Last week while paying half attention to Brett Baier's show on Fox I heard the 'crew' mention Geert Wilders and I thought, 'well, finally' and then I heard Krauthammer condemn Wilder's for calling to ban the Quran (actually what he said was if you are going to ban hate speech, then we ought to be examining the Quran for just that), and then Bill Kristol called Wilders a demagogue ...well arguable, but harsh. My reaction was just short of outright total shock.

Since neither of these men need to be on Fox considering their other accomplishments I have a hard time going along with some other authors who see the evil editorial conspiracies of Prince Talal who has a spermatic business exchange of moneys with Murdoch over newservices investments going both ways.

I believe them to be terribly in error (as apparently do Dutch voters).

I have personally said that if a mosque here in the USA actively teaches those parts of the Quran and Hadith which incite to violence, and violence results, the board of director of such a mosque should be held to account criminally, and civilly. When some mosques are buried under fantastically large lawsuits, the teaching WILL STOP. Legally.  And as a direct cause of those laws which also destroyed Aryan Nation.

I don't see much difference between the process used by the SPLC, and given the murder of Theo Van Gogh and the Cartoon Jihad, ETC, and what Geert Wilders is calling for in stating that if hate speech is going to be banned, and freedom of speech proscribed by limited religious offense, then blind application should be the result.

Nor, Mr. Kristol, do I find the heart of that request ANY kind of demagoguery.

King James Bible, Torah, Quran, whatever ..FINE BY ME. Either that, or allow freedom of speech, AND ENFORCE IT against those who would use intimidation to limit it.

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Everyone remember the 4th ID sitting on ships off the coast waiting? The votes by their parliament?

Gertz:

U.S. weighs strategic assistance, including missile defense, to Turkey

ANKARA -- The United States has been examining the prospect of extending military assistance to Turkey.

Officials said the administration of President Barack Obama was considering military aid as part of defense cooperation between Ankara and Washington. They said U.S. military aid could help Turkey launch strategic programs, including missile defense. (From who? Iran or Israel, or Greece, another NATO member?)

The Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3).

"I think that Turkey is in a unique position," U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said. "It is a member of the NATO alliance and is the southeastern anchor of the alliance. It is geographically located in the Middle East but also in Central Asia."

Turkey, opposed by the Greek lobby in Congress, has not received significant aid from the United States since Ankara rejected the deployment of American troops in 2003. Washington ended military grant aid to Ankara in 1993 and allowed Turkey to purchase weapons through direct loans.

In fiscal 2009, Turkey received $1 million in U.S. Foreign Military Financing, with no funds proposed for either 2010 or 2011. The administration has allocated $4 million for military education for Ankara in fiscal 2011, a $1 million decrease from the previous year.

During a surprise visit to Ankara on Feb. 6, Gates said Washington wanted to increase military cooperation with Turkey. He said this could include the stationing of missile defense assets as part of a U.S. plan to protect Europe from long-range ballistic missiles fired from Iran and North Korea.

"It [Turkey] has special access in a sense of a place at the table, if you will, from Europe to Central Asia to the Middle East," Gates said.

Turkey has requested the PAC-3 missile defense system in a deal estimated at more than $7 billion. Officials said some of the assets could be procured as part of the U.S. missile defense umbrella for Europe.

"I think that Turkey's taking that on and playing a constructive role in all of those areas is a very positive thing," Gates said.

Gates said the United States also wanted to help Turkey in the war against the Kurdish Workers Party in northern Iraq. Iraq, Turkey and the United States have established a joint intelligence center to monitor the PKK in Iraq's Kandil mountains.

"I offered during my visit here to see if there are more capabilities that we can share with Turkey in terms of taking on this threat," Gates told a news conference. "I think what we are seeing is a further intensification of the cooperation in an effort to deal with this threat."

The defense secretary said he did not press Turkish officials to contribute additional troops for Afghanistan. Gates expressed satisfaction with Turkey's 1,700-member contingent, which comprised two provincial reconstruction teams and several mentoring teams in the NATO stabilization mission.

"However, more trainers are needed, and needed immediately," Gates said. "I pressed the alliance to meet the long-standing demands of thousands more instructors and mentors for the Afghan army and police."

Barack Obama is CORRECT to use drones liberally inside Pakistan

Barack Obama using (and continuing) the use of american forces inside Waziristan is CORRECT

Barack Obama's belief that Afghanistan is the central front in the war on terror is a huge strategic error.

Barack Obama's inner compulsion that KSM, et al, and AND ALL COMERS retain the rights of American citizens and constitutional persons is, IMHO, not justified historically, and represents an attitude dangerous to the safety of the people and the survival of the republic.

Barack Obama's feeling that Gitmo is a recruiting tool for Al Qaeda and all the other Islamic inspired war fighters and killers of soft targets is correct. Unfortunately it is a minor one, and the US Constitution and way of life represents the CENTRAL RECRUITING TOOL for these people. Compared to our CIVILIZED, and civilization's need to get information from these mass murderers (as Eric Holder told us in 2002) their 'rights' are not even those of WW2 POW's.

Biden has today criticized an outspoken Dick Cheney saying:

In an interview taped Saturday night for "Meet the Press," Biden unloaded on his predecessor, saying Cheney is "wrong," is "trying to rewrite history," and "either is misinformed or he is misinforming."

"I'm not gonna guess about his motive," Biden told "Meet the Press" moderator David Gregory. "Dick Cheney's a fine fellow. He's entitled to his own opinion. He's not entitled to rewrite history. He's not entitled to his own facts. ... What is he talking about? ... I'm not being facetious: Maybe he's not fully informed of what's going on ... I don't know where he has been. Where was he the last four years of the last administration?" 

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Well that got your attention, didn't it

Saudi billionaire eyes new links with News Corp.

The Saudi billionaire whose investment firm is one of the biggest stakeholders in Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. said he is looking to expand his alliances with the media giant, in the latest indication that his appetite for growth remains robust even as his company retrenches.

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a nephew of the Saudi king and who was listed last year by Forbes as the world's 22nd richest person, met with News Corp.'s chief executive Rupert Murdoch on Jan. 14 in a meeting that "touched upon future potential alliances with News Corp.," according to a statement released by his Kingdom Holding Co. late Saturday.

Media reports have indicated that News Corp, parent to Fox News and Dow Jones & Co., among others, may be thinking of buying a stake in Alwaleed's Rotana Media Group, which includes a number of satellite channels that air in the Middle East.

Neither company has commented publicly on the possible deal, but the talks offer an indication yet that such an agreement may yet be in the offing.

Kingdom Holding's statement said Alwaleed is already the second largest stakeholder in News Corp., with 5.7 percent of the shares of the media company. The stake is held through Kingdom Holding, in which Alwaleed holds a 95 percent stake.

The investment company has a diverse portfolio, ranging from hotels to shares in Apple, eBay and Citigroup.

Does this mean "THEY" control the media? Oh, I forgot, KSA is our ALLY !

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Immigrants riot in Italy amid racial unrest

08 Jan 2010 19:58:31 GMT

Source: Reuters

* Worst episode of Italian racial unrest in years
* Opposition accuses govt of fuelling xenophobia
* Southern town still tense, more immigrants wounded
Friday (Recasts with new violence, background) By Ilario Filippone ROSARNO, Italy,

Jan 8 (Reuters) - Clashes between immigrants and locals in a southern Italian town entered a second day on Friday, with the government rushing extra police to try to stem one of the worst episodes of racial unrest in years.
The violence inflamed a long-running political debate on immigration, with the interior minister saying years of excessive "tolerance" were behind the violence, and the opposition accusing the government of fuelling xenophobia. President Giorgio Napolitano called for an immediate end to the unrest, during which at least 37 people, including 18 policemen, have been injured. Some 8,000 illegal immigrants work in the southern Calabria region where the clashes have erupted, most as day labourers picking fruit and vegetables.

Many live in abandoned factories with no running water or electricity and human rights groups say they are exploited by organised crime.

The clashes started on Thursday, when a gang of white youths in a car fired air rifles at a group of African immigrants returning from work on farms, injuring two of them. The attack set off a night of rioting by dozens of Africans, who smashed car windows with steel bars and stones and set cars and rubbish bins on fire. "Those guys were firing at us as if it were a fair ground, they were laughing. I was screaming and there were other cars passing by but nobody stopped, nobody called the police," Kamal, a Moroccan, told La Repubblica newspaper. On Friday, the violence continued. Police said two immigrants were shot at with air rifles and suffered leg wounds, while two others were attacked with iron bars and were said to be in serious condition. "WE ARE NOT ANIMALS" Earlier, about 2,000 immigrants demonstrated against what they said was racist treatment by many locals. Some shouted "we are not animals" and carried signs reading "Italians here are racist".

There is something about most of Europe that just cannot adjust in any way to an influx, or something different. Maybe they are worried about minarets. Maybe they are worried about crime. Maybe they are worried about jobs. But they have no way of ASSIMILATING in a somewhat classless, upwardly mobile way. And these 'Africans' as Reuters puts it in their morally coward's way, probably have LITTLE INTENTION of assimilating..after all, they can't really take the kufr as friends.

Made for each other.

On Tues the 12th @ 4PM EST, National Geographic will show THIS SHOW. It's already been on at least once this week.

Much of it dealt at the ground level UNSPARINGLY with how Islam deals with women. I found this a very good approach.

The sole factual fault I found was a typical error of the west in leaving out the start (and therefore meaning) of Sura 5:32

005.032
YUSUFALI: On that account: We ordained for the Children of Israel that if any one slew a person - unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land - it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if any one saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people. Then although there came to them Our messengers with clear signs, yet, even after that, many of them continued to commit excesses in the land.
PICKTHAL: For that cause We decreed for the Children of Israel that whosoever killeth a human being for other than manslaughter or corruption in the earth, it shall be as if he had killed all mankind, and whoso saveth the life of one, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all mankind. Our messengers came unto them of old with clear proofs (of Allah's Sovereignty), but afterwards lo! many of them became prodigals in the earth.
SHAKIR: For this reason did We prescribe to the children of Israel that whoever slays a soul, unless it be for manslaughter or for mischief in the land, it is as though he slew all men; and whoever keeps it alive, it is as though he kept alive all men; and certainly Our messengers came to them with clear arguments, but even after that many of them certainly act extravagantly in the land.

For me, the real issue f that Sura would have been to ask WHY the significant portion is pointing to it's meaning is ALWAYS LEFT OUT?

However, they get down to a lot of nitty gritty which FEW HAVE DEALT WITH in 2 hours.

Worth seeing.

In the "Looming Tower" by Lawrence Wright, a pitiless, accurate look at how we started in 1993, and a bit earlier and ended at 9/11, Wright (with confirmation by many others) makes the point over and over that MULTIPLE chances were had in the clear to kill Bin Laden but that the 'White House' stopped each and every one. This has been reinforced by Bob Baer, and Gary Bernsten and now Michael Scheuer has identified for us WHO the 'White House' executive was that made sure we did not kill Bin Laden.

Not Tenet (as ABC seemed to indicate). No.

Why it's the man who would be Jack Bauer's uber boss, if we had a Jack Bauer .. John Brennan, the man Barack Obama has made our Chief of Counter-terrorism.

The man who says we could have leveraged the dots if we had the dots and the leverage.
Barack Obama said yesterday 'we are at war'.
Why then does he retain a counterterror chief with a temerity quotient of 0.001?
Why retain men and women who think stuff was working and WENT ON VACATION BECAUSE NO ONE TOLD THEM THEY COULD NOT?

What kind of people do such things? What kind of responsibility and INITIATIVE allows such behavior?

Worse still, what kind of responsibility to the people allows reading of Miranda rights when an enemy war-fighter tells you 300 more just like him ARE TRAINED AND READY? Is conviction MORE IMPORTANT than getting those other Al Qaeda war fighters? FIND ANOTHER ROUTE TO HOLD THE MAN (OPERATION PASTORIUS). Are the airlines and the commercial traffic they encompass, and results throughout industry not key economic targets? Was FDR's course not a good enough example for today's progressives?

Maybe these people have never read about Gentleman Johnny Burgoyne and the results of insufficient cooperation, and aggressiveness

Is there anyone shocked that this guy could get on a plane with a crotch bomb?

We can't profile so single, young males from muslim nations with muslim nations' stamped visas (on a lost passport never presented) is equal in every way to my wife.

We don't believe it's a war, so minimum wage, low bid, minimum cost contracted employees in too few numbers guard the gates. Guard the luggage? Guard access to runways? Too few analysts watch over hastily constructed databases, and listen, read, and warn over a galatically huge volume of data, and media.

We are afraid to affront (Gitmo) and cause more upset (see Nigeria's pissed off response). Is there anyone who BELIEVES such strictures will stay?

We conduct ourselves in the area of the seminal activity of man caused disasters resulting in overseas contingency operations so that we neither cause casualties (can't take out that house if ANYONE besides Haqqani is there) and offense, nor receive them,  but if we have to choose, we'd rather receive casualties than cause them.

We see all inimical adversaries of any degree, commercial, philosophical, military, cultural and religious with a response of DIALOG AND ENGAGEMENT, carefully leaving to distant visage any talk of some kind of action, leaving these adversaries over dinner more worried about a supernova wiping out earth.

Were I in a cave near Qandahar, planning a raid in the Sudan, watching a demonstration in Tehran, digging a tunnel in Gaza, looking at finances for my new Borei class subs, boring a hole in a mountain near Qingdao for my new SLBM class weapons while signing new contracts with Walmart, reverse engineering Russian supersonic missiles in Pyongyang for sale in Tehran or ANYWHERE, contracting for SU-35's in Caracas, watching the needed by NATO convoys of supplies of fuel, and ammo go by near Khyber .. I would be filled with confidence, and the knowledge that I can go even further than I am afraid to, if I want to be bold, and one way or another kill, pressure and outlast.

Is there thus any shock we are not prepared to do what it takes to stop a euchered moron filled with hate for the godless as the pointy end of the spear of religious empire builders with no recognizable conscience? Does it matter if they represent 'real' Islam?

Shock?

The shock is in Qom, Mecca, Isfahan, Gaza, and Swat. All their predictions are coming true. Allah is delivering us to them.

He is rendering us stupid.

Following are excerpts from a TV debate with Abdul Alim Musa, imam of the Islam Mosque in Washington, DC, and George Mason University professor Jack Goldstone.

Musa is the founder and head of the As-Sabiqun organization in Washington, DC, which serves to "support the unique needs of Muslims living in the U.S." According to the As-Sabiqun website, Musa converted to Islam while in prison, and is a supporter of Iran's Islamic Revolution, having visited Iran on multiple occasions.  

The website also states that Musa's main inspirations are Malcolm X, Sayyed Qutb, Hasan Al-Banna, and Ayatollah Khomeini, among others. Imam Musa is a regular speaker at college campuses across the U.S. He claims that he is often accused of antisemitism, but defends himself as being anti-Zionist. In October 2001, he appeared at the National Press Club at an event aired on C-SPAN, in which he disputed the official story of what occurred on 9/11.[1]

The following debate aired in English on Press TV on January 5, 2010.

To view this clip on MEMRI TV, visit http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/2326.htm. "90% of the Bombing Plots... [are] Done By and With the Help and Aid of Mossad and the United States Government" Interviewer: "Imam, I guess this is something that most people didn't expect to hear on Christmas Day." [...] Abdul Alim Musa: "Right. I am just going to go straight to the point. If you go back for the last 20 years, from the first World Trade Center bombing in '93... This is our view, from those who... We said it then, and we say it now, and this is the belief in the Muslim world: 90% of the bombing plots - or this plot or that plot - we believe is done by and with the help and the aid of Mossad, and the United States government. This is our experience." "Whoever This Guy Is, from Nigeria - We don't Believe He Has Any Ties With Islam" Abdul Alim Musa: "We believe that whoever this guy is, from Nigeria - we don't believe he has any ties with Islam. If you talk about the World Trade Center bombing - all of these things are done... I can give you two quick reasons, and it will solve the problem. Number one - to blame these things on Muslims. You get the Patriot Act, you get the anti-terrorism bill, you get a right to what they call stop, put a freeze, on the global Islamic movement, which has been spreading, growing, and developing. You get a chance to launch missiles, to kill, and to put a freeze on the Islamic movement. But the Islamic movement is only the first target. "The second target is the American people, because as you see, you have a systematic crash of the economy in America, headed downhill. Eventually, it affects everybody. Eventually, it affects the general American people. They want to have all the guns, and they want to have terrorism acts, they want to have everything - not for the Muslims, because we are a small minority - but for the American people, who do not put up with high taxes, and starving to death..." "Al-Qaeda, Bin Laden, and All That - Those Are U.S. Friends" Interviewer: "Wait a second, did you say that America may have played a role in this?" Abdul Alim Musa: "No, we said they definitely did." Interviewer: "Definitely played a role?" Abdul Alim Musa: "Yes, definitely. This is our belief. We've said this. We have... I didn't bring them all... We have 'CIA Patterns of Deception,' 'Zionist Control of Media,' 'Babylon the Great'- these are years old - 'Bush the Unifier'... Our belief has always been, since 1993, and we've done TV programs on it - that the United States government... Who do you talk about? You talk about Al-Qaeda. Where did Al-Qaeda come from? Al-Qaeda, Bin Laden, and all that - those are U.S. friends." "American History is a History of Robbing and Stealing, and Setting Up People" Interviewer: "But why would the U.S. do this to its own people?" Abdul Alim Musa: "In order to control them." Interviewer: "Jack, what do you think? Jump in here." Abdul Alim Musa: "In order to control them. This is not new. The Maine - remember the Maine? How did the U.S. get Mexico? How did they get... How did they get California, Arizona, and all of that? They set up the Mexicans." Jack Goldstone: "Let's stay focused on the present." Abdul Alim Musa: "Yeah, that's what we're saying. We're showing how history... The American history is a history of robbing and stealing, and setting up people in order to get what they want." Jack Goldstone: "Well, I don't want to try and defend all of America's governments through all of history, because we've done some things that certainly we're not proud of now." Abdul Alim Musa: "Right." Jack Goldstone: "But it's hard to accept that Al-Qaeda, today, in the Arabian Peninsula, in the Maghreb, in Afghanistan, and in Pakistan, is working at the behest of the U.S. government." Abdul Alim Musa: "Who would they be working at the behest of, then, if it wasn't...?" Jack Goldstone: "They claim that they are working to create an Islamic caliphate. They claim that their enemy is all Western countries, and all Arab leaders who are supported by Western countries." Abdul Alim Musa: "Where did they come from? Where did Al-Qaeda come from? Let's go back to Afghanistan. Bin Laden - all of these people - were developed through the United States government, British intelligence, and Saudi money. "They brought them in, with new tanks, weapons, everything, to crush the real Afghani... Rabbani, Hekmatyar, and those people. They [the U.S.] brought the Taliban in to crush him, and bring in a type of Islam that was offensive to everybody - harsh, beating women, closing schools. That was to turn people against Islam. There are no accidents, I'm sorry. There are no accidents in Afghanistan, no accidents in Pakistan, no accidents in Iran. For the last 25 or 30 years, it's all been skillfully planned - all of it." Jack Goldstone: "The conspiracy theory described by our friend is appealing, because..." Abdul Alim Musa: "Is it true or not?" Jack Goldstone: "I don't believe that it's true." Abdul Alim Musa: "Which part don't you believe - so we can get it clear? We don't want to leave people up in the air." Jack Goldstone: "I don't..." Abdul Alim Musa: "Which part is not clear?" Jack Goldstone: "I don't believe that the United States today is directing Al-Qaeda." Abdul Alim Musa: "What I said about Al-Qaeda, its beginning, its development... When did the United States get mad at Al-Qaeda and Taliban? When did they get mad at them? Jack Goldstone: After 9/11." Abdul Alim Musa: "Okay... Then, instead of bombing Afghanistan, they should take the CIA people that developed them and put them in jail, instead of killing the people of Afghanistan - if that was even partially true, right? If they developed the group, and they went bad, why don't they put the CIA in jail? Why would they kill or slaughter the people of Afghanistan?" Jack Goldstone: "That is a reasonable question, and I don't have an answer that will convince you." Abdul Alim Musa: "No, convince the people, don't worry about me. The people need to know some..." Jack Goldstone: "What the people need to know..." Abdul Alim Musa: "Is the truth." Jack Goldstone: "...is that it is very difficult for pious Muslims to believe that Muslims could be responsible for acts of terrorism. Islam is a religion of peace." Abdul Alim Musa: "Iraqis lived together for a thousand years as Muslims - Sunnis and Shiites. The Shiites supported the rebellion against British colonialism in 1920 and 1921. This was a fatwa given from Najaf. When the Americans get there, all of a sudden, we have suicide bombings - of Shiites bombing Sunnis, and Sunnis bombing Shiites, to destroy the country. The people of Iraq feel like these are outside forces." The Killers of Nicholas Berg "Looked Like Americans" Abdul Alim Musa: "Even when the young brother - that guy, his name was Nick Bird [sic] or something - years ago, he was captured and killed - you know, on TV, and what have you... We looked at the guys - they had the pictures of the so-called "terrorists" on the Internet. The guy's chest was sticking out like this. Only one of them probably spoke Arabic. They looked like Americans. One thing was sure - two of them were wearing gold, and Muslim men do not wear gold - especially so-called fundamentalists. They were wearing gold. Muslim men do not wear gold. Muslim women can wear gold, but Muslim men generally wear silver. "I'm trying to tell you that we talk about... A conspiracy theory is supposed to be way out... We're talking about real bombings. Anywhere you take... If you talk about Mumbai, if you talk about all of these... These are people that are not well known in the Islamic movement. "Now, I'm saying this because I go to Pakistan, I've been to Afghanistan, I go to Iran. I have been knowing the people for thirty years, that are involved in the Islamic movement. None of us know, none of us! I talked with one of the main brothers here in the area, an Arabic-speaking brother. I said: 'Do we know any Al-Qaeda?' He said: 'I ain't never seen one.' And I asked him, because we had been to conferences all over the world. Neither one of us know any Al-Qaeda, and we are supposed to be the most revolutionary Muslims in the United States. I have never seen them. This is not conspiracy theory - this is the bombings and killings in Iraq and the bombings... This person, from Algeria [sic] - what does it do on Christmas Day? It says: 'Look at these evil Muslims.'" Interviewer: "It's a message..." Abdul Alim Musa: "It's a message that these Muslims are evil. It gives the United States the justification for Yemen, for even northern Nigeria, for anybody. And the people are doing it. Why is this young rich guy all of a sudden going to blow up something? "The no-fly list - the man [Obama] is lying through his teeth. I'm on the no-fly list. If I take 10 flights in the U.S., I'm held up. I miss five of them." Interviewer: "Why are you on a no fly list?" Abdul Alim Musa: "Because they don't like what I say." "Who Broke Every Treaty With the Indians? It Was the American Government! The Israelis and the Americans!" Abdul Alim Musa: "I remember 1898, I remember the Maine, where the U.S. battleship was blown up and, not sunk, but almost, in Havana Harbor. It gave the U.S. the ability... By the way, they had Navy already in the Philippines when it happened. But that gave the U.S. the excuse to, to take the Virgin Islands, to take the Philippines, and all of that. "And then, I remember reading about Mexico. You know, poor Mexico... The invasion of Mexico, when they got to California. They got Arizona, they got New Mexico. They had already just stolen Texas. The Gulf of Tonkin - some people forget the Gulf of Tonkin. You know. This is dealing in the Vietnam era, when they blamed North Korea, or someone, for firing on an American ship. It never happened, but they just bombed the place to smithereens because of that. "I'm saying the U.S. government has a history of this. And Mossad, the Israeli intelligence, also have a history of setting people up. I'm saying, as an active Muslim, and knowing Muslims all over the world, and I've been to most of these countries and spent time in them - Islam, right now, is trying to call people to a better world. That's what we're doing - right in south-east Washington. This stuff that comes up on the news every week is benefiting someone else, and is not benefiting Islam. And we look at the pattern of behavior - who has done this before? Who broke every treaty with the Indians? It was the American government! The Israelis and the Americans! They want a clamp-down. They want loose... not tight enough... They have plenty of security. "Osama bin Laden supposedly praised the bombing here, right? Now I've just had my regular one or two years of Arabic. When they translated what he said, there's one thing that they missed. They said: "Allah be blessed.' This is insanity. Muslims don't say that. In Christianity, you can say 'blessed be God,' but in Islam, you cannot - a human being cannot bless God. It's 'Allah be praised.' I'm telling you..." Interviewer: "So you're saying there's a translation mix-up?" Abdul Alim Musa: "Not translation! I'm saying that they're stooges, they're stooges... Remember, this is Osama Bin Laden, a rich Saudi that's been working with them, and they [Al-Qaeda] said: 'We are happy that the bombing went down.' And for that, they invade Afghanistan - for him being happy. Who is his being happy? What is his being happy about the bombing have to do with slaughtering people in Afghanistan? I'm trying to say this - is it... We are not on the defensive. "We've been not saying this outside much, but I am personally tired of the United States doing these things, and people not standing up. In America, I am not going to be quiet any more. We know that this is not done by us, because of the pattern of behavior and what Islam demands. It's done by somebody else. We would say, the United States government, the CIA, and Mossad. They are the ones you should look for. "Israelis, white Americans, have never forgiven anybody for anything, if it happened 50 years ago, 100 years ago, right? The Israelis are chasing down Nazis that can't even walk. Can't hardly talk, slobbering in the mouth - right today. But how many black people are chasing around South Africans, right? After what they did, right? How many of us are saying: 'You lynched us'... The same time during the Holocaust, we used to get lynched every day, regularly. When I grew up, this was common conversation. I'm born in Arkansas. This was common. You don't see none of us going around saying: '60 years ago, 70 years ago, you guys lynched us.' Except Americans and Europeans! They always say: Mau Maus are bad. They killed 55 British. The British killed 155,000 Mau Maus, and the Mau Maus are uncivilized." Endnote: [1] http://www.sabiqun.net/imam_musa.html

President Chavez brought the house down.

When he said the process in Copenhagen was "not democratic, it is not inclusive, but isn't that the reality of our world, the world is really and imperial dictatorship...down with imperial dictatorships" he got a rousing round of applause.

When he said there was a "silent and terrible ghost in the room" and that ghost was called capitalism, the applause was deafening.

But then he wound up to his grand conclusion - 20 minutes after his 5 minute speaking time was supposed to have ended and after quoting everyone from Karl Marx to Jesus Christ - "our revolution seeks to help all people...socialism, the other ghost that is probably wandering around this room, that's the way to save the planet, capitalism is the road to hell....let's fight against capitalism and make it obey us." He won a standing ovation.

Time to stake out the ground, and stand on it.

What the world does, a world with very different values, a world where those who make it unsafe for jews to walk the streets find superb levels of approval, where newspapers are shuttered, leaders self appoint for lifetimes, and TV stations are bludgeoned to silence ... a world ALIEN to the Founders hopes ... is nothing for us to seek approval from.

It is for us to hold them IN THE HIGHEST POSSIBLE CONTEMPT.

From Max Hastings at the NYT:

IT is hard to be optimistic about the outcome of President Obama's troop "surge" in Afghanistan. The additional forces sound large in headlines, but shrink small in the mountains. The commitment is intended as an earnest indication of America's will. But neither the number of troops nor the timeline that mandates a drawdown in less than two years is likely to impress the Taliban, who think in decades, or for that matter the Afghan people.

Most decision-makers on both sides of the Atlantic now privately believe we are in the business of managing failure, and that is how the surge looks. The president allowed himself to be convinced that a refusal to reinforce NATO's mission in Afghanistan would fatally weaken the resolve of Pakistan in resisting Islamic militancy. Meanwhile at home, refusal to meet the American generals' demands threatened to brand him as the man who lost the Afghan war. Thus the surge lies in the realm of politics, not warfare.

As the president said, the usual comparisons with Vietnam are mistaken. Today's United States Army and Marine Corps are skilled counterinsurgency fighters. Their commanders, especially Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top commander in Afghanistan, are officers of the highest gifts. Combat and casualties are on a much smaller scale than in Southeast Asia four decades ago.

The critical fact, however, is that military operations are meaningless unless in support of a sustainable political system. One Indochina parallel seems valid: that war was lost chiefly because America's Vietnamese allies were unviable.

If we lose in Afghanistan, it will not be because American soldiers are defeated, but because "our" Afghans -- the regime of Hamid Karzai -- cannot deliver to the people honest policing, acceptable administration and visible quality of life improvements.

Can anyone deliver this? Why not? Could the Taliban who crushed all opposition, including Massoud and the Northern Alliance in the 90's deliver this? They didn't try and they maintained control.

GERTZ:

Prospects of new war on rise as Hizbullah gains control in Lebanon

WASHINGTON -- Iran's proxies, particularly Hizbullah, are preparing for an imminent war against Israel, a report said.

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy said that Hizbullah has increasingly dominated Lebanon and could force the nation into another war against Israel. In a report, the institute said none of the issues that led to the 34-day war between Israel and Hizbullah in 2006 have been resolved.

"If the situation does not change significantly, it may only be a matter of time before a new conflict erupts in and around Lebanon," the report, titled "A Victory for Islamism: The Second Lebanon War and its Repercussions," said. "The group has spent the intervening years greatly expanding its military capacity, to such a degree that it can now decide whether Lebanon goes to war."

Authored by Swedish analyst Magnus Norell, the report said that neither the Lebanese government nor the international community has sought to address Hizbullah dominance, aided by Iran and Syria. Norell, a senior analyst at Swedish Defense Research Agency who formed a backchannel between Israel and Hizbullah to facilitate the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000, asserted that Hizbullah has prevented Beirut from using its military.

"Approximately 70 percent of privates in the Lebanese army are Shi'ite, the sect from which Hizbillah recruits practically all of its members," the report said. "Most officers, on the other hand, are Christian or Sunni. This, too, was the case before the civil war."

Norell, along with his Swedish colleague, Magnus Ranstorp, participated in the discussions with Israel that led to the withdrawal from Lebanon in 2000. Norell recalled that the government of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, today defense minister, decided to "bet" on the assurances of the United Nations and international community that they would prevent Hizbullah attacks on the Jewish state.

Instead, Norell said, Hizbullah embarked on an armament program that led to the 2006 war. He said the unilateral Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon as well as the pullout from the Gaza Strip five years later were regarded by Islamists as "pure capitulation."

"Not only has Hizbullah bolstered its military power and political influence, it has also strengthened its relations with Syria and Iran," the report said. "Finally, it has kept its conflict with Israel at a level high enough to ensure that the question of peace remains moot, but not so high as to endanger its political and military position within Lebanon."

Norell said Hizbullah was regarded by most Lebanese as having won the 2006 war with Israel. He said this has encouraged Arab states to reject peace negotiations with the Jewish state.

"Another war with Israel is expected to happen sooner or later, and Hizbullah is not prepared to allow its preparations to be hampered, either to the north or south of the Litani River," the report said.

Israel: Hizbullah has acquired long-range rockets based in Lebanon

TEL AVIV -- Israel's military has detected Hizbullah acquisition of missiles and rockets with ranges of up to 325 kilometers.

Officials said the weapons could strike targets in most of Israel.

"Some of them have a range of 300 kilometers and some of them have a range of up to 325 kilometers," Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi said.

In a Nov. 10 briefing to a parliamentary committee, Ashkenazi said Hizbullah has already deployed the long-range rockets in Lebanon. He said a rocket attack from the Beirut area could reach the nuclear reactor in the southern Israeli city of Dimona.

"There is a paradox," Ashkenazi told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee said. "On one hand, there is calm. But when you peek over the fence you can see armament and empowerment."

Officials said the latest acquisition marked the longest-range missiles and rockets in Hizbullah's arsenal. Until 2009, they said, Hizbullah wielded weapons with a range of about 200 kilometers.

Ashkenazi did not identify the latest Hizbullah missile. The missile approximated the range of the Soviet-origin Scud B.

Officials said Hizbullah has amassed an arsenal of 40,000 missiles and rockets, most of them short-range weapons. They said Iran has increased weapons and other military support to its Lebanese proxy.

"We don't delude ourselves," Ashkenazi said. "The situation is delicate and Hizbullah is growing stronger all the time. The Iranian challenge is to increase control over the Middle East through training, arms and money provided to all terror organizations."

Now imagine a massive missile response from Hizballah operating as volunteers operating in Syria against US forces in Iraq. Against US forces wherever they can bring these rockets. Iran maintains fig leaf deniability with Obama's timid, legal proof requirements for response, and need for world approval before proceeding.

Barack Obama told CNN yesterday, "I've restored America's standing in the world..."

Iran DEPENDS upon America's risk averse need for 'moral standing' to succeed in creation of CHAOS they can take advantage of, in ways 'civilized' societies are reluctant to respond to.

According to Dr. Hassan Abbasi, adviser to the Iranian govt, the global balance of power is in a state of flux and every nation should fight for a place in a future equilibrium. The Western powers, especially the United States, still wield immense military and economic power that "looks formidable on paper." But they are unable to use that power because their populations have become "risk-averse." "The Western man today has no stomach for a fight," Abbasi says. "This phenomenon is not new: All empires produce this type of man, the self-centered, materialist, and risk-averse man." Abbasi believes that the US intervention in Iraq, which involved "slightly higher risks" than the invasion of Afghanistan, was the very last of its kind. And even then, the US went into Iraq because of President George W Bush's "readiness to do what no other American leader would dare contemplate.

Israel's 'Iron Dome' missile defense system to be ready by 2011

Israel needs a real plan for Iran's REAL PLAN

TEL AVIV -- Israel plans to deploy a new rocket defense system in 2011.

Israeli Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi said the military would deploy the Iron Dome system to intercept incoming missiles and rockets. Ashkenazi said Iron Dome was advancing toward production and would be ready in 2011.

"Two new anti-aircraft artillery batteries of the Iron Dome missile defense system, which is designed for the interception of Katyusha and Kassam rockets, will begin operating in 2011," a military statement said on Nov. 14.

Iron Dome was meant to intercept missiles and rockets with a range of up to 70 kilometers. The system, which underwent its first live-fire test in mid-2009, has been developed by the state-owned Rafael Advance Defense Systems.

In a Nov. 10 briefing to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Ashkenazi said Iron Dome would be required for the growing arsenal of short- and medium-range missile and rocket arsenals stationed along Israel's borders. The chief of staff cited threats by Hamas and the Iranian-sponsored Hizbullah.

Ashkenazi said Hizbullah has acquired missiles with a range of 300 kilometers. He said Hizbullah has "tens of thousands of missiles in its possession, a small percentage of them able to reach a range of 300 kilometers," the military statement said.

"The chief of staff said that Hamas and Hizbullah, amid the relative quiet in recent months along borders of the north and Gaza Strip, have been rearming with missiles and rockets," the military statement said.

Allow me, Mr, Gittes to inform you that THEY ARE INDEED, ALL PSYCHOTIC.

And what difference does that make?

But there is a difference, and WE MUST ELUCIDATE IT FORCEFULLY WITHOUT BLANCHING

I am going to make an effort to be dispassionate.

Vulcan.

Was he disturbed after being educated as a psychiatrist at our expense all those years at Bethesda? Just crazy and he happened to be an MD about to be deployed?

Did taunts about his religion crack this trained and in service psychiatrist wide open like a school boy who is teased too many times?

Was this the same reaction some weak minded and weak souled Jewish doctor might have had over endless taunting that his antecedents killed the messiah?

We have to ask all the questions to KNOW. Was he a 'good american' as one friend put it?

Or does the army have no way, or is prevented from asking the questions which would filter out those whose loyalty to the ideals of their religion (or anything else) prevent them being effective defenders of the american people and way of life?

In the book Catch 22, Yossarian is upset because all the Germans are trying to kill him. He is scolded as being paranoid because the Germans were trying to kill everyone flying over them. Yossarian intelligently takes the discussion to the next level asking..'what difference does that make?'

If Dr. Hasan felt he had a higher duty then as Americans, part of whose job it is to ensure we pass to our children what we were handed, we have a very winding path to figure out. It will be compulsory to find an equitable way of getting these sons of bitches who are American but not. Who think the Quran demands they kill us as an individual responsibility. Who may be right about what that book says.

We have to ask the questions.

Someone impeccable who is asking himself the same questions inside his soul this morning needs to speak out and say 'if they are crazy, what difference does that make'?

From Gertz on a story about Obama avoiding all first person contact with Mubarak's son...Gamal (which can be understood, frankly)... HOWEVER...

Unlike Bush, Obama has signaled that he would seek a dialogue with Egypt's opposition movement, the Muslim Brotherhood. Obama also suggested that his administration would recognize any MB victory, including in parliamentary elections scheduled for 2010 in Egypt.

"There are some who advocate for democracy only when they are out of power; once in power, they are ruthless in suppressing the rights of others," Obama said. "No matter where it takes hold, government of the people and by the people sets a single standard for all who hold power: you must maintain your power through consent, not coercion." 

It might be a good idea to convince, via your genius conversational and rhetorical skills the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine of this, you know. - HAMAS?

So sorry but:

U.S. White House counterterrorism chief Juan Zarate, says "The Muslim Brotherhood is a group that worries us not because it deals with philosophical or ideological ideas but because it defends the use of violence against civilians.

Columnist and former Kuwaiti official Dr. Ahmad Al-Rabi, who has written that the "beginnings of all of the religious terrorism that we are witnessing today were in the Muslim Brotherhood's ideology."

Former U.S. Middle East peace envoy Dennis Ross (WHO WAS JUST FIRED BY OBAMA AS AMBASSADOR TO IRANIAN ISSUES AND 'DIALOGGING'), told Asharq Alawsat newspaper that the Muslim Brotherhood is a global, not a local organization, governed by a Shura (Consultative) Council, which rejects cessation of violence in Israel, and supports violence to achieve its political objectives elsewhere too

Magdy Khalil, executive editor of Egypt's Watani International, reports consistent MB deceit concerning Egypt's 12.5% Coptic Christian population, so as to oppress and dhimmify them

The Brotherhood is widely believed to have had a `secret apparatus` responsible for terrorist attacks in Egypt including the assassination of Egypt's prime minister in 1948.

Newsweek journalists Mark Hosenball and Michael Isikoff report connections between al-Qaeda and Brotherhood figures Mamoun Darkazanli and Youssef Nada.


MB Member Mohammed Qutb, brother of Sayd, ran to KSA to teach after the arrest and execution of Sayd, and did at Abdul Aziz U, School of Islamic studies teaching both Abdullah Azzam, and OBL.

A similar article in the Financial Times reported financial links between 74-year-old Swiss Muslim convert, businessman and neo-Nazi Ahmed Huber, and MB members, notably Youssef Nada, Ali Ghaleb Himmat and who founded the Al Taqwa Bank. According to the U.S. government, Al Taqwa "has long acted as financial advisers to al-Qaeda." Huber himself is noted in Europe for his links with alleged neo-Nazi and other far right elements. He is reported to have "confirmed" having "had contact with associates of Osama bin Laden at an Islamic conference in Beirut," whom he called `very discreet, well-educated, very intelligent people.`

Abdul Rahman al-Amoudi, an "expert in the art of deception" was an influential lobbyist and founder and head of the Brotherhood-linked American Muslim Council before being convicted and sentenced to 23 years in prison for conspiracy to murder Saudi Prince Abdullah at the behest of Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi.

In 1997 Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mustafa Mashhur told journalist Khalid Daoud that he thought Egypt's Coptic Christians should pay the long-abandoned jizya poll tax, levied on non-Muslims (In exchange for protection from the state, due to the fact that non-Muslims are exempt from military service, while it is compulsory for Muslims.). He went on to say that while `we do not mind having Christians members in the People's Assembly... the top officials, especially in the army, should be Muslims since we are a Muslim country... This is necessary, Mashhur explained because `when a Christian country attacks the Muslim country and the army has Christian elements, they can facilitate our defeat by the enemy.`"

Barack Obama and his ideas of how to live in this world, and protect the lives, security, and way of life of everyday american people, are totally disconnected from objective reality, and will lead DIRECTLY to a lot of american people getting killed for absolutely NO OTHER REASON than his determination to cling to delusional ideas

Amid the reviews of the Cairo episode of Pres. Obama we see those on the left lauding the effort, the words and the 'new beginning' after another reset button has been pressed. We see those on the right who think it was not 'too' bad and had some good points, and those who point to the historically factual errors as engendering another set of non apology apologies.

I have a very different view.

Sometimes the idea that talking set off a series of expectations about results that fires off it's own mandatory process in which the end becomes not only possible, but a demanding and nagging target.

What was the actual purpose of this speech?

1. Was there to be a general recognition from Morocco to Indonesia that the same people who elected Bush are now apologizing for this affront by presenting the new era of Obama?
2. Was he trying to convince the same people, hey, we're not so bad?
3. Was he trying to avoid Huntington's 'Clash'?
4. Just another stop on his 'we've been bad' tour?
5. Was he trying to pry moderate Muslims away from Tantawi-esque, MesbahYazdi, Jannatti Islam? If so, was the effort laudable regardless of the likelihood of the desired outcome?

I cannot imagine that if Barack Obama is as smart as we hear, that anything other than 1 and 5 are the main answers.
I think he succeeded with 1.

But 5 is a farce.

During the run up to the war in Iraq among the hundreds of Arabs 'debating' me over the worthiness of the endeavor's correlative effect (democracy in a middle eastern land) among those who scored worthy points was one who said 'NEVER FROM YOUR HANDS', and then began a chorus amid these mostly Sunnis from the gulf that underlying the western idea of democracy was the idea that law created by man trumped all in the end.

Of course, one must submit to the Quran. End of story.

I have no doubt there is a majority of humans who happen to be Muslim by birth that are appalled by the actions of the killers (though certainly more appalled when the victims are Muslims), and I have no doubt as well, no words of an American who may be argued to be born Muslim (by their rules), now elected President, about us or them which can invalidate the crux of the issue.

We make up our laws which are supreme, which means the words of God cannot be.
They submit to the word of God as they must, and part of those words are that in the end we must submit, pay the tax or, well, you know. Many here would like to argue that we can ignore certain unpleasant parts of the uncreated words of a perfect being.

Many feel we cannot, unless of course, Muslims admit to the idea the Quran is written by Mohammad and a committee of peers who collected all the differing Qurans in the years after his death.

So the idea moderate Muslims can be pryed from the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan Nasrallah, Tantawi, Qaradawi, Bin Baz, Khomeini Islam, when the very fact that these names are referenced as the authorities of the ascendant form of Islam due to their POPULARITY, and the accepted basis of their ideas, formed over 1500 years of Islam is a forlorn hope.

No deist Jefferson, rejecting man's religious authority to interpret and punish thru organized religious thought is in the offing over there to relieve this conundrum.

Better to say, 'we will never bridge this gap of western man's law being supreme vs the Quran, but do we have to kill each other? Can 9:29 (among other tasty treats) be ignored, or is Hudna the only way?'

And direct the question from the president of the USA in Cairo, OUTRIGHT to Tantawi, to Nasrallah, to Khameini.

Was this worth the effort?

If it aids us in seeing the truth.

Any takers?

I thought so.

So, was there a point to that speech?

Telegraph UK:

Barack Hussein Obama. Say it proud. Say it out loud. The middle moniker that dared not speak its name during the election campaign is now front and centre of the US president's attempt to woo the Muslim world, the theme of his visits to Riyadh on Wednesday and Cairo on Thursday.

No words can express my disgust for the gullibility, stupidity, naivety, and wishful thinking fantasy voting 53%, ESPECIALLY 78% of the idiot liberal wishing, seeing Seymour or Irving or Shoshana 'do good' , Tikkun Olan (heal the world) Americans who happen to be Jewish who swallowed the absolute MANURE put out by Barack Hussein Obama and his lying, disgusting, sleight of hand running dogs who portrayed HONEST QUESTIONING as vile extremism and then accused the right of doing PRECISELY what they knew they were guilty of.

Americans, you are idiots.

Petrified of the potential political fallout of being branded a Muslim, Candidate Obama - a practicing Christian - never used the name "Hussein" and its use was frowned upon as a forbidden code for the nutty accusation that he was some kind of Islamic Manchurian candidate.

No more. To say Barack Hussein Obama - BHO for short - now appears to be the height of political correctness.

As I argue in this analysis for the Telegraph dead tree edition, Obama is seeking to return to a Middle East policy based on realism - buttressed by the bona fides of his own multi-cultural (including Muslim) background.

In other words it's back to George Marshall speaking to Truman in 1947, who told the president if he recognized Israel not only would he lose his Secretary of State (Marshall) but he would lose his vote in 1948.

The State Dept wins. And all of American Israeli policy is conflated with American Jews, 2500 years of history, a president who is now liable to admit (or CLAIM) he was born Muslim, and the idea that American interests are served by oil from Wahabbis scared of nuclear Shia for a year or two who might be induced to not hate hate us with 205% of their souls, reducing it temporarily to 189%, and we will all be AGOG at the politics of religion mixed into this complete coming FIASCO

Make no mistake about the path we are on.

Israel and the USA are going in opposite directions, and will very shortly find themselves on OPPOSITE SIDES in the middle east.

OPPOSITE SIDES

The USA is going to try and impose a peace and will find Israel resistant to ideas which will kill it and in absolute, black and white terms RESIST AMERICAN POLICY GOALS.

Freeing Barack Hussein Obama to tack the other way, and radically change American policy AGAINST DEMOCRACY and TOWARDS OUTRIGHT POLICE STATES, AND THEOCRATIC DICTATORSHIPS for blurry goals of soft landings among those who see lions and lambs in the same bed.

This is NOT A LIBERAL POLICY.

BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA IS
JIMMY CARTER ON CRACK

The economy shows only manipulated numbers of some kind of hope for the end of the year for those who emotionally or politically cannot bear the realities of mild deflation (checked those LCD screen prices lately ?) .

Prices on homes, appliances, vehicles, even some foods are falling.

Jobs continue to disappear.

But gasoline here in Maine gas has gone from just over $2 to $2.47 in less than a month despite softening of demand, and incredibly high inventories.

When supply outstrips demand, and prices rise what shall we think?

Huh, Wahabbis? Huh, A'jad, Hugo and thugs?

Oil and gasoline prices hit a new high for the year Wednesday despite expectations that OPEC will not cut production again and more bad news arrived for the nation's automakers.

Benchmark crude for July delivery rose $1 to settle at $63.45 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices haven't been that high since early November.

Retail gasoline prices, which are up 19 percent in the past month, rose 0.9 cents overnight to $2.434 a gallon (64 cents a liter), according to auto club AAA, Wright Express and Oil Price Information Service. Prices are now 10 cents higher than a week ago and 38.4 cents a gallon higher than a month ago. It's also a high for the year.

Oil prices dipped below $35 a barrel as recently as March.

Many experts say that fundamentally, there is little reason for the recent price spikes and that consumers should expect related costs to come down before the summer is over.

Major U.S. industries continue to struggle and on Wednesday, a bankruptcy filing by General Motors Corp. appeared inevitable.

Jim Ritterbusch of Ritterbusch and Associates said U.S. gasoline prices could be back down to nearly $2 a gallon by the end of summer.

"Demand is going to remain weak, and we've got plenty of excess refining capacity to crank up production," he said.

ANY TAKERS WHEN DEMAND IS DOWN
NOW BUT PRICES RISE DRAMATICALLY?

TOO LATE FOR THAT AMERICAN FUEL CELL CAR NOW, HUH?

Saudi says Pakistan can survive Taliban

Urges U.S. out of Afghanistan

An influential member of the Saudi royal family, who headed the country's intelligence service for 25 years, said Monday that Pakistan can survive the Taliban threat provided the military remains intact.

Prince Turki al-Faisal, former ambassador to Washington, also called for the speedy withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan, saying that they are "not welcome" there. He did not specify a deadline.

I'm not even sure where to begin to comment on that one.
Also just in....

A key member of the Saudi royal family who headed the country's intelligence service for 25 years accused both the Obama and Bush administrations Monday of "deceiving" the American people that the U.S. can ever end its dependence on foreign oil.

"You can't get rid of oil. You can't get rid of fossil fuels -- gas and coal -- unless you want to price yourself out of existence," Prince Turki al-Faisal, former ambassador to Washington, told editors and reporters at The Washington Times.

"I'd hope that the general public in the United States would be wiser than to be deceived into thinking that the U.S. can ever be energy independent," he said. 

Relax.

Our madrassahs are harmless.

The Taliban will not destabilize Pakistan and gain control of their nukes

You need our oil

Relax

You always will need our oil

Relax

Why do I envision Obi Wan waving his right arm?

It's true.
The ruthlessness displayed towards domestic political opposition is aimed at those this president believes tinged with evil and the incredibly weak face displayed overseas is the product of naive belief in the goodness of man and the faults of our system which has suppressed them overseas.
I just can't think of any other explanation.

Interrogation Memos Detail Harsh Tactics by the C.I.A.

In dozens of pages of dispassionate legal prose, the methods approved by the Bush administration for extracting information from senior operatives of Al Qaeda are spelled out in careful detail -- like keeping detainees awake for up to 11 straight days, placing them in a dark, cramped box or putting insects into the box to exploit their fears.

You can read it all, and make up your own minds about whether or not this is torture, the means were effective, yadda.
But I find it unbelievable that this would be released in the middle of a war except for two things.

This leader and the people who voted for him don't believe there is a war (overseas contingency operation against man caused disasters..another ringing phrase ..measure that against the threat brought to mind's eye by RIGHT WING EXTREMISTS)

This leader and the people who voted for him are anxious to prove to the world how different he is from the previous admin, and are unmindful of the results of this.

Results which surely are to enlighten Al Qaeda, Hizballah and if needs be HAMAS as to the limits we will reach, and to teach PRECISELY how to resist the techniques so 'wonderfully' detailed in this report

READ IT ALL

The release of the documents came after a bitter debate that divided the Obama administration, with the C.I.A. opposing the Justice Department's proposal to air the details of the agency's long-secret program. Fueling the urgency of the discussion was Thursday's court deadline in a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union, which had sued the government for the release of the Justice Department memos.

Together, the four memos give an extraordinarily detailed account of the C.I.A.'s methods and the Justice Department's long struggle, in the face of graphic descriptions of brutal tactics, to square them with international and domestic law. Passages describing forced nudity, the slamming of detainees into walls (which turns out to be a soft wall rigged make a loud noice, and to prevent whiplash), prolonged sleep deprivation (which always ends if the subject shows any sign of hallucination) and the dousing of detainees with water as cold as 41 degrees (which is warmer than the water I go into with a bad heart to get the dock and boat in and out of the water in spring and fall ...this weekend actually and I am LOOKING FORWARD TO DOING IT) alternate with elaborate legal arguments concerning the international Convention Against Torture.

OPEC sees 'devastating contraction' in oil demand
OPEC again revised down its estimate for world crude demand on Wednesday, saying a "devasting contraction" in consumption would keep prices under pressure in the months ahead.

"In the coming months, the market is expected to remain under pressure from uncertainties in the economic outlook, demand deterioration and the substantial overhang in supply," the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries wrote in its latest monthly report.

It said "vigilant monitoring is essential" ahead of the cartel's next meeting at the end of May at which some members are expected to push for further output cuts to help support prices.

"Oil demand is suffering more and more from the world economic recession," it said, saying this had resulted in another downward revision in its forecast for demand this year of 0.4 million barrels per day (bpd).

OPEC estimated that demand would contract by 1.37 million bpd or 1.6 percent in 2009.

In its previous monthly bulletin released in March, OPEC had been pencilling in a contraction of 1.01 million bpd for 2009.

"World oil demand is already out of its high demand seasonality achieving nothing but devastating contraction," OPEC said.

They think a projection of 1.6% decline is devastating?

Just wait as America continues to refuse to spend on anything.

The more they cut production and the higher the price goes, the more we stay home. This economic fiasco has broken thru a threshold, I think.

I read a very interesting encomium, and a hoped for epitaph for the republican party by a very bitter Bob Schrum, who never won a presidential race as mgr for the democrats.

He sees the republicans as what the democrats were about 3 years ago. Leaderless, rudderless, simply obstinate and in opposition to anything Mr. Bush had to say. He sees them as a tiny minority bereft even of their 'moderate republican' wing.

He is wrong.

I remain independent but I have to tell you, there is a strategic reminder of republican ideas.

Barack Obama.

This man has turned out to be to the left, not of what he represented himself as during the campaign, but to the left of where he was as a Senator - the most liberal in the club. Of course his actions are couched now in the crisis which is now turning since he got his way with the congress and is enjoying a post coital smoke. So far his domestic actions remain somewhat within the realm of FDR-land of the early-mid 30's (a time fraught with fear of either a communist revolution amid 25% unemployment or fascist takeover ..search on Smedley Butler)...BUT

But what will turn the tide is the human nature of our enemies overseas

FDR recognized the nature of man, Obama is blind to it.

FDR, when the presidents of the 1920's (republicans), went to sign treaty after treaty limiting navies, limiting sizes of ships, limiting arms and finally outlawing war itself, expounded that such ideas would render the democracies unable to face reality when the issue was drawn AS IT MUST BE SOONER OR LATER, and supported hard headed policies AS EARLY AS 1928 (Stimson) which he was ready to stand behind even if they lead to war, and said just that.

NYT: The Obama administration and its European allies are preparing proposals that would shift strategy toward Iran by dropping a longstanding American insistence that Tehran rapidly shut down nuclear facilities during the early phases of negotiations over its atomic program, according to officials involved in the discussions.

If I am Iran, I am smelling a shot at throwing America out the middle east, suborning Euros with a few contracts, cowing the Sunni Oil states into frank sending of tribute, arming HAMAS and Hizballah and authorizing them to use their Iranian supplied missiles to make all of Israel into Sderot, uninhabitable under a sudden rain of missiles at random, whim and caprice, controlled by the spirit of Farfour, possibly triggering another exodus, and timing that, so that when Israel is finally provoked to strike at Iran, Iran responds to this 'aggression' with their new nuclear weapons. And not only do I like my chances thru at least 2012, it is Allah who has ordered the universe into this configuration for me.

Oh and coincidentally...

SEOUL, April 14 (Reuters) - North Korea said on Tuesday it saw talks on ending its nuclear weapons programme as "useless" and it planned to restart a plant that makes arms-grade plutonium, state media quoted its Foreign Ministry as saying. The comments came in response to the U.N. Security Council unanimously condemning North Korea's long-range rocket launch nearly two weeks ago as contravening a U.N. ban, and demanding enforcement of existing sanctions against Pyongyang.

The cynical leaders overseas smile..

Hey man, you wanted the job... you got it baby,....Bush is cutting bike paths on weekends in Crawford with his chainsaw, and living with neighbors near Dallas during the week who voted for him 2-1 BOTH TIMES.

GERTZ:

Intel reports Al Qaida regrouping for post-U.S.-withdrawal surge in Iraq

U.S. intelligence monitoring of terrorist web sites last week revealed that Al Qaida in Iraq is regrouping and planning for operations after U.S. troops withdraw from the country.

I guess, given the right American leadership and strategy, they DO NOT WANT TO DEAL WITH US, HUH? Maybe not even in the heart of the great caliphate.

A participant to a terrorist Internet forum on March 26 posted a statement that said a high-ranking Iraqi official believes Al Qaida groups in Iraq are regrouping in preparing for the pullout of U.S. forces.

The Iraqi official believes that the Islamic State of Iraq, the Al Qaida group in the country, is planning for operations after U.S. forces leave.

An Iraqi man walks past new cars at an automobile dealership in Baghdad, on April 1.    AP/Khalid Mohammed

The posting states that the number of terrorists is "large and the problem is more complicated."

The official stated that the situation in Iraq "might be more dangerous" and that "the Sunni rebels' who work under the umbrella of Al Qaida have regrouped in residential areas located south and west or the capital Baghdad, as well as in the Al-Karma area within the province of Al-Anbar.

"The security official in the Interior Ministry confirmed that 'these areas have become very dangerous in the government's view.'

"He also said 'Al Qaida is regrouping in preparation for the departure of US forces and plans for a revolt.'

According to the Iraqi official, 60 percent of the detainees released from prison have returned to these areas and rejoined the fighting.

The posting stated that U.S. forces will be defeated like the Russian in Chechnya.

The posting reveals that some in the Iraqi government are covertly working for Islamist terrorists.

No shock there, but clearly their numbers, and efforts have failed and they just want us out of the way. What's your plan Barack, if this is to be hte future there? 20 years force in the desert, 50? Who you gonna call?

It also reveals that the U.S. withdrawal, which is expected to be carried out August 2010, when most U.S. forces will be gone, is fueling plans for more terrorism.

On the day the British, who had trumpeted their final leave off day for a year, LEFT the Palestinian Mandate five arab armies invaded to get rid of the the european collaborators, crusaders and zionists.

Any wonder what the call will be as the final day americans are in Iraq approaches?

Russia, China, Norkland, Pakistan, Iran and TERROR.

The free nations will not simply disappear. Some of them may actually determine to live

The USA has no place in this.

Any longer.

Obama and Chuck Schumer have made this clear. Biden, who suggested sending $200 million to Iran in 2001 as literal jizya to convince them we meant no harm now says we are better off in a world WITH a nuclear Iran, than an Israel which will prevent it.

We now have no place in the struggle for freedom against absolutism, terror, and theocracy. We have no religion, a bad history and a destroyed economy. Our culture is to offend no one by representing nothing. Our birth is the result of slave holding old white guys more worried about preserving their properties than social justice. Our past is a bloody goop melange of the United Fruit Company, stealing from and slaughtering the former natives, punctuated by a bloody civil war to correct our permanent sin against humanity, and avoidable wars resulting in an imperial power dominated by other old white guys who manipulated what good there was to increase the gaps between rich and poor while inventing crack to keep the former slaves addicted and busy. Our stealing of and interefence with the resources of others, and colonial errors have resulted in a world now grown tired of our arrogance and interference.

We will be bitterly missed.

When the world turns and we must re-enter this timeless war going on since the first men stopped wandering to plant something, there will be cynical doubt about our staying power. After  all, it will have been the American people themselves who voted in the democrats and Obama.

Who can blame them for doubting us as a nation?

I DOUBT US TODAY.

The war Islam makes upon us?

People, we have a shambles here to correct before we can deal with anything. Neither this administration, nor this congress, nor our media, nor our education system is configured to defend those values the founders established. I am now convinced that THIS must be corrected and we must BELIEVE we have something to defend and promulgate before we can be successful against a malignant Islamic assault on those same values.

Franklin warned us "if you can keep it."

His warning echoes loudly.

When a scant 53% of the American people, and only 37% of young people believe capitalism to be superior to socialism we have a situation which compels more than a note, more than attention, and more than arguing left wing fools away from the idea that more votes means objective correctness.

"Persons and property make the sum of the objects of government." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1789

If 60% of the people believed the sky green voting it so would not SHOW US who cling the outmoded idea it is blue.

"A right to property is founded in our natural wants, in the means with which we are endowed to satisfy these wants, and the right to what we acquire by those means without violating the similar rights of other sensible beings." --Thomas Jefferson to Pierre Samuel Dupont de Nemours, 1816.

Can we win Huntington's war of the civilizations which is being made on us if we are like a Europe which has become so inured to it's own existence that more people are dieing than being born, and the imported 'underclass', never assimilable in the Europe our antecedents ran from, exerts itself, and HERE, those present ILLEGALLY from south of the border continues to grow?

Europe today as a whole doesn't care and doesn't want to be bothered.

Afghanistan? NATO? 'Hey, we're busy'. But thanks for the apology.

"[We in America entertain] a due sense of our equal right to... the acquisitions of our own industry." --Thomas Jefferson: 1st Inaugural, 1801.

Meanwhile, the people who warn of danger are seen as the danger by those in power as attacks against RADIO PERSONALITIES IN AMERICA are literally plotted by White House advisers who should have nothing else on their mind but helping businesses CREATE more wealth for all, and figuring out how to crush the sons of bitches in Waziristan, Swat and Afghanistan, and EQUALLY the apocalyptic freaks from Qom, the Hojatieh of Iran.

I don't think we can beat the aggressors overt and stealthy when our own leadership is elected to tell us the founding brothers had no clue as greedy slave owning white men whose only concern was the maintenance of their property from the crown? Don't think that's the issue?...wait until the ideas that using Jefferson, Madison, et al to beat back Obama and his incredible crowd of money pushers percolate up to people who want to be president on the republican side.

"He who is permitted by law to have no property of his own can with difficulty conceive that property is founded in anything but force." --Thomas Jefferson to Edward Bancroft, 1788

Just confront Geithner, Gibbs, Clinton, Biden and that level of the team with Jefferson on property/freedom and watch what happens next.

"Our wish... is that... equality of rights [be] maintained, and that state of property, equal or unequal, which results to every man from his own industry or that of his fathers." --Thomas Jefferson: 2nd Inaugural Address, 1805.

Confront? Right now, who besides Newt Gingrich even understands American history well enough to do that on the right?

"The political institutions of America, its various soils and climates, opened a certain resource to the unfortunate and to the enterprising of every country and insured to them the acquisition and free possession of property." --Thomas Jefferson: Declaration on Taking Up Arms, 1775

I see a lot of sqawking but who is arguing Madison against Obama?

"as a man is said to have a right to his property, he may be equally said to have a property in his rights." Madison

The names of the founders don't even have to be used, just their words, and after that nature will take it's course.

"It is the undoubted right and unalienable privilege of a [citizen] not to be divested or interrupted in the innocent use of . . . property. . . . This is the Cornerstone of every free Constitution" John Jay

The left is only interested in crushing the right in america. They think this signifies. They think we'll lump it. They think the inventors, builders, producers, risk takers will just go on because they can create mandatory laws making it so by taxes to 'spread the wealth around.'

"All men are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, and unalienable rights, among which may be reckoned the right of . . . acquiring, possessing, and protecting property"  John Adams

Human nature and history tell us otherwise. You cannot mandate productivity. You cannot demand invention by law. You cannot tell people that what they might think up is at the beck and call of people who vote that those thought belong to others. You cannot make people love what they do as work. And you cannot make that better with 8 weeks of vaccation, or a better health plan.

"No right [should] be stipulated for aliens to hold real property within these States, this being utterly inadmissible by their several laws and policy." --Thomas Jefferson: Commercial Treaties Instructions, 1784.

It's going to take the founders to pound some sense back into an America leaning towards socialism, and it's going to be done, IF IT CAN BE DONE, over the objections of the entire education establishment in the nation, nearly the entire MEDIA establishment of the nation, and a current corporate culture which is irresponsible, greedy and seemingly unsteered.

"To take from one because it is thought that his own industry and that of his father's has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association--'the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.'" --Thomas Jefferson 1816

There will be those who cherry pick quotes to show tho Founders had other ideas, but you will find them in publications, and from those whose entire function is to debunk the ideas and actions of those very men ,...... why - as greedy cynical old white guys with slaves to who the individualism and ingenuity of ALL MEN, including american men and women is a myth.

"[If government have] a right of demanding ad libitum and of taxing us themselves to the full amount of their demand if we do not comply with it, [this would leave] us without anything we can call property." --Thomas Jefferson: Reply to Lord North, 1775.

Iran poses no threat to US: Russia
Iran poses no threat to the United States, Russia said Tuesday, rebuffing a key argument of President Barack Obama on whether to go ahead with a European missile shield bitterly opposed by Moscow.

Former president George W. Bush had infuriated Russia by striking a deal to install 10 missile interceptors in Poland and related radar stations in the Czech Republic, saying they were needed to counter "rogue states" such as Iran.

The Obama administration says it is reviewing the shield project, studying whether it is militarily justified and cost effective.

But Sergei Kislyak, the Russian ambassador to the United States, said that the Iran threat was a myth.

"I don't see any threat to the United States coming from Iran anytime soon," Kislyak told a conference of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

I agree, let's wait until we can't attack and wipe out their ability to produce nuclear weapons or their ability to deliver them. They like us, right? It's not as if they run around chanting 'DEATH TO AMERICA' or anything like that, right?

Why would we need more than 183 F-22's to establish air superiority needed to attack ground targets which will keep our men and women's casualty rate down with friends like Russia? I mean, it's not as if the Russians would want to help Iran get a nuke so as to complicate any equation we have or anything right? I mean even if they did, we have a president who would make clear that the NUCLEAR FALLOUT FROM A 'HOT DISPUTE' with such an Iran would be all over southern Russia, right?

FIRST LAW OF RUSSIAN FOREIGN POLICY:

Anything which hurts the USA and its people -
is good for Russia in the big zero sum great game that doesn't exist.
EVEN IF that means a nuclear detonation in Israel or the USA since they have judged that a full scale nuclear war will not break out.

Look, there is no overt threat in Russia's words...but they live in a 9/10 world, with ideas of the great game of the 19th century, and would probably like to recreate the geographic integrity of 1945, if that outcome becomes available at low cost. This is just one piece of the foreign policy puzzle. But every piece is moving towards us, and the largest SINGLE part of the reason is Iran. Backed CLEARLY, tactically and strategically by both Russia and China, who use the UN far more deftly as a delaying tool, while we pretend they have some real function over there.

Mr. Obama is, judging by his available words and actions, blind, deaf, and dumb and in a different reality in which he thinks Russia, China and others would really go off and farm, bringing horns of plenty to the poor in the 3rd world if we could just sit down and have dinner with them a few more times.

Norkland could be solved in a month with Chinese help.
Iran would be totally introspective if they could not get help with centrifuges, SU's, Migs, Kilos, Shkval's, Ksh-55's, and S-300 AND S-400's (you better believe that last). And ASSURANCES that this help is strategically advantageous to Russia, and to a smaller degree China. Syria, Hizballah, and HAMAS might find life much more difficult if Iranian resources went into developing weapons they could not buy, and could not be sure would help them.

In short, the strategic decision by Russia to help Iran as they do, has OBVIOUS effects, and all of them bring danger to the USA and our allies. That is why they do it. While Mr. Obama dreams of better world, they cannot conceive of it, and believe such thoughts naive.

These thoughts and conclusions about Russia, China and Iran seem to me, self evident, let alone obvious. Yet even a man like Bush acted as if he were mired in low quality oatmeal.

The NIE is iconic of the problem.

Have the hired hands in state and defense taken over control from the people and their representatives?.

• The Westphalia order of states is dead, replaced by a modern system that includes states, semi-states, and irrational international players
• The free world must focus on defeating the countries, forces, and extremist entities "that are trying to violate it." The real problems are coming from "the direction of Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq"
• "The fact that we say the word 'peace' twenty times a day will not bring peace any closer."

If so, congratulations.

You are in accord with someone most people think of as an anathema .

AVIGDOR LIEBERMAN, the new Foreign Minister of Israel.

READ IT ALL

As we know the all seeing WT had certain proclivities regarding the exercise of force in the service of the state. He was almost uniformly successful in his use of force with minimum casualties to his own forces AND the opposing civilian population.

Yesterday we read with interest the publicly stated intention of Baitullah Mehsud, another gintsu wielding freak out of, alternately, a mud enclosed hacienda and a cave, to make an amazing attack on Washington, in retaliation for other ginstu wielding freaks being killed by remote control from Florida by 19 year old Domino's eating Americans who drink and fornicate while off duty. Since we are doing this because Washington was already attacked, and NY, and a field in PA contains the bodies of our innocents, we take note of the basic mind set of such people.

As you should all know, the righteous and kind WT told the elders of Atlanta:

1: "But, my dear sirs, when peace does come, you may call on me for any thing. Then will I share with you the last cracker, and watch with you to shield your homes and families against danger from every quarter."

Of course, this was after he carried out his primary policy:

2: "This war differs from other wars, in this particular. We are not fighting armies but a hostile people, and must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war."

and

3: "War is cruelty. There is no use trying to reform it. The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over."

Only through executing the last two is the first possible. Not necessary, or inevitable, just possible.

As we have seen over the last 8 years, it may not be possible to institute a government in which our freedoms, INCLUDING FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND RELIGION and all that confers upon individuals, in places such as Afghanistan, or Iraq. They are their own people and have other ideas.

More, we note today THIS typically hideous apparition of a law.

We also note here at this graduate school of human nature and national and extra national behaviors that our domestic political discussions have been adversely affected by our innocent intentions to bring Jefferson to other cultures while minimizing civilian discomfort where we do this.

Therefore we recommend the following course if, in the future, as it appears, we will be compelled by attacks against us and ours, and our allies, here and overseas to conduct further "Overseas Contingency Operations" against states which harbor or are ineffective in acting to prevent "Man Caused Disasters" ...

While taking SOME care to avoid killing everyone, in carrying out rules 2 and 3, lay waste via air and other power to the complete physical infrastructure of said states until no technical or manufactory means remain. Do this over no more than 60-90 days of relentless activity bearing in mind rule 3. Ignore anything other nations have to say, explaining this to them with regret on the first day.

Ignore rule 1, and consider it only if the target asks for help. Then politely refuse.

Leave a note behind for further consideration of the populace:
They can then go back to having their own lives and religious practices completely undisturbed by us, our armed forces, State Dept., or our unpleasant (as we have been told) ways. They will be free to contemplate the past and future as they please.

We, on the other hand, will have our men and women at home, our armed forces relatively undisturbed, and our body politic quickly returning to its normal course.

UN Security Council and Human Rights Council Advocates COMMENT HERE

GERTZ:

The director of the Defense Intelligence Agency told a Senate committee last week that U.S. adversaries are developing underground hardened structures that represent a new domain in warfighting, with dozens of deep underground bunkers built in the past year alone.

Army Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples, the DIA director, stated in written testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee that the growth of hardened underground facilities pose new challenges for American warfighters.

"In the past year, our potential adversaries have constructed dozens of deep underground facilities for their ballistic missile forces, including theater and intercontinental ballistic missiles," Maples said. "The use of underground facilities complicates the intelligence community's ability to monitor ballistic missile activities, and it improves the survivability of these weapons."

Director of the Defense Intelligence Lt. General Michael D. Maples    Getty

"We are witnessing the emergence of a new warfighting domain - the subsurface domain," Maples said. "Changes in warfare have dictated that nations to a much greater extent are constructing and relying on deep underground facilities to conceal and protect their most vital national security functions and activities."

Congress several years ago killed Pentagon funding for a nuclear warhead that could penetrate hardened underground facilities.

The Pentagon instead has been developing new and more lethal "bunker buster" bombs and missiles that are capable of burrowing scores of feet into hardened facilities before detonating.

Iran is known to have extensive underground nuclear facilities and North Korea also has placed much of its military, including aircraft bases, inside mountains.

And if we trash the entrances and exits under half a mountain?

The use of underground facilities is aimed at thwarting U.S. satellite surveillance and also aimed to preventing the greater firepower of precision guided missiles and bombs, Maples said.

In addition to major elements of the Iran and North Korean nuclear programs now hidden underground, Maples said the Lebanese Hezbollah terrorist group also used underground facilities to store weapons, conduct operations and launch rockets, as shown in the 2006 conflict with Israel.

Terrorist organizations also are building underground "havens," he said.

"Contributing to a large increase in underground facility construction are recent and rapid advances in commercially available Western tunneling technology," Maples said. "As potential adversaries improve their ability to build underground facilities, the U.S will find it harder to locate and successfully target these critical facilities."

Maples did not mention China's underground facilities. However, U.S. officials have said China has large elements of its nuclear forces hidden in hardened underground facilities in midwestern China. Chinese naval forces also have developed numerous underground submarine facilities. 

POLITICALLY CORRECT MULTICULTURAL COMMENTS HERE

In 2001 I would have agreed completely with SecDef Gates priorities. He believes that realistically we are going to be fighting guys making IED's with RPG's as the main heavy weapon, and an occasional Strela or Iggla.

To fight these wars we need A-10's flying low and slow, armored copters, and drones flying high and slow ready to pounce and fire. We need protective armor for small vehicles on patrol, and man-armor for exposed men and women in the countryside or in built up areas.

But in the last 3-4 years, especially as our indebtedness to China grew and oil skyrocketed, something else has occurred, peaking with China AND Russia poking around for naval and air bases in this hemisphere.

The Chinese Navy is now EXISTENT as a force in being, and their ships are good. They have Russian purchased (and you can bet now reverse engineered) ships like the Sovremenny Class destroyers (which mount Sunburn Missiles to take out carriers at a sea skimming Mach 2.5), lots of subs from the conventional type 93's built in China, excellent Kilos and Amurs purchased from Russia, ballistic missile subs, and they have committed to creating US type carrier force.

The Chinese Air Force is building rapidly it's J-10 force, the Israeli Lavi fighter which is superior to the F-16, as well as licensed production of Russian aircraft in the entire SU series. They tried to get the Israeli Phalcon AEW systems but we pressured the Israelis out selling it. Notable is the J-14 PROJECT which is a stealth fighter based on the J-10 (in service 2012)

Of course the Chinese Army and it's ICBM missile force is certainly adequate as a deterrent in being, and they have several thousand short range missiles in the Taiwan Strait.

Russia is now resurgent. Their bitterness at the Soviet defeat in the cold war is quite evident. They may have dismantled some Typhoons, but make no mistake about the Delta IV's out there, or the new Borei class missile subs ( a new class, something WE eschewed), the new Topol class ICBM's or what their otherwise INEXPLICABLE development MUST MEAN.

They are a huge arms exporter. Their army relies on older equipment, but their air forces DO NOT. The SU series and MIG-29's are fine aircraft of newer development that our F-16's and F-15's and can now fight with or outmanueverr anything we have except our 183 F-22's or the yet to be delivered F-35's.

The Russians have always put a lot of priority on air defense and their S-300, S-400 Tor/Pantsyr developments are being sold to our enemies.

In short we face about every challenge we did in the cold war EXCEPT the worry that the USSR would charge across the Fulda Gap with 50,000 T-72's.

While we should not underestimate the continuing efforts we will have to make with counterinsurgency warfare, which will be our emphasis, how can we cut back when we CANNOT rule out the possibility that China MIGHT decide we are overstretched and shoul dbe presented with a fait-accomplis in Taiwan, or that Russia might do the same with a base in Nicaragua, or reassert itself militarily in Estonia, or Azerbaijan or Kyrgistan (jeopardizing the entire effort in Afghnistan)?

This leaves us potentially in the unenviable position of Spain in 1700 given the state of the economy. More responsibilty than resources.

That means the challenges we face poltically and militarily must be underpinned by the economy.

TODAY.

That means to ensure our men and women have the resources they need to protect us, our people must be secure enough to go out and buy stuff.
That means secure in our jobs.
Mr. Obama's job #1.

Otherwise our men and women are liable to find themselves in fighters designed in the late 60's (the F-16), with airframes 20-30 years old and inferior numbers, going up against brand new J-10's and SU-30's with Israeli electronics to gain air superiority to protect our men and women on the ground, or at sea, who are facing brand new Chinese subs in order to get the material thru to keep those old planes in the air.

IBD:

A poll of average Iraqis conducted by ABC News, the BBC and Japan's NHK shows significant progress on virtually all fronts. Yet, we've heard nary a peep about it from anyone.

Some 85% of respondents said their neighborhood security was "good," vs. 62% a year ago and just 43% in August of 2007. And 52% said security had gotten better in the last year -- during the Bush-Petraeus "surge," which was widely ridiculed at the time as an unnecessary escalation of the Iraq War.

Support for democracy jumped to 64%, a 21-percentage-point gain since 2007, according to a report on CNSNews.com. As for how Iraqis felt about the general state of affairs in Iraq, 58% called it "very good" or "quite good," up significantly from 43% last year and 22% in 2007.

When asked what their concerns are today, Iraqis sound a lot like Americans: Jobs and prices are at the top of their list -- not war, not security, not terrorism.

In short, it sounds like we not only won the war, but the peace as well. And for those who cast a skeptical eye on the idea that any Islamic country could ever be democratized, it turns out the former President Bush is winning that debate too.

MEANWHILE in the land of relativity:

WSJ:

So why are the people who cheered Mr. Obama then (or offered no objection) now running for the exit signs? Why, for example, is New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, the paper's reliably liberal tribune, calling Afghanistan a "quagmire" -- after denouncing the Bush administration in 2006 for "taking its eye off the real enemy in Afghanistan"?

Tellingly, the phrase "another Vietnam" seems to have first appeared under the byline of New York Times reporter C.L. Sulzberger, who opined on August 31, 1969, that "chances are" that the only kind of war in which the U.S. could become involved in the future "is another Vietnam." Times change, but not at the Times.

Since then, "another Vietnam" has served as the left's ideological totem for military interventions in Lebanon, the Falklands (for Britain), Nicaragua and Central America generally, the first Iraq war, Somalia, the Balkans, Afghanistan right after 9/11, the second Iraq war, and now Afghanistan again. Maybe Grenada and Panama, too.

.........

The achievement of the past seven years lies mainly in what Afghanistan has not become: To wit, a safe haven for some of the worst people on earth.

THE HAGUE, 11/03/09 - The Supreme Court yesterday produced an important ruling in principle in favour of freedom of speech. The highest court of the Netherlands acquitted a man of insulting Muslims although he dubbed Islam a tumour.

The Supreme Court quashed a ruling by an appeal court in Den Bosch. As had a district court earlier, the appeal court did find the man guilty. Yesterday's acquittal can have consequences for all future court cases on insulting followers of a faith or ideology, including the notorious case against MP Geert Wilders.

According to the country's highest court, people expressing themselves offensively about a religion are not automatically guilty of insulting its followers, even if the followers feel insulted. "The statement must unmistakeably refer to a certain group of people who differentiate themselves from others by their religion," ruled the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court acquitted a man who in November 2004 stuck a poster in his window with the text: 'Stop the tumour that is called Islam'. While people may not insult believers, they can insult their religion, according to the Supreme Court. "The sole circumstance of offensive statements about a religion also insulting its followers is not sufficient to speak of insulting a group of people due to their religion."

The appeal court in Den Bosch had ruled that "in view of the bonds between Islam and its believers," as well as being unnecessarily offensive to Islam the poster was also offensive for those who practise Islam. But "the appeal court thereby gave too wide an interpretation of the expression 'a group of people according to their religion', as it occurs in Article 137c."

The case was about Article 137c of the Criminal Code, which makes offensive statements about a group of people an offence. It was not about incitement to hatred or discrimination, the Supreme Court stressed.

Party for Freedom (PVV) leader Wilders, meanwhile internationally known for his struggle against Islam, will be tried for insulting Muslims as a group. The court that will handle his case will have to take yesterday's Supreme Court ruling into account.

Originally, the Public Prosecutor's Office (OM) did not want to prosecute the MP, because it did not consider any of his statements a punishable offence. But in January, an appeal court in Amsterdam ordered the OM to change its mind.

As well as for insulting Muslims, Wilders will also be on trial for incitement to hatred and discrimination against Muslims. When the Wilders case will come to court is not yet known.

The Independent:

Today's Independent provides a classic example of the anti-Israel lobby thesis morphing seamlessly into the classic antisemitic Jewish power motif.

The article, by Rupert Cornwell, is ostensibly about the resignation of Charles Freeman as head of the National Intelligence Council. It is headlined: " 'Israel lobby' blamed as Obama's choice for intelligence chief quits".

The opening paragraph, however, morphs the 'Israel lobby' into "the Jewish lobby". It begins: "Fears over the Jewish lobby's excess influence on US foreign policy flared anew yesterday...".

It goes on to quote from Charles Freeman himself: "declaring he had fallen victim to what he [Freeman] called the 'Israel lobby' ". Next, Cornwell tells us that Freeman's thesis "exactly reflect the thesis of" Walt & Mearshemier's book "The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy" about the malign impact of "the Jewish state's supporters".

Cornwell then quotes Stephen Walt on the Freeman episode and Walt's words are placed in a highlights sidebar, "For all of you who questioned if there was a powerful 'Israel lobby', think again". The article ends by recalling that, "Pat Buchanan, a right-wing commentator and erstwhile presidential candidate, once described Capitol Hill as 'Israeli-occupied territory' ".

So, there we have it then. The Independent's correspondent Rupert Cornwell knows better than Freeman, Walt and (even) Pat Buchanan. This isn't all about the "Israel lobby", its all about "the Jewish lobby".

Egyptian Cleric Muhammad Hussein Ya'qoub: The Jews are the Enemies of Muslims Regardless of the Occupation of Palestine; 'Believe That We Will Fight, Defeat, and Annihilate Them, Until Not a Single Jew Remains on the Face of the Earth'

"If the Jews left Palestine to us, would we start loving them? Of course not. We will never love them. Absolutely not. The Jews are infidels - not because I say so, and not because they are killing Muslims, but because Allah said: 'The Jews say that Uzair is the son of Allah, and the Christians say that Christ is the son of Allah. These are the words from their mouths. They imitate the sayings of the disbelievers before. May Allah fight them. How deluded they are.' It is Allah who said that they are infidels.

"Your belief regarding the Jews should be, first, that they are infidels, and second, that they are enemies. They are enemies not because they occupied Palestine. They would have been enemies even if they did not occupy a thing. Allah said: 'You shall find the strongest men in enmity to the disbelievers [sic] to be the Jews and the polytheists.' Third, you must believe that the Jews will never stop fighting and killing us. They [fight] not for the sake of land and security, as they claim, but for the sake of their religion: 'And they will not cease fighting you until they turn you back you're your religion, if they can.'

"This is it. We must believe that our fighting with the Jews is eternal, and it will not end until the final battle - and this is the fourth point. You must believe that we will fight, defeat, and annihilate them, until not a single Jew remains on the face of the Earth."

"As For You Jews - The Curse of Allah Upon You... You Pigs of the Earth! You Kill the Muslims With That Cold Pig [Blood] Of Yours"

"It is not me who says so. The Prophet said: 'Judgment Day will not come until you fight the Jews and kill them. The Jews will hide behind stones and trees, and the stones and tree will call: Oh Muslim, oh servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him - except for the Gharqad tree, which is the tree of the Jews.' I have heard that they are planting many of these trees now.

COMMENT HERE

MAIL ONLINE:

A Christian minister who has had heated arguments with Muslims on his TV Gospel show has been brutally attacked by three men who ripped off his cross and warned: 'If you go back to the studio, we'll break your legs.'

The Reverend Noble Samuel was driving to the studio when a car pulled over in front of him. A man got out and came over to ask him directions in Urdu.

Mr Samuel, based at Heston United Reformed Church, West London, said: 'He put his hand into my window, which was half open, and grabbed my hair and opened the door.

He started slapping my face and punching my neck. He was trying to smash my head on the steering wheel.

Then he grabbed my cross and pulled it off and it fell on the floor. He was swearing. The other two men came from the car and took my laptop and Bible.'

The Metropolitan Police are treating it as a 'faith hate' assault and are hunting three Asian men.

Even when it slaps you in the face, even when it is an assault of freedom of both religion and speech, and the beating heart of terror and intolerance....PC.

Are we just too civilized to survive?

Maybe you believe that coincidentally the Kyrgyzstan of the ex-USSR is denying us our air basing to supply NATO in Afghanistan....long after our human rights fastidiousness got us booted by the brutes in Uzbekistan  ..leaving us with only Tadjikistan? Maybe? Until?
Anyone else smell pootey poot?

20 vehicles torched in NATO terminal attack

Updated at: 0611 PST,  Sunday, March 15, 2009  RAWALPINDI: The inferno, broke out after rocket attacks at NATO supply terminal, has engulfed as many as 20 vehicles destroying them completely, fire fighters said on early Sunday. According to fire fighting sources, rescue efforts are underway as several fire tenders are trying to bring inferno under control. Sources told Geo News, unknown militants lodges rocket attacks at NATO supply terminal on early Sunday. As a result, as many as 20 NATO vehicles caught fire and were torched completely. Meanwhile, several fire tenders are trying to bring ablaze under control. It is getting more and more difficult to control fire due to the its intensity, police sources maintained.

Meantime, that's the only land supply route. A route that is in trouble at a key point AFTER Peshawar
Any idea how much airlift would be required to supply 54,000 men every day?

OK Barry, this one you said was THE war. Go win it.

PS, you'll have to solve Pakistan to do it.

Somewhere near Hainan, the USS Chung Hoon (at LEAST this one ship), an Arleigh Burke Class destroyer, equipped with the Aegis missile system, and with the firepower of several WW2 fleet aircraft carriers, is escorting the unarmed ocean research/intelligence vessel Impeccable after interference with her by Chinese vessels in international waters.

In our hemisphere this morning both Cuba and Venezuela have announced they are ready to accept the basing of TU-160 Black Jack intercontinental bomber, which can carry 15-20 AS-15, or KS-55 Sunburn missiles, and a panoply of smart gravity weapons. These planes could be in American airspace in minutes.

James Monroe comes to mind.

In Afghanistan the Taliban have reversed the actions of 2001, and NO it wasn't because of Iraq, it's because it's is a different place. A place that took 10-11 years to get the Soviets out.  Soviets untrammeled by the fits of conscience and rules we have.

In Iraq a fragile near success still records suicide bombers as the jihadis watch Obama and his plans of a new American 'leadership' and 'cooperation' and 'respect'.

And the economic crisis, called dire and world ending (if we didn't listen to you...or GWB before you), every day by the new president as his minions face tax problems, attack republicans and radio personalities they hate, suddenly finds a newly confident Obama a day after his budget gets rammed down our throats in a transparent attempt to use FEAR to change America to something else, and in the background questions about the nature of his appointments and our closest ally in the middle east, and a vague sense that some kind of appeasement is under way.

In the meantime our very CLOSEST ally has a senior cabinet member express that in dealing with the Obama Admin, "there is no one there"

He now faces dwindling popularity, ENRAGED opposition, and greater polarization than even Mr. Bush faced.

You asked for this job.

Are you going to call for negotiations over what John Kennedy blockaded Cuba over? Will you say we cannot afford to bring on a confrontation now? Will you blame all this on the right? The Israel Lobby?  Will you just call this help on patrols and non-basing as a canard for Americans to continue their sleepwalk?

You are being asked who you are every day you display the lack of firm resolve and willingness towards risk in our favor. This will accelerate as you delay and seek to make no decision your decision, just as you voted PRESENT so many times.

This will occur until someone steps across a line they don't believe you have drawn, and then we will have the end of this economic downturn in the same old way, because we will then need a draft, and a lot of materials which will be used up in the most consuming activity of all....war.

I was no wild defender of Bush.

But what's going on now is the express elevator to hell.

GOING DOWN!

Afghanistan Taliban leader was at Gitmo
The Taliban's new top operations officer in southern Afghanistan had been a prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay detention center, the latest example of a freed detainee who took a militant leadership role and a potential complication for the Obama administration's efforts to close the prison. U.S. authorities handed over the detainee to the Afghan government, which in turn released him, according to Pentagon and CIA officials.

Abdullah Ghulam Rasoul, formerly Guantanamo prisoner No. 008, was among 13 Afghan prisoners released to the Afghan government in December 2007. Rasoul is now known as Mullah Abdullah Zakir, a nom de guerre that Pentagon and intelligence officials say is used by a Taliban leader who is in charge of operations against U.S. and Afghan forces in southern Afghanistan.

The officials, who spoke anonymously because they are not authorized to release the information, said Rasoul has joined a growing faction of former Guantanamo prisoners who have rejoined militant groups and taken action against U.S. interests. Pentagon officials have said that as many as 60 former detainees have resurfaced on foreign battlefields.

Pentagon and intelligence officials said Rasoul has emerged as a key militant figure in southern Afghanistan, where violence has been spiking in the last year. Thousands of U.S. troops are preparing to deploy there to fight resurgent Taliban forces.

These people are prisoners of war, and their release should not be a matter for discussion UNTIL THE WAR IS OVER. They are not car thieves looking for a sharp lawyer.

This entire matter is symptomatic of a society so arrogant it cannot manage to even CONSIDER seriously the idea that it can be extinguished, and that the luxury of treating these MURDERERS as if they should be represented by Alan Dershowitz is some kind of human right.

These are our enemies. We did not slaughter them, but suffer to feed them and keep them safe, even from their own desires. They are not to be returned, or released until they die of old age, or this war ends.

All else is simply arrogant folly.

FOLLY.

HAMAS and Hizballah exist, we should talk, bubby

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton grabbed headlines with an invitation to Iran to attend a conference on Afghanistan, but the significant Middle Eastern news last week came from Britain. It has "reconsidered" its position on Hezbollah and will open a direct channel to the militant group in Lebanon.Like Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah has long been treated by the United States as a proscribed terrorist group. This narrow view has ignored the fact that both organizations are now entrenched political and social movements without whose involvement regional peace is impossible.

Hallelujah.

Britain aligned itself with the U.S. position on Hezbollah, but has now seen its error. Bill Marston, a Foreign Office spokesman, told Al Jazeera: "Hezbollah is a political phenomenon and part and parcel of the national fabric in Lebanon. We have to admit this."

One difference is that Hezbollah is in the Lebanese national unity government, whereas Hamas won the free and fair January 2006 elections to the Legislative Council of the Palestinian Authority, only to discover Middle Eastern democracy is only democracy if it produces the right result.

Well no, Hizballah, the product of Iran (in fact today it's military wing is lead by an Iranian), and HAMAS the economic creature of Iran, and the philosophical creature of Hassan Al Banna represent the accurate desire of the peoples in the area to KILL the Jews who will not be dhimmis in their fay land (conquered and forever a waqf for the Muslim peoples).

The United States should follow the British example. It should initiate diplomatic contacts with the political wing of Hezbollah. The Obama administration should also look carefully at how to reach moderate Hamas elements and engineer a Hamas-Fatah reconciliation.

Once again the delusion, moderate genocidal Islamists. Moderate Taliban. Moderate Hizballah. We can find the moderates within HAMAS who stand up and disavow and repudiate the HAMAS charter at least IN PARTS. We can probably find them flying off rooftops.
I have so little patience left for these people. In this case it is Roger Cohen.
And then the attempt to administer the coup de main:

Israel, from the time of Ben Gurion, built its state by creating facts on the ground, not through semantics. Many of its leaders, including Ehud Olmert and Tzipi Livni, have been on wondrous political odysseys from absolutist rejection of division of the land to acceptance of a two-state solution. Yet they try to paint Hamas as irrevocably absolutist. Why should Arabs be any less pragmatic than Jews?

The QURAN, you utterly arrogant culturally ethnocentric fool. The others in this dispute have told you time and again.

FIFTH COLUMN by function if not cause.

Of course it's desirable that Hamas recognize Israel before negotiations. But is it essential? No. What is essential is that it renounces violence, in tandem with Israel, and the inculcation of hatred that feeds the violence.

Speaking of violence, it's worth recalling what Israel did in Gaza in response to sporadic Hamas rockets

SPORADIC? 5000 to 8000? in about 1000 days? That's not disingenuous, there's a far better word.

At this vast human, material and moral price, Israel achieved almost nothing beyond damage to its image throughout the world. Israel has the right to hit back when attacked, but any response should be proportional and governed by sober political calculation. The Gaza war was a travesty; I have never previously felt so shamed by Israel's actions.
No wonder Hamas and Hezbollah are seen throughout the Arab world as legitimate resistance movements.

SICK OF IT

We all remember Robert Spencer's post and hopeful notation that even though repudiation of this hate speech Hadith was not made, USC compelled its removal


It is now BACK ON LINE


COMMENT HERE

Memri:

Palestinian Academic: Hamas Must Amend Its Charter

The London daily Al-Hayat published an article by Palestinian academic and journalist Dr. Khaled Al-Hroub, director of the CambridgeUniversity Arab Media Project, in which he calls on Hamas to amend its charter. Al-Hroub argues that the charter, which is replete with hostility towards the Jews, harms Hamas' image and the Palestinian cause as a whole.

The Hamas Charter Is Not Sacred - It Can Be Amended

"The Hamas charter must be amended, since it harms the Palestinians and Hamas [itself]. We must not accept it or continue to keep silent about it. The Hamas charter is not a sacred text, and the [Hamas] leaders, members and supporters must not be so touchy about [the idea of] amending it.

Sorry but they want the Quran and hide in its 'perfection'

The Charter Incorporates Concepts of European Antisemitism

"Why must we amend the Hamas charter, how should we amend it, and how will it benefit the Hamas and the Palestinians to do so?

"The charter must be amended because it does not [accurately] reflect the essence of the Palestinian struggle against the Zionist entity, but conveys a message that Hamas [actually] abandoned a long time ago. The charter focuses on the Jews as followers of a different faith, and expresses hostility towards them as such, and not as aggressors. [Moreover,] the charter endorses all the European antisemitic claims, importing them and spreading [the notion of] the 'global Jewish conspiracy.'

"It says, [for example,] that the Jews have 'accumulated huge financial resources which they have used to realize their dream. By means of their money they have taken control of the world media and started revolutions around the world in order to serve their interests and to reap profits. They were behind the French Revolution, and the Communist Revolution, and most other revolutions of which we have heard.'

"It is truly appalling that such a text should remain in a charter of a Palestinian organization that calls to end the Zionist occupation..."

The Charter Cites The Protocols of the Elders of Zion - A Forged and Stupid Document

"The [true] message of Hamas is far removed from [what is conveyed by] the charter and has nothing to do with it.

Actually, every time I hear them, they reiterate the values of the charter. And if anyone strikes a more peaceful note on a cease fire (no one ever mentions peace ..unless it's Islamic Peace) they are quickly subsumed in an avalanche of correct attitude by the rest of the organization

All the Hamas leaders inside the Palestinian territories, from [late Hamas leaders] Sheikh Ahmad Yassin and 'Abd Al-'Aziz Al-Rantisi to Mahmoud Al-Zahar, as well as the Hamas leaders outside Palestine, such as [Hamas political bureau head] Khaled Mash'al, [his deputy] Moussa Abu Marzouq, and many others, have repeatedly stated that their war is against the Zionists and not against Judaism as a religion.

Yah sort of like them talking about a cease fire. That's' a dream

[In fact,] they take pride in the coexistence among Jews, Christians and Muslims that prevailed in Palestine and throughout the Arab world for many generations. In their discourse, they do not refer to The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. This stupid document was forged by European antisemites in order to justify their crimes against the Jews of Europe, and then disseminated throughout the Arab world. Hamas got itself into trouble by presenting it [in its charter] as support [for its position].

"These passages in the charter constrain Hamas' ability to speak to the world. The enormous media apparatus of the Zionist and Israeli lobby has translated the charter into every conceivable language - even into Chinese - in order to expose the 'antisemitism' of Hamas and of the Palestinians and to prove that their goal is to exterminate the Jews..."

Sorry but that racism gels too well with too many Surahs and Hadiths, and THAT is the problem.

The Charter Does Not Reflect Hamas' Positions

"Hamas leaders who are in contact with the outside world know that their movement is paying a heavy price for adhering to this charter... They know that it was published hastily in August 1988, and that there was no real discussion about its content. It does not reflect Hamas' convictions in those days, let alone today... [On the other hand,] if the charter does in fact reflect the essence of Hamas' [beliefs], its leaders must declare this openly, so that [any] decision of whether to support or oppose Hamas - and whether to negotiate with it or boycott it - can be taken [in an informed manner] based on [the decider's] attitude towards the charter.

They reaffirm this EVERY DAY ..the Charter is about adherence to the Quran.

Racist Expressions Must Be Eliminated

"[Those who] oppose amending the charter naturally make excuses. [For example, they voice] a concern that Hamas would be accused of changing its ideology, of making concessions, or of emulating the PLO.

Can you change the Quran? The you can change the charter easily. Let me know how that works out

.

The Right Time to Amend the Charter is Now

"Amending the charter can serve Hamas as an aggressive tactic, through which it can put an end to countless arguments that have been used by the world in the recent years in order to besiege the movement along with Palestine and the Palestinian people. This may be the best moment to initiate a change in the charter - since Israeli society has collectively slid to the right, while the U.S. administration is interested in openness towards the problems of the region and wants to speak with all the sides. [Furthermore,] Europe is realizing more and more that it must change its policy towards the Palestinians - a policy which [once] aligned itself too readily and shamelessly with the slanted policy of [former U.S. president] Bush.

Ahhhhhhhhhhh, yes, we get it. "Amending the charter can serve Hamas as an aggressive tactic"

So predictably transparent.

Call me, let's have lunch

COMMENT HERE

Confidence in how America is doing in the War on Terror has dropped dramatically in the past two weeks. Just 47% of voters now believe the United States and its allies are winning.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 23% believe the terrorists are winning, while 25% say it's a draw. Six percent (6%) are undecided.

Just over two weeks ago, 62% said the United States and its allies were winning the war, a new record high. Only 14% said the terrorists were winning at that time.