Sheikh and You Shall Find
“Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi has said he will urge US President Barack Obama to free the blind sheikh jailed for the 1993 World Trade Center attack,” according to al-Ahram. This comes as Algerian Islamists offered to trade American hostages taken in a raid on an Algerian gas field for the same blind sheikh. Great minds think alike.
The situation was fluid, but the U.S. said one thing was carved in stone: It would not be cutting any deals with the captors.
“The United States does not negotiate with terrorists,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said of reports the militants were seeking the release of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who is serving a life term for the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, and Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani scientist convicted of trying to kill U.S. soldiers after being arrested in Afghanistan in 2008.
But there’s no chance the sheikh will be freed and Nuland’s principled stand should serve as a warning that America does not give in to murderers. Meanwhile, U.S. Ambassador in Afghanistan James Cunningham said the United States wants serious peace negotiations with the Taliban but that it has not yet been possible to get the process underway.
“Our goal, or rather what we would like to see and I think the Afghans would like to see, is the beginning if not conclusion of a negotiation — at least the beginning of a serious process on peace and reconciliation — as soon as possible,” Cunningham told reporters. “But so far it hasn’t proven possible to bring those pieces together to get that going.”
That may change once the Taliban can be given a ride instead of having to walk to the negotiations. Just as soon as the cars are fixed. “The U.S. government paid $6.8 million for maintenance of more than 7,000 Afghan police vehicles that had been destroyed or were out of commission, according to an inspector general report released Thursday,” according to the Washington Post.
If you don’t maintain destroyed vehicles then they’ll become even more destroyed. The US is also paying for Egypt’s army. The Egptian Independent reported that “The United States plans to send a batch of F-16 fighter planes and 200 military tanks to Egypt on Monday, despite opposition from some Congressmen.”
While Americans are facing increasing restrictions on purchasing guns everyone else seems to be arming up. The Second Amendment really reads “a well regulated militant movement, being necessary for World Peace, the right of the people except citizens of the United States to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
According to the Washington Institute “rebel units in Syria can no longer be described as ‘lightly armed.’ Many have acquired heavy machine guns and antiaircraft guns, mortars, recoilless rifles, and artillery rocket launchers. Some also have tanks (see below) and BMP infantry fighting vehicles, while at least a few have shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles (MANPADS), antitank guided missiles (ATGMs), and medium field artillery pieces. Most of these weapons were captured from regime stocks, and the rebels are increasingly employing them against Bashar al-Assad’s forces.”
Meanwhile, the New York Times has made a startling discovery. Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, is promoting “repulsive” anti-semitism in the region.
His scurrilous comments from nearly three years ago about Zionists and Jews, which just came to light, have raised serious doubts about whether he can ever be the force for moderation and stability that is needed. As reported by David Kirkpatrick in The Times, Mr. Morsi is shown in a video from 2010 delivering a speech in which he urges Egyptians to “nurse our children and our grandchildren on hatred” for Jews and Zionists. In a television interview months later, he described Zionists as “these bloodsuckers who attack Palestinians, these warmongers, the descendants of apes and pigs.”
Who would have thought it? Calling Alan Dershowitz. Calling Noam Chomsky. Calling Ed Koch. Please pick up the courtesy found in the lobby to take an urgent call from Captain Obvious. The NYT continues:
Does Mr. Morsi really believe what he said in 2010? Has becoming president made him think differently about the need to respect and work with all people? So far, there has been no official reaction.
The White House called for Mr. Morsi to make clear that he respects members of all faiths and said the videotaped remarks run counter to the goal of peace. President Obama should also deliver that message to President Morsi directly.
Of course he doesn’t believe what he said in 2010. And doubtless President Morsi will explain how his remarks about apes and pigs were taken out of context. He’ll say that since Egypt will be hitting Obama up for money in the next sentence. As Spengler explains , Egypt is bust.
Egypt is on the verge of bankruptcy, as opposition leader as Nobel laureate Mohamed al-Baradei said recently. The Gulf states (including radical Qatar) aren’t going to throw Morsi a rope; Qatar’s $2.5 billion loan has been spent in defense of the sagging Egyptian pound. (Qatar appears to be forcing Egypt to pay the money back by purchasing gas at above-market prices, as I explained here).
Egypt needs money. So America will print some more money to get Morsi out of a jam, after which Mori will ask Obama to release the Blind Sheik. The Egyptian president has already said he would, so no surprises there. Now who can refuse an honored guest? It’s not as if you received a demand from a murderer.
Foreign policy under Barack Obama is a simple process. People hit America in the face and America pays them. Then the process is repeated. This brilliant plan is called smart adhocracy. One day the New York Times will discover this is actually happening — inadvertently of course. Thank God for brilliant minds like theirs.
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Unfortunately for those who would attempt negotiations with the current regime, any effort made is unproductive simply because the regime is unreliable…at every level. Unreliable at best; dishonest and malicious most likely.
This cuts both ways, with “allies” or non-aligned players alike.
Anybody the administration now trots out as a spokesperson share the same dilemma. “How can anybody believe what I say if the info feed I receive is unreliable, doctored, spun, etc”.
Are those on the left finally starting to see the folly of their choice for radicalism?
W: Dude! Unless I’m really off base, your prose has a new and remarkable whiff of disgust. It’s as if you don’t believe the New York Times, the Administration and President Morsi are doing a super-good job. How can that be?
All is for the best, in the best of all possible worlds.
If Morsi and the Taliban were Republicans I would be confident that Obama would be indefatigable.
Not disgust, but sadness afflicts my writing. Mickey Kaus traces the evolution of Ezra Klein’s attitude toward government healthcare from one of positive enthusiasm to a deflated realization that it wasn’t working out as planned — that maybe it was a bad idea all along.
A lot of people have been coming to that conclusion of late. Chomsky, Dershowitz, Koch, Greenwald. They don’t quite put their misgivings as remorse, but that’s a semantic difference. They’ve been had and they know it in their heart of hearts.
In a similar vein is the NYT’s Thomas Edsall admission that we’re in a “blue civil war”.
Blue civil war is a much nicer way of saying “fighting for the scraps”.
But Edsall “places part of the blame for the blue civil war on Republican-backed austerity measures”. It’s a form of denial. And the discussion on Mickey Kaus’ site over Klein’s recent rueful awakening centers around whether he was truly surprised to find his initial position wrong or whether he had engaged in “self-hoaxing” all along — that is Klein knew he was wrong from the first but believed the bullshit because he wanted to believe it.
My recent writing isn’t intentionally ironic so much as unavoidably so. The situation is objectively ironic; in fact, it is objectively absurd. It is so absurd that it is difficult to write without tripping over one laughable thing after the other. I do my best to write with a straight face. It’s the road that’s crooked.
I got yer unavoidably ironic right here:
Foreign policy under Barack Obama is a simple process. People hit America in the face and America pays them. Then the process is repeated. This brilliant plan is called smart adhocracy.
Having the American voter given the chance to VOTE for some goober named Barack Hussein Obama was the first hit in the face, and they LOVED it, and apparently want more and more and more!
“The White House called for Mr. Morsi to make clear that he respects members of all faiths and said the videotaped remarks run counter to the goal of peace. President Obama should also deliver that message to President Morsi directly.”
Unexpected. Ho hum.
And this time they really mean it. As they impotently pound the table, or not. John Brennan will be briefing our President on this. It is well in hand. And John Kerry will be formulating policy. Best man available.
Who knows how this turns out, but if it turns out badly (as is there was a way for it to turn out well) and there is a huge cultural, financial and political shock in these United States as a result, 25 years hence, young people will wonder what we were thinking. If we still have a democracy of sorts, which is not a sure thing at all.
How could a popularly elected American government get it so wrong? Hindsight will be incredible. Unless we are all truly living in the rubble of a shattered country, which could happen.
We are in a very interesting period. Many establishment figures, from both the Republican and Democratic sides of the aisle, privately understand that the system is in crisis. But having risen so far in the system, they cannot bring themselves to face the the implications of that realization.
Some are afraid to openly come out; still others are waiting for the moment to take the risk. Probably they’ll make their move when the danger of doing nothing outweighs the risk of taking a chance.
But the mortuary makeup that the press applied on the economic crisis and the foreign policy catastrophe in the runup to the president’s reelection is wearing thin. The ghastly pallor is now apparent. But at the same time the inner circle has become convinced of its invincibility and is acting arrogantly, recklessly and above all, stupidly.
It’s like standing next to a boiler and watching the rivets work loose as the pressure increases. The game is now about what to do when she blows. This kind of renewal has traditionally happened in America every 70 or so years — 3 generations — and the time is about right for yet another sea change.
There are none so despicable as those who allowed themselves to be willfully blinded by the most despicable man ever to become president. Only gauzy-sighted true believers and fools ever thought Obama anything other than a ignorant, thuggish, prick who loves the sound of his own voice. He of the middle school middle finger to his opponents. Somebody wrote a piece today asking whether term limits for presidents should be dispensed with. Perhaps, if removal from office with extreme prejudice were made legal by the same legislation.
I’ve identified Irony as a world historical force. That is where the Great and the Good produce the Small and the Bad. Then a lot of people die.
A Blue civil war? Over the holidays I listened to Democrats I know spew hatred for Republicans. It is the one thing that Unites them. The idea is simple: Republican voters should pay and have no say and make it all work. Oh, and shut up.
The platinum coin thing was another laughably stupid scheme, one more. Since 2001 the western establishment has been desperately trying to deny reality. It always intrudes but is pushed back at great cost. When the costs of maintaining an illusion is higher that the illusion produces, it is what we uneducated rubes call bankrupt. I take it a prepayed entertainment.
As the British broadsheets still phrase it, “A scene from Yes Minister ensued.”
We do not negotiate with terrorists. Therefore whatever we do must not be called that. The US may engage in a mutually beneficial exploration of areas of common interest leading to parallel but not linked actions that serve our respective interests, but under no circumstances will we negotiate with terrorists.
Maybe the State Department will discover an aversion to small dogs and announce that the policy always was, “We will not negotiate with terriers.” Perhaps the NYT will discover that the 2nd Amendment is about “the right to bare arms,” meaning short sleeve shirts,
And in other news speaking of the blind sheik, John Christopher Stevens is still dead…
We are in a very interesting period. Many establishment figures, from both the Republican and Democratic sides of the aisle, privately understand that the system is in crisis. But having risen so far in the system, they cannot bring themselves to face the the implications of that realization.
Some are afraid to openly come out; still others are waiting for the moment to take the risk. Probably they’ll make their move when the danger of doing nothing outweighs the risk of taking a chance.
But are they smart enough to know when that time arrives? And just how many of such people does it take to achieve a critical mass rather than a fizzle? What I fear is something analogous to what is happening in Syria right now. Assad cannot stop fighting. To do so is death because there is nowhere he can go or hide. Once it reaches a certain point those at the top here may find themselves in the same position. When handing over the levers of power is tantamount to securing your own indictment for treason and corruption a strong reluctance to do so will manifest itself. And we have gotten to the stage where you can’t keep any semblance of the blue model going anymore without treason and corruption.
Those who inhabit the top of this crumbling pyramid cannot really abandon it. Without it they will be nothing. And they didn’t get where they are now by considering being nothing to be an option at all.
If the Obama administration is stating flatly that we will never negotiate with terrorists, you can safely assume that we are negotiating with terrorists. It will probably cost us a blind sheik and a squadron of F 18′s.
One of the great consistencies of the Obama administration is that whatever they state as their position, they are doing the exact opposite. The other iron maxim is that whatever they accuse the Republicans of, they themselves are doing that same thing they denounce.
What I learned in government subsidized STEM classes.
1) For a stable, “balanced” system, there needs to be a slightly negative total feedback coefficient. Therefore, we should pass a budget with a decreasing baseline budget, say a -2% compound annual budget baseline factor for the next ten years.
Of course, the Nomenklatura can reduce their salaries, budgets and pensions by a measly 2%! Salaried taxpayers just got their take home paid by 2%!!!!
SOLIDARITY FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It’s true that everything that can be written now has to be ironic or perhaps sardonic. Nuland saying we don’t negotiate with terrorists while at the same time someone else in the State Dept tells us we have to negotiate with the Taliban is one of those moments. Not to mention that we want to negotiate with Iran, Hamas, the PLO, you name it. Every single day is a day with an unending pot of examples of a totally decadent ruling class living is some Alice in Wonderland world of their own making. And if my own personal experience is true,and I live in an area of highly educated people, the majority of educated people throughout the country think just like these leaders, and they are not about to change. After all, none of them can understand the world without the NY Times. Only when they see the wreckage around their very own abode will they come to see the obvious.
Speaking of civil war talk, has anybody at BC seen this? Mark Safranski aka ZenPundit illuminated the situation for me regarding this second strike in the ‘tell the military to prepare to fight bitter clingers’ sweepstakes (the first being the infamous Small Wars Journal article about suppressing the Tea Party Insurrection of 2016 in South Carolina):
http://zenpundit.com/?p=18697#comment-103817
#13 Tcobb
You have it right, but there are nuances that will complicate choices and timing. One can make a reasoned argument that our Nomenklatura has already gone well beyond treason and corruption as judged by those they would rule over. Some will realize this, and it will color their choices of future actions, but most do not realize this. And that knowledge will spread over time.
There is the fact that many of them are so caught up in the bubble of power that they cannot conceive of ever losing it, thus any suppressive action they take will be without repercussions in their minds. For some of those who can conceive of loss of power, there is a faith that even if they are out of power; that the new wielders of power will be as goolie-less and gormless as the Institutional Republicans. Thus, they will become an “Honorable Member of the Opposition” while they conspire for their return to power, with no fear of being ever called to account. And if some few can conceive being called to account, they believe in their shriveled, wizened, dark heart of hearts that they will be able to demand enforcement of every jot and tittle of due process, Law, and Constitution in their favor to avoid punishment; that they systematically destroyed while in power.
I think the lot of them are in for a surprise.
Countering that, is the fact that Democrats have become addicted to the concept of mass murder of the evil right wing Constitutionalists, and their savants call for such regularly. They will think it a holy duty to “cleanse” the country in order to “transform” it. And when they switch to open warfare on the American people, the “lot” due for a surprise will get bigger and bigger. Having Magda Goebbels-esque faith in Teh Won will not avail them.
Subotai Bahadur
to follow up on NUJ @17:
‘The progressive reaction to Newtown reveals the utopian impulse at the heart of the modern Left is the desire to escape responsibility itself.’
http://www.counter-currents.com/2013/01/why-liberals-hate-guns/
SF
“The United States does not negotiate with terrorists,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said”
Didn’t Ronald Reagan’s crew say the same thing while making “arms for hostages” deals behind the scenes?
Re: 17 Not Uncle Joe:
Link to the West Point study can be found here:
http://www.ctc.usma.edu/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/ChallengersFromtheSidelines.pdf
Interesting to note that the WashTimes online that posted the story had over 1400 comments within 24 hours of publication.
It’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you. Cheers -
If Greece is the canary in the coal mine that is western civilization, the US is the queen bee. She has contributed much but it is now time, it has been determined by our betters, for her to be cannibalized. What will arise upon her death, they say, is a new paradigm. Just what they promise that to be they cannot say. But it will surely be better than the last 200 years of Western hegemony.
I’m just a bitter clinger, but I believe the path that leads from this queen’s funeral to “better” will travel through decades – at minimum – of darkness.
My reason for pessimism… We have raised back to back generations – in this “superpower” – of spoiled, self absorbed narcissists (redundant?)They lack the real life skills of even the watered-down baby boomers let alone the greatest generation. They are not becoming wise through confronting the challenges real life presents. Their contentment with being perpetually entertained yields no inner sense of accomplishment…tattoos and body piercings being the closest facsimile. We engender an ever smaller productive class at the same time we institutionalize more millions into a lifetime of welfare: an economic black hole yielding only ever more welfare recipients. This is our legacy.
The new paradigm will be dominated by some aggressive, usurper culture that lacks the necessary fundamentals of personal virtue, individual rights/liberty, self reliance, equality of rights under just, objective law and economic opportunity. If there is such a rising star out there evolving, please point it out to me.
What will this new paradigm look like? A new dark ages?… or the Kingdom of Yahweh?
One man’s terrorist is John Brennan’s freedom fighter, now you can negotiate and even bow to them. Have a nice day, Blind Sheikh.
The acts of our Boy Emperor Buraq Hussein and the Institutional Republicans have much in common: they both feign opposition to our enemies.
This Algerian raid and the many more future atrocities to come will just demand “we do something” and give in to the Islamofascists, as in trade for the Blind Sheik. Just like we “had to do something” to stop the killing in Gaza and give Morsi his $4.8 Billion.
Similarly, Boehner and McConnell feign opposition to our big government overlords, but it was Boehner who shepherded the “Fiscal Crisis” tax bill and “Sandy” obscenely bloated hurricane relief bill. Interestingly both got a small minority of Pub votes. One would think he was a Democrat Speaker. It’s all Kabuki theatre with a prearranged ending: We get screwed.
But the worst part is just starting. The intimidation. Boehner is already intimidating Conservatives who tell the truth. A client of mine was telling me of a NPR radio interview with the CEO of WholeFoods where the NPR guy was trying to intimidate the CEO against explaining the disastrous effects of Obamacare. Now we get “Challengers from the Sidelines’ and other unconstitutional rot aimed at our military. Makes my blood boil.
And the idea that the US should stop farting around in the Middle East is as alien an idea to the neocon filth who have destroyed America as ever.
22: “Decades of darkness.” Yep
. . . and from Alaric to Charlemagne was several decades.
Oh please, Bill. Again with the Joos?
REPORTS OF MY DEATH WERE GREATLY EXAGGERATED – Uncle Sam
The American experiment was found dead yesterday, lying in a pool of blood in a rat and trash filled alley. The autopsy was conducted, but authorities refused to release the cause of death to the public. The New York Times is reporting the body may be that of a vagrant, a man the neighbors called Uncle Sam.
The ME, freshly gowned and masked,
The tilted body stiff and still
The nails first clipped and put in bags
The scalpel grasped, a pause until
With one swift stroke the scalpel cut
From shoulder to the breastbone deep
Then to the pubis, swift and straight
Onto the table dark blood seep
A bone saw with its high pitched whine
The rib cage cut and lifted clear
Organs looked at one by one
Then scalpel cut behind the ear
And pull the scalp over the head
The bone saw then into the skull
The top is off with hammer tap
Cut spinal cord, a moment’s lull
Remove the brain, dissect and weigh
Then put all back into its place
For shipment to his final rest
A look of peace upon his face
The verdict, died at Barack’s hand
The jury said it’s for the best
He was too old, too set in ways
And recommended no arrest
But in his grave Sam heard the worms
Bestir yourself, they cried at length
They put you here but there are those
Who will resist, will gather strength
And hearing this, Sam raised himself
And bursting forth beneath the sod
Old Uncle Sam rolled up his sleeves
And cried This Nation Under God
Will rise again with renewed will
And drive the despots to the sea
And set adrift the Lefty crowd
And once again we shall be free
“It is so absurd that it is difficult to write without tripping over one laughable thing after the other.”
Problem is, though, Wretchard, that it is really not laughable any more, is it? If you tried to pen this cavalcade of lunacy into a script or novel, people would reject it as unbelievable unless sold as farce.
And the lunacy is not the fun zany crazy of the Golden Age Comic Joker, but instead the Heath Ledger demonic force of destruction kind of insanity which seems eager to watch the world burn.
I myself asked when the scales would drop from people’s eyes in a previous post, and I truly believe that for many, they never will, even in the face of complete collapse.
No, what you will see is the same thing you are seeing now. Cause and effect will be rearranged to hide the guilty and assign responsibility to scapegoats as needed, killing two birds with one stone.
No responsibility for the irresponsible, with the added bonus of neutralizing any opposition to allow repeating whole cycle of folly.
What would change THAT?
It would take the gutting of the Elite power structure, either physically or mentally, or both. What I mean by that is a large Western city getting nuked, maybe more, whether Paris, London, New York, Chicago, DC, or some other bastion of the Elite. In that sense, the scales would not drop off, not be shot off as Herman Wouk put it, but be blasted off with kilotons.
Jerusalem would not do it, for example, because right after protestations of “horror” at the event, there will come the veiled/not so veiled insinuations that “those Jews had it coming”.
Ditto for most midwestern and southern cities. Gun-toting barbarians were asking for it too.
Alternatives are possible, like global pandemic, utter economic collapse with resultant resurgence of jungle rules in everyday life, and/or the overrun of areas thought to be “safe” in the Western world.
What I am basically saying is that like Piers Morgan, who is all lily liberal normally but who gets ferociously vicious when someone messes with him and his, until the Elite get gored by the Minotaur they are birthing, they will play their part to the very end no matter how ludicrous it becomes.
Have a Great Weekend, Ya’ll!
We make the mistake that many here see the problems so clearly, and believe that any rational person viewing the facts objectively will begin to understand.
Reading the comments to an article in “The Atlantic” convinces me that the opinions of much of the American polis are rotten to the core. Obama is convinced of his righteousness, and many Americans are behind him 1000 per cent.
There was an anti-war folk song from the 60′s called “Waste Deep in the Big Muddy”, about Lyndon Johnson and his quagmire of Viet Nam
“Waste deep in the big muddy
And the big fool says to push on…”
We will go down this road, and the Obama Administration is convinced in their righteousness. I know some young men in the military, and I really fear for them and where they will end up in a few years.
America has always suffered fools, but there have always been adults in the room to keep us honest. Today we cast furtive eyes about the Romper Room of our Ruling Class looking for the Hall Monitor…
-Maybe he stepped out for a smoke.
@18 Subotai “Countering that, is the fact that Democrats have become addicted to the concept of mass murder of the evil right wing Constitutionalists, and their savants call for such regularly. They will think it a holy duty to “cleanse” the country in order to “transform” it. And when they switch to open warfare on the American people, the “lot” due for a surprise will get bigger and bigger. Having Magda Goebbels-esque faith in Teh Won will not avail them.”
Yes. Kos Kidz are for the most part chicken necked pansies who can’t shoot straight. And those few who are veterans dumb enough to go along with a war under Obama Lincoln (I assume many BCers have seen this Obama swearing in on the ‘Lincoln Bible’ and Va. Gov’s Kean’s remarks contra Rand Paul that nullification is just a ‘code word’ for becoming Nathan Bedford Forrest)…will not find that things end well for them when they go up against the ‘neo-Confederates’.
http://reginaldquillbigsis.wordpress.com/2013/01/12/agitprop-against-neo-confederates-the-dirty-war-is-on-versus-the-2nd-amendment/
The short to medium term danger is not a hot civil war but a kind of Dirty War preceded (or accompanied by) DHS/BigSis harassment of all gun owners while the major thought leaders who make shooting cool for hipsters get picked off. FPS Russia’s Keith Ratliff I fear was the first but not the last. (FPS Russia for those unfamiliar with the record setting YouTube channel was run by two guys from Georgia, Keith Ratliff and Kyle Myers aka ‘Dmitry Potapoff’, and has nothing actually to do with the country Russia save for shooting bada– Russian guns).
I thank God that the county sheriffs and states are realizing that they have the power to stop all of this in its tracks, along with the Oath Keepers in the military.
Geez. This thread is really getting me down. Think I’ll read something lighter, happier. A Cormac McCarthy novel, perhaps.
33) Roughcoat try that one:
http://books.google.ca/books?id=Q8zM_BuvaroC&hl=fr
and remember
“Between the wish and the thing the world lies waiting.”
regards
SF
34. SF
Already read it … friendo.
“Whatcha got ain’t nothin new. This country’s hard on people, you can’t stop what’s coming, it ain’t all waiting on you. That’s vanity.”
Although I was thinking of something even lighter. Like, The Road.
Name dropping: As it happens, I have a passing acquaintance with McCarthy. Some years ago we exchanged letters. Just after Blood Meridian was published. He told me about his plans for writing the Border Trilogy. Nice guy.
….Someday soon. It will start with an outrage, and grow. Expidentially. It’s not predictable as to cause or event, but as to reason……………plenty of reason; more than enough. Way more. Cautious men will hesitate, the adventurious will plunge forward. The uncareful will err, the careful will plan, the naive will not bring enough, the planners will bring too much. But, American men and American women will be there, where ever ‘there’ is.
…Just as at Woodstock, millions will claim they were there but were not.
…Oh, but those that answer and go………..they will set the course and make all the difference. Lexington dedux. I hope I’m there. I’ve planned to be. Have you ?
Wretchard, its possible the American people will vote smarter next time.
I supported Nixon to the end. But after he was gone I voted straight democrat until Clinton cured me of the habit. Even tho Reagan pretty much proved the case for supply side economics and a more confrontational defence.
I mention this because at least for me, there is a period of time when a voter realizes something is wrong, but he is still in some way committed to his older views.
When a new election comes along, without Obama, people may have the opportunity to change course without admitting they screwed up.
John. I don’t think there’s either a necessity or a likelihood of admitting screwing up. The ease with which someone or something else is blamed will protect those who screwed up. The unfortunate results are always somebody else’s fault. So there’s nothing to learn about one’s own performance.
#37 john
With all due respect, I rather believe that we will have to go through #36 Dave D.‘s scenario before we have real elections again.
Subotai Bahadur
Marcia McNutt Leaving as USGS Director and taking Jane Luchenco with her http://preview.tinyurl.com/azurpmf
That “Dream team” keeps getting smaller and smaller as the rats continue to jump ship!
Now McNutt and Lubchenco are added to the list from just this past week, which already included Lisa Jackson, Ken Salazar and Steven Chu. Who will be left to testify against BP in the Deepwater Horizon trial? Are they all afraid of Kurt Mix. the BP engineer with the proven ability to “loose the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword”?
Let’s see…..
Thad Allen was already on the verge of retirement.
Robert Gibbs went to the permanent campaign office near Rahm Emanuel’s new hideout, Daley Center in Chicago.
Ken Salazar, Carole Browner and Lisa Jackson were all a part of the DofI/Climate Czar/EPA secret email sewing circle discussing the offshore drilling moratorium.
The anti-colonialists Chu, McNutt and Lubchenco were from the science team trying to screw that evil BRITISH PETROLEUM out of tens of billions in the Clean Water Act phase of the trial in the Big Easy.
Who is left to throw themselves off before the Ship of State hits the iceberg and the last lifeboat is full without them?
Janet Napolitano seems to be “IT”. The last line of defense between BHO II and his valet Eric Holder and Kurt Mix.
Can I get some odds as to when she joins the lifeboat brigade?
Marcia and Jane, this one’s for you. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4CbSvhmeww
Can we get Aretha for the inauguration? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xroRNBvvF9M
YO! BIG SIS, How is New York Special Agent in Charge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) James T. Hayes’s lawsuit coming????
http://preview.tinyurl.com/9e5kvao
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDWF7k2b2I4
Subotai…
Barry has weaponized the Census.
His legitimacy turns into a pumpkin this January.
I expect him to sail his Ship of Statists onto a reef — if not reefer.
House Republicans offer path to avert debt ceiling stand-off — for now http://preview.tinyurl.com/ayj7cfj
Okay Mr. Boehner, give Obama a temporary debt ceiling increase with one litle proviso. That Obama appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the validity of various lawsuits against the government, including
1) Fast & Furious (that will be Eric Holder’s denouement)
2) The “Richard Windsor” email accounts at the EPA lawsuit (Lisa Jackson’s)
3) The James T. Hayes lawsuit against Janet Napolitano and HHS. (Her’s)
4) Solyndra (Chu’s)
That should be enough for starters.
Watergate II here we come.
Never put off to tomorrow what you can do today. We need a pre-inaugural impeachment!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mW1dbiD_zDk
Before you know it John, you’ll have Obama “Beggin’” for mercy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=es6xywE9NP0&feature=fvsr
See how easy it is to reach Low Information Voters???
The situation is indeed itself so ironic that, as Lily Tomlin said, no matter how cynical we get, we can’t keep up. Your joke that Morsi would claim his remarks were out of context has in fact happened: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/17/world/middleeast/egypts-morsi-says-slurs-of-jews-were-taken-out-of-context.html?_r=0
If anybody has any doubt that the political atmosphere of the USA is not poisonous to living things not named Obama then spend five minutes noodling the implications of the launch of “Organizing for Action”.
CNN has confirmed that Obama for America will transform into a non-profit, tax-exempt group, that will attempt to leverage the re-election campaign’s powerful grassroots organization and social media operation, as well as its rich voter database and vast email distribution list, to build up public support for the president as he pushes for agreements over the debt ceiling and the federal budget, gun control legislation, immigration reform, and other objectives. CNN
Do you recall from the ’08 campaign when Obama said that he wanted a Civilian Defense Force as big as the military but separate from it? Not quite what he wanted but probably close enough.
An organization with a politically experienced leadership and millions of “members” with loyalty to one person, who happens to be arguably the most powerful figure in the world, is a few days away from inserting itself into the fabric of American life. This has never happened before in our history although just about anybody can draw the necessary parallels from similar organizations which have existed elsewhere.
Given the Democrat propensity to employ the politics of personal destruction as the default method of argument it’s not hard to imagine the outcome.
Walt, that gave me chills. Serious, skin-creeping chills.
Some things can only be communicated at a deep emotional level. Your use of gory realistic imagery in the beginning of the poem creates such an interesting, powerful experience. I guess it creates a place for the metaphor to deeply take root, so that it can blossom that effectively at the end.
Well done.
“One of the great consistencies of the Obama administration is that whatever they state as their position, they are doing the exact opposite.” TimW #14
Exactly! The 0bama Administration has been telling the Big Bold Faced Lie for so long that it has become Standard Operating Procedure.
No one at the NYT, WaPo, MSMBC or CNN has ever challenged the lies – they propagate 0bama’s lies. People in the blogosphere have challenged the lies but nobody in the MSM has done so (except for a few people at the Wall Street Journal). 0bama and his cronies have created an astounding propaganda machine.
Because of this nobody in my household owns a TV or has a cable network connection. I have been TV Free for over six years. I have not missed a thing. The internet provides much more accurate information.
T2costkeeper @ 47 – Fox challenges the Big Lie.
While I expect many of the BCers do not follow the links, especially if you have to watch a commercial, but here is a place ALL of you ought to do it. Have Huckabee invite P!nk, a new mother, onto his show with her father to sing songs from Camelot. She did not get to do it when she was on Ellen DeGeneres’ show (be patient) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGNS8qhuMHc
You may find yourself agreeing with her about “Stupid Girls”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BR4yQFZK9YM
A more recent show with her daughter http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWbeUqSPGO8
IT TAKES GUTS TO FIGHT BACK AGAINST THE LIBERAL CULTURE WHEN YOU ARE A YOUNG GIRL. P!NK’S GOT GUTS!
Some people say The Brotherhood is the same as Al Queda. Stupid stupid. Osama never wore an Italian suit. And check out Mr. Morsi’s shoes.
There was a bit of jubilation among economists last week when the new japanese prime minister announced that they would devalue the yen to increase exports. They would work to create inflation, making everybody rich by first making everybody poorer.
Kyle bass has been predicting a japanese collapse for a while.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-01-18/detonating-japanese-debt-time-bomb-kyle-bass
We are in for some interesting times. When you manipulate reality to avoid nastiness and tough decisions it seems successful for a time. The Fed is setting the price of US bonds by creating money and buying them up. They have set the price of renting money at close to nothing, telling us all that out really isn’t worth very much. Europe has solved the greek debt problem by writing down privately owned debt but buying up enough through government financing institutions, alleviating the need for anyone south any skin in the game to set prices. The impediments to success are institutions that aren’t quite powerful enough to impose their designs on the markets.
We know how this ends, it is a matter of figuring out when.
This Democratic administration is all about reliving history and if the economy has usually snapped back with a little austerity, then let the little people take hardships and let government use the opportunity to ingratiate itself in a little cash and power. All along, government needed to take a haircut like everyone else but Barry wasn’t giving up the checkbook. No contraction of his greatness. Let the rest of the economy crash and burn. The man on the top of the rubble would still be king.
Interesting times indeed! But let’s remind ourselves — Soetero is Simply the Symptom. The current catastrophe has been building for at least 4 decades; there are years more to go on this sorry road.
I was in an airline office recently. One wall was taken up with a giant photograph of the French-built A-380 Air-Whale in the airline’s colors. 4 decades ago (within living memory, even for Soetero), there were 3 competing US manufacturers of jumbo-jets. The only other country in the world which could build one was the USSR, and theirs was not available for commercial sale. Today, the US has only one company that assembles aircraft parts made in foreign countries, and French Airbus has a near-monopoly in many markets.
One of the other walls was taken up with an awe-inspiring photograph of the tallest building in the world — Burj Khalifa, in Dubai. Four decades ago, the inhabitants of Dubai were only just getting past stealing each others’ camels. Literally; read Richard Thessiger. And the tallest building in the world was in the US, back then.
Starting in the 1970s, the US took the wrong track. There is a lot of ruin in a nation, so it has taken this long to reach the crisis point. Now we are here, and that which cannot continue, won’t! There will be no quick resolution and recovery.
Interesting times!
Bloomberg – Energy Rigs in U.S. Slump to 22-Month Low, Baker Hughes Says
http://preview.tinyurl.com/baubj5t
I guess BHO is still attacking the USA’s center of gravity!
If this “smart power” , R2P and calling in the third string (or nobody) to “rescue” hostages keeps up there will be “bumps in the road” all over North Africa.
k @ 52: Starting in the 1970s, the US took the wrong track. There is a lot of ruin in a nation, so it has taken this long to reach the crisis point. Now we are here, and that which cannot continue, won’t! There will be no quick resolution and recovery.
Interesting times!
Yah. OTOH, we did some stuff right, too. And triple-net, it’s hard to find anyone else on the planet who did any better. China has been on a good trajectory recently but it’s still a horribly corrupt, polluted, and inefficient place, and they only get that far under the US ecnomic, military, and cultural umbrella. Nor were things perfect and ideal in the US before 1970, not economically, militarily, nor culturally. So there’s still room for improvement no doubt, but it’s not like the bottom fell out. Sometimes winning is just screwing up a little less than the other guys.
tw @ 14: One of the great consistencies of the Obama administration is that whatever they state as their position, they are doing the exact opposite.
Amen. Every word out of them is a lie of one variety or another. I suppose even what they tell each other and themselves is untrue.
Kin @ 52 – ExxonMobil has the world’s tallest structure built by humans at 12,736 meters. It just has very deep footings. http://preview.tinyurl.com/9629fo8
If only we could do this on our own continental shelf!
Interesting, MP. That’s 40,604 feet, over nearly 8 miles deep. What was the old song — “Eight miles high”?
As Josh says, it has not all been bad since the 1970s. And most everyone else has not done much better.
Still, it is very frustrating to see the French step in with ArianeSpace and sweep up much of the commercial potential from space — potential liberated with extensive taxpayer contributions from the US. Or to step over the abandoned Superconducting Supercollider in Texas to see the French/Swiss collider at CERN. It hurts to have to look up to the French! And let’s not even think about the long-gone nuclear powered SS Savanah.
The Roman empire financed the Pax Romana from the conquered territories.
The Americans are financing the Pax Americana how? With some baffling sleight of financial hand? Is this magic flow of credit related to the dollar being a reserve currency and therefore something the rest of the world is willing to take in trade for tangible goods?
Therefore, does an intimidating war machine help keep the dollars flowing?
In that case we either need more deficits and more interventions or we need to show the Greeks what austerity induced collapse looks like when the pros do it.
We should ask our real allies to join us in some kind of Nato like arrangement. Guard the shipping lanes. Get some free trade going if they know whats good for them.
McCain’s Mideast Blunders
Andy McCarthy
I wonder if the jihadists of eastern Libya are still “heroes” to John McCain. That’s what he called them — “my heroes” — after he changed on a dime from chummy Qaddafi tent guest to rabid Qaddafi scourge.
See, the senator and his allies in the Obama-Clinton State Department had a brilliant notion: The reason the “rebels” of eastern Libya hated America so much had nothing to do with their totalitarian, incorrigibly anti-Western ideology. No, no: The problem was that we sided with Qaddafi, giving the dictator — at the insistence of, well, McCain and the State Department — foreign aid, military assistance, and international legitimacy. If we just threw Qaddafi under the bus, the rebels would surely become our grand democratic allies.
This, of course, was a much more sophisticated theory than you’d get from lunatics like Michele Bachmann. Sit down for this, because I know it’s hard to believe anyone could spout such nutter stuff, but Bachmann actually opposed U.S. intervention in Libya. She claimed — stop cackling! — that many of McCain’s heroes might actually be jihadists ideologically hostile to the U.S. and linked to groups such as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the terror enterprise’s North African franchise. She even thought — yeah, I know, crazy — that if Qaddafi were deposed, the heroes would get their hands on his arsenal, ship a lot of it to AQIM havens in places such as Mali and Algeria, and maybe even turn rebel strongholds such as Benghazi into death traps for Americans.
Good thing we listened to McCain, no?
This week, while the guys the senator and the Obama administration aligned us with in Libya (and would like to align us with in Syria) were busy taking Americans and other foreigners hostage in Algeria, in addition to using Qaddafi’s arsenal to fight the French in Mali, McCain was working his magic in Cairo…
—
There is a war on over the course of American foreign policy and the security of the United States. The Left has aligned with the Brotherhood — some naïvely relying on the fiction that the Brothers are not the enemy vanguard, others seeing the Brothers as comrades in the quest for a utopian, post-American future. In opposition, the GOP can either continue looking to McCain for leadership or rally behind Bachmann the way the Left always circles the wagons around its stalwarts.
Anyone want to bet me on which way the Republicans will go?
hat tip: Deuce @ The Elephant Bar
Kin @ 57 – You want a new ship propulsion system? A nuke connected to a supercritical CO2 gas turbine driving a superconducting electric drive. Use any excess to power electromagnetic rail guns!!!
Now that would be a destroyer to make my Dad’s heart beat faster! He worked on everything from destroyers, to
Project Mohole http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Mohole
Project Azorian http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
SS United States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ss_united_states
And earned five Army-Navy “E”s http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army-Navy_%22E%22_Award
Kind of a tough act to follow! But at least I was a 20 year old thermodynamicist at Grumman Aerospace when the Eagle landed on the Sea of Tranquility. And I have the Grumman Aerospace plank owner lapel pin to prove it.
Peter Boston/45: that description of Organizing/Obama For/For America/Action is gralarming (my neologism for “grimly alarming” or “alarmingly grim”). It reminds me of the SA in a certain country under a certain leader in the 1930′s. The charismatic focus, the cult-like intensity, the mass, the ability to become lost in the mass, the constant hysteric energy, the instant supeficial solidarity. “Forward!” Where, doesn’t matter nearly as much as just…marching, assembling, showing that you Care. Being able to see the Leader’s image, to know that He’s looking! Right! At! You!
And being able to turn on those who drag their feet, who express skepticism, not to say real hostility: to turn on them with the pure white heat of self-righteous fury.
THAT’s the drug of choice here.
Very, very scary.
60. MachiasPrivateer
How much more efficient is a supercritical CO2 gas turbine than steam?
My best friend did thermo work on Lockheed Agena program.
Doug @ 62 – Here is a link you’ll find interesting http://preview.tinyurl.com/b5hrx9e
#52 Kinuachdrach – Burj Khalifa sounds like an excellent target. #4 after Mecca, Medina and Qom and just before the palace of the Witch-King of Angmar in Riyadh.
Unfortunately, what ought to be #4 is inviolate; vaguely decent people with a culture advanced from the 7th century live nearby.