RUTHFULLY YOURS

Happy Birthday, Teufel Hunden
Jim Hart was a Marine, and nothing trumped that credential.

Two hundred and thirty-nine years ago today, they were born at the Tun Tavern in Philadelphia. The news of their birth traveled far more slowly than they did. A short time later, according to their lore, their first man reported for duty aboard a US Navy ship. The officer of the deck barked, “What the hell are you?” and said, “You go aft and sit down ’till I find out.” The Tripolitan pirates didn’t know who they were when a handful marched across five hundred miles of Libyan desert in 1805. Led by a fiddle-playing Irish-American lieutenant named Presley Neville O’Bannon, they attacked Derna under a fierce barrage from three U.S. Navy ships, overcame odds of more than ten-to-one. and seized Derna in less than three hours.

The first American body armor, a leather collar, was added to their uniform to protect against saber cuts, so they were soon labeled the “leathernecks.” When about fifty of them led the attack and scaled the heights of Chapultepec in 1847, the Mexicans probably didn’t know who they were. Led by men such as Sergeant Major Dan Daley, they earned a new nickname from the Kaiser’s army in the First World War battle of Belleau Wood. Daley led them in one charge shouting, “Come on you sons of bitches! Do you want to live forever?” For their ferocious bravery, the Germans named them “teufel hunden” — devil dogs — a name they wear proudly to this day. Before the end of World War II, everyone knew who they were: the U.S. Marines.

Those of us who grew up in the ’50s and ’60s knew them as a breed apart. All my friends’ fathers had served in World War II, and they all had the same odd reaction to my father. He never shouted or growled (well, not that often), but when the veteran of Guadalcanal, Tarawa, and Iwo Jima spoke, his peers maintained a respectful silence. He was a Marine, and nothing trumped that credential. At Iwo Jima, it was said of them that uncommon valor was a common virtue. Americans understand that is still true today, but too few have a good idea why. What is a Marine? Let me suggest a definition.

A big part of it is still about valor and skill in combat, as Marine Sergeant-Major Brad Kasal proved in 2004 in Fallujah. Leading a handful of Marines to rescue three other wounded Marines, Kasal charged into a small house and shot it out with insurgents — sometimes so close he could ram the muzzle of his M-16 into their chests as he fired — for forty minutes. Kasal insists he wasn’t a hero, even though he dove atop another Marine and absorbed the blast of a grenade. He told me the Marines who dragged him out of the house after that forty-minute firefight were the heroes. But it’s not only heroism and skill in combat that defines a Marine. Maybe the tale of my late friend, James G. Hart, does.

Palestinians have refined a new form of homicide in recent weeks: driving vehicles into crowds of Israelis. This has the advantage of permitting Palestinian leaders to claim these are merely “accidents” to the Government of Israel while celebrating the attacks as “martyr operations.”
Cartoons, posted by what pass as Palestinian news agencies, establish the grizzly celebration of these murders as “heroic” acts which should be encouraged.
Two definite cases of car jihad have taken place in Jerusalem with a possible third attack in a nearby suburb:
• On October 22, a Hamas operative rammed his father’s car into a crowd waiting at the Jerusalem light rail. A 3-month-old American-Israeli baby, Chaya Zissel and a 22-year-old Ecuadorian converting to Judaism, Karen Mosquera, were killed in the attack. Seven others were injured.
• On November 5, a Palestinian with ties to Hamas accelerated a van into a crowd at a Jerusalem light rail station, and attacked others with a metal bar, killing a Druze Israeli Border Police officer, Jedan Assad, and injuring 14. Critically injured yeshiva student, Shalom Ba’adani, died on November 7.
• Also on November 5, a van with Palestinian license plates ran over 3 IDF soldiers near Bethlehem, injuring all 3. The IDF is currently investigating this incident.
Various Palestinian “news agencies” began posting cartoons celebrating the attacks on Facebook. These are but a few examples that appeared on November 5.
In the first cartoon, a terrorist in a Hamas-like headband accelerates towards a bloodied Star of David. In other words, a Palestinian terrorist purposely targets Jews with his car. In the background, the dome of the Al-Aqsa Mosque is seen in grey. The text commands:Step on it and take revenge for Jerusalem. It includes a religious hashtag in Arabic, though #CarJihad would be more appropriate.

In this decidedly anti Israel “letter” Remnick does include a new reality, citing none other than Sari Nusseibeh ‘ a professor of Arab Philosophy (???)” and a propagandist for Arafat.

“The next morning, as if to underline the excruciating proximities of the conflict, I crossed the street and called on Sari Nusseibeh, a professor of Islamic philosophy who was the longtime president of Al-Quds University and once an adviser—a particularly moderate adviser—to Yasir Arafat. Nusseibeh comes from one of the grandest of Palestinian families. His relatives hold the keys to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. He has always been overmatched by the fiercer voices around him. Now he appeared to have come very close to giving up. On a broiling day, we sat in his cool anteroom drinking tea with his wife and daughter. “The classical two-state solution is exhausted,” he said. “I’d like it to be working, but I don’t see it working. The wheels of history are grinding much faster than our ability to think or our ability to impose our ideas on history.”

Nusseibeh did not give in easily to defeatism. His liberalism, his alliances over the years with like-minded Israelis—a decade ago, he sketched out a peace agreement with Ami Ayalon, a former chief of Shin Bet—never made him popular in the Palestinian resistance. But, with the collapse of John Kerry’s recent attempt to forge an agreement, the Israeli and the Palestinian leaderships had proved, yet again, utterly unable to advance; Hamas, despite its weakness, had regained a place in the center of the Palestinian consciousness; and the entire region was inflamed, which was a pretext for Israel to stand pat. And so Nusseibeh has switched his focus from two states to something more limited and basic: the civil rights of Palestinian Arabs both in the occupied territories and in Israel proper.

When I mentioned that I had seen Meron Benvenisti the previous evening and that he had given up on a two-state solution more than thirty years ago, Nusseibeh replied, “In the eighties, Meron was already telling us that the settlements were developing in a way that was irreversible. We thought Meron was an Israeli agent trying to dissuade us from a Palestinian state! But then we began to see the new geography, the infrastructure of roads and roadblocks and checkpoints that was being built. It all became tangible.”

Nusseibeh was also hard on his own leadership. “In the eighties, the idea of a Palestinian state seemed beautiful,” he said. “It would be free and equal, with no occupation. Today, not as many people are enthused about it. People are disappointed by our failures—our internal failures, too. We used to think we would be the best and most democratic state in the Arab world, but now we are like the worst state in Africa. The older generation failed to translate the idea into reality.”

The instability throughout the region, meanwhile, conspires against any Israeli leap of faith. “The Arab world, the Muslim world, seems to be falling apart,” Nusseibeh said. “I grew up thinking there was something solid in the Arab world except for the Palestinian situation. Now all of these governments have failed. My generation grew up thinking that Muslims were tolerant. Now it’s scary, something totally different, a monster growing up all around you. Somehow it is less dangerous for the Palestinians here. It’s safer for people here than in the Arab world, if you take Gaza away. Under occupation, your land and your resources are taken, there are no rights, but we generally don’t live in fear.”

How did Jerusalem become so important to Muslims?

The importance of Jerusalem for Jews and Christians is beyond dispute,
since the connection of this city to Judaism and Christianity is part
of universal concepts about history and theology. However, when it
comes to modern politics, we hear over and over that Palestinians,
Arabs and Muslims demand that Jerusalem become the capital of the
future Palestinian state, owing to its holiness to Islam. The question
is how and when this city became holy to Muslims.

After Palestine was occupied by the Muslims, its capital was Ramle, 30
miles to the west of Jerusalem, signifying that Jerusalem meant
nothing to them.

Meet Jonathan Gruber, a professor at MIT and an architect of Obamacare. During a panel event last year about how the legislation passed, turning over a sixth of the U.S. economy to the government, Gruber admitted that the Obama administration went through “tortuous” measures to keep the facts about the legislation from the American people, including covering up the redistribution of wealth from the healthy to the sick in the legislation that Obamacare is in fact a tax. The video of his comments just recently surfaced ahead of the second open enrollment period for Obamacare at Healthcare.gov.

“You can’t do it political, you just literally cannot do it. Transparent financing and also transparent spending. I mean, this bill was written in a tortured way to make sure CBO did not score the mandate as taxes. If CBO scored the mandate as taxes the bill dies. Okay? So it’s written to do that,” Gruber said. “In terms of risk rated subsidies, if you had a law which said that healthy people are going to pay in, you made explicit healthy people pay in and sick people get money, it would not have passed. Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. And basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really really critical to get for the thing to pass. Look, I wish Mark was right that we could make it all transparent, but I’d rather have this law than not.
A few points. 1. Notice how lying to the American people is completely justified by Obama administration standards so long as the ends justify the means. Gruber would “rather have this law than not,” and therefore purposely lying about what the law actually is in order to get it passed is completely acceptable. regardless of the negative effects it has on the lives of Americans. 2. Lack of transparency might be a huge political advantage in the short term, but long term there are consequences from voters, which is exactly what we saw last week during the Democrat blood bath at every level of government across the country. 3. Insulting Americans as stupid and deceiving them is a really good way to lose your power on Capitol Hill, which is again exactly what we saw last week in the 2014 midterms. Twenty-eight Senators who voted for Obamacare are now out of the Senate for one reason or another. 4. Obamacare in its entirely was “sold” on lies. From the promise to keep your doctor to claims insurance rates would go down, not up — to hiding that the legislation was in fact a tax until of course it was necessary to argue it was a tax to save the legislation at the Supreme Court. Government bureaucrats promising an expansion of care knowing care under Obamacare would be limited, etc. Hell, even the official name for Obamacare, “The Affordable Care Act,” is a lie. Obamacare isn’t affordable. 5. The process through which Obamacare was shoved through and down the throats of the American people happened as a result of Harry Reid changing Senate rules and without the support of voters. The legislation didn’t receive a single Republican vote in the House or the Senate.

I showed my mother the headline about the stabbing. “A ‘settler’? Why did they call her a settler?”

I wanted my mother to come and see how absurd it is for the entire world – including virtually the entire Jewish world, and that includes most Jews who think of themselves as pro-Israel – to refer to the Jewish towns and communities beyond the 1949 Armistice Line as “settlements” in the “West Bank.”

But I never anticipated she would be at my side as we heard and saw, from a distance of just a few miles, a horrific terrorist attack.

This was the attempt by an Arab terrorist to run down and murder several Jews – any Jews, it didn’t matter who – with his car. When he failed to hit anyone, he jumped out of his car and began stabbing Jews who were just standing on the side of the road at a bus stop.

It happened yesterday, and by now most people who care about Israel have heard about Nov. 10, a day of rage, sadly one of many, a day of disparate attempts to murder as many Jews as possible. Attacks took place within the ’49 Armistice Lines and outside of them. It doesn’t matter, they want to kill us wherever we are.

One of the stabbing murders took place in Tel Aviv.

Just a few days ago one of my daughter’s friends, a young woman who is studying in Israel also this year, told us she really likes to go to Tel Aviv.

“Why?” I asked her.

“Because I never have that weight on my shoulder, wondering if there is going to be some horrible terrorist attack, like we have in Jerusalem.”

But now they’re everywhere.

The Case of Mohammed and Aisha — on The Glazov Gang
Scholar of Islam Louis Lionheart dissects one of the most controversial chapters in the Islamic narrative.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/2014/frontpagemag-com/the-case-of-mohammed-and-aisha-on-the-glazov-gang/

http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/attkisson-cbs-intentionally-held-obama-soundbite-to-help-him-win-reelection?f=must_reads#ixzz3IfMI9xt3
Sunday on Fox News Channel’s “MediaBuzz,” investigative journalist Sharyl Attkisson told the story of CBS executives intentionally hiding a clip from the day after the Benghazi attacks with President Barack Obama refusing to admit Benghazi was a terrorist attack.

Host Howard Kurtz asked, “Let’s talk about what happened with ’60 Minutes,’ the day after the Benghazi attacks with President Obama. and that sounded like — or some of that interview ended up not being used. after the second 2012 debate, it became a big issue whether or not the president had or had not referred to Benghazi attacks as terrorist attacks.”

During the 2012 presidential debate, Mitt Romney had said it took Obama 14 days to admit the attack was terrorism but Obama bulked saying he did that day, but when asked the next day he is seen refusing to give a terror motive saying, “Well, it’s too early to know exactly how this came about, what group was involved. but, obviously, it was an attack on Americans.”

Attkisson said, “Let me say that that exchange should have been pulled out immediately after the debate, which would have been very newsy at the time. It was exclusive to CBS. It would have to me proven Romney’s point against Obama. But that clip was kept secret.”

The news that President Obama has sent a secret letter to Iranian leader Ayatollah Khamenei––apparently promising concessions on Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for help in defeating ISIS–– is a depressing reminder of how after nearly 40 years our leaders have not understood the Iranian Revolution. During the hostage crisis of 1979, Jimmy Carter sent left-wing former Attorney General Ramsay Clark to Tehran with a letter anxiously assuring the Ayatollah Khomeini that America desired good relations “based upon equality, mutual respect and friendship.” Khomeini refused even to meet with the envoys.

Such obvious contempt for our “outreach” should have been illuminating, but the same mistakes have recurred over the past 4 decades. But Obama has been the most energetic suitor of the mullahs, sending 4 letters to Khamenei, none directly answered. In May of 2009 he sent a personal letter to Khamenei calling for “cooperation in regional and bilateral relations.” Khamenei’s answer in June was to initiate a brutal crackdown on Iranians protesting the rigged presidential election. Obama’s response was to remain silent about this oppression lest he irritate the thuggish mullahs, who blamed the protests on American “agents” anyway. Even Carter’s phrase “mutual respect” has been chanted like some diplomatic spell that will transform religious fanatics into good global citizens. In his notorious June 2009 Cairo “apology” speech, Obama assured Iran, “We are willing to move forward without preconditions on the basis of mutual respect.” This latest letter repeats the same empty phrase.

But our president is nothing if not persistent. In October of 2009, it was revealed that Iran had failed to disclose a uranium enrichment facility in Qom. Obama commented on this obvious proof of Iran’s true intentions, “We remain committed to serious, meaningful engagement with Iran,” and promised that the “offer stands” of “greater international integration if [Iran] lives up to its obligations.” Iran answered by increasing the pace of enrichment, helping the insurgents in Iraq kill our troops, and facilitating the movement and communications of al Qaeda with other jihadists.

Indeed, every concession and failure to respond forcefully to Iranian intransigence and aggression confirm its belief that Iran is strong and America weak. As Khamenei has said, “The reason why we are stronger is that [America] retreats step by step in all the arenas [in] which we and the Americans have confronted each other. But we do not retreat. Rather, we move forward. This is a sign of our superiority over the Americans.”

The Democrats lost and no one is resigning. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi intend to stay on even after overseeing the largest political catastrophe for their party in decades. In six years, Pelosi went from a House majority of 257 seats to a current running total in the 180s. Harry Reid took a Senate majority and turned it into a minority and all he has to show for it are a lot of donations from out-of-state law firms.

Not only aren’t Harry and Nancy resigning, but they aren’t even taking any responsibility. Irresponsibility is the Democratic word of the day and the decade. Harry is blaming Barry. Barry is blaming Harry. No one is even paying attention to Nancy ever since she became irrelevant four years ago.

The Democrats don’t just preach irresponsibility and pander to the irresponsible. They are irresponsible.

Democrats often point to Congress’s low approval ratings as proof that the public doesn’t support the Republicans. They neglect to mention that its present low approval rating of 14 matches its low point of 14 under Pelosi and Reid’s Democratic majority. The last time Congress had an approval rating above 40, there were Republican majorities in the House and Senate.

It isn’t Republican obstructionism that keeps the approval ratings low. That’s just the narrative that the real Democratic obstructionists used once they lost their majority in order to give Obama sanction for unilateral rule. Now Senate and House Democrats have paid the price for the damage that they inflicted on their party by allowing Obama’s unilateral and incoherent policymaking to define them.

Obama “won” by locking in an opposition Congress that leaves him as the only significant elected member of his party. He has achieved what he sought all along by reducing his entire party to him. By completely isolating himself politically, Obama has eliminated any dissent from within his own party.

He has become a “Party of One.”