http://spectator.org/archives/2012/11/12/the-petraeus-affair It’s such a cliché. A powerful man, away from home for years at a time, in jobs that put him under enormous emotional strain. A younger woman, attached to him by her job, spending endless hours with him on and off duty. That they fell into a love affair is so ordinary as to […]
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/bruce-thornton/the-democrats-success-and-the-dysfunctions-of-democracy/print/ The election post-mortem has identified all manner of causes for the Republicans’ defeat, from the “woman problem” and the “Hispanic problem,” as Peggy Noonan put it, to Romney’s fatcat persona and his inept campaign. But there’s a simpler reason, one consistent with the critics of democracy starting in ancient Athens––Obama and the Democrats promised […]
http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2012/11/11/senate-intelligence-panel-to-probe-why-congress-wasnt-told-about-petraeus-investigation/?singlepage=true The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee said that the timeline of the FBI’s investigation into the Petraeus emails in relation to campaign season “doesn’t add up.” “First of all, I’m wondering — excuse me, how a — something about emails went to the level of the FBI, how the FBI could have […]
http://pjmedia.com/blog/why-did-al-qaeda-target-ambassador-stevens/
Most of the questions related to the Benghazi debacle are about the mechanics, both offensive and defensive. What did the White House know and when? What assets were available to the military? Did someone order a stand down, and if so, who? Why was “the video” blamed long after the administration knew the truth — and didn’t the administration know the truth from the beginning? If it didn’t, why didn’t it?
All reasonable questions, but a generally unasked one deserves attention: “Why did al-Qaeda want to kill Ambassador Chris Stevens?”
The ambassador had good relations with some of the most extreme Libyan militias, including those with al-Qaeda ties. Did he upset them with something he did, or didn’t do? Was the White House fully apprised of his connections and dealings with the militias? Was he killed because of something the administration told him to start doing or to stop doing?
There are things we know and things upon which we must speculate, including the entry of surface-to-air missiles to the Levant.
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Emerging from the chaos is a dim understanding that the U.S. was operating a clandestine arms operation from the CIA post that was loosely — and incorrectly — described as a “consulate.” Before and during the revolution, Ambassador Stevens had helped arm the anti-Gaddafi militias, including the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIF), whose leader Abdulhakim Belhadj later became the head of the Tripoli Military Council.
The LIF’s Abdel-Hakim al-Hasidi told an Italian newspaper in 2011 (later reported in the British Telegraph) that he had fought the “foreign invasion” in Afghanistan. Captured in Pakistan, al-Hasidi was handed over to the U.S. and returned to Libya, where he was released from prison in 2008. Speaking of the Libyan revolution, he said:
Members of al-Qaeda are also good Muslims and are fighting against the invader.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/11/rebranding_the_democrats.html The Democrats are masters of political language, and as you may have noticed, they just won. Basically, they have two tricks. They concoct a simple negative label for anything they want to defeat and then relentlessly shriek it in unison. You know the drill: “racist,” “homophobe,” “bigot,” “right-wing lunatic,” etc. Then, they sanctify with […]
http://daphneanson.blogspot.com/2012/11/fightback-in-france-against-fascism.html
Fightback In France Against Fascism (video)
My Franco-Israeli reader Jean alerted me to a so-called “March Contre Le Fascisme Islamiste” that took place on Saturday afternoon (10th November) in Paris.
Chief organiser Christine Tassin explained beforehand:
‘”We want this march to be a march of hope and confidence in this country.
We refuse violence and terror, we must be united no matter our political views.
All patriots must be united against fascism of the 21st century that is Islamism.Bring your French flag!
Recent events have shown us in France and elsewhere in the world that Islamism is getting more and more dangerous for our democracies and the free world. Supporters of Islamism hate liberty and freedom, they want to impose us Sharia.
The Benghazi attack, the Criminal jihadist Mohamed Merah, Ilan Halimi [a young Jewish man] tortured for 3 weeks by a gang of barbarians. the Vogel Family Massacre stabbed in their sleep, the killing of Theo Van Gogh by muslim fanatics to name a few remind us that islamo fascism is a daily threat.”‘
Adds Jean:
This March highlights the threat from the Islamic jihad, and the oppression of Muslim women. Islamo-Fascism Awareness march.
Islamic fanatics operate a fascistic concept of the “pure” and the “exclusive” over the unclean and the kufar or profane. “fascism with an Islamic face”describes the attack on civil society on Sept. 11, 2001.
“It is right for us to be on the offense against Islamo fascism, and not wait until they attack us on our soil. Unlike any war we have ever fought in this nation, this is not a war for soil. It is a war for our soul. We will either win it or we will lose it. This nation must rally to the point where we recognize there is no compromise. There is no alternative. We must win; they must lose. Islam fascism must disappear from the face of the earth, or we will.” — Mike Huckabee
“What we have to understand is … this is not really a war against terrorism, this is not really a war against al Qaeda, this is a war against movements and ideologies that are jihadist, that are Islam fascists, that aim to destroy the Western world.” — Clifford May
“Islamic terrorist attacks serve a clear and focused ideology, a set of beliefs and goals that are evil, but not insane. Some call this evil Islamic radicalism; others, militant Jihadism; still others, Islamo-fascism. Whatever it’s called, this ideology is very different from the religion of Islam. This form of radicalism exploits Islam to serve a violent, political vision: the establishment, by terrorism and subversion and insurgency, of a totalitarian empire that denies all political and religious freedom.” — George W. Bush
http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/
Let’s begin with what this isn’t. It isn’t a final statement on anything. It’s the opening to a discussion and the discussion is a look at how we can win.
The proposals and ideas that follow are not in compliance with any dogma. They do not call for abandoning principles, but they do call for pragmatic action in the here and now in order to secure the victory of those principles. That’s a tricky line, but that’s also how political battles are won.
Plenty of readers will have philosophical objections to some of what follows and I respect that, but you can either wait for the public to come around or retreat to high ground and wait for everything to collapse. Neither is a very useful strategy and it behooves us to remember that the left did not go up into the hills and wait for us to come around. They used these strategies to win.
1. We Are Going to Take Care of You
Laying out grand arguments. The romance of the open marketplace and the responsibility to our children are big ideas. Breaking them down into bite sized pieces and hitting people directly on the impact it will have on them is far more useful.
http://hnn.us/articles/israel-can-curb-nuclear-iran
Louis René Beres (Ph.D., Princeton, 1971) is professor of political science and international law at Purdue University. He is the author of many books and articles dealing with nuclear strategy and nuclear war, including “Apocalypse: Nuclear Catastrophe in World Politics” (The University of Chicago Press, 1980); “Mimicking Sisyphus: America’s Countervailing Nuclear Strategy” (D.C. Heath/Lexington, 1983); “Security or Armageddon: Israel’s Nuclear Strategy” (D.C. Heath/Lexington, 1986); and “Terrorism and Global Security: The Nuclear Threat” (Westview, 1987). In Israel, he was Chair of Project Daniel.
When, back in March of this year, he was interviewed on CBS’s 60 Minutes, Meir Dagan, former chief of Israel’s Mossad, stated: “The regime in Iran is a very rational one.” Moments later, hedging a bit, Dagan admitted that it was “not exactly our rational.” He then proceeded to hedge even further, indicating that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was “not exactly rational based on Western thinking.”
What, exactly, was Meir Dagan saying? Reduced to its bare essentials, his statement claimed only that Iran’s leadership displays some form of “logical thinking.” Nothing more.
To be sure, there was literally nothing in his remarks to suggest that the regime in Tehran would consistently value collective survival as its highest goal.
Such an omission was plainly significant. This is because the rationale of strategic deterrence must always rest upon a uniformly presumed preeminence of national self-preservation. By definition, where such a presumption is absent, there can be no traditional deterrence.
Ideally, therefore, Iran would still be prevented from becoming a nuclear weapons state. After all, if we can accept Dagan’s personal and somewhat eccentric assessment of enemy rationality, that country’s prospective nuclear force commanders could ultimately choose to value certain preferences more highly than Iran’s survival as a state. Such a scenario of failed nuclear threat dynamics is improbable, but it is not inconceivable.
Already, it is widely and authoritatively acknowledged that a nuclear Iran is a fait accompli. For several generally-discussed operational reasons, the remaining prospect of any viable and cost-effective preemption by Israel is exceedingly small. In consequence and also in compensation, there must now be heightened Israeli preparations for effective anti-missile defense, especially the Arrow and Iron Dome interceptors.
Less obviously, perhaps, there must take place, in stark contradiction to the traditionally prevailing notion that “irrational” adversaries cannot be deterred, the thoughtful and systematic implementation of new forms of deterrence.
What, exactly, does this mean? Irrationality is not the same as madness. Unlike a “crazy” or “mad” adversary, which would have no discernible order of preferences, an irrational Iranian leadership might still maintain a distinct and consistent hierarchy of wants. The pinnacle or very top of this hierarchy would almost certainly be represented by abundantly clear and widely held religious values.
Although such an Iranian leadership might not be successfully deterred by the more usual threats of military destruction — because a canonical Shiite eschatology could genuinely welcome “end times” confrontations with “unbelievers” — it might still refrain from any attacks that could elicit credible harms to its most basic religious values. An overriding Iranian concern for safeguarding the holy city of Qom, for example, comes immediately to mind.
It is also plausible that an Iranian leadership would simultaneously value certain of its prime military institutions, and could also be deterred by compelling and possibly coincident threats to these institutions. A pertinent consideration would be the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, the power behind the Iranian dictatorship, the principal foe of the Iranian people, and the current leadership’s main instrument of repression. Here, it could be purposeful for Jerusalem to hold at risk the Guard’s physical facilities, its terrorist training camps, its navy of small attack boats, its missile program, the homes of its leaders, and even its space program.
Most civilian targets would be deliberately excluded from attack vulnerabilities, as would those particular military targets that were not identifiably Guard-related. Such a calculated exclusion would not only be in Israel’s best overall strategic interests. It would also be necessary to ensure proper Israeli compliance with the law of war.
A nuclear Iran could be dangerous to Israel even if its leadership were entirely rational. Miscalculations, or errors in information, could still lead a perfectly rational Iranian adversary to strike first. In these unstable circumstances, the very best anti-missile defenses would prove thoroughly inadequate.
All active defenses require a near-100 percent reliability of intercept to be useful for any “soft-point” protection of cities. Naturally, as purely a matter of physics, such an extraordinary degree of reliability could never be expected. In such defensive systems, there would inevitably be intolerable “leakage.”
If Iran were presumed to be rational, in the usual sense of valuing its national physical survival more highly than any other preference, of combination of preferences, Jerusalem could then begin to consider certain benefits of pretended irrationality. Years ago, Israeli General Moshe Dayan, had warned: “Israel must be seen as a mad dog; too dangerous to bother.” In this crude but effective metaphor, Dayan had already understood that, sometimes at least, it can be distinctly rational to feign irrationality.
An element of just such counter-intuitive reasoning may have been exhibited by U.S. President John F. Kennedy, during his handling of the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. Many years ago, when I was co-chairing a panel at the Naval Academy with Admiral Arleigh Burke, the former chief of naval operations repeated to me privately what had earlier been published by Ted Sorensen, JFK’s biographer. Kennedy, confirmed Burke, had believed that his actions, a “quarantine” of Cuba, would entail potentially “even odds” of a nuclear war with the Soviet Union.
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/dgreenfield/voter-fraud-obama-won-%108-of-registered-voters-in-ohio-county/
Let’s face it. Obama won the election. Just like Putin and Ahmadinejad did theirs. The only difference is that unlike Iranians and Russians, Americans won’t be gathering in the streets to protest their disenfranchisement at the hands of the corrupt Democratic Party machine.
First, he received over 99% of the vote in districts where GOP inspectors were illegally removed. Next, he won 100% of the vote in 21 districts in Cleveland. Well, he’s gotten another lucky break!
Mr. Obama won Wood County in Ohio this year. That’s right, Mr. Obama won the majority of Wood County’s 108% of registered voters. That’s not a typo.
In 2012, 106,258 people in Wood County are registered to vote out of an eligible 98,213.
Secretary of College Democrats Morgan Holliger chimed in, “We won Wood County, we won Ohio.”
Mr. Obama did indeed win Wood County, along with its 108% of voters.
Half the Democratic ground game is voter turnout. The other half is voter fraud. Voter ID would make an impact on this game, but that would be just like the return of Segregation or something.
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/more-false-bpa-science-by-news-release
News releases trumpeting not merely inaccurate, but false, science have become a way of life for Americans and others around the world. There is rarely, if ever, any fact checking done by the editors and reporters who pass along often dangerously false science on a wide range of topics, with many reports designed to alarm consumers.
Such is the case with bisphenol A (BPA), a chemical that has been in use for some 60 years to protect the contents of metal food containers and create shatter resistant plastics. In 2011 I wrote a four-part series about the efforts to ban BPA which has been subjected to more than 5,000 studies, none of which has found harm or undue risk in normal use. Its safety was reaffirmed earlier this year by the refusal of the Food and Drug Administration to ban it.
But the anti-chemical drumbeat continues. A recent study at the University of California-San Diego that purported to show a risk of danger when BPA was metabolized and this finding was announced by a news release issued by the university. It was reviewed and approved by researcher Michael Baker and contained the traditional hype we see when organizations want to whip up public concern when none is warranted. Remarkably, the tactic was exposed in a lengthy article by Jon Entine in Forbes magazine.
