Daily Briefing: Wednesdays News of the Week In Review(December 23,2020)

Donald Trump’s Lengthy Humiliation Is a Necessary Gift to the World:  Doug Sounders, The Globe and Mail, Dec. 12, 2020.

“The past six weeks have provided many of us the enjoyable experience of watching Donald Trump losing – badly – in a drawn-out series of public humiliations and serial self-abasements. This spectacle has grown tiresome to some, especially to Americans who face the constant horror of more than 3,000 daily deaths resulting from their President’s incompetent pandemic response. They’d like someone to shut him up, or cancel his social-media feeds, or at least teleport us to Jan. 21, when he will once again become part of the U.S. background noise. But we should resist the temptation to change the channel. It is vitally important that the entire world witnesses his loss and humiliation, his embarrassing tantrums, and his flailing displays of impotence and weakness. To see Donald Trump as a pathetic loser is the most effective imaginable challenge to the phenomenon that’s become known as “global Trumpism.” It has nothing to do with political beliefs or actual leadership styles; strongman leaders drawing on distrust and intolerance have been a 21st-century phenomenon for a decade, most of them inspired and supported by Russian President Vladimir Putin. …”

                                       WEEKLY QUOTES

“Jerusalem is not the cause of the problem, it is the core of the solution.  While some have used the cause of Jerusalem to divide, Jerusalem remains proudly open.” — Jared Kushner, senior adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump at a tree-planting ceremony at the Grove of Nations in Jerusalem a day before he was scheduled to travel on a special diplomatic flight from Israel to Morocco to sign the first documents of the normalization deal between the two countries. (Jewish Press, Dec. 22, 2020)
 
“This is an international issue, I support recognition of Israel.  Educated Muslims need to understand that the Quran and history prove to us that the Land of Israel belongs only to the Jews. King David built the house of God in Jerusalem for the Israelis and not for the Palestinians.” — Pakistani political and religious leader Maulana Muhammad Khan Sherani after announcing at a conference that he supports the normalization of his country with Israel.  (Israel Hayom, Dec. 20, 2020)
 
“For decades, the prevailing assumption was that the world would only see normalized international relations with Israel following a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. But we have proven this assumption wrong. All of us here should think long and hard about what else we may have missed or misinterpreted over the years,” — U.S. Ambassador Kelly Craft in an address to the UN Security Council where she touted the Trump administration’s pursuit of “economic and cultural ties” between Israel and its Arab neighbors. (WIN, Dec. 22, 2020)
 
“No matter what one’s political inclination is, from my point of view, if being a Zionist implies standing up for human rights, it should be considered a badge of honour.” — columnist Avi Benlolo writes.  He responded to the criticism waged against actress Scarlet Johansson for being a Zionist after she released a YouTube video calling for the release of four human rights activists who were arrested after they hosted foreign diplomats to discuss the human rights situation in Egypt. (National Post, Dec. 17, 2020)
 
“An equally blatant instance of the Trudeau government bending foreign policy to pursue special interest politics at home is its reversal of a longstanding commitment that Canada would stand with Israel at the UN, and either vote against, or abstain, when anti-Israel resolutions are raised in the General Assembly. Under Trudeau, Canada at the UN has now routinely begun to vote against Israel. While such votes are largely symbolic, they threaten to rupture Canada’s long-standing friendship with Israel, and could stoke anti-Semitism in Canada, which is already on the rise. It is noteworthy that Canada’s Muslim minority has served as a rich vote bank for the Liberals, which could help explain this damaging U-turn.” – writes columnist Rupa Subramanya.  He noted PM Trudeau’s reversal of behaviour vis-à-vis Israel as one example of many instances wherein the Federal Liberal Party’s “brand of politics fuelled by identity-driven special interests has taken hold in Canada,”  to Canada’s detriment. (National Post, Dec. 18, 2020)
 
“American politics are in shambles. Joe Biden is unequal to the tasks of a president and his election and personal probity are tainted. The Trump phenomenon will not go away whether Donald Trump himself does or not, and in the next four years America will be in a fierce struggle between the left and the centre- right … Canadians are best placed to judge this astonishing spectacle but are not doing so; our media are not as nasty as the American media, but they are just as incompetent. Imitative to some extent of America, as usual, but without the same lengthy legacy of slavery, we are torturing ourselves for imagined shortcomings. … The American crisis confers a huge opportunity on us to emerge creatively from the shadow of that great, turbulent nation. There is not a sign on the horizon that we are doing anything to exploit that opportunity, or are even remotely aware that it exists. Instead, we prattle on about race and gender and climate.” – Political commentator Conrad Black.  (National Post, Dec. 19, 2020)
 
“Last week, while listening to NPR, we heard this: “President Trump continues to lie, saying he won the election, and that fraud was rampant. … President Trump certainly wouldn’t be the first president to lie to the American people. And he probably won’t be the last. But he probably is the first American president to be called a liar by so many large mainstream news organizations in their news accounts. … And the divide among Americans gets even deeper. For … most of the 20th century, the press did not call the president of United States a liar. That wasn’t necessary, because when officials were lying, the press could present contradictory facts and information which was more believable. That let the readers, listeners, and viewers decide for themselves. But today many in the press don’t trust their readers, listeners, and viewers to come to their own conclusions. They believe they must tell the mass audience if someone with political power is lying. What these journalists seem oblivious to is that this can be an insult to their audiences, implying the mere reader isn’t smart enough to determine the truth for himself. … We wish NPR similarly trusted its listeners. We think that podcast tells its listeners more about NPR than it does about Donald Trump.” – Editorial.  (Arkansas Democrat Gazette, Dec. 13, 2020)
 
“That the University of Delaware would have rejected her 2006 dissertation as sloppy, poorly written, non-academic, and barely fit for a middle-school Social Studies classroom (all of which it is) when her husband had been representing its state in the U.S. Senate for more than three decades was about as likely as Tom Hagen telling Vito Corleone that his wife is a fat sow on payday. The only risk to the University of Delaware was that it might strain its collective wrist in its rush to rubber-stamp her doctoral paper. Mrs. Biden could have turned in a quarter-a**ed excuse for a magazine article written at the level of Simple English Wikipedia and been heartily congratulated by the university for her towering mastery. Which is exactly what happened.” – columnist Kyle Smith writing on Jill Biden’s Doctorate in Education and on her insisting on being addressed as Dr. Biden.  (National Review, Dec. 16, 2020)