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https://www.blacklistednews.com/article/78796/a-return-to-normalcy-joe-bidens-vision-of-normal-raises.html

A Return to Normalcy? Joe Biden’s Vision of Normal Raises Concerns

It has already been observed that Joe Biden’s incoming cabinet looks a bit like old wine in new bottles, drawing as it does on veterans from the Barack Obama and even the Bill Clinton administrations. That’s the bad news as it very much looks like business as usual as the Military-Industrial-Congressional-Wall Street kleptocracy is reasserting itself and will be in place for the next four years. Which is not to say that the Donald Trump version thereof was a whole lot different, but Trump was erratic enough to make the power brokers in America nervous, which was presumably enough reason to possibly rig the election and get rid of him.

The four key appointees to the new administration in terms of how the United States confronts the world are the Secretaries of State and Defense, the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and the National Security Advisor. All of Biden’s picks are, if not completely hawkish, at least dedicated to the notion that the U.S. should be actively pre-emptively engaged in democracy promotion and liberal interventionism. If a little regime change is needed here and there, so be it. General Lloyd Austin, who may have trouble in getting confirmed by the Senate as Secretary of Defense, Tony Blinken, Secretary of State presumptive, and DNI Avril Haines have all been involved in making money out of the defense/national security establishment since they have been out of office. There is an assumption among ex-officials in the United States government that lobbying one’s former colleagues to buy products or services that are not needed is a perfectly legitimate semi-retirement avocation. Some, however, do not see it that way and General Austin’s service on the board of major defense contractor Raytheon may have crossed the red line, even for those who are accustomed to looking the other way when corruption looms.

It is assumed that the former torture-prison chief and currently Director of CIA Gina Haspel will be fired either by Donald Trump or by Biden, meaning that that position will also be vacant, likely to be filled by another friend of Clinton/Obama. David Cohen, a former analyst has been spoken of as the likely candidate. He previously served as a widely acknowledged utterly incompetent and out of place Director of Operations, appointed by Barack Obama in 2015 even though he had no real experience in intelligence operations, much less in running the Agency’s Clandestine Service. Unfortunately, incompetence and irrelevancy have never stopped anyone from moving onward and upward in the U.S. government. Quite the contrary.

Some see a silver lining in the clouds, namely a “return to diplomacy” after the debacle of the belligerent dispensationalist Mike Pompeo. Alas Pompeo for all his bluster has not actually started any new wars, while Blinken was the main man behind the bid to overthrow the Syrian government even though it posed no threat to the United States. He has never apologized for the wars he was involved in under Obama and has only regretted that they were not more successful, so we can safely assume that he will continue to do what he can in support of the globalist agenda as well as for the country that he loves best, which is Israel.

And there are also the somewhat more elusive aspects of Democratic Party leadership thinking that will shape the course of the new Administration. Still simmering hatred for Russia over the phony narrative that the Kremlin was behind the 2016 defeat of the execrable Hillary Clinton means that relations with that country will if anything get worse, particularly if the Clintons continue to be a major driving force behind the Democratic National Committee. And then there is China. There is every indication that the Democrats have bought into the China-bashing initiated by Donald Trump and sustained by the conspiracy theory that Beijing both weaponized a virus to destroy Western democracy and threatens “freedom.” Pentagon plans to build up the U.S. Navy to confront China in its own coastal waters while also reshaping the Marine Corps to equip it with breakthrough guided battlefield weapons to confront the “Yellow Menace” will not be reversed by Biden and company.

It can be taken as a given that the Biden/Harris regime will continue America’s Israel-centric foreign policy but it will be interesting to see if they persevere in the Trump program of bribing fringe Arab states to “recognize” Israel. Up until now, Washington’s buying of desperate regimes has included F-35s for the UAE’s Mohammed bin Zayed, canceling of the inclusion on the economy-brutalizing “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list for the military junta of starving Sudan, and now, uniquely, endorsing Morocco’s 45-year-old sovereignty claim over the Western Sahara, a region that has its own government and has become a member state of the African Union. It has also been diplomatically recognized by 84 other governments represented at the U.N. The U.S. is in addition the only state to recognize Israel’s sovereignty over the Syrian Golan Heights while also giving the green light to the Jewish state’s stated intention to declare formal sovereignty claim over most of the occupied State of Palestine. It is unlikely that Biden will seek to reverse those sell-outs and he will not move the U.S. Embassy from Jerusalem back to Tel Aviv.

The Israelis have already warned Biden not to re-enter any U.N. human rights organizations or fund the agency that provides relief to Palestinian refugees. They have also advised him against trying to cut any kind of deal with the Iranians, sending the signal that when it comes to Iran, including assassinations, Israel is in charge. And also, the Biden “plan,” if one can dignify it by using that word, to reengage with Iran is a non-starter. American and Israeli belligerency over the past four years has soured the Iranian people on any kind of rapprochement, with conservatives now politically dominant. They will likely sweep the elections scheduled to be held next year. Biden’s intention to get the Iranians to abandon their sophisticated missile weapons program and their support for Syria in addition to reopening their nuclear sites to U.S. inspectors will also go nowhere. Iran will continue to be enemy number one for the Democrats just as it has been for Trump and his principal financial backer Israel-firster casino magnate Sheldon Adelson.

Joe Biden will certainly have to work hard to equal the interventionist policies entertained by his predecessors in office, but he, of course, has had experience both in Congress and as Vice President in shaping those policies and promoting American “exceptionalism” as we have come to know it. And he will be helped along the way by Tony Blinken, Avril Haines, Jake Sullivan and General Lloyd Austin lest he stray from the established path. The fact is that elections change nothing in Washington but the name plates on the doors.

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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/56054.htm

Deep State media issue Biden with marching orders

A flurry of articles has burnished Russia’s image as America’s “evil enemy.” Then quickly followed a piece in the New York Times, which read like an instruction to President-elect Biden for a more hostile line on Russia.

It’s a one-two sequence: set up a problem, then put forward a solution. This week’s US media choreography has the hallmarks of orchestration by the deep-state apparatus, which the New York Times and others willingly oblige.

First came the “blockbuster” reports claiming that Russian hackers had “penetrated” the heart of US government departments and agencies. As usual, no evidence is presented to back up the sensational claims. A software provider is alleged to have been hacked, various anonymous sources blame it on Russia, news outlets like the NY Times editorialize that it was Kremlin hackers and, before you know it, it snowballs into a “fact” that Russia launched a “sweeping attack” on America.

The purportedly hacked US software, SolarWinds, is used widely across government departments and agencies (how’s that for a security no-no!), and from the above assertion of “fact” that Russia was behind the cyber intrusion, then it follows – but only by implication – that all of the said US departments and agencies have been breached.

On Monday, the NY Times headlined: “Scope of Russia Hack Becomes Clear: Multiple US Agencies Were Hit.”

Well, it’s not at all “clear” because no evidence is provided. And the multiple agencies, which the newspaper implies might be affected, actually declined to give any comment, including the Pentagon, the Department of Homeland Security, National Security Agency and State Department.

“Investigators were struggling to determine the extent to which the military, intelligence community and nuclear laboratories were affected by the highly sophisticated attack,” reported the newspaper.

In other words, the Times is “struggling to determine” evidence to back up its story.

All we have, therefore, is lurid claim, assertion and innuendo, which is pretty-much par for the course of US journalism when it comes to demonizing Russia. In any case, serious journalism abiding by basic reporting standards is not the point. The point is to achieve perception. Perception of Russia as a very, very, bad, bad country that is out to ruin virtuous America.

Members of Congress were suitably outraged by the alleged Russian cyber assault. Top-ranking Democrat Senator Dick Durbin told CNN: “This is virtually a declaration of war by Russia on the United States, and we should take that seriously.” (The last clause suggests the senator is not really convinced by the alleged declaration of war. If it were war, then why would you need to lamely recommend taking it seriously?)

The New York Times was not the only paper to drool over the latest alleged Russia cyber attack at the heart of US government. Joining the media gang-bang was the Washington Post, Reuters, Associated Press, CNN and others. Whenever such a collective reflexive response is elicited one can be excused for thinking there might be orchestration going on.

But it was left to the NY Times, the unofficial media organ of the CIA and other deep-state operatives, to follow up with the gaslighting.

The day after “reporting” the “scope of Russia hack,” the Times ran its instruction for President-elect Joe Biden under the guise of a “news analysis” piece. The headline was: “Biden to Face a Confrontational Russia in a World Changed From His Time in Office”.

It went on to say: “The president-elect will have to assure American national security in ways that will require pushing back on the Kremlin at times and, at others, seeking Russian cooperation.”

Forget the appended sop about “Russian cooperation.” The thrust of the article was telling the incoming Biden administration to adopt a more “unified” policy towards Russia, which ends “the era of bifurcation between the West Wing and the American national security establishment.”

That’s just a verbose way of saying the national security apparatus and President Biden will from now on be working in unison towards confronting Russia, unlike during the Trump administration, when the White House was rather ambivalent about antagonizing Moscow.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is described as being “nakedly hostile to Western interests” and Biden is reminded of his own strident rhetoric during the election campaign when he vowed to “hold the Putin regime accountable for its crimes.”

Never mind that Putin telegrammed his congratulations to Biden this week and called for great cooperation between the US and Russia. That’s hardly the words and sentiments of someone “nakedly hostile,” as the Times would have us believe. Instead they focused on the fact Putin didn't rush the congratulation – like many others did– before Biden was confirmed as president-elect by the Electoral College.

There seems to be ample room for many to speculate over whether this latest US media frenzy in Russia-bashing was triggered by the intelligence agencies, and just in time for Biden’s formal election to the White House by the Electoral College this week.

Not that Sleepy Joe needs any wake-up call on how to be aggressive towards Russia. He has spent his entire career in Congress and previously in the White House as Obama’s vice president being a warmonger, a deep-state asset and Cold War cheerleader.

What is foreboding, however, is the emerging synergy between the anti-Russia agenda that is endemic to the US deep state and the absolute pliability of the new president.