RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303949504579260510644966826?mod=WSJ_hps_LEFTTopStories

A leading Saudi prince demanded a place for his country at talks with Iran, assailing the Obama administration for working behind Riyadh’s back and panning other recent U.S. steps in the Middle East.

MONACO—A leading Saudi prince demanded a place for his country at talks with Iran, assailing the Obama administration for working behind Riyadh’s back and panning other recent U.S. steps in the Middle East.

Prince Turki al-Faisal, an Arab royal and a brother of Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, said Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states were stunned by the secret American-Iranian diplomacy that led to the breakthrough deal between Iran and other world powers last month.
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Prince Turki al-Faisal says Gulf states must play a direct role in Iran talks. Reuters

His comments in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, rare in their bluntness, came on the sidelines of a security conference here at which he publicly blistered the U.S. for its role in Syria and in the region.

The Arab royal said the failure by Washington and the United Nations to take decisive steps to end the violence in Syria—which has claimed over 130,000 lives—bordered on “criminal negligence.”

Last week, the State Department said it had suspended nonlethal aid to the Syrian rebels after warehouses they controlled in northern Syria were overrun by Islamic militants with ties to al Qaeda. Saudi Arabia has armed some of those same rebels.

“The U.S. gave us the impression that they were going to do things in Syria that they finally didn’t,” Prince Turki said on the sidelines of the World Policy Conference in Monaco. “The aid they’re giving to the Free Syrian Army is irrelevant. Now they say they’re going to stop the aid: OK, stop it. It’s not doing anything anyway.”

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Blogs/Message.aspx/5456#.Uqz-xaVF7yD

Historical Contexts: Brewing a Deadly Potion

Violins and Gas Chambers

In 1892, cofounder of the World Zionist Organization and social critic Max Nordau wrote his most famous work, Degeneration, which presented a scathing critique of European society as it devolved into what he described as a “horrible train of murder, incendiarism, rapine, [and] torture.” Nordau systematically analyzed and dismantled theories put forth by elite thinkers in his time, such as Nietzsche and Tolstoy. Specifically, Nietzsche’s premise, that, ‘there is no good and there is no evil,’ and his praise of sin as man’s ‘great consolation,’ was what Nordau found repugnant. The explicit approval of such notions was visible in European art and literature. In French society, for example, the “contempt for traditional views and customs of morality” led to conspicuous consumption and a devaluation of moral virtue, and by extent, a deterioration of societal structures which had till then promoted social cohesion. This was illustrated by the French’s inclination to imitate art which was inherently unrestrained and subject to fleeting passions as opposed to principles of decency. Nordau found the praise of such ideas and pseudo-intellectuals by elite society to be doubly offensive. In addition to advocating for morally bankrupt principles, calling such principles ‘enlightened‘ was a gross inversion of objective norms and values, a reflection of the degenerate state into which European society became immersed.

www.israpundit.com/archives/63592388 Everybody knows that it is either going to be “settlements” or a “Palestinian State”. Both cannot coexist side by side. The fate of Jewish life in Judea and Samaria is the most important single defining issue for the future of the Jewish people. After Yasser Arafat convinced the Israelis that “delivering” Arabs to the […]

worldtribune.com In 1967 Rudi Dutschke, a flamboyant leader of post-World War II European student radicals looking back on two centuries of failed revolutions, had an epiphany: instead of attacking prevailing institutions head on, he advocated his fellow revolutionaries should take a “long march through the institutions’ of power to create radical change from within government […]

http://ruleofreason.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-perils-of-hate-speech-and-crime.html Defense attorney and seasoned trial lawyer Perry Mason never lost a case to a prosecutor who charged his clients with “hate speech” or with a “hate crime.” Or at least no defendant of Mason’s was every indicted, charged with, tried for, or found guilty of it. That is because the concepts of “hate speech” […]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/dec/12/pruden-the-last-living-witnesses/

BERLIN — The shadows deepen and lengthen, memories grow dim, and some of the survivors of the tragedies of World War II scramble to preserve the recollections before the colors fade to gray.

There’s no shortage of ghosts prowling the cities and countryside of Europe. Remembrances of monstrous evil lie all about. None have tried harder than the progeny of the Germans who started it all to learn from the past, and recall without flinching the scourge and stain on history that is still unfathomable three-quarters of a century later.

An exhibit of photographs of the Nazi era, with the faces of human evil so familiar to the fading generations is on view now in the shadow of the Brandenburg Gate. Crowds of weekend strollers come to study the photographs and to admire the 40-foot Christmas tree and — in an irony der fuehrer would not appreciate — a large menorah and a Star of David in bright lights.

The Topography of Terror, a museum of the Hitler time built at what was once the most feared address in Berlin, the headquarters of the Gestapo, is one of the most popular sites with visitors to Germany. So, too, the Jewish Museum, with its history of the Jews. But none work with more dedication and enthusiasm for keeping the dark memories alive than a dwindling group of survivors of Hitler’s death camps. Some of them are well into their 90s now, leaning on canes or advancing slowly across a room on a walker, talking to young people to whom World War II is as distant as the Hundred Years War.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/dec/13/mccain-biden-hes-able-articulate-honest/

Sen. John McCain sang the praises of Vice President Joseph R. Biden, touting his many positives at a ceremony to recognize the White House’s contribution to foreign aid.

“Vice President Biden deserves our gratitude and respect for his many years of effective leadership in ensuring that all the resources America has to influence the course of world events are funded adequately and used effectively,” Mr. McCain said Thursday during the ceremony, according to the Hill.

Mr. Biden was being recognized by the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, particularly for his work in the Senate when he chaired the Foreign Relations Committee.

Mr. McCain said Mr. Biden deserves “a share of the credit” for the advancement of U.S. principles and policies around the world.

The Arizona Republican said he’s never “doubted for a moment that the United States of America is fortunate to be served by as able, articulate, honest, dedicated and impassioned a world leader as my friend Joe Biden,” the Hill reported.

Mr. Biden said foreign is was “one of the best bargains for American taxpayers.”

http://pjmedia.com/blog/what-will-it-take/?print=1

Let me begin with a categorical statement that, given current events and recent political history, can be easily defended: Barack Hussein Obama is a willful, indoctrinated child of the Left with strong Islamic sympathies who is not fit to govern. Indeed, he would not be fit to govern Lower Slobovia [1], let alone the United States of America. Obama is a historic disaster of the first magnitude and, if not restrained, he will see to the irrevocable decline of the country which foolishly elected him, leaving the world on the brink of a conflict — or in the midst of one — whose repercussions cannot be underestimated.

Accompanying the undeniable havoc and damage that Obama is wreaking on his country and equally on its allies — Honduras, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Poland, Czech Republic, Israel, and possibly Taiwan — is the sense of helplessness that overcomes one when writing or speaking about a rogue president and his destructive administration. I feel this personally, having done my utmost in books, articles and lectures, from 2008 to the present, to warn whomever might read or listen that Obama represented a greater threat to the U.S. and the oddly named “free world” than any of our most dedicated and belligerent enemies. Even prior to his nomination as the Democratic candidate for the presidency, my distrust of this man was proprioceptive. And after his Missouri address, I wondered why anyone would want to “fundamentally transform” a country which, for all its flaws, perched atop the pinnacle of success in comparison to any other country.

Everything Obama has done since then has only served to confirm what was originally a deep suspicion and soon grew to become a complete certainty. Dozens of meticulously researched books have been published to the same effect. And yet very few people seemed to be paying attention. No less disconcerting, those who argue that to criticize Obama is a sign of deep-dyed racism are, of course, relying on slander and misappropriation of language to protect their chosen standard bearer and his Marxist/progressivist/utopian project.

What will it take to convince the ersatz aristocracy of frivolous intellectuals and brainless celebrities, partisan journalists, editors and academics, and an indifferent or deluded laity that they are heading for a crisis that will change our lives immeasurably for the worse? The evidence is beyond dispute.

http://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2013/12/08/the-ten-worst-u-s-purveyors-of-antisemitism-10-gordon-duff/?print=1

Compared to Europe, where antisemitism and attacks on Jews are sharply on the rise, and 40 percent or more of populations view Israel as a country committing genocide, America shines. Polls find levels of antisemitism to be much lower, and the latest Gallup poll in February found sympathy for Israel tying a previous all-time high of 64% (with only 12% supporting the Palestinians).

That is not to say, though, the problem does not exist. The FBI’s recently released Hate Crime Statistics report for 2012 found Jews by far the number 1 target of hate crimes in the country; 62.4 percent of reported anti-religious hate crimes were against Jews (compared to 11.6 percent against Muslims).

This was, of course, before the rise of the “knockout game” that victimizes Jews and others. The Anti-Defamation League also criticized the FBI’s report as “seriously flawed” because one-fourth of the country’s law-enforcement agencies did not turn in their numbers.

The ADL’s own recently released poll finds that 12 percent of Americans “harbor deeply entrenched anti-Semitic attitudes,” down from 15 percent in 2011 and 29 percent in 1964. The ADL found antisemitism to be most prevalent among African Americans and Hispanics, and noted:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/extremist-rebels-in-syria-target-foreign-journalists-for-abduction-a-938715-druck.html

Radical Islamists embedded among the rebels in Syria are reportedly targeting foreign journalists for abduction. Instead of holding them for ransom, however, they use them as trump cards in their power struggles with more moderate rebel groups.

It was Sept. 16. The two Spaniards had almost made it to safety. Journalists Javiar Espinosa and Ricardo García, as well as their escorts, fighters with the Free Syrian Army, were hardly 15 minutes by car from the Turkish border when they were stopped at the last checkpoint within Syrian territory and abducted.

Some of their escorts were subsequently freed. From them, it is known that the men at the checkpoint were members of the extremist rebel group “Islamic State of Iraq and Syria” (ISIS).

The two Spaniards were a big catch for the radical Islamists. Since early last summer, ISIS and other extremist groups have apparently shifted their strategy and begun targeting foreign reporters for abduction. On Tuesday, Ayman Mhanna, executive director of the Beirut-based SKeyes Center for Media and Cultural Freedom, said that 20 foreign journalists are being held captive in Syria. Some of the missing journalists are in the hands of the regime, he added, but the majority are captives of extremist groups.

And these are not the only missing reporters. In addition to foreign journalists, Mhanna says, about 10 Syrian journalists have been kidnapped and are being held. Since fighting broke out in the spring of 2011, roughly 55 journalists have lost their lives in Syria.