It wasn't the biggest city in the mix. Or the most diverse. Or the flashiest. But in the end, the winner is — Milwaukee!
Democrats have chosen the city on Lake Michigan as the site of their nominating convention to be held in the summer of 2020. It beats out two other finalists — Houston and Miami. Each of those towns had much to entice the DNC: plenty of hotel rooms, major arenas, event space, experience with major conventions. Each also has a large Latino population — voters Democrats need as a major element of any winning coalition in the next presidential election.But Milwaukee, Wisc., while the smallest of the cities in the running, had something big going for it as well: symbolism. A chance for the Democratic National Convention to send a message that no voter will be taken for granted, that the upper Midwest is extremely important, and that the party looks to reverse Trump's very narrow, upset win in Wisconsin in the last election.
In some ways it's the Democrats looking for a "do over."
Again, I'm really not thrilled with symbolic acts. Democrats want to win Wisconsin, they better be campaigning there. No more 'delicate Hillary' candidates who can't visit the states they want votes in. You want to be president? Get off your candy ass and campaign. 'Delicate Hillary' needed to be home every night to sleep in her own bed -- like Bully Boy Bush before her. There's no point in running if you are that delicate of a little flower.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard took the stage on The Late Show on Monday and introduced herself by listing her many accomplishments, among them that she serves as a major in the Hawaii Army National Guard, has been deployed to the Middle East, and currently serves in Congress on the Armed Services Committee. All of that plays into what Gabbard says was her motivation to run for president.
Stephen Colbert asked the Hawaiian congresswoman just that following her self introduction. "As a soldier I know the cost of war," she responded. "And the most important job that the president has is to be commander in chief."
That was just the beginning of a longer talk on war. Gabbard told Colbert that she didn't think the Iraq War or the war in Syria were worth it. "No," she repeatedly told the late-night host.
As for Syria, there was more she had to say. She talked both of a "regime-change war" that she said was started in 2011 "covertly by the CIA" to overthrow the Syrian government. She said it increased the suffering of the Syrian people and strengthened terrorists. "That's a regime change war that we should not have been waging," she said.
Mandy e-mailed that. C.I. covers it in the snapshot (below). I would've watched but I didn't know about it until this morning when I read the snapshot. (I did stream the segment at that point).
Tulsi's in the lead for me but no one's really on my X list except for Pete Buttigieg. I don't hear him speaking about serious issues. I do hear him talking smack. I hear him condemning Chelsea Manning and Ed Snowden. There are a lot of reasons I could support him including that he's openly gay. But at present he has turned me off with all his garbage -- including 'our generation' talk. I'm younger than him and he sounds stupid when he plays that crap. He's got time to turn it around but Tulsi remains in the lead for me.
After her? Probably Bernie. Then Marianne Williamson -- she's so much smarter than a lot of the candidates. I'm even seeing some good with Elizabeth Warren. But Pete's just really turned me off.
Here's C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Tuesday, March 12, 2019. The Iraq War continues -- and Tulsi Gabbard brings some reality to late night TV.
NEW: Speaker Pelosi on impeachment: "They wanted me to impeach President Bush for the Iraq War. I didn’t believe in it then, I don’t believe in it now. It divides the country. Unless there is some conclusive evidence that takes us to that place."
Nancy Pelosi didn't end the Iraq War. She didn't impeach Bully Boy Bush, She didn't do much of anything. She spoke a lot in front of the media. Most of the time, the media covered for her. Even in 2007, she had huge cognitive problems (we covered the time Rahm Emanuel had to rescue her publicly). Adam Schiff and others are wasting time with investigations and wasting tax payer monies. Impeachment will not happen under Nancy.
She didn't want accountability for the Iraq War and if something that monumental goes unanswered for, nothing else will be.
Part of Nancy's reasoning, as we've explained before, is the timeline issue. Impeachment attempts will take you right into an election cycle at this point. And an impeachment attempt, she fears, will energize the Republicans (not just the base) where as it will alienate swing voters and some Democrats.
War is never questioned, apparently, just used to turn out votes for both of the two major political parties. Jason Ditz (ANTIWAR.COM) reports:
As had been previously reported late last week, President Trump has unveiled a budget plan which, in addition to cutting social spending across the board, would seek a huge increase in military spending, centered almost entirely on war funding.
US military spending is always by far the largest on the planet, several times the amount of the next highest spending, China. But while other nations like China and Russia are scaling back their budgets, the Pentagon’s budget, as ever, continues to rise.
Trump’s proposal would bring the overall defense budget for 2020 to $750 billion. This includes a $544 billion base-line defense budget, which is not in and of itself a huge increase. But on top of that will be a nearly $100 billion in the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) Fund, and a $9 billion “emergency” funding request meant to make up for the money already taken from the military to build the border wall.
And it goes beyond just the US.
What Wikileaks reveals about the Blair and Brown governments – next 3 tweets.
1/ Wikileaks file show how the UK govt made promises to the US to “protect your interests” in the Chilcot enquiry into the Iraq war. bit.ly/2TBVBHx
2/ Wikileaks file shows how US and UK rigged the International Criminal Court to stop it being able to hold Blair and Bush accountable for the crime of aggression over Iraq bit.ly/2TBVBHx
3/ Wikileaks file shows UK International Development Secretary under Brown and soon-to-be-appointed MI6 chief working with the US to prevent reform of the world financial system. bit.ly/2TBVBHx
WIKILEAKS crime, never forget, was reporting the truth.
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard: "I served in a war in Iraq, a war that was launched based on lies and a war that was launched without evidence."
Some are supporting Tulsi because they believe she would be a great president. Some are supporting her to get her onstage at the debates because they know she will expand the conversation.
She expanded it for late night comedy talk shows last night.
Stephen Colbert: Why do you want to be president of the United States?
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard: Because as a soldier I know the cost of war and the most important job the president has is to be commander in chief.
Stephen Colbert: Do you think that the Iraq War was worth it?
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard: No.
Stephen Colbert: Do you think that our -- Do you think that our involvement in Syria has been worth it?
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard: No.
Stephen Colbert: Do you believe that -- Do you believe that ISIS could have been defeated without our involvement and support of the local troops there?
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard: There are two things we need to address in Syria. One is a regime change war that was first launched by the United States in 2011, covertly led by the CIA. That is a regime change war that has continued over the years that has increased the suffering of the Syrian people and strengthened terrorist groups like al Qaeda and ISIS because the CIA was using American tax payer dollars to provide arms and training equipment to these terrorist groups to get them to overthrow the government. So that is a regime change war that we should not have been waging --
Stephen Colbert: So but if --
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard: The second --
Stephen Colbert: -- someone like Bashar Assad [cross talk] or engages in War Crimes against his own people, should the United States not be involved.
US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard: The United States should not be intervening to overthrow these dictators and these regimes that we don't like, like Assad, like Saddam Hussein, like Qaddafi and like Kim Jong Un. There are bad people in the world but history has shown us that every time the United States goes in and topples these dictators we don't like, trying to act as the world's police, we end up increasing the suffering of the people in these countries, we end up causing a loss of life -- both American lives and the lives of people in these countries, we end up undermining our own security. [. . .] to speak of the trillions of dollars spent on these wars that we need to be using right here at home.
In Iraq, Hassan Rouhani, President of Iran, continues his visit (it's expected to be a three day visit).
Iraq and Iran signed several preliminary trade deals as Iranian President Hassan Rouhani held his first visit to Iraq, @SaskiaODonoghue reports reut.rs/2F4zeSW
Iran-Iraq Summit, Day 1:
Met Pres, PM, Speaker+political & business leaders
Agreed on:
-Inclusive regional security
-No-fee visas
-Connecting railways
-Dredging border river after 43 yrs
-Joint industrial zones
-Energy cooperation
-$20B in trade
-PTA
2 more days; 2 more cities
Margaret Griffis (ANTIWAR.COM) notes of yesterday's violence, "At least four people were killed, and six were wounded; 15 bodies were found."
AP has changed their headline on yesterdy's trash so we're ignoring it.
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