Larry Elder writes today on the flip flop of Paul Krugman. What a dishonest, political hack. Anyone can see through this obvious politically oriented "economist" and should disregard anything that Krugman says regarding the economy. Your comments are appreciated.
Krugman: Bush's deficit bad, Obama's deficit good
Larry Elder - Syndicated Columnist - 2/11/2010 9:45:00 AM
Left-wing economist, Nobel laureate and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman hates deficits in tough economic times -- when the president of the United States is named George W. Bush.
Krugman, in a November 2004 interview, criticized the "enormous" Bush deficit. "We have a world-class budget deficit," he said, "not just as in absolute terms, of course -- it's the biggest budget deficit in the history of the world -- but it's a budget deficit that, as a share of GDP, is right up there."
The numbers? The deficit in fiscal year 2004 -- $413 billion, 3.5 percent of the gross domestic product.
Back then, a disapproving Krugman called the deficit "comparable to the worst we've ever seen in this country....The only time postwar that the United States has had anything like these deficits is the middle Reagan years, and that was with unemployment close to 10 percent." Take away the Social Security surplus spent by the government, he said, and "we're running at a deficit of more than 6 percent of GDP, and that is unprecedented."
He considered the Bush tax cuts irresponsible and a major contributor -- along with two wars -- to the deficit. But he also warned of the growing cost of autopilot entitlements: "We have the huge bulge in the population that starts to collect benefits....If there isn't a clear path towards fiscal sanity well before (the next decade), then I think the financial markets are going to say, 'Well, gee, where is this going?'"
Three months earlier, Krugman said, "Here we are more than 2 1/2 years after the official end of the recession, and we're still well below, of course, pre-Bush employment." In October 2004, unemployment was 5.5 percent and continued to slowly decline. At the time, Krugman described the economy as "weak," with "job creation...essentially nonexistent."
How bad will it get? If we don't get our "financial house in order," he said, "I think we're looking for a collapse of confidence some time in the not-too-distant future."
Fast-forward to 2010.
The numbers: projected deficit for fiscal year 2010 -- over $1.5 trillion, more than 10 percent of GDP.
This sets a post-WWII record in both absolute numbers and as a percentage of GDP. And if the Obama administration's optimistic projections of the economic growth fall short, things will get much worse. So what does Krugman say now?
We must guard against "deficit hysteria." In "Fiscal Scare Tactics," his recent column, Krugman writes: "These days it's hard to pick up a newspaper or turn on a news program without encountering stern warnings about the federal budget deficit. The deficit threatens economic recovery, we're told; it puts American economic stability at risk; it will undermine our influence in the world. These claims generally aren't stated as opinions, as views held by some analysts but disputed by others. Instead, they're reported as if they were facts, plain and simple."
He continues, "And fear-mongering on the deficit may end up doing as much harm as the fear-mongering on weapons of mass destruction." Krugman believes Bush lied us into the Iraq War. Just as people unreasonably feared Saddam Hussein, they now have an unwarranted fear of today's deficit.
Questions: Didn't Krugman, less than six years ago, call the deficit "enormous"? Wouldn't he, therefore, consider a $1.5 trillion deficit at 10 percent of GDP mega-normous? Didn't he describe the economy with 5.5 percent unemployment as "weak"? Isn't the current economy, at 9.7 percent unemployment, even weaker? If the 2004 deficit was "comparable to the worst we've ever seen in this country," wouldn't today's much bigger deficit cause even more heartburn?
Nope. Now a huge deficit is actually a good thing: "The point is that running big deficits in the face of the worst economic slump since the 1930s is actually the right thing to do. If anything, deficits should be bigger than they are because the government should be doing more than it is to create jobs." The deficit "should be bigger"?! (Read related commentary by Michelle Malkin)
Long term, Krugman says, we've got concerns about revenue and spending. But as for now? "There's no reason to panic about budget prospects for the next few years, or even for the next decade." In 2004, Krugman warned that without a "clear path towards fiscal sanity" before "the next decade," we faced a "crunch." Presumably, we now have this "clear path."
Let's review. In 2004, an unhappy Krugman criticized Bush's "weak" economy and "miserable" job creation. Running an "enormous" deficit was a bad thing. Times were awful -- "by a large margin" the worst job crash and performance since Herbert Hoover. Today the deficit is four times as large in an even weaker economy with much higher unemployment. Times are awful. Now, though, the deficit is a good thing and should be even bigger.
Krugman's flip-flop on the deficit demonstrates a modern economic equation. Hatred of Bush + love for Obama = intellectual dishonesty.
CREATORS SYNDICATE COPYRIGHT 2010 LAURENCE A. ELDER
Friday, February 12, 2010
PIGS
PIGS--no we are not talking the farm animal, we are talking about Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain. These countries are on life support. Their deficits are immense and is causing the EU to come in and save them. Will the United States be next?
Pat Buchanan writes about this today in the Conservative Review.
THE CONSERVATIVE REVIEW - February 12, 2010
The Bankrupt PIGS of Europe
by Pat Buchanan
They are called the PIGS -- Portugal, Ireland, Greece,
Spain. What they have in common is that all are facing
deficits and debts that could bring on national defaults
and break up the European Union.
What brought the PIGS to the edge of the abyss?
All are neo-socialist states that provide welfare for poor
people, generous unemployment, universal health care,
early retirement and comfortable pensions. Most consume
40 percent to 50 percent of their gross domestic product
annually, a crushing burden on the private sector.
Dying populations is a second cause. After two world wars,
the Europeans lost their faith and embraced hedonism and
materialism, la dolce vita. Large families fell out of
favor. Women put off marriage and babies, and went to work.
Birth control and abortion were made readily available in
every country and, if not, just across the border.
For 30 years, the fertility rate of Europe has been below
the 2.1 children per woman necessary to replace a popula-
tion. In Russia and Ukraine, a million people disappear
yearly. In Western Europe, the passing of the native-born
goes on quietly, as Third World peoples come to fill the
empty spaces left by the aborted and unconceived.
Turks are in Germany. Pakistanis, Indians, Arabs and
Caribbean peoples are in Britain. Algerians, Tunisians
and Moroccans occupy the southern coast of France and
the banlieues around Paris.
These newcomers have neither the education nor skills of
the Europeans. Hence, they earn less and contribute less
in taxes, but consume more per capita in social benefits.
As the number of young entering the European labor forces
shrinks, the number of seniors and aged grows. And thanks
to advances in medicine, these retirees live lengthening
lives. Thus the burden of pensions and health care grows
steadily and the need for higher taxes and larger worker
contributions increases.
Then there is globalization. In Europe, wages and taxes
are high, regulations heavy, unions strong, and lawyers
ubiquitous. Manufacturers, to cut costs, have been out-
sourcing production to where the labor is cheap and
abundant, the unions are nonexistent or weak, and health,
safety and environmental regulations are lax. Welcome to
China.
Greece is the first European nation to hit the wall. As an
EU member state, she is obligated to keep her deficit to
3 percent of GDP. But this year's is 12.7 percent, and
Athens needs to issue $75 billion in bonds alone to finance
the deficit and roll over debt.
The markets, however, are rating Greek bonds as risky
bonds. To borrow, Athens must pay more than twice the
interest rate Germany pays. Faced with strikes by public
employees and students, Athens appears to lack the
political will to make the cuts necessary to bring the
budget back toward balance.
As Portugal, Ireland and Spain gaze on, Greece approaches
a moment of truth. Should she default, their bonds, too,
will plunge in value out of fear of a copycat default, and
the interest rate they pay would also rise. They, too,
might then take the Argentine road.
The EU's crisis would then be like a crisis in the United
States should California default on its state bonds and
interest rates on other municipal bonds surged to double
digits.
Is there a way out?
One option is for the EU to bail out Greece with a huge
loan. But if Greece cannot meet her debt obligations now,
how could she pay back the loan? And if the EU cannot
compel Greece to make deep budget cuts today, what
leverage would the EU have after bailing out Athens and
removing today's pressure on the government?
A second option is to call in the International Monetary
Fund, which imposes tough conditions on nations receiving
IMF loans -- the Third World therapy. But problems would
arise here, too.
First, it would be an admission that the EU cannot manage
its own household. Second, the largest contributor to the
IMF is Uncle Sam.
Why should America bail out Greece, when the EU is larger
and richer and did not help bail out California in 2009?
The stimulus bill did that in 2009, to which Europe
contributed nothing.
Where Greece is at today, however, we shall all arrive
tomorrow.
In every Western nation, government is growing beyond the
capacity of taxpayers to bear. Deficits and debt are surg-
ing. Not enough children are being born to replace parents.
The immigrant poor who consume more than they contribute
are coming to take the empty places. Seniors and elderly
are growing as a share of the population. Companies are
saying goodbye to the West and moving offshore to low-wage
lands.
The West begins to look like yesterday, while the East
begins to look like tomorrow.
The West is approaching a crisis of solvency and of
democracy. We shall see if democracy, which grew popular
lavishing benefits upon all, is strong enough to start
clawing them away. Or will democracy try to keep piling
the burden on the producers until they rebel or depart?
---------------------------------------------------------
END OF Conservative Review
Copyright 2010 by NextEra Media. All rights reserved.
Please feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others.
Pat Buchanan writes about this today in the Conservative Review.
THE CONSERVATIVE REVIEW - February 12, 2010
The Bankrupt PIGS of Europe
by Pat Buchanan
They are called the PIGS -- Portugal, Ireland, Greece,
Spain. What they have in common is that all are facing
deficits and debts that could bring on national defaults
and break up the European Union.
What brought the PIGS to the edge of the abyss?
All are neo-socialist states that provide welfare for poor
people, generous unemployment, universal health care,
early retirement and comfortable pensions. Most consume
40 percent to 50 percent of their gross domestic product
annually, a crushing burden on the private sector.
Dying populations is a second cause. After two world wars,
the Europeans lost their faith and embraced hedonism and
materialism, la dolce vita. Large families fell out of
favor. Women put off marriage and babies, and went to work.
Birth control and abortion were made readily available in
every country and, if not, just across the border.
For 30 years, the fertility rate of Europe has been below
the 2.1 children per woman necessary to replace a popula-
tion. In Russia and Ukraine, a million people disappear
yearly. In Western Europe, the passing of the native-born
goes on quietly, as Third World peoples come to fill the
empty spaces left by the aborted and unconceived.
Turks are in Germany. Pakistanis, Indians, Arabs and
Caribbean peoples are in Britain. Algerians, Tunisians
and Moroccans occupy the southern coast of France and
the banlieues around Paris.
These newcomers have neither the education nor skills of
the Europeans. Hence, they earn less and contribute less
in taxes, but consume more per capita in social benefits.
As the number of young entering the European labor forces
shrinks, the number of seniors and aged grows. And thanks
to advances in medicine, these retirees live lengthening
lives. Thus the burden of pensions and health care grows
steadily and the need for higher taxes and larger worker
contributions increases.
Then there is globalization. In Europe, wages and taxes
are high, regulations heavy, unions strong, and lawyers
ubiquitous. Manufacturers, to cut costs, have been out-
sourcing production to where the labor is cheap and
abundant, the unions are nonexistent or weak, and health,
safety and environmental regulations are lax. Welcome to
China.
Greece is the first European nation to hit the wall. As an
EU member state, she is obligated to keep her deficit to
3 percent of GDP. But this year's is 12.7 percent, and
Athens needs to issue $75 billion in bonds alone to finance
the deficit and roll over debt.
The markets, however, are rating Greek bonds as risky
bonds. To borrow, Athens must pay more than twice the
interest rate Germany pays. Faced with strikes by public
employees and students, Athens appears to lack the
political will to make the cuts necessary to bring the
budget back toward balance.
As Portugal, Ireland and Spain gaze on, Greece approaches
a moment of truth. Should she default, their bonds, too,
will plunge in value out of fear of a copycat default, and
the interest rate they pay would also rise. They, too,
might then take the Argentine road.
The EU's crisis would then be like a crisis in the United
States should California default on its state bonds and
interest rates on other municipal bonds surged to double
digits.
Is there a way out?
One option is for the EU to bail out Greece with a huge
loan. But if Greece cannot meet her debt obligations now,
how could she pay back the loan? And if the EU cannot
compel Greece to make deep budget cuts today, what
leverage would the EU have after bailing out Athens and
removing today's pressure on the government?
A second option is to call in the International Monetary
Fund, which imposes tough conditions on nations receiving
IMF loans -- the Third World therapy. But problems would
arise here, too.
First, it would be an admission that the EU cannot manage
its own household. Second, the largest contributor to the
IMF is Uncle Sam.
Why should America bail out Greece, when the EU is larger
and richer and did not help bail out California in 2009?
The stimulus bill did that in 2009, to which Europe
contributed nothing.
Where Greece is at today, however, we shall all arrive
tomorrow.
In every Western nation, government is growing beyond the
capacity of taxpayers to bear. Deficits and debt are surg-
ing. Not enough children are being born to replace parents.
The immigrant poor who consume more than they contribute
are coming to take the empty places. Seniors and elderly
are growing as a share of the population. Companies are
saying goodbye to the West and moving offshore to low-wage
lands.
The West begins to look like yesterday, while the East
begins to look like tomorrow.
The West is approaching a crisis of solvency and of
democracy. We shall see if democracy, which grew popular
lavishing benefits upon all, is strong enough to start
clawing them away. Or will democracy try to keep piling
the burden on the producers until they rebel or depart?
---------------------------------------------------------
END OF Conservative Review
Copyright 2010 by NextEra Media. All rights reserved.
Please feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Gingrich Has It Right
Once again Newt has it right. If only the Administration would listen, however, in the Administration's opinion they know more than anyone, are smarter than everyone and know that appeasement always works best. The parallels between 1930 Germany and 2010 Iran are so similar that even a blind man can see them. When are we going to wake up?
Gingrich: With Iran, 'It's Like the 1930s'
Robert Costa - Feb 11, 2010
NationalReview.com
Former House speaker Newt Gingrich tells National Review Online that Iran's self-proclaimed status as a "nuclear state" presents a "serious problem" for the United States that must be addressed by President Obama. "The president needs to say to the world that it is unacceptable to have a vicious dictatorship seeking to gain nuclear weapons with the direct goal of genocide," Gingrich says.
Gingrich worries that America's Iran policy is stuck in an appeasement mindset. "It's like the 1930s," he says. "The Iranian regime is dedicated to creating a second Holocaust, in terms of wanting to annihilate Israel. For 31 years, it has been trying to tell us through every method they know - through terrorism, killing Americans, and developing nuclear weapons - that they are trying to defeat us. Yet, while the regime is explicitly dedicated to the destruction of Israel, and the defeat of the United States, there remains an absolute refusal in the Western world to be honest about it. At what point do we decide that what we need is a calm and methodological regime-change policy - which doesn't have to mean war? Why is it so hard for us to see this as a ruthless regime? I think our allies would probably breathe a sigh of relief if we showed courage and determination, particularly if we did it in a steady and non-violent manner."
The U.S., Gingrich adds, should pledge to "aid every ally inside and outside Iran working to replace the regime - with the minimum of violence necessary but with an absolute commitment to replace the regime. No more negotiating, no more talking. We got the message. We know what you want, and it is unacceptable to us."
Gingrich says this is Obama's moment to articulate a new policy. "I've made two films with my wife, Callista, Ronald Reagan: Rendezvous with Destiny and Nine Days that Changed the World about Pope John Paul II's visit to Poland. Both outline how powerful leaders can devise strategies that dismantle entire empires within a decade. The Soviet Union was vastly bigger and more dangerous than Iran. If we could adopt non-violent strategies of coercion to break the Soviet empire, we should be able to help the millions of dissidents in Iran who want to replace the dictatorship."
Gingrich has two ideas for Obama: "We should announce that any person caught on film engaged in violence against protestors in Iran will be brought to trial under a new regime. Let it be known to every Iranian security guard that they are risking their life if they go out and kill a protestor." Second, he says, "if you simply blockade Iran's flow of gasoline, you can bring the country to a halt in 60 to 90 days, since they only have one refinery."
Time is of the essence, Gingrich concludes. "Iran doesn't have to deliver a weapon by some sophisticated missile, but simply could put it in a ship. These are people who will acquire nuclear weapons and will use them. Every day it gets worse and more dangerous. Nothing has changed; nothing will change, until we change the regime."
Gingrich: With Iran, 'It's Like the 1930s'
Robert Costa - Feb 11, 2010
NationalReview.com
Former House speaker Newt Gingrich tells National Review Online that Iran's self-proclaimed status as a "nuclear state" presents a "serious problem" for the United States that must be addressed by President Obama. "The president needs to say to the world that it is unacceptable to have a vicious dictatorship seeking to gain nuclear weapons with the direct goal of genocide," Gingrich says.
Gingrich worries that America's Iran policy is stuck in an appeasement mindset. "It's like the 1930s," he says. "The Iranian regime is dedicated to creating a second Holocaust, in terms of wanting to annihilate Israel. For 31 years, it has been trying to tell us through every method they know - through terrorism, killing Americans, and developing nuclear weapons - that they are trying to defeat us. Yet, while the regime is explicitly dedicated to the destruction of Israel, and the defeat of the United States, there remains an absolute refusal in the Western world to be honest about it. At what point do we decide that what we need is a calm and methodological regime-change policy - which doesn't have to mean war? Why is it so hard for us to see this as a ruthless regime? I think our allies would probably breathe a sigh of relief if we showed courage and determination, particularly if we did it in a steady and non-violent manner."
The U.S., Gingrich adds, should pledge to "aid every ally inside and outside Iran working to replace the regime - with the minimum of violence necessary but with an absolute commitment to replace the regime. No more negotiating, no more talking. We got the message. We know what you want, and it is unacceptable to us."
Gingrich says this is Obama's moment to articulate a new policy. "I've made two films with my wife, Callista, Ronald Reagan: Rendezvous with Destiny and Nine Days that Changed the World about Pope John Paul II's visit to Poland. Both outline how powerful leaders can devise strategies that dismantle entire empires within a decade. The Soviet Union was vastly bigger and more dangerous than Iran. If we could adopt non-violent strategies of coercion to break the Soviet empire, we should be able to help the millions of dissidents in Iran who want to replace the dictatorship."
Gingrich has two ideas for Obama: "We should announce that any person caught on film engaged in violence against protestors in Iran will be brought to trial under a new regime. Let it be known to every Iranian security guard that they are risking their life if they go out and kill a protestor." Second, he says, "if you simply blockade Iran's flow of gasoline, you can bring the country to a halt in 60 to 90 days, since they only have one refinery."
Time is of the essence, Gingrich concludes. "Iran doesn't have to deliver a weapon by some sophisticated missile, but simply could put it in a ship. These are people who will acquire nuclear weapons and will use them. Every day it gets worse and more dangerous. Nothing has changed; nothing will change, until we change the regime."
Frosty Wooldridge article on Detroit
I live in a suburb of Detroit and have lived here since 1986. I did not see Detroit before the Coleman Young Administration but every day I see the results of the benign neglect he administered. Later Administrations, notably of Kwame Kilpatrick, have only increased the ruination of a once magnificant city. One only has to drive through what were once very desirable neighborhoods and see the decline and decay. It is awful.
Can Detroit come back, probably not. Even though we have a great Mayor now, Dave Bing, the ability to work against the entrenched unions and special interests who do not want change, will make his job nearly impossible. A previous Mayor, Dennis Archer, tried to make changes but was stymied at every turn. He gave the city four years of his life and decided there were better things for him to do. So, I am not optimistic that things will change here.
The attached article by Frosty Wooldridge gives additional information.
HOW IMMIGRATION AND MULTICULURALISM DESTROYED DETROIT
By Frosty Wooldridge
October 5, 2009
NewsWithViews.com
For 15 years, from the mid 1970s to 1990, I worked in Detroit, Michigan. I watched it descend into the abyss of crime, debauchery, gun play, drugs, school truancy, car-jacking, gangs and human depravity. I watched entire city blocks burned out. I watched graffiti explode on buildings, cars, trucks, buses and school yards. Trash everywhere! Detroiters walked through it, tossed more into it and ignored it.
Tens of thousands and then, hundreds of thousands today exist on federal welfare, free housing and food stamps! With Aid to Dependent Children, minority women birthed eight to 10 and in once case, one woman birthed 24 kids as reported by the Detroit Free Press—all on American taxpayer dollarss. A new child meant a new car payment, new TV and whatever mom wanted. I saw Lyndon Baines Johnson’s “Great Society” flourish in Detroit. If you give money for doing nothing, you will get more hands out taking money for doing nothing.
Mayor Coleman Young, perhaps the most corrupt mayor in America, outside of Richard Daley in Chicago, rode Detroit down to its knees. He set the benchmark for cronyism, incompetence and arrogance. As a black man, he said, “I am the MFIC.” The IC meant ‘in charge’. You can figure out the rest. Detroit became a majority black city with 67 percent African-Americans.
As a United Van Lines truck driver for my summer job from teaching math and science, I loaded hundreds of American families into my van for a new life in another city or state. Detroit plummeted from 1.8 million citizens to 912,000 today. At the same time, legal and illegal immigrants converged on the city, so much so, that Muslims number over 300,000. Mexicans number 400,000 throughout Michigan, but most work in Detroit.
As the Muslims moved in, the whites moved out. As the crimes became more violent, the whites fled. Finally, unlawful Mexicans moved in at a torrid pace. You could cut the racial tension in the air with a knife! Detroit may be one our best examples of multiculturalism: pure dislike and total separation from America.
Today, you hear Muslim calls to worship over the city like a new American Baghdad with hundreds of Islamic mosques in Michigan, paid for by Saudi Arabia oil money. High school flunk out rates reached 76 percent last June according to NBC’s Brian Williams. Classrooms resemble more foreign countries than America. English? Few speak it! The city features a 50 percent illiteracy rate and growing. Unemployment hit 28.9 percent in 2009 as the auto industry vacated the city.
In this week’s Time Magazine October 4, 2009, “The Tragedy of Detroit: How a great city fell and how it can rise again,” I choked on the writer’s description of what happened.
“If Detroit had been savaged by a hurricane and submerged by a ravenous flood, we'd know a lot more about it,” said Daniel Okrent. “If drought and carelessness had spread brush fires across the city, we'd see it on the evening news every night. Earthquake, tornadoes, you name it — if natural disaster had devastated the city that was once the living proof of American prosperity, the rest of the country might take notice. Top of Form
Bottom of Form
But Detroit, once our fourth largest city, now 11th and slipping rapidly, has had no such luck. Its disaster has long been a slow unwinding that seemed to remove it from the rest of the country. Even the death rattle that in the past year emanated from its signature industry brought more attention to the auto executives than to the people of the city, who had for so long been victimized by their dreadful decision-making.”
As Coleman Young’s corruption brought the city to its knees, no amount of federal dollars could save the incredible payoffs, kick backs and illegality permeating his administration. I witnessed the city’s death from the seat of my 18-wheeler tractor trailer because I moved people out of every sector of decaying Detroit.
“By any quantifiable standard, the city is on life support. Detroit's treasury is $300 million short of the funds needed to provide the barest municipal services,” Okrent said. “The school system, which six years ago was compelled by the teachers' union to reject a philanthropist's offer of $200 million to build 15 small, independent charter high schools, is in receivership. The murder rate is soaring, and 7 out of 10 remain unsolved. Three years after Katrina devastated New Orleans, unemployment in that city hit a peak of 11%. In Detroit, the unemployment rate is 28.9%. That's worth spelling out: twenty-eight point nine percent.”
At the end of Okrent’s report, and he will write a dozen more about Detroit, he said, “That's because the story of Detroit is not simply one of a great city's collapse. It's also about the erosion of the industries that helped build the country we know today. The ultimate fate of Detroit will reveal much about the character of America in the 21st century. If what was once the most prosperous manufacturing city in the nation has been brought to its knees, what does that say about our recent past? And if it can't find a way to get up, what does that say about our future?”
As you read in my book review of Chris Steiner’s book, $20 Per Gallon, the auto industry won’t come back. Immigration will keep pouring more and more uneducated third world immigrants from the Middle East into Detroit—thus creating a beachhead for Islamic hegemony in America. If 50 percent illiteracy continues, we will see more homegrown terrorists spawned out of the Muslim ghettos of Detroit. Illiteracy plus Islam equals walking human bombs. You have already seen it in the Madrid, Spain, London, England and Paris, France with train bombings, subway bombings and riots. As their numbers grow, so will their power to enact their barbaric Sharia Law that negates republican forms of government, first amendment rights and subjugates women to the lowest rungs on the human ladder. We will see more honor killings by upset husbands, fathers and brothers that demand subjugation by their daughters, sisters and wives. Muslims prefer beheadings of women to scare the hell out of any other members of their sect from straying.
Multiculturalism: what a perfect method to kill our language, culture, country and way of life.
Listen to Frosty Wooldridge on Wednesdays as he interviews top national leaders on his radio show "Connecting the Dots" at www.themicroeffect.com at 6:00 PM Mountain Time. Adjust tuning in to your time zone.
© 2009 Frosty Wooldridge - All Rights Reserved
Can Detroit come back, probably not. Even though we have a great Mayor now, Dave Bing, the ability to work against the entrenched unions and special interests who do not want change, will make his job nearly impossible. A previous Mayor, Dennis Archer, tried to make changes but was stymied at every turn. He gave the city four years of his life and decided there were better things for him to do. So, I am not optimistic that things will change here.
The attached article by Frosty Wooldridge gives additional information.
HOW IMMIGRATION AND MULTICULURALISM DESTROYED DETROIT
By Frosty Wooldridge
October 5, 2009
NewsWithViews.com
For 15 years, from the mid 1970s to 1990, I worked in Detroit, Michigan. I watched it descend into the abyss of crime, debauchery, gun play, drugs, school truancy, car-jacking, gangs and human depravity. I watched entire city blocks burned out. I watched graffiti explode on buildings, cars, trucks, buses and school yards. Trash everywhere! Detroiters walked through it, tossed more into it and ignored it.
Tens of thousands and then, hundreds of thousands today exist on federal welfare, free housing and food stamps! With Aid to Dependent Children, minority women birthed eight to 10 and in once case, one woman birthed 24 kids as reported by the Detroit Free Press—all on American taxpayer dollarss. A new child meant a new car payment, new TV and whatever mom wanted. I saw Lyndon Baines Johnson’s “Great Society” flourish in Detroit. If you give money for doing nothing, you will get more hands out taking money for doing nothing.
Mayor Coleman Young, perhaps the most corrupt mayor in America, outside of Richard Daley in Chicago, rode Detroit down to its knees. He set the benchmark for cronyism, incompetence and arrogance. As a black man, he said, “I am the MFIC.” The IC meant ‘in charge’. You can figure out the rest. Detroit became a majority black city with 67 percent African-Americans.
As a United Van Lines truck driver for my summer job from teaching math and science, I loaded hundreds of American families into my van for a new life in another city or state. Detroit plummeted from 1.8 million citizens to 912,000 today. At the same time, legal and illegal immigrants converged on the city, so much so, that Muslims number over 300,000. Mexicans number 400,000 throughout Michigan, but most work in Detroit.
As the Muslims moved in, the whites moved out. As the crimes became more violent, the whites fled. Finally, unlawful Mexicans moved in at a torrid pace. You could cut the racial tension in the air with a knife! Detroit may be one our best examples of multiculturalism: pure dislike and total separation from America.
Today, you hear Muslim calls to worship over the city like a new American Baghdad with hundreds of Islamic mosques in Michigan, paid for by Saudi Arabia oil money. High school flunk out rates reached 76 percent last June according to NBC’s Brian Williams. Classrooms resemble more foreign countries than America. English? Few speak it! The city features a 50 percent illiteracy rate and growing. Unemployment hit 28.9 percent in 2009 as the auto industry vacated the city.
In this week’s Time Magazine October 4, 2009, “The Tragedy of Detroit: How a great city fell and how it can rise again,” I choked on the writer’s description of what happened.
“If Detroit had been savaged by a hurricane and submerged by a ravenous flood, we'd know a lot more about it,” said Daniel Okrent. “If drought and carelessness had spread brush fires across the city, we'd see it on the evening news every night. Earthquake, tornadoes, you name it — if natural disaster had devastated the city that was once the living proof of American prosperity, the rest of the country might take notice. Top of Form
Bottom of Form
But Detroit, once our fourth largest city, now 11th and slipping rapidly, has had no such luck. Its disaster has long been a slow unwinding that seemed to remove it from the rest of the country. Even the death rattle that in the past year emanated from its signature industry brought more attention to the auto executives than to the people of the city, who had for so long been victimized by their dreadful decision-making.”
As Coleman Young’s corruption brought the city to its knees, no amount of federal dollars could save the incredible payoffs, kick backs and illegality permeating his administration. I witnessed the city’s death from the seat of my 18-wheeler tractor trailer because I moved people out of every sector of decaying Detroit.
“By any quantifiable standard, the city is on life support. Detroit's treasury is $300 million short of the funds needed to provide the barest municipal services,” Okrent said. “The school system, which six years ago was compelled by the teachers' union to reject a philanthropist's offer of $200 million to build 15 small, independent charter high schools, is in receivership. The murder rate is soaring, and 7 out of 10 remain unsolved. Three years after Katrina devastated New Orleans, unemployment in that city hit a peak of 11%. In Detroit, the unemployment rate is 28.9%. That's worth spelling out: twenty-eight point nine percent.”
At the end of Okrent’s report, and he will write a dozen more about Detroit, he said, “That's because the story of Detroit is not simply one of a great city's collapse. It's also about the erosion of the industries that helped build the country we know today. The ultimate fate of Detroit will reveal much about the character of America in the 21st century. If what was once the most prosperous manufacturing city in the nation has been brought to its knees, what does that say about our recent past? And if it can't find a way to get up, what does that say about our future?”
As you read in my book review of Chris Steiner’s book, $20 Per Gallon, the auto industry won’t come back. Immigration will keep pouring more and more uneducated third world immigrants from the Middle East into Detroit—thus creating a beachhead for Islamic hegemony in America. If 50 percent illiteracy continues, we will see more homegrown terrorists spawned out of the Muslim ghettos of Detroit. Illiteracy plus Islam equals walking human bombs. You have already seen it in the Madrid, Spain, London, England and Paris, France with train bombings, subway bombings and riots. As their numbers grow, so will their power to enact their barbaric Sharia Law that negates republican forms of government, first amendment rights and subjugates women to the lowest rungs on the human ladder. We will see more honor killings by upset husbands, fathers and brothers that demand subjugation by their daughters, sisters and wives. Muslims prefer beheadings of women to scare the hell out of any other members of their sect from straying.
Multiculturalism: what a perfect method to kill our language, culture, country and way of life.
Listen to Frosty Wooldridge on Wednesdays as he interviews top national leaders on his radio show "Connecting the Dots" at www.themicroeffect.com at 6:00 PM Mountain Time. Adjust tuning in to your time zone.
© 2009 Frosty Wooldridge - All Rights Reserved
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Governor Wilder discusses Obama Governing
Attached is a summary of an editorial posted by Politico by Doug Wilder, former Governor of Virginia. Governor Wilder is a Democrat who makes some observations to which the White House should listen.
Posted:
Former Democratic Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder says if Barack Obama is to fulfill his promise of positive change in America, the president must "make some hard changes of his own" by replacing inexperienced members of his team with "others more capable of helping him govern."
In an editorial for Politico Tuesday, Wilder writes Obama's White House staff is made up of too many people left over from the campaign or from his time in Chicago. "Getting elected and getting things done for the people are two different jobs," Wilder writes, suggesting the president and his people haven't fully made the transition from campaign mode to governing.
Wilder, who endorsed Obama in 2008, goes on:
One problem is that they do not have sufficient experience at governing at the executive branch level. The deeper problem is that they are not listening to the people.
Hearing is one thing; listening is another.
Some are even questioning whether Obama has forgotten how he got elected and the promises he made to the people who elected him.
Don't take my word for any of this. Look at the clear message the American people have been sending at the polls these past few months.
Wilder places part of the blame for recent election losses in New Jersey, Virginia and Massachusetts squarely on one of his successors as governor: the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Tim Kaine. He calls on Kaine to step down as head of the DNC, saying it is "the wrong job for him."
Shake-ups at the White House and at the top of the party are necessary if the president is to succeed and Democrats are going to turn around downward trending poll numbers and survive in November, Wilder writes.
In addition to replacing his staff, Wilder, the nation's first African-American governor, also urges the president to fine tune his message and focus on one major issue: jobs.
"Unless changes are made at the top, by the top, when the time comes for voters to show how they really feel about Obama, his policies and the messages he sends directly or through the people around him, the president will discover that Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts were not just temporary aberrations but, rather, timely expressions of voters who always show that they are ahead of the politicians," Wilder writes.
Posted:
Former Democratic Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder says if Barack Obama is to fulfill his promise of positive change in America, the president must "make some hard changes of his own" by replacing inexperienced members of his team with "others more capable of helping him govern."
In an editorial for Politico Tuesday, Wilder writes Obama's White House staff is made up of too many people left over from the campaign or from his time in Chicago. "Getting elected and getting things done for the people are two different jobs," Wilder writes, suggesting the president and his people haven't fully made the transition from campaign mode to governing.
Wilder, who endorsed Obama in 2008, goes on:
One problem is that they do not have sufficient experience at governing at the executive branch level. The deeper problem is that they are not listening to the people.
Hearing is one thing; listening is another.
Some are even questioning whether Obama has forgotten how he got elected and the promises he made to the people who elected him.
Don't take my word for any of this. Look at the clear message the American people have been sending at the polls these past few months.
Wilder places part of the blame for recent election losses in New Jersey, Virginia and Massachusetts squarely on one of his successors as governor: the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Tim Kaine. He calls on Kaine to step down as head of the DNC, saying it is "the wrong job for him."
Shake-ups at the White House and at the top of the party are necessary if the president is to succeed and Democrats are going to turn around downward trending poll numbers and survive in November, Wilder writes.
In addition to replacing his staff, Wilder, the nation's first African-American governor, also urges the president to fine tune his message and focus on one major issue: jobs.
"Unless changes are made at the top, by the top, when the time comes for voters to show how they really feel about Obama, his policies and the messages he sends directly or through the people around him, the president will discover that Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts were not just temporary aberrations but, rather, timely expressions of voters who always show that they are ahead of the politicians," Wilder writes.
Why the silence on the Flight 253 hearings?
This article comes from a non-conservative source, the Media channel, with which I disagree most times. However, in reading this article, I find the notion that media and government silence is not in the best interests of the United States. Please read and comment.
Why the Media Silence on the Flight 253 Bombing Hearings?
By Alex Lantier, WSWS
The media’s failure to report the January 27 Congressional hearings on last Christmas’ Flight 253 bomb plot is both extraordinary and ominous. The hearings made the explosive revelation that US intelligence agencies acted to help the bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, gain access to the plane.
Amid the press attention immediately after Abdulmutallab’s arrest, it soon emerged that US agencies had had ample warning of the plot. Abdulmutallab’s father—a banker who had held minister-level office in Nigeria—told US officials in November that his son was influenced by radical Islam, had traveled to Yemen, and might become a terrorist. The same month, US spy agencies monitoring Al Qaeda operatives in Yemen had learned that “Umar Farouk” had volunteered for terrorist acts.
Nonetheless, US authorities did not put Abdulmutallab on a no-fly list or flag him for special searches—even after he paid for a one-way ticket in cash and tried to board the plane without showing a passport. President Obama, congressmen and the media absurdly claimed that US intelligence had not stopped the attack because it failed to “connect the dots” between such pieces of information and realize that Abdulmutallab in fact could pose a threat.
The January 27 hearing went even further in exploding the official explanation given by the government and media. (See “Congressional hearing reveals US intelligence agencies shielded Flight 253 bomber” ).
Under questioning about US visa policy, State Department Under-Secretary Patrick Kennedy said: “We will revoke the visa of any individual who is a threat to the United States, but we do take one preliminary step. We ask our law enforcement and intelligence community partners, ‘Do you have eyes on this person and do you want us to let this person proceed under your surveillance so that you may potentially break a larger plot?’ … And one of the members [of the intelligence community]—and we’d be glad to give you that out of—in private—said, ‘Please, do not revoke this visa. We have eyes on this person.’”
This unnamed US agency endangered the lives of hundreds of passengers, and more potential victims of flying debris on the ground. All three officials testifying—Kennedy, National Counter-Terrorism Center Director Michael Leiter, and Department of Homeland Security Deputy Director Jane Lute—said their agencies would take no disciplinary action over the Flight 253 events.
The hearing was reported in a brief January 27 article in the Detroit News, headlined, “Terror Suspect Kept Visa to Avoid Tipping Off Larger Investigation.” The News wrote: “The State Department didn’t revoke the visa of foiled terrorism suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab because federal counterterrorism officials had begged off revocation, a top State Department official revealed Wednesday.”
This article, published by one of the leading newspapers covering the aftermath of Flight 253, has not been challenged or retracted. Instead, it has been ignored. While there have been Congressional hearings involving leading figures in the US intelligence apparatus since January 27, Kennedy’s statements have not been raised in questioning.
Why is the media still saying nothing about the hearings?
Major press covered Congressional hearings on the Flight 253 attack extensively as they began. The New York Times ran a sympathetic January 16 article on Leiter—“For Antiterror Chief, a Rough Week Ahead as Hearings Begin”—praising him as “extremely bright.” It suggested Leiter’s agency struggled to keep track of different watch list systems.
On January 20, Washington news web site Talking Points Memo wrote: “As three separate Senate committees today hold hearings on the failed Christmas attack over Detroit, watch for Republicans to take the opportunity to ramp up their criticism of the Obama Administration.”
In fact, the Republican Party has been conspicuously silent since. Immediately after the bombing, former Vice President Dick Cheney attacked the Obama administration and nearly accused it of treason: “We are at war, and when President Obama pretends we aren’t, it makes us less safe.” However, after it became clear that US intelligence agencies were involved, Cheney has made no public criticisms of the White House’s handling of the issue.
The blackout is a devastating exposure of the state of US politics. If events do not fit the concocted “connect-the-dots” script, the political establishment treats them, in Orwellian style, as if they had never happened. This, in turn, further strengthens the power of the national-security apparatus inside the state, as it learns that it can plan operations risking mass deaths with impunity.
Washington proceeds in this manner to advance fundamental state interests: in protecting the “connect-the-dots” lie, it is trying to shield the credibility of the entire so-called “war on terror.”
This “war” relied on the claim that the only defense against a new September 11-type attack was giving the US national security apparatus carte blanche for an unpopular policy of preemptive wars, domestic spying, and other attacks on democratic rights. In earlier times, intelligence agencies had been known as the “department of dirty tricks.” However, US media treated their stunning lapses before September 11 as simply the product of honest mistakes or technical problems.
The Flight 253 hearings threatened to suggest the truth to masses of people: giving intelligence agencies free rein is extremely dangerous, both on the levels of personal security and of politics. This truth was, moreover, implicit in the US government’s unclear role in the September 11 events themselves.
In 2005, the New York Times published material on the Able Danger military intelligence unit. These revelations included confirmation of overseas reports that, as in Abdulmutallab’s case, the US had identified 9/11 operational leader Mohammed Atta before he entered the US on a visa in 2000. The World Socialist Web Site noted at the time: “How Atta was able to enter and re-enter the country on multiple occasions over the next year, enroll in flight school, and use credit cards and bank accounts in his real name, despite being a known Al Qaeda operative, has never been explained.”
Amid the toxic political atmosphere that swept the ruling class after September 11, 2001 and the invasion of Iraq, General Tommy Franks described in a November 2003 interview how he saw the security establishment’s response to another attack leading to military rule.
Franks said: “[It is] a terrorist, massive, casualty-producing event somewhere in the Western world—it may be in the United States of America—that causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass, casualty-producing event. Which in fact, then begins to unravel the fabric of our Constitution. … [T]he Western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we’ve seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy.”
Just the year before, the Bush administration had set up the Northern Command, to supervise military operations inside the US. In 2005, the Washington Post revealed that the US military was running so-called Vital Archer exercises involving US troops to “take charge” after a large-scale terrorist attack in the US.
In the days after the Flight 253 bombing, the World Socialist Web Site commented: “If this episode is to be examined seriously, the question must be asked: What would have happened had Northwest Flight 253 been destroyed? There is no question but that such a catastrophe would have had immense repercussions both internationally and within the United States. It would have seriously destabilized the Obama administration, politically strengthened the most extreme right-wing sections of the ruling class, and cleared the way for an even more massive expansion of military-intelligence operations overseas and a drastic curtailing of democratic rights at home.”
In keeping silent under such conditions, the mass media are helping to facilitate more anti-democratic plots.
Why the Media Silence on the Flight 253 Bombing Hearings?
By Alex Lantier, WSWS
The media’s failure to report the January 27 Congressional hearings on last Christmas’ Flight 253 bomb plot is both extraordinary and ominous. The hearings made the explosive revelation that US intelligence agencies acted to help the bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, gain access to the plane.
Amid the press attention immediately after Abdulmutallab’s arrest, it soon emerged that US agencies had had ample warning of the plot. Abdulmutallab’s father—a banker who had held minister-level office in Nigeria—told US officials in November that his son was influenced by radical Islam, had traveled to Yemen, and might become a terrorist. The same month, US spy agencies monitoring Al Qaeda operatives in Yemen had learned that “Umar Farouk” had volunteered for terrorist acts.
Nonetheless, US authorities did not put Abdulmutallab on a no-fly list or flag him for special searches—even after he paid for a one-way ticket in cash and tried to board the plane without showing a passport. President Obama, congressmen and the media absurdly claimed that US intelligence had not stopped the attack because it failed to “connect the dots” between such pieces of information and realize that Abdulmutallab in fact could pose a threat.
The January 27 hearing went even further in exploding the official explanation given by the government and media. (See “Congressional hearing reveals US intelligence agencies shielded Flight 253 bomber” ).
Under questioning about US visa policy, State Department Under-Secretary Patrick Kennedy said: “We will revoke the visa of any individual who is a threat to the United States, but we do take one preliminary step. We ask our law enforcement and intelligence community partners, ‘Do you have eyes on this person and do you want us to let this person proceed under your surveillance so that you may potentially break a larger plot?’ … And one of the members [of the intelligence community]—and we’d be glad to give you that out of—in private—said, ‘Please, do not revoke this visa. We have eyes on this person.’”
This unnamed US agency endangered the lives of hundreds of passengers, and more potential victims of flying debris on the ground. All three officials testifying—Kennedy, National Counter-Terrorism Center Director Michael Leiter, and Department of Homeland Security Deputy Director Jane Lute—said their agencies would take no disciplinary action over the Flight 253 events.
The hearing was reported in a brief January 27 article in the Detroit News, headlined, “Terror Suspect Kept Visa to Avoid Tipping Off Larger Investigation.” The News wrote: “The State Department didn’t revoke the visa of foiled terrorism suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab because federal counterterrorism officials had begged off revocation, a top State Department official revealed Wednesday.”
This article, published by one of the leading newspapers covering the aftermath of Flight 253, has not been challenged or retracted. Instead, it has been ignored. While there have been Congressional hearings involving leading figures in the US intelligence apparatus since January 27, Kennedy’s statements have not been raised in questioning.
Why is the media still saying nothing about the hearings?
Major press covered Congressional hearings on the Flight 253 attack extensively as they began. The New York Times ran a sympathetic January 16 article on Leiter—“For Antiterror Chief, a Rough Week Ahead as Hearings Begin”—praising him as “extremely bright.” It suggested Leiter’s agency struggled to keep track of different watch list systems.
On January 20, Washington news web site Talking Points Memo wrote: “As three separate Senate committees today hold hearings on the failed Christmas attack over Detroit, watch for Republicans to take the opportunity to ramp up their criticism of the Obama Administration.”
In fact, the Republican Party has been conspicuously silent since. Immediately after the bombing, former Vice President Dick Cheney attacked the Obama administration and nearly accused it of treason: “We are at war, and when President Obama pretends we aren’t, it makes us less safe.” However, after it became clear that US intelligence agencies were involved, Cheney has made no public criticisms of the White House’s handling of the issue.
The blackout is a devastating exposure of the state of US politics. If events do not fit the concocted “connect-the-dots” script, the political establishment treats them, in Orwellian style, as if they had never happened. This, in turn, further strengthens the power of the national-security apparatus inside the state, as it learns that it can plan operations risking mass deaths with impunity.
Washington proceeds in this manner to advance fundamental state interests: in protecting the “connect-the-dots” lie, it is trying to shield the credibility of the entire so-called “war on terror.”
This “war” relied on the claim that the only defense against a new September 11-type attack was giving the US national security apparatus carte blanche for an unpopular policy of preemptive wars, domestic spying, and other attacks on democratic rights. In earlier times, intelligence agencies had been known as the “department of dirty tricks.” However, US media treated their stunning lapses before September 11 as simply the product of honest mistakes or technical problems.
The Flight 253 hearings threatened to suggest the truth to masses of people: giving intelligence agencies free rein is extremely dangerous, both on the levels of personal security and of politics. This truth was, moreover, implicit in the US government’s unclear role in the September 11 events themselves.
In 2005, the New York Times published material on the Able Danger military intelligence unit. These revelations included confirmation of overseas reports that, as in Abdulmutallab’s case, the US had identified 9/11 operational leader Mohammed Atta before he entered the US on a visa in 2000. The World Socialist Web Site noted at the time: “How Atta was able to enter and re-enter the country on multiple occasions over the next year, enroll in flight school, and use credit cards and bank accounts in his real name, despite being a known Al Qaeda operative, has never been explained.”
Amid the toxic political atmosphere that swept the ruling class after September 11, 2001 and the invasion of Iraq, General Tommy Franks described in a November 2003 interview how he saw the security establishment’s response to another attack leading to military rule.
Franks said: “[It is] a terrorist, massive, casualty-producing event somewhere in the Western world—it may be in the United States of America—that causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass, casualty-producing event. Which in fact, then begins to unravel the fabric of our Constitution. … [T]he Western world, the free world, loses what it cherishes most, and that is freedom and liberty we’ve seen for a couple of hundred years in this grand experiment that we call democracy.”
Just the year before, the Bush administration had set up the Northern Command, to supervise military operations inside the US. In 2005, the Washington Post revealed that the US military was running so-called Vital Archer exercises involving US troops to “take charge” after a large-scale terrorist attack in the US.
In the days after the Flight 253 bombing, the World Socialist Web Site commented: “If this episode is to be examined seriously, the question must be asked: What would have happened had Northwest Flight 253 been destroyed? There is no question but that such a catastrophe would have had immense repercussions both internationally and within the United States. It would have seriously destabilized the Obama administration, politically strengthened the most extreme right-wing sections of the ruling class, and cleared the way for an even more massive expansion of military-intelligence operations overseas and a drastic curtailing of democratic rights at home.”
In keeping silent under such conditions, the mass media are helping to facilitate more anti-democratic plots.
Will Obama declare war against Iran?
This article comes from the Conservative Review by Pat Buchanan. It is thought THE CONSERVATIVE REVIEW - February 9, 2010
Will Obama Play the War Card?
by Pat Buchanan
Republicans already counting the seats they will pick up
this fall should keep in mind Obama has a big card yet to
play.
Should the president declare he has gone the last mile for
a negotiated end to Iran's nuclear program and impose the
"crippling" sanctions he promised in 2008, America would be
on an escalator to confrontation that could lead straight
to war.
And should war come, that would be the end of GOP dreams of
adding three-dozen seats in the House and half a dozen in
the Senate.
Harry Reid is surely aware a U.S. clash with Iran, with him
at the president's side, could assure his re-election. Last
week, Reid whistled through the Senate, by voice vote, a
bill to put us on that escalator.
Senate bill 2799 would punish any company exporting
gasoline to Iran. Though swimming in oil, Iran has a
limited refining capacity and must import 40 percent of
the gas to operate its cars and trucks and heat its homes.
And cutting off a country's oil or gas is a proven path to
war.
In 1941, the United States froze Japan's assets, denying
her the funds to pay for the U.S. oil on which she relied,
forcing Tokyo either to retreat from her empire or seize
the only oil in reach, in the Dutch East Indies.
The only force able to interfere with a Japanese drive into
the East Indies? The U.S. Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor.
Egypt's Gamel Abdel Nasser in 1967 threatened to close the
Straits of Tiran between the Red Sea and Gulf of Aqaba to
ships going to the Israeli port of Elath. That would have
cut off 95 percent of Israel's oil.
Israel response: a pre-emptive war that destroyed Egypt's
air force and put Israeli troops at Sharm el-Sheikh on the
Straits of Tiran.
Were Reid and colleagues seeking to strengthen Obama's
negotiating hand?
The opposite is true. The Senate is trying to force Obama's
hand, box him in, restrict his freedom of action, by making
him impose sanctions that would cut off the negotiating
track and put us on a track to war -- a war to deny Iran
weapons that the U.S. Intelligence community said in
December 2007 Iran gave up trying to acquire in 2003.
Sound familiar?
Republican leader Mitch McConnell has made clear the Senate
is seizing control of the Iran portfolio. "If the Obama
administration will not take action against this regime,
then Congress must."
U.S. interests would seem to dictate supporting those
elements in Iran who wish to be rid of the regime and
re-engage the West. But if that is our goal, the Senate
bill, and a House version that passed 412 to 12, seem
almost diabolically perverse.
For a cutoff in gas would hammer Iran's middle class. The
Revolutionary Guard and Basij militia on their motorbikes
would get all they need. Thus the leaders of the Green
Movement who have stood up to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the
Ayatollah oppose sanctions that inflict suffering on their
own people.
Cutting off gas to Iran would cause many deaths. And the
families of the sick, the old, the weak, the women and
the children who die are unlikely to feel gratitude toward
those who killed them.
And despite the hysteria about Iran's imminent testing of a
bomb, the U.S. intelligence community still has not changed
its finding that Tehran is not seeking a bomb.
The low-enriched uranium at Natanz, enough for one test,
has neither been moved nor enriched to weapons grade.
Ahmadinejad this week offered to take the West's deal and
trade it for fuel for its reactor. Iran's known nuclear
facilities are under U.N. watch. The number of centrifuges
operating at Natanz has fallen below 4,000. There is
speculation they are breaking down or have been sabotaged.
And if Iran is hell-bent on a bomb, why has Director of
National Intelligence Dennis Blair not revised the 2007
finding and given us the hard evidence?
U.S. anti-missile ships are moving into the Gulf. Anti-
missile batteries are being deployed on the Arab shore.
Yet, Gen. David Petraeus warned yesterday that a strike
on Iran could stir nationalist sentiment behind the
regime.
Nevertheless, the war drums have again begun to beat.
Daniel Pipes in a National Review Online piece featured by
the Jerusalem Post -- "How to Save the Obama Presidency:
Bomb Iran" -- urges Obama to make a "dramatic gesture to
change the public perception of him as a lightweight,
bumbling ideologue" by ordering the U.S. military to
attack Iran's nuclear facilities.
Citing six polls, Pipes says Americans support an attack
today and will "presumably rally around the flag" when the
bombs fall.
Will Obama cynically yield to temptation, play the war card
and make "conservatives swoon," in Pipes' phrase, to save
himself and his party? We shall see.
---------------------------------------------------------
END OF Conservative Review
Copyright 2010 by NextEra Media. All rights reserved.
Please feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others.
provoking.
Will Obama Play the War Card?
by Pat Buchanan
Republicans already counting the seats they will pick up
this fall should keep in mind Obama has a big card yet to
play.
Should the president declare he has gone the last mile for
a negotiated end to Iran's nuclear program and impose the
"crippling" sanctions he promised in 2008, America would be
on an escalator to confrontation that could lead straight
to war.
And should war come, that would be the end of GOP dreams of
adding three-dozen seats in the House and half a dozen in
the Senate.
Harry Reid is surely aware a U.S. clash with Iran, with him
at the president's side, could assure his re-election. Last
week, Reid whistled through the Senate, by voice vote, a
bill to put us on that escalator.
Senate bill 2799 would punish any company exporting
gasoline to Iran. Though swimming in oil, Iran has a
limited refining capacity and must import 40 percent of
the gas to operate its cars and trucks and heat its homes.
And cutting off a country's oil or gas is a proven path to
war.
In 1941, the United States froze Japan's assets, denying
her the funds to pay for the U.S. oil on which she relied,
forcing Tokyo either to retreat from her empire or seize
the only oil in reach, in the Dutch East Indies.
The only force able to interfere with a Japanese drive into
the East Indies? The U.S. Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor.
Egypt's Gamel Abdel Nasser in 1967 threatened to close the
Straits of Tiran between the Red Sea and Gulf of Aqaba to
ships going to the Israeli port of Elath. That would have
cut off 95 percent of Israel's oil.
Israel response: a pre-emptive war that destroyed Egypt's
air force and put Israeli troops at Sharm el-Sheikh on the
Straits of Tiran.
Were Reid and colleagues seeking to strengthen Obama's
negotiating hand?
The opposite is true. The Senate is trying to force Obama's
hand, box him in, restrict his freedom of action, by making
him impose sanctions that would cut off the negotiating
track and put us on a track to war -- a war to deny Iran
weapons that the U.S. Intelligence community said in
December 2007 Iran gave up trying to acquire in 2003.
Sound familiar?
Republican leader Mitch McConnell has made clear the Senate
is seizing control of the Iran portfolio. "If the Obama
administration will not take action against this regime,
then Congress must."
U.S. interests would seem to dictate supporting those
elements in Iran who wish to be rid of the regime and
re-engage the West. But if that is our goal, the Senate
bill, and a House version that passed 412 to 12, seem
almost diabolically perverse.
For a cutoff in gas would hammer Iran's middle class. The
Revolutionary Guard and Basij militia on their motorbikes
would get all they need. Thus the leaders of the Green
Movement who have stood up to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the
Ayatollah oppose sanctions that inflict suffering on their
own people.
Cutting off gas to Iran would cause many deaths. And the
families of the sick, the old, the weak, the women and
the children who die are unlikely to feel gratitude toward
those who killed them.
And despite the hysteria about Iran's imminent testing of a
bomb, the U.S. intelligence community still has not changed
its finding that Tehran is not seeking a bomb.
The low-enriched uranium at Natanz, enough for one test,
has neither been moved nor enriched to weapons grade.
Ahmadinejad this week offered to take the West's deal and
trade it for fuel for its reactor. Iran's known nuclear
facilities are under U.N. watch. The number of centrifuges
operating at Natanz has fallen below 4,000. There is
speculation they are breaking down or have been sabotaged.
And if Iran is hell-bent on a bomb, why has Director of
National Intelligence Dennis Blair not revised the 2007
finding and given us the hard evidence?
U.S. anti-missile ships are moving into the Gulf. Anti-
missile batteries are being deployed on the Arab shore.
Yet, Gen. David Petraeus warned yesterday that a strike
on Iran could stir nationalist sentiment behind the
regime.
Nevertheless, the war drums have again begun to beat.
Daniel Pipes in a National Review Online piece featured by
the Jerusalem Post -- "How to Save the Obama Presidency:
Bomb Iran" -- urges Obama to make a "dramatic gesture to
change the public perception of him as a lightweight,
bumbling ideologue" by ordering the U.S. military to
attack Iran's nuclear facilities.
Citing six polls, Pipes says Americans support an attack
today and will "presumably rally around the flag" when the
bombs fall.
Will Obama cynically yield to temptation, play the war card
and make "conservatives swoon," in Pipes' phrase, to save
himself and his party? We shall see.
---------------------------------------------------------
END OF Conservative Review
Copyright 2010 by NextEra Media. All rights reserved.
Please feel free to forward this, in its entirety, to others.
provoking.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Obama Joke
Now this is a joke, take it for that only!
Dear Lord, In the past year you have taken away my favorite actor, Patrick Swayze, my favorite actress, Farrah Fawcett, my favorite musician, Michael Jackson, my favorite salesman, Billie Mays, and my favorite athlete, Chris Henry. I just wanted to let you know, my favorite President is Barack Obama . . . Thank you and AMEN!!
Dear Lord, In the past year you have taken away my favorite actor, Patrick Swayze, my favorite actress, Farrah Fawcett, my favorite musician, Michael Jackson, my favorite salesman, Billie Mays, and my favorite athlete, Chris Henry. I just wanted to let you know, my favorite President is Barack Obama . . . Thank you and AMEN!!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)