From the front end of (this last) New Year’s weekend, Oliver North in Town Hall…

…This week, as we prepare to ring out 2011 and welcome 2012, President Barack Obama asked for Congress to authorize yet another increase in our national debt — the third such rise in less than 15 months. Housing prices continue to slide; more than 13 million Americans are unemployed; government spending continues unabated; and America’s credit rating is at risk of another downgrade. In January, barring action by Congress and the White House, U.S. defense spending cuts totaling $1.1 trillion over the next four years will begin to take effect. Such an outcome in the midst of these perilous times ought to be unthinkable.

Instead of putting tens of thousands of Americans to work building new ships, submarines, aircraft and a missile shield to protect the American people from nuclear attack, the Obama administration wants the federal government to create temporary jobs repaving highways, painting bridges and re-roofing public schools. Rather than have unemployed construction workers build a petroleum pipeline from Canada (and improve U.S. energy security), the Obama White House wastes billions on phony “green jobs.” The administration has to hope we all will forget the word “Solyndra.”

Ollie North looks like better presidential material than anyone running in the current field.

In a burst of year-end euphoria, progressive politicians, pundits and government economists are predicting that the worst of the “Bush-era recession” is behind us and that good times are just ahead. They pin their economic hopes for 2012 less on American entrepreneurs than they do on German taxpayers.

The experts are praying Berlin will continue to bail out European PIIGS (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain) and prevent an Old World financial collapse that would drag down the sale of U.S. goods and services on the Continent. Expect to see German Chancellor Angela Merkel feted at a White House state dinner early in the new year. A million or so American jobs could well depend on whether she likes the soup.

{In the Truth Hurts Department} OUCH!

Jobs — the word used most often by politicians running for office in 2012. Regardless of party, whether challenger or incumbent, every office seeker tells us he or she has a way of “creating,” “protecting,” “saving” or “improving” jobs for American workers. What few of our elected officials ever mention is how vulnerable these “well-paying” and “secure” jobs are to factors far more threatening than the European debt crisis. Here are the top three issues that should concern those who purport to care about our economic well-being in the year ahead:

1) An Iranian nuke. Just before Christmas, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told us Iran could have a workable nuclear weapon in 2012. He also knows — but didn’t say — that the theocrats in Tehran already have the means of delivering it. Tel Aviv, Israel, is target No. 1. American civilians are No. 2 on the ayatollahs’ hit parade. To Israelis, the expression “Never Again” isn’t a political slogan. It’s a way of life. They are not going to wait to be incinerated.

The Obama administration could stop the Iranians from building atomic weapons and perhaps even bring about regime change by forbidding any company doing any business in Iran from doing any business in the U.S. But unless the O-Team takes such a step, the Israelis will have to act pre-emptively to prevent annihilation. If you think the “2008-11 global recession” hurt, you don’t want to contemplate what the world economy would be like after an attack on Iran’s nuclear weapons sites.

2) The jihad. The “Arab Spring” — once so proudly proclaimed to have been instigated by Obama’s soaring rhetoric — has become a nightmare for democratic aspirations in the Middle East. Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, Moammar Gadhafi and Anwar al-Awlaki are dead, but the jihad being waged by radical Islamists is stronger than ever. Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Sudan are headed for Shariah rather than secular governance in 2012. Yemen, Pakistan, Syria, Jordan, Nigeria and even Saudi Arabia could follow suit soon. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom forecasts that Christianity could be eradicated in these countries. The economic impact of such an upheaval is potentially catastrophic.

3) The collapse of Russian democracy. Vladimir Putin is presiding over a dying country — and he knows it. Though Russian energy exports to Europe and China currently fill the coffers of Moscow’s kleptocracy and help rebuild Soviet-era nuclear weapons, the future for the land of the czars is bleak. Russia’s population — now 141.7 million — drops by nearly 1 million per year. With an average male life span of just 59 years, look for 2012 to be the year Putin and his cronies do all they can to line their pockets — at our expense.

You have to wonder what all those people we presently pay to think about these things and govern accordingly have been doing with their time, you know? Are they so busy working on getting reelected, lining their pockets via insider trading and figuring out new perks and benefits to give themselves that they haven’t got any time for America, their employer whose shareholders are the taxpayers?

Note to all running for office in 2012: The word “entitlement” does not appear in the Constitution. The words “provide for the common defence” do. Happy new year.

Yes, to all, Happy New Year.

…which, as we know, is their not-too-subtle public relations machine, get their backs up with profound indignancy, if not shock, when anyone infers, even remotely, that Barack Hussein Obama is in any way pro-Muslim, anyone who is unfamiliar with histrionics would take them seriously.

I will admit that I’m both Jewish and pro-Israel, and that I have little use for the “Palestinians”, a collective who have built up a well deserved reputation as a spawn of terrorism and a people who, as Abba Eban once said, “never miss a chance to miss an opportunity”, but even if I entertained totally neutral feelings between both the Jews and the “Palestinians”, I would have to be either completely obtuse or a bald faced liar if I failed to note that the Obama Administration is very much anti-Israel and pro-”Palestinian”.

The “Palestinians”, those fine folks who brought us Hamas.

In fact, there would seem to be a certain almost malevolent tone to Barack Hussein’s treatment of Israel, as is well defined in a column by Caroline Glick.

Once again, US President Barack Obama has demonstrated his intention of “putting light” between America and Israel. His hostility towards Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu during the latter’s visit to Washington this week was breathtaking.

It isn’t every day that you can see an American President leaving the Prime Minister of an allied government twisting in the wind for weeks before deciding to grant him an audience at the White House.

It isn’t every day that a visiting leader from a strategically vital US ally is brought into the White House in an unmarked van in the middle of the night rather than greeted like a friend at the front door; is forbidden to have his picture taken with the President; is forced to leave the White House alone, through a side exit; and is ordered to keep the contents of his meeting with the President secret.

You know, the very blatancy of this move speaks volumes.

I don’t guess the Chicago machine is what you’d call a bastion of discretion where its corruption is concerned — after all, in one of those few large U.S. cities where racketeering, graft and corruption are historically hallmarks of day-to-day reality, there is little need to try and mask what the people expect, anyway, as a matter of course.

Therefore, the Chicago Machine© product B. Hussein Obama brought to the White House is, for lack of any previous need for subtlety, is transparently obvious for what it is.

As a result, no amount of lying, nor third rate subterfuge performed under the nom de guerre of a “transparent administration” could be expected to fool anyone who wasn’t deaf, dumb, blind and brain dead — we’ve learned that nothing Obama says is worth taking seriously, that his actions will tell us the truth long before he will.

The fun part is that the mainstream media, liberal rodents that they are, will go with the program no matter what O says or does.

Knowing this, the president, feeling, I suppose, like any worthy communist party general secretary who knows he is well shielded by a strong propaganda ministry (or, in this case, the MSM), charges ahead with even his most extreme agendas, including that of bringing down Israel, taking the Jewish state away from the Jewish people.

Ahead of Obama’s meeting with Netanyahu, the Wall Street Journal reported that Obama was effectively attempting to blackmail the Israeli premier by conditioning the meeting on Netanyahu’s willingness to make tangible concessions to the Palestinians during his speech before the General Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America.

“Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” you exclaim.

Although the report was denied by the Obama administration, if it was true, such a move by the White House would be without precedent in the history of US relations with Israel. And if untrue, the very fact that the story rings true is indicative of the wretched state of US relations with Israel since Obama entered office.

Obama’s hostility was evident as well during his meeting with fifty Jewish leaders at the White House this week. In an obvious bid to split American Jewry away from Israel, Obama refused to discuss Israel or Iran with the concerned American Jewish leaders. As far as Obama was concerned, all they deserved from him was a primer on the brilliance of his economic policies and the worthiness of his plan to socialize the American healthcare industry. His foreign policy is none of their business.

Obama’s meeting with American Jewish leaders was supposed to be a consolation prize for American Jews after Obama cancelled his first public address to American Jews since taking office. The White House claimed that he cancelled the speech because his visit to the Fort Hood memorial service made it impossible for him to attend. But then the conference was a three-day affair. The organizers would probably have been happy to reschedule.

Although the report was denied by the Obama Administration…; Whose word is as good as what?

Uh oh, here’s the kicker!

Instead, as Iran races to the nuclear finish line, America’s Jewish leaders were forced to sit through White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel’s kitschy Borscht Belt schmooze about his bar mitzvah.

When you take all the above into consideration, the entire exercise was a calculated insult to Jews and Israel, a veritable slap in the face!

The ironic thing about Obama’s nastiness towards Netanyahu and his arrogant treatment of the American Jewish community is that while it has made him the first US president to have no credibility among Israelis and has caused a 14 percent drop in his support among American Jews, it has failed utterly to earn him the trust of the Muslim world.

Today the Fatah movement is in disarray. Last week its leader Mahmoud Abbas announced his intention to retire and has placed the blame for his decision on the Obama administration as well as on Israel. Key Palestinian spokesmen like Saeb Erekat have declared the death of the peace process and called for the renewal of the jihad against Israel.

As for the larger Muslim world, a report this week in the New York Timesstated that the US’s key Arab allies Egypt and Saudi Arabia have been perilously weakened since Obama took office. Their diminished influence has been accompanied by the rapid rise of Iran and Syria. Both of these rogue states have been on the receiving end of continuous wooing by Obama administration officials who seem ready to do just about anything to appease them.

And this is the president of what country? The U.S.? My country?

Gadzooks!!!!

Read the rest of the column here.

Having read the book of Revelations before, I wonder how many Christians there are out there who think of the Antichrist in the same context as they do B. Hussein Obama…

Chuck here (the durn contributor drop-down menu’s still not working).

Knowing that Middle east affairs, especially those of concern to Israel, are also of concern to Seth, I thought I’d bring up three items from that region.

The first is in response to a column by the excellent Caroline Glick, titled Et tu, Netanyahu?, that comes as something of a shock, considering that Benjamin Netaniahu has always been a strong defender of Israel’s right to its status as the Jewish Homeland, and was expected to resist, without compunction, any attempts by the Obama Administration to engender anything less.

This week we discovered that we have been deceived. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s principled rejection of US President Barack Obama’s bigoted demand that Israel bar Jews from building new homes and expanding existing ones in Judea and Samaria does not reflect his actual policy.

Housing and Construction Minister Ariel Attias let the cat out of the bag. Attias said that the government has been barring Jews from building in the areas since it took office four months ago in the hopes that by preemptively capitulating to US demands, the US will treat Israel better.

And that’s not all. Today Netanyahu is reportedly working in earnest to reach a deal with the Obama administration that would formalize the government’s effective construction ban through 2010.

Netanyahu is set to finalize such a deal at his meeting with Obama’s Middle East envoy George Mitchell in London next Wednesday.

Say what!?

Unfortunately, far from treating Israel better as a result of Netanyahu’s willingness to capitulate on the fundamental right of Jews to live and build homes in the land of Israel, the Obama administration is planning to pocket Israel’s concession and then up the ante. Administration officials have stated that their next move will be to set a date for a new international Middle East peace conference that Obama will chair. There, Israel will be isolated and relentlessly attacked as the US, the Arabs, the Europeans, the UN and the Russians all gang up on our representatives and demand that Israel accept the so-called “Arab peace plan.”

That deceptively named plan, which Obama has all but adopted as his own, involves Israel committing national suicide in exchange for nothing. The Arab plan — formerly the “Saudi Plan,” and before that, the Tom Friedman “stick it to Israel ‘peace’ plan” — calls for Israel to retreat to the indefensible 1949 armistice lines and expel hundreds of thousands of Jews from their homes in Judea, Samaria, Jerusalem and the Golan Heights. It also involves Israel agreeing to cease being a Jewish state by accepting millions of foreign, hostile Arabs as citizens within its truncated borders. The day an Israeli government accepts the plan - which again will form the basis of the Obama “peace” conference” — is the day that the State of Israel signs its own death warrant.

What the hell is the Israeli prime minister thinking? Has he caught Livni/Olmert Syndrome? How do you say “lemming” in Hebrew?

And if that’s not enough, well how about this?

Then there is the other Obama plan in the works. Obama also intends to host an international summit on nuclear security for March 2010. Arab states are already pushing for Israel’s nuclear program to be placed on the agenda. Together with Obama administration officials’ calls for Israel to join the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty — which would compel Israel to relinquish its purported nuclear arsenal — and their stated interest in having Israel sign the Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty — which would arguably force Israel to allow international inspections of its nuclear facility in Dimona — Obama’s planned nuclear conclave will place Israel in an untenable position.

Meanwhile, Barack, Hillary & the gang continue to pussyfoot around a soon-to-be-nuclear-armed Iran.

Moving on

Recognizing the Obama administration’s inherent and unprecedented hostility to Israel, Netanyahu sought to deflect its pressure by giving his speech at Bar Ilan University in June. There he gave his conditional acceptance of Obama’s most cherished foreign policy goal — the establishment of a Palestinian state in Israel’s heartland.

Netanyahu’s conditions — that the Arabs generally and the Palestinians specifically recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state; that they relinquish their demand that Israel accept millions of hostile Arabs as citizens under the so-called “right of return;” that the Palestinian state be a “demilitarized” state, and that Arab states normalize their relations with Israel were supposed to put a monkey wrench in Obama’s policy of pressuring Israel.

Since it is obvious that the Arabs do not accept these eminently reasonable conditions, Netanyahu presumed that Obama would be forced to stand down. What Netanyahu failed to take into consideration was the notion that Obama and the Arabs would not act in good faith — that they would pretend to accept at least some of his demands in order to force him to accept all of their demands, and so keep US pressure relentlessly focused on Israel. Unfortunately, this is precisely what has happened.

Ahead of Obama’s meeting Tuesday with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Al Quds al Arabi, reported that Obama has accepted Netanyahu’s call for a demilitarized Palestinian state. Although Netanyahu is touting Obama’s new position as evidence of his own diplomatic prowess, the fact is that Obama’s new position is both disingenuous and meaningless.

Obama’s supposed support for a demilitarized Palestinian state is mendacious on two counts. First, Palestinian society is already one of the most militarized societies in the world. According to the World Bank, 43 percent of wages paid by the Palestinian Authority go to Palestinian militias. Since Obama has never called for any fundamental reordering of Palestinian society or for a reform of the PA’s budgetary priorities, it is obvious that he doesn’t have a problem with a militarized Palestinian state.

The second reason his statements in support for a demilitarized Palestinian state are not credible is because one of the central pillars of the Obama administration’s Palestinian policy is its involvement in training of the Fatah-led Palestinian army. US Lt. Gen. Keith Dayton is overseeing the training of this army in Jordan and pressuring Israel to expand its deployment in Judea and Samaria.

Like they say, “SNIP”

There is another way. It is being forged by the likes of Vice Premier Moshe Ya’alon on the one hand and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee on the other.

Ya’alon argues that not capitulating to American pressure is a viable policy option forIsrael. There is no reason to reach an agreement with Mitchell on the administration’s bigoted demand that Jews not build in Judea, Samaria and Jerusalem. If the US wants to have a fight with Israel, a fight against American anti-Jewish discrimination is not a bad one for Israel to have.

Ya’alon’s argument was borne out by Huckabee’s visit this week to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. Huckabee’s trip showed that the administration is not operating in a policy vacuum. There is plenty of strong American support for an Israeli government that would stand up to the administration on the Palestinian issue and Iran alike.

Netanyahu’s policies have taken a wrong turn. But Netanyahu is not Tzipi Livni or Ehud Olmert. He is neither an ideologue nor an opportunist. He understands why what he is doing is wrong. He just needs to be convinced that he has another option.

Must read the entire column (yeah, there’s quite a bit more in there).

Speaking of Iran, while this isn’t all that surprising, it’s not exactly something to be taken lightly.

Ahmad Vahidi, nominated Thursday by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to serve as Iran’s defense minister, is a suspected international terrorist sought by Interpol in connection with a deadly 1994 attack on a Jewish community center in Argentina.

Mr. Vahidi, a former commander of the elite unit of the Revolutionary Guard known as the Quds Force, was one of 15 men and three women named to Cabinet posts by Mr. Ahmadinejad as he begins his second term in office. The choice is likely to further chill relations between Iran and the international community, especially Israel.

Interpol, the international police agency based in Lyon, France, placed Mr. Vahidi and four other Iranian officials on its most-wanted list in 2007 at the request of Argentine prosecutors, who say the men played a role in planning the July 1994 attack on the seven-story community center in Buenos Aires.

Obama’s friends, the Iranian government.

The bombing, which killed 85 people, is thought to have been carried out by members of Hezbollah, a Lebanese militia and political party with close links to Iran.

Kenneth Katzman, a senior analyst on Iraq and Iran at the Congressional Research Service, said that Mr. Vahidi is also suspected of having played a role in a 1996 attack on the U.S. Air Force barracks in Saudi Arabia known as Khobar Towers.

Mr. Vahidi is not the first prominent Iranian to be wanted in connection with terrorist attacks. Presidential candidate Mohsen Rezai, a former revolutionary guard commander, was among the five Iranians identified by Interpol in 2007, as was former President Hashemi Rafsanjani.

But Mr. Vahidi’s ascension to the high-profile post of defense minister suggests that Mr. Ahmadinejad will continue his policy of defiance toward the West.

Obama’s good friends, the Iranian government.

Lastly, there’s this Op-Ed in the Washington Post by Crown Prince of Bahrain Shaikh Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa.

We need fresh thinking if the Arab Peace Initiative is to have the impact it deserves on the crisis that needlessly impoverishes Palestinians and endangers Israel’s security.

This crisis is not a zero-sum game. For one side to win, the other does not have to lose.

The peace dividend for the entire Middle East is potentially immense. So why have we not gotten anywhere?

Our biggest mistake has been to assume that you can simply switch peace on like a light bulb. The reality is that peace is a process, contingent on a good idea but also requiring a great deal of campaigning — patiently and repeatedly targeting all relevant parties. This is where we as Arabs have not done enough to communicate directly with the people of Israel.

An Israeli might be forgiven for thinking that every Muslim voice is raised in hatred, because that is usually the only one he hears. Just as an Arab might be forgiven for thinking every Israeli wants the destruction of every Palestinian.

Essentially, we have not done a good enough job demonstrating to Israelis how our initiative can form part of a peace between equals in a troubled land holy to three great faiths. Others have been less reticent, recognizing that our success would threaten their vested interest in keeping Palestinians and Israelis at each other’s throats. They want victims to stay victims so they can be manipulated as proxies in a wider game for power. The rest of us — the overwhelming majority — have the opposite interest.

It is in our interest to speak up now for two reasons. First, we will all be safer once we drain the pool of antipathy in which hatemongers from both sides swim.

Second, peace will bring prosperity. Already, the six oil and gas nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council have grown into a powerful trillion-dollar market. Removing the ongoing threat of death and destruction would open the road to an era of enterprise, partnership and development on an even greater scale for the region at large.

That is the glittering prize for resolving the dilemma of justice for Palestine without injustice to Israel. Effectively, this is the meta-issue that defines and distorts the self-image of Arabs and diverts too much of our energies away from the political and economic development the region needs.

The wasted years of deadlock have conditioned Israelis to take on a fortress mentality that automatically casts all Palestinians as the enemy — and not as the ordinary, decent human beings they are.

Speaking out matters, but it is not enough. Our governments and all stakeholders also must be ready to carry out practical measures to help ease the day-to-day hardship of Palestinian lives.

The two communities in the Holy Land are not fated to be enemies. What can unite them tomorrow is potentially bigger than what divides them today.

Both sides need help from their friends, in the form of constructive engagement, to reach a just settlement.

What we don’t need is the continued reflexive rejection of any initiative that seeks to melt the ice. Consider the response so far to the Arab peace plan, pioneered by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. This initiative is a genuine effort to normalize relations between the entire Arab region and Israel, in return for Israel’s withdrawal from occupied territory and a fair resolution of the plight of the Palestinians, far too many of whom live in refugee camps in deplorable conditions.

We must stop the small-minded waiting game in which each side refuses to budge until the other side makes the first move. We’ve got to be bigger than that. All sides need to take simultaneous, good-faith action if peace is to have a chance. A real, lasting peace requires comprehensive engagement and reconciliation at the human level. This will happen only if we address and settle the core issues dividing the Arab and the Israeli peoples, the first being the question of Palestine and occupied Arab lands. The fact that this has not yet happened helps to explain why the Jordanian and Egyptian peace accords with Israel are cold. They have not been comprehensive.

We should move toward real peace now by consulting and educating our people and by reaching out to the Israeli public to highlight the benefits of a genuine peace.

To be effective, we must acknowledge that, like people everywhere, the average Israeli’s primary window on the world is his or her local and national media. Our job, therefore, is to tell our story more directly to the Israeli people by getting the message out to their media, a message reflecting the hopes of the Arab mainstream that confirms peace as a strategic option and advocates the Arab Peace Initiative as a means to this end. Some conciliatory voices in reply from Israel would help speed the process.

Some Arabs, simplistically equating communication with normalization, may think we are moving too fast toward normalization. But we all know that dialogue must be enhanced for genuine progress. We all, together, need to take the first crucial step to lay the groundwork to effectively achieve peace. So we must all invest more in communication.

Once we achieve peace, trade will follow. We can then create a “virtuous circle,” because trade will create its own momentum. By putting real money into people’s hands and giving them real power over their lives, trade will help ensure the durability of peace. The day-to-day experience would move minds and gradually build a relationship of trust and mutual interest, without which long-term peacemaking is impossible.

When stability pays, conflict becomes too costly. We must do more, now, to achieve peace.

The question is, is the crown prince truly sincere about finding a lasting, peaceful solution to the Israeli-Arab problem, or is this just more of the usual Arab hype?

…”catching up” posts.

First, there’s an excellent column by Caroline Glick on the ongoing western policy of appeasement in the face of what I personally prefer to term aggressive Islam.

MUSLIM MINORITIES throughout the world are being financed and ideologically trained in Saudi and UAE funded mosques and Islamic centers. These minorities act in strikingly similar manners in the countries where they are situated throughout the world. On the one hand, their local political leaders demand extraordinary communal rights, rights accorded neither to the national majority nor to other minority populations. On the other hand, Muslim neighborhoods, particularly in Europe, but also in Israel, the Philippines and Australia, are rendered increasingly ungovernable as arms of the state like the police and tax authorities come under attack when they attempt to assert state power in these Muslim communities.

Logic would have it that targeted states would respond to the threat to their authority through a dual strategy. On the one hand, they would firmly assert their authority by enforcing their laws against both individual lawbreakers and against subversive, foreign financed institutions that incite the overthrow of their governments and their replacement with Islamic governments. On the other hand, they would seek out and empower local Muslims who accept the authority and legitimacy of their states and their rule of law.

Unfortunately, with the notable exception of the Howard government in Australia, in country after country, governments respond to this challenge by attempting to appease Muslim irredentists and their state sponsors. The British responded to the July 7, 2005 bombings by giving representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood an official role in crafting and carrying out counter-terror policies.

In 2003, then French president Jacques Chirac sent then interior minister Nicholas Sarkozy to Egypt to seek the permission of Sheikh Mohammed Tantawi of the Islamist al-Azhar mosque for the French parliament’s plan to outlaw hijabs in French schools.

In the US, in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, the FBI asked the terror-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations to conduct sensitivity training for FBI agents.

In Holland last year, the Dutch government effectively expelled anti-Islamist politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali in the interest of currying favor with Holland’s restive Muslim minority.

At the minimum, I would say that sanity does not seem to prevail here; They are in the minority in all these countries, yet their demands are complied with post-haste, even to the point of exceeding accommodations accorded the majority in a respective host population.

This acquiescence is not restricted to laws of a social nature, on the contrary it has found its way into global politics.

THE FOREIGN policy aspect of the rush to appease is twofold. First, targeted states refuse to support one another when individual governments attempt to use the tools of law enforcement to handle their domestic jihad threat. For instance, European states have harshly criticized the US Patriot Act while the US criticized the French decision to prohibit the hijab in public schools.

More acutely, targeted states lead the charge in calling for the establishment of Muslim-only states. Today the US and the EU are leading the charge towards the establishment of a Palestinian state and the creation of an independent state of Kosovo.

In two weeks, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will host the Annapolis conference where together with her European and Arab counterparts, she will exert enormous pressure on the Olmert government to agree to the establishment of a jihadist Palestinian state in Israel’s heartland with its capital in Jerusalem and its sovereignty extending over Judaism’s most sacred site, the Temple Mount.

The establishment of the sought-for Palestinian state presupposes the ethnic cleansing of at a minimum 80,000 Israelis from their homes and communities simply because they are Jews. Jews of course will be prohibited from living in Palestine.

To continue,

FOR ITS part, the Palestinian leadership to which Israel will be expected to communicate its acceptance of the establishment of Palestine, is one part criminal, and two parts jihadist. As Fatah leader and Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and his colleagues have made clear, while they are willing to accept Israel’s concessions, they are not willing to accept Israel. This is why they refuse to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.

A rare consensus exists today in Israel. From the far-left to the far-right, from IDF Military Intelligence to the Mossad, all agree that the Annapolis conference will fail to bring a peace accord. Since Rice’s approach to reaching just such an accord has been to apply unrelenting pressure on Israel, it is fairly clear that she will blame Israel for the conference’s preordained failure and cause a further deterioration in US-Israeli relations.

While Israel is supposed to accept a Jew-free Palestine, it goes without saying that its own 20 percent Arab minority will continue to enjoy the full rights of Israeli citizenship. Yet one of the direct consequences of the establishment of a Jew-free, pro-jihadist State of Palestine will be the further radicalization of Israeli Arabs. They will intensify their current rejection of Israel’s national identity.

With Palestinian and outside support, they will intensify their irredentist activities and so exert an even more devastating attack on Israel’s sovereignty and right to national self-determination.

“Ma zeh?” {Hebrew for “what’s this?”} you may ask. Well, one answer is that it’s lackluster diplomacy — you know, just like what an employer might expect from a lazy employee of the “sweep under a rug” persuasion. The politicians and diplomats on the western side of the equation want only to put the Israeli-”Palestinian” affair to bed once and for all, the consequences of any expediency be damned, and as a bonus, giving Israel the fid will also fulfill the requisites of The New Dhimmitude©.

SHORTLY AFTER the Annapolis conference fails, and no doubt in a bid to buck up its standing with the Arab world, the US may well stand by its stated intention to recognize the independence of Kosovo.

Yeah, well,

As Julia Gorin

(Julia is profoundly well informed on affairs in the Balkans, and the bulk of her columns specialize therein)

documented in a recent article here, in Jewish World Review, Kosovo’s connections with Albanian criminal syndicates and global jihadists are legion. Moreover, Kosovar independence would likely spur irredentist movements among the Muslim minorities in all Balkan states. In Macedonia for instance, a quarter of the population is Muslim. These irredentist movements in turn would increase Muslim irredentism throughout Europe just as Palestinian statehood will foment an intensification of the Islamization of Israel’s Arab minority.

The Kosovo government announced last month that given the diplomatic impasse, it plans to declare its independence next month. Currently, the Bush administration is signaling its willingness to recognize an independent Kosovo even though doing so will threaten US-Russian relations.

In a bid both to prevent the Bush administration from turning on Israel in the aftermath of the failure of the Annapolis conference and to make clear Israel’s own rejection of the notion that a “solution” to the Palestinian conflict with Israel can be imposed by foreign powers, the Olmert government should immediately and loudly restate its opposition to the imposition of Kosovar independence on Serbia.

In the interest of defending the nation-state system, on which American sovereignty and foreign policy is based, the US should reassess the logic of its support for the establishment of Muslim-only states. It should similarly revisit its refusal to openly support the right of non-Islamic states like Israel, Serbia and even France, to assert their rights to defend their sovereignty, national security and national character from outside-sponsored domestic Islamic subversion.

There’s a lot more happening in Ms. Glick’s column, which can be read in its entirety here.

In my mind’s ear (if there can be a mind’s eye, there must surely also exist a mind’s ear) I keep hearing the phrase, “The creep of Islam”.

“Moving right along”…

This is really funny. Put down your coffee cup before you listen.

A car accident happened in the Dallas-Ft.Worth area.

This is a recorded phone call from a man who witnessed the accident involving four elderly women. It was so popular when they played it on the local radio station the station decided to put it on their website.

Next up, and while the following articles are several days old they are by no means historical,

Nearly two dozen illegal immigrants were arrested Wednesday, accused of using fake security badges to work in critical areas of Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, including the tarmac, authorities said.

The 23 illegal workers were employed by Ideal Staffing Solutions Inc., whose corporate secretary and office manager also were arrested after an eight-month investigation that involved federal, state and Chicago authorities.

The company contracted work for carriers including UAL Corp.’s (UAUA) United Airlines, KLM and Qantas Airways Ltd. (QAN.AU), said Elissa A. Brown, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent.

“The investigation identifies a vulnerability that could compromise national security, while bringing criminal charges against individuals who built an illegal work force into their business practice,” Brown said.

Read the entire article here.

As if that weren’t enough,

The Transportation Security Administration touts its programs to ensure security by using undercover operatives to test its airport screeners. In one instance, however, the agency thwarted such a test by alerting screeners across the country that it was under way, even providing descriptions of the undercover agents.

The government routinely runs covert tests at airports to ensure that security measures in place are sufficient to stop a terrorist from bringing something dangerous onto an airplane.
Alerting screeners when the undercover officer is coming through and what the person looks like would defeat the purpose.

But that’s exactly what happened April 28, 2006, according to an e-mail from a top TSA official who oversees security operations.

This one’s a real winner, read on…

On the one hand, we have airports hiring HR contractors who make a practice of endangering the lives of scores, hundreds or thousands of people and on the other, the government agency responsible for U.S. airport security is rigging security inspections to make it appear that they are doing their job.

No matter how much effort I put into it, I can’t find even the slightest hint of justification for the above two situations. Does this make me a bad person?

Some people definitely need to be punished to the fullest extent that the law allows, some people need to be replaced and some people need to be majorly retrained….

…This past week began with another one of those ambushes beginning in “…could you please…we really, really need…” and continuing along with a deadline-oriented project that consisted of writing a short but time-and-thought-consuming manual. To put things simply, whenever I freed up a little time to post, I was, to all intents and purposes, brain-dead.

So Friday, after Fed-Exing the finished product to the client, I determined to simply relax for a day (Saturday), get my head together, so to speak, watch a few DVDs and cook myself a humongous rib-eye from the best butcher shop in Chicago, accompanied by pasta with a jar-originated sauce — anyone who occasionally (or always) takes the shortcut of using pre-made pasta sauces might try Mezzetta’s Napa Valley Bistro brands, they make every other brand I’ve ever sampled pale to insignificance — that wasn’t a paid advertisement, it was a free endorsement from a devoted fan. A spinach salad with lots of grape tomatoes and Marie’s Creamy Italian Garlic dressing and about half a bottle of chiante classico rounded things out rather well…

I watched Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon (I am a major Humphrey Bogart fan, and especially enjoy the films he made with Peter Lorre and Sidney Greenstreet) a few Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts and Dean Martin Variety Show episodes and, conversely, a totally insane Rob Zombie gorefest called House Of 1,000 Corpses.

Having said all that, one of the most disconcerting, though not at all surprising in the Track Records Department bits of news I’ve read in the last few days was about Condoleeza Rice consulting with Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter in order to “benefit” from their Middle East Peace Talks experience.

Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot!!!?

What is she thinking?

Both of those administrations were failures in the Israeli/”Palestinian” arena, accomplishing nothing save for increased violence with a backdrop of Israel making mounds of concessions while the “Palestinians” honored none of their side of any agreements made.

Adding to that, Carter’s proven himself quite the anti-Israel lobbyist over the last few years.

George W. Bush’s “Roadmap” secured the release of beaucoup terrorists from Israeli prisons and subsequently resulted in Israel ceding territory to the “Palestinians”, territory the Arabs began utilizing, right off the bat, as launching platforms for terrorist attacks against Israel.

Every single “peace” accord in which we engage over there has identical results: Israel compromises more of her security and cedes more territory and the “Palestinians” gain additional one-way concessions.

Now Jerusalem has been thrown into the mix of diplomatic consideration.

Our (U.S.) involvement in the Israel-”Palestinian” relationship is a paradox: On one hand, we finance much of Israel’s self-defense capability via hundreds of millions of dollars, on the other hand we cripple Israel on the political/diplomatic stage.

Our diplomatic offerings over there are the epitome of profound idiocy.

Either we support Israel or we don’t.

I was a 100% supportive of Condi when she was first appointed. Her approach to the Israel/”Palestinian” millieu has changed my mind entirely.

We’re looking at a typical political appointee in a typical politics-first scenario: Support Israel with the right hand while allowing it to be gradually eroded and eventually destroyed by the left hand.

A column by Wesley Pruden (an icon of mine) gives a good example of those among my fellow Jews who have, unfortunately in large quantities, listed too far to port.

If at first you don’t succeed in making friends with a neighbor who’s forever dreaming of killing you, try again. If that doesn’t work, cry “mea culpa.” Then call your lawyer and make sure your will is up to date.

The notion that trusting your enemies against all evidence to the contrary is the most stubborn liberal pipe dream. If you wish upon a star hard enough, hold hands tight enough and sing kumbaya loud enough, dreams come true.

Right, as we once said, On!

Yosef Kanefsky, a prominent Orthodox Jewish rabbi in Los Angeles, detonated a fierce debate among Jews and their Christian allies here last week with his argument that maybe the insoluble, intractable standoff in the Middle East is the result of lies, or at least stretchers, told by Jews and evangelical Christians. And a few little white fibs told by misguided Muslims. A good place for repentance to start is to divide Jerusalem.

“The question of whether we could bear a redivision of Jerusalem is a searing and painful one,” he wrote in a provocative essay in the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles. “The Orthodox Union, National Council of Young Israel and a variety of other organizations, Christian Evangelical ones, are calling upon their constituencies to join them in urging the Israeli government to refrain from any negotiation concerning the status of Jerusalem at all, when and if the Annapolis [peace] conference occurs. …

“It’s not that I would want to see Jerusalem divided. It’s rather that the time has come for honesty. … [T]hese organizations are not being honest about the situation that we are in, and how it came about. And I cannot support them in this.”

Oh, yeah, as in almost every other venue in this cockamamie era, idiots are taking over. The rabbis who most figured into my much younger years were Boxer (deceased) and Spar, who Bar-Mitzva’d me. Both were conservatives, both religiously and politically.

Along came the liberals, introducing “reform” Judaism. Moral convenience over the laws set down in the Torah. Don’t stray too far while looking for comparable examples, just examine the Democrats here in the U.S. of A. Here, they simply do away with references to G-d altogeter and, in the same vein, treat the Constitution the way Reform Jews regard the Old Testament.

The fact that Kanefsky is an Orthodox Jew truly makes me wonder why he’s in the dhimmi camp rather than the Kahane camp.

Well, the rabbi, like the rest of us, at least in the West, is entitled. But it’s difficult to see how giving your enemies a “mea culpa” is a smart bargaining position when those enemies devoutly believe that with only a little more pressure you’ll cave. Rabbi Kanefsky goes further:

“No peace conference between Israel and the Palestinians will ever produce anything positive until both sides have decided to read the story of the last 40 years honestly. On our side, this means being honest about the story of how Israel came to settle civilians in the territories it conquered in 1967, and about the outcomes that this story has generated.”

This is the well-meant goodwill gesture that Israel’s enemies will take for an admission that the Palestinian radicals were right all along, that the Jews are as perfidious as the Islamic radicals have been saying they are, and their Crusader allies are just as bad. Conceding half of Jerusalem for nothing in return would further embolden the Palestinians to scorn the half-loaf when they can soon get the bakery

Nevertheless, the rabbi’s remarks are taken very seriously indeed. Several of his rabbinical colleagues praised his “bravery” and “courage,” though it’s not clear what bravery and courage have to do with anything, since rabbis, like Christian pastors, generally do not fear the beheadings, firebombings and similar tools of doctrinal suppression often employed in certain other places.

Mid-East (Israel, “Palestinian”) peace is a major political focus of every U.S. Government administration, be it Democrat or Republican.

Realistically, we should simply step aside and allow the Israelis and the Arabs to settle their differences. Every time we get involved, we kill more Israelis.

It’s not that our politicians and diplomats are ill intentioned, it’s just that they’re either naive, stupid or a combination of the two. Sort of like Rabbi Kanefsky.

I would really like to see Condi stand toe-to-toe with Abbas and say in level tones, “You folks never honor the obligations you assume in the course of these peace accords, yet you screech the second you don’t think Israel has honored theirs to the fullest extent to which you can milk them. You are not an honorable people. Until you have proven otherwise and civilized yourselves in the process, you will not receive a dime of U.S. largesse.”

Instead, she (and by extension, the administration) prefers to show us how lost she is on that front by consulting the architects of previous failure.

We are supposedly Israel’s friend — with a friend like us, who needs enemies?

A few years ago, I wasn’t all that concerned at the concept of a senator or congressman spending several terms in his/ her office, but I’ve since developed a different opinion as I’ve watched these folks “do their thing”.

The majority of voters, Democrat and Republican alike, read the papers, watch the news and so-forth, but don’t really delve into the details of their senators’ and reps’ job performances. They reelect a lot of complacent, useless, pontificating assholes because they simply don’t have time to do any research. Many figure, “Who cares? They’re all the same!”

Because of the above, we now have a permanent ruling class, people who have been in Congress forever and take their jobs for granted the same way semi-literate union factory workers might take their own positions.

It gets worse: Now these same parasites are fighting their constituencies’ efforts to impose term limits on their miserable, lazy, useless asses!

A Monday editorial at WSJ’s Opinion Journal by John Fund sums it up nicely.

If elected officials were half as imaginative at solving real problems as they are at perpetuating themselves in office, we’d see real confidence in government restored. Alas, the big issue on many pols’ minds right now is getting rid of the term-limit laws that threaten to knock down their impregnable incumbent fortresses.

Read the entire OpEd here.

Senator Russ Feingold’s proposal to censure President Bush over the Chief Executive’s counterterror measure of having the NSA monitor telephone calls between terrorists and their co-conspirators between phones inside the U.S. and phones overseas has his fellow Senate Democrats scuttling around in profound embarrassment as they desperately “avoid the media at all costs” on the issue.

Democratic senators, filing in for their weekly caucus lunch yesterday, looked as if they’d seen a ghost.

“I haven’t read it,” demurred Barack Obama (Ill.).

“I just don’t have enough information,” protested Ben Nelson (Neb.). “I really can’t right now,” John Kerry (Mass.) said as he hurried past a knot of reporters — an excuse that fell apart when Kerry was forced into an awkward wait as Capitol Police stopped an aide at the magnetometer.

Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) brushed past the press pack, shaking her head and waving her hand over her shoulder. When an errant food cart blocked her entrance to the meeting room, she tried to hide from reporters behind the 4-foot-11 Barbara Mikulski (Md.).

“Ask her after lunch,” offered Clinton’s spokesman, Philippe Reines. But Clinton, with most of her colleagues, fled the lunch out a back door as if escaping a fire.

So this one senator, who mistakenly “spoke for his party”, now feinds himself standing by himself after putting his fellow Dems on the spot. It seems that as the midterm elections grow nearer, even the Democrats who have shamelessly slandered the President over the War On Terror are beginning to attempt to try and create temporary facades of responsibility and patriotism, and Mr. Feingold is raining on their parade.

It’s enough to make you laugh with free, uncontrolled mirth at the way these opportunists and liars suddenly hide themselves from their own media to the point of sneaking out convenient back doors.

Poor, lonely Senator Feingold is understandably piqued at the lack of backup he’s receiving from his Democrat colleagues.

Sen. Russell Feingold on Tuesday blamed fellow Democrats for inaction on his stalled resolution to censure President Bush for his authorizing the National Security Agency’s electronic terrorist surveillance program.

“I’m amazed at Democrats … cowering with this president’s numbers so low,” said Feingold, D-Wis. “The administration … just has to raise the specter of the War on Terror, and Democrats run and hide.”

Heh heh heh….

Hat Tip: James Taranto

This in from yesterday…

Apparently in an effort to win international support and avoid censure by the United Nations Security Council, Iran on Tuesday proposed a resumption of nuclear talks with the Europeans, a move that was immediately rejected by Britain as “vacuous.”

Indeed.

The proposal came eight days after Iran resumed nuclear work at three sites in violation of an agreement 16 months ago with France, Germany and Britain that froze most of Iran’s nuclear activities. The resumption prompted the European trio to declare the talks dead and call for the Security Council to pass judgment on Iran.

This should be very frightening for Iran. The U.N. “passing judgement” can only mean one of two things:

a) They might be {gulp!} censured, or

b) There might be {shudder} sanctions.

Seriously, what will they do?

Impose a Megatons For Food Program?

Kofi & Son would be strongly supportive, as they would undoubtedly see some lucrative financial opportunities in the offing, as would most French U.N. diplomats and a few others of their ilk, such as a certain corrupt, left wing scumbag, terrorism supporting British traitor named George Galloway (spit).

In a letter on Tuesday, Javad Vaeedi, deputy head of the Supreme National Security Council, emphasized Iran’s determination to “continue its full cooperation” with the International Atomic Energy Agency, adding that Iran “spares no effort in removing any ambiguity on its peaceful nuclear activities through dialogue and negotiation,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by The New York Times.

Expressing appreciation for the Europeans, it added that Iran “considers dialogue and negotiation as the best course of action” and “is prepared to make the process a success.”

But the letter, addressed to the three foreign ministries and sent through their missions in Vienna, gave no indication that Iran would resume the freeze on its conversion, enrichment and reprocessing of uranium as required by the agreement.

Of course not! It’s amazing how after dealing with Islamofascist governments for so many years, these dynamic diplocrats would still like us to believe that they’ll bring anything reasonable to the bargaining table.

And camels might fly…

It’s always the same deal: The Muslim country offers nothing except doubletalk, promises they can break, according to their religious beliefs, because they’re made to infidels, or simply stands firm while insisting that all concessions come from the western governments involved in “negotiations”. And somehow they manage to word their diplomatic dictum in such a way as to give the impression that they’re proferring offers of great sacrifice to themselves and great benefit to all mankind.

Sure they are.

“It is unacceptable,” said a German official, who described the letter as “a lot of nice words without any concrete offer.”

Good for you! You tell ‘em!

And tell ‘em again, and again. Western diplomacy with Iran as regards their nuclear programs is reminiscent of something I saw in a cartoon as a kid where one character draws a line on the ground and says, “I dare you to cross this line.”

The other character crosses it.

The first character draws a second line on the ground.

“I dare you to cross this one.” He challenges.

What follows is: “And this one.” “And this one.” etc…

The U.N. and its Old Europe members have already proven themselves a toothless, unapplicable, cowardly, corrupt and overly expensive attempted remedy to the world’s more dangerous problems.

So,

Indeed, Ali Asghar Soltaniyeh, Iran’s representative to the international nuclear agency in Vienna, said in a telephone interview from Vienna that Iran’s decision to resume nuclear fuel research was “legal and irreversible.”

He added: “We are ready to negotiate with the Europeans and the Russians. It is now their turn to understand us.”

He called it unfair that Iran’s scientists had not been able to conduct their nuclear research under the freeze, saying, “The philosophy of telling scientists not to think and research is contrary to human rights principles and the United Nations Charter.”

Which means exactly what it reads like.

Iranian diplomats will talk day and night for as long as possible, buying time for their continued nuclear research and the development of their first atomic weapons.

Given the spinally challenged diplomacy of the folks in western Europe, “as long as possible” can mean forever, or at least right up until there is a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv and a score or so additional suitcase nuclear devices fall into the hands of terrorists. One suitcase nuke goes a long, long way.

Then again, perhaps Israel will do unto Iran’s nuclear reactor program what they once did unto Iraq’s.

Or for the entire issue coming down to the Eleventh Hour option of the U.S.(it always comes down to our country) allowing Iran to produce and deploy a nuclear weapon while the U.N. talks to a wall, or executing a military operation, up to and including invasion, to prevent a probable nuclear holocaust by removing the extremist government and replacing it with the same kind of democratic government we have helped install in Iraq.

Jeezzzz!!!! I can already hear the howling, booing, hissing, weeping and gnashing of teeth coming from the port side over that one!

They’ll just have to get it through their pointed, tinfoil covered little Utopian liberal heads that our entire operational profile in the Middle East and Southwest Asia is ultimately an act of self defense against people who don’t think like we do but would sure love to kill us, man, woman and child, because we don’t worship as they do, either.

All that said, I do not for a minute believe that this situation we now face as regards Iran’s nuclear weapons development energy program is going to be resolved peacefully.

All the Europeans and that useless fucking idiot U.N. nuke agency czar Mohamed ElBaradei are doing is blowing smoke, lots and lots of smoke.