Tuesday, January 31, 2012

MF Global's Jon Corzine Raises $500K For Obama

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Well, at least we know now where some of that $ 1.2 billion in investor funds that's 'missing' went!

According the Barack Obama's 2012 campaign website, Jon Corzine of Hoboken, New Jersey raised at least $500,000 for the president's reelection effort.

Corzine, of course, has most recently been in the news for being on the wrong side of a $6.3 billion bet as head of MF Global. "MF Global filed for bankruptcy on October 31, after $6.3 billion in risky bets on European sovereign debt spooked investors and an effort to sell the company failed," Reuters reported. "Investigators are searching for as much as $1.2 billion in missing customer money, which regulators said the company may have diverted for its own needs."

Later, Corzine admitted he could not account for the $1.2 billion.


Ah the sweet smell of The Chicago Way..if the president gets re-elected, any bets out there on how soon Jon Corzine gets a pardon if he ends up being convicted?

Newt Attacks Romney For Fiscal Conservatism And Leaner, Smarter Government!

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This gets more bizarre the longer it goes on.

Florida has a large population of elderly retired Jews, and Newt Gingrich is targeting them in his personal appearances by claiming that while he was governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney vetoed kosher food in state-supported old age homes, thus causing the retirees distress because of the disrespect to their religion.

Sounds pretty nasty, doesn't it? Especially to someone who keeps kosher and imagines all those poor elderly Jews having to choose between violating their faith by eating non-kosher food or starvation.

The real story? What actually happened is that the State of Massachusetts was going through a severe budget crunch and Governor Romney attempted to cut the state budget by ending expensive kosher kitchens in state-supported nursing homes and called for kosher meals to get prepared off-site and bused in to those locations where they were needed. It would have saved the state $600,000 per year, and still provided kosher meals to any Jew that wanted them. The Democrat- dominated Massachusetts legislature shot the proposal down.

Just listen to Newt's new radio spot:

“vetoed a bill paying for kosher food for our seniors in nursing homes -- Holocaust survivors, who for the first time, were forced to eat non-kosher, because Romney thought $5 was too much to pay for our grandparents to eat kosher.”

I'm upset about this not only because it gives the lie to Newt Gingrich's claim that he's a 'fiscal conservative' but because it's a disgraceful attempt to manipulate old people and slander another person with a deliberate falsehood. He'll be saying Romney eats babies for breakfast next, and poisons puppies for recreation.

After this, I don't want hear another word from Gingrich or his supporters about 'attack ads' or 'lies'. Not another single word.

Iranian Majlis Preparing Impeachment For Ahmadinejad


At least that's what a number of sources are reporting.

The rift I reported on earlier between President Ahmadinejad and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has not lessened, but gotten even greater.

The chief cause of the friction is that Ahmadinejad has been seeking increased power and freedom of action while showing a disturbing tendency not to follow orders to put it mildly, and the Mullahs don't like it, to say the least.

Under the velayat-e-faqih clerical government installed by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, the Supreme Leader and the Council of Guardians actually rule and the president's office is essentially an administrative one. If Khamenei decides he's had enough of Ahmadinejad,there's nothing stopping him from having the Iranian majlis (parliament) throw hm out of office.

However, the political discord may not be what Ayatollah Khamenei wants right now, especially if he can have a quiet talk with Ahmadinejad and let him know that there could be new accommodations for him in Teheran's Evin prison unless he changes his ways. Ahmadinejad's terms in up in 2013 anyway, and he would not be able to run fro re-election without the consent of Khamenei and the Council of Guardians anyway.

Another possible factor is Khamenei's reported ill health. He may very well decide to settle business with Ahmadinejad and not leave it for a successor to do.

Make no mistake about it - we're not talking about a 'Persian Spring' here..just a changing of one man's position.

Stay tuned...

Monday, January 30, 2012

CBC Chairman Emanuel Cleaver: 'Hey, We're Racists! What Of It?'



That's not exactly verbatim, but it's essentially what the Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus said:

Rep. Emanuel Cleaver — the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus – told The Daily Caller that African Americans won’t “march on the White House” over the high unemployment rate in the black community because President Barack Obama is black.

Following his appearance at Republican Rep. Allen West’s Black Conservative Forum, Cleaver elaborated on his past comments about Obama’s image in the African American community, saying, “The point I was making is that black people hold the president in such high esteem, that they would not dare march on the White House even though unemployment is at 15 percent and higher and if there was a white president we would do that because we’ve had white presidents since George Washington.”

Cleaver continued, “The point was that if we had anybody else in the White House, with this level of unemployment, that you know, you would see a lot more African Americans, African American organizations and retro organizations speaking out against it. But because he is revered, you know, he gets I guess the benefit of, you know, understanding that the situation was terrible when he came in. So, we’re not doing that.”

The Missouri Democrat told The DC that he personally resisted a proposed Annual Legislative Conference (ALC) “prayer” demonstration at the White House.

“I was resistant to a group of individuals who wanted to lock arms, surround the White House, with several thousand people during the ALC this past October and pray. I resisted it because I thought if we did that it would be interpreted as some kind of assault on the president, which I was not willing to launch,” he said.


So...it's OK to trash President Bush simply because he's white, but President Obama is sacrosanct just because he's black for even worse performance.

Does anyone have any doubt that if whites used exactly the same criteria in criticizing President Obama while giving a white president a pass Rep. Cleaver and his friends would be foaming at the mouth and screaming "Racism" ?

You see, Racism really is colorblind, as Dr, King so clearly saw.

It's an ugly cancer no matter who wears the sheet.

India Opts Out Of Participating In Iran Oil Embargo

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India, the world's fourth largest oil consumer has informed the US and Europe that it will not participate in the embargo on Iranian oil scheduled to start - if it starts - this summer.

"It is not possible for India to take any decision to reduce the imports from Iran drastically, because among the countries which can provide the requirement of the emerging economies, Iran is an important country amongst them," Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters on a visit to the Unites States.


Yeah, sanctions'll work. Sure they will.

In a related item, India and Iran have agreed to drop the use of the dollar as a reserve currency for oil trading between the two countries. They're using gold.

UK's Global Warming Office New Figures: No Warming in the Past 15 Years


Whoopsie:

The supposed ‘consensus’ on man-made global warming is facing an inconvenient challenge after the release of new temperature data showing the planet has not warmed for the past 15 years.

The figures suggest that we could even be heading for a mini ice age to rival the 70-year temperature drop that saw frost fairs held on the Thames in the 17th Century.

Based on readings from more than 30,000 measuring stations, the data was issued last week without fanfare by the Met Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit. It confirms that the rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997.


Remember 'the science is settled'?

What I'd like to know now is how taxpayers in the developed world go about reclaiming the billions of taxpayer dollars that were and still are literally being stolen from the public purse in the name of this scam.

Brinks, The Great Train Robbery and even Bernie Madoff aren't even in the same league.

Sunday, January 29, 2012

AG Holder Caught In Another Fast And Furious Lie


Attorney General Eric Holder’s Department of Justice did a document dump on Operation Fast and Furious to congressional officials late Friday night. One part of this was a series of emails showing Holder was informed of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder on the day it happened – December 15, 2010 – and that he was informed the weapons used to kill Terry were from Fast and Furious on the same day.

Let me reiterate. Eric Holder didn't find out about gunwalking and Fast and Furious "a few weeks" before Congress called him in as he originally said (later amended to "a few months") before his May 2011 testimony.He knew all about it the very same day:

An email from one official, whose name has been redacted from the document, to now-former Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke reads: “On December 14, 2010, a BORTAC agent working in the Nogales, AZ AOR was shot. The agent was conducting Border Patrol operations 18 miles north of the international boundary when he encountered [redacted word] unidentified subjects. Shots were exchanged resulting in the agent being shot. At this time, the agent is being transported to an area where he can be air lifted to an emergency medical center.”

That email was sent at 2:31 a.m. on the day Terry was shot. One hour later, a follow-up email read: “Our agent has passed away.”

Burke forwarded those two emails to Holder’s then-deputy chief of staff Monty Wilkinson later that morning, adding that the incident was “not good” because it happened “18 miles w/in” the border.

Wilkinson responded to Burke shortly thereafter and said the incident was “tragic.” “I’ve alerted the AG [Holder], the Acting DAG, Lisa, etc.”

Then, later that day, Burke followed up with Wilkinson after Burke discovered from officials whose names are redacted that the guns used to kill Terry were from Fast and Furious. “The guns found in the desert near the murder BP officer connect back to the investigation we were going to talk about – they were AK-47s purchased at a Phoenix gun store,” Burke wrote to Wilkinson.

“I’ll call tomorrow,” Wilkinson responded.


Adding to the paper trail, there already are a series of memos containing the intimate details of Fast and Furious that were sent to Holder throughout 2010 from several of his senior aides. Holder has continued to claim he never read them.

Holder is scheduled to appear before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform next Thursday, February 2. This will be the first time the House oversight committee will have an opportunity to question Holder himself, although Holder has already testified before Congress three times on Fast and Furious — twice before the House Judiciary Committee and once before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Congress needs to grow a spine and impeach this weasel, since the president won't fire him. And the fact that President Obama has had nothing to say about this also leads me to believe that this entire plot, which appears to be mainly directed at pushing a major erosion of Second Amendments rights by sparking violent incidents on the border goes far beyond AG Holder and directly into the White House itself.

Does Congress have the basic integrity to insist on a special prosecutor? Idoubt it, but if they do, we might actually be able to get to the bottom of this.

California Goes Crazy Again...

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Ah, the beat goes on...

Notwithstanding the massive recalls of Chevy Volts, the low driving range before recharging and the high incidence of battery fires,The California Air Resources Board unanimously approved a set of new rules requiring that one in seven of the new cars sold in California by 2025 be an electric or other zero-emission vehicle.

The plan also mandates a 75 percent reduction in smog-forming pollutants by 2025, and a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from today's standards. All hail Gaia! :

"Today's vote ... represents a new chapter for clean cars in California and in the nation as a whole," said Mary Nichols, the board's chairman. "Californians have always loved their cars. We buy a lot of them and drive them. Now we will have cleaner and more efficient cars to love." [...]

Trade groups representing auto dealers worried that the new regulations would increase the costs of vehicles for consumers and stifle the industry's growth.

The California New Car Dealers Association and other industry groups representing those who sell cars said the board is overestimating consumer demand for electric vehicles and other so-called "zero-emission vehicles."

Dealers are concerned that the regulations will lead to higher costs in all cars, and say consumers have been slow to warm to electric and other zero-emission vehicles.

Board member Sandra Berg, who said she drives the all-electric Nissan Leaf, said before the vote that regulators need to take consumer behavior and choice seriously in this equation.

She said a lot of work must be done to educate dealers to sell the new generation of cars.

"Early adopters (of electric cars) are willing to go without heat to save the miles they need to get to their destination, but that is not going to help grow the consumer base," Berg said, referring to the range issues with some current electric vehicles.

The board's research staff disputes the argument from dealers that the mandates for new technology will increase costs for cars. They point to steady increases in hybrid and other sales and argue that fuel cost savings will make up for any vehicle price increase.

"Our research shows a $1,400 to $1,900 car price increase. But over the life of the vehicles, the owners save $6,000 in reduced fuel and maintenance costs," board spokesman David Clegern said.


Consumers have largely shied away from these electric vehicles because of their limited driving range, higher purchase prices ( I don't know what planet Clegern and his 'researchers' are living on) and a mixed record for reliability in a number of models. Simple solution..California's bureaucrats are going to force you to buy them.

Let's look at the likely results of this stupidity:

  • Car prices across the board are going to rise sharply. That includes the price of used cars as people desperately try to avoid having to shell out huge bucks for an electric car that only gets 30 to 40 miles per charge and makes trips to outlying areas without a charging station a thing of the past.And by the way, do you know how long it takes to charge up an electric car as opposed to a fill up at your local gas station?


  • Additional government spending in a state that's already broke to put in the infrastructure for charging stations and the all important bureaucrats and their staffs to ensure and monitor compliance by dealers and manufacturers.


  • Increased demand in the urban areas of California for electric power from the state's already strained power grid...and of course, higher prices for energy for both homes and what remains of California's businesses. Welcome to blackout city!


  • The ironic part is that this is being done in the name of 'global warming', but will have little or no effect of emissions because all that electric power comes from - you guessed it, power plants fueled by oil, gas, coal or nuclear power. And even if that wasn't true, pollution doesn't honor state boundaries. Or even national borders.

    Of course, this isn't about pollution per se, but almost entirely political in nature. The Obama Administration loves cap n' trade because it provides tax revenues, cripples the hated oil and coal industries and gives them bureaucratic control over yet another segment of American industry. And it also allows them to use taxpayer dollars to reward campaign donors with Solyndra-like green energy scams. The Democrats who run California are no different.

    If California was anything but a state of the Union, it would be under receivership right now.

    Michael Savage Rips Ron Paul To Shreds



    Not one of my favorites, but when Dr. Savage is on target, he's really on target...

    Occupy Oakland Creeps Riot, Break Into City Hall, Burn American Flag



    You'll remember that far left Oakland mayor Democrat Jean Quan was noticeably tolerant and supportive of the #Occupy Oakland creeps the last time they erupted back in November.Their pestilential encampment was only dismantled by police after it became a major health hazard.

    Over the weekend, #Occupy Oakland repaid the city's tolerance by breaking into City Hall and did massive damage to the facility, including seizing American flags and burning them as part of the festivities.They also tore down fencing at the adjacent Henry Kaiser convention center and smashed everything they could get their hands on, including construction equipment left onsite. The #Occupy mob fought with police throughout the entire day, throwing rocks, bottles and other objects at officers. The Police responded by deploying smoke, tear gas and bean bag rounds. They later marched downtown,breaking into a number of buildings including a YMCA and damaging them.Over 300 were arrested.

    The riot occurred after #Occupy protesters demanded the use a vacant building as a social center and threatened to to shut down the port, occupy the airport and take over City Hall.

    Mayor Quan was typically schizoid about the event, on one hand demanding that the rioters "stop using Oakland as its playground" and on the other hand refusing to condemn the #Occupy movement, blaming on a small "very radical, violent" splinter group within #Occupy for the violence and destruction.

    In media stories about this and other incidents, it's notable that no mention has been made of the fact that prominent Democrats like Nancy Pelosi and President Obama have explicitly endorsed the #Occupy protesters and everything they stand for. And that the Democrats and of course Democrat paymaster George Soros have helped finance it.

    Israeli PM Netanyahu Wishes The Chinese People A Happy New Year



    Believe it or not, the most popular video on YouTube this week, with over 40 million hits and climbing.

    ( hat tip, Carl)

    Friday, January 27, 2012

    Muslim Shooting Out Of Car Shouting "Allahu Akbar" Pleads Guilty -WAPO: 'Motive Unclear'

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    Today's Washington Post provides a superb example of why the majority of the dinosaur media is not to be trusted when it comes to reporting about Islamists or about jihad activity, particularly in the United States.

    Yonathan Melaku, an ex-marine reservist and a naturalized citizen from Ethiopia pled guilty today in a plea bargain to three counts, including shooting at the Pentagon on Oct. 19, 2010, and attempting to vandalize veterans’ memorials on U.S. property. As part of a plea agreement, Melaku admitted to shooting at the National Museum of the Marine Corps, the Pentagon and two military recruiting offices in October and November of 2010. Here's how the WAPO described this, under the headline 'Motive of Shooter is Unclear':


    Yonathan Melaku was sneaking through Fort Myer and Arlington National Cemetery, his backpack filled with plastic bags of ammonium nitrate, a notebook containing jihadist messages, and a can of black spray paint. The 23-year-old former Marine was heading to the graves of the nation’s most recent heroes, aiming to desecrate the stones with Arabic statements and leave handfuls of explosive material nearby as a message.

    Before police foiled the plan in June, the vandalism was to be Melaku’s sixth attack, months after he went on a mysterious shooting spree that targeted the Pentagon, the National Museum of the Marine Corps and two other military buildings in Northern Virginia. A video found after Melaku’s arrest showed him wearing a black mask and shooting a 9mm handgun out of his Acura’s passenger window as he drove along Interstate 95, shouting “Allahu Akbar!”


    Yes, 'mysterious'. Wait, it gets better:

    FBI officials and prosecutors said Melaku was on a personal terror mission. They said he researched jihadism on the Internet and had references to terrorism in a notebook and on his computer. It also seemed like he was gathering materials to make an improvised explosive device, though there was no indication how he would have used it.

    Melaku wanted “to create fear and terror, which is what terrorists do,” said Dana Boente, first assistant U.S. Attorney in Alexandria.

    Special Agent Jacqueline Maguire, of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, said it was fortunate authorities caught Melaku before anyone was injured. She said it appears Melaku acted alone.

    “This case shows that violent homegrown extremism is present in our community, whether by one person or by many,” Maguire said.


    Even the FBI won't mention the words 'Islam' and 'terrorism' in the same sentence, but they at least mentioned an amorphous, undefined 'extremism' without mentioning the obvious. Listen to how the accussed's defense attorney is spinning this:

    Gregory English, Melaku’s defense lawyer, said after the hearing that Melaku’s family is of the Coptic Christian faith and that they were stunned to learn of his involvement in the crimes and the references to Islamic jihad. English said the shootings were out of character for Melaku, and he wonders whether his client suffers from a psychological problem, which he has asked the court to evaluate.

    “As bad as it is, this is someone who essentially broke windows,” English said. “It’s vandalism. He has no link to terrorism. . . . He had a message, but I don’t understand what that message was supposed to be.”


    Either Mr. English is stupid, or he thinks we are.The only reason this home grown jihadi didn't hurt anyone is because we were extremely lucky, and that luck might not have held if Melaku had managed to escape and proceeded to manufacture the IED for which he was already putting together the ingrediants. As for Melaku's Coptic background, here's a tip...find the imams he was associating with that converted him to Islam and you'll find where the 'violent homegrown extremism in our community' Special Agent Maguire was talking about is coming from.

    Melaku agreed to the plea bargain which carried a sentence of 25 years only because he was looking at a possible mandatory sentence of more than 85 years in the face of solid hard evidence. He's only 23, and he'll likely be out in 10 to 15, and you'll notice that no one is talking about deporting him when his sentence is served.

    'Ssssh! Don't mention the word jihad! Nothing to see here.

    The Council Has Spoken!! This Week's Watcher's Council Results



    The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and the results are in for the first Watcher's Council match up of 2012, carved eternally in the akhasic records of cyberspace.

    This week's winning essay, The Mellow Jihadi's Lance Corporal Donald Hogan, Marine Hero is a prime example of the Jihadi's unique literary style as he takes a stirring look at an American hero in and recounts his feelings on reading about his posthumous honoring. Here's a slice:

    I am sitting in my home away from home, Panera Bread. The traffic outside is all jerky bumpers and tire shrieks. A bummy dude with an expensive laptop sprawls a seat five feet from me. I finish reading this moving post on the Marine Corps and continue my duck hunt through the web for interesting stories to share. Posts, articles, pictures that capture me, waiting for me to do the same to them.

    Then this story waves at me and I know I have to salute a great hero:

    A Marine who died from a roadside bomb in Afghanistan was awarded the highest honor given to members of the Corps for his heroic actions as he hurled his body into a fellow serviceman and warned the rest of the his squad of the blast.

    Navy Secretary Ray Mabus said Tuesday that 20-year-old Lance Cpl. Donald Hogan is “now part of Marine lore along with the great heroes of the Corps” as he presented the fallen hero’s parents with the Navy Cross. He said his actions placed him among the “bravest and finest” in the Marines.

    Semper Fi indeed.

    In our non-Council category, the winner was a must read piece by an old favorite of mine, terrorism expert Dave Gaubatz writing in Family Security Matters on howMuslim Children in America are Being Taught to Hate submitted by The Political Commentator.

    Eventually, we're going to wake up to what's happening right under our collective noses as a new generation of American Muslims is indoctrinated by people who definitely mean us no good.

    Here are this week’s full results. Only New Zeal was unable to vote this week and was affected by the infamous mandatory 2/3 vote penalty:

    Council Winners



    Non-Council Winners



    See you next week! And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter..'cause we're cool like that!

    Thursday, January 26, 2012

    Happy Australia Day!!














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    A shout out to all my fiends in Oz...enjoy the day and make it beaut!


    Australians all let us rejoice
    For we are young and free
    We've golden soil and wealth for toil,
    Our home is girt by sea:
    Our land abounds in nature's gifts
    Of beauty rich and rare,
    In history's page let every stage
    Advance Australia fair,
    In joyful strains then let us sing
    Advance Australia fair.

    Beneath our radiant Southern Cross,
    We'll toil with hearts and hands,
    To make this Commonwealth of ours
    Renowned of all the lands,
    For those who've come across the seas
    We've boundless plains to share,
    With courage let us all combine
    To advance Australia fair.
    In joyful strains then let us sing,
    Advance Australia fair.

    'Everybody Needs to Pay Their Fair Share In Taxes' - Except Obama's Aides!



    My, my....after all the class warfare screed at last Tuesday's SOTU speech,it turns out that President Obama's chief aides are doing exactly the opposite - to the tune of almost $1 million in unpaid back taxes!

    And these aren't people struggling to get by on piddling incomes either. One-third of Obama's aides make more than $100,000 with 21 being paid the top White House salary of $172,200 apiece.

    It's not only good to be the King, it ain't so bad to be one of his lackeys either..although I'll give President Obama credit for perhaps not knowing how dirty his own house was before he pointed the finger at others.

    India Celebrates Republic Day!





    Republic Day is the day India celebrates its Constitution, written 3 years after India obtained its independence.

    Congratulations to the worlds most populous democracy on its sixty third anniversary! Many more!

    Wednesday, January 25, 2012

    The Gingrich Roundup

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    One of the interesting things about Newt Gingrich is how few people who actually know him or have served in Congress with him have much good to say about him. And we're not talking RINO's or establishment Republicans, but people who have been a part of the conservative cause for years. Today's crop includes:


  • Ann Coulter, who apparently loathes him


  • Long time conservative R. Emmett Tyrrell, the founder of the American Spectator, who weighs in on the many similarities between Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich, something I also picked up on here, along with certain similarities both Clinton and Gingrich have with President Obama.


  • Elliot Abrams, former Assistant Secretary of State in the Reagan Administration who went public on how insulting, obstructive and disdainful so-called 'Reagan conservative' Gingrich actually was of President Reagan and his policies, as does long time commentator Mark Shields.


  • I'll say it again. Character is destiny.

    If Newt Gingrich is the GOP nominee, I will vote for him over Barack Obama with my nose held and with grave misgivings. We may lose quite badly in the end even if Gingrich wins.

    Turkey Says Will Not Allow NATO To Use Its Territory To Attack Iran

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    Turkey, a member of NATO issued a statement today that they will not allow their fellow NATO allies to use Turkish soil or facilities to attack Iran. The statement came from Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, according to RIA Novosti. Davutoglu ended by saying that the borders between Iran and Turkey have been borders of peace and will remain that way.

    This is the second time the Islamist regime in Turkey has pulled this sort of thing.You might remember that the Turks refused to allow US forces to go through Turkey en route Iraq, causing America and its allies a great deal of extra logistical trouble and expense. You have to wonder why we still consider them allies at all.

    Hug and kiss Erdogan some more, Mr. President!

    The New Egypt - Bankrupt And Sinking Fast



    All hail the wondrous Arab Spring!

    It is one year ago today that the protests in Cairo's Tahrir Square began that ended in the fall of the Mubarak regime. It was fitting that President Obama mentioned it last night in his State of the Union Address, since he had a major role in that 'wave of change', calling for Mubarak's ouster and signalling to the Egyptian military whom now control the country which way to turn.It's well worth examining how things are going.

    The parliamentary elections have been held, and the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and the hard core Salafist al-Nour Party won - surprise!- over 75% of the seats.The FaceBook and Twitter liberals in places like Cairo and Alexandria everyone in the West was so in love with proved to be a negligible political force, and Egypt is likely headed towards an Islamist Republic as soon as the proper arrangements are made with the Army.

    The Army originally had ideas of a government that had little civilian control over the military or is it's budget, ala' the old Turkish model. In response, Islamists played their cards quite cleverly, gradually fomenting discontent against military rule and instigating violent riots after Friday prayers over the military's refusal to turn over power to a civilian government. The riots resulted in a harsh series of crack downs that effectively turned the military from the people's heroes during the Revolution into oppressors and the chief villains opposing 'democracy'. Between September and the end of December, something like 100 demonstrators were killed by the Army and police, while hundreds were injured and arrested.

    The military junta's tactics also turned the Brotherhood and the Salafis into heroes, and the election results show how effective their tactics were. The Egyptian military will almost certainly have to make the same devil's bargain with the Islamists that the Iranian military did.

    So Egypt is likely headed towards Islamist rule, but the country's future is looking increasingly grim. Egypt's economy is essentially collapsing from within.

    After the Lara Logan gang rape and the widespread scenes of unrest, most of Egypt's tourism industry is dead, and the rest will likely collapse as soon as the Islamists take power and put sharia law in place to outlaw alcohol, bikinis and mixed bathing on beaches.

    Increased sectarian violence against Egypt's Coptic Christians, who largely supported the Revolution, is ensuring that a large group of Egypt's more prosperous and educated citizens are emigrating in droves.

    Investors are unwilling to buy Egyptian bonds even at double digit interest rates, which means that Egypt's ability to borrow is being cut to the bone. No one wants the Egyptian pound. The only Egyptian bonds anyone wants to buy are dollar-denominated treasury bills. After the results of the last election, currency flight has become a major problem, as anyone with money is stashing it overseas as fast as they can in euros or dollars, preparing for a relocation out of the country.

    Foreign aid is also problematical.Egypt's government has begun negotiations for a $3.2 billion IMF loan and still receives about $1.3 billion annually in military aid from the US but that's not enough for Egypt's needs and won't even begin to replace the amount of money leaving the country. And it's also likely that as things unravel, any of that military aid that's in cash and isn't directly spent on armaments will likely follow the rest of Egypt's treasury overseas, while foreign nations are unlikely or unwilling to be able to commit large amounts of aid right now. Unlike Libya, there's no significant oil wealth in Egypt to tap.

    Any warehoused resources or stocks that can be sold for cash are being liquidated, resulting in shortages of fuel, foodstuffs and even medicines in a number of localities according to numerous reports. Since Egypt has a population of over eighty million it can't support or feed on it's own, food imports are a necessity and there is increasingly less money to do so, or for consumers to buy it even if it were available.

    Egypt is heading for some very uneasy times.

    Aside from major economic woes, Egypt's political situation looks increasingly bleak from an American standpoint. The best case scenario is an agreement between the military and the Islamists for governing which would at least ensure a certain amount of domestic peace, but would almost certainly be a setback for American strategic objectives in the region - helping to guard the Eastern Mediterranean, cooperating with the US on anti-terrorism efforts, keeping the Suez Canal and its access to the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf functioning and continuing to observe the Camp David Accords. Mubarak was at least a nominal, anti-Islamist ally in these matters, but those days are gone.

    The Obama Administration will likely try to appease Egypt's new Islamist rulers, and Deputy Secretary of State William Burns met with Brotherhood leaders earlier this month to begin that process. Given the Brotherhood's hostility toward almost every American policy aim in the Middle East, that will probably end up working as well as President Carter's early attempts to appease the Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran did.

    In later years, historians will be looking at President Obama's encouragement of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Islamists in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere the same way way they now see Jimmy Carter's encouragement of the same thing in Iran...as a major foreign policy blunder.

    Watcher's Council Nominations: State Of Obama Edition


    Welcome to the Watcher's Council, a blogging group consisting of some of the most incisive blogs in the 'sphere, and the longest running group of its kind in existence. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.Then we vote on the best two posts, with the results appearing on Friday.

    Council News:

    This week, Liberty's Spirit, The Independent Sentinel, Ask Marion and Capitalist Preservation took advantage of my generous offer of link whorage and earned honorable mention status.

    You can, too! Want to see your work appear on the Watcher’s Council homepage in our weekly contest listing? Didn’t get nominated by a Council member? No worries.

    Simply head over to Joshuapundit and post the title a link to the piece you want considered along with an e-mail address ( which won't be published) in the comments section no later than Monday 6PM PST in order to be considered for our honorable mention category, and return the favor by creating a post on your site linking to the Watcher’s Council contest for the week.

    It's a great way of exposing your best work to Watcher’s Council readers and Council members. while grabbing the increased traffic and notoriety. And how good is that, eh?

    So, let's see what we have this week....


    Council Submissions



    Honorable Mentions



    Non-Council Submissions



    Enjoy! And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter..'cause we're cool like that!

    Tuesday, January 24, 2012

    Obama's State Of The Union - The Hollow Man

    Ah, the Hollow Man...

    As I've told you before, I listen to these things so you don't have to, and I've got a pretty strong stomach - but tonight's festivities were truly something else.

    A transcript is available here for those of you into self-mortification, but I'll go over the basics.

    First off, the speech was obviously very well rehearsed down to the last vocal inflection and raised eyebrow..in fact. I wouldn't be a bit surprised if there were theatrical directions emanating from TOTUS tonight. Simply amazing..yet as he spoke, the contradictions between what was coming out of his mouth and what we've seen coming out of this White House are so radically different they underlined one of the qualities I dislike most about this president -the way he arrogantly thinks everyone's stupid except him, and thinks that the usual rule that nothing ever goes away on the internet doesn't apply where he's concerned.

    The president started off and ended by invoking what he referred to as 'this generation of heroes' returning from victory in Iraq, and indeed he used the military frequently as an example of how he wants the Republicans in Congress to behave . It was disgusting to hear, considering how Senator Obama and many of his fellow Democrats cheering him on tonight did everything they could to sabotage our troops in the field and their mission during wartime. Yet he had the unmitigated gall to use military teamwork as an example of what he wants to see in Washington!

    Our military is legally bound to follow President Obama's orders no matter how nonsensical. Congress is not, especially when their common sense revolts and it was both deeply insulting as well as very revealing of the president to use the comparison, making the expected rhetoric that came later about working together a mockery. As if President Obama made any pretense of that when he and the Democrats controlled Congress!

    The president of course mentioned bin-Laden, and regular members of Joshua's Army may recall what I had to say President Obama's chief boast perhaps being a huge error. And his statement about how the Taliban's momentum has been broken was simply a blatant falsehood - which is exactly why we're desperately negotiating with them and just released one of their leaders with American blood on his hands from Club Gitmo as a 'confidence gesture'.

    The president's chief theme, under the slogan 'an economy built to last' is actually pretty simple - eat the rich and punish the corporations to pay for more government spending.

    He called for a punishment levy on 'big banks' and 'big oil companies' and is apparently going to sic Eric Holder on the financial sector to ' find out who was responsible for the mortgage collapse'. I guarantee you that well connected Democrats like Franklin Raines and Jaimie Gorelick who ran Fannie Mae into the ground and walked away with multi-million dollar bonuses are not going to have to worry on that account.

    You see, it wasn't the banks that made the rules that governed the secondary mortgage market..it was Washington, and government entities Fannie and Freddie set the pace by reducing underwriting standards and down payment requirements while demanding that lenders make more loans to the unqualified based on racial bean counting. And the Democrat majority in Congress defended them from any oversight or reigning in while they did it.

    The president went on to mention his great achievement of 'saving' the auto industry. Will anyone remind him that he did it by gifting GM to his union political allies, crapping on private equity holders and giving the company special tax breaks at the taxpayer's expense to make them look artificially profitable? Or that he allowed GM to do stock dumping that was against SEC rules?

    Or about the outright lies he told the American people about GM and Chrysler being profitable and returning the money used to bail them out, when in reality they were a huge loss?

    We also had to listen to the president's blathering about trade. Rather than lower our corporate income tax sufficiently to encourage more companies to do business here, his solution is to put another punishment levy on companies that outsource, which will have the effect of even more companies relocating all but bare bones operations elsewhere. When Canada's corporate rate is less than half of ours, why not ?

    It was also unintentionally comical to hear the president make a vague call for tearing down regulations that stifle entrepreneurship in one part of his speech while mentioning at least three or four brand new regulatory bureaucracies he wants to create and calling for cap n' trade and climate change legislation in another.

    The president went on to discuss education, and of course his solution is to spend more taxpayer dollars to hire more teachers to pay more union dues to fund the Democrats. For such a pro-education guy, you'd never think he'd be the one to stop poor kids from getting into a decent school right there in DC.

    Not to mention the trillion dollar time bomb for America's economy this president enacted by executive order concerning a new student loans entitlement that will eventually create a bubble similar to housing and is guaranteed to raise the cost of college education.

    Yes, he really does intend to bankrupt the country. Or he's simply clueless, take your pick.

    The president also got in a nice plug for the DREAM Act for illegal aliens that he enacted by executive order after Congress rejected it twice. What was that about working together again?

    President Obama made quite a thing about his favoring the creation of domestic energy while believing that those of us listening would forget about his job killing de facto prohibition on offshore drilling, his opposition to drilling in ANWR , his recent fiasco with the Keystone Pipeline and his war on the coal industry. Or about Solyndra and the other green energy scams he doled out to his campaign donors and bundlers. All you have to do is look at what the price at the pump was when he came into office and what it is now, the largest increase in history...and that doesn't even calculate the corresponding rise in the price of food and other goods.

    And speaking of Keystone, I had to chuckle at President Obama's solemnly intoning the so-called Buffet Rule as an example of how 'the rich' should behave. Buffet, a nicely placed Obama donor stands to make a tidy sum because the pipeline got cancelled because the oil we buy from Canada will now have to be shipped via Buffet's railroads. At a surcharge, of course. It's good to be the King's friend!

    There's plenty more, but a few final bits that stood out.

    President Obama talked a bit about his foreign policy. He reverently evoked the Arab Spring he helped along as 'a wave of change', which it is. He failed to mention that the change involves the rebirth of al-Qaeda and some of it's affiliates in these countries and replacing dictators like Khaddaffi who was no threat to us and Mubarak, Ali Abdullah Saleh and Ben Ali who were at least nominal allies and replacing them with hard line Islamists and salafists who are not going to be friends to the West, not to mention the 'men and women; Christians, Muslims, and Jews' whose dignity and freedom he claims to be so concerned about. President Obama committed an an historic error here that will come back to haunt us long after he departs the scene.

    The president also mentioned what he described as his 'iron clad commitment to Israel's security' which is news to those of us who have followed the interaction between this president and Israel closely.But hey, it's election time, and there a sucker born every minute.

    I also found it particularly nauseating to hear this president talk about how smart he is in hollowing out our military budget and in the next moment talking about jobs and VA benefits for those he described as 'those men and women in uniform who defend our freedom.'

    This is the same president who is laying off an estimated 500,000 military personnel, many of them who haven't been in long enough to become vested for a military pension or full medical benefits. They'll simply be tossed into an already toxic job market for their 'reward' so President Obama can have more money for his domestic agenda. And I got a horrible taste in my mouth hearing the same President who tried to take away their VA benefits early in his administration talk about health care for veterans.

    You have to wonder at what goes through someone's mind when putting on this kind of a performance. Is it simply a case of 'the show must go on'? Or has he simply been mouthing these lies and untruths for so long that he actually believes them by now?

    Barack Obama is the modern version of Rehoboam, telling the people of America that he's going to double down his failed policies and add to their yoke.

    Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, who gave the Republican rebuttal did a decent job of responding to the president's little show tonight. But he didn't mention much about a lot of the things I've talked about here, and most of the media certainly won't.

    That's the real tragedy. It's one thing to snicker to yourself as you see through a cynical con man going through his act for you, but it' s quite another to keep quiet about it and let the rubes get screwed in the name of 'civility' by the Hollow Men of this world.

    They deserve better at your hands. We all do.

    Obama's Target - Mitt Romney

    One matter of interest about the current GOP race - in spite of Newt Gingrich's recent surge of popularity, the main target of the Obama campaign and it's surrogates remains - Mitt Romney.

    The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the major public employee union is spending 7 figure sums on ads depicting Governor Romney as an out of touch greedy plutocrat.

    In Florida, the SEIU and a super-PAC supporting President Obama have teamed up to make a major buy in Spanish language media, running an ad attacking Romney titled “Dos Caras” or "Two Faces".

    And tonight, depend on President Obama's State of the Union address to bash the class war drum for all he's worth by concentrating on ' the wealthy few', 'tax reform' ( read 'tax the rich' and 'economic inequality'. Romney's name won't be mentioned, but there's no doubt whom the president is talking about. It's the same ridiculous meme the president's surrogates in th epress have been pushing for days, aided and abetted by Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry and to an extent, Rick Santorum.

    The conclusion's obvious - the Obama campaign considers Romney a much greater threat to the president's re-election than they do Newt Gingrich.

    They're very likely right about that.

    Israel And 'Palestine' - An End To An Error


    As I predicted, the talks about talks in Amman between Israel and the PLO came to nothing, simply because there's nothing to negotiate...the 'Palestinians' are unwilling to do anything unless the Israelis agree to all their demands in advance. While Mahmoud Abbas played good cop and talked about seizing opportunities for peace, Fatah's negotiator Saeb Erekat made it very plain that the Amman talks were a mere formality and not a return to negotiations, saying, "Netanyahu needs to freeze the construction of settlements and accept the '67 outline for a two-state solution before we return to the negotiations table."

    So the 'Palestinians' are continuing with their plans to get what they want by other means than negotiations. And they have a full agenda planned this year in their campaign against Israel.

    While their efforts to unilaterally abrogate both Oslo and the Roadmap by having the UN declare 'Palestine' a state on the pre '67 lines and bypass any negotiations or concessions to Israel ultimately fell short last year, they plan to continue their efforts in 2012.

    As of January 1st of this year, several countries that would have voted against the Palestinians or been swayed by a US threat of a veto rotated off the UN Security Council as their terms expired and were replaced by Guatemala, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Morocco and Togo. At least four of those countries will vote in favor of admitting 'Palestine' as a full member with its borders on the pre '67 lines.

    And a US veto against it by the Obama Administration is unlikely if the vote occurs after the November 2012 American presidential elections, regardless of whether President Obama is re-elected or not. Israel, just as a side note, is the only UN member officially prohibited from serving on the UN Security Council as a rotating member.

    The 'Palestinians thus hope to have their demands for borders based on the pre '67 lines and half of Jerusalem backed up by a UNSC resolution for the first time.

    And that's not all. The 'Palestinians' are planning international efforts to turn Israel into the world's pariah state.

    Senior Fatah official Nabil Sha’ath, formerly the left fork of Yasser Arafat's tongue recently said on Palestinian radio that 2012 “will be the start of an unprecedented diplomatic campaign on the part of the Palestinian leadership, and it will be a year of pressure on Israel that will put it under a real international siege. The campaign will be similar to the one waged against apartheid in South Africa.”

    The PLO thus plans to hit Israel from two directions. According to my sources, while Abbas and Fatah will concentrate on gathering support at the UN, eliciting international boycotts and orchestrating violent riots and protests in Judea and Samaria. Hamas will take on the task of a new wave of rocket attacks and terrorism directed at Israel's populace, thus giving Fatah plausible deniability. Besides, Abbas and the Fatah Old Guard are already on the way out with the money they stole, and they know full well that Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood are almost certainly going to take over all of the 'Palestinian' territories in fairly short order. So does Hamas.

    It's a pretty straight forward strategy. If Israel actually were to go back to the pre '67 lines, the country would become indefensible with avowed enemies in control of the high ground in Judea and Samaria as well as an enclave right next door in Jerusalem. If the Israelis refuse to commit national suicide by doing so, they become a pariah nation in defiance of the UN and 'international law'. This is exactly why the two state solution envisioned by Oslo was always a myth..or more exactly, as Arafat's old political commissar in Jerusalem Faisal Husseini famously put it, "a Trojan Horse designed to trick the Jews."

    There are definite ways for the Israelis to head this off and frustrate it.

    At this point, I doubt that Israel talking about consequences for the PLO for this behavior really means much to Abbas and company. Since for the most part they're on their way out anyway there's no particular reason they should pay anymore than lip service to the well being of their people at this point than they have since the 1970's. And the truth of the matter is, the 'Palestinians' have never really suffered much in the way of real consequences for bad behavior, either from Israel or from their western donors. There isn't any reason for them to fear consequences now.

    With that in mind, from a strategic viewpoint the best thing Israel could do would be to publicly offer the 'Palestinians' a final settlement that involves recognition of Israel as a Jewish State, takes the so-called right of return, Jerusalem and Area C, the part of Judea and Samaria under Israeli sovereignty off the table, offers a division on Area B that maintains an Israeli presence in the Jordan Valley and cedes Area C, which Fatah already controls, to the 'Palestinians'.

    Abbas and the PLO would certainly reject this out of hand. As Abbas has said many times, he's not prepared to make even a single concession on 'Palestinian' demands.

    Once the 'Palestinian' refusal is made public, I recommend that Israel do what I've been suggesting for literally years - call the 'Palestinian's' bluff by simply unilaterally imposing their proposition on the ground, annexing the areas in question and declaring all agreements null and void.

    At the same time, the Israelis should announce an end to any contact with the 'Palestinians' based on prior agreements. No more free electricity and water, no more tax rebates, no more security cooperation, no more trade concessions, nothing. Any new agreements in these areas would need to be negotiated from scratch.

    The Israelis would simply be formalizing something that's evident to any objective observer. The 'peace process' is over, if indeed it ever really existed.

    The Israelis would need to accompany these declarations with certain concrete actions to underline their seriousness about this.

    They would need to be prepared to repatriate any Israeli citizens now living in 'Palestine' back to Israeli territory, while at the same time repatriating all non-Israeli citizens of 'Palestinian' origin to the new, second Arab 'Palestinian' state.

    Second, Israel also would need to publicly inform the 'Palestinians' and the world that any protests or violence directed at these areas or sovereign Israeli territory would be considered an act of war by a hostile entity and dealt with accordingly.

    And third, the Israelis would need to arm the Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria appropriately and fortify any Jewish communities that need it to resist attacks and hold out until the IDF gets there.

    There would undoubtedly be consequences for Israel from these actions, but the upside overwhelms them.

    For the first couple of weeks, the usual suspects would go absolutely insane. Elements of the media that are consistently anti-Israel like NPR, Newsweek, the New York Times and the Guardian would run the sort of stories and commentary you would expect, but the news cycle moves on, and honestly, their coverage of the Middle East conflict has not been objective for years anyway.

    The UN General Assembly might pass a motion or three condemning Israel - again, nothing new. It's highly doubtful the Security Council would and even if they did it would be unlikely to have much practical effect.

    Elements of the EU would undoubtedly condemn the Israeli actions, but again with limited effect. Aside from the fact that the continued existence of the EU itself is in doubt, the EU countries have a healthy appetite for Israeli agricultural and high tech products, and a trade boycott gets even less likely when you consider that the Europeans are unlikely to alienate an up and coming major source of gas and oil capable of providing an alternative to dealing with the Russians. Again, the likely impact is a certain amount of rhetoric for awhile, followed by business as usual.

    The same would likely be true of Australia, Canada, and the United States, even with a hostile Obama Administration in office.

    Israel's relationships in the Middle East might likely undergo one major change, the severing of diplomatic relations with Egypt and Jordan. The Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists whom now control Egypt are already talking openly about abrogating the treaty with the hated Jews anyway, the Israeli embassy in Cairo was recently sacked by a mob while Egyptian police looked on and even during the Mubarak regime outright anti-semitism was openly promulgated by the government controlled media as a tool of policy. There isn't much of a relationship to lose there.

    The same is true of Jordan, a country where almost 80% of the population identifies themselves as 'Palestinians'. There is little if any trade, tourism or cultural exchanges with Israel and as the Muslim Brotherhood gets stronger there's a real likelihood of Jordan cancelling its treaties with Israel no matter what Israel does.

    Neither country can afford the financial or social costs of a war with Israel, something that's also true of all of Israel's traditional Arab antagonists. And they're especially unlikely to go to war for 'Palestine'. Hamas and Hezbollah will remain hostile to Israel no matter what Israel does or doesn't do, but both have sufficient reasons for avoiding overt war Hamas because of it's relationship with the new Muslim Brotherhood ruled Egypt and Hezbollah because they have no desire to experience the kind of political fallout they got from their host country after the 2006 war...especially with Syria otherwise occupied.

    The major upside for Israel, of course, is that while unilaterally staking out its borders and declaring an end to the Oslo Era won't put an end to the effort to delegitimize and destroy the country, it will put it on life support. Without the possibility that the Jews could be tricked into further strategic concessions existing, there's about as much energy expended in trying to get Jerusalem away from Israel as there is in trying to get Texas away from America. And it will decrease even more with time.

    Oddly enough, there's also the possibility of an upside for the 'Palestinians' , believe it or not. After the initial shock and anger, they're going to be faced with two choices. Since the old dream of replacing Israel and driving the Jews into the Sea would no longer be a possibility, they can choose to either succumb to a preoccupation with revanchist dreams or they can look at the reality of having a country of their own to build and a destiny of their own to carve out. The first is far more likely, but only the second would lead to any kind of real future for themselves and their children, and there's just the chance they might finally realize it.

    Monday, January 23, 2012

    Senior Aide to Democrat Senator Kerry Charged With Leaking Classified Information

    The Justice Department has charged John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer and former senior Democrat Senate aide to John Kerry with being the source of major media leaks compromising national security, disclosing the identity of an undercover officer and lying to the CIA about the origin of other sensitive material he published in a book. He faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted.

    Kiriakou is also a popular Huffington Post columnist.Or was, at any rate.

    He first surfaced in the public eye in a 2007 interview with ABC News, where he claimed to have played a major role as a CIA agent in the capture and interrogation of al-Qaeda terrorist Abu Zubaydah, who was waterboarded. He was a huge source for the 'waterboarding is torture' crowd.

    Three years, when he published a book about his CIA experiences (and presumably after he cashed his advance check), he admitted on the second to last page that he hadn't participated at all in the capture and interrogation of Abu Zubaydah, but just relied on what he'd heard about it.

    The charges of disclosing the identity of an undercover officer came about because information Kiriakou supplied to journalists at Guantanamo Bay enabled defense attorneys there to obtain photographs of CIA operatives suspected of being involved in interrogations. Some of the pictures were subsequently discovered in the cells of terrorist detainees.

    A real prince, no?

    I can't help but wonder if the Obama Administration is planning on prosecuting the journalists and defense attorneys who aided and abetted - not to mention the editors and publishers. I doubt it, but it would certainly be fair and just to do so.

    Do you get the feeling Kiriakou learned about ethics and patriotism from his old boss Senator Kerry, who met with the North Vietnamese in Paris during the Vietnam War to plot strategy on how to undermine the US war effort?

    Sunday, January 22, 2012

    Nigeria Bleeds..176 Killed On Islam's Bloody Borders

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    Earlier this month, Christians were given an ultimatum by the Islamist group Boko Haram and its various affiliates to leave Northern Nigeria on pain of death.

    This weekend, Boko Haram struck in a series of coordinated attacks that left over 176 Christians dead and scores wounded in the northern city of Kano. The Islamists targeted several police stations and other public buildings, including the building housing the assistant inspector general of police. And of course, churches, businesses and private home belonging to Christians were attacked, with bloody results.

    This happened not in some remote backwater but in Kano, Nigeria's second largest city with a population of over 9 million.

    There has been continuous violence in Northern Nigeria for years, ever since the country became independent in 1960. The most populous nation in Africa and the eight largest oil exporter in the world, it is almost a poster case for what commonly happens along what many demographers and historians have called 'Islam's bloody borders'.

    The north is mainly Muslim and is fairly underdeveloped while the rest of the country is Christian or animist and has the oil wealth.

    A century ago, there were very few Christians in Nigeria, except for a few coastal enclaves; most of today's Nigerian Christians' families were either Muslims or followers of tribal religions not so long ago. The line between Islam and Christianity has continued to march north and as this process has continued, Nigeria's Islamists have repeatedly called for Islamic rule and sharia over the entire north, and used violence to attempt to drive the increasing numbers of Christians out by force.

    Just last Christmas Day, Boko Haram (the name loosely translates as 'western education is forbidden') bombed a church near Abuja that killed 43 people and carried out an August 26th suicide bombing of the United Nations building in the capital that murdered 24 people.

    Adding to Muslim unrest, the current President Goodluck Jonathan is a vocal Christian from the south who took over from ailing President Umaru Yar'Adua when he died in office. In 2011, Jonathan became the first ever sitting Nigerian president to run for re-election, which he won handily. His election victory was greeted by rioting by Muslims in the north.

    There are various analysts and pundits writing for the dinosaur media who are referring to what happened this weekend as 'unrest' based on the Nigerian government's cutting of the government fuel subsidy. Some, like CNN's Fareed Zakaria are typically attempting to spin this away from a problem with Islam-based terrorism as the harbinger of a 'Nigerian Spring' based on social disquiet, forgetting that unlike Libya, Tunisia and Egypt, the Nigerians just elected a president a little over a year ago.

    Make no mistake...this is about Islam and its interaction with the 'other'.

    Following this weekend's attacks, President Jonathan visited Kano, declared a state of emergency and pledged to to fight the insurgency.

    “They are no spirits,” Jonathan said of Boko Haram after his Kano visit yesterday. “Look at your neighbors and know what they do, and if there’s any suspicious movement, inform security agencies.”

    The problem, and one that has become increasingly more evident is that there are some elements in Nigeria that have been aiding and abetting Boko Haram. No insurgency of any kind in modern times can thrive without the support of a good number of the people within its operational bases - insurgencies need a secure source of money, arms and recruits as well as safe havens to train.Even though many Muslim leaders officially disavow Boko Haram, there is a wide spread belief in Nigeria that a significant Muslim element look the other way at best and provide a welcoming environment for them at worst, with the idea of dislodging a democratically elected non-Muslim government by making Nigeria as it is ungovernable. Rooting them out is going to be the real challenge, and there's a definite possibility it could lead to a second Nigerian civil war between the Hausa-Fulani Islamists and the Christians and animists.

    Ruth Bader Ginsberg Says No Plans to Resign From SCOTUS During Obama's Term

    Here's a bit of good news - Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg has let in be known that she will not be resigning during Obama's term.

    There's been a great deal of speculation that Ginsberg, 78 would step down and allow the president to put another überLefty Justice on the Court during an election year, but apparently Justice Ginsberg, who's been on the Court for 18 years isn't going anywhere just yet.

    While another far Left Obama nominee wouldn't change the balance of the Court since Justice Ginsberg is reliably Left leaning, both of President Obama's appointments have not only been even further off the spectrum than even the current Left-leaning Justices but fairly young, assuring that they're unfortunately going to be around for awhile. On the other hand, if Justice Ginsberg hangs on until 2013 and the president is defeated for re-election, the new president could very well have at least two Supreme Court justices to replace..and both of them are part of the current block of four Left leaning justices.

    Saturday, January 21, 2012

    South Carolina...And Beyond

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    I'm not encouraged by the results last night.

    There's absolutely nothing more President Obama and the Democrats want than a prolonged, drawn out primary campaign that spews bad blood and wastes resources..while the president continues to consolidate his re-election campaign unopposed on all fronts.

    Obviously a part of Saturday's result had to do with the despicable way the dinosaur media besmirched itself and Newt Gingrich's spirited response. The press launched outrageous attacks on both Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney and it was refreshing to see them slapped around for it. So the voters of South Carolina apparently surged at the last minute for Newt Gingrich, giving him a lopsided victory over Mitt Romney.

    This is all very well, but is 'sending a message' what's wanted or needed? Especially if it means re-electing President Obama, or even worse, putting another unfit individual in the Oval Office?

    I want emphasize again that there is no true Reagan-type conservative in this race as of yet. Newt Gingrich in his own words is a Teddy Roosevelt-style progressive , Rick Santorum leans towards 'compassionate conservatism ' ala' George W. Bush and Ron Paul is an isolationist conspiracy theorist fruitcake, while Mitt Romney as I've pointed out before is a pragmatist rather than an ideological conservative, who bends according to what he feels he can get accomplished.

    None of them is going to change the climate in Washington significantly, so competence and character take on an increased significance.At present, we have neither embodied in our current president, and it's essential he be defeated.

    The simple fact is that in my opinion, Newt Gingrich lacks the basic character and demeanor to be president.

    Intelligent and articulate? Definitely so, but much of his career has been a series of questionable and self-serving events. In that, he resembles both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who also saw government as a path to personal entitlement and wealth.The incident of his throwing a tantrum during his tenure as Speaker over being seated in the rear of Air Force One en route to the Rabin funeral and being asked to deplane via the rear exit upon returning is a revealing one.

    If you look at the Republican members of Congress he led, not only did they ask him to resign as Speaker but few of them if any have anything good to say about him or his leadership. That says something to me ...as does his personal history.

    The thing that bothers me most about Newt's Gingrich's story with both his ex-wives is not the adultery per se - stuff happens, after all - or the 'he said she said' stuff, but a simple, easily proven fact - in both cases, he started sniffing around, found someone willing to cheat with him and dumped wife # 1 and wife #2 once he found out they had become ill, #1 with cancer and #2 with MS.

    To my mind, that's simply not how a decent man acts.And again, it says a great deal about how he would conduct himself as president.We had a number of similar danger signs about both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.

    Admittedly, Newt Gingrich would likely squash President Obama in a debate, but only if there's actually a debate. President Obama is not obligated to hold one, and if the president is significantly ahead in the polls,he might use the excuse that he's simply 'too busy' running the country to do so. Meanwhile President Obama's shills in the dinosaur media would be broadcasting every nuance of Newt Gingrich's foibles - and there's quite a bit to get into.

    In short, even if he were to win, there's a good chance we might come to regret a President Gingrich for the reasons I outline here. Character is destiny, as a very wise man once said centuries ago.

    My preferred candidate chose to sit things out in Wasilla, and I did a great deal of thinking about the GOP field, based more on what I consider character and fitness for office rather than ideology or a chimera like 'electability'. All the stuff about the GOP establishment aside, there are a lot of reasons I consider Mitt Romney to be the most qualified and the best choice based on the field as it exists today.

    If Newt Gingrich runs against Barack Obama, I will vote for him, but with my nose held and with a deep sense of foreboding. I simply don't think he's what the country needs at this juncture. People change, but we had better think very carefully before we anoint him.

    My good friend Hube also weighs in on this subject here.