Former Vice President Dick Cheney died at 84 surrounded by his family following complications from pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease.
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Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who served under President George W. Bush during the 9/11 attacks and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, has died at 84, his family announced Tuesday.
The former vice president died due to complications of pneumonia and cardiac and vascular disease, his family said.
“For decades, Dick Cheney served our nation, including as White House Chief of Staff, Wyoming’s Congressman, Secretary of Defense, and Vice President of the United States,” a family statement reads.
Vice President Dick Cheney in his West Wing office at the White House, Jan. 25, 2007, in Washington, D.C.(Charles Ommanney/Getty Images)
“Dick Cheney was a great and good man who taught his children and grandchildren to love our country, and to live lives of courage, honor, love, kindness and fly-fishing. We are grateful beyond measure for all Dick Cheney did for our country. And we are blessed beyond measure to have loved and been loved by this noble giant of a man.”
He had a long history of cardiac problems, including five heart attacks. He received a heart transplant on March 24, 2012, at a Virginia hospital after nearly 21 months on a waiting list.
Cheney, who served as vice president for two terms under President George W. Bush, was one of the most powerful and controversial men ever to hold that position. He was a driving force behind America’s “war on terror,” including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and also known for his penchant for secrecy. A hero to hawkish conservatives, he was a villain to liberals and Democrats. Hillary Clinton once compared him to Darth Vader.
A son of the American West, Cheney went from the plains of Casper, Wyoming, to a decades-long public career as a Republican congressman, defense secretary, White House chief of staff and one of the most powerful American vice presidents ever.
FILE – Vice President Dick Cheney makes remarks to 4,000 Army soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division returning from duty in Iraq during a “Welcome Home Rally,” Oct. 16, 2006, at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.(TIM SLOAN/AFP via Getty Images)
In the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks, he never expressed doubt about his support for indefinite detention for alleged terrorist prisoners or even about waterboarding.
“I feel very good about what we did,” he told Fox News in 2008. “If I was faced with those circumstances again, I’d do exactly the same thing.”
In May 2011, after the death of Osama Bin Laden, Cheney called it a “very good day” for the U.S. but warned the country was “still at war” with terrorists and should not “let down our vigilance.”
After the election of Democratic President Barack Obama in 2008, Cheney, still a face of his party, became one of the new president’s most prominent critics, attacking his foreign policy and accusing him of being soft on terrorism. In addition to his decades-long political career, Cheney also worked in the oil industry as chairman and chief executive officer of the Halliburton Company, from 1995 until he returned to politics in 2000.
In 1968, he moved to Washington as a congressional fellow and in 1969 became a staff assistant in the Richard Nixon administration.
FILE – Former President George W. Bush, right, shakes hands with former Vice President Dick Cheney after Cheney introduced Bush during the groundbreaking ceremony for the President George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2010. (AP Photo/LM Otero, file)
From 1975–77, he was chief of staff for Nixon’s successor, Gerald Ford. In 1978 he was elected to the House of Representatives from Wyoming and served six two-year terms, rising to become minority whip. Cheney was popular in Congress, noted for his integrity and civility.
He next became Secretary of Defense under President George H. W. Bush, with the Senate confirming him unanimously, from 1989–93.
After Bush failed to win re-election, Cheney went to the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, and then to Halliburton.
FILE – Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, left, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Colin Powell, huddle prior to testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Thursday, Feb. 21, 1991 on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/John Duricka, file)
He was elected vice president in 2000 and 2004 on the ticket with George W. Bush and flourished as one of Bush’s inner circle of advisers on defense and foreign policy.
He also actively promoted expanding the powers of the presidency. In August 2011, he released a memoir, “In My Time.”
He was born on Jan. 30, 1941, in Lincoln, Nebraska, and grew up in Casper, Wyoming, where he captained his high school football team and married his high school sweetheart, Lynne Vincent, in 1964.
He is survived by Lynne Vincent, two daughters, Elizabeth and Mary, and seven grandchildren.
Michael Dorgan is a writer for Fox News Digital and Fox Business.
You can send tips to michael.dorgan@fox.com and follow him on Twitter @M_Dorgan.
The initial batch of projects will include three water harvesting dams and three land reclamation initiatives, according to an Iraqi water resources official.
Iraq signed a deal with Turkey on Sunday under which water infrastructure projects to be carried out by Turkish firms will be financed with revenue from oil sales, a Turkish official said.
The Iraqi prime minister’s office said in a statement that the two countries had signed an accord on an implementation mechanism for a water cooperation agreement that they sealed last year. It did not provide details on the mechanism.
New committee to be established for projects
Iraq’s government will establish a committee for water infrastructure projects and invite bids for them from Turkish companies, with payments for the projects to be financed by revenue from Iraqi oil sales to Turkey, the Turkish official said.
The initial batch of projects expected under the agreement includes three water harvesting dam projects and three land reclamation initiatives, an Iraqi water resources official said.
The original framework water agreement was signed in April 2024 during a visit to Baghdad by Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, which marked a new phase of better relations between the two neighbors after years of strained ties.
Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sign mutual agreements during their meeting in Baghdad, Iraq April 22, 2024. (credit: Ahmad Al-Rubaye/Pool via REUTERS)
Scarce water resources in Iraq have long been an issue between the two countries, with around 70% of Iraq’s water resources flowing from neighboring countries, especially via the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers. Both flow through Turkey.
BAGHDAD (Reuters) -Iraq signed a deal with Turkey on Sunday under which water infrastructure projects to be carried out by Turkish firms will be financed with revenue from oil sales, a Turkish official said.
The Iraqi prime minister’s office said in a statement that the two countries had signed an accord on an implementation mechanism for a water cooperation agreement that they sealed last year. It did not provide details on the mechanism.
Iraq’s government will establish a committee for water infrastructure projects and invite bids for them from Turkish companies, with payments for the projects to be financed by revenue from Iraqi oil sales to Turkey, the Turkish official said.
The initial batch of projects expected under the agreement includes three water harvesting dam projects and three land reclamation initiatives, an Iraqi water resources official said.
The original framework water agreement was signed in April 2024 during a visit to Baghdad by Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, which marked a new phase of better relations between the two neighbours after years of strained ties.
Scarce water resources in Iraq have long been an issue between the two countries, with around 70% of Iraq’s water resources flowing from neighbouring countries, especially via the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers. Both flow through Turkey.
(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu in Ankara and Ahmed Rasheed in Baghdad; Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by Jan Harvey)
BASRA,Iraq (Reuters) -At least two workers were killed in an oil pipeline fire in Iraq’s Zubair oilfield on Sunday, oilfield officials said.
There was no impact on oil flows, they said, with throughput currently at 400,000 barrels per day.
The blaze, which also seriously wounded five workers, erupted while a group of workers were conducting welding operations near the pipeline, the officials said.
Firefighters were working to extinguish the fire, which broke out on a section of the pipeline that transports crude oil from the Zubair field to nearby storage tanks.
Some of the injured workers suffered severe burns and remain in critical condition, raising concerns that the incident could result in more fatalities, the officials said.
The fire has not impacted production operations, but it needs to be extinguished quickly to avoid a partial shutdown of some loading operations, one of the officials said.
(Reporting by Aref Mohammed in Basra and Ahmed Rasheed in Baghdad; Editing by Tom Hogue)
Washington surprised as cannabis mogul appointed ambassador to Middle East Country amid tension
Considering the delay in rescheduling, it is a bit of surprising and positive news a cannabis mogul appointed ambassador to Middle East country. yes, Mark Savaya, a Michigan businessman best known for his Leaf & Bud marijuana dispensary chain and ubiquitous billboards around Detroit, may become the new special envoy to the Republic of Iraq. The pick, announced on Trump’s Truth Social, landed like a Twitter storm: part hometown booster move, part political reward, and part diplomatic wildcard.
Savaya’s rise is the kind of American-story headline editors love. An Iraqi-born Chaldean who built a visible cannabis brand in Metro Detroit, he became a local celebrity for aggressive billboard marketing and a social-media presence pushing his products — and his persona — into the public eye. His Leaf & Bud outlets and “Mark Savaya Collection” branding have been the subject of local debate and municipal attention.
The background matters for two reasons. First, Savaya has been politically active in Michigan and a visible backer of the current presideent’s campaign efforts in the state — a factor the White House explicitly referenced when explaining the appointment. Second, his cannabis ties present an awkward optics clash: the U.S. appointee’s business is legal under Michigan state law but remains illegal under federal law, while Iraq enforces some of the region’s toughest drug penalties.
Why Iraq makes this appointment a high-stakes headline: U.S.–Iraq ties are layered and fragile. The role of a special envoy historically carries weight — envoys have been central to reconstruction, counterterrorism coordination and high-stakes diplomacy since 2003 — and Baghdad’s politics are a mosaic of sectarian factions, foreign influences, and security challenges. The choice of a non-career political appointee with no formal diplomatic resume has prompted questions in both Baghdad and Washington about what the administration expects Savaya to accomplish.
And then there’s the cannabis angle. Iraq’s law is unforgiving: recreational and medical cannabis are illegal, and penalties for possession, trafficking and cultivation can be severe under Iraqi statutes and long-standing narcotics laws. That stark legal contrast — an American envoy whose public brand is tied to cannabis, representing U.S. interests in a country who criminalizes it — is likely to be raised in Baghdad’s briefings and in public reaction.
What to watch next: how Baghdad and Baghdad’s partners (including the Kurdistan Regional Government) publicly receive Savaya; whether his appointment is purely symbolic outreach to Iraqi-American communities and voters in Michigan, or whether he’ll be given a clear, policy-driven brief; and how the White House manages the optics of a cannabis entrepreneur handling sensitive Middle East diplomacy. For young readers and beat-followers, this is less a culture-war curiosity and more a case study in modern patronage diplomacy — where brand, social capital, and partisan loyalty can land you in a geopolitically delicate job.
The appointment is real, it’s provocative, and it underscores how unconventional pathways to influence are reshaping U.S. diplomacy — for better or worse — at a moment when Iraq’s stability and the U.S. role there remain anything but settled.
DUBAI (Reuters) -Iran has scrapped a cooperation deal that it signed with the UN nuclear watchdog IAEA in September, its Supreme National Security Council Secretary said on Monday, according to state media.
The statement came around three weeks after Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araqchi, said Tehran would scrap the agreement, which let the IAEA resume inspections of its nuclear sites, if Western powers reinstated U.N. sanctions.
Those were reinstated last month.
The confirmation will be a setback for the International Atomic Energy Agency which has been trying to rebuild cooperation with Tehran since Israel and the United States bombed the nuclear sites in June.
“The agreement has been cancelled,” Larijani said while meeting with his Iraqi counterpart in Tehran, according to state media.
“Of course, if the agency has a proposal, we will review it in the secretariat,” he added.
(Reporting by Elwely Elwelly; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) -A suspect has been identified in the murder of an anti-Islam campaigner in Sweden in January, the public prosecutor said on Monday, a case that the Swedish prime minister has said might have links to foreign powers.
“We have a good picture of the sequence of events and after extensive technical investigations and review of obtained surveillance footage,” the prosecutor said in a statement. “At present, the suspect’s whereabouts are unknown.”
The statement did not name the suspect.
Court documents obtained by Reuters showed the suspect was a 24-year-old Syrian man who lived in Sweden at the time of the murder. It said Koran-burner Salwan Momika had been shot three times and the killing “had been preceded by careful planning”.
A detention hearing was set for Friday in a district court – a procedure under Swedish law prior to the issuance of an international wanted notice for the suspect.
Momika, an Iraqi refugee who frequently burned and desecrated copies of the Koran at public rallies, was shot dead in a town near Stockholm hours before the verdict in a trial where he stood accused of “offences of agitation against an ethnic or national group”.
Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said in January, referring to the killing, that “there is obviously a risk that there is a connection to a foreign power”.
The Koran burnings, seen by Muslims as a blasphemous act as they consider the Koran to be the literal word of God, drew widespread condemnation and complicated Sweden’s NATO accession process, which was eventually completed in 2024.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in 2023 that people who desecrate the Koran should face the “most severe punishment” and that Sweden had “gone into battle array for war on the Muslim world” by allegedly supporting those responsible.
Sweden in 2023 raised its terrorism alert to the second-highest level and warned of threats against Swedes at home and abroad after the Koran burnings. It was lowered back to three on a scale of five earlier this year.
(Reporting by Johan Ahlander; editing by Niklas Pollard and Mark Heinrich)
Washington — House Republicans voted Wednesday to repeal the legal justifications used to attack Iraq in 1991 and 2003, the latest attempt by Congress to revoke the president’s authority to wage war.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have long questioned leaving the authorizations in place, arguing it allows presidents to abuse their power.
The House adopted the measure in a 261 to 167 vote. It was supported by 212 Democrats and 49 Republicans. The bipartisan amendment is linked to the annual National Defense Authorization Act, which passed later Wednesday. The amendment was sponsored by Democratic Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York and Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas.
During floor debate, Meeks said the authorizations are “long obsolete” and “risk abuse by administrations of either party.”
“It is time for Congress to reclaim its constitutional authority over matters of war and peace,” Meeks said.
Republican Rep. Brian Mast of Florida, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he was objecting to the amendment for “procedural reasons.”
“We have, I think, probably large agreement on reasons to sunset things,” Mast said. “But it should not be done in absence of doing something of this gravity in the proper way.”
A similar measure passed the Democratic-controlled Senate in 2023, with the support of 48 Democrats and 18 Republicans. But it never received a vote in the Republican-controlled House.
In the House, 219 Democrats and 49 Republicans voted to repeal the 2002 authorization in 2021. But it stalled in the Senate. Both chambers had a Democratic majority at the time.
Congress adopted the 2002 authorization ahead of the March 2003 invasion of Iraq that led to the toppling of Saddam Hussein’s regime. The 1991 authorization was approved during the Gulf War.
“We should not be operating under a 23-year-old authorization of the use of military force,” Roy said. “We don’t need to have Congress effectively modern-day declaring war and leaving it in place for a quarter of a freaking century, or in this case, 34 years since 1991.”
In 2020, Mr. Trump used the 2002 authorization as part of the legal justification for an airstrike that killed Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad.
Caitlin Yilek is a politics reporter at CBSNews.com, based in Washington, D.C. She previously worked for the Washington Examiner and The Hill, and was a member of the 2022 Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellowship with the National Press Foundation.
Archaeologists in drought-hit Iraq have discovered 40 ancient tombs after water levels in the country’s largest reservoir declined, an antiquities official said Saturday.
The tombs, believed to be over 2,300 years old, were unearthed at the edges of the Mosul Dam reservoir in the Khanke region of Duhok province in the country’s north.
“So far, we have discovered approximately 40 tombs,” said Bekas Brefkany, the director of antiquities in Duhok, who is leading the archaeological work at the site.
Archaeologists in drought-hit Iraq have discovered 40 ancient tombs after water levels in the country’s largest reservoir decreased, a local antiquities official said.
ISMAEL ADNAN/AFP via Getty Images
His team surveyed the area in 2023 but only spotted parts of a few tombs.
They were only able to work on the site when water levels dropped “to their lowest” this year, Brefkany said.
In recent years, archaeologists have uncovered ruins dating back thousands of years in the same area, as a result of droughts that have plagued Iraq for five consecutive years.
“The droughts have significant impact on many aspects, like agriculture and electricity. But, for us archaeologists… it allows us to do excavation work,” Brefkany said.
The newly discovered tombs are believed to date back to the Hellenistic or Hellenistic-Seleucid period, according to Brefkany.
Bekas Brefkany, director of the Dohuk Antiquities Department, poses for a picture next to a grave unearthed on the banks of Mosul Dam on an archaeological site in the Khanke sub-district of Dohuk Governorate.
ISMAEL ADNAN/AFP via Getty Images
He added that his team is working to excavate the tombs to transfer them to the Duhok Museum for further study and preservation, before the area is submerged again.
Iraq, which is particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change, has been facing rising temperatures, chronic water shortages and year-on-year droughts.
Authorities have warned that this year has been one of the driest since 1933 and that water reserves were down to only eight percent of their full capacity.
They also blame upstream dams built in neighbouring Iran and Turkey for dramatically lowering the flow of the once-mighty Tigris and Euphrates, which have irrigated Iraq for millennia.
Earlier this year, archaeologists in Egypt unveiled the millennia-old tombs of three senior statesmen, identified by inscriptions left on the tombs. The three sites in the city of Luxor date to the New Kingdom era, Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities said on social media, which ranged from about 1550 to 1070 B.C.
The sudden reason for the arrest of Lahur Talabany is not clear but it casts a potential shadow over the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.
A gun battle took place in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq’s Sulimaniyeh overnight between Thursday and Friday as security forces sought to arrest an opposition party leader.
The raid by the security forces targeted Lahur Talabany, who had previously been a senior leader within the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan party. However, he was pushed out in 2021 and has recently led a party called the People’s Front. The arrest of Talabany in the wake of the clashes and members of his party has raised eyebrows across Iraq with calls for an end to the violence.
Shadow looms over Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
The sudden reason for the arrest of Lahur Talabany is not clear but it casts a potential shadow over the PUK and Sulimaniyeh.
The PUK is the second largest Kurdish party in the Kurdistan region. It is strongest in Sulimaniyeh, sometimes known as “Suli,” a city near the Iranian border. The other large Kurdish party, the KDP, is strongest in Erbil which is West of Suli. In general the two parties are led by key members of two families, the Barzanis in the KDP and the Talibanys in the PUK.
People sit in a vehicle with flags of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) on it, as their Kurdish supporters celebrate after the voting is closed for the Iraq’s Kurdistan region parliamentary election, in Sulimaniyeh, Iraq October 20, 2024 (credit: REUTERS/AKO RASHEED)
“On Thursday, a court issued an arrest warrant for Talabany. Soon after news of the warrant broke, images of military vehicles patrolling city streets were shared on social media and by evening, security forces had surrounded Lalezar Hotel in the west of the city, home to Talabany’s party headquarters,” Rudaw media noted on Friday. “Aras Sheikh Jangi, brother of Lahur Talabany, predicted that blood would be shed that night,” the report noted.
Around 400 or 500 armed men had holed up with Lahur at his headquarters. The security forces of the PUK-led region were led by the Counter-Terrorism Group. Talabany is a former leader of the CTG.
The report noted that “Talabany, also known as Lahur Sheikh Jangi, was ousted in 2021 as co-chair of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) by his cousins Bafel and Qubad Talabani. He later founded the opposition party Baray Gal. The PUK is the ruling party in Sulaimani.” The autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, who is also deputy leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), called for calm. “I am working with all parties to end these tensions and prevent bloodshed and violence,” he said in a statement.
Later, the office of president of the KRG, Nechirvan Barzani, also put out a statement. “Following the unfortunate incident early this morning in Sulimaniyeh, which regrettably resulted in a number of casualties, we emphasize the rule of law and the protection of the city’s security and peace, as well as safeguarding the lives and property of citizens. It is necessary that all disputes and conflicts be resolved through law and without violence.”
In the wake of the battle, as the smoke cleared on Friday, it became clear several people had been killed, including a bodyguard affiliated with Lahur and his brothers; as well as members of the security forces. One of those killed was named as Ari Sheikh Suad Talabany, a member of the Counter-Terrorism Group. The Iraqi government has said it also regrets the violence in northern Iraq.
Internal Kurdish fighting weakens the region’s stance
US officials, members of the UN and others in Iraq are concerned. The officials in Erbil are concerned that the clashes in Suli could harm the entire region. This is because internal Kurdish fighting weakens the region’s stance in relation to Baghdad. Similar intrigue, for instance, caused the PUK to fold in the face of threats to Kirkuk by the federal government in 2017. The result was that Peshmerga of the KDP and PUK both withdrew from the city rapidly as the Iraqi army advanced. At the time Bafel had emerged as a leader of the PUK. For many years the leader of the PUK was Jalal Talabany, known locally as Mam Jalal. He died in October 2017 leading to power struggles within the party.
In the wake of the battle against Lahur and his supporters a number of his condidants were arrested. These reportedly included his two brothers Aso and Polad Sheikh Jangi as well as others. A channel linked to Lahur, called Zoom, was also raided after the clashes. There are concerns about the aftermath of the clashes in Suli. “Bafel went too far and no one will believe his story for arresting Lahur,” a senior Iraqi Kurdish government advisor told Al-Monitor.
Lahur was once a rising star in Kurdish politics. Back in 2016 a profile at the Insight International noted his key role in countering terrorism over the years. It noted how he had played a role in confronting Ansar al-Islam, an extremist group in the early 2000s. Later he rose to play a key role in the war on ISIS as the chief intelligence official in Suli.
The report noted that “[Lahur] Talabani co-founded the CTG in late 2002 with his cousin, Bafel Talabani – has now evolved into a sophisticated anti-terror agency.” His rise and fall from playing a key role against terrorism from the 2000s through the war on ISIS, to being arrest by the same counter-terrorism forces he once led, is a reversal of fortune for the Kurdish leader.
Republicans turned Tim Walz’s outing at a dog park nearly three years ago into an attack on the Democratic vice presidential nominee this week, working on a false online narrative to paint Walz as a liar.
The intended takeaway was that Walz somehow lied about the identity of his dog, Scout, by describing two different dogs as his beloved pet in separate X posts. Social media users shared screenshots of the posts as alleged proof that the Minnesota governor exhibits a pattern of deceit, garnering thousands of likes, shares and reactions across platforms.
In one post, from June 2022, Walz is pictured hugging a black dog. The caption reads, “Sending a special birthday shoutout to our favorite pup, Scout.” The other, posted in October 2022, showed Walz beside a brown and white dog with the caption: “Couldn’t think of a better way to spend a beautiful fall day than at the dog park. I know Scout enjoyed it.”
In response, Walz supporters shared posts on social media showing that Walz was simply playing with someone else’s dog while mentioning Scout in the caption.
The seemingly innocuous post was not the only fodder that has been used against Walz in recent days. A joke he cracked in a campaign video with Vice President Kamala Harris about eating “white guy tacos” was used to accuse him of lying about how much he seasons his food. Opponents have also taken issue with Walz describing himself as a former high school football coach, pointing out that he was the defensive coordinator.
False and misleading claims of such a trivial nature might not seem particularly harmful, but a deluge of them could easily add up to real damage at the polls, according to experts. This is especially true when they go after a figure such as Walz, who is still relatively unknown on the national stage, though the fact that he is not at the top of the ticket could lessen the impact on the Harris-Walz campaign.
“It might seem trivial, and in some cases they really truly are, but they’re trying to make a larger attack about character that fits in a bigger narrative that is being created around this persona,” Emily Vraga, a professor at the University of Minnesota who studies political misinformation, said of the recent attacks on Walz. “This becomes kind of a piece of the puzzle they’re trying to assemble.”
She added that “the sheer amount” of false claims can create the perception that there is some truth to them, even if voters don’t believe every single one.
Nathan Walter, an associate professor at Northwestern University who also studies misinformation, agreed that any one piece of misinformation doesn’t have to be significant in order to be damaging.
“The idea is to attack someone’s personality, and then these attacks become really almost like the canary in the coal mine, right?” he said. “So if he lies about his dog, if he lies about his illustrious career as a coach, he probably lies about many other things.”
Democrats have recently deployed a similarly shallow line of attack on the Republican ticket, Ohio Sen. JD Vance and former President Donald Trump, branding the pair as “weird.”
Mixed in with the frivolous attacks on Walz is criticism about other inconsistencies. For example, earlier this month Walz went after Vance by saying, “If it was up to him, I wouldn’t have a family because of IVF.” But his wife Gwen Walz issued a statement last week that disclosed they had relied on a different fertility treatment known as intrauterine insemination, or IUI.
What to know about the 2024 Election
Walz’s military record has also faced intense scrutiny from the right. One such concern is that he portrayed himself as someone who spent time in a combat zone when speaking out about gun violence in 2018. “We can make sure that those weapons of war, that I carried in war, is the only place where those weapons are at,” he said at the time.
Walz never served in a combat zone during 24 years in the Army National Guard, but held many other roles. They included work as an infantryman and field artillery cannoneer, as well as a deployment to Italy in a support position of active military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Vraga described the more superficial attacks as a “spaghetti approach,” in which Republicans are throwing out a lot of claims to see if they stick in place of a meatier narrative, dominating online discourse in the meantime. Plus, the idea that Walz is a liar “plays into this established worldview that we have about politicians as untrustworthy,” according to Walter.
Even in the polarized political climate of 2024, where many people on all sides hold strong beliefs unlikely to be changed by online name-calling, negative campaigning has the potential to repel potential voters altogether.
Such attacks could be used to demobilize voters, especially those who are not deeply engaged. “You might just start feeling like, why bother with politics at all?” Vraga said. “It’s just nasty.”
JERUSALEM — A year after Hamas’ fateful attack on southern Israel, the Middle East is embroiled in a war that shows no signs of ending and seems to be getting worse.
Israel’s retaliatory offensive was initially centered on the Gaza Strip. But the focus has shifted in recent weeks to Lebanon, where airstrikes have given way to a fast-expanding ground incursion against Hezbollah militants who have fired rockets into Israel since the Gaza war began.
Next in Israel’s crosshairs is archenemy Iran, which supports Hamas, Hezbollah and other anti-Israel militants in the region. After withstanding a massive barrage of missiles from Iran last week, Israel has promised to respond. The escalating conflict risks drawing deeper involvement by the U.S., as well as Iran-backed militants in Syria, Iraq and Yemen.
When Hamas launched its attack on Oct. 7, 2023, it called on the Arab world to join it in a concerted campaign against Israel. While the fighting has indeed spread, Hamas and its allies have paid a heavy price.
The group’s army has been decimated, its Gaza stronghold has been reduced to a cauldron of death, destruction and misery and the top leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah have been killed in audacious attacks.
Although Israel appears to be gaining the edge militarily, the war has been problematic for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, too.
Dozens of Israeli hostages are languishing in Hamas captivity, and a year after Netanyahu pledged to crush the group in “total victory,” remnants of the militant group are still battling in pockets of Gaza. The offensive in Lebanon, initially described as “limited,” grows by the day. A full-on collision with Iran is a possibility.
At home, Netanyahu faces mass protests over his inability to bring home the hostages, and to many, he will be remembered as the man who led Israel into its darkest moment. Relations with the U.S. and other allies are strained. The economy is deteriorating.
Here are five takeaways from a yearlong war that has upended longstanding assumptions and turned conventional wisdom on its head.
A region is torn apart by unthinkable death and destruction
A long list of previously unthinkable events have occurred in mind-boggling fashion.
The Oct. 7 attack was the bloodiest in Israel’s history. Young partygoers were gunned down. Cowering families were killed in their homes. In all, about 1,200 people died and 250 were taken hostage. Some Israelis were raped or sexually assaulted.
The ensuing war in Gaza has been the longest, deadliest and most destructive in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Gaza health authorities say nearly 42,000 people have been killed — roughly 2% of the territory’s entire population. Although they do not give a breakdown between civilians and combatants, more than half of the dead have been women and children. Numerous top Hamas officials have been killed.
The damage and displacement in Gaza have reached unseen levels. Hospitals, schools and mosques – once thought to be insulated from violence – have repeatedly been targeted by Israel or caught in the crossfire. Scores of journalists and health workers have been killed, many of them while working in the line of duty.
Months of simmering tensions along Israel’s northern border recently boiled over into war.
A growing list of Hezbollah officials – including the group’s longtime leader — have been killed by Israel. Hundreds of Hezbollah members were killed or maimed in explosions of pagers and walkie-talkies. Israel’s ground offensive is its first in Lebanon since a monthlong war in 2006.
Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah has displaced tens of thousands of Israelis and over 1 million Lebanese. Israel promises to keep pounding Hezbollah until its residents can return to homes near the Lebanese border; Hezbollah says it will keep firing rockets into Israel until there is a cease-fire in Gaza.
The leaders of Hamas and Israel appear in no rush for a cease-fire
When the war erupted, the days appeared to be numbered for both Netanyahu and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.
Netanyahu’s public standing plummeted as he faced calls to step aside. Sinwar fled into Gaza’s labyrinth of tunnels as Israel declared him a “dead man walking.”
Yet both men — facing war crimes charges in international courts — remain firmly in charge, and neither appears to be in a rush for a cease-fire.
The end of the war could mean the end of Netanyahu’s government, which is dominated by hard-line partners opposed to a cease-fire. That would mean early elections, potentially pushing him into the opposition while he stands trial on corruption charges. Also looming is the prospect of an unflattering official inquiry into his government’s failures before and during the Oct. 7 attack.
Fearing that, his coalition has hung together even through mass protests and repeated disagreements with top security officials pushing for a deal to bring home the hostages. After a brief period of post-Oct. 7 national unity, Israel has returned to its divided self — torn between Netanyahu’s religious, conservative, nationalist right-wing base and his more secular, middle-class opposition.
Sinwar, believed to be hiding in Gaza’s tunnels, continues to drive a hard bargain in hopes of declaring some sort of victory. His demands for a full Israeli withdrawal, a lasting cease-fire and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for scores of hostages have been rejected by Israel — even as much of the international community has embraced them.
With cease-fire efforts deadlocked and Netanyahu’s far-right coalition firmly intact, the war could go on for some time. An estimated 1.9 million Palestinians remain displaced in Gaza while an estimated 68 hostages remain captive in Gaza, in addition to the bodies of 33 others held by Hamas.
Bitter enemies experience the limits of force
Early in the war, Netanyahu promised to destroy Hamas’ military and governing abilities.
Those goals have been achieved in many ways. Israel says it has dismantled Hamas’ military structure, and its rocket barrages have been diminished to a trickle. With Israeli troops stationed indefinitely in Gaza, it is difficult to see how the group could return to governing the territory or pose a serious threat.
But in other ways, total victory is impossible. Despite Israel’s overwhelming force, Hamas units have repeatedly regrouped to stage guerrilla-style ambushes from areas where Israel has withdrawn.
Across the Middle East, bitter enemies are witnessing the limits of force and deterrence.
Israel’s deepening invasion of Lebanon and repeated strikes on Hezbollah have failed to halt the rockets and missiles. Missile and drone attacks by Iran and its allies have only deepened Israel’s resolve. Israel is vowing to strike Iran hard after its latest missile barrage, raising the likelihood of a broader, regionwide war.
Without diplomatic solutions, the fighting is likely to persist.
Israel and Gaza will never be the same
Israel is still deeply traumatized as people try to come to terms with the worst day in its history.
The Oct. 7 killings and kidnappings had an outsized impact on a tiny country founded in the aftermath of the Holocaust. Israelis’ sense of security was shattered, and their faith in the military was tested like never before.
Photos of Israeli hostages are everywhere, and mass demonstrations are held each week calling on the government to reach a deal to bring them home. The prospect of ongoing war looms over families and workplaces as reserve soldiers brace for repeated tours of duty.
The trauma is far more acute in Gaza – where an estimated 90% of the population remains displaced, many of them living in squalid tent camps.
The scenes have drawn comparisons to what the Palestinian call the Nakba, or catastrophe – the mass displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians during the war surrounding Israel’s creation in 1948. The Palestinians now find themselves looking at a tragedy of even greater scale.
It remains unclear when displaced Palestinians in Gaza will be able to return home and whether there will be anything to return to. The territory has suffered immense destruction and is littered with unexploded bombs. Children are missing a second consecutive school year, virtually every family has lost a relative in the fighting and basic needs like food and health care are lacking.
After a hellish year, the Palestinians of Gaza have no clear path forward, and it could take generations to recover.
Old formulas for pursuing Mideast peace no longer work
The international community’s response to this bloodiest of wars has been tepid and ineffective.
Repeated cease-fire calls have been ignored, and a U.S.-led plan to reinstate the Palestinian Authority in postwar Gaza has been rejected by Israel. It remains unclear who will run the territory in the future or who will pay for a cleanup and reconstruction effort that could take decades.
One thing that seems clear is that old formulas will no longer work. The international community’s preferred peace formula – the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel – seems hopelessly unrealistic.
Israel’s hard-line government opposes Palestinian statehood, says its troops will remain in Gaza for years to come and has further cemented its undeclared annexation of the West Bank. The internationally recognized Palestinian Authority has been pushed to the brink of irrelevance.
For decades, the United States has acted as the key mediator and power broker in the region – calling for a two-state solution but showing little political will to promote that vision. Instead, it has often turned to conflict management, preventing any side from doing anything too extreme to destabilize the region.
This approach went up in smoke on Oct. 7. Since then, the U.S. has responded with a muddled message of criticizing Israel’s wartime tactics as too harsh while arming the Israeli military and protecting Israel against diplomatic criticism. The result: The Biden administration has managed to antagonize both Israel and the Arab world while cease-fire efforts repeatedly sputter.
This approach has also alienated the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, complicating Kamala Harris’ presidential aspirations. The warring sides appear to have given up on the Biden administration and are waiting for the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election before deciding their next moves.
Whoever wins the race will almost certainly have to find a new formula and recalibrate decades of American policy if they want to end the war.
In an operation last month, Iraqi forces and American troops killed a senior commander with the Islamic State group who was wanted by the United States, as well as several other prominent militants, U.S. Central Command and Iraq’s military said on Friday.
The Aug. 29 operation in Iraq’s western Anbar province also involved members of the Iraqi National Intelligence Service and Iraq’s air force.
Among the more than a dozen militants killed in the operation was an ISIS commander from Tunisia, known as Abu Ali Al-Tunisi, for whom the U.S. Treasury Department had offered $5 million for information. Also killed was Ahmad Hamed Zwein, the Islamic State deputy commander in Iraq.
In a statement, U.S. Central Command identified two other ISIS leaders killed as Ahmad Hamid Husayn Abd-al-Jalil al-Ithawi, responsible for all ISIS operations in Iraq, and Shakir Abud Ahmad al-Issawi, responsible for overseeing military operations in western Iraq.
Friday’s announcement was not the first news of the operation.
Officials previously reported two weeks ago that the U.S. military and Iraq had launched a joint raid targeting suspected ISIS militants in the country’s western desert that killed at least 15 people and left seven American troops hurt.
CENTCOM said Friday that a total of 14 “ISIS operatives” were killed in the operation, and the Iraqi military said that the 14 were identified after DNA tests were conducted. U.S. and Iraqi authorities did not clarify the identity of the 15th person who was allegedly killed.
Five of the American troops were wounded in the raid itself, while two others suffered injuries from falls during the operation. One who suffered a fall was transported out of the region, while one of the wounded was evacuated for further treatment, a U.S. defense official said at the time, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss details of the operation that had not yet been made public.
In Friday’s announcement, the Iraqi military said the operation also confiscated weapons and computers, smart phones and 10 explosive belts.
The Islamic State group seized territory at the height of its power and declared a caliphate in large parts of Iraq and Syria in 2014, but was defeated in Iraq in 2017. In March 2019, the extremists lost the last sliver of land they once controlled in eastern Syria.
At its peak, the group ruled an area half the size of the United Kingdom where it enforced its extreme interpretation of Islam, which included attacks on religious minority groups and harsh punishment of Muslims deemed to be apostates.
Despite their defeat, attacks by ISIS sleeper cells in Iraq and Syria have been on the rise over the past years, killing and wounding scores of people.
Earlier Friday, the U.S. Central Command said its forces killed an ISIS attack cell member in a strike in eastern Syria. It added that the individual was planting an improvised explosive device for a planned attack against anti-IS coalition forces and their partners, an apparent reference to Syria’s Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.
In August last year, the U.S. had agreed to enter into talks to transition U.S. and anti-ISIS coalition forces from their long-standing role in assisting Iraq in combating ISIS. There are approximately 2,500 U.S. troops in the country, and their departure will take into account the security situation on the ground, and the capabilities of the Iraqi armed forces, officials have said.
Iraq has postponed censuses several times in almost three decades because of the security situation in the country.
Iraq will impose a two-day curfew in November for the country’s first census in 27 years, officials said.
“[The] curfew will be imposed in all provinces of Iraq on November 20 and 21 to conduct a population census,” Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said in a statement on Sunday.
Local media reports said various measures have been approved for the process, including finalising coordination with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) for the training of statistical staff.
Also, the process will receive support from multiple ministries in providing classrooms and youth centres for staff training, reports added.
Ravaged by decades of conflict and violence, Iraq has postponed a census several times, most notably in 2010 because of tensions over disputed territories.
The last general census was held in 1997 in 15 Iraqi provinces – excluding the three northern provinces that make up the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.
Iraq has regained some semblance of stability in recent years, despite sporadic violence and political turmoil.
Current estimates put the country’s population at about 43 million.
Iraqi authorities have partnered with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) for the upcoming census.
The initiative “plays a crucial role in equipping Iraq with accurate demographic information, facilitating effective policymaking, and promoting inclusive growth,” the agency has said.
In the past, Iraq held a census every 10 years. A count could not be organised in 2007, when the country was embroiled in sectarian violence.
The United States military and Iraq launched a joint raid targeting suspected Islamic State group militants in the country’s western desert that killed at least 15 people and saw seven American troops hurt, officials said Saturday.
For years after dislodging the militants from their self-declared caliphate across Iraq and Syria, U.S. forces have continued fighting the Islamic State group, though the casualties from Friday’s raid were higher than others in previous ones.
The U.S. military’s Central Command alleged the militants were armed with “numerous weapons, grenades, and explosive ‘suicide’ belts” during the attack, which Iraqi forces said happened in the country’s Anbar Desert.
“This operation targeted ISIS leaders to disrupt and degrade ISIS’ ability to plan, organize, and conduct attacks against Iraqi civilians, as well as U.S. citizens, allies, and partners throughout the region and beyond,” Central Command said, using an acronym for the militant group. “Iraqi Security Forces continue to further exploit the locations raided.”
It added: “There is no indication of civilian casualties.”
An Iraqi military statement said “airstrikes targeted the hideouts, followed by an airborne operation.”
“Among the dead were key ISIS leaders,” Iraq’s military said, without identifying them. “All hideouts, weapons and logistical support were destroyed, explosive belts were safely detonated and important documents, identification papers and communication devices were seized.”
A U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss details of the operation yet to be made public, told The Associated Press that five American troops were wounded in the raid, while two others suffered injuries from falls during the operation. One who suffered a fall was transported out of the region, while one of the wounded was evacuated for further treatment, the official said.
“All personnel are in stable condition,” the official said.
It wasn’t immediately clear why it took two days for the U.S. to acknowledge it took part in the raid. Iraq did not say the U.S. took part in the operation when initially announcing it, as politicians debate the future of having American troops in the country. There are approximately 2,500 U.S. troops in Iraq.
Since the U.S. toppled dictator Saddam Hussein with its 2003 invasion of Iraq, the country has struggled to balance relations between America and neighboring Iran. Since the Israel-Hamas war broke out, Iraqi militias allied with Iran have targeted U.S. forces there, leading to American airstrikes targeting them.
At its peak, the Islamic State group ruled an area half the size of the U.K. It attempted to enforce its extreme interpretation of Islam, which included attacks on religious minority groups and harsh punishment of Muslims deemed to be apostates.
A coalition of more than 80 countries led by the United States was formed to fight the group, which lost its hold on the territory it controlled in Iraq in 2017 and in Syria in 2019.
Iraqi officials say that they can keep the ISIS threat under control with their own forces and have entered into talks with the U.S. aimed at winding down the mission of the U.S.-led military coalition in Iraq.
TENSIONS in the Middle East have long been a fluctuating and dangerous area of global concern.
Conflict between Israel and Palestine in the Gaza Strip, West Bank and on Israeli territory itself is nothing new.
Iran and Israel have long been in conflict with each other too.
But after a brutal terrorist attack by Hamas on Israeli soil in October last year, things entered a new phase.
Israel hit back like never before, unleashing almost ten months of ground warfare and airstrikes on the decimated enclave in a bid to destroy Hamas and rescue its hostages.
The Iran-backed terror group had killed some 1,200 Israeli people and kidnapped 250 more in the hideous October 7 massacre.
The UN estimates that at least 39,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the fresh war there broke out.
This figure includes data from the health ministry in Gaza which falls under Hamas domain and has sparked concerns from officials about accuracy.
Now, after almost ten months of war in Gaza, tensions have appeared to enter an all new high after a series of deadly strikes and high-profile assassinations in late July and early August.
Less than two days later, at around 2am on Wednesday July 30, Israel killed Hamas’ top political leader Ismail Haniyeh as he slept in Iran’s capital Tehran.
Israel has yet to explicitly claim responsibility for the hit, but after vowing to take out all of Hamas last year, they are widely believed to be behind it.
US officials have also said they suspect Israel of being behind the assassination.
Unnamed Iranian officials also shared the explosive theory with The Telegraph, further confusing the murky details around Haniyeh’s death.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), concluded its investigation into the humiliating security breach on Saturday August 1 and said he died after a “short-range projectile” was fired from outside the building.
A statement shared on Iranian state TV said a 7kg rocket warhead was used in the attack.
Iran and its proxy groups; Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen all vowed to seek revenge on Israel over the assassination of Haniyeh.
Then, on the night of Saturday August 3, Hezbollah fired some 30 rockets from Lebanon towards Galilee in northern Israel.
Tel Aviv’s impressive Iron Dome Defence system launched into action, destroying “most” of the missiles and no one was hurt.
But the UK, US and France have all urged their citizens to evacuate from Lebanon as fears of a wider war breaking out in the region continue to spiral.
Chuck Rotenberry served in Iraq and Afghanistan and returned home with post-traumatic stress disorder. He encouraged veterans confronting PTSD to not give up hope.
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BAGHDAD — Iraqi authorities on Saturday were investigating the killing of a well-known social media influencer, who was shot by an armed motorcyclist in front of her home in central Baghdad.
Ghufran Mahdi Sawadi, known as Um Fahad or “mother of Fahad,” was popular on the social media sites TikTok and Instagram, where she posted videos of herself dancing to music and was followed by tens of thousands of users.
An Iraqi security official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak to the media, said that the assailant opened fire as Sawadi parked her Cadillac in front of her house on Friday, killing her, then took her phone and fled the scene.
The killing took place in Zayoona, the same neighborhood where a prominent Iraqi researcher and security expert Hisham al-Hashimi was gunned down in 2020. Before the U.S. invasion of 2003, the neighborhood was home to military leaders and considered a prestigious area in Baghdad. In recent years, many militia leaders have taken up residence there.
Sawadi isn’t the first prominent social media figure to be gunned down in central Baghdad. Last year, Noor Alsaffar or “Noor BM,” a transgender person with a large social media following, was also fatally shot in the city.
A neighbor of Sawadi who identified himself only by his nickname, Abu Adam or “father of Adam,” said he came out to the street after hearing two shots fired and saw “the car’s door open and she was lying on the steering wheel.”
“The woman who was with her (in the car) escaped, and security forces came and sealed off the entire area, and they took the victim’s body and towed her car,” he said.
In Iraq, the role of social media influencers has broadened from promoting beauty products and clothing to government projects and programs. Official government invitations classify these influencers as key business figures at sports, security and cultural gatherings.
Videos featuring a prominent influencer during the 93rd anniversary on Thursday of the Iraqi air force’s founding sparked a backlash, with many criticizing the Ministry of Defense for allowing them to record and publish videos from sensitive military sites. The ministry defended itself, saying that in the era of social media, like defense ministries worldwide, it uses influencers alongside traditional media to communicate with the public.
Last year, an Iraqi court sentenced Sawadi to six months in prison for posting several films and videos containing obscene statements and indecent public behavior on social media as part of a recent push by the Iraqi government to police morals.
Separately on Saturday, the Iraqi parliament passed an amendment to the country’s prostitution law — widely criticized by human rights groups — that would punish same-sex relations with a prison term ranging from 10 to 15 years. A previous version of the law would have imposed the death penalty.
The law also bans any organization that promotes “sexual deviancy,” imposing a sentence of at least seven years and a fine of no less than 10 million dinars (about $7,600).
The acting parliamentary speaker, Mohsen Al-Mandalawi, said in a statement that the vote was “a necessary step to protect the value structure of society” and to “protect our children from calls for moral depravity and homosexuality.”
Rasha Younes, a senior researcher with the LGBT Rights Program at Human Rights Watch, said the law’s passage “rubber-stamps Iraq’s appalling record of rights violations against LGBT people and is a serious blow to fundamental human rights, including the rights to freedom of expression and association, privacy, equality, and nondiscrimination.”
A report released by the organization in 2022 accused armed groups in Iraq of abducting, raping, torturing, and killing lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people with impunity and the Iraqi government of failing to hold perpetrators accountable.
Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) tore into the Senate’s approval of a $95 billion aid package to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan during a speech to the chamber earlier this week. He compared the narrative to propaganda used to draw America into the Iraq War.
History, he believes, is repeating itself. And it’s repeating itself on the same level of incompetence when it comes to dealing with the region.
“There is another historical analogy that I think is worth pointing out, and that is the historical analogy of the early 2000s,” Vance railed.
“Now, in 2003, I was a high school senior, and I had a political position back then: I believed the propaganda of the George W. Bush administration that we needed to invade Iraq, that it was a war for freedom and democracy, that those who were appeasing Saddam Hussein were inviting a broader regional conflict.”
“Does that sound familiar to anything that we’re hearing today?” he asks. “It’s the same exact talking points 20 years later with different names. But have we learned anything over the last 20 years? No, I don’t think that we have.”
Sen. @JDVance1 compares the propaganda from the establishment that pushed us into the Iraq War, to the propaganda pushing for unlimited funding and escalation in Ukraine today 🔥🔥🔥
Senator Vance said that today’s Ukraine propaganda is similar to that surrounding the Iraq War. That, by beating the war drums, we will achieve success rather than engaging in competent diplomacy.
“We learned that if we talk incessantly about World War II, we can bully people and cause them to ignore their basic moral impulses and lead the country straight into catastrophic conflict,” he laments.
The Congress today says we must provide endless military aid to Ukraine to avoid further war, and to stop greater death and destruction.
In the early 2000s, they gave us the ‘weapons of mass destruction’ excuse. A narrative that we must fight to stop greater death and destruction. That argument led to a nearly 9-year war in Iraq that cost countless military and civilian lives.
Likewise, the war in Afghanistan lasted so long that some of the people who fought in it weren’t even born yet on 9/11.
Critics of the Iraq war and the preceding intelligence failure involving weapons of mass destruction have become more prevalent.
The war effort was authorized at the time by a bipartisan vote in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate in October 2002.
The Iraq War resolution passed the House by a vote of 296-133, and the Senate 77-23.
But those votes were based on faulty intelligence. Are we operating in Ukraine under the same faulty talking points and information?
Former President George W. Bush made one of the all-time Freudian slips in 2022 when he attempted to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and accidentally stepped on a rake.
Former President George W. Bush: “The decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean of Ukraine.” pic.twitter.com/UMwNMwMnmX
Speaking on the topic of democracy, Bush condemned Russia where “elections are rigged” and “political opponents are imprisoned or otherwise eliminated from participating in the electoral process.”
Sound familiar?
“The result,” he said, “is an absence of checks and balances in Russia and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq.” Paging Dr. Freud.
Right now there are no checks and balances on US aid to foreign nations. There are no checks and balances on our own border protection.
Vance, meanwhile, slammed European countries for not taking greater responsibility in coming to Ukraine’s aid. Perhaps their propaganda isn’t as effective as our own.
“For three years, the Europeans have told us that Vladimir Putin is an existential threat to Europe,” the senator states. “And for three years, they have failed to respond as if that were actually true.”
The United States Congress though, has continuously been duped into providing an open spigot of taxpayer money to one of the most corrupt nations in Europe.
