Mark Twain: Everyone Talks About The Lobby ...

Or maybe I got that wrong. Whatever. Everyone these days is talking about who actually runs America, so it seems a natural to talk about The Lobby.

Let’s start with this article, that quotes extensively from Semafor:

The tales of pervasive senility are not new or lost on conservatives; we’ve seen Joe and know he’s half-dead. But an article in Semafor from an unnamed source from a “scared” Biden aide paints a picture that is unsettling about the inner workings of the White House, which in some ways is a Nixonian throwback regarding secrecy (via Semafor): 

Midday on the Fourth of July, I received a call from a government official with regular access to the West Wing, who said they had reached a breaking point and wanted to sound the alarm.

The person insisted on careful ground rules: No details on the specific policy area they’d work on, no gender, age, or sexual orientation. Their credibility basically depends on my vouching that they’re a serious person, which I can do — though I should also say this person has nothing to say about the president’s physical condition, and was limited to their own experience outside Biden’s tight inner circle. 

Here is the assertion this person would like to get across: It’s unclear even to some inside the West Wing policy process which policy issues reach the president, and how. Major decisions go into an opaque circle that includes White House chief of staff, Jeff Zients (who talks to the president regularly) and return concluded. (The big exception to this pattern, they said, is foreign policy.) 

This pattern had already been a topic of discussion, and curiosity, among the high-powered aides who work in and around the White House. The rituals of paperflow are technical, but they say they’re surprised by the lack of briefings to the president, and of readouts from consultations with the president and worry about the possibility of decisions “being made without him.” 

…

Of course, the White House denied what this source told Semafor, but even Ben Smith, who penned the piece, said that Biden’s command and decision-making processes have been questioned since the president’s disastrous debate. There’s deep skepticism that age hasn’t changed anything about Biden’s decision-making process, but there's no solid evidence that Jill is in charge, though who knows? 

“My source’s call — as they say, from inside the building — is a mark of why the panic inside the Democratic Party is running so deep right now,” wrote Smith. “Even inside the West Wing, not everyone is sure.” 

How did Jeff Zients—who previously was best known as a bagel impresario—become the guy who runs the White House and, therefore, pretty much runs America? Well, it turns out that it’s kind of a traditional thing—just as Congressmen and Senators have AIPAC keepers so, too, do presidents. The Times of Israel explains:

Biden announces appointment of Jeff Zients to replace Ron Klain as chief of staff

Ex-director of White House’s COVID response and initial investor in DC Jew-ish deli ‘Call Your Mother’ becomes second successive member of Tribe to fill senior post

He will be the sixth Jewish American to serve as White House chief of staff, joining Klain, Rahm Emanuel and Jack Lew from the Obama administration, Joshua Bolten from George W. Bush’s administration and Ken Duberstein from the Regan [sic] administration, according to The Forward.

…

Zients succeeds Klain, a longtime fixture in Biden’s political orbit ...

“I’m confident that Jeff will continue Ron’s example …

“I respect him enormously,” Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, who spoke regularly with Zients during his stint as COVID-19 response coordinator …

Normally, this kinda stuff flies under the radar—only people like Walt and Mearsheimer talk about it in public. But, of course, these are not normal times—America is up to its neck or above in genocide on behalf of Israel and its supporters:

White House grapples with internal divisions on Israel-Gaza

The Hamas attacks and Israeli reaction have roiled the Biden team like no other issue during his presidency

Who does the grappling?

Earlier this month, a group of about 20 distressed White House staffers requested a meeting with President Biden’s top advisers, as Israel’s war in Gaza entered its sixth week.

The diverse group of staffers had three main issues they wanted to discuss with White House Chief of Staff Jeff Zients, senior adviser Anita Dunn and deputy national security adviser Jon Finer: They wanted to know the administration’s strategy for curbing the number of civilian deaths, the message it plans to send on the conflict and its postwar vision for the region.

The staffers may have been diverse—not so much the top advisers. Finer seems to be Jake Sullivan’s keeper.

Zients, Dunn and Finer listened respectfully, but some participants felt they fell back on familiar talking points, said a White House official familiar with the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private exchange. The administration had to be careful not to criticize Israel in public so it could influence its leaders in private, the advisers said. U.S. officials were pushing Israel to minimize civilian casualties. And the president and his top aides were advocating for a two-state solution once the conflict was over.

Ah, the old “influence ‘em in private” wheeze. Because, well, just because. We can’t talk about that.

Lest anyone suspect I’m slanting things by quoting US, UK, and Israeli sources, here’s Press TV’s take on this administration:

Zionist Jews in Biden administration calling the shots on Israeli war on Gaza

The Zionist Jewishness of Biden's cabinet was pointed out recently by The Forward, a progressive media for a Jewish American audience, as well as the Israeli right-wing newspaper Times of Israel.

Being a Jew should not be seen as a problem, ...

There are also non-Jewish Zionists whose support is motivated by Christian Zionism or belonging to pro-Israel lobbies, a common case in the ranks of the Republican Party.

The problem lies in the fact that everyone in the Biden administration is a radical Zionist who will uncompromisingly justify Israeli war crimes, with slight disagreements over relatively minor issues, such as illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank.

In the American mainstream media, voting in the UN Security Council and supporting the genocidal destruction of Gaza is treated as common sense and a natural course of action.

…

Biden made no secret of his Zionist inclinations, uttering the words "I am a Zionist". And he has proved it through numerous pro-Israeli activities in his decades-long political career.

One of them is the placement of Jewish Zionists in top positions in his administration, which at the beginning of 2021 evoked a popular joke on social networks that the West Wing would have a “minyan.”

The Hebrew term “minyan” means the minimum number of males (10) required to constitute a representative "community of Israel" for liturgical purposes.

Biden's initial lineup includes Anthony Blinken as Secretary of State, Merrick Garland as Attorney General, Avril Haines as Director of National Intelligence, Ronald Klain as White House Chief of Staff, Rachel Levine as Assistant Secretary for Health, Alejandro Mayorkas as Secretary of Homeland Security, and Janet Yellen as Secretary of the Treasury.

One level down are David Cohen as Deputy CIA Director, Eric Lander as science and technology adviser, Ann Neuberger as Deputy National Security Adviser, and Wendy Sherman as Deputy Secretary of State.

In the meantime, Victoria Nuland took the position of Undersecretary of State for political affairs, Ed Siskel as White House counsel, and Klain was replaced by Jeff Zients as chief of staff.

Others appointed by Biden include Daniel Shapiro as a special liaison to Israel on Iran, Ned Price as spokesman for the Department of State, Jennifer Klein as executive director of the White House Gender Policy Council, as well as a large number of ambassadors.

The Zionist envoys include Michael Adler, David Cohen, Rahm Emanuel, Eric Garcetti, Mark Gitenstein, Amy Gutmann, Jonathan Kaplan, Yael Lempert, Alan Leventhal, Randi Levine, Jack Lew, Jack Markell, Constance Milstein, Marc Nathanson, Marc Ostfield, David Pressman, Daniel Rosenblum, and Marc Stanley, among others.

…

Blinken, the top American diplomat, comes from a Zionist family. His grandfather Maurice was one of the early American Zionists and the founder of the American Palestine Institute, in the years before the declaration of the Zionist entity.

...

He was a close confidant of the Israeli ambassador to the US Ron Dermer who could call him in the middle of the night for pro-Israeli services, such as lobbying hard to have Israel's Iron Dome air military system financed with American taxpayer money.

…

As for Mayorkas, even the Israeli media boasted of his strong family ties to Tel Aviv and praised him for the data-sharing pact between the United States and the Zionist regime.

Even greater Zionist credit for intelligence sharing goes to CIA deputy chief David Cohen, whose career under Obama focused on sanctioning Israel's enemies.

Thus, it is no surprise that Americans are bankrolling the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza while harping about ceasefire and aid airdrops to hoodwink the international community.

I know. Talk, talk, talk. Gada, gada, gada.