The Great U.S. Retreat: Unnerving Our Friends, Encouraging Our Enemies

The Great U.S. Retreat: Unnerving Our Friends, Encouraging Our Enemies by Peter Huessy The Hudson Institute

The United States seems to be under the impression that being the ‘strong horse’ in international affairs harms our standing in the world. We are retreating from the international stage, seemingly happy in the idea of turning both national and international security policy over to a combination of global UN agencies and regional authorities we hope will cooperate with us, and motivated more by good will than hard interests.

As members of Congress review the administration’s proposals on counterterrorism, nuclear deterrence, missile defense, and proliferation, this retreat seem to be the ‘elephant in the room’ about which few appear willing to talk. For now.

Beneath the surface, however, Congress is becoming increasingly worried, even alarmed. Representative Howard Berman, the chair of the House International Relations Committee, has said publicly that it is long past the time when the US should have acted on Iran, with or without the cooperation of China and Russia. He sounded even more frustrated in comments he made privately at the recent AIPAC conference. And Senator Jon Kyl, from the opposite side of the political spectrum, addressing a Congressional seminar on April 20, explained he was worried that this administration was not committed to a sufficiently strong and secure nuclear deterrent.

Some important Bush-era counterterrorism policies are being retained, for example much of the Patriot Act. Also, apparently, our nuclear Triad of submarines, bombers and land-based missiles will also remain, although diminished, at least for now. And theater missile defenses will improve, which are useful, but further protection of the US mainland remains elusive. But the broader reality reflects a gradual retreat:

Senior members of the defense committees in Congress see no long-term plan for the sustaining or modernizing the US strategic nuclear deterrent -- even though the law requires such a plan.

Although plans for a new strategic submarine are on the table, in part to coincide with Britain"s need to replace its own version of the Trident, no associated missile program is in the works.

On the land-based missile leg of the US nuclear deterrent, after a two-decade long effort to extend the life of the Minuteman, there is yet to emerge any long-term plan to sustain the missile to 2030 or beyond, as required by Congress -- and which would be essential if the US were to maintain a balanced and stable strategic environment.

Many Senators from both parties have written the administration asking for a commitment to modernize the nuclear force, but have yet to receive an answer.

There is also a delay in plans for a new strategic bomber. Internal discussions within the Department of Defense on a long-term solution continue, with many options under consideration, including an unmanned nuclear-capable bomber.

At a recent private disarmament conference in Geneva, a representative from New Zealand complained to the US participants that our ICBMs could be launched accidentally (they cannot) if there were a computer malfunction in our launch-control facilities. As a result, pressures remain to stand-down our deterrent, which, if implemented would unnerve our allies and encourage our adversaries.

Although the current US administration is increasing funding for the nuclear weapons infrastructure by over $600 million, and although increased funding for counter-proliferation efforts within both the Departments of Energy and Defense have been proposed, members of Congress, while pleased with such efforts, are puzzled about why a nuclear summit, dedicated to the proposition that nuclear terrorism is our most serious security problem, did not focus on the most serious threat of all — Iran.

A senior member of the House Committee on Foreign Relations complained last week that the Iran Sanctions Bill - approved by both the House and Senate -- which prohibits companies who do business in the refined-petroleum and energy sector with Iran from doing business with the US, may be eviscerated even before it becomes law.

To move the bill, the administration has insisted that China be exempt from the legislation—making the bill a dead letter. Here the dots remain unconnected. Even as Chinese firms are aiding Iran’s nuclear weapons program, we give them a free ride on doing energy business with Tehran.

Congress therefore wonders how serious the administration really is about sanctioning Iran.

Meanwhile, the Director of the FBI says that right-wing militias are now the most serious terrorism threat facing the country, even greater than the threat from Al Qaeda, which had been identified only a week earlier as an even greater terrorist threat than a nuclear-armed Iran or North Korea. Is this now going to be the basis for US counter-terrorism policy?

The same holds true for missile defense. Defense Department debates have centered around a point largely ignored up to now: We are placing almost our entire future for missile defense on one technology, the Navy standard missile, to be deployed in ever-increasing capabilities in 2011, 2015, 2018 and 2020 --and eventually protecting not only all of Europe, but also the United States, from Iranian missiles.
The back-up system on which we were to have relied in case this did not work was the two-stage rocket we planned to deploy in Poland, with its associated radar in the Czech Republic, but both were cancelled.

The irony is that the Russians are even more opposed to the new plan than they were to the previous plans. The now-cancelled Polish deployment was supposed to consist of 10 interceptors, insignificant in strategic terms in relation to more than a thousand deployed strategic Russian nuclear warheads; and the new Navy-based standard missile could have been placed on the Aegis Navy ships and thus can be made mobile. With interceptor-speeds of 5-6 kilometers per second, should we obtain such a future capability, the Russians might be faced with hundreds of such missile defenses, capable of easily shooting down Russia strategic rockets.

But these future US plans are not funded -- yet.

They depend upon future assessments of Iranian missile capabilities, which might not reach a consensus for many years, although just last week a report was sent to Congress warning that Iran could build an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching the United States by 2015. However, supplemental missile defenses against such a rocket threat will not be built until 2020, at the earliest.
So here we get promises of future deployments that may never even materialize.

We have agreed to too few nuclear platforms under the new START Treaty, where we have to cut our stockpile by 188 missiles or bombers, while Russia"s force of just under 500 has room to expand. If the Russians insist on limiting future US missile-defense deployments, why are we assuming that our future missile defense plans will get a free ride? They might not.

The unsettled nature of Congressional opinion may not yet be reflected in the considerations of the defense budget now before the House and Senate. But Congressional unsettledness may be part of why consideration of the START arms control treaty might be delayed until next January at the earliest.

Congress seems to be in a ‘waiting’ mode — to see what other shoe will drop. This might be the reason for much of the calm one sees. Beneath the surface, though, is real concern that the administration is putting off many tough but critical decisions about the security threats we face.

Unfortunately, the US nuclear deterrent does not move forward automatically.. It atrophies if not sustained and modernized, just like any other element of our national security.

At present, we have no commitment to a new air-launched cruise missile for our bombers, or new land- or sea-based missiles. Drafters of the Iran sanctions bill said they had to exempt China to secure Administration support, so not only have we let China off the hook, but, as noted, some planned missile-defense protections rely on future promises that may never materialize.

This global retreat also involves issues such as immigration, supposedly the next ‘big ticket’ item on the Congressional agenda. Enforcement of immigration laws has been scaled back: border arrests have fallen sharply. Columbia and Honduras, key US allies in the fight against drugs, have been ignored as the US either disregards -- or facilitates by inaction -- the increasing dangers of the alliance between our neighbor, Venezuela, and Iran -- including their ties with terrorist groups and drug cartels and their meddling in elections throughout the continent. If granting amnesty in the US is not combined with serious efforts to control our borders, we may very well make these dangers worse. Drug cartels and terrorist groups may find in no more difficult to cross our borders after immigration-reform than before it.

Some argue that the administration’s rhetoric about a nuclear-free world can be understood simply as a necessary bow in the direction of the disarmament goals of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Venezuela and Iran are working together on both missiles and nuclear matters. China sustains the regime in Caracas with $20 billion in new loans. The dots of immigration, nuclear proliferation and rogue states should be connected.

Tehran, Peking and Caracas are cooperating to enhance their power, not only in the Persian Gulf but in our hemisphere as well. This can not only limit US freedom, it can intimidate our allies. Iranian missiles tipped with nuclear warheads and deployed in Venezuela can easily reach Miami. The message to Washington is clear: Back off!

There may be a method to all this. The administration’s rhetorical promises of a nuclear free world get good photo ops and nice editorials, and it is argued that any administration would tout an arms control agreement. But none before has ever so firmly embraced a world without nuclear weapons. And while we get pledges to secure nuclear material from Canada and Chile, bomb-making material and bombs themselves may soon be available in Tehran for terrorists to pick up.

Tough but necessary decisions are still being avoided. The easy decisions get done.

When faced with delivering tough sanctions on Iran and allow China an exemption, will we now go to the UN and get China’s support for equally weak measures -- then call it a success because we ‘had the support of the international community’?

It is true that the charade with Iran has been going on for some time, through various administrations. But eventually the ‘tough talk’ image, combined with no corresponding action, has consequences.

One senior Senator, a leading voice in security affairs, mentioned recently that since we are perceived to be getting out of the nuclear business -- reducing our commitment to protecting America from ballistic missiles, and leaving ourselves vulnerable to terrorism -- others around the world will make their own accommodations. He said that here at home, ‘these are the dots few are connecting.’ But, he warned, ‘others, especially our friends overseas, are connecting the dots. They too will change their calculations. And they will look elsewhere for the strong horse. And that strong horse? It will not be our friend.’


Copyright © 2010 Hudson New York. All rights reserved

My Truth, Your Truth & Objective Truth

Is there any such thing as objective truth?

Or is my truth as valid as your truth?

I stumbled upon a blog written by an old high school friend and his wife admonishing a news commentator's suggestion that Tiger Woods convert to Christianity. She blathered on about how dare he this and how dare he that and on and on.


Now, in her defense as a psychologist a large part of her "job" is to "validate" others feelings. In the parlance of the common man this means whatever you are and whatever you do is ok . Over the last 15 years in family practice I have seen a variety of psychiatric ills and "validating" someone has its place within the context of counseling.


My problem comes when telescopic logic is used to apply this utopian dream to everything which has at its heart the lie of equality in all things.

In my experience "my truth" is equally valid as your truth ONLY until MY TRUTH conflicts with YOUR TRUTH.


Then YOUR truth suddenly and most amazingly assumes a position of "greater truth" and validity than "my truth."
For example ; how can you be so "judgmental" as to say that my truth which may include my preference for sexual relationships with small underage children - toddlers in fact - is any better or worse than your "truth" which includes a preference for monogamous relationship with adults and your ostensibly equal truth/reality including a desire to protect your children from people like me ?

Left wing lunatics like this are fine with other peoples reality until it intersects with their reality. I mean how could you be so "intolerant" and "cruel" as to impose your morality about the kind of a relationship I should have?

Of course one tried and true method is to change the language and try to control the argument altogether via linguistics. They seem to indict Christianity in general as being responsible for "judgementalness". I am sure this would be a lively discussion but not at all sure there is any factual or supportable credible evidence of any kind to support the opinion. It is in situations like this that I am always puzzled by two things:

1)The hesitance to assert the superiority of Western values which the very ability to publicly ponder points to the obvious answer in the affirmative.

2)The "critical gaze" extended to Christianity or traditional American culture is not being applied equally to other religions and cultures.


While my old high school friend rages about Christianity and its "harm" to society His opinion of perhaps a female's life under sharia law in an unnamed generic Islamic Republic is conspicuously absent.
I don't believe that people like my old friend have bad intentions. Quite the contrary -I believe they are good hearted people just severely misguided. They, like so many of us are the victims of good hearted well intentioned parents particularly of the baby boom generation that wanted to give us everything and not have to "suffer" the things that they did growing up. Yet unwittingly in many cases have to doomed us to a path that in modern political parlance is unsustainable for "civil society" free of tyranny.

We have sevral generations that honestly believe that they are entitled to all the trappings of success previous generations worked a lifetime for. They scream at their children's teachers for honestly grading their child and so we are left with teachers who hand out meaningless A's to all and everyone is a star.

Is it any wonder that mental illness in College students has increased dramatically? Can you imagine finding out that you are NOT the smartest most beautiful person in the world !?!?! They largely believe that objective truth is unknowable if it exists at all and frequently I see them use this as a rationalization for apathy in trying to make any choices. Their morality is purely relative and has been shaped by modern textbooks that undergo sensitivity and review - again resulting in a sanitized meaningless distortion of history that is fantasy. They have been taught more about the internment of Japanese in WWII as opposed to the nature of Hitler's evil.


Sadly, critical thinking and the traditional triumvirate of education is no longer taught in most schools and our test scores and recent history is evidence of the impact this has had. But then that's just "my truth"

The bad-nukes myth - NYPOST.com

The bad-nukes myth - NYPOST.com

The bad-nukes myth

By RALPH PETERS

Last Updated: 5:01 AM, April 7, 2010

Posted: 1:39 AM, April 7, 2010

Nuclear weapons are not evil. Terrifying, yes. But their horrific capabilities prevented a Third World War. It all depends on whose finger is on the button.

Until yesterday's formal announcement of the administration's new Nuclear Posture Review, nukes also kept us safe from a range of threats short of a doomsday scenario: Our enemies risked going only so far. Nukes didn't prevent all wars -- but wars remained local.

Yesterday, we threw away a significant part of history's most successful deterrent.

This looks like an act of reckless vanity on the part of the administration, but let's allow that this weakening of our national defense is the result of misguided idealism. The important thing isn't the politics, but the practical consequences.

Summarizing the changes in a Pentagon briefing yesterday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates looked weary and chastened. The new posture emerged only after months of bitter argument between realists and activists. Without Gates, it would have been even worse.

Still, it must be painful to Gates -- a great American -- to accept that this policy went into effect on his watch.

Of all its malignant provisions, from accomodating Russian demands to preventing overdue updates for our arsenal, the most worrisome is the public declaration that, if the US suffers a biological, chemical or massive cyber attack, we will not respond with nukes.

This is a very real -- and unilateral -- weakening of our national security. In the past, our ambiguity made our enemies hesitate. The new policy guarantees that they'll intensify their pursuit of bugs, gas and weaponized computers.

Intending to halt a nuclear arms race, we've fired the starter pistol for a rush to develop alternative weapons of mass destruction.

Will this policy be the inspiration for an engineered plague that someday scythes through humankind? Chemical attacks are horrible, but local; cyber attacks are potentially devastating. But an innovative virus unleashed on the world could do what Cold War nuclear arsenals never did: Kill hundreds of millions.

This change leaves us far less safe. If a thug has a knife, but knows you're packing a gun, he's considerably less likely to attack you. Why promise him that you won't use the gun -- and might not use your knife?

Idealism has devolved into madness.

The left has never been willing to accept that deterrence works. In the left's world-view, hostile foreign actors aren't the problem.We are. If we disarm, surely they will . . .

This no-nukes obsession dates back to the early Cold War, when the Soviets used every available means, from dollars to earnest dupes, to persuade Western leftists that America's nuclear weapons were about to wipe out humanity. The USSR couldn't expand its European empire in the face of US nukes -- so the Soviets brilliantly portrayed us as the aggressors. (And the left praised Stalin as a man of peace.)

Massive ban-the-bomb demonstrations filled Western streets for decades (but not the streets behind the Iron Curtain). The left rejected deterrence as a security model.

The seeds sown by the deceased USSR put down durable roots. Pursuing a nuke-free world became a litmus test for the left.

Now we have a president who's taken on that goal as his personal grail. He's absolutely right that nukes have horrifying power -- but the paradox of deterrence is that, the more monstrous the weapons you possess, the less likely you are to ever need to employ them.

The new policy won't stop Iran and other rogue states from pursuing nukes (even though Iran and North Korea were singled out as policy exceptions). But it will accelerate the proliferation of other weapons of mass destruction. And it certainly won't reduce the probability of war.

It will also ensure that our aging arsenal will have to be content with a few Band-Aids; that we won't develop new, safer nuclear weapons -- and that we'll increasingly have to rely on the kindness of strangers.

Idealists just invited the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse to ride a little closer.

Ralph Peters' new book is "Endless War."

NEW YORK POST is a registered trademark of NYP Holdings, Inc.

Climate Catastrophists' Mi$$ion Creep

The Hudson Institute

Climate Catastrophists' Mi$$ion Creep

by Anna Mahjar-Barducci  

At a moment when private industry and governments around the world are spending trillions of dollars in the name of saving our planet from man-made global warming, there is mounting evidence that academic institutions, think tanks and public institutions around the world have started to alter their findings again to reach a “global warming consensus” -- regardless that there have also been in history a Flat-Earth Consensus, a Sun-Goes-Around-The-Earth Consensus, and an Anti-Evolution Consensus - none of which made them less false.


Proponents of man-made global warming recently suffered yet another blow when the leading climate change scientist, Phil Jones, granted an interview to the BBC.


Jones had to acknowledge that the Earth may have been warmer in Medieval times than now, and that, during the past fifteen years, there has been no “statistically significant” warming; on the contrary, there are signs, also not statistically significant, that after 2002, the climate may have cooled. Jones, at the heart of the so-called "Climate-gate" controversy last year, just before the Copenhagen climate summit, was forced to step down as director of the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit in Britain after leaked e-mails indicated that scientists there were manipulating data to strengthen the argument for man-made global warming. The data had been used to support efforts by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to urge governments to cut carbon dioxide emissions and to produce a “hockey stick graph” showing temperatures relatively stable for centuries before rising sharply in recent decades.


Despite this interview, that suggested a conspiracy by some of the world's leading global warming alarmists -- many with direct ties to the IPCC -- to manipulate temperature data, major TV networks in the US, with the exception of Fox, totally ignored the subject -- indicating the degree of politicization that affects the climate change issue.


So now the new evidence is showing that there is no “hockey stick graph,” and that other warmer periods have taken place in the past, when carbon dioxide emissions from manufacturing did exist. The warmer periods are said to have occurred between 1860 and 1880, and then again from 1910 to 1940. Professor Jones admitted that the Medieval Warm Period (800 A.D. to 1300 A.D.) might well have been as warm as the Current Warm Period (1975-present), or warmer, and that if it was, “then obviously the late-20th century warmth would not be unprecedented.”


Alarmists’ predictions are also being retracted. The 2007 IPCC report, which won the Man-Maders a Nobel Peace Prize, said the probability of Himalayan glaciers “disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high” as a result of man-made global warming. But the IPCC was recently forced to retract its disappearing-glacier claim, which had been made on the basis of a non-scientific magazine article. The IPCC additionally had to retract its claim that up to 40 percent of the Amazonian forests were at risk from global warming and would likely be replaced by “tropical savannahs” if temperatures continued to rise.
Climate change alarmists, however, are continuing to pose as saviours of the planet. Says U.S. President Barack Obama: “Generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell the children this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs for the jobless. This is the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.” The Messiah himself could not make better promises.


And what about Al Gore? A few years ago, while striving to become the leader of climate catastrophists, he made a presentation showing how the rise of the oceans would affect the coastal areas of the U.S. such as Florida, Manhattan and the San Francisco Bay. Then, with computer animation, he showed how the rising waters would flood all these places.


But according to Lord Moncton, a climate change debunker, the same year Al Gore was making these dire predictions, he bought a $4 million dollar condominium in San Francisco just a few feet away from the shoreline, apparently unshaken by his own predictions.


Over the last 20 years we have been told that we are destroying the climate through the use of fossil fuels; that our “carbon footprints” will cause the melting of polar ice caps, the extinction of polar bears, extensive flooding, diseases -- that, if we do not mend our habits, the Apocalypse is just around the corner.


A closer look at the past history of our planet, though, shows that the Earth has undergone cyclical periods of warming and cooling and this is linked to astronomical factors such as modifications in the eccentricity of the orbit, solar flares and even the rotation of our galaxy.


We have records that date back more than 300 million years: there have been inter-glacial periods, that is the warm spell, when life on the planet flourishes, and ice-ages, when many forms of life perish. We have consistent records of ice- ages followed by inter-glacial periods; we can see that temperatures and CO2 content in the atmosphere have both increased and fallen over thousands of millions of years - all without burning any fossil fuel.


John Coleman, the senior meteorologist who had the courage to expose the repeated manipulations of data by some relevant climate institutions, wrote: “Some misguided scientists with environmental and political motives manipulated long-term scientific data back in the late 1990's to create an illusion of rapid global warming. Other scientists of the same environmental extremism type jumped into the circle to support and broaden the "research" to further enhance the totally slanted, bogus global warming claims. Their friends in government steered huge research grants their way to keep the movement going. Soon they claimed to be a consensus. Environmental extremists, notable politicians among them, then teamed up with movie, media and other liberal, environmentalist-journalists to create this wild "scientific" scenario of the civilization threatening environmental consequences from Global Warming unless we adhere to their radical agenda.”


And - you guessed it! -- their radical agenda calls for more government power and less room for individuals. It looks as if Marxist economics, in which even middle-class wealth is redistributed to people in lower income brackets and which we thought had been thrown out of the window for good by the end of the 1980s, is trying to climb back in through the front door.

Apologies, war and growing up...

In the largest and most aggressive offensive to date in Afghanistan (in the Marjah province) US and NATO forces are apologizing for civilian deaths.

Last week in the first days of the offensive it was initially reported that there were 12 civilian deaths. Ultimately of the 12 initially reported nine of them were civilians and three were Taliban combatants. In another offensive this past weekend NATO Commanders are again apologizing for civilian deaths. Military commanders in the region report that in Afghanistan (as in Iraq) it has become a common to use civilians as a "human shields". More on this later...

No sane person rejoices at the deaths of 12 people. Combatant or not. In previous times the term "collateral damage" was used. Yet I hesitate even now to use it as it is dehumanizing on some level. But isn't that really the point? How can any sane person speak of the horror of war without attempting to insulate the psyche from war's heinous nature. War really is hell. This is not a cliché but a truth every soldier, every warrior, can attest to.


In previous posts I've written about the subject of “political correctness”. I bring this up because it seems to me that we are dealing with an enemy that is completely and totally committed to victory. An enemy that views this conflict as a "zero sum" game. There will be no negotiated peace nor co existence. An enemy whose time frame is radically different than ours.


I understand and even wholeheartedly agree with the current strategy of "winning hearts and minds".


This requires United States and NATO troops to exhibit a level of restraint never seen before on the battlefield. It is a testament to the character of America that we are putting our soldiers in harms way going far above and beyond not only what is required to protect civilians but demonstrating an unprecedented level of care in this regard. There is NO other nation that behaves in this fashion. Quite the contrary... even NATO allies like Germany put their soldiers first. Not allowing their soldiers to operate after dark. The dirty business falls mainly upon the United States. As even Mr Obama observed in Oslo when accepting his Nobel Prize:

"...the plain fact is this: The United States of America has helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms"

Under the most recent rules of engagement soldiers cannot fire upon a person unless they can see that person in possession of a weapon. Previously, if fire came from a building and eventually people walked out of that building a logical assumption could be made (of course relying on training, experience, and common sense) about returning fire directed at that person that might now be leaving the building where previously a fierce firefight took place. Our enemy is not stupid. Soon enough reports began to come on that Taliban fighters simply put down their weapons and walked out and even taunt soldiers under these new rules. They know their safe passage is guaranteed now.


Much like terrorists know that they will not ever face water boarding. Or that if they are given “tough” interrogations they will be not all that tough and a physician will be standing by and slaps to the face will be open handed and away from the airway. Such are the details divulged by Mr. Obama in a hasty attempt to placate his far left supporters at the expense of keeping America safe.


Mr. Obama takes us back to what has been called a “pre-9/11 mentality” and intimidates our intelligence officers with the threat of prosecution. All the while running about the globe apologizing for what are the greatest accomplishments of any modern nation as if this will bring anyone closer to his dreamlike utopian fantasy and vision of America as a green and clean “global citizen” Our adversaries do not fetter themselves with such ideas.


During his campaign the Obama PR machine was tenacious in trying to enrobe Obama with the attire of President Lincoln. Anyone with even a passing familiarity of Lincoln's writings, presidency and in particular his actions during the civil war (including the suspension of Habeas Corpus) rightly blushed at the mere mention of the two names in the same sentence. Lincoln understood the primacy of keeping the union exactly that : united.


IF one accepts the Declaration of Independence and its inherent “theology” that is so unpolitically correct to speak of... appealing to “Nature and Nature's God”, speaking of rights from man's “Creator” and appealing to the “Supreme Judge of the world” with a “firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence” then these “unalienable rights” accorded all humans not from any piece of paper or governmental body And that the United States best embodies these unlaienable rights then the hopes of humanity itself are the hopes of the United Sates. That is if it is properly governed in line with these “self evident truths”.


Our strategy of being buddies to the people of Afghanistan is acceptable only within the larger framework and understanding of the exceptional nature of America. At the end of the day... America must prevail for the sake of the millions who still yearn to breathe the air of Liberty in North Korea, China, Cuba, Iran and others countries still in the grip of maniacal tyrants. There may be a time in our near future when we must think primarily as a fierce warrior and less so of a “global citizen”


I'll close with Lincolns own words that I have often wondered if Mr Obama ever read. It shows Mr Lincoln as a person who I doubt could even conceive of Mr Obama's view of the world where the admitted mastermind of 9/11 who has tried to plead guilty in a military tribunal is thought to be best handled on US soil for reasons (other than political theater choreographed by Eric Holder who refuses to reveal how many of his attorneys have previously defended high profile terrorists) that are still unknown.

"Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs who should be arrested, exiled or hanged."

Abraham Lincoln

Checks, balances and Chicago politics ...

Hope.
Change.
You bring a knife and I will bring a gun.


That's the way things are done in Chicago. For all his vaunted intelligence and promises of a new era in bipartisanship in Washington Barack Obama has shown his preferred style of working. The rough and tumble style of politics that is the norm in the windy city. His calls anew for bipartisanship on health care after breaking his now infamous promises of CSPAN coverage of what in reality were secret meetings behind closed doors where only Dems were given a seat at the table. Where CSPAN dared not tread to televise his secret deals with drug companies, AARP, and of course the bribery of Senators from Nebraska, Louisiana and Arkansas.


After a year of this and an onerous bill weighing in at close to 3,000 pages which he reaffirmed his commitment to he NOW wants to play nice? Almost 3,000 pages and accounting trickery to claim (with a straight face no less) that it would reduce the deficit? Accounting tom foolery that would land any non federal accountant in prison?


Shame on all of us for even considering that this administration has any integrity left after its legion of broken promises.


It disturbs me that we all seem to forget that this mammoth piece of legislation was something Mr Obama tried to force through in a matter of days or weeks without ANY discussion at all... Never mind the promise of posting it on the internet and the subsequent votes to keep it from being made available by Senate Healthcare finance members. That anyone can even take the matter seriously anymore is an act of self deception. Am I the only one outraged that US Congress and Senate members voted to keep ANY non national security related information from the public? The Constitution is the greatest political document in history. No qualifications nor prefaces needed..


Depending on the version that you are reading the total number of pages is approximately 15. Yet these few pages have governed the most incredible nation this earth has seen in modern times. In less than 200 years a meteoric rise to prosperity, military might and standard of living that is unprecedented and the envy of the world. A Nation where people risk life and limb and routinely die to get IN not out...


The founders knew of the wisdom of our system of governance. So it is only with some difficulty that it is changed. It was not meant to be easily changed in any wholesale fashion nor tinkered with in response to any fad or modern novelty of thought. The filibuster is an integral part of our legislative bodies' byzantine procedural maze of parliamentary procedure. It allows a minority party to hold up legislation from being rammed through and is functionally a primary facilitator of bi partisanship. To stop the filibuster requires a super majority. A super majority the Democrats have held for the past 13 months. although the party in power does not like this procedural weapon they know that their very existence and ability to shape legislation may also depend upon it in a different time when they are the minority.


It's with disgust that once again we are witness to the antithesis of bipartisanship called for by the president just 24 hours ago. Leading Democrats are now furiously working to eliminate the filibuster after their humiliating loss in Massachusetts with Scott Brown and with him so too their filibuster proof super majority in the Senate. That is not to say that they were able to accomplish much even though they had a super majority. If there is going to be blame for the failure to pass major legislation during the honeymoon first year of the Obama presidency it certainly cannot be blamed on Republicans. The gargantuan failure rests firmly on the shoulders of a divided democratic party torn between the "progressive" contingency and more moderate blue dog Democrats.


In all fairness Tom Harkin has been calling for elimination of the filibuster for many years now. However this is a new chant for most everyone else in the recently formed chorus of whining on Capitol Hill. To hear congresswoman Wasserman Schultz (D FL) opine that Republicans have,"... used the filibuster beyond the founders intentions" when she herself has been supportive of legislation that would make most of the founders shake their heads in bewilderment at how their simple clear instructions could be so hideously twisted. Once again this administration has demonstrated that it says one thing - usually what it believes the public wants to hear - and then proceeds to pursue it's extreme ideological agenda without regard to anyone or anything else.


At least conservatives CAN take solace in the consistency of what these tenacious proponents of state-ism actually DO as opposed to the perpetual verbal pandering to special interests and constituencies. For the progressive who governs from a fantastical Utopian dream state that is unachievable The answer always lies in additional regulations and legislation More dictates as to how you as an individual must live your life because you are obviously incapable and the "progressive" obviously of superior intellect DOES know what you need.


The cause of ALL problems is NOT human nature or our shear flawed state of humanity - the reality of which a conservative faces head on and must deal with in practical ways - but to the "progressive" ALL problems have a root cause in an imagined universal deficiency of governmental authority which must be constantly expanded in pursuit of achieving the unrealistic utopian dream of collectivism. I'd be happy to entertain the notion if anyone can tell me where it has ever worked in all of history.


I'm still waiting.

Audacity Indeed...

Today, like most days presents ample opportunity to be outraged. Joe Biden's has begun to take credit for the success in Iraq! Indeed the audacity of this administration knows no bounds! Joe Biden claims that Iraq can be one of the "proudest achievements of this administration"!


Yet 5 minutes on You Tube or Google easily locates video of Joe Biden and his boss Barack Obama declaring that not only will Iraq be a complete failure but also that the "surge" will "never work." Barack Obama stated that he felt the surge would have the opposite effect. Since taking office and particularly of late as his image as commander in chief has suffered he has taken to claiming credit for Iraq.

It's interesting to recall the negative PR strategy over Iraq and the surge's fantastic results. First with absolute opposition to the very idea then as the surge began working (then Sen) Obama claimed this was simply "spin" and as the success continued it became an egregious act of willful denial . At this point Obama and his cadre of "progressives" simply started to ignore the questions and stop talking about it while simultaneously the news media simply stopped reporting about Iraq all together.


For a while Iraq (at least in its early phases) should not be used as a model for future actions the latter phases (post surge) are in terms of the military effort and nation building an unmitigated success.


Afghanistan of course remains a book whose conclusion is as yet unwritten. For while Iraq was a functioning society albeit a dysfunctional one replete with sons of the tyrannical dictator who routinely chose women from the street and had them kidnapped for a night of rape it still was a society with organizational structure, industry and institutions. Afghanistan remains an essentially 12 or 13 Century land of warring tribes and villagers whose primary export is opium. America can export Democracy... and it can be argued that this is in the interest of our national security. It can also be argued from the sound position of the founders that it is not our responsibility to ensure the enforcement of the unalienable rights that are the cornerstone of our own society. For this would lead us down many dangerous paths. George Washington warned of this in his farewell address to the Nation.


The proper goal of Government is the preservation and improvement of our United States - first and foremost. All else is necessarily second. America remains the last best hope for all those yearning to breathe the air of liberty. Excessive foreign entanglements will only serve to weaken our ability to remain that shining city on a hill.