Who's Pulling The Strings?
If you only get your news from legacy media you may not be fully aware of the mounting evidence that Joe Biden has cognitive impairment. I'm being polite. He's not in the early stages of dementia, he's well advanced into this progressive illness. We know from the abandoned laptop that even his own son, Hunter, joked about his father's failing cognitive ability with his therapist in 2019, before Biden took office.
The Leader Of The Free World often appears dazed and confused, forgetting key facts, names of key people and even which way to turn after finishing the script he's been told to read. He's unsteady on his feet and shuffles. With increasingly vacant eyes, he normally exits the podium immediately after reading his teleprompter because he can't answer even soft-ball questions from the media. He can barely read the teleprompter, stumbling over bigger words. Recently we were treated to the spectacle of the Easter Bunny interrupting the Leader Of The Free World to get him away from journalists he had wandered over to and questions about Afghanistan. Bunny muscled in, getting between Biden and the journalist pack, waving their arms before drawing Joe away to safety. Bunny was clearly a staffer/minder.
Ask yourself this. Would the Easter Bunny have ever interrupted Trump or Obama like this?
His wife, Dr. Jill Biden, can be heard clearly instructing the POTUS to "wave, wave" with bunny minders on each side of the couple. It's not the first time the President needed intervention from his wife on how to answer a question in mushy interviews. She mutters almost without moving her lips like an expert ventriloquist. There's recent footage of an event with Obama surrounded and holding court, as if he were the current POTUS, while a clearly confused Biden wanders about behind, ignored by everyone there. Biden couldn't even get Obama's attention despite tugging at him forlornly.
So this is the most powerful man in the world?
It would all be funny if it wasn't so serious! But, at least the Orange Man isn't in charge anymore...eh?
Do you think Putin and Xi Jinping would have had intelligence on Biden's actual cognitive state 18 months ago?
Having worked in aged care, I saw it and so did many others even as the legacy media tried their best to cover for him. Covid gave Biden the excuse to hide in his basement instead of being on the campaign trail. When he did appear in public, the public noticeably didn't appear, not in the numbers that attended Trump rallies. The few people sitting in the circles at his rallies were 'friendlies' instructed to clap politely.
Following the election outcome on 3rd November 2020, I made the assessment that "our world just got dangerous!" The left and anti-Trump establishment were in good cheer celebrating. So were Putin, Kim Jong-un, the Ayatollah of Iran and Xi Jinping... as America headed towards a predictable re-neutering.
Side-stepping the democratic process of Congress, there were 70+ Executive Orders signed within a day or so of Biden taking office. They looked much like Obama era policy. Anyone could see that deliberate damage to the US economy would have confirmed to world dictators and despots that now is the perfect time to make their moves.
The 2020 summer BLM riots with burning and looting that were left to spiral in blue states because the Democrats thought it would hurt Trump. That cost whole communities and small businesses, mostly black. The lockdowns that demolished small business even as it further enriched billionaires like Amazon's Bezos. States like Florida (Republican) never indulged in authoritarianism and came through without all the economic and social harm others are now grappling with.
Shutting down the XL Pipeline and other policy resulting in the loss of energy independence that had been gained under Trump. Undoing Trump border policy created the border crisis with millions of illegal immigrants (not to mention human trafficking, especially children and drugs like Fentanyl) flowing into America. Unsurprisingly, Democrats not only want to give illegal immigrants amnesty, with right to work, but they then want non-citizens to be able to vote. In short they're flooding the country with cheap workers, thus lowering wages for Americans at the lower end who are already struggling. It's not hard to imagine they expect the influx of illegals would be Democrat voters. Lastly, let's not forget the mess that was the Afghanistan withdrawal.
While not an exhaustive list, you get the picture. It's a catalogue of incompetence and predicable consequences. Poorly conceived right-on wokism. Performative emoting that masqueraded as fully thought-through policy. It wasn't, which is why the Biden Administration is now trying to resurrect Trump era policy on borders. The last 18 months or more has been a tale of systematically weakening America. Using a senile leader to sign off on the most radical left agenda in American history, and in the process creating the perfect conditions for despots and dictators with dastardly plans!
Putin finally makes his move
This would have been the assessment Putin arrived at despite underestimating the grit of the Ukrainian people to put up a fight. Thank goodness Trump had sold Ukraine the weapons needed, weapons that Obama had refused to sell them. Without that they would have had little choice but to capitulate immediately to Putin, as some pundits in the West thought they should. War is horrible, but playing dead to bullies and despots and the prospect of a life on your knees isn't the answer. Capitulation is not what the Ukrainian people have chosen. Imagine if our forebears had done that circa 1939?
Putin began his plans to invade shortly after Biden took office with troops beginning to appear on Ukraine's border in the Northern Hemisphere spring of 2021. He knew it would take the best part of a year to amass 100,000+ troops on the border, get his supply chains in place, and crucially for the Biden Administration policies to bite the US domestic economy. Americans are now preoccupied with surviving record inflation, lowered wages, and hiked costs of living, from energy to food, than with what's happening in Eastern Europe. There's little appetite for an escalation to a hot war.
Few good comes of war, however, the realisation that Russia's army isn't the formidable bogey we've been told to fear, given the two day incursion is now stretching into months, might be one. This just makes Putin more dangerous; a wounded animal in a corner so to speak. He's now more likely to resort to desperate tactics to retrieve the situation and his legacy with the Russian people. It's why he's now targeting civilian infrastructure.
The only other positive to emerge is that NATO countries are now pitching up with the required 2% contribution, instead of free-loading on the US. Recall that Trump demanded they do this several years ago, which looks now to be positively prescient. Finland and Sweden look set to join NATO, so this has been something of an own-goal for Putin. Germany and Europe in general are also re-evaluating the wisdom of relying on intermittent energy. They've had to drop the green-wash and get real about energy security and the dangers of being dependent on Russian gas, as Poland and Bulgaria have now found out. Like a bucket of icy water, it's the wake-up they've needed. Better late than never, I guess?
Recall that at the height of the Russia Collusion Hoax, with Trump Derangement displays being de rigueur, Chancellor Merkel indulged in geo-political politicking. How can we forget her standing over a defensive Trump demanding he sanction Russia (to prove Trump wasn't a Putin puppet?), even as Germany propped up Putin by buying his gas. Trump had warned about the dependence on Putin and giving him the means to wage war. He thought it more effective to sell her American gas instead, since they had plenty. She declined, and well, here we are.
China's distracting ally
What of Kim Jong-un? That guy who was the most pressing threat facing the world and the new Trump administration according to Obama? When Obama was President, North Korea's Dear Leader was on the path to getting nuclear weapons and regularly firing missiles at his neighbours. If you recall, Trump decided to depart from the historical foreign policy playbook that clearly hadn't deterred Kim and to meet with him, including a private conversation. It's not public knowledge what was actually said. What we can observe however, is that despite much left media huffing and puffing, we ended up with almost 4 years cessation of missile lobbing.
Did you notice?
Biden takes office and in just over a year America is distracted and in economic turmoil. Kim Jong-un is an opportunist and naturally taking advantage, openly resuming his nuclear program, some say in concert with Iran. He's begun menacing the neighbourhood once again, testing the biggest, long reaching missiles yet.
Who doesn't want there to be peace?
How about Iran and their efforts to get nuclear weapons along with the calls to "annihilate the state of Israel"? Iran wants to drive all Jews from the Middle East, and put approximately 10 million of them in 'camps', in what must feel like deja vu for Jewish people. The Iranian regime actively funds terrorism, even as they tell Iranian people there isn't the money for medicine (no doubt blamed on the West). Before losing office in 2020 Trump's Administration had put in place The Abraham Accords, a historic achievement to bring peace to the ME with Arab nations signing up to work alongside Israel. The aim for all parties wasn't just economic, but to neutralise the region destabilising ambitions of Iran.
Trump dumped the nuclear deal Obama had struck that effectively exchanged sanctions in return for Iran not developing their nuclear program (so fast). It wasn't going to stop them becoming nuclear weapon capable, just slow it down. By 2017 there was concern Iran might be flouting the agreement and stockpiling enriched uranium, not allowing UN inspectors to fully check they were holding up their end of the agreement. With these suspicions Trump chose to curtail Iran's nuclear ambitions via reintroduction of sanctions. There was also the assassination of a top scientist responsible for Iran's nuclear program.
Biden has been seeking to revert to Obama policy in a weaker version of the initial Obama deal. Tehran for it's part has rebuffed Biden's Administration and been clear to state they have no intention of abandoning their nuclear program believing it to be their right. Consider that when Obama's nuclear deal was implemented, and while then VP Biden visited Israel, Iran promptly tested two ballistic missiles each labelled with the phrase "Israel must be wiped out". This is the same Iranian regime that refers to America as simply "The Great Satan". In 2015 when Obama's policy was enacted there was the following report.
Hardliners in [the Iranian] Parliament have also taken a tough stand. On November 2, 192 out of 290 lawmakers signed a letter vowing not to abandon the slogan “Death to America (also translated as “Down with the USA”)
The above provides context on the need for realism and pragmatism when dealing with the Iranian regime. So, when we recently witnessed the debasing spectacle of the Biden Administration begging OPEC countries (including Iran, Iraq, Libya,Venezuela) to pump more oil to help bring fuel costs down in America...? My, how America has fallen so fast. Unsurprisingly OPEC declined, despite the grovelling.
This is what happens when political parties indulge in the folly of demolishing their own energy independence. In America's case it was a futile, green-tinged and juvenile anti-anything-Trump-achieved, fit. Nothing quite like putting your fate, economy, world security even, in the hands of the world's dictators... who can barely conceal their hatred of you.
China isn't a friendly actor
China deserves an entire blog on its own. While the world was distracted with Covid, the CCP took control of Hong Kong and has since cracked down on any democratic dissent. Xi has explicitly said that Taiwan will be bought to heel during his time as supreme ruler, just as he said that Hong Kong would be. We should take him at his word. Xi is not a young man so we don't have the luxury of worrying about this in 10 - 20 years.
Of course China will be watching what's happening in Ukraine. Do you think Putin's missteps will deter Xi or do you think he'll rapidly learn from them, getting his ducks in a row first?
Have you seen the footage of the wailing towers in Shanghai? It's disturbing on a level we find hard to comprehend and as sickening as the plight of Uighur Muslims with forced labour and internment camps. Millions of Chinese people locked-down and unable to get sufficient food with accusations of starvation. All to quell the now cold-like Omicron outbreak?
Clearly the Chinese Government's prescription to deal with Covid is worse than the virus itself. What is clear is that Xi expects the virus to bend to his dictates of "zero tolerance". Consider the underlying message: if Xi can do this to his own people, do you think world sanctions will deter him from moving on Taiwan?
It's not like he respects international law, as we saw when he laid claim to, then built and militarised islands in the South China Sea. You don't build militarised islands with runways capable of accomodating long distance bomber planes for no reason! It's no holiday resort and most of our trade via ships goes through this region. Xi will sacrifice his own people for a greater aim - his personal glorification and lasting legacy of world dominance.
How dependent on China is the West? How beholden or indebted are we?
Think about it from Xi's perspective. When would be the best time to move on Taiwan? Now while America and the world are distracted, weakened and have entwined capital and supply chains? Or do you think he'll wait a few years, risking the scenario of a more hawkish, less compromised POTUS? What about the prospect the world disentangles its capital and supply chain if he waits and America gets focussed and economically strong again? Xi may have a short window in which to act.
Our weakened state
We're experiencing worryingly high inflation and unprecedented level of indebtedness after a two year bender for a virus that for most is 99.97% survivable, not to mention treatable. Like waking up with a hang-over, most of us are now paying for the binge when we pay our mortgage and grocery bill. Our Government is focussed on green policies that achieve nothing in terms of lowering global temperatures but will further slay economic performance and therefore standards of living. Think energy and grocery bills are high now?
We're deliberating making one primary input (energy) too costly thus sending industry, jobs...wealth... to China! Even agriculture (dairy/meat) and NZ's largest contributor to GDP, is now on the agenda for the climate cultists. What's a bit of mass starvation when saving the planet from fractions of a degree REwarming? In case I need to state the obvious, that was sarcasm. The faddish fixation on CO2 would diminish if more people knew paleoclimate history and basic biology.
The adage of not listening to what is said but to look at what they do, applies. At the same time Xi pays lip-service to 'climate' he is building coal fired power stations as fast as he can, and last year "started building 33 gigawatts of new coal-fired power generation capacity... the most since 2016." At last count China had 1,110 to America's 240.
What's that saying about not intervening when your enemy is doing something stupid? It's dangerously naive to think that an increasingly authoritarian and belligerent China, with ambitions to become the dominant superpower, wouldn't encourage the West to continue the bizarre practice of economic self-harm. It's beneficial to China that we continue handicapping ourselves with climate posturing, whilst China builds energy capacity to reap economic and strategic advantage, including militarily.
America, the current dominant superpower keeping Xi in check, was energy independent 18 months ago and a net exporter. Now Biden is pilfering America's emergency fuel stocks to keep the country going, whilst grovelling to dictators.
So, America's hip and clever class traded prosperity and world security to scratch the itch of Trump Derangement. They wanted the mad media frenzy to stop and likewise, the mean Tweets so life could go back to 'normal'?
You have to ask, how's that working out?
So, who's in charge then?
It's unambiguously evident that Joe Biden isn't in charge of anything! So the question I have is, who exactly is in charge of the world super-power tasked with keeping the geo-political balance of power, for all our sakes?
Obama? Last time he was in charge Putin took Crimea, Xi built and militarised islands in the South China Sea, Syria's Assad used chemical weapons against his own people to quell an uprising, completely ignoring Obama's finger-wagging "red line" warning (that had no follow-through consequences). There was regime change and military foray into Libya including the Benghazi scandal, an intervention the Libyan people are still recovering from a decade later. There's more, but suffice to say, the foreign policy disaster that was Obama, with his lofty but meaningless rhetoric, was inconsequential to the aims of world dictators and despots.
Who will the American people hold democratically accountable in the mid-terms in November 2022, and in the Presidential election in 2024?
Biden? You have to be kidding! But, at least the mean Tweets stopped, eh?