The John Batchelor Show

Friday 3 June 2016

Air Date: 
June 03, 2016

Photo, left:  The Saker, line drawing: see A Russian warning, Hour 2, Blocks A & B; http://thesaker.is
 
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
 
Hour One
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 1, Block A: Jim McTague, Barron’s Washington, in re:  A Rude Jobs Interruption    The labor market finally catches up with slower economic growth.
(Podcast: Gigot, Freeman and Rago discuss the jobs report, Clinton’s attack on Trump’s foreign policy and Paul Ryan’s endorsement of Trump. / http://www.wsj.com/podcasts/the-lack-of-jobs-report-clinton-attacks-trump/ED53E4E1-C795-4A1E-8DF2-5AE55033A6DA.html )
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 1, Block B:  Harry Siegel, Ndew York Daily News & Daily Beast, in re:  This reporter is not in Gov. Cuomo's pocket, Mayor de Blasio  Apparently Mayor de Blasio is not a big fan of mine.
The de Blasios are strapped for cash  De Blasio Defends Fund-Raising and Stokes Feud with Cuomo
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 1, Block C:  Liz Peek,  Fiscal Times & Fox, in re:  Forget ‘Great.’ Trump Should Just Promise to Make America Work Again
Let’s be clear: There are no excuses for the incompetence that Americans routinely experience from the federal government.     There is no excuse for any American missing his plane because the TSA...
Bernie Should Hit Hillary with the Dubious Donations in ‘Clinton Cash’  M
The FBI is investigating Terry McAuliffe’s ties to the Clinton Foundation, and donations made by a prominent Chinese businessman to both the Virginia governor’s campaign and to the foundation. Why . . .
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 1, Block D:  James Taranto, WSJ editorial, in re:  http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-empire-strikes-back-1464974487?tesla=y
 
Hour Two
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 2, Block A: Michael E Vlahos, Johns Hopkins, in re: Vineyard of the Saker   http://thesaker.is    June 1, 2016   A Russian warning  (1 of 2)
The US leadership has done everything it could to push the situation to the brink of disaster. First, its anti-Russian policies have convinced the Russian leadership that making concessions or negotiating with the West is futile. It has become apparent that the West will always support any individual, movement or government that is anti-Russian, be it tax-cheating Russian oligarchs, convicted Ukrainian war criminals, Saudi-supported Wahhabi terrorists in Chechnya or cathedral-desecrating punks in Moscow. Now that NATO, in violation of its previous promises, has expanded right up to the Russian border, with US forces deployed in the Baltic states, within artillery range of St. Petersburg, Russia's second-largest city, the Russians have nowhere left to retreat. They will not attack; nor will they back down or surrender. The Russian leadership enjoys over 80% of popular support; the remaining 20% seems to feel that it is being too soft in opposing Western encroachment. But Russia will retaliate, and a provocation or a simple mistake could trigger a sequence of events that will end with millions of Americans dead and the US in ruins. 
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Letter issued by Russian bloggers, all well connected to the Kremlin: The US leadership has done everything it can to push things toward the brink of disaster. .  . “  Vide: On the Beach, by Nevil Shute: the accidental war where Albania attacks Italy, then Egypt attacks the US, and Washington thinks the USSR has created this and attacks Russia.   We're being warned right now that a mistake could set off a war between the US and Russia.  The very notion of a mistake in this matter should never come to pass. We’ve never fought the Russians; in two world wars we’ve been allies. I do not like to see American govt as representing Russia as an alien or orthogonal co0untry we have to fight.   The early-Nineties agreements between Yeltsin and Clinton acknowledged that Russia had lost its [adjacent] states so we promised never to absorb the neighbors – but that’s precisely what the US has done and is doing. With the Baltics, the US and Ukraine, Russia feels as though it's just been served the Brest-Litovsk treaty of 1918 by the Germans – feels defeated.  If you  want to work with them, you don’t do that!  We still keep talking about creating a Ukrainian resistance movement, Ukraine in NATO – pie in the sky: Ukraine is so corrupt it could never be part of NATO or the EU as things now are constituted.
Yet we're in an escalation cycle.  Take China: highly aggressive, a huge power putting us up against the wall, demanding to renegotiate the entirety of the world system – which we need to resist. Russia, by contrast, is struggling to regain a respected stature in the eyes of the world.
We need to do that. This has nothing to do with Putin, someone who's passing from state left to stage right, The connection between Russia and American holds longstanding ties of fraternity, By failing this, we force them into the arms of China.  Today, Russia is grandstanding; we al sh9ld be sympathetic to their wish to be seen as a great power.  The bloggers warn that:
“We are absolutely and categorically certain that Russia will never attack either the US or the EU.  . . . But if Russia is attacked or threatened thereof, she will not back down.   MEV: I’d call this a cry for help. The way we've treated Russia for the past twenty years has rankled them.  Americans are arming Poland, put a missile defense system in Romania, training Ukrainian cutthroats --  US is wholly insensitive to Polish-Russian relation. The Poles are , um, not arrogant, but they've been through a lot and they want [revenge for 17 Sept 1939]  -  the Rzeczpospolita Polska  occupied . . .  The US needs to be more responsibly detached, see how to modulate; JB: Adding Norway and Sweden to NATO doesn't modulate anything.   MEV:  I'd reach out to Russia and say, “Let’s elevate you,  . .  If Ukraine were a Luxemburgish democracy, it’d be different. We need to find a way to embrace Russia.  JB: Does the Obama Adm know that nukes are being discussed in the Kremlin?  MEV: Why wd Russia even raise the issue; Realpolitik strategists don't like: it's about respect! We don't give them respect; we need to find a way to do that.  JB: Anything from Clinton or Trump?  MEV: No. Clinton boosted Victoria Nuland [utterly disgraced!].  Russia is not like Germany in the Thirties.  . . . There’s so much water under the bridge that we need to let go. 
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*  The establishment of a Polish state can be traced back to 966, when Mieszko I, ruler of a territory roughly coextensive with that of present-day Poland, converted to Christianity. The Kingdom of Poland was founded in 1025, and in 1569 it cemented a longstanding political association with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by signing the Union of Lublin. This union formed the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, one of the largest and most populous countries of 16th and 17th-century Europe. The Commonwealth ceased to exist in the years 1772–1795, when its territory was partitioned among Prussia, the Russian Empire, and Austria. Poland regained its independence (as the Second Polish Republic) at the end of World War I, in 1918. In September 1939, World War II started with the invasions of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (as part of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact). More than six million Polish citizens died in the war.  In 1944, a Soviet-backed Polish Committee of National Liberation was formed and, after a falsified referendum in 1947, it took control of the country and Poland became a satellite state of the Soviet Union, as People's Republic of Poland. During the Revolutions of 1989 Poland's Communist government was overthrown and Poland adopted a new constitution establishing itself as a democracy. Despite the large number of casualties and destruction the country experienced during World War II, Poland managed to preserve much of its cultural wealth. There are 14 heritage sites inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage and 54 Historical Monuments and many objects of cultural heritage in Poland.
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http://thesaker.is/a-russian-warning/   A RUSSIAN WARNING
We, the undersigned, are Russians living and working in the USA. We have been watching with increasing anxiety as the current US and NATO policies have set us on an extremely dangerous collision course with the Russian Federation, as well as with China. Many respected, patriotic Americans, such as Paul Craig RobertsStephen CohenPhilip GiraldiRay McGovern and many others have been issuing warnings of a looming a Third World War. But their voices have been all but lost among the din of a mass media that is full of deceptive and inaccurate stories that characterize the Russian economy as being in shambles and the Russian military as weak—all based on no evidence. But we—knowing both Russian history and the current state of Russian society and the Russian military, cannot swallow these lies. We now feel that it is our duty, as Russians living in the US, to warn the American people that they are being lied to, and to tell them the truth. And the truth is simply this:
If there is going to be a war with Russia, then the United States will most certainly be destroyed, and most of us will end up dead.
Let us take a step back and put what is happening in a historical context. Russia has suffered a great deal at the hands of foreign invaders, losing 22 million people in World War II. Most of the dead were civilians, because the country was invaded, and the Russians have vowed to never let such a disaster happen again. Each time Russia had been invaded, she emerged victorious. In 1812 Napoleon invaded Russia; in 1814 Russian cavalry rode into Paris. On June 22, 1941, Hitler’s Luftwaffe bombed Kiev; On May 8, 1945, Soviet troops rolled into Berlin.
But times have changed since then. If Hitler were to attack Russia today, he would be dead 20 to 30 minutes later, his bunker reduced to glowing rubble by a strike from a Kalibr supersonic cruise missile launched from a small Russian navy ship somewhere in the Baltic Sea. The operational abilities of the new Russian military have been most persuasively demonstrated during the recent action against ISIS, Al Nusra and other foreign-funded terrorist groups operating in Syria. A long time ago Russia had to respond to provocations by fighting land battles on her own territory, then launching a counter-invasion; but this is no longer necessary. Russia’s new weapons make retaliation instant, undetectable, unstoppable and perfectly lethal.
Thus, if tomorrow a war were to break out between the US and Russia, it is guaranteed that the US would be obliterated. At a minimum, there would no longer be an electric grid, no Internet, no oil and gas pipelines, no interstate highway system, no air transportation or GPS-based navigation. Financial centers would lie in ruins. Government at every level would cease to function. US armed forces, stationed all around the globe, would no longer be resupplied. At a maximum, the entire landmass of the US would be covered by a layer of radioactive ash. We tell you this not to be alarmist, but because, based on everything we know, we are ourselves alarmed. If attacked, Russia will not back down; she will retaliate, and she will utterly annihilate the United States.
The US leadership has done everything it could to push the situation to the brink of disaster. First, its anti-Russian policies have convinced the Russian leadership that making concessions or negotiating with the West is futile. It has become apparent that the West will always support any individual, movement or government that is anti-Russian, be it tax-cheating Russian oligarchs, convicted Ukrainian war criminals, Saudi-supported Wahhabi terrorists in Chechnya or cathedral-desecrating punks in Moscow. Now that NATO, in violation of its previous promises, has expanded right up to the Russian border, with US forces deployed in the Baltic states, within artillery range of St. Petersburg, Russia’s second-largest city, the Russians have nowhere left to retreat. They will not attack; nor will they back down or surrender. The Russian leadership enjoys over 80% of popular support; the remaining 20% seems to feel that it is being too soft in opposing Western encroachment. But Russia will retaliate, and a provocation or a simple mistake could trigger a sequence of events that will end with millions of Americans dead and the US in ruins.
Unlike many Americans, who see war as an exciting, victorious foreign adventure, the Russians hate and fear war. But they are also ready for it, and they have been preparing for war for several years now. Their preparations have been most effective. Unlike the US, which squanders untold billions on dubious overpriced arms programs such as the F-35 joint task fighter, the Russians are extremely stingy with their defense rubles, getting as much as 10 times the bang for the buck compared to the bloated US defense industry. While it is true that the Russian economy has suffered from low energy prices, it is far from being in shambles, and a return to growth is expected as early as next year. Senator John McCain once called Russia “A gas station masquerading as a country.” Well, he lied. Yes, Russia is the world’s largest oil producer and second-largest oil exporter, but it is also world’s largest exporter of grain and nuclear power technology. It is as advanced and sophisticated a society as the United States. Russia’s armed forces, both conventional and nuclear, are now ready to fight, and they are more than a match for the US and NATO, especially if a war erupts anywhere near the Russian border.
But such a fight would be suicidal for all sides. We strongly believe that a conventional war in Europe runs a strong chance of turning nuclear very rapidly, and that any US/NATO nuclear strike on Russian forces or territory will automatically trigger a retaliatory Russian nuclear strike on the continental US. Contrary to irresponsible statements made by some American propagandists, American antiballistic missile systems are incapable of shielding the American people from a Russian nuclear strike. Russia has the means to strike at targets in the USA with long-range nuclear as well as conventional weapons.
The sole reason why the USA and Russia have found themselves on a collision course, instead of defusing tensions and cooperating on a wide range of international problems, is the stubborn refusal by the US leadership to accept Russia as an equal partner: Washington is dead set on being the “world leader” and the “indispensable nation,” even as its influence steadily dwindles in the wake of a string of foreign policy and military disasters such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Yemen and the Ukraine. Continued American global leadership is something that neither Russia, nor China, nor most of the other countries are willing to accept. This gradual but apparent loss of power and influence has caused the US leadership to become hysterical; and it is but a small step from hysterical to suicidal. America’s political leaders need to be placed under suicide watch.
First and foremost, we are appealing to the commanders of the US Armed Forces to follow the example of Admiral William Fallon, who, when asked about a war with Iran, reportedly replied “not on my watch.” We know that you are not suicidal, and that you do not wish to die for the sake of out-of-touch imperial hubris. If possible, please tell your staff, colleagues and, especially, your civilian superiors that a war with Russia will not happen on your watch. At the very least, take that pledge to yourself, and, should the day ever come when the suicidal order is issued, simply refuse to execute it on the grounds that it is criminal. Remember that according to the Nuremberg Tribunal “To initiate a war of aggression… is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.” Since Nuremberg, “I was just following orders” is no longer a valid defense; please don’t be war criminals.
We also appeal to the American people to take peaceful but forceful action to oppose any politician or party that engages in irresponsible, provocative Russia-baiting, and that condones and supports a policy of needless confrontation with a nuclear superpower that is capable of destroying the US in about an hour. Speak up, break through the barrier of mass media propaganda, and make your fellow Americans aware of the immense danger of a confrontation between Russia and the US.
There is no objective reason why US and Russia should consider each other as adversaries. The current confrontation is entirely the result of the extremist views of the neoconservative movement, whose members have infiltrated the US Federal government, and who consider any country that refuses to obey their dictates as an enemy to be crushed. Thanks to their tireless efforts, over a million innocent people have already died in the former Yugoslavia, in Afghanistan, in Iraq, Libya, Syria, Pakistan, the Ukraine, Yemen, Somalia and in many other countries—all because of their maniacal insistence that the USA must be a world empire, not a just a regular, normal country, and that every national leader must either bow down before it, or be overthrown. In Russia, the irresistible force that is the neocon movement has finally encountered the immovable object. They must be forced to back down before they destroy us all.
We are absolutely and categorically certain that Russia will never attack the US, nor any EU member state, that Russia is not at all interested in recreating the USSR, and that there is no “Russian threat” or “Russian aggression.” Much of Russia’s recent economic success has a lot to do with the shedding of former Soviet dependencies, allowing her to pursue a “Russia first” policy. But we are just as certain that if Russia is attacked, or even threatened with attack, she will not back down, and that the Russian leadership will not “blink.” With great sadness and a heavy heart they will do their sworn duty and unleash a nuclear barrage from which the United States will never recover. Even if the entire Russian leadership is killed in a first strike, the so-called “Dead Hand” (the “Perimetr” system) will automatically launch enough nukes to wipe the USA off the political map. We feel that it is our duty to do all we can to prevent such a catastrophe.

Eugenia V Gurevich, Ph.D.
http://thesaker.ru/

Dmitri Orlov
http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/

The Saker (A. Raevsky)
http://thesaker.is/

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Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 2, Block B:   Michael E Vlahos, Johns Hopkins, in re: Vineyard  of the Saker   http://thesaker.is    June 1, 2016   A Russian warning  (2 of 2)
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 2, Block C:   Richard A. Epstein , Hoover, and NYU and Chicago Law Schools, via Defining Ideas; in re: Tyranny within the Administrative State  The D.C. Circuit should strike down the authoritarian tendencies of the one-man Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. (1 of 2)
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 2, Block D:  Richard A. Epstein , Hoover, and NYU and Chicago Law Schools, via Defining Ideas; in re: Tyranny within the Administrative State  The D.C. Circuit should strike down the authoritarian tendencies of the one-man Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. (2 of 2)

 
Hour Three
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 3, Block A: Eric Trager, Washington Institute and author: Arab Fall: How the Muslim Brotherhood won and lost Egypt in 891 days; in re:  Israel, Palestinians Court Egypt's Sisi as Broker in Peace Talks   Israeli and Palestinian officials have been pushing Egypt's President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi to assume a lead mediating role in attempts to restart . . .
Egypt court sentences 187 Morsi supporters to life in prison  An Egyptian court has sentenced nearly 200 supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and ousted President Mohamed Morsi to life in prison on . . .      Egypt warship: First French-made Mistral ship handed over  Egypt has received the first of two advanced warships from France in a deal worth $1bn (£692m). The Mistral helicopter carriers were originally . . .   Moscow receives no Egypt's response to recommendations on air ...  SKOLKOVO, June 3. /TASS/. Russia has not yet received Egypt's response to its recommendations on airport security, Russia's Rosaviatsiya . . .
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 3, Block B:  Eric Trager, Washington Institute and author: Arab Fall: How the Muslim Brotherhood won and lost Egypt in 891 days; in re: Israel very much wants Egypt to mediate the upcoming talks on Palestine. People in Egypt are confuse –political and community leaders aren’t used to seeing a president with such good relations with Israel and emphatic, They’re not on tune with the high politics, either. The French Initiative: Palestinian intention is that Pres Sisi also mediate.  This is an inward-looking Egypt after 5-1/2 yrs of upheaval. El Sisi: ltd involvement in Yemen and elsewhere except anent Palestinians.  . . . He gave a long interview on Egyptian TV: almost entirely focussed on domestic matters; a little or foreign relations.  / Court sentence d 200 members Muslim Brotherhood and condemned Morsi to life in prison for 2013 storming a  . . .  he’s on a kill-or-be-killed relationship with the Ikhwan Between 30-40,000 people in prisons now, most MB/Ikhwan. At this point, almost no Egyptian citizen expresses any interest in the Muslim Brotherhood, so it's been neutralized in that sense but not diminished the Ikhwan’s profound hostility.   After Morsi was removed, “reconciliation” became a dirty word in Egyptian politics—compromise no longer is feasible, is considered traitorous 
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 3, Block B:  Eric Trager, Washington Institute and author: Arab Fall: How the MB won and last Egypt in 891 days; in re:  Eric is in the Nile River valley right now; in the coming days, the French Initiative for Peace [to which Israel and Palestine are not invited?]. About to transfer a French-built warship, aircraft carrier, Mistral class, was built of for Russia but Ukraine sandbagged the sale.  Will sell two; first will be the Gamel Abdul Nasser     Recall that Pres Obama withheld aid for 17 months “pending restoral of the democratic process,” which never happened the way Pres Obama wants.  These aircraft carriers can be used in Libya, regionally.  Signals that Egypt isn’t entirely reliant on the US, and can buy weapons were it chooses. Potentially undermines Egypt’s claims in DC.  . . .    Note that the Red Sea Basin is a conflict region in which Egypt has entered, but it’s reluctant to get involved in Yemen – lost 26,000 troops there in the 1960s and prefers not to get involved.  The two islands:  the transfer is enormously controversial, rejected by the Egyptian populace Saudis sent Sisi many billions of dollars; gen felt that Cairo wasn’t helping enough in Yemen, inter al.; in Syria (Sisi has been very conservative in Syria, fears the fall of Assad as leading to chaos). El Sisi’s mistake is his failure to prepare the citizens, since textbooks claim that the islands are Egyptian.  Because of how the media works here, the protest has simmered down.  Security: Egypt has not yet responded to Russian suggestions for airport security so Russia has cancelled Russians’s ability to visit Egypt.  /   Tourism is a critical source of forex and basic income; Egypt has been confusing here, which reflects a govt that never feels completely secure, won't admit error, turns to conspiracy to explain many events. 
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 3, Block C:  Anu Ramaswami, University of Minnesota, in re:  Meta-principles for developing smart, sustainable, and healthy cities    Policy directives in several nations are focusing on the development of smart cities, linking    (1 of 2)  http://science.sciencemag.org/content/352/6288/940.full
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 3, Block D:  Anu Ramaswami, University of Minnesota,  in re:  Meta-principles for developing smart, sustainable, and healthy cities    Policy directives in several nations are focusing on the development of smart cities, linking    (2 of 2) http://science.sciencemag.org/content/352/6288/940.full
Dr. Anu Ramaswami, Charles M. Denny Jr. Chair Professor of Science, Technology, & Public Policy, Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs and Professor, Department of Bioproducts & Biosystems Engineering, University of Minnesota
 
Hour Four
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 4, Block A:   Robert Zimmerman, behind the black, in re:  A faster Hubble constant?   The uncertainty of science: New data from the Hubble Space Telescope suggests the universe’s expansion rate is 5%-9% faster than previously thought.
They say they have refined the expansion rate to a margin of error of only 2.4%, but forgive me if I remain skeptical. When it comes to cosmology, the uncertainties dominate, despite these claims.
Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have discovered that the universe is expanding 5 percent to 9 percent faster than expected.
"This surprising finding may be an important clue to understanding those mysterious parts of the universe that make up 95 percent of everything and don't emit light, such as dark energy, dark matter, and dark radiation," said study leader and Nobel Laureate Adam Riess of the Space Telescope Science Institute and The Johns Hopkins University, both in Baltimore, Maryland.
The results will appear in an upcoming issue of The Astrophysical Journal.
Riess' team made the discovery by refining the universe's current expansion rate to unprecedented accuracy, reducing the uncertainty to only 2.4 percent. The team made the refinements by developing innovative techniques that improved the precision of distance measurements to faraway galaxies.
The team looked for galaxies containing both Cepheid stars and Type Ia supernovae. Cepheid stars pulsate at rates that correspond to their true brightness, which can be compared with their apparent brightness as seen from Earth to accurately determine their distance. Type Ia supernovae, another commonly used cosmic yardstick, are exploding stars that flare with the same brightness and are brilliant enough to be seen from relatively longer distances.
By measuring about 2,400 Cepheid stars in 19 galaxies and comparing the observed brightness of both types of stars, they accurately measured their true brightness and calculated distances to roughly 300 Type Ia supernovae in far-flung galaxies.
The team compared those distances with the expansion of space as measured by the stretching of light from receding galaxies. The team used these two values to calculate how fast the universe expands with time, or the Hubble constant.
The improved Hubble constant value is 73.2 kilometers per second per megaparsec. (A megaparsec equals 3.26 million light-years.) The new value means the distance between cosmic objects will double in another 9.8 billion years. (1 of 2)
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 4, Block B:  Robert Zimmerman, behind the black (2 of 2)
Note: :American Caudillo" is an excellent report.
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 4, Block C: Omar G. Encarnación, Bard College, via Foreign Affairs, in re: American CaudilloTrump and the Latin-Americanization of U.S. Politics
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2016-05-12/american-caudillo (1 of 2)
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American Caudillo  Trump and the Latin-Americanization of U.S. Politics  By Omar G. Encarnación
For those of us who study Latin America, it has been fascinating to watch the gradual but certain Latin-Americanization of U.S. politics. The latest and most compelling sign yet is the rise of Republican presidential contender Donald J. Trump, whose braggadocio, demagoguery, and disdain for the rule of law puts him squarely in the tradition of El Caudillo (loosely translated into English as “the leader” or “the chief”), a mainstay of Latin American politics. Although difficult to define, the phenomenon of caudillismo is easy to trace through Latin American history. During its golden age—the nineteenth century—the typical caudillo was a charismatic man on horseback with a penchant for authoritarianism. Early caudillos such as Argentina’s Juan Manuel de Rosas and Mexico’s Antonio López de Santa Anna ruled their countries by the sheer force of personality as they sought to negotiate the rough-and-tumble world of politics of postcolonial Latin America.
It was the postwar years, however, that produced the most enduring symbols of caudillismo. . . .  The Dominican dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo, in office from 1930 until his assassination in 1961, came to embody the caudillo as a racist, narcissistic, virility-obsessed, and self-aggrandizing despot. Indeed, Trujillo’s capacity for glorifying himself might make Trump blush. He renamed the capital city of Santo Domingo to Trujillo City, changed the name of the country’s highest mountain from Pico Duarte to Pico Trujillo, and held parades and celebrations for his own commemoration. January 11, for example, was declared “Day of the Benefactor.” Little wonder that . . . 
Friday  3 June 2016 / Hour 4, Block D:   Omar G. Encarnación, Bard College, via Foreign Affairs, in re: American CaudilloTrump and the Latin-Americanization of U.S. Politics
https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2016-05-12/american-caudillo (2 of 2)
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