Some Thoughts on Hillary and That Ben Ghazi Guy

I've never been a fan of Hillary Clinton and she scored no points with me today. For a win today, all she needed to do today was not disrespect the dead and she couldn't even do that. What does it matter? Even with the qualifier (and the Clintons are all about qualifiers) of what does it matter today, the administration LIED to the American people about this incident. and that's the good version of that particular story, because the alternative is that they were IGNORANT and not even I can buy that...

Jeff Flake made a few good points in his post on Facebook today:

It is regarding the aftermath of the Benghazi tragedy that the Obama Administration still has not come clean. It seems clear that the President and his team fostered a world view with which a premeditated terrorist attack in Benghazi did not comport, so they spun these attacks (largely through Ambassador Rice's TV appearances) as a spontaneous protest.

Secretary Clinton's response during the hearing: "What difference does it make?" It makes a big difference, actually. To wage effective diplomacy, statecraft and military strategy, you have to see the world as it is, not as you wish it to be.

Madam Secretary, it matters to the families that you lied to on that tarmac. In today's testimony, you claim that you cried and hugged family members of the fallen, but those families tell a much different story and they have FAR more credibility on ANY subject than you.

Flake was much more forgiving about the actual event than most of us who actually know that Benghazi isn't some dude who got kicked off American Idol. And unlike most pontificators (including myself) on the subject, he looks to the future.

"It's easy now, with hindsight, to see the warning signs regarding the lack of adequate security for our Ambassador and others. Requests for additional security were not heeded, but that is not an infrequent occurrence regardless of the Administration in charge. Attacks happen, and we are often unprepared for such attacks. We hope to be better prepared next time.

...

The recent events in Mali and Algeria are a reminder that we'd better understand this principle. If we don't, Benghazi will be just the beginning of our troubles."

The world is full of evil and people who wish to do us harm. While I agree that we shouldn't let that fact cripple us or interfere with our diplomatic efforts, we must take that threat seriously or people will continue to die.

UPDATE: How bad was this Clinton performance? It was so bad that the administration let it leak that Panetta is planning to announce Women in Combat so that the talking heads in the 527 Media would have something else to talk about tonight...

WaPo Obama Boosters Clueless About MidEast

While talking about how the Embassy and Consulate attacks could be the biggest challenge for Obama, Obama Propagandists had this gem to say about the MidEast and North Africa:

The attacks offered a vivid reminder that despite more than a year of turbulence that has produced a more democratic Middle East and North Africa, violent extremists remain a potent force. And it is still unclear whether the new governments in Libya and Egypt are able, or willing, to confront those bent on attacking U.S. interests.

A more democratic Middle East? One where more and more women face sharia law? That is democratic? One where apostates face death sentences because they are not devout followers of the religion of Islam? More democratic? Give me a break. Unless you are talking about democracy in the Aristotle definition of rule by the mob or frenzies.

The Middle East is about as democratic as Ronald Reagan was liberal.

Then, the part about whether the new governments are able or willing to confront the attackers? Hello, morons! The attackers were fellow travellers in the islamist fanaticism! The President of Egypt is part of the Muslim Brotherhood, a known supporter of terrorists! This Morsy guy even wants us to go after people who made the film, as if we were dictators like he and his brotherhood are:

The Egyptian government is struggling to walk a fine line on this situation. On the one hand, the Egyptian public is deeply offended by the video and looks to its government to defend the faith. While President Morsy has made some lukewarm statements about the responsibility of the Egyptian government to protect diplomatic missions, he has issued much stronger words denouncing the film.

Indeed, he has demanded the United States take "all possible legal action" against the producers of the movie, an indication he does not fully understand our First Amendment. This is a widespread problem across the Arab world: People who have lived their lives largely under dictatorship simply cannot understand how a film can be made without government sanction. Their protest against the film is a protest against America.

Disgusting.....

Obama Has Lost Touch with Reality: June 8th edition

The latest proof that Obama has lost his freaking mind and lost touch with reality. First, he is dishttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifhing out money that we don't have to Greece:

President Barack Obama on Tuesday urged European countries and bondholders to prevent a "disastrous" default by Greece and pledged U.S. support to help tackle the country's debt crisis. After a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, he stressed the importance of German "leadership" on the issue - a hint that he expects Berlin to help - while expressing sympathy for the political difficulties European Union countries face in helping a struggling member state.

"I'm confident that Germany's leadership, along with other key actors in Europe, will help us arrive at a path for Greece to return to growth, for this debt to become more manageable," Obama said.

"But it's going to require some patience and some time. And we have pledged to cooperate fully in working through these issues, both on a bilateral basis but also through international and financial institutions like the IMF."

A proposal for a second Greek bailout package worth 80 bihttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifllion to 100 billion euros over three years was taking shape, euro zone sources said.

But wait, there is more. Last time, he threw Israel under the bus in favor of the terrorists at Hamas. Now, it is Britain's turn again:

President Obama was effusive in his praise for the Special Relationship when he visited London recently, but his administration continues to slap Britain in the face over the highly sensitive Falklands issue. Washington signed on to a “draft declaration on the question of the Malvinas Islands” passed by unanimous consent by the General Assembly of the Organisation of American States (OAS) at its meeting in San Salvador yesterday, an issue which had been heavily pushed by Argentina. In doing so, the United States sided not only with Buenos Aires, but also with a number of anti-American regimes including Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela and Daniel Ortega’s Nicaragua.

They say you can be judged by the company you keep. Let's see: Obama hearts Hamas, the Muslim Brotherhood, Ajad, Hugo Chavez, and Daniel Ortega--all murderous thugs. Hmmmm.....

US To Bailout EU?

Yes, you read that right. Even though we are broke beyond reason, we are now going to bailout the European Union. From CNBC:

The United States would be ready to support the extension of the European Financial Stability Facility via an extra commitment of money from the International Monetary Fund, a U.S. official told Reuters on Wednesday.

"There are a lot of people talking about that. I think the European Commission has talked about that," said the U.S. official, commenting on enlarging the 750 billion euro ($980 billion) EU/IMF European stability fund. "It is up to the Europeans. We will certainly support using the IMF in these circumstances."

"There are obviously some severe market problems," said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "In May, it was Greece. This is Ireland and Portugal. If there is contagion that's a huge problem for the global economy."

The remarks foreshadow a visit to Europe this week by a U.S. Treasury envoy who is expected to visit Berlin, Madrid and Paris to hold talks on the ramifications of the debt crisis.

The developments have echoes of the pressure applied by Washington on European capitals last May to create the near $1 trillion EFSF safety net that was last week used to rescue Ireland after its banking crisis spiraled out of control.

The IMF, whose biggest single shareholder is the United States, has committed 250 billion euros to the EFSF.

While reluctant to dictate to Europe how it should address the unfolding debt crisis, the U.S. government is growing concerned about the global fallout of Europe's predicament.

UGH! WTF?!?!?!?

How to Deal With WikiLeaks Shows "Brave New World"

Between the Global War on Terror, Al Queda, and now Wikileaks, how we deal with internal and global security may have to be totally reevaluated. Jay Tea over at Wizbang has some salient thoughts and ideas:

What we are seeing with WikiLeaks is very akin to what we are seeing with militant Islam and the War On Terror: a non-state entity taking on some of the powers and influence previously accorded only to nation states. WikiLeaks is acting like the intelligence agency of a nation hostile to (if not at war) with the United States. They, like the terrorists, have declared a modern form of war against us, and are waging it just like the KGB would. They are violating our secrets and publicizing them for their own ideological ends -- which are inimical to our own national security.

In the old days, we had ways of dealing with that sort of thing. We could arrest, try, convict, and imprison them. We could swap them for our own intelligence agents. We could identify them and turn them to our own use, or feed them false information. We could even, in extreme circumstances, kill them. (Usually behind some euphemism like "sanction" or "terminate" or "vanish.")

But all those options, save the first and last, were contingent on one element that we lack here: a nation-state behind the opposing intelligence agency that which we could deal with. A counterpart, with clearly identifiable leadership and goals.

Here, like in the War on Terror, we are seeing a group take on some of the aspects of a nation-state, but not enough to qualify as such. They still qualify, under the old and still existing rules, as "civilians" and have the protections accorded thereto.

Quite frankly, the world has outgrown the presumptions behind those principles. Civilians were protected because they were seen as largely helpless and harmless.

No longer. Groups like Al Qaeda and WikiLeaks can actually cause more harm, in different ways, than many actual nations.

This isn't like dealing with the KGB or the Mossad or MI-5 or other intelligence organizations. There isn't a nation state to cajole. This may necessitate drastically changing our worldview and how to deal with threats in this new age:

What we are seeing very well could be the beginning of the end of the modern nation-state. Non-state actors are becoming more and more powerful, taking on many of the powers that have been traditionally been reserved for nation-states -- but without the corresponding responsibilities and liabilities and weaknesses. They are, in their own way, waging war against the United States and other nations -- and doing so in a way that our own laws and customs regarding warfare limit our ability to fight back.

We need to adapt to this new reality. We need to rework how we deal with these trans-national organizations, to come up with new rules that cover groups that wage war on the US while still pretending to be "civilians."

In the case of WikiLeaks, my personal sentiment is to treat them precisely how they have become to be: a hostile foreign intelligence agency at war with the United States. Espionage charges, counterintelligence, information warfare, and even -- if necessary, "wet work" -- targeted assassinations.

That's the game they have chosen to play. And by choosing to play in the big leagues, they have forfeited their right to the protections accorded civilians.

My gut says, right on right on! However, the notion of targetting assassinations for things like this could produce that ever present slippery slope. Where will the line be drawn? Will the proprietors of WMD become targets because they disagree with an administration? That last idea--wetwork--is one that must be considered only in the most grave situations, I think. Time will tell.

Schlafly: Government by Regulation At Hand

From the Grand Dame of Conservatism, Phyllis Schlafly, we get an outstanding editorial regarding how despite the GOP thinking cap and tax is dead, Obama and the EPA are pushing it through by using executive regulations and fiat in order to remake the world in their globaloney image of destroying our energy system and making us hostage to foreign powers for the forseeable future:

The Senate's environmentalism expert, Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., warns us that the Obama administration is trying to implement cap-and-trade anyway by bureaucratic regulations. Directives issued by the Environmental Protection Agency are coming down the pike to increase energy costs and kill jobs.

Last May, the EPA issued what it called a tailoring rule to govern new power plants, oil refineries and factories that yearly emit 100,000 tons or more of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons or sulfur hexafluoride. Inhofe reports that this tailoring rule will further reduce our manufacturing base and especially hurt the poor and elderly.

Inhofe predicts that the EPA standards planned for commercial and industrial boilers will cost 798,000 jobs. He also warns about the harmful effects on jobs caused by new rules on ozone emissions.

Since Barack Obama moved into the White House, the EPA has proposed or finalized 29 major regulations and 172 major policy rules. The EPA is, for the first time, simultaneously toughening the regulations on all six major traditional pollutants such as ozone and sulfur dioxide.

Before Climate-gate exposed the politics behind the "science" of global warming, a 5-to-4 Supreme Court ordered the EPA to consider regulating emissions based on that unsubstantiated and now largely discredited theory.

Even Democrats in Congress are worried (or so it appears) about this power grab:

Opposition to EPA's new rules is remarkably bipartisan. Seventeen Democrats signed a letter to EPA Director Lisa Jackson opposing them.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., was elected after running a TV ad showing himself firing a rifle to put a bullet through a copy of the cap-and-trade bill, and he promised to fight EPA attempts to curb greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired power plants. He may have a difficult task because Jackson is plotting to force mass retirements of the coal plants that provide half of U.S. electricity.

EPA's aggressive overregulation is forcing the electric industry to choose between continuing to operate while taking on major capital costs of complying with heavy new burdens or closing down and building new plants that use more expensive sources such as natural gas. The public will surely end up paying higher electric rates (aka a big tax increase).

This will also help out so-called green firms that people like Nancy Pelosi, Al Gore, and other liberals are heavily invested in. Gee, I thought the only people who sought after their own self interests were those evil Republicans! I thought the lefties were out to help the little guy. How is making power and energy and heating 200 times more expensive going to help anyone?
However, the power grabs continue elsewhere. To wit:

The ObamaCare law was deviously designed to take decision-making away from our elected representatives and give it to 15 "expert" members of the Obama-appointed Independent Payment Advisory Board. Many provisions of this law prohibit Congress from repealing or changing decisions of the "experts."

Tyranny! Tyranny! Tyranny! This is an abuse of power and violates the separation of powers and the division of powers as well as the oversight of Congress. This in itself should be used as an argument that the law is unconstitutional! But wait, there is more:

The Obama administration is using administrative regulations to implement what is known as card check, which even the Democratic Congress refuses to legislate. Obama's recess appointee to the National Labor Relations Board, Craig Becker, has lined up a 3-to-2 board majority to repeal the rule that requires secret ballots in unionization elections.

Currently, a secret ballot of workers is mandated to unionize a company. Becker's new regulation will eliminate workers' right and make them subject to coercion and bullying to induce them to vote yes on a card visible to union bosses.

The Obama administration is also toying with a plan to substitute administrative regulations for treaties. Several years ago, the Council on Foreign Relations fingered the treaty provision of the U.S. Constitution as its most objectionable section, and now an ex-Clinton administration State Department bureaucrat, James P. Rubin, has floated a New York Times op-ed suggesting that treaties are not "worth the trouble anymore," and we should substitute domestic regulations.

This administration is turning into a dictatorship by executive fiat. We are losing our republic to a bunch of academics who care only for convenience and not for consequences. These people are whiny little babies who only want their way and their legacy. It is time to stand up and defend what is left of the Constitution, before Obama and his thugocracy destroy the shreds of it that remain.

North Korea Could Produce 2 Nukes a Year? Where was the State Department?

Perhaps if Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were more concerned with keeping the peace instead of having diplomats spy and learn about what makes the leader of Argentina cry, we would have been more in front of this North Korean Debacle:

North Korea, which fired dozens of artillery shells at the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong this morning, could make one or two bombs' worth of enriched uranium per year if its new enrichment facility is fully operational, a nuclear analyst says.

The shells killed two soldiers and set houses ablaze, according to Reuters, in one of the heaviest attacks on South Korea since the Korean war in the 1950s. The two countries then exchanged further fire.

These events closely follow reports on 20 November by an engineer and two nuclear policy experts from the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University in California that they saw an industrial-scale uranium enrichment plant in a visit a few days earlier to North Korea.

North Korean officials told the team that the plant has 2000 centrifuges that are already being used to separate fissile uranium-235 from the more abundant uranium-238.

If that is true, North Korea could make 30 to 40 kilograms of highly enriched uranium per year, enough for one or two nuclear weapons, says Hui Zhang of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Although North Korea is believed to already possess plutonium-based nuclear weapons, uranium-based weapons can be more efficient, allowing them to produce more powerful explosions, says Robert Alvarez of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington DC.

However, it is nice to know what Nick Sarkozy is eating and that Quadaffi travels with a Ukrainian blonde nurse. Don't you feel safer knowing these things?

Obama Lied about Israel Concessions-Iran Compliance Connection

One of the sad benefits of the wikileaks debacle is seeing how sinister and manipulative this administration is. For the purpose of doing nothing, Obama artificially tied Israel making concessions to Hezbollah and Hamas to getting sanctions from Iran, knowing that in fact it did not matter to heads of state in the MidEast (like King Abdullah) who privately expressed fear and a desire to be rid of Iran. Check it out:

But -- as the Wikileaks disclosures make clear -- Israeli concessions have (and had) nothing at all to do with stopping Iran. Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries wanted Iran crushed -- as King Abdullah put it, "cut off the head of the snake" -- period.

Let me repeat: Obama knew all along that Israeli concessions had nothing to do with stopping Iran's march to nuclear weapons. Yet he persisted in linking the two, even though it raised the risk of an atomic conflagration that could engulf the world.

And, in typical Jimmy Carter 2.0 fashion, he overly trusted the Russians, trading our defense shield for aid in cajoling Iran from Russia that never materialized. Who exactly are you trying to help, Barry? The free world does not appear to be it.

Even the UAE Realizes Iran is a Threat!

Gosh, the UAE is more realistic and sensible when it comes to Iran than President Obama and his idiotarian state department and advisers are. From Fox News:

ASPEN, Colorado — The United Arab Emirates ambassador to the United States said Tuesday that the benefits of bombing Iran’s nuclear program outweigh the short-term costs such an attack would impose. In unusually blunt remarks, Ambassador Yousef al-Otaiba publicly endorsed the use of the military option for countering Iran’s nuclear program, if sanctions fail to stop the country’s quest for nuclear weapons.”
Ambassador Yousef al-Otaiba: “I think it’s a cost-benefit analysis. I think despite the large amount of trade we do with Iran, which is close to $12 billion… there will be consequences, there will be a backlash and there will be problems with people protesting and rioting and very unhappy that there is an outside force attacking a Muslim country; that is going to happen no matter what. If you are asking me, ‘Am I willing to live with that versus living with a nuclear Iran?’ my answer is still the same: ‘We cannot live with a nuclear Iran.’ I am willing to absorb what takes place at the expense of the security of the U.A.E.”

C'mon, everybody, sing along with Johnny:

Obama Hearts Hamas, former Terror CFO Abbas

OK, seriously. Just say you don't like Israel. I mean, Helen Thomas got a nice retirement package for saying so. President Obama and his love affair with terrorists is just getting too much. I mean, first, there was Bill Ayers. Then, there was the sympathy he expressed for people like Che Guevara. Then, he said that terrorists ruthlessly cutting off Danny Pearl's head captured the world's imagination. Before that, he snubbed BB Netanyahu and wagged his finger at Israel for defending itself. Now, we get this yesterday in a meet and greet photo op with former terrorist CFO Mahmoud Abbas, who was part of the organization that perpetrated the Munich murders of Israeli athletes. Guess it don't matter to Obama, because they were Israelis:

I think everybody, people in Israel, people in Turkey, people within the Palestinian territories, certainly people here in the United States, want to know the facts of this tragedy -- what led to it, how can we prevent it in the future.

And I think -- I've said to the Israelis directly and certainly my team has communicated the fact that it is in Israel's interest to make sure that everybody knows exactly how this happened so that we don't see these kinds of events occurring again. And we expect that -- the standard that was called for in the U.N. Security Council to be met.

Barry, here is like some evidence that shows us what happened, you dolt:




I mean, do we need anyone to tell us? Oh yeah, I forgot, you need people to tell you whose @$$ to kick, at least that is what you told Matt Lauer.

And so how did we respond? We bought 400 million dollars worth of infrastructure for Hamas to hide behind: According to Mr. Obama the money will be used for housing, schools, health and infrastructure needs.

Given that terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah have no problem with using schools, synagogues, and even hospitals from which to launch their attacks against Israel, America could be aiding and abetting further terror attacks against Israel.

Another Obama Mistake: Trusting Russia

Look, don't get me wrong. I have some Russian friends. One of my favorite hockey players is Russian. However, you cannot trust the nation of Russia, especially under Vlad Putin. This guy is a throwback to the days of the Cold War. He is just as paranoid as Stalin and twice as cunning. He is KGB for goodness sake! Here is what Russia has to say about sanctions against Iran and nuclear policy:

Russia's Foreign Ministry said on Thursday that new U.N. sanctions against Tehran over its nuclear programme do not oblige Moscow to scrap a controversial deal to deliver surface-to-air missiles to Iran.

Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko spoke after the Interfax news agency cited a Russian arms industry source as saying Russia would freeze its unfulfilled contract to sell S-300 missiles to Iran because of the sactions.

But it's OK Barry. Tell Russia we are scrapping our nukes. Tell them how many we have. They are our friends, right? Yeah, and these are not the droids you are lookin for.....geez.

Why Does Obama Hate Our Allies?

Obama hates Israel. That is evidenced by his treatment of BB Netanyahu, as well as his stance and tacit agreement with condemning Israel for the "peaceful" blockade runner episode last week, as well as some of his homeland security and intelligence folks saying we should shoot down Israeli jets headed for bombing Iran.


He sold out our Eastern European allies by giving up the missile shield as a concession to Russia (more on that later) in order to get a "victory" in terms of diplomacy. Now, he has angered the Brits. Gee, if this is how he treats the friends of the US, one wonders if he really has the interests of the US and its allies at heart? How is that "smart diplomacy" working for ya, Barry?
From the London Evening Standard:

Senior Tories today warned Barack Obama to back off as billions of pounds were wiped off BP shares in the row over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Mayor Boris Johnson demanded an end to “anti-British rhetoric, buck-passing and name-calling” after days of scathing criticism directed at BP by the President and other US politicians.

Former Conservative Party chairman Lord Tebbit branded Mr Obama's conduct “despicable”. And with the dispute threatening to escalate into a diplomatic row, Mr Johnson also appeared to suggest that David Cameron should step in to defend BP.

He spoke as the US onslaught against the firm became a “matter of national concern” — especially given its importance to British pensions, which lost much of their value today as BP shares plunged to a 13-year low.

Asked on BBC Radio 4's Today whether he thought the Prime Minister should intervene, Mr Johnson said: “Well I do think there is something slightly worrying about the anti-British rhetoric that seems to be permeating from America. Yes I suppose that's right.

I would like to see cool heads and a bit of calm reflection about how to deal with this problem rather than endlessly buck-passing and name-calling.

“When you consider the huge exposure of British pension funds to BP and its share price, and the vital importance of BP, then I do think it starts to become a matter of national concern if a great UK company is being continually beaten up on the international airwaves.

“OK, it has presided over a catastrophic accident which it is trying to remedy but ultimately it cannot be faulted because it was an accident that took place. BP, I think is paying a very, very heavy price indeed.”

People are judged by their actions, not just what they say. Does Obama's stance toward our friends seem like he is an ally? And what about his stance toward our enemies? Hmmmm.....

Obama is Jimmy Carter part Deux, not Give em Hell Harry

Victor Davis Hanson has an excellent piece about foreign policy, Jimmah Carter, Barack Obama, and the last great Democrat President, Harry Truman. While Mr. Obama entered the White House with as little foreign policy experience as Mr. Truman, it appears he is more likely to follow the dangerous and deadly naivete of the peanut farmer from Georgia, rather than the failed haberdasher of Missourah:

Upon entering office, Barack Obama knew little about foreign policy. But then neither did Vice President Harry S. Truman when Franklin Delano Roosevelt died suddenly on April 12, 1945.

President Obama often invokes the supposed mess abroad—especially in Iraq and Afghanistan—left to him by George W. Bush. But Mr. Obama's inheritance is mild compared to the myriad crises that nearly overwhelmed the rookie President Truman.

All at once Truman had to finish the struggle against Hitler, occupy Europe, and deal with a nominally allied but increasingly bellicose and ascendant Soviet Union. Within months of taking office he had to make the awful decision to drop atomic bombs on Imperial Japan.

At war's end, Truman was faced with a global propaganda nightmare. Stalin's victorious Soviet Union—soon to be nuclear—cynically posed as the egalitarian leader for millions of war-impoverished and newly liberated colonial peoples. In contrast, America accepted the difficult responsibility and expense of rebuilding the destitute former European colonial powers and rehabilitating ex-Axis Japan and Germany.

Some of Truman's initial military decisions proved nearly disastrous. After the atomic bombs forced Japan's surrender, he was stubbornly convinced that a nuclear air force could ensure American security on the cheap.

The result was that between 1946 and 1949 Truman tried to emasculate the Marine Corps. He mothballed much of the Navy and slashed the Army. Only the Communist invasion of South Korea in the summer of 1950 finally woke him to the reality that there would still be plenty of limited conventional threats in the Cold War, and that he'd better rearm if the U.S. was going to protect its interests and allies.

But the public had already lost confidence in Truman's military leadership during the so-called Revolt of the Admirals in spring and summer 1949, when top Navy officials blasted the president's plans to reduce conventional maritime forces. In just four years (between 1947 and 1951), Truman went through four secretaries of defense.

His necessary firing of Gen. Douglas MacArthur in 1951 set off an even greater firestorm. For months Truman had allowed MacArthur far too much leeway to attack his civilian superiors. But when Truman finally dismissed him, he did so in clumsy fashion that won the general iconic status and only fueled doubts about the commander in chief.

No matter: Truman constantly learned from his mistakes. Gradually, the president shed his Wilsonian trust that there would be a postwar global consensus under the aegis of the new United Nations. Instead, he came to believe that too many trans-Atlantic diplomatic elites had been terribly naïve about Stalin's murderous agenda.

This is an important point. Like many New Deal Democrats, Truman had been indoctrinated with Wilsonian ideals and such blather that left the world unsettled after the First World War and produced such despots as Ho Chi Minh and others. Truman was able to see past the indoctrination and utopian fantasies to deal with the world as it was. It appears that Obama, like Carter and the Dem party today, is nothing more than a Wilsonian dreamer regressive, intent on leaving matters to others in a world deliberative body while the world suffers. Truman realized the danger and the insincerity of Stalin and the Soviets. Carter didn't understand until it was too late and the tanks had already levelled Afghanistan. What will it take for Obama, or will he do as Carter did and just use empty gestures like boycots of Olympics? Back to the Hanson piece:

Against the advice of his angry State Department, Truman supported the establishment of the Jewish state of Israel in 1948. The Berlin Airlift, the Marshall Plan, the salvation of Greece and Turkey, and success pushing the Communists north of the 38th parallel in Korea all established the parameters of the next half-century of bipartisan American foreign policy. To craft a strategy of communist containment, Truman brought in conservative advisers like Paul Nitze, while working closely with Republican Sen. Arthur H. Vandenberg.

Truman's no-nonsense Secretary of State Dean Acheson summed up the president's doctrines: "Released from the acceptance of a dogma that builders and wreckers of a new world order could and should work happily and successfully together, he was free to combine our power and coordinate our action with those who did have a common purpose."

Ever since, most Democrats have embraced Truman's "common purpose." That means containing rival anti-Western ideologies, establishing alliances of similarly-minded democratic allies, and periodically standing up to regional thugs.

Jimmy Carter's presidency was a departure from this strategy. Mr. Carter started out cutting defense. He questioned the U.S. commitment to South Korea and offered homilies about the inordinate fear of communism. Then there was the short-sighted decision to arm radical Islamists in Pakistan, the abrupt abandonment of the previously allied Shah of Iran, and initial courting of the exiled radical Ruhollah Khomeini. The president seemed stunned into inaction by the subsequent Iranian hostage crisis and the rise of militant Islam. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Communist inroads into Central America, and the alienation of European governments further weakened American interests.

Truman was able to stave off the spread of Communism throughout Europe and help build back the Continent under freedom and present REAL HOPE to those behind the Iron Curtain. Carter only made many question whether America could handler herself, much less lead the world. And whither Obama?

The Obama administration reaches out to enemies such as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Bashar al Assad, the Castro brothers and Hugo Chávez. It pays far less attention to British, Colombian, French, Israeli and Japanese allies. In unilateral fashion we withdrew promises of land-based antiballistic missile defense from Eastern Europe, giddy that we might appease the Russians into abrogating their patronage of Iran's nuclear ambitions. But so far the centrifuges keep spinning while we appear unreliable to friends, compliant to rivals, and weak to enemies. The administration has also promised greater support to the U.N., seemingly unworried that the organization's illiberal majority has often appeased or abetted autocratic governments.

Will an inexperienced Barack Obama, in the fashion of Harry Truman, learn quickly that the world is chaotic and unstable—best dealt with through strength and unabashed confidence in America's historic role galvanizing democratic allies to confront illiberal aggressors?

Or will a sermonizing Mr. Obama follow the aberrant Democratic path of the sanctimonious Jimmy Carter: finger-wagging at allies, appeasing enemies, publicly faulting his less than perfect predecessors, and hectoring the American people to evolve beyond their supposed prejudices?

America awaits the president's choice. The world's safety hinges upon it.

Kerry Wants Law Library of Congress to Change its Mind...Or else...

From a report:

The chairmen of the House and Senate foreign relations committees are asking the Law Library of Congress to retract a report on the military-backed coup in Honduras that they charge is flawed and “has contributed to the political crisis that still wracks” the country.
The request, by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. and Rep. Howard Berman, D-Calif., has sparked cries of censorship from Republicans who say the Democrats don’t like what the August report said: that the government of Honduras had the authority to remove President Manuel Zelaya from office.
Zelaya has been holed up at the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa for several weeks, and high-ranking U.S. officials arrived Wednesday to try to broker a resolution.
Critics of the Obama administration — which condemned Zelaya’s removal in June — have pointed to the report as evidence that the White House was wrong when it sided with most Latin American countries in calling for Zelaya to be returned.

The only political “crisis” that the report stoked was the one in the US, when people wondered why we were suddenly taking the same side as Hugo Chavez, Daniel Ortega, and the Castro brothers against one of the more stalwart US allies in the region.

This effort shows you how much the Dems are all in for Obama. They will seek to rewrite history, to force people to rewrite history. They have already cowed the Congressional Budget Office. Remember when the CBO excoriated the stimulus bill as well as the original proposals for healthcare, only to flaccidly give a nod toward teh disastrous Bacchus bill when the time came, with inaccurate lowballing of the cost? These people care only for their own power and that of the beloved leader.

Obama is trying to make us liked, at the cost of our national prestige and security. Going to bed with thugs like Chavez and Co. and not giving full support to a valued ally like Israel is ignorant and denotes a rather startling naivete of the way the world is at present.

The efforts by Kerry and Co. show you that the Left is not about truth and divergence of opinion and never has been. It is only about the castration of thought and the acquiescence of the masses to whatever excrement falls from the mouth of the annointed one.

Biden Said Give Iran Mullahs Money After 9/11 and other follies of Foreign Relations

Is this the type of foreign policy leadership we need? I think not:

Finally, were it not for the national spotlight on his Iraq farrago, Biden would be best known for his relentless appeasement of Iran, the world’s leading sponsor of jihadist terror. Along with top members of Clinton’s inner circle, Biden was in the vanguard of foreign-affairs “engagement” enthusiasts who got goo-goo eyes in 1997 when the Islamic Republic’s then-president, Mohammed Khatami, proposed a “dialogue between civilizations.” The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps had only recently assisted Hezbollah in bombing the Khobar Towers complex in Saudi Arabia, murdering 19 members of the U.S. Air Force. And Iran was busily pursuing its nuclear aspirations. Still, as American Enterprise Institute scholar Michael Rubin recounts, Biden stubbornly pushed for cultivating Iranian “reformers” and encouraging trade and dialogue to bring the mullahs around. The European Union followed just such advice, increasing trade threefold with Iran, which promptly diverted 70 percent of the haul to its military and nuclear programs. The mullahs responded to this sensitive diplomacy by installing as their president a hardliner, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is more clearly reflective of the “Death to America” philosophy.
As the Iranians laughed all the way to the bank and continued killing Americans in Iraq, Congress voted last year to designate the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps a terrorist organization, a move that imposes economic sanctions. Only 22 senators opposed that designation; Biden and Obama were prominent among them. That called to mind the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. As policymakers considered potential responses to the attacks, Biden had a brainstorm. “Seems to me,” he told Foreign Relations staffers, that “this would be a good time to send, no strings attached, a check for $200 million to Iran.”

Yes, give them appeasement....that worked so well for Neville Chamberlain, now didn't it? This is not the foreign policy experience one should brag about...but wait, there is more:

Biden is first and foremost a combative partisan, but he modulates his left-wing orientation in accordance with public opinion, following the polls slavishly when exigencies like 9/11 arise.

When a Democrat is in the White House, Biden’s internationalist moralism proves remarkably flexible. During the Carter administration, Biden’s easy cynicism made an impression on the Soviets. When Biden traveled to Moscow in 1979 for discussions about the SALT II treaty, Vadim Zagladin, deputy head of the Central Committee’s International Department, noted in a memo (later obtained by the dissident Vladimir Bukovsky) that Biden and his companion, Sen. Richard Lugar, had not raised human-rights concerns — the duo said they didn’t wish “to spoil the atmosphere with problems which are bound to cause distrust in our relations.” “Unofficially,” Zagladin recounted, the senators “were not so much concerned with solving a problem of this or that particular citizen as with showing to the American public that they do care for ‘human rights.’ . . . In other words, the collocutors directly admitted that what is happening is a kind of a show, that they absolutely don’t care for the fate of most so-called dissidents.”

Is this someone who will be able to go against Putin? I think not...But wait:

But if Iraq is the topic, a more interesting debate would pit Biden against . . . Biden. By comparison, John Kerry is a paragon of consistency: Biden was not merely for the Iraq War before he was against it; he was also against it before he was for it.

As President George H. W. Bush launched the 1991 Gulf War to drive Saddam Hussein’s marauding army out of Kuwait, Biden argued passionately against doing so — a position he later admitted was a mistake. He subsequently morphed from Iraq dove to Iraq hawk, a transformation that happened to coincide with the election of a Democratic administration. In 1993, when Bill Clinton ordered a cruise-missile attack on an empty Iraqi intelligence headquarters in response to Saddam’s assassination plot against Bush, Biden was a staunch supporter. By early 1998, the born-again hawk was imploring Clinton to take military action against Iraq. Worried about the dictator’s “ability to produce the most deadly weapons known to mankind,” Biden warned that, “left unchecked, Saddam Hussein would in short order be in a position to threaten and blackmail our regional allies, our troops, and, indeed, our nation.”

Though he now repeats the Left’s charge that the Bush administration willfully misconstrued intelligence coming out of Iraq, the Clinton-era Biden dismissed the very notion that there existed any reliable intelligence on Baghdad’s arsenal. “As long as Saddam’s at the helm,” he inveighed during a September 1998 hearing, “there is no reasonable prospect [that] . . . any . . . inspector is ever going to be able to guarantee that we have rooted out . . . the entirety of Saddam’s [WMD] program.” Along with John McCain, Biden agitated for the Iraq Liberation Act, which made seeking regime change in Baghdad the policy of the United States. And in December 1998, the Delaware Democrat strongly backed Operation Desert Fox, in which Clinton ordered four days of bombing attacks without congressional authorization or Security Council approval.

By late 2001, a Republican was in the White House and post-9/11 polls reflected public demand for robust action against terrorists and rogue states. Biden comfortably reprised his Iraq saber-rattling. Al-Qaeda’s atrocities convinced him that the assurance of superpower retaliation was no longer sufficient to discourage America’s enemies. It didn’t matter to him that Iraq was not an imminent threat; Biden saw the economic sanctions faltering, presumed Iraq’s weapons programs remained viable, and argued that U.N. resolutions should be strictly enforced. “If we wait for the danger from Saddam to become clear,” he reasoned, “it could be too late.”

By the summer of 2002, Biden was publicly stating that war with Iraq was a virtual certainty — tracking his 1998 assertion that “the only way we’re going to get rid of Saddam Hussein is we’re going to end up having to start it alone . . . . It’s going to require guys . . . in uniform to be back on foot in the desert taking Saddam down.” Countering critics of his October 2002 pro-war vote, he insisted, “I do not believe this is a rush to war. I believe it is a march to peace and security.
. . . [Saddam Hussein] possesses chemical and biological weapons and is seeking nuclear weapons.” Though Biden predicted a lengthy, difficult battle, he stressed the imperative of persevering: “We must be clear with the American people that we are committing to Iraq for the long haul; not just the day after, but the decade after.”

Biden hedged his bets, of course, co-sponsoring a failed resolution that would have called on the administration to exhaust all diplomatic options. Biden always favors exhausting all diplomatic options — chatter, after all, is inexhaustible, a proposition the loquacious senator often is at pains to prove. The resolution was a bid for wiggle room — take credit for success but second-guess if things get tough before that “decade after” rolls around. Still, as the March 2003 invasion neared, Biden was adamant: “The choice between war and peace is Saddam’s. The choice between relevance and irrelevance is the U.N. Security Council’s.”

POLICY OF CONVENIENCE
For all Biden’s twaddle about doctrines and concepts, there is a simple technique for divining this foreign-policy solon’s bobs and weaves: Consult the polls and the calendar. His opposition to the Gulf War was an example of Democrats’ post-Vietnam squeamishness about military actions abroad. His 1998 hawkishness dovetailed with growing public anger after the U.S. embassies in East Africa were bombed by bin Laden, in whose activities the Clinton administration suggested Iraq was complicit. Post-9/11, Biden was a top adviser to Senator Kerry’s campaign. Convinced that Democrats could not win unless the public believed they took national security seriously, he pushed his reluctant candidate to talk tougher. Over time, Iraq became more difficult and the expected caches of WMD failed to materialize, but as long as the mission enjoyed public support, Biden maintained that Saddam had been both a long- and a short-term threat to the United States, as well as an “extreme danger to the world.” Even a year after the 2004 election — which, the senator told the The New Yorker’s Jeffrey Goldberg, the Democrats lost because voters decided Bush was strong and Kerry weak — Biden declared, “The decision to go to war was the right one.” The ensuing problems, he elaborated, stemmed from the conduct of the mission, not the mission itself.

But change, we now know, was in the air. Howard Dean, who had risen from the fever swamps to the cusp of wresting the nomination from Kerry, was elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Biden was eyeing a presidential run of his own. Though he scoffed that “no goddam chairman’s ever made a difference in the history of the Democratic party,” Biden couldn’t help but appreciate the declaration of MoveOn.org’s Eli Pariser: “It’s our party. We bought it, we own it, and we’re going to take it back.” He couldn’t help but notice the elevation of Barack Obama. By the fortuity of not being in the Senate in 2002, Obama had been spared the need to cover himself and his party with a vote for war. As an inconsequential state legislator from an ultra-Left Chicago district, Obama could afford to oppose the invasion of Iraq. And now that opposition was gaining him traction.

The result was a one-eighty that would have been comical if the stakes hadn’t been so high. The Foreign Relations chairman turned against the war with a vengeance, clinging to the bogus narrative that congressional Democrats had been gulled by the administration’s “manipulation of intelligence” — intelligence Biden had reviewed himself. Biden characterized that intelligence as worthless because of Saddam’s duplicity, and superfluous because “everyone in the world thought [Saddam] had [WMD]. The weapons inspectors said he had them.” After years of calling for a surge in U.S. forces to quell the post-invasion insurgency, Biden bitterly opposed the surge once Bush ordered it in late 2006 — when the Democrats’ presidential debates were on the horizon. At a January 2007 hearing, he thundered: “Why do we want to stop the surge? We don’t agree with the mission.” Of course “the mission,” defeating al-Qaeda and securing Iraq for “the long haul,” was the same one Biden had championed for years.

With this transformation, Biden has managed an unlikely feat: He has been just as wrong about Iraq this time around as he was in 1991. Though Biden maintained that the surge would fail (“Sending additional troops to Baghdad will place more Americans in harm’s way with little prospect for success”), even Obama today grudgingly concedes it has “succeeded beyond our wildest dreams.”

With similar gloom, Biden predicted the 2005 Iraqi elections were “going to be ugly,” marred by violence. Instead they went off smoothly. By late 2006, Biden concluded that Sunni-dominated Anbar province had “morphed into an indigenous jihadist movement” and that “no number of troops can solve the sectarian problem and we don’t have enough troops to definitively deal with the jihadist threat.” In reality, the jihadist movement was not indigenous and, bolstered by the surge’s modest increase in U.S. forces, Anbaris rejected al-Qaeda. Anbar is now one of the war’s greatest triumphs: The enemy has been vanquished and control of the province has just been turned over to the Iraqi government.

These developments underscore the folly of Biden’s ballyhooed 2006 proposal for a soft partition of Iraq into a loose federation of three ethno-sectarian enclaves. Now rendered irrelevant by events, the gambit — premised on an ill-conceived understanding of Iraq’s demographics and a disregard for its constitution — promised a chaotic descent into civil war, massive population displacements, and the possibility of luring Turkey and Saudi Arabia into a conflict that already includes Iran and Syria. Biden’s plan did succeed, however, in uniting Iraqis: Revulsion for the proposal cut across the ethno-sectarian divide.

And now, the dénouement. Well into 2005, Biden pronounced that timetables for a U.S. withdrawal would be a “gigantic mistake.” The imposition of arbitrary deadlines, Biden assured his fellow experts at the Brookings Institution, would “encourage our enemies to wait us out,” cause Iraq to “degenerate quickly in the sectarian violence,” and result in a debacle reminiscent of “Lebanon in 1985, and God knows where it goes from there.” But — surprise! — Biden then had another epiphany. He now sees the wisdom of withdrawal timelines, such as those urged by his running mate, whom he previously dismissed as too green for the heady arena of foreign affairs.

Playing politics with national and global security...this is foreign policy experience we need right now? I think not.

Obama: The Military As Social Workers

Think Obama will end "adventures in intervention," as some have called the Bush Administration's policy? Think again.

From David Weigel:

Obama believes all of what he said six years ago in Chicago. He has called for, or retroactively endorsed, interventions in Zimbabwe, Pakistan, and Sudan. He has advocated a humanitarian-based foreign policy for his entire public career. Since coming to the U.S. Senate in 2005, he has built up a brain trust of academics and ex-Clintonites who, like him, challenge the logic of the Iraq war but not the logic of wars like Iraq.

So, he just doesn't like Iraq, but he will give us more....Somalias?

Rudy Giuliani Announces Foreign Policy Team Members

New York City – The Rudy Giuliani Presidential Committee announced today several members of Mayor Giuliani’s foreign policy team. The team will advise the Mayor on a foreign policy vision that advances the United States as a world leader, while expanding America ’s involvement in the global economy, strengthening our reputation around the world, and keeping our country on the offense in the Terrorists’ War on Us.

Charles Hill, former executive aide to President Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of State George P. Shultz, a lecturer in the International Security Studies program at Yale University , a special consultant on policy to the United Nations Secretary-General, and a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, will serve as the Chairman of the Senior Foreign Policy Advisory Board. He is also the campaign’s Chief Foreign Policy Advisor.

Senior foreign policy team members include Norman Podhoretz and Senator Bob Kasten. Other team members include Steve Rosen, Senior Defense Advisor; Martin Kramer, Senior Middle East Advisor; S. Enders Wimbush, Senior Public Diplomacy Advisor; Peter Berkowitz, Senior Statecraft, Human Rights and Freedom Advisor; and Kim R. Holmes, a Senior Foreign Policy Advisor.

“This group is committed to helping the Mayor develop a comprehensive foreign policy vision that keeps America globally strong, promotes the expansion of freedom, and recognizes that our greatest challenge is remaining on offense in the Terrorists’ War on Us,” said Bill Simon , the campaign’s Policy Director. “Mayor Giuliani understands the critical foreign policy issues facing our nation, and we’ve assembled an outstanding team with decades of experience and knowledge to help advise the Mayor.”

There are some real heavy hitters there...

Are Democrats Still Conducting Their Own Parallel Foreign Policy?

This is a weird comment on the part of Sen. Joe Biden (D-Mercury) on CNN's Situation Room (transcript):

BIDEN: […] I met with the Security Council privately on Monday, the permanent five of the Security Council, up in New York City. And I raised the question with them. I said, if the president came to you and said, we want to make this the world's problem, we want you to call an international conference on Iraq , and bring in the parties, so we can be -- come up with a political solution, would you do it? They all said, yes, their countries would.

Seems to me, any meeting with the United Nations ought to be handled through the State Department. Is this yet another attempt by Congressional Democrats to do an end run around the Bush administration's diplomats?

What sort of outrage would there be if there was a Demcorat in the White House and Republicans running off to conduct talks with Syria (as Pelosi and company - including at least one White Flag Republican - did) and now the United Nations Security Council.

Or is Joe Biden suffering from a John Kerry Moment and is exaggerating...

UPDATE: This just in...

Sen. Biden’s “private” meeting with the Security Council wasn’t actually private – it was attended by other Senators, including a Republican.

Who is this Republican and was the meeting conducted with the blessings of the State Department?