Branding Versus Reason. Painted Into A Corner and Unable to Confront In A Rational Manner!

A lot of my liberal friends hate Rush Limbaugh yet, probably have never even listened to him or did so with impenetrable predetermined, preset  views.

Rush is a showman, often pompous but, like Newt, is extremely articulate and more than capable of explaining his disagreement with progressiveness and liberalism.  He makes a strong case and those who attack him, reject him, find it difficult to respond in a rational and practical manner  so they attack the person.

They hate O'Reily for the same reason because anyone who challenges their views must be despised and attacked largely because their views are driven by empathetic feelings not logic, by narrow orthodoxy not reasoning. 

They defend their views by setting up straw persons, distorting the thinking of those they oppose and then attack and branding them for contrived distortions of their thinking.  David Mamet and David Horowitz have written outstanding books explaining why they chose  'to leave the brain dead .' I previously reviewed their writings and commend them to you.  Then come to your own opinion but I doubt you will find it easy to dismiss them out of hand.

Rush's interview with Greta tonight was very worth listening to  because he gave a clear explanation of why he believes what he espouses.  You do not have to agree with him but you cannot rebut without at least listening to his thoughts in an honest and open manner.

The same is true of the demonizing of Sara Palin while liberals completely embrace and defend Joe Biden. Many of my liberal friends admit they are disappointed with Obama, but cannot bring themselves to reject or disavow him and/or his policies so they resort to decrying the lack of Republican alternatives. Clever but disingenuous.

I repeat, 2013 could prove a water shed year  because the incompetence of Obama has cut the ground out from under liberal orthodoxy and confronted them with indefensible responses.  They have allowed themselves to be painted into a corner by the failures of what they embraced and fought for on the basis it was fair.

The consequences have been all but fair.  They have been disrupting, divisive and dangerous, costly and dehumanizing and unconstitutional. The response to their negative effect has been limply stated -  give them time and they will work.

Liberals were quick to conclude GW's policies would not work, they lambasted him when he sought to double down.  How come they were so quick to judge demand more time for Obamacare to prove affordable? 

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A new disengagement policy?  (See 1 below.)
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My Palestinian editorial friend, Khaled Abu Toameh, recently received Camera's Emet Award for being a staunch defender of free speech and journalistic integrity.

Camera is a magazine committed  to  journalistic truth  in the Middle East.  I commend it as well as Honest Reporting.Com.
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Dick

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1) A new doctrine of disengagement

By James A. Lyons  

Most Americans did not comprehend in 2008 what President-to-be Obama meant when he declared that he was going to “fundamentally” transform America. The first clear indication should have come with his June 2009 Cairo “outreach” speech to the Muslim world. With the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood leadership prominently seated in the front row (and his host, Egypt’s then-president, Hosni Mubarak, not in attendance), his speech, in effect, gave the green light to the Arab Spring movement. Secular dictatorships that were cooperating with the United States and keeping Islamic jihadists under control were clearly the first targets.

This should have raised the question: Is this the new Obama doctrine? If so, it has left our friends and allies not only confused, but at times feeling betrayed. Certainly, that is the case for our longtime and closest ally in the Middle East, Israel. With the Obama administration’s ill-conceived agreement with Iran, Israel, for all practical purposes, has been cast adrift and must now make plans to ensure its own survivability.

The sense that America is disengaging, coupled with our unilateral disarmament, is contributing to instability throughout the world. With Iran on the cusp of becoming a nuclear power, the net result will be to foster the spread of nuclear-weapon states. Clearly, this initial agreement with Iran has implications far beyond the Middle East. It has brought into question the reliability of our security guarantees that our allies and friends have counted on as part of the key underpinning for their own national security. Aside from Israel, this is of particular concern to our allies in the Western Pacific with China’s bullying tactics in trying to enforce their illegal claims in both the South China Sea and East China Sea.

Beijing’s massive military buildup over the past two decades is clearly targeting the United States, particularly the U.S. Navy. Its anti-ship ballistic missile is designed to attack our aircraft carriers and other major surface combatants as part of their anti-denial, anti-access strategy. China’s strategic force modernization program, which includes more than 3,000 miles of underground reinforced tunnels for its fixed and mobile nuclear forces, also includes its strategic nuclear ballistic-missile and conventional submarine forces operating from underground submarine pens off Hainan Island. With typical arrogance, some Chinese have boasted that their submarines are on alert and prepared to kill between 5 million and 12 million Americans in Western U.S. cities.

Not surprising, with the perception that the United States is disengaging with its ill-advised one-war strategy, our pivot to Asia has not impressed the Chinese. Beijing senses the opportunity is near to achieve its core objectives of hegemony in the Western Pacific. As part of what some analyst have termed the “Finlandization” of the Western Pacific, China’s latest move was to declare an air-defense identification zone in the East China Sea requiring all military and civilian aircraft to report flight information before entering. Japan has ordered its domestic and military aircraft to ignore the requirement.

Regretfully, Japan was undercut by the Obama administration, which has told U.S. commercial carriers to comply, even though we have flown military aircraft through the zone without notifying China. The identification zone just happens to cover the disputed Senkaku Islands, which Japan has administered since 1951 as part of our World War II peace treaty and China is now claiming. Our response should be to demand that China withdraw the zone. Further, equivocation on our part will only lead to additional Chinese air-defense identification zones.

Likewise, Russia’s announced $750 billion modernization military program cannot be ignored. It will include new strategic ballistic- and cruise-missile submarines, and new fifth-generation stealth fighters as well as modernization of its strategic and theater nuclear forces. Vladimir Putin’s attempt to re-establish part of the old Soviet empire, primarily through economic blackmail, should be of serious concern. Ukraine is the key prize that Mr. Putin has forced into joining Russia’s Customs Union instead of the European Union. Even with massive street protests in Kiev, the Obama administration ignores what clearly would be a victory for the West, just as he did in ignoring the 2009 Green Revolution in Iran.

The actions the Obama administration are now pursuing are clearly jeopardizing our national security. The continued pursuit of the “zero option” along with the failure to modernize our strategic nuclear infrastructure is but one example. The crushing debt now at more than $17.2 trillion and growing at the rate of more than $1 trillion per year will fundamentally change America. It certainly will call into question our creditworthiness.

The unilateral disarmament brought about by forcing our military forces to absorb 50 percent of the sequestration cuts made no sense. Our open-border policy is another serious national-security issue. Al Qaeda jihadists are free to infiltrate our borders at will. It should be remembered that, ideologically, there is no difference between al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood and the Iranian theocracy. They all have the same objective; namely, to destroy America and Israel. The Muslim Brotherhood creed is instructive as it clearly states the objective is to destroy America from within. The question is, with his left-wing background, has Mr. Obama and his administration embraced the Muslim brand of fundamental change for America? If so, then this represents the greatest threat to our nation’s security.

Retired Adm. James A. Lyons was commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet and senior U.S. military representative to the United Nations