Netanyahu's gift to Obama was "The Book of Esther." This gift was intended to send a subtle stealth like message, one akin to the planes Netanyahu will surely launch, as well as a deafening one. The latter being, Netanyahu will not 'duck his' responsibility as a leader of a nation whose existence came about as a result of the concentration ashes of his people.
Netanyahu cannot/will not wait for the 'tortoise,' Obama, to take action after the election if ever if the 'rabbit,' Iran, is to be halted in its nuclear tracks.
Netanyahu cannot/will not allow Iran's act of world defiance to 'pass over.'
However, this paper finds clarity. (See 1 below.)
While Pruden finds an empty scabbard? (See 1a below.)
Bret Stephens finds a 'Jewish President Wannabe' lacking presidential honesty. (See 1b below.)
This article is too long to publish but you decide. Pillar already has: "We Can Live With a Nuclear Iran - Paul Pillar, Washington Monthly."
Guess Pillar would have said the same about Hitler.
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Another comment from the wife of the husband whose very name was the embodiment of AIPAC: "I was at the policy conference & I agree with all of the below! (referring to one of my memos.) He could have been talking at the Afl-CIO no heart or enthusiasm! Hugs, ------"
Another comment from a friend of long standing and fellow memo reader: "My wife and I had the simultaneously, exact same response to hearing Obama at the AIPAC. It rhymes with 'pants on fire.'”
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A liberal's view of abortion and her twisted mind.
As for myself I believe politics should not enter,and should it it should be taken out of, the birth canal. A woman should have a right to her body but when it comes to abortion I would prefer my tax dollars not pay for it. That said, talk about abortion also morphs into, and begs the question of, morality and the value a nation places on life. That is when it gets extra complicated.
In a progressive-liberal womb to tomb should society/tax payers pay for my burial? (See 2 below.)
This was sent to me by a dear friend and fellow memo reader who also happens to be Catholic. (Listen to 2a below.)
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I have just listened to a recap of the AIPAC conference by two Mid East experts;
Their conclusions:
The gap has narrowed between the U.S. and Israel but was not closed and neither country wants their options hijacked by the other.
The discussion of the Palestinian issue/settlements are no longer the most important and thus, Netanyahu gained in the chess game between the two leaders because Iran is now the main issue.
Netanyahu's emphasized Israel's must retain freedom of action and again, Obama publicly acknowledged this fact. Another plus vis a vis Netanyahu strategy.
Iran poses a strategic problem for both nations but there is a signifcant difference as to its magnitude and nature.
Bottom line, both speakers believe the prospect of war has been heightened and Netanyahu, it appears, is now freer to act vis a vis America's desires even though Obama would prefer no conflict take place until more diplomatic time has passed and the election is behind.
Why? Because Netanyahu cannot allow his military zone option to slip away and because both leaders are on different time parameters this too increases the likelihood Netanyahu is more likely to act. Another critical zone which Netanyahu must take into consideration is the political one of the U.S. election. Netanyahu has more leverage before the election than after.
Netanyahu prepares his speeches carefully and thus his changed rhetoric must be taken seriously.
Israels' military capability is not as great as the U.S. and this increases the likelihood of an attack.
Everything for Netanyahu is now weighed against an Iranian nuclear bomb threat. Netanyahu can no longer allow history to record he allowed Iran to become nuclear.
Netanyahu has moved Obama closer to his view.
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Dick
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1)Obama offers clarity on Iran, and a vital message to Israel
IN THE DAYS leading up to his meeting Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Obama said he doesn’t, “as a matter of policy, go around advertising exactly what our intentions are.’’ But in the same interview, and then in his powerful speech before the pro-Israel group AIPAC on Sunday, Obama did just that - and brought important clarity to the most immediate national-security challenge facing his administration.
In one stroke, Obama raised the ante on Iran, declaring that his administration would work tirelessly to tighten economic sanctions in the short term, but in the long term would be willing to use military force to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. He also made it clear to Israel that the United States does not want a premature military strike against Iran, which would allow that government to cast itself as a victim of aggression.
Obama’s departure from his usual policy of not “advertising what our intentions are’’ was deeply necessary, to blow away the fog surrounding America’s position toward Iran’s nuclear program. Obama put new pressure on Iran, and also on potential US allies. To China and India, who purchase Iranian oil, Obama’s remarks over the weekend demonstrated the necessity for cooperation on sanctions against Iranian oil exports. Recently imposed international sanctions against Iran’s central bank are already being felt in Tehran. To Israel, where the Netanyahu government is considering whether to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities, Obama’s remarks underscored the president’s willingness to take the lead on Iran, but also established his opposition to an early strike.
While no country can cede its security interests to another, Israel should recognize that the path laid out by Obama - of tightening sanctions, international isolation, increasing military threats, and worldwide calls for negotiations - offers the best hope for a long-term solution. An early strike aimed at Iran’s research facilities wouldn’t settle the issue. It might set back some aspects of the nuclear program, but only strengthen Iran’s determination to become a nuclear power.
The global risks of an early Israeli military strike are manifest. Iran is already feeling pressure from unfriendly Arab neighbors, while its closest ally, Syria, is in turmoil. An Israeli strike against Iran, however, would rally other Muslim nations to Iran’s side. The potential disruption of oil from other Middle Eastern countries through the Strait of Hormuz would trigger a worldwide recession and propel the United States and perhaps European allies into a wider conflict.
It’s hard to see how any of this would be in Israel’s interest, but there are troubling signs that the Netanyahu government, uncertain of Obama’s commitment, has been sowing support for a military strike of its own among American backers of Israel, including Republican leaders.
Now, however, Obama’s intentions should be clear - and should satisfy Israel and its backers. The president’s message should be heard in Beijing, Moscow, and New Delhi, as well. And it should put Tehran on notice: Come to the bargaining table, establish peaceful intentions by allowing full inspections of Iran’s nuclear program, and thereby begin the process of rebuilding the country’s standing in the world.
1a)The romance of the empty rhetoric
By Wesley Pruden
Words, words, words. Stonewall Jackson famously told soldiers to "make short speeches, and when you draw the sword throw away the scabbard."
Barack Obama is obsessed with words. He never learned to make a short speech, and he's certainly no Stonewall Jackson. The Israelis understand that, however well-meaning he may be. The president may even believe most of the stuff he hears himself say.
Mr. Obama made another pretty speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, on Sunday and thrilled only those who gorge on the romance of rhetoric. Mr. Obama and his teleprompter put on a show of bluffery that was surely the envy of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "Iran's leaders should know," the president said, "that I do not have a policy of containment. I have a policy to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. And as I've made clear time and again during the course of my presidency, I will not hesitate to use force when it is necessary to defend the United States and its interests."
Almost any Iranian truck driver could guide a Mack truck through the loopholes with no fear of scratching the paint. The president won't hesitate when it's "necessary" to defend the United States and its "interests." The president, of course, will decide when it's "necessary," and he gets to determine what those "interests" may be. It may be "necessary" to soothe the Islamic world by doing nothing beyond making still another speech. The "interests" of the United States, as Mr. Obama might define them, could only be defended by another bow from the presidential waist.
Binyamin Netanyahu, the visiting Israeli prime minister who is accustomed to tense visits to friends in Washington, reminded Mr. Obama the next day that despite the president's scolding about "loose talk of war" his own responsibility to his country is "to ensure that Israel remains the master of its fate." He could have reminded the president of the reply of Charles Cotesworth Pinckney to French demands for tribute and other bribes for "offensive" remarks by President John Adams to Tallyrand: "Millions for defense, sir, but not one cent for tribute." Such plain speech has gone out of style in Washington, when and where it is needed most. But not in Jerusalem, where the prospect of hanging naturally focuses the mind, as Dr. Johnson said it does.
Mr. Obama, with his high regard for his reputation as a man with singular gifts of pretty speech, no doubt imagines he has discharged his obligations to an ally with words (and a few notes of music). If he were a true student of the Muslim mind, instead of being merely an admirer of the cultural gifts of Islam (such as they are), he would understand that the hard men in Tehran hear his rhetoric not as kindly sentiment but as evidence of weakness and flaccid impotence. That's why they so eagerly get on with the pursuit of the weapons needed to "wipe Israel off the map." The Islamic despots understand a thing or two about empty rhetoric.
Nobody wants war, which is always bad for all living things. The Israelis understand that a nuclear weapon in evil hands will be bad for Israel most of all. "I have said that when it comes to preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon," Mr. Obama told AIPAC, "I will take no options off the table, and I mean what I say." This echoes his declaration earlier to an interviewer that he doesn't bluff. Alas, a man who doesn't bluff never has to say so; if he makes such a boast it's usually a giveaway that he's bluffing. When Richard Nixon declared that he was not a crook everyone took that as confirmation that he was. Some things are most obvious when unspoken.
Through word and lack of deed, Mr. Obama leaves the inevitable impression that he regards the standoff between Iran and Israel in terms of moral equivalence, not as the harsh reality that it's Iran's boast that it is building the weapons to destroy the Jewish state that is the source of fear and loathing in the Middle East. It's Mr. Obama's insistence that he prefers diplomacy that reassures the mullahs in Tehran, that he is counting on his eloquent bluster, boasting and bombast that will make the Iranians and their like-minded friends repent and behave themselves.
The president's romantic rhetoric only persuades them that he wears an empty scabbard.
1b)The 'Jewish' President
Don't believe Obama when he says he has Israel's back.
By BRET STEPHENS
Should Israelis and pro-Israel Americans take President Obama at his word when he says—as he did at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference in Washington, D.C., on Sunday—"I have Israel's back"?
No.
Here is a president who fought tooth-and-nail against the very sanctions on Iran for which he now seeks to reap political credit. He inherited from the Bush administration the security assistance to Israel he now advertises as proof of his "unprecedented" commitment to the Jewish state. His defense secretary has repeatedly cast doubt on the efficacy of a U.S. military option against Iran even as the president insists it remains "on the table." His top national security advisers keep warning Israel not to attack Iran even as he claims not to "presume to tell [Israeli leaders] what is best for them."
Oh, and his secretary of state answers a question from a Tunisian student about U.S. politicians courting the "Zionist lobbies" by saying that "a lot of things are said in political campaigns that should not bear a lot of attention." It seems it didn't occur to her to challenge the premise of the question.
Still, if you're looking for evidence of Mr. Obama's disingenuousness when it comes to Israel, it's worth referring to what his supporters say about him.
Consider Peter Beinart, the one-time Iraq War advocate who has reinvented himself as a liberal scourge of present-day Israel and mainstream Zionism. Mr. Beinart has a book coming out next month called "The Crisis of Zionism." Chapter five, on "The Jewish President," fully justifies the cover price.
Mr. Beinart's case is that Mr. Obama came to his views about Israel not so much from people like his friend Rashid Khalidi or his pastor Jeremiah Wright. Instead, says Mr. Beinart, Mr. Obama got his education about Israel from a coterie of far-left Chicago Jews who "bred in Obama a specific, and subversive, vision of American Jewish identity and of the Jewish state."
At the center of this coterie, Mr. Beinart explains, was a Chicago rabbi named Arnold Jacob Wolf. In 1969, Wolf staged a synagogue protest in favor of Black Panther Bobby Seale. In the early 1970s, he founded an organization that met with Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization—this being some 20 years before Arafat officially renounced terrorism. In the early 1990s, Wolf denounced the construction of the Holocaust Museum in Washington.
And, in 1996, the rabbi "was one of [Mr. Obama's] earliest and most prominent supporters" when he ran for the Illinois state Senate. Wolf later described Mr. Obama's views on Israel as "on the line of Peace Now"—an organization with a long history of blaming Israel for the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Mr. Obama had other Jewish mentors, too, according to Mr. Beinart. One was Bettylu Saltzman, whose father, developer Philip Klutznick, had joined Wolf in "his break with the Israeli government in the 1970s." Ms. Saltzman, writes Mr. Beinart, "still seethes with hostility toward the mainstream Jewish groups" and later became active in left-wing Jewish political groups like J Street. Among other things, it was she who "organized the rally against the Iraq War where Obama proclaimed his opposition to an American invasion."
Ms. Saltzman also introduced Mr. Obama to David Axelrod, himself a longtime donor to a group called the New Israel Fund. For a flavor of the NIF's world view, a WikiLeaks cable from 2010 noted that an NIF associate director told U.S. embassy officials in Tel Aviv that "the disappearance of a Jewish state would not be the tragedy that Israelis fear since it would become more democratic."
Other things that we learn about Mr. Obama's intellectual pedigree from Mr. Beinart: As a student at Columbia, he honed his interests in colonialism by studying with the late pro-Palestinian agit-Prof. Edward Said. In 2004, Mr. Obama "criticized the barrier built to separate Israel and its major settlements from the rest of the West Bank"—the "barrier" meaning the security fence that all-but eliminated the wave of suicide bombings that took 1,000 lives in Israel.
We also learn that, according to one of Mr. Beinart's sources, longtime diplomat Dennis Ross was brought aboard the Obama campaign as part of what Mr. Beinart calls "Obama's inoculation strategy" to mollify Jewish voters apprehensive about the sincerity of his commitments to Israel. Not surprisingly, Mr. Ross was a marginal figure in the administration before leaving last year.
In Mr. Beinart's telling, all this is evidence that Mr. Obama is in tune with the authentic views of the American Jewish community when it comes to Israel, but that he's out of step with Jewish organizational leadership. Maybe. Still, one wonders why organizations more in tune with those "real" views rarely seem to find much of a base.
But the important question here isn't about American-Jewish attitudes toward Israel. It's about the president's honesty. Is he being truthful when he represents himself as a mainstream friend of Israel—or is he just holding his tongue and biding his time? On the evidence of Mr. Beinart's sympathetic book, Mr. Obama's speech at Aipac was one long exercise in political cynicism.
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2)Sibelius Spills the Beans
By Tom Trinko
Liberals accuse conservatives of using secret signals that only conservatives can hear -- dog whistles -- to send racist messages. These accusations are in reality a reflection of what liberals think rather than accurate assessments of what conservatives are saying, like the pimpled teen who thinks that nearly everything is a dirty joke.
Liberals, on the other hand, constantly have to hide what they believe in order to get votes -- getting rid of blacks by making abortion easily available in minority neighborhoods and advocating socialism are not winning campaign positions these days. That's why almost every liberal runs for re-election as a conservative. Fortunately, liberals are sufficiently un-self-aware as to let their true beliefs show through their verbiage on occasion -- an unconscious dog whistle, if you will.
Secretary Sebelius has stated that providing free contraception would reduce overall insurance costs because there would be fewer people for the insurance companies to pay for.
In doing so she provided insights, probably unwittingly, into how liberals think about Americans. Her statement is flawed from numerous perspectives, but let's look at just two.
First, she is assuming that the average American who would not be born if she has her way would burden society, not benefit it. She's saying that having more Americans is a bad idea, that people do not generate wealth, that we should be depressed over every legal immigrant and every new birth in America.
After all, if people cost more than they are worth, they are nothing but a burden, right? That has to be her reasoning; otherwise, why object to the birth of someone who will be a net contributor to society via years of taxes, and a future payee of health insurance premiums?
What Sebelius is doing is counting the medical costs for a person until he has his own insurance but not counting the premiums and taxes that person will pay. Insurance companies work only so long as they make a profit. Hence, on average, anyone who has health insurance has to pay in, over a lifetime, more than the insurance company spends on the average person.
As a result, the cost of insurance -- i.e., the amount they have to charge per person to stay solvent -- is independent, over the long haul, of the number of people they cover, assuming the ratio of healthy young people to less healthy older people stays constant. By reducing the number of young people, however, the cost per insured person will go up since the ratio of older people to younger people will go up.
What happens in real life is that you pay health insurance premiums over your whole life. When you're young, you're subsidizing the health care of your parents' generation. When you're old, you're subsidized by your children's payments. But if the number of young people goes down, then either they have to pay huge premiums or the insurance company won't be able to cover the costs of the older customers.
By ignoring the lifelong contributions of individuals, Sebelius is skewing the books.
Reality provides object lessons on why Sebelius is wrong about the impact of reducing the number of young people. The train wrecks of public-service funding we're seeing in areas where the population is decreasing, such as Europe and Japan, are pretty clear signs that fewer Americans will not be good for Social Security, Medicare, or any other government health program.
By declaring that people are a net burden on society, Sebelius reveals that she believes that it is government that is the source of wealth and power, which it bestows on the people who are essentially parasitic -- their medical care is welfare, not a return for the money they pay in premiums/taxes for example.
The second insight Sebelius provides is that liberals doesn't really understand where babies come from. Teen pregnancy has soared even as free contraceptives have been made readily available. Why?
The answer is simple. Free contraception does not reduce teen sex; it increases it. Most people will avoid sex if they think they, or their partner, can get pregnant. That's one of the key reasons why, prior to the Pill, people were far less promiscuous than they are now. Providing free birth control both tells people that casual sex is okay and ensures that people aren't kept from having sex because they fear pregnancy. But since no form of contraception is foolproof -- thank either God or four billion years of evolution -- the more sex there is, the more pregnancies there will be.
A typical woman who takes the Pill religiously -- even if she's an atheist -- has a 3-6% chance of getting pregnant in any given year. If you doubt that, ask yourself why there are 1.4 million abortions in America each year. Not that many people engage in sex without contraception; abortion is the necessary ancillary if you refuse to be pregnant but you want to have sex in a time when no one has invented a "perfect" contraceptive.
Even if you wish to ignore the impact of free contraception on the average sexual activity level, it's not obvious that providing free contraceptive and abortifacient coverage will reduce the number of pregnancies. Unless there are a lot of women who don't use contraception just because of the cost and who don't abort the resulting babies, providing free contraception will not change the birth rate.
The reality is that people who engage in sex without contraception generally do so because they are either using abortion as their method of choice or, more likely, they were overcome by the heat of the moment -- something that no amount of free contraceptive coverage will change.
Sebelius is unwittingly revealing a core liberal belief. Casual sex is a sacred right, and free contraception is necessary to ensure that that right has no adverse consequences.
No one has died from being chaste. Sex is something people enjoy. If it's important to them, they can pay for contraceptives, just as they pay for their cable TV and bowling balls. It's hard to believe that in a country where 77% of the "poor" have either cable or satellite TV, a significant number of people can't afford contraception. Especially since a month's worth of generic contraceptives costs only about $20 -- less than two movie tickets or a DVD.
If liberals think like Sebelius does, it's no wonder liberals are sure they can keep kids from smoking (something liberals abhor), somewhat sure that they can keep kids from driving drunk (something liberals dislike), tenuous about the odds of keeping kids from using drugs (which liberals like), and 100% sure that they can't keep kids from having casual sex -- something that liberals celebrate.
Irrespective of how this current affair winds up, Secretary Seibilus has clearly stated that liberals view people as a problem, not a solution.
It's not surprising, then, that liberals have no problem with their god, government, which they view as the source of all good things telling heretical adherents of other faiths what they can and can't do.
2a)Subject: Fwd: FW: catholic priest's homily
This short sermon explains what it means to the Church and our country if/as the Church is denied the right Under the 1 st Amendment to express its religious beliefs regarding abortion and contraception and therefore morally renounce what the government is telling us to do. The question at large affects freedom in all religions. This is a slippery slope of losing our freedoms and rights and heading toward….and I hate to say this….a socialistic society.
Subject: FW: catholic priest's homily
The following link is a homily from St John the Evangelist parish in ST. John Indiana.
The priest was a lawyer - the parish is middle class, northern Indiana, blue collar, likely democratic.
It is incredibly clear, direct and created a fire of activity - it doesn't take long. The people in his church listened and they clapped for the homily
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