#Tom Cotton

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Corey Walker

US Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) sent a letter to President Joe Biden on Wednesday demanding that his administration produce evidence that Israel has blocked humanitarian aid into Gaza, accusing Biden of engaging in a “politically driven” campaign against the Jewish state.

In the letter, Cotton wrote that he condemned “the Biden administration’s threat to impose an arms embargo on Israel.” He added that the president has made “unreasonable demands” on Israel to ramp up humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza, the neighboring enclave ruled by the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.

“Denying Israel military aid is in direct opposition to the will of Congress, as expressed in the Israeli security supplemental passed earlier this year,” Cotton wrote. “Unilaterally threatening to cut off aid by declaring Israel in violation of US law also ignores Congress’s oversight role. Your administration insists on protecting a terrorist organization in the name of humanitarian aid.”

Cotton demanded that the Biden administration release any “evidence” to congressional committees that Israel has systematically prevented humanitarian aid from entering the Gaza Strip. The senator claimed that, if the Biden administration could not produce the desired evidence, then it should rescind its threats to Israel. 

The White House had sent a letter, addressed to Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, expressing concern over what it said was a significant drop in aid deliveries to northern Gaza in recent months. The letter stated that the decline raised questions about Israel’s compliance with a National Security Memorandum (NSM) issued by the Biden administration earlier this year.

The memo requires US security aid recipients, including Israel, to ensure that humanitarian aid is not obstructed in areas where American-supplied weapons are being used.

[workersolidarity]

🇺🇸⚔️🇨🇳. 🚨

UNITED STATES SENATOR DOESNT KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CHINA AND SINGAPORE

📹 U.S. Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) questions the CEO of TikTok U.S., Shou Zi Chew, a Singaporian national, about his nationality and affiliations with the "Chinese Communist Party," an entity that does not actually exist.

Chew repeatedly states his nationality and history as a Singaporian, having served in the military, and mentions his loyalty to his home country before Senator Cotton begins ranting about the events of Tiananmen Square in 1989.

#source

@WorkerSolidarityNews

[news4dzhozhar]

So a handful of Republicans literally sent a letter to the ICC Prosecutor threatening the entire office AND their families if they (International Criminal Court) move forward with issuing arrest warrants for any member of Israel's government for war crimes. You know, cuz the US is the mafia now 🙄🤦 Considering the US and Israel are 2 countries who aren't members of the ICC (if that doesn't speak volumes) the warrants wouldn't be enforceable regardless but yah, let's make the US look like an even bigger pile of shit than they already do. If you dare try to prosecute war crimes...you've been warned (literally how the letter is worded). So embarrassed of this country that I'm at a loss for words. Just think for a minute what any sane, rational person would take from such a letter.

[fuckyeahmarxismleninism]

Sales of stolen Palestinian land must be stopped!

Across the United States, demonstrations have been organized against the illegal sale of stolen Palestinian lands. Protesters compare these events to the “Indian Land Sales” that were conducted in the U.S. West.

Many of these protests have been viciously attacked by police and Zionist thugs. That was the case in Los Angeles at the Adas Torah synagogue on June 25. Brutal police attacks against protesters have also occurred in Pikesville, Maryland (just outside Baltimore), and Nassau County, New York (near New York City.)

These sales of stolen land are usually conducted in Jewish neighborhoods, often inside synagogues. Protesters — many of whom are Jewish — make clear that they are demonstrating in solidarity with Palestinians, not attacking Jewish people.

That doesn’t prevent the corporate media and capitalist politicians from smearing these righteous protests as “anti-Jewish.” Arkansas statesman Tom Cotton issued a statement demanding “action from DOJ [Department of Justice] and White House on synagogue attack by pro-Hamas mob.”

[theinconvenientlifestyle]

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Dartagnan at Daily Kos:

As anti-Israel protests have spread across many of the country’s most prestigious college campuses this week, several Republicans in Congress have sought to burnish their pro-Israel credentials by calling for the U.S. military to respond.  Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton exhorted President Joe Biden to send in National Guard units, while obliquely encouraging motorists to run over protestors. Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley similarly demanded a militarized federal response “to protect Jewish Americans,” while Mitch McConnell and John Thune penned a letter, signed by 25 of their fellow GOP senators, calling the demonstrators “anti-Semitic, pro-terrorist mobs” and demanding that “federal law enforcement” respond.

Meanwhile, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson paid a visit to Columbia University’s campus on Wednesday where he was greeted by catcalls and boos. Upon leaving, Johnson also declared he would be demanding that Biden deploy the National Guard to quell the protests if they continued.  As Adam Serwer, writing for the Atlantic, observes, these reflexive calls by Republicans for a military response to protests seem to be less rooted in genuine concern that the protests pose a serious danger to the public or Jewish people than “because these powerful figures find the protesters and their demands offensive.” Serwer points out that school administrators have, when necessary, called in local police to address potential violence, harassment, and property damage, and thus far, the protests do not evince the kind of “mass violence and unrest” that would normally suggest the need for federal involvement. He also notes that such a deployment of federal troops would likely escalate the protests. 

Without debating the relative merits or lack thereof of the protests themselves, then, it’s important to note that these demands for a federal militarized response are coming almost entirely from one side of the political aisle. As Serwer points out, they echo the same sentiments Republicans expressed in 2020 in response to the protests by Black Lives Matter over the police murder of George Floyd. 

In other words, thus far we have seen a markedly asymmetrical, political response by Republicans to  campus protests this week. But we are also witnessing something else: an explicit acceptance of a militarized solution to protests where Republicans find it politically advantageous. Notably, another well-known Republican has also proposed sending the U.S. military and National Guard units to quell anticipated public protests, albeit of a far different nature, should he be afforded another term in office. That person is Donald Trump, and the people he proposes to target are those Americans he suspects would turn out in the hundreds of thousands to protest the policies he intends to implement.

Prominent Republicans such as Tom Cotton, Donald Trump, and Mike Johnson are demanding a militaristic response to end the pro-Palestinian protests across the nation's campuses as a way of burnishing their pro-Israel Apartheid bona fides.

Such a response would further escalate protests instead of quell them.

See Also:

Vox: Student protests are testing US colleges’ commitment to free speech

The Nation: The Crackdown on Campus Protests Is Happening Everywhere

[mysharona1987]

[nodynasty4us]

Who will Trump pick as his VP candidate? (Part 1)

Who do you think Donald Trump will pick as his running mate in 2024? This does not mean who you would prefer--just who you think is most likely.

I've divided the possibilities into 4 polls because Tumblr only allows 12 choices per poll. Here are the senators. You can also vote in the other polls for representatives, governors, and non-politicians.

After these polls close, I'll post a final round consisting of the top choices.

Tumblr does not allow political posts like this to be Blazed. So to increase participation, please reblog if US politics is a topic that you post about.

[phoenixyfriend]

Hmm, does anyone have a good resource for checking against the claims of Senator Cotton? Some of these I already know are lies (e.g. "from the river to the sea" is labeled a call for the destruction of Israel, but AFAIK has a range of meanings, some significantly more extreme than others, depending on who is saying it), and I'm suspicious of a few others, like the 'Hamas Headbands' thing, where he might just be referring to keffiyeh?

Yeah, just, does anyone have a good, quick fact check resource on this? I first heard an excerpt in this episode of the BBC Global News podcast, second segment.

These criminals are chanting eliminationist slogans, like from "the River to the Sea, Palestine will be free" and "globalize the Intifada." At Stanford, they wore Hamas headbands. At Princeton, they flew the Hezbollah flag. At Harvard, they ripped down the stars and stripes and replaced it with the Palestinian flag. At George Washington University, they called for the "final solution" and posted sign saying they wouldn't leave until Jews go back to their "real homes.

(Source, which I'm not sure about the bias of, but it's the only one I've found with a transcript of the relevant section.)

[loungingbear]

Another video to pass around as you please~

[ent-maiden]

"He felt the cool mud about his toes as he paddled in the Pool at Bywater with Jolly Cotton and Tom and Nibs, and their sister Rosie." (Lotr pg. 939)

Sam has a beautiful, tormenting memory

I really wanted to draw this and only watercolor could do, even though I had never painted a background before. Interesting how he has paddled but clearly never learned to swim. Anyway I put a lot of effort into representing their comparative ages with Sam being in the front next to Rosie. (I found out she is slightly older than him!) Only once I started painting them did I realize Hobbits age differently but whatever.

[pennsyltuckyheathen]

MAGARepublicans always take the low road in pandering to their racist, bigoted uninformed base (which MAGA Republicans prefer)

[sunshineandlyrics]

🤦🏻‍♀️

[frodothefair]

He's just so... Tom.

Tom Cotton, Rosie’s brother, had been one of Marigold’s most tenacious suitors, and returned to renew his affections every time his courtship with someone else fell apart. And indeed, her and Tom, unlike her and Frodo, would have made sense. They were of an age, from similar families, they even acted and looked similar – but therein lay the rub. Being with Tom was like being with her own brother, not to mention the fact that Tom was just so… Tom. He was energetic, kind, hardworking, and generally without a flaw, but the truth was, he was boring. After knowing each other for many years, she could predict what he would say on any subject, and how he would react in any situation. Mostly out of an obligation to Rosie, she searched her heart many times for any shred of love for poor old Tom – searched with all her might – but could find none. 

--Excerpt that may or may not make it into "Yule," Chapter 16 of Flowers of Mordor. Canonically, as I'm sure many of you know, Tom is Marigold's husband. This is my nod to canon. @konartiste