General Frank McKenzie - Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association

Biden’s standing among Americans nosedives in wake of rocky Afghanistan exit, COVID surge

Paul Steinhauser — Tue, 07 Sep 2021 14:57:56 +0000

As Labor Day marks the traditional close to summer, President Biden’s poll numbers are taking a hit.

Facing a barrage of bipartisan criticism for weeks over his handling of the turbulent U.S. withdrawal and evacuation from Afghanistan, and with a surge in new COVID cases due to the spread across the country this summer of the highly infectious delta variant, the president’s approval ratings are slipping.

As Labor Day marks the traditional close to summer, President Biden’s poll numbers are taking a hit.

CLICK HERE FOR THE LATEST FOX NEWS REPORTING ON THE AFGHANISTAN EXI

Biden’s approval rating hovered in the low to mid 50s since taking office in late January. But his numbers started sliding last month, as the crisis in Afghanistan dominated media coverage and mask mandates started returning in certain spots across the country as coronavirus cases rose.

The president stands at 45%-49% approval/disapproval in an average of the latest surveys compiled by RealClearPolitics, and at 46%-48% in a compilation by the polling and analysis website FiveThirtyEight.

Forty-four percent of Americans questioned in an ABC News/Washington Post poll released this weekend said they approved of the job Biden’s doing in the White House, down six points from June. Just over half of those polled (51%) gave the president a thumbs-down on how he’s handling his duties, a jump of nine points from June.

WITH BIDEN’S POLL NUMBERS DROPPING, DEMOCRATS WORRY AFGHANISTAN EXIT MAY IMPACT 2022 MIDTERMS

Gary Langer, the longtime director of polling at ABC News, highlighted that in data dating back to the Harry Truman administration, “only two presidents have had a lower approval rating at this point in their terms: Donald Trump, at 37% in August 2017, and Gerald Ford, also 37%, in March 1975.”

The ABC News/Washington Post poll, conducted Aug. 29-Sept 1, is among the latest national surveys to indicate that the rocky exit from Afghanistan, ending a two-decade U.S. military presence in the war-torn Central Asian country, is taking a toll on the president’s political standing.

The poll’s release followed by a day an NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist national survey that indicated Biden at 43%-51%, the president’s lowest approval in Marist polling since taking office. The president stood at 46%-48% in an Ipsos national survey conducted Sept. 1-2.

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Marist Poll director Lee Miringoff highlighted last week that “the end of this chapter of American involvement in Afghanistan has taken a significant toll on Biden’s standing with Americans.”

Similar to the Marist poll, the drop in Biden’s overall approval rating in the ABC News/Washington Post survey was fueled by a 14-point plunge in support among independents since late June and a significant slip among Democrats, from 94% approval to 86%. Republican disapproval of Biden – at 89% – was little changed from June.

Biden has been pilloried for his handling of the hastily organized evacuation efforts in Afghanistan. While the president has repeatedly declared the withdrawal and evacuation a success – the U.S. airlifted roughly 120,000 people, including more than 5,500 Americans, after the fall of Kabul through the end of August – he’s been accused by Republicans and some Democrats for underestimating the Taliban and overestimating the strength of the now-collapsed, U.S.-backed Afghan government and military.

Biden’s approval of handling the situation in Afghanistan stood at 30%-60% in the ABC News/Washington Post poll. Among the vast majority of Americans questioned in the survey who supported the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, by a two-to-one margin they disapproved of the way the president handled the withdrawal.

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And with serious concerns that ISIS or al Qaeda may use the war-torn Central Asian country as a platform to launch terrorist attacks on the U.S. mainland or U.S. forces overseas, 44% say the withdrawal made America less safe from terrorism. Just eight percent said the U.S. is safer as a result of the Afghanistan exit.

Biden touted his foreign policy prowess and his competence in running an administration as he challenged former President Trump in the 2020 election. And while the chaotic exit from Afghanistan is the major culprit in the president’s approval rating plunge, it’s not the only issue that’s fueling the fall.

One of the issues that vaulted Biden to the presidency was the coronavirus, the worst pandemic to sweep the globe in a century. Biden vowed to do what Trump seemingly couldn’t do – get COVID cases under control, bring back a sense of normalcy to Americans and boost an economy that was severely battered by the pandemic.

But the late-summer COVID surge due to the Delta variant is another gut punch to the president. Biden’s approval rating on handling the coronavirus in the new ABC News/Washington Post poll stands at 52%-41%. The president’s approval is down 10 points from June, when Biden stood at 62%-31%.

And with rising consumer prices this summer raising economic concerns, the president has also seen his approval on the economy slip, from 52%-41% in an ABC News/Washington Post poll in April to 45%-49%. The poll was conducted before Friday’s dismal unemployment report, which was another key indicator that the spread of the delta variant is hampering the economic recovery.

Source: https://news.yahoo.com/biden-apos-standing-among-americans-105217356.html

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As US scales back in Middle East, China and Russia may step in, general says

Lolita C Baldor — Mon, 24 May 2021 07:35:57 +0000

As the United States scales back its military presence across the Middle East to focus on great power competition with China and Russia, it risks giving those two countries a chance to fill the gap and expand their influence around the Gulf, the top US commander for the region said today.

While traveling through the Middle East over the past week, Marine General Frank McKenzie, who heads US Central Command, fielded a persistent question from the military and political leaders he met: Is the US still committed to their country and the region, and what more support can they get.

From the dusty battlefields in Syria to the rocket-pummelled neighbourhoods in Iraq and Saudi Arabia, they worry that America’s pivot to Asia means they will be left without the troops, ships, aircraft, and other military aid they need to battle Iranian-backed militant groups attacking their people.

And if the US is slow to respond, they may look elsewhere for help.

“The Middle East writ broadly is an area of intense competition between the great powers. And I think that as we adjust our posture in the region, Russia and China will be looking very closely to see if a vacuum opens that they can exploit,” McKenzie told reporters travelling with him.

“I think they see the United States shifting posture to look at other parts of the world and they sense there may be an opportunity there.”

Marine General Frank McKenzie, top US commander for the Middle East. Photo / AP

Speaking in his hotel room after meeting with Saudi officials, McKenzie said weapons sales would be one need that Moscow and Beijing could exploit.

Russia, he said, tries to sell air defence systems and other weapons to whomever it can, and China has a long-term goal to expand its economic power and ultimately establish military bases in the region.

In the few short months since President Joe Biden took office, he has ordered the full withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan and begun to review America’s force presence in Iraq, Syria and around the globe.

His administration is cutting US military support for the Saudi-led offensive against Iranian-back Houthi rebels in Yemen, and the Pentagon has moved ships, forces and weapons systems out of other Middle East countries.

US President Joe Biden said he would withdraw of American troops from the “forever war” in Afghanistan by September 11 this year. Photo / AP

At the same time, however, Biden this month dispatched senior administration officials to the Gulf region to reassure nervous allies as the US looks to reopen talks with Iran on the 2015 nuclear deal, which former president Donald Trump scrapped three years ago.

The effort to restart talks with Iran triggers worries in a number of Middle East nations who rely on the US to maintain pressure on Tehran and its campaigns to fund and supply weapons to militant groups in the region.

But there is ongoing discussion within the Pentagon about sending more assets to the Pacific to fight a rising China.

And US military commanders around the globe, including McKenzie, may lose troops and resources as a result. Those could include warships such as the aircraft carrier now sitting in the Gulf, providing security for the Afghanistan withdrawal.

The Biden administration views China’s rapidly expanding economic influence and military might as America’s primary long-term security challenge.

Officials believe the US must be more ready to counter threats to Taiwan and China’s development of military outposts on man-made islands in the South China Sea.

Chinese vessels in the disputed South China Sea. Photo / AP

Military commanders caution that China’s growing assertiveness isn’t limited to Asia, noting that Beijing is aggressively seeking footholds in Africa, South America and the Middle East.

“I agree completely that China needs to be the pacing threat we orient on,” McKenzie said in the interview with reporters from The Associated Press and ABC News. “At the same time, we are a global power and we need to have a global outlook. And that means that you have the ability to consider the globe as a whole.”

In meetings today, Saudi leaders were “very concerned” about the ongoing US military posture review, McKenzie said.

The kingdom is under almost daily bombardment from Houthi rebels with a variety of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and small drones. And Saudi leaders rely on the US to help them defend themselves.

McKenzie said his message to them was that the number of troops and weapons is not as important as the overall capability of the integrated US and Saudi air and missile defence system arrayed around the country.

And more broadly, he said, that strategy of doing more in the region with less military presence may prevent China and Russia from cashing in on any US void.

Houthi supporters at a protest in Sanaa, Yemen. Photo / AP

“I’m not sure it’s actually going to turn out to be an opportunity for them when it’s all said and done,” he said.

The troop numbers may not be the same as the hundreds of thousands that were in the region five to seven years ago, he said, but the US will have a presence in the region.

“I think we’re going to play a very smart game … to leverage what we have,” he said.

“The United States is the partner of choice. It’s only when that option is not open are countries going to hedge and seek other opportunities.”

Source: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/as-us-scales-back-in-middle-east-china-and-russia-may-step-in-general-says/YZ7SZ2HKIDWNOJ4PYYYLGJPNFM/

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