Estelle 'Stella' Victoria----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
While creating women, God promised men that good and obedient wives would be found in all corners of the earth.
And then God smiled and made the earth round.
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I asked my grand son how his presentation before investors went regarding UNBUGGET.COM His response: " Apologies for being so slow to respond to emails. Been swamped responding to feedback.
It went very, very well. We had multiple people come up to us and say that we were the best startup to present."
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Issa plays cat and mouse with Holder. I have a mole that is eating up our backyard. Issa's mole is far more revealing and useful.Before long, all kind of nefarious undertakings will be revealed about this administration focusing on how underhanded they have been, how they sought to operate outside the law and to engage in cover up after cover up.
One thing that should be evident about Obama by now. When he tells you something believe and expect the opposite. remember he said his administration would be the most open blah, blah, blah.(See 1 below.)
But when Obama is open, it appears he is doing so simply to enhance his tattered reputation and at the expense of national security. How sick, how narcissistic! (see 1a and 1b below)
Contrast his alleged leaking of classified information with his handling of Iran and Syria. (See 5 below.)
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Words have meaning and convey intent. (See 2 and 2a below.)
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Another slant on 'Ole Bill's' recent behavior. (See 3 below.)
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As previously indicated Iran's leadership are masters at stalling tactics, all for the purpose of buying time to produce more low grade uranium in contemplation of going nuclear. (See 4 below.)
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Glick to somnambulant Jews - WAKE UP!
Her message applies to more than just sleep walking Jews.(See 5 below.)
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Yesterday I used the house of card phrase/anology now Noonan has done so as well. (See 6 below.)
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Is Obama in a race against race? (See 7 below.)
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Point: A case why stocks will soar.
I understand when you have everyone trying to solve intractable problems it is likely the market has not discounted the prospect of some success but, more than likely reflects the problems, thus leaving room for an up move. The Fed is going to keep rates low, Germany will probably relent and fund the sinking nations of Europe and China's interest rate reduction is designed to re-stimulate their own economy. We are making slow and awkward progress and all of this can mean higher markets after the recent technical correction. Should Romney's election seem assured that would add to the upward pressures. (See 8 below.)
Counterpoint: Unemployment comments! (See 8a below.)
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Will there be life after The Supremes decide 'Obamascare?' (See 9 below.)
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Dick
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1)Mole helps Rep. Issa whack Justice Dept.
By Jordy Yager
With the help of a mole, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) has turned the tables
on Attorney General Eric Holder.
Issa has long been exasperated with Holder, claiming that the Department of
Justice (DOJ) has been withholding information on a controversial
gun-running operation. But through an anonymous source, Issa has obtained
information about the initiative that is under a federal court-ordered seal.
Issa has asked the DOJ for the documents - wiretap applications it used in
the botched federal gun-tracking Operation Fast and Furious - for months.
The California lawmaker has taken preliminary steps to move
contempt-of-Congress citations against Holder, but it remains unclear if GOP
leaders support that move. This new controversy could help Issa attract more
Republican support for a contempt-of-Congress resolution.
If Holder does launch an investigation into where the leak originated, the
powerful Republican could paint the move as an attempt by the DOJ to hide
the documents' contents. It would also raise the possibility that DOJ
investigators will seek information from Issa, who has been trying to
determine who approved the "gun-walking" tactics used in Fast and Furious
along the U.S.-Mexico border.
On the other hand, not launching a probe would mean turning a blind eye to a
criminal breach and could lead Issa's source and others to reveal other
information sealed by a judge.
Issa told Fox News on Wednesday that he has no intention of shining the
light on his source: "We're not going to make our whistleblower available.
That's been one of the most sensitive areas, because some of the early
whistleblowers are already feeling retribution. They're being treated
horribly."
Asked earlier this week where he got the wiretap applications, Issa told The
Hill, "You can ask, but you should have no expectation of an answer. By the
way, if I asked you where you got yours, would you give me your sources?"
Of course, there is some political risk for Issa. The Obama administration
could point out that he is stonewalling federal authorities after
complaining throughout this Congress of being stonewalled by DOJ.
As the lead congressional investigator of Fast and Furious, Issa says the
documents show top-ranking DOJ officials signing off on the condemned
"gun-walking" tactics used in the failed operation. Senior DOJ officials
have repeatedly denied that they approved the botched initiative.
The documents have not been made public, and Issa has apparently broken no
laws by being given the information.
Regardless, the DOJ is not pleased.
"Chairman Issa's letter makes clear that sealed court documents relating to
pending federal prosecutions being handled by the U.S. Attorney's Office for
the Southern District of California have been disclosed to the Committee on
Oversight and Government Reform in violation of law," wrote Deputy Attorney
General James Cole to House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), House Majority
Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)
and Issa this week.
"This is of great concern to us," the letter added.
A spokesman for the DOJ declined to comment about whether it was planning to
launch an investigation into the leak.
Democrats say that Issa is exaggerating what he has. Rep. Elijah Cummings
(D-Md.), the ranking member on Issa's panel, reiterated this week that
top-ranking DOJ officials didn't personally review any of the six wiretap
applications related to Fast and Furious. Issa sent Cummings the information
he received from his source.
In the past, the DOJ has justified not turning over the wiretap applications
to Issa by saying that doing so could jeopardize the current criminal cases
it is prosecuting.
Two former prosecutors for the DOJ, who were not familiar with the details
of this article, independently told The Hill that defense lawyers could use
an instance of documents being leaked in violation of a court-ordered seal
to justify seeking a mistrial.
It is unlikely that the DOJ, if it does investigate the leak, will have
grounds to go after Issa for accepting the documents. In past instances of
court-ordered seals being broken, it is the actual breaker of the seal who
is held responsible, which in this case could mean criminal contempt
proceedings and possible jail time.
The battle between Issa and the DOJ has escalated over the past month, with
House Republican leaders writing a letter to Holder asking him to hand over
information about who was responsible for Fast and Furious. The letter also
asked whether the DOJ misled Congress on when officials, including Holder,
became aware of the program.
Issa is set to square off against Holder on Thursday when the attorney
general is scheduled to appear before the House Judiciary Committee. The
Republican lawmaker will appear on a panel to discuss oversight of the DOJ.
Under the now-defunct Fast and Furious initiative, agents from the Bureau of
Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which is under the DOJ,
authorized the sale of firearms to known and suspected straw purchasers for
Mexican drug cartels, but lost track of many of the weapons. Some of those
guns might have contributed to the December 2010 shooting death of Border
Patrol agent Brian Terry.
1a)
Gates to National Security Team on Osama Raid: 'Shut the F--- Up'
By DANIEL HALPER
Robert Gates, the former defense secretary, reportedly blasted the national
security team in the Obama White House for blabbing about the raid to kill
Osama bin Laden. "Shut the f--- up," Gates told Tom Donilon, who is now
Obama's national security adviser, according to a book by New York Times
reporter David Sanger.
By Wednesday of that week, Gates went to see Donilon, offering up a barbed
assessment of how the White House had handled the aftermath of the raid. "I
have a new strategic communications approach to recommend," Gates said in
his trademark droll tones, according to an account later provided by his
colleagues. "What was that?" Donilon asked. "Shut the fuck up," the former
defense secretary said.
The interesting detail is in Sanger's new book, Confront and Conceal, on
page 107
Gates is no longer in the Obama administration, and has since voiced his
displeasure over the bin Laden leaks. But this new detail signals a
frustration above and beyond what has previously been expressed.
1b)Obama, Drones and Thomas Aquinas
By DANIEL HALPER
Robert Gates, the former defense secretary, reportedly blasted the national
security team in the Obama White House for blabbing about the raid to kill
Osama bin Laden. "Shut the f--- up," Gates told Tom Donilon, who is now
Obama's national security adviser, according to a book by New York Times
reporter David Sanger.
By Wednesday of that week, Gates went to see Donilon, offering up a barbed
assessment of how the White House had handled the aftermath of the raid. "I
have a new strategic communications approach to recommend," Gates said in
his trademark droll tones, according to an account later provided by his
colleagues. "What was that?" Donilon asked. "Shut the fuck up," the former
defense secretary said.
The interesting detail is in Sanger's new book, Confront and Conceal, on
page 107
Gates is no longer in the Obama administration, and has since voiced his
displeasure over the bin Laden leaks. But this new detail signals a
frustration above and beyond what has previously been expressed.
1b)Obama, Drones and Thomas Aquinas
Obama has avoided vexing detention issues simply by depriving terrorists of all of their rights—by killing them.
By JOHN YOO
President Obama notched another victory in the war on terror Monday, when a CIA drone strike killed al Qaeda's second-in-command in Pakistan. No one should mourn the death of Abu Yahya al-Libi, a charismatic terrorist who had risen to assume operational leadership after Osama bin Laden's death last year at the hands of Navy SEALs.
Al-Libi's death, however, may represent tactical success in the drone war at the expense of broader strategy. Recent stories in major newspapers portray a White House war room where Mr. Obama studies the files of potential targets, compiles a "kill list," and makes the final decision on strikes—at last count, 269 in Pakistan, 38 in Yemen.
"He is determined that he will make these decisions about how far and wide these operations will go," Thomas Donilon, the White House national security adviser, told the New York Times. "He's determined to keep the tether pretty short."
The administration has made little secret of its near-total reliance on drone operations to fight the war on terror. The ironies abound. Candidate Obama campaigned on narrowing presidential wartime power, closing Guantanamo Bay, trying terrorists in civilian courts, ending enhanced interrogation, and moving away from a wartime approach to terrorism toward a criminal-justice approach. Mr. Obama has avoided these vexing detention issues simply by depriving terrorists of all of their rights—by killing them.
Some information about these strikes comes from the disclosure of national secrets that appear designed to help the president's re-election. Recent leaks have blown the cover of the Pakistani doctor who sought to confirm bin Laden's presence in Abbottabad; revealed a British asset who penetrated al Qaeda and stopped another bombing of a U.S.-bound airliner; and assigned credit to the administration for the Stuxnet computer virus that damaged Iran's nuclear program (even identifying the government lab that designed it).
Associated Press
This undated image taken from video provided by IntelCenter shows al-Qaida's former second-in-command Abu Yahya al-Libi.
American intelligence will have a steep hill to climb when it asks for the future cooperation of agent-assets and foreign governments. Notably silent are the Democrats and media figures who demanded the scalp of a Bush White House aide, Scooter Libby, for leaks by another government official of the cover of a CIA operative who had left the field years earlier.
Yet the greater threat to security comes from Mr. Obama's micromanagement of the drone campaign. Poring over the files of kill-list nominees recalls Lyndon Johnson's role in tightly controlling bombing strikes during the Vietnam War. During Operation Rolling Thunder, Johnson held Tuesday lunches when he and his advisers picked targets to avoid attacks that might provoke Soviet or Chinese intervention.
This misuse of presidential time produced a myopic focus on tactics. Photos of LBJ hunched over maps said it all: Staring at individual targets prevented him from seeing the broader strategic picture in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. Worse yet, it encouraged the military to set aside its judgment in favor of the president's political preferences.
In Vietnam, LBJ and his advisers placed off limits vital targets in Hanoi, Haiphong harbor and the North's supply chains, preventing the U.S. military from striking the enemy's war-making capacity and isolating the North from its allies. Today the Obama administration commits mistakes of similar dimension by rushing for the exits in Iraq, hastily drawing down in Afghanistan, and failing to pressure Pakistan to control its western regions, where al Qaeda and the Taliban operate with little restraint. America's high-tempo drone campaign cannot succeed for long without the ground support of local bases and intelligence assets.
To stop an enemy without territory, population or regular armed forces, the U.S. must have access to timely, actionable intelligence gleaned from captured terrorists. The interrogation of terrorist leaders not only led the CIA to bin Laden's doorstep. It helped produce the success of the last decade: not a single follow-up al Qaeda attack in the U.S. Exclusive reliance on drones and a no-capture policy spend down the investments in intelligence that made this hiatus possible, without replenishing the interrogation-gained information needed to predict future threats.
According to press reports, aides claim the president is a student of St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas who brings their views to targeting choices. This is scarcely believable.
But even taking the claim at face value, just-war theory should broaden, rather than limit, the use of force against terrorists. The work of the Catholic theologians drew upon traditions stretching back to the ancient world that would have considered terrorists to be hostis humani generis, the enemy of all mankind, who merited virtually no protections under the laws of war.
Some church thinkers approved of wars for conversion (i.e., the Crusades), reprisal, conquest and punishment. While Mr. Obama surely does not seek a return to these earlier forms of conflict, a return to first principles such as hostis humani generis may prove a better guide for a nation at war than a president's day-to-day instincts.
Mr. Yoo, a professor at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law who served in the Bush Justice Department, is the author of "Taming Globalization" (Oxford University Press, 2012).
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2)
World Leaders Ignore International Law
Jewish Settlements in Judea and Samaria are Perfectly Legal and Legitimate
By Eli. E. Hertz |
The U.S. Administration, the European Union, the United Nations, and Russia's decision to rewrite history by labeling the Territories 'Occupied Territories,' the Settlements as an 'Obstacle to Peace' and 'Not Legitimate,' thus endowing them with an aura of bogus statehood and a false history. The use of these dishonest loaded terms, empowers terrorism and incites Palestinian Arabs with the right to use all measures to expel Israel.
The Jewish People's Right to the Land of Israel
The "Mandate for Palestine" & the Law of War
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, United States President Barack Obama, and the European Union Foreign Affairs Chief Catherine Ashton became victims to the 'Occupation' mantra their own organization has repeated over and over in their propaganda campaign to legitimize the Arab position.
Continuous pressure by the "Quartet" (U.S., the European Union, the UN and Russia) to surrender parts of the Land of Israel are contrary to international law as stated in the "Mandate for Palestine" document, that in article 6 firmly call to "encourage ... close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes." It also requires, under Article 5 of the Mandate to "seeing that no Palestine territory shall be ceded or leased to, or in any way placed under the control of the government of any foreign power."
Any attempt by the World Leaders to negate the Jewish people's right to Palestine - Eretz-Israel, and to deny them access and control in the area designated for the Jewish people by the League of Nations, is a serious infringement of international law, and as such - illegitimate.
International Law - The "Mandate for Palestine"
The "Mandate for Palestine" an historical League of Nations document, laid down the Jewish legal right under international law to settle anywhere in western Palestine, the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, an entitlement unaltered in international law. Fifty-one member countries - the entire League of Nations - unanimously declared on July 24, 1922:
"Whereas recognition has been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country."
On June 30, 1922, a joint resolution of both Houses of Congress of the United States unanimously endorsed the "Mandate for Palestine":
"Favoring the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.
"Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled. That the United States of America favors the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which should prejudice the civil and religious rights of Christian and all other non-Jewish communities in Palestine, and that the holy places and religious buildings and sites in Palestine shall be adequately protected." [italics in the original]
Law of War - Arab Unlawful Acts of Aggression in 1948
Six months before the War of Independence in 1948, Palestinian Arabs launched a series of riots, pillaging, and bloodletting. Then came the invasion of seven Arab armies from neighboring states attempting to prevent the establishment of a Jewish state in accordance with the UN's 1947 recommendation to Partition Palestine, a plan the Arabs rejected.
The Jewish state not only survived, it came into possession of territories - land from which its adversaries launched their first attempt to destroy the newly created State of Israel.
Israel's citizens understood that defeat meant the end of their Jewish state before it could even get off the ground. In the first critical weeks of battle, and against all odds, Israel prevailed on several fronts.
The metaphor of Israel having her back to the sea reflected the image crafted by Arab political and religious leaders' rhetoric and incitement. Already in 1948 several car bombs had killed Jews, and massacres of Jewish civilians underscored Arab determination to wipe out the Jews and their state.
6,000 Israelis died as a result of that war, in a population of 600,000. One percent of the Jewish population was gone. In American terms, the equivalent is 3 million American civilians and soldiers killed over an 18-month period.
Israel's War of Independence in 1948 was considered lawful and in self-defence as may be reflected in UN resolutions naming Israel a "peace loving State" when it applied for membership at the United Nations. Both the Security Council (4 March, 1949, S/RES/69) and the UN General Assembly (11 May, 1949, (A/RES/273 (III)) declared:
"[Security Council] Decides in its judgment that Israel is a peace-loving State and is able and willing to carry out the obligations contained in the Charter ..."
Arab Unlawful Acts of Aggression in 1967
In June 1967, the combined armies of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan attacked Israel with the clear purpose expressed by Egypt's President: "Destruction of Israel." At the end of what is now known as the Six-Day War, Israel, against all odds, was victorious and in possession of the territories of Judea and Samaria [E.H., The West Bank], Sinai and the Golan Heights.
International law makes a clear distinction between defensive wars and wars of aggression. More than half a century after the 1948 War, and more than four decades since the 1967 Six-Day War, it is hard to imagine the dire circumstances Israel faced and the price it paid to fend off its neighbors' attacks.
Who Starts Wars Does Matter
Professor, Judge Stephen M. Schwebel, past President of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) states the following facts:
"The facts of the June 1967 'Six Day War' demonstrate that Israel reacted defensively against the threat and use of force against her by her Arab neighbors. This is indicated by the fact that Israel responded to Egypt's prior closure of the Straits of Tiran, its proclamation of a blockade of the Israeli port of Eilat, and the manifest threat of the UAR's [The state formed by the union of the republics of Egypt and Syria in 1958] use of force inherent in its massing of troops in Sinai, coupled with its ejection of UNEF.
"It is indicated by the fact that, upon Israeli responsive action against the UAR, Jordan initiated hostilities against Israel. It is suggested as well by the fact that, despite the most intense efforts by the Arab States and their supporters, led by the Premier of the Soviet Union, to gain condemnation of Israel as an aggressor by the hospitable organs of the United Nations, those efforts were decisively defeated.
"The conclusion to which these facts lead is that the Israeli conquest of Arab and Arab-held territory was defensive rather than aggressive conquest."
Judge Sir Elihu Lauterpacht wrote in 1968, one year after the 1967 Six-Day War:
"On 5th June, 1967, Jordan deliberately overthrew the Armistice Agreement by attacking the Israeli-held part of Jerusalem. There was no question of this Jordanian action being a reaction to any Israeli attack. It took place notwithstanding explicit Israeli assurances, conveyed to King Hussein through the U.N. Commander, that if Jordan did not attack Israel, Israel would not attack Jordan.
"Although the charge of aggression is freely made against Israel in relation to the Six-Days War the fact remains that the two attempts made in the General Assembly in June-July 1967 to secure the condemnation of Israel as an aggressor failed. A clear and striking majority of the members of the U.N. voted against the proposition that Israel was an aggressor."
Israel Has the Better Title to the Territory of Palestine, Including the Whole of Jerusalem
International law makes it clear: All of Israel's wars with its Arab neighbors were in self-defence.
Professor, Judge Schwebel, wrote in What Weight to Conquest:
"(a) a state [Israel] acting in lawful exercise of its right of self-defense may seize and occupy foreign territory as long as such seizure and occupation are necessary to its self-defense;
"(b) as a condition of its withdrawal from such territory, that State may require the institution of security measures reasonably designed to ensure that that territory shall not again be used to mount a threat or use of force against it of such a nature as to justify exercise of self-defense;
"(c) Where the prior holder of territory had seized that territory unlawfully, the state which subsequently takes that territory in the lawful exercise of self-defense has, against that prior holder, better title.
"... as between Israel, acting defensively in 1948 and 1967, on the one hand, and her Arab neighbors, acting aggressively, in 1948 and 1967, on the other, Israel has the better title in the territory of what was Palestine, including the whole of Jerusalem, than do Jordan and Egypt."
"(b) as a condition of its withdrawal from such territory, that State may require the institution of security measures reasonably designed to ensure that that territory shall not again be used to mount a threat or use of force against it of such a nature as to justify exercise of self-defense;
"(c) Where the prior holder of territory had seized that territory unlawfully, the state which subsequently takes that territory in the lawful exercise of self-defense has, against that prior holder, better title.
"... as between Israel, acting defensively in 1948 and 1967, on the one hand, and her Arab neighbors, acting aggressively, in 1948 and 1967, on the other, Israel has the better title in the territory of what was Palestine, including the whole of Jerusalem, than do Jordan and Egypt."
"No legal Right Shall Spring from a Wrong"
Professor Schwebel explains that the principle of "acquisition of territory by war is inadmissible" must be read together with other principles:
"... namely, that no legal right shall spring from a wrong, and the Charter principle that the Members of the United Nations shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State."
Simply stated: Arab illegal aggression against the territorial integrity and political independence of Israel, cannot and should not be rewarded.
Professor Julius Stone, a leading authority on the Law of Nations, stated:
"Territorial Rights Under International Law.... By their [Arab countries] armed attacks against the State of Israel in 1948, 1967, and 1973, and by various acts of belligerency throughout this period, these Arab states flouted their basic obligations as United Nations members to refrain from threat or use of force against Israel's territorial integrity and political independence. These acts were in flagrant violation inter alia of Article 2(4) and paragraphs (1), (2), and (3) of the same article."
Thus, under international law Israel acted lawfully by exercising its right to self-defence when it redeemed and legally reoccupied Judea and Samaria, known also as the West Bank.
Legalities aside, before 1967 there were no Jewish settlements in the West Bank, and for the first ten years of so-called occupation there were almost no Jewish settlers in the West Bank. And still there was no peace with the Palestinians. The notion that Jewish communities pose an obstacle to peace is a red herring designed to blame Israel for lack of progress in the 'Peace Process' and enable Palestinian leadership to continue to reject any form of compromise and reconciliation with Israel as a Jewish state.
2a)SOCIAL SECURITY NOW CALLED 'FEDERAL BENEFIT PAYMENT' /ENTITLEMENT!
Have you noticed, your Social Security check is now referred to as a "federal benefit payment"? I'll be part of the one percent, to forward this, our government gets away with way too much in all areas of our lives, while they live lavishly on their grossly overpaid incomes! KEEP passing THIS AROUND UNTIL EVERY ONE HAS READ IT..... This was sent to me, I am forwarding it because it does touch a nerve in me. Remember, not only did you contribute to Social Security but your employer did too. It totaled 15% of your income before taxes. If you averaged only $30K over your working life, that's close to $220,500. If you calculate the future value of $4,500 per year (yours & your employer's contribution) at a simple 5% (less than what the government pays on the money that it borrows), after 49 years of working you'd have $892,919.98. If you took out only 3% per year, you'd receive $26,787.60 per year and it would last better than 30 years (until you're 95 if you retire at age 65) and that's with no interest paid on that final amount on deposit! If you bought an annuity and it paid 4% per year, you'd have a lifetime income of $2,976.40 per month. Entitlement my butt, I paid cash for my social security insurance!!!! Just because they borrowed the money, doesn't make my benefits some kind of charity or handout!! Congressional benefits ---- free healthcare, outrageous retirement packages, 67 paid holidays, three weeks paid vacation, unlimited paid sick days, now that's welfare, and they have the nerve to call my social security retirement entitlements? We're "broke" and can't help our own Seniors, Veterans, Orphans, Homeless. In the last months we have provided aid to Haiti , Chile , and Turkey . And now Pakistan .......hideout of bin Laden. Literally, BILLIONS of DOLLARS!!! Our retired seniors living on a 'fixed income' receive no aid nor do they get any breaks while our government and religious organizations pour Hundreds of Billions of $$$$$$'s and Tons of Food to Foreign Countries! They call Social Security and Medicare an entitlement even though most of us have been paying for it all our working lives and now when it’s time for us to collect, the government is running out of money. Why did the government borrow from it in the first place? Imagine if the *GOVERNMENT* gave 'US' the same support they give to other countries. Sad isn't it? 99% of people won't have the guts to forward this. I'm one of the 1% -- I Just Did.
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3)Did Bill Clinton Deliver a Coded Warning about Obama?
By Jason Kissner
A crescendo of jabs from Bill Clinton aimed at Barack Obama's re-election chances have caused much commentary, but the pundits have ignored an anomalous digression in a recent speech, which may be a startling coded warning about Obama.
In a June 4 New York City fundraiser speech featuring the joint appearance of Messrs. Clinton and Obama, Mr. Clinton says, at 16:23 of this CSPAN link and after having praised Mr. Obama's economic policies and extolled Mr. Obama's contributions to national security:
Has Mr. Clinton ever heard of Mr. Van Jones -- avowed Communist and Obama "green jobs" czar (albeit former czar, but Mr. Jones is, then again, still "walking around")?
Many readers will have heard that Mr. Jones is a self-declared communist. Has he lately declared himself a communist?
No. But wait: let us now parse Mr. Clinton with utmost care, and note once again that he said in the New York speech that "nobody's seen a communist in over a decade...no criticism is too vicious."
Indeed, no criticism is too vicious. Did the word "decade" materialize out of thin air? In all likelihood not, especially when you consider that it is very reasonable to believe that Mr. Van Jones' communism formally ended in...you guessed it...2002, about a decade ago:
What is a rational person to make of this, other than that Mr. Clinton is pointing a pink finger at Mr. Van Jones, and therefore at Mr. Barack Hussein Obama?
It now seems anticlimactic to ask if Mr. Clinton is aware that Mr. Obama, again just last week, awarded the Medal of Freedom to the honorary chair (Ms. Dolores Huerta) of the largest socialist organization in America (can you believe it?). Has he ever heard of Senator Bernie Sanders, self-declared socialist, or Mr. William Ayers, a communist?
Moreover, a 2009 letter by the Democratic Socialist (sic) of America outfit indicated that 70 members of Congress were DSA members. Do you suppose Mr. Clinton may have gotten wind of this?
The answer to each of these questions is almost certainly: of course he has. So why does Mr. Clinton, in a major fundraising speech on behalf of Mr. Obama in New York, even mention Communism (and therefore, implicitly, socialism), in a way that obliquely impugns Mr. Obama ?
Why would someone of Mr. Clinton's stature, intelligence, and political expertise subtly, psychologically, and politically link Mr. Obama with communism/socialism, and, what's more, do so (1) just after Mr. Obama's "Medal of Freedom" link to socialism was all over the news and (2) when the link comes out of nowhere in terms of the flow of Mr. Clinton's speech preceding it, so that it is even more difficult to discern an affirmative reason, helpful to Mr. Obama, in support of the link?
Was the idea that Mr. Obama is a socialist/communist far enough from Mr. Clinton's mind that Mr. Clinton was simply attempting to assuage the concerns of the marginal independent voter as to the prospect that Mr. Obama may be a socialist/communist? This seems very doubtful. Independents who are concerned with the notion that Mr. Obama may be a socialist/communist are unlikely to have had their worries muted by a statement from the likes of Mr. Clinton, and many of the remaining independents are either leaning towards or committed to Mr. Obama whether he is a socialist/communist or not. With respect to those independents left over, seemingly throwaway ideological lines at a New York fundraiser are unlikely to make much difference.
However, the "throwaway lines" might not be throwaway at all if the lines telegraphed something to persons other than middling independents. The question then partly becomes: whom might Mr. Clinton have been telegraphing?
Perhaps the answer to the part-question has to do with Mr. Clinton's now very widely discussed criticism of the Obama campaign's opening, major salvo against Mr. Romney and Bain Capital. Rather than buttress Mr. Obama's characterization of Mr. Romney as a vampire capitalist (curiously, Marx had a fondness for vampiric imagery, and so does popular culture in contemporary America, although vampires seem to be morphing into zombies before our very eyes, which might well say something about the unconsciously cannibalistic nature of socialism), Mr. Clinton does the opposite and suggests that Mr. Romney's business performance has been "sterling."
Similarly, might Mr. Clinton's throwaway ideological lines been only superficially throwaway? That is, might Mr. Clinton have been, as the saying goes, "protesting too much" with his ideological lines, so that the lines, as telegraphed to certain persons and institutions, are properly read as Van Jones-related lines, and therefore as having suggested the very opposite of what they appeared to be saying?
That interpretation would certainly dovetail perfectly with the Van Jones timing coincidence and with Mr. Clinton's demolition job of Mr. Obama's opening act against Mr. Romney and Bain, would it not? And all while giving Mr. Clinton plausible deniability on the issue and thereby helping preserve Mr. Clinton's political capital with Mr. Obama's supporters.
So, on this analysis, what persons and institutions did Mr. Clinton telegraphically target when, in New York, he alluded, for no apparent reason, to socialism and communism and a "decade" ago in a speech supposedly praising Mr. Obama? He may be saying that Mr. Obama is not simply a menace to capitalist finance in terms of his economic policies, but rather, and much more gravely, Mr. Obama is an ideological menace to capitalist finance.
So, what would Mr. Clinton's motives be for proceeding in this way? Clearly, he cannot brazenly declare Mr. Obama a socialist/communist without decimating his own political capital. More affirmatively, do you suppose that Mr. Clinton has his legacy in mind? Should Mr. Obama win a second term at this momentous period in history, might there not be an excellent chance that Mr. Clinton's two terms will be relegated to, shall we say, "second-class" status?
Furthermore, here is a very interesting datum: Democrats have not held the presidency for more than two terms in a row since FDR. If Mr. Obama wins, he will almost certainly complete his two terms. Thus, there is fairly persuasive historical reason for believing that, should Mr. Obama win in 2012, a Democrat is unlikely to win in 2016, which would all but scuttle Mrs. Hillary Clinton's chances of occupying the Oval Office. Moreover, Mr. Clinton may well think that given Mr. Obama's politics, the likelihood of Democrats holding the presidency for three or more consecutive terms may be low even aside from what history tells us.
There are thus good reasons to believe that Mr. Clinton does not welcome the prospect of a second term for Mr. Obama. Either way, though, if Mr. Clinton is willing to go so far as to render a vicious ideological criticism of an incumbent Democratic president -- one that meticulously yet cautiously associates that president with the black hole of communism/socialism and fits the chin forever jutting toward the clouds -- we can be very confident that people in very powerful places are paying attention.
There is one other possibility worth considering: that damaging information, perhaps a cascade of damaging information about Mr. Obama's past, a decade or more ago, is known by Mr. Clinton to be waiting in the wings. Just yesterday came news of newly available archives which prove that the Obama campaign lied during the 2008 campaign about Obama's membership in the radical socialist New Party, uncovered by the National Review's Stanley Kurtz. Democratic Party elders are reluctantly concluding that they may be headed for a disaster in November of Wisconsonian proportions. Could this be a warning shot across Obama's bow, pressure on him to pull an LBJ and bow out?
Reasonable people will agree that Mr. Obama came out of nowhere and ascended to power. Mrs. Clinton was swept aside by a perfect storm whose elements included Bush fatigue and the release, by MSM forces, of a hitherto mostly latent cultural psychosis.
Once Mr. Obama thusly achieved power, he exercised it impetuously and impudently, thereby jeopardizing the future of his party. Very powerful Clintonian forces are crystallizing once more, and Mr. Obama is going to pay the price.
Therefore, even absent any other reason, it is reasonable to believe that Mr. Obama is ideologically dangerous for the same basic reason why he will lose in 2012, which is that Mr. Clinton is telegraphing that Mr. Obama is dangerous, and that he (Mr. Clinton) is therefore willing to negotiate with Republicans.
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4)Iran thwarts Syrian “contact group” plan over US conditions for nuclear talks
More atrocities at Mazraat al-Qubeir, Hama
Discussion of the plan was therefore abandoned in the hall and confined to UN corridors. By forcing the pace at the special general assembly crisis session, Tehran once again demonstrated its refusal to play ball with the international community until its major power status in the Middle East is recognized. Iranian sources have insisted in recent days that the six power talks with Iran were not just about its nuclear program but affected a wider spectrum, because the nuclear issue could be settled at the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna. Tehran has made it clear that the continuation of nuclear diplomacy is contingent on the general recognition of Iran’s major power status. The situation in Syria meanwhile continues to deteriorate disastrously amid conflicting claims about another massacre at the Hama village of Mazraat al-Qubeir: Opposition activists have disseminated video footage illustrating the slaughter of up to 70 people, including women and children, by Assad’s security forces and militiamen less than two weeks after the Houla massacre. This is denied by official sources in Damascus who say no more than nine people died at the hands of “terrorists.” No independent testimony was available on the episode from the UN monitors, who set out for the Hama village. The UN Secretary said they turned back after they were fired on by small arms and would set out again Friday. Kofi Annan warned that if nothing changes in Syria, the future holds all-out civil war. His words attested to the helplessness of the world body to put a stop of the bloodshed in Syria, combined with the Obama administration’s refusal to intervene in the crisis in the expectation that Russia and Iran would step up. That expectation has faded. Israel remains dormant despite the serious consequences to its strategic and security situation threatened by the new proposal the UN-Arab League envoy for Syria Kofi Annan is to present to the UN Thursday, June 7, for saving his peace plan. The nub of his proposal is the creation of a “contact group” for handling the hot Syrian potato. It is to be composed of the five permanent Security Council members (US, UK, France, Russia and China) plus Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The proposal has won the blessing of the Obama administration, meaning its consent to letting the two powers that will dominate the contact group, Russia and Iran, determine the course and outcome of the Syrian crisis. Washington believes that only they have the clout in the Syrian army for bringing about Bashar Assad’s removal and his replacement in Damascus by a provisional military regime. Washington also hopes, according to our sources, that this gesture will give Moscow a strong incentive to lean hard on Tehran for concessions at the next round of its talk with the six world powers on June 13. Neither Iran nor Moscow have promised the US anything of the sort, but the administration hopes Iran will start being forthcoming on its nuclear program after being permitted to assume a central role in Damascus. There is less optimism outside administration circles and in Israel. They expect from Tehran nothing more at the next round of talks than token nuclear concessions, and none at all toward curtailing its work on a nuclear weapon. However the Obama administration appears to have opted for this course, even though it is the first time since the outbreak of the Arab Revolt in December 2010 that the United States is willing to let go of a major Middle East crisis and allow its foremost Middle East rivals, Moscow and Tehran, to take charge. President Barack Obama had proposed to President Vladimir Putin the creation of a large force of 5,000 international monitors for Syria, most of them Russians, to safeguard Assad’s stock of biological and chemical weapons against falling into the hands of al Qaeda or Syrian rebels. This team consisting of thousands of Russian troops would be the operational arm of the future “contact group.” As far as Israel is concerned, the plan has disastrous connotations. Instead of containing the spread of hostile Iranian influence in the region, as Obama promised Israel, he is opening for the door for Iran to extend its influence squarely in the countries neighboring on – and still at war with – Israel, while at the same time moving back from a focused effort to draw the sting of Iran’s nuclear bomb program. Israel’s political and security tacticians never took into account that a consequence of the Syrian revolt would be the establishment of full-blown Iranian sway over Damascus in partnership with Russia. Indeed, for 15 months, they insisted that the Syrian uprising was proof of America’s success in breaking up the dangerous Tehran-Damascus-Hizballah axis. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
5)Defeating the Alinskyites --- ours
By Caroline B. Glick
9)
So they made the fight about the “right” to collective bargaining, which the reforms severely restricted. In a state as historically progressive as Wisconsin — in 1959, it was the first to legalize the government-worker union — they thought they could win as a matter of ideological fealty.
But as the recall campaign progressed, the Democrats stopped talking about bargaining rights. It was a losing issue. Walker was able to make the case that years of corrupt union-politician back-scratching had been bankrupting the state. And he had just enough time to demonstrate the beneficial effects of overturning that arrangement: a huge budget deficit closed without raising taxes, significant school-district savings from ending cozy insider health-insurance contracts, and a modest growth in jobs.
The real threat behind all this, however, was that the new law ended automatic government collection of union dues. That was the unexpressed and politically inexpressible issue. That was the reason the unions finally decided to gamble on a high-risk recall.
Without the thumb of the state tilting the scale by coerced collection, union membership became truly voluntary. Result? Newly freed members rushed for the exits. In less than one year, AFSCME, the second-largest public-sector union in Wisconsin, has lost more than 50 percent of its membership.
It was predictable. In Indiana, where Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) instituted by executive order a similar reform seven years ago, government-worker unions have since lost 91 percent of their dues-paying membership. In Wisconsin, Democratic and union bosses (a redundancy) understood what was at stake if Walker prevailed: not benefits, not “rights,” but the very existence of the unions.
So they fought and they lost. Repeatedly. Tuesday was their third and last shot at reversing Walker’s reforms. In April 2011, they ran a candidate for chief justice of the state Supreme Court who was widely expected to strike down the law. She lost.
In July and August 2011, they ran recall elections of state senators, needing three to reclaim Democratic — i.e., union — control. They failed. (The likely flipping of one Senate seat to the Democrats on June 5 is insignificant. The Senate is not in session and won’t be until after yet another round of elections in November.)
And then, Tuesday, their Waterloo. Walker defeated their gubernatorial candidate by a wider margin than he had — pre-reform — two years ago.
The unions’ defeat marks a historical inflection point. They set out to make an example of Walker. He succeeded in making an example of them as a classic case of reactionary liberalism. An institution founded to protect its members grew in size, wealth, power and arrogance, thanks to decades of symbiotic deals with bought politicians, to the point where it grossly overreached. A half-century later these unions were exercising essential control of everything from wages to work rules in the running of government — something that, in a system of republican governance, is properly the sovereign province of the citizenry.
Why did the unions lose? Because Norma Rae nostalgia is not enough, and it hardly applied to government workers living better than the average taxpayer who supports them.
And because of the rise of a new constitutional conservatism — committed to limited government and a more robust civil society — of the kind that swept away Democrats in the 2010 midterm shellacking.
Most important, however, because in the end reality prevails. As economist Herb Stein once put it: Something that can’t go on, won’t. These public-sector unions, acting, as FDR had feared, with an inherent conflict of interest regarding their own duties, were devouring the institution they were supposed to serve, rendering state government as economically unsustainable as the collapsing entitlement states of southern Europe.
It couldn’t go on. Now it won’t. All that was missing was a political leader willing to risk his career to make it stop. Because, time being infinite, even the inevitable doesn’t happen on its own.
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6)-What's Changed After Wisconsin
The Obama administration suddenly looks like a house of cards.
By Peggy Noonan
What happened in Wisconsin signals a shift in political mood and assumption. Public employee unions were beaten back and defeated in a state with a long progressive tradition. The unions and their allies put everything they had into "one of their most aggressive grass-roots campaigns ever," as the Washington Post's Peter Whoriskey and Dan Balz reported in a day-after piece. Fifty thousand volunteers made phone calls and knocked on 1.4 million doors to get out the vote against Gov. Scott Walker. Mr. Walker's supporters, less deeply organized on the ground, had a considerable advantage in money.
But organization and money aren't the headline. The shift in mood and assumption is. The vote was a blow to the power and prestige not only of the unions but of the blue-state budgetary model, which for two generations has been: Public-employee unions with their manpower, money and clout, get what they want. If you move against them, you will be crushed.
Mr. Walker was not crushed. He was buoyed, winning by a solid seven points in a high-turnout race.
Governors and local leaders will now have help in controlling budgets. Down the road there will be fewer contracts in which you work for, say, 23 years for a city, then retire with full salary and free health care for the rest of your life—paid for by taxpayers who cannot afford such plans for themselves, and who sometimes have no pension at all. The big meaning of Wisconsin is that a public injustice is in the process of being righted because a public mood is changing.
Political professionals now lay down lines even before a story happens. They used to wait to do the honest, desperate, last-minute spin of yesteryear. Now it's strategized in advance, which makes things tidier but less raggedly fun. The line laid down by the Democrats weeks before the vote was that it's all about money: The Walker forces outspent the unions so they won, end of story.
Money is important, as all but children know. But the line wasn't very flattering to Wisconsin's voters, implying that they were automatons drooling in front of the TV waiting to be told who to back. It was also demonstrably incorrect. Most voters, according to surveys, had made up their minds well before the heavy spending of the closing weeks.
Mr. Walker didn't win because of his charm—he's not charming. It wasn't because he is compelling on the campaign trail—he's not, especially. Even his victory speech on that epic night was, except for its opening sentence—"First of all, I want to thank God for his abundant grace," which, amazingly enough, seemed to be wholly sincere—meandering, unable to name and put forward what had really happened.
But on the big question—getting control of the budget by taking actions resisted by public unions—he was essentially right, and he won.
By the way, the single most interesting number in the whole race was 28,785. That is how many dues-paying members of the American Federation of State, County and Municiple Employees were left in Wisconsin after Mr. Walker allowed them to choose whether union dues would be taken from their paychecks each week. Before that, Afscme had 62,218 dues-paying members in Wisconsin. There is a degree to which public union involvement is, simply, coerced.
People wonder about the implications for the presidential election. They'll wonder for five months, and then they'll know.
President Obama's problem now isn't what Wisconsin did, it's how he looks each day—careening around, always in flight, a superfluous figure. No one even looks to him for leadership now. He doesn't go to Wisconsin, where the fight is. He goes to Sarah Jessica Parker's place, where the money is.
It became apparent some weeks ago when the president talked on the stump—where else?—about an essay by a fellow who said spending growth is actually lower than that of previous presidents. This was startling to a lot of people, who looked into it and found the man had left out most spending from 2009, the first year of Mr. Obama's presidency. People sneered: The president was deliberately using a misleading argument to paint a false picture! But you know, why would he go out there waving an article that could immediately be debunked? Maybe because he thought it was true. That's more alarming, isn't it, the idea that he knows so little about the effects of his own economic program that he thinks he really is a low spender.There is, now, a house-of-cards feel about this administration.
For more than a month, his people have been laying down the line that America was just about to enter full economic recovery when the European meltdown stopped it. (I guess the slowdown in China didn't poll well.) You'll be hearing more of this—we almost had it, and then Spain, or Italy, messed everything up. What's bothersome is not that it's just a line, but that the White House sees its central economic contribution now as the making up of lines.
Any president will, in a presidential election year, be political. But there is a startling sense with Mr. Obama that that's all he is now, that he and his people are all politics, all the time, undeviatingly, on every issue. He isn't even trying to lead, he's just trying to win.
Most ominously, there are the national-security leaks that are becoming a national scandal—the "avalanche of leaks," according to Sen. Dianne Feinstein, that are somehow and for some reason coming out of the administration. A terrorist "kill list," reports of U.S. spies infiltrating Al Qaeda in Yemen, stories about Osama bin Laden's DNA and how America got it, and U.S. involvement in the Stuxnet computer virus, used against Iranian nuclear facilities. These leaks, say the California Democrat, put "American lives in jeopardy," put "our nation's security in jeopardy."
This isn't the usual—this is something different. A special counsel may be appointed.
And where is the president in all this? On his way to Anna Wintour's house. He's busy. He's running for president.
But why? He could be president now if he wanted to be.
It just all increasingly looks like a house of cards. Bill Clinton—that ol' hound dog, that gifted pol who truly loves politics, who always loved figuring out exactly where the people were and then going to exactly that spot and claiming it—Bill Clinton is showing all the signs of someone who is, let us say, essentially unimpressed by the incumbent. He defended Mitt Romney as a businessman—"a sterling record"—said he doesn't like personal attacks in politics, then fulsomely supported the president, and then said that the Bush tax cuts should be extended.
His friends say he can't help himself, that he's getting old and a little more compulsively loquacious. Maybe. But maybe Bubba's looking at the president and seeing what far more than half of Washington sees: a man who is limited, who thinks himself clever, and who doesn't know that clever right now won't cut it.
Because Bill Clinton loves politics, he hates losers. Maybe he just can't resist sticking it to them a little, when he gets a chance.
6a)What Wisconsin means
Tuesday, June 5, 2012, will be remembered as the beginning of the long decline of the public-sector union. It will follow, and parallel, the shrinking of private-sector unions, now down to less than 7 percent of American workers. The abject failure of the unions to recall Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) — the first such failure in U.S. history — marks the Icarus moment of government-union power. Wax wings melted, there’s nowhere to go but down.
The ultimate significance of Walker’s union reforms has been largely misunderstood. At first, the issue was curtailing outrageous union benefits, far beyond those of the ordinary Wisconsin taxpayer. That became a nonissue when the unions quickly realized that trying to defend the indefensible would render them toxic for the real fight to come.
So they made the fight about the “right” to collective bargaining, which the reforms severely restricted. In a state as historically progressive as Wisconsin — in 1959, it was the first to legalize the government-worker union — they thought they could win as a matter of ideological fealty.
But as the recall campaign progressed, the Democrats stopped talking about bargaining rights. It was a losing issue. Walker was able to make the case that years of corrupt union-politician back-scratching had been bankrupting the state. And he had just enough time to demonstrate the beneficial effects of overturning that arrangement: a huge budget deficit closed without raising taxes, significant school-district savings from ending cozy insider health-insurance contracts, and a modest growth in jobs.
The real threat behind all this, however, was that the new law ended automatic government collection of union dues. That was the unexpressed and politically inexpressible issue. That was the reason the unions finally decided to gamble on a high-risk recall
Without the thumb of the state tilting the scale by coerced collection, union membership became truly voluntary. Result? Newly freed members rushed for the exits. In less than one year, AFSCME, the second-largest public-sector union in Wisconsin, has lost more than 50 percent of its membership.
It was predictable. In Indiana, where Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) instituted by executive order a similar reform seven years ago, government-worker unions have since lost 91 percent of their dues-paying membership. In Wisconsin, Democratic and union bosses (a redundancy) understood what was at stake if Walker prevailed: not benefits, not “rights,” but the very existence of the unions.
So they fought and they lost. Repeatedly. Tuesday was their third and last shot at reversing Walker’s reforms. In April 2011, they ran a candidate for chief justice of the state Supreme Court who was widely expected to strike down the law. She lost.
In July and August 2011, they ran recall elections of state senators, needing three to reclaim Democratic — i.e., union — control. They failed. (The likely flipping of one Senate seat to the Democrats on June 5 is insignificant. The Senate is not in session and won’t be until after yet another round of elections in November.)
And then, Tuesday, their Waterloo. Walker defeated their gubernatorial candidate by a wider margin than he had — pre-reform — two years ago.
The unions’ defeat marks a historical inflection point. They set out to make an example of Walker. He succeeded in making an example of them as a classic case of reactionary liberalism. An institution founded to protect its members grew in size, wealth, power and arrogance, thanks to decades of symbiotic deals with bought politicians, to the point where it grossly overreached. A half-century later these unions were exercising essential control of everything from wages to work rules in the running of government — something that, in a system of republican governance, is properly the sovereign province of the citizenry.
Why did the unions lose? Because Norma Rae nostalgia is not enough, and it hardly applied to government workers living better than the average taxpayer who supports them.
And because of the rise of a new constitutional conservatism — committed to limited government and a more robust civil society — of the kind that swept away Democrats in the 2010 midterm shellacking.
Most important, however, because in the end reality prevails. As economist Herb Stein once put it: Something that can’t go on, won’t. These public-sector unions, acting, as FDR had feared, with an inherent conflict of interest regarding their own duties, were devouring the institution they were supposed to serve, rendering state government as economically unsustainable as the collapsing entitlement states of southern Europe.
It couldn’t go on. Now it won’t. All that was missing was a political leader willing to risk his career to make it stop. Because, time being infinite, even the inevitable doesn’t happen on its own.
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7)-The silent issue that could doom President Obama in 2012 election
Unlike 2008, race works against President this time in a big wayNEW YORK DAILY NEWS MANDEL NGAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
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