Ukraine
June 17, 2021 — Paul Mirengoff
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken is no one’s idea of a hardliner. For example, he’s leading the charge to appease Iran in the hope that, with the pot sweetened, the mullahs will permit the U.S. to reenter the nuclear deal. But Blinken is what passes for a hardliner in the feckless Biden administration. Reportedly, he strongly urged Joe Biden to sanction the company and the CEO behind the Nord Stream
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April 12, 2021 — Paul Mirengoff
John wrote below about the heightened threat Russia is now posing to Ukraine. Taking an American-centric view of the matter, some news outlets characterize Russia’s move as “testing Biden.” Russia’s actions will test Biden. But it doesn’t follow that Vladimir Putin is taking these actions for that purpose. I think it’s true, however, that our adversaries are far more likely to take aggressive action against our allies when they sense
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April 12, 2021 — John Hinderaker
America’s adversaries are on the march. China has suppressed Hong Kong and threatens Taiwan, along with Japan and other Asian allies of America. ISIS is rearing its head again in the Middle East. And Russia is once again threatening Ukraine. Russia now has more troops along its border with Ukraine than at any time since 2014, and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky has little hope that war can be avoided. Moscow’s
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October 22, 2020 — Paul Mirengoff
There is no dispute that, as vice president and point man on U.S. policy towards Ukraine, Joe Biden caused the Ukrainian government to sack its lead prosecutor, Viktor Shokin. Biden has bragged about doing so. There is also evidence that, before his removal, Shokin was investigating Burisma, the shady company on whose board Hunter Biden served. And there’s no dispute that Hunter Biden had no background relevant to Ukraine or
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February 4, 2020 — Paul Mirengoff
Tomorrow, the Senate will acquit President Trump. There’s a good chance that more Democrats will vote to acquit than Republicans will vote to convict. In fact, there’s a good chance that no Republican Senator will vote to convict. These outcomes would be a defeat for the Democrats. However, the impeachment will still be worth it for the Dems if it helps them in November — e.g., by enabling them to
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February 2, 2020 — Paul Mirengoff
So now it’s John Bolton who, in the name of defending President Trump, is to be demonized by conservatives. Some conservatives will find the task an easy one. Bolton is a foreign policy/national security hawk. Many conservatives have become rather dovish. But many other conservatives have continued to admire, or at least respect, Bolton. We like his hard line stance against America’s worst enemies, especially Iran. Bolton has plenty of
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January 24, 2020 — Paul Mirengoff
The latest impeachment related story — a non-story in my view — is about a tape recording in which President Trump (according to reports) instructed associates to fire Marie Yovanovitch, the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. The recording apparently was made at a dinner party in April 2018 by Igor Fruman, one of Rudy Giuliani’s main Ukraine operatives (along with Lev Parnas). Yovanovitch wasn’t fired until May 2019. Thus, there is
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January 24, 2020 — Scott Johnson
As I have said a time or two before, behind the whistleblower lies what must be an interesting back story. We published Paul Sperry’s 4,000-word investigation here earlier this week. Now on an interesting segment of her FOX News show Laura Ingraham draws on emails she has obtained to push the story a few years further back (video below). FOX News itself reports on the segment in “Laura Ingraham: Much
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January 18, 2020 — Paul Mirengoff
New evidence from Lev Parnas has Democrats more insistent than ever that the Senate impeachment trial include testimony from witnesses who did not appear before the House. Parnas joins the ranks of John Bolton and Mick Mulvaney as key witnesses the Dems say they need testimony from. Even the Democrats can’t deny that Parnas is a problematic witness. He appears to be a crook with a motive to lie. However,
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January 18, 2020 — Scott Johnson
According to Politico, the “bombshells” keep falling in the impeachment farce, this time courtesy of the indicted Lev Parnas. Bombshells “keep falling on my head/And just like the guy whose feet are too big for his bed/Nothing seems to fit.” How come all the things that Parnas asserts “had to happen” didn’t have to happen before the aid flowed? Oh, well. What we seem to have here, beginning with the
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January 9, 2020 — Paul Mirengoff
As Scott discusses below, U.S. officials say they have “high confidence” that an Iranian antiaircraft missile brought down that Ukrainian passenger jet near Tehran. So reports the Washington Post. The missile strike killed all 176 people aboard the plane. None was an American. More than 60 were Canadians. 82 were Iranians. The U.S. believes that the aircraft was hit by a SA-15 surface-to-air missile, a Russian-made system. This occurred about
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December 26, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I didn’t get a Christmas card from Joe Biden, but I take the Daily Caller’s word that the family picture that graced the card did not include Hunter Biden. Six family members appear on the card, along with the former vice president and his wife. Hunter is not among them. Joe Biden followed up with a video of two family dogs. He tweeted: When we say Merry Christmas from the
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November 20, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
The Washington Post tries to find harm that resulted from the brief hold President Trump placed on aid to Ukraine. However, its reporters acknowledge that the withheld aid did not disrupt Ukrainian military activities. Undaunted, the Post insists that the delay sowed doubt in Ukraine about America’s commitment to that country. If so, this must not have been a first. President Obama refused to provide lethal military assistance to Ukraine,
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November 19, 2019 — Scott Johnson
Senator Ron Johnson attended the inauguration of Volodymyr Zelensky as president of Ukraine in May and returned on an official trip in September. He has been in the middle of several crucial investigations from his perch on Senate committees including Homeland Security and Foreign Relations. He has also been a vocal supporter of lethal military aid to Ukraine. On Monday he sent a 10-page letter dated November 18 to House
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November 16, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I want to add two points to the ones Scott makes about the testimony of Marie Yovanovitch. First, Yovanovitch had nothing of significance to say about issues relevant to impeachment. Second, her testimony was an attempt by Adam Schiff to play the identity politics card. Yovanovitch was not the ambassador to Ukraine during the period when the Trump administration withheld military aid. She has no knowledge as to why the
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November 15, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
John has already noted the fine job Rep. Elise Stefanik, a former “Power Line pick,” did today of questioning Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to Ukraine. Stefanik also did well during Wednesday’s hearing. Indeed, John McCormack at NRO says she was “clearly the strongest Republican questioner of the day.” Stefanik has distinguished herself by focusing on four indisputable facts: (1) Ukraine didn’t agree to investigate the Bidens, (2) Ukraine got
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November 14, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
In an unflattering column about President Trump called “Incompetence is not an impeachable offense,” Marc Thiessen writes: What we saw on display Wednesday were two dedicated, experienced career foreign policy officials who had been desperately trying to figure out what the president wanted — and inferring his intentions based on snippets of information from others. But their efforts to divine Trump’s desires presume that the president knew what he wanted.
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