'We're having the plows clear us a path in'

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'We're having the plows clear us a path in'

January 4, 2022

Stephen Collinson and Shelby Rose

Slim pickings for Biden abroad

Once, presidents who found tough sledding at home cherry-picked wins abroad.

Joe Biden's domestic hopes aren't busted yet, despite a daunting political year ahead. If he can somehow build back his Build Back Better social spending and climate plan — derailed by Democratic divisions — he'll have a decent legacy.

With the real possibility that he could lose Democratic congressional majorities in November's midterm elections, Biden — who marketed himself as a statesman in 2020 — might have to chase success outside Washington.

But there's not much of what Beltway pundits call "low-hanging fruit" to pluck overseas. In fact, Biden is President at probably the most challenging moment for US global power since World War II. He faces two immediate crises, with Russia and Iran. And don't forget that generational showdown with China he'll have to manage and pass on to his successor.

Plus, at any moment, unexpected issues springing from the worst pandemic in 100 years, climate change, wars, revolutions, coups, civil unrest and natural disasters abroad could also upend his presidency.

Biden's first job in 2022 is to somehow convince Vladimir Putin not to redraw the post-Soviet order in Europe and trigger the worst standoff between the Kremlin and the West since the Berlin Wall fell. He's using persuasion and threats of sanctions to coax the Russian leader back from the brink of invading Ukraine. But it might not be enough.

Talks on reviving the international nuclear deal with Iran trashed by then-President Donald Trump are also running out of time. The Islamic Republic may be months, the US says, or weeks, according to the Israelis, from spinning up sufficient uranium to build a bomb. If diplomacy fails, Biden faces a choice between living with that threat or trying to bomb it out of existence — in attacks that would risk the new foreign war he's promised to avoid.

Meanwhile, China's building clash with the US looks like a 21st-century version of the superpower endurance test with the Soviets. Flashpoints loom this year over the US diplomatic boycott of the Winter Olympics in Beijing and the future of Taiwan.

There's a reason they call the US presidency the toughest job in the world.

'We're having the plows clear us a path in'

Talking of tough sledding, here's Biden arriving back at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland from his trip home to Delaware. After landing, Air Force One had to wait for snow to be cleared to offload POTUS to his motorcade back to the White House, since his usual helicopter ride was grounded by a winter storm. "We're having the plows clear us a path in," the presidential pilot was heard saying over the intercom.

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And an NFL player retired midway through a game

The plot thickens with US democracy in peril

There's big news out of the House committee investigating the Capitol insurrection. And it's not good for Trump.

Despite the ex-President's relentless campaign to hide the truth, it's now clear the committee has breached Trump's wall of obstruction in a way that may offer the clearest insight into what really happened on a day of infamy. Ahead of the January 6 anniversary of the attack on the US Capitol by a mob of Trump supporters, key details are emerging about what Trump did and did not do.

Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming is one of two Republicans on the panel who may pay the price for anti-Trump heresy with her career. But she says the committee has firsthand testimony that the ex-President's daughter Ivanka Trump twice asked him to call off the attack in the 187 minutes before his tweeted video belatedly doing so. CNN revealed that the committee has a sworn deposition from Keith Kellogg, former Vice President Mike Pence's national security adviser, who was with Trump during the riot.

These breakthroughs could flesh out reports that Trump sat back and watched the citadel of US democracy being sacked on TV, that he took a deliberate decision not to stop it and was pleased it was happening after telling his supporters to "fight like hell." It's hard to come up with a more flagrant violation of the presidential oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution.

In normal circumstances, this would doom any politician's future aspirations. But Trump is building a likely 2024 campaign nonetheless and plans a news conference on the January 6 anniversary to cast a new storm of lies.

His Republican Party is whitewashing history in order to co-opt Trump supporters in its bid to win midterm elections. And a new poll by The Washington Post and the University of Maryland shows that only 27% of Republican voters think that Trump shares a "great deal" or a "good amount" of blame for the riot.

All of this explains why this week's events will not merely revisit the worst attack on US democracy in modern times but will also stress that US electoral freedoms and values are now under even graver threat than a year ago.

Thanks for reading.

On Tuesday, the 24th OPEC and non-OPEC Ministerial Meeting takes place via videoconference. All of BlackBerry's older devices will no longer be able to use data, send text messages, access the internet or make calls -- even to 911.