it is very undemocratic. The appeal may be sent to the rank and file, but the real target is the donor class. Candidates love to say that they will accept donations of three dollars, but what they really want are the four and five figure donations from those who make a habit of funding political campaigns. There can be exceptions to this rule such as Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign where the average donation was $27, and he had millions of supporters make small donations. But unless a candidate has a real message like Bernie, he or she is going to have to fund a campaign by tapping into the resources of the donor class.

Money is necessary for campaigns, but far less necessary than in the past. Campaigns now can be targeted and decentralized. The mode of communication need not be the printed piece or the commercial spread over a mass market. Rather, the internet, and social media in particular, can be the vehicle by which the message is delivered. Not only is this inexpensive, but it also provides candidates with opportunities to explain in detail what their positions are on various issues. No need to engage in cost-saving editing.

To paraphrase James Carville, candidates continue to shill for money. It’s the “bragging rights,” stupid. Bragging is one of the three ‘B’s’ that most characterize asking for money:

1. Begging
2. Boorish
3. Bragging

If you think about your relationship as a voter to the candidate, these are terrible words to characterize your relationship. These are among the last things that you would want in a friendship.

So, what can we do about it. A couple of things:

1. Public financing of elections. Many pay lip service to this, but few make it a priority. But as voters, we can restrict our support to candidates who truly value it.
2. Support candidates who exercise self-restraint in raising money. These candidates are more likely to have clean campaigns which are truly informative. Their real constituency is more likely to be the entire voter base rather than the donor class.
3. Encourage those like Tom Steyer who can afford to get the message out without begging for money to do so. It is like a waft of fresh air to open a political solicitation with no request for money.

Ultimately, we as voters have the power to reject candidates who are all about money. Disseminating this message can be inexpensive. If each of us tries to lead by example, we’ll be off to an excellent start.

The post Tom Steyer: The Fresh Air of Politics without Begging for Money appeared first on Occasional Planet.