RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/
The death of Neil Armstrong, the first man on the moon, takes place in the shadow of the death of the space program. Last year Armstrong had called the dismantling of the space program under Obama, leaving behind a shadow space agency: “embarrassing and unacceptable”.

Armstrong had proposed not only future investments, but along with other astronauts had sensibly proposed retaining the space shuttle program until they were ready, instead of scrapping the shuttle program and distributing viable shuttles to museums. Armstrong was critical of the Bolden regime at NASA that had stripped the space agency of its best people and its ability to conduct manned space exploration or even reach the International Space Station without begging passage on Soviet Soyuz tubs.

“The reality that there is no flight requirement for a NASA pilot-astronaut for the foreseeable future is obvious and painful to all who have, justifiably, taken great pride in NASA’s wondrous space flight achievements during the past half century,” Armstrong concluded his testimony. “In space fight, we are in the process of exhausting alternatives. I am hopeful that, in the near future, we will be doing the right thing.”

If we ever do get around to doing the right thing, in space or on the ground, Neil Armstrong will not be around to see it. The famously reclusive astronaut passed away after being drawn out to make a final bid at reviving the space program. His final contribution may be that he joined the many voices warning of the decline of America. His final legacy may be determined by whether the American people choose to listen to some of his final words.

Neil Armstrong was born in 1930, the year that a young researcher watching the sky over Flagstaff, Arizona, discovered Pluto. By 2006, it was decided that Pluto was no longer a planet. By 2016 we may decided that Neil Armstrong never really walked on the moon and that walking on the moon is an assault on the lunar ecology.

Two years ago, Charles Bolden, the incompetent Obama appointee who has implemented his mission of killing America’s space program, declared that the agency’s chief goal was outreach to the Muslim world. This was not his original idea.

While visiting Egypt, Bolden told Al-Jazeera that Obama had given him three missions. “One, he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math and engineering,”

Space exploration was not on the list for a reason. Michael Griffin, Bolden’s predecessor, who had done much to rebuild NASA, only to have his work ruined by Obama’s affirmative action appointees, Charles Bolden and Lori Garver, said of those comments, “NASA … represents the best of America. Its purpose is not to inspire Muslims or any other cultural entity. If by doing great things, people are inspired, well then that’s wonderful. If you get it in the wrong order … it becomes an empty shell… That is exactly what is in danger of happening.”

NASA, like the rest of American exceptionalism, has become that empty shell in the throes of Obama’s Post-American national order. It exists to make Muslim boys feel good about imaginary Muslim inventions and to provide jobs to Russian engineers. In the last week NASA premiered a new song from one of Obama’s favorite musicians, will.i.am and demonstrated a new “green” alternative to existing rocket fuels.

In a memo for NASA’s OEOD, Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity, Charles Bolden declared that, “Diversity and inclusion are integral to mission success at NASA”. Because how can we possibly reach the stars unless there are mandated diversity targets among the launch crews and the conflict management specialists?

“As NASA’s Diversity and Inclusion Champion,” Bolden wrote,”I belicve it is incumbent on every member of the NASA community to advocate for promote, and most importantly, practice the principles of diversity and inclusion in everything that we do.”

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/12097

Israel has never asked for American soldiers to help defend it. It has the right to defend itself.

“America has gotten involved in conflicts for reasons less pressing than what it faces with the potential of a nuclear Iran. If Washington chooses not to act decisively itself, the least it can do is not force Israel’s current six million Jews to face the prospects of what befell another six million not that long ago.”

Speaking to reporters upon his arrival in Afghanistan on August 19th, he stated that Israel and the United States view the Iranian nuclear threat differently. Their “clocks are ticking at different paces.” In fairness, the General also mentioned that Israel sees this more seriously “…because a nuclear Iran poses a threat to Israel’s very existence.”

The reality is that a nation some 3,000 miles wide, with over 300 million inhabitants, and two vast oceans separating it from its most-likely enemies should not be telling another nation (and one of its best friends and allies in the world)–a country that could fit some 34 times just into the state of Texas–what it ought to do to defend itself against would-be nuclear enemies who repeatedly call for its destruction and have already acted upon those deadly desires repeatedly via proxies and so forth.

Let’s be blunt about this…

Israel has never asked for any American blood to be spilt on its behalf. The Afghanistan Dempsey just visited has already cost much American life and limb–besides over a half trillion dollars to date and climbing–and despite that, things will likely be no better off there when we leave.

Similar life and limb have been extracted from America on behalf of Muslims in Iraq–and over one trillion dollars spent there as well.

Much is made of the 2.5 billion dollars in aid Israel receives each year. Do the math to find out how long it would take for Israel to receive the money that America has recently spent just in Iraq and Afghanistan (where Americans are killed by “friendly” forces, let alone others)–not to mention the rest of the “Arab”/Muslim world, and with no thank you either.

While it’s close to a truism that nations don’t have friends, just interests, we should nevertheless strive for something better.

Israel does not deserve to constantly be placed in danger by its so-called friends. Yet, those in key leadership roles in America–especially in the State Department–have indeed done just that for over a half century now. I won’t get into this issue here, but there is solid documentation supporting this claim. Let’s just say that recent “leaks” regarding potential Israeli plans involving flight paths, Azerbaijani bases, and so forth have many past precedents–along with many other types of unpleasantness as well.

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=282340 General Martin Dempsey has made it clear that America’s timetable and Israel’s differ. We are facing utter annihilation; America is not. Israel, the end of summer, 2012. We drive down Highway 6, crowded with families headed to holiday flats in the Galilee, the Jezreel Valley and the Golan Heights, station wagons filled with laughing […]

Investigative Project on Terrorism

http://www.meforum.org/3313/ramadan-christian-oppression

The month of Ramadan, which ended earlier this week, proved to be a month of renewed Muslim piety on the one hand, and renewed oppression of non-Muslim minorities on the other. In Nigeria, for example, Islamic militants are living up to the assertion that “Ramadan is a month of jihad and death for Allah,” proving that killing Christians is not only reserved for Christian holidays—like Christmas and Easter, when militants bombed churches killing dozens—but is especially applicable during Islam’s Ramadan. Usually, however, Ramadan-related oppression has to do with Muslim perceptions that Christians do not “know their place”—either because the latter openly do things forbidden to Muslims during Ramadan, or because they dare object to the things Muslims do during their holy month.

When it comes to these aspects of dhimmitude, Egypt offers countless examples, past and present, simply because it houses the Middle East’s largest Christian minority, the Copts, and thus offers more opportunities for the intolerant face of Ramadan to reveal itself. Two recent examples follow:

First, according to Coptic websites, on July 27, a diabetic man in Egypt was driving his car in Maadi, a suburb of southern Cairo, when he was struck with great thirst, “which he could not bear” (a side-effect of diabetes, further exacerbated by Egypt’s July weather). He pulled over by a public water source and started drinking water. Soon three passer-bys approached him, inquiring why he was drinking water (among the many things forbidden to Muslims during daylight in Ramadan). The diabetic man replied, “Because I am a Christian, and sick,” to which they exclaimed “you’re a Christian, too!” and begun beating him mercilessly. Other passer-bys began to congregate to see what was happening, but no one intervened on behalf of the diabetic non-Muslim, until he managed to make a dash for his parked car and fled the scene.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/314949/understanding-muslim-brotherhood-andrew-c-mccarthy

I’m a big fan of the 1 percent. No, not the dastardly 1 percent of Occupy Wall Street myth; I’m partial, instead, to the 1 percent of Congress that takes seriously the threat of Islamic-supremacist influence operations against our government.

The people have 435 representatives serving in the House and another hundred in the Senate. Of these 535, a total of 288 are Republicans — 241 and 47 in the lower and upper chambers, respectively. Of these, only five House conservatives — five — have had the fortitude to raise concerns about the Islamist connections of government officials entrusted with positions enabling them to shape U.S. policy.

Think about that. Republicans purport to be the national-security party. For decades this claim was well founded, starting with Ronald Reagan’s clarity in seeing the Soviets as enemies to be defeated, not accommodated. President Reagan’s plan for the Cold War was, “We win, they lose,” and he pulled it off because he was not under any illusions about who “they” were.

But something happened to the GOP in the Bush years. For all the welcome understanding that Bill Clinton was wrong — that the jihad could not be indicted into submission — the Bush administration never learned a fundamental truth that Reagan knew only too well: You cannot defeat your enemies unless you understand them, and you cannot even begin to understand them if you are too craven to name them.

As they gather in Tampa for their quadrennial showcase, Republicans, but for the 1 percent, remain timorous on the subject of America’s enemies. Oh, they’ll tell you that we must confront “terrorism” and crack down on the “terrorists.” But that’s not much different from claiming to be against “burglary” and “burglars.” Terrorism is a vicious crime, but it becomes a national-security threat only when it is an instrument of an ideology that aims to destroy our country. What made the terrorist organizations armed and trained by the Soviets in the Sixties and Seventies a threat was the Soviets, not the terrorism.

America’s enemies are Islamic supremacists: Muslims adherent to a totalitarian interpretation of Islam who, like Soviet Communists, seek to impose their ideology throughout the world, very much including the United States. Terrorism is an offensive strategy they use, but it is only one arrow in the quiver. Its chief utility, moreover, is not that it will coerce surrender on its own; it is the atmosphere of intimidation it creates. That dramatically increases the effectiveness of the enemy’s several other offensive strategies — legal demands for concessions, media campaigns, infiltration of society’s major institutions, and influence operations against government.

The most disheartening thing about the modern Republican party’s dereliction — about its accommodation and empowerment of our enemies under the delusional guise of “Muslim outreach” — is that it flies in the face of the Bush Justice Department’s signal counterterrorism achievement.

That was the 2007–08 Holy Land Foundation case. For once, political correctness and the fear of being smeared as “Islamophobic” were shelved. In the course of convicting several Hamas operatives, prosecutors proved that the Muslim Brotherhood is engaged in a far-flung enterprise aimed, in the Brothers’ own words, at “eliminating and destroying” our way of life “from within” by means of “sabotage.” The Bush Justice Department not only showed that what the Brotherhood calls its “grand jihad” (or “civilization jihad”) is real; Justice shed light on the ideology that fuels this enterprise, and expressly identified many of the global Brotherhood’s accomplices.

Alas, this achievement is one today’s Republicans prefer to ignore. The party of Ronald Reagan would have worn it like a badge of honor. Today’s GOP would rather engage our enemies and call them our friends — not understand them, call them what they are, and defeat them. Today’s Beltway Republicans save their wrath for the occasional conservative — the messengers who embarrass them by illustrating how small the big time has made them.

Did you know, for example, that when the Republican establishment had its hissy fit over the inconvenient 1 percent — when John McCain and John Boehner led the shrieking over their five conservative colleagues’ purported scaremongering over Islamist influence-peddling — the fact that this influence-peddling effort exists had just been proved in court?

As Patrick Poole, one of few to cover the case, has observed, it is the biggest spy scandal you’ve never heard about. Right around the time McCain and Boehner were dressing down the 1 percent last month, Ghulam Nabi Fai was finally heading off to prison. He had pled guilty last December to acting as a secret foreign agent against our government.

In sum, Fai was paid millions of dollars over two decades by the Pakistani intelligence service to push its agenda through a D.C.-based front, the Kashmiri American Council. You haven’t heard much about it because it is a Muslim Brotherhood operation through and through, one that demonstrates exactly what the 1 percent is warning about.

Fai grew up in Kashmir, the disputed territory Islamists have sought to wrest from India, often by terrorism, for over half a century. His story would be typical of Muslim Brotherhood operatives if we actually spoke about Muslim Brotherhood operatives. He became a member of Jama’at-e-Islami, which maintains close relations with the Brotherhood and is, for Pakistanis, what the Brotherhood is for Arabs — the vanguard of global Islamic supremacism.

The force that globalizes this movement is Saudi money and commitment. During one of the many Indian crackdowns on Kashmiri Islamists, Fai did exactly what Muslim Brothers in Egypt frequently did during regime crackdowns: He fled to Saudi Arabia. While studying at one of the kingdom’s Wahhabist universities, he made himself useful to a highly influential imam who incited Kashmiri jihadists. Impressed by Fai’s devotion to the cause, the Saudi government agreed to pay for his education in the United States.

The Saudis steered Fai to Temple University, where Islamists had a beachhead. Fai studied under a Palestinian sharia specialist, Ismail Raji al-Faruqi, who led the Saudi-funded “Islamization of knowledge” program. Ismail would later join Muslim Brotherhood operatives to found the International Institute of Islamic Thought — a think tank dedicated to the “Islamization of knowledge” project, and one that worked so closely with Sami al-Arian, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad emir, that its leadership was listed among the unindicted co-conspirators cited by the Bush Justice Department at al-Arian’s terrorism trial.

At Temple, Fai became the president of the Muslim Students Association — the national organization. Established in the early sixties, the MSA is the original foundation of the Muslim Brotherhood’s American infrastructure. It now has hundreds of chapters grooming Islamists across the United States and Canada. Patrick Poole has recounted the numerous MSA leaders who have graduated to violent jihadism. They include — and this is just to name a few of many — Wael Jalaidan, a founder of al-Qaeda; Abdurahman Alamoudi, a leading financier of al-Qaeda who was eventually convicted in a murder plot; and Anwar al-Awlaki, the al-Qaeda leader who counseled the 9/11 hijackers and, before finally being killed in Yemen last year, was implicated in sundry jihadist plots, including the Fort Hood massacre and the attempt to bomb a plane over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. Like Fai, both Alamoudi and Awlaki were once admired in Washington as model moderates thanks to the magic of “Muslim outreach.” (So was al-Arian.)

From the MSA, Fai seamlessly moved on to the “shura council” (i.e., the advisory board) of the Islamic Society of North America. ISNA evolved out of the MSA and the two organizations consider themselves as one. ISNA has become the largest and, perhaps, the most influential Brotherhood affiliate in the United States — see its president, Mohamed Magid, pictured here with State Department official Huma Abedin at the Iftar (end-of-Ramadan) dinner hosted by President Obama just a few weeks ago.

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Read more: http://times247.com/#ixzz24XxbERqA
U.Va. turns down Obama request for campus rally
The Wall Street Journal
Friday, August 24, 2012
Blogs
U.Va. turns down Obama request for campus rally
The Obama campaign was forced to scramble after the University of Virginia rejected a request to hold a rally on campus next week. In another hiccup, the campaign late on Friday canceled Vice President Biden’s plans to visit Tampa, Fla., next week, which is hosting the Republican National Convention. The campaign cited concerns connected to a looming hurricane. View Video…

Read more: http://times247.com/#ixzz24XzgnKOO
Chaffetz digs into stimulus cash used on job ads
Jim McElhatton

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, Utah Republican and a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, plans to push Obama administration officials for more information on why the Labor Department spent a half-million dollars in federal stimulus money for more than 100 commercials that ran on MSNBC.
Read more…

Read more: http://times247.com/#ixzz24Y0V0nO8

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/how-german-islamists-recruit-young-men-for-jihad-a-851393.html Young Muslim men in Germany are systematically trying to recruit their peers for jihad using sophisticated rhetoric and psychology and by targeting vulnerable youths who are searching for direction in life. Two men who have quit the scene tell their story to SPIEGEL, providing a rare look into a dangerous underground. Young Muslim men […]

THAT MUSLIM VOTE In Mitt Romney’s home state of Michigan, about 1.5 percent of the population is Arab-American. In 2008, President Obama beat opponent John McCain by 49 percentage points in Wayne County which claims to have the largest Arab-American population in the country. MUSLIM PAEDOS ON WHEELS In a triumph for disabled child molesters […]

http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2012/08/friday-afternoon-roundup-carjackers-and.html RELEASE THE BACON-SNIFFING HOUNDS Turn on CNN or MSNBC and the topic of choice will either be how Paul Ryan intends to turn America into Afghanistan (which would be swell because Afghanistan is run by the Religion of Peace and is a very tolerant place) or how four trillion Muslims were killed by Islamophobia […]

http://pjmedia.com/blog/five-must-watch-congressional-races-for-2012/?singlepage=true

Two years ago, Republican congressional candidates overwhelmed their Democratic counterparts, winning just about everything in sight. In the end, the GOP tsunami picked up 66 seats while losing just 3 of its own, and carried a solid majority into the 112th Congress. 2010 was, at least in the House, a historic shift in the balance of power and the largest in over 60 years [1].

Now, nearly two years removed from that electoral wipeout, it’s time to look ahead to the 2012 edition of the battle for Capitol Hill. The question that usually arises first when evaluating possible House election outcomes is whether the minority party will regain control of the chamber. This year, Democrats will need to realize a net gain of 25 seats in order to accomplish that feat. The current consensus [2] is that they will probably gain a handful but not enough to tip the balance in their favor.

Enough about the big picture — what about the races themselves? All 435 seats are up for election every two years. Most of them are nothing more than formalities in which the incumbent, or incumbent party, waltzes to Washington for another term. Others feature competitive matchups whose outcomes are uncertain. These are the races that make Election Projection’s Contested House Race Summary [3].

And then there are the truly interesting, pure toss-up contests, made all the more intriguing by unusual circumstances or colorful personalities. They are the “must-watch” races for any political aficionado. Today, we’ll look at five such races you’ll want to follow closely over the next 10 weeks.

California CD-52

Brian Bilbray-inc (R) vs. Scott Peters (D)

Of all the House targets on the DCCC’s wish list, few rate higher than Brian Bilbray. In 2006, Bilbray won a controversial special election [4] against Francine Busby to fill the vacancy in CD-50 left by Randy Cunningham’s resignation and subsequent conviction on an assortment of felony counts. Bilbray followed his special election victory by winning the rematch against Busby in November that year, and then cruising to two more re-election triumphs in 2008 and 2010. Given his 18-point margin of victory in the latter election, one might wonder why this race is on this list.

Something happened on the way to Election 2012 — redistricting. California’s non-partisan redistricting commission played havoc with the former congressional district lines and landed Bilbray in a newly minted District 52. Not only is Bilbray’s seat now much bluer than two years ago (Cook Political PVI D+1), but he must also face a formidable challenger in Democrat Scott Peters.

(Note: PVI = Partisan Voting Index. Developed by political handicapper Charlie Cook, the PVI average results from the prior two presidential elections and compares them to national results. So a PVI of D+1 indicates a district that went Democratic exceeding the national average of the Democratic vote over the last two presidential elections by 1 percentage point.)

After the controversy surrounding Bilbray’s first election victories, Democrats may, at long last, have the opportunity to send Bilbray packing. This race is up for grabs.

_________________

Illinois CD-12 (open seat)

William Enyart (D) vs. Jason Plummer (R)

Like Republicans in North Carolina, Democrats in Illinois used redistricting to carve out a substantial advantage in House elections for the next decade. Election Projection currently shows Democrats picking up 4 seats [5] in the Land of Lincoln against just one Republican pick-up, which happens to be Illinois CD-12.

Democrat Jerry Costello was supposed be an easy victor here. His seat was to be a solid hold for the blue team — until Costello decided to retire at the end of the current term. Charlie Cook reacted to the announcement by moving his rating from “Solid Democrat” to “Toss-up” in one drastic shift.

Further complicating their prospects, Brad Harriman, winner of the Democratic primary, dropped out of the race due to health concerns. Now, his replacement, William Enyart, must run double-time to catch up to Republican nominee Jason Plummer. Still, the district does sport a D+3 PVI so Plummer’s road is uncertain at best. Polls show Plummer ahead, but expect them to tighten considerably between now and November 6.

_________________

New Hampshire CD-1 and CD-2

Frank Guinta-inc (R) vs. Carol Shea-Porter (D)

Charlie Bass-inc (R) vs. Ann McLane Kuster (D)

These two seats have so much in common and are so competitive that a package deal is in order. Besides, they have mirrored each other in recent elections. In fact, these two seats have gone to the same party in every election since 1992. Both were Democratic pick-ups in 2006, and Republicans reclaimed them both two years ago.

But the similarities don’t end there. All four of the likely nominees (likely because the Democratic primary won’t be held until September 11) were on the ballot in 2010. It’s a pair of rematches, and early polls indicate two razor-close battles are in store.

As red spots in the blue expanse of the Northeast, these two contests hold special significance for the GOP. Along with a competitive Senate race in nearby Connecticut, they represent two of very few opportunities for Republican victories in the region.

_________________

Pennsylvania CD-12 (merged seat)

Mark Critz-inc (D) vs. Keith Rothfus (R)

An interesting phenomena of reapportionment after every 10-year census is the incumbent-vs-incumbent race. When a state loses seats to reapportionment, it is quite common for two incumbents to end up in the same district. That’s just what happened in Pennsylvania this year. Republicans used their control over the redistricting process to paint Democratic Congressmen Jason Altmire and Mark Critz into a newly configured CD-12. Critz won the primary and will face Keith Rothfus, a Tea-Party backed Republican who lost to Altmire in 2010 by just 2 percent.

This year, Rothfus may turn the tables on Critz, given the new district’s R+6 PVI, but Critz has proven a formidable challenge in the past. He won a special election to replace the late John Murtha in May 2010 and then held on to win re-election, 51-49, in November of that year, despite seeing so many of his Democratic colleagues go down to defeat.

It’ll be an exciting race in a battleground state, and the winner could be determined by the color and length of the coattails at the top of the ticket.

_________________

Minnesota CD-8

Chris Cravaack-inc (R) vs. Richard Nolan (D)

Democrat Jim Oberstar rarely campaigned for re-election. His seat was one of those formalities I mentioned earlier. In 2010, Chris Cravaack was supposed to be just the next GOP pretender to lose big to the 19-term incumbent. But then the red wave kept rising and rising. Once Oberstar realized his race was competitive, it was too late. Cravaack’s stunning victory was one of the most surprising in recent memory.

Now, it is Cravaack who must work hard for re-election in this Democrat-leaning district (D+3 PVI). Demographic shifts may have moved his constituency rightward, but this remains difficult territory. His opponent, DFL-endorsed Richard Nolan, has been through the House election wars before — most recently in 1978. No, that’s not a typo, Nolan served three terms in Congress during the 1970s [6] and hasn’t run for office since!

This race will be another nail-biter, but if Cravaack avoids the sophomore slump, he may be set up for easier tests in future cycles.

_________________

Overall these races won’t decide who controls the House. If the Democrats manage an unlikely takeover, all of the races on this list — and many other less competitive ones — will have to fall in their favor. If that happens, these races may not turn out to be very competitive after all. But, barring the unforeseen, we will still have a Republican majority come January, albeit a few seats smaller, and these select contests will have provided us the suspense and intrigue that keep us coming back to the elections arena cycle after cycle.

Article printed from PJ Media: http://pjmedia.com

URL to article: http://pjmedia.com/blog/five-must-watch-congressional-races-for-2012/