Please Tokyo, No More Provocation Between Beijing and DC
Tokyo 11.11am (Sept. 21) / DC 11.11pm (Sept. 20)
The irony here is that for all the criticism Rahm Israel Emanuel is so inspired by China he adopted their "wolf warrior" diplomacy. He's even called "America's warrior diplomat". Imitation is after all the sincerest form of flattery. America's efforts to block China's rise will be futile. Instead, the US can better serve its own and the world's interests by pursuing greater cooperation with China. There is still time but it’s starting to look like Joe Biden will leave a very poor foreign policy legacy. Confusion reigns and gets worse every month, sometimes not because Biden but because ambassador(s). Foreign policy like any other policy should be judged in terms of its effectiveness. What is the use of this declaration ? What is its goal? Beyond maybe some domestic profit or personal satisfaction.
President Joe Biden’s aides have asked that Rahm Israel Emanuel, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, stop posting messages on social media taunting Chinese President Xi Jinping, according to three administration officials. Just 3 days ago, a high-ranking meeting between Chinese FM Wang Yi and NSA Adviser Jake Sullivan, also Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, was held in Valletta, Malta, to follow up a talk between Biden and Prime Minister Li Qiang in the middle of G20 Summit in New Delhi.
DC was inviting Ambassador Rahm and several Chief of Staff or former occupant in the US Presidency, for a secret dinner.
Officials at the National Security Council told Emanuel's staff in recent days that his comments risk undermining the administration’s efforts to mend deeply strained relations with China, including with a possible meeting this fall between Biden and Xi, according to the officials.
Over the past two weeks Emanuel, who served as White House chief of staff to former President Barack Obama, has criticized Xi directly and sarcastically speculated about the Chinese leader’s treatment of his top aides, using the hashtag “#MysteryInBeijingBuilding.”
Rahm Emanuel sees it as his mission to pick fights with China because it makes him look like a tough guy, continuing to break diplomatic protocol in a very crass and swaggering way. Another star from the Pompeo school of diplomacy.
Emanuel’s tweets are “not in keeping with the message coming out of this building,” a White House official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the issue.
In his address to the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, Biden struck a conciliatory tone when it comes to America’s rivalry with China. The U.S., he said, is “ready to work together with China on issues where progress hinges on our common efforts.”
"We seek to responsibly manage the competition between our countries so it does not tip into conflict," Biden added.
It was a markedly different message than the one Emanuel has recently conveyed publicly. “President Xi’s cabinet lineup is now resembling Agatha Christie’s novel And Then There Were None,” the ambassador wrote on Sept. 7 on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, referring to the disappearance of China’s foreign minister earlier this year and more recently its defense minister. “Who’s going to win this unemployment race? China’s youth or Xi’s cabinet?”
The administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said China has been furious about Emanuel’s posts.
Is China the first nation to rise to Superpower status without the application of military oppression of other countries, colonialism or subversive political regime change in other countries? If so, then they are worthy of the role of global leadership. Everyone says "if you want peace prepare for war" ("Si vis pacem, para bellum") but it's actually one of the most idiotic sayings in history. It's been proven time and time again that there's a self-fulfilling prophecy aspect to preparing for war (like the famous "security dilemma") and what you get is war. Truth is: if you want peace, prepare for peace. To get peace you need to actively work at it.
100 incidents of Chinese nationals “gate-crashing” US military bases over several years seems a bit less ominous when you get to the part about 10,000 people who aren’t supposed to be there being turned away from US bases every day. A significant share of the China panic stories lose most of their terror once you’re able to place them in context.
Okinawa governor tells U.N. that U.S. military base threatens peace", asking "the world to witness" that the US "proceed [with building the base] despite the fact that it was clearly opposed by Okinawan voters in a democratically held referendum." The U.S. military presence in Okinawa is a blight on the prefecture, one of Japan's poorest, where a majority of the population are indigenous Ryukyuan peoples. Pollution, drunk hit-and-runs & sexual assault by U.S. soldiers, etc. People there have wanted the U.S. gone for years.
“Ambassador Emanuel is serving with distinction as an uncommonly effective representative of the United States in Japan. Every day his inventiveness, passion and relentlessness are on full display,” Kurt Campbell, deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for the Indo-Pacific, said in an interview.
He continued, “This guy is a superstar and when you put Rahm on the field you get the full Rahm.”
When asked about news that a virus-like threat could infect President Joe Biden's administration, Mayor Lori Lightfoot wore a pained expression on her face.
"I don't have any opinion about that," she said.
By "that," Lightfoot was referring to reports that Biden might offer a spot on his Cabinet to Rahm Emanuel, her mayoral predecessor whose administration orchestrated what a lot of Chicagoans call the cover-up of Laquan McDonald's murder.
I don't understand why Lightfoot claimed neutrality. Emanuel's abysmal failure as Chicago's mayor inspired Lightfoot to quit her City Hall appointment to announce plans to run against him.
Maybe Lightfoot held back because she didn't want to openly embarrass the president-elect's transition team insiders who floated the idea of appointing Emanuel as U.S. secretary of transportation to The New York Times by telling the whole truth: Biden would be better off without Rahm's political baggage.
And Rahm's got a lot.
It's no secret Emanuel was co-architect of the "three strikes" crime bill that led to the mass incarceration of African Americans — which Biden has called a "mistake" he regrets backing as a U.S. senator. In 1996, Emanuel advised former President Bill Clinton to "claim and achieve record deportations of criminal aliens." He was the architect of the North American Free Trade Agreement that sent American jobs across borders, and so-called welfare reform that only made extreme poverty worse.
But, let's face it, that's old news on a long list of reasons there should be a ban on appointing Emanuel to any job that gives him a say in public policy.
It's the state in which Emanuel left Chicago that is the most troubling part of his legacy, and a harbinger for the damage he can do when entrusted with power. His administration treated Chicago as if it were two cities — one for the rich and powerful, another for the poor and forgotten.
Chicagoans remember how often Emanuel bragged of attracting an always increasing number of tourists from around the world, while turning a blind eye to the exodus of Black families fleeing neighborhoods neglected by City Hall.
As mayor, Emanuel closed the most public schools in American history and shut down half of the city's mental health centers, most of them in poor and minority neighborhoods.
Emanuel catered to the rich and famous. His administration squandered millions of dollars in federal funding pushing Elon Musk's high-speed train tunnel to O'Hare International Airport that died before the digging started. He funneled billions of taxpayer dollars skimmed from public schools and the park district to developers building the rich part of town.
And Emanuel would have given away a corner of Chicago's precious lakefront land — and millions more taxpayer money — for "Star Wars" creator George Lucas' private museum, if a righteous lawsuit didn't stop him.
During Emanuel's tenure, he hit homeowners with the biggest property tax increase in our city's history, raised fines and fees that hurt poor folks the most, and made the city's bad deals with money-grubbing parking meter and red-light camera companies worse.
And let's not overlook Emanuel's lacking judgment on who was best to lead Chicago's efforts on everything from improving schools and reforming the police department to managing public housing.
His hand-picked public schools chief, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, went to federal prison for pocketing.
The guy Emanuel promised would restore trust in the Chicago Police Department, former Superintendent Eddie Johnson, only made matters worse. He got fired for lying to Mayor Lightfoot about the night cops found him passed out behind the wheel after a boozy night of kissy-face with an officer — who wasn't his wife and who recently filed a lawsuit accusing him of years of sexual assault.
Emanuel's choice to lead the Chicago Housing Authority board, John Hooker, has since been implicated (but not charged) in a bribery scheme in which, according to a federal deferred-prosecution agreement, ComEd dolled out jobs and money to win legislative favors from Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.
Emanuel's pick to run the Chicago Board of Education, Frank Clark — ComEd's chief executive when the feds say the bribery scheme began — was named in a federal subpoena served on Madigan. And the FBI is currently investigating a dirty $1 billion custodial contract approved when Clark was board of education boss.
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