Bob Beckel Provides Nourishment For The Brain Dead!

El Al commercial planes to be outfitted with anti-missile defense capability. (See 1 below.)

Joint international conference planned by Germany and Israel to try and block Iranian nuclear program. Nice idea but probably a waste of time because Iran's leaders are not likely to respond. They have no incentive to do so short of knowing their nation will be attacked. You cannot make nice with radicals nor can or should you trust their word. You do so at your peril and that has been proven time and again.

Eastern and Western commitments generally do not equate when the Mid-Eastern party is a terrorist organization etc. Even the word Hudna is interpreted by Westerners to mean a cease fire, which it is. To the radical Mid East mind it is a temporary pause allowing them to re-arm for the purpose of re-engaging. Hudna is used to lull and to provide cover for rebuilding so they could carry out their original intent- strategy is not to stop hostilities but to stop in preparation for ultimately winning. (See 2 below.)

When I inform about the insanity and outright lies Palestinians teach in their schools as part of their education curriculum, in order to radicalize their next generation, I know there is disbelief. Perhaps this article will proove convincing.

Terrorism and propaganda used in radical Islamic teachings, forms the basis of future hate and warped thinking. What the Western mind finds difficult to conceive is that terrorists are bent on raising an entire maggoty generation prone to engage in whatever tactic is feasible to defeat freedom and create havoc and spread chaos among civilized society. (See 3 below.)

Karl Rove plays hard ball politics but since joining Fox, as a political news guest analyst, the public has had a better chance to judge him and what motivates his thinking. He is brilliant and far more balanced in this analysis than many of other such guest commentators and I cite the article below as evidence of a balanced view about an unbalanced position far too many Democrats take regarding national security. It is absurd so many in their party favor law suits over national security. (See 4 and 5 below.)

Charles Krauthammer, hammers home needed responses to Sen. Obama's "brilliant" but crafty address this week in response to the rev. Wright episode. Krauthammer and I are on the same wave length when it comes to pointing out Obama showed he learned well how to craft a lawyerly speech due to his Harvard education. (See 6 below.)

What I am finding interesting is how the mindless recite back verbatim what they have heard without thinking about what they are repeating. A perfect example is Bob Beckel's equating Rev. Wright's comments with those of Ms. Ferraro, Obama picking it up along with comments about his Grandma in his address and then I keep hearing it repeated by the brain dead.

Ferraro surely hurt herself by her comment, because it was immediately picked up by "The Gotcha" press and was used to club her, but what she said had a ring of truth as opposed to Wright's claim that our nation was the source of AIDS etc. We all repeat what we hear sometimes and without thinking it through but it is discouraging.

There has been and continues to be a lot of commentary about Rev. Wright etc. and it gets tiresome but it serves to reveal several things:

It gave Sen. Obama a challenge and we got to observe him under fire.

We witnessed Sen. Obama engage in a clever and masterful job of oratory using Rev. Wright's inflammatory speeches as a platform, shift gears and weave us artfully and skillfully away from the core issues raised by the Reverend's intemperateness.

Then we have been deluged with a flood of commentary from others on both sides of the political spectrum giving us plenty of food for thought and I am guilty for my own contributions.

All of this has probably given us some insights we might not otherwise have gleaned and for some, like myself, it confirmed my belief that Sen. Obama is "The Music Man I always thought him to be and for others it reaffirmed their belief that he is some kind of political Messiah with all the answers to our ills.

It also probably hardened and shifted a few votes mostly against him, I suspect, because he failed to truly answer the lingering question of why he remained a member of a church whose Minister he only denounced only after deciding he would run for president, explained, perhaps, why his wife said what she did about our nation and leaves a large number wondering what impact, if any, the Reverend's comment's have on his children.

Finally, as Sen. Obama tries to row away from the shores of his Minister's mouth he still docking at his anti-Iraq platform, repeating his intention to bring the troops home knowing that he will not because if he has the judgment he claims he has he knows he cannot.

Obama probably has the nomination locked up and it will be interesting to see just how must socialist solutions voters are willing to buy as he is eventually forced to flesh out his solutions to a whole slew of our problems. It will be up to McCain to smoke Obama out because the majority of the press and media certainly will not. At best they will come to his defense after the fact as Bob Beckel always does,



Dick

1)Israel to begin outfitting airliners with anti-missile systems within weeks

Defense officials say Israel will begin outfitting some of its passenger aircraft with missile defense systems within weeks.

The plans have been in the works since 2002, when an Arkia passenger jet was targeted after takeoff by militants firing missiles in Mombasa, Kenya. The missiles missed, but the attack spurred Israel to consider equipping passenger aircraft with defense systems similar to those already used by the air force.

The officials say the system fires flares that disrupt an incoming missile's heat-seeking mechanism.

It will be installed first on airplanes flying to destinations considered dangerous, especially in Africa and parts of Asia.

The officials say the plans were held up until this month by arguments between government ministries over who would foot the bill.

2) Israel, Germany plan int'l summit to stop Iran nuke program
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent
Tags: Israel, Germany, Iran, Syria

Germany and Israel will try to initiate an international conference aimed at stopping Iran's nuclear program, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed during their working meeting in Jerusalem on Monday.

Haaretz has meanwhile learned that Iran has provided Syria with more than $1 billion for arms purchases, reflecting Syria's drive to build up its military power in the last year, as well as the strengthening of ties between the two countries.

Olmert and Merkel discussed steps to continue the international pressure on Iran that has developed following the third round of sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council. Both leaders voiced ideas on increasing the pressure on Iran and enlisting the international community to support the effort

A senior source said that Olmert had suggested holding an international conference on Iran. The two leaders decided to advance the initiative and will try to enlist other states to back it, including the United States, France, Britain, Russia and China, as well as other European states and Arab countries that are threatened by Iran's nuclear program.

Israel hopes that states from the moderate Sunni bloc in the Middle East, such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and others would take part in the conference.

Olmert said a widely supported international gathering would initiate diplomatic pressure on Iran. A government source said such a conference could discuss practical suggestions for dealing with the nuclear issue, while sending a message to Tehran.

The $1 billion that Iran has recently provided Syria has been used to buy surface-to-surface missiles, rockets, anti-tank missiles and anti-aircraft systems.

Israel has learned that Syria is buying more missiles than tanks, on the assumption that attacking the Israeli home front would deter Israel on the one hand, and help to determine the war on the other.

A government official said this week that Iran was making huge efforts to upgrade the Syrian army. He said the close relations between Iran and Syria could make it difficult for Syria to sever its strategic alliance with Iran.

The London based Al-Sharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported in July 2007, during Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to Damascus, that he promised his counterpart Bashar Assad that Iran would finance Russian and North Korean weapon deals for $1 billion. In exchange, Syria reportedly undertook not to proceed with the peace process with Israel.

Intelligence officials presented different opinions on the Syrian-Iranian alliance at the annual intelligence evaluation presented to the cabinet some two weeks ago.

Mossad head Meir Dagan said Syria would be unlikely to break its ties with Iran, even if talks with Israel resumed and it repaired relations with Washington.

Military Intelligence chief Amos Yadlin disagreed, and said it was possible Syria could sever these ties in exchange for a reversal of American policy and an Israeli agreement to talk about the Golan Heights.

Israel is concerned over Iran's continuing weapon deliveries to Hezbollah via Syria. Recently, it has become known that Iran sent Hezbollah a number of deliveries, including a large amount of explosives.

2) Israel, Germany plan int'l summit to stop Iran nuke program
By Barak Ravid

Germany and Israel will try to initiate an international conference aimed at stopping Iran's nuclear program, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed during their working meeting in Jerusalem on Monday.

Haaretz has meanwhile learned that Iran has provided Syria with more than $1 billion for arms purchases, reflecting Syria's drive to build up its military power in the last year, as well as the strengthening of ties between the two countries.

Olmert and Merkel discussed steps to continue the international pressure on Iran that has developed following the third round of sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council. Both leaders voiced ideas on increasing the pressure on Iran and enlisting the international community to support the effort.

A senior source said that Olmert had suggested holding an international conference on Iran. The two leaders decided to advance the initiative and will try to enlist other states to back it, including the United States, France, Britain, Russia and China, as well as other European states and Arab countries that are threatened by Iran's nuclear program.

Israel hopes that states from the moderate Sunni bloc in the Middle East, such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and others would take part in the conference.

Olmert said a widely supported international gathering would initiate diplomatic pressure on Iran. A government source said such a conference could discuss practical suggestions for dealing with the nuclear issue, while sending a message to Tehran.

The $1 billion that Iran has recently provided Syria has been used to buy surface-to-surface missiles, rockets, anti-tank missiles and anti-aircraft systems.

Israel has learned that Syria is buying more missiles than tanks, on the assumption that attacking the Israeli home front would deter Israel on the one hand, and help to determine the war on the other.

A government official said this week that Iran was making huge efforts to upgrade the Syrian army. He said the close relations between Iran and Syria could make it difficult for Syria to sever its strategic alliance with Iran.

The London based Al-Sharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported in July 2007, during Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to Damascus, that he promised his counterpart Bashar Assad that Iran would finance Russian and North Korean weapon deals for $1 billion. In exchange, Syria reportedly undertook not to proceed with the peace process with Israel.

Intelligence officials presented different opinions on the Syrian-Iranian alliance at the annual intelligence evaluation presented to the cabinet some two weeks ago.

Mossad head Meir Dagan said Syria would be unlikely to break its ties with Iran, even if talks with Israel resumed and it repaired relations with Washington.

Military Intelligence chief Amos Yadlin disagreed, and said it was possible Syria could sever these ties in exchange for a reversal of American policy and an Israeli agreement to talk about the Golan Heights.

Israel is concerned over Iran's continuing weapon deliveries to Hezbollah via Syria. Recently, it has become known that Iran sent Hezbollah a number of deliveries, including a large amount of explosives.

3) Horrific Arab Twist on an Ancient Blood Libel
By Hana Levi Julian and Gil Ronen

Palestinian Authority children in Gaza are being raised to believe the ancient Eastern European blood libel myth about Jews, with a twist: in this version, the Jews don't make matzah from children's blood; they burn them alive..

According to Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), Gaza children were recently taken to an exhibit depicting Israel burning children in a crematorium. The exhibit was created by a body named “The National Committee for the Defense of Children from the Holocaust.”

The exhibit also featured a black platform with the words, “Stop the Israel’s Holocaust” [sic]. Both are used to reinforce programs on PA TV (the television station controlled by PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah terror group) that brainwash Arab children to believe that Israel burned children during the Holocaust.

About 1.5 million Jewish children were murdered during the Holocaust which accompanied World War 2. They were shot, gassed, tortured, worked, starved, frozen, neglected to death – and on some occasions, burned alive.

Complete details about the exhibit and the TV programs can be found on the PMW website.

Oslo Accords negotiator Dennis Ross, a former senior State Department official, told the New York Sun last week that he sees no signs that the Bush administration is dealing with the issue of incitement. "I have not even heard the Bush administration talk about it," he said. He revealed that during the Oslo talks, the PA agreed to review media incitement against Israel but that little change has taken place.

From medieval times, Anti-Semites have promoted the belief that Jews kidnap and murder gentile children and use their blood in the preparation of matzah for the Passover holiday.

This belief has also been resurrected recently in the Russian Siberian city of Novosibirsk, where posters have been put up warning gentile parents to “keep [their] eyes and ears open” and “watch [their] children” to guard them from “these disgusting people."

“Wedding of Mass Murderer of Yeshiva Boys"

The Muslim terrorists’ belief that murderers who die while executing Jews are martyrs who will wed 72 “dark-eyed virgins in Paradise” is alive and well among the Arab neighborhoods of eastern Jerusalem.

The official daily PA newspaper, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’s Al Hayat Al Jadida, described Ala Abu Dheim, who slaughtered eight young students at Jerusalem’s Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva two weeks ago, as a martyr and a “bridegroom.”

The paper indignantly lamented the fact that Abu Dheim’s family was forced by Israeli officials to bury the murderer before dawn without the traditional fanfare that accompanies terrorist funerals, “without a celebration and without a wedding procession.”

Although Israel did not demolish the terrorists’ house and also allowed the family to erect a mourners’ tent in which to greet people who came to console and congratulate them on their son’s "achievement," security officials initially refused to hand over his body.

The government agreed to release the terrorist’s remains only after the family promised to bury him in a private funeral before dawn in order to avoid the typical procession by thousands who would celebrate the murder and then riot in the streets.

4) Democrats Are Still Weak on Security
By KARL ROVE

One out of five is not a majority. Democrats should keep that simple fact of political life in mind as they pursue the White House.

For a party whose presidential candidates pledge they'll remove U.S. troops from Iraq immediately upon taking office -- without regard to conditions on the ground or the consequences to America's security -- a late February Gallup Poll was bad news. The Obama/Clinton vow to pull out of Iraq immediately appears to be the position of less than one-fifth of the voters.

Only 18% of those surveyed by Gallup agreed U.S. troops should be withdrawn "on a timetable as soon as possible." And only 20% felt the surge was making things worse in Iraq. Twice as many respondents felt the surge was making conditions better.

It gets worse for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Nearly two out of every three Americans surveyed (65%) believe "the United States has an obligation to establish a reasonable level of stability and security in Iraq before withdrawing all of its troops." The reason is self-interest. Almost the same number of Americans (63%) believe al Qaeda "would be more likely to use Iraq as a base for its terrorist operations" if the U.S. withdraws.

Just a year ago it was almost universally accepted that Iraq would wreck the GOP chances in November. Now the issue may pose a threat to the Democratic efforts to gain power. For while the American people are acknowledging the positive impact of the surge, Democratic leaders are not.

In September, Mrs. Clinton told Gen. David Petraeus "the reports that you provide to us really require the willing suspension of disbelief." This week, she said "we'll be right back at square one" in Iraq by this summer.

In December, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid refused to admit progress, arguing, "The surge hasn't accomplished its goals." He said a month earlier there was "no progress being made in Iraq" and "it is not getting better, it is getting worse."

Asked by CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Feb. 9 if she was worried that the gains of the last year might be lost, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shot back: "There haven't been gains . . . This is a failure." Carl Levin, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee told the Associated Press the same month that the surge "has failed."

This passionate, persistent unwillingness to admit what more and more Americans are coming to believe is true about Iraq's changing situation puts Democrats in dangerous political territory. For one thing, they increasingly appear out of touch with reality, a charge they made with some success at the administration's expense before the surge began changing conditions in Iraq.

For another, Democrats appear to have an ideological investment in things going badly in Iraq. They seem upset and prickly when asked to comment on the progress America is making. It's hard to see how Democrats can build a majority if their position on what they claim is one of the campaign's central issues is shared by less than a fifth of the electorate. They'd be better off arguing success allows America to accelerate the return of our troops rather than appear to deny the progress those troops are making.

There are more problems for Democrats on national security. Led by Ms. Pelosi, House Democrats are digging their party into even deeper difficulty by holding up the bipartisan Senate Protect American Act reauthorization. The reason? House Democrats want personal injury lawyers to be able to sue telecommunications companies for having the audacity to cooperate with the government in monitoring terrorist communications after 9/11.

It appears that in Ms. Pelosi's warped world, the monetary needs of the Democratic Party's most generous financial benefactors take precedence over the nation's security. How else could one rationally explain her opposition? Sens. Clinton and Obama, both of whom opposed the bipartisan Senate reauthorization bill, have joined in her approach.

That is a mistake, both on the merits and politically. For example, a question added to a recently conducted, private national poll introduced the issue by saying "Congress is now debating extending legislation called the Protect America Act, which allows U.S. intelligence agencies to monitor communications of foreign terrorists. Part of the debate is about protecting telephone companies or leaving them open to lawsuits."

It then described two positions, drawing on public statements by those involved in the issue. One position is that of Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell and Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who "say it is critical that Congress act as soon as possible to reauthorize the Protect America Act. They said we have already lost intelligence information because Congress let it expire, it has had negative consequences for our national security and degraded our intelligence capability."

The other position is that of "Democrat Congressional leaders Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi," who say "this is a manufactured political crisis, the intelligence community already has the tools that they need, and private companies should not be granted protection from being sued when they cooperate with the government."

When asked whom they agree with, Americans side with Messrs. McConnell and Mukasey over Mr. Reid and Ms. Pelosi by a 54%-37% margin. And this is without describing why House Democrats are fighting this battle: campaign donations from wealthy trial lawyers. The more this issue is discussed, the more Americans will come to see Democrats have put their campaign donors -- an unsavory group of lawyers, some of whom have been in the headlines recently with guilty pleas in fraud and bribery attempts -- above the country's security.

Elections are rarely decided over just one issue; to win, candidates don't need to have a majority of Americans agreeing with them on every big issue. But when it comes to choosing a president, Americans take seriously the candidates' views and experience on national security. Voters instinctively understand a president's principal constitutional responsibility is protecting the country.

The Democrats have two candidates with less national security experience and fewer credentials than the presumptive Republican nominee, Sen. John McCain. And they are compounding these difficulties with positions on Iraq and terrorist surveillance that are shared by a shrinking minority of Americans.

5) Wiretaps and Blue Dogs
Review and Outlook
(WSJ Lead editorial 3/21/'08)

Democratic cynicism on national security reached new heights with a House vote last Friday that deserves more public scrutiny. Lawmakers approved a bill that not only fails to provide liability protection for phone companies that assisted the government after 9/11 but actually greases the skids for trial lawyers.

The real purpose of the legislation, which ostensibly updates the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), was to cover political backsides as the House adjourned for a two-week recess. Democrats wanted to appease their antiwar base that equates any talk of a terrorist threat with "fear-mongering." At the same time they wanted to be able to say they voted for something, in case there's another attack while they're not in session.

What the vote really demonstrates is liberal unseriousness on national security, and a willingness to hang more moderate Democrats out to dry to make their point. The Senate has passed a bipartisan bill that would grant immunity to the phone companies and is backed by President Bush. In January, 21 "Blue Dog" Democrats in the House even sent a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi that said the Senate FISA legislation "contains satisfactory language" and that "we would fully support that measure should it reach the House floor without substantial change."
[Wiretaps and Blue Dogs]

Ms. Pelosi's reply was to force the signatories to take a vote that repudiates their earlier position. The nearby table names the 14 Members who signed that letter but voted for the Pelosi bill. One of the signers, Tennessee's Lincoln Davis, was so nonplused he could only bring himself to vote "present."

Mr. Bush has promised to veto the bill, which is actively hostile to the intelligence gathering necessary to fight terrorists in the 21st century. In addition to leaving phone carriers exposed to billion-dollar lawsuits, the legislation strips away the "state secrets" privilege for any entity that cooperated with the U.S. intelligence community. What this does, essentially, is ensure that the dozens of suits already pending against carriers would, at the very least, reach the merit phase of litigation and possibly drag on for years. Such legal exposure makes it that much more difficult to gain private cooperation in national security emergencies going forward.

Another provision would create a new 9/11-style commission to investigate antiterror surveillance. Congressional committees already exist to perform this oversight, but no matter. The first 9/11 commission blamed everyone for not doing enough to fight terror. This commission would have as its main goal blaming the Bush Administration for trying to do too much.

By requiring prior court approval to gather foreign intelligence from foreign targets on foreign soil, the House measure would also further involve unelected judges in warfighting decisions. By the way, since when do foreign targets have a right to any court review under the U.S. Constitution? It tells you something about today's Democrats that when a previous Democratic Congress passed FISA 30 years ago, it omitted any such "probable cause" and "significant purpose" tests for foreigners overseas.

This exercise shows that the Democratic left that runs the House is a danger to American security. Senate Democrats would be doing their party a favor by killing this bill before voters figure out they really believe this stuff.

6) The Speech: A Brilliant Fraud
By Charles Krauthammer

WASHINGTON -- The beauty of a speech is that you don't just give the answers, you provide your own questions. "Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes." So said Barack Obama, in his Philadelphia speech about his pastor, friend, mentor and spiritual adviser of 20 years, Jeremiah Wright.

An interesting, if belated, admission. But the more important question is: which "controversial" remarks?

Wright's assertion from the pulpit that the U.S. government invented the HIV virus "as a means of genocide against people of color"? Wright's claim that America was morally responsible for 9/11 -- "chickens coming home to roost" -- because of, among other crimes, Hiroshima and Nagasaki? (Obama says he missed church that day. Had he never heard about it?)

What about the charge that the U.S. government (of Franklin Roosevelt, mind you) knew about Pearl Harbor, but lied about it? Or that the government gives drugs to black people, presumably to enslave and imprison them?

Obama condemns such statements as wrong and divisive, then frames the next question: "There will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church?"

But that is not the question. The question is why didn't he leave that church? Why didn't he leave -- why doesn't he leave even today -- a pastor who thundered not once but three times from the pulpit (on a DVD the church proudly sells) "God damn America"? Obama's 5,000-word speech, fawned over as a great meditation on race, is little more than an elegantly crafted, brilliantly sophistic justification of that scandalous dereliction.

His defense rests on two central propositions: (a) moral equivalence, and (b) white guilt.

(a) Moral equivalence. Sure, says Obama, there's Wright, but at the other "end of the spectrum" there's Geraldine Ferraro, opponents of affirmative action and his own white grandmother, "who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe." But did she shout them in a crowded theater to incite, enrage and poison others?

"I can no more disown (Wright) than I can my white grandmother." What exactly was grandma's offense? Jesse Jackson himself once admitted to the fear he feels from the footsteps of black men on the street. And Harry Truman was known to use epithets for blacks and Jews in private, yet is revered for desegregating the armed forces and recognizing the first Jewish state since Jesus' time. He never spread racial hatred. Nor did grandma.

Yet Obama compares her to Wright. Does he not see the moral difference between the occasional private expression of the prejudices of one's time and the use of a public stage to spread racial lies and race hatred?

(b) White guilt. Obama's purpose in the speech was to put Wright's outrages in context. By context, Obama means history. And by history, he means the history of white racism. Obama says, "We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country," and then proceeds to do precisely that. And what lies at the end of his recital of the long train of white racial assaults from slavery to employment discrimination? Jeremiah Wright, of course.

This contextual analysis of Wright's venom, this extenuation of black hate speech as a product of white racism, is not new. It's the Jesse Jackson politics of racial grievance, expressed in Ivy League diction and Harvard Law nuance. That's why the speech made so many liberal commentators swoon: It bathed them in racial guilt, while flattering their intellectual pretensions. An unbeatable combination.

But Obama was supposed to be new. He flatters himself as a man of the future transcending the anger of the past as represented by his beloved pastor. Obama then waxes rhapsodic about the hope brought by the new consciousness of the young people in his campaign.

Then answer this, senator: If Wright is a man of the past, why would you expose your children to his vitriolic divisiveness? This is a man who curses America and who proclaimed moral satisfaction in the deaths of 3,000 innocents at a time when their bodies were still being sought at Ground Zero. It is not just the older congregants who stand and cheer and roar in wild approval of Wright's rants, but young people as well. Why did you give $22,500 just two years ago to a church run by a man of the past who infects the younger generation with precisely the racial attitudes and animus you say you have come unto us to transcend?