#Biden calls #America’s democratic values the “grounding wire of our global power” & its #alliances “our greatest asset.” …#Trump, called for withdrawing American forces in #Europe & #Asia & has promised… to cut loose even our closest #allies if they don’t do as he tells them. …Trump sees all countries as unreliable, the relations between them #transactional. That sentiment has spread throughout a #GOP that once championed America’s values abroad…
…#Biden responds to a question about America’s relationship w/ #SaudiArabia by saying that the #US has 2 kinds of #alliances: “There are #values-based, & there are #practical-based.”
…One of his first moves in office was to cut off certain #arms supplies over the kingdom’s #war in #Yemen, which has #displaced 4.5M people & #killed 377k, including 11k children…. Soon after, the de facto Saudi ruler… #MBS, met w/ #China’s FM & proposed greater cooperation on #nuclear energy & #security….
"Call it anomie or call it airsickness—we find ourselves in a land of confusion. Trump pays off a porn star and yet is hailed as a champion of Christian values. He mocks prisoners of war and calls dead soldiers 'suckers,' and his MAGA base is thrilled by his patriotism."
"To hear conservative Christians argue that personal character doesn’t matter, or to witness self-described constitutional conservatives defend a relentless attack on the rule of law, is disorienting. To see advocates of law and order embrace rioters who attacked the Capitol and beat police officers is baffling."
"To watch the party of Ronald Reagan embracing isolationism and following Trump in truckling to the Butcher of Ukraine, Putin, is bewildering. Mind-bending, also, is that, despite Trump’s fire hose of lies, 71 percent of Republicans describe him as 'honest and trustworthy.'”
"The challenge of the present moment is to continue to relentlessly observe, report, and document each of Donald Trump’s serial transgressions of democratic norms, the rule of law, and basic human decency. Challenging because the list is endless, the mind numbs, the body tires, and because the effort is not going to change his behavior or calm the fervor of his true believers."