Friday, January 30, 2015

Romney out--Lots of 2016 election news today

Update

Why I do this blog: " Life is really simple: Do all that you can, for as many as you can, for as long as you can." –Anonymous US Marine Corps Sergeant Major.

On Friday, 1/23 my FEV1 average (amount of air I can exhale in one second) was 1.697, the lowest this month. Thursday, 1/28 it was 1.845, the highest since March 29. Highest I ever had was a 2.28 in January. Some of the guys who got two lungs are blowing in the 3.6 range. But two is cheating, right? ~Bob

General News and Comment

Important: Mitt Romney Opts Out of Third Presidential Bid in 2016
Excerpt: Former Gov. Mitt Romney, R-Mass., announced to supporters on Friday that he will not seek the Republican presidential nomination for a third time. Romney was the Republican presidential candidate in 2012 who lost to President Barack Obama. Conservative pundit and radio show host Hugh Hewitt received a copy of what Romney told supporters on Friday. Romney insisted that he could win the nomination but decided against a third bid. (Romney was the front runner among Republican voters. Jeb Bush was second. I think this makes Jeb the front runner. If Romney should throw his support to Jeb, it could be over. ~Bob)

Romney announces he will not run for president in 2016
Excerpt: Bush, in a written statement on Friday, praised Romney as a party leader and a patriot. "There are few people who have worked harder to elect Republicans across the country than he has," he said. "Though I'm sure today's decision was not easy, I know that Mitt Romney will never stop advocating for renewing America's promise through upward mobility, encouraging free enterprise and strengthening our national defense." A day earlier, it emerged that a key former Romney adviser was joining up with Bush's team. 

A Message From Marco Rubio
After listening to Mitt Romney's latest... I Thought you would be interested in this.. A message from Marco Rubio. His FB message to followers. "Over the past two years, there hasn't been a day when I didn't think that Mitt Romney would have been a better president than Barack Obama. Over the years, I’ve enjoyed getting to know Mitt and campaigning for him, was grateful for his support in my Senate race, and I know what a difficult decision this must be given his love of our country. He certainly earned the right to consider running, so I deeply respect his decision to give the next generation a chance to lead. I wish him, Ann and his entire family the best and hope he will continue to serve our country and his community as he’s done throughout his life." To me it kind of looks like Mitt might have been referring to Marco. Personally, I would love to see Marco run. --Laura (Laura knows politics. She and her late husband, Ron [A local selectman] were staunch Hall Campaign Volunteers throughout my five successful races. ~Bob)

Lindsey Graham of South Carolina joins other Republicans in pursuit of presidency
Excerpt: The already-crowded field of would-be Republican presidential candidates grew again on Thursday when Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) announced the formation of an exploratory committee for president. The launch of the Security Through Strength committee enables Graham to raise money for a potential run. It’s the clearest sign yet that he is serious about entering the race, and comes as a flurry of White House aspirants are taking public and private steps toward entering what could be the most wide-open GOP primary in memory.

New signals of Rubio weighing a 2016 bid as senator makes California fundraising stop
Excerpt: Sen. Marco Rubio this week may be sending the clearest signals yet that he intends to run for president rather than seek reelection to a second term in 2016. In a week when the Senate was consumed with a bill to approve construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, Rubio (R-Fla.) was in California raising money for his political action committee and reelection campaign. He was the only Republican senator who did not vote on final passage of the Keystone bill Thursday.

Time for Scott Walker to get serious about foreign policy. By Philip Klein 
Excerpt: So, having talked up Walker’s chances when many were underestimating him, I think it’s worth offering a note of caution now that that everybody else has realized he’s been underestimated. For Walker to realize his potential as a candidate, he will have to get serious about foreign policy. This isn’t to say that Walker, to date, has said or done anything particularly embarrassing when it comes to foreign policy. But for perfectly understandable reasons — advancing ambitious reforms in a state while running for election three times in four years — he hasn’t had the time or cause to do much studying of national security issues until now.

Excerpt: A group of major liberal donors who want Elizabeth Warren to run for president have paid for a poll intended to show that Hillary Clinton does not excite the Democratic base and would be vulnerable in a 2016 general election. The automated poll of nearly 900 registered voters, conducted last week by Public Policy Polling, found that 48 percent of respondents had an unfavorable opinion of Clinton, compared to 43 percent who viewed the former secretary of State favorably. (I have a very unfavorable opinion of both Benghazi Hill and Big Squaw Warren. ~Bob)


True, this: Sniping Potshots at American Sniper. By Andy Weddington
Excerpt:" I saw American Sniper less than two weeks ago - on a weekday in the middle of the afternoon. Long ticket lines. Packed theatre. ... And after ignoring nearly a dozen irritatingly noisy previews of "coming attractions" while lost in thought, the film began."

Good Review: American Sniper: The Voice of Veterans
Excerpt: I fear the plaid shirt, hash-tagging, trust-fund protestors are going to start coming out of the woodwork. The people who have kept their mouths shut because the war was still ongoing, are going to come forward and start openly bashing on us. The war is “officially” over and as a country, we are no longer engaged in combating terrorism with any sort of genuine commitment. ... To those that saw it as more “pro Bush/Iraq/Right Wing/anti-Muslim” political statement and wants to bash it and our military, I say this: The movie wasn’t for you. It was for the guy with mud on his boots and a hole in his heart, and for the families that are left to pick up the pieces. Go back to your latte.

Worth Reading: Neither A Lender Nor A Borrower Be. By Theodore Dalrymple
Excerpt: Two considerations led me to turn down all these kind offers. The first is that my taste in holidays of a lifetime runs more to observing civil wars than to lolling in the lap of luxury, and while sometimes expensive to go to, civil wars offer little in the way of sybaritic possibilities (though there was a surprising availability of pink champagne during the Liberian civil war, even if it was difficult to chill). The second consideration was the faintly puritanical belief, no doubt the psychological consequence of having been born only a few years after the end of the Second World War, that if one could not afford to pay cash on the nail for the holiday of a lifetime, one could not afford the holiday of a lifetime. One did not go deeply into debt for the sake of evanescent pleasures, such as that of a couple of weeks’ sitting under palm trees by a lighted pool in the tropical sunset, waited upon by obsequious, and no doubt secretly resentful, flunkies. Even allowing for the change in my personal circumstances over the forty years, the irresponsibility of the bank (and other financial institutions) seemed to me – if one absented knowledge of history, that is - astonishing. There is no doubt, however, that many people, in fact many millions of people, listened to the siren song of easy credit, of fritter now, pay later.

Castro To Obama: Reparations, Gitmo, and Cutoff From Dissidents
Excerpt: Here’s the price for ‘normalized relations.’ The good news: The discomfort over the embargo of Cuba has led to a good bargaining position in talks with the US. The bad news: Raul Castro’s the one that thinks so. Far from being grateful for the diplomatic overture from Barack Obama, Castro wants the US to pay reparations for the economic damage that Castro says the embargo caused, plus the immediate return of control over Guantanamo Bay, as the opening ante for normalizing relations:

Texas Executes Man for Killing Woman Two Decades Ago While on Parole for Triple Slaying Years Earlier
Decades late. ~Bob

Man Heard Threatening Police Faces Weapons Charges: NYPD
Excerpt: Elvin Payamps, 38, was arrested after a 54-year-old man overheard a suspect matching his description talking about killing cops and having guns at his home while at a TD Bank on Metropolitan Avenue and 80th Street in Woodside on Christmas Eve. ("What do we want?" "DEAD COPS!" Protesters at Al Sharpton's march. ~Bob)


Worth Reading: What is courage? By Noemie Emery 
Excerpt: What is courage? In Valor, his book of the tales of grace under pressure that have been ignored, suppressed and largely omitted from the recognized history of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by a press that prefers to focus on traitors and victims, Washington lawyer Mark Lee Greenblatt hits on a number of things: an innate or learned ability to be calm under fire; the impact of training, which builds in some responses until some reactions become automatic; and a sense of attachment to cause and to comrades that crowds out all concerns for the self. "If you reflect on the anecdotes of anyone who has faced death and lived to tell you about it, there is almost a universal response," a psychiatrist told Greenblatt. "They did what they had to do. They never felt it was heroic, and never even felt it was a choice." (This is a superb article, it covers an important topic better than I have ever seen before. And it makes a point that we don't usually think about. What takes more courage to face, the near certainty of imminent death, or the absolute certainty of a life changed enormously for the worse by huge changes to your own body, perhaps to your own sense of self, and with a never-ending need for help and care by others? I vote for Door #2 in a heartbeat. Just facing dying is one thing, but facing living as a changed being, with your expectations of what you can do cut far back from what you had up until the explosion rearranged your body, that's tough, very, very tough. And not just on you, but on everyone who loves or cares for you. God bless all our people so affected. --Del)

Now You See It, Now You Don’t: Putin Cheating on the Armistice Line in Ukraine. By Vladimir Socor
Excerpt: Russian President Vladimir Putin is playing a cheating game with the West and Ukraine, not only hollowing out the Minsk armistice agreements (see EDM, January 22,2327), but even shifting the agreed-upon demarcation line on the ground and on the map. Kyiv is alert to Putin’s con games, but it is forced to face a stronger Russia one-on-one, without Western assistance. Ukraine’s Western partners are slow, as usual, to notice Putin’s maneuvers, most recently at the January 21 “Normandy group” meeting in Berlin. There, Russia’s Foreign Affairs Minister Sergei Lavrov prevailed on his German and French counterparts to evenhandedly urge “all signatories of the Minsk agreements to meet in the coming days to implement the ceasefire and the withdrawal of heavy weapons in accordance with the Line of Contact as agreed in Minsk on September 19 [2014]” (Auswaertiges-amt.de, January 21). (Anyone know this media outlet? first I've seen it. ~Bob)

Foreign Firm Funding U.S. Green Groups Tied to State-Owned Russian Oil Company
Excerpt: A shadowy Bermudan company that has funneled tens of millions of dollars to anti-fracking environmentalist groups in the United States is run by executives with deep ties to Russian oil interests and offshore money laundering schemes involving members of President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle. (Both the Saudis and the Russians, dependent on oil money, have a large interest in defeating fracking, Keystone and anything the helps the American oil industry. Duh. ~Bob)

After 500 Years, Portugal Says Jews Can Return. By Rob Quinn
Excerpt: Portugal is trying to make amends with the descendants of the Jews who were ordered to convert to Christianity or get out of the country more than 500 years ago. The country's lawmakers have approved a plan to grant citizenship to Sephardic Jews who can prove a strong connection to the country through surname, language, or direct descent from the heavily persecuted population of Portuguese Jews that once numbered in the tens of thousands, the BBC reports. (Come back, all is forgiven. Please bring money. ~Bob)

Gun News

Interesting: Guest Post: US Murder Rate. From Del

Excerpt: Thanks to her father who gave her a revolver when she went off to college, college student Sable Nehme was able to save both herself and her boyfriend when two home invaders broke into her apartment Tuesday near the university’s Orange County campus, WFTV reported. (I doubt the home invaders are part of the "No Means No!" campaign. ~Bob)

WSJ Report: “U.S. Spies on Millions of Cars” – Aligns With Our 2013/2014 Maryland MCAC Hub Research…
Excerpt: Over a year ago we brought you the story of Mr. Filippidis and his family, a Florida Driver who was pulled over by law enforcement in Maryland. The traffic stop would have been typical except for the fact the responding officer demanded, at random, Mr. Filippidis’s firearm. Mr. Filippidis did not have his legally owned -CCW permitted- hand gun, it was home in Florida. Nor did Mr. Filippidis ever say he had a firearm – yet the officer was insistent Mr. Filippidis owned one, handcuffed Mr. Filippidis, and strip searched his vehicle on the side of the road. Numerous Maryland state police arrived to assist in the search. They found nothing, because Mr. F was telling the truth. After two hours Mr. Filippidis and his family were allowed to continue their travels, but the entire process was unnerving. Which prompted Mr. Filippidis to ask “how did a Maryland officer know I was a gun owner”? Which led to a severely awkward litany of obfuscations and explanations from Maryland that did not make sense.
 (This article, starting with a 2 hour harassment of a Florida driver in Maryland, then leads on to exactly what people said was a Right Wing paranoid fantasy of police organizations tapping into all kinds of records from all over to find out who owns a gun or has a carry permit. I am as much a law abiding citizen and supportive of law enforcement as you are going to find in this country, but this stuff really bothers me. --Del)

Race Card News


"You're Greener than Gore" News

Saudi Arabia Opens Window of Opportunity for Obama. By Jonah Goldberg
Excerpt: With no help from Barack Obama, the U.S. has launched an energy revolution, becoming the world’s leading oil and natural gas producer. This has dismayed environmentalists and donors in and out of the Obama administration. After all, Obama bet big – really big – on green energy. The oil and gas boom is not the energy revolution Obama was looking for. Saudi Arabia and other petro-monarchies aren’t happy about it either (which is one reason the United Arab Emirates and other OPEC states bankroll anti-fracking propaganda in the West). Until recently, Saudi Arabia was the world’s biggest oil producer, and it is still arguably the most important one in global markets because its oil is so easy to get out of the ground. The cheaper it is to extract, the easier it is to maintain profits when prices go down. That means the Saudis have an outsized ability to affect the global price of oil.

What Does the Future Look Like for American Coal?
Excerpt: While coal remains America's most used energy resource, it faces mounting challenges, writes Jacopo Zenti, research fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis. Natural gas is becoming increasingly popular compared to coal due to a decrease in natural gas prices spurred by hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling technologies. Worse, coal is the target of many Environmental Protection Agency regulations which seek to limit power plant emissions. However, the decreased domestic demand for coal does not necessarily spell doom for coal producers. In 2012, the United States produced 1 billion short tons of coal and exported 125 million short tons. More could be exported: India, Japan and China all have increasing demand for coal, and China relies on coal for more than 70 percent of its energy production. Demand is also high in Europe -- Germany decided in 2011 to replace its nuclear energy production with coal by 2022, which led to a doubling of American coal exports to Germany between 2010 and 2011. The United Kingdom and the Netherlands were the two largest importers of American coal in 2012, and American coal exports to Britain were 73 percent higher in the first three quarters of 2012 than in 2011. (In 8th grade, I lived with my Grandmother in her large four-square in Collingswood, NJ. One of my jobs was to fill the coal hopper every night. It was very modern with auto feed, only had to be filled once a day. The ashes had to be put out with the trash--large, heavy buckets. Coal was delivered via a shoot through a window into a basement coal bin. ~Bob)

Religion of Peace News


Excerpt: The Charlie Hebdo massacre once again has politicians and the media dancing around the question of whether there might be something a little bit special about this one particular religion, Islam, that causes its adherents to go around killing people. It is not considered acceptable in polite company to entertain this possibility. Instead, it is necessary to insist, as a New York Times article does, that “Islam is no more inherently violent than other religions.” This, mind you, was in an article on how Muslims in the Middle East are agonizing over the violent legacy of their religion. ... As an atheist, I have no god in this fight, so to speak. 

NO ONE saw this coming: Terrorist released by Obama for Bergdahl has gone BACK to terrorizing!
http://therightscoop.com/no-one-saw-this-coming-terrorist-released-by-obama-for-bergdahl-has-gone-back-to-terrorizing/
Excerpt: I mean it’s not like an army of bloggers and conservatives tried to warn the American public that this deal was full of the same crap that the negotiator-in-chief was, no. There was absolutely no way that the Obama administration could have known that terrorists that the Taliban wanted would go back to terrorism once released.

Obama Funding the Anti-Bibi Campaign. By Matthew Vadum 
Excerpt: The Obama administration is using taxpayer dollars to fund a radical anti-Israel group that aims to drive Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from office in March parliamentary elections. And the U.S.-based group receiving the U.S. government money, OneVoice International, in turn is working with V15, an “independent grassroots movement” in Israel, according to Ha’aretz. V15’s unofficial motto is said to be “anyone but Bibi,” a reference that includes the prime minister’s nickname.

Excerpt: U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Congressman Lee Zeldin, R-NY-1, today sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry asking for information regarding media reports that U.S. taxpayer dollars are being used to fund efforts to influence upcoming elections in Israel. “Has President Obama launched a political campaign against Prime Minister Netanyahu and his representatives?” Sen. Cruz asked. “This administration’s relentless harassment of Israel is utterly incomprehensible. The Islamic Republic of Iran is pursuing the deadliest weapons on the planet, and there can be no doubt that their first target will be Israel, followed by the United States. This administration should be focusing its animosity on the very real enemies we face, not on our staunch allies.”

Worth Watching: Who ended the war in Iraq?
Watch to the end--only one minute long. It will seem strangely repetitive (because it is), but the finale is really a killer. Pretty much guaranteed to make you laugh. --Del

What we fight: Isis publicly behead man in Syrian town square for 'insulting Allah' as he screams for help
Excerpt: A man was held down and beheaded for “insulting Allah” in the middle of a Syrian town by Isis fighters as he screamed for help from the silent crowd. ... Unlike most victims, the young man was not blindfolded and was forced to the ground face down to be decapitated. ... One militant dropped his Kalashnikov as the man fought his captors for several minutes, eventually being pinned down by four men including one sitting on his back and pinning his arms behind him. ... The group has recently carried out an unprecedented string of public executions – including throwing men accused of being gay off towers, stoning a woman accused of adultery and crucifying at least 17 young men in a 48-hour period.

ISIS Operative: This Is How We Send Jihadis To Europe. By Mike Giglio and Munzer al-Awad
Excerpt: An ISIS operative traveled across the Syrian border late last year, settled in a Turkish port city, and began work on a mission to sneak jihadis into Europe. It has been successful, he said, in an interview near the Turkey-Syria border: “Just wait.”
The operative, a Syrian in his thirties with a close-cropped black beard, said ISIS is sending covert fighters to Europe — as did two smugglers who said they have helped. He smuggles them from Turkey in small groups, he said, hidden in cargo ships filled with hundreds of refugees. 

Worth Seeing: Video: "Islam & Free Speech"
Dr. Carol Swain, black professor. ~Bob

Where's PETA? Sharp rise in halal abattoirs slaughtering animals without stunning them first. Experts said the rise in non-stun killings was due to 'stronger campaigning' from Muslims who wrongly believed that stunning killed animals
Excerpt: The number of animals killed in halal abattoirs without being stunned first soared in the last year, figures have revealed. Campaigning by Muslims for traditional methods of slaughter has led to a 60 percent rise in the number of non-pain free killings, industry experts said. Last year 2.4 million sheep and goats had their throats cut without being stunned in halal and kosher abattoirs, according to the British Veterinary Association (BVA).

The political divide on views toward Muslims and Islam
Excerpt: A separate,2011 survey found that 15% of Muslims said that they see the Republican Party as friendly toward their community while 48% said they are unfriendly. By contrast, 46% of Muslims said the Democratic Party is friendly toward them and only 7% said they are unfriendly. ... In September, a Pew Research Center survey found that 82% of Republicans are “very concerned” about the rise of Islamic extremism in the world, compared with 60% of political independents and 51% of Democrats. Similarly, two-thirds of Republicans (67%) say that Islam is more likely than other religions to encourage violence among its believers, compared with 47% of independents and 42% of Democrats.

Yes, and Obama is too dumb to realize that the Western World will eventually do what they have done in the past...stand up to the Muslims in a serious way, and then the Muslims will retreat until a future generation becomes aggressive and brave enough to attack the west again. History repeats itself. But, too many American voters are "low information voters" and continue to give Obama the benefit of the doubt...they keep taking him seriously believing that he is on the side of our citizens. Unfortunately his bible is Alinsky. --ME

Homeland Security Adviser Mohamed Elibiary Goes on Hate-Filled Anti-Christian Rant, Attacks Jindal as ‘Bottom Feeder’
Excerpt: Obama administration Muslim adviser Mohamed Elibiary is no stranger to regular PJ Media readers. In September, Elibiary was unceremoniously removed from his fellowship position with the Department of Homeland Security, which he tried to spin as a “resignation,” but letters sent to members of Congress by DHS officials indicated he would not be reappointed. Undoubtedly, one of the chief reasons for DHS cutting ties with Elibiary was a long string of extremist statements he had been making on Twitter, including talking about the inevitability of the return of an ISIS-style caliphate — tweets that were subsequently used by ISIS supporters for recruiting purposes. (A "moderate" Muslim? If he's moderate, then it's easy to understand how those not-moderate ISIS guys act. He's smart though, he tries to make arguments that sound somehow reasonable, but in fact are just major bias on his part. That's one of the sad things of aggressive Islamists, they may even thing they ARE reasonable, when in fact they are very biased. --Del)

Kurdish PM says U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State faces long war. By Samia Nakhoul, Ned Parker and Isabel Coles
Excerpt: Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani warned that despite victories in the war against Islamic State, the global coalition against the group was inadequate and predicted a campaign to retake the Iraqi city of Mosul would not happen before the fall.

The Moderates are Coming! Muslim Brotherhood: Prepare for Jihad
Excerpt: Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, hailed as a moderate voice and welcomed by officials in the Obama administration just this week, issued separate statements on its English and Arabic websites this week that appear to contradict each other. A call for "a long, unrelenting Jihad" appeared on the Brotherhood's Arabic language website Tuesday. The statement, reported Friday by the Washington Free Beacon's Adam Kredo, starts by invoking a passage from the Quran: "And prepare against them whatever you are able of power and of steeds of war by which you may terrify the enemy of God and your enemy and others besides them whom you do not know but whom Allah knows. And whatever you spend in the cause of God will be fully repaid to you, and you will not be wronged."

Blast at Shi'ite mosque in southern Pakistan kills 49. By Mukhtar Ahmed
Excerpt: At least 49 people were killed in a powerful explosion at a crowded Shi'ite mosque in Pakistan during Friday prayers, the latest sectarian attack to hit the South Asian nation. ... Jundullah, a splinter group of Pakistan's Taliban which last year pledged support for the Islamic State group based in Syria and Iraq, claimed responsibility. Jundullah, a splinter group of Pakistan's Taliban which last year pledged support for the Islamic State group based in Syria and Iraq, claimed responsibility.

At least 32 killed in Egypt as militants attack army and police targets in Sinai
Excerpt: Egypt’s president, Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, has cut short a visit to Ethiopia for an African Union summit after his country’s security forces suffered one of the bloodiest days in their peacetime history. At least 32 people were killed on Thursday in a series of attacks on soldiers and police in north-east Sinai, where the government has struggled to contain an 18-month insurgency by militants linked to Islamic State (Isis).

Here's what a Hamas training camp for teens looks like
Excerpt: Judging by the orderly rows of hundreds of young wanna­bes lined up in crisp military fashion at their graduation ceremony here Thursday, the armed wing of the Islamist movement Hamas will have plenty of eager recruits this year. More than 17,000 fresh-faced teenagers and young men, ages 15 to 21, mustered at a dozen camps over the past week in the Gaza Strip to climb ropes, practice close-order drills and fire Kalashnikov rifles, all of them pledging to defend the coastal enclave and ready to fight the next war against their Zionist enemies.

The Ghosts of Auschwitz in the Muslim World. By Daniel Greenfield 
Excerpt: “You 360 million Mohammedans to whom I have had a strong inner connection since the days of my association with your Grand Mufti of Jerusalem,” Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the Holocaust wrote. “You, who have a greater truth in the surahs of your Koran, I call upon you to pass judgment on me.” Eichmann knew he could expect a good verdict from a religion whose prophet had ordered the ethnic cleansing of Jews and which believes the end will
“not come until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them. When a Jew hides behind a rock or a tree, it will say, ‘O Muslim, O servant of Allah! There is a Jew behind me, come and kill him!’

University Professors Blame the West for Paris Terror Attacks. By Cinnamon Stillwell
Excerpt: Middle East studies professors responded to the attacks by Islamic terrorists in Paris earlier this month not with rigorous, informed analysis or even unadulterated sympathy for those gunned down in the offices of Charlie Hebdo and a kosher market. Their reaction was instead precisely what one has come to expect from academics more concerned with shielding Islam from blame and shifting responsibility for its adherents' actions to the West than with the disinterested pursuit of truth. University of Michigan history professor Juan Cole accused the Bush/Cheney administration and the Iraq War of "radicalizing" terrorist brothers, Sharif and Said Kouashi: (If I feel the need to knock off some Brit, at my trial I'll say the revolution radicalized me. ~Bob)

Kerik, Harvey: Obama 'In Denial' on Iran, Taliban, Islamic Terror
Excerpt: A White House's characterization Wednesday of the Taliban as an "armed insurgency" rather radical Islamic terrorists is another example of the Obama administration's failure to grasp the gravity of the situation, retired Army Col. Derek Harvey said Thursday on Newsmax TV's "America's Forum." "It is very dangerous because it continues to show that there's intellectual dishonesty by the administration," said Harvey, who was joined by former New York Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik to discuss the Obama administration's paralysis in dealing with terror groups. "They refuse to define the threat and importantly, it seems that they don't understand the threat. Words do matter. (Something is really wrong when you can't even name the enemy properly. Sun Tzu said "know the enemy, know yourself" if you want to win in a war. We have a "leader" who can't begin to even name the enemy, or give full recognition to how widespread this threat to civilization is. And we have to somehow bungle through two more years of this, while things only go downhill? How worrisome is that! --Del)

*****
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://www.amazon.com/Coming-Collapse-American-Republic-prevent/dp/1461122538/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1304815980&sr=1-5 For a free PDF of Collapse, e-mail him at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com. Hall’s eleven books are listed here:

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