by Julian Krasta
The veneer is peeling, the wax is melting … and hell may indeed be freezing over – and after what appeared to be a near-perfect pitch campaign that reminded me of the flawlessly timed cadences of Johnny Mathis when he sang ‘Chances Are.’
From where I sit, the wunderkind’s façade has slipped, and what we might be seeing now is the tried and true Barack Obama. Like water seeking its own level, his principles, too, have bubbled up through the glossy surface – and they are appearing not so wunderbar.
Up to now, Obama – using fast & loose rhetoric – has gotten farther up the political ladder than any other non-Caucasian in American history. The devotion and cheering on of the African-American communities and, by enormous measure, the white communities, have aided in propelling him straight toward the most coveted, most powerful executive position this country has to offer.
He has played his role skillfully as he delivered, and continues to deliver, mile-long stretches of imaginative, albeit immature, speculation, which his followers eat up like free ice cream on a hot day. According to those adoring fans, there seems to be nothing he could ever say that is wide of the mark. One liberal lady friend even said to me, “If Barack Obama could sprout wings we’d see him fly!”
His ability to soar above the skyline notwithstanding, Obama’s long-term, personal association with a certain racist pastor has grounded him, at least for the time being. This close association might possibly cancel out a significant share of all the good will, trust, and hope for progress – and I am not talking just in terms of the Presidency. I include the ongoing, exhaustive and frustrating wars against racial prejudice in America in general, which we were winning…we were winning.
Each inch-by-bloody-inch victory broke more and more barriers down and Americans were growing closer. When you add up all those inches that we here in America have gained, no one could deny that we had in fact come a very long way.
I dare compare the nature of our contentions to the centuries-long vicious turmoil in the Middle East where countries are crying out for freedom from mullahs and terrorists – for democracy, for equality. This is a universal refrain everyone can hum in unison regardless of the differences in languages.
Then, just at the moment when evolution occurs, another hothead – another racial ‘jihadist’ – comes scurrying out of his hole and starts hurling verbal IEDs in every direction causing widespread damage. This hothead – this pastor in Christ – refuses to let go of the past, because he is not happy unless he dredges up old ghosts and shoots every good intention in the head to impede advancement.
The stage was set for his ignominious emergence (like an irascible first-time homeowner who purposely blows his leaves into a neighbor’s yard, “…because now I can.”). He must have been thinking that his chummy friendship with Obama gave him the right to platform farcical and hateful statements such as “The government invented AIDS to kill black people,” and “The government is building concentration camps for black people,” and “The government provides drugs to blacks to hold them down,” etcetera, ad nauseum.
When I had read the pastor’s rants I thought for a moment they were Stokely Carmichael’s words rising from his grave (about the cancer that took his life). Carmichael had said, it was “…given to me by the forces of American imperialism and others who conspired with them.” He further claimed that the FBI had put the disease in his body to assassinate him.
Oceans of water have passed since Carmichael was on the scene and sparked the term Black Power. His attitude nonetheless remains inured in the pastor’s heart and mind. He has proven without a shadow of doubt that he, and persons like himself (and certainly not all of them black) who perpetually and unnecessarily let fly the words ‘racist’ and ‘racism’ at our faces and into our collective consciousness, have no intention of changing one iota either their points of view or their off-color tune any time soon.
What I find disturbing is not so much what this pastor blurted but rather that Obama, who has been mentored by this person for over twenty years, claims he was not aware of his pastor’s intimate feelings (all unquestionably uber-radical), and has made clumsy excuses for the man and for what the man has said. Unlike Mitt Romney’s stirring speech concerning his Mormonism in which he emphasized his love and devotion for this country, Obama’s speech made no mention of patriotism or love for America. I welcome correction if I didn’t read it right.
Therefore, it is because of Obama’s obvious reluctance to put the pastor fully and equivocally in his place, and spending far too much time in his speech preaching about the good, bad, and ugly – and on and on and on and on – of race relations in America that I perceive a rapid withering of Obama’s perfect presentation of himself.
Strangely enough, I must thank the pastor for his horrid honesty. Until now, conservatives have decided to regard Obama’s spell over his followers as charming. No prima facie evidence we have presented to Democrats and liberals has been beefy enough to cause them to understand and accept the fact that he is not yet – I repeat: not yet – qualified or experienced to assume the mantle of Commander in Chief, particularly at this volatile time.
The pastor, however, quite possibly has single-handedly delivered the long-overdue hangover remedy the bloated masses of spellbound Obama followers have needed to sober up and face reality. That reality is, if their candidate cannot – or will not – take control over one person’s ravings, how can they expect him to control the White House?
Monday, March 24, 2008
The Damage Some Men's Dreams Can Do
by Julian Krasta
With proper upbringing, a boy can grow into a strong, self-reliant and sensible man. If that grown man is also well adjusted and has self-respect, he will neutralize deficiencies in his character (e.g., hubris, and that brother bugaboo “machismo”) to defray misgivings and ridicule by family, co-workers and friends – even his enemies. If a man behaves or speaks idiotically, someone eventually will call him on it.
Generally, men are dreamers … like our Founding Fathers were dreamers. It was upon their collective vision that the foundation of this great country was conceived and created where we live in blessed freedom, to achieve as much as we can in the short time given us – to be as great as we wish to be. I am always happy when trying to explain this to my liberal friends; and, if I am lucky, they will still not understand it and I will have to explain all over again.
But I digress.
I dream, too – of owning one of those ultimate driving machines, turning my baseball cap front to back and pushing the pedal to the metal. Realistically, I dream of owning a handsome house in a neighborhood where I can walk, shop, socialize, sleep and just breathe without feeling afraid – where the fellow next door is not secretly buying thousands of Uzis to ship to Iran.
There are dreamers like Mahmoud Admadinejad who, along with other rogue tyrants, refers to the United States as the Great Satan. If this were true, it would be fair of me to say he is the reincarnation of Josef Stalin, only without the whimsy.
As millions of witless Americans parade in intoxicated revelry over the frenetic campaigning by the Democratic candidates (in my opinion, by the weakest field I can recall), Admadinejad skulks in shadow, waiting restlessly to dare the United States into a confrontation, possibly nuclear. He did it once, almost a year ago – to test our patience and gauge our potential firepower – when he ordered the abduction of British sailors. It was only after his advisors informed him that President George W. Bush ordered the deployment of the USS Nimitz strike group into the Persian Gulf, and with all possible speed, that Admadinijad backed down and released the prisoners to England. Our Commander in Chief had called his bluff, because his ace was, and is, the might of the United States military.
I do not need to know him personally to recognize that Admadinijad’s behavior is the product of a twisted twilight zone for the pathological and squirrelly, which pushed me to wonder: “What dreams does this man have?”
I began my research with the virgins in paradise myth. Its explanation is straightforward (according to Muslim legend):
"The smallest reward for the people of heaven is an abode where there are eighty thousand servants and seventy two wives, over which stands a dome decorated with pearls, aquamarine and ruby … etc. …"
The wives referred to in this narrative are purported to be black-eyed, voluptuously beautiful virgins awaiting “the faithful” (i.e., martyrs). Who are the martyrs? They are the wretched dreamers who strap explosives to their bodies, pull the cord and destroy the lives of innocent human beings (men, women, children … babies) so that they can catapult to their heaven and luxuriate in the attention of obedient maidens.
This fantasy worries me a great deal, because I suspect Admadinejad’s dreams are loftier – that they exceed the 72-virgin limit. Why do I presume this? My wise dad once told me:
“To know your enemy you must learn to think like him – to imagine every possible angle and move that runs through his mind, like a chess game.”
Armed with this counsel, I deduced the following:
If a couple of sticks of dynamite earns a murder-suicide bomber 72 chaste females, Mahmoud Admadinejad might believe (or is being led to believe by mullahs, or his own demons, or both) that he would be rewarded with a thousand, maybe a million, times the legal limit if he sets off a nuclear device. The incentive is there if he accepts as true his craven ideology’s party-line propaganda of being forever fondled by nubile nymphs.
He and others like him could avoid such razzle-dazzle if they instead bought a membership at the Emperor’s Club in New York, where Governor Eliot Spitzer had found his paradise – several times, according to the reports. There a man does not have to be blown to bloody bits in order to attain nirvana.
I have a second, even greater worry. It is about the liberals and Democrats amongst us, whose foresight is, at best, fanciful. They dismiss the fact that it was daring and enlightened dreams that built America – that Admadinejad’s blasphemous trances could propel him and others to destroy it.
On the bright side, if Hillary Clinton becomes president her political party should split in about four months. On the down side, if Barack Obama succeeds to the Presidency this country could split in four weeks. We would then not need to concern ourselves over what aggressions Admadinejad might or might not attempt, because we (“we” includes every Barack-head who thinks he or she is exempt from being hit with taxes that will sustain Obama’s dream changes) will be drowning in the muck of his sausage factory, oxymoronic statements, such as:
“My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you’ll join me as we try to change it.”
That is the same as saying, “The Rolls Royce is the most beautifully appointed, masterfully built automobile in the world. Come on down and join in on its transformation. And bring your hammer, duct tape and can of spray paint.”
If the next President of the United States turns out to be either fantasist Democrat (both guaranteeing to fulfill a campaign pledge to leave the Middle East militarily unattended), we might as well draw a pentagram on the ground, face Mecca and join hands, and chant:
“The door is open. Do your worst.”
With proper upbringing, a boy can grow into a strong, self-reliant and sensible man. If that grown man is also well adjusted and has self-respect, he will neutralize deficiencies in his character (e.g., hubris, and that brother bugaboo “machismo”) to defray misgivings and ridicule by family, co-workers and friends – even his enemies. If a man behaves or speaks idiotically, someone eventually will call him on it.
Generally, men are dreamers … like our Founding Fathers were dreamers. It was upon their collective vision that the foundation of this great country was conceived and created where we live in blessed freedom, to achieve as much as we can in the short time given us – to be as great as we wish to be. I am always happy when trying to explain this to my liberal friends; and, if I am lucky, they will still not understand it and I will have to explain all over again.
But I digress.
I dream, too – of owning one of those ultimate driving machines, turning my baseball cap front to back and pushing the pedal to the metal. Realistically, I dream of owning a handsome house in a neighborhood where I can walk, shop, socialize, sleep and just breathe without feeling afraid – where the fellow next door is not secretly buying thousands of Uzis to ship to Iran.
There are dreamers like Mahmoud Admadinejad who, along with other rogue tyrants, refers to the United States as the Great Satan. If this were true, it would be fair of me to say he is the reincarnation of Josef Stalin, only without the whimsy.
As millions of witless Americans parade in intoxicated revelry over the frenetic campaigning by the Democratic candidates (in my opinion, by the weakest field I can recall), Admadinejad skulks in shadow, waiting restlessly to dare the United States into a confrontation, possibly nuclear. He did it once, almost a year ago – to test our patience and gauge our potential firepower – when he ordered the abduction of British sailors. It was only after his advisors informed him that President George W. Bush ordered the deployment of the USS Nimitz strike group into the Persian Gulf, and with all possible speed, that Admadinijad backed down and released the prisoners to England. Our Commander in Chief had called his bluff, because his ace was, and is, the might of the United States military.
I do not need to know him personally to recognize that Admadinijad’s behavior is the product of a twisted twilight zone for the pathological and squirrelly, which pushed me to wonder: “What dreams does this man have?”
I began my research with the virgins in paradise myth. Its explanation is straightforward (according to Muslim legend):
"The smallest reward for the people of heaven is an abode where there are eighty thousand servants and seventy two wives, over which stands a dome decorated with pearls, aquamarine and ruby … etc. …"
The wives referred to in this narrative are purported to be black-eyed, voluptuously beautiful virgins awaiting “the faithful” (i.e., martyrs). Who are the martyrs? They are the wretched dreamers who strap explosives to their bodies, pull the cord and destroy the lives of innocent human beings (men, women, children … babies) so that they can catapult to their heaven and luxuriate in the attention of obedient maidens.
This fantasy worries me a great deal, because I suspect Admadinejad’s dreams are loftier – that they exceed the 72-virgin limit. Why do I presume this? My wise dad once told me:
“To know your enemy you must learn to think like him – to imagine every possible angle and move that runs through his mind, like a chess game.”
Armed with this counsel, I deduced the following:
If a couple of sticks of dynamite earns a murder-suicide bomber 72 chaste females, Mahmoud Admadinejad might believe (or is being led to believe by mullahs, or his own demons, or both) that he would be rewarded with a thousand, maybe a million, times the legal limit if he sets off a nuclear device. The incentive is there if he accepts as true his craven ideology’s party-line propaganda of being forever fondled by nubile nymphs.
He and others like him could avoid such razzle-dazzle if they instead bought a membership at the Emperor’s Club in New York, where Governor Eliot Spitzer had found his paradise – several times, according to the reports. There a man does not have to be blown to bloody bits in order to attain nirvana.
I have a second, even greater worry. It is about the liberals and Democrats amongst us, whose foresight is, at best, fanciful. They dismiss the fact that it was daring and enlightened dreams that built America – that Admadinejad’s blasphemous trances could propel him and others to destroy it.
On the bright side, if Hillary Clinton becomes president her political party should split in about four months. On the down side, if Barack Obama succeeds to the Presidency this country could split in four weeks. We would then not need to concern ourselves over what aggressions Admadinejad might or might not attempt, because we (“we” includes every Barack-head who thinks he or she is exempt from being hit with taxes that will sustain Obama’s dream changes) will be drowning in the muck of his sausage factory, oxymoronic statements, such as:
“My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you’ll join me as we try to change it.”
That is the same as saying, “The Rolls Royce is the most beautifully appointed, masterfully built automobile in the world. Come on down and join in on its transformation. And bring your hammer, duct tape and can of spray paint.”
If the next President of the United States turns out to be either fantasist Democrat (both guaranteeing to fulfill a campaign pledge to leave the Middle East militarily unattended), we might as well draw a pentagram on the ground, face Mecca and join hands, and chant:
“The door is open. Do your worst.”
Friday, February 15, 2008
Missing WWII Airmen Are Identified
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
No. 132-08
February 15, 2008
[Source]
The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of three U.S. servicemen, missing from World War II, have been identified and will be returned to their families for burial with full military honors.
They are 2nd Lt. John F. Lubben, of Wisconsin Rapids, Wis.; Sgt. Albert A. Forgue, of North Providence, R.I.; and Sgt. Charles L. Spiegel, of Chicago, Ill.; all U.S. Army Air Forces. They will be buried on April 18 in Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C.
Representatives from the Army met with the next-of-kin of these men in their hometowns to explain the recovery and identification process and to coordinate interment with military honors on behalf of the Secretary of the Army.
On Dec. 12, 1944, these men crewed an A-20J Havoc aircraft departing from Coullomiers, France, to bomb enemy targets near Wollseifen, Germany. The aircraft was last seen entering a steep dive near Cologne, Germany. Several searches and investigations of this area and reviews of wartime documents failed to provide information concerning the incident.
In 1975, a German company clearing wartime mines and unexploded ordnance near Simmerath, Germany, reported the discovery of a gravesite northeast of Simmerath where American servicemembers were buried. U.S. officials evaluated the remains and determined they represented three individuals, but they could not make identifications at that time. The remains were subsequently buried as unknowns in the Ardennes American Military Cemetery in Neupre, Belgium.
In 2003, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) was notified that a group of German citizens had information correlating the three servicemembers who were buried as unknowns with the crew from the 1944 A-20J crash. Based on that information, JPAC exhumed the three unknown graves from the Ardennes American Military Cemetery in 2005.
Among dental records, other forensic identification tools and circumstantial evidence, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory also used mitochondrial DNA in the identification of the remains.
For additional information on the Defense Department's mission to account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo/ or call (703) 699-1169.
No. 132-08
February 15, 2008
[Source]
The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of three U.S. servicemen, missing from World War II, have been identified and will be returned to their families for burial with full military honors.
They are 2nd Lt. John F. Lubben, of Wisconsin Rapids, Wis.; Sgt. Albert A. Forgue, of North Providence, R.I.; and Sgt. Charles L. Spiegel, of Chicago, Ill.; all U.S. Army Air Forces. They will be buried on April 18 in Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C.
Representatives from the Army met with the next-of-kin of these men in their hometowns to explain the recovery and identification process and to coordinate interment with military honors on behalf of the Secretary of the Army.
On Dec. 12, 1944, these men crewed an A-20J Havoc aircraft departing from Coullomiers, France, to bomb enemy targets near Wollseifen, Germany. The aircraft was last seen entering a steep dive near Cologne, Germany. Several searches and investigations of this area and reviews of wartime documents failed to provide information concerning the incident.
In 1975, a German company clearing wartime mines and unexploded ordnance near Simmerath, Germany, reported the discovery of a gravesite northeast of Simmerath where American servicemembers were buried. U.S. officials evaluated the remains and determined they represented three individuals, but they could not make identifications at that time. The remains were subsequently buried as unknowns in the Ardennes American Military Cemetery in Neupre, Belgium.
In 2003, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) was notified that a group of German citizens had information correlating the three servicemembers who were buried as unknowns with the crew from the 1944 A-20J crash. Based on that information, JPAC exhumed the three unknown graves from the Ardennes American Military Cemetery in 2005.
Among dental records, other forensic identification tools and circumstantial evidence, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory also used mitochondrial DNA in the identification of the remains.
For additional information on the Defense Department's mission to account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo/ or call (703) 699-1169.
WELCOME HOME, BOYS.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
"We, the People"
By Amil Imani
In the United States, the oath of office for the President of the United States is specified in the U.S. Constitution (Article II, Section 1):
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of the President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
For other officials, including members of Congress, they "shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation to support the constitution." They must recite an oath to support and protect the United States citizens from her enemies:
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter.”
In an oath of office, no matter in what capacity one serves as a public servant, he or she must be reminded that everyone at all levels must first and foremost focus on the needs and the security of its citizens rather than on the desires of his or her services. With that in mind, one must be ready to follow the bylaws as his or her guide and exercise the functions of the office with which he or she is entrusted.
Democracy, by its accommodating and benign nature, is susceptible to corruption and even destruction by forces from within and from without. With this realization in mind, the founding fathers of the United States enshrined the Constitution to safeguard and protect the rule of the people.
While America opens its doors to the poor, the hungry and the oppressed of the world, Americans open their hearts to the less fortunate people of various lands by their unsurpassed generosity. No nation gives more aid to international charities, as a percentage of its gross domestic product, than the American people.
Recent migration of Muslims to non-Islamic lands began as a seemingly harmless, even useful, trickle of cheap and necessary labor. Before long, greater and greater numbers of Muslims deluged the new territories and as they gained in numbers—by high birth rate as well as new arrivals—Muslims began reverting to their intolerant ways by, for instance, demanding legal status for Sharia (Islamic laws), the type of draconian laws that, for the most part, resemble those of humanity’s barbaric past.
There is no need to belabor the point that Islam is not, and has never been, a religion of peace. Islamism has set a new record for brutality, contrary to the contention that there is no reason to worry about it. Jihadist Wahabism’s tentacles are reaching out from its cradle in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf Arab Emirates. And murderous Shiism, led by the Islamic terrorist state in Iran, is racing to arm itself with the ultimate weapon, and is doing whatever it can to ensnare the world into Islam’s nation, the Ummeh.
President George W. Bush, on several occasions, has repeated the mantra and attributed the horrific violence committed under the banner of Islam to a small band of extremists. The President on his latest trip to Turkey said, "I think Turkey sets a fantastic example for nations around the world to see where it's possible to have a democracy coexist with a great religion like Islam and that's important.” Ironically, the Turkish Parliament voted on Saturday to amend the constitution to lift a decades-old ban on Islamic headscarves at Turkey's universities, despite fierce opposition from the secular establishment.
The President’s assertion is either based on ignorance of the facts about Islam or his attempt at political correctness. Perhaps the President’s reticence to speak on the true nature of Islam was due to his desire to avoid inflaming the already charged feelings of many about Islam. In any event, truth is sacrificed and the public continues to cling to the false notion that Islam is a peaceful religion. People who dare to disclose the true nature of Islam run the risk of being castigated as a bigot and a hatemonger.
Calling Islam a great religion and misrepresenting it is not simply a harmless gesture of goodwill and peacemaking. This is flaming the fire that has every intention of consuming us. Therefore, it is imperative that in November 2008, we choose the chief custodian of our constitution, the President, with great care. We must entrust the helm of our nation to the hands of a person of impeccable integrity who is unconditionally loyal to the constitution, who does not sacrifice principles and truth at the altar of expediency, and who is not shirking from what he must do to ensure our nation’s survival in the face of internal and external assaults.
The pundits, the analysts and the politicians indeed are doing a great disservice to the public, each segment for its own expedient reasons, by parroting the mantra regarding the peaceful nature of Islam. As a matter of fact, the so-called small band of Islamic extremists is the true face of Islam.
Islam is indeed misrepresented. Islam is not misrepresented by its “detractors.” It is misrepresented by Islamic mercenaries, organizations and individuals generously funded by states as well as wealthy believers who are making billions of dollars pumping and selling oil at astronomical prices. Prestigious universities in the West, always looking for handouts, are tripping over one another to establish Islamic studies programs staffed by professors who sing the praise of Islam. Newspapers are routinely intimidated by Islamic associations if they dare to print the truth about Islam. Legions of lawyers, both Muslims as well as hired guns, are on the lookout to intimidate and silence any voice speaking the truth about Islam. The media that falls in line may receive generous advertising and other incentives from Islamic lobbyists.
All extreme solutions, if unwise, are fraught with extreme dangers. During the presidential campaign of the Vietnam War, Barry Goldwater proclaimed, “Extremism in the defense of freedom is no vice.” The collective wisdom of the American public prevailed and Goldwater didn’t get a chance to put his belief into practice. It is prudent to reserve extreme measures for extreme cases. Just as important, it is best to follow the less glamorous solutions of the problems as they gather momentum and diffuse them.
The U.S. government should, without delay, underwrite a massive program of making the nation energy independent so that the Islamic gas station nations will no longer be able to hold the country hostage for oil. Each citizen, in the meantime, must do everything possible to conserve energy and deny the flow of dollars to the coffers of the enemy.
The -- not-- so grateful world owes the U.S. an infinite debt of gratitude for defeating the evil of Nazism, and then the scourge of Soviet Communism. We all have to do what each one of us can to right the wrongs of this world. We don't have to be Einstein -- each one of us must do something according to his or her capacity. Once again, this champion nation of freedom is called upon to defeat the most tenacious and deadly enemy, Islamofascism.
In the United States, the oath of office for the President of the United States is specified in the U.S. Constitution (Article II, Section 1):
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of the President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
For other officials, including members of Congress, they "shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation to support the constitution." They must recite an oath to support and protect the United States citizens from her enemies:
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter.”
In an oath of office, no matter in what capacity one serves as a public servant, he or she must be reminded that everyone at all levels must first and foremost focus on the needs and the security of its citizens rather than on the desires of his or her services. With that in mind, one must be ready to follow the bylaws as his or her guide and exercise the functions of the office with which he or she is entrusted.
Democracy, by its accommodating and benign nature, is susceptible to corruption and even destruction by forces from within and from without. With this realization in mind, the founding fathers of the United States enshrined the Constitution to safeguard and protect the rule of the people.
While America opens its doors to the poor, the hungry and the oppressed of the world, Americans open their hearts to the less fortunate people of various lands by their unsurpassed generosity. No nation gives more aid to international charities, as a percentage of its gross domestic product, than the American people.
Recent migration of Muslims to non-Islamic lands began as a seemingly harmless, even useful, trickle of cheap and necessary labor. Before long, greater and greater numbers of Muslims deluged the new territories and as they gained in numbers—by high birth rate as well as new arrivals—Muslims began reverting to their intolerant ways by, for instance, demanding legal status for Sharia (Islamic laws), the type of draconian laws that, for the most part, resemble those of humanity’s barbaric past.
There is no need to belabor the point that Islam is not, and has never been, a religion of peace. Islamism has set a new record for brutality, contrary to the contention that there is no reason to worry about it. Jihadist Wahabism’s tentacles are reaching out from its cradle in Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf Arab Emirates. And murderous Shiism, led by the Islamic terrorist state in Iran, is racing to arm itself with the ultimate weapon, and is doing whatever it can to ensnare the world into Islam’s nation, the Ummeh.
President George W. Bush, on several occasions, has repeated the mantra and attributed the horrific violence committed under the banner of Islam to a small band of extremists. The President on his latest trip to Turkey said, "I think Turkey sets a fantastic example for nations around the world to see where it's possible to have a democracy coexist with a great religion like Islam and that's important.” Ironically, the Turkish Parliament voted on Saturday to amend the constitution to lift a decades-old ban on Islamic headscarves at Turkey's universities, despite fierce opposition from the secular establishment.
The President’s assertion is either based on ignorance of the facts about Islam or his attempt at political correctness. Perhaps the President’s reticence to speak on the true nature of Islam was due to his desire to avoid inflaming the already charged feelings of many about Islam. In any event, truth is sacrificed and the public continues to cling to the false notion that Islam is a peaceful religion. People who dare to disclose the true nature of Islam run the risk of being castigated as a bigot and a hatemonger.
Calling Islam a great religion and misrepresenting it is not simply a harmless gesture of goodwill and peacemaking. This is flaming the fire that has every intention of consuming us. Therefore, it is imperative that in November 2008, we choose the chief custodian of our constitution, the President, with great care. We must entrust the helm of our nation to the hands of a person of impeccable integrity who is unconditionally loyal to the constitution, who does not sacrifice principles and truth at the altar of expediency, and who is not shirking from what he must do to ensure our nation’s survival in the face of internal and external assaults.
The pundits, the analysts and the politicians indeed are doing a great disservice to the public, each segment for its own expedient reasons, by parroting the mantra regarding the peaceful nature of Islam. As a matter of fact, the so-called small band of Islamic extremists is the true face of Islam.
Islam is indeed misrepresented. Islam is not misrepresented by its “detractors.” It is misrepresented by Islamic mercenaries, organizations and individuals generously funded by states as well as wealthy believers who are making billions of dollars pumping and selling oil at astronomical prices. Prestigious universities in the West, always looking for handouts, are tripping over one another to establish Islamic studies programs staffed by professors who sing the praise of Islam. Newspapers are routinely intimidated by Islamic associations if they dare to print the truth about Islam. Legions of lawyers, both Muslims as well as hired guns, are on the lookout to intimidate and silence any voice speaking the truth about Islam. The media that falls in line may receive generous advertising and other incentives from Islamic lobbyists.
All extreme solutions, if unwise, are fraught with extreme dangers. During the presidential campaign of the Vietnam War, Barry Goldwater proclaimed, “Extremism in the defense of freedom is no vice.” The collective wisdom of the American public prevailed and Goldwater didn’t get a chance to put his belief into practice. It is prudent to reserve extreme measures for extreme cases. Just as important, it is best to follow the less glamorous solutions of the problems as they gather momentum and diffuse them.
The U.S. government should, without delay, underwrite a massive program of making the nation energy independent so that the Islamic gas station nations will no longer be able to hold the country hostage for oil. Each citizen, in the meantime, must do everything possible to conserve energy and deny the flow of dollars to the coffers of the enemy.
The -- not-- so grateful world owes the U.S. an infinite debt of gratitude for defeating the evil of Nazism, and then the scourge of Soviet Communism. We all have to do what each one of us can to right the wrongs of this world. We don't have to be Einstein -- each one of us must do something according to his or her capacity. Once again, this champion nation of freedom is called upon to defeat the most tenacious and deadly enemy, Islamofascism.
Monday, February 11, 2008
The Homeless Conservative
By Lance Thompson
Ideally, voters join the party which most represents their views. Historically, the Republican party is more conservative, the Democrat party more liberal. Thus, conservatives make up a majority of the GOP, liberals a majority of the Democrats. These majorities constitute the "bases" of the parties–the stalwarts who contribute, volunteer, get out the vote, and sustain the party.
Having associated with the parties which most represent their views, the base voters in turn exert influence on the positions of their respective parties. The Democrats have been greatly influenced by the liberal base of their party, so much so that Hillary Clinton has had to backtrack and dissociate herself from her vote to authorize military force to remove Saddam, even though many other Democrats also voted for the authorization.
But what is a base voter to do when the party he or she supports no longer represents his or her views? Obviously, a voter will usually not agree with every item of a party’s plank, but there is ordinarily general agreement on a majority of issues. But party leaders will say, "We stand for most of the things you believe in, and certainly more of them than the other party stands for." In a two-party system, this is a compelling argument. The Presidential election always comes down to two choices, and a vote is cast for that candidate whose views are closer to that of the voter.
Conventional wisdom holds that parties cater to their bases during the primaries, when candidates are competing for the votes of their own parties, then try to appeal to a wider audience during the general election, hoping to attract more middle-of-the-roaders than the other side.
But if the party’s front-runner has never catered to the base, has always made a greater effort to accommodate the other side, and does not stand for the base’s issues, then that candidate risks alienating the base. For the GOP, John McCain is such a candidate.
The Republican party leadership encourages all Republicans to forget their differences and unite behind John McCain. After all, the alternative–Obama or Clinton–is surely more objectionable than a moderate Republican. And if we don’t support McCain, the Republicans risk losing the presidential election.
But if the party and its candidate no longer represent the principles and values of the party members, what claim can the party have to their votes? There are only two possible outcomes in a presidential election. If McCain, the Republican candidate who voted against Bush tax cuts because they favored the rich, wants to close Guantanamo Bay, voted to extend citizenship to illegal aliens, voted to limit free speech in political campaigns, voted to fund stem cell research with federal money, was a charter member of the Keating Five and the Gang of 14, wins the contest, what have we achieved? We have placed in the White House a candidate marginally more conservative than his liberal Democrat opponent.
A McCain victory will demonstrate to the Republican party that a moderate Republican can overcome either the heir to the last Democrat dynasty or a tremendously charismatic Senator from the new generation of Democrat leadership. Republican leaders will conclude that conservative credentials are not necessary to win a national election–they are, in fact, a hindrance. Candidates in subsequent elections will be required to show that they are bipartisan, moderate, and able to work with Democrats and see things from the Democrat point of view. This will set conservative values back for several election cycles.
It is also possible that McCain could lose to his Democrat opponent. This would result in a marginally more liberal president than McCain, who would probably also enjoy a majority in Congress. The liberal agenda could be enacted with dispatch–higher taxes, withdrawal from Iraq, socialized medicine, and amnesty for illegal aliens. This agenda could prove beneficial to the nation or, more likely, disastrous, and by the time the next election comes around, the nation will be ready for a change, as it was after four years of Jimmy Carter. The party of change would be the party that stands for conservative values. The GOP candidate would not be a middle-of-the-road accommodator, but a strong, proven conservative.
The GOP leadership will argue that we all want what’s best for the country, regardless of whether a moderate or conservative Republican wins. But if conservatives truly believe in their own principles, they must also believe those principles are best for the country. They must believe a liberal agenda, conversely, is bad for the country. And, on many if not most issues, John McCain stands for a liberal agenda. He is less liberal than his Democrat opponents, but only by degree, and not by nature.
The Republican party must not take its conservative base for granted, must not assume we will go along with any candidate because we fear the prospect of the Democrat alternative. None of us wants a Democrat in the White House. But a Republican who caters to Democrats is very little better, and self-defeating in the long run. If McCain enacts sixty, seventy, or even eighty percent of what the Democrats hope to accomplish, each vote for McCain is in equal percentage a vote for the Democrat agenda.
There is talk of the GOP "suicide voter," described as some one who disagrees so much with McCain that he or she plans to vote for the Democrat. I don’t know how many such voters are in the Republican ranks. But I do know that the conservative base of the party, the marrow of the GOP, has no passion for McCain. There is no enthusiasm on the GOP side to match the mesmerized crowds at Obama rallies, or the determined passion of the Clinton supporters. Only a true conservative can mobilize that base, and John McCain is not that candidate.
John McCain has enjoyed favorable press, including an endorsement from the New York Times. He has worked closely with Democrats in Congress, even considering a spot as John Kerry’s running mate in 2004. He has branded himself a maverick, willing to defy conservatives in Congress and in the White House. So in the coming election, let John McCain call upon his friends in the press, his moderate supporters, his colleagues "across the aisle" when he seeks campaign workers, volunteers, donations, and support. They may be hard to reach, however. Because when the general election comes, they will all be working for the real Democrat candidate.
Ideally, voters join the party which most represents their views. Historically, the Republican party is more conservative, the Democrat party more liberal. Thus, conservatives make up a majority of the GOP, liberals a majority of the Democrats. These majorities constitute the "bases" of the parties–the stalwarts who contribute, volunteer, get out the vote, and sustain the party.
Having associated with the parties which most represent their views, the base voters in turn exert influence on the positions of their respective parties. The Democrats have been greatly influenced by the liberal base of their party, so much so that Hillary Clinton has had to backtrack and dissociate herself from her vote to authorize military force to remove Saddam, even though many other Democrats also voted for the authorization.
But what is a base voter to do when the party he or she supports no longer represents his or her views? Obviously, a voter will usually not agree with every item of a party’s plank, but there is ordinarily general agreement on a majority of issues. But party leaders will say, "We stand for most of the things you believe in, and certainly more of them than the other party stands for." In a two-party system, this is a compelling argument. The Presidential election always comes down to two choices, and a vote is cast for that candidate whose views are closer to that of the voter.
Conventional wisdom holds that parties cater to their bases during the primaries, when candidates are competing for the votes of their own parties, then try to appeal to a wider audience during the general election, hoping to attract more middle-of-the-roaders than the other side.
But if the party’s front-runner has never catered to the base, has always made a greater effort to accommodate the other side, and does not stand for the base’s issues, then that candidate risks alienating the base. For the GOP, John McCain is such a candidate.
The Republican party leadership encourages all Republicans to forget their differences and unite behind John McCain. After all, the alternative–Obama or Clinton–is surely more objectionable than a moderate Republican. And if we don’t support McCain, the Republicans risk losing the presidential election.
But if the party and its candidate no longer represent the principles and values of the party members, what claim can the party have to their votes? There are only two possible outcomes in a presidential election. If McCain, the Republican candidate who voted against Bush tax cuts because they favored the rich, wants to close Guantanamo Bay, voted to extend citizenship to illegal aliens, voted to limit free speech in political campaigns, voted to fund stem cell research with federal money, was a charter member of the Keating Five and the Gang of 14, wins the contest, what have we achieved? We have placed in the White House a candidate marginally more conservative than his liberal Democrat opponent.
A McCain victory will demonstrate to the Republican party that a moderate Republican can overcome either the heir to the last Democrat dynasty or a tremendously charismatic Senator from the new generation of Democrat leadership. Republican leaders will conclude that conservative credentials are not necessary to win a national election–they are, in fact, a hindrance. Candidates in subsequent elections will be required to show that they are bipartisan, moderate, and able to work with Democrats and see things from the Democrat point of view. This will set conservative values back for several election cycles.
It is also possible that McCain could lose to his Democrat opponent. This would result in a marginally more liberal president than McCain, who would probably also enjoy a majority in Congress. The liberal agenda could be enacted with dispatch–higher taxes, withdrawal from Iraq, socialized medicine, and amnesty for illegal aliens. This agenda could prove beneficial to the nation or, more likely, disastrous, and by the time the next election comes around, the nation will be ready for a change, as it was after four years of Jimmy Carter. The party of change would be the party that stands for conservative values. The GOP candidate would not be a middle-of-the-road accommodator, but a strong, proven conservative.
The GOP leadership will argue that we all want what’s best for the country, regardless of whether a moderate or conservative Republican wins. But if conservatives truly believe in their own principles, they must also believe those principles are best for the country. They must believe a liberal agenda, conversely, is bad for the country. And, on many if not most issues, John McCain stands for a liberal agenda. He is less liberal than his Democrat opponents, but only by degree, and not by nature.
The Republican party must not take its conservative base for granted, must not assume we will go along with any candidate because we fear the prospect of the Democrat alternative. None of us wants a Democrat in the White House. But a Republican who caters to Democrats is very little better, and self-defeating in the long run. If McCain enacts sixty, seventy, or even eighty percent of what the Democrats hope to accomplish, each vote for McCain is in equal percentage a vote for the Democrat agenda.
There is talk of the GOP "suicide voter," described as some one who disagrees so much with McCain that he or she plans to vote for the Democrat. I don’t know how many such voters are in the Republican ranks. But I do know that the conservative base of the party, the marrow of the GOP, has no passion for McCain. There is no enthusiasm on the GOP side to match the mesmerized crowds at Obama rallies, or the determined passion of the Clinton supporters. Only a true conservative can mobilize that base, and John McCain is not that candidate.
John McCain has enjoyed favorable press, including an endorsement from the New York Times. He has worked closely with Democrats in Congress, even considering a spot as John Kerry’s running mate in 2004. He has branded himself a maverick, willing to defy conservatives in Congress and in the White House. So in the coming election, let John McCain call upon his friends in the press, his moderate supporters, his colleagues "across the aisle" when he seeks campaign workers, volunteers, donations, and support. They may be hard to reach, however. Because when the general election comes, they will all be working for the real Democrat candidate.
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Book Report on Ronald Kessler's "The Terrorist Watch"
from Amil Imani
Ronald Kessler has written an extremely important book that discloses the inside story of the War on Terrorism. He takes a complex subject full of long functional names and leads the reader to relatively easy comprehension. He has exposed the incredibly difficult counterterrorism job of protecting this nation from Islamic extremists. This book was very difficult to write but Kessler has humanized the people of the FBI and CIA by telling their personal story as part of the massive efforts they undertook that overhauled our defenses from September 11, 2001 to today. There has not been a successful al Qaeda attack on American soil since 9/11. And these folks are entitled to our praise for their fine work. Along the way, Kessler reveals the distortions and harm that the left leaning media and especially the New York Times and Washington Post have done to the nation’s efforts to protect our citizens.
Mr. Kessler performed the difficult task of providing a documented and readable history of the seven-year period starting in 2000, but he reaches back in history when the circumstances require. There are no footnotes, but the work retains an academic documented quality by providing prolific actual quotes from interviews of the approximately 50 government employees, which Kessler interviewed to bring the story together.
Almost fiction like, the author starts the book with a Prologue, which brings the reader into the world of counter intelligence as it is today. He displays the immense power and cooperation between agencies that is being brought to bear now. Then he steps back in time and in conjunction with cases in progress involving the infamous names like Khalid Sheik Mohammad, Jose Padilla, Abu Zabaydah and others, he introduces the major stumbling blocks facing the FBI, CIA and other intelligence agencies that existed from 2001.
A most significant stumbling block in 2001 was the artificial legal “Chinese Wall” in place at each criminal investigative agency to isolate the crime enforcement personnel of the agency from the intelligence personnel. Kessler does a good job of explaining how that procedure came into being. It isn’t simple to explain but he does a good job. An attorney in the FBI Office of Intelligence Policy Review (OIPR) came up with the idea of using the mechanism of the Chinese Wall to be extra sure that a criminal indictment was never thrown out because the prosecutor had used information to make his criminal case where that information had been obtained under an investigation authorized under the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act (FISA). This Wall procedure required the FBI to maintain separate files for Intelligence Investigations and Criminal Investigations and disallowed the Criminal prosecutors access to Intelligence files. This fear of overturn arose because evidence obtained in foreign electronic interception of a communication that originates outside US is not necessarily subject to the same Constitutional requirements for a search warrant as is an interception (search) in the US of a US person.
The above paragraph is to explain the problem to be addressed by the “Chinese Wall”. But it is understandable that most non-lawyers will still be confused. The Chinese wall mechanism is a well-known procedure in many other legal situations. But the above paragraph was simply the definition of the nature of the issue. Even more burdensome was the fact that there were rules set in place by the OIPR to handle exceptions. These rules were extraordinarily complex and were not generally understood even by the attorneys in the OIPR. Further, OIPR put out the word that anyone who violated the rules was going to be disciplined. So, as is the usual case with human beings, everyone in the agency opted to take the easy way out. The FBI, CIA and other Intelligence agencies adopted the practice of never permitting criminal prosecutors or intelligence investigators to see the other investigators files. Although this was an interpretation unwisely set in place by Attorney General Janet Reno and therefore was only applicable to the FBI and the Justice Department it was eventually adopted by the CIA as well. This “Chinese Wall” problem explains why the FBI was unaware that the CIA had intercepted several al Qaeda transmissions that might have related to the 9/11 plot including a message on 9/10/01 that stated “Tomorrow is zero day.” None of that information was shared with the FBI.
Immediately after 9/11/01 bombing, President Bush asked for an investigation of the “Wall” problem, which showed that no Court had ever thrown out a case because of the feared mixing of information. Unfortunately, the OIPR had adopted an overkill solution that was too complex for the problem and the work around was too easy. The “risk avoidance” or CYA solution was predictable. Every manager needs to be on guard because every perceived possible future problem is not necessarily a real problem, or the fix, as here, can be worse than the problem. FBI Director Mueller immediately withdrew the “Wall” requirement and Congress specifically removed any Wall requirement in the Patriot Act in 2003. As an aside, the Patriot Act amendment kicked off major left-leaning media objections to alleged expansion of governmental power and potential violations of the civil rights of American citizens.
The FBI and CIA immediately after 9/11/01 with President Bush’s full support attacked its other problems including its incredibly outdated computer record systems, diminished morale at the CIA because of President’s Clinton’s de-emphasis in counterterrorism, and inadequate human intelligence at the CIA.
Kessler provides the entire engaging story relating to the reliance by Secretary of State Powell on information from German intelligence in preparing his speech to the UN in which he asserted that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. Powell had refused to use the US generated intelligence information and he independently reached the same conclusion. Ultimately the Iraqi source that had provided intel to German Intelligence was much later proven to be unreliable. He turned out to be a lower level Iraqi employee in the Saddam nuclear program that was seeking asylum in Germany. Again, the left media accused General Powell and the Bush Administration of intentionally lying in the run up to the Iraq war about Saddam’s possession of WMD.
The real facts underlying the Washington Post story of Dana Priest relating to alleged thousands of CIA’s prisoners being held in secret prisons around the world to enable the CIA to torture prisoners. This story earned her a Pulitzer Prize and caused many European nations to cease cooperating with the US in Afghanistan. The facts were that there were no secret prisons and fewer than 100 prisoners had been rendered to anti-terrorist agencies of countries cooperating with the US in the war on terror. Also many of those prisoners originated in those countries.
Kessler also related the embarrassing story about Brandon Mayfield. Brandon was a US attorney, a recent convert to Islam that had given funds indirectly to Hamas. His fingerprint had showed up on a plastic bag discovered in the Spanish train bombing and he was planning a trip to Barcelona. Multiple experts had confirmed the finger print match. Brandon was arrested but there was no other links. Ultimately, in a raid on the terrorist hideout in Spain, the Jihadists blew themselves up to escape capture and the authorities found a finger, the print of which perfectly matched the plastic bag print. Mayfield got $2M settlement and the FBI imposed a higher standard requiring a greater level of assurance on a finger print match.
There are many more interesting stories including the identity leak of Valerie Plame as a CIA agent. Although this investigation lead to the conviction of Vice President Chaney’s deputy for lying to the FBI, in the end, Richard Armatage, the ex-Deputy Sec. of State, a critic of the Bush Administration was revealed to be the leak to Robert Novak. Although both the Washington Post and NYT were on a daily rampage to show Chaney was the source of the Plame link, when the true identity of the leaker broke, the Washington Post ran it on Page 6 and the NYT ran it on Page 12. I find both those papers disgusting.
This book describes several investigations in minute detail. The manpower and the resources it takes to gather all the facts about the alleged actors and the potential links of their brothers, sisters and friends, the travels of each, schools of each, etc, etc mushrooms gigantically. Everyday the investigators evaluate the risk of the advancement of the plot to the point where continuation of the investigation risks injury to citizens and property. Sometimes where an investigation is centered abroad, and there are domestic actors linked to the plot, when we are warned by the foreign agency that it is going to roll up the plot in their country, the US must make the decision if it is better to place the US actors under 24/7 surveillance to see their response to the foreign arrest or to arrest them. How and where they respond when the branch of their plot is arrested is frequently revealing of the cell.
Home grown US terrorists are a new concern. Several networks have already been rolled up involving prison grown networks of Islamic extremists with serious plans of bombing and destruction. Fortunately these groups have not been sophisticated so far.
The public is aware of only the tip of the counter-terror iceberg. In 2007, there were 60-70 terror plots in US being investigated every day. Every morning in the NCTC at 8:00 AM the Threat Matrix involving these treats is evaluated. Vice Admiral Redd, NCTC, with his small group of representatives from all the security agencies prepares a list of 25-30, which list is further reduced to 10-20. These are brought into the daily videoconference involving the President, National Security Council, DHS, and National Intelligence Director. In 2004 alone, the Justice Department reported 379 convictions related to terrorism.
The NCTC is a 10,000 sq. ft. facility built like a TV network control center with 32 large screens and 350 computer stations. They operate a web page for 5000 worldwide intelligence analysts. They control the no-fly list, and they are available for instant communication countrywide access from police, customs or immigration officers having a suspicious incident involving a terror risk. Someone on the no-fly list, if stopped for a traffic violation, can be held for a surveillance interview. There are 400,000 names on the NCTC list of terrorist entities.
Kessler points out that a major concern of our all of counter-terror officials is the demoralizing effect of the attacks by the left leaning media. The effectiveness of the terror investigations depends to great degree on the assistance and cooperation of the public. To the extent that the left is successful in engendering suspicion of the counter efforts it will further damage our security. At the current level, even though less than 1% of the open tips actually have lead to a terrorist, they are a valuable eye on the ground that has been extremely important especially regarding the new home grown Jihadist threat.
This book is a MUST READ for all Americans. It contains stories of hundreds of specific events, arrests and convictions and hundreds of details that could not be mentioned in this report.
Ronald Kessler has written an extremely important book that discloses the inside story of the War on Terrorism. He takes a complex subject full of long functional names and leads the reader to relatively easy comprehension. He has exposed the incredibly difficult counterterrorism job of protecting this nation from Islamic extremists. This book was very difficult to write but Kessler has humanized the people of the FBI and CIA by telling their personal story as part of the massive efforts they undertook that overhauled our defenses from September 11, 2001 to today. There has not been a successful al Qaeda attack on American soil since 9/11. And these folks are entitled to our praise for their fine work. Along the way, Kessler reveals the distortions and harm that the left leaning media and especially the New York Times and Washington Post have done to the nation’s efforts to protect our citizens.
Mr. Kessler performed the difficult task of providing a documented and readable history of the seven-year period starting in 2000, but he reaches back in history when the circumstances require. There are no footnotes, but the work retains an academic documented quality by providing prolific actual quotes from interviews of the approximately 50 government employees, which Kessler interviewed to bring the story together.
Almost fiction like, the author starts the book with a Prologue, which brings the reader into the world of counter intelligence as it is today. He displays the immense power and cooperation between agencies that is being brought to bear now. Then he steps back in time and in conjunction with cases in progress involving the infamous names like Khalid Sheik Mohammad, Jose Padilla, Abu Zabaydah and others, he introduces the major stumbling blocks facing the FBI, CIA and other intelligence agencies that existed from 2001.
A most significant stumbling block in 2001 was the artificial legal “Chinese Wall” in place at each criminal investigative agency to isolate the crime enforcement personnel of the agency from the intelligence personnel. Kessler does a good job of explaining how that procedure came into being. It isn’t simple to explain but he does a good job. An attorney in the FBI Office of Intelligence Policy Review (OIPR) came up with the idea of using the mechanism of the Chinese Wall to be extra sure that a criminal indictment was never thrown out because the prosecutor had used information to make his criminal case where that information had been obtained under an investigation authorized under the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act (FISA). This Wall procedure required the FBI to maintain separate files for Intelligence Investigations and Criminal Investigations and disallowed the Criminal prosecutors access to Intelligence files. This fear of overturn arose because evidence obtained in foreign electronic interception of a communication that originates outside US is not necessarily subject to the same Constitutional requirements for a search warrant as is an interception (search) in the US of a US person.
The above paragraph is to explain the problem to be addressed by the “Chinese Wall”. But it is understandable that most non-lawyers will still be confused. The Chinese wall mechanism is a well-known procedure in many other legal situations. But the above paragraph was simply the definition of the nature of the issue. Even more burdensome was the fact that there were rules set in place by the OIPR to handle exceptions. These rules were extraordinarily complex and were not generally understood even by the attorneys in the OIPR. Further, OIPR put out the word that anyone who violated the rules was going to be disciplined. So, as is the usual case with human beings, everyone in the agency opted to take the easy way out. The FBI, CIA and other Intelligence agencies adopted the practice of never permitting criminal prosecutors or intelligence investigators to see the other investigators files. Although this was an interpretation unwisely set in place by Attorney General Janet Reno and therefore was only applicable to the FBI and the Justice Department it was eventually adopted by the CIA as well. This “Chinese Wall” problem explains why the FBI was unaware that the CIA had intercepted several al Qaeda transmissions that might have related to the 9/11 plot including a message on 9/10/01 that stated “Tomorrow is zero day.” None of that information was shared with the FBI.
Immediately after 9/11/01 bombing, President Bush asked for an investigation of the “Wall” problem, which showed that no Court had ever thrown out a case because of the feared mixing of information. Unfortunately, the OIPR had adopted an overkill solution that was too complex for the problem and the work around was too easy. The “risk avoidance” or CYA solution was predictable. Every manager needs to be on guard because every perceived possible future problem is not necessarily a real problem, or the fix, as here, can be worse than the problem. FBI Director Mueller immediately withdrew the “Wall” requirement and Congress specifically removed any Wall requirement in the Patriot Act in 2003. As an aside, the Patriot Act amendment kicked off major left-leaning media objections to alleged expansion of governmental power and potential violations of the civil rights of American citizens.
The FBI and CIA immediately after 9/11/01 with President Bush’s full support attacked its other problems including its incredibly outdated computer record systems, diminished morale at the CIA because of President’s Clinton’s de-emphasis in counterterrorism, and inadequate human intelligence at the CIA.
Kessler provides the entire engaging story relating to the reliance by Secretary of State Powell on information from German intelligence in preparing his speech to the UN in which he asserted that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. Powell had refused to use the US generated intelligence information and he independently reached the same conclusion. Ultimately the Iraqi source that had provided intel to German Intelligence was much later proven to be unreliable. He turned out to be a lower level Iraqi employee in the Saddam nuclear program that was seeking asylum in Germany. Again, the left media accused General Powell and the Bush Administration of intentionally lying in the run up to the Iraq war about Saddam’s possession of WMD.
The real facts underlying the Washington Post story of Dana Priest relating to alleged thousands of CIA’s prisoners being held in secret prisons around the world to enable the CIA to torture prisoners. This story earned her a Pulitzer Prize and caused many European nations to cease cooperating with the US in Afghanistan. The facts were that there were no secret prisons and fewer than 100 prisoners had been rendered to anti-terrorist agencies of countries cooperating with the US in the war on terror. Also many of those prisoners originated in those countries.
Kessler also related the embarrassing story about Brandon Mayfield. Brandon was a US attorney, a recent convert to Islam that had given funds indirectly to Hamas. His fingerprint had showed up on a plastic bag discovered in the Spanish train bombing and he was planning a trip to Barcelona. Multiple experts had confirmed the finger print match. Brandon was arrested but there was no other links. Ultimately, in a raid on the terrorist hideout in Spain, the Jihadists blew themselves up to escape capture and the authorities found a finger, the print of which perfectly matched the plastic bag print. Mayfield got $2M settlement and the FBI imposed a higher standard requiring a greater level of assurance on a finger print match.
There are many more interesting stories including the identity leak of Valerie Plame as a CIA agent. Although this investigation lead to the conviction of Vice President Chaney’s deputy for lying to the FBI, in the end, Richard Armatage, the ex-Deputy Sec. of State, a critic of the Bush Administration was revealed to be the leak to Robert Novak. Although both the Washington Post and NYT were on a daily rampage to show Chaney was the source of the Plame link, when the true identity of the leaker broke, the Washington Post ran it on Page 6 and the NYT ran it on Page 12. I find both those papers disgusting.
This book describes several investigations in minute detail. The manpower and the resources it takes to gather all the facts about the alleged actors and the potential links of their brothers, sisters and friends, the travels of each, schools of each, etc, etc mushrooms gigantically. Everyday the investigators evaluate the risk of the advancement of the plot to the point where continuation of the investigation risks injury to citizens and property. Sometimes where an investigation is centered abroad, and there are domestic actors linked to the plot, when we are warned by the foreign agency that it is going to roll up the plot in their country, the US must make the decision if it is better to place the US actors under 24/7 surveillance to see their response to the foreign arrest or to arrest them. How and where they respond when the branch of their plot is arrested is frequently revealing of the cell.
Home grown US terrorists are a new concern. Several networks have already been rolled up involving prison grown networks of Islamic extremists with serious plans of bombing and destruction. Fortunately these groups have not been sophisticated so far.
The public is aware of only the tip of the counter-terror iceberg. In 2007, there were 60-70 terror plots in US being investigated every day. Every morning in the NCTC at 8:00 AM the Threat Matrix involving these treats is evaluated. Vice Admiral Redd, NCTC, with his small group of representatives from all the security agencies prepares a list of 25-30, which list is further reduced to 10-20. These are brought into the daily videoconference involving the President, National Security Council, DHS, and National Intelligence Director. In 2004 alone, the Justice Department reported 379 convictions related to terrorism.
The NCTC is a 10,000 sq. ft. facility built like a TV network control center with 32 large screens and 350 computer stations. They operate a web page for 5000 worldwide intelligence analysts. They control the no-fly list, and they are available for instant communication countrywide access from police, customs or immigration officers having a suspicious incident involving a terror risk. Someone on the no-fly list, if stopped for a traffic violation, can be held for a surveillance interview. There are 400,000 names on the NCTC list of terrorist entities.
Kessler points out that a major concern of our all of counter-terror officials is the demoralizing effect of the attacks by the left leaning media. The effectiveness of the terror investigations depends to great degree on the assistance and cooperation of the public. To the extent that the left is successful in engendering suspicion of the counter efforts it will further damage our security. At the current level, even though less than 1% of the open tips actually have lead to a terrorist, they are a valuable eye on the ground that has been extremely important especially regarding the new home grown Jihadist threat.
This book is a MUST READ for all Americans. It contains stories of hundreds of specific events, arrests and convictions and hundreds of details that could not be mentioned in this report.
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
Rush Limbaugh on Super Tuesday
Limbaugh: Romney Is a 3 Legs Conservative
Tuesday, February 5, 2008 8:01 AM
By: Newsmax Staff
Reversing his previously stated belief that none of the Republican candidates for the GOP presidential nomination have all three legs of the conservative stool, Rush Limbaugh told his listeners Monday that Mitt Romney is indeed a three-leg conservative.
Describing the three legs as "national security/foreign policy, the social conservatives, and the fiscal conservatives," Rush said, "The social conservatives are the cultural people. The fiscal conservatives are the economic crowd: low taxes, smaller government, get out of the way... The foreign policy crowd is obviously what it is. I don't think there's anybody on our side who doesn't care about national security."
"I think now, based on the way the campaign has shaken out, that there probably is a candidate on our side who does embody all three legs of the conservative stool, and that's Romney," the talk radio host added.
As for Mike Huckabee, Limbaugh pronounced, "You might just say the things he's saying about it represent an ignorance born of inexperience in the subject. I don't think Huckabee has any deleterious intentions about the country."
Turning to McCain, Rush said, "When it comes to the fiscal side, you cannot say -- you just cannot say -- that John McCain is interested. He's even admitted he's not interested in the social side. He's not interested in the economic side. He said this, and when he has spoken up about it, he sides more often with liberal Democrats on fiscal issues than he does with his own side.
"If I look at this roster of three candidates -- if I look at Hillary-Obama, about whom there's not a dime's worth of difference, because they're so far left it doesn't matter which one of them wins. If McCain adopts economic policies that sound very much like what you'd get from Hillary-Obama, and if I think those policies are going to take the country down the tubes I'd just as soon the Democrats take the hit for it, not us. Plain and simple."
His conclusion? "I think the one candidate of the three still out there on our side that matter (and, actually, it's just two, because Huckabee doesn't, in terms of a chance to win) is saying who more closely embodies all three legs of this conservative stool, you'd have to say that it's Mitt Romney. There's actually no choice in the matter. It certainly isn't Senator McCain."
Tuesday, February 5, 2008 8:01 AM
By: Newsmax Staff
Reversing his previously stated belief that none of the Republican candidates for the GOP presidential nomination have all three legs of the conservative stool, Rush Limbaugh told his listeners Monday that Mitt Romney is indeed a three-leg conservative.
Describing the three legs as "national security/foreign policy, the social conservatives, and the fiscal conservatives," Rush said, "The social conservatives are the cultural people. The fiscal conservatives are the economic crowd: low taxes, smaller government, get out of the way... The foreign policy crowd is obviously what it is. I don't think there's anybody on our side who doesn't care about national security."
"I think now, based on the way the campaign has shaken out, that there probably is a candidate on our side who does embody all three legs of the conservative stool, and that's Romney," the talk radio host added.
As for Mike Huckabee, Limbaugh pronounced, "You might just say the things he's saying about it represent an ignorance born of inexperience in the subject. I don't think Huckabee has any deleterious intentions about the country."
Turning to McCain, Rush said, "When it comes to the fiscal side, you cannot say -- you just cannot say -- that John McCain is interested. He's even admitted he's not interested in the social side. He's not interested in the economic side. He said this, and when he has spoken up about it, he sides more often with liberal Democrats on fiscal issues than he does with his own side.
"If I look at this roster of three candidates -- if I look at Hillary-Obama, about whom there's not a dime's worth of difference, because they're so far left it doesn't matter which one of them wins. If McCain adopts economic policies that sound very much like what you'd get from Hillary-Obama, and if I think those policies are going to take the country down the tubes I'd just as soon the Democrats take the hit for it, not us. Plain and simple."
His conclusion? "I think the one candidate of the three still out there on our side that matter (and, actually, it's just two, because Huckabee doesn't, in terms of a chance to win) is saying who more closely embodies all three legs of this conservative stool, you'd have to say that it's Mitt Romney. There's actually no choice in the matter. It certainly isn't Senator McCain."
Monday, January 28, 2008
A Soldier's Last Words
Listen up CBS, CNN, Cindy Sheehan, Al Franken
by Louisa Centanni
SGT. Edmund John Jeffer's last few words were some of the most touching, inspiring and most truthful words spoken since the tragedy of 9/11 - and since our nation went to war.
SGT. Jeffers was a strong soldier and talented writer. He died in Iraq on September 19, 2007. He was a loving husband, brother and son. His service was more than this country could ever grasp - but the least you can do for the man who sacrificed his life for you ... is listen to what he had to say.
Listen up and pay attention to all of the Cindy Sheehans and Al Frankens of the world. To MSNBC, CNN, and CBS. To all who call themselves Americans ... Hope Rides Alone.
"Hope Rides Alone"
By Eddie Jeffers
I stare out into the darkness from my post, and I watch the city burn to the ground. I smell the familiar smells, I walk through the familiar rubble, and I look at the frightened faces that watch me pass down the streets of their neighborhoods. My nerves hardly rest; my hands are steady on a device that has been given to me from my government for the purpose of taking the lives of others.
I sweat, and I am tired. My back aches from the loads I carry. Young American boys look to me to direct them in a manner that will someday allow them to see their families again...and yet, I too, am just a boy....my age not but a few years more than that of the ones I lead. I am stressed, I am scared, and I am paranoid...because death is everywhere. It waits for me, it calls to me from around street corners and windows, and it is always there.
There are the demons that follow me, and tempt me into thoughts and actions that are not my own...but that are necessary for survival. I've made compromises with my humanity. And I am not alone in this. Miles from me are my brethren in this world, who walk in the same streets...who feel the same things, whether they admit to it or not.
And to think, I volunteered for this...
And I am ignorant to the rest of the world...or so I thought.
But even thousands of miles away, in Ramadi , Iraq , the cries and screams and complaints of the ungrateful reach me. In a year, I will be thrust back into society from a life and mentality that doesn't fit your average man. And then, I will be alone. And then, I will walk down the streets of America , and see the yellow ribbon stickers on the cars of the same people who compare our President to Hitler.
I will watch the television and watch the Cindy Sheehans, and the Al Frankens, and the rest of the ignorant sheep of America spout off their mouths about a subject they know nothing about. It is their right, however, and it is a right that is defended by hundreds of thousands of boys and girls scattered across the world, far from home. I use the word boys and girls, because that's what they are. In the Army, the average age of the infantryman is nineteen years old. The average rank of soldiers killed in action is Private First Class.
People like Cindy Sheehan are ignorant. Not just to this war, but to the results of their idiotic ramblings, or at least I hope they are. They don't realize its effects on this war. In this war, there are no Geneva Conventions, no cease fires. Medics and Chaplains are not spared from the enemy's brutality because it's against the rules. I can only imagine the horrors a military Chaplain would experience at the hands of the enemy. The enemy slinks in the shadows and fights a coward's war against us. It is effective though, as many men and women have died since the start of this war. And the memory of their service to America is tainted by the inconsiderate remarks on our nation's news outlets. And every day, the enemy changes...only now, the enemy is becoming something new. The enemy is transitioning from the Muslim extremists to Americans. The enemy is becoming the very people whom we defend with our lives. And they do not realize it.
But in denouncing our actions, denouncing our leaders, denouncing the war we live and fight, they are isolating the military from society...and they are becoming our enemy.
Democrats and peace activists like to toss the word "quagmire" around and compare this war to Vietnam . In a way they are right, this war is becoming like Vietnam Not the actual war, but in the isolation of country and military. America is not a nation at war; they are a nation with its military at war. Like it or not, we are here, some of us for our second, or third times; some even for their fourth and so on. Americans are so concerned now with politics, that it is interfering with our war.
Terrorists cut the heads off of American citizens on the Internet...and there is no outrage, but an American soldier kills an Iraqi in the midst of battle, and there are investigations, and sometimes soldiers are even jailed...for doing their job.
It is absolutely sickening to me to think our country has come to this. Why are we so obsessed with the bad news? Why will people stop at nothing to be against this war, no matter how much evidence of the good we've done is thrown in their face? When is the last time CNN or MSNBC or CBS reported the opening of schools and hospitals in Iraq ? Or the leaders of terror cells being detained or killed? It's all happening, but people will not let up their hatred of Bush. They will ignore the good news, because it just might show people that Bush was right.
America has lost its will to fight. It has lost its will to defend what is right and just in the world. The crazy thing of it all is that the American people have not even been asked to sacrifice a single thing. It's not like World War Two, where people rationed food, and turned in cars to be made into metal for tanks. The American people have not been asked to sacrifice anything. Unless you are in the military or the family member of a service member, its life as usual...the war doesn't affect you.
But it affects us. And when it is over, and the troops come home, and they try to piece together what's left of them after their service...where will the detractors be then? Where will the Cindy Sheehans be to comfort and talk to soldiers and help them sort out the last couple years of their lives, most of which have been spent dodging death and wading through the deaths of their friends? They will be where they always are, somewhere far away, where the horrors of the world can't touch them. Somewhere where they can complain about things they will never experience in their lifetime; things that the young men and women of America have willingly taken upon their shoulders.
We are the hope of the Iraqi people. They want what everyone else wants in life: safety, security, somewhere to call home. They want a country that is safe to raise their children in. Not a place where their children will be abducted, raped, and murdered if they do not comply with the terrorists demands. They want to live on, rebuild and prosper. And America has given them the opportunity, but only if we stay true to the cause, and see it to its end. But the country must unite in this endeavor...we cannot place the burden on our military alone. We must all stand up and fight, whether in uniform or not. And supporting us is more than sticking yellow ribbon stickers on your cars. It's supporting our President, our troops and our cause.
Right now, the burden is all on the American soldiers. Right now, hope rides alone. But it can change, it must change. Because there is only failure and darkness ahead for us as a country, as a people, if it doesn't.
Let's stop all the political nonsense, let's stop all the bickering, let's stop all the bad news, and let's stand and fight!
Eddie's father, David Jeffers, writes:
I'm not sure how many letters or articles you've ever read from the genre of "News from the Front," but this is one of the best I've ever read, including all of America 's wars. As I was reading this, I forgot that it was my son who had written it. My emotions range from great pride to great sorrow, knowing that my little boy (22 years old) has become this man.
He is my hero. Thank all of you for your prayers for him; he needs them now more than ever. God bless.
Though Eddie is no longer with us, you can help to let his voice be heard.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Learning the Hard Way is Still the Best Way
Moses learned the hard way that he was Hebrew and not Egyptian. What we know about Moses and his calling has been gathered from Scripture: being the one chosen to see the Israelites freed from bondage. They were liberated in the end, and their journey to the Promised Land -- albeit coursed with peril -- was a welcome new beginning.
So it was with the men, women and children who fled the lands of their birth to escape despots and religious persecution -- to walk unfettered and unthreatened upon the new promised land: America. They risked all traveling thousands of miles to be counted amongst those who chose to face unknown dangers rather than bend or perish under the yoke of tyranny.
In 1781, America became a free and independent nation. Our Constitution was written not for the leaders but for the people -- for “We, the People.” This sacred document ensured that no imperial classes would be allowed to exist. There would be no monarch to set down archaic rules. It was by the sweat and labor of immigrants from all the world’s nations that America was created, in which hope and opportunity is limitless -- where Americans rule themselves.
These pioneers built this country, and this country built them into Americans. They cleared the land, raised homes and houses of worship and drew up colonies of free citizens, carving new states out of the forests, prairies and wilderness as they pushed westward. They carried freedom with them. Here a vast segment of humanity was given the chance to start fresh:
The English, the Scotsmen and the Dutch produced elegant furniture in their workshops in New England. The Italians worked the sulfur mines of Louisiana. The French and Swiss planted vineyards in California and New York State. Danes, Norwegians and Swedes seeded the earth and made the Midwest flourish with grain. It was Irishmen whom, in large part, constructed the Erie Canal, the Statue of Liberty and the eastern section of the transcontinental railroad.
Welshmen farmed, dug coal and quarried in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Among their descendants were William Penn, Thomas Jefferson, Chief Justice John Marshall, and Robert Morris - the foremost financier of the American Revolution and a signer to the Declaration of Independence.
The Spanish Conquistadores -- the first to roam the Southwest in the 1500s -- infused music, art, language, architecture and literature to the region. They brought from Spain the horse and cattle, and established ranches (haciendas) upon which these noble creatures could serve their owners. The Spaniards also introduced the rites of faith and built Catholic missions.
Mexicans worked the oil fields of Texas proficiently, and rode herd in New Mexico with equal expertise. Greek and Portuguese fishermen harvested the oceans. Germans, Hungarians, Russians, Slavs and Chinese all worked side by side with so many, many more peoples of diverse cultures -- and this great nation was built by the industry of such Americans.
America became the country where dreams were transformed into certainties.
Came then 2001, and our country was brutally attacked and is since being menaced by Islamic terrorists. Executing murder and mayhem against entities and persons American (and anything and everyone from the West; and all who are non-Islam) is the standing order handed down by their mullahs.
Compounding abuse with the damage and death suffered on that Tuesday morning six years ago, here in the United States there is a growing army of conspiracy theorists who are littering the intellectual landscape with their bent notion that the Central Intelligence Agency and the U.S. Military had a hand in the monstrous events of September 11th. Additionally, our Congress, of which the majority are Democrats, appear to be attempting to countermand the efforts of our National Security Agency, and thereby playing straight into the hands of the very disciples of hell who are hell-bent on destroying us.
Terrorists and Democrats alike should be reminded of the following insofar as Americans are concerned:
In spite of everything, we never lose our faith in the future. We believe in the future. We build and will continue to build for the future. And when we’ve finished building, we develop something new and have to start re-building.
Deep down we yearn for peace. We take every route to avoid conflict. But when conflict is unavoidable we engage with a ferocity that is unrivaled to protect our freedom.
That’s the kind of people Americans are: we work and fight hard, and harder still, because we have the freedom to do it.
Beginning in 1777 at Valley Forge, Americans fought and froze, suffered and died for the future freedom of all Americans. Our freedom is the only way of living we know. We fought for it 300 years ago, 200 years ago, a century and a half ago, and in both world wars -- and continue fighting the same fight today.
Americans are slow to anger and easygoing, but merciless when our freedom is threatened, because we are passionately dedicated to the ideals our forefathers passed on to us: the liberty and dignity of all men.
We believe that if all men throughout the world could turn their energies towards peaceful coexistence the way Americans have turned their energies towards the construction of this great nation, wars would soon be as outdated as the soon-to-be-outdated death cry 'Allah Akbar!'
The pioneer Americans had to learn and adapt the hard way. They never failed to give thanks every day for what they had. And we, their descendants, must never go to sleep at night ashamed of our deeds, whether for ourselves, our country, or the world at large.
**********
Note from the author: Parts of this writing were inspired by a film prepared by the War Department during World War II, entitled, “Why We Fight World War II - The Battle of China / War Comes to America” (available on DVD), and I have blended -- and expounded upon -- segments of the film’s narration (read by the actor Walter Huston) into this commentary.
So it was with the men, women and children who fled the lands of their birth to escape despots and religious persecution -- to walk unfettered and unthreatened upon the new promised land: America. They risked all traveling thousands of miles to be counted amongst those who chose to face unknown dangers rather than bend or perish under the yoke of tyranny.
In 1781, America became a free and independent nation. Our Constitution was written not for the leaders but for the people -- for “We, the People.” This sacred document ensured that no imperial classes would be allowed to exist. There would be no monarch to set down archaic rules. It was by the sweat and labor of immigrants from all the world’s nations that America was created, in which hope and opportunity is limitless -- where Americans rule themselves.
These pioneers built this country, and this country built them into Americans. They cleared the land, raised homes and houses of worship and drew up colonies of free citizens, carving new states out of the forests, prairies and wilderness as they pushed westward. They carried freedom with them. Here a vast segment of humanity was given the chance to start fresh:
The English, the Scotsmen and the Dutch produced elegant furniture in their workshops in New England. The Italians worked the sulfur mines of Louisiana. The French and Swiss planted vineyards in California and New York State. Danes, Norwegians and Swedes seeded the earth and made the Midwest flourish with grain. It was Irishmen whom, in large part, constructed the Erie Canal, the Statue of Liberty and the eastern section of the transcontinental railroad.
Welshmen farmed, dug coal and quarried in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Among their descendants were William Penn, Thomas Jefferson, Chief Justice John Marshall, and Robert Morris - the foremost financier of the American Revolution and a signer to the Declaration of Independence.
The Spanish Conquistadores -- the first to roam the Southwest in the 1500s -- infused music, art, language, architecture and literature to the region. They brought from Spain the horse and cattle, and established ranches (haciendas) upon which these noble creatures could serve their owners. The Spaniards also introduced the rites of faith and built Catholic missions.
Mexicans worked the oil fields of Texas proficiently, and rode herd in New Mexico with equal expertise. Greek and Portuguese fishermen harvested the oceans. Germans, Hungarians, Russians, Slavs and Chinese all worked side by side with so many, many more peoples of diverse cultures -- and this great nation was built by the industry of such Americans.
America became the country where dreams were transformed into certainties.
Came then 2001, and our country was brutally attacked and is since being menaced by Islamic terrorists. Executing murder and mayhem against entities and persons American (and anything and everyone from the West; and all who are non-Islam) is the standing order handed down by their mullahs.
Compounding abuse with the damage and death suffered on that Tuesday morning six years ago, here in the United States there is a growing army of conspiracy theorists who are littering the intellectual landscape with their bent notion that the Central Intelligence Agency and the U.S. Military had a hand in the monstrous events of September 11th. Additionally, our Congress, of which the majority are Democrats, appear to be attempting to countermand the efforts of our National Security Agency, and thereby playing straight into the hands of the very disciples of hell who are hell-bent on destroying us.
Terrorists and Democrats alike should be reminded of the following insofar as Americans are concerned:
In spite of everything, we never lose our faith in the future. We believe in the future. We build and will continue to build for the future. And when we’ve finished building, we develop something new and have to start re-building.
Deep down we yearn for peace. We take every route to avoid conflict. But when conflict is unavoidable we engage with a ferocity that is unrivaled to protect our freedom.
That’s the kind of people Americans are: we work and fight hard, and harder still, because we have the freedom to do it.
Beginning in 1777 at Valley Forge, Americans fought and froze, suffered and died for the future freedom of all Americans. Our freedom is the only way of living we know. We fought for it 300 years ago, 200 years ago, a century and a half ago, and in both world wars -- and continue fighting the same fight today.
Americans are slow to anger and easygoing, but merciless when our freedom is threatened, because we are passionately dedicated to the ideals our forefathers passed on to us: the liberty and dignity of all men.
We believe that if all men throughout the world could turn their energies towards peaceful coexistence the way Americans have turned their energies towards the construction of this great nation, wars would soon be as outdated as the soon-to-be-outdated death cry 'Allah Akbar!'
The pioneer Americans had to learn and adapt the hard way. They never failed to give thanks every day for what they had. And we, their descendants, must never go to sleep at night ashamed of our deeds, whether for ourselves, our country, or the world at large.
**********
Note from the author: Parts of this writing were inspired by a film prepared by the War Department during World War II, entitled, “Why We Fight World War II - The Battle of China / War Comes to America” (available on DVD), and I have blended -- and expounded upon -- segments of the film’s narration (read by the actor Walter Huston) into this commentary.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
A President's Prayer
My Fellow Americans:
Last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our Allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far.
And so, in this poignant hour, I ask you to join with me in prayer:
Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity.
Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.
They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.
They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest -- until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men's souls will be shaken with the violences of war.
For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and goodwill among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.
Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom.
And for us at home -- fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas, whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them -- help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.
Many people have urged that I call the nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.
Give us strength, too -- strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our armed forces.
And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.
And, O Lord, give us faith. Give us faith in Thee; faith in our sons; faith in each other; faith in our united crusade. Let not the keeness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment -- let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.
With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogances. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace -- a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.
Thy will be done, Almighty God.
Amen.
Franklin D. Roosevelt - June 6, 1944
Last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our Allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far.
And so, in this poignant hour, I ask you to join with me in prayer:
Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity.
Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.
They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.
They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest -- until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men's souls will be shaken with the violences of war.
For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and goodwill among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.
Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom.
And for us at home -- fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas, whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them -- help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.
Many people have urged that I call the nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.
Give us strength, too -- strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our armed forces.
And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.
And, O Lord, give us faith. Give us faith in Thee; faith in our sons; faith in each other; faith in our united crusade. Let not the keeness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment -- let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.
With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogances. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace -- a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.
Thy will be done, Almighty God.
Amen.
Franklin D. Roosevelt - June 6, 1944
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
"Red Shirt Fridays" for our Military
**Author unknown**
Last week, while traveling to Chicago on business, I noticed a Marine sergeant traveling with a folded American flag, but did not put two and two together.
After we boarded our flight, I turned to the sergeant, who'd been invited to sit in First Class (across from me), and inquired if he was heading home.
“No,” he responded.
“Heading out?” I asked.
“No. I'm escorting a soldier home.”
“Going to pick him up?”
“No. He is with me right now. He was killed in Iraq. I'm taking him home to his family.”
The realization of what he had been asked to do hit me like a punch to the gut. It was an honor for him. He told me that although he didn't know the soldier, he had delivered the news of his passing to the soldier's family and felt as if he knew them after many conversations in so few days.
I turned back to him, extended my hand, and said, “Thank you. Thank you for doing what you do so my family and I can do what we do.”
Upon landing in Chicago the pilot stopped short of the gate and made the following announcement over the intercom:
"Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to note that we have had the honor of having Sergeant Steeley of the United States Marine Corps join us on this flight. He is escorting a fallen comrade back home to his family. I ask that you please remain in your seats when we open the forward door to allow Sergeant Steeley to deplane and receive his fellow soldier. We will then turn off the seat belt sign."
Without a sound, all went as requested. I noticed the sergeant saluting the casket as it was brought off the plane, and his action made me realize that I am proud to be an American.
So here's a public Thank You to our military Men and Women for what you do so we can live the way we do:
Red Fridays.
Very soon, you will see a great many people wearing Red every Friday. The reason? Americans who support our troops used to be called the "silent majority." We are no longer silent, and are voicing our love for God, country and home in record-breaking numbers. We are not organized, boisterous or overbearing.
Many Americans, like you, me and all our friends simply want to recognize that the vast majority of America supports our troops. Our idea of showing solidarity and support for our troops with dignity and respect starts this Friday -- and continues each and every Friday until the troops all come home, sending a deafening message that every red-blooded American who supports our men and women afar, will wear something red.
By word of mouth, press, TV -- let's make the United States on every Friday a sea of red much like a homecoming football game in the bleachers. If every one of us who loves this country will share this with acquaintances, coworkers, friends, and family, it will not be long before the USA is covered in RED and it will let our troops know the once "silent" majority is on their side more than ever, certainly more than the media lets on.The first thing a soldier says when asked "What can we do to make things better for you?" is. "We need your support and your prayers."
Let's get the word out and lead with class and dignity, by example, and wear something red every Friday.
Friday, May 11, 2007
The Grand Delusion Islam
by Amil Imani
"We are our beliefs," it is said. Beliefs steer people in life. Some beliefs are harmless, some are the motive force for good, and yet others are delusional, misguided, and even outright dangerous. Every version of the belief called "Islam" ranges from the delusional to the dangerous.
Islam is a Grand Delusion, birthed by Muhammad's hallucination he relayed to his first wife and employer, Khadija. Greatly frightened, he told Khadija that he was visited by jinn (devil) in the Hira cave. Khadija comforted the distraught man by assuring him that the episode was Allah's way of choosing him as his messenger. Muhammad believed his rich wife-employer who was 15 years his senior and the delusion became a belief-Islam.
Remarkably enough, under the early tutelage of Khadija, Muhammad succeeded in attracting a number of influential followers. Before long, the movement gathered more and more power through violent campaigns and the faith was taken to new people and alien lands. This grand delusion, Islam, presently has in its stranglehold over a billion humans, posing an existential threat to all non-Muslims.
Islam is rooted in the primitive tribal mentality of "We against Them," "We the righteous against the heathens," "We the servants submissive of the Great Allah against the rebellious enemies of Allah." Islam is a polarizer. Islam is an enemy-maker. To Islam, a non-Muslim is a combatant against Allah and he is fair game to be subjugated and killed.
When some billion and a half adhere to the pathological belief of Islam and use it as their marching order of life, the rest of humanity can ignore the threat only at its own peril.
Once again, a resurgent Islam is on a campaign of conquest throughout the world. Hordes of life-in-hand foot-solider fanatical Muslims are striving to kill and get killed. All they want is the opportunity to discharge their homicidal-suicidal impulse, on their way to Allah's promised glorious paradise. And in the background granting the foot soldiers' wishes are their handlers, the puppeteers, who pull the strings and detonate these human bombs. Those who cherish life must recognize these emissaries of death, what makes them, what motivates them, and how best to defend against them.
The campaign of death waged by the Islamist-jihadist, be he a puppet or a puppeteer, is energized by the belief of delectable rewards that await the faithful implementer of Allah's dictates. Through a highly effective indoctrination, the jihadist has come to believe firmly in Islam's grand delusion. He believes that Allah is the one and only supreme creator of earth and heavens; that it is his duty and privilege to abide by Allah's will and carry out his plans at all costs; he believes firmly in a gloriously wonderful immortal afterlife in paradise, for which a martyr's death is the surest quickest admission. Although the dominating theme of the delusion is quasi spiritual, the promised rewards of the afterlife awaiting the martyr are sensual and material. All the things and activities that the jihadist desires and cannot attain or practice, and rejects in his earthly life will be purified and proffered to him in the paradise of the next life. Thus goes the delusion.
It is important to understand that the human mind is not a perfect discerner of the objective reality. In actuality, reality is in the mind of the beholder. The outside world only supplies bits and pieces of raw material that the mind puts together to form its reality. Depending on the type and amount of bits and pieces that a given mind receives, its reality can be very different from that of another mind.
The more prescribed and homogeneous a group, the greater is the group's consensual reality, since the members share much in common experiential input and reinforce each others' mindset. Thus, members of a given religious order, for instance, tend to think much more similarly to one another than to members of other groups with different experiential histories.
Various approximations of the objective reality, therefore, rule the mind. The degree to which these approximations deviate from the larger group's consensual reality determines its delusional extent and severity.
A cocaine mainliner, for instance, under the influence of the drug, may become convinced that a bug is burrowing under his skin. In his absolute, although clearly false, certitude of the reality of his perception, cocaine users are known to take a knife to their own body to dig the burrowing bug out before it has penetrated too deeply.
A methamphetamine user's reality is often distorted in a different way. Under the influence of the drug, an intense paranoia overtakes him. His reality is dominated by the belief that one or more people are lurking about to harm or kill him. He may wield a deadly weapon, going from room to room, from closet to closet, in search of the assailants. If you believe that a bug is camping deeply in your body, then you might go ahead and try to dig the non-existent bug out. If you believe that people are lurking around the house to harm or kill you, you go after them before they get you. If you believe that all the troubles of the world are due to the evil-doings of the non-Muslims who war against Allah, then you do all you can to fight and kill them, particularly since Allah tells you to do so in the Quran.
The drug-induced delusions are hallucinations. They are dramatic and usually transitory, while religion-based implantation of ideas program the mind with lasting delusions.
Delusions, even when they are at great variance from the objective reality, can rule the mind without the need for drugs, or as a result of neurological dysfunctions or other factors. The young and less educated are most vulnerable to believe the claims of charlatans, con artists and cunning clerics as truth and reality.
A tragic example of the young's susceptibility to induced delusion is the case of thousands of Iranian children who were used as human minesweepers in the last Iran-Iraq war. The mullahs issued made-in-China plastic keys for paradise to children as enticement to go forward and clear the minefield with their bodies ahead of the military's armored vehicles. The children believed the murderers and rushed to their death, thinking that they were headed for Islam's glorious paradise.
The repeated intense indoctrination of the children even changed the perception of some of the charlatan mullahs so that they, themselves, believed their own lies, took their own keys to Allah's paradise and rushed to their death clinging to the plastic trinkets. Hence, some of the puppeteers, in this instance, became puppets themselves. Such are the follies and fallibilities of the human mind.
It is, therefore, understandable that many of the higher-up Islamic puppeteers, who are usually brainwashed from early childhood, devote their fortunes and persons to the implementation of their deeply engrained delusions.
Deluded by the threats and promises of Islam, Muslims, poor or rich vie with one another in furthering the violent cause of Allah.
Many non-Muslims are also victims of a different, yet just as deadly, delusion. They believe that Islam is a religion of peace, that only a small minority of Muslims are jihadists, and Muslims can be reasoned with to abandon the Quran-mandated elimination of the non-believers. These well-meaning simpletons are just as deluded as the fanatic jihadists by refusing to acknowledge the fact that one cannot be a Muslim and not abide by the dictates of the Quran.
Amil Imani is an Iranian-born American citizen and pro-democracy activist residing in the United States of America. Imani is a columnist, literary translator, novelist and an essayist, who has been writing and speaking out about the urgency of confronting the jihadists and Islamism. He maintains a website at http://www.amilimani.com/
Your contribution is earnestly appreciated, and it will immensely help us to carry on.
"We are our beliefs," it is said. Beliefs steer people in life. Some beliefs are harmless, some are the motive force for good, and yet others are delusional, misguided, and even outright dangerous. Every version of the belief called "Islam" ranges from the delusional to the dangerous.
Islam is a Grand Delusion, birthed by Muhammad's hallucination he relayed to his first wife and employer, Khadija. Greatly frightened, he told Khadija that he was visited by jinn (devil) in the Hira cave. Khadija comforted the distraught man by assuring him that the episode was Allah's way of choosing him as his messenger. Muhammad believed his rich wife-employer who was 15 years his senior and the delusion became a belief-Islam.
Remarkably enough, under the early tutelage of Khadija, Muhammad succeeded in attracting a number of influential followers. Before long, the movement gathered more and more power through violent campaigns and the faith was taken to new people and alien lands. This grand delusion, Islam, presently has in its stranglehold over a billion humans, posing an existential threat to all non-Muslims.
Islam is rooted in the primitive tribal mentality of "We against Them," "We the righteous against the heathens," "We the servants submissive of the Great Allah against the rebellious enemies of Allah." Islam is a polarizer. Islam is an enemy-maker. To Islam, a non-Muslim is a combatant against Allah and he is fair game to be subjugated and killed.
When some billion and a half adhere to the pathological belief of Islam and use it as their marching order of life, the rest of humanity can ignore the threat only at its own peril.
Once again, a resurgent Islam is on a campaign of conquest throughout the world. Hordes of life-in-hand foot-solider fanatical Muslims are striving to kill and get killed. All they want is the opportunity to discharge their homicidal-suicidal impulse, on their way to Allah's promised glorious paradise. And in the background granting the foot soldiers' wishes are their handlers, the puppeteers, who pull the strings and detonate these human bombs. Those who cherish life must recognize these emissaries of death, what makes them, what motivates them, and how best to defend against them.
The campaign of death waged by the Islamist-jihadist, be he a puppet or a puppeteer, is energized by the belief of delectable rewards that await the faithful implementer of Allah's dictates. Through a highly effective indoctrination, the jihadist has come to believe firmly in Islam's grand delusion. He believes that Allah is the one and only supreme creator of earth and heavens; that it is his duty and privilege to abide by Allah's will and carry out his plans at all costs; he believes firmly in a gloriously wonderful immortal afterlife in paradise, for which a martyr's death is the surest quickest admission. Although the dominating theme of the delusion is quasi spiritual, the promised rewards of the afterlife awaiting the martyr are sensual and material. All the things and activities that the jihadist desires and cannot attain or practice, and rejects in his earthly life will be purified and proffered to him in the paradise of the next life. Thus goes the delusion.
It is important to understand that the human mind is not a perfect discerner of the objective reality. In actuality, reality is in the mind of the beholder. The outside world only supplies bits and pieces of raw material that the mind puts together to form its reality. Depending on the type and amount of bits and pieces that a given mind receives, its reality can be very different from that of another mind.
The more prescribed and homogeneous a group, the greater is the group's consensual reality, since the members share much in common experiential input and reinforce each others' mindset. Thus, members of a given religious order, for instance, tend to think much more similarly to one another than to members of other groups with different experiential histories.
Various approximations of the objective reality, therefore, rule the mind. The degree to which these approximations deviate from the larger group's consensual reality determines its delusional extent and severity.
A cocaine mainliner, for instance, under the influence of the drug, may become convinced that a bug is burrowing under his skin. In his absolute, although clearly false, certitude of the reality of his perception, cocaine users are known to take a knife to their own body to dig the burrowing bug out before it has penetrated too deeply.
A methamphetamine user's reality is often distorted in a different way. Under the influence of the drug, an intense paranoia overtakes him. His reality is dominated by the belief that one or more people are lurking about to harm or kill him. He may wield a deadly weapon, going from room to room, from closet to closet, in search of the assailants. If you believe that a bug is camping deeply in your body, then you might go ahead and try to dig the non-existent bug out. If you believe that people are lurking around the house to harm or kill you, you go after them before they get you. If you believe that all the troubles of the world are due to the evil-doings of the non-Muslims who war against Allah, then you do all you can to fight and kill them, particularly since Allah tells you to do so in the Quran.
The drug-induced delusions are hallucinations. They are dramatic and usually transitory, while religion-based implantation of ideas program the mind with lasting delusions.
Delusions, even when they are at great variance from the objective reality, can rule the mind without the need for drugs, or as a result of neurological dysfunctions or other factors. The young and less educated are most vulnerable to believe the claims of charlatans, con artists and cunning clerics as truth and reality.
A tragic example of the young's susceptibility to induced delusion is the case of thousands of Iranian children who were used as human minesweepers in the last Iran-Iraq war. The mullahs issued made-in-China plastic keys for paradise to children as enticement to go forward and clear the minefield with their bodies ahead of the military's armored vehicles. The children believed the murderers and rushed to their death, thinking that they were headed for Islam's glorious paradise.
The repeated intense indoctrination of the children even changed the perception of some of the charlatan mullahs so that they, themselves, believed their own lies, took their own keys to Allah's paradise and rushed to their death clinging to the plastic trinkets. Hence, some of the puppeteers, in this instance, became puppets themselves. Such are the follies and fallibilities of the human mind.
It is, therefore, understandable that many of the higher-up Islamic puppeteers, who are usually brainwashed from early childhood, devote their fortunes and persons to the implementation of their deeply engrained delusions.
Deluded by the threats and promises of Islam, Muslims, poor or rich vie with one another in furthering the violent cause of Allah.
Many non-Muslims are also victims of a different, yet just as deadly, delusion. They believe that Islam is a religion of peace, that only a small minority of Muslims are jihadists, and Muslims can be reasoned with to abandon the Quran-mandated elimination of the non-believers. These well-meaning simpletons are just as deluded as the fanatic jihadists by refusing to acknowledge the fact that one cannot be a Muslim and not abide by the dictates of the Quran.
Amil Imani is an Iranian-born American citizen and pro-democracy activist residing in the United States of America. Imani is a columnist, literary translator, novelist and an essayist, who has been writing and speaking out about the urgency of confronting the jihadists and Islamism. He maintains a website at http://www.amilimani.com/
Your contribution is earnestly appreciated, and it will immensely help us to carry on.
Friday, March 30, 2007
Stand Up or Stand Down?
In America’s political system, the people are represented by two separate -- but not necessarily equal -- groups: Republicans who set off to hunt down, prosecute, and eliminate terrorist regimes and Democrats who draft deadlines in favor of admitting defeat.
Since the birth of this nation, procedural and legal dramas have been the bases for the system we call “political.” In recent days, these stage shows have spawned self-destruction rhetoric from the Left: a timed withdrawal from Iraq (which coincides with another Iran hostage crisis that has ignited international furor, this one involving captured British sailors).
Congress’ plan to pull out our troops was loosely addressed to the American people. In actuality, the audience viewing and hearing such imprudence is worldwide and thus seen and heard by our enemies -- and could not have been broadcast (and repeatedly re-broadcast) at a worse possible time in view of Iran’s seizure of Britain’s military personnel and property.
The plan, especially now, can only serve to promote the false idea that we and our allies are credulous; and it will exacerbate the festering hatred of everything and everyone American and allied to America, both in the U.S. and abroad. The plan’s authors seem unable to comprehend that they are also recklessly wagering our country’s existence against President Bush’s unyielding efforts to extinguish terrorism.
As expected, protecting America and its citizens has evolved into a mêlée for absolute power on the part of Democratic leaders in the House and Senate, particularly third-in-line-to-the- Presidency, Nancy Pelosi. Coupled with this is Congress’s voracious craving to paint our Chief Executive a fool with public statements such as: “[The President should] calm down with the threats … there’s a new Congress in town,” from Pelosi; and “[The President should] get real with what’s going on in the world” from Harry Reid -- as Iran plays Russian roulette with members of England’s Royal Navy.
These are the same addled pronouncements mouthed by liberals to evade the fundamental issues. Rather than assist in fortifying our nation’s moral fiber, shoring up our borders, and taking positive and responsible leadership for the long-term, this new Congress seems incapable of arriving at unassailable solutions to bring down terrorists; they prefer to take the overcrowded low road of mercilessly censuring, demeaning and vilifying our President and his administration.
Congress’ plan to disassemble our offensive barriers will backfire disastrously, for us and for all of humankind. It shouldn’t take a Rhodes scholar to calculate the math, that at the moment the last uniformed soldier steps off Middle East soil there will be a worldwide, all-out holy war declared by the dedicated forces of evil. Thereafter, not a minute, hour or day will pass without the global media delivering staggering accounts of noncombatant civilians -- both non-Muslim and Muslim -- summarily dismembered, blown up, and shot down. Sociopathic madness will stampede out of control and the countries under attack can blame none but themselves for having left the terrorists uncontained and their borders undefended and vulnerable.
To Speaker Pelosi and Harry Reid: This includes the United States of America.
These nightmare scenarios are not spun from a storyteller’s imagination. They are the present day realities, and are precisely what President Bush has worked hard to prevent from happening (again) on U.S. soil as well as throughout the enlightened world. He has never asked for plaudits or shiny medals or a fatter bank account for his endeavors. He does it because it was, is, and always will be the right thing to do. At the same time, it has taken an insurmountable leap of faith and strength of will on the part of our President to battle not just the terrorists but also his own Congress.
President Bush’s concept to wipe out terrorism is unique inspiration. After September 11, 2001, he did not shirk his responsibilities and act as if all was, once again, at peace with the world. With the majority consent of Congress at the time, our President deployed the matchless power of our all-volunteer armed forces to fight terrorists on their ground. That was then.
This is now:
The world has turned its back on America and on the battle against terrorism. Congress are doing the very same, because it is they, not the President, who are ill equipped emotionally to deal with “...what’s going on in the world” -- because the Democrats do not, and apparently will never, possess the chutzpah it takes to ride the lonely high road and be as unique and courageous as George W. Bush.
Since the birth of this nation, procedural and legal dramas have been the bases for the system we call “political.” In recent days, these stage shows have spawned self-destruction rhetoric from the Left: a timed withdrawal from Iraq (which coincides with another Iran hostage crisis that has ignited international furor, this one involving captured British sailors).
Congress’ plan to pull out our troops was loosely addressed to the American people. In actuality, the audience viewing and hearing such imprudence is worldwide and thus seen and heard by our enemies -- and could not have been broadcast (and repeatedly re-broadcast) at a worse possible time in view of Iran’s seizure of Britain’s military personnel and property.
The plan, especially now, can only serve to promote the false idea that we and our allies are credulous; and it will exacerbate the festering hatred of everything and everyone American and allied to America, both in the U.S. and abroad. The plan’s authors seem unable to comprehend that they are also recklessly wagering our country’s existence against President Bush’s unyielding efforts to extinguish terrorism.
As expected, protecting America and its citizens has evolved into a mêlée for absolute power on the part of Democratic leaders in the House and Senate, particularly third-in-line-to-the- Presidency, Nancy Pelosi. Coupled with this is Congress’s voracious craving to paint our Chief Executive a fool with public statements such as: “[The President should] calm down with the threats … there’s a new Congress in town,” from Pelosi; and “[The President should] get real with what’s going on in the world” from Harry Reid -- as Iran plays Russian roulette with members of England’s Royal Navy.
These are the same addled pronouncements mouthed by liberals to evade the fundamental issues. Rather than assist in fortifying our nation’s moral fiber, shoring up our borders, and taking positive and responsible leadership for the long-term, this new Congress seems incapable of arriving at unassailable solutions to bring down terrorists; they prefer to take the overcrowded low road of mercilessly censuring, demeaning and vilifying our President and his administration.
Congress’ plan to disassemble our offensive barriers will backfire disastrously, for us and for all of humankind. It shouldn’t take a Rhodes scholar to calculate the math, that at the moment the last uniformed soldier steps off Middle East soil there will be a worldwide, all-out holy war declared by the dedicated forces of evil. Thereafter, not a minute, hour or day will pass without the global media delivering staggering accounts of noncombatant civilians -- both non-Muslim and Muslim -- summarily dismembered, blown up, and shot down. Sociopathic madness will stampede out of control and the countries under attack can blame none but themselves for having left the terrorists uncontained and their borders undefended and vulnerable.
To Speaker Pelosi and Harry Reid: This includes the United States of America.
These nightmare scenarios are not spun from a storyteller’s imagination. They are the present day realities, and are precisely what President Bush has worked hard to prevent from happening (again) on U.S. soil as well as throughout the enlightened world. He has never asked for plaudits or shiny medals or a fatter bank account for his endeavors. He does it because it was, is, and always will be the right thing to do. At the same time, it has taken an insurmountable leap of faith and strength of will on the part of our President to battle not just the terrorists but also his own Congress.
President Bush’s concept to wipe out terrorism is unique inspiration. After September 11, 2001, he did not shirk his responsibilities and act as if all was, once again, at peace with the world. With the majority consent of Congress at the time, our President deployed the matchless power of our all-volunteer armed forces to fight terrorists on their ground. That was then.
This is now:
The world has turned its back on America and on the battle against terrorism. Congress are doing the very same, because it is they, not the President, who are ill equipped emotionally to deal with “...what’s going on in the world” -- because the Democrats do not, and apparently will never, possess the chutzpah it takes to ride the lonely high road and be as unique and courageous as George W. Bush.
Monday, March 26, 2007
Mr. Right, not "Mr. Right Now"
by Tanya Simon
You don’t become President. The Presidency is an institution and you have temporary custody of it.
–Ronald Wilson Reagan
In the four short years of the office’s term, the man elected must rise up to and sustain the Constitutional oath: ‘…that I will faithfully execute the office of the President of the United States and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, so help me God.’
There is no pledge as powerful and as selfless, because it demands that the succeeding custodian of the Presidency continue the eternal uphill struggle for, by and against the myriad of domestic and foreign issues that eclipse our lives: hostile world leaders; growing numbers of disillusioned and dissatisfied citizens; invidious politicians on both sides of the aisle who handily switch from ally to adversary between sunrise and sunset; biased media reporting with the intent to thwart the Chief Executive’s credibility; predisposed civilian groups aggressively intoning issue after issue (whether relevant or not) -- to name a few. And there remains the singular matter that requires our sitting and future President’s attention 24/7: the promise by riotous Islamist terrorists to cause our destruction.
In view of these contentious realities, what distinctions should Americans expect from our next President?
Above all: Leadership. He must be governed by a steel-eye countenance in order to effectively assume the mantle of Commander in Chief and stand knuckle to knuckle with our avowed enemies -- upholding the principle that America takes a backseat to no one.
The next man destined to serve the American people knows to expect a daunting hand-off from George W. Bush, which is why that man must also cross the threshold of the Oval Office fully armed with practical business and management experience required for controlling the White House.
He will be a man who says what he means and means what he says -- who can 'talk with beggars and walk with kings.'
He must possess unshakable moral integrity.
He must be fearless when confronted with intense and unending enmity and criticism.
He must passionately pursue every best measure necessary to defend our nation and amplify our security, no matter the cost.
These are only some of the reasons why the Republican Party should not support a candidate who is only partially qualified for the post. To invest any hope in a man based solely on poll popularity or, worse, name recognition, could prove fatal for the GOP and the American people. This would be as dangerous as placing our trust in a non-FDIC bank with a flashy name that caters mainly to the glitterati while dealing junk bonds to the middle class.
We would be incompetent if we champion any Presidential candidate who has broken his sacred marriage vows by publicly satisfying his carnal pleasures, and who joined himself to a spouse who has been a wife to more than one man. The Presidency has already suffered the shame of adulteration from a ‘Mr. Right Now,’ and we should, therefore, not risk the possibility of more reprehensible maltreatment of the station.
Americans deserve better. Americans deserve the best.
We must seriously consider that one candidate who is wholly qualified to be the 44th President of the United States:
That one candidate who is capable of rising up to and sustaining the Constitutional oath...
That one man who can lead us back up the iron mountain we proudly call America.
That one man is Mitt Romney.
The life of our country depends on him.
You don’t become President. The Presidency is an institution and you have temporary custody of it.–Ronald Wilson Reagan
In the four short years of the office’s term, the man elected must rise up to and sustain the Constitutional oath: ‘…that I will faithfully execute the office of the President of the United States and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, so help me God.’
There is no pledge as powerful and as selfless, because it demands that the succeeding custodian of the Presidency continue the eternal uphill struggle for, by and against the myriad of domestic and foreign issues that eclipse our lives: hostile world leaders; growing numbers of disillusioned and dissatisfied citizens; invidious politicians on both sides of the aisle who handily switch from ally to adversary between sunrise and sunset; biased media reporting with the intent to thwart the Chief Executive’s credibility; predisposed civilian groups aggressively intoning issue after issue (whether relevant or not) -- to name a few. And there remains the singular matter that requires our sitting and future President’s attention 24/7: the promise by riotous Islamist terrorists to cause our destruction.
In view of these contentious realities, what distinctions should Americans expect from our next President?
Above all: Leadership. He must be governed by a steel-eye countenance in order to effectively assume the mantle of Commander in Chief and stand knuckle to knuckle with our avowed enemies -- upholding the principle that America takes a backseat to no one.
The next man destined to serve the American people knows to expect a daunting hand-off from George W. Bush, which is why that man must also cross the threshold of the Oval Office fully armed with practical business and management experience required for controlling the White House.
He will be a man who says what he means and means what he says -- who can 'talk with beggars and walk with kings.'
He must possess unshakable moral integrity.
He must be fearless when confronted with intense and unending enmity and criticism.
He must passionately pursue every best measure necessary to defend our nation and amplify our security, no matter the cost.
These are only some of the reasons why the Republican Party should not support a candidate who is only partially qualified for the post. To invest any hope in a man based solely on poll popularity or, worse, name recognition, could prove fatal for the GOP and the American people. This would be as dangerous as placing our trust in a non-FDIC bank with a flashy name that caters mainly to the glitterati while dealing junk bonds to the middle class.
We would be incompetent if we champion any Presidential candidate who has broken his sacred marriage vows by publicly satisfying his carnal pleasures, and who joined himself to a spouse who has been a wife to more than one man. The Presidency has already suffered the shame of adulteration from a ‘Mr. Right Now,’ and we should, therefore, not risk the possibility of more reprehensible maltreatment of the station.
Americans deserve better. Americans deserve the best.
We must seriously consider that one candidate who is wholly qualified to be the 44th President of the United States:
That one candidate who is capable of rising up to and sustaining the Constitutional oath...
That one man who can lead us back up the iron mountain we proudly call America.
That one man is Mitt Romney.
The life of our country depends on him.
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
Protesting the War is Not a Strategy
By Rose Pedenko and Tanya Simon
The moment the final midterm election votes were counted, Democrats wasted no time stumping for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. However, real conservatives-the normal majority-continue to believe, as we always have, that pulling our forces out prematurely will be a blunder of monumental proportions. It would not only be viewed as frailty on our part, but serve to embolden the enemy and further imperil our nation and its allies. It is the liberal wing of the Democratic Party and their "rush to escape" Iraq that causes great consternation. Conservatives believe it is not really Iraq from which they want to retreat-but from the war itself.
Democrats preach for peace. This is a good thing, but it is neither the answer nor a solution to the death threats that dangle every day over our lives like the Sword of Damocles.
Since the horror of 9/11, liberals would have us believe they support the war in Afghanistan, because that is where the Taliban trained and from where Osama bin Ladin directed or still directs his murder/suicide operations. If we had engaged the Taliban in Afghanistan-and not concurrently expanded the front of the war on terrorism to Iraq-the same peace protesters would be calling for a pull-out of troops from Afghanistan as well. Three and a half years have gone by and the early success in Afghanistan remains, at best, tenuous. With no defined war front or uniformed enemy, the anti-war crowd will always find itself in an apparent quagmire.
We must ask: What then, Democrats? You should not demand we withdraw unless and until you have a bulletproof strategy up your collective sleeve-not some blue sky vision of sitting down with the devil to negotiate a better position in hell.
Speaker of the House-Elect Nancy Pelosi and her liberal colleagues, tend not to think about the ghastly realities with which we are threatened but how they can toss more rhetoric into the air without actually delivering decisive action over the next two years. The bluster and brouhaha surrounding their investigations into past-perceived mistakes does not equal a National Security policy.
At this critical turning point for our nation, Pelosi et al. should remove their rose-colored glasses, turn their attention away from the wholly unrealistic expectations of their "peace without honor" constituents, and concentrate on building up our nation's strengths rather than tearing them down. We cannot protest our way to victory.
Every American, regardless of political persuasion, must accept the realities of our war on terrorism. The enemy has no intention of going away, whether from Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Iran, Syria, or from inside our own borders. They have but one goal: the destruction of Israel and America. This is burned into their hearts as children and continues until the day they die, taking as many "infidels" with them as they possibly can. This is not some quixotic mission for Allah they are on, but a duty as natural as the wretched air they breathe.
The gravity of this Islamo-fascist indoctrination cannot be dismissed with a knowing smile before Congress or the wasting of taxpayer money on unnecessary partisan investigations. This, like preaching peace, will not bring relief from our fears, and it won't end the war. The enemy we face is terminally serious. They have no timetables, or exit strategies, and are wholly unconcerned with how many of their own people die in order to achieve their ends.
They will not go home until they win.
Democrats preach for peace. This is a good thing, but it is neither the answer nor a solution to the death threats that dangle every day over our lives like the Sword of Damocles.
Since the horror of 9/11, liberals would have us believe they support the war in Afghanistan, because that is where the Taliban trained and from where Osama bin Ladin directed or still directs his murder/suicide operations. If we had engaged the Taliban in Afghanistan-and not concurrently expanded the front of the war on terrorism to Iraq-the same peace protesters would be calling for a pull-out of troops from Afghanistan as well. Three and a half years have gone by and the early success in Afghanistan remains, at best, tenuous. With no defined war front or uniformed enemy, the anti-war crowd will always find itself in an apparent quagmire.
We must ask: What then, Democrats? You should not demand we withdraw unless and until you have a bulletproof strategy up your collective sleeve-not some blue sky vision of sitting down with the devil to negotiate a better position in hell.
Speaker of the House-Elect Nancy Pelosi and her liberal colleagues, tend not to think about the ghastly realities with which we are threatened but how they can toss more rhetoric into the air without actually delivering decisive action over the next two years. The bluster and brouhaha surrounding their investigations into past-perceived mistakes does not equal a National Security policy.
At this critical turning point for our nation, Pelosi et al. should remove their rose-colored glasses, turn their attention away from the wholly unrealistic expectations of their "peace without honor" constituents, and concentrate on building up our nation's strengths rather than tearing them down. We cannot protest our way to victory.
Every American, regardless of political persuasion, must accept the realities of our war on terrorism. The enemy has no intention of going away, whether from Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Iran, Syria, or from inside our own borders. They have but one goal: the destruction of Israel and America. This is burned into their hearts as children and continues until the day they die, taking as many "infidels" with them as they possibly can. This is not some quixotic mission for Allah they are on, but a duty as natural as the wretched air they breathe.
The gravity of this Islamo-fascist indoctrination cannot be dismissed with a knowing smile before Congress or the wasting of taxpayer money on unnecessary partisan investigations. This, like preaching peace, will not bring relief from our fears, and it won't end the war. The enemy we face is terminally serious. They have no timetables, or exit strategies, and are wholly unconcerned with how many of their own people die in order to achieve their ends.
They will not go home until they win.
Friday, February 09, 2007
An injured soldier has a new future... in pizza!
A
merican Forces Press Service
merican Forces Press Service WASHINGTON, Feb. 9, 2007 - A U.S. veteran who lost both legs in 2004 when a roadside bomb exploded in Iraq will begin a new career because his indomitable spirit moved a total stranger to give back to those who have served their country.
Army Staff Sgt. Robbie Doughty and Michael Ilitch, the founder of Little Caesars Pizza, one of nation's largest pizza chains, proudly stood side by side for the grand opening of the veteran's new pizza store in Paducah, Ky., yesterday.
Doughty, 31, was honorably discharged from the Army in July 2004 and began a long road to recovery facing an uncertain future with his young family. As he endured months of rehabilitation, he never gave up hope, never lost his courageous spirit and learned to walk again, he said.
Ilitch who, along with Little Caesars Pizza, owns Major League Baseball's world champion Detroit Tigers and the National Hockey League's Detroit Red Wings, read about Doughty in a Nov. 23, 2004, USA Today article.
Ilitch was so moved by Doughty's courage and determination that he called the Kentucky veteran to thank him for serving the country. After many conversations, Ilitch offered Doughty an opportunity to open his own Little Caesars Pizza franchise in his hometown of Paducah.
"Doughty stood strong for our country. I was so impressed by his courage, commitment and upbeat attitude in the face of adversity, that I wanted to do something," Ilitch said. "Offering him a new career path in his hometown seemed like a good transition. Doughty's 'can-do' attitude will make him a strong Little Caesars franchisee."
Doughty accepted Ilitch's offer and followed his suggestion to find a business partner. His choice was fellow veteran Lloyd Allard, who served with Doughty in the 3rd Battalion, 5th Special Forces Group, in a dangerous area in Iraq. "
After a career in the military, I was open to a new venture," Doughty said. "Our military background and familiarity with systems, processes and a teamwork management style make the Little Caesars franchise a good fit.
"Opening a business and becoming an entrepreneur will definitely be an exciting new chapter in my life for my family and me," he said.
"From day one, Doughty was ready for his next challenge," Allard said. "With our leadership skills and Little Caesars' training and ongoing support system, we look forward to becoming strong franchisees and sharing our experience with other veterans."
Their story also prompted Ilitch to launch a new, innovative franchise program to provide qualified, honorably discharged veterans with a business opportunity when they transition to civilian life or seek a career change. The program provides a benefit of $10,000 for qualified veterans and up to $68,000 in benefits for service-disabled veterans. "
Doughty and Allard inspired me with a vision: to develop a program to create career opportunities for military veterans," Ilitch said. "I believe that it's important for Little Caesars and corporate America to thank the men and women who have served in the armed forces and this program offers an exceptional opportunity for veterans who are seeking new career options."
(From a Little Caesars Pizza news release.)
[Web Version: http://www.defenselink.mil/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=2989]
Veterans of our military should go to the Little Caesars Pizza site for more information on how to start up a new career. http://www.littlecaesars.com/
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
Iraq is "Winnable"
By Linda D. Kozaryn
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Feb. 2, 2007 - While the situation in Iraq is challenging, it is "winnable," U.S. Navy Rear Adml. Mark Fox told a group of online journalists and bloggers yesterday during an operational update by telephone.
Fox, who has flown combat and contingency missions over Iraq in Operations Desert Storm, Southern Watch and Iraqi Freedom, is now communications director for Multi-National Force, Iraq.
"Sectarian violence is now the gravest threat to our strategic objectives in Iraq, and to be honest, Iraq is a more complex strategic problem entering 2007 than it was this time last year," he said. However, he noted, he's seen cause to believe the struggle is winnable.
"I draw hope from the fact that we are joined, not opposed, by the overwhelming majority of the Iraqi people in this struggle," Fox said. "In polling conducted in November, 89 percent of Iraqis nationwide agreed with the statement: 'My first loyalty is to my country rather than my sect, ethnic group, or tribe.'"
Fox said he's pleased to be "working in partnership with the liberated people of Iraq as they work to build a stable, secure, and self-governing country." The fact that more Iraqis are joining police forces is cause for optimism, he said.
In December, 1,115 Iraqi men signed up to join the Police Forces. "To put this in context," Fox said, "eight months ago we had zero recruits from Ramadi. In one month, over 600 tribesmen in Ramadi alone qualified for enlistment."
In December, he added, Multinational Force officials restored responsibility for security in Najaf Province to Provincial Iraqi Control.
"Last week, Iraqi forces in Najaf detected and assessed a significant security threat, realized they were outnumbered and facing an entrenched enemy, and did exactly what American forces are trained to do in that tactical situation: call for airpower," he said. "In the end, we killed 262 anti-Iraqi forces, and captured 411. We also recovered 11 mortar systems and enough heavy machine guns to show this was not a group of pilgrims."
Fox attended a city council meeting in Fallujah that he described as raucous and disorganized. He said council members had some significant points of contention. "But it demonstrated even if the Iraqis are not at the levels of Jeffersonian democracy yet, they are eager to find solutions to their problems."
The Iraqi economy is also showing positive signs, Fox said.
"Each time I travel outside the International Zone, I'm amazed that virtually every house in Baghdad has a satellite dish on the roof," he said. "While everybody focuses on the violence in Baghdad, rural Iraq has experienced a post-Saddam boom that is employing and putting cash in the pockets of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi families."
Fox cautioned, however, that it's important to have realistic expectations about short-term progress.
"First, it will take some time for the effects of the additional troops being deployed to take hold," he said. "Second, although (U.S. Army Lt. Gen. David) Petraeus brings unparalleled experience and wisdom to this fight, Iraq's problems are systemic, and will not be turned around immediately in February and March."
Fox went on to highlight what he called "one of the most important intangibles" that doesn't make it through the mainstream media filter: "the sense of mission, and the morale of the people who are serving here.
"It's not every day that you have the opportunity to leave your fingerprints on great work," Fox said. "And this is one of those times where everybody that's here understands what an incredibly important mission we're engaged in.
"We're also focused on this mission to the point where we understand the vast majority of the American people support everything about the military," he continued. "And the people who disagree with the nature of the political decisions that brought us here, we still appreciate the fact that those people also support the military."
[Web Version: http://www.defenselink.mil/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=2920]
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
2007 will be "Battle of the Wills" in Iraq
By Sgt. Sara Wood,USA American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Jan. 5, 2007 - The next year will be an important time in Iraq, when the Iraqi government must take more responsibility for the country and the coalition must continue its commitment to creating a stable, unified Iraq, a top British general in Iraq said today."
In 2007, we really are in an interesting time in which we hope to see the government understanding its responsibilities and having the confidence to step up and take those responsibilities ... (and) the indigenous Iraqi security forces taking the full responsibility for their security," British Army Maj. Gen. Simon Mayall, deputy commander of Multinational Corps Iraq, said in a Pentagon news conference via satellite.
This year will be a battle of wills in Iraq, Mayall said, as the coalition and the majority of Iraqis struggle against those who don't want a democratic, representative society that responds to the rule of law. The stakes are very high, and the Iraqi security forces and government need to see the strong commitment of the coalition as they grow and develop the ability to take over their own country, he said.
"Those people are absolutely relying on us in the coalition to continue to stand by them to give them the confidence to continue to defend the security of the Iraqi people, to develop their competence to do it, and to take forward this shared mission -- to deliver a new future to Iraq," he said.
When the Iraqis will be ready to take over security completely is conditions-based, Mayall said, but the important thing is to keep them in the fight and continue to develop their capabilities. Iraqi units fight alongside coalition forces every day, and they will continue to improve as they are given more responsibility, he said.
The Iraqi security forces are increasing the coalition's capacity, but a surge in troops alone will not be the answer for Iraq, Mayall said. A surge is needed in every element of the counterinsurgency operation, including development of the Iraqi government and ministerial capabilities, and economic development, he said.
"In any counterinsurgency operation, particularly the type of complexity of operation we're in at the moment, the security line of operation cannot and was never designed to deliver the desired end state," he said. "Therefore, around any application of military force, we must assume that the government of Iraq is also stepping up to the plate."
Speaking from the perspective of a British officer, Mayall said he is utterly impressed by the dedication and courage of the U.S. servicemembers in Iraq. Britain remains a staunch ally in the war on terror, he said, and he expressed optimism about Iraq's future. "I remain utterly confident, with the commitment we have from the Iraqis and ourselves, that we are going to be successful in 2007," he said.
[Web Version: http://www.defenselink.mil/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=2603]
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