Plenary Authority, Trade Wars and a Gaza peace deal, that isn't
End of the week roundup
TAT readers,
Phew, what a week! Not only has it been a jam-packed week around home, but the news this week has also been coming at us fast, furious and for lack of a better term, bonkers. There is simply not enough time for a deep-dive on the named topics so I will do as I have done occasionally in the past, and make today’s work a bit of a news-round up. Also, apologies for being so busy this week that I’m late getting out a second essay.
Onward
Introduction
There is an old saying that gets a lot of attention in the special operations community that deals with all types of irregular, unconventional and asymmetric warfare that says, “there is opportunity in chaos.” This quote stems from an ancient Chinese text, The Art of War that is primarily attributed to a general, philosopher, strategist and soldier by the name of Sun Tzu. He is required reading for most military leaders when in professional education. This text also has drawn deep interest from the Boardrooms of America as well.
Without going deeply into this topic, it is enough to say that people and organizations who know how to operate in chaos, tend to find success, especially if they created it in order to direct attention away from what they are actually doing. Much of what we are experiencing today, is intended chaos, to keep us from focusing on the dismantling of our republic by the administration, the GOP and their voter’s. When so much insanity comes at us so fast and intentionally inducing chaos, we must all pay even more attention to what is really being done in Washington D.C. outside of mainstream news coverage. This week has been a good example of such chaos.
Each one of the topics in the title of today’s essay, would be worthy of massive condemnation by themselves, but by ramping up the chaos in the manner the administration is now doing, diminishes the amount of pressure that can be brought to bear, against them individually. Also, though not included in the title, there are countless other severe threats from this administration to deal with, therefore greatly intensifying the chaos. There has been so much exhausting chaos since January 20th’s Inauguration Day, that it is surprising that any of us still have any energy left at all.
Onward
Plenary Authority
This week during a CNN interview, White House Deputy Chief of Staff, the universally reviled, Stephen Miller uttered a phrase that should terrify all Americans, including the MAGA GOP’s millions. The phrase plenary authority for all intents and purposes, simply means that Miller was declaring that the White House has limitless power to do as it pleases. To declare that the White House has plenary authority, means that there is no longer any constitutional republic, as that our beloved constitution no longer matters.
The “father of our constitution,” James Madison, a radical progressive or in modern terms, “woke,” could have as a man raised with privilege, attended Harvard, as men of his class traditionally did. He chose instead the College of New Jersey, now Princeton, a hotbed of radically progressive thinking based on the Scottish Enlightenment. The ideals of the Enlightenment though radical for their time due to most nations being monarchies and other forms of similar rule, was grounded in the “inalienable human rights” stemming from a creator, not the false narratives of our nation being born as a, Christian Nation.
In preparing for the constitutional convention and the convention to ratify our new constitution, Madison had done his homework on all of the most prominent experiments in some form of representative government, from the ancient Greeks and Romans, up through his them modern times. He analyzed each to find their weaknesses and why each had previously not long endured. He did so in order to build a constitution that was stronger and that had built in “check and balances” in order to defeat human nature’s penchant for destructive levels of human ambition.
James Madison on the topic of checks and balances The Federalist Papers: No. 48 by James Madison, writing under the nom de plume, Publius. "To the People of the State of New York: IT WAS shown in the last paper that the political apothegm there examined does not require that the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments should be wholly unconnected with each other. I shall undertake, in the next place, to show that unless these departments be so far connected and blended as to give to each a constitutional control over the others, the degree of separation which the maxim requires, as essential to a free government, can never in practice be duly maintained. It is agreed on all sides, that the powers properly belonging to one of the departments ought not to be directly and completely administered by either of the other departments. It is equally evident, that none of them ought to possess, directly or indirectly, an overruling influence over the others, in the administration of their respective powers. It will not be denied, that power is of an encroaching nature, and that it ought to be effectually restrained from passing the limits assigned to it. After discriminating, therefore, in theory, the several classes of power, as they may in their nature be legislative, executive, or judiciary, the next and most difficult task is to provide some practical security for each, against the invasion of the others." - Federalist Papers, No. 48 - The Avalon Project - James Madison - February 1st, 1788
He was both a scholar and a visionary whose work has enabled the nation to survive, thrive and succeed. Now, floating the phrase plenary authority by Miller, clearly demonstrates for those mysteriously still baffled by the Trump regime’s intentions, that they intend some form of autocracy. Nothing could be more un-American and less patriotic.
"On February 8, 1788, James Madison published Federalist 51—titled “The Structure of the Government Must Furnish the Proper Checks and Balances Between the Different Departments.” In this famous Federalist Paper essay, Madison explained how the Constitution’s structure checked the powers of the elected branches and protected against possible abuses by the national government. With the separation of powers, the Framers divided the powers of the national government into three separate branches: a legislative branch (called Congress), an executive branch (led by a single President), and a judicial branch (headed by a Supreme Court). By dividing political power between the branches, the Framers sought to prevent any single branch of government from becoming too powerful. At the same time, each branch of government was also given the power to check the other two branches. This is the principle of checks and balances. Madison and his fellow Framers assumed that human nature was imperfect and that all political elites would seek to secure greater political power. As a result, the Framers concluded that the best way to control the national government was to harness the political ambitions of each branch and use them to check the ambitions of the other branches." - Federalist 51 (1788) - The National Constitution Center
Any American abdicates their rights to describe themselves as patriots, if they continue to support Trump, his oligarchs, the GOP and the voters that keep them in power. This is not an opinion, but based exclusively on the clearly drawn lines of our constitution and its amendments. None of this is a surprise to anyone who has experienced our republic in the Trump era. As Maya Angelou so eloquently expressed, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”
"Whether the Trump Administration gets away with its flouting of the Constitution and democratic norms will ultimately be a matter for the American public to decide. That is why President Trump is so anxious to use tactics as complicated as gerrymandering and as blunt as the intimidation of local election officials to stem the tide of potential resistance in the midterm elections. If the public is OK with masked federal agents seizing people off the street, the deployment of military force for ordinary law enforcement, attempting to rewrite American history to erase the contributions of women and people of color, inflicting trauma-inducing cruelty on career civil servants, surveilling college admissions and curricula, and dismantling legislative programs without congressional sanction, all that will continue. My sometime coauthor Hal Bruff once said that the legal precedents Presidents care most about are the examples of what their predecessors got away with. That’s what is at stake. Benjamin Franklin’s conditional characterization of the constitutional form of government launched in 1787—“a republic, if you can keep it”—has never seemed more prescient or, since the Civil War, more foreboding." - The Uncertain Future of the Separation of Powers - The Regulatory Review - Penn State - Catherine Lewis interview with Peter M. Shane
I would suggest sharing this section of today’s essay with Republican voting family and friends. Most will not care due to the level of brainwashing done to the red, voting base but even trimming a few percentage of their voters from their herd, may well be the deciding factor in the Midterms, if we make it that far.
Trade Wars
Okay, I get it that I have covered this topic often, but I believe that revisiting the topic of tariffs is crucial to those worried about adhering to their household budgets and trying to survive Trumpflation, the stock market and even holding onto their jobs. Today’s announcement that Trump intends on adding 100% tariffs on China, sent the S & P, Nasdaq and the Dow into a slump and every retailer in the country into a state of depressive anxiety, as we barrel towards the holiday season, where most retailers make the majority of their yearly profits.
His tariff announcement was in retaliation to China’s announcement of new powerful limitations on the licensing and export of rare earth minerals and magnets. China controls roughly 70% of all rare earth resources, critical to military and technology industries. Both Xi and Trump have been involved in tit-for-tat trade wars since his first administration. There are plenty of good reasons to punish China for their aggression, but tariffs are not one of the reasonable responses, especially at the shocking levels preferred by publicity and attention seeking Trump.
The US has plenty of tools for imposing costs on China and especially if we worked collectively with our allies and friends. Trump’s ego is a poor character trait for inspiring collective actions in conjunction with the our allies. This mostly means that we the American people will again bear the costs of his ego and obsession with tariffs. Historically, draconian tariffs have not worked out well for the US nor the world.
A previous TAT essay, explains in detail how the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 played a significant role in deepening the pain of the Great Depression and accelerating the world towards WW II. When you strip away all of the supporting understanding of tariffs, it all comes down to them being a tax or sorts, imposed on consumers. Yes, the Federal government pockets the money from tariffs and we pay higher prices on nearly every good or service that we purchase.
Trump’s tariff threats are one of his severely limited negotiating tactics. For good reason, he is called TACO, which means, “Trump is Always Chickening Out.” “Taco” is now universally synonymous with his limited understanding of negotiations outside of mafioso-themed, threatening tactics. In my youth, he would be called a “one trick pony.” Time will tell if he holds to his November first start date for his tariffs or if he once again lives up to his TACO reputation. A phrase common in military circles for behavior like this is, “when all that you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” Trump never minds wielding a hammer at anyone, but this makes him predictable and largely unsuccessful negotiator, without his only other tactic, wielding force.
Gaza, the peace deal that isn’t a peace deal
All across the world, people and nations are closely following the recently announced Gaza ceasefire with intense interest, but allow me to be very straightforward about my perspectives, which are uncharacteristically somewhat pessimistic. Because so little is known in detail and tonight just offering a thumbnail sketch, I will try and go point-by-point for the first 10 points but see no reason to go further at this time. I simply don’t believe that this plan will last long enough to get past the first 8 or 9 points, at best.
To be clear, all that we currently know is that for the moment, there is no ongoing fighting and hostage releases are being coordinated for Monday, as required. As far as peace, I see little chance of the overall strategy succeeding, no matter how much I wish for it.
Now, let’s go through the 20 part alleged peace plan. the 20 points are numbered with my comments below each in italics.
Gaza will be a deradicalized terror-free zone that does not pose a threat to its neighbors.
This is a wonderful wish list but for anyone who has followed this issue for as long as I have, sees this as more fantasy than reality.
Gaza will be redeveloped for the benefit of the people of Gaza, who have suffered more than enough.
This has been tried in multiple ways for decades, with Israel, the US and mostly our allies footing the costs. At every opportunity, they were undermined by perpetually importing and radicalizing a terrorist army, that still partially exists.
As one with deep experience in CT/ Counterterrorism and CVE/ Countering Violent Extremism, I know that once radicalized deeply enough to participate in war in support of their radical ideology, that well over half will never fully recover from their radicalization. Extremist ideology for those so radicalized, will last for generations, not weeks, months or years. The perpetual availability of weapons in the region, will always be little different for these fighters, than a glass of alcohol to a recovering alcoholic.
The grievances between Israel and what today are called Palestinians, predates Israel by roughly 1400 years based on Islam’s birth. Regional inhabitants prior to Islam and even the much older Jewish religion, still had enduring grievances as well. For an example, just look at the US where here in the South, Confederacy sentiments towards the northern states and their citizens, still exist. Even the MAGA GOP’s ideology, is built onto much of the backbone of the Civil War South’s ideology.
If both sides agree to this proposal, at least the current shooting will cease... for a little while. Israeli forces will withdraw to the agreed upon line to prepare for a hostage release. During this time, all military operations, including aerial and artillery bombardment, will be suspended, and battle lines will remain frozen until conditions are met for the complete staged withdrawal.
In Israel, families are celebrating the projected release of the final hostages, as well as the families somberly preparing to receive the remains of murdered hostages.
Israel is in the process of withdrawing to the boundaries established in the ceasefire agreement
Israel though is under no illusion that a signed piece of paper with guarantee follow-through from Hamas or others of the same ilk, who fought alongside of Hamas against Israel. There is no shortage of personal and nation-state agendas that are outstanding. Conflict in the region has largely been driven by outside interference from other regional states, like Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran.
From the outside, both Iran and Russia, have for a very long time been the trainers, armorers, financiers of a multitude of extremist organizations. Iran is now badly wounded from an economic and military perspective, and Russia, much the same. Who knows whether or not they will not continue to stir up trouble.
Within 72 hours of Israel publicly accepting this agreement, all hostages, alive and deceased, will be returned.
We’ll see on Monday whether or not this element of the deal holds.
Once all hostages are released, Israel will release 250 life sentence prisoners plus 1700 Gazans who were detained after October 7th 2023, including all women and children detained in that context. For every Israeli hostage whose remains are released, Israel will release the remains of 15 deceased Gazans.
Israel has been on the short end of the stick when it comes to prisoner exchanges multiple times. For those claiming that Israel doesn’t want peace should revisit this issue. Just imagine after decades of war, constantly agreeing to prisoner exchanges where the ratio of those released so greatly favors the aggressors.
Once all hostages are returned, Hamas members who commit to peaceful co-existence and to decommission their weapons will be given amnesty. Members of Hamas who wish to leave Gaza will be provided safe passage to receiving countries.
This is one of the points I have zero confidence in. Like I noted above, there is little supporting research to support the fact that these released fighters will simply throw up their hands and just say, “I won’t fight Israel again.”
Releasing those professing “peaceful-coexistence” to other nations removes the opportunity to verify if these couple of thousand of prisoners won’t rearm and retrain in neighboring countries where their extremism already has safe areas to rest, retrain and rearm. Today in a news conference Netanyahu firmly committed to restarting the war if the agreements are not heeded in full. Again, only time will tell.
Upon acceptance of this agreement, full aid will be immediately sent into the Gaza Strip. At a minimum, aid quantities will be consistent with what was included in the January 19, 2025, agreement regarding humanitarian aid, including rehabilitation of infrastructure (water, electricity, sewage), rehabilitation of hospitals and bakeries, and entry of necessary equipment to remove rubble and open roads.
Again, time will tell but I suspect this will hold, at least initially.
Entry of distribution and aid in the Gaza Strip will proceed without interference from the two parties through the United Nations and its agencies, and the Red Crescent, in addition to other international institutions not associated in any manner with either party. Opening the Rafah crossing in both directions will be subject to the same mechanism implemented under the January 19, 2025 agreement.
The January 19th, 2025 agreement was reasonable but as we have all seen, it did not hold. Competition for lifesaving aid is fierce in such war zones. Hamas has long, via being the official government of Gaza and as a terrorist organization taken control of such aid and used it for their own purposes, even to include selling aid on the black-market and used the proceeds to fund terrorism.
Just like any other business, Hamas doesn’t want to lose their access to the outside world or their profits. Also, their arms dealers and suppliers of other materials won’t just walk away from the massive profits they made from supplying terrorists.
Gaza will be governed under the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee, responsible for delivering the day-to-day running of public services and municipalities for the people in Gaza. This committee will be made up of qualified Palestinians and international experts, with oversight and supervision by a new international transitional body, the “Board of Peace,” which will be headed and chaired by President Donald J. Trump, with other members and heads of State to be announced, including Former Prime Minister Tony Blair. This body will set the framework and handle the funding for the redevelopment of Gaza until such time as the Palestinian Authority has completed its reform program, as outlined in various proposals, including President Trump’s peace plan in 2020 and the Saudi-French proposal, and can securely and effectively take back control of Gaza. This body will call on best international standards to create modern and efficient governance that serves the people of Gaza and is conducive to attracting investment.
This is so ambiguous as to be worthless. How do they Vet the participants of “the temporary transitional governance of a technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee?”
Even worse, how does a power mongering sitting US president in the middle of his own coup at home, have time to chair a gratuitously named, “Board of Peace?”
I have personally watched the US and our allied partners attempt to impose US or Western styled democracy in Iraq and Afghanistan during war. There was never any indication that we had much success and I don’t see anything but political motivations for Trump to play any real role. Besides, Trump appears to hate good governance as evidenced by the fact that he’s making war on our constitutional republic as I write this.
A Trump economic development plan to rebuild and energize Gaza will be created by convening a panel of experts who have helped birth some of the thriving modern miracle cities in the Middle East. Many thoughtful investment proposals and exciting development ideas have been crafted by well-meaning international groups, and will be considered to synthesize the security and governance frameworks to attract and facilitate these investments that will create jobs, opportunity, and hope for future Gaza.
This is nothing more than reworked nonsense from what we tried in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia and represents western and American arrogance of the highest order. No state in the region has a well functioning democracy with Israel being the closest but still hampered by their coalition of parties required to govern effectively. The Netanyahu administration, like our government under the Trump regime and run by the GOP, has saddled Israel with a far-right minority extremist government.
When I wrote one of roughly 20 essays reporting on the war in Gaza, one of the first was to lay out all of the primary players to blame for October 7th. Netanyahu’s administration was one of the six detailed in the essay.
I caution everyone to stop paying attention to the false narratives of genocide claims against Israel. There is some fault there but quite far from intentional and yet, no one mentions that Hamas’ charter, spells out genocide for Israel. The problem with the false narratives about Gaza that are reinforced everyday, by news agencies. Those false narratives have solidified on both sides of the aisle, which turns this tragic issue into a political bomb.
This bomb by all reason appears to be further hardening the rabid hyper-partisanship currently infecting our nation. The essays I wrote about the war, details many of the issues that will be landmines for this peace plan. It’s not just military and diplomatic landmines either. There are so many layers of historical grievances that no western styled plan, with ambiguous language will serve the needs of sustainable peace.
Summary
The three topics today are far more complex than the time allowed for this essay, but I hope that these short overviews offer a bit of clarity to these three dangerous issues and before media narratives take over. We’re living in dangerous times and seeing things clearly is essential to getting through them.
The administration-induced instability that continues to undermine and diminish our national economy, won’t get any better with the tariff games being played the administration. These tariffs will undoubtedly affect our increasing inflation rate. With a nation already anxious about the state of our economy, this tariff game will take its toll on consumer confidence, critical to coming holiday sales numbers.
Meanwhile in Gaza, we are all grateful for a ceasefire. For the reasons discussed above, I see danger and failure with the twenty-point plan. I suspect that the first couple of steps in the plan will gratefully go fairly well. But, then things begin to unravel. The hostage/ prisoner exchange puts a couple of thousand, mostly hardcore terrorists back on the street.
Those thousands of released fighters will now have a chance to refill the war-depleted ranks of Hamas. They will find a way to reconstitute and again, become a threat to both their fellow Palestinians and Israel. Anyone that believes that a violent extremist ideology as intense as Hamas’, will simply dissipate just because some folks signed a paper, you are tragically mistaken. The insanity of imposing a western styled system of government with western oversight headed by Trump and Tony Blair simply reinforces the colonialism narrative, a deeply triggering topic in the region.
Of course I’m grateful if this effort brings some relief to the suffering, and I will continue to wish that I am wrong about the viability of this plan. Like I said, this is an uncharacteristic pessimism for me. For the time being, let’s just see this as a welcome pause in the death and destruction, while we wait for more detailed information.
And finally, the words “plenary authority” oozing from the mouth of Stephen Miller, are fighting words. True Americans will never accept what Miller was proposing. It’s in our DNA to be passionate about our independence and go to the limits, to keep it. This time will be no different.
Best for everyone’s weekend,
Paul