Week In The News: Impeachment, Trump's Middle East Peace Plan, 2020 Latest
Impeachment. Trump’s Middle East peace plan. Election 2020 latest. All unfolding at a critical moment. Our week in review panel will tackle the week’s big stories.
Guests
Peter Baker, chief White House correspondent at the New York Times. (@peterbakernyt)
Julie Pace, Washington bureau chief for the Associated Press. (@jpaceDC)
Hayes Brown, world news editor and reporter for BuzzFeed News. (@HayesBrown)
From The Reading List
The New York Times: “For John Bolton, an ‘Upside-Down World’ After Trump Revelation” — “Not long ago, they called him ‘too extreme,’ ‘aggressively and dangerously wrong’ and ‘downright dangerous.’ They called him ‘nutty,’ ‘reckless’ and ‘far outside the mainstream.’ Now they would like to call him their star witness.
“Suddenly, John R. Bolton, the conservative war hawk and favorite villain of the left, is the toast of Senate Democrats, the last, best hope to prove their abuse-of-power case against President Trump. Democrats who once excoriated him are trumpeting his credibility as they seek his testimony in Mr. Trump’s impeachment trial.
“On the other side of the aisle, some of Mr. Bolton’s longtime Republican friends are just as abruptly tossing him to the curb, painting him as a disgruntled former adviser who just wants to sell books. Some of the same senators who allied with him, promoted his career, consulted with him on foreign affairs and took his political action committee money are going along as he is painted as ‘a tool for the radical Dems and the deep state,’ as he was termed on one of the Fox News channels, part of the network where he worked for 11 years.”
Associated Press: “Trump peace plan delights Israelis, enrages Palestinians” — “President Donald Trump unveiled his long-awaited Mideast peace plan Tuesday alongside a beaming Benjamin Netanyahu, presenting a vision that matched the Israeli leader’s hard-line, nationalist views while falling far short of Palestinian ambitions.
“Trump’s plan envisions a disjointed Palestinian state that turns over key parts of the West Bank to Israel. It sides with Israel on key contentious issues that have bedeviled past peace efforts, including borders and the status of Jerusalem and Jewish settlements, and attaches nearly impossible conditions for granting the Palestinians their hoped-for state.
“Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed the plan as ‘nonsense’ and vowed to resist it. Netanyahu called it a ‘historic breakthrough’ equal in significance to the country’s declaration of independence in 1948.
‘It’s a great plan for Israel. It’s a great plan for peace,’ he said.”
The New York Times: “Biden Aides Weigh Pursuing an Iowa Caucus Alliance With Klobuchar” — “Aides to former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. are discussing the possibility of seeking an alliance with Senator Amy Klobuchar in next week’s Iowa caucuses, a plan that would involve a pledge to help each other in precincts where one of them does not have enough support to win delegates.
“Three staff members for Mr. Biden’s Iowa campaign tentatively floated the idea to a top Klobuchar adviser at a meeting this week, according to Democrats briefed on the meeting.
“People in both the Biden and Klobuchar camps played down the discussion, which took place at a Des Moines restaurant, and aides for Ms. Klobuchar said they did not regard it as a serious overture. But there is little doubt among Mr. Biden’s allies in the state that his campaign is contemplating such steps, with an eye toward preventing a messy split among moderate candidates on Monday.”
This article was originally published on WBUR.org. [Copyright 2020 NPR]
