RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323478304578330433455556410.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop

First came the jihadist leader seeking treatment. Then came the guards with thieves whose hands needed cutting off.

Gao, MaliAs international terrorists go, Mokhtar Belmokhtar has built an impressive résumé. The Algerian-born Islamist began his career in Afghanistan in the early 1990s before going on to lead a unit of al Qaeda in the Maghreb. His most recent splinter group, which calls itself Those Who Sign in Blood, was responsible for last month’s bloody hostage crisis at the In Amenas gas plant in Algeria.

He spent much of the past year moving from safe house to safe house here in Gao, northern Mali’s largest city, which jihadists controlled until the French arrived in January. The kill-list candidate, smuggler and prolific kidnapper is now a key target of the French terrorist-hunt in the Ifoghas Mountains.

But to Dr. Abdoulaziz Maiga, a family practitioner and aspiring surgeon at the Hospital of Gao, Belmokhtar is just another patient.

“Belmokhtar—it’s complicated,” Dr. Maiga said with a sigh last week when I visited his office. “Yes, I saw him—sometimes he came to the hospital, and sometimes we went to his house. But it was purely medical.”

A rock holds up one corner of Dr. Maiga’s desk and he swats at the occasional fly. After nearly a year of fighting and jihadist occupation, he is one of only 13 physicians still in Gao and its environs, serving a population of nearly half a million. Having attended university in Bamako, the 29-year-old Gao native has been practicing medicine here since 2011. His motivation, he says, is to “help people and save lives, like any other doctor.” Any other doctor, that is, until the jihadists came to town.

http://news.yahoo.com/ethiopian-runner-wins-jerusalem-marathon-091021887–spt.html

JERUSALEM (AP) — Abraham Kabeto Ketla of Ethiopia has won the third Jerusalem marathon, setting a record for the race. About 20,000 runners took part despite protests by Palestinians.

Ketla finished in 2 hours, 16 minutes and 29 seconds Friday, beating the record by three minutes.

Luka Kipkemoi Chelimo of Kenya was second at 2:19:02. Vincent Kiplagat Kiptoo of Kenya finished third.

Mihiret Anamo Anotonios of Ethiopia set a record in the women’s race with 2:47:26. Radiya Mohammed Roba of Ethiopia was second with 3:05:58.

Palestinians called for a boycott of the marathon because it passed through east Jerusalem, which they claim for a future capital. Palestinians held a small protest without disrupting the race, police said.

Israel captured east Jerusalem in the 1967 war. It claims the whole city as its capital.

http://newmediajournal.us/indx.php/item/8540

Back in February of 2012 – in what seems like a political eternity ago, I dared to broach the subject of honesty in American politics. Being equally disgruntled with the establishment Republicans, as was I (and still am) with the entirety of the Left side of the aisle, I provided instance after instance about how disgusted I was (am) with our political class’ abdication of ethics in their embrace of “the narrative,” and how I viewed the various special interest groups and media – from both sides of the aisle – pathetic in their abdication of a quest for truth. With recent events surrounding a plethora of issues, but specifically the “sequester,” I feel the need to address the issue again.

When I crafted my analysis back in 2012, I wrote:

“Throughout time politicians and their handlers have been prone to omitting unpleasant facts or manipulating them so as to mold issues to their advantage. This is the concept behind ‘spin’; a form of propagandizing that crafts an ‘alternative’ interpretation of an issue, organization, person, event or campaign in order to sway the public’s opinion ‘for’ or ‘against’ said issue, organization, person, event or campaign. In fact, the ‘art of spin’ has created an entirely separate category of political animal; the ‘spin doctor,’ many of whom are regularly featured on the many mainstream media news outlets disguised as ‘political strategists.’ But somewhere along the line, the art of employing wit, reason, personality and persuasive rhetoric in order to achieve a political ends gave way to the blatant lie, and never before has it been as evident as it is today.

“This political malady is not exclusive to one side of the aisle or the other. Neither is it exclusive to the elected class. In fact, some of the most egregious abusers of truth and honesty come in the form of agendized media operatives. It is an across-the-board problem that comes with the intellectual infections that are the ‘inside-the-beltway mentality’ and the special interest mentality, both of which are shared by the elected class, the media who cover them and the special interest groups who try to sway them both.”

http://pjmedia.com/spengler/2013/02/28/tayyip-erdogans-cave-of-wonders/?print=1

Prince Metternich, the architect of the Holy Alliance against France, is supposed to have said after hearing news of the death of his arch-rival, the devious French diplomat Talleyrand, “I wonder what he meant by that?” Metternich (if he really said it) mean it as a joke. The State Department will ask what Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan meant by his outburst yesterday that Zionism is “a crime against humanity.”

Erdogan, after all, has “bonds of trust” with Barack Obama. Last year Obama told Fareed Zakaria of Time magazine that the “friendships and the bonds of trust” that he forged with Erdogan (whom he named among five foreign leaders) is “precisely, or is a big part of, what has allowed us to execute effective diplomacy.” What could the president’s friend have meant by that? Erdogan said exactly what he believes. The Turkish leader is a holdover from the enchanted world of rural Anatolia, in which Jewish conspiracies swirl in the night air along with jinn and witches. That is not an exaggeration, but an objective report, as I will explain below. No-one should be surprised. Lunatics have run better countries than Turkey in living memory.

I wrote in my 2011 book How Civilizations Die (and Why Islam is Dying, Too):

There is bizarre edge to Tayyip Erdogan. He is given to lurid, sometimes bloodthirsty outbursts. During a February 2008 visit to Germany, Turkey’s most important European trading partner, Erdogan scandalized his hosts when he told an audience of 20,000 Turks that assimilation into German culture was “a crime against humanity.” Germany, after all, knows a thing or two about crimes against humanity. German opinion was outraged, and Turkey’s chances for membership in the European Community—a pillar of Turkish diplomacy for a generation—fell to negligible. Erdogan ignored the uproar, and told the Turkish Parliament upon his return to Ankara, “I repeat… assimilation is a crime against humanity . . . . We can think differently from (Chancellor Angela) Merkel about this, but that is my opinion.” The German attitude towards its Turkish minority has swung from multicultural outreach to pessimism about their future in German society. In October 2010, German Chancellor Angela Merkel told a gathering of her political party that Germany’s attempt to create a multicultural society has “utterly failed.” As press reports paraphrased her remarks, “Allowing people of different cultural backgrounds to live side by side without integrating has not worked in a country that is home to some four million Muslims.”

We obtain some insight into Erdogan’s warped view of the world by considering the leading ideologue of Turkish Islamism, Fethullah Gulen. I profiled him in a September 2010 Asia Times essay. He presides over a business empire worth tens of billions of dollars and a system of Islamist schools that stretches from Central Asia to charter schools in the United States. The Gulen organization took control of Turkey by infiltrating its security services in a patient march through the institutions over the past two decades. Gulen’s pan-Turkic mysticism views Turkey as the center of a new caliphate uniting the Muslim world. He preaches a “Turkish renaissance” with a modern spin “to ensure that religion and science go together and that science penetrates not only individual lives, but also social life.”

http://www.juliagorin.com/wordpress/?p=2999

STUNNING: U.S. takes Serbia’s side over KLA monument; issues “warning” to Albania over NATIONALIST rhetoric as Albanian officials openly call for UNIFICATION of “Albanian lands.” State Dept in bizarre departure from accusing and threatening Serbia over such things….J.G.

Kosovo independence changed Balkans’ status, geopolitical position of [Albanians], says Pandeli Majko (FOCUS News Agency, Feb. 13)

Former Albanian prime minister, Pandeli Majko, said that the independence of Kosovo has changed the status and the geopolitical position of the Albanian nation in the region, KS Reporter informs.

“History is nothing, if nothing is being done. Albanians won independent existence, but they lost half of their territory, while Kosovo is the price that had to be paid: In 1919 Albania was divided by Kosovo and it was like the separation of twins with different fates. In 1999 Albanians’ historical battle for Kosovo was won and today Kosovo is officially recognised country. Soon, when Kosovo joins the UN, the historical process of the formation of the Albanian nation will be finalised,” Pandeli Majko remarked.

Wasn’t it just the other day that Reich spokesman in occupied Serbia was desperately parsing, un-parsing and re-parsing his words about Kosovo and UN membership?

But the bigger point today is that here’s the Albanian former prime minister announcing what Washington is still desperately lying about: that the end game will inevitably be a Greater Albania (a.k.a. “Serbian Myth/Propaganda” No. 426)

A week ago Sunday was the “five-year anniversary” of Kosovo’s self-proclaimed independence. Which is like me congratulating myself for winning a second presidential term. (The first term never happened either.) But check out this latest creative Balkan inversion that was born during the five-year anniversary celebrations last weekend. Al Jazeera’s (purposely?) confused headline to be explained further down:

Kosovo’s Unification Flag Reinforces Division (Al Jazeera, Feb. 16)

Kosovo will on Sunday [Feb. 17] mark five years since it declared independence from Serbia.

Most people are expected to wave the black and red Albanian flag, however, rather than the Kosovar flag during celebrations.

[How surprising!]

The new symbol of multi-ethnic Kosovo, bearing stars representing the six main ethnic groups of the republic, is seen by some as dividing the country. […]

Clever obfuscation. The “division” the Albanians are worried about is between Kosovo and Albania, which is why they wave the Albanian flag — the real “unification flag.” They don’t like the new, six-star flag because it reminds them that there are still non-Albanians in Kosovo, and this apparently is “divisive.” Albanians are the ultimate xenophobes. Knowing this but never admitting it, the EU therefore created the six-star flag to “serve as a consistent reminder of the ethnic groupings here,” as the Jazeera reporter puts it. Precisely to remind Albanians that they’re supposed to keep some non-Albanians around and protect them from the Albanian majority, so as to keep up the charade of “multi-ethnic Kosovo.”

Which brings us back to Al Jazeera’s misleading headline. The blue and yellow six-star flag is not a “unification” flag, since “unification” generally refers to that between Kosovo and Albania. Perhaps the intended word was “unity” flag. As in, unity among the six ethnic groups of Kosovo — the fairy tale that Western political elites tell themselves before bed. As already stated, that unity is indeed something an Albanian would find divisive.

In the video above, Self-Determination party (Vetevendosje) leader Albin Kurti is interviewed. Reporter Paul Brennan says Kurti “sees no difference between campaigning for stronger Kosovo independence and eventual unification with Albania.” (Insert 14-year Duhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! here.) Brennan paraphrases Kurti: “The Kosvoan flag will never be loved,” and Kurti adds, “It will never take a proper place in the hearts of the people.”

That’s because the Kosovo war was never about Kosovo, “freedom”, “liberation” or “independence.” It was always about Albania. The Clintons lied. The Bushes lied. John McCain lied. Madeleine Albright lied. Condoleezza Rice lied. And the rest of the clones.

And, lo and behold, just a few days before the “independence” celebrations, a leaked State Dept. memo is revealed. Notice the unprecedented entrance (unprecedented until December 2012) of the word “nationalist” to describe someone in the Balkans other than the Serbs. Indeed, it’s finally being used to describe our clients, the Serbs’ avowed enemy. But, again, don’t expect any reassessments about whether it was this virulent nationalism that the “nationalist” Serbs were fighting in the first place. Notice also the “danger to regional stability” charge now finally being applied to the actual danger, whereas for the past two decades we’ve been told that not giving Albanians what they want (a.k.a. “Serbian intransigence”) is the “danger to regional stability.”

http://www.andrewbostom.org/blog/2013/02/28/times-demonizes-hedegaard-lionizes-danish-muslim-instigator-of-murderous-cartoon-riots/ Andrew Higgins’ [2] “inspirational” muse must be the ignoble New York Times reporter Walter Duranty, who deliberately concealed Stalin’s campaign of mass starvation and murder (or “dekulakization”) of 14.5 million in the Ukraine, from 1930-1937 (see Robert Conquest’s magisterial Harvest of Sorrow [3], pp. 299-307). This travesty was compounded when Duranty was awarded a […]

http://www.dianawest.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryId/2430/The-NYT-on-the-Would-Be-Might-Have-Been-Assassination-of-Lars-Hedegaard.aspx The New York Times weighs in today (like a ton of bricks) on the attempted assassination of Lars Hedegaard, editor of Dispatch International. “Danish Critic of Islam Attacked, and Muslims Defend His Right to Speak” (with links from the NYT original) By Andrew Higgins (photo above): COPENHAGEN — When a would-be assassin disguised as […]

http://pjmedia.com/andrewmccarthy/2013/02/28/erdogan-piles-up-those-crimes-against-humanity/ I think “crime against humanity” has become a verbal tic for Turkey’s Islamic-supremacist Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. In Vienna, at one of the UN’s nauseating “dialogues” between Islam and the West (you know, those conferences where Western leaders explain how much they admire Islam and Islamic leaders reciprocate by explaining how much they, […]

http://nsroundtable.org/as-we-see-it/here-we-go/

Here we go. Further to yesterday’s posting, i.e., Feeding The Enemy, here we go aiding “rebels” again without knowing or understanding WHO they are.

Who exactly make up the so-called Syrian opposition (see below)? Jihactivists, i.e., a mixed bag of activists and jihadists (e.g., al Qaeda, Jabhat al-Nusra)? Or maybe the folks who declared they’d be willing to work with Hezbollah “because it did a glorious job when it stood against Israel”?

Are these the people the U.S. is preparing to give direct assistance to (as opposed to indirect assistance it has been giving)? Last time we looked, U.S.-supported rebels were (literally) singing the praises of Osama bin Laden (see “US $$ For Ode To Osama”).

America has a history of arming the wrong side (e.g., Mujahideen/Taliban), yet it continues to do the same thing over and over and expects different results. Isn’t that the definition of something?

US Set To Send Direct Aid To Syrian Rebels, Says John Kerry

http://www.wnd.com/2013/02/gops-erratic-confirmation-strategy/

Diana West is the author of “The Death of the Grown-up: How America’s Arrested Development Is Bringing Down Western Civilization,” and blogs at dianawest.net.

One last question about newly confirmed Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel.

Why?

Why for nearly two months (a Washington eternity) did this nominee above all others galvanize GOP Senate opposition?

I ask the question in genuine wonderment. After all, there was John Kerry with that giant bull’s-eye on his record for giving outrageous aid and comfort to America’s enemies by, among other things, entering into negotiations with the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong in 1971. How does a U.S. citizen tapped to lead the State Department not have to answer to U.S. senators for such treasonous behavior while a young but already noted public figure?

He was never asked the question, that’s how. Kerry sailed, or even windsurfed, through his confirmation hearing right into Foggy Bottom with only three little dissenting bumps (no votes from GOP Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz of Texas and James Inhofe of Oklahoma).

Then there’s John Brennan, President Obama’s nominee for CIA director. Sure, the president’s counterterrorism adviser still sits unconfirmed on a hottish seat. But I would bet large sums of money that, whether confirmed (likely) or not, senators will never ask Brennan a single question about the gross misinformation or, worse, disinformation that he regularly disseminates concerning the nature and aims of Islamic jihad. Nor will he be asked about allegations from a credible source – former FBI investigator John Guandolo (whose special expertise is Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood) – that, as CIA station chief in Saudi Arabia, Brennan was successfully targeted for conversion to Islam by a Saudi intelligence operation. And forget about any GOP pooh-bah being bold enough to inquire about the role Brennan might have played in 2008 as CEO of the security company whose employee helped breach the State Department passport records of Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Barack Obama – whose new administration, not incidentally, Brennan would join a few months later. Mum is always the word.

But Hagel drew the heavy fire. Why? Let me explain that, except for sharing with Hagel the goal of bringing home American troops from Iraqi and Afghan hellholes and excusing them from nation-building duties forever, I do not share much of the former senator’s worldview. But when I look at the red flags the GOP seized on and waved, I remain perplexed.

Take GOP concerns over whether Hagel received compensation for speeches or think-tank contributions from freedom-hostile foreign governments – financial ties that do seem to bind. Even a quick perusal of the donors to the Atlantic Council, for example, where Hagel was chairman, reveals troubling tranches of Turkish money coursing through the coffers, as well as donations from Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Jordan and other countries.

I believe the appearance of influence-selling – or even simply taking bids – should disqualify all nominees from Cabinet positions. That includes Hillary Clinton when, in 2009, she came up for confirmation to be secretary of state. Hundreds of millions of dollars flooded her husband’s William J. Clinton Foundation, with many millions sluicing in from Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Kuwait, Qatar and elsewhere, creating not just a “conflict” of interest, but total wars of interest for America’s top diplomat. Not to worry, said the U.S. Senate, voting the nomination out of committee 16-1 (Republican Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana voted no) and confirming her 94-2. (Vitter and Republican Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina voted no.) Why was foreign money a confirmation problem only for Hagel?