When I look into the mirror, I see more than the physical man steering back at me.
I see my emotional health expressed in the posture of my stance and the glow in my eyes.
I notice the resonance of my soul based on the ease by which I can accept and respect the man before me.
When I am out of sorts, I feel uncomfortable when looking at the reflection I see.
And on those rare occasions where I have acted shamefully, I can’t bear to look in my own eyes.
On November 5th, 2024, I face one of the most important decisions of my adult life. On that day I will vote for my choice of President of the United States. I have voted in every Presidential Election since 1984 when Republican President Reagan was running against Democrat, Walter Mondale. It has become commonplace for candidates to insist the current election is the most important in U.S. history. And maybe there is some truth in the assertion given the trend line of national and international events over the last few decades. Nonetheless, by any objective standard, this Presidential Election is by far the most important election in U.S. History.
When a Presidential election includes an incumbent, it invariably becomes a referendum of the governing performance of the President. In order to re-elect a President, the electorate necessarily affirms and assumes responsibility for the decisions the President has made. This is the basis of government of the People, by the people, and for the People.
As I consider the governing performance of President Joe Biden, I see the death of government for the People. When we elected President Joe Biden in 2020, he presented himself as the Adult in the Room who would restore steady leadership in the White House. Yes, he made many promises that he barely tried to keep, but this has become normal for Presidents over the last four decades. What distinguished President Biden is his willingness to gaslight the American People on the two conflicts that very well may lead to irreparable damage to the American economy and ultimately to WWIII.
According to the Biden Administration, Russia’s attack on Ukraine was an unprovoked act of naked aggression. On this basis, the Biden Administration in collaboration with global allies imposed the worse economic sanctions in global history on Russia including seizing hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian U.S. dollar reserves. This narrative professed by the U.S. government and parroted by the establishment media could not be further from the truth and the rest of the world knows it.
The issues leading up to the War in Ukraine involve a mirrored reversal of the issues leading up to the Cuban missile crisis. In the Cuban Missile crisis, the United States brought the world to the edge of a nuclear war because the Soviet Union placed intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads in Cuba. In the War in Ukraine, the United States announced as early as 2008, during the George W. Bush administration, the intent to expand NATO across eastern Europe to include Ukraine, which shares a 2,000 kilometer border with Russia. Vladimir Putin made it clear at the time that the expansion of NATO to the Russian border, which includes the deployment of intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads, would pose an existential threat that Russia would never allow. So clear was Putin’s message that President Obama openly acknowledged America was at a strategic disadvantage in the goal to expand NATO to include Ukraine because America was unwilling to sacrifice what Russia would sacrifice to prevent it. Nonetheless, the Obama Administration authorized the financing of the violent overthrow of a democratically elected, pro-Russian government in Ukraine in 2014, and the installation of a fiercely anti-Russian government intent on joining NATO.
America’s involvement in the overthrow was proven when the Russian’s were able to produce a audio recording of Assistant National Security Advisor Victoria Nuland revealing to the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine the new Ukrainian leadership to be installed before the coup had occurred. Once installed, the new Ukrainian government began ethnically cleansing Russian Ukrainians living in the southeastern region (including Donbass), killing up to 15,000 people. Russia intervened by launching an attack in 2014 that secured the southeastern region and took control over Crimea, which included a vital naval base Russia had been leasing from the previous Ukrainian regime. Russia and Ukraine reached a negotiated peace agreement called the Minsk II agreement, which was guaranteed by Germany, France and Poland and approved by the United Nations Security council. Under the Minsk II agreement, the southeastern region would remain a part of Ukraine, though protected from the anti-Russian government in Ukraine. A referendum was held in Crimea where local residents voted to join Russia. Armed by the support of the United States, Ukraine chose not to abide by the Minsk II agreement. Germany and France refused the enforce the agreement they guaranteed, and no action was taken at the United Nations Security Council. The United States began building military bases in Ukraine and increased arms sales to Ukraine.
By the winter of 2021, Russia moved significant military assets to the Ukrainian border and announced their intent to attack Ukraine if the NATO build-up in Ukraine did not end. In December 2021, Vladimir Putin sent an official communique to the NATO leadership requesting to open negotiations on the expansion of NATO in Ukraine. The NATO leadership refused the Russian request stating NATO expansion was not the business of Russia. This concludes the multi-year provocation of Russia that led to their attack in Ukraine. If NATO expansion to the Russian border, which includes the installation of nuclear missiles, is not the business of Russia, on what basis did the United States bring the world to the edge of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile crisis? Yet our government still relentlessly insists the Russian attack on Ukraine was unprovoked.
In the War in Gaza, Israel has launched a comprehensive siege and military attack on the entire population of Palestinians in Gaza in response to the Hamas’ terrorist attack on October 7th, 2023. The issue in dispute is not Israel’s right to defend itself. The issue concerns Israel’s duty under the Geneva Convention and the Genocide Convention to limit civilian casualties in their response to the Hamas attack. In the eight months since October 7th, 2023, Israel, which has control of the border in Gaza, has ordered a complete siege effectively denying the Palestinians food, water, medical supplies, and other essential good and services needed to support the 2.3 million people living in Gaza. Israel has also launched the most devastating bombardment and ground attack on a civilian population in modern history.
The death toll as of June 23, 2024:
- 37,626 Palestinians including over 15,000 children and over 10,000 women
- By comparison, 7,792 children and 3,219 women were killed in the last ten years of the U.S. War in Afghanistan
- 108 journalists have been killed in Gaza since 10/7/2023 versus 29 killed in 20 years of the U.S. Afghanistan War or 69 journalists killed during WWII.
- 250 aid workers have been killed in Gaza versus 115 aid workers killed in the 19 years of the Vietnam War.
- 500 medical staff have been killed in Gaza versus 645 in the 19 years of the Vietnam War
This ongoing death toll is in response to Hamas’s attack on October 7th, 2023 that killed 1,139 Israelis and took 251 hostages
In December 2023, South Africa brought a claim of Genocide in Gaza against the Israeli government to the International Court of Justice (ICJ). In response to South Africa’s case filed with the ICJ, U.S. National Security spokesperson, John Kirby, stated “the claim of genocide against Israel is baseless and without merit.” The ICJ who has exclusive jurisdiction under the Genocide Convention to decide questions of genocide determined by a vote of 15-2 that Israel was plausibly committing genocide in Gaza. Further, the ICJ found the danger of irreparable harm to the Palestinians were likely if they did not immediately intervene. The ICJ by a vote of 15-2 ordered Israel to stop harming Palestinians in Gaza as prescribed by the Genocide Convention. By a vote of 16-1, including the Israeli judge, the ICJ ordered Israel to stop publicly inciting genocide, to punish anyone publicly inciting genocide, and to stop blocking humanitarian aid from reaching the Palestinians in Gaza. The ICJ’s rulings expose the official narrative of the U.S. government and the establishment media as boldface lies.
Given these two catastrophic lies perpetrated on the World by the Biden Administration, America has totally lost credibility and is quickly joining Israel as a pariah state. The international community is responding by reducing the U.S. dollar reserves held by countries around the world. The global reserve percentage of U.S. dollars has dropped from 66% in 2003 to 47% in 2022, including an 8% drop since the War in Ukraine began. To date, the American people has expressed their opposition to the Biden administration’s unwavering support of the Israeli onslaught in Gaza, with 67% supporting a permanent ceasefire now. College students across the country have established protest encampments in support of a permanent ceasefire now and the establishment of a Palestinian state.
The critical test the world awaits is whether the American electorate will endorse President Biden’s hypocritical war in Ukraine and his unwavering complicity in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. This election offers each of us the opportunity to reject the blatantly manipulative narratives rationalizing President Biden’s catastrophic foreign policy. If we fail this test, the American people will earn the same pariah status of our much maligned federal government.
On November 6th, 2024, I intend to look directly in my mirror and observe a grateful man staring back at me. What do you intend to see when you look into your mirror?
Either way, the mirror never lies.
