I continue to be offended by Obama's
disingenuous defense of Hillarious' and his
excusing her for placing her personal interest
above that of our national security.
===
If Hillarious wanted to convenience herself over protecting our nation then that becomes a matter of questionable judgement. Carelessness can be attributable to judgement.

Hillarious made a big deal of her 'reset' with Russia and Putin and that turned out to be a disaster. Again questionable judgement.

Her non-response to Benghazi, another instance of poor judgement.

Her concurrence with placing Qaddaf's life on the line, poor judgement.

Actually her poor judgement has been evident all along and became public back during The White Water Days and then continued with her failed efforts on behalf of health care.

The woman has been around for over 30 years making mistakes, covering up her activities, lying and now she wants to be Commander in Chief.

I play tennis with a Secret Service Agent who was on the Clinton Detail. Obviously, Hillarious is not made of presidential material but then after Obama anything has become acceptable. That is why we have the current crop running and that is also why we have become a failing power.

Does Obama's improper comments, which should never have been made for a variety of reasons, connote a desire to place his thumb on the scale of justice? Was he sending a signal to those in the FBI? As a lawyer and avowed Constitutional expert, he knew what he was doing.

There is a lot of great talent in this nation. We need to ask why that talent is unwilling to offer itself in the service of our nation?
====
Obama's social experiment with our military will end in disaster, weaken our ability to defend ourselves and cause more casualties which will play into the hands of those who want to gut our military even more. Why? Because anarchists hate Capitalism, America's success and want to bring about radical change. Creating chaos greases their way to power.

Obama has served them well while destroying our nation by playing up discord created by pushing wedge issues which disunite us all the while professing he wants to help the 'little guy,' bring about fairness and narrow wage disparity blah, blah, blah!
===
I previously wrote about Obama using the military as a social experiment (See 1 below.)

He also denies he has Marines engaged in a war. (See 1a below.)

America no longer best sited place to achieve American Dream according to Fed official (See 1b below.)
===
Sowell addresses the issue of "The Voice of The People Fallacy." (See 2 below.)
===
I have never denied Obama has generally responded to Israel's security when it comes to intelligence sharing and military assistance. What I have stated is Obama's Iran Deal is an existential threat not only to Israel but also to world peace and the fact that Obama also offered Israel bigger boxing gloves, militarily speaking, is a very weird way of offsetting this disastrous act.

Also, I would submit the anti-Israel J Streeters, are an equally great threat to Israel and ultimately to America because a weakened Israel will lead to unpredictable consequences.

J Street was established to cut the ground out from under the effectiveness of AIPAC. It is partly funded by Soros who has a problem with his own Jewishness and it attracts apologists and other assorted radical 'kooks' who believe Israel has no right to exist etc.

J Streeters are predominantly insecure liberal Jews who are embarrassed and caused anxiety by their Jewishness and believe a powerful Israel calls too much attention to them.

My former fraternity brother, "Richard "Andy" Falk, who never lost an opportunity to bash Israel while he was a patsy in the U.N for that purpose, is a role model for J Street.

It should be evident, I have nothing but contempt for J Street. However, they have their right to destroy the nation that actually protects what they most hate - themselves.

I also have little regard for those who do not like themselves and who find reasons to project their own neurosis on others.(See 3 and 3a below.)
===
I guess they showed us!!! (See 4 below.)
===
Dick
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1)Get Over It! We Are Not All Created Equal

By Capt Katie Petronio

Originally posted in the July 2012 issue of the Marine Corps Gazette. Posted so memo readers can weigh in on this hot topic.

-

As a company grade 1302 combat engineer officer with 5 years of active service and two combat deployments, one to Iraq and the other to Afghanistan, I was able to participate in and lead numerous combat operations. In Iraq as the II MEF Director, Lioness Program, I served as a subject matter expert for II MEF, assisting regimental and battalion commanders on ways to integrate female Marines into combat operations. I primarily focused on expanding the mission of the Lioness Program from searching females to engaging local nationals and information gathering, broadening the ways females were being used in a wide variety of combat operations from census patrols to raids. In Afghanistan I deployed as a 1302 and led a combat engineer platoon in direct support of Regimental Combat Team 8, specifically operating out of the Upper Sangin Valley. My platoon operated for months at a time, constructing patrol bases (PBs) in support of 3d Battalion, 5th Marines; 1st Battalion, 5th Marines; 2d Reconnaissance Battalion; and 3d Battalion, 4th Marines. This combat experience, in particular, compelled me to raise concern over the direction and overall reasoning behind opening the 03XX field.

Who is driving this agenda? I am not personally hearing female Marines, enlisted or officer, pounding on the doors of Congress claiming that their inability to serve in the infantry violates their right to equality. Shockingly, this isn’t even a congressional agenda. This issue is being pushed by several groups, one of which is a small committee of civilians appointed by the Secretary of Defense called the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Service (DACOWITS). Their mission is to advise the Department of Defense (DoD) on recommendations, as well as matters of policy, pertaining to the well-being of women in the Armed Services from recruiting to employment. Members are selected based on their prior military experience or experience with women’s workforce issues. I certainly applaud and appreciate DACOWITS’ mission; however, as it pertains to the issue of women in the infantry, it’s very surprising to see that none of the committee members are on active duty or have any recent combat or relevant operational experience relating to the issue they are attempting to change. I say this because, at the end of the day, it’s the active duty service member who will ultimately deal with the results of their initiatives, not those on the outside looking in. As of now, the Marine Corps hasn’t been directed to integrate, but perhaps the Corps is anticipating the inevitable—DoD pressuring the Corps to comply with DACOWITS’ agenda as the Army has already “rogered up” to full integration. Regardless of what the Army decides to do, it’s critical to emphasize that we are not the Army; our operational speed and tempo, along with our overall mission as the Nation’s amphibious force-in-readiness, are fundamentally different than that of our sister Service. By no means is this distinction intended as disrespectful to our incredible Army. My main point is simply to state that the Marine Corps and the Army are different; even if the Army ultimately does fully integrate all military occupational fields, that doesn’t mean the Corps should follow suit.

I understand that there are female service members who have proven themselves to be physically, mentally, and morally capable of leading and executing combat-type operations; as a result, some of these Marines may feel qualified for the chance of taking on the role of 0302. In the end, my main concern is not whether women are capable of conducting combat operations, as we have already proven that we can hold our own in some very difficult combat situations; instead, my main concern is a question of longevity. Can women endure the physical and physiological rigors of sustained combat operations, and are we willing to accept the attrition and medical issues that go along with integration?

As a young lieutenant, I fit the mold of a female who would have had a shot at completing IOC, and I am sure there was a time in my life where I would have volunteered to be an infantryman. I was a star ice hockey player at Bowdoin College, a small elite college in Maine, with a major in government and law. At 5 feet 3 inches I was squatting 200 pounds and benching 145 pounds when I graduated in 2007. I completed Officer Candidates School (OCS) ranked 4 of 52 candidates, graduated 48 of 261 from TBS, and finished second at MOS school. I also repeatedly scored far above average in all female-based physical fitness tests (for example, earning a 292 out of 300 on the Marine physical fitness test). Five years later, I am physically not the woman I once was and my views have greatly changed on the possibility of women having successful long careers while serving in the infantry. I can say from firsthand experience in Iraq and Afghanistan, and not just emotion, that we haven’t even begun to analyze and comprehend the gender-specific medical issues and overall physical toll continuous combat operations will have on females.

I was a motivated, resilient second lieutenant when I deployed to Iraq for 10 months, traveling across the Marine area of operations (AO) and participating in numerous combat operations. Yet, due to the excessive amount of time I spent in full combat load, I was diagnosed with a severe case of restless leg syndrome. My spine had compressed on nerves in my lower back causing neuropathy which compounded the symptoms of restless leg syndrome. While this injury has certainly not been enjoyable, Iraq was a pleasant experience compared to the experiences I endured during my deployment to Afghanistan. At the beginning of my tour in Helmand Province, I was physically capable of conducting combat operations for weeks at a time, remaining in my gear for days if necessary and averaging 16-hour days of engineering operations in the heart of Sangin, one of the most kinetic and challenging AOs in the country. There were numerous occasions where I was sent to a grid coordinate and told to build a PB from the ground up, serving not only as the mission commander but also the base commander until the occupants (infantry units) arrived 5 days later. In most of these situations, I had a sergeant as my assistant commander, and the remainder of my platoon consisted of young, motivated NCOs. I was the senior Marine making the final decisions on construction concerns, along with 24-hour base defense and leading 30 Marines at any given time. The physical strain of enduring combat operations and the stress of being responsible for the lives and well-being of such a young group in an extremely kinetic environment were compounded by lack of sleep, which ultimately took a physical toll on my body that I couldn’t have foreseen.

By the fifth month into the deployment, I had muscle atrophy in my thighs that was causing me to constantly trip and my legs to buckle with the slightest grade change. My agility during firefights and mobility on and off vehicles and perimeter walls was seriously hindering my response time and overall capability. It was evident that stress and muscular deterioration was affecting everyone regardless of gender; however, the rate of my deterioration was noticeably faster than that of male Marines and further compounded by gender-specific medical conditions. At the end of the 7-month deployment, and the construction of 18 PBs later, I had lost 17 pounds and was diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome (which personally resulted in infertility, but is not a genetic trend in my family), which was brought on by the chemical and physical changes endured during deployment. Regardless of my deteriorating physical stature, I was extremely successful during both of my combat tours, serving beside my infantry brethren and gaining the respect of every unit I supported. Regardless, I can say with 100 percent assurance that despite my accomplishments, there is no way I could endure the physical demands of the infantrymen whom I worked beside as their combat load and constant deployment cycle would leave me facing medical separation long before the option of retirement. I understand that everyone is affected differently; however, I am confident that should the Marine Corps attempt to fully integrate women into the infantry, we as an institution are going to experience a colossal increase in crippling and career-ending medical conditions for females.

There is a drastic shortage of historical data on female attrition or medical ailments of women who have executed sustained combat operations. This said, we need only to review the statistics from our entry-level schools to realize that there is a significant difference in the physical longevity between male and female Marines. At OCS the attrition rate for female candidates in 2011 was historically low at 40 percent, while the male candidates attrite at a much lower rate of 16 percent. Of candidates who were dropped from training because they were injured or not physically qualified, females were breaking at a much higher rate than males, 14 percent versus 4 percent. The same trends were seen at TBS in 2011; the attrition rate for females was 13 percent versus 5 percent for males, and 5 percent of females were found not physically qualified compared with 1 percent of males. Further, both of these training venues have physical fitness standards that are easier for females; at IOC there is one standard regardless of gender. The attrition rate for males attending IOC in 2011 was 17 percent. Should female Marines ultimately attend IOC, we can expect significantly higher attrition rates and long-term injuries for women.

There have been many working groups and formal discussions recently addressing what changes would be necessary to the current IOC period of instruction in order to accommodate both genders without producing an underdeveloped or incapable infantry officer. Not once was the word “lower” used, but let’s be honest, “modifying” a standard so that less physically or mentally capable individuals (male or female) can complete a task is called “lowering the standard”! The bottom line is that the enemy doesn’t discriminate, rounds will not slow down, and combat loads don’t get any lighter, regardless of gender or capability. Even more so, the burden of command does not diminish for a male or female; a leader must gain the respect and trust of his/her Marines in combat. Not being able to physically execute to the standards already established at IOC, which have been battle tested and proven, will produce a slower operational speed and tempo resulting in increased time of exposure to enemy forces and a higher risk of combat injury or death.

For this reason alone, I would ask everyone to step back and ask themselves, does this integration solely benefit the individual or the Marine Corps as a whole, as every leader’s focus should be on the needs of the institution and the Nation, not the individual?
Which leads one to really wonder, what is the benefit of this potential change? The Marine Corps is not in a shortage of willing and capable young male second lieutenants who would gladly take on the role of infantry officers. In fact we have men fighting to be assigned to the coveted position of 0302. In 2011, 30 percent of graduating TBS lieutenants listed infantry in their top three requested MOSs. Of those 30 percent, only 47 percent were given the MOS. On the other hand, perhaps this integration is an effort to remove the glass ceiling that some observers feel exists for women when it comes to promotions to general officer ranks. Opening combat arms MOSs, particularly the infantry, such observers argue, allows women to gain the necessary exposure of leading Marines in combat, which will then arguably increase the chances for female Marines serving in strategic leadership assignments. As stated above, I have full faith that female Marines can successfully serve in just about every MOS aside from the infantry. Even if a female can meet the short-term physical, mental, and moral leadership requirements of an infantry officer, by the time that she is eligible to serve in a strategic leadership position, at the 20-year mark or beyond, there is a miniscule probability that she’ll be physically capable of serving at all. Again, it becomes a question of longevity.

Despite my personal opinion regarding the incorporation of females into the infantry community, I am not blind to the fact that females play a key role in countering the gender and cultural barriers we are facing at war, and we do have a place in combat operations. As such, a potential change that I do recommend considering strongly for female Marine officers is to designate a new secondary MOS (0305) for a Marine serving as female engagement team (FET) officer in charge (OIC). 0305s would be employed in the same way we employ drill instructors, as we do not need an enduring FET entity but an existing capability able to stand up based on operational requirements. Legitimizing a program that is already operational in the Corps would greatly benefit both the units utilizing FETs and the women who serve as FET OICs. Unfortunately, FET OICs today are not properly screened and trained for this mission. I propose that those being considered for FET OIC be prescreened and trained through a modified IOC with an appropriately adjusted physical expectation. FET OICs need to better understand the infantry culture and mindset and work with their 0302 brethren to incorporate FET assistance during specific phases of operations to properly prepare them to serve as the subject matter experts to a regimental- or battalion-level infantry commander. Through joint OIC training, both 0302s and FET OICs can start to learn how to integrate capabilities and accomplish their mission individually and collectively. This, in my mind, is a much more viable, cost-effective solution, with high reward for the Marine Corps and the Nation, and it will also directly improve the capabilities of FET OICs.

Finally, what are the Marine Corps standards, particularly physical fitness standards, based on—performance and capability or equality? We abide by numerous discriminators, such as height and weight standards. As multiple Marine Corps Gazette articles have highlighted, Marines who can run first-class physical fitness tests and who have superior MOS proficiency are separated from the Service if they do not meet the Marine Corps’ height and weight standards. Further, tall Marines are restricted from flying specific platforms, and color blind Marines are faced with similar restrictions. We recognize differences in mental capabilities of Marines when we administer the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery and use the results to eliminate/open specific fields. These standards are designed to ensure safety, quality, and the opportunity to be placed in a field in which one can sustain and succeed.

Which once again leads me, as a ground combat-experienced female Marine Corps officer, to ask, what are we trying to accomplish by attempting to fully integrate women into the infantry? For those who dictate policy, changing the current restrictions associated with women in the infantry may not seem significant to the way the Marine Corps operates. I vehemently disagree; this potential change will rock the foundation of our Corps for the worse and will weaken what has been since 1775 the world’s most lethal fighting force. In the end, for DACOWITS and any other individual or organization looking to increase opportunities for female Marines, I applaud your efforts and say thank you. However, for the long-term health of our female Marines, the Marine Corps, and U.S. national security, steer clear of the Marine infantry community when calling for more opportunities for females. Let’s embrace our differences to further hone in on the Corps’ success instead of dismantling who we are to achieve a political agenda. Regardless of the outcome, we will be “Semper Fidelis” and remain focused on our mission to protect and defend the United States of America.

1a) Obama Hides His Iraq War

The White House pretends that Marines fighting ISIS aren’t really there.

By WILLIAM MCGURN
Are Marines combat troops?

In Barack Obama’s world, the answer is apparently not—not even when they are on the ground exchanging fire with the enemy. This is the fiction supported by Hillary Clintonand largely unchallenged by any of the three Republican candidates for president.

A recent headline in the Marine Corps Times summed it up this way: “Marines in Iraq technically not in combat but still getting some.”

Welcome to Mr. Obama’s hidden war.

Forty-five years ago this month, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a young war vet named John Kerry complained that the whitewashing of the reality of American involvement in Vietnam meant that each day “someone has to give up his life so that the United States doesn’t have to admit something that the entire world already knows, so that we don’t have to admit a mistake.”

Today, as secretary of state, Mr. Kerry travels about the world rationalizing an Iraq policy designed to keep President Obama from having to admit his mistake: that he has only made worse a war he claimed to have ended. The entire world knows this too.

In an interview aired Sunday on Fox News, President Obama declared that his “number one priority right now” is defeating Islamic State. But how does the man who sees himself as the guy who gets America out of its wars deal with the contradiction?

Part of the answer seems to be fudging the troop numbers. Officially U.S. troop levels in Iraq and Afghanistan are capped at 3,870 and 9,800 respectively. But after a Marine in northern Iraq—Staff Sgt. Louis F. Cardin—was killed in an ISIS rocket attack, the Pentagon was forced to admit there are as many as 5,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Only then did Americans learn that men such as Staff Sgt. Cardin are not included in the official troop count because they were rotated in on a temporary basis.

Mrs. Clinton has her own version of the charade. “I will not send American combat troops to Iraq or Syria,” she has declared in more than one primary debate. Instead, she says, “we will continue to use Special Forces.”

It’s pure hooey, of course. For one thing, it is based on the ridiculous idea that special ops forces are also not combat troops. Which is part of the larger Obama fable that ISIS can be knocked off with only a handful of American fighters.

So we are left with a war in which the president continues to tell us more about what our troops won’t do than what they will, even as he sends more of them back to Iraq. In the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, columnist Cynthia Allen notes how ironic it would be if the cumulative effect of Mr. Obama’s increasing deployments would be “the kind of long-term stabilizing force in Iraq that he so vehemently opposed.”

Meanwhile, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Texas Rep. Mac Thornberry, confirms that Congress has no real idea of how many U.S. troops are in fact in Iraq. Unfortunately, he says, there is “a political reluctance to speak forthrightly on what’s at stake and what is required” to defeat ISIS—and he senses “some of that reluctance in both parties.”

It’s a good point. Take Donald Trump, who entered the race touting his opposition to President Bush’s invasion of Iraq and fretting about anything that might get us “bogged down” there. More recently Mr. Trump suggested that, if the generals were right, he might have to send as many as 30,000 troops to defeat ISIS. Later he denied saying he would send them.

Ted Cruz has declared that “we need to put whatever ground power is needed.” But the Texas senator has also called for making the sands glow around ISIS, feeding the impression we can do most of it with air power. As for John Kasich, though he’s been the most forthright about putting “boots on the ground,” he offers few details.

In Congress, general after general has testified that more troops are likely to be needed to defeat ISIS. What these men have not yet recognized is that their commander in chief’s main priority is not victory over ISIS. It’s to do nothing that would jolt the American people into recognizing what Staff Sgt. Cardin’s death exposed: Americans are still fighting and dying in Iraq.

In 1971, a much younger John Kerry complained to Congress about the phony distinction between ground troops and helicopter crews in Vietnam, and an American people who “accepted a differentiation fed them by the administration.”

How fitting that Mr. Kerry, who recently returned from Baghdad, now serves as secretary of state for an administration feeding us the whopper that Marines fighting ISIS in Iraq are not combat troops.

1b) Fed's Dudley: U.S No longer Top Country to Achieve American Dream
By Newsmax Wires
The United States is no longer the top country for achieving the American Dream, a Federal Reserve official claims.

“While income mobility in the United States has been relatively unchanged, it remains well below several other nations,” New York Fed President William Dudley said in a speech about economic opportunity and income mobility.

“The probability of moving from the bottom quintile to the top quintile is 7.5 percent in the United States, as compared to 11.7 percent in Denmark and 13.5 percent in Canada — two countries with relatively high levels of intergenerational mobility.”

“So effectively the chance of achieving the American Dream is not the highest for children born in America,” said Dudley, a permanent voter on policy.

“Broadly, the economy’s potential growth rate depends on effectively investing in and taking advantage of all of the resources in the economy — in particular, we need to achieve the full potential of the human capital of all Americans,” Dudley said.

“For the United States to reach its maximum economic potential, all Americans must have the opportunity to reach their potential,” he said.

Dudley touted income mobility as a key ingredient of the American Dream. He explained the difference between income mobility and income inequality, the Free Beacon explained. “Income mobility is a dynamic concept — the degree to which individuals or families can move up or down in the income distribution over time,” he said. “Income inequality is a static concept — how unequal are individual or family incomes at a particular point in time.”

Dudley seemingly was referring to recent research by Stanford University economist economist Raj Chetty, who claimed the ability to move up from the bottom quintile to the top quintile in America remains below several other nations, including Denmark and Canada.

Chetty, one of the world’s foremost economists and currently a visiting professor at Harvard University, also has released a major new study that says the richest Americans live at least 10 years longer on average than the poorest, but the gap isn't as wide in many communities, especially affluent, highly educated cities, the Associated Press reported. That research emphasizes that income plus where you live help determine life expectancy.

Chetty isn’t alone, as other academics also have supported similar theories.

Miles Corak, professor of economics at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa, tackled the inequality and social mobility in his study “Inequality From Generation to Generation.”

"Corak’s research showed that the family an American child is born into greatly affects that child’s future earnings. His international rankings of the countries with the worst intergenerational mobility included Chile, the U.K., Italy and the U.S. (in that order)," Newsweek reported.

"Countries offering the best intergenerational mobility were Denmark, Norway, Finland and Canada. Countries falling somewhere in the middle were Spain, Japan, Germany and New Zealand," Newsweek reported.

But one of history’s greatest investors apparently disagrees with such a dismal outlook.

Warren Buffett recently said in his annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders that any baby born in the country today will live better than their parents, even with the current slow economic growth.

"It's an election year, and candidates can’t stop speaking about our country's problems (which, of course, only they can solve)," he writes. "As a result of this negative drumbeat, many Americans now believe that their children will not live as well as they themselves do,” the “Oracle of Omaha” wrote.

"That view is dead wrong: The babies being born in America today are the luckiest crop in history."
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inShareThe United States is no longer the top country for achieving the American Dream, a Federal Reserve official claims.“While income mobility in the United States has been relatively unchanged, it remains well below several other nations,” New York Fed President William Dudley said in a speech about economic opportunity and income mobility. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The 'Voice of the People' Fallacy

By Thomas Sowell
We hear many fallacies in election years. The fallacy that seems to be most popular this year is that, if Donald Trump comes close to getting the 1,237 delegates required to become the Republican nominee, and that nomination goes instead to someone else, then the convention will have ignored "the voice of the people."

Supposedly Republican voters would be outraged, many would stay home on election day, and some might even vote for the Democrats' nominee, whether Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders.

Mr. Trump has more than once made the veiled threat that he would run as a third-party candidate if the Republicans failed to "respect" him. And of course Trump would himself decide what "respect" means.

In so far as the voting public believes the fallacy that choosing someone other than Trump is ignoring "the voice of the people," when Trump has the most delegates, his threat carries weight.

In reality, Trump has never gotten a majority of the votes in any state. In other words, "the voice of the people" has been consistently against nominating Trump.

In a poll of Republican voters in Wisconsin, 20 percent of them said that they would be "concerned" if Trump became President of the United States, and 35 percent said that they would be "scared."

If "the voice of the people" has spoken, whether in Wisconsin or nationally, what it has said repeatedly is "No" to Donald Trump. The illusion of Trump's overwhelming appeal to the Republican voters has been maintained by the fragmenting of Republican votes because so many candidates were running as conservatives that Trump won primaries without ever getting a majority of the votes.

This would not be the first time that the conservative majority votes in a Republican primary season have been split so many ways that someone who is not a conservative ends up with the nomination.

That is how the Republicans ended up with Mitt Romney in 2012 and lost the election. That is also how the Republicans can end up with Donald Trump and lose this year's election. Worse yet, from the standpoint of the country, that is how Donald Trump might end up in the White House.

The Republicans in Wisconsin who were scared of the possibility of Trump as President were on to something. We should all be scared.

Why? There is not room enough to list all the reasons. But Trump himself has demonstrated, over and over, how he lacks the depth of knowledge -- and sometimes any knowledge at all -- of complex life and death issues that are inescapable for any President of the United States.

Ignorance is dangerous enough in itself. But ignorance on the part of an egomaniac, who announces that he is his own best advisor, is incorrigible ignorance. He can surround himself with the best minds in the country and it will not do any good if they are just there for window dressing.

Barack Obama has already demonstrated what disasters a President can create when he ignores the warnings of the country's top military leaders, as he did when he pulled American troops out of Iraq, setting the stage for the emergence of ISIS.

Obama dealt with that problem, as he has dealt with other problems, by coming up with glib rhetoric -- in this case, dismissing ISIS as the junior varsity. The horrors that have followed -- especially for women and girls -- wherever ISIS has taken over in the Middle East make Obama's slick words grotesque.

So too do the terrorist slaughters in Europe that are virtually guaranteed to be repeated in America.

The unprecedented public criticisms of President Obama by four of his former Secretaries of Defense, not to mention retired four-star generals, demonstrate that having knowledgeable and experienced advisors cannot make up for headstrong ignorance on the part of a President.

A headline on Bret Stephens' column in the Wall Street Journal -- "Trump Is Obama Squared" -- hit the nail on the head. After seven long years of disaster after disaster, at home and abroad, under the Obama administration, have we learned nothing about the dangers of choosing an untested candidate for President of the United States on the basis of his saying things we want to hear?

Elections are not held to make us feel good at the time, but to select someone with the depth of knowledge and character to be entrusted with our lives and the future of the nation.

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3)The New York Times Calls Obama ‘Israel’s Unsung Protector’

Ira Stoll

“Israel’s Unsung Protector: Obama” is the click-bait provocative headline the New York Times hangs over an opinion piece by Lara Friedman of Americans for Peace Now. The article faults President Obama for reliably siding with Israel at the United Nations Security Council, and it calls on him to stop it.

If Mr. Obama does that, Ms. Friedman argues somewhat convolutedly, “President Obama will not be betraying Israel. He will be Israel’s true friend.”

This is off base in at least two important ways.

First, it’s not accurate that up to this point the Obama administration has been, as the Times op-ed puts it, “shielding Israel” at the United Nations. The op-ed — in a stunning omission — doesn’t mention the single most significant UN Security Council vote to affect Israel during the entire Obama administration. That is the UN vote on Security Council Resolution 2231, which implemented the Iran nuclear deal.

The Israeli government was so opposed to the deal that Prime Minister Netanyahu went to Washington to beseech Congress to stop it. The lifting of UN sanctions on Iran effectively put hundreds of billions of dollars in the pockets of Israel’s terrorist enemy, a country whose government is dedicated to wiping Israel off the map. The idea that President Obama is Israel’s “protector” is undercut by that deal, which America voted for at the UN.

Second, it’s preposterous that Ms. Friedman, or any other American, would claim that she is better equipped than the democratically elected government of Israel to judge what is in Israel’s interest. That’s essentially what she is arguing when she calls on President Obama to start voting against Israel at the UN.

If Ms. Friedman wants to argue that voting against Israel is in America’s interest, she is free to make that argument, though I would disagree with her. Instead, she argues that for the US to undermine Israel at the UN would be in Israel’s interest. In other words, she knows better than Israel what is in Israel’s interest. If this is how a “true friend” behaves, who needs enemies? It makes no sense.

If Ms. Friedman disagrees with the Israeli government’s policies, let her take the issue up with it directly, or move there and vote for left-wing parties. Instead, she’s asking America to undercut what Israel says is in its interest. If she’s wrong, she’ll be safe in America. Israelis, meanwhile, will be called up on reserve duty, huddled in bomb shelters or worse.

Middle East and Other Musings

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

Hillary's Abject Incompetent Judgement!. My Unmitigated Contempt For J Street! They Showed Us!

The White House pretends that Marines fighting ISIS aren’t really there.

The 'Voice of the People' Fallacy

Biden to address to J Street, one month after AIPAC

The vice president's address comes amid speculation over whether Obama will announce the outlines of a two-state solution before the end of his term.

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