RUTHFULLY YOURS

One great disconnect afflicting American society is between earning a profit and safeguarding our national security. On one side are those who support free trade in the belief that open markets and shared technology trade strengthen the economy. On the other hand, there is something categorically wrong with the free trade paradigm if free trade means selling or sharing technology critical to national security. Then, the cost of free trade is very high, so much so that it could be fatal to the long-term survival of the state.

The United States is justifiably proud of its technological prowess; in fact, much of our military might is based on our superior technical smarts. But is this an artifact of a fast-evaporating past?

Starting in the early 1970s, or even perhaps a little before, the then-Soviet Union embarked on a massive military buildup, committing a huge portion of their Gross National Product (GNP) to military development and production, starting with nuclear weapons and their delivery systems. The Soviet aim was to shift the balance of power between East and West, and secure for the Soviet Union something better than equality with the United States. By threatening to overrun NATO in a general war, the Soviets were looking for economic and political concessions — principally in Europe, although they also promoted a big push in the Middle East, rich in oil and in markets for Soviet military goods.

Now that so many opinions, columns, politicians are focusing on the next appointment to the Supreme Court, let me recommend a book that explains how important it is to replace Antonin Scalia with a learned and principled and genuine Conservative. rsk

“The Supreme Court vs. The Constitution: You don’t have to be a lawyer to understand how Supreme Court Justices have recently substituted their own elitist views for Constitutional guarntees that protect the average American’s security and values”By Gerald Walpin

They’re on a “rampage,” writes Gerald Walpin, one of the country’s top litigators, in his astonishing new book, The Supreme Court Vs. The Constitution.And it takes just five of them to lay waste to the rights of 300 million Americans.

A mostly bare majority of justices of the United States Supreme Court, the only judicial body enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, have spent recent decades reversing, revoking and rescinding the fundamental guarantees of that sacred document to the people of America.

They’ve freed thousands of murderers, rewritten sound and time-tested laws, crippled religious liberty, enabled the spread of pornography and immorality. They have ignored the letter and spirit of the Constitution and its amendments in grabbing power that rightfully belongs to the Executive and Legislative branches, the states − and, ultimately, the people.

Gerald Walpin, who prosecuted criminals and pursued crooked bureaucrats as a federal Inspector General nominated by President George W. Bush and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, and, many years before, as a top prosecutor for the Department Of Justice in New York, dramatically sets out the deliberate push by a bare majority of Supreme Court justices to usurp the role of our country’s elected lawmakers and executives.

The justices time and again seize the rightful authority of those we elect to represent us, and with unchallengeable arrogance undermine the “inalienable rights” that long have made the United States the world’s brightest beacon of freedom, democracy, and personal security.

As if seven years of Obama’s efforts to diminish the world’s superpower were not enough, recent events in the Middle East highlight the need for American leadership capable of righting the ship.

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter’s statement that the U.S. sailors “obviously had misnavigated” two boats into Iran’s territorial waters illustrates the administration’s mindset of blaming America first, as well as its efforts to neuter America’s defense forces.

This was exacerbated by Secretary John Kerry’s thanks and “gratitude to Iranian authorities for their cooperation,” for releasing the ten sailors whose boats were hijacked by the terrorist designated Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Once again he demonstrated his acquiescence to Iran and inaptness to represent America’s interests.

President Obama’s foreign policy in the Middle East thus far, included the enabling of Iran’s nuclear ambitions, accelerating Iranian intervention in the Middle East, and elevating the regime’s influence on the international stage.

Lifting the sanctions and filling the coffers of the terrorist theocracy of Iran with more than $100 billion, not only increased the funding of Iran’s terrorist activities and groups but also served to justify the Iranian Revolution agenda.

Expressions of the regime’s appreciation of these American concessions were exhibited this week by millions who marched in celebration of the 35th anniversary of the Iranian Revolution. The government organized demonstrators carried signs calling for “Death to America” while chanting “Death to Obama” and “Death to Kerry.”

Obama’s illusionary ‘red-line’ on Syria’s chemical weapons was made worse when the U.S. agreed to Assad regime’s demands that limited inspection and controlled the inspectors access even at the sites they were allowed into. While 1,300 metric tons of weapons-grade chemicals were removed from Syria, this was only part of Assad’s arsenal. Some of what was left behind was seized and used by ISIS. But none of that stopped Obama from celebrating his alleged success.

Imagine that it is Dec. 8, 1941, the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor. President Franklin Roosevelt goes before the Congress to request a declaration of war against . . . the Nazis’ SS.

Not the Japanese—they could never occupy the U.S. Not Hitler—we don’t much like him, but he’s not doing the killing. Not the regular Wehrmacht troops, they’re following orders. Not the Nazi Party—they aren’t a direct, physical threat to the U.S. Only the SS, because they are perpetrating the genocide that is the Third Reich’s worst crime.

Then FDR calls up Stalin and Churchill and urges them to quit worrying about German army divisions and the Luftwaffe and Hitler’s munitions factories—and focus only on the SS.

If America had taken that approach to World War II, it would have been utterly nonsensical, yet that is, in effect, how the Obama administration is dealing with the Middle East conflagration: by focusing exclusively on Islamic State.

The murderous jihadists of Islamic State, or ISIS, are only one symptom of a much larger problem in the Middle East. By fixating on this one symptom—rather than its sources—and then trying to convince everyone else in the region to do the same, we are setting ourselves up for failure.

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This very week General James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, testified that Castro’s spies remain a serious security threat to the U.S.:

“The threat from foreign intelligence entities…is persistent, complex, and evolving. Targeting and collection of US political, military, economic, and technical information by foreign intelligence services continues unabated. Russia and China pose the greatest threat, followed by Iran and Cuba…” (General James Clapper, Washington D.C. Feb 9, 2016.)

But two weeks ago (Jan. 26-29th) when the U.S. military’s Southern Command held its annual “Caribbean regional security conference,” senior members of Castro’s KGB-trained spy agency were kindly invited to participate.

“Aw come on, Humberto,” you say! “All nations embed spies in their diplomatic corps, for crying out loud. Let’s give Obama’s people a break on this one. How are they supposed to know which Cubans are the spies? It’s a jungle out there, amigo!”

Good point. Very true. In fact, U.S. intelligence services, regardless of the president they served, do not have an exactly stellar record with regards to Castro. To wit:

“We’ve infiltrated Castro’s guerrilla group in the Sierra Mountains. The Castro brothers and Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara have no affiliations with any Communists whatsoever.” (In Nov. 1958 Havana CIA station Chief Jim Noel, was reacting to warnings from “tacky right-wing Mc Carthyite!” Cubans.)

First- Following the death of a great justice …..In a better world Michael Mukasey would be appointed to the Supreme Court….rsk

Second : The Debate
John Kasich is what we used to call a “goody two shoes” defined as a smugly or obtrusively virtuous person; a goody-goody. He reminds me of Philip Roth’s aunt in “Portnoy’s Complaint” who claimed that her only flaw was being “too good.”

Trump was worse than usual- rude, obnoxious, insulting, void of any real policy gravitas- and his grimaces were clownish. A schoolyard bully and a mud wrestler.

Jeb? He tried gamely to go after Trump but the oaf outshouted him. He was right that the Cruz/Rubio skirmish over a bill that never passed was silly.

Cruz and Rubio were better but Rubio won in delivery, personal message, answers, and foreign policy. It was definitely a comeback.

Ben Carson? Alas….nice guy who finished last.

I remember a lot of people speculating about what would have happened in the world if Jimmy Carter had been elected to a second term. Many believed that the Soviets would have taken advantage of Carter’s weakness and confusion to confront NATO, believing that the U.S. would be paralyzed into inaction.

Something similar could happen today, according to some analysts. Vladimir Putin’s saber-rattling at Turkey could become more than bluster if the Russian strongman doesn’t think that the U.S. and NATO would go to war if Moscow attacked Turkey.

The Russians are beginning military exercises in the region immediately adjacent to their border with Turkey. The exercises are a threat because Russian troops will be on the highest level of alert short of war. And Russian rhetoric aimed at Turkey has become more bellicose as events in the Syrian city of Aleppo may force Turkey to try and intervene in the conflict. With Russian jets pounding rebel positions in and around Aleppo and Syrian and Iranian proxy troops surrounding the city, Turkey may feel it has no choice but to lift the siege of Syria’s largest city.

One of Russia’s most knowledgable and respected defense analysts – a critic of Putin and Russian military policy – offered some insight into what’s going on in Moscow:

Today Pavel Felgenhauer published his analysis under the alarming title, “Russia has begun preparations for a major war,” and he marshals a convincing case that the snap exercises in the country’s southwest are really a cover for a shooting war with Turkey—and therefore with NATO too, if Ankara is perceived as defending itself and can assert its right to Article 5, collective self-defense, which obligates all members of the Atlantic Alliance to come to Turkey’s aid.

Barack Obama’s foreign policy – and by extension Hillary Clinton’s – received a stinging rebuke this week…from Obama’s own intelligence chiefs. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and Lieutenant General Vincent Stewart, head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, gave Congress an assessment of threats around the globe that amounted to a direct indictment of Obama’s failed foreign policies.

Clapper called the dangers currently facing the United States “a litany of doom.” He told the Senate Armed Services Committee, “In my fifty-plus years in the intelligence business, I cannot recall a more diverse array of challenges and crises that we confront as we do today.”

Where have Obama’s policies failed? You might as well put on a blindfold and throw a dart at a map of the world.

On the nuclear accord with Iran, which Obama seems to think is his crowning foreign policy accomplishment, Clapper said that Iran could begin construction of a nuclear weapons program at any time. “Iran probably views the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) as a means to remove sanctions while preserving some of its nuclear capabilities, as well as the option to eventually expand its nuclear infrastructure.”

Tom is a black belt basher of Israel who would gladly blame the Zika virus on the Jewish state. He is also a sniveling coward by his own admission. In his dreadful book “From Beirut to Jerusalem” in 1989 he states:
“There was not a single reporter in West Beirut who did not feel intimidated…no one had any illusions that [the factions] would tolerate much serious reporting.” When an Araft spokesman warned that he was not “friendly”enough to the PLO cause he “lay awake in my bed the whole night worrying that someone was going to burst in and blow my brains all over the wall.” He further states:“the truth is, the Western press coddled the PLO and never judged it with anywhere near the scrutiny that it judged Israeli, Phalangist, or American behavior.” ….. “For any Beirut-based correspondent, the name of the game was keeping on good terms with the PLO, because without it,you would not get the interview with Arafat you wanted when your foreign editor came to town.”

And he is still going strong: An e-pal Mike M, sent me his latest spoor from February 2016: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/10/opinion/the-many-mideast-solutions.html and his comment:

“As usual Friedman blames Israel for the work of the Palestinians. it is not “lack of imagination” that leads all rational people to the idea that withdrawal from Gaza led to the creation of the terrorist base of Hamastan, so further withdrawal will probably lead to further terrorism.Only a coward makes his nasty points in the guise of “questions. ”

Friedman: “Was it the fanatical Jewish settlers determined to keep expanding their footprint in the West Bank and able to sabotage any Israeli politician or army officer who opposed them? Was it right-wing Jewish billionaires, like Sheldon Adelson, who used their influence to blunt any U.S. congressional criticism of Bibi Netanyahu? Or was it Netanyahu, whose lust to hold onto his seat of power is only surpassed by his lack of imagination to find a secure way to separate from the Palestinians?”

p.s. spoor is defined as “1 : a track, a trail, a scent, or droppings especially of a wild animal. rsk