http://www.agsiw.org/trumps-election-mean-gulf-arab-countries/

Like most of the rest of the world, including the U.S. political class (leading Republicans no exception), the Gulf Arab states awoke this morning to find that the American people have elected Donald J. Trump to be the next president of the United States. All indications leading up to the vote had been for a narrow but clear Hillary Clinton victory. But as the night unfolded it increasingly became evident that polling and other forecasting models, virtually across the board (reportedly including within the winning campaign itself), had failed to predict the uprising against the Washington establishment that Trump campaigned to represent. Like other major U.S. allies around the world, the Gulf Arab countries now face a period of relative uncertainty, given the difficulties of predicting the outlines of a Trump foreign policy. Yet some of the most obvious factors that will help shape the nature of this vital relationship over the next four years can be gleaned even at this early stage.

A Blank Slate

The first problem confronting any analysis is the paucity of evidence upon which to speculate about where a Trump foreign policy would potentially converge or diverge with traditional and consensus U.S. policies. Trump has no track record in office, elected or appointed. During his campaign he did not evince any particular knowledge of, or interest in, foreign policy, beyond his hostility to economic globalization and trade agreements. He did not lay out any detailed or coherent programs regarding foreign policy, let alone toward the Middle East. And it is unclear who his main advisors on Middle East-related matters will be, not least because most of the Republican foreign policy establishment and Trump avoided each other (at best) during the campaign. Indeed, it is precisely among Republican national security and foreign policy experts that Trump may have enjoyed some of the most meager support within his own party, and, despite his noted penchant for valuing subordinates’ “loyalty,” the small group of advisors he did assemble may not be the ones actually entrusted with crafting and implementing his administration’s policies after his inauguration.

For the Gulf states, the biggest challenge in dealing with a Trump presidency and foreign policy will not be his anti-Muslim comments or Islamophobia-tinged rhetoric from the campaign. It certainly won’t win him much affection among their leadership or in public opinion, but such issues are essentially a domestic challenge facing Muslim and Arab Americans and not other countries. Instead, the biggest challenge will be how a President Trump will approach some of the issues closest to Gulf states’ national security agendas given the jarring foreign policy contradictions that emerged from the handful of themes repeated throughout his campaign, including his sympathy for aspects of Russian foreign policy combined with his evident hostility toward Iran.

The Syria Conflict and Iran’s Relationship with Russia

From a Middle Eastern strategic perspective, this combination makes no sense, because Moscow and Tehran are increasingly finding themselves on the same page on many of the most pressing regional strategic issues, especially those that are paramount in the security files of the Gulf states, such as the regionalized civil wars in Syria and Yemen. Trump’s enthusiasm for building bridges with Moscow, and apparent sympathy for the Russian intervention in Syria (which he has, like the Kremlin, falsely characterized as being essentially an international counterterrorism operation aimed at the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant), must surely be alarming. If that dominates strategic thinking in his White House, it would be an enormous boon to Iran and the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. On the other hand, Trump’s hostility toward Tehran might seem to offer interesting prospects for improved strategic cooperation with Gulf countries in regional confrontations with Iran, including via proxies in theaters such as Syria and Yemen. U.S. priorities, as defined by a Trump administration, will determine how this plays out.

Would a Trump administration regard the survival and empowerment of the Assad regime in Syria – currently a mutual Russian and Iranian goal being pursued through profound military and diplomatic cooperation – as a legitimate, if not laudable, Russian goal, and a counterterrorism project, to be tolerated and possibly even encouraged? Much of his campaign rhetoric about the Syrian conflict and the struggle against ISIL suggests it might. Or, might he, upon greater reflection, come to view the joint intervention on behalf of the Syrian regime more as an Iranian and Hizballah project, to be countered in a more aggressive manner than President Barack Obama has attempted?

Could a Trump White House try to split Moscow from Tehran on Syrian issues in some artful diplomatic manner? A subtle and engaged foreign policy might find opportunities for exploiting genuine divergences between Moscow and Tehran regarding their long-term goals in Syria, which are not absolutely synonymous. Or might a Trump foreign policy fall back on a neo-isolationist attitude and regard the Syrian imbroglio as simply no concern of the United States, in effect perpetuating the essence of the Obama approach, albeit perhaps motivated by a different set of priorities?
These are some of the key questions that the Gulf Arab countries will seek to evaluate as soon as possible. Since these states view their national security primarily, although not exclusively, through their rivalry with Tehran, the U.S. attitude towards Iran’s regional ambitions and policies will go a long way to determining their relationship to U.S. policy. Under Obama, they viewed Washington as increasingly unresponsive to their anxieties vis-à-vis Iran. They worried that the nuclear agreement might herald a broader rapprochement with Tehran, although that didn’t happen. They were dismayed at the lack of U.S. engagement regarding Syria. And they decided to take action on their own in Yemen, when they believed the Houthi rebels and their Iranian supporters posed an intolerable threat to their vulnerable underbelly.

The Gulf states will be hoping that Trump’s voluble antipathy toward Iran on the campaign trail will, once he is in office, prompt him to reevaluate his attitude toward some of Russia’s current policies and strategies in the Middle East, particularly Moscow’s intervention in Syria. He is going to have to reconcile these two positions, and the Gulf states have every incentive to advocate at an early stage that a Trump White House view Syria and other regional conflicts primarily through the lens of Iran’s expanding influence in the Middle East, and not see them as aspects of “legitimate” Russian international relations and counterterrorism initiatives. And they will certainly hope that, given his strong statements condemning Iran’s regional role, Trump’s new brand of “nationalism” will not simply be nativism but can be translated into a substantive international agenda.

The Iran Nuclear Agreement

Trump has been strongly critical of the nuclear agreement with Iran, calling it “catastrophic,” and one of the worst deals ever made. Yet he is unlikely to simply abrogate the agreement. However, insofar as the Gulf Arab states continue to view the agreement with suspicion, they will find a much more sympathetic ear in a Trump White House. The Gulf states may have somewhat reconsidered their strong initial objections to the agreement, given that it has apparently succeeded in mothballing Iran’s nuclear program for at least the next decade, and has not led to a broader rapprochement between Washington and Tehran. But if they still yearn to see the agreement collapse, there is renewed hope. At a minimum, Trump is likely to greatly intensify U.S. demands regarding implementation and hold back on rewards for Iranian compliance when possible.

It’s actually hard to imagine that the implementation phase can continue to go relatively smoothly unless Trump’s foreign policy bears no resemblance whatsoever to his campaign rhetoric. That’s possible, but it’s more likely that Tehran will find itself dealing with a completely different attitude on the part of its U.S. interlocutors within a few weeks. The lifespan of the agreement may be in serious jeopardy because of bitter disputes over the rights and responsibilities of both sides during the forthcoming, and more difficult, parts of the implementation phase. In the long run, Iran’s regional adversaries might regret the downfall of the agreement; though in the short run they might welcome it. And, of course, that would only end up empowering the most hard-line forces in the Iranian government.

Financial and Military “Burden-Sharing”

The two clearest themes in Trump’s campaign rhetoric on foreign policy have been at the heart of his populist vision: a neo-isolationist, “America-first” set of priorities that effectively devalues long-standing formal alliances such as NATO, and anti-trade and anti-globalization imperatives that would introduce new levels of economic protectionism into U.S. trade relations with the whole world. Regarding trade, the Gulf states have little to fear. Their relationship with the United States has always been based, first and foremost, on their role as energy suppliers to the global marketplace, not just to the United States, but especially to Washington’s crucial trading partners in East and South Asia. Trump’s apparently mercantile, instrumental, and ledger-sheet approach to relations should allow the Gulf states to present a good case as important U.S. allies.

During the campaign Trump frequently cited Saudi Arabia, along with Germany and Japan, as countries that he implied were not paying their fair share for their own defense and, implicitly, owed the United States more money. Unless he drastically alters his values and priorities, a President Trump is likely to be pleased by the actual balance of payments with the Gulf states. In 2010, Saudi Arabia, for example, agreed to purchase $60 billion in U.S. military aircraft, as well as countless other military and nonmilitary purchases. In 2015, the United States sold an estimated $33 billion in weapons to the Gulf states. Added to that are the myriad in-kind, value-added, facilities, services, and other arrangements that typically characterize U.S. basing in the Gulf region, especially the UAE, Qatar, and Bahrain. If campaign priorities about burden sharing and financial contributions to defense are imported into the next White House’s foreign policy, the Gulf states are well-positioned to present themselves as key allies in very good standing.

If a Trump administration deprioritizes U.S. engagement, and possibly even military presence, in the Middle East, that would be a double-edged sword from a Gulf perspective. On the one hand, the Gulf states want the assurance of fundamental U.S. protection, particularly in the case of a direct confrontation with, and even more specifically an attack on them by, Iran. The prospect of the United States turning even more deeply inward could be alarming in that context. However, a more attenuated application of the principle of neo-isolationism could extend significant leeway to the Gulf states to continue to chart an independent national security, and even military, agenda for dealing with regional crises, with the expectation of U.S. weapons supplies and logistical support.

By the time of their intervention in Yemen in March 2015, the Gulf states, especially Saudi Arabia and the UAE, had long since reconciled themselves to the need for greater “burden sharing” on their part and, when need be, taking unilateral military action to secure their own interests independent of U.S. participation or guidance. As long as they can continue to pursue and expand this agenda without risking the basis of their relationship with the United States, and the fundamental guarantees of U.S. protection and access to U.S. weapons and technology, a more hands-off approach by a Trump administration could have some positive consequences for independent Gulf national security decision-making.

Islam and Terrorism

Finally, while Muslim-bashing and the Islamophobic nature of some of Trump’s campaign rhetoric is primarily a domestic political issue, President Trump and Arab leaders will need to find mutually respectful language, something they had already developed, for the most part, with Hillary Clinton. In short, overt Muslim-bashing rhetoric, entry bans based on national origin (let alone religious orientation), and words and deeds that seem to equate Islam in general with terrorism could cause serious harm to both sides of the U.S.-Gulf relationship in a Trump era. Having already secured victory, there is no longer a need for the new president to pander in such a manner, and his new responsibilities could and should put an end to any such talk.

Trump has emphasized his determination to destroy ISIL in vivid language. As long as he is not perceived as effectively playing into Iran’s regional agenda with such a focus, he will find enthusiastic partners in that campaign among the Gulf states. It is very much in the interests of both sides to forge a strong anti-terrorism and counter-extremist agenda. Such a relationship should also serve as the ultimate guarantee against additional loose talk that seems to promote anti-Muslim bigotry. Such a partnership would also have to avoid some of Trump’s wilder campaign comments about introducing forms of torture for terrorism suspects including “waterboarding and much worse,” the killing of terrorists’ families, and other extreme and extraordinary measures that not only violate international norms, but probably U.S. law as well. Yet even during the course of the campaign he distanced himself from some of the more extreme of these earlier remarks. That process is likely to continue. Such growth will be crucial for the development of an effective anti-terrorism and counter-extremism partnership with the Gulf states and many others around the world.

JASTA

The outgoing Obama administration can help by working with Gulf countries even before the Trump inauguration to find a legislative “fix” for the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, which would allow Americans to sue Saudi Arabia and its officials, among others, for alleged complicity in deadly terrorist attacks in the United States. The veto override that allowed JASTA to become law immediately after the 15th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and right before the election was the source of a great deal of regret in Congress on the very day it passed. Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies are concerned about the potential impact of the law on bilateral relations with the United States. But informed and serious Americans are also concerned about the potential impact on U.S. diplomacy and military actions if the U.S. government and its officials could be sued around the world in turn.

It remains to be seen whether Trump’s new brand of “nationalism” and populist rhetoric would allow him to openly be party to correcting this mistake, so it is preferable that the law is corrected in some mutually satisfactory manner in the coming weeks with the explicit cooperation of the Obama administration and congressional leaders, and, hopefully, the implicit support of the incoming Trump administration (which can overtly hold the matter at some arm’s length until the inauguration). For all those who value both the efficacy of U.S. diplomacy and military strategy, and the bilateral relationship with Saudi Arabia, a JASTA “fix” is an important step, and the Trump team should at least step back and allow for such a vital correction.

http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/why-a-clinton-presidency-could-be-good-for-the-gulf

In these pages last month, I outlined a number of reasons why the Gulf states should be cautiously optimistic about US foreign policy in a Hillary Clinton administration, given that the Democratic nominee is still likely to become the next president. But there are several additional factors, both positive and negative from a Gulf perspective, worth elucidating.

In addition to reaffirming shaken American alliances in Europe and the Middle East, Mrs Clinton is likely to move quickly to bolster America’s global economic stature. Her foreign policy team views domestic economic initiatives, for example on infrastructure and investment stimulus, as crucial to restoring confidence in American leadership, particularly in Europe.

Gulf investment in the United States is significant and growing. Mrs Clinton’s team is likely to work with Congressional leaders, possibly in coordination with Barack Obama before he leaves office, to create a legislative “fix” for the recently passed Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (Jasta). The law is designed to allow the families of Americans killed in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks to sue Saudi Arabia and its officials for alleged complicity (for which there is no evidence) in the attacks.

Correcting Jasta is important to protect American interests and to prevent an exodus of Saudi and other Gulf investments in the United States. It’s also crucial to restoring confidence and trust to this vital relationship.

Rectifying the Jasta blunder by Congress will be a crucial early test for a president-elect Clinton and a late test for the outgoing Mr Obama.

Mrs Clinton will also seek to demonstrate that she will be more assertive, and in the phrase being promoted by her campaign, “muscular,” in defending American interests than Mr Obama, including through a greater willingness to use military force if need be.

This means she will probably look for an early opportunity to confront Russian president Vladimir Putin, take a tougher line with Iran while continuing to implement the nuclear agreement, and strengthen American engagement in Syria.

Less to the liking of Washington’s Gulf allies will be Mrs Clinton’s probable greater emphasis on human, and especially women’s, rights around the world, including in the Middle East. She has long positioned herself as an international champion of women, and this could be a source of tension, particularly in Washington’s relationship with Riyadh, given that Saudi women still face numerous social restrictions including “guardianship” laws and the prohibition on women driving.

Hacked emails reveal that when she was secretary of state, Mrs Clinton held back from promoting the issue of women driving in Saudi Arabia for fear that “public comments by me would hurt [this] … cause.” Yet she reportedly raised the question repeatedly in private conversations with senior Saudi officials.

Mrs Clinton is surely pragmatic enough to ensure that disagreements on women’s rights don’t seriously harm US relations with Saudi Arabia. As secretary of state, she pursued what her aides called “quiet diplomacy” on this issue. That may continue to be the fundamental approach she brings to the White House, but it’s hard to imagine that she won’t place a greater emphasis on these concerns than any other recent American president.

Mrs Clinton has long favoured personalised diplomacy based on building a strong rapport with foreign leaders. With his more cerebral and aloof style, Mr Obama has relied on the formal channels and mechanisms of diplomacy, and eschewed close personal relationships.

He has also largely avoided negative ones, even effectively shrugging when Filipino president Rodrigo Duterte publicly called him a “son of a whore”. Only Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu managed to get under Mr Obama’s skin by repeatedly misleading him regarding Israel’s intentions on settlements and blatantly interfering to support Mitt Romney in the 2012 election.

But this is the exception that proves the overall rule that Mr Obama has studiously avoided making personalities a factor in his diplomatic approach.

Mrs Clinton is unlikely to reprise George W Bush’s overemphasis on interpersonal relations and gut reactions. But her tenure as secretary of state suggests she will reintroduce personal relationships as an important element of American diplomacy. The visceral mutual animosity with Mr Putin is already well-established.

Gulf leaders have traditionally also favoured intimate personal relationships as a foundation, along with the core realities of national interest, of international cooperation. Mrs Clinton will almost certainly give them an opportunity to utilise these skills, following eight years of chilly unresponsiveness from Mr Obama.

Such strong personal relationships – along with an improved policy environment on issues regarding Iran, Syria and Russia – can help ensure that if and when Mrs Clinton voices criticism about human and women’s rights, Gulf leaders know they are listening to a trustworthy friend and not an unreliable or unfair critic.

http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/is-there-a-late-surprise-afoot-in-the-us-election

Is it the most extraordinary “October surprise” yet, or a meaningless illusion? Either “this changes everything” as Donald Trump exulted, or it amounts to nothing. No one has a clue, and the American presidential election now hangs in limbo, with no indication of when or how the most basic questions about the latest dramatic development will be answered.

On Thursday night, there was every reason to believe Donald Trump had virtually no chance of beating Hillary Clinton. She held a substantial lead according to most polls, both nationally and in the all-important swing states, and a large funding advantage.

But by Friday afternoon, the election may have suddenly been thrown wide open. FBI director James Comey informed Congress that the bureau is reviewing newly discovered emails that “appear to be pertinent” to an investigation into Mrs Clinton’s communications that everyone had considered resolved.

Mrs Clinton has been haunted by her use of a private email server when she was secretary of state. Almost 32,000 emails she considered “personal communications” were deleted from the server in an apparent violation of regulations adopted 10 months into her tenure.

On July 5, Mr Comey announced the FBI was recommending no criminal charges be filed, and that he did not believe any laws had been broken. Nonetheless, he chided her for being “extremely careless”.

The FBI says it has discovered emails that “appear to be pertinent” to the server investigation, whatever that might mean, on a computer belonging to disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner, the estranged husband of a key aide to Mrs Clinton, Huma Abedin. Mr Weiner, who has a long history of reckless online sexual behaviour, is the subject of an unrelated investigation for allegedly sending improper messages to a 15-year-old girl.

A virtual tsunami of breathless, but often misleading, reportage suggested the FBI had “reopened” its investigation into Mrs Clinton’s server.

The FBI says that it will review the messages to determine what, if any, relevance they have to that case. But it hasn’t said how many emails will be examined, whether any were to or from Mrs Clinton, if any involve classified formation, or why the FBI considers them potentially “pertinent”.

Mr Comey says he felt bound to inform Congress, even though the bureau has no idea about “the significance of this newly discovered collection of emails”.

So, at this stage, there is no indication that the FBI has discovered anything mildly interesting, let alone important, not to mention scandalous.

The public, however, was subjected to reporting that implied that a massive scandal had been uncovered or confirmed. The words Clinton, emails, FBI and investigation were typically strung together in a manner that created the impression that the Democratic nominee is a target of a major new criminal investigation, or that the old case has been reopened in some meaningful sense (it was never formally “closed”), or that a new bonanza of information (the word “bombshell” was ubiquitous) has been discovered. None of that is, at least for now, even remotely accurate.

Yet the presidential campaign has been thrown into utter disarray. Mr Trump preposterously declared that “this is bigger than Watergate”. Mrs Clinton and members of Congress from both parties demanded that the FBI release “the full and complete facts immediately”. The justice department said it strongly opposed Mr Comey’s letter because it violates policies prohibiting influencing elections.

It is exceptionally difficult to evaluate the impact of Mr Comey’s reckless letter, which raised innumerably more questions than it answered.

Voters may have long ago chosen sides regarding Mrs Clinton’s private server. Or the controversy might breathe new life into the notions that she is untrustworthy, dishonest and corrupt. Even if few people alter their basic evaluation of the candidates, the uproar could prompt potential Clinton voters to stay home on election day.

Mr Comey has, intentionally or not, whipped up a colossal, and potentially game-changing, controversy that is entirely content-free. He has, in effect, constructed a gigantic blank screen on to which the media and the public can project their darkest fantasies about Mrs Clinton, with the implicit imprimatur of the FBI.

It’s hard to imagine more irresponsible conduct or a greater public disservice. Given the forthcoming election, the FBI should shift heaven and Earth to provide as much detail as soon as possible to the public about these emails, and the nature and scope of their inquiry. Even then, assuming that this is the tempest in a teapot the Clinton campaign insists it must be, real harm to the democratic process may have already been done.

The American public has an absolute right and urgent need to know what, if anything, the FBI has actually discovered. Heading into the final week of the campaign with such a shadow hanging over the election and without clarification would be indefensible and intolerable.

http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/the-trump-narrative-is-a-familiar-loser-wins-confidence-trick

The United States presidential election has degenerated into an unprecedented assault against the bedrock institutions of American democracy. Donald Trump is no longer running against Hillary Clinton. He is now campaigning against the entire American system through hysterical and paranoid rhetoric about an evil plot by corrupt global elites.

In a 2005 video, Mr Trump boasted about routinely sexually assaulting women. During the second debate he insisted he would never do anything like that and it was just “locker room talk”. But in recent days at least 11 women offered accounts, spanning several decades, that indicate Mr Trump was telling the truth on the video and lying during the debate.

It has become clear to everyone that he cannot win. His reaction has been that of a wounded animal, enraged and bleeding, wildly lashing out in all directions.

Proclaiming his “shackles” removed, he declared war on his own “disloyal” party, particularly Paul Ryan, the house speaker. He seems to be not only willing but eager to pull the entire American political edifice down with him.

When his fortunes waned in late summer, Mr Trump began darkly warning about the election “being rigged”. He mothballed such rhetoric during the autumn as his prospects improved somewhat. Now, with virtually no chance of winning, he is emphasising the “rigged election” theme, calling it “one big ugly lie”.

Mr Trump is indoctrinating his followers with a paranoid narrative that is virtually cut and pasted from the alt-right Breit­bart.com website and ripped from the pages of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, giving it a distinctly anti-Semitic subtext.

There is no American democracy, Mr Trump insists, only “a small handful of global special interests rigging the system”. Mrs Clinton meets secretly with the “international banks” that control the “Clinton machine” which lies at the conspiracy’s centre. The media are just another “political special interest”, as the sexual assault coverage demonstrates. His accusers are unattractive, he adds, weirdly implying that he might have assaulted prettier women.

American elections are rigged, and polls fabricated (unless they show him winning). The courts, with “Mexican” judges from Indiana, are also hopelessly biased.

This conspiracy involves such strange bedfellows as Republican party leaders, government agencies, Mexico, China and “­Islamic terrorists”.

Alone against this near-universal cabal of evil, which is on the brink of triumph, stands Mr Trump. Only he can save civilisation. His (entirely self-inflicted) political meltdown is cast as a Christ-like martyrdom. “I take all of these slings and arrows gladly for you – gladly,” Mr Trump tells his enraptured acolytes.

By systematically discrediting all other governance and civic institutions, Mr Trump leaves only an all-powerful president.

Both major political parties, the courts, media, financial institutions and so on, have all betrayed the American people and are working together to destroy the country. No wonder many Trump supporters, including Paul ­LePage, the governor of Maine, openly yearn for an “authoritarian” Trump presidency.

The Trump narrative is a familiar “loser wins” confidence trick. If he wins it will be despite the election and the system being “rigged”, though he does not explain how that could happen. If he loses, that will just prove they are indeed “rigged”.

If his followers really believe that the Trump campaign is “a struggle for the survival of our nation”, and the election was “our last chance to save it” but was “rigged”, why would – and how could – they calmly and peacefully accept Mrs Clinton’s victory?

In August Mr Trump darkly implied that only “Second Amendment people” (ie, gun owners) could “do something” about a Clinton presidency. And he has frequently incited violence against protesters at his rallies.

By insisting the system is rigged, the future of civilisation is at stake, and violence is a legitimate political tool, Mr Trump is inviting an outburst of violence after the election. Media reports are replete with Trump supporters warning of revolution, a coup, or at least bloodshed if he loses.

Violence could begin as early as election day, with Mr Trump recklessly urging his supporters to “monitor” polling places, especially in minority districts to “make sure that this election is not stolen from us”.

Following the Republican convention, I wrote that Mr Trump demonstrated “what American authoritarianism looks like”. Since then he has intensified his extremism and demagoguery, seeking to explain his impending defeat through a “stabbed in the back” fairy tale.

Authoritarianism is no longer an adequate term. It’s far too mild. This is American fascism.

http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/as-trump-flounders-his-party-fights-over-its-future

The wreck of the Trump-­tanic is a spectacular political disaster. With Donald Trump’s unsalvageable campaign sinking fast, Republican leaders are scrambling to the lifeboats in levels of despair and desperation not seen in Washington since Watergate.

Mr Trump and his allies were already reeling from an unparalleled series of setbacks: a terrible performance in the first debate against Hillary Clinton; revelations he lost almost $1 billion in a single year and may not have paid any federal taxes for almost two decades; and continued, apparently compulsive, bizarre behaviour including a Twitter feud with a former beauty queen over her weight and eating habits.

The coup de grace came on Friday when the Washington Post revealed a videotape from 2005 showing Mr Trump boasting about routinely sexually assaulting women, grabbing their private areas, and attempting (unsuccessfully) to seduce a married woman (when he was well into his own third marriage).

This cavalcade of scandals has sealed his defeat and rendered him politically radioactive. He’s not only going to lose. Any Republican who fails to disassociate themselves from him while they have a chance might be permanently discredited.

The video is especially devastating because Mr Trump’s last, rather desperate, line of attack against Mrs Clinton, in the run-up to the second debate, was to dredge up dated controversies about Bill Clinton’s behaviour with women and accuse his wife of being “an enabler”.

The Clinton campaign was strongly signalling it was ready, if not eager, to engage Mr Trump on this issue. Given they now have what amount to tactical nuclear weapons for a counter attack on sexual proprieties, they probably can’t wait.

Beleaguered Republicans find themselves in an impossible series of traps, largely of their own construction. The biggest losers are those, such as Senator Ted Cruz, who only just clambered aboard the ill-fated SS Trump-tanic.

Party leaders are dutifully issuing their latest strong condemnations of their own candidate’s words and deeds. But they look absolutely ridiculous continuously denouncing Mr Trump in harsh terms, while simultaneously still backing him for the presidency. It makes no sense whatsoever. Additional Trump scandals are likely to be revealed in the month remaining before the election.

A movement is brewing among Republican politicians, eager to salvage their own futures, to repudiate Mr Trump, rescind their endorsements of him, and urge him to withdraw from the election. He says he would never consider voluntarily withdrawing, and, indeed, that would be completely out of character.

Its own rules do not allow the Republicans to replace Mr Trump as the candidate, and even if he did voluntarily withdraw, with ballots already printed and early voting having already begun in many places, it would be practically impossible to plausibly field another candidate at this stage. They are stuck with him, especially since there is almost no chance he will voluntarily step aside.

Worse still, Mr Trump’s plummeting reputation looks increasingly likely to threaten Republican prospects of retaining a majority not only in the Senate, but even in the House of Representatives.

It seems increasingly plausible that enough Republican and independent voters, particularly women, will be so disgusted by Mr Trump that they will stay home on election day, to render otherwise safe seats in Congress suddenly susceptible to heretofore unanticipated Democratic victories.

Moreover, Republicans face a bleak future in the aftermath of a Trump-engineered electoral defeat. A vicious, bloody fight over the leadership, future and even identity of the Republican Party seems inevitable between traditional constituencies such as social and religious conservatives, business interests and hawkish neoconservatives versus newer blocs such as the white nationalist “alt-right” and the nativist, protectionist tea party movement that fuelled the Trump insurgency.

These groups have all been willing to put their differences aside for much of the campaign in mutual hopes of electing Mr Trump, but with very different expectations and aspirations. Negotiating the reunification of the party in the aftermath of a stinging defeat to Mrs Clinton, and possibly in Congress, and in the context of deep and bitter divisions and, in many cases, contradictory and mutually exclusive agendas, will be extremely difficult.

Traditional factions will blame the Trump-adoring insurgents for the debacle and demand a return to traditional conservatism. The upstarts will castigate traditionalists for not sufficiently backing the candidate and being dinosaurs out of touch with the public mood.

Individual Republican politicians, meanwhile, will struggle to explain to the broader public why they supported someone who, from the outset, was obviously unqualified and unfit, and is quickly becoming a ­widely-despised synonym for racism, misogyny, greed, cheating and sleaze.

Mr Trump is dragging everyone around him towards a watery political grave. Knowing this, the Republican National Committee has halted at least some work on its “Victory” project to elect him. For the panicking Republican crew, it’s now every one for themselves.

http://www.agsiw.org/veto-override-isnt-the-last-word-on-jasta/

http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/america-needs-to-compromise-over-terror-act

Anger in some parts of the Arabian Gulf over a new US law, the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (­Jasta), is understandable. But the energy being squandered complaining would be much better spent on the lively prospects for finding a solution.

Jasta allows Americans to sue foreign governments over the deaths of Americans killed in terrorist attacks on US soil. It’s mainly intended to allow the families of the victims of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks to sue the Saudi government and officials over alleged complicity in the atrocities.

Such legal cases have been routinely dismissed because of “sovereign immunity”, the pillar of international law and relations whereby all countries agree that other governments and their officials can’t be sued or prosecuted for their official conduct.

It’s strange that Congress would initiate the scrapping of sovereign immunity as an inviolable principle when the United States has an unrivalled global role, and is therefore uniquely vulnerable to legal challenges, and even prosecutions.

Because of the dangers he outlined in a strongly-worded “veto message”, Barack Obama rejected Jasta. But last week the US Congress overwhelmingly delivered the first veto override of his presidency.

For the United States, Jasta is a proverbial Pandora’s Box: irresistibly attractive but potentially catastrophic.

American officials could find themselves hauled before judges around the world regarding drone strikes, covert operations, other military actions or anything else another country deems illegal. Moreover, the US government and its officials could even be held responsible for the actions of private American citizens, organisations or companies.

How did this fiasco happen? Why did the US Congress insist on delivering this self-inflicted wound?

It’s partly timing. The original Jasta vote and the veto override both came just a few weeks before the November 11 elections, when many politicians will be facing their constituents. Campaigning under a cloud of having “denied September 11 victims their day in court” is certainly terrifying, and perhaps unthinkable, for many American politicians. The only senator who voted against the veto override, Harry Reid, is retiring.

It’s partly partisan politics. Republicans welcomed the opportunity to deliver the first and probably only veto override of Mr Obama’s presidency. Democrats can tell voters they love the president but “bravely” stood up to him on this issue. And both can boast that they faced down a supposedly mighty “Saudi lobby”.

And partly it’s tension between two rival branches of government. The White House called the veto override the “single most embarrassing thing that the United States Senate has done” in decades.

Almost to confirm this, on the very same day they voted, 28 senators also issued a letter expressing precisely the same concerns Mr Obama had outlined about Jasta’s “potential unintended consequences”.

The outpouring of what the White House aptly called “buyer’s remorse” regarding Jasta was almost instantaneous. Many American politicians are apparently determined to try to “fix” Jasta through additional legislation soon after the election, maybe even in November.

Republicans, knowing they have to correct this potential disaster, are blaming Mr Obama and a supposedly egregious “failure to communicate” by the White House. They claim no one ever warned them about threats to American national interests posed by Jasta, that they couldn’t get a meeting with the White House about it, and their calls were not returned.

They’d have us believe they were blissfully unaware of the implications when they voted for the veto override, only to suddenly discover, a few hours later, all these unimagined but dire perils.

Think about it: Republicans are actually denouncing Mr Obama for failing to successfully block a bill that they not only supported, but also dramatically defended through the first veto override in almost eight years. That’s genuinely funny.

But Democrats are complaining too. Nancy Pelosi, the House minority leader, insists she was never contacted about marshalling sufficient votes to sustain the veto. That’s less amusing.

Dismay over Jasta is widespread in Washington. Therefore, a compromise – which could include limiting the scope and nature of legal action, creating an adjudicating tribunal, restoring an executive waiver, or somehow otherwise limiting the effect and implications of the act – is achievable.

Plaintiffs’ lawyers clearly understand this. The act could effectively outsource foreign policy decision-making to lawyers who exploit the discovery process, demand the release of sensitive information, and create diplomatic crises to try to win summary judgments and make money. These lawyers are scrambling to file legal cases against Saudi Arabia before any additional legislation limits their options.

Instead of wasting time venting outrage, Saudis, their friends and all serious people, should promote compromise legislation, which would be in everybody’s interests, by focusing on the significant threats Jasta poses to American national interests.

http://www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/obamas-failure-in-syria-will-haunt-his-successor