RUTHFULLY YOURS

The following essay is adapted from Mark’s book A Song For The Season:

In the weeks after September 11th, several commentators wanted to know why everyone was singing “God Bless America” rather than the national anthem. The song was everywhere in those early days, and various musicologists were called upon to speculate learnedly on why this song had caught the public mood: Perhaps “The Star-Spangled Banner” requires too great a range, perhaps its complex use of melismas demands a professional vocalist, etc, etc.

All irrelevant. The reason the nation sang “God Bless America” is its first seven words. “The Star-Spangled Banner” is about a historic event; “America The Beautiful” is (principally) about the topography; but when it comes to the nation, Irving Berlin said it simplest and said it best:

God Bless America
Land that I love.

Berlin was a contemporary of Cole Porter, Ira Gershwin and Lorenz Hart, but, unlike those sophisticated rhymesters, only he could have written those words without embarrassment. As Jule Styne, the composer of “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” once said to me about Berlin, “It’s easy to be clever. The really clever thing is to be simple” – to say it directly, unaffectedly, unashamedly:

God Bless America
Land that I love.

It was the song which members of Congress broke into spontaneously, and charmingly raggedly, on the steps of the Capitol. Sung on Federal property in normal circumstances, Berlin’s words would be considered religious enough to attract a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union:

Stand beside her
And guide her
Through the night
With a light from above…

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/irans-dhimmi-conference-in-washington-dc?f=puball
John Hajjar is a member of the Executive Committee of the Middle East Christian Committee MECHRIC a coalition of Assyrian, Syriac, Chaldean, Maronite, Coptic, Melkite and other Middle East Christian NGOs www.Mechric.org

How Iran, Assad and Hezbollah are using Christian persecution by ISIS to hijack the minorities

On September 9, 2014, a conference organized by the newly formed group “In Defense of Christians” (IDC), will be addressing the issue of “persecution of Christians in the Middle East at the hands of ISIS.” The event is very well funded and a sophisticated outreach has been mobilizing Mideast Christian churches in the United States over the past few months to participate in great numbers. The board of IDC includes prominent citizens, former government officials, and experts in the field of international religious freedom. The context of the conference, with one day in Congress and another day at a DC hotel is very appealing to the public. Christians in northern Iraq were ethnically cleansed from Mosul back in June and from the Nineveh plain–the last geographical enclave for Christian Assyrians, Chaldeans and Syriacs in Iraq–in July. More than 400,000 Christians are refugees in Kurdistan with no immediate hope for a return home. Scores of Christians have been killed, raped, and kidnapped by the Jihadists of ISIS, as were Yazidis and other Iraqis. Christians of Iraq and Syria–and before there, in Egypt–have been under persecution and submitted to violence for the past few years. In short, the cause is a good one, and most of the official workers for such a conference are well intentioned. However, the American public must be informed: while the narrative of IDC is directed at ISIS violence, the conference is intentionally or not, profiting the Iranian and Syrian regimes and Hezbollah.

Readers may be stunned by this assertion, but here are the facts and some of the evidence:

Iranian Christians Absent
The conference is surely condemning the Jihadists of ISIS, but it is ignoring the oppression by the Iranian regime against its own Christian community, particularly the Iranian Persian Christians. Many Americans are aware of the horrific jailing in Iran of Pastor Saeed Abidini whose only crime was his conversion to Christianity. With countless other pastors and activists assassinated, tortured, and jailed for years, an “In Defense of Christians” conference in Washington should at a minimum invite Iranian Christian dissidents and victims to testify about the Ayatollahs regime’s brutality against the community. Obviously, there are Christians who work with the Khomeinist regime inasmuch as there were French collaborating with the Nazis in WWII or “official churches” under the Soviet Bloc. Free Iranian Christians have not been seen at the IDC meetings.

Assad’s War on Christians Ignored
The Assad regime’s massive brutality against Lebanon’s Christian community during the war of 1975-1990 has nowhere been cited at the conference. Neither is the torture, jailing and assassinations of hundreds of Christian citizens, politicians and journalists under Syrian occupation between 1990 and 2005 included. Two Christian presidents, many Christian ministers, members of parliament, and students were killed by the Assad regime, but the conference has ignored this tragedy and no speaker is slated to address the issue. In addition, the Christians who are opposing Bashar Assad were not invited while those who claim he protects them are omnipresent.

Hezbollah Terror Deleted
Hezbollah, a violent pro-Iranian organization on the US terror list that has eliminated, kidnapped and threatened Lebanese Christians (as well as members from other communities) will not be condemned. Victims of its violence and terror are not scheduled to speak.

Barrack Hussein Obama is the example of what happens when the mightiest nation on earth elects a politician whose worldview is to naively make the world a level playing field.

America goes into reverse and “leads from behind.” He goes on An apology tour to the Muslim folk and tell them America is out of there, and they are free to conduct their own business, free of American interference. No more good side or bad side. Let’s push the “reset” button with Russia. Assad is “a reformer” and the world is “a global village” according to his Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. “Bin Laden is dead, General Motors is alive, and Al-Qaida is on the run.” There is no such thing as Islamic terror. Let’s throw Mubarak under the bus to give Egyptians democracy and, just to show our good intentions, let’s invite the Muslim Brotherhood into the White House. Let’s set red lines in Syria and if they use their chemical weapons again our response will be, according to John Kerry, “incredibly small.”

Always the charmer, Obama has been out-charmed by a smiling Rouhani face that disguises an Iranian on-going pursuit of nuclear missiles. Replacing Ahmadinajad abusive rhetoric with a Tehran grin has lulled the Obama Administration as the Iranians run down the clock to breakout time.

America has a president that has been shackled by an early presentation of the Nobel Peace Prize which was given more as a warning than an award for peacemaking. Received gladly, it now weighs heavy on the thin chest of a lightweight president.

So when Russia invades Ukraine, Obama manages a verbal bluster and nothing of substance. Releasing some of the worst Islamic terrorists from Guantanamo to plan and wreak havoc on the West was a kind-hearted gesture that the world will live to regret.

We are already regretting the Obama insistence of pulling US troops out of Iraq. Leading from behind in Libya and Syria, and putting a misplaced faith in a Shiite Maliki government in Iraq, has left a vacuum that has been gruesomely filled by an Islamic horror the world has never known since the brutal days of Mohammad, who slaughtered his way across the Arabian and Jewish worlds.

Let’s be honest, the brand of terrorism we are witnessing was unleashed by the wealthy fat cats of today’s Islamic world from Iran to Qatar, from Turkey to Saudi Arabia who set Wahhabism, the Muslim Brotherhood, Al-Qaida, and ISIS on their path of mayhem and murder in the name of Allah and Mohammed.

While Barack Obama spends so much of his time on golf courses, some 14 million Americans are the ones who want to take a Mulligan.

Extrapolating from Obama’s record-low approval rating of 38 percent (via Gallup last week), compared with his 51 percent share of the vote in the 2012 election (he received nearly 66 million votes), that’s how many Americans actually pulled the lever for Obama but now think he’s doing a lousy job.

Americans would need to take a Clintonian number of policy Mulligans just to start putting the world and our country back in order. And since the real world doesn’t allow do-overs, we’ll need to “play the ball as it lies” — from the deep rough into which Obama has driven us. The question thus becomes what steps the United States should take — and will be able to take once Obama and Harry Reid are no longer standing in the way — to create a world more akin to what novelist Walker Percy once described as the “pleasant licit fairways and the sunny irenic greens” of peace and prosperity.

Herewith, then, a set of rescue clubs:

First, to take just the first step in countering a problem George Will reasonably calls “more dangerous than the Islamic State,” namely the emergence of Russian fascist hegemonism, the United States should take the advice of (amazingly enough) New Jersey senator Robert Menendez and arm Ukraine, very quickly, with “sophisticated weapons.” We should further arm the Baltics and other Eastern European nations, too, along with providing the missile-defense systems we once promised. And domestically, we should ramp up as many kinds of energy production as possible, as quickly as possible, while removing as many of Obama’s hindrances thereto as possible — the better to provide Europe cheaper, more abundant energy supplies so it can forswear oil from Russia. (A regime of sanctions won’t be effective against Putin unless Europe feels confident that Russia can’t do much, economically, to fight back.)

Second, the United States must begin treating the Islamist State as a mortal threat. Congress should officially declare war against it. (It calls itself a state, and it controls a large swath of territory, so we should treat it as a state actor via an official declaration of war, thus letting Congress assert its constitutional role in the process.) In addition to air strikes, we should send Special Forces against it. And we should use every arrow in our diplomatic quiver to pressure other Arab states (note: this excludes Iran) to use all their might, behind our leadership, to crush the barbarians out of existence.

If you haven’t heard of this post-industrial town of 258,000 in South Yorkshire, England, you should have. If you have heard of the town and its scandal, but its memory is already beginning to fade, don’t let it. What happened in Rotherham is but one example of what is happening throughout much of the world by young Muslim men – terrorists and those who are just twisted – who have abducted young girls that come from poor – sometimes illiterate – and often broken families. The girls, who are usually Christian, are gang-raped, beaten, threatened and turned into “sex slaves.” In denying what is happening – if we in the West don’t get off our politically correct horse – we are all going to be taken on a ride to a land where no civilized person wants to go.

For years, city council members and local police in Rotherham played the game of “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.” Officials allowed Muslims of Pakistani heritage to sexually exploit young, poor, white Christian girls – some no more than eleven. According to a recent report in The Economist, three reports over the past twelve years had been commissioned by the Rotherham City Council to investigate allegations of sexual abuse by these men. Those reports found that young girls were being exploited and the men accused had also been involved in “gun crimes and drug-dealing.” But one report was suppressed because senior officers disbelieved the data; and the other two were ignored. Local officials were concerned they “might be fingered as racists.” Consequently, for over a decade Muslim perverts plied young girls with alcohol and drugs, gang-raped and beat them, told them their families would be killed if what happened got out, and then trafficked them to other cities. The young men had no fear from authorities. They were protected by a culture of political correctness that prevented the police from confronting them. At least 1,400 young girls were subjected to these criminal acts over a 16-year period. In an article last week, the New York Times reported that the police in Rotherham referred to the girls as “tarts” and that their abuse was a “lifestyle choice.” Rapists were noted as “boyfriends.”

What finally brought this story to light was an investigative report by Andrew Norfolk of The Times of London (a Robert Murdock paper). That report, belatedly, prompted the Rotherham City Council to hire an independent investigator, which they did in the person of Alexis Jay. Professor Jay is visiting professor at University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. She was formerly the Chief Social Work Advisor to the Scottish Government. Her report, as one commentator wrote, was not for the squeamish. Following its release, both the city council head and police chief resigned.

What’s worse than a United Nations agency that provides massive welfare and support services to a Palestinian enclave run by terrorists?

Well, how about having that same agency run by a loquacious Swiss national who apparently believes that UN “neutrality” consists of blaming Israel for the local mayhem, while ignoring the terrorists?

That’s pretty much the scene right now at UNRWA, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. Following the latest bout of war between Israel and the Hamas terrorists who rule Gaza, UNRWA’s Swiss commissioner-general, Pierre Krahenbuhl, has been talking and tweeting about a “crying need for financial assistance to help the people of Gaza.” Krahenbuhl has also been accusing Israel of war crimes, and calling for Israel to be immediately and thoroughly investigated and called to account (as I detailed in “The U.N.’s Grotesque Gaza Inquiry,” the UN Human Rights Council is delighted to oblige). Krahenbuhl wants to address “underlying causes” — by which he apparently means Israel’s attempts to protect itself against Hamas rocket and mortar bombardments and miles of attack tunnels that were dug (right under UNRWA’s nose) from Gaza into Israel.

It appears to have escaped Krahenbuhl’s attention that Israel ended its occupation of Gaza in 2005, and that this enclave so pervasively serviced by UNRWA is run by Palestinian terrorists — variously trained and bankrolled by the likes of Iran and Qatar. The priorities of Hamas are not the well-being of women and children, or peace and prosperity, or anything of the kind. Hamas specializes in repressive rule (including summary executions), thrives on cultivating hate, and prefers pouring resources into making war on Israel (which Hamas aspires to obliterate), rather than cultivating Gaza as a productive entrepot on the Mediterranean.

UNRWA’s Krahenbuhl runs an agency that is troubling enough for its policies of extending refugee status plus a cornucopia of welfare benefits to succeeding generations of Palestinians — fostering a vast and chronically aggrieved population permanently on the dole. UNRWA has kept itself in business for 64 years by creating its own ever-expanding clientele — now numbering more than 5 million “refugees.” Does Krahenbuhl’s brief also include inserting himself into the complex Middle East scene as an arbiter of policy, war and the complexities of seeking peace in the Middle East?

“Hold On, They Got a White Dude” in Memphis Posted By Colin Flaherty

“Hold on, they got a white dude.” And it sure seemed like fun, if the laughing and shrieking on this latest video of black mob violence is any indication.

This racial mayhem happened Saturday night in Memphis at a Kroger’s department store. WMCA Channel 5 out of Jackson, Mississippi picks up the story, all of it except the central organizing feature of the violence: All of the hundreds of people involved in the mayhem and violence are black. Except the victims. They are white:

“Three people were jumped by a large group of teenagers who were chanting “fam mob.” The group, who came from CiCi’s Pizza, reportedly attacked a 25-year-old customer as he left his car to enter Kroger. Two employees, ages 17 and 18, were attacked while trying to stop the fight. Both were “struck several times in the head and face, while being knocked to the ground.” The victims say large pumpkins were thrown at their heads. They both eventually were knocked unconscious.”

However serious it seemed to the victims, the predators and their videographer were having a good time. Laughing and running.

Former prison psychologist Marlin Newburn has been on the front lines of racial violence for more than 30 years. Newburn said the laughing is part of the large scale violence, something he has seen many times before:

“These predators were merely living out their preferred lifestyle, a primary part of the black culture, as opposed to a subculture,” said Newburn. “This lifestyle of one of sadistic and primitive impulse where they believe themselves to be 10 feet tall, bullet proof, very smart, good looking, gifted, and tougher than anyone. If you’re thinking that’s the narcissism common among pre-adolescent children, ages 6 through 12 inclusive, you’d be correct.”

While President Obama dithers about whether to “destroy” ISIS or “manage” them, the Christian left is urging him to engage the butchers in nonviolent, “community-level peace and reconciliation processes.”

The Catholic, Washington-based Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns recently posted a letter addressed to President Obama and other White House officials at the end of August. Signed by 53 national religious groups (including Maryknoll), academics, and ministers, the letter urged the White House to avoid warfare in Iraq by resorting to “a broader set of smart, effective nonviolent practices to engage hostile conflicts.” The strategies are part of “a fresh way to view and analyze conflicts” offered by an emerging ecumenical paradigm called “justpeace” (a cutesy combination of justice and peace). This approach was initiated by the Faith Forum for Middle East Policy, a “network of Christian denominations and organizations working for a just peace in the Middle East.”

The signers expressed their “deep concern” not so much over “the dire plight of Iraqi civilians” being slaughtered by ISIS as “the recent escalation of U.S. military action” in response. “U.S. military action is not the answer,” they claim, sounding a pacifist note common among left-leaning Christians. “We believe that the way to address the crisis is through long-term investments in supporting inclusive governance and diplomacy, nonviolent resistance, sustainable development, and community-level peace and reconciliation processes.”

Good luck with that. It doesn’t take a diplomatic genius to know that ISIS’ response to such flaccid tactics would be the same as the one they delivered recently in a video warning to the U.S.: “We will drown all of you in blood.”

But the left deals in wishful thinking, not reality. Thus the signers affirm, with Pope Francis, that “peacemaking is more courageous than warfare” – a statement that makes a great bumper sticker for Priuses but has no basis in fact. “It is licit to stop the unjust aggressor,” concedes Pope Francis, but “stop” does not mean wage war, which he calls the “suicide of humanity.”

Typical of the blame-America-first left, the letter’s signers faulted “decades of U.S. political and military intervention, coupled with inadequate social reconciliation programs,” for “the current crisis in Iraq.” More violence, they believe, will simply lead to “a continual cycle of violent intervention” that does not address “the root causes of the conflict.” You know that when the left speaks of “root causes,” they mean poverty, social injustice, imperialism – all of the familiar grievances whereby the left legitimizes “freedom fighters” such as ISIS. The left is also fond of the notion of the “cycle of violence” – as if both sides are equally to blame, and if one side takes the bold step to end that cycle, the other side will stop as well.

“We… deeply share the desire to protect people, especially civilians,” the letter continues, but “there are better, more effective, more healthy and more humanizing ways” to do that. Those steps include the following recommendations:

http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/frontpagemag-com/obamas-managing-of-isis-on-the-glazov-gang/

This week’s Glazov Gang was guest hosted by Michael Hausam and joined by Mark Tapson, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, Mike Munzing, a Tea Party Activist and Jennifer Van Laar, a writer at Independent Journal Review.

The guests gathered to discuss Obama’s ‘Managing’ of ISIS, analyzing the Radical-in-Chief’s disdain for American victory:

Obama often boasted that Al Qaeda was on the run. However it was Obama who had been running away from Al Qaeda ever since he took the job.

The botched surge in Afghanistan, where his own intelligence people had told him there were barely a 100 Al Qaeda fighters left, had been an attempt to escape Al Qaeda.

Not the terrorists themselves, but the issues they raised.

September 11 had disrupted the multicultural consensus by raising serious questions about immigration and Islam. It had also thrown away the consensus that the collapse of the USSR had made American military power obsolete. Obama had come to revive these consensuses and as recently as the last election dismissed Romney as a reactionary warmonger who didn’t understand the new world order.

Obama had declared victory over an undefeated enemy. He had passed off a strategic withdrawal as a victory. His wars, victories and withdrawals were a series of blatant lies that are catching up with him.

His administration tried to blame the takeover of Libya by Islamist militias after his disastrous regime change intervention on a YouTube video. But there isn’t a YouTube video big enough to blame ISIS on.

Obama was determined to go on pretending that ISIS didn’t exist. Even while drones were hitting Al Qaeda leaders in Yemen and Pakistan, Al Qaeda in Iraq’s Caliph got a free pass from our drones and our custody. When ISIS took Fallujah, he dismissed it as a JV team. Now he’s trying to build a coalition, but his air strikes are a belated response to a threat that he should have been on top of all along.

Even without boots on the ground, the United States could have continued suppression operations against Al Qaeda in Iraq after the withdrawal. Drones would have ruled out the problem of Americans being tried in Iraq, the supposed reason for the total withdrawal.

A responsible administration wouldn’t have had to scramble for a strategy at the last minute because it would have been on top of the problem all along. But Obama cared more about being able to check the Iraq box and the Al Qaeda box in the election than about stopping the rise of Al Qaeda.