Category Archives: Foreign Policy

Go Jump In Lake Kinneret (Sea Of Galilee)

America, Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, Israel

Good for them: The Israeli press, out in force at a press conference which was held this afternoon by President Barack Obama and Israeli President Benjamin Netanhayu, is giving Obama a cultural shock. Obama is not used to the irreverent way Israelis treat leaders; they do not worship politicians as we in the US do.

However, during the press conference, an indignant Israeli journalist demanded to know why we in the US have not stopped the carnage in Syria.

To him I say, “Go jump in Lake Kinneret, sir.” Why us? Why not Israel? Let Israel police the region. The president replied firmly, politely putting the man in his place. Good for President Obama.

For one thing, no less a war monger than Colonel Oliver North has disputed the latest chemical-weapons allegations against Syria. Colonel North told an annoyed Sean Hannity:

…”I’ve seen the intelligence reports, I’ve seen the unclassified version of it and we’ve seen the footage that came out of Aleppo today. This does not appear to me as a person who understands a little bit about chemical weapons — about 10 years ago today, I was wearing a chemical suit, you may remember and broadcasting on your show. On this footage that you’re watching right now, there’s no evidence of anybody suffering from the symptoms of exposure to chemical agents. Whether it’s propaganda on the part of the rebels or propaganda on the part of the government, it appears to me, as a person who understands what the consequences of exposure to chemical weapons would be, there’s nobody in this, what that footage we just saw, that’s suffering from chemical weapons.”

For another, “The Titan Is Tired:

“We Americans have our own tyrants to tackle. We no longer want to defend to the death borders not our own—be they in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, wherever. And we don’t need our friends looking to us to do so.”

UPADTED: Ciao, Chavez (Wealthy Commie Croaks)

Democracy, Foreign Policy, Politics, Propaganda, Socialism

The “loss” of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has hit hard at MSNBC. (Rachel Maddow is sure to turn on the waterworks during her show.) How do you omit the pejorative “socialist,” in a piece about the death of one? Look to one Tracy Connor, staff writer at NBC News, who finesses an economy partly nationalized or under threat of expropriation with upbeat words: Chavez was a “self-styled populist,” who initiated “government reforms that championed the downtrodden,” and who “took greater control of the state-run oil company.”

More control than complete state control? More control than the nationalization of industry?

“A kind of very personalized socialism” is Eugene Robinson’s spin. Robinson is a writer at the Washington Post and an MSNBC pundit. Chavez, like the Cuban brothers, followed a “pure ideology model,” Robinson noodled.

Robinson proceeded to underscore the broad popular support Chavez enjoyed among his people, and then … contradicted himself (Robinson did; Chavez was consistent), saying that Chavez’s popularity ran counter to his many anti-democratic policies.

Robinson is no different to almost every single American voter, politician and chattering-class member. He equates crude majoritarianism with justice. If the masses want something—the masses must be right. Where mobocracy appears manifestly unjust, reason people like Robinson, this must be because it veered from the express wishes of the upright majority that unleashed the People’s Power.

News flash: Chavez was on his way to securing leader-for-life status because he had the support of the masses. Democracy—rule by absolute and unfettered majorities—is dictatorship by any other name.

More eulogizing for “Hue” courtesy of Eugene Robinson: Chavez was “quick witted,” “loose,” “idiosyncratic.”

UPDATE: Via Nick Gillespie come some facts about the “affable” commie who croaked, including that Chavez had amassed a fortune of $1 billion.

Fear Not: Uncle Sam Can Kill You, But Likely Won’t

Foreign Policy, Homeland Security, Law, Military, Terrorism

You just know that the information has been fully accessible through “The Freedom of Information Act,” but that the scurrilous US media have chosen to let sleeping dogs lie, because Barack Obama is their favorite top-dog.

Libertarians have been on the issue from day one. On rare occasions, left-liberals like Rachel Maddow have galvanized to protest B. Hussein’s drone program—the en masse, extrajudicial, long-distance killing of foreigners and Americans without due process (the latter being a farce too).

You must realize that “the media mollusk are not for peace; they’re for Barack Obama. They’ve continued to depict this war president as your good kind of killer; a thoughtful, great leader who agonizes over his kill lists with excruciating care.”

What more can a moronic people want, right? Naturally, America’s leaders are entitled to their Kill Lists. It’s all a matter of how they mange and execute the grave “responsibility,” not so? No! Not so! Wrong you knuckleheads!!!

In the fifth year of the “Killer Drone’s” faith-based outreach abroad, media watchdogs are finally reporting on a “Justice Department memo” that says “it’s legal to use drone strikes against Americans.”

MSNBC discloses that,

“A confidential Justice Department memo concludes that the U.S. government can order the killing of American citizens if they are believed to be “senior operational leaders” of al-Qaida or “an associated force” — even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the U.S.
The 16-page memo, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, provides new details about the legal reasoning behind one of the Obama administration’s most secretive and controversial polices: its dramatically increased use of drone strikes against al-Qaida suspects, including those aimed at American citizens, such as the September 2011 strike in Yemen that killed alleged al-Qaida operatives Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan. Both were U.S. citizens who had never been indicted by the U.S. government nor charged with any crimes.
The secrecy surrounding such strikes is fast emerging as a central issue in this week’s hearing of White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, a key architect of the drone campaign, to be CIA director. Brennan was the first administration official to publicly acknowledge drone strikes in a speech last year, calling them “consistent with the inherent right of self-defense.” In a separate talk at the Northwestern University Law School in March, Attorney General Eric Holder specifically endorsed the constitutionality of targeted killings of Americans, saying they could be justified if government officials determine the target poses “an imminent threat of violent attack.”
But the confidential Justice Department “white paper” introduces a more expansive definition of self-defense or imminent attack than described by Brennan or Holder in their public speeches. It refers, for example, to what it calls a “broader concept of imminence” than actual intelligence about any ongoing plot against the U.S. homeland.
“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states.

Were the “White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, a key architect of the drone campaign,” not scheduled for a confirmation hearing for the position of CIA director—you’d be none the wiser.

Note the broad definition of “imminent danger,” subject to which YOU and I could become targets for elimination.

UPDATED: Hagel Raises Neocon Hackles (‘Axis Of Error’ Enraged)

Foreign Policy, Israel, Middle East, Neoconservatism

Neoconservatives are having grand mal seizures and that’s a good thing. “President Obama on Monday nominated former Nebraska senator Chuck Hagel as defense secretary,” reports the Washington Post.

Obama called Hagel “the leader that our troops deserve” and a “champion of our troops and our veterans and our military families.” He said Hagel, a former Army sergeant, would be the first person of enlisted rank and the first Vietnam War veteran to head the Defense Department.
“Maybe most importantly, Chuck knows that war is not an abstraction, Obama said.

CNN recounts that Hagel’s:

fierce opposition to the Iraq War went far toward creating the schism that now exists between him and the Republican establishment.
“The damage this war has done to our country will play out for years to come,” he wrote in his 2008 book, “America: Our Next Chapter.”
“While it is easy for nations to blunder into war, they never blunder into peace,” he added.
His opposition to the 2009 surge in Afghanistan put him at odds with the president who nominated him.

This is all good, although Hagel’s promise to “advance global freedom, decency and humanity’ in the effort to ‘build a better world for all mankind'” smacks of neocon Manifest Destiny. Defend US borders and no more.

As to the hackles Hagel has raised among Israel devotees. “Nothing Hagel has said about Israel,” ventures Richard Cohen at the WaPo, “is not said in the Israeli press on a daily basis. Trust me: By the Wall Street Journal’s standards, Israeli media would be deeply anti-Semitic.”

(Cohen points out that Chuck Hagel “earned his wariness of war the hard way — two Purple Hearts in Vietnam.” Cohen is wrong to frame war wariness as a privilege that needs to be earned.)

UPDATE (Jan. 8): Lindsey Graham, a member of the unholy trinity of neoconservative law makers—the “three amigos; the three blind mice; aka the ‘axis of error’”“was on CNN’s ‘STATE OF THE UNION’ yesterday calling this an ‘in your face’ nomination and basically saying that this is going to be a very controversial pick for President Obama.”