When will the liberal melt down end? Maybe it will take a cup of decaf.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2JM5Sbd2Ro&feature=youtu.be
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The nations seems to be going bonkers.
Were I Putin, it would become obvious to me America is melting from within. (See 1 below.)
The mass marches and comments from the more radical participants seem to define the protesters, and simply enhances the causes they are protesting. I have no doubt, women feel aggrieved about everything on Venus. Maybe they should protest in Saudi Arabia where their multitude of disdains would be more appropriate. (See 1a and 1b below.)
Meanwhile, questions from the mass media are petty, the responses from the Trumpians are even worse.
While all of this insanity is occurring, Trump is engaged in changing the landscape of this nation and rolling back the Obama agenda one tweet and Executive Order after another.
Finally, stalling by Demwits, led by Schumer, is also petty but then what do you expect from those who have nothing better to do and seemingly don't care about their effect upon the nation.
They too hurt whatever cause they have.
Most Americans are tired of the frantic and self-serving tactics of politicians from both aisles. We have serious problems to overcome and it is time to focus on them and craft solutions.
===
While America is coming apart at the seams, I spent an enjoyable day showing my cousin, his wife, daughter, sister and mother around our beautiful city. They had never been to Savannah and found everything about our city delightful. They hope to return.
Sam is enjoying his post in Los Angeles and feels he is making progress. His goal is to meet as many governors and influential politicians and leaders as he can in order to get the message out about Israel, the problems his nation faces and the benefits they offer the world because of their technology and desire to live in peace with their neighbors etc.
We discussed a variety of issues and he is hopeful the relationship between our two nations can return to pre-Obama times and believes it will. He was delighted to know Elliott Abrams was the next SIRC President's Day Dinner Speaker.
================
As I have often said, wars are a waste of time but they are often necessary because it takes two to tango and every nation/people, have a right to defend themselves.
However, a war without a winner is doubly wasteful and a war that is won and the victor is not allowed to prevail and dictate certain terms borders on the immoral.
This is the case in which Israel has found itself for well over 60 plus years. They are attacked, they win and the world patronizes the loser. Until such time as the loser pays a deserved price there will be no resolutions, no peace.
In the case of the Palestinians, the defeated won the propaganda war, their failed and corrupt leadership has been rewarded, their people have been oppressed and prevented from recovering from unsought misery and their children, entire generations, have been taught hatred.
The Palestinians are pawns on The Middle East's chess board. Until such time as their leadership is allowed to pay a price for their intransigence change is unlikely. One day, the Palestinians must be allowed to realize the opportunities they had, and which their leaders rejected more than once, are no longer available. However, as long as they are allowed to believe they can reset the clock they have little incentive to reach an accord.
This is why I believe making Jerusalem, Israel's capital, allowing settlements to expand, de-funding their relief is the vise that might force them to be realistic. Sadat understood this, Jordan's King understood this but the Palestinian leadership has been rewarded for their selfish backwardness. Thus, they have not been allowed to endure the pain of their stupidity and cupidity, only their people have paid a price.
Trump may eventually fall into the same trap our State Department has employed which is to keep pulling the Palestinian chestnuts out of the fire out of the mistaken fear reality would enrage the so called moderate Arabs, Trump may eventually take the same route we have employed and, if so, our policies will remain hostage to stupidity, more wars will result, more misery will be imposed and more suffering will be the rewards.
In the case of Iran, pre-emption is no longer a reasonable option. Obama saw to that with his secret Iran deals and hostage payments. The best that can be hoped for is that penalties will be strictly enforced by Trump, leadership change will occur over time and sanity will dictate.
History, however, is not on the side of sanity. (see 2 below.)
====
Dick
===========================
1) America's Second Civil War
By DennisPrager
It is time for our society to acknowledge a sad truth: America is currently fighting its second Civil War.
In fact, with the obvious and enormous exception of attitudes toward slavery, Americans are more divided morally, ideologically and politically today than they were during the Civil War. For that reason, just as the Great War came to be known as World War I once there was World War II, the Civil War will become known as the First Civil War when more Americans come to regard the current battle as the Second Civil War.
This Second Civil War, fortunately, differs in another critically important way: It has thus far been largely nonviolent. But given increasing left-wing violence, such as riots, the taking over of college presidents' offices and the illegal occupation of state capitols, nonviolence is not guaranteed to be a permanent characteristic of the Second Civil War.
There are those on both the left and right who call for American unity. But these calls are either naive or disingenuous. Unity was possible between the right and liberals, but not between the right and the left.
Liberalism — which was anti-left, pro-American and deeply committed to the Judeo-Christian foundations of America; and which regarded the melting pot as the American ideal, fought for free speech for its opponents, regarded Western civilization as the greatest moral and artistic human achievement and viewed the celebration of racial identity as racism — is now affirmed almost exclusively on the right and among a handful of people who don't call themselves conservative.
The left, however, is opposed to every one of those core principles of liberalism.
Like the left in every other country, the left in America essentially sees America as a racist, xenophobic, colonialist, imperialist, warmongering, money-worshipping, moronically religious nation.
Just as in Western Europe, the left in America seeks to erase America's Judeo-Christian foundations. The melting pot is regarded as nothing more than an anti-black, anti-Muslim, anti-Hispanic meme. The left suppresses free speech wherever possible for those who oppose it, labeling all non-left speech "hate speech." To cite only one example, if you think Shakespeare is the greatest playwright or Bach is the greatest composer, you are a proponent of dead white European males and therefore racist.
Without any important value held in common, how can there be unity between left and non-left? Obviously, there cannot.
There will be unity only when the left vanquishes the right or the right vanquishes the left. Using the First Civil War analogy, American unity was achieved only after the South was vanquished and slavery was abolished.
How are those of us who oppose left-wing nihilism — there is no other word for an ideology that holds Western civilization and America's core values in contempt — supposed to unite with "educators" who instruct elementary school teachers to cease calling their students "boys" and "girls" because that implies gender identity? With English departments that don't require reading Shakespeare in order to receive a degree in English? With those who regard virtually every war America has fought as imperialist and immoral? With those who regard the free market as a form of oppression? With those who want the state to control as much of American life as possible? With those who repeatedly tell America and its black minority that the greatest problems afflicting black Americans are caused by white racism, "white privilege" and "systemic racism"? With those who think that the nuclear family ideal is inherently misogynistic and homophobic? With those who hold that Israel is the villain in the Middle East? With those who claim that the term "Islamic terrorist" is an expression of religious bigotry?
The third significant difference between the First and Second Civil Wars is that in the Second Civil war, one side has been doing nearly all the fighting. That is how it has been able to take over schools — from elementary schools, to high schools, to universities — and indoctrinate America's young people; how it has taken over nearly all the news media; and how it has taken over entertainment media.
The conservative side has lost on every one of these fronts because it has rarely fought back with anything near the ferocity with which the left fights. Name a Republican politician who has run against the left as opposed to running solely against his or her Democratic opponent. And nearly all American conservatives, people who are proud of America and affirm its basic tenets, readily send their children to schools that indoctrinate their children against everything the parents hold precious. A mere handful protest when their child's teacher ceases calling their son a boy or their daughter a girl, or makes "slave owner" the defining characteristic of the Founding Fathers.
With the defeat of the left in the last presidential election, the defeat of the left in two-thirds of the gubernatorial elections and the defeat of the left in a majority of House and Senate elections, this is likely the last chance liberals, conservatives and the right have to defeat the American left. But it will not happen until these groups understand that we are fighting for the survival of America no less than the Union troops were in the First Civil War.
1a) Chronicles of Self-Destruction
In 1969, demonstrations, rallies, campus takeovers, and violence abounded. America was roiled in the spitefulness of the New Left. It was a most intense time. Being a student, I went to the rallies, curious about the left’s “new” ideas. They were making their case, were mobilized, intense, and loud. Their speakers could be engaging, and the crowds were big. I listened, wondering if what they were saying was true. America was being described as racist, heartless, warlike, imperialist, and rotten. The speakers were animated, confident, bold, and they were swaying many with their message.
As I listened, I slowly became turned off. Watching the strident anger of these people was disturbing. In every speech, in every action, they were more intense and extreme. Continuing to attend, I couldn’t help but suspect these New Left people had deep personal problems. There were two experiences that created an indelible imprint about the left.
The first was at a rally. Speeches stirred the crowd, one saying we needed to take to the streets. Well, the speaker got the crowd into lines of about ten; a lot of lines, one behind the next, and we walked into the street. I already felt a little uncomfortable, but I was in a line with a friend. We’re marching, line after line on the street. Someone held a bullhorn and started chanting the following. “Vote with your feet, get to the street, vote with your feet, get to the street!” I was in my line, looking both ways, and there we were, supposedly intelligent students, chanting mindlessly. I tried. Honestly, I never felt so foolish in my life. Rather than empowerment, I felt deflated. Instead of thinking I was doing something good, I felt like a total doofus. Materially well-off college students pretending we were the proletariat to take power from the eeevil capitalist bosses was full-on absurd.
Another event came weeks later. There had been a building takeover on campus. I knew some of my friends had participated, and after a class I went there. I noticed a long line of tough-looking policemen in helmets, with guns, batons, and large (well behaved at that moment) police dogs. I took one look, then headed towards the door of the occupied building to warn my friends. Suddenly the door swung open, and the leftist leadership burst out, raising their fists, chanting “Workers to the street, workers to the street!” over and over, yelling epithets at the policemen as they went by. I found one of my friends at the back of the line, asked what that was all about, getting a blank stare for an answer.
The leftist message was ugly; authoritarian, angry, ingrown, hyperbolic, self-righteous, untrue, and yes, violent.
It was my last day as a potential leftist. I never attended another meeting, coming to the realization if these people ever came to power we would be in huge trouble. The left was a strange cult, a group that believed in things that weren’t true. They were an unrelenting set of true believers that excluded all others who didn’t agree with them as ignorant and immoral. They were angry, doing nothing helpful, just venting and yelling. They were intellectually shallow, they were much ado about nothing. What they had achieved was to make me become apolitical for much of the next decade. Looking back, I am fairly certain the main effect they had on most was to drive them away. By their juvenile tactics, they drove tremendous numbers of people from their message. The country went in the opposite direction. Yes, the radical left would remain, but it was marginalized. Two years later, Nixon would be reelected in a massive landslide. Ten years later, Ronald Reagan would come to power, gaining momentum from people such as myself who had run from the leftist agenda. I thought I had seen the worst, and strangest, political debacle in my lifetime back then. Shrillness and juvenile toddler-like behavior would never take over this many people again.
Then came this year. They have finally outdone themselves a generation later. Violent, self-righteous, and banal, they have returned with a vengeance.
Now, I know there are a lot of people, young and old, who would like to believe the narrative of the left, who lean enough to the left to try to listen. But I have watched this movie once before, and I also know the real effect the left is having, and it’s not what they think. There is a parallel of banality here years later. Yes, the United States has changed, but what hasn’t changed is the left’s transparent self-righteousness, their bent towards anger, towards violence, towards destructiveness, and yes, towards the grotesque.
The destruction in Washington DC and other cities this past weekend was not unnoticed. The violence in the name of moral superiority is hard to overlook. The demands to be heard, the demands to force all others to see their narrow viewpoint, these are hard to see without cringing. It’s the same very uncivilized, quite grotesque, and yes, banal attitudes from years before. When Madonna and Ashley Judd can get up in front of thousands with their message of F-ombs and tampon inanity broadcast to millions of people without an adult from the left standing up to say, “Stop! You are making fools of us all,” you know they are in trouble.
They can’t help themselves, it’s who they are, it’s who they’ve become. Tone deaf, shrill, and on the edge of sanity. My moment of never wanting to listen to the left again has returned for a new generation; they are metaphorically watching the lines of chanters, wondering if the emperor has no clothes.
Yes, it’s disturbing to watch these people, and yes, it’s sad they think so highly of their opinions that they can act like two-year-olds who believe they are winning because they are so loud. Unfortunately for them, it didn’t work years ago, and it’s not working now. A whole generation is watching this meltdown, likely feeling as foolish as I did long ago. Yes, a few in the current generation are lost to the nonsense. Yes, the mainstream media is trying to sell this as “public discourse” and righteous civil disobedience. Yes, a political party is trying to regain a political foothold on the backs of this craziness.
But no, it’s not working. The leftist narrative is not being bought. People are not flocking to this message. Instead, even those who are left-leaning are watching in horror as the extreme left displays who they are. The center may not listen to them for a decade. The right is finally seeing just how terrible an enemy this is, maybe they’ll even stop saying we should reach across the aisle and work with these people.
We can hope so, and surely, it’s been a long time coming.
1b) The DC Women's Tantrum
The day after Donald Trump took the oath of office to become the forty-fifth President of the United States, radical liberal feminazis took to the streets of Washington D.C. and put on a disgusting display of hedonism and hate. What was billed as the “Women’s March on Washington” quickly devolved into what any sound-minded political observer knew it would, and the worst of the American left was on unhinged display for all the world to see.
Clueless to the notion that their unseemly words and deeds were instrumental in Mr. Trump winning the White House and conservative candidates across the U.S. winning in historic fashion, angry leftist women held back little as they vented their political rage in the nation’s capital and across the U.S. Illustrated by a young female (perhaps a juvenile, which should surprise no one) with “F-ck Trump” written on the front of her shirt and both middle fingers singularly pointed at the sky, Drudge’s headlined blared, “Women’s March Turns Nasty.” Was there any real doubt it would?
What else is to be expected when angry liberals don’t get their way, especially in an election? Have you ever wondered why liberals get so upset when they lose elections? It is because they have placed their hope in the forces of this world, especially political ones. Thus, when they lose at the ballot box, often, a fit ensues. Those who understand that this world is not our home -- that real hope and real change are not brought about by mere politicians -- are not very prone to throwing vile and violent tantrums when an election doesn’t go their way.
The Drudge headline was only a sampling of the ugliness on display this past Saturday. The very appropriately named Jezebel magazine provides a revealing montage (warning: graphic language -- of course) of the message liberals wanted to impart to the world after Donald Trump’s inauguration. Reporting on what he deemed a “p*ssy riot,” Byron York at the Washington Examiner provides another smattering of the rampant nastiness that was paraded across the U.S.
Of course, being like-minded, the liberal media gleefully lapped this all up and spewed it back out far and wide. Again, all of this was probably to President Trump’s advantage. As if we needed to be reminded of the liberal double-standard in the mainstream media, nevertheless, as Erick Erickson noted,
People are idiots. Donald Trump will keep winning because people are idiots. And no, I am not talking about Trump supporters. I am mostly talking about the press corps.The press decided to give massive coverage to the Women’s March in Washington with members of the press gleefully reporting every insult against Trump, but patently ignoring that one of the key speakers opposed the collapse of the Berlin Wall because she thought the communists were better than us. Another speaker, Ashley Judd, suggested Trump supporters were Nazis.
Let’s review Saturday shall we?
Consider the reaction of the press had this been said of Barack Obama. Well, we do not have to ponder it. We know. The press was outraged. Remember how a congressional staffer got fired for tweeting something about the Obama kids? On Friday, multiple people with blue check marks on Twitter were attacking Baron Trump and the press said nothing. We also know how the press responded when anyone called Obama a Muslim, Nazi, commie, etc.
All this reinforces in many people’s minds that there is a double standard. And that double standard went into full force on Saturday. Supposedly objective reporters spent the day as activists and you all know it.
Along with the expected Nazi and Hitler references, the most common theme of the protestors centered around sex organs and sexual acts. Probably the most-used verb on any poster was, as Ralphie Parker put it, “the queen mother of all dirty words:” the “f-dash-dash-dash.” Taking her queue from the posters (as if she needed any
encouragement), pop-harlot Madonna left the live-broadcasting media to apologize for her f-themed tirade. And along with foolishly declaring that she had “thought about blowing up the White House,” Madonna also sang some of her nastiness and changed the lyrics of one song to include “Donald Trump suck a d*ck.”
No doubt the most used noun on any poster was some vulgar reference to a vagina. In fact, whether in print or of a more knit variety, there were more references to female genitalia at this women’s march than in all of the dirty gas station men’s rooms across the U.S. Yet, we are told that Donald Trump is the vulgar one. Again, no one should be surprised that tens of thousands of angry protestors devoted to a liberal worldview would resort to hypersexual behavior in order to make their point. For liberals, sex so often is the point.
Whether screaming about Planned Parenthood, ObamaCare, the Supreme Court, bathroom privileges, redefining marriage, redefining gender, and so on, the left -- especially the feminist left -- is consumed with sex. Most of this energy is concentrated on keeping the “right” to kill children in the womb. Tellingly, pro-life women were excluded from the march. When it initially looked like pro-life groups were going to be allowed to participate, the radical pro-abortionists went ballistic. Declaring that the killing of children in the womb is “central” to feminism, Jessica Valenti was “horrified” that pro-life women were going to be allowed to march with what she must deem as “real feminists.”
March organizers soon apologized for including those willing to stand for the most innocent and defenseless females (and males) among us. The photo below reveals the tragic level of devotion to abortion that exists among the modern left:
Having placed such hope in politics and government explains well why liberals crave political power and why they will do most anything -- including donning a “p*ssy hat,” conducting a “p*ssy riot,” and longing for the death of the unborn baby Jesus -- to obtain such power. After all, as the Obama years well demonstrated, perverse liberal “values” are best imposed -- whether by the threat of jail, fines, or even at the end of a gun -- by Big Brother.
++++++++++++++++++
2)Trump, Europe and the Way Forward on Iran
Cracking down on Tehran’s destabilizing behavior in the Middle East is an early chance for cooperation.
European powers have been quietly warning members of President Trump’s team that new sanctions on Iran are a nonstarter across the Atlantic. One senior European official went as far as to say that if any new U.S. sanctions were to cause the Iran nuclear deal to collapse, most Europeans will say it was Washington’s fault, barring any “major provocation” from the Iranians.
This warning ignores an important fact: In the time since the Iran nuclear deal was implemented, Tehran has already shown a willful disregard for the spirit of the agreement.
In the past year, Tehran has tested multiple ballistic missiles, ordered Russian Sukhoi-30 fighter jets without receiving the required blessing of the United Nations Security Council and continued its “illegal proliferation-sensitive procurement activities” at a “quantitatively high level,” according to the German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
Given that the European Union spent considerable political capital sealing the nuclear deal, its leaders should be more invested in ensuring it is strongly enforced and that Iran is held accountable for its nonnuclear aggression. Continuing to ignore the mullahs’ actions will mean surrendering the West’s considerable economic, political and moral leverage.
Rather than clipping Tehran’s wings, the nuclear deal has given the mullahs the money—more than $100 billion—and the political cachet to double down on their aggression in the region. Their threatening and destabilizing behavior prompted 11 Arab states to write to the U.N. General Assembly in November accusing Iran of sponsoring terrorism and constantly interfering in the internal affairs of Arab nations.
Nowhere is Iran’s regional aggression more evident than in Syria. Estimates put Iran’s funding of the Syrian regime at $6 billion a year, not including the arms and personnel that keep flooding into the country, enabling the barrel bombing of innocent civilians.
Emboldened by their efforts in Syria—and the lack of a coordinated Western response—the mullahs make no secret of their greater regional ambitions. The deputy commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps recently warned that “it is now time for the Islamic conquests. After the liberation of Aleppo, Bahrain’s hopes will be realized and Yemen will be happy with the defeat of the enemies of Islam”—meaning the legitimate government of Bahrain will be overthrown and the Saudi-led anti-Iran coalition defeated in Yemen.
This aggression cannot go unchecked. The U.S. and the EU must work together to address these continuing threats.
The trans-Atlantic alliance must strictly enforce the letter of the nuclear deal. Washington and Brussels should hold the Iranians accountable for their flouting of restrictions on ballistic missiles and arms, and allegations of proliferation of illegal nuclear equipment. If Iran continues its intransigence, the P5+1 must not be afraid to employ nonnuclear sanctions and even threaten to walk away from the deal. Tehran needs the nuclear deal more than the West does—President Rouhani admitted as much in a Jan. 1 interview that if the deal hadn’t been inked, Iran’s budget would have been severely strained.
The EU should also sanction the entire Hezbollah organization as a foreign terrorist entity. While the U.S. State Department has designated the Iranian-backed Lebanese Shiite militia as such since 1997, the EU has only blacklisted its military wing. This is a distinction without a difference. Just ask the deputy secretary-general of Hezbollah, Naim Qassem, who once told a Lebanese newspaper, “Hezbollah’s secretary-general is the head of the Shura Council and also the head of the Jihad Council, and this means that we have one leadership, with one administration.”
Europe has long been an important source for Hezbollah fundraising. In February, Hezbollah members were arrested after using millions of dollars from the sale of cocaine in the U.S. and Europe to purchase weapons in Syria. These are issues which should concern the EU, given that the crisis in Syria—enabled by Hezbollah and its patron, Iran—has resulted in a massive refugee crisis that is threatening the stability of many member countries. Europe desperately needs to crack down on this permissive environment.
As America has done, the EU must deepen security cooperation with the Gulf states. Britain’s announcement in December of an additional £3 billion ($3.73 billion) in defense spending in the region to thwart “Iran’s destabilizing activities” is a step in the right direction, as is the creation of the European Defense Fund to invest more in the creation of joint capabilities. More countries, including France, Germany and Italy, need to follow and increase their defense contributions in the Middle East. As British Prime Minister Theresa May has said, “Gulf security is our security.”
As EU leaders look for opportunities to collaborate with the new U.S. administration, Iran should be center stage. Collaborative efforts to crack down on Iran’s aggressive and destabilizing behavior may go a long way in addressing some of the most pressing challenges on the global agenda.
Mr. Terzi, a former foreign minister of Italy, is a senior adviser to United Against Nuclear Iran, where Mr. Brodsky is the policy director.
+++++++++++++++++++++
No comments:
Post a Comment