Obama and Preparation H!

Hezballah now dominates Lebanon politically - another blow to the West. (See 1 below)

Obama is clever. Realizing his pledge to negotiate without pre-conditions had become an abatross Obama shifted his stated position and now states it always implied a vast amount of preparation. Should Obama become president and implements his plan he should take a lot of Preparation H with him to the conference table.

Sent by a fellow memo reader. (See 2 below.)

Olmert announces Israel will begin talks with Syria.

Perhaps this is why those opposed to Olmert recently revealed his accepting money so long ago in hopes of cutting him off at the pass and they may still do so.

Yesterday, I posted George Friedman's comments regarding Syria and Israel and it now appears Olmert is going to make a stab at protecting Assad on the premise 'the enemy you know is better than the one you do not know.'

Is Olmert about to engage in another wistful effort to save his skin? (See 3 below.)

Israel's policy of talking with Syria flies in the face of the U.S.'s stance and it is highly unlikely Israel can offer Syria something that will cause Assad to break with Iran.

Will Obama use Olmert's decision as a basis for justifying his own stance vis a vis meeting with terrorist leaders from the Middle East without pre-conditions or even with them? (See 4 below.)

More commentary from John Mauldin. This time it pertains to how to make money from oil alternatives as well as the need to focus on not only production but the consequences when it peaks and the unwillingness of producing nations to then continue exporting. Very interesting. (See 5 below.)

More thoughts regarding Obama from one of his own race. (See 6 below.)

Sen.Joe Lieberman speaks out and steps on some toes. (See 7 below.)

More sounding off from Tom Friedman as if GW dug the entire hole and predecessor politicians never knew how to use a shovel. (See 8 below.)

Hamas knows if it keeps pressing Olmert is likely to cave. But, as alays the terrorists will overplay their hand and force him to have to play his in an unexpected manner.(See 9 below.)

Dick

1)Analysis: Doha accord swings Lebanon’s balance of power to Iran-backed Hizballah


Heads of the pro-government majority factions and the Hizballah-led opposition reached an agreement in the Qatar capital early Wednesday, May 21, aimed at pulling Lebanon back from the brink of civil war. A president, lacking since last November, will be elected immediately, a new government will be formed with 11 ministries out of 16 for the Hizballah bloc (veto power), new elections will be held and Iran’s Shiite surrogate will not have to disarm.

Middle East sources report that after 26 years, and in defiance of two UN Security Council resolutions, Hizballah’s armed militia won formal national acceptance and the right to possess an independent weapons arsenal.

While the pro-government Sunni, Christian and Druze faction heads at Doha accepted the standing of Hizballah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, as a central national figure, they also agreed to drop his archenemy, the pro-US Fouad Siniora, as prime minister in the new government.

The only candidate for president, chief of staff Gen. Michel Suleiman, expects to be elected by a parliamentary consensus before the end of the week.

Middle East sources term the Doha deal on Lebanon a Hizballah walkover, its reward for six days of armed onslaught on government positions, unopposed by the armed forces. It marks the most resounding strategic debacle the West, Israel have experienced since Hamas’ forcible takeover of the Gaza Strip in 2005 and Israel’s failure to smash the Shiite terrorists’ armed strength in 2006.

2)We are witnessing a political phenomenon of rare magnitude with

Barack Obama. His speeches have inspired millions, and yet most of his

followers have no idea of what he stands for except platitudes of "Change"

or that he says he will be a "Uniter". The power of speech from a

charismatic person truly can be a powerful thing.


Many Americans out there are feeling like a surfer who might be ecstatic

and euphoric while riding a tidal wave, the real story is what happens

when it hits shore.


People have a sked, "what has Barack Obama actually

accomplished to qualify himself as a candidate for President?"


Here is a list of Barack Hussein Obama's accomplishments:



* He voted against banning partial birth abortion.

* He voted no on notifying parents of minors who get

out-of-state abortions.

* Supports affirmative action in Colleges and Government.

* In 2001 he questioned harsh penalties for drug dealing.

* Says he will deal with street level drug dealing as minimum-wage affair.

* Admitted marijuana and cocaine use in high school and in college.

* His religious convictions are very murky.

* He is willing to meet with Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Kim Jung Il and

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

* He said that one of his first goals after being elected would be to have

a conference with all Muslim nations.

* Opposed the Patriot Act.

* First bill he signed that was passed was campaign finance reform.

* Voted No on prohibiting law suits against gun manufacturers.

* Supports universal health-care.

* Voted yes on providing habeas corpus for Guantanamo detainees.

* Supports granting driver's licenses to illegal immigrants.

* Supports extending welfare to illegal immigrants.

* Voted yes on comprehensive immigration reform.

* Voted yes on allowing illegal aliens to participate in Social

Security.

* Wants to make the minimum wage a "living wage".

* Voted with Democratic Party 96 percent of 251 votes.

* Opposed to any efforts to Privatize Social Security and

instead supports increasing the amount of tax paid.

* He voted "No" on repealing the Alternative Minimum Tax

* He voted "No" on repealing the "Death" Tax.

* He wants to raise the Capital Gains Tax.

* Has repeatedly said the surge in Iraq has not succeeded

* He is ranked as the most liberal Senator in the Senate today

and that takes some doing.


If your political choices are consistent with Barack Obama's

and you think that his positions will bring America together or

make it a better place, then you will probably enjoy riding the

wave.


If you are like most Americans who, after examining what he

stands for, are truly not in line with his record, it would be prudent

to get off the wave, or, better yet, never get on, before it comes on

shore and undermines the very foundations of this great Country.

3) Syria FM: Israel promises to withdraw to '67 borders: Israel and Syria confirm they are to launch indirect talks
By Barak Ravid

Israel and Syria are set to begin indirect peace negotiations brokered by Turkey, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's bureau and the Syrian Foreign Ministry confirmed Wednesday.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem said that in advance of the negotiations, Israel promised to withdraw from the Golan Heights, to the July 4, 1967 borders. There was no comment from Israel on that matter.

Announcement of the negotiations was the first official confirmation of contacts between the long-time enemies. In statements issued minutes apart, the two governments said they have declared their intent to conduct these indirect talks in good faith and with an open mind, with a goal of reaching a comprehensive peace.

"The two sides have begun indirect talks under Turkish auspices," Olmert's bureau said. "The sides have declared their intention to conduct the talks without prejudice and with openness... They have decided to conduct the dialogue in a serious and continuous manner with the aim of reaching a comprehensive peace."

The Syrian Foreign Ministry statement said that, "Syria has started indirect peace talks with Israel under Turkish auspices. Both sides have expressed their desire to conduct the talks in good will and decided to continue dialogue with seriousness to achieve comprehensive peace."

Israel captured the Golan Heights, along with the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem in the Six-Day War of June 1967. In recent years, the Arab League has offered Israel normalized ties in return for its withdrawal from all of these lands. In 2005, Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip.

An Israeli official said Wednesday that Olmert gave Syria a "formula" for the Golan Heights "that [Syrian President Bashar] Assad wanted," although the details remain secret.

Another Israeli official familiar with the two country's relations said Wednesday that, "It will be a very long process. The direct talks themselves have not yet started."

Both nations thanked Turkey for its help, and Turkey issued its own confirmation. Muslim Turkey has good ties with both Israel and Syria.

Officials from both sides now in Ankara

Senior officials from both sides were currently in Turkey, an Israeli government official said Wednesday. Olmert's aides Yoram Turbovitz and Shalom Turjeman have been in Ankara since Monday holding indirect talks with Syrian officials under Turkish mediation.

The Israeli official said: "The prime minister visited Turkey in February 2007 and in talks with the Turkish prime minister it was agreed that Turkey would start to act in a mediating role.

"The idea was to restart the peace process with Syria... We feel these contacts reached fruition about three weeks ago. It was decided to have a gathering in Ankara. The two officials have been there since Monday, in parallel with Syrian representatives," the official said, stopping short of confirming any direct talks between the two sides."

Syrian Foreign Ministry adviser Riad Daoudi is leading the Syrian team, diplomats familiar with the talks said on Wednesday.

"Daoudi has been in Ankara for a few days. At this stage it does not seem that he has met face to face with the Israelis," one of the diplomats said. Daoudi is a lawyer who has worked on the details of the
Syrian position on the full return of the Golan Heights.

Israel and Syria last held peace talks in the United States in 2000 but they collapsed after the two sides failed to reach an agreement on the fate of the Golan.

A government official said that preparations for the talks have been underway since last year. "This has been worked on for quite some time... This started already last year, during a visit by the prime minister to Turkey, and it's coming to fruition now."

Olmert, who relaunched peace talks with the Palestinians six months ago, has said he is willing to discuss handing back the Golan to Syria in return for Damascus severing ties with Iran and guerrilla movements hostile to Israel, notably the Palestinians of Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah.

'Israel committed to both Palestinian and Syrian tracks

The renewed negotiations will not come at the expense of ongoing statehood talks with the Palestinians, a senior Israeli official said on Wednesday.

"The government remains committed to pursuing both the Syrian and Palestinian tracks," said the official, who disclosed after an official announcement of the indirect Israeli-Syrian talks.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said the Palestinians welcomed the latest news. "We want to reach a comprehensive peace and therefore we support talks between Israel and Syria," he said.

4) Syria-Israel peace deal 'requires shift in U.S. policy'

Analysts, including former senior Israeli officials, believe there is little prospect of a peace between Israel and Syria without a shift in U.S. policy toward Damascus, possibly once President George W. Bush steps down in January.

One view is that, aside from territory, Israel has little to offer Syria and that Damascus would move its allegiances away from Tehran only on the prospect of being embraced economically and diplomatically by the United States and its allies.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said earlier this month that Washington would support Turkish-brokered talks between Israel and Syria.

But she repeated U.S. demands that Damascus should change its policies on Lebanon, where Syria's allies have been at odds with other factions backed by the United States.

Paul Salem, an analyst at the Carnegie Endowment in Beirut, said: "The Americans are not obstructing it, but they are taking a wait-and-see approach.

"If Syria and Israel make progress, this could be presented to the next U.S. administration some time in 2009, when such an agreement could become part of a wider agreement that might involve other regional issues like Lebanon, Syria and Iran."

"At that stage it would require the United States to be more engaged. For now they [Syrians, Israelis] want to focus on the technical issues, bilateral issues, on the Golan."

The U.S. government had asked Turkey to increase efforts to advance negotiations between Israel and Syria, according to a report published by the London Arabic daily Al-Hayat on Saturday.

According to the report, the U.S. request comes in light of the recent political crisis in Lebanon, and U.S. assessments that peace between Israel and Syria will help distance the country from Hezbollah.

The report quoted a source as saying that Washington has hinted to Israel more than once the importance of progress in talks with Syria.

The source added that the U.S. said they are ready to participate in talks between the countries if Turkey is able to achieve a breakthrough between them.

Last week, Olmert said he was prepared to bring about a peace agreement between Israel and Syria during his term in office, according to a report in the magazine Paris Match.

Ankara would like both sides to commit to a signed declaration as a starting point for talks. According to the report, Turkey decided to postpone the proposed sit-down after the Syrians revealed Jerusalem's stated willingness to withdraw from the Golan Heights in exchange for peace.

The newspaper added that the Syrian leadership was assuaged by Olmert's refusal to deny or backtrack from the claims when word reached the news media in Israel.

5) What the Export Land Model Means for Energy Prices
By David Galland, Managing Director Casey Research - Casey Energy Speculator


Jeffrey Brown is someone you should know. That's because he can help you understand today's high energy prices and that, as an investor, can make you a lot of money.

I'll introduce to you to Jeff Brown in a moment. But first, as it's relevant to the discussion, I want to touch on an important concept related to investing in challenging times.

You might call it "the Davy Crockett principle" in honor of something that American icon said during the War of 1812: "Be sure you are right and then go ahead."

Simply, it's critical to step away from all the noise and clutter that passes for knowledge on the financial talk shows, and take the time to be very sure you are investing in close concert with a powerful unfolding trend. That accomplished, come what may, you'll come out okay once the dust has settled.

And the earlier you can get on board with a trend, the more money you can make.

In fact, Casey Research chief economist Bud Conrad has shown how, by making just four trades over the last four decades -- into exactly the right sector at the beginning of a strong new trend -- you could have turned $35 into $150,000. Or $350 into $1,500,000 ... or $3,500 into $15 million. And that assumes you don't use leverage. Toss in some options or futures and the returns run exponentially higher.

How to Turn $35 Into $159,591

While it is unlikely anyone actually made those exact trades, it is a certainty that many investors got in early on one or more of those big moves.

(Interestingly, replacing the last trade -- the move into crude -- with gold produces a final number of $131,496. Proving there is more than one path to the top.)

The key point I'm trying to make is simple: focusing your investments on big trends is a big leg up in your quest for investment success. By then digging in to find the right opportunities, whether they be in commodities or undervalued companies that benefit from those trends, assures you earn returns that are well above average.

More importantly, in the context of the current market environment, the combination of the right investment in the right trend makes your portfolio bullet-proof.

Which brings me to the work being done by Jeffrey Brown, a professional geoscientist with an avid academic and professional interest in something called the Export Land Model.
Turning off the Taps

You don't have to have an awful lot of gray hair to remember the excitement around England's massive North Sea oil fields. While discovered in 1969, it wasn't until well into the 1980s, on the back of surging oil prices, that the fields came into full production. Turning up the taps, the United Kingdom (as well as Norway and Germany, who also have North Sea production) became a significant exporter of oil.

But then, in 1999, something happened: the UK's North Sea production hit peak ... that tipping point after which reservoirs go into decline, setting in motion both reduced production and progressively higher costs related to extracting the remaining oil.

While the experience of North Sea oil production provides yet another useful example of the validity of the Peak Oil theory, what concerns us today is a critical but usually overlooked aspect of the discussion, exports.

At the time the North Sea peaked in 1999, the U.K. was exporting 1 million barrels of oil per day. By August 2004, it had become a net importer. What happened to cause the situation to turn around so quickly?
The Export Land Model

To understand the importance of exports when discussing peak oil, ask yourself the question, "What's more important: the fact that global oil production is falling ... or that the oil-exporting nations are cutting off their exports?"

While the two questions are clearly linked, it is the nuance of the export question that clearly matters the most. Especially if you live in a country such as the US, which currently imports about 70% of its oil.

Which brings us to the Export Land Model (or ELM, as I will refer to it from here). The basic thesis expressed by Jeff Brown and other students of the ELM is that, to fully appreciate the impact of peak oil, you cannot look only at the production declines so presciently anticipated by MK Hubbard in 1956. You also have to look at the rate of local consumption and the effect of that consumption on the ability of a country to export its oil.


Export Land Model

ELM assumes that, after a country's oil production hits peak it will decline at a rate 5% annually, at the same time that local consumption increases by 2.5%.Using these assumptions, the ELM shows that exports reach zero in 9 years.

Real-world data shows that the metrics used in the ELM are quite conservative. The chart below plots the hypothetical ELM against the actual data from the United Kingdom and Indonesia. While the ELM forecast hypothesizes 9 years between peak to the end of exports, Indonesia's exports ceased 7 years after peak, and the UK's exports stopped just 6 years after peak.

ELM, UK and Indonesia, Year over Year Changes in Net Exports

The important take-away here is not that the UK and Indonesia are no longer receiving the oil export income of the good old days -- that is entirely a localized concern.

Rather it is that the global market is now deprived of those exports; between UK and Indonesia alone, the change over just the last decade amounts to a swing in the wrong direction of a total of 2 million barrels per day. And those are just two of a number of important countries which have swung from exporters to importers in recent years.

China, for example, became a net importer in 1993, the result of flattening production against skyrocketing consumption. Over the last decade alone, China's oil consumption has almost doubled, to about 8 million barrels a day, about half of which is now imported.

So, again, while people tend to focus on production, they are overlooking the impact on exports forecasted by the ELM. In the case of China, they went from a net exporter in 1993 to importing 4 million barrels a day today ... with those imports projected to rise another 50% over the next 10 years.

This is what is creating so much international competition for the remaining supplies of oil. And why the trend to higher energy prices is so well entrenched. And if the ELM is right, things are about to get far worse ... far sooner than most people expect.
The #3 Source of Oil to the US Is About to Go Offline

Mexico provides about 14% of the oil the US imports. On any given day that makes it either the #2 or #3 leading source for US oil imports after Canada and Saudi Arabia. Given that the US currently imports close to 70% of its oil needs, the Mexican oil is critical.

But here's the thing. Using straightforward ELM calculations, Jeffrey Brown is confident that Mexico will ship its last barrel of oil to the United States -- or anywhere else, for that matter -- about 6 years from now, in 2014. In a recent interview with Brown, I asked about this forecast.

"Mexico was consuming half of their production at peak in 2004. And if you look at the '05, '06, '07 data, they're basically on track, on average, to approach zero net oil exports no later than 2014," he confirmed.

Of course, the US is completely unprepared to replace this source of oil, especially considering the growing stresses on global oil supplies causing by ballooning demand from emerging markets. That means the international competition for available supplies is only going to get more desperate in the months and years ahead.

What will this mean to oil prices, according to Brown?

"From this point out I think we'll see a geometric progression in prices ... you know, $50, $100, $200, $400, whatever. The only question now is how short the periods will be between prices doubling again."

Coincidentally, while this report was in preparation, on April 30, 2008, PEMEX, Mexico's national oil company, announced it would be unable to fulfill this year's scheduled oil export obligations to the United States ... falling short by about 11%, or 184,000 barrels a day.

(As an aside, I also have to believe that Mexico's coming transition to a net importer and the loss of almost 6% of the country's GDP, now earned from exporting oil, will trigger serious social issues in that country. But that is another story for another day.)
The Even Bigger Picture

In my interview, I also asked Jeffrey to share his thoughts on the situation globally. Here's his response.

"Global production peaked in 2005, and we're now into the third year of decline. And the critical point to keep in mind is, our model and case histories show that the decline rate accelerates, year by year. Using the Lower 48 in the United States as an example, you can see the annual declines going 2%, 3%, 5%, 7%, 10%, 15%, 20, on and on. So it's an accelerating decline rate."

Underscoring Brown's concerns:

* On April 15, 2008 the Russians, the world's second largest oil exporter, announced that their oil production appeared to have peaked, with production in the first quarter of this year declining for the first time in a decade. If they have indeed peaked then, based on the ELM, the world could lose Russia's current ~7 million barrels a day in exports within 6 to 9 years.

* Echoing the baseline premise of the ELM, Herman Franssen, president of International Energy Associates, projects that Iran, the world's fifth largest exporter, may consume an amount equal to their exports by 2015. A prominent oil analyst, the late Dr. Ali Samsam Bakhtiari, estimated that Iran is either at or near peak.

* Most concerning, this April Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah announced they were not going to raise oil production above 12.5 million barrels a day. Commenting on the news, Tom Petrie, vice president of Merrill Lynch, said

"King Abdullah's quote speaks to the fast-emerging reality of what I call 'practical peak oil.' The Saudis and other exporters are placing a new emphasis on elongating the petroleum exploitation and depletion cycle. This stems from a growing awareness of the challenges of conventional resource maturity, as well as rising resource nationalism. This is likely to result in an earlier occurrence of global peak oil output than many consumers yet recognize."

Summing it up, Brown told me that "The reality is that this thing is coming so much faster and so much harder than even most pessimists were expecting."
Rice & Oil: a Useful Comparable

For a useful way to think about energy exports and prices, Jeff Brown points to the current situation with global rice supplies.

As long as there are abundant local supplies, countries are happy, eager in fact, to export excess production in order to generate foreign exchange. But as soon as local consumption exceeds locally available production, then all hell breaks loose, and the next thing you know countries are banning exports, a move that has already been undertaken by Vietnam and a number of other countries.

In that scenario, price is eventually no longer a factor in the availability of the commodity. Vietnam, for example, is not going to let its people starve just because higher global prices would allow it to earn an extra $10 per bag of rice.

And so in the face of the prospect of any serious shortage of an important resource -- energy being maybe the most important - export markets freeze up and the price begins to be set at the margin, literally based on a global competition for the dwindling supplies that manage to leak out around the edges.

"People are crazy not to be focusing on the oil export situation," Dr. Brown told me.
Any White Knights on the Horizon?

Of course, the question of energy alternatives is a big topic and one which needs a far more extensive discussion than space allows for here.

Will viable alternatives be developed to help mitigate a domino collapse of oil exports? Absolutely. Of those alternatives, nuclear, solar, and heavy oil seem to hold the greatest promise.

But the sheer scope of the problem - with the world now consuming the energy equivalent of 1 billion barrels of oil every 5 days - assures that we are probably decades away from a real solution.

In the words of Jeff Brown:

"If you look at the situation in US presidential terms, looking at fossil fuels plus nuclear, the world burned through the equivalent of 10% of all oil ever consumed in Bush's first 4-year term. And, in our model, we're going to burn 10% of all remaining conventional crude in the second 4 years of Bush's term.

"That is the equivalent of around 25 billion barrels a year. So that's 100 billion barrels every four years, and we've burned 1,000 billion barrels. It gets interesting when you consider that current estimates are that we've only got 1,000 billion barrels of conventional crude remaining. I think with natural gas liquids, we've got a little bit more. But of the conventional crude oil, we've got 1,000 billion remaining. Which then begs the question, how fast can we bring on the tar sands and everything else?"

Grasping for straws, I asked Jeff about an article I had read recently about the Bakken oil shale reserves around North Dakota.

"They're talking about somewhere between 200 billion and 500 billion barrels in situ, but the USGS recently came out with a mean estimate of between 2.5 and 4.4 billion barrels recoverable, as an outer limit," he replied, before continuing:

"In 1966 they said, if Lower 48 ultimately recoverable is 150 billion barrels, then the US would peak in 1966. If the recoverable oil from the Lower 48 ultimately came in at 200 billion barrels, then the US peak would come in 1971. The higher-end estimate probably turned out to more accurate, and the U.S. peaked in 1970. But the point is this: a one-third increase of estimated ultimate recoverable - a total increase of 50 billion barrels - postponed the peak by all of 5 years."
Rigging for Persistent High Energy Prices

The trend for sustained higher energy prices appears solidly in motion. If Brown and the ELM are correct, energy prices will double, then double again.

Even if he is wrong and prices don't rise geometrically, the global dogfight to replace declining supplies - decidedly exacerbated by the loss of Mexican and maybe Russian (and ??) exports in the near future - is going to get ugly and expensive.

So, what's the investment angle? Paradoxically, the larger energy companies are probably a bad bet, because they are forced to replace their depleting reserves, which is getting harder and more expensive to do with each passing day.

It is our contention that, because the solutions to the world's energy problems are going to involve a variety of energy sources and technologies, you have to build a portfolio that is equally varied.

That assures you are well positioned to profit from the broader trend, while avoiding the risks of being overly exposed to a single sector. (As an example, solar has had a great run, but most solar plays are now overvalued.)

The good news is that there are no shortage of high-quality energy-related investments available ... in coal, heavy oil, LNG, photovoltaics, natural gas consolidators, "run of river" hydroelectric, uranium, and small to mid-cap oil companies with the potential for significant near-term gains in reserves or production.

In the final analysis, it comes down to two choices: you can either suffer the consequences of persistent higher energy prices, or use the work Jeffrey Brown has done with the Export Land Model as an early warning and get positioned to profit.

The decision is yours, but don't wait long to make it.

David Galland is the Managing Director of Casey Research, publishers of the Casey Energy Speculator, a comprehensive newsletter dedicated to helping individuals and institutions uncover today's most undervalued and compelling energy investments. A no-risk three-month trial subscription is available that allows you to access all current recommendations and to decide for yourself if the service is right for you. Learn more by clicking here now.






Your believing the cure for high prices is high prices analyst,
image
John F. Mauldin
johnmauldin@investorsinsight.com


Reproductions. If you would like to reproduce any of John Mauldin's E-Letters or commentary, you must include the source of your quote and the following email address: JohnMauldin@InvestorsInsight.com. Please write toReproductions@InvestorsInsight.com and inform us of any reproductions including where and when the copy will be reproduced.

6) By: Ken Blackwell - Columnist for the New York Sun

It's an amazing time to be alive in America. We're in a year of firsts in this presidential election: the first viable woman candidate; the first viable African-American candidate; and, a candidate who is the first frontrunning freedom fighter over 70. The next president of America will be a first.

We won't truly be in an election of firsts, however, until we judge every candidate by where they stand. We won't arrive where we should be until we no longer talk about skin color or gender. Now that Barack Obama steps to the front of the Democratic field, we need to stop talking about his race, and start talking about his policies and his politics.

The reality is this: Though the Democrats will not have a nominee until August, unless Hillary Clinton drops out, Mr. Obama is now the frontrunner, and its time America takes a closer and deeper look at him. Some pundits are calling him the next John F. Kennedy. He's not. He's the next George McGovern. And it's time people learned the facts.

Because the truth is that Mr. Obama is the single most liberal senator in the entire U.S. Senate. He is more liberal than Ted Kennedy, Bernie Sanders, or Mrs. Clinton. Never in my life have I seen a presidential frontrunner whose rhetoric is so far removed from his record. Walter Mondale promised to raise our taxes, and he lost. George McGovern promised military weakness, and he lost. Michael Dukakis promised a liberal domestic agenda, and he lost.

Yet Mr. Obama is promising all those things, and he's not behind in the polls. Why? Because the press has dealt with him as if he were in a beauty pageant. Mr. Obama talks about getting past party, getting past red and blue, to lead the United States of America. But let's look at the more defined strokes of who he is underneath this superficial "beauty."

Start with national security, since the president's most important duties are as commander-in-chief. Over the summer, Mr. Obama talked about invading Pakistan, a nation armed with nuclear weapons; meeting without preconditions with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who vows to destroy Israel and create another Holocaust; and Kim Jong II, who is murdering and starving his people, but emphasized that the nuclear option was off the table against terrorists - something no president has ever taken off the table since we created nuclear weapons in the 1940s. Even Democrats who have worked in national security condemned all of those remarks. Mr. Obama is a foreign-policy novice who would put our national security at risk.

Next, consider economic policy. For all its faults, our health care system is the strongest in the world. And free trade agreements, created by Bill Clinton as well as President Bush, have made more goods more affordable so that even people of modest means can live a life that no one imagined a generation ago. Yet Mr. Obama promises to raise taxes on "the rich." How to fix Social Security? Raise taxes. How to fix Medicare? Raise taxes. Prescription drugs? Raise taxes. Free college? Raise taxes. Socialize medicine? His solution to everything is to have government take it over. Big Brother on steroids, funded by your paycheck.

Finally, look at the social issues. Mr. Obama had the audacity to open a stadium rally by saying, "All praise and glory to God!" but says that Christian leaders speaking for life and marriage have "hijacked" - hijacked - Christianity. He is pro-partial birth abortion, and promises to appoint Supreme Court justices who will rule any restriction on it unconstitutional. He espouses the abortion views of Margaret Sanger, one of the early advocates of racial cleansing. His spiritual leaders endorse homosexual marriage, and he is moving in that direction. In Illinois, he refused to vote against a statewide ban - ban - on all handguns in the state. These are radical left, Hollywood, and San Francisco values, not Middle America values.

The real Mr. Obama is an easy target for the general election. Mrs. Clinton is a far tougher opponent. But Mr. Obama could win if people don't start looking behind his veneer and flowery speeches. His vision of "bringing America together" means saying that those who disagree with his agenda for America are hijackers or warmongers. Uniting the country means adopting his liberal agenda and abandoning any conflicting beliefs.

But right now everyone is talking about how eloquent of a speaker he is and - yes - they're talking about his race. Those should never be the factors on which we base our choice for president. Mr. Obama's radical agenda sets him far outside the American mainstream, to the left of Mrs. Clinton.

It's time to talk about the real Barack Hussein Obama. In an election of firsts, let's first make sure we elect the person who is qualified to be our president in a nuclear age during a global civilizational war.

This subject is king of scary, wouldn't you think.

Remember -- God is good, and is in time, on time--every time. According to the Book of Revelations the anti-christ is:

The Anti-christ will be a man, in his 40's, of MUSLIM descent, who will deceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal... the prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace, and when he is in power, will destroy everything. Is it OBAMA?? I STRONGLY URGE each one of you to repost this as many times as you can! Each opportunity that you have to send it to a friend or media outlet... do it!

If you think I am crazy ... I'm sorry but I refuse to take a chance on the "unknown" candidate, who in my opinion reeks of racism & hate for white America.





P.S. Before you hastily label Mr. Blackwell "just another white racist", you should know that he is a black man.

7) Democrats and Our Enemies
By JOSEPH LIEBERMAN

How did the Democratic Party get here? How did the party of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy drift so far from the foreign policy and national security principles and policies that were at the core of its identity and its purpose?

Beginning in the 1940s, the Democratic Party was forced to confront two of the most dangerous enemies our nation has ever faced: Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. In response, Democrats under Roosevelt, Truman and Kennedy forged and conducted a foreign policy that was principled, internationalist, strong and successful.


This was the Democratic Party that I grew up in – a party that was unhesitatingly and proudly pro-American, a party that was unafraid to make moral judgments about the world beyond our borders. It was a party that understood that either the American people stood united with free nations and freedom fighters against the forces of totalitarianism, or that we would fall divided.

This was the Democratic Party of Harry Truman, who pledged that "it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures."

And this was the Democratic Party of John F. Kennedy, who promised in his inaugural address that the United States would "pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of freedom."

This worldview began to come apart in the late 1960s, around the war in Vietnam. In its place, a very different view of the world took root in the Democratic Party. Rather than seeing the Cold War as an ideological contest between the free nations of the West and the repressive regimes of the communist world, this rival political philosophy saw America as the aggressor – a morally bankrupt, imperialist power whose militarism and "inordinate fear of communism" represented the real threat to world peace.

It argued that the Soviets and their allies were our enemies not because they were inspired by a totalitarian ideology fundamentally hostile to our way of life, or because they nursed ambitions of global conquest. Rather, the Soviets were our enemy because we had provoked them, because we threatened them, and because we failed to sit down and accord them the respect they deserved. In other words, the Cold War was mostly America's fault.

Of course that leftward lurch by the Democrats did not go unchallenged. Democratic Cold Warriors like Scoop Jackson fought against the tide. But despite their principled efforts, the Democratic Party through the 1970s and 1980s became prisoner to a foreign policy philosophy that was, in most respects, the antithesis of what Democrats had stood for under Roosevelt, Truman and Kennedy.

Then, beginning in the 1980s, a new effort began on the part of some of us in the Democratic Party to reverse these developments, and reclaim our party's lost tradition of principle and strength in the world. Our band of so-called New Democrats was successful sooner than we imagined possible when, in 1992, Bill Clinton and Al Gore were elected. In the Balkans, for example, as President Clinton and his advisers slowly but surely came to recognize that American intervention, and only American intervention, could stop Slobodan Milosevic and his campaign of ethnic slaughter, Democratic attitudes about the use of military force in pursuit of our values and our security began to change.

This happy development continued into the 2000 campaign, when the Democratic candidate – Vice President Gore – championed a freedom-focused foreign policy, confident of America's moral responsibilities in the world, and unafraid to use our military power. He pledged to increase the defense budget by $50 billion more than his Republican opponent – and, to the dismay of the Democratic left, made sure that the party's platform endorsed a national missile defense.

By contrast, in 2000, Gov. George W. Bush promised a "humble foreign policy" and criticized our peacekeeping operations in the Balkans.

Today, less than a decade later, the parties have completely switched positions. The reversal began, like so much else in our time, on September 11, 2001. The attack on America by Islamist terrorists shook President Bush from the foreign policy course he was on. He saw September 11 for what it was: a direct ideological and military attack on us and our way of life. If the Democratic Party had stayed where it was in 2000, America could have confronted the terrorists with unity and strength in the years after 9/11.

Instead a debate soon began within the Democratic Party about how to respond to Mr. Bush. I felt strongly that Democrats should embrace the basic framework the president had advanced for the war on terror as our own, because it was our own. But that was not the choice most Democratic leaders made. When total victory did not come quickly in Iraq, the old voices of partisanship and peace at any price saw an opportunity to reassert themselves. By considering centrism to be collaboration with the enemy – not bin Laden, but Mr. Bush – activists have successfully pulled the Democratic Party further to the left than it has been at any point in the last 20 years.

Far too many Democratic leaders have kowtowed to these opinions rather than challenging them. That unfortunately includes Barack Obama, who, contrary to his rhetorical invocations of bipartisan change, has not been willing to stand up to his party's left wing on a single significant national security or international economic issue in this campaign.

In this, Sen. Obama stands in stark contrast to John McCain, who has shown the political courage throughout his career to do what he thinks is right – regardless of its popularity in his party or outside it.

John also understands something else that too many Democrats seem to have become confused about lately – the difference between America's friends and America's enemies.

There are of course times when it makes sense to engage in tough diplomacy with hostile governments. Yet what Mr. Obama has proposed is not selective engagement, but a blanket policy of meeting personally as president, without preconditions, in his first year in office, with the leaders of the most vicious, anti-American regimes on the planet.

Mr. Obama has said that in proposing this, he is following in the footsteps of Reagan and JFK. But Kennedy never met with Castro, and Reagan never met with Khomeini. And can anyone imagine Presidents Kennedy or Reagan sitting down unconditionally with Ahmadinejad or Chavez? I certainly cannot.

If a president ever embraced our worst enemies in this way, he would strengthen them and undermine our most steadfast allies.

A great Democratic secretary of state, Dean Acheson, once warned "no people in history have ever survived, who thought they could protect their freedom by making themselves inoffensive to their enemies." This is a lesson that today's Democratic Party leaders need to relearn.

8)mbalances of Power

* Sign In to E-Mail or Save This
* Print
* Share
o Digg
o Facebook
o Mixx
o Yahoo! Buzz
o Permalink

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Published: May 21, 2008

There has been much debate in this campaign about which of our enemies the next U.S. president should deign to talk to. The real story, the next president may discover, though, is how few countries are waiting around for us to call. It is hard to remember a time when more shifts in the global balance of power are happening at once — with so few in America’s favor.
Skip to next paragraph
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

Thomas L. Friedman
Go to Columnist Page »

Let’s start with the most profound one: More and more, I am convinced that the big foreign policy failure that will be pinned on this administration is not the failure to make Iraq work, as devastating as that has been. It will be one with much broader balance-of-power implications — the failure after 9/11 to put in place an effective energy policy.

It baffles me that President Bush would rather go to Saudi Arabia twice in four months and beg the Saudi king for an oil price break than ask the American people to drive 55 miles an hour, buy more fuel-efficient cars or accept a carbon tax or gasoline tax that might actually help free us from what he called our “addiction to oil.”

The failure of Mr. Bush to fully mobilize the most powerful innovation engine in the world — the U.S. economy — to produce a scalable alternative to oil has helped to fuel the rise of a collection of petro-authoritarian states — from Russia to Venezuela to Iran — that are reshaping global politics in their own image.

If this huge transfer of wealth to the petro-authoritarians continues, power will follow. According to Congressional testimony Wednesday by the energy expert Gal Luft, with oil at $200 a barrel, OPEC could “potentially buy Bank of America in one month worth of production, Apple computers in a week and General Motors in just three days.”

But that’s not all. Two compelling new books have just been published that describe two other big power shifts: “The Post-American World,” by Fareed Zakaria, the editor of Newsweek International, and “Superclass” by David Rothkopf, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment.

Mr. Zakaria’s central thesis is that while the U.S. still has many unique assets, “the rise of the rest” — the Chinas, the Indias, the Brazils and even smaller nonstate actors — is creating a world where many other countries are slowly moving up to America’s level of economic clout and self-assertion, in every realm. “Today, India has 18 all-news channels of its own,” notes Zakaria. “And the perspectives they provide are very different from those you will get in the Western media. The rest now has the confidence to present its own narrative, where it is at the center.”

For too long, argues Zakaria, America has taken its many natural assets — its research universities, free markets and diversity of human talent — and assumed that they will always compensate for our low savings rate or absence of a health care system or any strategic plan to improve our competitiveness.

“That was fine in a world when a lot of other countries were not performing,” argues Zakaria, but now the best of the rest are running fast, working hard, saving well and thinking long term. “They have adopted our lessons and are playing our game,” he said. If we don’t fix our political system and start thinking strategically about how to improve our competitiveness, he added, “the U.S. risks having its unique and advantageous position in the world erode as other countries rise.”

Mr. Rothkopf’s book argues that on many of the most critical issues of our time, the influence of all nation-states is waning, the system for addressing global issues among nation-states is more ineffective than ever, and therefore a power void is being created. This void is often being filled by a small group of players — “the superclass” — a new global elite, who are much better suited to operating on the global stage and influencing global outcomes than the vast majority of national political leaders.

Some of this new elite “are from business and finance,” says Rothkopf. “Some are members of a kind of shadow elite — criminals and terrorists. Some are masters of new or traditional media; some are religious leaders, and a few are top officials of those governments that do have the ability to project their influence globally.”

The next president will have to manage these new rising states and these new rising individuals and networks, while wearing the straightjacket left in the Oval Office by Mr. Bush.

“Call it the triple deficit,” said Mr. Rothkopf. “A fiscal deficit that will soon have us choosing between rationed health care, sufficient education, adequate infrastructure and traditional levels of defense spending, a trade deficit that has us borrowing from our rivals to the point of real vulnerability, and a geopolitical deficit that is a legacy of Iraq, which may result in hesitancy to take strong stands where we must.”

The first rule of holes is when you’re in one, stop digging. When you’re in three, bring a lot of shovels.

8)Suicide bomb truck blows up Gaza Erez crossing, no Israeli casualties

Military sources report sector outside northern Gaza, including Netiv Ha’asara and up to Kibbutz Yad Mordecai, is declared a closed military area Thursday, May 22, after a suicide pick-up truck laden with tons of explosives blew up 50 meters on the Palestinian side of the northern Erez crossing. It was followed by gunmen in a jeep. There were no Israeli casualties. Israeli soldiers are scouring the closed area for possible infiltrators from Gaza. The border terminal was heavily damaged, a large gap blown in the defensive wall opposite Netiv Ha’asara and windows shattered in Israeli buildings to the north of the Gaza Strip. The bang was heard kilometers away.

A second Palestinian bomb vehicle heading out of northern Gaza was struck by the Israeli air force.

Mortar fire was directed simultaneously at the Sufa crossing to the south. The Palestinians kept up a hail of gunfire, which was returned by Israeli soldiers.

Jihad Islami and a Fatah faction claimed the attacks. Israel has closed the Sufa crossing through which the Gaza population has been supplied daily with basic commodities.

Overnight, Hamas announced that the truce talks taking place in Egypt for an informal ceasefire with Israel in the Gaza Strip had ended without results. The Hamas negotiators have returned to Damascus.

During the week, armed Palestinian buffeted the border fence in an effort to force Israel to climb down on its conditions for a ceasefire and demand the abducted soldier Gilead Shalit’s release be incorporated in the deal.

Hamas demanded the release of 350 jailed terrorists “with blood on their hands”, whereas Israel offered 72. Hamas sought the immediate end of the Gaza blockade, while Israel agreed to open the crossings after the truce took hold.
Print