Tuesday, December 15, 2020
Barr shielded Trump from Congress, Mueller and the law, but couldn't save him from voters
Barr's legacy of presidential supremacy
► Almost his first act in office was to defend Trump by wildly mischaracterizing Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report. That report credibly collected evidence that the president had obstructed justice and laid out extensive evidence of connections between the Trump campaign and Russian actors. In defending the president against these claims. Barr sank into obfuscation and outright misdescription.
Not content with misstating the law, Barr also took operational control of defending the president’s political image. He personally directed law enforcement and military officials to clear Lafayette Square of protesters last summer so that Trump could walk across the part and have a Bible-holding photo op in front of St. John’s Church.
► Diverging from the long-standing practice of attorney general neutrality, Barr injected himself into the presidential election, warning that if Biden won, the United States would be “irrevocably committed to the socialist path.”
He interfered in the criminal investigation of Trump confidants Roger Stone and Michael Flynn to protect the interests of the president. In Stone’s case he sought to get Stone a lighter sentence. In Flynn’s he sought to dismiss criminal charges to which Flynn had already pled guilty. In both cases, career prosecutors at the Department of Justice resigned in protest at Barr’s political interference.
► He likewise politicized the criminal investigation process by continuing a seemingly-unending investigation into the Russian investigators — an inquiry he has now sought to entrench by the appointment of a special counsel in a manner that is clearly intended to limit the discretion of the incoming Biden-appointed attorney general.
DOJ in ruins:Trump and Barr wrecked the Justice Department. Here are 6 ways Joe Biden can fix it.
► He refused to recognize the lawful authority of Congress to conduct oversight of the executive branch. On Barr’s watch, Trump’s Department of Justice has fought every subpoena issued by Congress, sometimes on the fanciful ground that the president is absolutely immune from congressional review.
But most fundamentally, Barr served Trump by promoting the principle that the president is above the law. At every turn, Barr has advanced a view that the executive branch is not restrained by our constitutional system of checks and balances and that the president is not subject to criminal review of his actions. Here, perhaps, Barr most closely mirrors Cromwell, whose view of royal supremacy is an almost perfect analog for Barr’s view of presidential supremacy.
Barr is the Cromwell of the Trump era
In the end, Cromwell lost his head because he could got give Henry the one thing Henry wanted most desperately — a male heir. It simply proved impossible, and for the sin of failing to achieve the impossible, Cromwell was removed and executed.
Barr, likewise, has lost his job because of his failure to do the impossible. Confronted with the hard reality that there was no evidence of significant fraud in this election — indeed that it was, as Trump’s cybersecurity chief put it, “the most secure election in history” (for which apostasy he, too, got fired) — Barr simply could not conjure an alternate reality in which Donald Trump won reelection.
2020 election watershed:Barr finally met a Trump lie he couldn't swallow
And for that failure Barr, like Cromwell, met the fate of all failed loyalists, discarded on the ash heap of history where his memory will deservedly be that of a faithful subordinate to a failed leader. The best thing that can be said of him — quite literally the very best — is that he refused to join other Republican leaders as they followed Trump like lemmings off the cliff of electoral authoritarianism. His refusal to influence the election by announcing an investigation of Hunter Biden, combined with his refusal to call the election a fraud, show that even for the most devoted adherents there are lines they cannot or will not cross. But after all of Barr’s failures that have gone before, that is modest praise, indeed.
And so, William P. Barr’s legacy is this: He is the Thomas Cromwell of our age.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/12/15/barr-blind-loyalty-not-enough-to-save-trump-from-voters-column/3904158001/
Pakistan Army is now an echo chamber — look at what it did to ex-ISI chief Asad Durrani
The ex-ISI chief was punished not for disclosing any secret, but for analysing the tantalising event of the 2011 American operation in Abbottabad to kill Osama bin Laden.
When Field Marshal Sir Claude John Eyre Auchinleck returned to India in 1943 as the commander-in-chief of the military, one of his goals was to ‘Indianise’ the force while ensuring high levels of professionalism. Though the demands of performing in the Second World War obfuscated his plans to move away from limiting recruitment to the ‘martial races’, he developed a culture of professionalism that made it imperative for the armed forces to analyse every operation, including failures, for future benefit.
Reading the recently published opinion article by the former head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Lt. General (retd) Asad Durrani, it seems that Pakistan’s military has deviated from the culture of questioning its actions and carrying out analysis. General Headquarters of Pakistan Army in Rawalpindi is no longer interested in critical evaluation even if it is from one of its own. The current leadership has reached the new milestone of tightly locking itself up in an echo chamber and not tolerating dissent. A senior retired officer like Durrani fears for his life and has been constrained from traveling to meet family. This is in addition to him being hauled up in front of an inquisition regarding his books, especially Spy Chronicles, which he co-authored with the former chief of India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), A.S. Dulat, and his pension being stopped for a while.
Durrani’s punishment
Durrani was punished not for disclosing any secret, but for analysing the tantalising event of the 2011 American operation in Abbottabad to kill al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The general retired in 1993, which means he wasn’t privy to any secret, but could still analyse based on his knowledge of his institution. Perhaps due to his pride in the military, he could not believe that the Pakistan Army could be caught with its pants down. And so, he claimed in an interview to Al Jazeera that the top generals negotiated the Osama bin Laden operation with the Americans. While the interview was ignored, Durrani repeating this claim in the book angered army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa, who was totally sidetracked by his political ego. Durrani’s theory about the Abbottabad operation took attention away from what the army chief was trying to do – tell the world that former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had hurt national interests by disclosing to the newspaper Dawn that the world was concerned about Pakistan’s involvement with militant groups and extremism.
The jury on how much the army top brass knew about the American operation is still out. In his recently published book The Promised Land, former US President Barack Obama claims that it was a secret kept from Pakistan because some of its intelligence personnel were deeply connected with the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Former army chief General Ashfaq Kayani seems to have only demanded that Washington come clean about the operation after it was all done. None of this means that the generals at the helm of the Pakistan Army did or did not have more details. We will probably have to wait many more years when American records get declassified to get a clearer picture. Durrani, and many other officers like him, might eventually get disappointed as they realise that the military high command continued to sleep during the operation, as they did during the outbreak of the 1965 war with India.
Impact of the Durrani leak
However, Durrani’s article is important due to six factors. First, there is unrest in the larger military fraternity of Pakistan caused by actions of the new generation of generals. Second, there is an indication of a shift in the army’s culture. The institution has strayed away from its tradition of showing respect to the senior command, and even the retired ones. What started under General Pervez Musharraf in the form of criticising Lt. General Ali Quli Khan in his book has come full circle with a senior retired general being mercilessly hounded.
Third, the article says a lot about the military’s socialisation process. Power is maintained not just through distribution of perks and privileges, a system that Durrani criticises as being abused by the top brass, but also by revoking security clearance of officers that are seen as having stepped out of line. While Asad Durrani’s clearance was withdrawn for using his pen instead of the sword, Maj. General (retd) Mahmud Durrani lost his clearance that would enable him to attend functions where the chief would be present probably for his admission that Ajmal Kasab was a Pakistani citizen. There are many more stories waiting to be told about how men may retire from their respective services but can never return to civilian life.
Fourth, Durrani seems to have exposed the working of General Bajwa’s cabal, the influence of former generals, and the petty-mindedness behind the targeting of a senior retired officer. The former spy chief came out guns blazing about corruption of the military leadership, especially the story of General Beg extracting money from a Karachi banker, Younis Habib, to finance an ISI operation against Benazir Bhutto’s government. I remember my own interview with General Beg for my first book on Pakistan’s arms procurement decision-making at his think tank in Rawalpindi, in which he confessed that this was not the first time that the ISI had got money from private entrepreneurs. Intriguingly, Beg also managed to extract resources from the Germans, who continue to be a significant European source for financing both kosher and dubious think tank activities in Pakistan. The picture that emerges then is of a military with issues at the top.
Fifth, such close-mindedness means that the top-brass lacks capacity to deviate from their traditional behaviour, and are not capable of any strategic policy review. This means they are more likely to get stuck geo-politically and politically in situations from which they will be unable to extricate themselves. Finally, the institution’s capacity to harm people, including its own officers, has multiplied.
The building of an echo-chamber
Durrani published his thoughts in an Indian news blog probably because because he didn’t think it would be printed in Pakistan. He timed it well to further expose the shallowness of the existing top brass that is confronted with mounting political opposition to its hybrid rule formula. His article is a rap on Bajwa’s knuckles, and could become painful if it gets circulated widely in military circles. In his novel Honour Among Spies, Durrani shows the army chief exiting from the office, which is not a probability in real life except in case of a coup by another general. But additional pressures could be consequential for Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed’s future, whose desire to become the next army chief is no secret.
The Durrani leaks tell us about the growing weakness of an institution that has made it a habit not to expose itself to critical examination or alternative views. This particular problem dates back to the Musharraf years, when any discussion of the Kargil operation and shooting down of Pakistan Navy’s Breguet Atlantic maritime patrol aircraft at war colleges was totally forbidden. At that time, any discussion that took place was by the larger security community and in the country’s media. However, over the years, this became a bad habit with the military shifting from not listening to alternative views to gagging voices and planting views that would echo its own. The 14-15 think tanks in Islamabad mostly say what is approved. This creates the problem of an echo chamber that only regurgitates what the military leadership wants to hear.
There is a larger problem at the back of this behaviour: the proclivity of military leadership to generally consider itself like Caesar’s wife — above questioning. It tends to enforce its sensitivity on society as a fact of life. From a command-and-control perspective, such sensitivity is tricky. From the Pakistan Army punishing its own general for reviewing his institution’s performance to the Indian Air Force chief complaining about something minor in a Netflix series, this kind of behaviour implies that military leadership is not open to the idea of evaluation, or even laughter. In the process, it’s a bid to create a special category for the military as an institution that cannot be examined.
Surely, modern militaries are technologically advanced and more complex, which makes control difficult. The myth-building about their service to the nation and how critical they are for ensuring security to the State then puts them at a pedestal where questioning becomes relatively difficult. This is not easy to ignore because it presents a long-term issue for civil-military relations. The sensitivity of the military is negotiated through the society with the legitimacy of politicians, depending upon the respect they show their armed forces.
Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, the leader of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), was told not to allow any discussion of the 1971 debacle and the military’s performance. He ensured silence, but paid with his own life. The survival of politics makes it vital for societies and polities to engage with the armed forces and treat them as one of the institutions, rather than the only one.
https://theprint.in/opinion/pakistan-army-is-now-an-echo-chamber-look-at-what-it-did-to-ex-isi-chief-asad-durrani/566966/
PDM is united against this selected government - Bilawal Bhutto Zardari
Chairman PPP said that it is our tradition and custom that we sympathize to the bereaved family at the time of grief and sorrow and express solidarity with them. He said that he had gone to meet Shahbaz Sharif to condole with him on his mother’s death who recently passed away. He said that this selected Prime Minister and his government does not have courage to hear the truth. This is probably the only government in the world in which current and former leaders of opposition are languishing in prison without any conviction namely Shahbaz Sharif and Syed Khursheed Ahmed Shah respectively. President Zardari was kept in prison for 12 years without any conviction. This is against democracy and human rights. Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that this is the reason the democracy has not progressed in this country.
He said that the government is unable to control price-hike and economically Pakistan is continuously suffering. In democracy the government and the opposition both put forward their view points and a way to stabilize the economy is found but unfortunately this selected government refused the democratic way to solve the problems. We had asked Imran Khan to become prime minister of Pakistan but he refused to take this advice and chose to become prime minister of PTI. We want to restore the real democracy in Pakistan as Imran Khan has sent critique of his policies to prison whether politician or media men.
Responding to questions by the journalists, Chairman PPP said that all the parties of PDM are on one page and one stage and our target is the same to send this puppet home. The resignations have to be submitted to the party leadership by 31 December and these resignations are our atom bomb which we will use from the platform of PDM. He said that there are puppets in this government from speaker of the assembly to the chief minister Punjab. We cannot have dialogue with the puppets. When the leader of opposition is not allowed to talk on the floor of assembly then what national dialogue the government is talking about, he asked. Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that the message for Imran Khan is loud and clear that he should resign. We will go to every nook and corner of Punjab and the country to mobilise people against this selected government. The mobilization is increasing by the day.
Today Pakistani economy is worst than Afghanistan and in this situation Imran Khan will have to resign. Imran khan has made institutions disputed and the integrity of institutions is being harmed by Imran Khan. This selected prime minister makes hue and cry about corruption but the entire corrupt are in his cabinet. The thieves of sugar, flour, K-electric, Malam Jabba, BRT etc are with him. Imran Khan is protecting them all. Funds from Israel and India are in the foreign funding case against Imran Khan.
Chairman PPP Bilawal Bhutto Zardari - Bloodshed of the innocent children and martyrs of Army Public School, Peshawar will continue to shake the conscience of the entire nation
Bilawal Bhutto Zardari paid glowing tributes to the innocent souls whose loss shook the nation, adding that it is the responsibility of the state and the government to prove that terrorists are not more powerful than them, and to provide justice, bringing long deserved solace to grieving families.
کراچی: بلاول ہاؤس کے سامنے گاڑی میں نصب بم برآمد
کراچی کے علاقے کلفٹن میں بلاول ہاؤس کے سامنے کھڑی گاڑی میں بم نصب ہونے کی اطلاع پر بم ڈسپوزل اسکواڈ پہنچ گیا جس نے بم برآمد کر کے ناکارہ بنا دیا۔
پولیس کے مطابق چلتی ہوئی گاڑی میں میگنیٹک بم چپکایا گیا تھا، مذکورہ گاڑی میں غیر ملکی سوار تھے، جنہیں محفوظ مقام پر منتقل کر دیا گیا ہے اور ان سے تفتیش کی جا رہی ہے۔
پولیس کو بم کی اطلاع ون فائیو مددگار پر دی گئی تھی جس پر پولیس نے بم ڈسپوزل اسکواڈ کو طلب کر لیا تھا۔
ایس ایس پی ساؤتھ زبیر نذیر نے بتایا کہ بم ڈبل کیبن گاڑی میں نصب کیا گیا تھا، یہ گاڑی بلاول ہاؤس کے سامنے بینک کے سامنے کھڑی تھی۔
ایس ایس پی ساؤتھ نے یہ بھی بتایا کہ بم والی گاڑی کی نشاندہی ہونے کے بعد پولیس نے 200 میٹر کے علاقے کو گھیر لیا تھا جبکہ مذکورہ گاڑی اور علاقے سے لوگوں کو ہٹا دیا گیا تھا۔