Episode 2 - Iraq, Israel and French Riots.

Thanks for listening!  On this, our second episode (the first didn't really count, though) of the Hot Zone podcast, we talk Iraq, Israel and France.  I'm going to try and pick three current events or hot zones each day to discuss, with some flashbacks on relevant topics (you'll see what I mean today) and my take on stuff at the end.  I may not be able to make a video version of the podcast every day, but I'll try.  When I'm on the road I'll just record something wherever I am and talk about what I'm doing there.  

Thanks

Chuck

 

Below you will find:

- A transcript of the show (roughly followed)

- Show notes with links to relevant articles and videos.

 

Hot Zone Transcript for Monday, 10 December 2018

 

Today on the Hot Zone:

 

- New York protests over Marc Lamont Hill

(sound from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn0CnmCmkKE)

 

Meanwhile, rockets from Palestinian Territory rain down on Israel on an almost daily basis.

 

Sound from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpsVSXjeIcU

 

And tax hikes in France continue to be popular with the working man…NOT

 

Sound bites: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfoObECZiSw

 

I’m Chuck Holton, and this is the Hot Zone.

 

Thanks for being with us.

 

The government of Iraq has announced Monday the 10th of December to be a public holiday commemorating the first anniversary of its declared victory over the terror group ISIS. A military parade planned for this morning could not be confirmed beforehand because of fears that remnants of ISIS would attack the parade.  So…the Iraqis might have declared victory, but ISIS is still a threat and the violence in Iraq is still a daily occurrence.  But there are places that are getting better. 

 

The United States still has about six thousand troops in Iraq, but you don’t hear much about them anymore, partially because the media has decided not to tell you about them, but also because they aren’t really doing the frontline fighting they were doing up until 2009. 

 

I was in Baghdad last in November 2014 - and at that time ISIS had just taken over Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city months before and was pushing south toward Baghdad.  Check out this package I shot while I was there.

 

[5 min package from Baghdad] https://vimeo.com/305240679/34e6bfb1ba

 

So unlike Afghanistan, Iraqi forces have finally gotten to the point where they can stand on their own and defend their own country, and the US is just there to facilitate that.  In that role, we’ll probably have boots on the ground for the foreseeable future, but we should hope to see incremental gains there until we can finally bring everyone home.

 

In other news, CNN contributor Marc Lamont Hill made some incendiary remarks regarding Israel last month, calling for a Palestinian state “from the river to the sea.”  It caused an uproar here in the US because that phrase has been used for decades by Palestinians to call for the destruction of Israel as a state.  CNN received enough pushback on Hill’s remarks that it cut ties with the ultra-liberal Princeton college professor, and now it’s getting pushback from the left for doing so.  Over the weekend there was a rally in New York City to protest CNN.  Which I find really amusing. 

 

(sound from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn0CnmCmkKE)

 

What’s with the repeat after me thing you always see at leftist protests?   If you ask me, that’s just weird.  Meanwhile in Gaza Palestinians have been busy lobbing rockets at civilians inside Israel, this was last month near the border….

 

Sound from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpsVSXjeIcU

 

And Israeli forces found several terror tunnels being constructed across their border with Lebanon and destroyed them.  In one press release, the Israeli military claims that one out of every three homes on the Lebanese side of their northern border is related to terrorism in some way…either as a cache for weapons, a gun emplacement, or a tunnel entrance, or something like that.  I don’t know if that’s actually true, but it’s safe to say Israel remains surrounded by enemies who continually plan and pray for the day when they can wipe out Israel and extend the Palestinian homeland from the river to the sea.

 

Now, to France.  There were lots more violent protests and riots across that country over the weekend, and the news is sort of giving an overly simplistic view of the reasons for them.  The protests are primarily the work of what they call the yellow vests - folks who are fed up with the ridiculously high tax rates in the country and the poor employment of those taxes in benefitting the society. 

 

Here’s a good couple of interviews from Al Jazeera of people involved in the protests:

 

Sound bites: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfoObECZiSw

 

It’s easy for the media to stop there - blame the riots on Joe Sixpack who’s just mad he has to pay seven bucks a gallon for gas.  But that’s only part of the story.  First of all, these people aren’t just protesting the high cost of fuel.  And they aren’t exactly conservatives calling for smaller government.  Part of their platform is calling for much higher wealth taxes on the rich - that is, not just taking a percentage of what the wealthy earn every year, but taxing their net worth as well.  Which would play better with fans of Alexandria Ocasio Cortez or Bernie sanders than Ron Paul.  Not only that, the protests started out peacefully, but bad actors took advantage of the large numbers to start bashing store windows, looting and burning cars, etc.  Not exactly like the tea party movement, if you know what I mean. 

 

Also, the tax increases proposed by French President Emmanuel Macron were just the beginning of a plan of increased carbon taxes put forth by a recent UN climate study which called for ….get this…taxes of up to $240 dollars per gallon by the end of this century.  Macron’s tax was about fifty cents…but the Paris accords say in order to save the planet (by which they mean keep the global temperatures from rising 1.5 degrees by the end of the century) the government is going to have to tax the snot out of fossil fuels. 

 

As you can imagine, that’s not going to happen without a whole lot more of what we saw in France over the weekend.  In fact, these tax protests are spreading across Europe, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them in the US if things keep up. 

 

Now, here’s my opinion:

 

Emmanuel Macron became president of France partly because of the overt efforts of the Obama administration to get him elected.  I was in France when Obama sent a personal message to Macron of his support which was broadcast throughout the country.  The same Obama administration which agreed to the Paris accords.  And the next leftist president of the United States will undoubtedly pick up where he left off. 

 

Never mind that if the US stopped the use of all fossil fuel today - just parked all our cars and went back to the horse and buggy, China and India’s carbon emissions will increase over the next thirty years more than all the US emissions are today.  So whatever your take on climate change is, ask yourself if you’re cool with a ten-dollar-per-gallon tax on gasoline.  Yeah, me neither.

 

That’s all for now, You can watch my work today on NRA.tv and you can also look for me on CBN’s 700 club and some of their other shows.  If you’d like to be a part of what we’re doing here at the hot zone, you can look me up on Patreon, or send a donation via PayPal - We’re going to save up the donations until I come across someone in desperate need and then we’re going to let you turn someone’s worst day into their best day.

 

Please do us a favor and like this podcast and subscribe wherever you watch or listen.  Search for Chuck Holton Hot Zone on youtube, and we’ll have our website up and running shortly as soon as we can get the DNS servers to resolve correctly.

 

Thanks for being with us.  I’m Chuck Holton, in the Hot Zone.

 

Show Notes:

 

$240 dollar per gallon tax on gas?

The UN committee with the worst name ever

175 Countries Sign Paris Climate Accords, immediately fail to follow them.

China burns 4 billion tons of coal per year