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July 2012

IS ROMNEY McCAIN REDUX? JERROLD SOBEL

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If the Romney campaign thinks they have a chance of beating the current occupant in the White House by playing Mr. politically correct, nice guy, he just has to look back four years and recognize the error of his ways. John McCain, a war hero in every way turned timid at the thought of confronting Obama on a myriad of issues which should have highlighted the absurdity of him running for president, more or less winning.

After months upon months of campaigning, on Oct. 9, 2008 John McCain, badly trailing in the polls, finally gave in and decided to stop being a gentleman, got down into the gutter with Barak Obama and challenged him on his associations with the likes of former Weather Underground leader Bill Ayers and his equally despicable wife, Bernadine Dohrn. Speaking of Ayers, McCain stated, “The point is Senator Obama said he was just a guy in the neighborhood. We know that’s just not true. We need to know the full extent of the relationship because of whether Senator Obama is telling the truth to the American people or not. That’s the question.” In light of the present campaign, Obama’s response was quite ironic. He stated that in the midst of a bad economy, McCain’s attack was part of a strategy to “change the subject.” Sounds a bit like Obama 2012 blowing smoke at the American people with Bain Capital, Swiss bank accounts, the former Governor’s tax returns and anything else he can think of to deflect attention from a dismal domestic and foreign relations record in shambles, one which he can not defend.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2008/10/09/McCain-questions-Obamas-associations/UPI-68521223594984/#ixzz20j0RCNqN

For his part, Romney seems to be falling into the same trap that McCain did 4 years ago. Seemingly hesitant to get down and dirty with a political street fighter like Obama, the presumptive Republican candidate seems content to sit back and defend himself against charges from what’s basically an “emperor without clothes.”

The day after McCain finally built up the courage to confront Obama on his association with William Ayers, famed syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer wrote the following article: Obama’s Associations Keep Character Suspect. He aptly stated, “Convicted felon Tony Rezko. Unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers. And the race-baiting Rev. Jeremiah Wright. It is hard to think of any presidential candidate before Barack Obama sporting associations with three more execrable characters.” Further into the article Krauthammer mentions, “McCain has only himself to blame for the bad timing. He should have begun challenging Obama’s associations months ago, before the economic meltdown allowed the Obama campaign (and the mainstream media, which is to say the same thing) to dismiss the charges as an act of desperation by the trailing candidate.” Indeed McCain did miss his opportunity. The question is, is Romney following in his footsteps?

SARAH HONIG: THE SAME SEA

http://sarahhonig.com/2012/07/20/another-tack-the-same-sea/
Another Tack: The same sea
One of US President Barack Obama’s few admitted regrets is his inability to conjure up an instant resolution to our vexing dispute. This seems a tad odd considering that during her recent whirlwind visit to our troublesome midst, his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had waxed ecstatic about this being a time of “great change and transformation in the region.”

If things are so upbeat, why are they so intractable?

Both Obama and Clinton would be a lot less frustrated and much wiser had they turned to the late Yitzhak Shamir for clues.

He was endlessly mocked by members of our chattering classes when he stated outright that “the sea is the same sea and the Arabs are the same Arabs.” He plainly harbored no illusions in a wishy-washy world of wishful-thinking, where reality often becomes a most unwelcome intruder.

Political vogue decrees that disagreeable facts shouldn’t inconsiderately interfere with uplifting fantasy, but Shamir didn’t mind being denigrated as insular, intransigent and above all terminally uncool.

With both his feet solidly on the ground, he had no patience for pipe-dreams about a phenomenal sea change in the Arab mind-set. Continuity appeared more plausible, especially given the depth and duration of virulent Arab enmity toward the Jewish state. Hardhearted hate is unlikely to wondrously dissipate overnight.

Shamir sounded this observation on more than one occasion and in a variety of contexts, most notably on the eve of the 1991 Madrid Conference to which he went unwillingly and in which he had no trace of trust.

Yet his reluctant participation in what he termed as the Madrid charade suffices for many today to misrepresent him as the trailblazer to what eventually culminated in the Oslo folly.

When Shamir took over from Menachem Begin as Israel’s seventh prime minister in 1983, our ever-presumptuous trendsetters and omniscient opinion-molders disdained him and scorned what they determined were his unimaginative orientations and do-nothing proclivities. They couldn’t stand him. He was anathema to them no matter how much they now, after his death, expediently reinvent him, much as they have been dishonestly skewing Begin’s legacy for decades.

But the truth is that Shamir was never cool and never aspired to be popular. He aspired to do the right thing, a fact which in and of itself made him different, an odd bird in a setting obsessed with the façade but leery of the substance. And if the right thing meant keeping mum, Shamir didn’t answer his voluble detractors and didn’t get dragged into verbal bouts.

In an interview years ago, I asked him whether he didn’t think he was thereby losing the battle for public opinion by default. He insisted that “most of the time the least said is best.” It was his “responsibility not to babble needlessly,” even if that cost him support.

World’s Oldest Bra Found in Medieval Austrian Castle?

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/07/19/world-oldest-bra-found-in-medieval-austrian-castle/ WAS IT A MAIDENFORM? WHAT SIZE? SO MUCH REMAINS UNANSWERED IN THIS UPLIFTING STORY…..THE ARCHAEOLOGIST INVOLVED HERE IS NAMED NUTZ….RSK VIENNA – A revolutionary discovery is rewriting the history of underwear: Some 600 years ago, women wore bras. The University of Innsbruck said Wednesday that archeologists found four linen bras dating from the Middle […]

THE OBAMA RECORD: GIVNG THE MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD THE KEYS TO THE MIDEAST

http://news.investors.com/articleprint/618823/201207191846/obama-gave-muslim-brotherhood-keys-to-mideast.aspx

“The Muslim Brotherhood’s sudden ascendancy in the Mideast didn’t happen organically. It was helped along by a U.S. president sympathetic to its interests over those of Israel and his own country.”

The Obama Record: After angry Egyptians pelted her motorcade with shoes, chanting “Leave!,” Secretary of State Clinton insisted the U.S. wasn’t there to take sides. Too late.’I want to be clear that the United States is not in the business, in Egypt, of choosing winners and losers, even if we could, which of course we cannot,” Hillary Clinton intoned earlier this week.

Of course, the administration could, and it did, picking and even colluding with the Muslim Brotherhood. And one of its hard-liners, Mohammed Morsi, now sits in the presidential palace, where he refused to shake unveiled Clinton’s hand.

This administration favored Islamists over secularists and helped them overthrow Hosni Mubarak, the reliable U.S. ally who had outlawed the terrorist Brotherhood and honored the peace pact with Israel for three decades. The Brotherhood, in contrast, has backed Hamas and called for the destruction of Israel.

Now the administration is dealing with the consequences of its misguided king-making. Officials fear the new regime could invite al-Qaida, now run by an Egyptian exile, back into Egypt and open up a front with Israel along the Sinai. Result: more terrorists and higher gas prices.

In fact, it was Hillary’s own department that helped train Brotherhood leaders for the Egyptian elections. Behind the scenes, she and the White House made a calculated decision, and took step-by-step actions, to effectively sell out Israel and U.S. interests in the Mideast to the Islamists.

The untold story of the “Arab Spring” is that the Obama administration secretly helped bring Islamofascists to power. Consider this timeline:

READ IT ALL AT SITE

THE FBI DID NOT INVESTIGATE FORT HOOD SHOOTER BECAUSE OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS…….SEE NOTE PLEASE

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/07/19/fbi-did-not-investigate-fort-hood-shooter-because-political-correctness-report/?test=latestnews
ROBERT MUELLER THE CURRENT DIRECTOR OF THE FBI IS A BUSH NOMINEE…RSK

The FBI was too concerned about political correctness and did not launch an investigation into a man who was later charged with killing 13 people in a 2009 attack at the Fort Hood military installation in Texas, despite significant warning signs that he was an Islamic extremist bent on killing civilians, according to a lawmaker briefed on a new report about the terrorist attack.

In emails to a known terrorist, Army Maj. Nidal Hasan expressed his support for suicide bombings and killing civilians, while the terrorist, Anwar al-Awlaki, encouraged Hasan to stay in touch, Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, told The Associated Press on Wednesday after he was briefed on the findings of a new review of the attack.

The review was done by former FBI Director William Webster and was more than two years in the making. FBI Director Robert Mueller asked that Webster conduct an independent review, and the bureau is expected to release an unclassified version this week.

Much was already known about the series of oversights and missteps the government made leading to the terror attack at the Fort Hood Army post. Soon after the attack, it was revealed that members of two FBI anti-terrorism task forces saw emails between the Army psychiatrist and al-Awlaki beginning in December 2008. Those task forces reviewed the communications and decided they were in keeping with Hasan’s research at the time, and as a result, no formal investigation of Hasan was opened. Hasan was writing a research paper about the effects of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.

FRANK SALVATO: TAX THE RICH OR WE’LL KILL THIS DOG

http://newmediajournal.us/indx.php/item/6256

Back in the 1970s, National Lampoon released an edition of their parody magazine with a picture of (presumably) a man holding a gun to a dog’s head. The edition headline read, “If You Don’t Buy This Magazine We’ll Kill This Dog.” The implication, clearly, was one of extortion. Of course, the threat, made by the editors of National Lampoon, was based in dark comedy. The same cannot be said of the recent threat made by US Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), regarding the expiration of the so-called “Bush Tax Cuts.” Where National Lampoon was advancing comedy, Murray and her fellow Democrats are serious. They are trying to extort congressional Republicans to join in executing tax increases on those individuals making over $200,000, and couples making over $250,000 annually, or they will preside over a gigantic tax increase for all…all for political gain.

Daniel Gordis and the Prestige of Israel By Emmanuel Navon superb response****

“I fail to understand why the simple legal facts and the healthy common sense that emerge from the Levy Report should be a source of concern to Mr. Gordis. Why on earth should Israel’s prestige be imperiled for respecting more carefully the rule of law, as the Levy Report recommends? I wonder if Daniel Gordis and his co-signatories actually read the Levy Report. But if saying the truth imperils our prestige, then the lack of prestige is a badge of honor.”

www.navon.com

Last month, a panel of three Israeli legal experts (former Supreme Court Judge Edmond Levy, former District Judge Tchia Shapira, and the former legal advisor of Israel’s Foreign Ministry Alan Baker) submitted to the Prime Minister and to the Minister of Justice a “Report on the Status of Building Activities in Judea and Samaria” (the “Levy Report”). The report was immediately condemned by the US State Department whose spokesman, Patrick Ventrell, declared: “We do not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity and we oppose any effort to legalize settlement outposts.”

Less expected was the condemnation coming from mainstream North American Jewish leaders. In a letter to Prime Minister Netanyahu, those leaders expressed concern “about the recent findings of government commission led by Supreme Court Justice (Ret.) Edmond Levy.” They went as far as to claim that the endorsement of the Levy Report by the Israeli government would place the “prestige of Israel as a democratic member of the international community in peril.” The letter was noticeably signed by Shalem Foundation President Daniel Gordis.

I found it hard to believe that a report whose purpose was to analyze the legal status of Israeli buildings beyond the armistice lines of 1949 would, if officially endorsed, imperil the “prestige of Israel as a democratic member of the international community.” So I read it.

RUTH KING: THINK VEEP….IT’S IMPORTANT

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/think-veepits-important

Rumors are swirling about Governor Romney’s pick for a running mate. It’s no small matter. An active Vice-President can influence policy, be an effective spokesman for legislation, and if necessary take over the administration and finish an interrupted term. A vice president is also poised to run for election and complete the agenda of a successful predecessor. The Vice President is first in the line of succession to a President who is removed, resigns, becomes incapacitated or dies. The Vice President as designated by our Constitution, is also the President of the Senate and can break tie votes. That can be crucial in a closely divided Congress.

In the past, electors in the Electoral College, were permitted two votes and the candidate who came in second became the Vice President almost automatically but since 1940 the candidate chooses the potential Vice-President.

The only modern Presidential candidate who did not pick a Veep and had Congress do it for him was Adlai Stevenson, a pompous poseur who lost to Dwight Eisenhower whose Vice President was Richard Nixon.

The qualifications for Vice President are exactly like those for President ….an individual must:

* Be a natural born U.S. citizen
* Be at least 35 years old
* Have resided in the U.S. at least 14 years

Too bad. That leaves Ileana Ros- Lehtinen the doughty Representative from Florida (District 18) out. She is a she, is savvy, great on defense and foreign policy and Hispanic. But, she was born in Cuba.

Although the President is limited to only two terms, a Vice-President has no limit of terms. Thus, Joe Biden can be Vice-President for life as long as a Democrat is President. And Al Gore could do so too. In fact, Al Gore could have become President if Bill Clinton had been removed from office after the impeachment. He would have had almost two full years to cool America.What a chilling thought.

The office of Vice President has evolved greatly. At one time it was seen as ceremonial and virtually a sinecure. However, the influence and prestige of the office grew markedly in the last century. Perhaps because a seemingly unprepared and unprepossessing figure like Harry Truman became a worthy successor to Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

President Roosevelt who was ill for much of his time in office actually had two Vice Presidents before Harry Truman. John Nance Gardner, a governor of Texas was the Veep in the first two terms (1933-41). Gardner did not think much of the office. He is quoted as saying “the office is not a bucket of warm piss.”

Henry A. Wallace, a Republican progressive served during Roosevelt’s third term (1941-1945). Wallace was an apostle for the “New Deal” and an apologist for Russia. Fortunately President Roosevelt dumped him in 1944 and selected Harry Truman. Imagine America if Wallace had become President. He certainly would have attempted a radical transformation and one can only guess at how the war in the Pacific would have ended.

In 1947 when Wallace tried to run for President a writer described his effort as “”the closest the Soviet Union ever came to actually choosing a president of the United States.”

Harry S Truman of Missouri was elected Vice President for Roosevelt’s fourth term, but served only a few months (Jan-May 1945) before becoming president. The office of the Vice President became vacant when Harry Truman succeeded to the presidency in 1945 and remained so until 1948 when Alben Barkley of Kentucky, was elected.

Barkley was a likeable chap who was seventy years old when he was sworn in as vice president. Age did not crimp his style and he courted and wed a widow half his age while in office. He had a long career in national politics that took him from the House to the Senate to the vice-presidency. However, he took no real part in the tumultuous events of the Truman Presidency and never had an office in or near the White House.

Barkley left no real footprints but the term “Veep” which he coined has lasted and is now being recycled by the media.

FEEL SAFER? GOVERNMENT LET 25 ILLEGALS ATTEND FLIGHT SCHOOL OWNED BY ILLEGAL ALIEN: EDWIN MORA !!!!

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/government-let-25-illegal-aliens-attend-flight-school-owned-by-illegal-alien?f=puball

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/tsa-let-25-illegal-aliens-attend-flight-school-owned-illegal-alien

(CNSNews.com) — The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) approved flight training for 25 illegal aliens at a Boston-area flight school that was owned by yet another illegal alien, according to the Government Accountability Office.The illegal-alien flight-school attendees included eight who had entered the country illegally and 17 who had overstayed their allowed period of admission into the United States, according to an audit by the GAO.

Six of the illegal aliens were actually able to get pilot’s licenses.

Discovery of the trouble at the flight school began when local police–not federal authorities–pulled over the owner of the school on a traffic violation and were able to determine that he was an illegal alien.

Rep. Mike Rogers (R.-Ala.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Transportation Security, said he found the GAO’s findings “amazing.”

“We have cancer patients, Iraq War veterans and Nobel Prize winners all forced to undergo rigorous security checks before getting on an airplane,” said Rogers, “and at the same time, ten years after 9/11, there are foreign nationals in the United States trained to fly just like Mohammed Atta and the other 9/11 hijackers did, and not all of them are necessarily getting a security background check.”

Stephen Lord, who is the GAO’s director of Homeland Security and Justice Issues, testified about the matter Wednesday in Rogers’ subcommittee. Rogers asked him: “Isn’t it true that, based on your report, the Transportation Security Administration cannot assure the American people that foreign terrorists are not in this country learning how to fly airplanes, yes or no?”

Lord responded: “At this time, no.”

THE SAUDI INDOCTRINATION OF CHILDREN: N.M. GUARIGLIA….MUST READ****

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/the-saudi-indoctrination-of-children

The Muslim community of believers is the best in the eyes of God, and we must make it the same in the eyes of men by force… We must fight the unbelievers. When I grow up, I intend to carry out jihad in every possible way.

– Nine-year-old madrasa student, Northwest Pakistan

When the Soviet Red Army captured Berlin in May 1945, the last Germans to surrender were the Hitler Youth. Most of these young boys chose to fight to the death. For their entire cognizant existence, all they had known was Aryan supremacy, hatred of inferiors, and subservient allegiance to the Führer. The Nazis were not the first to use children in combat, nor have they been the last. Excluding North America, to this day the depraved practice of child soldiery has continued on every inhabited continent.

Before a child’s life is destroyed in this manner, an adult must destroy the child’s mind. The apparent ease with which this can be done is chilling. It requires the devious task of using a child’s weakness to eradicate his natural-born strengths. Children’s strengths are evident. They are curious and question everything. They are not born blindly adhering to a political or religious doctrine. They are eager to befriend others regardless of differences. They are not born hateful and vindictive.

But this innocence is their vulnerability. Children trust adults with their safety. They believe as truth whatever adults tell them to be true. As such, they are not aware of the fact that they are being conscripted against their will. A child will endure an adult’s seminar and unknowingly emerge with a contaminated character. The most prevalent contemporary example of such evil is Saudi Arabia and its religious indoctrination of children throughout the world’s mosques and madrasas.

Even if international affairs were placid, the Saudi royal family’s global propaganda would constitute an egregious offense to supporters of human rights. International affairs, however, are not placid. There is a bit more urgency to the matter. Saudi Arabia is on the other side-and at the forefront-of an ideological conflict that has for decades shown its potential to bend the trajectory of the human condition violently downward.