http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/341408 For years, most Americans’ vision of history has been shaped by the New Deal historians. Writing soon after Franklin Roosevelt’s death, Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and others celebrated his accomplishments and denigrated his opponents. They were gifted writers, and many of their books were bestsellers. They have persuaded many Americans — Barack Obama definitely included […]
http://news.yahoo.com/qatar-poet-remains-prison-offensive-verse-072500475.html
PLEASE REMEMBER TO PRONOUNCE THAT “MODERATE” KINGDOM’S NAME CORRECTLY….IT IS “GUTTER’…SERIOUSLY….ASK THE ISLAMODIPLOMATS WHO ARE SO ENCHANTED BY THE OILY EMIRATES….RSK
A poet jailed for a verse considered offensive to Qatar’s ruler harshly denounced the Gulf nation’s legal proceedings on Monday after an appeals court reduced his life sentence but still kept a 15-year prison term.
The rant in court — rare in the tightly controlled Gulf Arab states — underscored the free speech battles across the region as Western-backed authorities take strict measures against perceived political dissident in the wake of the Arab Spring.
From Kuwait to Oman, dozens of people have been arrested in the past year for social media posts deemed insulting to leaders or calling for political forms.
“Unjust,” shouted poet Muhammad ibn al-Dheeb al-Ajami in the heavily guarded courtroom in Qatar’s capita, Doha, after his appeal to drop the conviction was denied. The court, however, cut the life sentence handed down in November and imposed a 15-year term.
Al-Ajami faced specific charges from a poem posted online in 2010 that discussed the traits needed for a good leader — which apparently was seen by authorities as a challenge to Qatar’s emir and the ruling family.
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/02/13/as-americas-credibility-wanes-iran-upgrades-its-nuclear-capacity/
Iran can sometimes be very hard to read, but the announcement that even as talks approach it is installing advanced and more capable centrifuges at its nuclear facility in Natanz doesn’t need much interpreting: Iran isn’t afraid of Barack Obama. The Ayatollahs have looked at the clues, added up the numbers, and come to the conclusion that the President will not use military force as Iran presses forward with its nuclear plans.
One of the clues that lead them to this conclusion is the U.S. decision to cut back the number of aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf region. If Washington were serious, the Iranians believe, we would be building up our naval presence, not drawing it back.
President Obama’s choice of one of the most prominent “Iran doves” in American public life as his new Defense Secretary is also being read in Tehran as a sign of the President’s thinking. Surely, the mullahs appear to believe, if the President were really serious about using force to stop Iran’s nuclear program, he would be appointing someone who isn’t deeply opposed to it. In any case, this kind of appointment is what people overseas often see as a signal. The President may not have meant to send it, but he did.
The announcement of more troop withdrawals from Afghanistan in last night’s SOTU will confirm the already widespread view in Tehran that the U.S. is in retreat and that if Iran hangs tough it can get what it wants. If the U.S. really were gearing up for war, the mullahs would expect to see signs that American forces in the region were strengthening positions rather than standing down by land and by sea.
From Iran’s point of view the Administration also seems to be standing down in Syria. A year ago Washington was full of tough talk: demands that Assad relinquish power, unambiguous statements that he “must go.” America was huffing and puffing—but folded like a cheap suit when it came time to back words with deeds. From an Iranian point of view this sends two very clear signals. First, don’t worry about threats and rhetoric from this White House. When they utter threats, they are just making noise. Assad “must go,” Iran “must stop” its nuclear program. This is just chit-chat; it won’t be followed up by anything other than diplomatic notes.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323384604578323624206553326.html?mod=WSJ_article_MoreIn_Opinion
Who Has Abe’s Back?
Obama leaves doubts whether he fully supports Japan.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s visit to Washington last Friday bore fruit in several ways. In public, both sides emphasized the strength of the alliance and the importance of Japan shouldering more responsibility for global peace and prosperity. In private, Mr. Abe discussed with President Barack Obama Japan’s plans to participate in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade negotiations. Perhaps most encouraging was the Prime Minister’s optimistic message: I am back and so is Japan.
Mr. Abe has enjoyed considerable success in the first two months of his return to power. With the stock market on a tear and his popularity rating above 70%, he has momentum needed to overcome domestic vested interests and commit to trade liberalization. But he also needs the Obama Administration’s support to ensure American interests don’t block Japan’s entry into TPP. That support is still in question, in part because U.S. automakers and unions don’t want to see lower tariffs on Japanese trucks.
The Prime Minister was also focused on shoring up Japan’s security, which depends on the U.S. alliance. In public he only obliquely referred to the long-running conflict over a deal to relocate U.S. bases on Okinawa, but he left little doubt that his government will work to clean up the mess left by the Democratic Party of Japan’s attempt to renegotiate the plan.
China’s challenge over the Senkaku Islands drew the most pointed comments of his visit. In an interview with the Washington Post published as the visit began, and again in a speech to a foreign policy think tank, Mr. Abe stressed that he would not allow Beijing to change the status quo in the East China Sea by force or intimidation. At the same time, the Prime Minister made clear that he is not spoiling for a fight with China. He offered an open hand of cooperation and compromise to Beijing, and he steered clear of controversies over Japan’s wartime history.
http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?url=http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2013/02/life_without_father.html
The research continues to affirm it. The statistics highlight it. But actually reading what young people have to say about the reality of missing dads and overworked but caring mothers confirms it. There is no pretense, and the pain is evident.
After assigning Langston Hughes’s “Thank You Ma’m” and Anthony Brandt’s “My Grandmother: A Rite of Passage” to my college composition class, I asked them to select one of the following writing choices.
Describe a person who has acted as a mother to you. Even though she may not be your biological mother, what makes you see her as a mother-figure? Why do you view her as special?
Do outside research on the importance of fathers in children’s lives. How do mothers and fathers differ in their parenting styles? Why is a father important in a daughter’s life? In a son’s life? Be very specific and make sure you cite your research.
How has the loss of a parent affected your outlook on life? Is the loss a result of divorce, death, separation or desertion? Does it make a difference what caused the loss? In what way?
Here is a part of the selection from a 19-year-old single mom.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323549204578320020544095106.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEFTTopOpinion
GINGRICH MANAGED TO DESTROY ROMNEY IN THE PRIMARIES AND ROVE IS DEAD WRONG….THEY SHOULD BOTH MOVE OVER…..THERE IS PLENTY OF TALENT AND WINNABILITY AMONG NEW REPUBLICANS WITHOUT THEIR SO CALLED WISDOM….RSK
Some notable conservatives have reacted with a fury to Karl Rove’s announcement that he has formed a Super Pac to help nominate “electable” Republicans to the House and Senate in 2014.
Even Newt Gingrich has entered the fray. In a memo to fellow conservatives, the former House Speaker scoffs at the idea of Mr. Rove as kingmaker. “I am unalterably opposed to a bunch of billionaires financing a boss to pick candidates in 50 states,” he writes. “This is the opposite of the Republican tradition of freedom and grassroots small town conservatism. No one person is smart enough nor do they have the moral right to buy nominations across the country.”
http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/02/secretary_kerrys_maiden_speech.html
Stipulating that foreign aid can be an important part of American foreign policy, and further that trade is an important component of U.S. foreign policy; Secretary of State John Kerry made two really important mistakes in his maiden speech, delivered to a fawning audience of American university students.
The first was in the definition of America’s challenges in the second decade of the 21st Century. Mr. Kerry posited:
“Our challenge is to tame the worst impulses of globalization even as we harness its ability to spread information and possibility, to offer even the most remote place on Earth the same choices that have made us strong and free.”
“Our challenge” is, in fact, to defeat the forces of Islamic radicalism that threaten us at home sometimes, and that threaten our friends in the Middle East, Southwest and East Asia all the time. Secular people, Christian people, Jews, women and progressive people in those regions — including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, North Africa, Egypt, Jordan, Nigeria, Mali, Iraq and Turkey, and more — feel the pressure of the Muslim Brotherhood, Salafists, al Qaeda and Taliban forces snuffing out the tentative whiffs of freedom and equality presaged by President Bush’s “democracy agenda” and the now-cold “Arab Spring.” The less-than-optimal “impulses of globalization” are far more benign than the less-than-optimal impulses of a political-religious philosophy that holds the 7th Century to be the apex of human endeavor.
The destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas and the Sufi treasures of Timbuktu are object lessons; Nedha Sultan and Malala Yusufzai are object lessons in the threats posed by a maleficent strain of Islam.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/02/hollywoods_pious_hypocrisy.html
Hypocrisy is endemic in Hollywood. That is one reason Barack Obama and other Democrats feel so welcome there. Hypocrisy is a wide spectrum disorder in Hollywood. Similar to a virus, it has many types and mutates as time goes by. There are the obvious displays.
However, one form of hypocrisy mostly escapes notice, and it cuts to the heart of the Democrats’ phony posturing. President Obama slammed Mitt Romney for the same thing during the campaign but, of course, is silent when it comes to celebrities. Its practice may also be responsible for the sheer mediocrity of movies.
Hollywood stars routinely tout the virtues of the little guy battling the rich and powerful. They are legendary in their support for the income-leveling agenda of Barack Obama-while enjoying a sybaritic lifestyle (multiple houses, servants, nannies to act as proxy parents, chauffeurs) that make them the 1% of the 1%. They have access to private planes (John Travolta has a veritable air fleet) to avoid long lines and exposure to the hoi polloi at airports. These are the same planes that Barack Obama condemned while vilifying the rich. Of course, Barack Obama and his family hypocritically revel in the same luxe lifestyle.Fat cats abound in Hollywood-anyone think Obama would scathingly attack them as he has other wealthy figures?
Of course, this lifestyle sucks up as much energy as Al Gore does calories. The carbon used up by giant and multiple houses, the limos, and other accoutrements of great wealth cannot possibly be paid back to Mother Earth by showy driving around of donated Teslas. Meanwhile, Matt Damon uses Arab oil wealth to campaign against the miracle of fracking that has saved Americans many billions of dollars through cheap and relatively green natural gas and oil, while enriching communities and the “little people” across America.
http://www.thecommentator.com/article/2787/exposing_the_un_s_dirty_little_secrets
A gathering of the tortured in Geneva shames the UN Human Rights Council by giving victims not perpetrators a platform to tell their story
The speakers were never meant to live and tell their stories. Their torturers expected them to either submit or die. But somehow these men and women managed to escape from their dungeons and concentration camps to gather at the seat of the United Nations Human Rights Council.
They came to bear witness to the crimes committed by some of the very members of this esteemed UN body. Naturally, at the Palace of the Nations, where over 80 international officials, including Foreign Secretary William Hague, will over the coming days address the Council, there will be no space for these brave freedom fighters.
This is why UN Watch, together with over 20 other NGOs, organized the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy last week. Now in its fifth year, the annual summit does the sort of work the UN shies away from. It gives the victims, not the perpetrators, of state terror a podium.
While the international dignitaries will speak under the auspices of Council Vice President Mauritania, the Geneva Summit participants heard from a former subject of the North African country—Abidine Merzough, a man born as a slave to slave parents.
http://www.thecommentator.com/article/2788/hezbollah_calling_a_spade_a_spade
Hezbollah remains confident that the influence of Germany and France will see to it that the EU will not proscribe the group
Following seven months of investigation, the Bulgarian government finally announced at the beginning of the month that Hezbollah was responsible for the bus bombing in the coastal town of Burgas in July 2012. This attack, which left five Israeli tourists and the Bulgarian bus driver dead, demonstrated yet again Hezbollah’s willingness to conduct its terror operations to Europe; a graphic reminder that it has no hesitation about endangering EU citizens in pursuit of its goals.
What’s more, the investigation has revealed the extent of Hezbollah’s activities on European territory in planning further attacks. Last July, a Lebanese-born Swedish citizen was arrested in Cyprus, for allegedly conducting surveillance work for Hezbollah. He has since admitted to being a member of the organisation and his trial is currently on-going in Limassol.
Previously, Hezbollah and its Iranian sponsors were linked to attacks in the early 90s against the Jewish community in Argentina and more recently, there was the attempted killing of Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the US in Washington DC in 2011, as well as a botched attack in Thailand.
Nonetheless, following the Burgas bombing, the EU still refuses to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation, though Europe’s own police force, EUROPOL, stores Hezbollah on its database as a “terrorist entity”.
