Senator Marco Rubio questioned Rex Tillerson closely about his ties to Russia. Tillerson hemmed and hawed. Some thought Rubio might vote against Tillerson.
He announced today that he would vote for Tillerson.
Putin really likes Tillerson. He conferred an award on him as a Friend of Russia.
Why? Tillerson negotiated a $500 billion deal to drill for oil in Russia. ExxonMobil has more land under contract in Russia than in the U.S.
Only one problem: the U.S. sanctions imposed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea put ExxonMobil’s deal with Russia on hold.
How long do you think the Trump administration will keep those sanctions in place? Rex Tillerson has worked in only one corporation for 42 years. ExxonMobil. Whose interests will he represent as Secretary of State? The U.S. or ExxonMobil?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Watch what happens to NATO.
No Alliances To Observe
Watch what happens to the UN, as well. The Republicans are pushing for the old John Birch Society “US out of the UN and UN out of the US” meme, as well.
Rubio, like all the GOP sycophants, will put on a show of doing the right thing, to show how ‘smart he is,” but will do what is best for Rubio, which is to get he PAC money to help him run again in 2012 after Trump goes down in flames.
A profile in milquetoast cowardice. Need to find some more synonyms 🙂 .
You want a few four letter words.
I think Greg and Joel are good enough for now!
thesaurus.com is my most used site for synonyms
trump, trump, trump the boys are marching
I’ve read that most if not all Republicans are afraid of the next choice Littlefingers Donald Trump will make if they reject his current crop of deplorables. They fear he will just go lower into the cesspool of extremists and racists for his next round of choices.
For instance:
Rocky J. Suhayda, the Chair of the American Nazi Party
Alex Linder, Vanguard News Network
Don Black, former KKK grand dragon and founder of the white supremacist website Stormfront.
For the rest of this even more deplorable list, click the Mother Hones link. If they are in jail, Trump is now in a position to pardon them.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/trump-supporters-neo-nazis-white-nationalists-kkk-militias-racism-hate
Lloyd Lofthouse
Nah they love his choices. Little Marco, Oswald’s god son , The idiot who got shot down and the guy who had to ditch his cell phone .
Do not have a bone of integrity in their bodies.
Don’t just gripe although I thoroughly understand that.
Get busy, get like minded folks and inundate our politicians with phone calls, lwtters As far as I know that is the only way right now to fight back. The women’s march is a good BEGINNING.
Fighting back is absolutely essential.
I’m dismayed about Trump’s coziness with Putin, but I can’t help noticing a huge irony. During a debate in 2012, Mitt Romney said that Russia was the greatest strategic threat to America; Obama accused Romney of wanting to re-start the Cold War. Obama’s PR sycophants – the mainstream media – pilloried Romney for weeks afterward for his hawkishness and backward thinking.
I see that this blog has morphed into all-purpose left-wing advocacy on every issue and is no longer just about education – just like the NEA. Oh, well – at least Diane Ravitch again publicly supports the value of content knowledge as opposed to the vapid emphasis on “skills” that is indoctrinated into future teachers in schools of education.
John Webster,
I don’t belong to any union and never have. It is my blog, I have lived a very long time, and I write what I want. I don’t think we can consider the future of education without considering the future of our nation.
It is of course your blog, and you have the right to do whatever you want with it. I’m just mentioning that it is no longer exclusively about education, just as the NEA long ago felt compelled to start opining on all kinds of issues that are tangential to their central mission of education.
John, education is the intellectual glue that holds all public policy issues together. Check out any K through 12 curriculum. You can’t leave out education when discussing science or anti-science, math or statistics the fit the predetermined narrative, journalism or propaganda, or art vs. conformity. Most of those who are drawn to this site are aware of that.
Since the election, I’ve been reading “The Encyclopedia of German Resistance” in small doses (I can see those of you who know me by now rolling your eyes). Here’s the lesson that applies to today: by 1943 and at the end of the war, there were many resistance groups, though few knew about each other. In the beginning there were only Communists and leftist Social Democrats who resisted. Virtually all Catholic, Protestant, old-monied, military, and Weimar-era political centrists who later became resistors were quiet during the advent of Nazi rule and they weren’t particularly bothered about those the Nazis initially sought to persecute and murder. They felt, regardless of what they thought about Hitler and the Nazis, that they needed to protect and focus on their interests on “their” issues. It took many of them time to change their sense of urgency about opposing the Nazis, and then it was too late. Hence the famous Pastor Martin Niemöller quote, “When they came for the Communists…”
So John, that’s why, if one cares about education, it is no longer permissible to be “just about education.” It’s not about left-wing indoctrination, as you would characterize it. It’s about deciding which side you’re on and if the values that have sustained this nation since 1787, give or take some historical glitches, are still valid today. The issues that have drawn the majority of us to Diane’s blog (if I may be so bold as to speak for you) are about much more than education. But education, especially the K through 12 kind, is the most essential part of the foundation of the type of nation we believe is worth fighting to preserve. Buckle up or bail out.
The NEA is a left wing organization? I must have missed something. Please note their early endorsement of HRC.
Rex Tillerson is also hot to ensure regime change in oil rich Venezuela. Guess it’s closer to home than going to Iraq to just take their oil, as Trump mused about doing during his CIA visit.
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Rex-Tillerson-Already-Talking-Regime-Change-in-Venezuela-20170122-0020.html
Tillerson and Russia have a $500 billion joint exploration deal that fell apart due to sanctions. Tillerson wants to ensure the deal goes through. As Diane has said, Tillerson’s primary allegiance is to Exxon Mobil.
Let’s hope that there is regime change and soon in Venezuela, which most of this blog’s readers have no doubt regarded as Utopia for many years, but where people are dying because of the socialist kleptocracy of Chavez and his successors.
Why would you make the assumption that “most of this blog’s readers have no doubt regarded [Venezuela] as Utopia for many years”? That’s just trying to be insulting for insulting’s sake. We can discern the difference between left-wing authoritarianism and social democracy. By saying something so stupid, it makes me wonder if you can tell the difference between social conservatism and neo-fascism. I would guess not.
I’m guessing “not,” as well, Greg.
I know the difference between social democracy and left-wing authoritarianism, but the problem for you and your ideological soulmates is that it takes forever for you to recognize such authoritarianism. Just after Fidel Castro died several commenters on this blog justified his rule; to her great credit, Diane Ravitch did not. I would bet my life that ten years ago you thought Hugo Chavez was the savior of Venezuela and a model for the world, just like your predecessor political pilgrims went to the Soviet Union in the 1930’s, China in the late 1940’s, and Cuba in the 1960’s, and found all of them to be vastly superior to the United States. Where is your next (to inevitably fail) Utopia?
John,
FYI, I was never a fan of authoritarian, fascist regimes, whether left or right. I have been anti-Stalin, anti-Castro, anti-Chavez, anti-Trump, anti-Putin. I don’t like tyrants. I prefer freedom. I prefer the rule of law.
I’m old and experienced enough to know there’s no such thing as a Utopia. Life is a continuous work in progress. Not sure who “my predecessor” is. You obviously do. Ideologues have been responsible for most of the social and political ills of the past 37 years: the ideology of trickle down economics, the ideology of unfettered free markets in every area of life including health care and education, the ideology of test and punish in education, the ideology of deregulation of banks, the ideology of white supremacy etc. All things, based on what I’ve read, you seem to love. To quote your role model, Sad!
Ah, yes, the standard tactic of the lazy far Left: call someone a racist (“white supremacy”) when you can’t argue logically. If you had actually read my comments from a few days ago, I criticized Trump for his unwillingness to become adequately informed about serious issues. Because I don’t uncritically support every left-wing idea and hero, you automatically conclude that I like everything about trump. I don’t. I like this blog, though, even less. It has become a left-wing fever swamp read mostly by people who never break out of their ideological bubbles, who ascribe bad motives to everyone who has different views on anything. I won’t waste my time any more. And you call yourselves “educators.”
Why do you characterize everyone who disagrees with you as “lazy far left”? You may not “uncritically support every left wing idea or hero”, but you are quick to characterize anyone who disagrees with you as “ideological.” I apologize if I jumped the gun on linking your ideas of white supremacy, hadn’t read your earlier remarks and shouldn’t have done that. But you seem to have no compunction about ascribing ideas to me and many other commentators when you know nothing about us. Speaking for myself, I am an unabashed liberal, but it is not an ideology.
It’s one more ill-advised entry into a sovereign nation in our quest for oil, this adventure lead by an oil executive – the last time we did that it was called Iraq. We are supposed to learn from our mistakes.
Mr. Webster,
Like most of the readers of this blog, I exert every effort to make informed choices based on my readings of viewpoints left, right and center. I have taught for over twenty-five years in poor, urban districts. I resent the notion that I be lumped in with your overgenerizations about knee jerk progressives. I would be grateful if some of the alt-right crowd did some serious reflecting on their racist, xenophobic dog whistling.
Keith Olbermann’s latest (why can’t he and Jon Stewart collaborate?): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qdRyMgaR2g
Hit send too early: “You try ‘alternative facts’ in your life for one hour. Let me know how it goes.”
One & done–11-10 passed through Committee, Tillerson on to Senate vote.