Day: January 22, 2017
Peace Picks January 23-27
- Powerplay: The Origins of the American Alliance System in Asia | Tuesday, January 24 | 3:00pm – 4:30pm | Woodrow Wilson Center | Click HERE to Register Join the Wilson Center’s Hyundai Motor-Korea Foundation Center for Korean History and Public Policy and Asia Program as Georgetown University professor and CSIS Korea Chair Dr. Victor Cha discusses his newest book, Powerplay: The Origins of the American Alliance System in Asia. Dr. Cha investigates the origin of American alliances in Asia, how the system has changed over time, and what must be done to navigate a complex new era of international security. Looking from the time of Truman and Eisenhower, through the Cold War, and into today, he offers a compelling perspective on U.S.-China relations that pays heed to historical and contemporary contexts alike, and argues that the U.S. must maximize stability and economic progress amid Asia’s increasingly complex political landscape. Joining the conversation are Ambassador Stapleton Roy, Founding Director Emeritus of the Kissinger Institute on China and the United States, and Dr. Andrew Yeo, Associate Professor of Politics at the Catholic University of America.
- Understanding ISIS and its Followers | Tuesday, January 24 | 5:30pm – 6:30pm | AEI |
Click HERE to Register In March 2015, The Atlantic magazine ran a cover story titled “What ISIS Really Wants.” The author was Graeme Wood, journalist, correspondent for The Atlantic, and lecturer at Yale University. His reporting and research on ISIS has now become a book, “The Way of the Strangers: Encounters with the Islamic State” (Random House, 2016), which examines the origins, plans, and followers of ISIS. In this Bradley Lecture, Mr. Wood will discuss his firsthand encounters with ISIS’s true believers, which will help clear away common misunderstandings about this distinctive variety of Islam. Please join us for Mr. Wood’s first public lecture on the book in Washington, DC. A reception and book signing will follow. - Libya Beyond ISIS: Prospects for Unity and Stability | Wednesday, January 25 | 10:00am – 11:00am | Carnegie Endowment for International Peace | Click HERE to Register Despite a successful campaign this summer against the self-proclaimed Islamic State in Sirte, a war-weary Libya is still wracked by mounting internal divisions, and its United Nations-backed unity government remains fragile. Jonathan Winer, who has served as the U.S. State Department’s special envoy for Libya, will reflect on his tenure in a tumultuous period, Libya’s prospects for the future, and what the next U.S. administration and the international community can do to help.
- The Iran Deal Under Trump | Wednesday, January 25 | 11:45am – 1:30 pm | Hudson Institute | Click HERE to Register During the campaign, President-elect Donald Trump promised significant changes to U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, centered around a repeal of the Iran Deal. Will he deliver? How would a repeal impact such a highly unstable region? What would it mean for future nuclear nonproliferation efforts? The Hudson Institute will host a panel of experts to analyze the fate of the Iran Deal and examine potential changes to U.S. policy in the Middle East under the incoming administration. Moderated by Suzanne Kianpour of BBC News, the panel will feature Michael Pregent, Hudson Institute adjunct fellow and former U.S. intelligence officer, Trita Parsi, an award-winning author and president of the National Iranian American Council, and Gary Samore, executive director for research at Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. This event will be live streamed on Hudson’s homepage.
- Iranian Attitudes About US-Iranian Relations in the Trump Era | Wednesday, January 25 | 3:30pm – 5:00pm | Atlantic Council | Click HERE to Register The Atlantic Council’s Future of Iran Initiative and the Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland invite you to a panel discussion on Iranian public opinion toward the United States following the election of Donald Trump. The event will present new public opinion data gathered since the election on Iranian attitudes toward domestic and international economic and political issues. In particular, the event will explore current Iranian attitudes toward the recent nuclear agreement, potential changes in US policy toward Iran, the upcoming Iranian president elections, and Iranian economic policy. The conversation includes Ms. Sanam Naraghi-Anderlini, Co-Founder and Executive Director at the International Civil Society Action Network, Dr. Ebrahim Mohseni, Research Scholar at the Center for International and Security Studies at Maryland at the University of Maryland, and Dr. Paul Pillar, Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Studies at Georgetown University.
- Islamists movements in the MENA: Adaptation and divergence | Thursday, January 26 | 6:00pm – 7:30pm | The Elliott School of International Affairs | Click HERE to RegisterIn the post-Arab uprisings political landscape, Islamist movements across the Middle East and North Africa are adapting in unique ways to face challenges from the evolution of Salafi-jihadist movements to local insurgencies and repression. Some – like Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood under President Sissi – have faced severe domestic and regional repression disrupting their organization, ideology and strategy. Others have found new opportunities, whether in formal politics or as members of military coalitions. These structural changes have produced an intriguingly diverse array of responses at the ideological, strategic and organization level.This panel, including Khalil al-Anani, Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, Monica Marks, University of Oxford, Jillian Schwedler, Hunter College CUNY, and Eva Wegner, University College Dublin, will seek to address timely questions such as: what explains the variation in the ways in which Islamists have adapted to these new challenges and opportunities? To what extent have Islamist parties, movements, members or intellectuals engaged in significant strategic adaptation, ideological rethinking, or internal reorganization? What are the appropriate historical or cross-national comparisons to make sense of the current political moment?
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36 hours
Donald Trump’s first 36 hours as president:
1. He gave a dark inauguration address repeating the dystopian tone of his campaign, despite well-established facts on the economy and crime disproving his allegations.
2. He and his spokesman lied about the size of the crowd at the inauguration, with the latter threatening to hold the press accountable for what he claimed was their false (but thoroughly verified) reporting.
3, Trump appeared at the CIA with a claque to ensure applause while he falsely claimed not to have criticized the intelligence community, seemed not to understand the distinction between it and the military, and rambled on about the size of the inauguration crowd and taking Iraqi’s oil, whatever that means. If he weren’t a teetotaler, I’d have thought him drunk.
4. Well over a million people attended peaceful rallies countrywide against him, in particular his attitude towards women. Trump’s surrogates were busy claiming the demonstrations were disorderly. No one was arrested at the big one in DC.
Can the country take another 1460* days of this?
I doubt it. Something has to give. It will either be American democracy, which depends on established rules of the game that Trump violates often. Or it will be his presidency, which is built on shaky foundations: he lost the popular vote by a substantial margin, he benefited from Russia’s cyber intervention, and he enjoyed a boost–intended or not–from an FBI director who breached his own organization’s rules to publicize an investigation (that then came to nothing).
American democracy is also looking shaky. Trump is lambasting the press and pledging to keep it in line. Fantastic quantities of money are pouring into elections at every level. Trump is defying ethics laws, regulations, contractual provisions, and expectations. He refuses to make an even modest effort to avoid conflicts of interest. At least two of his cabinet nominees are already tarred with scandal for nonpayment of taxes and failure to declare assets.
My Republican friends: this mess can only be sorted if you use your majorities in the House and Senate to channel the new administration into propriety and moderation. There is no sign of either yet. Trump is still trash talking the NATO Alliance, encouraging the breakup of the European Union, trying to befriend Putin, and threatening China with trade war and war in the South China Sea. Is that what you want? Have you done everything you can to stop him?
Propriety will be even tougher. I’m willing to predict now that this will be the most scandal-ridden administration in a century. Without more transparency on Trump’s taxes and businesses, suspicion will be rife, journalists will be digging deep, and prosecutors will be having a field day.
These 36 hours should be giving Republicans pause. But the campaign didn’t, so why should they wake up now?
*I originally gave an incorrect number here.
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