RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/03/26/no-man-can-fight-forever

“The futility of the way we have fought this war must be felt by everyone fighting it. As I’ve written here often,if you don’t fight a war in a manner calculated to win it decisively, you will lose it inevitably. The corollary to that is that you will also weaken the spirit and readiness of your forces to fight again. Not permanently. Americans are resilient, and our armed forces are still the best in the world. But it may be a long time before we can unbreak our promises to them and restore their readiness to fight again.”

Army Staff Sergeant Robert Bales stands accused of murdering 17 Afghani civilians in two different villages on the night of 11 March. From the charges themselves (which include six counts of assault, bringing the total number of civilians believed hurt to 23) we know the army believes it has sufficient evidence to support the charges of premeditated murder which, under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, can carry the death penalty.

And there is much we do not know. Bales’ civilian lawyer has said several times that his client has no memory of the events of that night, obviously thinking of an insanity plea. Under the UCMJ, that requires the defense to prove the insanity by “clear and convincing” evidence, a much lower standard than the “beyond reasonable doubt” standard by which Bales would or would not be found guilty.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/mar/23/why-obamacare-is-bad-for-americas-health/

Expensive overreach could prove fatal if not struck down

On Monday, the Supreme Court will consider the legality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, also referred to as Obamacare. The high court will pore over Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution to determine the true meaning behind the words, “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common Defense and general welfare of the United States; To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations and among the several states, and with the Indian Tribes.” The 2012 Supreme Court must determine whether the Founders had any intention of mandating the behavior of private enterprises and individuals.

To me, the answer is obvious: absolutely not.

Our nation was founded on the Declaration of Independence. Freedom of choice and a free market are at the core of our nation’s soul. A governmental mandate for the behavior of individuals and private enterprises is anathema to what our founders intended. The prospect of having an unelected panel of bureaucrats determining fundamental decisions about our individual health care is perhaps the most personal and intimate intrusion into our lives. The concept of this absurd and dangerous law surely ranks with the grievances laid down 236 years ago.

http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/

“The old Nazis marched in at the head of an army. The new Nazis bought a plane ticket. The old Nazis had to get by the French Armed Forces and the Royal Air Force. The new Nazis are welcomed in and anyone who says a word otherwise faces trials and jail sentences. The old Nazis deported Jews to camps. The new Nazis kill them right in the cities. And the killing will not stop until the Muslim occupation of Europe comes to an end.”

There was a time when Jewish children were hunted down and killed in France. Their killers believed themselves to be members of a superior group that was destined to rule the world and enslave or exterminate members of inferior groups. The cowardice and appeasement of the French authorities allowed them to operate freely, to kill Jews and launch attacks on other countries.

What was then is now again. The occupying army doesn’t wear uniforms, it wears keffiyahs. It doesn’t speak German, it speaks Arabic. It doesn’t believe that it is superior for reasons of race as much as for reasons of religion. It does not view all others as Untermenschen, but as infidels. It looks forward not to a thousand year Reich, but to a thousand year Caliphate.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/294309/don-t-stay-course-andrew-c-mccarthy

He couldn’t name a single one.

In this tense campaign season, al-Qaeda is very much in the front of the Obama administration’s mind. In fact, administration officials can’t remind you often enough that Barack rubbed out Osama — which you may see as a no-brainer, but which, to hear them tell it, was actually the greatest single act of executive courage in half a millennium. Yet, when ABC’s Jake Tapper recently asked White House press secretary Jay Carney, “When’s the last time U.S. troops in Afghanistan killed anybody associated with al-Qaeda?” Obama’s mouthpiece went mum.

This was not a concession that the Afghan mission is pointless. It was a powerful indication that the Afghan mission has already been accomplished.

Whitewashing Islamic Terror in Toulouse Posted By Jacob Laksin URL to article: http://frontpagemag.com/2012/03/23/whitewashing-islamic-terror-in-toulouse/ Now that French anti-terror police have fatally shot Mohammed Merah, the French-born Algerian jihadist suspected in the murders of three French paratroopers, three Jewish children and a rabbi, it’s worth commending their refusal to go along with the international media’s speculative and […]

http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=263064

WILL ALL DUE RESPECT, AND WE DO RESPECT DR. MARTIN SHERMAN VERY MUCH….AMERICANS FOR A SAFE ISRAEL IS ON THE RECORD AS THE FIRST AMERICAN ISRAEL SUPPORT GROUP TO DENOUNCE THE WITHDRAWAL FROM GAZA AND THE “ROAD MAP” LAID OUT BY PRESIDENT BUSH IN 2002 WHICH WAS A DIRECT PRECURSOR TO THE GAZA SURRENDER….RSK

The nation’s leaders have proved bereft of foresight – or hindsight for that matter. Can a dangerous ‘trust deficit’ be avoided?

The nightmare stories of the Likud are well known. After all, they promised Katyusha rockets from Gaza as well. For a year, Gaza has been largely under the rule of the Palestinian Authority. There has not been a single Katyusha rocket. Nor will there be any Katyushas. – Yitzhak Rabin, radio interview, July 24, 1995

I am firmly convinced and truly believe that this disengagement… will be appreciated by those near and far, reduce animosity, break through boycotts and sieges and advance us along the path of peace with the Palestinians and our other neighbors. – Ariel Sharon, Knesset address, October 25, 2004

Let me be quite clear as to what this article is and is not about. It is not about whether the unilateral evacuation of Gaza was a success or failure or whether it was a good or bad for Israel. Only the moronic, the myopic or the mendacious could claim it was any but a disastrously debacle. It is not about whether, despite everything, Israel is better off after disengagement. Only the fanatical, the foolish or the fraudulent would suggest it is. Nor is about the precision of my own predictive powers (Well, perhaps just a little. After all what’s the point of being right if you can’t rub it in?)

http://pjmedia.com/rogerkimball/2012/03/23/how-to-lose-a-war-afghan-desk/

What do you think of this little tidbit from the Wall Street Journal [1]:

The Obama administration is offering to cede some control over nighttime missions into Afghan village homes, U.S. officials say, in a bid to ease tensions with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. . . .

The administration’s most significant proposed concession on night raids would subject the operations to advance review by Afghan judges, U.S. military officials said. One option under discussion in U.S.-Afghan talks would require warrants to be issued before operations get the green light.

Come again? Our soldiers will have to go to Afghan, i.e. Muslim, judges to get warrants to conduct nighttime raids against Taliban and al-Qaeda cells? How’s that going to work out? How, in other words, does this “concession” differ from a capitulation?

http://www.dianawest.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryId/2073/Silence-of-the-Lapdogs.aspx This week’s syndicated column: Warning: This column contains news of evidence of possible forgery and fraud in the long-form birth certificate of the president of the United States and – bonus – his Selective Service registration card. I figure the warning is necessary to prevent Americans, particularly Americans who work in news media and […]

Dershowitz’s Two State Solution is No Solution

Canadians for Israel’s Legal Rights – CILR
www.cilr.org

Professor Dershowitz assails the notion of a “one Jewish state solution” and characterizes it as “extreme right” as opposed to his preferred “two-state solution.” It is not a matter of “extreme right” vs. “extreme left” as he depicts it: it is a matter of right vs. wrong; a wrong that has proven to be totally divorced from reality, as the past two decades of the failed Oslo process can attest.
First, Prof. Dershowitz’s recipe crumbles on its own logic. If, as he says, “the Palestinians now seem unwilling to agree” to the cession by Israel of “all the territory captured in the defensive war of 1967”, what makes him believe that they will accept a far smaller territory consistent with Israel’s security requirements? According to a recent presentation by the JCPA, Israel’s security demands it retain the Jordan Rift Valley; control the Mountain Ridge; demilitarize the putative “Palestinian state”; and control its airspace and the main transportation networks. Does Prof. Dershowitz believe the “Palestinians” would now be more receptive to these drastic limitations on sovereignty?

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=1599

Beinart’s Zionist B.S.

In a New York Times op-ed this week (“To Save Israel, Boycott the Settlements,” March 18), Peter Beinart says it makes him “cringe” to have to call for a boycott of Israeli goods. “I am a committed Jew,” he writes. “I belong to an Orthodox synagogue, send my children to Jewish school and yearn to instill in them the same devotion to the Jewish people that my parents instilled in me.”

Then he adds, “Boycotting other Jews is a painful, unnatural act. But the alternative is worse.”

Beinart, a professor at the City University of New York, is the author of “The Crisis of Zionism,” a book that has been causing the kind of buzz that publishers love. On the basis of its contents, he has also gotten a new gig with The Daily Beast, as the editor-in-chief of a blog called “Zion Square.”

To sweeten his already plentiful pot of acclaim – awarded him by virtue of his being an American Jew who thinks Israel is headed for an implosion of its own making – Beinart’s recent piece has gone viral. One can just see him counting his book sales instead of sheep, while he lies awake at night busily solving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in his megalomaniacal head. There might be a Pulitzer Prize in it for him, after all, or maybe even a Nobel.