Denial- what a wonderful thing until reality happens!

What do John Bolton and Karl Rove's Op Ed articles in today's Wall Street Journal and Iran have in common? They are about denial. GW and our State Department are trying to finesse reality when it comes to N Korea's nuclear program. Liberal Democrats have decided to disregard who Obama is, what he stands for, his lack of experience and who his former relationships have been. The world remains in denial concerning Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Denial is a powerful force and generally is followed by surprises which cannot be denied.

And for a little history about HST from a fellow memo reader. Either proves HST was a man of principle or too dumb to come out of the rain. For sure times have change. I think HST was principled and wish he were here today running the show. (See 1 below.)

Olmert accused of accepting funds from U.S. business man? Probably the only smart thing Olmert has done and this before he even became PM.(See 2 below.)

Ahmadinejad sends greeting to Israel on its 60th birthday. His greeting alone would seem to justify eliminating his own country.(See 3 below.)

Would it not be nice if it were doable. Dream on you yet to be shorn sheep. (See 4 below.)

Amazing how the Saudis funded terrorism for decades and now decry what they have reaped. (See 5 below.)

Obliterate on Hillary. It is your right according to Michael Rubin. As for Obama he remains in a cocoon of naivity. (See 6 below.)

Olmert ain't no HST. He has decided even though he may have accepted accepted bribes, which he denied, it was so long ago it has no relevance. (See 7 below.)

Dick

1) When President Truman retired from office in 1952, his income was substantially a U.S. Army pension reported to have been 13,507.72 a year. Congress, noting that he was paying for his stamps and personally licking them, granted him an 'allowance' and, later, a retroactive pension of $25,000 per year.


When offered corporate positions at large salaries, he declined, stating, "You don't want me. You want the office of the president, and that doesn't belong to me. It belongs to the American people and it's not for sale.'

Even later, on May 6, 1971, when Congress was preparing to award him the Medal of Honor on his 87th birthday, he refused to accept it, writing,

'I don't consider that I have done anything which should be the reason for any award, Congressional or otherwise.'


We now see that politicians have found a new level of success in cashing in on the presidency, senate, etc., resulting in untold wealth.

Today, many in Congress also have found a way to become quite wealthy while enjoying the fruits of their offices. Political offices are now for sale.


Was good old Harry Truman correct when he observed, 'My choice early in life was either to be a piano player in a whorehouse or a politician. And to tell the truth, there's hardly any difference.

A job playing the piano is much more honorable.

2) Olmert suspected of accepting illicit funds from U.S. businessman.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is suspected of illicitly receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from an American businessman before assuming his position, according to the details of an investigation currently being carried out against him.

Judicial officials decided on Thursday to request an ease on the sweeping media gag order that has prevented the reporting of details on the probe.

Following the officials' decision, police petitioned the Tel Aviv Magistrates Court immediately to lift the gag order. Shortly after, the request was approved.

Channel 10 TV reported that the American in question, Moshe Talansky, was a middleman for illegal campaign contributions, and that he readily told Israeli interrogators everything he knew about the case.

The contributions were allegedly made while Olmert was mayor of Jerusalem, before he became prime minister. Channel 2 TV reported that police do not know what the money was used for.

Olmert convened a late-night news conference at short notice on Thursday as speculation swirled that the police investigation into his affairs would increase pressure on him to resign.

An aide said Olmert would speak to journalists at his Jerusalem residence some time after 10 P.M. as most Israelis were still celebrating Independence Day and the 60th anniversary of the foundation of the state.

Even before the gag order was loosened, Olmert's opponents were calling on him to resign. Olmert is the target of several other investigations, but he has never been charged or convicted. He denies any wrongdoing.

The attorney general, State Prosecution officials and police investigators met Thursday to discuss what aspects of the gag order, placed last week on all details surrounding the case, could be relaxed.

On Tuesday, police said that leaks coming from the foreign media regarding the investigation "undermined" the gag order on the case and rendered it "losing its significance."

The New York Post on Tuesday revealed details on the probe on its Web site, including the name of a foreign national summoned by police for questioning, but these details are banned in Israel.

The Jerusalem Magistrates Court on Tuesday morning rejected a petition by Haaretz and Channel 10 television to lift the gag order on the details of the criminal investigation into Olmert.

The gag order prohibits the publication of details of the probe, over which Olmert was questioned under caution last Friday. Justice Daniel Beeri ruled that the order would remain in effect until it expires on Sunday.

Attorney Mibi Mozer, on behalf of Haaretz, told the court that the gag order creates an imbalance between the necessity to refrain from perverting the course of justice, and the public interest to be informed of the nature of the allegations against the prime minister.

3) Ahmadinejad: Israel is a 'stinking corpse' doomed to disappear


Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday called Israel a "stinking corpse" which is doomed dissappear, as the state celebrated 60 years of independence.

"Those who think they can revive the stinking corpse of the usurping and fake Israeli regime by throwing a birthday party are seriously mistaken," Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency.

"Today the reason for the Zionist regime's existence is questioned, and this regime is on its way to annihilation," he said.

Ahmadinejad added that Israel "has reached the end like a dead rat after being slapped by the Lebanese" - a reference to the 2006 war between Israel and the Shiite Hezbollah militia.

The hardline Iranian leader has made previous comments against Israel reminiscent along the same lines a number of times in recent years.

He has told the West to prepare for Israel's "imminent collapse," said the state was doomed to fail, during an international conference questioning the Holocaust, and on a separate occasion threatened that the state would "be wiped off the map."

4) Life Without Edges -- The Left's Seductive Promise
By AWR Hawkins

In an election year such as this, the responsible voter must assess the "glorious" ends of the Left's various offers of a life without edges: an existence free of the normal dangers, struggles, and consequences of life.

For example, when the candidates on the Left tout universal healthcare as an end, the voting public should recognize that the means to that end will be higher taxes with less medical choices for all patients, as well lower pay and less treatment options for doctors. It should be evident that universal healthcare will ultimately be disastrous instead of beneficial, crippling instead of healing any current problems in the healthcare industry. Will the candidates on the Left take time to assess the end in the same way and, considering the train-wreck that universal healthcare has caused in Canada and other countries, abandon their course and opt for sticking with private healthcare as we have today?

If we rely on history as an indication of how politicians on the Left have frequently operated since the mid-1930s, then the answer to this question is "no." In fact, empirical evidence argues that the candidates on the Left already know that universal healthcare is a sham, but that will not stop them because they are not really seeking access to better healthcare for the citizenry, but rather a means to more control and government involvement in the everyday lives of citizens. If history is right, the closer we get to November 2008, the louder the politicians on the Left will proclaim their efforts "for the public good." They will promise us a life without edges in so many words, yet deliver a life without liberty.

The Left's offer of a life without edges began when Franklin Delano Roosevelt pushed Social Security as a kind of investment without risk in 1935. Through payroll deductions, which are simply taxes by another name, Social Security was created with the understanding that the working class would have guaranteed retirement savings. Today, we know that this grand promise of investment without risk has amounted to investment without return. It is impoverishing rather enriching for the hard working people who gain approximately two percent annual interest on their retirement savings in Social Security, while private savings accounts pay eight percent or more annually.

And where is the Left on this issue when a Republican Senator or Congressman calls for privatization of Social Security? They are aligned with Hillary's and Obama's position of refusing to look at the facts when people point out the bankruptcy of leftist contrivances like universal healthcare.

In 1947 the Left discovered the Separation of Church and State in the Constitution. This eventually led the benevolent Left to protect us from too much exposure to religion by prohibiting prayer in public schools. Ironically, this new separation from religion "for our own good" has resulted not simply in schools without prayer, but education without morality. But of course, the problem is that the Left is still teaching a morality; it is simply not a Christian one.

And where is the Left when parents, who are desperate to shield their children from humanist indoctrination, plead for school vouchers so they can use their own tax money to send their children to a private school? The Left will never support a voucher plan because they cannot afford to allow the children of the less afluent, "dependent" classes to attend schools that would actually teach them how to invest, rise above poverty, and live life apart from the government dole.

After the 1950s, the Left began a rapid fire implementation of even more aspects of life without edges. From 1964-68, President Lyndon B. Johnson brought America a war without sacrifice by downplaying the level to which we would have to commit to the Vietnam War in order to win it. In 1973, through Roe vs. Wade, the Leftists in the Supreme Court brought us women without unwanted pregnancies. President Jimmy Carter attempted to make us safe by creating a military without bombers when he canceled the B-1 bomber along with the missiles already in development. The result of such innovation was war without victory, children without life, and a military without important weapons. Once again, life without edges proved antithetical to liberty and encumbering to a once awe-inspiring superpower.

The pursuit of life without edges continued unabated during the Clinton years, and also during the first two years of George W. Bush's Presidency through Senator Tom Daschle. When Enron collapsed and investors lost their retirement due to foolishly putting too much money in one stock, Daschle was "Johnny on the Spot" with a plan for the federal government to stick its nose in personal retirement accounts to guarantee us more investments without risk. Fortunately, the public did not want another investment without return and voted Daschle out of office.

During the last decade, the Left has promoted a movement aimed at bringing us bars and restaurants without smoke. As is the norm of the Left, this agenda is sold on the promise that it is "for our own good." However, the Left fails to acknowledge that frequenting a business that permits smoking is a consumer's choice. We can only conclude that the pursuit of bars and restaurants without smoke has resulted in land owners without property rights, as the "tobacco Nazis" are implementing legislation that prohibits property owners from doing what they wish with their own things.

When the Left promises us life without edges, what they really have in mind is life without freedom.

5) Saudi warns Lebanon Hezbollah-led opposition against escalation



Saudi Arabia warned Lebanon's Hezbollah-led opposition on Thursday against
an escalation of its confrontation with the government, warning that
conflict would only benefit "extremist external forces," in an apparent
reference to Iran.

"The kingdom urges the groups behind the escalation to reconsider their
position, and to realise that leading Lebanon towards turmoil will not bring
victory to any party except extremist external forces," the state news
agency SPA quoted an official as saying.

These forces "are still hindering every sincere and honest effort to end the
political crisis in Lebanon," the official said.

The Saudi comments came on the second day of anti-government protests in
Beirut which blocked roads and forced Lebanon's only international airport
to close in a major escalation of a long-running political crisis.

Lebanon's opposition is backed by Iran and Syria while Saudi Arabia, the
regional Sunni Arab powerhouse, supports the Western-backed ruling majority.

The news agency said Saudi Arabia will continue its efforts to restore
security and peace in Lebanon.

"It will spare no effort in helping and will stand by its side to defend...
the independence of its political decision and unity," it added.

"The kingdom calls upon everyone in Lebanon, regardless of their political
affilations... to give the interests of Lebanon priority over other
considerations," it said.

6) Hillary Clinton's right to say 'obliterate'
By Michael Rubin


On April 29, answering a question on ABC's "Good Morning America," Sen. Hillary Clinton warned that if Iran attacked Israel with nuclear weapons, "we would be able to totally obliterate them." On NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday, Sen. Barack Obama chided Clinton. "It's language reflective of George Bush. ...This kind of language is not helpful," Obama told Tim Russert.

If peace and stability are Obama's goals, one only needs to read the Iranian newspapers to see that he is dead wrong. On Sunday, the economic daily Donya-e Eqtesad declared the most recent diplomatic initiative - a package of incentives offered by the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany - to be a validation of Iranian defiance. Then, the next day, Kayhan, the daily newspaper that is the mouthpiece of the Supreme Leader, ridiculed international diplomats' offers of incentives to Iran if it stops its nuclear enrichment, chiding them "for mistaking Iran today with Iran four years ago" and noting that "Iran's bargaining position has strengthened considerably" since it began to accelerate its enrichment.

Obama must confront reality: While everyone wishes for diplomacy's success, it is Iran's nuclear advance, not American "saber-rattling," that is the single greatest danger to international peace and security.

The civilian nature of Iran's nuclear program is fiction. First, there is original sin: Iran experimented with warhead design until 2003. It spent millions to conceal its enrichment capability. It rests on a sea of oil and gas, giving it almost limitless generating capability for a fraction of its nuclear investment. Most damning, Iran does not possess the uranium resources to power its reactors beyond 2023.

Iran's Foreign Ministry officials - basically out-of-the-loop minders for Western diplomats and journalists - deny military ambitions. But those closer to Iran's leadership tell a very different story. On Dec. 14, 2001, then-President Hashemi Rafsanjani raised the possibility that, because Iran has the size to withstand a nuclear response, a nuclear first strike on Israel might be worthwhile.

On May 29, 2005, Hojjat ol-Islam Gholam Reza Hasani, the Supreme Leader's representative in West Azerbaijan, declared possession of nuclear weapons to be one of Iran's top goals. "An atom bomb ...must be produced as well," he said. While University of Michigan Prof. Juan Cole has made acottage industry of denying that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he wished to wipe Israel off the face of the map, the president's official translation affirmed his genocidal intent, as did the missiles paraded through Tehran with banners calling for Israel's demise.

The next U.S. President will confront a very different Iran from that faced by George Bush. That Obama - while not taking military options off the table entirely - seems bent on relying primarily on inspections and negotiations shows ignorance and inexperience.

The International Atomic Energy Agency inspects only Iran's declared facilities. It does so once a month. But if Iran has installed 6,000 centrifuges as Ahmadinejad has claimed, the Islamic Republic could produce a bomb's worth of highly enriched uranium in a matter of weeks.

If Iran goes nuclear, no amount of diplomacy will put the nuclear genie back in the bottle. And while most Iranians are peaceful, they do not control the country's nuclear program; the Supreme Leader and the Revolutionary Guards - the most ideological and reactionary faction within the Islamic Republic - do.

And so, in the face of a saber-rattling Iran, the next U.S. President will have just two main policy options: containment and deterrence. Both are military strategies. Containment requires alliances with regional states, forward deployment and, yes, permanent bases. Deterrence requires all Iranians to understand the collective responsibility that accompanies any use of nuclear weapons.

Clarifying red lines and consequences is not warmongering; it is responsible diplomacy.

7)Ehud Olmert says he will not quit although suspected of taking bribes before he became prime minister


Thursday night, May 8 the court gag order imposed on the police investigation against the prime minister was partially lifted. Olmert immediately denied the charge published against him of bribe-taking, admitted only accepting political campaign funds which never reached his pocket and said he would only resign if indicted.

The charge against him is of receiving from an outside party or parties hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes over a period spanning his terms as mayor of Jerusalem and minister of trade and industry between 1999 and 2005.

The evidence against him came from two sources: the millionaire financier Rabbi Morris Talanksy, CEO of Global Resources Group, Long Island and Olmert’s former partner in his law practice and close friend Uri Messer.

Talansky, who arrived in Israel before Passover, gave police investigators details of the sums in cash he handed to Olmert directly and indirectly through Shula Zaken, his personal assistant as mayor and minister, with dates.

She then passed the cash to Messer.

In his statement, the prime minister admitted receiving money from Talanksy for all his election campaigns. He said he handed the moneys to Uri Messer, whom he hoped had managed the financial side of his political campaigns professionally and lawfully.

Messer is willing to testify against his former partner. According to the investigation, no records were found to establish how the moneys were used.

Olmert finished his television statement by saying: I can look you straight in the eye and say I never took bribes or used the money for my personal needs. If the attorney general indicts me I will resign. I don’t believe it will come to this.

I have served the Israeli people for 30 years faithfully and I regret the storm shaking the country.