Overcoming Obama’s Neglect of Latin America : Senator (R-FL) Marco Rubio

As the Summit of the Americas approaches, we again see that dictators have more sway over its agenda than democracies. Not that long ago, when the Western Hemisphere’s leaders would gather at the Summit of the Americas, the only price of admission was to be the duly elected representatives of democratic nations.

In recent summits, that democratic requirement has been tested, as Latin American leaders who came to power by winning elections then became authoritarian rulers who have weakened democratic institutions, taken over media outlets, arrested or intimidated political opponents, and stolen elections. As the next Summit gets underway in Panama this weekend, that democratic prerequisite is sadly being fully discarded as Cuban dictator Raúl Castro participates for the first time. Allowing a brutal dictator to attend undermines the future of democracy in the region.

Already we’ve seen more evidence of the summit’s being influenced by Cuba than of Cuba’s being influenced by the summit’s principles supporting democracy. This past weekend, members of Cuba’s real civil society were subjected by Panamanian authorities to questionable detentions, searches, and threats “to not make any trouble.” Then on Wednesday afternoon, a group of Cuban dissident leaders and American citizens supporting them were attacked in Panama City by agents of the Castro regime.

Why Palestinians in Yarmouk Are Unlucky by Khaled Abu Toameh

For Palestinian Authority (PA) leaders, the desire to punish Israel is stronger than the will to save the lives of thousands of Palestinians being killed in Syria by the Islamic State and starved by the Syrian army, which has been besieging Yarmouk for 700 days.

Instead of devoting their energies and efforts to stop the massacres in Yarmouk, PA officials were busy preparing a new draft resolution to be submitted to the UN Security Council, establishing a timeline for ending Israeli “occupation.”

The Arab foreign ministers who met in Cairo earlier this week to discuss ways of backing the new Palestinian bid, deliberately ignored that, as they were chatting and sipping coffee, Palestinians were being slaughtered and forced to flee their homes in Yarmouk.

For the PA, Jews participating in a marathon seems to be more serious and life-threatening than Islamic State terrorists beheading Palestinians and destroying Palestinian homes in Yarmouk.

“All that is left for us to do is howl, slap and cry.” — Ashraf al-Ajrami, former Palestinian Authority minister.

As Palestinians were being killed and beheaded by Islamic State terrorists in the Yarmouk refugee camp near Damascus over the past week, Palestinian leaders once again proved that delegitimizing and isolating Israel is more important than caring about their people.

BRENDAN O’NEILL:YARMOUK EXPOSES THE CALLOUS DOUBLE STANDARDS OF UGLY ISRAEL BASHERS ****

f there were an award for double standards, for getting crazily angry about some people’s behaviour while turning a blind eye to other people’s behaviour, anti-Israel activists would win it every year.

These are people who take to the streets to march and holler whenever an Israeli warplane leaves its hangar, yet who say next to nothing about the militarism of France, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and too many other states to mention.

They bang on endlessly about Israel being an apartheid state, yet through BDS they have created a system of cultural apartheid. In their eyes, culture created by us, or by China, or by Zimbabwe, is fine, but culture produced by them, those nasty Israelis, must be hounded out of theatres and galleries lest it infect us all with its contagious Zionism.

These are activists who cry “Censorship!” when a conference of theirs is pulled, as happened at Southampton University recently. Yet they spend the rest of their time agitating for the No Platforming of Israeli representatives on campus and for the shutting down of pro-Israel university societies. “Free speech! (For nice people like me, not for rotters like you)” — that’s their fantastically hypocritical motto.

And now we can see that their double standards extend even to the people they claim to care for: the Palestinians.

Even here, even on the question of Palestinian suffering, anti-Israel activists only care some of the time. If you’re a Palestinian whose life is made harder by Israeli forces, they’ll share pictures of you, march in the streets for you, write tear-drenched tweets about you. But if you’re a Palestinian under threat from a non-Israeli force, forget about it. You’re on your own.

This has become clear in recent days, following reports that the Islamic State’s deathly grip now reaches into the Palestinian refugee camp of Yarmouk in Syria.

DANIEL GREENFIELD: THE CLOSING OF THE LIBERAL MIND

Suppose that you are a Soviet agent in 1955. Your cover is that of an insurance salesman.

Of your two “jobs”, the Soviet agent part is more important, but you need to be a good insurance salesman to maintain your cover

Being a good insurance salesman doesn’t clash with being a good Communist, because your job selling life insurance allows you to pursue your real job. And you cannot conflate the two jobs. You can’t sell insurance to your KGB bosses or pitch Communism to your insurance prospects. If you do that, then worlds will collide.

But if Communism is on the way up, then you can stop selling insurance and tell everyone who walks into your office that Communism is their best insurance. You are no longer a Communist who sells insurance. You are just a Communist running an insurance agent’s office.

Lies, Damned Lies and a Fabricated Fatwa:Ruthie Blum

On April 2, U.S. President Barack Obama issued a statement on the “framework to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.”

The commander-in-chief was positively cheerful when he took to the podium in the Rose Garden to announce that a framework for a deal between the P5+1 countries and the Islamic Republic had finally been reached, “after many months of tough, principled diplomacy.”

He then went on to assure the American people that “it is a good deal, a deal that meets our core objectives.” He described it as an agreement that “would cut off every pathway that Iran could take to develop a nuclear weapon,” claiming, “Iran will face strict limitations on its program, and Iran has also agreed to the most robust and intrusive inspections and transparency regime ever negotiated for any nuclear program in history.”

In the same vein, Obama depicted the many “achievements” of the framework agreement in a positive light, and declared that it was going to make the whole world, including Israel, more secure.

Before he and his European counterparts had a chance to pop the cork, however, the leadership in Tehran was calling the American version of the framework forged in Lausanne that day utterly false. Indeed, on every single point, the Islamic republic had a completely different interpretation from the West of the “fact sheets.”

This is just as well, since even the deal as presented by the U.S. is a disaster. Still, it does impose some restrictions on Iran’s ability to build an atom bomb out in the open.

It is impossible to ascertain which side in this farce is lying and which is engaged in wishful thinking, but it doesn’t take an Iranian rocket scientist to make an educated guess. One thing we do know is that the U.S. president is still spreading the following fabrication: “Since Iran’s supreme leader has issued a fatwa [religious Islamic degree] against the development of nuclear weapons, this framework gives Iran the opportunity to verify that its program is, in fact, peaceful.”

AMB.(RET.)YORAM ETTINGER: THE IRAN CHALLENGE- IS THERE ANOTHER WAY?

President Obama asserted on April 2, 2015 that he was ready to conclude an agreement with the Ayatollahs “only if Iran came to the table in a serious way.” On April 6, 2015, Obama stated that it would be “a fundamental misjudgment” to precondition an agreement with the Ayatollahs upon the transformation of the nature of their regime.

Indeed, the Ayatollahs must come to the table in a serious way for an effective agreement to be concluded – advancing peaceful coexistence, rather than fueling violence. However, “a serious (peace-driven) way,” on the one hand, and the nature of the Ayatollahs, on the other hand, constitutes an oxymoron.

The well-documented nature of the Ayatollahs consists of: Islamic supremacy; violent intolerance of the Christian and Jewish “infidel;” apocalyptic and megalomaniac worldview and policies; worshipping martyrdom/suicide bombing; ruthless domestic repression; hate-education in K-12; sponsorship of global Islamic terrorism; subversion and terrorism against all pro-US Arab regimes; collaboration with all anti-US regimes; nuclear cooperation and co-development of long-range ballistic capabilities with North Korea, a rogue nuclear power; expansion of economic, military, gas and nuclear cooperation with Russia, which collaborates with Iran in Syria and Yemen; undermining the US position in Latin America via the enhancement of economic, military and gas cooperation with Venezuela and Bolivia, which supply uranium to Iran, as well as overall cooperation with Argentina and uranium-rich Ecuador; demonization of the USA in schools, media and mosques – “the Great Satan;” celebration of the November 4 “Death to America Day;” systematic non-compliance with agreements through the art of nuclear concealment, double-talk and deception (Taqiyyah).

LEADING BY EXAMPLE: THE PRESIDENT INSTALLS GENDER NEUTRAL BATHROOM: BY CLINTON GILLESPIE

The White House announced that staff and visitors will be able to use a new gender-neutral restroom right next to the West Wing.

Valerie Jarrett, Senior Adviser to President Obama, announced in an editorial in The Advocate that the president is determined to lead by example. “We have closely examined our internal policies on everything from benefits, to restroom access, to how we invite people to events, to ensure that everyone who enters this building feels safe and fully respected,” she said.

The announcement came a day after President Obama’s executive order, that he signed on July 21, 2014, came into effect that requires federal contractors not to fire anyone based on their sexual orientation.

“This will effectively prevent any company that does business with the government from firing an employee based on who they are or who they love,” Jarrett said.

Israel’s Cuban Missile Crisis: Jack Engelhard

Americans barely remember the time they had their own nuclear crisis and how then US president, John F. Kennedy, dealt with it.
Reclining comfortably here in the United States, Americans are apt to wonder why the panic in Israel.

Details of the deal hatched between the Obama Administration and the ayatollahs over Iran’s nuclear program are still in flux except for this:

Iran gets to keep its missiles and this has Israel terrified, as once we were terrified.

Political differences were set aside between ourselves when we faced the Cuban Missile Crisis and today even the hard Left in Israel joins the Netanyahu Administration in expressing fear and loathing if, as appears to be the case, Iran’s ICBM’s stay poised toward the Jewish State.

What’s missing for a Nuclear Catastrophe? A single device and, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned, “They’re getting it – a free path to the bomb.”

Jihadist Dzhokhar Tsarnaev: Convicted — on The Glazov Gang

Jihadist Dzhokhar Tsarnaev: Convicted — on The Glazov Gang
The true reason why an Islamic terrorist was convicted that you won’t hear about.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2015/frontpagemag-com/jihadist-dzhokhar-tsarnaev-convicted-on-the-glazov-gang/

Sweden Surrenders to Saudi Arabia by Ingrid Carlqvist and Lars Hedegaard

The Swedish Prime Minister added that Sweden has no intention of ever criticizing Islam. As is customary, Expressen refrained from asking the PM if his comments should be taken as an indication that Sweden would stop criticizing such Islamic practices as torturing bloggers, executing infidels and oppressing women.

It is hard to say what concessions Sweden may have given King Salman in exchange for normalizing relations. Sweden may even have agreed to further the cause of Islam back home by, for example, promising to build new mega-mosques and giving greater influence to local imams.

Sweden’s Minister for Culture and Democracy, Alice Bah Kuhnke, has already promised to initiate a “national strategy against Islamophobia” — meaning any criticism of Islam or mass immigration.

If the Swedish-Saudi deal is as conjectured, Saudi Arabia will have obtained de facto veto power over Sweden’s foreign policy — and perhaps its domestic policies.