The John Batchelor Show

Thursday 31 October 2019

Air Date: 
October 31, 2019

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-hosts: Sebastian Gorka, Fox; and Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents
 
Hour One
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 1, Block A: Dr Sebastian Gorka, America First radio program; FOX Business Network; & author of  The War for America’s Soul; Why We Fight: Defeating America’s Enemies—with No Apologies (Regnery) and Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War (Regnery); in re: Baghdadi is dead. The monster is dead – we celebrate this victory, It’s a puzzle why not every American does.  Thugs, rapists, murderers: the territory of All Sham, the final caliphate before the end of the world. Mrs Pelosi is running a mystery: her lieutenant brings in witness after witness to say – we don't know what. No crime has been cited.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 1, Block B: Dr Sebastian Gorka, America First radio program; FOX Business Network; & author of The War for America’s Soul; Why We Fight: Defeating America’s Enemies—with No Apologies (Regnery) and Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War (Regnery); in re: Why do the Democrats never mention the economy? 
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 1, Block C: Victor Davis Hanson, author: The Case for Trump; Hoover, in re: Rules formulated for the behind-closed-doors Adam Schiff committee. Mrs Pelosi has to do soothing for his base but she sort of doesn’t want to.  . . .  Next year could be dangerous – could have a Horowitz report, possible indictments.   Seems to be an effort to change the narrative. American sill put up with a lot, but won’t accept a Star Chamber to impeach a president. If you have something, come forward with it. The military-intelligence complex.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 1, Block D: Dan Henninger, WSJ Wonder Land, in re: Democratic candidates.  Corporations: tricky.  Currently, they're dropping many hiring requirements because they’re desperate to find employees. The economy is booming; eventually, even the Democrats will have to address this.  The “sugar high” of the revival of the US economy in response to the tax cut and deregulation?   Staggering amount of underlying strength — businesses invested and invested and brought in more workers.
 
Hour Two
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 2, Block A:  Simon Henderson, in re: Gulf States; Iraqi unrest. The UAE is acting friendly to Iran. UAE has released $700 million in frozen funds to Iran. They may fear Iran, but are always ready to make accommodation to Iran to protect themselves. A Gulf recalibration: Straits of Hormuz?  Note that he UAE has continued to trade extensively w Iran for years. Dubai is a major port for goods into the Gulf and transshipped to Iran. Emirati airlines flies into many Iranian cities.    Yemen/Saudi/Israel:  Missiles shot from Iran into Saudi are short-range; would require longer-range missiles to get to Israel.
●     https://www.timesofisrael.com/uae-frees-millions-in-frozen-funds-amid-warming-ties-iran-says/
●        https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/view/bahrain-hosts-regional-maritime-security-meeting
●        https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-protests/iraqi-prime-ministers-main-backers-agree-to-oust-him-idUSKBN1X90HX
●        https://www.gov.il/en/departments/news/event_steven281019
Simon Henderson is the BakerFellow and director of the Bernstein Program on Gulf and Energy Policy at The Washington Institute, specializing in energy matters and the conservative Arab states of the Persian Gulf. A former journalist with Financial Times, Mr. Henderson has also worked as a consultant advising corporations and governments on the Persian Gulf. He became an associate of the Institute in 1999 and joined the staff in 2006. He started his career with the British Broadcasting Corporation before joining the Financial Times. His experience includes serving as a foreign correspondent in Pakistan in 1977-78, and reported from Iran during the 1979 Islamic revolution and seizure of the U.S. embassy.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 2, Block B:  Michael Rubin in re: for centuries, Iaqi s have resented Iranian overreach. Iran now responds with much violence, and much feels their backs agains the wall. If Iran will do this now, inagine hat would happen to any protesting Iranians. They respond with brutal violence in Iraq, but in Syria, where the Kurds have no love for Assad, the Kurds apparently feel safer with Iran.   Assad now asserts that he wants autority on NE Syria. Kurds want a federal repubic while the Syrian Resistance wants a united Syria but Assad to be gone. 
●       http://jcpa.org/iraqis-take-to-the-streets-to-oppose-irans-involvement-in-their-country/
●        https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/iraq-violence-shows-folly-of-placing-hope-in-iran-reform
●        https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/iraqi-protests-bring-baghdad-to-the-tipping-point
●        https://nationalinterest.org/blog/middle-east-watch/abu-bakr-al-baghdadi-dead-his-legacy-lives-91536
●        https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-10-24/as-turkey-and-russia-deal-iran-is-odd-man-out
Michael Rubin is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, where he researches Arab politics, the Gulf Cooperation Council, Iran, Iraq, the Kurds, terrorism, and Turkey. He concurrently teaches classes on terrorism for the FBI and on security, politics, religion, and history for US and NATO military units. A former Pentagon official, Dr. Rubin has lived in post-revolution Iran, Yemen, and both pre- and postwar Iraq, and he spent time with the Taliban before 9/11. He is the author, coauthor, and coeditor of several books exploring Iranian history, American diplomacy, Kurdish studies, and Shi’ite politics. Dr. Rubin has a Ph.D. and an M.A. in history from Yale University, where he also obtained a B.S. in biology.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 2, Block C:  DAS David Peyman, in re: How State implements sanctions policy; the role of the private sector in complying with sanctions; and principles guiding sanctions approach. 
David Peyman is Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Counter Threat Finance and Sanctions. In this capacity, Mr. Peyman leads the Office of Economic Sanctions Policy and Implementation and the Office of Threat Finance Countermeasures.
Mr. Peyman joined the State Department from BlackRock, Inc., where he was Global Head of Sanctions and led the sanctions compliance framework for over $6 trillion in assets under management and offices in 30 countries.
·         https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/US-On-The-Hunt-For-Iranian-Ghost-Tankers.html
·         https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-iran-sanctions/seven-countries-issue-iran-related-sanctions-on-25-targets-idUSKBN1X91PO
·         https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Documents/iran_humanitarian_20191025.pdf
·         https://www.israelhayom.com/2019/10/28/us-treasury-head-meets-with-pm-netanyahu-promises-more-sanctions-on-iran/
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 2, Block D: Mohsen Sazegara (Iran’s domestic situation)
In re:  IS Iaranmade up of a bunch of zillionaire tax dodgers?    Many of htem don't.  The many billionaires don’t; only poor people pay taxes in Iran. Because of he shortage of oil inome, this year
Mohsen Sazegara is a visiting Fellow at The Washington Institute where he will focus on the prospects for political change in Iran and the role of the international community in the movement for democracy in Iran.
           In the late 1970s, as an undergraduate at Sharif University of Technology in Iran and Illinois Institute of Technology, Mr. Sazegara was a leader in the Iranian student movement against the shah. During the 1979 revolution, he returned with Ayatollah Khomeini to Iran, where he served as a founder of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and as managing director of the National Radio of Iran (1979-1981). During the 1980s, he served as political deputy in the prime minister’s office, deputy minister of heavy industries, chairman of the Industrial Development and Renovation Organization of Iran, and vice minister of planning and budget.
·         https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/10/29/iran-irgc-islamic-revolutionary-guard-corps-kept-supreme-leader-ayatollah-ali-khamenei-power/
·         https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-protests-iran-exclusive/exclusive-iran-intervenes-to-prevent-ousting-of-iraqi-prime-minister-sources-idUSKBN1XA2DI
·         https://en.radiofarda.com/a/half-of-iran-s-high-income-earners-do-not-pay-tax/30238506.html
·         https://nationalinterest.org/feature/new-faces-iranian-protest-90976
 
Hour Three
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 3, Block A: Tony Badran (Lebanon Protests). Lebanon  is a basket case being run by a terrorist grop. Hezbollah a taken aback by htthe sigh of all these Lebanese on hthe streets, especially the Shi’ites. The came to denounce Hezbollah and its leader, which is quite unusual. Hezbollah resorted to threats and intimidation, then sent in thugs.  Had to focus on s a small numer of areas, so did on southern Lebanon then Beirut street. . . . Hariri wound up as Hezbollah’s bagman.  The US needs to let this play out and the pressure increase. The country is in a really really deep crisis; Hezbollah is affected by that.  Lebanese depend a good deal on remittenaces from overseaes; a good deal of tht was laundered funds from drugs. When the US put sanctions on the banks, that source dried up.
     Hrrible governance in Lebann and Iraq, and Iran is much invoved in both, but there’s no organization tie btween the two sets of demonstrations.  Soleimani in Iraq now? 
Tony Badran is a research Fellow at FDD, where he focuses on Lebanon, Hezbollah, Syria, and the geopolitics of the Levant. Born and raised in Lebanon, Tony has testified to the House of Representatives on several occasions regarding U.S. policy toward Iran, Syria, and Lebanon. His research currently focuses on the relationship between Iran’s Hezbollah model and regional states, as well as the history of and future scenarios for Israel-Hezbollah wars.
●        https://www.axios.com/israel-us-military-aid-lebanon-hezbollah-missile-factories-e38dfb36-f403-4f02-a000-2242cba2b354.html
●        http://jcpa.org/is-lebanon-sliding-again-into-civil-war/
●        https://english.alarabiya.net/en/views/news/middle-east/2019/10/31/Lebanon-is-a-basket-case-run-by-a-terror-group-don-t-fund-it.html
●        https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/10/lebanon-protests-hezbollah-amal-fpm.html  
●        https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-19/how-lebanon-s-unrest-is-both-new-and-more-of-the-same-quicktake
●        https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/10/22/iran-losing-middle-east-iraq-lebanon-protests-bad-governance/
●        https://www.mei.edu/blog/hezbollahs-counterrevolution
●        https://www.timesofisrael.com/air-defense-batteries-being-put-on-alert-amid-iranian-attack-fears/
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 3, Block B: Malcolm Hoenlein, in re:  Warren, Sanders, Buttagieg propose to reduce to zero the amount ____, and we should condition aid to Israel on conduct in Gaza.  They’re joining the Jeremy Corbyn school of leadership.  (Incidentally 75% of British Jews said they’d vote for Johnson and Brexit over Corbyn.)
      Complete misunderstanding and misrepresentation: it’s all for security, and includes US security.
      Pres Erdogan was invited to the WH for mid-November, but that may not occur.  Soleimani was in Baghdad, is putting down the markers, trying to defend the PM. At a meeting in the Palace, Soleimani chaired the meeting. “We know how to deal with these protestors.”  Why isn't Soleimani a dead man?  Why hasn't the NSC given the kill order?
     Hand-launched drones in Iran. Tarpad drones are a new threat.
      Rockets in Gaza.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 3, Block C: Andrew C McCarthy, author, Ball of Collusion, in re:
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 3, Block D:  
 
Hour Four
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 4, Block A:  Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo Lunar Program, (The MIT Press) by David Meerman Scott, Richard Jurek, et al.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 4, Block B:  Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo Lunar Program, (The MIT Press) by David Meerman Scott, Richard Jurek, et al.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 4, Block C:  Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo Lunar Program, (The MIT Press) by David Meerman Scott, Richard Jurek, et al.
Thursday 31 October 2019/ Hour 4, Block D:  Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo Lunar Program, (The MIT Press) by David Meerman Scott, Richard Jurek, et al.