Long opposed to US attempts to impose regime change in Syria, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D – HI) has made a trip to Syria this week, an unannounced visit which saw Gabbard spending considerable time in the capital city of Damascus “to promote and work for peace.”
Gabbard’s office, citing security, says a lot of the details of the trip are not going to be revealed until she has returned to the United States, and they declined to say if she had met directly with President Bashar al-Assad, though they did confirm she’d met with several government leaders while in Damascus.
With considerable foreign policy similarities between the two, Gabbard has met with President-elect Donald Trump since the election, and was rumored to be under consideration for important cabinet positions. It is entirely possible then that she made the visit as a de facto Trump Administration negotiator.
That they specifically declined to say if Rep. Gabbard met with Assad is tantamount to an admission that she did, and indeed it’s hard to imagine she would visit Damascus with an eye toward talking peace without meeting with the Syrian president.
It’s more likely that the denial is intended to prevent any specific official debate around the visit until Friday’s inauguration, and that this represents an attempt by the Trump Administration to covertly get out in front of the upcoming Syrian peace talks, which begin Monday in Astana, Kazakhstan.
Trump has already been very public in faulting the existing US policy in Syria, and has talked about scrapping efforts to arm the various rebel factions. Gabbard has long criticized the CIA arms smuggling venture, and could easily be laying the groundwork for a quick policy shift in the days to come.
Let’s hope, for the Syrian people’s sake that this is a positive move for peace.
That would cause you to have to decide whether she is a loose cannon or she’s there on Obama’s initiative to support the peace talks.
Any time you’re ready?
luv from Canada.
Is that the range of choices, Mockingbird Don from Langley?
I beg to differ.
Good to know that there is at least one sane person in Congress, who recognizes the disaster that our Government’s relentless pursuit of “regime change” in Syria has caused — and who is willing to try to do something other than throwing more fuel on the fire that our Government helped light.
I think she is a democrat too .
Excellent.
So let me get this straight- Donald Trump allegedly won the election because of “Russian hacking” of the DNC. Based on this lie, Obama has all but provoked Russia into a war and sanctions have been placed on it. Anyone with half a brain knows that the USA is NOT fighting “terrorists” in Syria but funding, training and supporting them in violation of the cease fire. The Obama administration frames Syria and Assad as the “enemy”, If this is the case, then why isn’t this woman being criticized of even punished for cavorting with the “enemy”? If Gabbard was one of Trump’s envoys, all hell would break loose in the media with call of treason and “helping the enemy”! I support Gabbard’s actions now and in the past- she seems intent on pushing the diplomatic peace agenda, which is what the USA needs big time! Double standards permeate this administration from top to bottom. It does routinely what it criticizes and even lies about what other nations do that allegedly “threatens USA national security”! BS!
“, If this is the case, then why isn’t this woman being criticized of even punished for cavorting with the “enemy”?
Because there’s only one day left in which to do it. Today she’s acting on the wishes of the Dems, if indeed she’s not just a loose cannon.
Tomorrow she will be promoting peace in Syria on behalf of The Trump regime. Which is pretty well impossible of course!
So that only leads to the conclusion that she is (will be) a loose cannon in Syria tomorrow. (if she isn’t home by then)
love Tulsi
God bless Tulsi Gabbard for her efforts to achieve peace & stability in Syria.
Poor Tulsi. She’s going to get whacked upside of the head for being so naive and stepping out of line on the Syria plan. These kind of goofs should be kept in a cage at least until Trump is informed of what’s right and what’s wrong.
luv from Canada.
In a saner world, Tulsi would be the Dem nominee in 2020 (and would probably win). Instead she will be vilified, and turned into an outcast. The Ds will run Cory Booker, and Trump will get 400+ EC votes.
I hope I am wrong with this prediction — desperately wrong.
The Dem party is in terminal phase. Tulsi is a defacto “Trump” Republican in the New Republican — ie Trump Republican — party. This is the revolution I have been waiting for my entire life.
Drain the Swamp.
Switch her party to suit your agenda jeff?
luv from Canada.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D – HI) is emerging as a major player in Washington. That is an important hope for Hawaii, where it is widely agreed that such influence is important to the State’s future.
She is an impressive person. She deserves closer attention, and I expect she’ll be getting it during the Trump Admin, as an interesting alternative to Trump’s policies that is also not what Hillary would have done, in fact the opposite of what Hillary would have done.
In that, she will be an important part of the future of the Democratic Party, if it chooses to go the way it must to recover from what the Clintons did to it.
Trump is going to make America great again so will part of that be handing over Syria to Russia.
Doesn’t seem all that consistent with tearing up the Iran deal.
If anybody didn’t think out some of the important questions, maybe now would be a good time to do so? Start with the first one: Does Russia get Syria? Would Trump have been briefed on the problems with doing that yet? Word is that he’s a good listener who does exactly what he’s told by the spooks and and the pols in the loop!
luv to you patsies from Canada.
Russia doesn’t want Syria or Eastern Europe, it wants the US and EU to stop demonizing and threatening it. Syria will not be Russia’s or anyone else’s vassal.
Syria will be Russia’s in the same way the rest of the conquered in the ME are now belonging to the US. Or at least in the case of the US, those countries that are still resisting.
Russia’s presence is something quite different for Syria because Russia has the support of that country’s leadership and it will only be a small minority resisting on behalf of the US. They are known as terrorists, moderate or otherwise.
Then with Iran, it too will be seen as different because Iran will remain as in control over it’s own destiny, with sympathies devoted to Russia.
But it would be fair enough to suggest that Russia doesn’t want Syria, with some important qualifications. Russia won’t allow the US to own Syria, which is pretty much the same thiing as Russia owning Syria anyway.
And China.
Tulsi Gabbard is one ray of hope coming out of the mostly vile US Congress.
#Gabbard2024
I bet Asma Al Assad personally picked her up from the airport.
The lady drives alone through war zones to attend community meetings…
I love this chick more and more every day. 2020 suddenly looks a little brighter.
And you dear comrade, are going to eat those words with your crow in very short order. It just ain’t gonna happen comrade, under the Trump regime.
luv from Canada.
Hopefully this is the end of the zio-masonic plans to destroy secular Syria, secular Lebanon, and their planned WWIII end game to destroy Iran.
Bless the peacemakers, and Gabbard if she is one of them. Beware the hasbara trolls that infect the narrative with multiple comments.
Love from Canada