This morning I went to sign my dogs up for welfare. At first the lady at the Welfare office said, "Are you crazy, dogs are not eligible to draw welfare.
I explained to her that I didn't understand why they should be excluded from consideration. I told her that my dogs are mixed in color, unemployed, lazy, can't speak English, and none of them has a clue as to who their Daddy's are. All of them expect me to feed them, provide them with housing, medical care, and feel discriminated against because they are dogs.
So she looked in her policy book to see what it takes to qualify.
My dogs get their first checks next Friday. Is this is a great country or what?
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Peter Baker's interview, which I posted earlier, is very revealing and now Henry Percy has done an analysis. (See 1 below.)
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The true meaning of Socialism - theft by taking. (See 2 and 2a below.)
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The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamic Hydra and Octopus!
My next speaker, Avi Jorisch, will have much to say about their funding sources. (See 3 and 7 below.)
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The government basically is stifling public education through support of unions and debilitating legislation.
Has public education improved after the billions spent? If so, explain. (See 4 below.)
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Russia sneaking missiles into Iran through the Venezuelan back door?
Israel has been training against them in Greece. (See 5 below.)
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Is Netanyahu double dipping by offering concessions to what was already been agreed upon? (See 6 below.)
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Merkel says multi-culturalism in Germany has failed.
It succeeded for several hundred years in America because those who came wanted to be part of the experiment. I am not so sure the same holds true any more in America.
Political correctness thwarts assimilation and, in terms of Muslims it would seem many want to adhere to Sharia Law and Muslims, who might wish to assimilate, are muted by fear of retribution and intimidation.
Furthermore, our jails seem to have become breeding grounds for Islamic thinking and indoctrination among the already disaffected.
Roosevelt said it in 1941 - "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." When freedom of speech and expression are silenced a democracy cannot survive and this is the goal of all goons whether they be The Klan, White Citizen Councils or Islamist Brother -hoods!(See 7 and 7a below.)
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But then what about 'silent' Cal? (See 8 below.)
Meanwhile, Obama sought change and has succeeded.
He no longer even mesmerizes many of his early believers.
Like the joke about the minister performing a Baptism and asking the kid after every dunking "Do Your Believe" and after the fifth comes: "Yes, I believe you are trying to drown me."
Obama drowned the 'unwashed' in words and now he is drowning America in debt. (See 8a below.)
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Dick
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1)Obama on Obama 2.0
By Henry Percy
Peter Baker's interview of the president in the New York Times Magazine (appearing in print today) has many creepy moments in it. To start with, Mr. Obama "has spent what one aide called 'a lot of time talking about Obama 2.0.'"
What is the administration's fixation in seeing itself as a computer program? To show that Mr. Obama is With It? Up-to-Date? Comfortable with Technology? Remember the "reset" of our relations with Russia and Iran? Worked out splendidly, that did. And now Obama 2.0? It fits with the media's laudatory meme during the election: "no drama Obama." Cool. Oh, yeah, he was so cool. Nothing flustered him. More like an automaton as he reads his teleprompters. As America has gotten to know him, it has become clear that the cool emanates not from a calm center, but from a vacuity, an inability to empathize with others.
But wait -- Baker informs us that Mr. Obama has "learned" from his years in office, learned "what he called 'tactical lessons.' He let himself look too much like 'the same old tax-and-spend liberal Democrat.'" Has this man ever done anything wrong? Deficits four times higher than the highest under the terror of G.W. Bush, deficits that he intends to continue for every one of his hoped-for eight years, and, mirabile dictu, people got the impression that he was "the same old tax-and-spend liberal Democrat"? How could his subjects be so -- so...unfair? It's a perception problem: he just looks like one. Everyone has blinders, but our president lives in a cocoon.
And then there's the naïveté riff, the I'm-no-politician excuse:
Given how much stuff was coming at us ... we probably spent much more time trying to get the policy right than trying to get the politics right. There is probably a perverse pride in my administration -- and I take responsibility for this; this was blowing from the top -- that we were going to do the right thing, even if short-term it was unpopular. And I think anybody who's occupied this office has to remember that success is determined by an intersection in policy and politics and that you can't be neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion.
Was there ever an administration more permanently in campaign mode? The endless stream of magazine articles and TV appearances and speeches and faux townhalls (but few press conferences) to sell the ignorant public on the wonders of health care "reform" and all the other measures Team Obama was doing for us? Was there ever an administration less "neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion"? Granted, it did not work out very well, but that was not for want of trying.
Baker was bold enough to read Mr. Obama his fatuous lines after securing the Democrats' nomination:
"We will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth."
I read that line to Obama and asked how his high-flying rhetoric sounded in these days of low-flying governance. "It sounds ambitious," he agreed. "But you know what? We've made progress on each of those fronts."
There's that No-Drama Cool again. Kinda, ya know, sounds ambitious. How does the president measure the healing of the planet? The same way he calculates the Number of Jobs Saved by the stimulus? The man appears to be incapable of embarrassment.
The hauteur of the president and his staff peeps out of every paragraph. "White House aides wonder aloud whether it is even possible for a modern president to succeed, no matter how many bills he signs." That's it! We hunger for the president to sign more bills! Just sign so we can discover what's in them! More! More! More!
When the Obamaites look around for scapegoats, they see many: "1, an implacable opposition with little if any real interest in collaboration; 2, a news media saturated with triviality and conflict; 3, a culture that demands solutions yesterday; 4, a societal cynicism that holds leadership in low regard" [numbers added].
Let's take these seriatim. 1. Remember when the president told congressional Republicans, "I won"? So who had "little if any real interest in collaboration"? 2. Taking potshots at the media is too easy -- I'll pass this time. 3. Oh, are we ever impatient. Obama promised jobs for the jobless, that the seas would recede, that the planet would heal itself, and what do we get? Rising unemployment and cap-and-tax and stimulus dollars spent educating Africans how to wash their penises after sex. Sign more bills -- that's what we crave! More! Faster! 4. To take just one instance of cynicism, a huge majority of Americans were and are opposed to health care "reform," yet Obama and Harry and Nancy jammed it down our throats (while exempting themselves). And we're the ones who are cynical about such "leadership"? The president gives chutzpah a bad name.
And then Baker gives away the game without even thinking:
Obama came to office with enormous faith in his own powers of persuasion. He seemed to believe he could overcome divisions if he just sat down with the world's most recalcitrant figures -- whether they be the mullahs in Tehran or the Republicans on Capitol Hill.
Obama's enemies are Iranian mullahs and Republicans! Except he has handled the mullahs with kid gloves, saving the bellicose, breast-beating, belligerent rhetoric for his fellow countrymen: "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun." And the Left lectures the Republicans about the tone of our political discourse.
"One prominent Democratic lawmaker told me Obama's problem is that he is not insecure -- he always believes he is the smartest person in any room." Thinking you are the smartest person on the planet is not a sign of insecurity? I'm waiting for the psychiatrists to unpack that one for us.
Finally, we learn that Obama's contempt of two years ago for Bill Clinton has turned to hope -- hope that he can become Clinton by getting reelected rather than Carter, sent home in ignominy two years hence. My, how hope can change.
Henry Percy is the nom de guerre for a technical writer living in Arizona.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------2)Socialism Is Theft
By James Lewis
All you fans of the Left will recognize that title as a twist on Proudhon's historic slogan, "Property is theft."
That's the personal catechism of Obama and his gang. Or, to put it more honestly, "Your property is theft. My property is untouchable."
Gimme that Air Force One. Gimme that trillion-dollar slush fund. Gimme that vacation in Spain at taxpayer expense. It's mine! The Clintons even took the White House silverware, remember?
Some people have a monstrous appetite for power and privilege, but they always claim to do what they do from compassion for the little people. Kim Jong-Il in North Korea is starving his people from love of the people. He's got a Stalinist propaganda apparatus and real concentration camps to make sure that the people actually go along with that. North Korea has the only permanent diet plan in the world that actually works. Has anybody told Michelle?
But forget Stalinism. In the European Union, the power class are so locked in that they don't bother with real elections anymore. The "elected" EU Parliament makes no real laws, and the real lawmakers are not elected. It's a big socialist front, a bureaucratic coup d'état.
It was Newsweek magazine that recently proclaimed, "We Are All Socialists Now." The readers didn't seem to go for that, actually, and Newsweek has just been sold for $1.00.
Which kind of tells the story.
Newsweek elevated Evan Thomas to its top ranks. Mr. Thomas is the grandson of Norman Thomas, the longtime capo di capi of the Democratic Socialists of America. The acorn has not fallen far from the oak, either. Which means that the WaPoCo drove Newsweek into the ground by appointing a socialist to run it -- on the assumption, I suppose, that Americans could be forced to love being robbed of the fruits of their labor. What Newsweek meant by We Are All Socialists Now was that Obama got elected, and we're takin' over.
Evan Thomas knew perfectly well who Obama was. But he forgot to tell his readers before the election. Then he celebrated with his headline We Are All Socialists Now! and his readers said, Whatever, baby!
Now Newsweek is a nonprofit, albeit involuntarily.
Which is fine, as long as Newsweek can get enough leftist billionaires to pay the high salaries its propaganda artists demand. Or maybe Obama will find a few billion bucks for those obedient JournoLists? You can bet they are trying to figure out how. They have to, because without their propaganda apparatus, they are gone.
Ever since that triumphalist Newsweek headline, the Democrats have been trying to boogie away from self-proclaimed socialism, but they can't. Reality gets in the way.
Affirmative action is racial socialism. ObamaCare is the worst kind of medical socialism. One point three trillion additional dollars of deficit spending over one year is socialist socialism. If it smells like it, by golly, it probably is.
Newsweek is all but out of business, but Obama and his gang believe that ordinary people still shouldn't be allowed to decide where their money goes. Which is why you pay for PBS, NPR, and the National Endowment for Offending All Religions Except Islam. It is America's official leftist Ministry of Propaganda, something any self-respecting tyranny has had for the last six thousand years, ever since the imperial powers of Sumer, Egypt, and Beijing.
Egypt had its priesthood to propagandize for the Pharaohs and to all make the lowly slaves worship the State. The Left calls itself Progressive, but it's just a throwback to ancient times. The Left is as Retro as Retro gets.
So the question of theft and property turns out to be -- surprise, surprise! -- a question of Us versus Them. Deep in his bones, Obama knows with Pharaoh-like certainty that it's Us, the victim groups from Harvard Law, who deserve all the goodies they can extort; which is what the IRS does, after all.
Still, a lot of Americans think they own the fruits of their labor.
Property is theft.
Socialism is theft.
Who wins that one?
That's the struggle today. The next few elections will decide. That means you, buster! Stay home come election time, and Obama wins. Forever.
2a)Covetous Democrats
By Richard Pecore
We know Moses as the Law Giver. He brought God's Holy Word down from the mountain and gave us the first structure of real law built not upon the mutating sands of "Fairness," but upon the rock of Truth.
"Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbor's Goods."
The Democrats' philosophy can be summed up in this single precept -- covet what thy richer neighbors have. Democrats believe in a zero-sum game. For their entire philosophy of scarcity to function and breed class warfare, they must promote the idea that the world has a finite amount of wealth and that if John has more, it's not because he worked for it. It's because he somehow stole it from someone else. We'll call him Sam.
Government doesn't produce anything of value in the marketplace. It contracts with private concerns to build, grow, manufacture, or otherwise provide them. This includes important matters like defense. Therefore, in order to implement their plan, government's agents must first take from others.
The Democrats need many people on their side to support this, so class warfare ensues. It is easy enough to blame the "rich" for everything. They have it all. Fostering envy and coveting something that belongs to someone else is the oldest trick in the book, and it never works out well. Ask Eve.
The "rich" are a great target because they can bear greater burdens and seldom fire back until it's too late. But it's not a perfect socialist world, and even taxing the rich won't pay for everything the less fortunate want. With fewer than 2.3 million "rich" in the U.S. who qualify as millionaires, those who do not qualify can't afford to be so picky, so they must expand what being "wealthy" means.
In a Human Events article, "Obama's Biggest Lies," Donald Lambro illustrates this clearly.
According to Forbes magazine, there were only 469 billionaires in the U.S. and 2.2 million whose net worth was at least $1 million (this includes home values). But the higher taxes will fall on millions more small business employers who earn over $200,000 and who provide most of the jobs in our country.
European socialist models depend upon wealth redistribution, which follows this idea of scarcity. There is only so much wealth or property to go around, so it must be "managed" if we're to be "fair" to everyone, and of course, only the elite left is wise enough to know how to fairly manage these assets for everyone's benefit.
This certainly seems to be how it worked out in the (former) Soviet Union, China, North Korea, Vietnam, and Cuba. It seems to be equally true in Greece and France. Great Britain and Germany have been so impressed with socialism's results that they are turning en masse from its principles.
Liberals love to ignore the obvious. If this absurd idea of wealth scarcity were true, the world would have run out of money thousands of years ago. There would be no point to creating a new product or innovation because there would be no market for it, no reward, and no profit to be made.
A fair opportunity is not the same thing as a fair outcome.
It is counterintuitive for a people whose business is business to subscribe to a philosophy that declares private salaries and profits "excessive," since it is the private investor and shareholder who took the risk in the first place and who hire the very workers who now demand a piece of the pie. Few share in the risk, yet all should share in the reward. Certainly sounds "fair" to me.
When the top 50% pay over 95% of all taxes and the bottom 50% pays less than 5%, something is very wrong. Liberals put forward a zero-sum philosophy but are burning up the money presses 24/7. What's wrong with this picture?
Jesus said the poor will be with us always.
A nirvana "Star Trek" world without money, without sickness, and without envy ignores reality. Yet not only do the Left pretend this is possible, but they sell the idea by using envy and government checks like candy from their pocket. They sell this idea to those in need, taking power in exchange for promises they cannot possibly keep. They have merely shifted the burden, first to "the rich," and then always expanding according to ever-increasing needs to the entire producing half of the country. This is not fairness. This is lust for power. This is the face of tyranny in disguise.
This, then, is the liberal Democrat message of Hope and Change. Don't worry, they say. The rich can easily afford you, but they don't because they are greedy and do not care. Empower us, and we will look after you. We care for you. You will have less, but you will survive. You will not succeed, but you will subsist. If you will only do as we say and keep us in power, you may stay on the government plantation as long as you like. Look to us first as your guardian and your resource. Look unto us as your creator and your salvation, and we shall reward you. Surrender your free will unto us, and we shall always care for you.
Of course, the rules may change from time to time.
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3)The Muslim Brotherhood: Islam's Global Challenge to the West
By Moshe Dann
The Muslim Brotherhood (MB) is one of the most dangerous Islamic groups in the world today, not only because it supports terrorism -- providing political and financial support for its Palestinian branch, Hamas, for example -- but because it is part of a global Islamist network and promotes an ideology that encourages extremism and terrorism.
With branches in seventy countries and linked to major Islamic organizations, the MB has an extensive and well-financed network of educational, social, and cultural institutions which promote a strategic MB plan for Islamic dominance -- not through violence, but integration, becoming part of the national social and political life, and the application of Shariah law. These connections give it access to political power and explain why it and the organizations it supports are courted by governments and NGOs. Jean-Pierre Filiu of the Hudson Institute:
The Muslim Brotherhood ... has for reasons both ideological and tactical tended in recent decades to embrace a more limited conception of jihad combined with missionary activity and organized political struggle.
Hillel Fradkin, director of the Hudson Institute's Center on Islam, Democracy and the Future of the Muslim World, notes that the MB, founded in Egypt in 1928, is the source of modern radical Islamic movements and an important part of Muslim communities around the world. The takeover of the Gaza Strip by Hamas changed the picture. For the first time, the MB had its own territory, a virtual state, and an army. Filiu:
The Brotherhood-offshoot Hamas, which since 2006 has officially ruled over the Gaza strip, is the first Palestinian militia to consistently limit its activities to the territory of pre-1948 Palestine-meaning Israel, the West Bank and Gaza... In the process of consolidating its power, [it] subsequently repressed Gaza's al-Qaeda-inspired groups. Nowadays, al-Qaeda's ongoing conflict with Hamas has become one of the main liabilities to al-Qaeda's propaganda and its efforts to establish itself as the leader of the worldwide jihadist movement.
According to an MB document written in 1991, its role in host countries is a process of settlement called "Civilization-Jihad," which will "eliminate and destroy Western civilization from within" and establish a "global Islamic state." To accomplish this, through mosques and Islamic centers, the MB engages in "coalitions," "absorption," and civic "cooperation," building parallel social, political, and cultural organizations. Its guiding principles are those of Hasan al-Banna, who established the Egyptian MB movement and was closely allied with the Nazis.
The North American Connection
The most comprehensive study of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States is Steven Merley's monograph published by the Hudson Institute (April 2009). He concludes:
[The MB's] extensive history of support for Islamic fundamentalism, anti-Semitism, and support for terrorism ... includes ideological, financial, and legal support, particularly for Hamas and other Palestinian terror organizations.
MB affiliate organizations like the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) -- which grew out of the Islamic Association of Palestine (IAP), a front group fund-raising for Islamic jihad and Hamas terrorist organizations -- are not outgrowths of popular or communal expressions, like Christian and Jewish organizations, but instead are self-appointed representatives, combining a volatile mix of religion and politics. Most MB organizations are funded by Saudis and Gulf States, representing non-American, predominantly Arab Muslims.
With over thirty branches in North America, CAIR presents itself as the largest "Muslim civil rights organization," seeking to "enhance understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding." A few years ago, CAIR was included in a list of unindicted co-conspirators alleged by prosecutors to have participated in a conspiracy to funnel money to Hamas through the Holy Land Foundation.
Daniel Pipes and Sharon Chadha write,
Perhaps the most obvious problem with CAIR is the fact that at least five of its employees and board members have been arrested, convicted, deported, or otherwise linked to terrorism-related charges and activities ... CAIR has a key role in the 'Wahhabi lobby' -- the network of organizations, usually supported by donations from Saudi Arabia, whose aim is to propagate the especially extreme version of Islam practiced in Saudi Arabia ... CAIR has consistently shown itself to be on the wrong side of the war on terrorism, protecting, defending, and supporting both accused and even convicted radical Islamic terrorists.
The Muslim Student Association (MSA), the largest Muslim campus organization, with more than 250 chapters at nearly every university, was also initiated by the Muslim Brotherhood. Although the MB's current involvement is unclear, the agenda is similar. Engaged in protests against Israel and disrupting pro-Israel speakers and forums, assisted by left-wing student organizations, and, of course, tolerated by administrators, this explains the upsurge of hostility towards Israel; opposing America's involvement in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan; and "American imperialism." Not limited to campus activities, however, in 1981, the MSA and MB morphed into the Islamic Society of North America to carry on its "after-school" activities.
Saudi prince Alweed Bin Talal is a major financier of Muslim Brotherhood fronts in the U.S. via his Kingdom Foundation, which supports the American Society for Muslim Advancement and the Cordoba Project, backers of the "Ground Zero Mosque.
In the early 1990s, following the Oslo Agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, the MB formed several organizations which opposed any peace agreement. The Muslim American Society describes itself as a civic group, involved in "religious, charitable, social, cultural, and educational" affairs, working to improve "family and society" and "move people to strive for God consciousness, liberty, and justice and to convey Islam with utmost clarity. Its vision is a "virtuous and just American society."
Its fundamentalist ideology and political activities, however, don't fit its lofty words and ideals. According to reports, the Muslim American Society's goal is the radical transformation of America into a Muslim society under strict Shariah law.
The Islamic American University, a MAS project, is a training center for the MB philosophy, associated with Sheikh Yousef al-Qardawi, who promotes jihad, proclaims that Muslim forces fighting American troops are "martyrs," and supports Arab Palestinian terrorist organizations, like Hamas.
MAS publishes a magazine, The American Muslim, which supports suicide bombings as "martyr operations" sanctioned by the Qur'an, and portrays Asian Muslim terrorists as "freedom fighters."
With all of this information available, one would think that U.S. government officials would be concerned about the activities of these MB-supported organizations. Instead, they are feted by the White House and supported by the State Dept and CIA, according to www.globalmbreport.com, which systematically tracks the MB.
"Their allure," according to counter-terrorism researcher Steve Emerson, "to governments and non-Muslim agencies in foreign countries is that these MB groups have a monopoly on the leadership and representation of most Muslims, due to the fact that the MB in the Muslim world occupies the center of political and religious gravity and does not tolerate dissent." And it can, when necessary, call upon its adherents to act, using "soft power," rather than "hard power," to influence.
Take over the world
The MB is a critical part of a vast Islamic movement that uses a religious identity to mask its political agenda. Represented by hundreds of social, political, and cultural organizations and banks and financial institutions in the United States alone, the MB is able to infiltrate and exert influence on every aspect of national and international affairs.
According to Islamic expert Bat Ye'or, the MB (through its Muslim World League) is involved with the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), a religious and political organization representing 56 countries (and "Palestine," which they consider a state under the PA) with a permanent delegation at the U.N. Like the MB, the OIC supports Islamist rule, which in other words is the establishment of Shariah (Islamic) Law and the rule of a Caliphate -- i.e., Islamic political and cultural takeover of the world. Because of their political and diplomatic role, however, they use a more subtle, incremental approach.
In Jordan, the main opposition party, the Islamic Action Front, represents the MB's "political wing." Islamists, they call for a boycott of elections, hoping to topple the current government and assume control of Parliament. Although banned from politics in Egypt and Syria and accused of being behind terrorist attacks, the MB runs networks of social and charity organizations, giving itself a firm popular basis.
The MB is also a major opposition group in Egypt and will be decisive when Egyptian President Mubarak dies. Egyptian Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie recently declared that "waging Jihad is mandatory."
The MB is also expanding in Canada, where they recently hosted "the largest Islamic conference in Montreal's history."
A recent Pew Report on the Muslim Brotherhood in Western Europe documents its extensive network. Yet little or nothing is done to monitor and restrict these organizations and their influence in growing Muslim communities. The presence of so many MB organizations explains the widespread demonstrations against Israel and violent reactions to what are perceived as "insults to Islam."
Lorenzo Vidino provides an excellent study of the MB in Europe:
The Brotherhood has long served as a key financial node for different Islamist groups, and the intelligence officials say that ... the Brotherhood has expanded its financial network of holding companies and bank accounts in almost every European country.
How it happened
The growth and spread of the global MB network appears to be the result of a carefully planned organizational strategy:
(1) Funded by Saudi Arabia, Gulf States, and wealthy Arab Muslim families, the MB promotes a strict interpretation of Shariah and Islamic rule through educational, social, and religious organizations; in schools, campus organizations, and study centers; and in Muslim professional and "civil rights" organizations. Their extremist brand of Islam in the West, based on Wahhabism and jihadism, however, is rarely exposed.
(2) Focusing attention on the Palestinian issue, they joined with "liberal," "progressive," and anti-Jewish elements around the world, especially in the media, and now use their influence in the U.N. and international bodies and agencies to demonize, delegitimize, isolate, and boycott Israel.
Through a carefully planned strategy of deception -- masking their sources of support, activities, philosophy, and goals -- MB-sponsored organizations are able to present themselves as religious and/or civil rights groups and thereby avoid scrutiny. Numbed by words like "peace" and "justice," unable to understand Arabic used by clerics and in printed material, non-Muslims have little or no understanding of what goes inside mosques and Muslim social and cultural centers and are unaware of the threat posed by the Muslim Brotherhood.
Though some academics and government officials try to portray the MB as "moderate," the facts prove differently. "The MB actively seeks to destroy America's status as a world power and to replace it with an Islamic power whose foreign policy will be based on jihad and the spread of Islam."
What can be done?
The first step in countering the MB is identifying their organizations. In addition to those cited above, here are some of the most prominent in the U.S. that have been linked to MB:
Islamic Society of North America (ISNA)
Fiqh Council of NA (FCNA) (formerly American Muslim Council)
North American Islamic Trust (controls most mosques)
Muslim Youth of North America
Association of Muslim Scientists and Engineers
PAC's and Muslim chaplains programs (in prisons, military and schools)
Islamic Medical Association
American Trust Publications
Islamic Circle of North American
International Institute for Islamic Thought (IIIT)
Association of Muslim Social Scientists
Charity foundations, like Kind Hearts, and HolyLand Foundation (now closed), The Union of Good, which assisted the IHH, a Turkish "charity" that backed the "Gaza flotilla," and supports terrorism, Islamic Relief USA and Mercy USA, and thousands more.
Follow the money.
With thousands of affiliated organizations in America, and perhaps millions around the world -- well-organized, accepted as part of the academic community and by religious and political leaders, operating within democratic systems, financed by radical jihadists, and supported by many in the international community -- the MB is a formidable threat. It are vulnerable, however, when exposed -- and that is a task which everyone can share.
Global jihadist groups
In the late 1970s, as the Egyptian-Israeli peace agreement was taking shape, a new terrorist organization was formed by members of the MB in Egypt: Islamic Jihad. The name was chosen to justify terrorism in the name of Islam -- not only as a PLO tactic, but to attack anyone, anywhere, including one's own family, without approval from any authority. Like other totalitarian movements, it was intended to break traditional discipline and encourage terrorism as a religious obligation.
Islamic Jihad (IJ) was declared a terrorist organization by the United States in 2005, and later by the EU, U.N., and other countries despite the fact that it had been carrying out terrorist attacks for more than a decade -- primarily against Jews in Israel.
IJ is reported to receive funding from Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries; it is currently based in Syria, but today it is funded mostly by Syria and Iran. Members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad work with Hamas and Fatah (PA); it has no direct ties to MB. IJ is also active in Uzbekistan, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, and other areas in the region.
American Muslims need to take seriously why their non-Muslim neighbors are suspicious, just as those neighbors must be careful of prejudice. Hiding agendas and intentions are as bad as bigotry.
Underestimating the message and influence of the Muslim Brotherhood is a threat to global, and especially Western, security. That is the message of 9/11 and terror attacks in London and Madrid. It is a message we ignore at our peril.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------4)The Problem With Government Schools
By Jerry Shenk
Public -- that is, government -- education in America is in terrible shape. No matter what professional educators tell us, identifying the causes and solutions isn't rocket science.
There's plenty of blame to go around, but the fault lies largely with union influence and federal and state government interference and ineptitude. The political class erred only in creating and expanding social programs that have effectively weakened the family units that should be the main stakeholders in, and beneficiaries of, a good educational system. But politicians and those who support their candidacies arguably have been criminally negligent in the formulation and administration of education policy. Malefactors in labor and government have much to answer for.
Quality education is the fundamental civil rights issue of this century. Too many school districts have failed too many minority and disadvantaged students. Centralized governmental attempts to improve education have had poor results.
The parties sharing power sometimes agree on education. For example, there is bipartisan opposition to the No Child Left Behind Act. The stated purpose of the law was to prevent schools from hiding the poor performance of minorities behind the results of other, more successful students. By setting educational standards and testing, the government says that NCLB has improved math and reading scores and begun to narrow the gap between poor and more affluent students.
Though there are many reasons to dislike it, most conservatives oppose NCLB primarily because conservatives believe that the federal government has no legitimate constitutional mandate to interfere in public education.
Conversely, the American left's position on public education is based on denial of the problems. It makes no difference that the late Ted Kennedy, a liberal icon, wrote the bill. Attacking No Child Left Behind is a campaign applause line for liberal politicians. They don't like it because the teachers' unions hate it.
Ask Democrats to name a single aspect of American education that has improved since the teachers' unions took it over in the 1960s, and then cue the crickets. Unions are solely responsive to their own interests and the interests of dues-payers. It's all about the Benjamins for the unions and not at all about the kids, despite the teachers' protestations to the contrary.
Cash doesn't produce quality in education.
Throwing more money into the existing system isn't the answer unless one can explain how Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Cleveland, Kansas City, and New York, failed school systems by anyone's standards, can spend at least forty percent more money per student per year than more successful suburban districts and continue to fail.
No union-owned politician will answer a question about merit pay for teachers. Nor will they discuss eliminating tenure. That reveals all taxpayers need to know about the teachers' unions' financial stranglehold on the Democratic Party. But to be fair, plenty of Republicans, especially in state governments, slop at the union trough and do the unions' bidding, too. The teachers' unions want poor schools and, especially, incompetent dues-paying teachers to be spared the discomfort of objective scrutiny. But testing is the only way to know when underperforming students are being shortchanged.
Among the unions' most persuasive historical arguments for pay increases has been average teacher pay relative to other professional employment categories. Average teacher pay is a very misleading statistic. There's a lot of turnover in the teaching profession. History suggests that up to forty percent of the new teachers hired each year will be out of teaching in seven years. Accordingly, there are always a significant number of teachers at the bottom of the pay scale. The statistic also ignores teachers who moved into higher-paid positions in administration and never factors in teachers' time off or Cadillac benefit and pension packages.
In Pennsylvania, a union-friendly state, a teacher with a taxpayer-funded, tuition-reimbursed master's degree and thirteen to fifteen years of teaching experience can be paid more than $70,000 per year for 180 days of instruction plus a few in-service days -- that's fifteen work weeks of vacation. Teachers can also retire and collect immediate pension and lifetime health care benefits after only thirty years of service. The average household income in Pennsylvania is roughly $50,000.
Collective bargaining is an inequitable way to determine teachers' compensation. As in any business, teacher competence should determine pay, especially in low-income schools that can least tolerate poor teachers. The good teachers know who they are and don't fear being measured objectively. Their unions bargain for all dues-paying members, but they most vigorously protect and defend the bad ones.
It's not just teachers. Students are overprotected, too. American education has been sheltering students from society's realities for years. Conditioned by constant positive reinforcement about how well they're doing, students are too often rewarded for participation rather than for achievement. Their grades are inflated, and many are passed without their earning promotion. As a result, many never learn what they're really good at. Some kids don't learn anything useful at all. This often creates unrealistic expectations and causes problems later in life.
Standards and accountability for teachers and standards for student performance are reasonable starts to improving our schools, but the standards should be set locally, where their relevance and integrity can be best evaluated and measured. Standards for classroom discipline should be toughened, and the authority of teachers and principals to maintain discipline should be strengthened so teachers can concentrate on teaching kids instead of just struggling to maintain order.
High-quality, logical, content-based school curricula presented by qualified professional teachers and administrators are essential to quality education.
Since not all districts have such curricula, teachers, or administrators, and because the skills and needs of students differ, school choice is necessary, too. Specialization creates niches that strengthen other markets; it will benefit the education market as well.
Providing tuition vouchers to poor students stuck in bad public schools is a good way to break the cycle of school failure. We can learn from successful experimental programs for vouchers and school choice and implement them more broadly, especially in the worst districts. Results from existing programs confirm the moral and civil rights justification for vouchers.
The best chance for improving education is a combination of parental choice, including vouchers, charter schools, and tuition tax credits. Incentives work. Add results-based merit-pay plans for teachers, an end to automatic tenure, and accountability standards to evaluate school administrators.
The free market -- and the need to survive in it -- raises the quality of every other service provision business. Americans have huge numbers of choices in the way we live our lives and the services we choose. Why not have choices in education, too?
If we are truly concerned about our kids' futures, we must remove politics from education.
For years, politicians who take their campaign cash have voted with self-interested teachers' unions against parental choice, scholarships, and vouchers to keep poor inner-city kids in failing schools. By casting those votes, politicians have denied many thousands of children they will never meet a chance to get a decent start in life and condemned them to a lifetime of failure.
Jerry Shenk is co-editor of the Rebuilding America.
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5)Iran may get Russian S-300 interceptors after all - via Venezuela
Military sources report Venezuela's ruler Hugo Chavez, offered to buy the Russian S-300 missiles when he met Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in Moscow Thursday, Oct. 14. Israel immediately turned to Washington to try and block the transaction. Clearly, the highly-sophisticated interceptors are bound for their original client, Iran, through its good friend Chavez.
This time, the deal will be much harder to stop.
These sources stress Iran needs the S-300 as the key to the effective defense of its nuclear and strategic sites against air or missile attack - even by cruise missiles - and to raising the risk to the assailants of heavy casualties. That said, the Israeli Air Force has spent the last two years training intensively in tactics for countering those very Russian interceptors. In September, Israel and Greece carried out joint practice strikes against the S-300 missiles Athens had purchased from Moscow.
Chavez began his Moscow visit by voicing interest in "buying different types of Russian-made air defense systems to create a multilayered air defense network."
The day after his offer, Russia cautiously tested the water in Washington to find how the Obama administration reacted to the prospect of ballistic missile interceptors being deployed not only in Iran but in the United States' Latin American backyard.
Igor Korotchenko, head of a Moscow think tank on the international arms trade, revealed: "Russia is looking for a buyer for five battalions of S-300PMU-1 defense systems ordered by Iran and Venezuela could become such a buyer."
He knew enough about the deal to disclose that Caracas was prepared to pay the asking price of $800 million in cash to expedite the deal although it asked Moscow for several loans to cover previous arms transactions, including the recent $2.2 billion purchase of 92 Russian T-72 tanks and the Smerch multiple launch rocket systems.
Our sources add Iran rather than Venezuela is in a hurry to get hold of the missiles and install them around its most vulnerable sites. There should be no delay once they reach Tehran because special units of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards had finished training on the weapon's operation in Russia.
Hardly a month has gone by since Sept. 22 when Medvedev publicly announced the S-300 missile system sale to Iran was cancelled - to wide acclaim from the US and Israeli media. Moscow lost no time in finding a neat stratagem for bypassing the UN sanctions barring arms sales to Iran with impunity. Even the Russian offer to return the $166.8 million Iran advanced for the deal can be covered by Caracas as intermediate customer.
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6)Peace process a disgrace
Op-ed: Why is Israel offering concessions in return for what was agreed to in past deals?
By Moshe Dann
Wait a minute. Wasn't Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state part of the Oslo Accords?
"The Government of the State of Israel and the PLO team… representing the Palestinian people, agree that it is time to put an end to decades of confrontation and conflict, recognize their mutual legitimate and political rights, and strive to live in peaceful coexistence and mutual dignity and security and achieve a just, lasting and comprehensive peace settlement and historic reconciliation through the agreed political process."
If this isn't what Prime Minister Netanyahu is asking for now, what does this document mean?
And why is PM Netanyahu willing to make more concessions in return for something which was already agreed upon?
True, none of the major issues were dealt with, including "refugees," "settlements," "Jerusalem," etc. According to those behind the negotiations, that would have meant no agreement!
Thank you Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres for an agreement in which one side got most of what they wanted, and the other side got nothing. Thank you Alan Baker, for your legal "expertise," and Yossi Beilin for the PR cloud cover. Nice show.
Excuse me for asking, but, if the Oslo Accords, and Wye, and Hebron Agreements did not mean an end to incitement and terrorism, what do they mean? And, if these agreements do not mean what they say, why did Israel give up territory, help create a Palestinian army, and transfer billions of dollars to the PA?
If all of these agreements and Israeli concessions did not bring Israel closer to "peace," an "end to the conflict," and greater security and world acceptance, why were they made, and why is PM Netanyahu now back at square one?
De-legitimization must stop
If the PA has not lived up to its agreements, why doesn't President Peres object that he was misled? Why isn't he demanding that the Palestinians live up to their side of the bargain? Or, is he part of the campaign of disinformation?
The fact that PM Netanyahu needs to call for recognition, and is rejected by the PA, means that the agreements were a fake, and the Israeli people have been brainwashed.
That the Israeli government offers further concessions in return for what was agreed to during the past 17 years, is a disgrace.
It is a disgrace because it means that the "peace process" was a lie, and those who perpetrated it - deliberately, or, naively - have some explaining to do to the Israeli people. They include not only current and past government officials, but academics who supported this fraud, and especially the media which managed the brainwashing.
Those who oppose "the occupation" owe the Israeli people an explanation for why Palestinians reject any form of recognition of Israel's legitimacy – and why they remain silent in the face of that insult. Why do they call for boycotts of Israel, and refuse to demand PA compliance?
There is no need for further Israeli concessions. The Israeli government can announce that until and unless the PA accepts Israel's legitimacy, there is no basis for ongoing economic assistance, and no further cooperation on infrastructure.
For example, it is totally absurd that the Israeli government assists the PA in building the new city of Rawabi, near Ramallah, without such basic agreements. That this project, and others that are being planned, are supported by the Peres Center for Peace, without PA acceptance of Israel is mind-boggling.
PM Netanyahu's policy of unilaterally "freezing" Jewish construction led to this impasse. It's time to freeze the system that rewards PA non-compliance and contributes to undermining Israel, at home and the international community. PA de-legitimization of Israel must stop now.
An obstacle for Palestinians and those who support their demands, the question of recognition shows that the primary dispute – obviously – is not over territory, but over Israel's existence.
PM Netanyahu's demand that Palestinian leaders recognize Israel as a Jewish state is not a semantic tease; Israel's Jewish character is its raison d'etre, the "Jewish national home," and the essence of its sovereignty.
The author is a writer and journalist living in Israel
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7)Merkel says German multicultural society has failed
Attempts to build a multicultural society in Germany have "utterly failed", Chancellor Angela Merkel says.
She said the so-called "multikulti" concept - where people would "live side-by-side" happily - did not work, and immigrants needed to do more to integrate - including learning German.
The comments come amid rising anti-immigration feeling in Germany.
A recent survey suggested more than 30% of people believed the country was "overrun by foreigners".
The study - by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation think-tank - also showed that roughly the same number thought that some 16 million of Germany's immigrants or people with foreign origins had come to the country for its social benefits.
Foreign workers
Mrs Merkel told a gathering of younger members of her conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party on Saturday that at "the beginning of the 60s our country called the foreign workers to come to Germany and now they live in our country."
She added: "We kidded ourselves a while, we said: 'They won't stay, sometime they will be gone', but this isn't reality."
Angela Merkel took pains to say immigrants are welcome.
The words "utterly failed" are very strong, but there are also nuanced messages about the usefulness of immigrants in a country that needs skilled labour.
She is pitching it very carefully, with important elections coming up in the spring.
The tone is very important.
The chancellor is basically saying that Germany needs immigrants but immigrants need to do something to get into the society.
Germany's charged immigration debate
"And of course, the approach [to build] a multicultural [society] and to live side-by-side and to enjoy each other... has failed, utterly failed."
In her speech in Potsdam, however, the chancellor made clear that immigrants were welcome in Germany.
She specifically referred to recent comments by German President Christian Wulff who said that Islam was "part of Germany", like Christianity and Judaism.
Mrs Merkel said: "We should not be a country either which gives the impression to the outside world that those who don't speak German immediately or who were not raised speaking German are not welcome here."
Mounting debate
There has been intense debate about multiculturalism in Germany in recent months.
Correspondents say Mrs Merkel faces pressure from within her CDU and its allies to take a tougher stance and require immigrants to do more to adapt to German society.
Earlier this week, Horst Seehofer, the leader of the CDU's Bavarian sister party, the CSU, said it was "obvious that immigrants from different cultures like Turkey and Arab countries, all in all, find it harder" to integrate.
Earlier this month the chancellor held talks with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in which the two leaders pledged to do more to improve the often poor integration record of Germany's estimated 2.5 million-strong Turkish community.
The debate first heated up in August when Thilo Sarrazin, a senior official at Germany's central bank, said that "no immigrant group other than Muslims is so strongly connected with claims on the welfare state and crime". Mr Sarrazin has since resigned.
Such recent strong anti-immigration feelings from mainstream politicians come amid an anger in Germany about high unemployment, even if the economy is growing faster than those of its rivals, our correspondent says.
He adds that there also seems to be a new strident tone in the country, perhaps leading to less reticence about no-go-areas of the past.
7a) First They Came for the Cartoonists . . .
By A. BARTON HINKLE TIMES-DISPATCH COLUMNIST
Critics of the Cordoba mosque that has been proposed for a site a couple of blocks away from the location of the former World Trade Center have been labeled Islamophobic. That's not a very accurate term. Something like misislamic would be more useful -- at least in certain instances -- as it suggests hostility rather than fear.
Fear, however, seems to have been at work at The Washington Post and several other newspapers when they decided not to run a "Non Sequitur" cartoon earlier this month. Playing off the popular Where's Waldo? children's books, the cartoon showed a busy park scene. A label above the cartoon read, "Picture book title voted least likely to ever find a publisher . . . " A label below it read, "Where's Muhammad?"
Many characters occupy the park scene, from joggers to a giraffe. But not the Prophet himself. The cartoon was so mild even the hair-trigger Council on American-Islamic Relations took no offense. "The reference [to Muhammad] in this case was so vague that I don't even know if offense comes into it," said CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper. Nevertheless numerous other prominent papers joined The Post in spiking the cartoon: The Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, the Dallas Morning News, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the San Francisco Chronicle, and more. (
The Times-Dispatch ran the comic as scheduled.)
Wiley Miller, the artist, drew the panel to protest the dangerous rise of violence and censorship surrounding discussions of anything Muslim. Those include a 2005 controversy over cartoons in a Danish newspaper that sparked violent protests around the globe, as well as Comedy Central's decision earlier this year to alter an episode of "South Park" to avoid depicting Muhammad. The network did so after another episode, in which the Prophet was disguised as a bear, provoked a death threat from a Muslim group. Revolution Muslim warned that the show's creators would end up "like Theo Van Gogh" -- a filmmaker murdered in 2004 for making a movie offensive to Muslim sensibilities.
Last year, Yale University Press published a book about the Danish cartoon controversy -- after excising the cartoons themselves from the work. And last month Seattle cartoonist Molly Norris had to change her identity and disappear after making a tongue-in-cheek proposal for "Everybody Draw Muhammad Day" -- ironically meant to protest the very sort of threats of violence that have driven her into hiding.
Miller, the "Non Sequitur" cartoonist, aptly notes that "great newspapers like The Washington Post, that took on Nixon . . . run in fear of this very tame cartoon, thus validating the accuracy of the satire."
It is tempting to believe some editors may have been so pickled in the juices of political correctness that they now consider any religious reference simply beyond the pale. But that sensitivity clearly does not extend to the feelings of either evangelical Christians or the Catholic Church, both of which endure frequent and withering ridicule. Part of this may be merely a reflection of the soft left's double standard: Muslims are a minority, at least in the U.S., and liberalism sees itself as bravely standing between the little guy and the oppressor. Christians, being in the majority, need scant protection.
Yet applying that matrix to the cartoon controversy is obviously wrong. Christians may be in the majority, but it seems closer to the truth to say they are a safe target. A movie mocking Jesus will draw polite demonstrations and angry letters of protest. But Christians will not cheer in the streets when someone cuts off the director's head. (It will not even occur to them to cut off the director's head.) Just contrast the reaction to a Florida pastor's proposal to burn a Quran a few weeks ago with this May 2009 headline from CNN: "[U.S.] Military Burns Unsolicited Bibles Sent to Afghanistan." Hear anything about that? Of course you didn't. Fundamentalist Islam represents a far greater threat to the values of Western liberalism than even the most conservative Christians do today.
This is not about showing polite consideration for the feelings of others, which is entirely appropriate. Gratuitously mocking other people's religious beliefs is uncalled for. But there was nothing remotely, never mind gratuitously, offensive about the "Non Sequitur" cartoon -- the target of which was violent intimidation, not Islam. Nevertheless, many newspapers apparently feared that some Muslims somewhere could, maybe just possibly, take offense. Parts of the media seem to have been intimidated to such a degree that they are now pre-emptively silencing their most entertaining and creative voices.
Once upon a time, members of the media could be counted upon to champion free expression even when nobody else would. Where the First Amendment was implicated, newspapers were willing to go to bat for everyone from neo-Nazis to Hustler magazine, and to take on powerful institutions from the Vatican to the Pentagon, often while patting themselves on the back for "speaking truth to power." Yet when it comes to the Islamic question, many in the media will not even stick up for themselves. That is, to say the least, a very ominous development.
One of the quickest ways to find out if you are wrong is to state what you believe.
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8)Can You Name the Greatest President of the Past 100 Years?
Byaniel J. Mitchell
It’s tempting to say that Ronald Reagan was the best U.S. president of the past century, and I’ve certainly demonstrated my man-crush on the Gipper. But there is some real competition. I had the pleasure yesterday of hearing Amity Shlaes of the Council on Foreign Relations make the case for Calvin Coolidge at the Mont Pelerin Society Meeting in Australia.
I dug around online and found an article Amity wrote for Forbes that highlights some of the attributes of “Silent Cal” that she mentioned in her speech. As you can see, she makes a persuasive case.
… the Coolidge style of government, which included much refraining, took great strength and yielded superior results. …Coolidge and Mellon tightened and pulled [income tax rates] multiple times, eventually getting the top rate down to 25%, a level that hasn’t been seen since. Mellon argued that lower rates could actually bring in greater revenues because they removed disincentives to work. Government, he said, should operate like a railroad, charging a price for freight that “the traffic will bear.” Coolidge’s commitment to low taxes came from his concept of property rights. He viewed heavy taxation as the legalization of expropriation. “I want taxes to be less, that the people may have more,” he once said. In fact, Coolidge disapproved of any government intervention that eroded the bond of the contract. …More than once Coolidge vetoed what would later be called farm allotment–the government purchase of commodities to reduce supply and drive up prices. …Today our government has moved so far from Coolidge’s tenets that it’s difficult to imagine such policies being emulated.
But if you don’t want to believe Amity, here’s Coolidge in his own words. This video is historically significant since it is the first film (with sound) of an American President. (YOU TUBE Film: President Coolidge, First Presidential Film [1924]The real )value, however, is in the words that are being said.
8a)President Obama’s faithful losing hope as the magic fades
By Margery Eagan
This president gives rousing speeches. He did it again yesterday. He bounded out onto the Hynes Convention Center stage, all youth and vigor, open-necked white shirt, navy blazer.
But he didn’t sell me, or reassure me.
And he obviously knows he’s having trouble connecting — even with true believers. He talked about this yesterday: the “fun” and “feeling good” and overwhelming optimism of Inauguration Day vs. the undercurrent of skepticism now.
Remember? Obama was JFK, RFK and MLK rolled into one. He was a once-in-a-generation superstar. The savior had been born.
What happened?
“I know that hope may have faded as we grind it out. I know it’s hard to keep faith,” he said yesterday, “with another foreclosure sign hung on the house down the street, and you watch TV and all you see are politicians tearing each other down.
“(The Republicans) figured they could ride people’s frustration and anger all the way to the ballot box,” he said.
Alas for Obama, it looks like Republicans figured right. Here’s one emotion loose upon the land that Obama neglected to mention: fear.
Barack Obama offered up this metaphor yesterday: America’s a car that Republicans drove into a ditch.
Then along came Obama and the Democrats. “We put our boots on and went down into the ditch, and we started pushing that car out,” the president told the cheering crowd. “It was hot down there and muddy, but we kept on pushing. And every once in a while we looked up and the Republicans are standing up there tanning themselves, sipping Slurpees, and we say, ‘Hey, are you gonna help?’ ”
But the Republicans told us, said Obama, “You’re not pushing the right way.”
You’re not pushing the right way.
I don’t think the president meant to undermine anybody’s confidence with his wrong-way-out-of-the-ditch story yesterday. But that’s the nagging question — isn’t it? Even among the once-Obamified, like me? We’re afraid he’s not really getting us out of our ditch. And the ditch is getting deeper. And it’s very scary stuff.
Yesterday was Day 2 of Barack Obama’s pre-election, pump-up-nervous-Democrats tour. It was as much about convincing us that we’re, in fact, on the right road. Obama reminded us: He passed health care and Wall Street reform. The stimulus, supposedly, saved us from a depression.
But you know what? I read newspapers and watch the news for a living. Yet even I can’t figure out if health care or Wall Street reform are really good for us or not.
I want Barack Obama to give me something concrete to hang onto so I can hang in myself. I am trying, Mr. President. But you don’t make it easy
So now we’re back to the car in the ditch. Obama said yesterday that even though the GOP didn’t lift a finger, he and the Democrats kept pushing, and “finally we got this car on level ground. It’s a little banged up,” he said, “It needs some body work, a tune-up.” But at least it’s finally out of the ditch. And now, Obama said, the GOP says, “Excuse me, can we have the keys back?’’
We’re not supposed to give the keys back, see. That’s Obama’s message this election season. We’re supposed to “keep moving forward between our doubts and our hopes . . . to push forward even when success (is) uncertain.”
OK, I get it. There are no guarantees. But I, for one, would feel much better with some kind of evidence that Obama’s GPS works.
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