Partial Mia Culpa and Full Caveat Emptor. There Is Something About The Clinton's That Turns Me Off!

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I posted a squib about Hillary being fired last night which has been challenged as not totally accurate so here is the rebuttal from Snopes: (See 1 below.)

Apparently she continues to lie but was not fired for allegedly doing so in 1974.

Personally, I thought she should have been disbarred along with her husband for her deception in the White Water matter and the way she handled the Rose Law Firm Documents among other questionable episodes but then I am prejudiced.

Maybe this is no true either. (See 1a below.)

I admit, I post a lot of articles and items sent to me by others and I do not always check them, as I should, but then I do not get paid for this either so caveat emptor! 

You decide!

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Dagny and Blake's father, Brian, was a champion skier at Rollins College and yesterday, several of his co-skiers from Rollins came by and we went out on the lake across the street from their house in their ski boat and we were treated to an exhibition.  This is a link to Sean who travels the world doing exhibitions and teaching. https://vimeo.com/77070672

Brian and Josh also performed doing double flips etc.  Dagny and Blake, no doubt, will be doing so as well a few years from now.

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Has Iran become Obama's close, best and closest newest ally like Turkey was before they screwed him and America?  You decide! (See 2 below.)
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If you are depending on America protecting you is that any longer a justifiable position?  (See 3 below.)

Is another bad deal about to be shoved down our throats?  (See 3a below.)
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Dick

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Zeif-geist

Is this true:

As a 27 year old staff attorney for the House Judiciary Committee during the Watergate investigation, Hillary Rodham was fired by her supervisor, lifelong Democrat Jerry Zeifman. When asked why Hillary Rodham was fired, Zeifman said in an interview, "Because she was a liar. She was an unethical, dishonest lawyer, she conspired to violate the Constitution, the rules of the House, the rules of the Committee, and the rules of confidentiality."

Origins: Former First Lady Hillary Clinton is no stranger to political scandal and controversy and a specific accusation

concerning her work as a young lawyer on the Watergate investigation has dogged her political career for more than a decade. The claim originated with Jerry Zeifman, under whom Clinton worked in 1974 as a member of the impeachment inquiry staff for the House Committee on the Judiciary during the course of the scandal.


The notion Hillary Clinton was fired by Jerry Zeifman for "lying" and "unethical behavior" has circulated across social media and in e-mails for years. The belief that Clinton's early career was marked by this buried scandal is widespread, but is there any merit to the claim?

By Zeifman's own admission there is not. Statements made by Zeifman himself contradict the claim he fired Hillary Clinton. During a 1998 interview with the Sacramento Bee in which he discussed his work with Clinton on Watergate, Zeifman not only stated he hadn't fired her, but he didn't even have the authority to fire her:

If I had the power to fire her, I would have fired her.

Ten years later, Zeifman's story had shifted. When asked by radio host Neal Boortz in April 2008 if he had fired Hillary Clinton from the Watergate investigation, Zeifman hedged by stating Clinton had been let go, but only as part of a layoff of multiple personnel who were no longer needed:

Well, let me put it this way. I terminated her, along with some other staff members who were — we no longer needed, and advised her that I would not — could not recommend her for any further positions.

Following Zeifman's 2008 interview with Boortz, a column by Dan Calabrese ("FLASHBACK: HILLARY CLINTON FIRED FROM WATERGATE INVESTIGATION FOR 'LYING, UNETHICAL BEHAVIOR'") cemented the belief that Hillary Clinton had been "fired" from the Watergate investigation in political lore:

Jerry Zeifman, a lifelong Democrat, supervised the work of 27-year-old Hillary Rodham on the committee. Hillary got a job working on the investigation at the behest of her former law professor, Burke Marshall, who was also Sen. Ted Kennedy’s chief counsel in the Chappaquiddick affair. When the investigation was over, Zeifman fired Hillary from the committee staff and refused to give her a letter of recommendation — one of only three people who earned that dubious distinction in Zeifman's 17-year career.

However, one need only go back to the source of the rumor and Zeifman's own statement that he did not have the power to fire Hillary Clinton to discount that now common version of political lore: the evidence indicates that, whatever Zeifman may have thought of Clinton's behavior, she was let go from the Watergate committee because she was one of a number of people who were no longer needed as the investigation wound down (and Nixon's resignation made the issue moot), not because she was "fired" over ethical issues. 


1a)HIS IS WHAT "BROKE" LOOKS LIKE !

Welcome to the Clintons' $11 Million Dollar Mansion
in New York state

Hillary Rodham Clinton, as a New YorkState Senator now comes under this fancy

 "congressional retirement staffing plan" which means that if she never gets re-elected, she STILL receives her Congressional salary until she dies. 

If Bill out-lives her, he then inherits HER salary until he
dies. He is already getting his Presidential salary ($20,000 a month) until he dies. If Hillary out-lives Bill, she also gets HIS salary until she dies, Guess who pays for that? WE DO!

Clinton's 20 Acre - $11 million mansion is Common knowledge. For her to establish NY
residency, they purchased this mansion in upscale Chappaqua, New York....makes sense. They are entitled to Secret Service protection for life. Still makes sense.

Here is where it becomes interesting.

Their mortgage payments are around $10,000/month. But an extra residence had to be built by the government on the acreage to house the Secret Service Agents. Any improvement to the property is owned by the property owners...the
Clinton's. So....the Clinton's charge the federal government $10,000 monthly rent for the use of the extra residence to house the Secret Service staff which is just about equal to their mortgage payment.

He is the ONLY ex-president to use this loophole, thus earning the name 'Slick Willie'.

This means that we, the taxpayers, pay the Clinton's, salary, mortgage,
transportation, safety and security as well as the salaries for their 12 man staff and it is all perfectly legal. 

AND DON’T FORGET HIS
GOVERNOR’S PENSION AND HER SECRETARY OF STATE PENSION…..  

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2)  Obama: The Chamberlain of Our Time?

By Ron Radosh
In recent weeks, it has become clear that the Obama administration’s policy is to regard Iran as an ally in the fight against ISIS, and to overlook its goal of attaining hegemony throughout the Middle East. Iran essentially controls Baghdad and the Iraqi army fighting ISIS, Lebanon, and Assad’s Syria. We no longer hear Obama pronouncing that “Assad must go.”

The Iranian expansion is described in a Wall Street Journal editorial, in which the editors write:

The strategic implications of this Iranian advance are enormous. Iran already had political sway over most of Shiite southern Iraq. Its militias may now have the ability to control much of Sunni-dominated Anbar, especially if they use the chaos to kill moderate Sunnis. Iran is essentially building an arc of dominance from Tehran through Baghdad and Damascus to Beirut on the Mediterranean.

Iran’s actions threaten the Sunni states of Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the Gulf states, all of whom fear that an emerging alliance of the U.S. with Iran poses a great threat to their own national interest. Writing in the Lebanese paper The Daily Star, columnist Michael Young further explains this new reality:

As Iran expands its power throughout the Middle East, it is seeking to reshape the political landscape in ways designed to enhance its leverage and that of its allies. Nor is anybody successfully hindering this. On the contrary, it has become increasingly apparent that the United States has no intention of challenging Iran’s sway in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. Gone are the days when the American priority was containment of Iran in the region. Under Barack Obama, the U.S. appears to favor a new regional order in which Iran will be granted a choice role.

A few days ago, Bloomberg columnist and  The Atlantic national correspondent Jeffrey Goldberg tweeted an article in Foreign Policy  by Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.  If Lewis represents the viewpoint of nonproliferation experts, they should stop wasting their time.  According to him, the most nonproliferation efforts can achieve is to delay Iran’s acquisition of a nuclear bomb.  As he argues in his piece, any delay is beneficial.

Lewis skewers Tom Cotton for putting together the letter to Ayatollah Khamenei signed by 47 Republican senators, and its threat that the Senate could later undo any agreement signed by Obama. Calling the letter “a violation of the Logan Act,” Lewis continues to argue that “no agreement…would satisfy the president’s opponents.”  Then comes his main argument, “that there is no good deal.” Our only option is to “buy time” until Iran gets the bomb. He fully understands that the U.S. and the West have made “one concession after another” which failed, since by the time they made them, Iran had moved so far along the path to a bomb that “the concession had no value.”

Rather than understand that this actually is an argument for being firm before Iran moves forward, Lewis concludes that no sanctions will work,  that Iran will not respond to any form of pressure, and hence a tough policy will end “with a half-assed airstrike against Iran…and eventually an Iranian nuclear weapon.” Lewis avoids entirely another option favored and advanced by PJ Media’s Michael Ledeen: aid Iran’s beleaguered youth, dissenters and others who would support regime change.  In the past, during the uprising of the Green movement, Obama — as we know — chose to ignore them. We also know that this strategy was adopted by the Reagan administration to aid the emerging Solidarity movement in Poland, and led to its successful challenge to the Communist regime.

Instead, Lewis writes that the U.S. will be blamed by Europe if the negotiations fail and all sanctions will collapse, and that military action against Iran would be a mistake and would only set its nuclear program back by a few years. It is foolhardy to demand, as Republicans do, the dismantling of Iran’s nuclear capability; better Lewis says an “imperfect freeze on plutonium programs.”

To Lewis, North Korea’s violation of a treaty it signed in 1994 is not a reason to oppose another foolhardy agreement.  The “Agreed Framework” with North Korea to freeze its plutonium production infrastructure was readily violated and meant nothing.  Somehow Lewis concludes that it showed “even an imperfect freeze on plutonium programs put the United States in a stronger, safer position to manage the problem.” That, of course, is a statement that makes no sense whatsoever. How does allowing North Korea to go nuclear in its weapons stash make anyone safer?

Finally, he argues that Republicans are fibbing, and that once in power, they would do precisely as Obama is doing. He thinks they would negotiate with Iran in the same manner and eventually end up with the same agreement Obama will obtain, “with all its flaws and shortcomings.” So his conclusion:

Iran is still going to engage in all kinds of regional aggression that threatens our allies and interests. It will still treat its citizens terribly. But it might not have a bomb- at least, not for the moment.

Obviously, the Obama administration sees things exactly that way. No longer is our policy “a bad deal is worse than no deal,” but the opposite: “A bad deal is far better than no deal at all.”

Lewis wrote his article before the appearance in yesterday’s Washington Post of an op-ed by Joshua Muravchik, who makes a cogent case for the possibility that, contrary to most assertions, war and military action would actually work, and could be limited in scope. I am not entirely convinced of his argument, since he believes sanctions can never work, and hence he believes that a military strike against Iran is the only serious option that could force Iran’s hand. But his argument that “force is the only way to block Iran from gaining nuclear weapons” should be debated and taken seriously as a possible alternative.

Like the Nazis and the Soviets, the Iranian mullahs, Muravchik says, are legitimized by ideology, which motivates every step they take. He believes “an air campaign targeting Iran’s nuclear infrastructure would entail less need for boots on the ground than the war Obama is waging against the Islamic State, which poses far smaller a threat than Iran does.”

Perhaps that is the rub. Iran does indeed pose a far greater threat to the U.S. and the West than does ISIS. Yet the administration is in effect accepting and perhaps favoring a de facto alliance with Iran that will be only to the mullahs’ benefit. Some of us charge the administration with pursuing a Chamberlain-like policy of appeasement. Lewis and the Obama administration see appeasement as beneficial, much like elite liberal and left-wing opinion viewed Chamberlain’s Munich agreement he negotiated with Hitler. Rather than prevent World War II as  Chamberlain thought it did, it made war inevitable and it came at a time when Germany was much stronger.

Muravchik is saying in effect that we should strike before it is too late, and not act like the British did at Munich.   In one sense, Ben Rhodes, the key White House adviser to Obama, agrees with Muravchik that sanctions will not work, which would leave the United States only with a military option to use against Iran.

In an interview with Jeffrey Goldberg, Rhodes explained that the White House position is to avoid war by doing the only thing possible: negotiate a nuclear agreement. As Rhodes and obviously Obama see things, Iran will not give up its nuclear power and will not change the nature of its oppressive regime. And since war must be avoided at all costs, that leaves only an agreement, even if some see it as imperfect or even meaningless.

Obama and Ben Rhodes may think a U.S.-negotiated deal with Iran will boost the president’s  legacy, but the way things are going, Obama may go down as the Chamberlain of our time.

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3)Do Israelis Really Think the U.S. Will Come to Their Aid?

(They Will Be in for a Shock)

by Bassam Tawil

Many Israelis seem to think that if Iran does acquire nuclear weapons, if Israel could just offer up a more friendly face, the current U.S. Administration would, in a crisis, come to their help. They could not be more wrong.

Many Israelis seem to be counting on some deeply wished-for love from the current U.S. Administration. What they may not want to see is that their unrequited love for the U.S. runs far deeper than any disagreement with Israel's current prime minister. Just ask Syria, ask Iraq, ask Yemen, ask Libya, ask Saudi Arabia, ask Kuwait, ask Egypt. The current U.S. Administration does not even send weapons; it sends meals-ready-to-eat. Israel and the rest of us in the region -- as Iran has already encircled all the oil fields and is now taking over Iraq -- have no more to look forward to than that.

Hard as it may be for Israelis to believe it, Israel's survival most likely does not figure into the current U.S. Administration's calculations at all. No matter who wins the election this week, the U.S. will grant Iran its nuclear weapons. If they end up turned on Israel, no matter who is prime minister, so be it.

No matter who wins the election this week in Israel, if and when Iran has a nuclear bomb, there is not a thing the current U.S. Administration will do to help Israel. To the current U.S. leadership, Israel is just the next Sudetenland. The Israelis will have only themselves to rely on.

There is about to be a mistake. The only country in the region of which all the other countries are envious -- for opportunity, equal justice under law, freedom to speak without the 2 a.m. knock on the door -- has an election this week. Its citizens are tired of war -- right on schedule for its enemies' plans to destroy it. The Israelis are meant to be tired of war; that is why it is called "a war of attrition."

Many Israelis seem to be counting on some deeply wished-for love from the current U.S. Administration. What they may not want to see is that their unrequited love for the U.S. runs far deeper than any disagreement with Israel's current prime minister. Just ask Syria, ask Iraq, ask Yemen, ask Libya, ask Saudi Arabia, ask the Emirates, ask Kuwait, ask Egypt. The current U.S. Administration does not even send weapons to help; it sends meals-ready-to-eat, perhaps with the occasional unserious bombing, and tells others to do any serious work themselves. Israel and the rest of us in the region -- as Iran has already encircled all the oil fields and is now taking over Iraq -- have no more to look forward to than that.

Bassam Tawil writes that if and when Iran has a nuclear bomb, there is not a thing the current U.S. Administration will do to help Israel. (Image sources: Israel PM office, PressTV video screenshot)

The Israelis may be conning themselves into thinking that if they could just stay friendly with America, America will not "let Israel down" -- whatever that is supposed to mean. Perhaps they think that the U.S. will not let Iran acquire a nuclear weapons capability -- as the U.S. has been promising for twenty years. But the U.S. has already made clear that it will fast-track, or slow-track, Iran to nuclear weapons capability.

Or maybe it means that many Israelis think that if Iran does acquire nuclear weapons, if Israel could just offer up a more friendly face, the U.S. would, in a crisis, come to Israel's help.

They could not be more wrong.

Sadly, the current administration in Washington has reportedly already sabotaged several efforts by Israel to address its Iran problem. The current U.S. Administration seems to care about only one thing: making just about any deal with Iran. It does not even care about America, or it would never have enabled Iran to get as far along as it is now.

From some apparent self-infatuated fantasy of "landing a big one" -- luring the world's most medieval, genocidal, terror-promoting state to be a responsible member of the "family of nations" -- the current U.S. Administration will help exactly no one.

Hard as it may be for Israelis to believe, Israel's survival most likely does not figure into the current U.S. Administration's calculations at all. Israel was excluded from the P5+1 negotiations -- they might actually have insisted on not handing Iran a nuclear weapons capability, and ruined the current U.S. Administration's dream of turning the deadliest enemy of the "Big Satan" into its new-found friend -- like the wish of turning a prostitute into a doting wife.

The Israelis, of course, will vote for whomever they wish, but if they are voting with the thought that a new Prime Minister will save their country from being turned onto roadkill by the current U.S. Administration -- the world's next Sudetenland -- and that their current prime minister has been the problem, they have a nasty surprise coming. Everyone else has been lied to, misled, double-crossed, and tossed over the cliff – especially the American people themselves. The problem is not in whoever is Israel's Prime Minister. The problem is three thousand miles away, in a leadership that cares only about following in the footsteps of Neville Chamberlain returning from Munich: waving around a dangerous, illusory, non-existent "peace in our time." To the current U.S. leadership, Israel is just the next Sudetenland.

For its own fantasy of turning a voracious, extremist Islamic regime into the "stripper who becomes the girl next door," the current U.S. Administration will grant Iran its nuclear weapons. If they end up turned on Israel, so be it. No matter who wins the election this week in Israel, if and when Iran has a nuclear bomb, there is not a thing the current U.S. Administration will do to help Israel. The Israelis will have only themselves to rely on.

Bassam Tawil is a scholar based on the Middle East.

3a)

US Senate leader: Obama on cusp of 'very bad deal' with Iran

By REUTERS

Top US diplomat Kerry heads to Switzerland to continue talks with the Iranians on reaching a deal to contain their disputed nuclear program.

WASHINGTON - US Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said on Sunday that President Barack Obama was on the verge of making a "very bad deal" on Iran's nuclear program and made clear that Congress will weigh in on any agreement.

"Apparently the administration is on the cusp of entering into a very bad deal with one of the worst regimes in the world that would allow them to continue to have their nuclear infrastructure," McConnell said on CNN's "State of the Union" program. "We're alarmed about it."

US Secretary of State John Kerry was resuming negotiations with the Iranians in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Sunday with the goal of reaching a framework agreement by the end of March and a final accord by June 30. Kerry said on Saturday he hoped "in the next days" it would be possible to reach an interim deal.

As negotiations between world powers and Iran intensified this month, opposition to the agreement in the works erupted in the US Congress. An open letter sent last week to Iran's leaders from 47 Republicans in the 100-member Senate warned that any nuclear deal reached with Obama may be undone after he leaves office in 2017.

The letter was denounced by the White House and the State Department as interference into international negotiations.

On Saturday, the White House warned Republican senators that proposed legislation requiring Congress to approve any accord reached with Iran over its nuclear capabilities could have a "profoundly negative impact" on negotiations.

The letter from White House Chief of Staff Dennis McDonough was the latest sign of rising tension between the White House and Republicans.

McConnell said the Democratic president "clearly doesn't want Congress involved in it - at all. And we're worried about it."

He said if a deal is reached with Iran, the Senate would vote on a bill that would require the deal to come to Congress. Obama has said he would veto such a measure.

If no deal is reached, McConnell said, lawmakers will consider a bill that would ratchet up sanctions against Iran.

Some Senate Democrats also want a congressional review.

"I have supported the negotiations to this point but any deal that touches upon the congressional statutory sanctions is going to get a review of Congress," said Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia.

"The only question is, are you going to have a constructive deliberate bipartisan process, or are you going be rushed and partisan?"

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also adamantly warned again a "bad deal" on Iran's disputed nuclear program, which would allow the Islamic Republic to achieve nuclear weapons capabilities. 

The US and Israel have experienced strained ties after Netanyahu's March 3 speech to Congress assailing a potential nuclear deal with Iran sought by Obama.

On Tuesday, former Israeli ambassador to Washington and Kulanu candidate Michael Oren said Israel must try to repair relations with the United States no matter who wins Tuesday's election.

"We have to do a major reach-out. There's some work to be done," Oren said, citing Netanyahu's Congressional speech. 

The US-born Oren, 59, was appointed ambassador by Netanyahu in 2009 and served until 2013. He is running for parliament as a candidate of the centrist Kulanu party that could be a kingmaker in building a governing coalition after the poll.

In an interview with Reuters, Oren, a historian, said Israel needed to restore bipartisan Congressional support in the face of Democrats' anger over Netanyahu's acceptance of the Republican invitation to address Congress.-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------