Trump's triumph is Carney's time to pivot...
Plus, Qatar's role in the world and Canada's breaking point.
No one can take anything away from Donald Trump this week after the signing of the peace agreement in Egypt. It’s true, we don’t know if Hamas will abide by any of the terms of the agreement but Trump performed an incredibly impressive feat in bringing everyone else to the table.
On Monday he went to Israel, spoke to the Knesset and while celebrating the return of the hostages, also pushed on the need for peace. A short time later, he was in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt signing the peace deal with leaders of the Muslim and Arab world alongside western leaders.
Of all the reactions that I saw, and I watched a lot of coverage on Thanksgiving Day, this brief clip from ABC’s James Longman summed it up best as someone who was there.
Carney doing the right thing…
There are plenty of reasons for criticizing Mark Carney, including his decision to unilaterally recognize a Palestinian State. There is even the bizarre story about how Carney had to charter a jet to get to the signing ceremony because there were no military planes or crews available to take him.
Compared to him being there, none of that matters, if he does the right thing.
As I was arguing in my Toronto Sun column today, Carney has taken a reflexive anti-American position against Donald Trump and it is time to end it. He spent the weekend trying to bask in Trump’s glow and it is time to drop the anti-Americanism and work with Trump instead of against him.
This is truly in Canada’s best interests.
How did Qatar become the major player in the Middle East…
If you follow world affairs, especially the Middle East, you know that Qatar is something of a problem child in the region. They fund Al Jazeera, they spend billions buying influence in Washington, at American and Canadian universities, in fact, for all the talk of the Israel lobby in DC, Qatar is spending way more and has become incredibly powerful.
This week on the Full Comment Podcast I tried to seek out answers on the issue of Qatar and how they became the lynchpin in the peace talks.
I spoke to two very different people, Alon Ben-Meir, retired New York University professor and author. And Haras Rafiq, a researcher and anti-terrorism expert sought out by governments around the world who has real concerns about Qatar’s role in the world.
Excited for this book…
I get sent a lot of books, I interview a lot of authors, especially for the Full Comment Podcast. I hope you like listening to those chats as much as I like having them.
This one though is special.
Darrell Bricker is an old friend that I’ve known for at least 20 years and John Ibbitson is a colleague who worked in the Parliamentary Press Gallery at the same time as me for some time. I don’t know John as well as Darrell, but I’ve long respected his work and his desire not to be pigeonholed.
The book comes out October 28 and whether it is on Full Comment or Lilley Unleashed, you will hear what they have to say. In the meantime, you can order the book here.
That clip with Trump and Mark Blarney at the treaty signing is hilarious. Trump trying to be gracious but still being Trump singles out Blarney for making the time to be there. Nice - but he calls him President ( of Canada) twice. After he is done Blarney swoopes over and thanks him for promoting him to President. Trump realizing his gaffe, tells Blarney “ At least I did not call you Governor” ( like he did to Trudeau to belittle him) and Mark Blarney and Trump think that is hilarious. The irony here is that it while this same guy who thought that this was so funny today, is the same guy was whipping up Canadian nationalism just 8 months ago, scaring Canadians into believing that Trump was the boogeyman out to get us, threatening to take us over, calling our leader a “Governor”. Now all of a sudden it’s funny ? If you are a Liberal voter and you bought into all of that horse hockey and now you see this how can you not draw any other conclusion that you were totally played. They played on your Nationalisim and used it against you. Mark Blarney has done none of the things he promised you, he has delivered nothing in terms of trade or finding new markets for our goods. He has capitulated to Trump over and over again and he has come home empty handed , which has also happened on his 5 trips to Europe and Britain. This is a total charade of a leader, and we are going down the tubes while the Liberals do nothing.
Only a Communist WEF Marxist indoctrinated Woky would battle against an Awake Domocracy such as Trump. Canada and our Corrupt government are a running embarrassment to the World!