Chiefs Win the Super Bowl . . . in 1970

Ken Belson, the excellent New York Times reporter, has a story about CTE and the '72 Dolphins (see "The Perfect ’72 Dolphins and Football’s Ultimate Toll").

Sunday the Kansas City Chiefs return to the Super Bowl for the first time in 50 years. The last time they were there was January 11, 1970, at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans, a few years prior to the Dolphins perfect season.

This week I've been watching the YouTube above, a lovingly restored kinescope of the original CBS telecast of AFL-NFL World Championship Game between the Minnesota Vikings and Kansas City Chiefs with play-by-play by Jack Buck and Pat Summerall.

The Chiefs ran a "Power I" formation: three backs lined up directly behind quarterback Lenny Dawson. The backs would usually motion out of the formation, with the tight end taking his place on the line and the two running backs in a three-point stance behind and to the right and left of the quarterback.

It is interesting to watch. The players are slower than today's players. Everything takes place much closer to the line of scrimmage. Lots of physicality but nowhere near the level of athleticism in today's game. Conditioning, nutrition and money have all improved in 50 years.

But something has been lost. We were a far more people-powered nation in 1970, less hierarchical and not smothered by corporate branding and in thrall to the U.S. Armed Forces. Was the nation more conformist? Yes. Was it militarist? Yes, but not in the way we are today.

You'd have to watch the video to see what I mean.

Bernie Surge Continues

It's hard not to come away from reading yesterday's Water Cooler thinking that Bernie Sanders is going to win the Democratic Primary. He's up in Iowa; he's up in New Hampshire; and he's seriously pulling away in California while Joe Biden's support plummets in the Golden State. The one handhold Biden maintains is South Carolina. But is South Carolina enough to turn things around for Obama's VP? No, I think not.

The downside to Bernie's front-running is that if there is an upset in Iowa or New Hampshire the corporate media frenzy it will kick off will be intense and deafening. I believe Bernie could weather a second-place finish in either of these first two states because he has built such formidable campaign operation -- Sanders is much better able to deal with setbacks than his Democratic Party rivals -- but under-performance after surging in the polls is not a good look.

The political establishment is beginning to line up its sharpshooters. A pro-Israel, pro-war-with-Iran Democratic Super PAC, "Democratic Majority for Israel," started anti-Sanders attack ads yesterday in Iowa. It's not that Sanders is anti-Israel; it's that he is anti-war and pro-Palestinian. For a candidate of either of the two major parties, these perspectives are not allowed. One could argue that Trump's big hustle in 2016 was convincing enough swing voters he was a legitimate anti-war voice. Trump will not be able to repeat that legerdemain in 2020.

The attack made by "Democratic Majority for Israel" is two-prong: one, Bernie is unelectable; and two, Bernie is too old and unhealthy, having recently suffered a heart attack. The first prong is the one that is going to get plenty of traction in the corporate media if the polls are correct and Bernie rolls along in February picking up Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada. He'll be called the George McGovern of 2020.

In the back of my mind are the shocking December 12 UK general election results. Corbyn is an old anti-war campaigner like Sanders, and the Tories made mincemeat out of him.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Bernie has to make it through the primaries first. The fundamental reason why I think he will is that the Democratic establishment has not settled on any one candidate. First it was Kamala Harris. Then it was Beto Then it was Buttgieg. Then it was on-and-off-again with Warren. Then it was Klobuchar. It's always been Biden but also not-Biden.

The plutocrats who run the DNC cannot decide. On the other hand, Sanders has maintained his supporters from the last go-round while at the same time he has widened his base of support to include more Latinos and African-Americans.

Trump is pulling out the stops to make sure GOP caucus participation in Iowa is robust, while Trump surrogates attempt to buy black votes. It is going to be a fascinating and hideous election year.

The MAGA Equivalent of the Obama Coalition

It has become widely accepted that Trump beat Hillary in 2016 because his campaign focused and spent heavily on social media. Think Cambridge Analytica. Today in "Trump’s Digital Advantage Is Freaking Out Democratic Strategists" Thomas Edsall explains how the Trump reelection team is broadening the scope of the 2016 digital campaign:

Experts in the explosively growing field of political digital technologies have developed an innovative terminology to describe what they do — a lexicon that is virtually incomprehensible to ordinary voters. This language provides an inkling of the extraordinarily arcane universe politics has entered:

geofencing, mass personalization, dark patterns, identity resolution technologies, dynamic prospecting, geotargeting strategies, location analytics, geo-behavioural segment, political data cloud, automatic content recognition, dynamic creative optimization.

Geofencing and other emerging digital technologies derive from microtargeting marketing initiatives that use consumer and other demographic data to identify the interests of specific voters or very small groups of like-minded individuals to influence their thoughts or actions. Microtargeting first had a significant impact on American politics in state level campaign work by Alec Gage, a Republican, and his firm TargetPoint in 2002.

Now, political operatives are exploiting commercial techniques to correlate microtargeting data with the identification numbers of cellphones. This allows campaigns to mobilize, persuade and turn out — or to suppress turnout among — key voters.

Beneath the cloak of neologisms the gist of the new microtargeting strategy is that it will allow Trump's reelection campaign to push his non-voting supporters to the polls:

On Monday, Parscale boasted on the conservative website Townhall that Trump rallies are providing a gold mine of data for the 2020 election:

"Out of more than 20,000 identified voters who came to a recent Trump rally in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 57.9 percent did not have a history of voting for Republicans. Remarkably, 4,413 attendees didn’t even vote in the last election — a clear indication that President Trump is energizing Americans who were previously not engaged in politics."

Similar findings are coming out of other rallies, according to Parscale:

"Nearly 22 percent of identified supporters at President Trump’s rally in Toledo, Ohio, were Democrats, and another 21 percent were independents. An astounding 15 percent of identified voters who saw the president speak in Battle Creek, Michigan, has not voted in any of the last four elections. In Hershey, Pennsylvania, just over 20 percent of identified voters at the rally were Democrats, and 18 percent were nonwhite."

Consider this the MAGA equivalent of the Obama Coalition.

I'm skeptical. Getting people to vote for the first time is a lot harder than sending an ad to a smartphone. Plus, I think a lot of the nonvoters in attendance at a Trump rally are there not because of some sort of political awakening but because it's cheap, novel entertainment.

Geofencing might not be effective in turning out Trump's non-voting base, but I do think it will be effective in suppressing turnout for the eventual Democratic nominee. Negative campaigning generally works.

2020 Democratic Primary is Mirroring 2016 Republican Primary

Today, with less than a week to go until the Iowa caucus, it is interesting to assess the attack on Bernie Sanders being formulated by corporate thought managers. A good example, which appeared yesterday in the national edition of The New York Times, is "Bernie Sanders and His Internet Army." Written by Matt Flegenheimer, Rebecca Ruiz and Nellie Bowles, the idea being peddled is that Bernie Sanders telepathically controls millions of vicious, violent, sleepless trolls and bots that patrol the online universe snuffing out any perspective critical of the Vermont senator and two-time presidential aspirant. In other words, Bernie Sanders is guilty of having loyal supporters.

Writing for Jacobin, Julie Holar makes the insightful observation that "Mainstream Media Are Obsessed With Comparing Bernie to Trump," which was basically the underlying premise of the lengthy Flegenheimer et al. piece: SandersForPresident Reddit group is the left version of Trump supporters on 8chan.

There is one aspect, a very important one, in which the Trump-Sanders conflation makes sense. In 2016 Trump weathered every conceivable attack from the mainstream corporate media and rolled to an easy win in the GOP primary. It is as if the Republican electorate was fervently taking its cues from corporate media; except, rather than strictly adhering to the admonitions of the prestige press and its corp of pundits, it consistently did the exact opposite of what it was told.

We'll see how things break, but it looks like the 2020 Democratic Primary is mirroring the 2016 Republican Primary. Then as now mainstream thought managers didn't have a singular champion to combat the anti-establishment foe. Scott Walker? Marco Rubio? Jeb Bush? Kamala Harris? Cory Booker? Joe Biden?

The New York Times presidential endorsement is case in point. The "newspaper of record" couldn't even make a clear choice, splitting its support between an also-ran Amy Klobuchar and a viable contender Elizabeth Warren.

When the rubble of the 2020 Democratic Primary clears Fourth Estate elites are going to realize an opportunity lost. Warren was their best hope. But the only time the corporate media backed her candidacy was to diminish Sanders'; the rest of the time it spent attacking her policy proposals.

Now that it appears that Democrats are replaying the 2016 Republican Primary, the questions becomes, "Is there anything that elites can do differently this time to block the anti-establishment candidate?"

The first answer the pops into my head? Mike Bloomberg.

Rockets Red Glare in the Green Zone

According to Reuters (see "Two Iraq protesters killed as anti-government unrest persists") Muqtada al-Sadr has pulled his support of protests that are part of the ongoing October Revolution in Iraq:

After a lull in unrest earlier this month, demonstrations resumed in Baghdad and southern cities and protesters have controlled three key bridges in Baghdad and maintain camps and road blocks in several cities in the south.

[snip]

Operations by security forces to remove the protest camps started after populist cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said on Saturday he would halt the involvement of his supporters. 

Sadr had backed the demands of protesters for the removal of corrupt politicians and for the provision of services and jobs soon after the demonstrations began in October, but stopped short of calling all his followers to join in.

Demonstrations continued in Baghdad where security forces used tear gas against protesters in central Baghdad. Protests also continued in many southern cities on Monday, resisting repeated attempts by security forces to end their protests.

Protesters in Nassiriya broke into a police office on Monday and set fire to at least five police vehicles parked inside before they left the location, police and Reuters witness said.

Alissa Rubin of The New York Times elaborates that

The government’s move to clear protesters came after the prominent Shiite cleric, Moktada al-Sadr, announced in a tweet on Friday that he was withdrawing support for the demonstrators and would no longer intervene on their behalf. He said his move was a result of what he called the antagonistic behavior of some of the protesters toward his followers.

His withdrawal of support, and the resulting departure of many of his followers from the demonstrations, deprived the protests of a critical base of participants, leaving those remaining more vulnerable to a government crackdown.

[snip] 

His followers had presented themselves as protectors of the protesters — whether nor not that was consistently the case — so their withdrawal implicitly opened the way for those antagonistic to the demonstrators, including the Iraqi government forces, to move in.

Mr. Sadr is also well known in Iraq for his sizable militia, known as Soraya Salaam, or the Peace Brigades, who although they did not come to the protest squares armed, represented a veiled threat to the government and others who wanted to see the protesters removed.

Late Sunday the U.S. embassy in Baghdad was struck in a rocket attack.  According to Al Jazeera, USJOC said in a statement that no rockets hit the embassy. But AFP said that three rockets hit the embassy, one striking the cafeteria during dinnertime.

No one has claimed responsibility. Caretaker prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi condemned the attack, promising to bring the perpetrators to justice. If the U.S. decides to target militia units of the Popular Mobilization Forces, as it did earlier with Kata'ib Hezbollah, Iraq will be on the brink of a full-scale war.

The U.S. goal in that war, as we saw on Friday, is partition of Iraq. I doubt the Trump administration is ready to commit to such a project right now, with the Iowa caucus next Monday; and I doubt U.S. allies in Erbil and Anbar are ready either. So the U.S. response to these rocket attacks on the Green Zone is not going to be as incendiary as the assassination of Soleimani. Trump has to get reelected before full-scale war in the Middle East can get underway.

Obama to Campaign for Bloomberg? Don't be Surprised.

The latest New York Times/Siena College poll of likely Iowa caucusgoers (see "Sanders Seizes Lead in Volatile Iowa Race, Times Poll Finds" by Jonathan Martin and Sydney Ember) shows Bernie surging prior to the February 3 vote.

Bernie leads the field at 25%. Biden and Buttigieg are frozen in the high teens, and Elizabeth Warren is fading at 15%.

Warren's misogyny-baiting attack on Sanders has backfired. According to The Times:

And while Ms. Warren’s support fell across nearly all groups in the poll, her decline was particularly pronounced among young voters. Just 16 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds supported her in the poll, down from 38 percent in October.

Is there a scenario where Warren can win the nomination? Not if she loses Iowa and New Hampshire, and that's what the polls are saying is going to happen.

It's strange because Warren looked like the nominee this past summer, the Goldilocks candidate who could unite moderates with the Bernie Bros. Warren's failure means it's either a moderate, Biden at this point, or Sanders. Given that "either/or," recent polls are showing voters moving to Bernie.

If Biden stumbles and under-performs in the first three primary states -- Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada -- the pressure on Obama is going to be intense to take to the hustings for Mike Bloomberg.

U.S. Engineering Caliphate 2.0

Today in Baghdad Muqtada al-Sadr's promise of a "million-strong march" protesting U.S. military presence in Iraq materialized. Al Jazeera reports that

Al-Sadr, whose party won the most number of seats in the May 2018 parliament elections, seized on the public anger over the drone attack to call "a million-strong, peaceful, unified demonstration to condemn the American presence and its violations".

Iraq's top Shia Muslim leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, later called in his weekly sermon for political groups to form a new government as soon as possible to bring stability to the country and enact reforms to improve Iraqis' lives.

He also reiterated his opposition to foreign interference in Iraq, having previously condemned the US killing of Soleimani.

"Iraq's sovereignty must be respected ... and citizens should have the right to peaceful protest," he said.

Friday's rally is supported by mainstream Shia parties, including al-Sadr's political rival Hadi al-Ameri, who heads the Fatah bloc in parliament, as well as the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF, or Hashd al-Shaabi), an umbrella group comprised of an array of militias, including Iran-backed groups.

Al Jazeera's Imran Khan, reporting from the protest, said the turnout was a "real show of strength".

"It almost doesn't matter if this is a million people or less. The size and the vocalness of the crowd has made sure that the message has been sent now."

The New York Times (see "Protesters Mass in Baghdad, Demanding U.S. Leave Iraq") laughably attempts to dismiss the protest by saying it was organized:

This demonstration — unlike those in Tahrir Square in central Baghdad, which have gone on for months and involve a ragtag group of antigovernment protesters with homemade signs and a range of backgrounds — is heavily orchestrated rather than a spontaneous outpouring of feeling.

Participants were recruited, transported by buses provided by the organizers and given signs, flags and sometimes food. The vast majority of the participants are Shiite Muslims, the main constituency of the cleric Mr. al-Sadr and the armed groups close to Iran.

“The organizers of the demonstration in the southern city of Najaf called the Sadr followers, including me, and told us that there are buses and cars to transport the demonstrators from Najaf to Baghdad on Thursday at 1 p.m. and 9 p.m. and 11 p.m.,” said Mohammed Ali, 33, a taxi driver.

I suppose the same argument was used by the White Citizens' Council to dismiss Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" March on Washington.

Reuters gets into the act (see "'No, No America': Iraq protesters demand U.S. military pullout") by belittling the protest for "largely dissipating after several hours." Yes, that's what protest marches do.

There is intense antipathy in the corporate mainstream media for Muqtada al-Sadr and any Iraqi leader who stands up for Iraq sovereignty.

Reuters reminds us in the last paragraph of its story that

For the first time in nearly two years, parliament voted along sectarian lines to press the government to kick out U.S. forces. Shi’ite parties voted in favor, while Sunni Muslim and Kurdish lawmakers boycotted the session.

There is a bombshell story in the Middle East Eye by Suadad al-Salhy (see "US seeking to carve out Sunni state as its influence in Iraq wanes") which exposes where those Sunni and Kurdish lawmakers where when parliament was voting to kick out U.S. troops from Iraq:

The absence of Sunni and Kurdish MPs in parliament highlighted the fragile relationship between Sunni leaders and their Iran-backed Shia allies. Most abstaining MPs left Baghdad toward either Erbil in northern Iraq or Jordan’s Amman for fear of retaliation.

The latest developments in Iraq have prompted them to search for other options, foremost among which was an autonomous Sunni region, Sunni lawmakers told MEE.

As soon as some Sunni politicians arrived in Erbil and Amman, they met US officials there to "discuss options for both sides,” sources said.

In the early hours of 8 January, Iran targeted two Iraqi military bases hosting US forces, one in western Iraq and the other in the north, with ballistic missiles that left no casualties.

Less than 24 hours later, US Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs David Schenker flew to Erbil, without going through Baghdad, to meet key US ally and former president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, Masoud Barzani, in addition to a number of other Kurdish officials.

Although statements later issued by the US did not mention any meetings that took place with Sunni leaders in Erbil, many sources confirmed that both the assistant secretary of state and Stephen Fagin, the US consul in Erbil, met a number of Sunni politicians “to discuss the implications of the parliament’s decision, the threats that Sunnis face and options for facing the two issues”.

On the same day, Schenker flew to the UAE. There, he later said, he met "by chance" with the speaker of the Iraqi parliament, Muhammad al-Halbousi, “who happened to be there”.

After meeting with Schenker, Halbousi held a series of meetings in the UAE on 9 and 10 January with several prominent Sunni leaders.

The plan is to create a Sunnistan with Anbar Province as its anchor:

None of the Sunni and Shia leaders and officials spoken to by MEE have any clear idea of the project’s details.

They all say that it is still just ideas and no clear information has been provided regarding the region’s prospective borders, the number of provinces it would contain and mechanisms to solve the problems that it will face.

It is perfectly clear, however, that the project will be launched from Anbar province, to later include the provinces of Nineveh and Salah al-Din, and part of Diyala.

The proposed Sunni region will be created first in accordance with the articles of the Iraqi constitution, which allows for administrative regions to be established alongside Kurdistan.

Later, the region will be temporarily annexed to Kurdistan in a federal or confederal form, "to avoid the conflict between Sunnis and Kurds over Kirkuk and the disputed areas", according to a prominent Sunni leader.

The last step, MEE understands, will be to have this region recognised internationally.

The Arab Gulf states allied to US, led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, support and finance this project, Sunni and Shia leaders and officials told MEE.

“Funding is in place, international pressure is in place, and the necessary military strength is in place to create this region,” a prominent Sunni leader familiar with the talks said.

“Neither Iran nor the Shia forces will be able to stand against the project because the US and Gulf states back it,” the leader added.

“A huge amount of money and investment offered by the Sunni states is at stake, and these will turn the Anbar desert into green oases and rebuild the destroyed areas in Mosul and Salah al-Din. Who will care about oil?”

It is important to remember that immediately following the ISIS capture of Mosul and the collapse of the Iraqi Army this was Brett McGurk's demand of Iraq's government -- an autonomous Sunni region in Iraq with its own armed forces. ISIS was always a means to the end of an internationally recognized partition of Iraq.

The Scenario Where Bernie Beats Trump

In yesterday's Water Cooler Lambert Strether assessed, accurately I think, the Democratic Primary over the last week-plus as reflected in the polls:

The Biden juggernaut rolls on, but Sanders is closing. Warren is in trouble (meaning her smear of Sanders did not work). Needless to say — though of course IA, NH, SC, and NV are each different — this is a good place for Sanders to be. It’s hard to believe this was the DNC’s desired result.

Nate Silver basically agrees, with the caveat that Sanders is not performing as well in Iowa and New Hampshire state polls as he is in the national polls, where his gain in momentum is clearly registered, along with, believe it or not, Mike Bloomberg's.

To review from yesterday the winning scenario for Joe Biden: a commanding win in South Carolina, followed by a decisive victory on Super Tuesday; the mainstream media lines up behind Biden in the early spring at the same time recession appears; recession is declared by the end of the second quarter, and it picks up steam going into the general election; the DJIA drops by 10,000 points. Biden wins in a landslide.

For Bernie the scenario is different. I should say the "scenarios" are different because his candidacy has much more activist grassroots backing than any other Democratic aspirant. Bernie can win in multiple scenarios, including a "status quo" election against Trump. Meaning? Bernie can beat Trump with the socio-economic conditions exactly as they are today -- with the Dow at 29,000, low unemployment and the war drums muffled for the time being.

Why? Because Bernie will outperform Hillary in the three states -- Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania -- that Trump carried narrowly, very narrowly, to win the 2016 election.

Trump has not widened his base in four years. I'd argue that his base in these three states -- because of his warmongering, his failure to deliver an infrastructure spending jobs program -- has diminished, so much so that Trump will have his hands full beating a cadaver like Joe Biden let alone someone like Bernie who will draw the underclass to the polls in November.

Let's cut to the chase. What's the scenario where Bernie beats Trump? As I said yesterday, and the polling appears to reflect this, the first four states, with the exception of South Carolina, will be a tight scrum. Super Tuesday performance is all-important. When you look at the Super Tuesday states -- California, Massachusetts, Vermont, Maine, Colorado -- it's not the Dixie Primary of yesteryear. Absent some sort of unforeseen collapse, Bernie is going to do well on Super Tuesday, and he will continue to do well as the primaries grind along until June 6. Bernie easily has the most solid campaign organization. He is going to continue to amass delegates throughout the spring giving the electorate ample time to comprehend the enormity of Biden's appalling record in Congress.

During this time, whether before or after Super Tuesday is anyone's guess, Obama will attempt to shatter Bernie's candidacy. It will boomerang as Hillary's recent attack did. If you have David Axelrod on the record saying Hillary fucked up by attacking Bernie on the eve of Iowa, you know Hillary's attack backfired. The same thing will happen for Obama. Obama will have to attack Sanders because the billionaire class will demand it.

There will be a big anti-DNC backlash as a result, which will make it difficult for Super Delegates to toss the nomination to a neoliberal in a brokered convention. Sanders wins.

As a result, Trump will overreact and become so bellicose and absurd another war scare with Iran or with Venezuela or with North Korea or with China will result. Bernie's long anti-war record will provide a bright and shining example of sanity and Trump will be turned out handily, losing all the industrial states he won four years ago to beat Hillary.

The Scenario Where Biden Beats Trump

It's hard not to feel as if we are on the cusp of a great reckoning. The global economy floats on a sea of "fake money." As Nick Beams of WSWS reports:

Global debt is on track to reach an all-time high of more than $257 trillion in the coming months after surging by around $9 trillion in the first three quarters of 2019, according to a report issued by the Institute for International Finance earlier this month.

Total debt now amounts to $32,500 for each of the world’s population of 7.7 billion and stands at 320 percent of global gross domestic product. In the major economies, total debt is $180 trillion, equivalent to 383 percent of their combined GDP.

It cannot be sustained. In an annual survey of chief executives, more than half believe a recession is on the way in 2020. Only 29% felt that way last year.

Given that Trump is in Davos boasting that "The American dream is back, bigger, better and stronger than ever,” when the recession comes,  if it comes before November, it should be devastating to his reelection hopes. But Trump, impending recession and all, has an ace in the hole. Hillary Clinton has for all intents and purposes announced that the DNC will not support Bernie Sanders. According to Patrick Martin of WSWS,

The vicious tone of Clinton’s declaration is revealing. If Sanders were to become the frontrunner for the nomination, the party establishment and the media would seek to wreck his campaign. If Sanders won the nomination, they would try to defeat him, either openly supporting Trump or running a third-party “independent” candidate such as billionaire Michael Bloomberg, who has already entered the Democratic contest for the purpose of blocking Sanders. If, despite such efforts, Sanders were to win the general election, they would seek to sabotage his administration and block any attempt to pass Sanders-backed legislation through Congress.

Martin is wrong on Bloomberg. Bloomberg's strategy to capture the Democratic Party nomination by focusing on primaries beginning with Super Tuesday March 3 precludes an independent presidential campaign. Maybe if Bloomberg rolled up his Democratic Party candidacy early, like late April, and quickly pivoted to gaining ballot access as an independent, maybe he could do it. I'm sure he has professionals on the payroll who have gamed out every possible scenario. The only scenario where Bloomberg might pursue an independent presidential campaign is one where Bernie locks up the necessary delegates to win the nomination after sweeping Super Tuesday. That's extremely unlikely.

What's unknown at this point in the Democratic Primary is how strong Biden is going to be on election day March 3. Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada should all be relatively close contests. Biden should win South Carolina by double digits. If Biden can then parlay a strong showing in South Carolina into an approximate performance on Super Tuesday, then mainstream corporate media will begin his coronation.

My guess is if the first signs of recession appear late spring, early summer, and the recession widens as we move into fall, then Biden -- old addled corrupt Iraq war-voting, NAFTA-loving, financial services Delaware Joe -- beats Trump in November.

Impeachment: Let's Hope for the "Nuclear Option"

Impeachment proceedings begin today in the U.S. Senate. Majority leader Mitch McConnell, assuming he can hold his Republican caucus together, plans for the impeachment trial to take place over a week or two. According to the AP:

After the four days of opening arguments — two days per side — senators will be allowed up to 16 hours for questions to the prosecution and defense, followed by four hours of debate. Only then will there be votes on calling other witnesses. 

At the end of deliberations, the Senate would then vote on each impeachment article.

The only news that seems to have struggled free from the morass of impeachment reporting  is whether there will be enough GOP senators to break with their caucus to approve the Democrats' call for witnesses. Even if that occurs, and I'm skeptical that it will, Republicans are threatening a nuclear option, which includes calling witnesses who Democrats don't want to see testify, like Joe and Hunter Biden.

The two articles of impeachment are abuse of power and obstruction of justice. Trump's novel, if ludicrous, defense is that impeachment can only occur if the president commits an ordinary crime. Since Trump is not accused of committing an ordinary crime (though the Government Accountability Office found the Trump administration guilty of illegal impoundment of funds, there are no criminal penalties for violating that law), he never should have been impeached in the first place.

The Democrats made a calculation at the start of the impeachment process that it was best to limit proceedings to the discussion of Ukraine and the transfer of funds to the Ukrainian military to help with the battle against "Russian aggression"; that way, Democrats could obliquely rehabilitate their discredited Russiagate fixation without reanimating the left populist energy that followed Trump's surprise election in 2016. (Whither the Women's March? Indivisible? #Resist?)

The strategy failed to rehabilitate Russiagate but it was successful in reducing popular enthusiasm for impeachment. The problem with reducing popular engagement in impeachment is that it allows McConnell to run the show as he sees fit, confident that there will be no voter blowback for creating a show trial designed to exonerate Trump.

That's why I'll be very surprised if witnesses are allowed to appear. There is a chance that Schumer and McConnell will get together and decide on a few mutually-agreed-upon witnesses. No incendiary testimony. No bombshells. Much the way Trent Lott and Tom Daschle got together and agreed upon video testimony from a few key witnesses during the Clinton impeachment trial.

My hope, as it has been from the beginning, is for the "nuclear option" --- a runaway-train situation where McConnell loses control and the GOP calls the Bidens and the Dems call Pompeo, Bolton, et al. and both institutional parties burn to the ground.

NFL Championship Playoff Games

Last weekend's divisional round was something of a surprise. Coming after an excellently competitive wild card round, all the divisional playoff games were lopsided with the exception of Seattle at Green Bay.

The Ravens of Baltimore, the pick of many to win the Lombardi Trophy, were shockingly dominated by the Tennessee Titans. Once again Lamar Jackson proved to have playoff feet of clay. The Chiefs were routed in the first quarter 24-0, only to improbably ricochet back with 28 points in the second quarter, eventually blowing out Houston. The Seahawks ended their season as they played seemingly every game this year -- starting slowing, giving up loads of yards and points, only to claw back in the second half. Seattle came up short, but it was a successful season, if only to have Marshawn Lynch back for three games.

The one game last weekend that didn't feature a surprise of some sort was Minnesota versus San Francisco. The 49ers dominated, plain and simple. San Francisco is a fantastic football team. The 49ers pretty much have it all -- speed, innovative offensive schemes, a young dominant defensive line and a wily veteran in Richard Sherman. Absent some sort of catastrophic meltdown -- repeated turnovers, Garoppolo getting knocked out of the game -- the Packers don't stand a chance. The 49ers are favored by seven-and-a-half points. Take San Francisco.

Today's earlier game, the AFC Championship, will probably be the better of the two. The Titans travel to Arrowhead Stadium to take on Andy Reid's Kansas City Chiefs. Tennessee has been the story of the playoffs to date; in particular, running back Derrick Henry, who has gained 377 yards in Tennessee victories over New England and Baltimore. If Henry gains 123 yards on the ground today he will join John Riggins and Terrell Davis as the only players in NFL history to gain 500 yards rushing in a single postseason. Incredible.

The Titans have a much steeper hill to climb because -- believe it or not -- neither the Patriots nor the the Ravens were as motivated as the Chiefs. Patrick Mahomes wants the Super Bowl. Brady didn't really care and Lamar Jackson had stage fright. Mahomes is ready. He withstood several first quarter miscues from his teammates and quickly mounted a comeback. If it happens again, he'll come back again.

Yes, Tennessee's defense is playing well. Yes, Ryan Tannehill is having a career year. Benjamin Hoffman of The New York Times thinks that Kansas City, favored by seven, will win but won't cover. I'm hoping for a good game, but I don't think it will be that close. Take Kansas City.

One last thing. I was under the impression that this year -- which saw more black starting quarterbacks in the NFL than ever before, with Russell Wilson and Lamar Jackson vying most of the season for MVP, with the Ravens the favorite to win the Super Bowl -- the ascension of the black quarterback in the NFL would augur the end of Trump and Trump's white supremacist know-nothing ultra-nationalism. Biracial Patrick Mahomes is our only avatar left. There is still hope. Let's go Chiefs!

Khamenei's Friday Sermon

This morning both The New York Times and Reuters are leading with Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's first Friday sermon in eight years. Neither news organization links to Khamenei's actual comments, which can be found on Imam Khamenei's website. Khamenei devotes choice words regarding the recent decision by Britain, Germany and France to trigger the dispute resolution mechanism of the JCPOA:

"With their turnout in the 10s of millions for Martyr Soleimani's funeral, the Iranian nation showed they support resistance against the enemy’s aggression. These American clowns lie in utter viciousness that they stand with the Iranian people. See who the people of Iran are."

"Are the few hundred people who disrespected posters of Iran's honorable Martyr General Soleimani “the people of Iran"? Or, are the tens of millions attending his funeral the Iranian people?"

"The villainous US govt repeatedly says that they are standing by the Iranian ppl. They lie. If you are standing by the Iranian ppl, it is only to stab them in the heart with your venomous daggers. Of course, you have so far failed to do so, and you will certainly continue to fail."

"The threat of the French and German governments and the vicious British government to send Iran's case to the Security Council proved once again that they are the footmen of the US. These 3 countries are the ones who helped Saddam as much as they could in his war against us."

"The German govt provided Saddam with chemical weapons to target our cities and frontlines, and its effects are still with us. The French govt provided Saddam with Super Étendards to attack our oil ships. The British govt served Saddam in every way too. This is how they are."

"Even when these governments negotiate, their negotiations are mixed with deception. The same people who appear at the negotiating table - the same so-called “gentlemen” behind the table - are the same terrorists of the Baghdad airport. They just change clothes."

It's an interesting question. Are the governments of Britain, Germany and France capable of independent action on issues of war and peace? I'd say no they are not. Therefore, in terms of their national "ontology," they are subsidiary to or franchises of the U.S. nation-state. British, Germany and French sovereignty is counterfeit.

When a threat emerges internally in one of these nations, like Jeremy Corbyn's anti-war, socialist politics, that threat is ruthlessly snuffed out.

Iraq's Rebellion Against U.S. Occupation

While Alissa Rubin and Eric Schmitt of The New York Times report that "U.S. Military Resumes Joint Operations With Iraq," making a farce of Iraq's sovereignty and its parliamentary vote following the U.S. assassination of Qassim Suleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis to expel all American forces from the country, what they do not report, what Rubin and Schmitt don't say is that Muqtada al-Sadr is planning huge protests. According to AP's Samya Kallab in "Outgoing Iraq PM says US troop ouster up to next government":

Meanwhile, followers of influential Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr acted on his call for “millions” to take to the streets to demonstrate against the American troop presence by announcing planned protests to take place next week, according to a statement circulating on social media verified by two activists. The protests are expected to take place on Jan. 24, according to the statement.

The cleric, who also leads the Sairoon bloc in parliament, derives much of his political capital through grassroots mobilization.

Activists in Tahrir Square, the epicenter of a four-month anti-government protest movement, said they feared the demonstrations would spark clashes.

“We are afraid that he will decide to start the protests in Tahrir,” said Mustafa, an activist who gave only his first name fearing reprisals. “In this case there would be big issues with the Tahrir demonstrators.”

Rubin and Schmitt also somehow  fail to mention the ongoing missile strikes on Iraqi military bases where U.S. troops are stationed. Reuters reported that

Iraqi camp Taji north of Baghdad was targeted by Katyusha rockets on Tuesday, with no casualties reported, an Iraqi military statement said.

[snip]

On Sunday, four people were wounded after eight Katyusha rockets were fired at Balad air base, which houses U.S. personnel, located about 80 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad, the Iraqi military said in a statement. Military sources identified the wounded as Iraqi soldiers.

Why can't the "newspaper of record" accurately report basic, fundamental aspects of this story? Why did The New York Times downplay if not outright dismiss the probability that Iraq's parliament would vote to expel U.S. troops following the assassination of Suleimani and al-Muhandis?

The New York Times as the broadsheet of American empire strives to foster a milieu of the inevitability of U.S. imperial dominance. There is no sovereignty other than the sovereignty of U.S. military, economic and cultural might. All other nations and their interests are mere baubles to the United States, except for precious allies Saudi Arabia and Israel, and vicious offical enemies Russia and China.

In this context it is completely natural for the United States to ignore Iraq's sovereignty and for The New York Times to remain silent about a burgeoning Iraqi rebellion against U.S. occupation.

Believe It or Not, Tom Steyer Did Well

The Democratic presidential debates have degraded as the number of participants has diminished. There was a time last summer when the stage was packed with ten-plus candidates that the exchange was lively. Now with the field reduced to Klobuchar, Steyer, Buttigieg, Warren, Sanders and Biden the best thing about the debates, if you exclude Bernie's tried-and-true jeremiads, is Tom Steyer, the anti-plutocratic plutocrat. It is not a surprise that Steyer's performance is given the lowest marks by a New York Times panel.

A billionaire's invective directed at the political-economic system that allowed him to accumulate his wealth and build the platform on which he stands is captivating. Klobuchar and Buttigieg, who are peddling similar versions of the same centrist snake oil, can't compete. Biden is only interesting because of the ease with which he slides into gibberish. Warren can still speak articulately about the perversions of the status quo, but more and more she's looking gassed. Sanders remains the standard-bearer for ending neoliberal hegemony.

Warren Attacks Sanders

Going into tonight's presidential debate, the final one before the February 3 Iowa caucus, it's illuminating that Elizabeth Warren has decided to go negative (see "Warren Says Sanders Told Her a Woman Could Not Win the Presidency" by Astead Herndon and Jonathan Martin). Illuminating in that it speaks of a Warren candidacy that has given up on running a positive, unifying, policy-driven campaign to go negative in hopes of clawing a few votes from Bernie's base. (Lambert Strether has a full write-up.)

It's a foolish he-said/she-side sidebar about a private conversation regarding what it is going to take to beat Trump in 2020. Bernie vehemently denies he ever said a woman could not win, mentioning, appropriately, that a woman did win the popular vote in 2016. Warren says that Sanders did say a woman couldn't win in 2020.

It's pointless and will likely cost both candidates a marginal number of votes; thereby benefiting Biden and Buttigieg infinitesimally. More importantly it speaks of the desperation of the Warren campaign, and I think it seals Warren's fate as an also-ran. How soon she will join Cory Booker and Marianne Williamson on the sidelines, I'm not sure; it's just a matter of time.

If Warren does have life going forward in the primary, it is exactly as we see it now -- an attack dog for the DNC to tear into the ballooning support of Bernie Sanders.

Macron Blinks

A little bit of good news over the weekend: Emmanuel Macron flinched (see Adam Nossiter's "Macron Scraps Proposal to Raise Retirement Age in France"); he agreed to remove the requirement that French workers retire at the age 64:

On Saturday, with a crippling transport strike already in its sixth week, Mr. Macron’s government backed down, announcing that it would “withdraw” the new age limit, and put off decisions on financing the system until it gets a report on the money problem “between now and the end of April.”

But the government did not entirely rule out the idea of reintroducing a new retirement age if funding solutions to the pensions deficit are not reached.

And the government’s concession is unlikely to end either the strike or the demonstrations. The more militant unions — and the ones most heavily represented in the railways and the Paris subway — are demanding that Mr. Macron abandon his entire reform plan.

The demand in the streets Saturday was for precisely that. The mood was militant, and the more violent demonstrators once again clashed with the police, even as they sowed a trail of damage through eastern Paris. A bank branch was sacked, and bus shelters smashed and fires set. Unions said 150,000 protesters were in the streets of Paris on Saturday.

Macrons concession seems designed to split the unions:

The moderate French Democratic Confederation of Labor, or CFDT, which has long been calling for the withdrawal of the new retirement age, welcomed the government’s move on Saturday, which it said had shown “the government’s willingness to compromise.”

The French have taken to the streets in huge numbers week after week. Macron remains enormously unpopular. The problem is the French presidential election is more than two years off and Macron controls the National Assembly.

Macron was placed in the presidency to "modernize" the French political economy, which has meant bringing it in closer alignment with the zombie neoliberal Washington Consensus, something he has done with aplomb despite more than a year of social unrest, first with the Yellow Vests protests and now with the month-plus general strike.

Macron is like Trump, a political extremist whose presidency is based on the sine qua non of a handful of policies. For Macron, that includes the destruction of France's excellent pension system; for Trump, war on Iran.

I think the French are less likely to block Macron than Americans are to block Trump. Trump will continue to wage war on Iran prior to this November's presidential election, but it will be a covert, shadow war. The downing of the Ukrainian 737 has delivered an unexpected PSYOP bonanza for the Trump administration which will keep the Western mainstream media and Langley busy for months.

With Bernie Sanders well positioned to deal a blow to the DNC, a question that remains unanswered is the lengths to which the Democratic Party establishment is willing to go to tomahawk his candidacy.

There's an argument, based on the outcome of the December general election in the United Kingdom, that the best bet for neoliberal-dominated party would be to allow Sanders to capture the nomination and then make sure he loses the general election in a landslide, like Corbyn lost to Johnson. That way you can swab the decks of all those pesky Democratic Socialists and Justice Democrats post-November.

NFL Divisional Playoff Round

I did well last week, going 3-1. My only miss was the big Minnesota upset of New Orleans in Superdome. It took a missed pass interference call and some sub-par play from future Hall-of-Famer Drew Brees to keep the Vikings alive and the on road once again, this time to Santa Clara, to face the NFC #1 seed San Francisco 49ers. I don't want to downplay Minnesota's achievement, which was significant. The defense played superbly and Kirk Cousins got the monkey off his back by winning a playoff game. But San Francisco I believe is a better team than New Orleans. The 49ers have too much speed on both sides of the ball. Except for the KC-Houston match-up tomorrow, I think this is the easiest game to pick. Take the 49ers.

The evening game might be the biggest upset of the divisional round. The robust Titans, fresh off their humiliation of the Patriots in Foxborough, travel to Baltimore for a clash with the ascendant Ravens. I say might be the biggest upset because the Ravens are favored by ten points, but last season in the playoffs Lamar Jackson under-performed against the Chargers and the Ravens were upset at home. Could freshman jitters give man to a sophomore jinx? Maybe. Mark Ingram is nursing a bad calf. But Jackson is a better passer this year than last. I like Baltimore's tight ends. Plus, Baltimore's defense is better than the New England's, despite all the hype about how great the Patriots were. Take the Ravens.

The Kansas City Chiefs are also favored by ten points. (Benjamin Hoffman of The Times thinks that the Texans will cover but lose a close game.) Though Houston beat the Chiefs in Kansas City Week 6, I don't see a repeat. Kansas City's defense is playing better, as is the Kansas City ground game. Take the Chiefs.

The final game of the divisional round is Seattle at Green Bay. The Russell Wilson Seahawks have never triumphed at Lambeau Field. The weather will be cold; it'll be in the twenties with snow flurries. Not Seattle Seahawks weather. Fast-twitch muscles don't function the same in weather that cold. Green Bay has a strong pass rush, a good running back and Aaron Rodgers. Hoffman's going with the Packers. That's the smart pick. But I'm banking on a miracle. Take the Seahawks.

The Necessary Theater of Congressional War Powers Resolutions

Yesterday the U.S. House of Representatives passed a War Powers Resolution 224 to 194 mandating that Trump must seek congressional approval for any further military escalation against Iran, the bare minimum, one hopes, from Democratic Party leaders who acquiesced in stripping Ro Khanna's amendment blocking funds for any military action against Iran from the National Defense Authorization Act.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi passed the War Powers Resolution as a concurrent resolution -- the kind that becomes enacted without the president's signature once both chambers pass it -- rather than a joint resolution which Trump would veto.

The problem is that senator Tim Kaine's yet-to-be-voted War Powers Resolution is a joint resolution. If it passes in the U.S. Senate, it will have to be voted again in the House, only for Trump to veto it.

If it all smacks of theater, I'm okay with it. It's theater that is driving voters away from the GOP. A very small segment of the public favors an open-ended war with Iran. The more Republicans are heard banging the drum for Trump's war on Iran, the closer we come to Medicare For All and a Green New Deal.

The World We Live in Today is Not Going to Last

Charles Blow has a good column this morning on becoming a "radical environmentalist" as an elite living in the sunset years of peak neoliberalism. What's particularly interesting about it is his description of how his mother fed his family growing up poor in rural Louisiana. It's like reading about life on another planet.

The world we live in today is not going to last. The last couple of months I've grown accustomed to watching the Keiser Report. Always informative, Max Keiser and his partner Stacy Herbert tend to consistently stress a couple of points with vigor, one of which is that the U.S. banker-led capitalist world order, a.k.a., the Washington Consensus, is actually a vast kleptocracy that has led to a neo-feudal society where the financial elite masterclass rule over billions of serfs. This neo-feudal world order is falling apart and its collapse is going to play out via de-dollarization, de-globalization and depopulation.

Return to the "Shadow War Ante"

The Iranians have extended an olive branch to the Trump administration in the form of 22 missiles fired at two military bases -- one, Al Asad, outside Ramadi in Anbar Province; the other, Erbil, next to the international airport in Erbil -- in Iraq. Craig Murray has an interesting assessment on the ornamental nature  of the Iranian missile strikes:

There is this morning a chink of light to avoid yet more devastation in the Middle East. Iran’s missile strikes last night were calibrated to satisfy honour while avoiding damage that would trigger automatically the next round. The missiles appear to have been fitted out with very light warhead payloads indeed – their purpose was to look good in the dark going up into the night sky. There is every reason to believe the apparent lack of US casualties was deliberate.

Even more important was the Iraqi statement that “proportionate measures” had been “taken and concluded” and they did not seek “further escalation”.

The "apparent lack of U.S. casualties" is muddied by Iranian news agency Fars reporting "at least 80 US arm personnel have been killed and around 200 others wounded." Then there's the mysterious fatal crash of a Ukrainian 737 leaving Tehran. A Moon of Alabama commentator noted

The Boeing 737-800 Ukrainian Airlines was most likely shoot down by one of these fine shoulder launched missiles. The plane has no problem flying on one engine even on take-off. Most of these missiles are heat seeking, so they would hit the engine and start that fire that we saw in the video. 

With just the video and radar information at this time it is all about statistics. Pilot error or mechanical problems are statistically unlikely compared to an eternal missile attack right after the Iranian attack on US bases.

As far as who did it? Just ask who benefits?

Trump, on the verge of political doom, will likely be mollified by the death of 147 Iranians compared to 80 U.S. servicemen; hence, there's a good chance of no further escalation. That puts us back to the status quo ante, but not quite, since the Iraqis are on record requesting that the United States military vacate the country.

Iran was winning the shadow war. So a return to the "shadow war ante" is in Iran's interest. But now Tehran will refocus its energies on the long-term strategy, as president Hassan Rouhani promised, of driving all U.S. forces out of the region.

Trump and his coterie of Likudniks, evangelicals and Wahhabites will favor a return to the shadow war ante until after he's reelected. Then we'll be treated to the regime change "full monty."

Trump's Keystone Kops

It's good to see that mainstream reporting on the aftermath of the Suleimani assassination is basically in agreement with alternative media. I was concerned that Iraqi prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi's assertion that Suleimani was in Baghdad on a peace initiative -- a refutation of the Trump administration's rationale for its drone strike, that Suleimani was in Iraq to execute an attack on U.S. forces -- was going unmentioned in the Western prestige press. But it is featured in "Khamenei Wants to Put Iran’s Stamp on Reprisal for U.S. Killing of Top General" by Farnaz Fassihi and David Kirkpatrick:

[Iraqi prime minister] Abdul Mahdi met with Matthew Tueller, the American ambassador to Iraq, on Monday, and “stressed the need for joint action to implement the withdrawal,” according to a statement and photo released by Mr. Abdul Mahdi’s office. He also emphasized Iraq’s efforts to prevent the current tensions between Iran and the United States from sliding into “open war.”

The United States military stirred a media flurry by accidentally releasing a draft letter that seemed to describe imminent plans to withdraw from Iraq. Marine Corps Brig. Gen. William H. Seely III, the commander of the United States forces in Iraq, wrote to the Iraqi government that the American troops would be relocated “to prepare for onward movement.”

“We respect your sovereign decision to order our departure,” he wrote.

But Defense Department officials played down the significance of the letter. “Here’s the bottom line, this was a mistake,” Gen. Mark A. Milley, President Trump’s top military commander, told reporters at the Pentagon during a hastily called press briefing. “It’s a draft unsigned letter because we are moving forces around.”

“There’s been no decision whatsoever to leave Iraq,” Mark T. Esper, the defense secretary, told reporters. “There’s been no decision made to leave Iraq. Period.”

Although the Trump administration has said that the United States killed General Suleimani because he was planning imminent attacks against American interests, there were indications Monday that he may have been leading an effort to calm tensions with Saudi Arabia.

Prime Minister Abdul Mahdi of Iraq said that he was supposed to meet with General Suleimani on the morning he was killed, and that he expected him to bring messages from the Iranians that might help to “reach agreements and breakthroughs important for the situation in Iraq and the region.”

In Washington, two top Senate Democrats urged President Trump early Monday to declassify the administration’s formal notification to Congress giving notice of the airstrike that killed General Suleimani.

Such notification of Congress is required by law, and to classify the entirety of such a notification is highly unusual.

There are still a few Trump ultras who insist that Trump is playing 5-D chess; that Trump's assassination of Suleimani will end up bringing U.S. troops home as originally intended. But the Pentagon's Keystone Kops revocation of the troop withdrawal letter to Iraq's ministry of defense, along with the Pentagon walking back Trump's threat to destroy Iranian cultural sites, not to mention the U.S. illegally barring Iran foreign minister Javad Zarif from appearing at the United Nations, illuminate an administration in free fall, destroying the U.S. world order.

There is no coming back from this. The only question is at what point does U.S. leadership break its fall?

"The Symbol of Ignorance"

Throngs of people chanting “Death to America” crowded the streets of Tehran on Monday as Iran mourned Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, whose funeral was held in the capital. The military commander was hailed as a martyr, and his successor swore revenge.

“God the almighty has promised to get his revenge, and God is the main avenger,” vowed Esmail Ghaani, the Iranian general who will take over the Quds Force, the foreign expeditionary arm of Iran’s elite paramilitary organization, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. “Certainly actions will be taken,” he added.

State-run news outlets reported that millions had gathered in Tehran, and images showed of a sea of mourners, many wearing black and waving the nation’s flag in an outpouring of grief.

General Suleimani was killed by the United States on Friday in Baghdad in a drone strike. American officials said the general had ordered assaults on Americans in Iraq and Syria and was planning a wave of imminent attacks.

His killing has set off fears of escalating retaliatory actions by Iran and the United States, and of a broader regional conflict. In the aftermath of the attack, Iran said it would no longer abide by a 2015 agreement to suspend uranium production.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, wept openly at the funeral while offering prayers over the general’s coffin. Ayatollah Khamenei had a close relationship with the general, who was widely considered to be the second most powerful man in Iran.

General Suleimani’s daughter, Zeinab Suleimani, said in a eulogy that the United States and Israel faced a “dark day.”

“You crazy Trump, the symbol of ignorance, the slave of Zionists, don’t think that the killing of my father will finish everything,” she said at the funeral.

"Successor to Slain Iranian General Vows Revenge: Live Updates" by The New York Times

David Sanger, the chief national security reporter for The New York Times, has declared Trump's "maximum pressure" campaign against Iran a total failure. Iran announced an end to all restrictions on it nuclear program, while holding open the door to a maintenance of the JCPOA if the Trump administration drops its sanctions. We know that is not going to happen.

Why? Because Trump strictly adheres to the wishes of hard-line Likudniks. Israel is the foreign power, along with the absolutist Gulf monarchies, Trump kowtows to, not Russia. The Israelis and the Saudis fear Iran, and they feared Qassim Suleimani. The plan all along has been to get the United States into a war with Iran. Now it appears that plan has been successfully implemented.

Barring a removal of office via impeachment, a removal that would require a sudden "Road to Damascus" conversion of one-to-two dozen Republican senators, the United States appears to be going to war with Iran. Even if Congress were to pass legislation requiring Trump to seek authorization for the use of military force against Iran, Trump would ignore it.

The mistake Trump has made is thinking that voters will forgive this provocation. They will not. Trump is out. "Endless wars" was Trump's principal populist, anti-establishment talking point. It's gone now, replaced by the usual Neocon Likudnik anti-Iranian perpetual warfare hooey, a product at least a decade beyond its "sell-by" date.

 I'm assuming that either Bernie or Biden can beat Trump now; Warren, too. Maybe even Buttigieg.

The End of American Exceptionalism

Americans are waking up this morning to the enormous magnitude of Trump's murderous blunder in the assassination by drone of Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani. The size of the crowds greeting the return of Suleimani's body to Iran will pierce the usual fog of the American consumerist-militarist-exceptionalist mindset. There was decent anti-war showing yesterday in towns and cities across the United States.

Trump has threatened to bomb Iran if it retaliates, targeting its cultural sites, a war crime. Iraq's parliament has voted to expel U.S. forces. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) has introduced a War Powers Resolution requiring Trump to come to Congress before he escalates attacks on Iran any further.

Unless Trump can somehow get the tiger he has unleashed back in its cage, my guess is that he has significantly damaged his hopes for reelection. Tucker Carlson defended Trump's reticence to retaliate against Iran this past summer when Iran shot down a U.S. drone by asserting that to do so would have alienated Trump's base. Well, assassinating Suleimani, an Iranian national hero, is a unilateral declaration of war. How is that going to play with Trump's putative anti-war base? At this point I would think that even an addled Joe Biden, arguing for a restoration of JCPOA and the Obama status quo, could beat Trump.

Make no mistake, the situation is dire. The red flag has been unfurled. American exceptionalism -- the U.S. as "indispensable nation" -- is done. Kaput.

NFL Wild Card Playoff Round

I have yet to write about the National Football League this season, its centenary year. This is the weekend of the wild card games, the first round of the playoffs. I thought I would provide my picks again this year.

I have watched a lot of NFL games in 2019. I even paid for a NFL Network subscription. The regular season was a good one. Ratings were the highest they have been in three years. This year saw the rise of the black quarterback to heights never before seen in the 100 years of the league's existence. More starting black quarterbacks than ever before. Tom Brady lost four regular season games. Three of those losses were to black quarterbacks: Lamar Jackson, Deshaun Watson and Pat Mahomes. If the playoffs go the way of the regular season, Lamar Jackson will join Doug Williams and Russell Wilson as the only black quarterbacks to win the Super Bowl.

There are only two black quarterbacks playing this weekend: Deshaun Watson of the Houston Texans and Russell Wilson of the Seattle Seahawks. Wilson plays the Eagles in Philadelphia tomorrow afternoon. I'm taking the Seahawks on the road. They beat the Eagles once already in Philly this season. Seattle's defense is not what it once was, but Philadelphia is depleted. The Seahawks got their mojo back in the second half of the final game of the season against San Francisco. With Marshawn Lynch back in action after more than a year, I'm anticipating an offensive rebirth.

Watson will face the formidable Buffalo Bills, who proved that they can travel to the Lone Star and win on the road in a high-profile match-up, as they did on Thanksgiving against the Cowboys. The Bills have a good defense and a strong rushing attack, but I'm convinced that Houston's offense is too powerful with Watson's strong arm and scrambling ability, DeAndre Hopkins and Kenny Stills at wide receiver, and Carlos Hyde and Duke Johnson out of the backfield. Too bad the speedy Will Fuller is banged up. I'm taking the Texans.

In the other games I'm taking the New Orleans Saints at home against the Minnesota Vikings, and I'm going out on a limb to pick the Tennessee Titans over the New England Patriots at home. It's a long shot to think that the Titans, who almost always seem to under-perform in big games, can go into Foxborough and best Brady and that Belichik defense, particularly with the playoff-unproved Ryan Tannehill at quarterback, but the Patriots are not the Patriots of old. I know that is said every year, and every year New England is back in the Super Bowl. This year will be different. If it is not Tennessee, then it will be Kansas City or Baltimore that knocks off Brady and Belichik who will have to get back to the Super Bowl by winning payoff games on the road.

Incidentally, and atypically, all these picks are in agreement with The New York Times' tout, Benjamin Hoffman.

To wrap up here, my biggest takeaway of another regular season spent watching countless hours of commercial television is the rampant, excessive militarism on display. The National Football League is now basically synonymous with the U.S. Armed Services. As Brittainy Newman notes in "The N.F.L. Wears Patriotism on Its Sleeve":

By the end of November, every N.F.L. team had hosted a Salute to Service game, during which active duty military members and veterans could watch the game from field-level suites. Players shook their hands, thanking them for their service.

[snip]

At the Panthers game, Bart Bazquez, a Marine, used his phone to take pictures of his friend Thomas Garza, also a Marine, as he posed by a fountain with a Marine Corps embroidered flag. “I think people see football players how they see military,” Mr. Garza said, “watching them from a distance, idolizing them.”

Never before in my lifetime has the military been so extolled in the United States. Since the NFL is the last bastion of national culture (along with the Hollywood superhero blockbuster), it makes sense that it is slathered in militaristic patriotism.

The founder of Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, freshly-designated by the United States as a "terrorist organization," Qais al-Khazali correctly identifies this U.S. cultural monochrome in a quote from one of the many stories in The New York Times today about the assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassim Suleimani:

“The United States has only one color, it is the military color, that is all that it spends its money on,” said Qais al-Khazali, the leader of a pro-Iranian militia. “But Iran has many colors — in culture, in politics, in religion, in many spheres.” 

"All 'Red Lines' Have Been Crossed"

Trump charged that the Iranian general “has been perpetrating acts of terror to destabilize the Middle East for the last 20 years.” He declared, “What the United States did yesterday should have been done long ago. A lot of lives would have been saved.”

Who does the US president think he is fooling with his Mafia rhetoric? The last 20 years have seen the Middle East devastated by a series of US imperialist interventions. The illegal 2003 US invasion of Iraq, based on lies about “weapons of mass destruction,” claimed the lives of over a million people, while decimating what had been the among the most advanced societies in the Arab world. Together with Washington’s eighteen-year-long war in Afghanistan and the regime-change wars launched in Libya and Syria, US imperialism has unleashed a regionwide crisis that has killed millions and forced tens of millions to flee their homes.

Soleimani, whom Trump accused of having “made the death of innocent people his sick passion”—an apt self-description—rose to the leadership of the Iranian military during the eight-year-long Iran-Iraq war, which claimed the lives of some one million Iranians.

He became known to the US military, intelligence and diplomatic apparatus in 2001, when Tehran provided intelligence to Washington to assist its invasion of Afghanistan. Over the course of the US war in Iraq, American officials conducted back-channel negotiations with Soleimani even as his Quds Force was providing aid to Shia militias resisting the American occupation. He played a central role in picking the Iraqi Shia politicians who led the regimes installed under the US occupation.

Soleimani went on to play a leading role in organizing the defeat of the Al Qaeda-linked militias that were unleashed against the government of Bashar al-Assad in the CIA-orchestrated war for regime change in Syria, and subsequently in rallying Shia militias to defeat Al Qaeda’s offspring, ISIS, after it had overrun roughly one-third of Iraq, routing US-trained security forces.

To describe such a figure as a “terrorist” only means that any state official or military commander anywhere in the world who cuts across the interests of Washington and US banks and corporations can be labeled as such and targeted for murder. The attack at the Baghdad airport signals that the rules of engagement have changed. All “red lines” have been crossed. In the future, the target could be a general or even president in Russia, China or, indeed, any of the capitals of Washington’s erstwhile allies.

After this publicly celebrated assassination—openly claimed by a US president without even a pretense of deniability—is there any head of state or prominent military figure in the world who can meet with US officials without having in the back of his mind that if things do not go well, he too might be murdered?

The killing of General Soleimani in Baghdad was compared by Die Zeit, one of Germany’s newspapers of record, to the 1914 assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria. As in the prior case, it stated, “the whole world is holding its breath and anxiously waiting for what may come.”

This criminal act carries with it the threat of both world war and dictatorial repression within the borders of the United States. There is no reason to believe that a government that has adopted murder as an instrument of foreign policy will refrain from using the same methods against its domestic enemies.

The assassination of Soleimani is an expression of the extreme crisis and desperation of a capitalist system that threatens to hurl humanity into the abyss.

"The murder of Qassem Soleimani and assassination as state policy" by Bill Van Auken

The End of the Neoliberal Age

With the assassination of Iranian Quds Force commander Qassim Suleimani the United States has started a war with Iran (see "U.S. Strike in Iraq Kills Qassim Suleimani, Commander of Iranian Forces" by Michael Crowley, Falih Hassan and Eric Schmitt):

Hawkish Iran experts said the strike would be deeply painful for Iran’s leadership. “This is devastating for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps, the regime and Khamenei’s regional ambitions,” said Mark Dubowitz, the chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, referring to Ayatollah Khamenei.

“For 23 years, he has been the equivalent of the J.S.O.C. commander, the C.I.A. director and Iran’s real foreign minister,” Mr. Dubowitz said, using an acronym for the United States’ Joint Special Operations Command. “He is irreplaceable and indispensable” to Iran’s military establishment.

For those same reasons, other regional analysts warned, Iran is likely to respond with an intensity of dangerous proportions.

“From Iran’s perspective, it is hard to imagine a more deliberately provocative act,” said Robert Malley, the president and chief executive of the International Crisis Group. “And it is hard to imagine that Iran will not retaliate in a highly aggressive manner.”

“Whether President Trump intended it or not, it is, for all practical purposes, a declaration of war,” added Mr. Malley, who served as White House coordinator for the Middle East, North Africa and the gulf region in the Obama administration.

[snip] 

The strike killed five people, including the pro-Iranian chief of an umbrella group for Iraqi militias, Iraqi television reported and militia officials confirmed. The militia chief, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, was a strongly pro-Iranian figure.

The public relations chief for the umbrella group, the Popular Mobilization Forces in Iraq, Mohammed Ridha Jabri, was also killed. 

It is also a declaration of war on Iraq. Jason Ditz reports that in addition to the assassination of PMF leadership, U.S. forces have snatched Iraqi militia leaders:

Following the United States attack on the Baghdad International Airport on Thursday evening, a strike which killed seven people, including Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and two top Iraqi members of the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), it is now being reported that US Marines carried out arrest raids inside Baghdad, capturing high ranking Iraqi MP Hadi al-Amiri and militia leader Qais al-Khazali.

Details are still emerging, but the Marines were reported by several Middle East sources to have conducted raids in the Jadriah district of Baghdad, and came out of it with Amiri and Khazali.

This comes a day after Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared Amiri to be “an Iranian asset,” citing his presence at the protests at the US Embassy in Baghdad. Amiri is the leader of Iraq’s second largest parliamentary bloc, as well as the head of the powerful Badr Brigade. In recent years he had been under consideration as a potential premier.

Khazali is the head of Qa’saib Ahl al-Haq, a substantial militia within the PMU in its own right. Though Khazali has politically been aligned to Amiri in recent years, in the past he was an aide to top cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, head of the main Iraqi parliament bloc.

This is dire. Muqtada al-Sadr is mustering the Mahdi Army. If the U.S. plans on staying in Iraq, it will have to fight to do so.

Caitlin Johnstone defines the politics behind Trump's assassination of Suleimani and his drive to war with Iran:

Many are understandably claiming that this geostrategically pivotal confrontation was precisely what Trump was installed to facilitate all along. The largest donor to any campaign in 2016 was oligarch Sheldon Adelson, who gave $25 million to the Trump campaign, and who in 2013 said that the US should drop a nuclear bomb on Iran. After Trump’s election win, Adelson gave another $5 million to his inauguration, the largest single presidential inaugural donation ever made. Newt Gingrich, another of the billionaire’s hired politicians, has said that Adelson’s “central value” is Israel.

Make no mistake, Iran is not Iraq or Libya. A full-scale war against Iran would be many times more deadly, costly and destabilizing than those interventions; the UK’s Admiral Lord West told The Daily Star Online last year that winning such a war would require no less than a million troops, or nearly the total number of active duty US military personnel in the entire world. Even if a direct war with Iran didn’t lead to a confrontation with China, Russia and the other unabsorbed allies, it would still be worse than Vietnam and Iraq combined in terms of death, destruction, expense, and regional destabilization. 

Trump was able to defeat Hillary Clinton in 2016 by running to her left on war and peace. He won't be able to do that again.

Trump has overstepped. China and Russia will assist Iran. The U.S. is a rabid, destructive hyper-power that needs to be hobbled before every inch of the globe is drenched in blood. Events will quickly unravel U.S. hegemony, and not just in the Middle East. What will Trump do when North Korea launches a long-range ballistic missile over Japan?

The neoliberal age began with the Iranian Revolution, and now it will end with a war on the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The New Great Game in the Greater Middle East

Carlotta Gall has an excellent overview this morning of Turkey's projection of power in Libya, "Erdogan Prepares a New Military Intervention, Sending Troops to Libya":

Beneath Mr. Erdogan’s agreement with Libya is a desire to position Turkey to explore for oil and gas exploration in the eastern Mediterranean, off the coast of Cyprus, in competition with Greece, Cyprus, Egypt and Israel, analysts say.

“Turkey does not want to be frozen out of the great game which revolves around the hydrocarbon deposits in the Eastern Mediterranean,” Ms. Aydintasbas said.

As in Syria, Turkey wants to have troops on the ground in Libya in order to gain a place at the table, she said.

Turkish-backed Syrian proxy fighters have already arrived in Libya, and more have assembled in training camps in Turkey ahead of deployment, according the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an independent monitoring organization.

The moves follow increased support this summer by Mr. Erdogan to Libya’s Government of National Accord, or G.N.A., headed by Prime Minister Fayez Al-Sarraj.

Turkey sent military advisers, arms and a fleet of 20 drones to defend Tripoli from attack by the forces of Gen. Khalifa Hifter, who controls much of eastern Libya and is backed by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.

After Russia recently became involved, sending contract forces to support General Hifter’s offensive, Mr. Erdogan upped the ante.

Gall doesn't mention Somalia in her story, but Turkey is there too, along with Qatar, struggling against the UAE and Saudi Arabia. It's all part of the new Great Game in the Greater Middle East, which features proxy wars between U.S. client states.

Perpetual warfare is here to stay.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Speaks

“You can’t do anything,” [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader] said in a speech in Tehran [on Wednesday], according to his website, adding: “If the Islamic Republic decides to challenge and fight, it will do so unequivocally.”

[snip]

Mr. Khamenei, addressing Mr. Trump, said, “If you were logical — which you’re not — you would see that your crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan” and elsewhere “have made nations hate you,” the ayatollah’s website reported.

Iraqi militias — in theory under the umbrella of the national military, but often quite independent — played a major role in the fight against the Islamic State, or ISIS. While many of are Shiite Muslim groups backed by Iran, a Shiite theocracy at odds with the United States, they had goals in common until the Islamic State lost its territory.

Mr. Khamenei, said the United States was “taking revenge on the Popular Mobilization Forces for defeating ISIS,” a group that he claimed “the U.S. had created.”

"U.S. Troops Fire Tear Gas as Protesters Swarm Embassy in Iraq Again" by Falih Hassan and Alissa J. Rubin