Monday, November 17, 2014

A lot of worth-reading political news today

Update

Five AM Sunday morning, and every hard-wired smoke alarm in the house went off. We searched for the cause while trying to calm the pup. The fire Department came. Finally they discovered that one of the detectors had gone over to the dark side. Firefighter said they only last ten years at most. We are at 10.5...~Bob

General News and Comment


Worth Reading: President Obama's spiteful legacy. By Kathleen Parker
Excerpt: Post-election analysis falls somewhere between amusing and clueless. In the amusing camp are Democratic strategists who intone that more Democrats would have won if only more people had voted. The gods surely blush with envy. And of course, there’s the conventional wisdom that Democrats always suffer in midterms because they lack “intensity,” meaning they don’t care, and that presidents are always unpopular in their sixth year in office. So much for insight.

Excerpt: Scott Walker, the Republican governor of Wisconsin, took on public employee unions about to sink the state and reduced their bullying powers sufficiently to save the government billions and help rejuvenate a tepid economy. Despite a variety of retaliatory efforts by the unions and rival politicians to then sink him — some of the efforts about as dirty as dirty gets — he rose high, he overcame and, in the recent elections, was happily victorious. Three other Republican governors beat back intense opposition from public unions they had challenged — Rick Scott in Florida, John Kasich in Ohio and Rick Snyder in Michigan. That’s major, but the story does not end with Republicans.

A Russian Plane Zaps U.S. Warship’s Missile Defense System
An unarmed Russian bomber in April flew over a high-tech U.S. ship. A crew member pressed a button. Poof! No more missile defense system on the ship. No more radar. The ship became a defenseless floating coffin. Then the plane flew over the blind ship a dozen times. Basically, it was “Nyah, nyah, nyah.” This story got no play in American media. (This is very unsettling, and it does seem strange there's been so little reported about it. --Del)

Reagan Praised as Hagel Announces ‘Game-Changing’ Military Strategy to Compete With Russia, China
Excerpt: Wary of a more muscular Russia and China, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Saturday the Pentagon will make a new push for fresh thinking and creative ideas about how the U.S. can keep and extend its military superiority despite tighter budgets and the wear and tear of 13 years of war. ... Speaking just a short walk from Reagan’s tomb, Hagel invoked the late president’s legacy as a rebuilder of U.S. military strength in the 1980s and cited Reagan’s famous call for the Soviets to tear down the Berlin Wall, which epitomized a divided Europe and a world at risk of a new global war. (Reagan rebuilt the military after Jimmy "Barack One" Carter wrecked it. ~Bob)

Dir. of U.S. Navy Intelligence sacked for warning about China’s aggressive designs in East China Sea
Excerpt: In February of this year, at the U.S. Naval Institute’s WEST 2014 conference, Capt. James Fanell, 52, the director of intelligence and information operations at U.S. Pacific Fleet, said that the Chinese Navy was practicing for a “short sharp war” against Japan. According to Fanell, the PLA Navy had been carrying out amphibious assault drills to practice taking territory in the East China Sea, specifically the Senkaku or Diaoyu islands that are claimed by both Japan and China. Once the uninhabited islands come under Chinese control, the PLA could then attack Okinawa to remove the facilities of the US Air Force and Marine Corps from the island. (Folks, I had pointed out before that the US oligarchs keep telling us that the Russians are our no. 1 enemy while giving China a pass. That is absolutely false and I would never vote for a candidate who said that. Romney did say it, among others. Obviously the real reason the oligarchs want you to hate Russia is that Russian officials like Vladimir Putin and foreign minister Sergey Lavrov tell the unadorned truth about US and EU foreign policy, which is utterly diabolical and seems aimed at getting Christians and minorities killed while supporting Muslim thugs. Assad supports and protects Christians so he must be ousted. Libya protected its minorities so Ghadaffi had to go. As bad as he was, Saddam also protected Christians and minorities. As soon as we 'won' the war, the Assyrian Christians who had lived in relative peace in Iraq for 2000 years started emigrating and their churches were burned by the people we helped put in power. Please read my article on this here http://www.americandailyherald.com/pundits/donald-hank/item/facts-be-damned-russia-is-foe-china-is-friend and connect the dots in that to this big dot. China is clearly the REAL enemy while Russia is potential friend and is a natural friend of the American people. Our oligarchs are the real enemy and that means both parties (I just sent you a link to a video of the opening prayer in Congress. Boehner invited a Muslim imam to offer this prayer to Allah https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gA7mS77fhYQ. The political class is openly defiant and antagonistic toward us. I see that some of the enthusiastic GOP defenders are starting to get the point. So what to do? The first step is to warn as many people as you can. The solution starts with education--and ends with education. It is all we need to win. The elites are like cockroaches prancing around the kitchen floor in a dark house. When the family flips on the light, they scurry off behind the fridge and stove. Keep the lights on and keep them at bay indefinitely. --Don Hank)

Excerpt: He has captured the media's imagination. He's unlikely to capture the Republican nomination. (Paul has some foreign policy positions that really worry me. ~Bob)


Nancy Pelosi, partisan warrior in denial. By Dana Milbank
Excerpt: There are five 2014 House races still to be decided before we can answer a question of historical interest: Was this the worst election for House Democrats since 1928? Or was it merely their worst since 1946? Either way, the results do not reflect well on the House Democratic leader, Nancy Pelosi — a conclusion that seems to have escaped Nancy Pelosi.

Decorated Combat Commander Learns the Hard Way: Military Rules Don't Apply to Lesbian Officers
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/decorated-combat-commander-learns-the-hard-way-military-rules-dont-apply-to-lesbian-officers-thomas-more-law-center-files-federal-lawsuit-282548581.html#> <http://www.prnewswire.com/rss>
Excerpt: The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC), a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, late yesterday (Nov. 12th) filed a federal lawsuit in the Federal District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia against the Secretary of the Army on behalf of highly decorated active duty Army Officer Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) Christopher Downey. ... The lawsuit stems from LTC Downey's effort to prevent two female officers under his command, a Captain and a Lieutenant, who were in uniform at a formal military ball and were on the dance floor engaged in prolonged French kissing, taking off each other's uniform jackets, and other intimate conduct, from violating Army regulations regarding public display of affection.

Food Stamps--comment on the Grunt.com e-newsletter
Bob received his Phd in Bio-Chemistry in 1976. During that time we ate a lot of hot dogs, chicken pot pies (when you could buy them 5 for $1.00.) When I told him we qualified for food stamps, he looked at me with his typical jaw out and said, "You have a roof over your head? You have enough to eat?" When I said yes, his reply was, "We don't need food stamps!" Marine training! After that he accepted a position for 3 years in a post-doc research position.


Colonel's call for better leadership touches a nerve. By Stephen Losey
Excerpt: Col. Donald Grannan's commentary, "How did we lose this young Airman?" has sparked widespread discussion about Air Force leadership. It was the shot heard 'round the Air Force. On Nov. 7, Wright-Patterson Air Force base posted a commentary from 88th Communications Group commander Col. Donald Grannan entitled, "How did we lose this young Airman?" In the short space of a dozen paragraphs, Grannan related the story of a bright, talented, and driven airman he knew who, nevertheless, chose not to reenlist because "in her words, the Air Force had made it clear it didn't want her." He pointed the finger at failures in the service's leadership culture. (Sad story, but at least it got out and is causing some thinking. --Del)

Homeschool Family Sends Seven Kids to College — All by Age 12! By Dave Bohon
Excerpt: A family from Alabama is inspiring the nation with its amazing homeschool success story. In fact, Kip and Mona Lisa Harding, from Montgomery, have been so successful in educating their 10 children at home that seven have gone on to college — by the age of 12!

A brave new world of intolerance
Excerpt: Confronted with Muslim demands for equal status with Christian and Jewish holidays, the school board in Montgomery County, Md., voted 7-1 on Nov. 11 to do away with acknowledging all religious-themed holidays. Schoolchildren will get vacations at Christmas and Easter, and days off for Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah. However, as with the evil Lord “He-who-must-not-be-named” Voldemort in the “Harry Potter” books, the holidays shall go unnamed on school calendars, replaced by Winter Break, Spring Break and days with “no school for students and teachers.”


Tweet from WH PRESS SECRETARY @weknowwhatsbest (Parody Account)
We have the smallest Army since 1940, the smallest Navy since 1950, and the smallest president since, well, ever.

Worth Reading: The Loneliest President Since Nixon: Facing adversity, Obama has no idea how to respond. By Peggy Noonan 
Excerpt: Seven years ago I was talking to a longtime Democratic operative on Capitol Hill about a politician who was in trouble. The pol was likely finished, he said. I was surprised. Can’t he change things and dig himself out? No. “People do what they know how to do.” Politicians don’t have a vast repertoire. When they get in a jam they just do what they’ve always done, even if it’s not working anymore. This came to mind when contemplating President Obama. After a devastating election, he is presenting himself as if he won. The people were not saying no to his policies, he explained, they would in fact like it if Republicans do what he tells them.

Worth Reading: Liberals Already Trying to Re-write the History of the Obama Presidency. By John C. Goodman
Excerpt: The Obama presidency is a failed presidency. He has presided over one of the slowest economic recoveries in history. His foreign policy has been a disaster. ObamaCare is a mess. And it’s hard to lay the blame off on anyone else. The president didn’t make Republicans part of any of his decisions and most of the time he ignored congressional Democrats as well. To make matters worse, Barack Obama is the most polarizing president we have had in the past 60 years. What makes that so strange is that we were all promised something completely different.

Walker-Martinez in 2016? By Jim Geraghty, Morning Jolt
When I declared, tongue-in-cheek, that ticket had already been decided in advance and that the correct answer was Scott Walker-Susana Martinez, the audience seemed pretty darn pleased by that combination. ... Jumping off a John Fund comment, I don’t see how Hillary Clinton can be the first woman president when Valerie Jarrett has been running the country for six years.

NJ: Poll: The high-tax, gov’t union model at work. By Steve Malanga
Excerpt: A new poll finds that half of all New Jersey residents say they plan to leave the state, compared to just 45 percent who want to stay. The desire to leave is particularly strong among working age people, reflecting the state’s more than 10 years of economic struggles. Some three-in-ten who say they want to leave specifically blame the state’s high taxes for their desire to leave, while 12 percent blame a lack of economic opportunity. Business executives around the country who rate Jersey as one of the nation’s worst business environments would tell you that, too, is largely a function of high taxes. (Since I grew up in South Jersey, I'd love to live there. Just not possible on Social Security and savings, now that my health has forced my retirement. ~Bob)

Vote Fraud News

No, Voter ID Didn’t Cost Democrats the U.S. Senate. By Brian Sikma
Excerpt: Contrary to allegations that voter ID laws amount to a poll tax because identification cards cost money, many states with voter ID laws make the identification available for free to anyone who cannot afford it. In Wisconsin, where the state’s voter ID law was recently upheld by the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals only to be briefly and temporarily suspended by the U.S. Supreme Court for the midterm election, the state’s Division of Motor Vehicles website explains how one may obtained a free state-issued photo ID card for voting purposes. State law also allows for certain non-government issued forms of photo ID to suffice as a valid voter ID card on election day. ... What is known for sure is that in the state of Georgia voter turnout actually increased after that state passed a voter ID law. 

Gun News


Excerpt: With all the numbers tallied, out of 251 races, NRA-backed candidates won in 229, over 91 percent of Congressional races in which they endorsed a candidate. According to the Washington Examiner, NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam explained that the Second Amendment group was able to win at this level because individual NRA members were motivated to vote for freedom. He said: “Our members came out in droves and voted for their rights and their freedom. This was one of the most successful election cycles in a decade.”

Ebola and Enterovirus News

Ebola Doctor Pronounced Dead in Nebraska. By Daniel Doherty 
Excerpt: Ebola patient -- and Good Samaritan -- Dr. Martin Salia landed in the United States from Sierra Leone on Saturday. He was, one might say, trying to make the world a better and more humane place. Earlier today, however, the hospital treating him announced he didn't make it: (Prayers for him. Rest in Peace. ~Bob)

Race Card News

‘What Is the Probability That LaPrincess Will Inherit Her Mama’s Big Bootie?’: High School Test Question Leaves Parent ‘Stunned’
Excerpt: North Carolina school district officials acted quickly to remove a question that appeared on a high school biology test that more than a few observers said was racist. Here’s how the question began: “LaShamanda has a heterozygous big bootie, the dominant trait. Her man Fontavius has a small bootie which is recessive. They get married and have a baby named LaPrincess…” (The kids are being educated by idiots. The person responsible should be fired. Both racist and stupid--a twofer. ~Bob)

True, this: Black Males Open Fire on 5 Year-Old White Girl. Where’s Sharpton and Jackson?
Excerpt: A five year old girl who had done nothing wrong was wantonly murdered as she sat on the lap of her grandfather. You haven’t heard about it? That’s not surprising; while the Al Sharptons and the Jesse Jacksons of the world posture and bloviate about violence and a lack of respect for human life that permeates communities, they routinely keep quiet about attacks that happen every single day in America unless the victim was a person of color and there are television cameras pointed at them. (Her picture will move you to tears. We have a double standard in the media. The average person doesn't know that blacks kill twice as many whites as whites that kill black. and both whites and blacks murder people of their own race at ten times the rate of interracial murder. There isn't a person in America who hasn't heard of Trayvon Martin, but not one in ten thousand can tell you who Chris Cervini is: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/03/what_if_trayvon_had_been_white_and_the_shooter_black.html#ixzz1qBLNnX9L ~Bob)

Dear Black People: The Democrats Are About To Break Up With You. By Derek Hunter
Excerpt: or decades, the black vote in the United States almost uniformly has gone to Democrats.
How’s that working out? Black unemployment is twice the national average, poverty rates are higher than before Democrats offered “help,” and the education system fails a disproportionate number of black children. That’s what 50-plus years of blind voting loyalty to Democrats has earned. And, thanks to those same Democrats and the nation’s first black president, it’s about to get a lot worse. (back in the late 1890s, early 1900, Chicago democrat alderman used to bring in drifters from outside the city who slept in the bars and brothels the week before election day, got 50 cents for each chain vote election day. This is just importing outside votes on a grand scale. ~Bob)

Black Man Arrested for Keeping Slaves. By Dave Jolly
Excerpt: Case in point is 45 year old Christopher Hisle, a black man who lives in Cincinnati.
Hisle was arrested this past April after he drove a woman down to Louisville to be used as a prostitute. Since his crime involved the crossing of state borders, the FBI got involved in the investigation. When they went to Hisle’s home they discovered a dozen women being held captive and being used as sex slaves. (He has historical precedent. In 1860, there were 3,000 black slave owners in New Orleans. ~Bob)

Obamacare/Government Healthcare News

Tweet From WH PRESS SECRETARY @weknowwhatsbest (Parody Account)
O-Care architect Jon Gruber is in trouble for saying O-care passed thanks to voter stupidity. Here are the YES voters: Dems: 219 GOP: 0

Thanks to Gov. Jim Doyle, Wisconsin Taxpayers got to Pay Jonathan Gruber $400,000
Excerpt: As Gruber-gate accelerates, it is interesting to note that Governor Jim Doyle once paid Gruber $400,000 to conduct a study released in 2011 on "The Impact of the ACA on Wisconsin's Health Insurance Market." Proving him right about some WI voters. ~Bob)

Empirically Speaking, Gruber Has a Point, Americans Are Stupid. By Andy Weddington
Excerpt: Jonathan Gruber, an economist and among the chief designers of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), said Americans are stupid. Mr. Gruber said it multiple times over a handful of years, and was recorded as many times. That is empirical evidence. His audiences laughed - at his condescending putdown, and at stupid Americans (their brethren).

Excerpt: For ObamaCare “architect” Jonathan Gruber, the health law he helped design has been the gift that keeps on giving. Gruber has come under blistering criticism since videos resurfaced of him saying the law passed due to the “stupidity” of Americans who didn’t understand its complexity. Now, a series of government contracts totaling more than $2 million for consulting services provided by the Harvard-trained economics professor are coming under scrutiny.

Gruber White House Meeting Included CBO Director, Robert Gibbs, Axelrod and Barack Obama
Excerpt: "In addition to the president and Elmendorf, present in the meeting were White House officials such as Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs Phil Schiliro, Director of the White House Office of Health Reform Nancy-Ann DeParle, Office of Management and Budget director Peter Orszag (a former CBO director himself), National Economic Council Director Larry Summers, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers Christy Romer, senior adviser David Axelrod, and press secretary Robert Gibbs. Others were there as well, including Department of Health and Human Services adviser Meena Seshamani, Harvard University economist David Cutler and Alice Rivlin of the Brookings Institute, who was founding director of CBO from 1975-1983.” Gruber was not mentioned by name in the ABC piece, but the White House logs show us that Jonathan Gruber and David Cutler, a Harvard economist, entered the White House at the same time to meet the POTUS in the West Wing.

Washington state healthcare exchange shuts down on first day of enrollment
Excerpt: Washington’s state’s healthcare exchange shut down after the first few hours of open enrollment on Saturday, as state officials and software engineers tried to resolve a problem with tax credit calculations. The much-maligned federal site, Healthcare.gov, appeared meanwhile to be working smoothly on the first day of the second open enrollment period for people seeking insurance plans under President Barack Obama’s signature – and singularly troubled – reform.

State, federal insurance sites face first-day hiccups
Excerpt: Open enrollment on the federal HealthCare.gov site kicked off relatively smoothly in many parts of the nation Saturday, although there were reports in some areas that consumers and brokers had problems logging into accounts. Healthcare.gov launched amid much anticipation after last year's botched rollout.. Department of Health and Human Services reported more than 23,000 people had submitted applications in the first eight hours. Just as the federal log in issues appeared resolved Saturday afternoon, issues on state-run sites cropped up.

Medicaid Spending Has Exploded, And It Will Keep Rising Faster Than Expected. By John R. Graham
Excerpt: In 2014, total Medicaid spending is projected to grow 12.8 percent because Obamacare has added about 8 million dependents. A large minority of states have chosen to increase residents’ eligibility for Medicaid by expanding coverage to adults making up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. Unfortunately, more states are likely to expand this welfare program. This is expected to result in a massive increase in the number of Medicaid dependents: From 73 million in 2013 to 93 million in 2024. 

Undocumented Democrat News

Tweet from WH PRESS SECRETARY @weknowwhatsbest (Parody Account)
Pres. Obama will not only pardon this year's WH turkey again, it will receive a work permit and a driver's license.

Worth Reading: Executive order on immigration would ignite a political firestorm. By Chris Cillaizza, Washington Post
Excerpt: Reports are rampant that President Obama will sign an executive order as soon as this week that will allow up to 5 million undocumented immigrants to avoid deportation. Signing such an order would have explosive political consequences — it would not only reshape the near-term fights in Congress but also have a potentially profound effect on the two parties’ national coalitions heading into the 2016 election and beyond.

Obama Once Worried About Immigration's Toll on U.S. Workers
Excerpt: Obama’s ambivalence on the issue was even evident in his famed 2006 autobiography, “The Audacity of Hope,” in which he states: “The number of immigrants added to the labor force every year is of a magnitude not seen in this country for over a century. If this huge influx of mostly low-skill workers provides some benefits to the economy as a whole – especially by keeping our workforce young, in contrast to an increasingly geriatric Europe and Japan – it also threatens to depress further the wages of blue-collar Americans and put strains on an already overburdened safety net [emphasis added].” He continued, “When I see Mexican flags waved at pro-immigration demonstrations, I sometimes feel a flush of patriotic resentment. When I’m forced to use a translator to communicate with the guy fixing my car, I feel a certain frustration.” 

The Midterms’ Immigration Lesson. Last week’s election results proved that open-borders advocates have become reactionaries. By Victor Davis Hanson
Excerpt: Everyone finds a lesson in the Republican midterm tsunami. One message was that so-called comprehensive immigration reform and broad amnesty have little national public support. Polls have long shown that, but so do last week’s election results. Candidates in swing states who promised amnesties got no edge from such opportunistic posturing. Candidates who pandered to identity groups and played the ethnic card lost in most cases.

"You're Greener than Gore" News


I think summer is over
Sunday morning we had about 2 inches of Global Warming--on November 16. The Weather Channel said the average national high temps were 27 degrees, and that it has only been this cold this early 8 times since the 1880s. They were posting, "You know it's cold when" jokes from viewers. I sent, "You know it's cold when...people are burning copies of Al Gore's books to keep warm." Yes, I know your bosses won't let you use it, but thought it was funny. On Monday morning, the wind chill was minus 7--on November 17. All 50 states are supposed to go below freezing tonight. ~Bob

Tweet from Walter Cronkite ‏@CronkiteSays  (Think a parody account)
BREAKING Gore was asked to comment on the recent record low temperatures but unfortunately his tongue is stuck to a flagpole in Tennessee.

Weather Channel Comment
There is a famous quotation that is suitable here, “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.” Can anyone say, "Obama"? --Noel Mann, Ph.D. (in Environmental Science).

Global Warming Quote
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary." --H.L. Mencken, [1918]

Worth Reading: Climatologist: 30-Year Cold Spell Strikes Earth. By Clayton B. Reid
Excerpt: With nasty cold fronts thrusting an icy and early winter across the continental U.S. — along with last winter described by USA Today as "one of the snowiest, coldest, most miserable on record" — climatologist John L. Casey thinks the weather pattern is here to stay for decades to come. In fact, Casey, a former space shuttle engineer and NASA consultant, is out with the provocative book "Dark Winter: How the Sun Is Causing a 30-Year Cold Spell," which warns that a radical shift in global climate is underway, and that Al Gore and other environmentalists have it completely wrong. The earth, he says, is cooling, and cooling fast. (Isn't this an interesting twist? --Del. Very scary. Warming has some winners in increased food production. Cooling has none. Ask the Norse, who settled Greenland during the Medieval Warm Period, when it was much warmer than now due, I suppose, to SUVs, but who died when the Earth returned to normal temps. ~Bob)

Ice Visible on Lake Superior Weeks Ahead of Schedule
Excerpt: Cold temperatures and snow across the Great Lakes in November is certainly nothing out of the ordinary, but this morning, a layer of ice was visible on parts of Lake Superior in Ashland, Wis. While this may not seem unusual given the current stretch of unseasonably cold temperatures, it is actually several weeks earlier than normal. The first sightings of ice on Lake Superior and the Great Lakes overall usually occur during the beginning to middle of December.

Special Interests Keep Ethanol Mandate Alive (Second story on this page)
America is enjoying a huge oil and gas boom due to improved drilling techniques, yet the nation's energy sector is still plagued by government intervention and favoritism, a report from the Heritage Foundation warns. "Energy production, specifically shale oil and shale gas on private lands, has been one of the greatest success stories in recent years," writes Nicolas Loris, the foundation's Herbert and Joyce Morgan Fellow. "Households save money through lower energy bills and cheaper goods when businesses compete and pass cost savings along to consumers."(Repealing the ethanol mandate is absolutely the right thing to do for everyone except those corn growers who are reaping high profits because of it. They will not go out of business when they lose the mandate, they'll still grow corn and sell it, but in a more competitive market. And that's how the system is supposed to work. I hope the new Congress will be able to get past all the lobbyist money and do the right thing at last. --Del.)

Religion of Peace News


Excerpt: The Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot that controls large portions of Iraq and Syria, has released a new video showing the mass beheadings of Syrian soldiers. The video also includes a scene purportedly showing the severed head of Peter Kassig, who was kidnapped in late 2013. Kassig is a former US Army Ranger who was serving as an aid worker in Syria at the time of his disappearance. As in past videos, the Islamic State's executioner, a man dubbed "Jihadi John" in the press because he speaks with an English accent, is featured. He taunts the West, saying that the Islamic State cannot wait to face American ground troops. (If they were beheading illegal immigrants, or if the Sierra Club said beheadings cause global warming, Obama would spring into action. ~Bob)

Islamic State beheads American Kassig; Obama condemns ‘act of pure evil’
Excerpt: The Islamic State beheaded an American Muslim convert and former U.S. Army Ranger who had traveled to Syria on a humanitarian mission, according to a gruesome video released Sunday by the terrorist group. The death of Abdul-Rahman Kassig, previously known as Peter, came weeks after the terrorist group said it would kill him because of the U.S. bombing campaign in Syria.

Nothing says "peaceful" quite like a weekly beheading.

A 26 Year-Old Woman Is ISIS’s Last American Hostage
Excerpt: The extremists didn’t show her off in their latest snuff film. And her family doesn’t want her name released. But what is known about ISIS’s remaining U.S. captive is heartbreaking.

Got him! Jihadi John is 'wounded in US airstrike that killed 10 top ISIS commanders at secret bunker meeting in Iraq'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2836124/GOT-Jihadi-John-wounded-airstrike-Foreign-Office-confirms-MOS-aware-reports-injury.html#ixzz3JEM80J6T%20
Excerpt: Jihadi John, the Briton who beheaded two British and two American hostages held by Islamic State terrorists, has been injured in a US-led air strike, according to reports received by the Foreign Office. The masked ‘executioner’ with a London accent is believed to have narrowly escaped death when he attended a summit of the group’s leaders in an Iraqi town close to the Syrian border last Saturday. (Note to Air commander: Need bigger/more bombs. ~Bob)

Isis and al-Qaeda agree 'to end fighting and join against their opponents'
Excerpt: Militant leaders from the Isis and al-Qaeda terrorist groups have agreed to stop fighting each other in order to join against their opponents. Isis, which calls itself the Islamic State (Isis), and al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate, Jabhat al-Nusra, have been engaged in bitter fighting for more than a year in an attempt to dominate the bloody rebellion against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Worth Reading: Will Islamic State Cripple the Pivot? By Robert E. Kelly
Excerpt: The “pivot to Asia,” also known as the “rebalance,” is the most important geopolitical shift in U.S. strategy since the declaration of the “long war” (against terrorism) after September 11, 2001. Yet try as it might, the U.S. seems permanently bogged down in the Middle East. As Fred Kaplan has noted, the campaign against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL) has “already lost its way.” After just a month, the U.S. already seems adrift; it is becoming painfully clear that America is once again fighting a war in the Middle East with no clear goal, strategy, or exit pathway. There is growing talk of a ground intervention that would suck the U.S. much more deeply into Iraqi, Syrian, and regional affairs. If this all seems familiar, it should. This has been the U.S. way of war in the region for more than two decades.

The Emergence of the Islamic State's 'Cyrenaica Province' (Wilayat al-Barqa) in Libya. By Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi
Excerpt: As has been noted previously, in his new speech put out by al-Furqan Media, the Islamic State's leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi explicitly acknowledged the recent series of pledges of allegiance to him from Sinai, Libya, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Algeria, with the creation of new 'wilayat' ('provinces') therein. I had also noted that the most realistic prospects of this declaration translating to tangible results on the ground- that is, in terms of actually building the trappings of a state on the precedent in Syria and Iraq- exist in Libya and Sinai. 
Excerpt: This 1939 flag of Palestine shows that it was recognized as a Jewish entity even then, and that the name “Palestine” historically referred to a region (so named by the Romans after they expelled the Jews in 134AD, using the name of the Philistines, the Israelites’ Biblical enemies), not to a people. There was no Palestinian nationality before the 1960s, when it was invented in order to reposition what was then universally known as the Arab/Israeli conflict. Up to the invention of “Palestinians,” the Israelis were the tiny, besieged people amidst a huge number of hostile Arabs; after that invention, the “Palestinians” themselves became the tiny, besieged people against the big, bad Israelis. PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein said this in 1977:

Worth Reading: Why a German lingerie ad leads Mark Steyn to question whether Western civilization can survive. By Benjamin Weingarten
Excerpt: I’m not sure that we will survive…It’s interesting to me how even the most obvious provocations…for example a woman being beheaded in Moore, Oklahoma, a policeman having a hatchet stuck in his skull on the streets of New York, a guy being shot at the War Memorial in Ottawa, somebody being beheaded — hacked to pieces on the streets of London in broad daylight…even the most obvious provocations, we…duck into the multicultural cringe.
And Obama, and David Cameron and Justin Trudeau (who G-d help us may well be the next Prime Minister of Canada) — all these people…keep saying “No Islam to see here.”

UAE Designates CAIR, MAS as Terrorist Groups
Excerpt: The United Arab Emirates' (UAE) cabinet approved a comprehensive list of 83 designated terrorist organizations Saturday, the WAM Emirates News Agency reports. The list includes various al-Qaeda affiliates and the Islamic State. But the UAE also considers the Muslim Brotherhood and some of its global affiliates as terrorist organizations. The list includes the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim American Society (MAS). (Huh. CAIR and MAS are practically wings of the Democrat party. ~Bob)

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Robert A. Hall is a Marine Vietnam Veteran who served five terms in the Massachusetts State Senate. He is the author of The Coming Collapse of the American Republic. http://tiny.cc/g02s4 For a free PDF of Collapse, e-mail him at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com. Hall’s eleven books are listed here: http://tinyurl.com/o4nu65u. His blog of political news and conservative comment is www.tartanmarine.blogspot.com.

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