Displaying posts published in

March 2022

A Sleepwalker Stumbles on the Right Answer Peter O’Brien

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2022/03/a-sleepwalker-stumbles-on-the-right-answer/

As I write there are signs that Putin may be prepared to limit his ambitions and settle for some portion of east Ukraine.  President Zelensky may be prepared to accept a compromise of this nature simply in order to ease the suffering of his people.  That will ease the immediate human problem but the issue will not be resolved.  Putin’s long-term ambitions will not be assuaged.  Ukrainian resentment will not abate. 

But, more critically, Putin has undoubtedly committed war crimes.  Arguably he has committed them before, but this time the West in its customary impotence cannot credibly turn a blind eye.  Could it allow a Putin dominated Russia to remain on the UN Security Council or any other UN organisation?  Could it refrain from prosecuting Putin in the International Court of Justice?  Could it allow Russia to compete in sporting events?  Can we continue to indulge Putin continuing to thumb his nose at the world?

Putin cannot be allowed even the semblance of a victory – we cannot think that if we allow him a face-saving compromise that will be an end of the matter.

Of course, yes, we tolerate murderous dictators all the time as long as they confine their atrocities to their own people.  But pragmatic indifference can only be stretched so far.  This time Putin has gone beyond his own borders.  Surely this is a red line we cannot compromise. 

The January 6 committee has crossed a massive line in the sand with its attack on the Thomases; Republicans need to respond accordingly. Policy task forces won’t cut it. By Julie Kelly

https://amgreatness.com/2022/03/28/gop-must-promise-inquisitions-not-meaningless-task-forces/

Using the pretext of the so-called insurrection on January 6, 2021, the long knives are out for Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Post-election text exchanges between Mrs. Thomas and Mark Meadows, President Trump’s chief-of-staff, recently were leaked by the January 6 select committee to none other than the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward, who darkly described the communications as proof that “Ginni Thomas used her access to Trump’s inner circle to promote and seek to guide the president’s strategy to overturn the election result.”

The small cache of texts—29 total—shows Thomas expressing frustration at the election’s outcome. There is nothing sinister, and certainly nothing criminal, about the messages.

But like everything related to the events of January 6, the truth doesn’t matter. Doubt about the legitimacy of the 2020 election is considered a thoughtcrime and handled as such by Joe Biden’s Justice Department and Congress; CNN reported Monday afternoon that the January 6 select committee led by U.S. Representative Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) now wants to interview Thomas. If she refuses—as she should—it’s highly likely the committee will issue a subpoena to compel her testimony, which it has done in numerous cases.

The poisonous tree of Thompson’s committee is yielding a bumper crop of political fruit for House Democrats and their useful idiots in the Republican Party such as Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.). With little else to run on and a White House in freefall, Democrats think they can sustain enough outrage over January 6 to stem major electoral losses in November.

Support Ukraine & USA Energy Independence by Lawrence Kadish

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18374/ukraine-us-energy-independence

In late 1944, desperate Poles radioed the Allies pleading for weapons to help them stop the Nazis from massacring the citizens of Warsaw.

The Soviet Army was within easy distance of the Polish capital but, for some reason, decided to pause in their deadly offensive against the Third Reich at the exact same time the Poles had risen up against the Nazis. Some historians suggest that the pause was Stalin’s cold-blooded decision to let the Germans destroy the under-armed Polish resistance, whose leaders would have demanded independence when the war was over.

Now, some eighty years later, beleaguered freedom fighters throughout Ukraine are begging for the West to send them more arms so that they may confront and defeat Hitler’s protégé, Russian President Vladimir Putin. If America and NATO fail this test, history will record a craven retreat of democracy that makes our shameful departure from Afghanistan a mere footnote.

There is no room for any equivocation on the part of the Biden White House or members of Congress. We need to face this Russian threat as a united country with a single focus: providing Ukraine with every weapon and every resource this democracy can offer.

US President Joe Biden also needs to hear from those who engineered his political campaign and who still play closeted roles as kitchen cabinet advisors; they have much to say about both domestic and international policy. They too must insist on all available aid to the people of Ukraine.

Is the US Pretending That Iran’s IRGC, “Mother of All Terrorist Groups”, Is Not a Terrorist Group? The Biden Administration’s Never-ending Appeasement of the Mullahs by Majid Rafizadeh

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18375/us-irgc-terrorist-group

“It [the IRGC] is also a chief supporter and enabler of other FTOs and insurgent groups in the region. These organizations include, but are not limited to: Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Houthi insurgency. The IRGC’s actions have led to decades of instability and conflict across the Middle East and the group is responsible for countless deaths, including more than 600 U.S. troops during the occupation of Iraq.” — Letter from 80 Republicans to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Fox News, March 23, 2022.

“In Havlish, et al. v. bin Laden, et al., Judge Daniels held that the Islamic Republic of Iran, its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei, former Iranian president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, and Iran’s agencies and instrumentalities, including, among others, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (‘IRGC’), the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security (‘MOIS’), and Iran’s terrorist proxy Hezbollah, all materially aided and supported al Qaeda before and after 9/11.” — PR Newswire, December 23, 2011.

One of the IRGC’s elite branches, the Quds Force, deploys its proxies and militia groups to attack the interests and assets of the US and its allies in the Middle East, as well as the soft underbelly of the US, Latin America. The Quds Force exerts significant influence, direct or indirect, through a conglomerate of more than 40 militia groups….

“The Iranian Al-Quds Force packs weapons, ammunition and missile technology to Hezbollah in suitcases and puts them on Mahan Air flights…. these planes fly directly to the airport in Lebanon or Damascus and from there the weapons are transferred on the ground to Hezbollah.” — Amb. Danny Danon, then Israeli Ambassador to the UN, from a 2016 letter to UN Security Council members.

The IRGC “continues transferring weapons and drones to terrorist proxies.

The mission of Jihad for the IRGC is unmistakably clear in Iran’s Constitution. Its Preamble states: “the Constitution provides the necessary basis for ensuring the continuation of the Revolution at home and abroad… the Army of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps are to be organized in conformity with this goal, and they will be responsible not only for guarding and preserving the frontiers of the country, but also for fulfilling the ideological mission of (Shiite) jihad in God’s way; that is, extending the sovereignty of God’s (Shiite) law throughout the world in the hope that this century will witness the establishment of a universal holy government and the downfall of all others.” [Emphasis added.]

“These assessments, combined with the IRGC’s lengthy history of killing hundreds of Americans… make it clear: The IRGC is a terrorist organization and should remain labeled as such…. The pursuit of an ill-conceived ‘deal’ should not compel American leaders to acquiesce to the demands of a terrorist regime to deny the truth. American lives are at stake, and this is a time to project strength, not weakness.” — Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, former National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien and former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, joint statement, Axios, March 22, 2022.

To appease the ruling mullahs of Iran, the Biden administration in January 2021 first suspended some of the anti-terrorism sanctions on Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthis that the Trump administration had imposed. Soon after, the Biden administration revoked the designation of the Houthis as a terrorist group. Since then, the Houthis have been attacking their neighbors, as recently as this week.

DERANGED: These Libs Are Denouncing Trump’s Role in Will Smith’s Oscars Assault on Chris Rock “Will Smith and Trump are the same guy.” Andrew Stiles

https://freebeacon.com/culture/will-smith-chris-rock-donald-trump/

Will Smith, a prominent Scientologist and Democratic donor best known for co-writing the hit song “Gettin’ Jiggy wit It,” shocked the civilized world on Sunday by slapping the s—t out of comedian Chris Rock at the Oscars.

Libs were flummoxed. Should they be outraged? Was it racist? A number of Democratic politicians, including “Squad” member Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D., Mass.), initially applauded Smith’s violent outburst, which came in response to Rock making a joke about the actor’s nominal wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D., N.Y.) tweeted, then deleted, the following take: “Teachable Moment: Don’t joke about a Black Woman’s hair.”

Doing what comes naturally, a number of libs reacted by denouncing former president Donald Trump for his role in the slapping incident. “So did like anyone walk out after that happened???” wrote Asha Rangappa, the CNN analyst best known for doxxing a Washington Free Beacon intern. “Or are we getting an independent psychological case study on how Trump got normalized?”

Steve Schmidt, the schlubby Lincoln Project cofounder who once compared himself to the soldiers who stormed the Normandy beaches on D-Day, offered a similar assessment. “Do you want to understand how Trump happened? Watch the Oscars and the crowd reaction,” he wrote. “Applause for assault in a tuxedo in California is the same as applause for assault while wearing a red hat in Alabama.”

Howard Stern, the former anti-establishment shock jock turned boring liberal scold, suggested (without evidence) that “Will Smith and Trump are the same guy.” The fact that Smith, who would go on to accept the best actor award for his role in King Richard, did not face any meaningful consequences for his actions was an example of “how Trump gets away with shit,” Stern said.

Left-wing radio host Dean Obeidallah used the violent outburst as an opportunity to complain that “Donald Trump [has] still NOT been criminally charged for his attempted coup and his role in the Jan 6 terrorist attack.” It is almost as if America’s libs have developed an unhealthy addiction to the constant outrage and anxiety they felt during Trump’s presidency, and miss him even more than his biggest fans.

Smith and his wife, who have said they are in an open marriage, were among the campaign bundlers who raised at least $500,000 for former president Barack Obama’s reelection campaign in 2012, along with disgraced Hollywood rapist Harvey Weinstein.

Putin Finds Some Unlikely Allies in the United States Congress The Squad and the Democratic Socialists of America. Robert Spencer

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/03/putin-finds-some-unlikely-allies-united-states-robert-spencer-0/

Everyone knows that The Squad in the House of Representatives is so far to the Left as to make Stalin look like a John Bircher, but would they go so far as to cheerlead for a former KGB man’s war of aggression? It looks as if the answer is yes.

“The Democrats,” Stephen Kruiser observed on Feb. 21, “were lurching leftward long before the arrival of AOC and her gang. What they’ve done though is help drag the party so far to the lunatic fringe left that whatever passes for center with them these days is probably somewhere in Cuba.” Or, say, Moscow. Putin, after all, has called the fall of the Soviet Union a “tragedy” for “most citizens,” and said it was “the greatest geopolitical disaster of the 20th century.”

In October 2020, Putin praised the Democrat Party for being “traditionally closer to the so-called liberal values, closer to Social Democratic ideas, if compared to Europe. And it was from the Social Democratic environment that the Communist Party evolved.” He went on to reveal: “I still like many of these left-wing values. Equality and fraternity. What is bad about them? In fact, they are akin to Christian values. Yes, they are difficult to implement, but they are very attractive, nevertheless.”

What’s for a good Squad member not to like in all that, except maybe the reference to detested “Christian values”? And so the New York Postreported Saturday that “comrades in ‘The Squad’ have bent over backwards in the House of Representatives to defend Vladimir Putin, voting against sanctions on Russian oil and parroting Kremlin talking points.”

NATO Needs a Reset The Ukraine conflict highlights the long-evident dysfunctions of the treaty. Bruce Thornton

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/03/nato-needs-reset-bruce-thornton/

Last week Joe Biden and his foreign policy team attended the NATO Heads of State and Government summit in Brussels. This gathering was more consequential than usual given the ongoing brutal war Russia is waging against Ukraine. Though Ukraine is not a member of NATO, this conflict on the borders of several NATO nations highlights the long-evident dysfunctions of the treaty, some of which are only now being acknowledged.

Yet little went on last week to suggest that NATO member-states are serious about making the deep reforms that should have taken place in the decade after the Cold War ended.

The official NATO statement was certainly filled with “rules-based international order” clichés typical of large bureaucracies suffering from professional deformation and fossilized narratives. It spoke of Russia’s “assault on international norms” that don’t exist, any more than the “international community” it implies will “hold accountable those responsible for violations of humanitarian and international law, including war crimes.” No more substantial are phrases like the “values and norms that have brought security and prosperity”; or “the foundations of international security and stability”; or the “international order including the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity, as enshrined in the UN Charter.”

In reality, all these laws, institutions, and principles are the result of treaties made among sovereign nations that join them not because of shared “norms” or “values,” but because they serve those nations’ interests. And when a treaty stops doing so, those nations will ignore or violate them. That fact of history calls into doubt the statement’s claim that “Our commitment to Article 5 of the Washington Treaty is iron-clad.”

Biden denies saying every bad, stupid, scary thing he said last week By Andrea Widburg

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/03/biden_denies_saying_every_bad_stupid_scary_thing_he_said_last_week.html

As every media outlet in the world reported last week, Joe Biden said three remarkable things: That America’s military would be heading into Ukraine, that it was possible America would use chemical weapons, and that Putin needed to be removed from power, which presumably either a call for Putin’s assassination or for regime change (which Putin probably wouldn’t survive). In each case, the White House went into emergency damage control. Now, though, Biden denies saying any one of those things. Is this a broken brain or his usual narcissistic dishonesty?

One of the coolest things about malignant narcissism, if you happen to be the narcissist, is that you never tell a lie. It’s possible other people might perceive you as lying or even accuse you of lying, but the fact is that you never lie—and you have the passed lie detector tests to prove it.

You see, the deal about being a malignant narcissist is that there is only one truth: Yours. Whatever you need to say at any given moment, either to achieve an advantage or to protect yourself, instantly becomes the one, the only, the absolute truth.

That’s the world in which Biden, a compulsive liar, has always existed. However, when he was one Senator among many—especially among many who shared the same trait—his chronic lying was less obvious. For most people, it first burst into view during his 1987 run for the presidency, when he told a series of lies about his educational abilities and plagiarized a speech from a British politician.

After that, “Joe Biden lies” was a known fact but most people ignored it.

Swimming with Dolphins Ban – Regulatory Overreach? By Janet Levy

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/03/swimming_with_dolphins_ban__regulatory_overreach.html

“The stark arbitrariness of the ban is evident from the following: a) spinner dolphins are abundant around Hawaii, and there is no evidence of a population decline; b) dolphins, as is well known, are friendly and approach humans for benign, exuberant interactions; c) the ban applies only to tourism-related businesses, while the captive dolphin industry is exempt from it; and d) military activities, which might endanger dolphins with shelling, sonar, and underwater explosions, are also exempt.”

Who decides whether you may or may not swim with dolphins?  You may think this is determined by some environment-related law, made by elected representatives who constitute the legislature.  But the generalities of law are often translated into the specifics of practice through rules and regulations made and enforced by officials.  Not all these officials answer to the checks and balances of the democratic process.  Therein lies the scope for them to further political agendas or the interests of pressure groups unsanctified by the ballot, which alone represents the will of the people of America.  It is for this reason that a landmark lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of an arbitrary ban on human-dolphin interactions in Hawaii gains importance.

President Biden proposes a punitive wealth tax, and the AP dutifully publishes a puff piece saying how great Biden’s economic policies are By Jack Hellner

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/03/president_biden_proposes_a_punitive_wealth_tax_and_the_ap_dutifully_publishes_a_puff_piece_saying_how_great_bidens_economic_policies_are.html

Either the media is full of economic illiterates, or they don’t care about the truth as they seek to influence voters.

The proposal includes taxing unrealized capital gains which are not income. The tax would destroy investment and cause stock prices to go down. The collapse in stock prices would harm everyone because public pensions will be harmed, leaving government entities trolling for higher taxes.

It is not as if Musk, Buffet, Gates, Bezos, and other billionaires have billions sitting around waiting to pay taxes. They would have to sell assets and they would be inclined to move more investments overseas, which would contribute to economic decline.

There are two sensible, easy ways, to get more money from billionaires.

The first is to only allow the billionaires to deduct their cost, instead of market value, for charitable contributions. Allowing them to deduct market value makes us subsidize them.

The other sensible, appropriate way is to finally tax hedge fund billionaires, like George Soros, at ordinary income tax rates instead of at a lower special rate. From the Associated Press:

The fading of the pandemic and the growth has enabled the deficit to fall from $3.1 trillion in fiscal 2020 to $2.8 trillion last year and a projected $1.4 trillion this year. That deficit spending paid off in the form of the economy expanding at a 5.7% pace last year, the strongest growth since 1984. But inflation at a 40-year high also accompanied those robust gains as high prices have weighed on Biden’s popularity.