There are those who write Obama is experiencing a second term let down but this is not the case. His arrogance, his belief the Constitution is simply a document he can ignore at will reveals the true Obama, the first term Obama that everyone in the press and media purposely disregarded.
There are also those who now believe Obama will suffer from the various transgressions of selectively attempting to destroy the freedom of those Obama opposes, placing winning an election to a second term above his responsibility of saving lives of Americans and trampling on First Amendment Rights when it comes to, again, selected members of the press and media doing their job, acting responsibly who distrust highly placed members of his administration who have a proven record of lying.
I do not agree. I believe Obama has begun a series of initiatives which will take attention away from his own lies and mis-deeds and the press and media attention's focus will fade. Yes, his party could lose some votes in the mid 2014 election and some Democrats may lose their seats but Obama will be allowed to slither away. The public is more concerned about the economy and have little understanding that this president is hell bent on attacking their/our freedoms of choice and disengaging from our allies as he slinks away from foreign policy commitments.
When government fails it sets about correcting its failures and simply grows larger and less competent in the process.
If you believe this corrupt Attorney General is capable of investigating himself you are a fool and if you believe Obama intends to fire him you are a bigger fool. Obama knows he can stonewall and outlast because those who voted for him are incapable of and/or unwilling to see him for what he is - a silver tongue scoundrel and the liberal media and press have a vested interest in protecting the messiah they helped elect.
I find it tragic that voters believe the attacks on Obama are because he is black, because he is a liberal, because he is a Democrat and because those in opposition are wild eyed Tea Party cranks instead of patriots. Obama's protectors are incapable of connecting the dots, the many lies that all point in one direction - The White House's Oval Office.
The mounting attacks on our Constitution , the oozing sleaze and stench coming from the State Department, The IRS, The Justice Department is without precedence.
Americans will eventually pay a heavy price but they currently are too busy drowning in their own ignorance and disinterest to care and/or understand.
Will Obama be allowed to lie his way out of Benghazi, The IRS and AP accusations and if so will he then be allowed to escape being accused of incompetence as a manager of the government he presides over? I believe he will.(See 1, 1a, 1b,1c and 1d below.)
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So you think Kerry understands The Middle East? (See 2 and 2a below.)
Worse yet, do you think Obama understands the mess he created?(See 2b and 2c below.)
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Who is Tom Sowell and why do I believe he ranks at the top? (See 3 and 3a below.)
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When Obama is no more and America begins seriously developing its energy sources this may well pose some serious problems for the Saudis, the entire Middle East and even Russia. (See 4 below.)
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Glick thanks Assad! (See 5 below.)
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Why God Made a Democrat
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1)Conservatives Became Targets in 2008
The Obama campaign played a big role in a liberal onslaught that far pre-dated Citizens United.
The White House insists President Obama is "outraged" by the "inappropriate" targeting and harassment of conservative groups. If true, it's a remarkable turnaround for a man who helped pioneer those tactics.
On Aug. 21, 2008, the conservative American Issues Project ran an ad highlighting ties between candidate Obama and Bill Ayers, formerly of the Weather Underground. The Obama campaign and supporters were furious, and they pressured TV stations to pull the ad—a common-enough tactic in such ad spats.
What came next was not common. Bob Bauer, general counsel for the campaign (and later general counsel for the White House), on the same day wrote to the criminal division of the Justice Department, demanding an investigation into AIP, "its officers and directors," and its "anonymous donors." Mr. Bauer claimed that the nonprofit, as a 501(c)(4), was committing a "knowing and willful violation" of election law, and wanted "action to enforce against criminal violations."
AIP gave Justice a full explanation as to why it was not in violation. It said that it operated exactly as liberal groups like Naral Pro-Choice did. It noted that it had disclosed its donor, Texas businessman Harold Simmons. Mr. Bauer's response was a second letter to Justice calling for the prosecution of Mr. Simmons. He sent a third letter on Sept. 8, again smearing the "sham" AIP's "illegal electoral purpose."
Also on Sept. 8, Mr. Bauer complained to the Federal Election Commission about AIP and Mr. Simmons. He demanded that AIP turn over certain tax documents to his campaign (his right under IRS law), then sent a letter to AIP further hounding it for confidential information (to which he had no legal right).
The Bauer onslaught was a big part of a new liberal strategy to thwart the rise of conservative groups. In early August 2008, the New York Times trumpeted the creation of a left-wing group (a 501(c)4) called Accountable America. Founded by Obama supporter and liberal activist Tom Mattzie, the group—as the story explained—would start by sending "warning" letters to 10,000 GOP donors, "hoping to create a chilling effect that will dry up contributions." The letters would alert "right-wing groups to a variety of potential dangers, including legal trouble, public exposure and watchdog groups digging through their lives." As Mr. Mattzie told Mother Jones: "We're going to put them at risk."
The Bauer letters were the Obama campaign's high-profile contribution to this effort—though earlier, in the spring of 2008, Mr. Bauer filed a complaint with the FEC against the American Leadership Project, a group backing Hillary Clinton in the primary. "There's going to be a reckoning here," he had warned publicly. "It's going to be rough—it's going to be rough on the officers, it's going to be rough on the employees, it's going to be rough on the donors. . . Whether it's at the FEC or in a broader criminal inquiry, those donors will be asked questions." The campaign similarly attacked a group supporting John Edwards.
American Leadership head (and Democrat) Jason Kinney would rail that Mr. Bauer had gone from "credible legal authority" to "political hatchet man"—but the damage was done. As Politico reported in August 2008, Mr. Bauer's words had "the effect of scaring [Clinton and Edwards] donors and consultants," even if they hadn't yet "result[ed] in any prosecution."
As general counsel to the Obama re-election campaign, Mr. Bauer used the same tactics on pro-Romney groups. The Obama campaign targeted private citizens who had donated to Romney groups. Democratic senators demanded that the IRS investigate these organizations.
None of this proves that Mr. Obama was involved in the IRS targeting of conservative nonprofits. But it does help explain how we got an environment in which the IRS thought this was acceptable.
The rise of conservative organizations (to match liberal groups that had long played in politics), and their effectiveness in the 2004 election (derided broadly by liberals as "swift boating"), led to a new and organized campaign in 2008 to chill conservative donors and groups via the threat of government investigation and prosecution. The tone in any organization—a charity, a corporation, the U.S. government—is set at the top.
This history also casts light on White House claims that it was clueless about the IRS's targeting. As Huffington Post's Howard Fineman wrote this week: "With two winning presidential campaigns built on successful grassroots fundraising, with a former White House counsel (in 2010-11) who is one of the Democrats' leading experts on campaign law (Bob Bauer), with former top campaign officials having been ensconced as staffers in the White House . . . it's hard to imagine that the Obama inner circle was oblivious to the issue of what the IRS was doing in Cincinnati." More like inconceivable.
And this history exposes the left's hollow claim that the IRS mess rests on Citizens United. The left was targeting conservative groups and donors well before the Supreme Court's 2010 ruling on independent political expenditures by corporations.
If the country wants to get to the bottom of the IRS scandal, it must first remember the context for this abuse. That context leads to this White House.
1a)
1d)
MYRON Greenberg, a wealthy L.A. businessman received a
letter of audit from the IRS. It really upsets him and
he called his Accountant, SAUL Meyers.
MYRON: (pleading): “Saul, what are they doing to me?
Why are they doing this to me?”’
Saul calming); “Myron, don’t worry about it. I’ve got
all the receipts, the account is up to date, it’s no
problem. But let me
give you a bit of advice. When you go to the Audit, make a
bad impression. Wear the crummiest, dirtiest clothes
you’ve got. Have holes in your shoes, ripped pants and
look shabby , I mean really look terrible, because if the
have a little sympathy, they’ll go easy on you.
Then Myron called his Lawyer, CHARLIE Steinberg. His Lawyer said:
CHARLIE: “Andy it’s no problem, I’m sure they got the receipts,
I’m sure everything is up to date, you’ve got a great
accountant, don’t worry about it.
Let me give you a tip. When you go to the Audit, it’s very
important that you make a good impression. Wear your best
suit, and your shirt with a silk tie and cuff links and
shine your shoes, look like somebody. Because if you look like a somebody
they respect you and will go easy on you.”
And now he’s torn. And that night he bumped into his RABBI
at the Deli. And he told the Rabbi the story.
Rabbi --“Myron, it reminds me of sometimes when I perform
a wedding. The bride’s father will tell his daughter that
on her wedding night to wear a nightgown with a high collar and long
sleeves and a full-length robe...cover up, you know, be a
little demure. And the mother says, ‘Don’t be silly.
Wear a low cut “negligee” with the cleavage sticking out
--- look a little sexy’…
And Myron I will say to you just like I say to the Bride on
her wedding night, it makes no difference what you wear
you’re gonna get f-----”….
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2)What Mideast Crisis? Israelis Have Moved On
FOR years, conventional wisdom has held that as long as Israel faces the external challenge of Arab — especially Palestinian — hostility it will never come to terms with its internal divisions. The left has sometimes used it as an argument: we must make peace with the Palestinians so that we can set our house in order — write a constitution, figure out the public role of religion. Others have viewed the threat as almost a silver lining keeping the place together: differences among Israeli Jews (religious or secular, Ashkenazic or Sephardic) are so profound, the argument goes, that if the society ever manages to turn its attention inward, it might tear itself apart.
Back in Tel Aviv for a recent visit a year after ending my tour as Jerusalem bureau chief, I was struck by how antiquated that wisdom felt. At a fascinating and raucous wedding I attended and from numerous conversations with a range of Israelis, I came away with a very different impression. Few even talk about the Palestinians or the Arab world on their borders, despite the tumult and the renewed peace efforts by Secretary of State John Kerry, who has been visiting the region in recent days. Instead of focusing on what has long been seen as their central challenge — how to share this land with another nation — Israelis are largely ignoring it, insisting that the problem is both insoluble for now and less significant than the world thinks. We cannot fix it, many say, but we can manage it.
The wedding took place near Ben-Gurion airport, where a set of event halls has gone up in the past seven years, including elaborate structures with a distinct Oriental décor of glistening chandeliers, mirrored place mats and sky-high ceilings with shifting digital displays. The groom’s grandparents emigrated from Yemen; the bride’s came from Eastern Europe, an example of continuing and increasing intermarriage between Sephardim and Ashkenazim.
The music was almost entirely Middle Eastern in beat, some of it in Arabic, some of it religious. The hundreds on the dance floor, many staying until dawn singing along with arms gesticulating, came from across a range of political, geographic and religious spectra — from miniskirted to ultra-Orthodox modesty. Frumpy settlers in oversize skullcaps mingled with Tel Aviv metrosexuals in severe eyewear. Some women hugged you; others declined to shake your hand. Everyone was celebrating. No one, especially the Orthodox rabbi who presided over the ceremony, mentioned that the young couple had been living together for more than three years. Some talked politics with me. No one mentioned the Palestinians.
ISRAEL today offers a set of paradoxes: Jewish Israelis seem in some ways happier and more united than in the past, as if choosing not to solve their most difficult challenge has opened up a space for shalom bayit — peace at home. Yes, all those internal tensions still exist, but the shared belief that there is no solution to their biggest problem has forged an odd kind of solidarity.
Indeed, Israel has never been richer, safer, more culturally productive or more dynamic. Terrorism is on the wane. Yet the occupation grinds on next door with little attention to its consequences. Moreover, as the power balance has shifted from the European elite, Israel has never felt more Middle Eastern in its popular culture, music and public displays of religion. Yet it is increasingly cut off from its region, which despises it perhaps more than ever. Finally, while the secular bourgeoisie, represented by Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid Party, has forged an unexpected alliance with West Bank settlers, represented by Naftali Bennett’s Habayit Hayehudi Party, aimed at reducing the political power of the ultra-Orthodox, alarm over the failure to address the Palestinian problem has grown in a surprising place — among some of the former princes of the Zionist right wing.
At a Jerusalem cafe one noon, Dan Meridor, the former Likud minister and son of right-wing Zionist aristocracy, could not stop talking about the Palestinians.
“It is a sword of Damocles hanging over our heads,” he said. “We are living on illusions. We must do everything we can on the ground to increase the separation between us and the Palestinians so that the idea of one state will go away. But we are doing nothing.”
Mr. Meridor, nursing an American coffee at the cafe near the house his parents bought many decades ago in the upscale Rehavia neighborhood, sounded like two other public figures from famous right-wing families — Ehud Olmert, the former prime minister, and Tzipi Livni, the justice minister and chief peace negotiator. Both have made a series of emotional speeches begging Israelis to take the Palestinian issue seriously. They are getting little traction.
The Israeli left is still there, of course, but in increasingly insignificant knots. Two Israeli friends in Jaffa, from which tens of thousands of Palestinians left or were driven out in 1948, have beautifully renovated a house, even preserving a pre-state lemon tree in the courtyard. They are friendly with the Arabs who live nearby. Their children refused military service in protest over the West Bank occupation. And on the outside of their house they have put up a plaque noting that until 1948 the structure was the home of the Khader family, a tiny homage to a destroyed world.
But the family is rare. Mr. Lapid, the rising star of Israeli politics, is a former television host who agrees that something must be done about the Palestinians. But in an interview he offers no specifics other than hoping Mr. Kerry will pressure them to return to the negotiating table under conditions they have long rejected. Mr. Lapid, who spoke in the outdoor section of his neighborhood cafe in north Tel Aviv on a fragrant spring afternoon, was relaxed and buff in his long-sleeved black T-shirt and black jeans. Well-off Tel Avivians at nearby tables argued into their iPhones. Mr. Lapid said Israel should not change its settlement policy to lure the Palestinians to negotiations, nor should any part of Jerusalem become the capital of the Palestinian state he says he longs for. He has not reached out to any Palestinian politicians nor spoken publicly on the issue. As finance minister, he is focused on closing the government’s deficit.
Mr. Lapid may be a political novice but he knows the public mood. A former senior aide to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed, over a Jerusalem lunch of toasted bagels and salad, that most Israelis considered the peace process irrelevant because they believed that the Palestinians had no interest in a deal, especially in the current Middle Eastern context of rising Islamism. “Debating the peace process to most Israelis is the equivalent of debating the color of the shirt you will wear when landing on Mars,” he said.
An afternoon in Ramallah revealed no stronger sense of urgency among Palestinians. But, unlike Israeli Jews, they are increasingly depressed and despondent over their quandary and dysfunctional leadership. Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, who showed real competence in his job but is resigning, says Palestinian leaders must acknowledge their failure to deliver on their promises and call new elections. That is not happening. He tells friends that if he believed Mr. Kerry’s efforts had any chance of yielding results, he would not be quitting.
All of which suggests that, as has long been argued, there can be no Israeli-Palestinian peace deal so long as outsiders want it more than the parties themselves. Some have likened Israel to the deck of the Titanic. That may not be right, but you can’t help wondering about that next iceberg.
Ethan Bronner is the national legal affairs correspondent for The New York Times.
2a) Kerry: Israel, Palestinians must take hard decisions
US Secretary of State John Kerry urged Israeli and Palestinian leaders on Friday to take “hard decisions” to revive the Middle East peace process, which has stalled for almost three years.
“We're getting toward a time now when hard decisions need to be made,” he told a news conference in Tel Aviv at the end of his fourth visit to the region since he took office in February.
Kerry has been pressing Israel and the Palestinians to resume peace talks that broke down in September 2010. He said there was “one way” to make peace a reality, “and that is through direct negotiations.
“Ultimately it is the Israeli and Palestinian people who both decide the outcome… and who will get the greatest benefits” from a resumption of talks, he said.
“I know this region well enough to know there is scepticism, in some quarters there is cynicism, and there are reasons for it. There have been bitter years of disappointment,” he said.
But he insisted: “It is our hope that by being methodical, careful, patient, but detailed and tenacious, that we can lay on a path ahead that can conceivably surprise people and certainly exhaust the possibilities for peace.” And in a powerful message to Palestinians, who are used to just seeingAmerican motorcades sweep by into Abbas's high-walled headquarters compound, Kerry went for a stroll along a Ramallah street.
Despite public pronouncements of support, there is growing frustration that there has been little sign of a shift in the long-held positions of the two
sides.
sides.
Complicating efforts is the new Israeli government, which has moved more towards the right and includes some ministers who oppose a two-state solution.
Kerry also warned on Friday that there was a time limit on the possibility of peace, after Thursday comments from British Foreign Secretary William Hague — also on a visit to the region — that the prospects of a two-state solution “cannot be kept alive forever.”
“It is clear that in the long run the status quo is not sustainable,” Kerry said. The secretary of state also touched on the sensitive issue of Jewish settlement building in the Palestinian territories, one of the principal issues over which the 2010 talks stalled. “The US position on settlements is clear and has not changed… we believe they should stop,” he said.
2b)Obama's Head-in-the-Sand Speech on Terror
By Barry Rubin
President Barack Obama’s speech at the National Defense University, “The Future of Our Fight against Terrorism,” is a remarkable exercise in wishful thinking and denial.
Essentially, his theme: the only strategic threat to the United States is posed by terrorists carrying out terrorist attacks. In the 6400 words used by Obama, Islam only constituted three of them, and most interestingly, in all three instances the word was used to deny that the United States is at war with Islam. In fact, this is what President George Bush said precisely almost a dozen years ago, after September 11.
If one wanted to come up with a slogan for the Obama Administration it would be that to win the war on terrorism one must lose the war on revolutionary Islamism because only by showing that America is the Islamists’ friend will it take away the incentive to join al-Qaida and attack the United States.
So: why have not hundreds of such denials had the least bit of effect on the course of that war?
To prove that the United States is not at war with Islam, the Obama administration has sided with political Islam throughout the Middle East to the extent that some Muslims think Obama is doing damage to Islam — their kind of Islam.
Along the way, the fight against al-Qaeda resulted in a policy that has — however inadvertently — armed al-Qaeda in Libya and Syria.
Once again, I will try to explain the essence of Obama’s strategy, a simple point that many seem unable to grasp:
Obama views al-Qaeda as a threat because it wants to attack America directly with terrorism. But all other Islamist groups are not seen as a threat by Obama. In fact, Obama believes they can be used to stop al-Qaeda.
This is an abandonment of a strategic perspective. “Islamism” or “political Islam” or any other version of that does not appear even once. Yet this is the foremost revolutionary movement of this era, the main threat in the world to U.S. interests, and even to Western civilization.
Yet, according to Obama:
If the Muslim Brotherhood takes over Egypt, that is not a strategic threat but a positive advantage because it is the best organization able to curb al-Qaeda. And that policy proves that the United States is not at war with Islam.
If the Muslim Brotherhood takes over Tunisia, that is not a strategic threat but a positive advantage because it is the best organization able to curb al-Qaeda. And that policy proves that the United States is not at war with Islam.
If the Muslim Brotherhood takes over Syria, that is not a strategic threat but a positive advantage because it is the best organization able to curb al-Qaeda. And that policy proves that the United States is not at war with Islam.
If a regime whose viewpoint is basically equivalent to the Muslim Brotherhood — albeit far more subtle — dominates Turkey, that is not a strategic threat but a positive advantage because it is the best organization able to curb al-Qaeda. And that policy proves that the United States is not at war with Islam.
These and other strategic defeats do not matter, says Obama:
After I took office, we stepped up the war against al-Qaeda, but also sought to change its course. We relentlessly targeted al-Qaeda’s leadership. We ended the war in Iraq, and brought nearly 150,000 troops home. We pursued a new strategy in Afghanistan, and increased our training of Afghan forces. We unequivocally banned torture, affirmed our commitment to civilian courts, worked to align our policies with the rule of law, and expanded our consultations with Congress.
And yet: the Taliban is arguably close to taking over Afghanistan, and has spread to Pakistan. The rule of law in Afghanistan is a joke.
And soldiers there know that the Afghan government still uses torture.
Meanwhile, Obama:
Today, Osama bin Laden is dead, and so are most of his top lieutenants. There have been no large-scale attacks on the United States, and our homeland is more secure. Fewer of our troops are in harm’s way, and over the next 19 months they will continue to come home. Our alliances are strong, and so is our standing in the world. In sum, we are safer because of our efforts.
Well, it is quite true that security measures within the United States have been largely successful at stopping attacks. But the frequency of attempted attacks has been high. Some of them were foiled by luck, some by the expenditure of one trillion dollars.
Elsewhere, countries have been taken over by radical Islamists who can be expected to fight against American interests in the future.
Obama continues:
So America is at a crossroads. We must define the nature and scope of this struggle, or else it will define us.
But he never actually defines it, except to suggest that: a) al-Qaeda has spread to other countries (which does not sound like a victory); and b) its affiliates and imitators are more amateurish.
Indeed, rather than describing a movement and ideology like Communism and fascism, Obama sounds like a comic-book superhero describing life in Gotham City:
Neither I, nor any president, can promise the total defeat of terror. We will never erase the evil that lies in the hearts of some human beings, nor stamp out every danger to our open society.
Yet — his advisor on this issue, CIA director John Brennan, has said that the United States cannot be at war with terror because terror is merely a tactic. Which is it? Is the problem just “the evil that lies in the hearts of some human beings,” as if the Taliban, al-Qaeda, the Salafists, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Hamas are equivalent to the Newtown, Connecticut shooter?
Obama continues:
What we can do — what we must do — is dismantle networks that pose a direct danger, and make it less likely for new groups to gain a foothold, all while maintaining the freedoms and ideals that we defend.
In other words, it is not a strategic problem, but a law enforcement problem.
At another point, Obama added:
Deranged or alienated individuals … can do enormous damage, particularly when inspired by larger notions of violent jihad. That pull towards extremism appears to have led to the shooting at Fort Hood, and the bombing of the Boston Marathon.
“Appears”?
So Fort Hood and the Boston bombing are still not considered by the American president as part of a war against America, but perhaps due to that evil that lies in the hearts of men?
And what is the nature of that criminal conspiracy?
Today, the core of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan is on a path to defeat. Their remaining operatives spend more time thinking about their own safety than plotting against us. They did not direct the attacks in Benghazi or Boston. They have not carried out a successful attack on our homeland since 9/11. Instead, what we’ve seen is the emergence of various al-Qaeda affiliates. From Yemen to Iraq, from Somalia to North Africa, the threat today is more diffuse, with al-Qaeda’s affiliate in the Arabian Peninsula — AQAP — the most active in plotting against our homeland.
One would never know, however, that al-Qaeda was always basically decentralized. Al-Qaida in Arabic means “the base,” and what Osama bin Laden did was to create a focal point to start off a global jihad. Bin Laden is dead but he accomplished his short-term objective. Moreover, al-Qaeda’s partner, the Taliban, is doing very well.
Who cares whether they directed the attacks in Benghazi (apparently it wasn’t a video) and Boston? They inspired those attacks.
“Unrest in the Arab World has also allowed extremists to gain a foothold in countries like Libya and Syria,” says Obama, a man who clearly need not fear the mass media turning his phrase against him. After all, it wasn’t just unrest, but Obama’s policies that armed al-Qaeda in Libya and helped it participate in a successful revolution. And the same point is true in Syria. Indeed, if Bush was responsible for unintentionally magnifying the appeal of al-Qaeda in Iraq, Obama did the same thing in Syria — except Obama didn’t fight them, but instead helped supply the weapons!
At least he called Hizballah a “state-sponsored” terror network, though it might have been nice if he mentioned that the state in question is Iran, which also supported terrorists who killed Americans in Iraq. That is another point that Obama left out and yet could easily have mentioned.
And of course he mentioned Oklahoma City — which happened 20 years ago — in order to suggest that right-wing extremists are also involved in terrorism, and Fort Hood and Boston are due to some vague cause.
Here’s the kicker:
Moreover, we must recognize that these threats don’t arise in a vacuum. Most, though not all, of the terrorism we face is fueled by a common ideology — a belief by some extremists that Islam is in conflict with the United States and the West, and that violence against Western targets, including civilians, is justified in pursuit of a larger cause. Of course, this ideology is based on a lie, for the United States is not at war with Islam; and this ideology is rejected by the vast majority of Muslims, who are the most frequent victims of terrorist acts.
Yet clearly Obama has no notion — or will not admit to one — of what that “common ideology” might be, except for a misunderstanding about American intentions. Which, presumably, his outreach will correct.
In fact, in the sense that they speak of it, the United States is at war with Islam — the revolutionary sort of Islam, of course. To help any country resist radical political Islam is, in their eyes, opposition to proper Islam. Perhaps this is why the Obama administration seeks to help turn other countries toward Islamist regimes.
Of course, the United States is not at war with Muslims, but not only al-Qaeda but Hamas, Hizballah, the Muslim Brotherhood, the Salafists, the Taliban, and dozens of other groups, ideologues, and militants know that America is their enemy. No matter what Obama does, he will not persuade them and their millions of supporters that the United States is their ally. Even though Obama has often actually made America their ally.
It would be like helping Communism in the Cold War to take over countries in order to show that America is not at war with the Russian people; or to do the same with Nazism to show that America is not at war with the German people; or to help Gamal Abdel Nasser or Saddam Hussein to take over the Middle East to prove America is not at war with the Arab or Muslim people.
A more accurate picture is offered by a Saudi writer in al-Sharq al-Awsat:
The most acute [aspect of] the problem is that Obama is laying down the systematic groundwork for the development of extremism and sectarian violence that will make us miss the al-Qaeda of George W. Bush’s era, while deluding himself that he eliminated Al-Qaeda when he killed Osama bin Laden!
2c)Another Display of Israel's Strategic Value
By Evelyn Gordon
The ongoing debate about whether America should intervene in Syria highlights an important point about Israel’s unique value as a U.S. ally: It is the only American ally in the Middle East willing and able to serve American interests by projecting power independently, rather than waiting for American troops to ride to the rescue.
One of the most bizarre features of Syria’s ongoing civil war is the widespread assumption that outside intervention against the Assad regime will come from the U.S. or not at all. After all, the rebels’ main backers include two American allies with powerful militaries, Turkey and Saudi Arabia. Turkey has one of the region’s largest armies, significantly larger than Syria’s; moreover, as a NATO member, it’s equipped with state-of-the-art Western weaponry. Saudi Arabia has been a major purchaser of the best American weaponry for years, including fighter jets, missiles and airborne warning and control systems. Both have billed Assad’s departure as a major national interest. Yet never once have they suggested that their combined air forces could use Turkey’s bases to impose a no-fly zone over part of Syria; they take it for granted that if military intervention is to happen, America will have to do it. And so does Washington.
In contrast, Israel has always insisted on taking sole responsibility for its own defense, and is consequently both willing and able to take independent military action. And because its interests in the region often overlap with those of its American ally, such action often ends up serving American interests. That was true in the Cold War, when Israeli battles with the Soviet Union’s Arab proxies repeatedly proved the superiority of American over Soviet arms. It was true when Israel bombed Iraq’s nuclear reactor in 1981: Had it not thereby stopped Saddam Hussein from acquiring nukes, an American-led coalition wouldn’t have been able to oust his forces from Kuwait a decade later. And it was true when Israel bombed Syria’s nuclear reactor in 2007: Today, Americans are sleeping better because they don’t have to worry about al-Qaida-linked militias in Syria getting their hands on nuclear material.
Thanks to Israel, America never had to face a choice between taking military action against Syria or Iraq itself or letting a hostile dictator acquire nukes. But because its other Middle Eastern allies aren’t willing or able to act independently, it does face that kind of choice in Syria today: either take military action itself, or see its credibility in the region shredded by allowing Assad to survive despite President Barack Obama’s repeated statements that he must go–with the attendant risk that some of its regional allies will switch sides and align instead with Russia and Iran, who have proven their willingness to support their Syrian ally to the hilt.
This understanding of Israel’s unique value was precisely what led to yesterday’s astounding 99-0 Senate vote on a resolution pledging American support for Israel if it is compelled to take independent military action against Iran’s nuclear program. The senators understand that despite Congress’ best efforts, sanctions may fail to halt Iran’s nuclear drive; that the Obama administration may ultimately prefer to avoid military action, even though a nuclear Iran would be disastrous for America’s interests in the region; and that none of the Arab countries that have vociferously lobbied Washington to attack Iran would ever do so themselves. But they know that Israel really might. And through this resolution, they were expressing their appreciation of the only Middle Eastern ally America has that is willing to act independently to advance shared regional interests.
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3) TOM SOWELL: A BRILLIANT MAN!
Sowell was born in North Carolina, but grew up in Harlem, New York. He dropped out of high school, and served in the United States Marine Corps during the Korean War. He received a Bachelor's Degree from Harvard University in 1958 and a Master's Degree from Columbia University in 1959. In 1968, he earned his Doctorate in Economics from the University of Chicago.
Sowell has served on the faculties of several universities, including Cornell University and University of California, Los Angeles, and worked for think tanks such as the Urban Institute. Since 1980 he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is the author of more than 30 books. A National Humanities Medal winner, he advocates Laissez-faire economics and writes from a conservative and libertarian perspective.
3a)The Bullying Pulpit
By Thomas Sowell
We have truly entered the world of "Alice in Wonderland" when the CEO of a company that pays $16 million a day in taxes is hauled up before a Congressional subcommittee to be denounced on nationwide television for not paying more.
Apple CEO Tim Cook was denounced for contributing to "a worrisome federal deficit," according to Senator Carl Levin -- one of the big-spending liberals in Congress who has had a lot more to do with creating that deficit than any private citizen has.
Because of "gimmicks" used by businesses to reduce their taxes, Senator Levin said, "children across the country won't get early education from Head Start. Needy seniors will go without meals. Fighter jets sit idle on tarmacs because our military lacks the funding to keep pilots trained."
The federal government already has ample powers to punish people who have broken the tax laws. It does not need additional powers to bully people who haven't.
What is a tax "loophole"? It is a provision in the law that allows an individual or an organization to pay less taxes than they would be required to pay otherwise. Since Congress puts these provisions in the law, it is a little much when members of Congress denounce people who use those provisions to reduce their taxes.
If such provisions are bad, then members of Congress should blame themselves and repeal the provisions. Yet words like "gimmicks" and "loopholes" suggest that people are doing something wrong when they don't pay any more taxes than the law requires.
Are people who are buying a home, who deduct the interest they pay on their mortgages when filing their tax returns, using a "gimmick" or a "loophole"? Or are only other people's deductions to be depicted as somehow wrong, while our own are OK?
Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes pointed out long ago that "the very meaning of a line in the law is that you intentionally may go as close to it as you can if you do not pass it."
If the line in tax laws was drawn in the wrong place, Congress can always draw it somewhere else. But, if you buy the argument used by people like Senator Levin, then a state trooper can pull you over on a highway for driving 64 miles per hour in a 65 mile per hour zone, because you are driving too close to the line.
The real danger to us all is when government not only exercises the powers that we have voted to give it, but exercises additional powers that we have never voted to give it. That is when "public servants" become public masters. That is when government itself has stepped over the line.
Government's power to bully people who have broken no law is dangerous to all of us. When Attorney General Eric Holder's Justice Department started keeping track of phone calls going to Fox News Channel reporter James Rosen (and his parents) that was firing a shot across the bow of Fox News -- and of any other reporters or networks that dared to criticize the Obama administration.
When the Internal Revenue Service started demanding to know who was donating to conservative organizations that had applied for tax-exempt status, what purpose could that have other than to intimidate people who might otherwise donate to organizations that oppose this administration's political agenda?
The government's power to bully has been used to extract billions of dollars from banks, based on threats to file lawsuits that would automatically cause regulatory agencies to suspend banks' rights to make various ordinary business decisions, until such indefinite time as those lawsuits end. Shakedown artists inside and outside of government have played this lucrative game.
Someone once said, "any government that is powerful enough to protect citizens against predators is also powerful enough to become a predator itself." And dictatorial in the process.
No American government can take away all our freedoms at one time. But a slow and steady erosion of freedom can accomplish the same thing on the installment plan. We have already gone too far down that road. F.A. Hayek called it "the road to serfdom."
How far we continue down that road depends on whether we keep our eye on the ball -- freedom -- or allow ourselves to be distracted by predatory demagogues like Senator Carl Levin.
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The coming American oil boom is bad news for Saudi Arabia. How the kingdom responds could very well determine if it survives.
FOREIGN POLICY MAGAZINE
BY GAL LUFT
Current trends in the global energy market don't look good for Saudi Arabia. First, the International Energy Agency projected in November 2012 that the United States will surpass the Gulf petrogiant as the world's top energy producer by 2020. Then, last week, it revealed that North America, buoyed by the rapid development of its unconventional oil industry, is set to dominate global oil production over the next five years. These unforeseen developments not only represent a blow to Saudi Arabia's prestige but also a potential threat to the country's long term economic well-being -- particularly in the post-Arab Spring era of elevated per-capita government spending.
But if the kingdom's outlook is decidedly bleak, its official response has been muddled. Within a period of just five days last month, two senior Saudi Arabian officials laid out starkly different versions of their country's oil production plan. In an April 25 speech at Harvard University, Prince Turki al-Faisal, a former head of Saudi Arabia's top intelligence agency and the current chairman of the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies, announced that the kingdom is set to increase its total production capacity from 12.5 million barrels per day (mbd) today to 15 mbd by 2020, an amount that would easily make it the world's top oil producer once again. But five days later, in a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, DC, Saudi Arabian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Ali al-Naimi conveyed an entirely different message, rejecting Turki's statement out of hand. "We don't see anything like that, even by 2030 or 2040," he said. "We really don't need to even think about 15 million."
So what are we to make of this 2.5 mbd discrepancy? Considering the world's dependency on petroleum and the projected growth in global demand for oil, it's certainly not chump change. In fact, 2.5 mbd is roughly equivalent to the entire production capacity of major oil producers like Mexico, Kuwait, Iraq, Venezuela, and Nigeria. Whether or not Saudi Arabia plans to ramp up its production, in other words, is relevant to virtually every household on the planet.
One might be tempted to dismiss Turki's grandiose projection on grounds of technical ignorance and defer to the man who is actually in charge of the country's oil industry. That is certainly one way to read the official inconsistency. But in Saudi Arabia, how much oil to produce is first and foremost a political decision. Unlike Naimi, a petroleum engineer who climbed up the ladder of Saudi Aramco, Turki is a member of the royal House of Saud, and when it comes to politics, his views are not less important. The dispute between the two boils down to a major strategic decision Saudi Arabia will have to make in the coming years: whether to drill more or to drill less.
With no revenues from personal income tax and 40 percent of its 28 million citizens under the age of 15 -- not to mention a male population that is mostly employed in the bloated public sector -- Saudi Arabia is heavily dependent on oil revenues to provide cradle-to-grave social services to its people. And the financial liability has only gotten heavier since the Arab Spring forced the regime to fight public discontent with ever more gifts and subsidies. To make things worse, Saudi Arabia is the world's sixth -- sixth! -- largest oil-consuming country, guzzling more crude than major industrialized countries such as Germany, South Korea, and Canada. With so much of its oil consumed at home, the kingdom has only 7 mbd to export -- even as government expenditures are on the rise.
All this is to say that in order for Saudi Arabia to guarantee its economic viability, it must ensure that the breakeven price of oil -- the price per barrel it needs to balance its budget -- matches the country's fiscal needs. This breakeven price -- the "reasonable price" or, as the Saudi Arabian euphemism has it, the "fair price" -- has risen sharply in recent years. "In 1997, I thought 20 dollars was reasonable. In 2006, I thought 27 dollars was reasonable," Naimi explained in March. "Now, it is around $100 ... and I say again ‘it is reasonable.'"
According to the Arab Petroleum Investments Corporation, the breakeven price is currently $94 per barrel, less than the current spot price for Brent crude. (Iran needs oil to be at $125 per barrel to break even, which explains the feud between Iran and Saudi Arabia within OPEC.) But absent deep political reforms that create new sources of income, the breakeven price will surely grow. According to Riyadh-based Jadwa Investment, one of the world's most important knowledge bases on Saudi Arabia's economy, by 2020 the breakeven price will reach $118 per barrel. At this point, the Saudi Arabia Monetary Agency's cash reserves will begin to drain rapidly and the breakeven price will soar to $175 a barrel by 2025 and to over $300 by 2030. And this cuts to the heart of the dilemma: In order to balance its budget in the future, Saudi Arabia will need to either drill more barrels and sell them for lower prices or drill fewer barrels -- actively reducing global supply -- and sell each at a higher price.
This is the crux of the Turki-Naimi debate. Both officials understand the centrality of oil revenues to the survival of the House of Saud, but they differ on how best to come up with the money. Turki believes that Saudi Arabia should grow its production capacity in sync with the growth of the global economy. But Naimi, the person who will actually be charged with meeting this goal, prefers to keep capacity as it is and, if needed, even let it slide. If history is our guide, Naimi's way will prevail. Since 1980, as the world economy grew by leaps and bounds, oil prices more than quadrupled in real terms. Yet Saudi Arabia, which sits atop of one fifth of the world's economically recoverable reserves, has barely increased its production capacity.
Another potential explanation for Naimi's reluctance to grow capacity is that he knows what Sadad al-Husseini, the former head of exploration at Saudi Aramco, allegedly told the U.S. consul general in Riyadh in 2007. According to a leaked cable published by WikiLeaks, Husseini said that Saudi Arabia may have overstated its oil reserves by as much as 40 percent, meaning that production at current levels is unsustainable.
If Husseini's claim is true, it means there is only one way for the kingdom to make ends meet: Keep prices high by stalling the development of new capacity while adjusting the production of oil downward to offset any growth in supply emanating from the American oil boom. It also means, contrary to popular belief, that the current rise in U.S. domestic production will have minimal impact on global crude prices, and hence on the price we pay for gasoline at the pump. Oil is a fungible commodity and its prices are determined in the global market. If the United States drills more, Saudi Arabia will simply drill less, keeping the supply/demand relationship tight and prices high.
The Turki-Naimi dispute is not an academic one but one with potentially serious implications for the future of the world economy. Whether or not Saudi Arabia likes it -- and it almost certainly does not -- the global energy market is about to get more competitive. In a competitive market, oil should be supplied by all producers roughly in accordance with their geological reserves and marginal costs. There is something profoundly wrong when the United States, which sits atop barely two percent of global conventional oil reserves, produces more barrels per day than Saudi Arabia, a country with reserves ten times bigger.
Saudi Arabia presents itself as a responsible producer sensitive to the needs of consuming countries. These needs are surely growing. It would only be appropriate for the kingdom to grow its capacity in kind by making additional investments. Should Saudi Arabia decide not to do so, the United States should use its vast reserves of cheap natural gas as a trump card. Once cars and trucks sold in the United States are capable of running on fuels made from natural gas and its products -- whether compressed natural gas itself, liquid fuels such as methanol, or natural-gas derived electricity -- the price of transportation fuel will be determined by free and diversified commodity markets, not decisions made in Riyadh.
A system in which oil consumers are forced to pay a rising "reasonable price" per barrel in order to fund Saudi Arabia's ever-growing fiscal obligations is unsustainable, especially in a time when most cash-strapped countries are looking for ways to reduce their own fiscal obligations. As the world moves gradually toward more reasonably priced methods of powering vehicles, the kingdom would do well to drill into the brains of its people -- and that includes women -- as vigorously as it drills into the ground.
Gal Luft is senior adviser to the United States Energy Security Council and co-author of Petropoly: The Collapse of America's Energy Security Paradigm
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5)Thank you, Hafez al-Assad
By Caroline B. Glick
Israel -- and by extension, the West -- owes the Syrian dictator, BIG time. But why is Obama ignoring his lessons?
The threats emanating from Syria have become downright frightening. For the past several days, Homeland Security Minister Gilad Erdan has been warning repeatedly that it is certain that Israeli population centers will be hit by Syrian ballistic missiles and that we have to be prepared for the worst case scenarios, including Scud missile launched chemical weapons attacks on Israel's metropolitan centers.
Wednesday, Air Force Commander Maj. Gen. Amir Eshel spelled out Israel's concerns from a military perspective. The chance of war breaking out at any time is extremely high. Syria has a massive arsenal that includes advanced anti-aircraft missiles, anti-ship missiles and surface to surface missiles. Syria also has large stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, advanced artillery as well as the other components of a large conventional military force.
Eshel warned, "Syria is collapsing before our eyes. If it collapses tomorrow we could find its vast arsenal dispersed and pointing at us."
In that event, Eshel said, the Air Force will have to operate at one hundred percent of its capacity to clear a path for ground forces to operate in Syria and secure the armaments to prevent them from being dispersed, or used against Israel.
For his part, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. General Benny Gantz warned that Israel could easily find itself fighting a three front war in the near future. Presumably we would be fighting Syria, Lebanon and Iran — whose nuclear program continues to move to completion undaunted by empty US and European threats.
Syria is a mess because there are no good guys in a position to win. Syrian President Bashar Assad is one of the most dangerous leaders in the world. He is a major supporter of terrorist groups. He enabled al Qaeda and Hezbollah to use Syria as a logistical base in their war against US forces in Iraq. He is a vassal of Iran. He is allied with Hezbollah. He is a mass murderer.
Since the civil war began two years ago, Assad's complete dependence on Iran and Hezbollah — as well as Russia — has been exposed for all to see. There is little doubt that whatever checks the US was able to exert against him before the civil war began no longer exist. And if he survives in power, he will be completely indifferent to US pressure and so will behave far more violently than he did before the war began.
And yet for all Assad's horrific behavior and the reasonable presumption that his actions will only become more violent and dangerous with each additional day he remains in power, the most telling aspect of the Syrian civil war is that Israel, the US and Europe are incapable of deciding whether he is better or worse than the alternatives.
Because standing opposed to Assad and his Hezbollah and Iranian protectors is al Qaeda. Last week we were regaled with news analyses and stories about how the al Qaeda forces fighting Assad are now splintering. According to breathless, detailed reports, the "moderate" al Qaeda group, the al Nusra Front is being overwhelmed by the "extremist" al Qaeda in Iraq faction. The latter has moved into Syria and is taking over operations, much to the consternation of their moderate Syrian al Qaeda brothers.
But on second thought, since both the al Nusra guys and the al Qaeda in Iraq guys are loyal to al Qaeda boss Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Zawahiri told the al Qaeda in Iraq fellows to move to Syria, and since al Qaeda in Iraq formed and financed the al Nusra Front, it is not at all clear that anyone is splintering off from anyone, or that anyone is upset about anything.
Aside from revealing the pathological stupidity of Western news services, the attempt to make a distinction between good and bad al Qaeda forces fighting Assad points to the futility of trying to choose sides in this horrible war, which has already seen more than eighty thousand killed.
At this point, despite Assad's successful campaign to restore his control over Qusair, a strategically vital city adjacent to the Syrian-Lebanese border, most assessments indicate that the war is not nearly over. The sides may well stay bogged down fighting one another for years. Then again, as Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon said it is also possible that it will all be over quickly.
In short then, no one knows how the war will play out in Syria. All Israeli political and military leaders know is that whatever happens, the situation in Syria is dangerous and highly flammable. Moreover, everyone agrees that the conflict can spill out in two ways — which are not mutually exclusive.
First both the government forces and their Shiite allies, and well as their al Qaeda opponents could attack Israel. Both sides have a clear interest in attacking Israel since the one thing they all agree on is that they wish to see Israel destroyed. So as is the case for the Palestinians from all parties, for both Assad and his Shiite allies and his Sunni opponents, attacking Israel is a surefire way to build public support.
This danger has already materialized. Assad's forces shot at an IDF jeep patrolling the border this week and rushed to get the story — and their exaggerated version of its outcome — to the media. Rebel forces have taken pot shots at Israel, and targeted UN forces along the border, accusing them of siding with Israel.
As Eshel made clear, the second danger is that the weapons in Syria will proliferate far and wide. US officials have already admitted that they have lost track of much of Syria's chemical weapons arsenal.
This week PJ Media reported that a new State Department whistleblower is about to come forward to divulge new information about the September 11, 2012 al Qaeda attack on the US consulate in Benghazi. US Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other US personnel were murdered in the attack. The whistleblower will reportedly reveal that Stevens was sent to Benghazi in a secret State Department effort to buy back anti-aircraft Stinger missiles that al Qaeda received from the State Department during the 2011 US-led NATO campaign to overthrow the regime of longtime Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
Since Gaddafi was defeated, his massive arsenal of terror weapons has spread out across the region, and particularly to Syria and Gaza. If Syrian weapons are similarly dispersed, the Libyan disaster will look like the military equivalent of a skinned knee.
The party most responsible for the barbarous, protracted Syrian civil war that will almost certainly drag Israel into a regional war with is of course the Syrians themselves. But the party second most responsible for this mess is the Obama administration.
Since the outset, the US had only one good option for intervention. It could have operated jointly with Israel to destroy Syria's missile arsenals and confiscate its weapons of mass destruction. That is the only sure bet move the US had. Every other action came with high risks.
Rather than take its sure bet move, at every turn, the Obama administration has opted for the most dangerous action with the smallest possible payoff.
For instance, rather than actively build an opposition army based on Syrian army defectors, Kurds and other relatively moderate forces, Obama subcontracted the formation of the Syrian opposition to Turkey's Islamist Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. As Israel and others warned, Erdogan used his power as the US contractor to build an opposition dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, whose ideology is largely indistinguishable from al Qaeda. It was the Brotherhood's domination of the Syrian opposition forces that paved the way for al Qaeda to enter and dominate opposition forces.
After Obama ensured that pro-Western forces would have no chance of taking over a post-Assad Syria, he allowed Russia to make matters worse. Rather than threaten Russian President Vladimir Putin in a credible way to prevent him from supplying S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to Syria, Obama sat back and did nothing to block the imminent transfer of the game changing system to Syria.
And as Eshel warned, Syria's advanced anti-aircraft batteries, which will threaten Israel's air superiority, will increase the probability that Assad will attack Israel in a profound way.
In the face of rank American incompetence, Assad has already broken all the red lines he and his father followed for more than forty years. He has already used chemical weapons. He has proliferated advanced weaponry to Hezbollah. And he has already attacked Israel in the Golan Heights. Now that he has already crossed all of these redlines, the only question is how much he will escalate. Equipped with the S-300, the probability that he will escalate drastically has risen precipitously.
For all the danger now emanating from Syria, Israel has one ace in the hole. We have a consensus that we must win the coming war with Syria decisively, whatever the cost. And for that consensus, we have just one man to thank: the late Hafez al-Assad.
During the 1990s, the Israeli Left and the Clinton administration managed to convince the Rabin, Netanyahu and Barak governments to offer to surrender the Golan Heights to Syria. The only reason that the initiative failed was because Assad Sr. rejected Israel's repeated offers to surrender the strategic plateau in exchange for a piece of paper with a smiley face on it.
Had Assad accepted Israel's offers, we would have been facing a situation today that we would be hard pressed to contend with. On the one hand, we would be facing an all but certain war with Syria with al Qaeda or Iran controlling everything from the Jordan Valley to the Gulf of Haifa. On the other hand we would be facing this threat as a fractured society.
To hide their culpability for rendering Israel all but powerless to defend itself, those that supported surrendering the Golan would be pretending the dangers away. Instead of being free to discuss how to win a war in Syria, we would be bogged down in discussions of whether we have a right to fight in Syria.
In other words, if it hadn't been for Assad Sr. and his unyielding hatred for Israel, we would be facing the same situation in relation to Syria today that we faced in Lebanon in 2006 and as we have faced in Gaza since we withdrew in 2005. The lack of consensus regarding our strategic imperative to defeat our enemies in Gaza and Lebanon caused the IDF to fail to win its campaigns in both theaters.
So at this bitter juncture, as we face the all but certain prospect of war with Syria while our one ally is behaving like a drunken bull in a China shop, we have one man to thank for our continued ability to face this daunting challenge.
Thank you Hafez al-Assad. Your hatred has saved us.
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