RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2013/05/08/at-all-costs-at-any-price/

The hearing on Benghazi has made one thing abundantly clear. The Democratic Party will do whatever it takes to bury the Benghazi consulate attack issue. The chief defense against the accusations raised is that there’s nothing to see in that ‘long ago’ event which is not simply partisan and political in nature.

Everything from filibusters, administrative delays, backhanded intimidation — the works — has been thrown into the defense. And defenders of the administration will point out that these are merely the same tactics Republicans have used in the budget and gun regulation debates and are simply being paid back in their own coin.

Yet that would be to imagine that nothing of importance is at stake. That what is at issue is mere partisan political preference, no more significant than a choice of ties or socks to be worn to a dinner party. The only response will be an appeal to substance: to right and wrong. That the battles over the budget, the Second Amendment and especially Benghazi were in fact political in the sense of ‘concerning policy’. That the Benghazi hearings are political in the best meaning of the term: not in the sense of trivial point scoring or character assassination but over genuine difference in the direction the ship of state should take.

However the distinction between what is good for Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton and the best interests of the Democratic Party has become blurred by loyalty and their immense influence in the party. The retainers are serving their lords even when it works against them.

It is in the long-term interest of the Democratic Party for their foreign policy in the Middle East to succeed, because even with the press on their side they cannot wholly escape the effects of failure. By contrast candidates have shorter cost/benefit horizons. They only need to survive long enough to get theirs. Once that is done their loyal serfs are left to make shift as best they can. Defending the leadership at the cost of courting a foreign policy disaster must mean that the Party will eventually hold the bag.

But anyone who thinks Hillary and Barack will reward them for their sacrifice should ask themselves how Chris Stevens fared when he pleaded for help. Can they expect better?

http://pjmedia.com/blog/benghazi-and-the-lust-for-power/

Did the president sacrifice four American lives on the altar of ambition?

The Benghazi scandal raises the issue of whether President Barack Obama’s and Hillary Clinton’s lust for power is so addictive that they would sacrifice the lives of four fellow Americans, put scores of others in harm’s way, and then precipitate an ongoing national crisis through a long, torturous cover-up. We expect our politicians to lie. We expect them to be corrupt. We expect them to be a class unto themselves and to exempt themselves from the laws they create. We just don’t expect them to kill to attain power.

Or shouldn’t we? Ricky Ray Rector [1] is a name you will probably seldom see in the mainstream media. On January 24, 1992, the state of Arkansas executed Rector for murder. Rector, however, was mentally deficient. He was so mentally deficient that he put aside a piece of pecan pie from his last meal and told his guards he would finish it after his execution.

Then presidential candidate and Governor of Arkansas Bill Clinton could have stopped the execution. Instead, Clinton made sure the execution went ahead as scheduled, breaking off his primary campaign in New Hampshire to return to Arkansas to personally oversee the implementation of the sentence.

Clinton was capitalizing on pro-capital punishment voters and on distancing himself from 1988 Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis’s [2] strong stand against capital punishment, a stand that many observers felt cost him the race for the presidency in 1988.

http://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2013/04/28/abraham-part-2-gods-gadfly-or-meek-servant/?print=1 Last week I maintained that the patriarch Abraham is in certain key ways a paradigmatic figure for today’s Israel. A paradigm, though, would be expected to show some consistency in his conduct. In at least one important regard, Abraham seems to engage in behaviors that radically contradict each other. When God prepares to leave […]

http://pjmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2013/05/09/benghazi-continues-hillary-de-medici/?print=1 The Benghazi scandal is not over.  You will be told that by a lot of people. There is no smoking gun, etc. (Actually, there are many.) Some folks on the right, because they have been so accustomed to failure in the face of a monolithic media, will be ready to throw in the towel. […]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324244304578470880723398290.html?mod=WSJ_hps_LEFTTopStories In Riveting Account of Libya Raid, Official Knocks Administration Response By SIOBHAN HUGHES And ADAM ENTOUS WASHINGTON—A high-ranking American diplomat delivered an emotional reconstruction Wednesday of the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, providing the first detailed public account from an American official who was on the ground in […]

http://www.andrewbostom.org/blog/2013/05/09/libya-the-best-of-bad-plans/

In reality, the entire US-led NATO Libyan fiasco was the worst of see no Islam, see no jihad, see no Sharia bad plans as discussed at length in a presentation here. (See also John Rosenthal’s superb monograph on the subject, and Diana West’s recent interview of Rosenthal)

Kudos to Texas Rep. Farenthold who pierced the Ambassador Rice talking points epiphenomenon during today’s Benghazi hearings, and grabbed hold, if ever so briefly and superficially, of one of the myriad examples of how our catastrophic policy in Libya empowered North African jihadism.

This loony, self-destructive policy was epitomized in the choice of the “February 17th Martyrs Brigade”—named after the jihadist rioters killed by then US-supported Libyan (anti-jihadist) strongman Qaddafi while they were sacking the Italian embassy in Benghazi, because Italian minister (of Constitutional reforms) Roberto Calderoli wore the satirical Muhammad cartoon image (from Le Soir’s front page, published February 1, 2006, just below, which simply said,“Don’t rale [rage] Muhammad…We’ve all been caricatures here”), on a tee shirt (also below) he exposed on Italian state television.

france-soir

Calderoli

At 3 minutes of this clip, Rep. Farenthold asks about the “February 17th militia,” i.e., the February 17th Martyr’s Brigade

At the 4:10 mark Rep Farenthold queries, “I am going to ask you both this question…I am stunned that the state dept. was relying on a militia with extremist ties to protect American Diplomats….that doesn’t make any sense. How does that happen?” Eric Nordstrom replies, “You mean like in Afghanistan where Afghanis that are working with our Military that are embedded & turn on them and shoot them…or uh Yemen where our Embassy was attacked in 2008 by attackers wearing police uniforms.”

Stephen Hawking Flash 90 http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/167861#.UYtxdrPD-Uk Hawking Confirms He is Boycotting Israel British physicist Stephen Hawking confirms that he cancelled his trip to Israel because of an academic boycott, not illness. British physicist Stephen Hawking has confirmed that he will not be attending the Presidential Conference in Israel because he is joining an academic boycott of […]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324059704578471453006383248.html

WASHINGTON—Israel has warned the U.S. that a Russian deal is imminent to sell advanced ground-to-air missile systems to Syria, weapons that would significantly boost the regime’s ability to stave off intervention in its civil war.

U.S. officials said on Wednesday that they are analyzing the information Israel provided about the suspected sale of S-300 missile batteries to Syria, but wouldn’t comment on whether they believed such a transfer was near.

Russian officials didn’t immediately return requests to comment. The Russian Embassy in Washington has said its policy is not to comment on arms sales or transfers between Russia and other countries.

The government of President Bashar al-Assad has been seeking to purchase S-300 missile batteries—which can intercept both manned aircraft and guided missiles—from Moscow going back to the George W. Bush administration, U.S. officials said. Western nations have lobbied President Vladimir Putin’s government not to go ahead with the sale. If Syria were to acquire and deploy the systems, it would make any international intervention in Syria far more complicated, according to U.S. and Middle East-based officials.

According to the information the Israelis provided in recent days, Syria has been making payments on a 2010 agreement with Moscow to buy four batteries for $900 million. They cite financial transactions from the Syrian government, including one made this year through Russia’s foreign-development bank, known as the VEB.

  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323744604578471282063848980.html ‘I was stunned. My jaw dropped,” said Gregory Hicks at Wednesday’s House hearing on the Benghazi terror attack last fall and its aftermath. Mr. Hicks, deputy chief of mission in Libya under Ambassador Chris Stevens, was referring to the now-famous TV appearances by U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice. Ms. Rice, blanketing the Sunday talk […]

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/347735/damned-foolishness-would-be-setting-benghazi-syria-senator-mccain If Saturday Night Live or the Onion were doing a John McCain skit, I doubt they could come up with something more ludicrous than the real Maverick being interviewed on Charlie Rose. Senator McCain was grousing about what he asserts is the Obama administration’s shifting position on arming the jihadist-rife “rebels” in Syria. As the Washington […]