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As the initial excitement over Kamala Harris’s emergence as the presumptive Democratic nominee wanes, increased scrutiny is being directed toward her past positions, policies, and advisors.

On July 31, Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) and Congresswoman Elise Stefanik (R-New York) sent a letter to Vice-President Harris, inquiring about her national security advisor, Philip H. Gordon, and his possible ties to Iran’s influence network in the US, known as the Iran Expert Initiative. This network was exposed in a joint investigation by Iran International and Semafor last September.

The letter from Cotton and Stefanik followed a similar letter by Senator Jim Risch (R-Idaho) and Congressman Michael McCaul (R-Texas) on July 30 to Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, expressing concerns about Iran's influence operations in the US and threatening to subpoena the State Department if it failed to respond to their May 6 request regarding Robert Malley’s alleged sharing of classified documents.

These efforts to verify the relationship between Iran’s Expert Network and a senior advisors like Philip Gordon are part of a broader investigation that began in October 2023 and cannot be dismissed as mere partisan rabble-rousing.

Until the Cotton-Stefanik public letter, Gordon's career and influence were mostly unfamiliar to those outside Washington, DC. On August 2, 2024, Politico article offered some background on Gordon for European readers, yet it failed to offer a thorough account of his career and national security vision.

Gordon’s influence on Harris’s policy is evident in her televised remarks after meeting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on July 25, where she condemned the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and urged Israel to accept the US-backed ceasefire plan. This aligns with Gordon’s long-standing advocacy for de-escalation and multilateral engagement in the Middle East. However, skepticism persists around Gordon’s recent post on "X," where he reassured the public of Harris’s unwavering support for Israel against Iran and its proxies, reflecting doubts rooted in his extensive diplomatic history.

Given Harris's limited foreign policy experience before becoming vice president, intense scrutiny of Gordon's background is essential for both the press and politicians. Analysts viewed Harris as a “neophyte” in foreign policy as she prepared for the vice presidency. Over the past four years, Gordon likely offered the vice president strategic counsel and education on US diplomacy's nuances. Assessing how Gordon’s perspectives might have shaped Harris’s approach and how they might influence her policies if she becomes president—and potentially appoints him as her national security advisor, a role not requiring Senate confirmation—is vital.

Understanding Gordon’s extensive intellectual and diplomatic career requires piecing together his various roles, interviews, articles, op-eds, and books, as no comprehensive biography of his exists. This thorough examination is essential to grasp his current national security stance, which notably aligns with pro-Iran “engagement” and “incentives” advocates.

Philip H. Gordon: From a Europeanist to an expert on Middle East

Philip H. Gordon is a distinguished diplomat and scholar, a European languages polyglot, with a PhD from Johns Hopkins University (1991) on Gaullist Legacy and France’s Security Diplomacy (1993). Known for his mild-mannered demeanor, Gordon has held key diplomatic roles under Presidents Clinton, Obama, and Biden. Unlike many diplomats who maintain a nonpartisan approach, Gordon is noted for his strong partisan alignment in foreign policy. This contrasts with figures like Victoria Nuland and Brett McGurk, who have served across party lines while maintaining a more neutral stance in their careers. For instance, McGurk, now serving as the White House’s Middle East Coordinator—a position Gordon once held under Obama—has worked under both Republican and Democratic presidents. He resigned in protest during the Trump administration, showcasing his commitment to his principles despite political pressures and accusations of "careerism."

Gordon acquired much of his expertise on the Middle East during his sabbaticals from the Bush and Trump administrations. In a 2004 interview promoting his book “Allies at War,” he argued against military confrontation with Iran and advocated for a mix of sanctions and incentives to encourage Iran's cooperation on its nuclear program. He also contributed to the “2005 US Compact with Europe,” which proposed a US commitment to allow EU investment in Iran in exchange for halting its nuclear fuel cycle. Mentioning Iran 24 times, the document can be seen as a precursor to shaping Obama's policy toward Iran. In his 2007 book “Winning the Right War,” Gordon proposed a “New Deal for the Middle East,” advocating withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan, an Arab-Israeli détente (distinct from Trump’s Abraham Accords), and engaging Iran through sanctions and incentives.

After Obama's election, Gordon served as Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs from 2009 to 2013. The May 2010 National Security Strategy closely mirrors many ideas from Winning the Right War, particularly on engaging Iran, though it is not easy to fully assess his influence on the document.

During the Arab Spring and the Iran nuclear negotiations, Gordon was appointed Special Assistant to the President and White House Coordinator for the Middle East, North Africa, and the Gulf Region. While the specifics of his role in the 2013-2015 negotiations remain unclear, his expertise in European diplomacy, Middle Eastern affairs, and intelligence was probably helpful. Gordon excelled at processing piles of detailed daily briefings from the CIA, Pentagon, and State Department and was an effective liaison between the White House and negotiators in Oman and Vienna, leveraging long-standing relationships with key figures like Anthony Blinken and Rob Malley; his colleagues and soccer buddies from the late 1990s. His policy recommendations on Iran, outlined in Winning the Right War, influenced the November 25, 2013, “Joint Plan of Action,” which later became the framework for the 2015 Iran nuclear deal (JCPOA).

https://www.iranintl.com/en/202408085225

IT IS MOST LIKELY THAT KAMALA HAS NO CLUE ABOUT SUCH THINGS AND HAD TO BE "CONTRADICTED" (CORRECTED) BY PHILIP GORDON (MASTER OF WH COMMUNICATIONS?) ON HER "INDISCRETION" IN REGARD TO ISRAEL AND AMERICAN WEAPONS, WHILE "HELPING (NOT HELPING) THE GAZAN PEOPLE...:

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Kamala Harris running ads with fake news headlines – Axios

Google believes that marking such advertisements as “sponsored” is enough to keep voters from being misled

US Vice President Kamala Harris has been using Google search advertisements that link to real news articles from legitimate sources, but with the headlines and descriptions altered to paint the Democratic presidential candidate in a more favorable way, according to an Axios report.

The Harris campaign has been running such ads linking to stories by “nearly a dozen” news outlets, including CNN, AP, CBS, NPR, The Guardian, USA Today and others since at least August 3, Axios reported on Tuesday.

The ads apparently mimic real news results “closely enough” that they can potentially mislead users. Axios wrote that such ads are a “common practice,” but acknowledged that according to Google’s ad transparency center, Harris’ rival Donald Trump is not running these types of misleading ads.

Some of the outlets claimed they were blindsided and “unaware” that their brands were being featured this way, according to Axios. A spokesperson for The Guardian said the company will be “reaching out to Google for more information about this practice.”

Meanwhile, Google has insisted that the practice does not violate its rules, claiming that since the ads are labeled as “sponsored,” they are “easily distinguishable” from legitimate search results.

However, the tech giant admitted that due to an alleged “technical glitch” in Google’s Ad Library, some of the ads “appeared” to lack the necessary disclosures, Axios wrote. A Google spokesperson promised to investigate the glitch, insisting that the company has for years “provided additional levels of transparency for election ads specifically.”

https://www.rt.com/news/602588-kamala-harris-google-ads-news/

SHOULD DONALD TRUMP DO THE SAME THING, HIS MESSAGES WOULD BE TAKEN OUT BY GOOGLE....

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.