Daily Archives: August 10, 2022

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I am appalled at the intentional cruelty and shocking incompetence that drove the Trump administrations family-separation tragedy.

But first, heres more from The Atlantic.

Welcome to the week, and allow me to introduceor reintroducemyself to you. Im Tom Nichols, a staff writer here at The Atlantic, where Im also the proprietor of the Peacefield newsletter. If youre a regular Daily reader, you might remember that I authored this newsletter in June; Im back, and Ill be writing the Daily most days of the week. Along with some of my Atlantic colleagues, Ill be sharing thoughts and analysis about the days news and other issues.

I write, among other things, about the perilous state of democracy in the United States and around the world. Today, I urge you to read The Atlantics new cover story by my colleague Caitlin Dickerson about the origins and consequences of the disastrous decision by President Donald Trump and his advisers to curtail illegal immigration by instituting a brutal family-separation policy in which childrenincluding infants and toddlerswere intentionally taken from their parents.

Caitlins intense and detailed examination shows that the family-separation policy was not a misunderstanding, or a bureaucratic error, or some sort of overzealous interpretation of otherwise sensible rules. It was, as one government figure told her, evil, and intentionally so: The goal of the policy was to pull children from their parents at the border as a deterrent, to inflict so much pain on people trying to enter the United States illegally that no one would be brave or tough enough to keep trying to do it.

Heartbreaking stories of children torn from their parents and then subjected to inhumane detention conditions should afflict the conscience of any decent person. But Americans should also be enraged by the completely dysfunctional nature of their own government. Even if you believe in taking a tough stand against illegal immigration (as I do) the combination of moral rot and bureaucratic incompetence produced outcomes that were far worse than the policys designers expectedand they already expected it to be bad.

When Trump officials such as Stephen Miller and Jeff Sessions finally got the family-separation policy under way, the immigration systems courts, shelters, and other assets were almost instantly overwhelmed by a flood of traumatized children. The fallout was so awful and so obvious that soon, even Trumps people began to backpedal away from it. Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsenwho spoke with Caitlin on the recordadmitted that she did not understand how bad the situation would get and that she regretted caving to the pressure to sign the order.

The family-separation nightmare is what can happen when zealots who have no idea what theyre doing get control of the levers of a gigantic and powerful government. Not only were Trumps aides clueless about how the immigration system worked, but they took pride in their ignorance and saw any attempt to inject facts or caution into the debate as a sign of weakness. Theres this worship of process, one member of Millers team said. Process, process, process. Process is code for We can slow down the quick impulses of a fiery political administration with no experts. Well, thats not what was voted for.

The public never votes for process, but thats how governments work, and it is how, in a system of separated powers, policies are formed, funded, and implemented. But immigration was merely one of many areas in which the Trump White House regarded the Constitution and federal law as little more than annoyances. At one point, according to the notes of a senior DHS official, Trump told Chief of Staff John Kelly to tell Nielson to, Round them all up and push them back into Mexico. Who cares about the law.

According to this officials notes, silence followed.

This silence was part of a persistent cowardice among senior figures in the U.S. government. Opponents of the policy thought that the system, or the courts, or the person in the next office down the hall would somehow stop the cruelty. But the people who wanted to do the right thingor, at the least, knew how the immigration system actually workedwere shouted down by low-level minions such as Katie Waldman (who was soon to be Mrs. Stephen Miller). This kind of bullying, Caitlin writes, was part of an administration plagued by insecurity and imposter syndrome. Whether out of misplaced loyalty or fear of professional repercussions, the professionals just took it. They made me lie, claimed one government official who misled Caitlin when she was reporting an earlier story about the policy.

This remarkable article is a cautionary tale for Americans and other citizens of democratic nations, a story of a political monkeys paw. When people vote for incompetent and cowardly leaders to execute policies founded on ignorance and cruelty, they will get what they asked forto their shame and regret.

Related:

Join Caitlin Dickerson and Atlantic editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg for a live discussion about the secret history of the U.S. governments family-separation policy on August 12 at 2 p.m. ET. Register here.

Fish Oil Is Good! No, Bad! No, Good! No, Wait

By Jacob Stern

At first, it was all very exciting. In 1971, a team of Danish researchers stationed on Greenlands northwest coast found that a local Inuit community had remarkably low levels of diabetes and heart disease. The reason, the researchers surmised, was their high-marine-fat dietin other words, fish oil. Incidence of heart disease, which once afflicted relatively few Americans, had shot up since the turn of the century, and here, seemingly, was a simple solution. I remember how exciting those studies were when they first came out, Marion Nestle, a professor emerita of nutrition and food studies at NYU, told me. The idea that there were populations of people who were eating fish and were protected against heart disease looked fabulous.

Read the full article.

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Read. Hotel Earth, a poem from our September issue.

Watch. Netflixs The Sandmanespecially if youre a fan of the original comic books.

Play our daily crossword.

The launching of the Webb space telescope has, for many of us, rekindled a fascination with space. I feel it, and Im now binge-watching two television shows about it: The Star Trek series Strange New Worlds on Paramount+, and the Apple TV+ series For All Mankinda what if alternate history of the Cold War space race. Both of them are throwbacks to a time in the late 1960s when Americans took the conquest of space as their birthright, a natural extension of our technological optimism and can-do approach to the world. I wont spoil the major plotlines of either for you, but I recommend them both. I miss the days when Americans were space pioneers, and now that the Russians have threatened to pull out of international space cooperation with the United States, I hope that the Americans take up the challenge of space once again.

Isabel Fattal contributed to this newsletter.

Here is the original post:

The Secret History of Family Separation - The Atlantic

Editors Note: Do not miss the first part of this essay.

We hope, to paraphrase Santayana, that we are not doomed to repeat our alternative histories. That is our purpose as an answer to those who might ask why we engaged in this exercise when we know what really happened. The first part of our story about how the Army might have modernized as the final drawdown began during the Vietnam War shows the inclination of vested interests, wittingly or unwittingly, to draw lessons that support that they are on the right track. We believe that this fictional step back provides a useful, and perhaps cautionary, lens through which to view how the U.S. military might approach identifying and assessing lessons from the Russo-Ukrainian War.

In some ways, the alternative history we pose is where we find ourselves today. The ongoing modernization efforts in the U.S. military began in response to a policy change the pivot to Asia or to aggression without any direct threat to the United States the 2014 Russian takeover of Crimea and its encroachment into Eastern Ukraine. Nevertheless, they served an important institutional purpose in shifting the mindset of the force from its near-total focus on counterinsurgency to peer warfare as the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq were clearly winding down.

Furthermore, U.S. capabilities and preparations during the Afghan and Iraq Wars focused on, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates insisted, current war demands, even if it means straining the U.S. armed forces and devoting less time and money to future threats. The Defense Department, particularly the Army, found itself in a circumstance similar to that of the Army at the end of the Vietnam War, in that they had lost a generations worth of technical modernization there while gaining a generation of nearly irrelevant combat experience. The U.S. military realized that it had to look to the future.

Our alternative history just pushes the timeline back from 1973 to 1970. It assumes that the Army realized that it had to do something to demonstrate relevance as the United States began withdrawing from Vietnam and in the face of a new national strategy with less demand for the Army. The 1967 Six-Day War was the perfect case study, for similar reasons that the later 1973 conflict offered: preparation for the defense of NATO. The clear difference is that the 1967 war was an Israeli triumph that never called into significant question U.S. capabilities. Consequently, it did not create the demand for introspection and the sense of urgency that an Israeli near-defeat did in 1973.

In the face of the 1973 war, the Army would have had two choices: view it through an unobstructed lens in an attempt to understand what might be wrong with its new approach, or utilize the conflict to validate the decisions it had already made. The validation approach is simultaneously more satisfying and less risky than seeing ones own errors in the mistakes of either side in the war. First, validation shows all the hard work has been paying off. We are on the right track. Second, findings that question the current path put the credibility of the institutions and senior leaders who determined that course at risk. They can also challenge the significant investments made in programs that might be deemed irrelevant to the wars lessons.

Now, we turn our attention to the allure of validation in the case of Ukraine. Additionally, we offer recommendations on how to analyze the war in Ukraine in a way that incorporates service perspectives to achieve a joint solution that puts the Department of Defense clearly in the lead.

What Has Any of This Got to Do with the War in Ukraine?

The creation of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command in 1970 would have created strong biases that could have skewed the key lessons from the 1973 War. The reputation of the Army as an institution, not to mention those of its most senior leaders, was at stake. This is not to say that their behavior was disingenuous. It was not. It is, however, a warning that well-meaning leaders who deeply believe in the results of their hard work are hard to convince that their efforts are wrong, even in the face of new evidence. This is particularly true if the new reality could upend hard-won gains in the budget battles or service relevance.

With the war in Ukraine ongoing, the services now find themselves in a 1973 moment again. One option, as alternative history, uses the 2014 Russian invasion of Crimea and Eastern Ukraine to validate its ongoing efforts to prove its relevance in a large-scale war and justify its investments. The Army is heavily invested in the lessons of 2014, modeling itself, it believes, on the services approach during the 1970s. In 2018, it created a new four-star headquarters U.S. Army Futures Command assuming from U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command the responsibility for concept development, organizational design, and materiel modernization.

U.S. Army Futures Command notes with justifiable pride what it has accomplished since its inception in July 2018:

The Army is nearly four years into the biggest transformational change since the early 1980s, modernizing and building a multi-domain-capable force that delivers speed, range, and convergence of emerging technologies.

What has resulted is a new concept multi-domain operations and several large materiel development efforts that span the key deficiencies the Army believes it needs to correct for large-scale combat operations. All of these initiatives began years before the current war in Ukraine. Indeed, the multi-domain operations concept, now being turned into doctrine, predates U.S. Army Futures Command itself, having first been published by U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command in 2017 as Multi-Domain Battle: Evolution of Combined Arms for the 21st Century, 2025-2040.

The unique challenge the Army faces in its current effort at transformation is that it must now prepare for two very different peer competitors: China and Russia. Russia, a land power, is seemingly right up the Armys alley. China, however, is a harder case in which to demonstrate Army relevance. This is the key difference between now and the 1970s: The United States faces two very different peer competitors in widely separated theaters. The last time such a reality faced the United States was during World War II, with operations against Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany. It is an open question whether or not multi-domain operations and related materiel development efforts are equally suited against Russia and China.

This is particularly important to the Army because the clear policy of the United States is that China is the greatest long-term threat to American security and the nations most difficult military challenge. Furthermore, the prevailing and deep belief in the Army is that you cannot have two different armies at the same time. Apparently, this remains the belief even in the face of the radically different military problems posed by Russia and China based on their place, the specific adversary, and that adversarys capabilities. We believe that the Army can play an important combat role in the Pacific if it looks beyond its current preconceptions while also taking a long view of what might be possible in the deeper future.

We believe that it is too early to draw lessons learned from Ukraine or, for that matter, the earlier Nagorno-Karabakh War that received so much attention before Ukraine. A clear example of why rigorous analysis is necessary before jumping to premature conclusions was the rush during both of those conflicts to proclaim the end of the role of the tank on future battlefields. A representative article asserted that the annihilation of Russian mechanized formations in Ukraine where the power of the defense and the lethality of light infantry armed with modern anti-tank weapons [e.g., Javelins and Switchblades] defeated Russias assaults.

Ironically, this is not dissimilar to what happened in the aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, when the Sagger anti-tank guided missile was widely touted as signaling the death knell of the tank. In this case, the obituary was premature. The Israelis and other armies fielded better armor and improved their combined arms tactics, thus providing technical and tactical solutions to guarantee tank survivability.

In the 2006 Second Lebanon War, the Kornet anti-tank guided missile with its dual-warhead wreaked havoc on Israeli tanks. Once again, this was the end of tank warfare. However, just like after the 1973 war, the solutions were technical and tactical. The Israelis fielded the Trophy active protection system to protect against the weapons. They also reemphasized combined arms tactics and high-intensity warfighting skills, after years of focusing on irregular warfare, to improve their ability to suppress Hezbollah weapons and fighters.

There are likely similar solutions for the lessons about tank survivability in the face of drones and light anti-tank weapons. A technical solution would be the extension of a Trophy-like system to defeat top attack weapons. Tactically, competent execution of combined arms to suppress drone and anti-tank guided missile locations and defeat enemy light infantry enhance tank survivability and utility. This was something the Israeli forces were not trained for in 2006 and, as we are seeing in Ukraine, nor are Russian forces.

Investments in tank survivability were made because only the manned tank at this point in time provides mobile, protected lethality to enable maneuver on the battlefield. That may not be true in the future, but it is now. It is not yet the age of drones and light anti-tank weapons.

This case regarding a single weapon system highlights the importance of actually learning lessons from a war. The aforementioned article that argued the vulnerability of tanks in Ukraine was made to buttress the already-made decision to rid the Marines of their tanks. That decision was made before the war, based on the reality that the modernized Army M1 Abrams tanks the Marines had employed had become too heavy to be of use in Marine concepts.

Finally, learning lessons effectively includes attending to what really happened, especially from the perspective of Ukraine. A senior advisor to Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, commander of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, emphasized that although anti-tank missiles slowed the Russians down what killed them was our artillery. That was what broke their units. Ongoing operations in Eastern Ukraine buttress this observation about the significant role of artillery.

One should not impute any malice to conclusions about the value of anti-tank weapons and the possible end of the tank, but this case shows that one has to be aware that there is a strong proclivity to look for lessons that support already-made decisions. For example, senior Army leaders were confidently noting as early as May that its massive modernization effort, which predated the Russian invasion and ranges from helicopters to secure communications, has been validated by the conflict.

Initial assessments about drones in the Nagorno-Karabakh, which seemingly foreshadowed a revolution in military affairs, become less dire in the face of deeper analysis as well, as seen in an article by Israeli analyst Edo Hecht:

For decades the Israeli army has been used to fighting without looking up to see whose aircraft was rumbling overhead, knowing with virtually 100% certainty it was Israeli. It can no longer be certain of that and must prepare to operate under unfriendly skies air defence [sic] forces and ground forces, even of armies that have advanced air forces, must take into account and prepare to meet a new threat that enables poorer and even primitive military forces to create an aerial threat that did not exist before.

What lessons have been observed so far still await objective, rigorous analysis to understand their significance. This will be difficult if the institutional imperative is to look for lessons that support and validate, rather than challenge current efforts. These decisions, based on premature, faulty assessments, can become baked in and not reexamined, given that they were proven in combat and are supportive of the current path.

Consequently, the Ukraine war lessons-collection process is important enough that it should be a priority of the Department of Defense to get it right. The services will understandably look at the war from their own perspectives. That is to be expected and reasonable, because warfighting expertise in the various domains resides within the individual services. But the Department must also recognize that the services will apply filters, either wittingly or unwittingly, to many of their individual observations.

Indeed, at its extreme, a conflict may elicit very different conclusions and recommended solutions, depending on the service making the assessment. Here, another Army case is instructive.

During the interwar period, the branch chiefs held great authority over their branchs doctrine, personnel, and materiel requirements. The Air Force had not yet gained its independence and was a branch of the Army. In February 1942, Maj. Gen. John Herr, the U.S. Army chief of cavalry, met with Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Marshall. He truly believed what he told Marshall: In the interest of National Defense in this crisis, I urge upon you the necessity of an immediate increase in horse cavalry. From his perch, and with the experience of a full and successful career, Herr viewed horse cavalry as a key reason for German successes in Poland and France. He honestly believed what he told Marshall, and Germany did have cavalry formations. Thus, if you looked for validating observations, you could find them and laud their importance.

The other Army branches also searched for supportive lessons from these early German successes. The chief of infantry highlighted the contributions of German infantry, while the Army Air Corps contended that the strategic bombing of Warsaw had been central to the German victory over Poland. Finally, the chief of the newly formed Armored Force, who was basing his concepts largely on the cavalry tactics he had developed in the 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized), saw the use of tanks by the Germans as a validation of his approach.

They all missed the reality of the blitzkrieg because it combined armor and air power. Indeed, the Armored Force doctrinal manuals did not require air support for operations. Consequently, the Army, less the disbanded horse cavalry, took its existing concepts and weapons into the war where they suffered unnecessarily for their parochial decisions. However, it is important to understand that all of these senior officers believed their validating observations. It would be difficult to expect them to see and believe something that conflicted with what they had spent their careers mastering.

There is also a positive lesson to be drawn from how the Army dealt with the lessons of the Yom Kippur War, in that it is a good model of how to ensure interservice collaboration on assessing and institutionalizing lessons from the Ukraine War. In 1973, U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command and U.S. Air Force Tactical Air Command began a decade-long process to reach an agreement on how to collaborate and eliminate redundancies in key service programs.

The resulting agreements between the two service chiefs were a recognition that neither service could independently solve the challenges the Soviets posed to NATO. Eventually, they agreed to 31 initiatives that permitted the fuller integration of air and land capabilities and concepts into AirLand battle. However, the 31 Initiatives effort was about much more than service capabilities integration or interdependence. Henceforth, each service would rely on the other for capabilities, and each eliminated programs for capabilities that they agreed the other service could better execute. Unfortunately, with the end of the Cold War, this interservice agreement dissolved and the Army and Air Force again went their own ways in the absence of the shared problem.

Given the scope of the challenges posed by China and Russia, we believe that a truly joint approach must be taken to ensure their resolution. The rationalization of service approaches into a joint warfighting concept is no longer sufficient. What is required is an overarching joint concept that serves as the blueprint for service contributions. Furthermore, this concept should respond to the unique needs of the combatant commands.

Where to?

The 31 Initiatives effort, albeit important, was a bi-service effort completed before the passage of the GoldwaterNichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act in 1986. Since then, the Joint Staff and the Joint Requirements Oversight Council have been statutorily charged with executing what was a voluntary, ad hoc collaboration between the Army and Air Force on the 31 Initiatives. This is ostensibly where joint concepts and capabilities are developed in support of the regional combatant commanders requirements. It is also the venue where service concepts and capabilities are supposed to be vetted to ensure they support the overall direction of the joint force.

In the absence of compelling national security threats, there has not been a forcing function to demand focused collaboration. Regrettably, what passed for jointness during operations in the aftermath of 9/11 against completely overmatched adversaries prompted Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to deactivate the Joint Forces Command, which was essentially a joint U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command.

Since the dissolution of the Joint Forces Command, the services have dominated the development of concepts and capabilities. They are ostensibly exercising their Title 10 authorities to train, organize, and equip the forces that they will provide to the combatant commanders to meet their operational requirements. As a result of the existing practice, the overall joint warfighting concept is an amalgamation of service concepts and capabilities, rather than a foundational concept that drives and integrates the services efforts.

This shortfall has been obvious in the wars the United States has fought since the demise of the Soviet Union. Indeed, the joint plan executed in Operation Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Freedom could be simply characterized as: Army, stay on the left of the Euphrates; Marines, stay on the right; and Air Force, go where the Army and Marines allow. Each service exercised its own concept within its area of operations. Such a campaign plan was possible because a U.S. military designed and trained to fight the Soviet Union completely overmatched the Iraqis. In the case of Desert Storm, the resounding victory validated all the hard work done since the 1973 Yom Kippur war. There was little to be learned and it did not particularly matter given the reality that with the demise of the Soviet Union the U.S. military was without even a near-peer competitor.

Any inclination to understand the lessons of the lopsided defeat of the Iraqis in Operation Iraqi Freedom vanished with the onset of the post-victory insurgency. Consequently, the U.S. military has not thoroughly examined a large-scale conventional war between two closely matched adversaries since the 1973 Yom Kippur War. And the last time it analyzed its own combat against peer competitors that could challenge it in all the domains was in the aftermath of World War II.

The Ukraine war, as a harbinger of the potential realities of large-scale combat operations against a nuclear-armed state competitor, should serve as a catalyst to rejuvenate the role of the Secretary of Defense, the combatant commanders, and the joint staff.

We are generally averse to creating blue-ribbon panels or other committees to examine issues. That said, the United States is clearly at an inflection point. The war in Ukraine has shown that competition and conflict between major states are not theoretical or, unfortunately, unlikely. We should model the analysis and response to the Ukraine war on the spirit embodied in the 9/11 commissions charter. The commission to study the Ukraine war should be intergovernmental and directed under the auspices of the National Security Council.

The Department of Defense should clearly have representation on this commission. There is a unique military dimension to this war that demands introspection and analysis by the Pentagon. Accordingly, the secretary should establish an independent commission to examine the Ukraine war in detail. It should be co-chaired by the deputy secretary of defense and the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Its composition is extremely important. The commission must have hand-picked and thoroughly vetted senior-level representation from all the services as well as individuals extremely familiar with current service doctrine, concepts, and existing and envisioned capabilities. Only with this kind of representation can the commission view the war through the multiple lenses it will take to understand its implications for the entire, integrated joint force. One should expect that each lens will distill many of the observations in very different ways and often reflect a bias towards showing how each service believes it can uniquely solve the problem. This should be encouraged. The resolution of these varied perspectives will yield a better joint solution.

The question before the Department of Defense as it grapples with the implications of the Ukraine War is whether it will treat that conflict as it would have in 1973, based on an assessment of the 1967 Six-Day War as postulated in this alternative history? Or will it react to the Ukraine War as a conflict similar in consequence to what spurred its actual response to the 1973 war? If the former path is taken, one could reasonably expect military service leaders to mine any lessons to support and validate the hard work that is been done since the pivot to Asia and the initial 2014 Russian invasion of Crimea in Ukraine. If the latter, the Department of Defense can assess what needs to be done against a peer competitor to prevail in the future. The question before us is which path will be taken?

The stakes are high. To be sure, China and Russia are studying the Ukraine war, as they did perhaps more rigorously than the United States did in the aftermath of Operation Desert Storm. While the United States took a victory lap, the Chinese and the Russian militaries looked at the war to understand our capabilities to not only close the gaps but to eventually surpass us. In short, the United States viewed post-Cold War conflicts as validation of existing concepts and capabilities, while our adversaries saw them as a crisis and a call for action.

One should recall that our assessment of Chinese and Russian forces in 2000 dismissed them as significant threats. This can be seen in the fact that they were not even one of the two major theater wars that served as the basis of the U.S. force-sizing construct. For those that believe that the Ukraine War shows the rank incompetence of Russian forces, we should remember that the Russian Army that was annihilated in the initial stages of Operation Barbarossa in the summer of 1941 was occupying Berlin in the spring of 1945. More recently, the 1994 First Chechen War was a disaster: In 2000 Russian forces occupied Grozny. Furthermore, the war in Ukraine is not over and could yet upend the varied predictions of its outcome. Russian forces are still in it and neither they nor Ukrainian forces show any signs of capitulation.

In our own history, we might recall that the American military that had its share of defeats at the beginning of World War II, learned from those defeats, and was occupying Germany and Japan as victors in 1945. The United States and Russia both learned hard lessons during World War II out of necessity: it was a war of survival.

Our sense is that great attention needs to be paid to understanding how Russia and China will learn from this war and matching ourselves up against what they have the potential to be in the future. Whatever emerging concepts and programmed capabilities are up to the challenge should be accelerated. Those that are not must be ruthlessly identified and modified or eliminated. Finally, if the Russo-Ukrainian War shows that we are not fully prepared for future competition and conflict with China and Russia, then we should be learning from it with the sense of urgency it deserves.

Our concern is that the policymakers, given the abysmal Russian performance, will see little to learn from the war beyond minor adjustments to existing concepts and capabilities. Furthermore, the American public may lose interest in the war and perhaps believe it less consequential than its effects on the important issues of inflation and the world food supply. Thus, our goal with this essay is to provide a warning not just about the present but about the future.

Moscow will learn from this war, as will Beijing. Washington needs to get ahead of them in grasping the gravity of this war, understanding the challenges preconceived notions pose to the U.S. understanding of its implications, and finally, to providing a path forward for its rigorous assessment to identify and correct deficiencies.

David Johnson is a retired Army colonel. He is a principal researcher at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation and an adjunct scholar at the Modern War Institute at West Point. He is the author of Fast Tanks and Heavy Bombers: Innovation in the U.S. Army, 1917-1945 and Learning Large Lessons: The Evolving Roles of Ground Power and Air Power in the Post-Cold War Era. From 2012-2014 he founded and directed the Chief of Staff of the Army Strategic Studies Group for General Raymond T. Odierno.

Zach Alessi-Friedlander is a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, having served in tactical, operational, and strategic assignments in light infantry and armored cavalry units. He was a member of General Odiernos inaugural Strategic Studies Group and participated in the Art of War Scholars program at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College. He is currently a Ph.D. student in History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Image: ArmyInform

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An Alternative History of AirLand Battle, Part II - War on the Rocks

NPR (8/5/22) revises Afghan history.

In the first part of a series of reports on Afghanistan, NPR host Steve Inskeep (Morning Edition, 8/5/22) interviewed current Afghan Defense Minister Mohammad Yaqoob Mujahid. In introducing Yaqoob on air, Inskeep referenced Yaqoobs father, the former head of the Taliban, Mullah Muhammad Omar: He was the leader who refused to turn over Osama bin Laden in 2001, a refusal that led to the US attack.

In the online version of the article, NPR wrote: Omar also sheltered Osama bin Laden, and refused to turn over the Al Qaeda leader when the United States demanded him after 9/11.

This line that the Taliban refused to turn over Osama bin Laden, and that this led to the US attack, though part of the commonly accepted chronology of the war, is a gross distortion of history. The truth is almost the exact opposite: The Taliban repeatedly offered to give up Bin Laden, only rejecting George W. Bushs demands for immediate and unconditional acquiescence without discussion.

The series of events leading up to the US Afghanistan invasion were laid out recently in a Current Affairs essay by Nathan Robinson and Noam Chomsky (8/3/22), titled What Do We Owe Afghanistan?

Even before 9/11, the Talibanwho already had a deeply contentious relationship with Al Qaedarepeatedly signaled their willingness to work with the US in bringing Bin Laden to justice. Former Taliban Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil told Al Jazeera (9/11/11) that for years, they had used unofficial channels to present ways to resolve the Osama issue. One such proposal, Muttawakil said, was to set up a three-nation court, or something under the supervision of the Organization of the Islamic Conference [OIC].

Robert Grenier, former CIA station chief in Pakistan, confirmed US receipt of these proposals to Al Jazeera, but dismissed them as a ploy to be ignored. According to Grenier, the US did not trust the Taliban and their ability to conduct a proper trial.

In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the US demanded that the Taliban immediately hand over Bin Laden. The Taliban responded by offering to put Bin Laden on trial if they were shown evidence of his involvement in the attacks. The US refused to share proof, rejecting any diplomatic option.

Bush announced, There are no negotiations, then proceeded to bomb Afghanistan, despite numerous warnings from both humanitarian organizations and anti-Taliban forces in the country that their actions would only hurt the Afghanistani people. Even after the bombs began to fall, the Taliban repeated their offers to give up Bin Ladeneven dropping the requirement for actual evidence. The US continued its onslaught, initiating the 20-year odyssey of occupation that unraveled last year.

Zbigniew Brzezinskis vision of the Grand Chessboard included a prospective pipeline across Afghanistan.

Its abundantly clear that US aims in the country transcended capturing Bin Laden and obtaining justice for 9/11 victims. Some, like Chomsky and Robinson, attributed the hasty invasion to Bushs personal bloodlust.

Others trace US policy in Afghanistan to longstanding geopolitical imperatives for military influence and control of the worlds natural resources. Former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, architect of the Afghan Trap, wrote in his 1997 book The Grand Chessboard that Americas global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained. The book even contained a map of a proposed pipeline through Afghanistan.

The Bush administrations ranks were pulled in large part from the neoconservative think tank, the Project for a New American Century. In PNACs now infamous 2000 document, Rebuilding Americas Defenses, the overtly imperial organization called for the establishment of forward-facing bases in Central Asia, calling these an essential element in US security strategy given the longstanding American interests in the region.

Of PNACs 25 founding members, ten went on to staff the Bush administration, including Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. The day before 9/11, the Bush administration had already made a decision to eventually attack Afghanistan, using Bin Laden as a pretext. On September 12, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were trying to initiate a wider war by attacking Iraq, despite nothing linking Iraq to the attacks.

Nathan Robinson and Noam Chomsky (Current Affairs, 8/3/22) : Long before 9/11, the Taliban had reached out to the United States and offered to put Bin Laden on trial under the supervision of a neutral international organization.'

Whatever the Bush administrations motivations, its clear that the reality is a far cry from NPRs propagandistically simple formulation that the Taliban simply refused to hand over Bin Laden, and this is what led to the US attack on Afghanistan.

However, it should be noted that even in Inskeeps version of events, the US invasion would still be an unlawful and unnecessary act of aggression. As Chomsky and Robinson wrote in Current Affairs (8/3/22):

The 9/11 attacks could have been dealt with as a crime. This would have been sane and consistent with precedent. When lawbreaking occurs, we seek the perpetrators, rather than starting wars with unrelated parties.

If the Bush administration had wanted to defend Americans from another terrorist attack, it would have pursued the criminal network responsible for the original attack. Instead, it wanted vengeance, and launched an illegal war that killed thousands of innocent people.

NPRs historical framing is an attempt to paint the Taliban as prepared to defend Bin Laden to the death, and thus complicit or supportive of the 9/11 attacks. This inaccurate portrayal serves to retroactively justify the US assault on one of the poorest countries in the world.

Despite Biden withdrawing from Afghanistan after a brutal 20-year occupation, the US continues to attack the population today. Earlier this year, the Biden administration directly invoked the horrors of 9/11 to justify robbing the Afghans of $7 billion in central bank reserves. In some twisted form of justice, the Biden administration decided to keep the stolen funds and distribute half of it to families of 9/11 victims.

The other half was to be redistributed to Afghanistan in the form of humanitarian aid, though experts warn that this is far from a substitute for restarting the economy. This despite outrage from several 9/11 families over the violence committed in their name. As the Afghan economy collapses, nearly the entire country is being plunged into misery on a mass scale, and the US is intent on making it worse (FAIR.org, 2/15/22).

In future reporting, NPR should present a clearer picture of historical events to provide proper context for their listeners, and to avoid legitimizing the ongoing, massively destructive policies of the United States by promoting official state mythology.

ACTION ALERT: You can send a message to NPRs public editor here(or viaTwitter:@NPRpubliceditor). Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective. Feel free to leave a copy of your message in the comments thread of this post.

Featured image: NPR depiction (8/5/22) of a Taliban compound in Afghanistan (photo: Claire Harbage/NPR).

FAIRs work is sustained by our generous contributors, who allow us to remain independent. Donate today to be a part of this important mission.

Read more:

NPR Distorts History of US Invasion of Afghanistan - FAIR

When you look back through the archives of NBA history, some of the greatest players of all-time that you will pass by from generation-to-generation are Stephen Curry, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird,Kareem Abdul-Jabbarand Wilt Chamberlain.

If you go back even further though to when the NBA was in its early days, you will stumble across a man by the name of Bob Cousy, someone who is oftentimes overshadowed by Bill Russell's greatness and dominance with the Boston Celtics.

One of the greatest point guards of all time, what Cousy did on the basketball court in the 1950s and early 1960s with Boston was remarkable and his achievements show this.

Cousy won six championships with the Celtics, five straight from 1959 to 1963, he was an All-Star for all 13 seasons of his career in Boston, he led the league in assists eight different times and in 1971, Cousy was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.

On this day in 1928, Bob Cousy was born in New York, New York and he grew up in the Yorkville neighborhood of Manhattan's East Side during the Great Depression.

Beginning to play basketball when he was 13-years-old, Cousy broke his right hand at a young age after falling out of a tree, forcing him to learn how to play with his left hand and ultimately leading to the future Hall-of-Famer becoming ambidextrous.

This ended up being one of the greatest things that could have happened to Cousy simply because of the fact that he became dominant on the court utilizing both hands.

The game of basketball was much different when Bob Cousy was growing up and even when he made his first professional appearance with the Boston Celtics in 1950, but the concept of the game has remained the same since its creation.

Proving to be a crafty point guard who could find his open teammates and truly being one of the innovators of the point guard position in the NBA, Cousy made an immediate impact on the Celtics and helped them claim their first title in team history in 1956.

The trio of Hall-of-Fame head coach Red Auerbach, Hall-of-Famer Bill Russell and Hall-of-Famer Bob Cousy went on to win five of the next six titles together following Bostons first title in 1956 and following the 1962-63 season, Cousy retired. Russell and Auerbach continued their dynasty with other future Hall-of-Famers in John Havlicek, Sam Jones and Tom Heinsohn, as the Celtics won five of the next six titles following Cousys retirement.

While he did officially retire from the NBA in 1963 in a heartfelt moment in a packed Boston Garden, Bob Cousy did end up playing in seven games during the 1969-70 season while he was the head coach of the Cincinnati Royals. This franchise ultimately relocated to Sacramento and became what we now know as the Sacramento Kings in 1986.

A true pioneer of the game, Bob Cousy celebrates his 94th birthday today, reaching yet another milestone in what has been a remarkable life.

He is a Celtics legend, NBA legend and he continues to serve the community as a legend of life off-the-court.

Happy Birthday Mr. Cousy.

Read more:

On This Day In NBA History: August 9 - A Celtics Legend And Hall-Of-Famer Is Born - Sports Illustrated

Plans for the nomadic Museum of Jersey City History to take up permanent residency at the historic Apple Tree House on Academy Street are advancing at a rapid pace, according to Martin Pierce, president of the its board of directors.

Pierce said the City Council has authorized a $25,000 payment to the board as the first installment of a $100,000 contribution from the citys Office of Cultural Affairs to be used for general operating expenses. The balance will be paid after the MJCH board signs a lease with the city to occupy the Apple Tree House, he added.

In the meantime, Pierce said, the board is in the process of adopting by-laws and securing its 501 (c) 3 tax-exempt status to become eligible for charitable donations to help support the museum operation. Pierce was unable to say what the institutions annual operating budget would be, but he did say MJCH planned on tapping philanthropic grantors, corporate and individual donors, and eventually monies from a membership fee with the intent of being self-sustaining. The Dante Alighieri Society of Jersey City has already pledged $1,000 as the first such donor, he noted.

The 12-member board, which includes Mayor Steven Fulop as an ex-officio member, has been meeting every couple of weeks to lay the groundwork for the new enterprise.

Once the lease is signed, Pierce said, we plan to have our first exhibition, which were calling Frank Hague: Then and Today as we examine the former mayors legacy and themes associated with his mayoralty, such as viewing the Jersey City Medical Center as a municipal experiment with socialized medicine, (the former) Roosevelt Stadium as a federal Works Progress Administration project, and the H&M tubes as a major transportation advancement.

Optimistically, well open in late fall, certainly no later than Christmas, he added.

To help organize the event, the board has hired a pair of exhibition consultants: Claudia Ocello (Museum Partners Consultants), of Morristown, and Johanna Goldfeld (Exhibitista.com), of Brooklyn, to help design the Hague exhibition and others following.

Asked how the museum will function day-to-day, Pierce said: The city wants to see it open regularly during the week and on some weekends, and it wants us to engage with students. This is supposed to be a happening place with our doors swinging open for all residents.

To that end, the board is partnering with the Hudson County Heritage and Cultural Affairs Office and its program specialist Matthew Caranante to co-host a panel discussion on immigration in the county, which will take place Oct. 6 at 7 p.m.

The museum, housed for a century on the top floor of the Jersey City Public Librarys main branch on Jersey Avenue, was relocated to a new building nearby on Montgomery Street in 2001 but closed a decade later due to fiscal troubles and friction with the city. Its historical contents were dispersed.

Many of those materials, including glasswork, china, furniture, costumes, and artifacts, ended up at the Vorhees Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, Pierce said. Now, he pointed out, we can expect to see a flow of material back to the Jersey City Museum.

MJCH board members say theyre excited about the prospect of the museums reopening shedding light on the citys rich history not only for longtime residents but for the citys many newcomers as well.

And, said board member Paul Dennison, who doubles as board president of the Jersey City Theater Center, its vital that the museum portray Jersey City from multiple perspectives and not just from a political elite.

In that context, Dennison said, the museum must extend its borders to placeholders in the community and connect to its diversity and inclusiveness like a Ken Burns film that connects the dots of different parts of the community. We have to ensure that this space is inviting to people from all different walks of life and that requires we listen to different expectations.

For board member Jerome Choice, the museum will reflect the mosaic of the people in Jersey City and, because Jersey City is one of the most diverse cities in New Jersey, thats what makes this city great.

Another board member, Heather Wahl, said she is excited to celebrate the history of our community. Founding artistic director of the Speranza Theater Company, which currently operates in the Tree House, Wahl added, from a theatrical perspective, think Williamsburg: Actors dressed in period costume can give historical tours and free performances at the historic Apple Tree House.

Read the rest here:

Museum of Jersey City History is One Step Closer to Reality - Jersey City Times

Back in spring training New York Yankees slugger Aaron Judge rejected a very reasonable seven-year contract extension worth $213.5 million. It was a bold decision, no doubt about it, and Judge has responded this season by doing what seemed impossible: he's made himself more money. Some players would crack under that pressure. Judge hasn't. He's thrived.

Through Sunday's games Judge owns a .301/.389/.669 batting line and an MLB-leading 43 home runs. He also leads baseball in runs scored, RBI, total bases, OPS, OPS+, and both the FanGraphs and Baseball Reference versions of WAR. The race for the home run title isn't much of a race at all.

Here is the MLB home run leaderboard as of Aug. 9:

Judge homered Monday night against the Mariners, and he has now gone deep 11 times in 17 games played in the second half. He has more second-half homers than the Marlins. Literally the entire team.

Slugging 44 homers through 110 team games puts Judge on pace to hit 65 home runs this season (64.8, to be exact). We are now more than a week into August and Judge has maintained a home run pace that not only gives him a chance at 60 homers, but also a chance to set a new American League single-season record. That is still Roger Maris' 61 homers with the 1961 Yankees.

"I try not to, but people keep asking me that question," Judge told our Matt Snyder at the All-Star Game when asked whether he thinks about chasing 60 homers. "... I might have a better answer at the end of the year if it happens. If I get to that point, we can talk about it. Until then, it's just so hard. We're only halfway through. Only being halfway there, it's tough to talk about."

There is some wonderful symmetry in Judge's pursuit of Maris' AL home run record. Maris hit 61 homers 61 years ago in 1961. He also wore No. 9. Judge wears No. 99. The question is, can Judge actually break Maris' record? Or reach 60 homers in general? Here's what you need to know about Judge chasing Maris.

Before we go any further, I should note only eight times in MLB history has a player hit 60 home runs in a season, and six of the eight came during the so-called Steroid Era. What we're talking about Judge possibly doing doesn't happen often. Here are the eight 60-homer seasons in history:

Giancarlo Stanton made MLB's most recent run at 60 homers, going deep 59 times in his 2017 NL MVP season. That includes a truly mind-boggling stretch in which Stanton hit 30 homers in a 48-game span. Ryan Howard slugged 58 homers in his 2006 NL MVP season. Even in this homer-happy era, it is not often a player makes a real run at 60 dingers like Judge is this year.

While we're focused on how many home runs Judge will finish the season with, it's important to note we're discussing this because of what Judge has done to date. He was the 10th player in history to hit 43 homers through his team's first 109 games. Only three players (five instances) hit more. Here are the five:

Barry Bonds, 2001 Giants

50 (2.18 G per HR)

73 (2.22 G per HR)

Mark McGwire, 1998 Cardinals

46 (2.37 G per HR)

70 (2.31 G per HR)

Mark McGwire, 1996 Athletics

46 (2.37 G per HR)

52 (3.12 G per HR)

Babe Ruth, 1921 Yankees

46 (2.37 G per HR)

59 (2.59 G per HR)

Mark McGwire, 1999 Cardinals

44 (2.47 G per HR)

65 (2.49 G per HR)

McGwire's home run rate slipped significantly after his first 109 games in 1996. The others all more or less maintained their home run pace through the rest of the season. When you're chasing 60 homers, I reckon the first 30 are much easier to hit than the last 30 for many reasons, including fatigue. The hardest part of this chase is still in front of Judge.

"Aaron is cut out for this. If we're a month from now, six weeks from now, and he's knocking on the door of those kind of things, and we understand the attention that's going to come with that, I can't think of someone more equipped to handle it,"Yankees manager Aaron Boone told Newsday earlier this month. "I think you can start at the start of this year with all the talk centered around the contract and how that's affected him. He's built for this. I think anything you throw at him, whether he gets to a number or doesn't get to a number, I don't think that the circumstances and the pressure is going to be a reason he does or doesn't."

Judge needs to hit 17 home runs in New York's final 52 games to match Maris' AL record, meaning he needs 18 homers to break the record and 16 to reach 60.

Here are the paces Judge needs to maintain to reach those milestone totals:

62 homers (new AL single-season record)

18

2.89

61 homers (ties Maris' AL record)

17

3.06

60 homers (ninth 60-homer season ever)

16

3.25

Judge's current pace

--

2.50

If you're thinking big, Judge will need to hit a home run once every 1.93 games from here on out to match (not even beat) Bonds' single-season record of 73 home runs. As much fun as that chase would be, Judge won't get there. Unless Judge gets nuclear hot the next few weeks and catching Bonds become plausible, Maris' AL record is the only realistic target.

Judge certainly plays in the right home ballpark to make a run at 60 homers. Yankee Stadium is one of the most home run happy ballparks in the big leagues, though Judge isn't exactly padding his total with short right field porch cheapies. His 412-foot average home run distance is fifth-highest in baseball among players with at least 20 homers.

According to Statcast, Judge has hit only two home runs this season that would have been homers at Yankee Stadium and only Yankee Stadium: 364-footer vs. Shane McClanahan on June 15 and another 364-footer against Jonathan Heasley on July 30.

That home run against Heasley was Judge's 200th career homer. He reached 200 career homers in only 671 games, second fewest ever behind Ryan Howard (658).

It is no surprise Judge's career home run rate at home (one every 13.1 plate appearances) is higher than his home run rate on the road (one every 16.3 plate appearances). That works against Judge in his pursuit of Maris' AL record because the Yankees will play only 25 of their remaining 52 games at home. Here is the ballpark breakdown of those games 52 games:

Yankee Stadium

25

112

Fenway Park

5

107

Globe Life Field

4

96

RingCentral Coliseum

4

69

Angel Stadium

3

114

Rogers Centre

3

114

American Family Field

3

119

T-Mobile Park

2

92

Tropicana Field

3

89

What these numbers mean is Yankee Stadium inflates home runs by right-handed batters to 112 percent the league average. RingCentral Coliseum, on the other hand, suppresses righty homers to only 69 percent the league average. The higher the number, the more homer friendly the ballpark plays, at least when it comes to righty homers.

The good news: Judge will play 30 of the team's remaining 52 games in a good ballpark for righty homers. The bad news: the Yankees wrap up their season with four makeup games in Texas (that's one of the series postponed by the owners' lockout), so, if Judge is creeping up on 60 homers in the final week, he'll have to get it in a ballpark unfriendly to righty power hitters.

The other good news: I'm not entirely sure home run park factors apply to Judge. As noted earlier, his power is mammoth and only a few players have averaged more distance on their homers this season. He can hit the ball out of any part of any park. That said, to get 60 homers, Judge will need a few cheapies along the way. The schedule seems to work in his favor.

This is important. The Yankees have 52 games remaining but Judge almost certainly will not play all of them. The Yankees are all-in on load management, have been for years, and they rarely deviate from their rest schedule. In fact, Judge was out of the lineup last Wednesday even though the Yankees had an off-day Thursday. They used it as an opportunity to give him two straight days off his feet.

Judge has been perfectly healthy this season, not even a single day-to-day injury situation, and he has started 101 of his team's 109 games (he's pinch-hit four times). A similar pace would have Judge starting 49 of New York's final 52 games. Four fewer starts could really cut into his home run total! It could cost Judge a shot at Maris' AL record too.

The Yankees are a postseason lock and the ultimate goal is winning the World Series (Judge himself would tell you that), so they will do what they think is best to make sure the team is in the best position heading into October. That said, they are not oblivious to the home run chase and the potential history, especially since it'll put a lot of butts in the seats in September. How could the Yankees sit Judge at home in September?

My guess -- and I emphasize this is just a guess -- is the Yankees will revise their rest schedule a bit, and rather than give Judge full days off down the stretch, they'll give him more (potentially much more) time at DH. Judge's rest schedule is definitely a thing to monitor, particularly as we get into September and have a better idea of whether Judge really has a shot at Maris' AL record.

Read the original:

Aaron Judge chasing home run history: Yankees star on pace to break Roger Maris' record; will he get there? - CBS Sports

Moving a nearly 200-year-old house would be an expensive and time-consuming process, but for the director of the Klein Historical Foundation, it was worth it to ensure a piece of local history could be restored and displayed for the community.

The Frank House, built in the 1840s, finally found a new home Tuesday after it was lifted from its foundations, loaded onto a truck and hauled down Spring Cypress Road in Klein to nearby Wunderlich Farm, where KHF director Steve Baird hopes generations of future schoolchildren will get to see what life was like in the area all those years ago.

The addition of the house widens the scope of history the museum covers by decades and offers even more insight into Kleins past.

This building allows us to extend our story a little bit further, Baird said. This gives us another piece to the puzzle.

Wunderlich Farm, built in the early 1890s, opened to the public in 1995 and has since served as a window into Kleins rural past at the turn of the century. Every year, tens of thousands of museum-goers, including 4,000 Klein ISD fourth graders on field trips, visit the farm for hands-on tours and demonstrations.

Baird, who began fundraising for the non-profit he leads in March 2021 and raised $95,000 for the relocation, is no stranger to moving buildings. The Wunderlich Farm grounds house a half dozen other historical homes and structures, including a once-segregated two-room schoolhouse that closed in 1966.

To move the Frank House, Baird contracted K. Nelson Services, the company he has used before to transport Wunderlich Farms other historic buildings.

The relocation involved splitting the house into thirds and lugging the parts down the road to the farm-turned-museum. Its complicated, Baird said, but he trusts the movers.

Once I have the money and Im ready to pull the trigger I just leave it to them, he said.

In a way, the Frank House perhaps symbolizes much of Kleins history in just one home.

The wooden house was built by a Scottish family, rented by a French family and then bought by a German family in the 1880s. The three nationalities are discussed extensively at Wunderlich Farm as some of the first European American settlers of the area in the first half of the 19th century.

The Frank family moved there in the 1880s and gave the house its name.

Although it's finally at Wunderlich Farm, Baird predicts it could take six months for the house to be walkable and another two or three years for it to be fully integrated into the museum.

With Houston weather the way it is, we knew it was only a matter of time until it completely fell apart, Baird said.

Extensive repairs will be needed to preserve the houses unique features and architecture, he added. Much of the house's wood panels and floorboards, some ridden with termites, will need to be either replaced or preserved. A new roof will also be installed.

The price tag for the top-to-bottom restoration? At least another $100,000, which Baird said he will begin fundraising soon. Erratic lumber prices could change that figure.

Just like the relocation, he believes the cost is worth it.

We want there to be a big to-do about it, Baird said. We want to make sure its all done right.

jhair.romero@chron.com

Originally posted here:

Nearly 200-year-old Klein house moved to nearby history museum - Houston Chronicle

For Immediate Release

August 9, 2022

Contact:

Mike Inacay or Manu Tupper (202) 224-3123

Schatz: Largest Climate Action In American History Includes First-Time-Ever Investment In Climate Resilience For Native Hawaiian Community

Inflation Reduction Act Contains $25 Million In Dedicated Funding For Native Hawaiian Climate Resilience

WASHINGTON U.S. Senator Brian Schatz, chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, released the following statement on funding for the Native Hawaiian community in the Inflation Reduction Act, which passed the Senate on Sunday.

For the first time ever, the federal government will directly support Native Hawaiian-led climate action, said Chairman Schatz. This historic funding recognizes the importance of Native Hawaiian traditional knowledge and stewardship in developing effective climate solutions, upholds the federal trust responsibility, and will help the Native Hawaiian community build on its existing climate resiliency work.

The Inflation Reduction Act, which Schatz voted to pass, provides $25 million to the Office of Native Hawaiian Relations at the Department of the Interior for Native Hawaiian climate resilience and adaptation activities.

Native Hawaiian-serving non-profits may also be eligible to receive additional funding from the bill for coastal community climate resilience, forest restoration and conservation, deployment of zero-emission technologies, and environmental and climate justice block grants.

###

View original post here:

SCHATZ: LARGEST CLIMATE ACTION IN AMERICAN HISTORY INCLUDES FIRST-TIME-EVER INVESTMENT IN CLIMATE RESILIENCE FOR NATIVE HAWAIIAN COMMUNITY | The...

With help from Eli Okun and Garrett Ross

President Joe Biden speaks to reporters as he emerges from his quarantine at the White House. | Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo

RECONCILIATION LATEST The overnight vote-a-rama is winding down and a final vote on the Inflation Reduction Act in the Senate will come this afternoon. The House is scheduled to return and take up the bill on Friday. Our sleep-deprived Hill team has all the latest details here

BIDEN ENDS QUARANTINE The president tested negative on an antigen test for the second day in a row, per a note from his doctor, which means JOE BIDEN is free to leave his 16-day isolation, which happened to coincide with the best stretch of his presidency so far. (This morning, Biden headed to his beach house in Rehoboth, natch.)

MEANWHILE, the president is about to make history.

Passage of the Inflation Reduction Act will make Biden one of the most legislatively successful presidents of the modern era. We once noted that the mismatch between the size of Bidens ambitions and his margins in Congress made it seem like he was trying to pass a rhinoceros through a garden hose. It ended up being more like a pony, but its still pretty impressive.

To wit:

American Recovery Act: $1.9 trillion

Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act: $550 billion

Chips and Science Act: $280 billion

Inflation Reduction Act: $700 billion

Thats a nearly $3.5 trillion agenda. The scope of the issues addressed is notable: the pandemic and its economic fallout, highways, bridges, broadband, rail, manufacturing, science, prescription drug prices, health insurance, climate change, deficit reduction and tax equity.

He also expanded NATO, passed a new gun safety law and passed a bill to address the effects of vets exposed to toxic burn pits. Five out of seven of these laws all but the two biggies, the ARP and IRA received significant Republican support.

Theres not much debate anymore over whether Biden has been a consequential president. In the long run, his first two years may be remembered as akin to LBJ when it comes to moving his agenda through Congress.

The current political question is how much it will matter in the short term.

Passing legislation is no guarantee of electoral victory. All modern presidents, with the exception of GEORGE W. BUSH after 9/11, saw midterm losses two years after being first elected regardless of how successful they were with Congress. For members facing reelection, voting with the president can just as easily be a political burden as a political boost. One study after the Democrats 2010 midterm drubbing suggested that the more a Democratic House member voted with BARACK OBAMA on his top priorities, the more likely they were to lose. Last year, Biden literally mailed checks to every American and he was repaid with lower approval ratings than any of his predecessors at this point.

In the spring, JOHN ANZALONE, Bidens pollster, told us the political environment for Democrats was the worst hes seen in 30 years. We talked to him this morning and his assessment has changed dramatically.

I dont feel like that today, he said. Three months ago, we were on the defensive and now were on the offensive.

First, he argued, was the burst of legislation. Part of the problem that Democrats had, he said, including the president, is this idea that we just couldnt get anything done. And the fact is we got something done.

This president has set up in a very short time period for Democratic frontline candidates something they didnt have a few months ago, he said. They were on the defensive on inflation and a host of other issues. And since then the president has helped with CHIPS and the Inflation Reduction Act and a compelling positive message: lowering drug prices, lowering energy prices, making America more energy independent, bringing the supply chain back from China, deficit reduction and making big companies pay their fair share.

Then theres the spate of new issues that werent as important earlier this year. Republicans are out of step on abortion, guns and Jan. 6, he said.

We put our last silver dollar in our slot machine and came up big, Anzalone said. And they were sitting there with a stack of chips and are down to just one. The turnaround is unbelievable.

He cautioned that the change was unlikely to show up in the polls this summer. (Indeed, a new ABC News/Ipsos poll has dismal numbers for Biden, including a 37% job approval.)

But between now and Election Day there will probably be $6 billion spent on communications, Azalone said. Democrats will spend about half of that. Thats a lot of money to explain what weve done for the American people.

In the WSJ, Karl Rove takes exception with the more upbeat Anzalonian view of the midterms. So Democrats are pumping this latest Build Back Better incarnation big time, hoping itll be the life raft they need, he writes. Rove thinks the bill can be easily picked apart and turned into an albatross. Retiring Illinois Rep. CHERI BUSTOS claims it gives her party the Big MO, while Virginia Rep. ABIGAIL SPANBERGER proclaimed it will change peoples lives. he writes. Such hyperbole wont save Democrats; voters will see that the promises dont match reality. But Rove also offers this warning: The Schumer-Manchin deal wont save the Democrats. But unhinged GOP candidates might.

Conservative columnist Henry Olsen agrees with pieces of the Anzo and Rove analyses. Tuesdays results in Kansas are a blinking red light for Republicans, he writes in WaPo, and the national GOP should try to take abortion off the table as quickly as possible. Like Rove, he fears that poor candidates mean that the GOP is blowing its chance to make the midterms a referendum on Democrats.

NYTs Shane Goldmacher and Maggie Haberman argue that control of the upper chamber rests on whether Democratic candidates in crucial Senate races can continue to outpace the presidents unpopularity.

APs Seung Min Kim and Zeke Miller note a central irony in Bidens string of recent victories: Over five decades in Washington, Joe Biden knew that the way to influence was to be in the room where it happens. But in the second year of his presidency, some of Bidens most striking, legacy-defining legislative victories came about by staying out of it.

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Good Sunday morning. Thanks for reading Playbook. Drop us a line and tell us what you think the IRA means for the midterms and for history: Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza.

SUNDAY BEST

Sen. BEN CARDIN (D-Md.) on the reconciliation process, on Fox News Sunday: Let me say this: Turning all these bills by reconciliation is not the right way to do it. The Republicans did it in 2017 on the tax bill, we are obligated to use this process because we can't get Republicans to work with us on fundamental issues, such as energy, climate and health care costs. But theyd be much better if we could have a process where we work together and had the richness of every member participating in the process, bipartisan process.

Rep. NANCY MACE (R-S.C.) on Congress role in abortion policy folliowing the overturning of Roe v. Wade, on NBCs Meet the Press: You know, Handmaid's Tale is not supposed to be a roadmap, right? This is a place where we can be in the center, we can protect life, and we can protect where people are on both sides of the aisle.

On how abortion issues will affect the midterms: I do think that it will be an issue in November if were not moderating ourselves. We can't go to the far corners of the right or the far corners of the left. More from Myah Ward

Taiwanese Ambassador BI-KHIM HSIAO on whether Taiwan shared U.S. concerns about Speaker NANCY PELOSIs trip, on CBS Face the Nation: We have been living under the threat from China for decades. And we cannot let their ongoing threats define our desire to make friends internationally. The risks are not posed by Taiwan, nor are they posed by the United States. The risks are posed by Beijing.

NIKKI HALEY on whether shell run in 2024 on Fox News Sunday: MARGARET THATCHER said, If you want something said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman. We should not take our eyes off of 2022. If we don't win in 2022, there won't be a 2024. So we need to stay humble, disciplined and win that. And then if there's a place for me, Ive never lost a race. Im not going to start now. More from David Cohen

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TOP-EDS: A roundup of the weeks must-read opinion pieces.

Biden

DONALD TRUMP

After Roe

SCOTUS

Pelosis trip to Taiwan

The ZAWAHRI strike

BIDENS SUNDAY The president is in Rehoboth Beach, Del., and has nothing on his public schedule.

VP KAMALA HARRIS SUNDAY The VP has nothing on her public schedule.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

Smoke rises following Israeli airstrikes on a building in Gaza City on Sunday, Aug. 7. | Hatem Moussa/AP Photo

1. MAJOR SUNDAY READ: The September cover story of The Atlantic is Caitlin Dickersons blockbuster investigation of the creation and implementation of Trumps family-separation policy. The nearly 30,000-word article, We Need to Take Away Children, spans forty-one pages of the magazine and is one of the longest reported pieces The Atlantic has ever published. Dickerson spent 18 months on it, conducted over 150 interviews and reviewed thousands of pages of government documents. Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeff Goldberg calls it a heartbreaking and damning story. (The piece is also published in Spanish here.)

It is easy to pin culpability for family separations on the anti-immigration officials for which the Trump administration is known, Dickerson writes. But these separations were also endorsed and enabled by dozens of members of the governments middle and upper management: Cabinet secretaries, commissioners, chiefs, and deputies who, for various reasons, didnt voice concern even when they should have seen catastrophe looming; who trusted the system to stop the worst from happening; ... who assumed that someone else, in some other department, must be on top of the problem; who were so many layers of abstraction away from the reality of screaming children being pulled out of their parents arms that they could hide from the human consequences of what they were doing.

Former DHS Secretary KIRSTJEN NIELSEN, who for months tried to stop the policy but ultimately became the face of it, tells Dickerson that she regrets signing the order to implement it: Frankly, I wish I hadnt.

2. RECONCILIATION READ: How the Private-Equity Lobby Won Again, by WSJs Julie Bykowicz in Washington and Miriam Gottfried in New York: Private-equity industry lobbyists have worked hard to keep the status quo. They say they know private equity has an image problem. So they have worked to persuade lawmakers to think not of the New York and San Francisco investment managers, but of the local businesses throughout America those managers fund, such as medical practices, small manufacturers and auto-repair businesses. Private-equity advocates say that because fund managers help form the backbone of the economy, they deserve lower tax rates.

3. THE MAN FOR THE MOMENT? Biden Is an Uneasy Champion on Abortion. Can He Lead the Fight in Post-Roe America? by NYTs Michael Shear: Inside the West Wing, President Biden has made it clear that he is uncomfortable even using the word abortion, according to current and former advisers. In speeches and public statements, he prefers to use the word sparingly, focusing instead on broader phrases, like reproductive health and the right to choose, that might resonate more widely with the public. Mr. Biden, a practicing Catholic who has drawn on his faith to shape his political identity, is now being called on to lead a fight he spent decades sidestepping and many abortion rights advocates worry that he may not be the right messenger for the moment.

Post Roe, some in GOP wage uphill battle to offer families more support, by WaPos Jeff Stein and Leigh Ann Caldwell

The post-Kansas mood: Some South Carolina Republicans pause at abortion ban brink, by APs Jeffrey Collins

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4. THE TRUMP EFFECT: Trump wins CPAC straw poll in Dallas, by CNNs Michael Warren: Among the attendees who voted, 69% said they preferred Trump, with 24% saying they would prefer Florida Republican Gov. RON DESANTIS. When asked about who they would prefer if Trump did not run for president, 65% of respondents said they preferred DeSantis, while 8% said they would support DONALD TRUMP JR.

Trump is trying to mold the GOP governor field and found a favorite in Kari Lake, by Meridith McGraw

5. PRIMARY COLORS: Liz Cheney Is Ready to Lose. But Shes Not Ready to Quit, by NYTs Jonathan Martin in Cheyenne, Wyo.: Polls show [Rep. LIZ] CHENEY losing badly to her rival, HARRIET HAGEMAN, Mr. Trumps vehicle for revenge, and the congresswoman has been all but driven out of her Trump-loving state, in part because of death threats, her office says. Yet for Ms. Cheney, the race stopped being about political survival months ago. Instead, shes used the Aug. 16 contest as a sort of a high-profile stage for her martyrdom and a proving ground for her new crusade. The money line: In a state where Mr. Trump won 70 percent of the vote two years ago, Ms. Cheney might as well be asking ranchers to go vegan.

Inside the race to replace Congress' first quadriplegic and its effect on disability rights, by Katherine Tully-McManus: Rep. JIM LANGEVIN is retiring after more than two decades as a champion for access and equity. The Republican who's leading the battle to replace him says his legacy isn't at risk.

6. TENSIONS OVER TAIWAN: White House resists Congress bipartisan bid to overhaul U.S.-Taiwan relations, by Andrew Desiderio: After warning Pelosi that her travel plans could provoke China only to see the speaker make the trip anyway and lawmakers in both parties cheer her on the Biden administration is now trying to make changes to a bipartisan bill that would overhaul longstanding U.S.-Taiwan policy in favor of a more aggressive posture.

7. WHAT THE WHITE HOUSE IS WATCHING: Drivers could soon see average gas prices hit $3.99 per gallon, by CBS Allison Elyse Gualtieri

8. GRIPPING READ: The Excruciating Echo of Grief in Uvalde, with writing from NYT's Rick Rojas and Edgar Sandoval, videos by Emily Rhyne and photographs by Tamir Kalifa and Callaghan OHare: The community buried 21 people after the Robb Elementary School massacre. In the weeks that followed, the aftershocks only compounded the agony.

9. MEDIAWATCH: Rachel Maddow Gives Her First Interview As She Steps Back From The Nightly Grind And Revs Up For Her Next Act, by Vanity Fairs Joe Pompeo, with quite the photo of Maddow chopping wood in a forest and an opening scene with the two ice-fishing in Western Massachusetts. On her new megadeal: Its potentially higher risk, higher reward, right? I think, writ large, if they ended up with, like, a hit award-winning podcast, and a hit movie, and a docuseries, and a serial TV show, and Im covering the State of the Union, and some of the time Im doing The Rachel Maddow Show, thats probably a better deal for them long-run than me just doing TRMS and killing myself and not being able to do anything and, ultimately, having a shorter career because Im burning myself out. Like, Im not becoming a painter.

Roger Waterstalked politics with CNNs Michael Smerconish, including why the Pink Floyd co-founder, now 78 years old, tells fans on his current solo tour of the U.S. that if they hate politics they can F off to the bar. (Waters comes to D.C. to play the Capital One Arena on Aug. 16.)

WHAT PLAYBOOKERS ARE READING: A roundup of the most-clicked links from the past week in Playbook.

1.Jon Stewartsresponse to Tucker Carlson calling him too short to date.

2.Trumpsmessage for Biden after his rebound Covid case.

3. Inside the wild Bedminster lobbying spree that led to Trumps double Missouri endorsement, by Alex Isenstadt

4. Matt Gaetz and the R word: Floridas Democratic primary takes bitter detour, by Gary Fineout

5. A Netflix show starring Keri Russell stirs buzz among U.S. diplomats, by Nahal Toosi

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: Reps. Chip Roy (R-Texas), Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) and Mary Miller (R-Ill.) Robert Mueller Axios Jonathan Swan and Sara Fischer Larry Sabato of the U.Va. Center for Politics (7-0) Reasons Nick Gillespie Ron Christie CNNs Matt Dornic and Dan Merica Andrew Gradison The Atlantics Scott Stossel Allyn Brooks-LaSure Matt Mazonkey of Airbus Alisa Wolking Jordan Heiliczer of the Asian American Hotel Owners Association POLITICOs Maura Forrest Agency IQs Bennie Johnson Jenn Lore London Bruce Friedrich of the Good Food Institute Juven Jacob of Rep. Anthony Browns (D-Md.) office Kimberly Ellis of Monument Advocacy Washington Examiners Breanne Deppisch Alex Kahan Commerces Caitlin Legacki Defense Threat Reduction Agencys Ryan Callanan Tamika (Day) Mason of House Majority Whip Jim Clyburns (D-S.C.) office Tom McClusky Wesley Derryberry of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati Andrew DeSouza Kirsten Borman Dougherty Matt Lehner Ryan Pettit Kellie Chong Daryn (Frischknecht) Sirrine MSNBCs Hollie Tracz H.W. Brands Alan Keyes Susan Feeney of GMMB former Commerce Secretary Mickey Kantor Martina McLennan of Sen. Jeff Merkleys (D-Ore.) office Brenton Temple Daniel Heuer of Voters of Tomorrow

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POLITICO Playbook: The politics of making history- POLITICO - POLITICO

Buff Bradley still has the photo.

It's of his late father, Fred, in the winner's circle of Dade Park in 1938, soaking in the Henderson, Ky., venue that would become Ellis Park as well as the catalyst behind a life's work. It was at the Pea Patch where Fred Bradley fell in love with Thoroughbred racing, a passion that gave rise to his family's Indian Ridge Farm in Frankfort where he and his son worked to produce the kind of horses that would allow them to experience all the peaks and valleys of this mercurial industry.

In his decades as an owner and breeder, having one of his homebreds prevail in the biggest stakes race at his adopted home track was on par with any aspiration Fred Bradley could have conceived. Hence, when the chestnut filly out of his mare Deputy Doll stepped into the Ellis Park starting gate for the Grade 3 Gardenia Stakes 11 years ago and proceeded to saunter her way into the same winner's enclosure her owner used to visit as a kid, it held more than the obvious level of significance.

My dad grew up at Ellis Park, that was his home track and then when (the Gardenia) became their signature race, it was a race we always looked at, recalled Buff Bradley, who retired from training last year to become Associate of Sales Development at Keeneland. It's their biggest race down there and the fact it's now named after our champion mare, that does feel pretty good. It's special to me becausethat's what started it all for all of us,

More than a decade after Groupie Doll announced herself as one of the best female sprinters of her generation, the race that now bears her moniker will be contested for the eighth time at Ellis Park on Aug. 14, 2022. In 2015, the track announced it was renaming the Gardenia in honor of the Bradleys' champion following a career that saw her annex consecutive editions of the Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1) en route to earning Eclipse Awards for divisional honors in 2012 and 2013.

Before she became known as a four-time Grade 1 winner and the only horse to win two runnings of the Filly & Mare Sprint, Groupie Doll was the pretty daughter of Bowman's Band that Buff Bradley held high hopes for even though her first career start didn't exactly inspire confidence.

Following her debut at Churchill Downs on June 4, 2011, an eighth-place run going five furlongs on the turf, Fred Bradley gently suggested to his son that maybe they should consider dropping the filly in for a claiming tag in her next start. What Buff Bradley had seen from Groupie Doll in the mornings, however, told him that first outing should be forgiven. After breaking her maiden next time out on the Churchill main track, she proceeded to continuously raise the bar on every expectation placed upon her copper shoulders.

In her third career start and first visit to Ellis Park, she ran her rivals off their feet during an 8 1/2-length triumph in a seven-furlong allowance test that July. When the decision was made to try her against older mares the following month in the one-mile Gardenia, it spoke to the level of confidence the Bradleys had faith that subsequently went through the roof when she galloped to a three-length triumph that day.

We always liked her and even before she ever ran the first time, we thought she would be a nice enough filly, said Bradley, who trained Groupie Doll and campaigned her along with his father and partners Carl Hurst and Brent Burns. The first time she ran was on the turf and she looked like deer in the headlights, she was just kind of like 'What's going on here.' I remember my day saying after the race 'You can drop her if you want to because I didn't see much,' and I said, 'Yeah, but I see it every day. She's going to get another shot.' And obviously the rest is history.

We knew that she was moving forward leaps and bounds obviously (heading into the Gardenia). I never like thinking too far ahead but we had already thought about that race when she won the non-winners of two and won impressively. And she was the only 3-year-old in the race that year too.

It would be eight months after her Gardenia triumph before Groupie Doll would earn another stakes victory, but when she did have another high-end breakthrough it came in eye-opening fashion. In April 2012, she notched the first of her four top-level wins when she captured the Madison Stakes (G1) at Keeneland, besting a field that included 2011 champion female sprinter Musical Romance.

That triumph kicked off a run of five straight victories for Groupie Doll, a streak that culminated with her first Breeders' Cup heroics at Santa Anita Park and only ended when Stay Thirsty edged her by the narrowest of nostrils in that November's Cigar Mile Handicap (G1).

She would go to the sidelines for nearly eight months at the conclusion of her 2011 championship campaign and when she did resurface, the Gardenia was again tapped as the spot for the Bradleys to showcase their stable star to the masses. Whereas she emerged from her first Gardenia run with questions about how good she could possibly be, however, her third-place finish in the 2013 edition of the race sparked some whispers that maybe her heralded form was now missing a step.

Just as he was insistent after her career debut that there was more there than the result suggested, Buff Bradley exited that Gardenia as emboldened as ever.

I think we were disappointed for about five minutes, he said. She hadn't even walked up to the top of the stretch before going back to the barn and we just kind of caught ourselves and said, 'Hey she made her run, she showed us that she's back.' The initial blow of not winning maybe caught us right there because you're expecting to win, you want to win. But we caught our heads and got really positive again real quickly. We knew that race was going to move her forward.

I had people just questioning me that maybe she'd lost a step, maybe she's not as good. I said let me tell you, this filly couldn't be any better than she is right now.

Three starts later, Bradley didn't need to convince anyone of how exceptional Groupie Doll was. She returned to Santa Anita and again departed with Breeders' Cup hardware having bested future champion Judy the Beauty by a half-length for her second Filly & Mare Sprint crown.

In the days that followed, another whirlwind of emotion would hit her connections when Groupie Doll was sold to Mandy Pope's Whisper Hill Farm for $3.1 million at the 2013 Keeneland November Breeding Stock Sale. She would retire after a final career victory in the Hurricane Bertie Stakes (G3) in February 2014, providing the Bradleys with one last image of her in the winner's circle and giving Fred Bradley full realization of a dream that first manifested at the Western Kentucky track he called home.

You know, when she won the Breeders' Cup, that was my relief. I felt like I could breathe, Buff Bradley said. I knew that she had done what we wanted her to do. I knew what she could do, and I just wanted her to prove it.

Read more:

History, Family, And Groupie Doll: Buff Bradley Reflects On Impact Of Ellis Park - Horse Racing News - Paulick Report