Category Archives: Israel

UPDATED: The Vexing Case of the Vanishing Iranian Scientists

Barack Obama, Foreign Policy, Hillary Clinton, Intelligence, Iran, Israel, Middle East

I fully expect to hear former CIA operative Michael Scheuer on Judge Napolitano’s Freedom Watch tonight. I expect Scheuer to implicate the Israeli Mossad in the killing of an Iranian nuclear chemist by motorbike assassins. For once, I expect I to agree almost completely with what Scheuer will posit on the show (if Nap’s producers have been quick on their feet, as I expect they have).

If Israel has indeed been eliminating Iran’s intellectual arsenal, it may be acting in bad faith, in seriously bad faith. It knows that the US has zero credibility with the Arab world. No surprise there. America’s lack of credibility in the Middle East is well deserved. Israel knows full well that if Hillary Rodham Clinton, “the gorgon who heads Caesar’s state department,” denies doing the deed, as Clinton has, no one will believe the woman who cackled, “I came, I saw, I conquered,” when she was informed of Col. Muammar Gadhafi’s execution by her proxies.

If Israel had indeed “recruited Iranian operatives on the ground,” as it is alleged to have done, to carry out these precision killings, Bibi’s government has placed the Obama administration in a very dodgy position.

UPDATE: I stopped listening after a while; I have an allergy to truth deniers such as Erika Payne. I think the story was not covered on Freedom Watch. Perhaps tomorrow.

Pipes on Private Property (Courtesy of JIMS)

Individual Rights, Israel, Political Economy, Political Philosophy, Private Property, Pseudo-history, Russia

Sponsored by the Jerusalem Institute for market Studies, the “Property and Freedom” lecture below was given by Prof. Richard Pipes, author of the book Property and Freedom. Here’s a shocker: historians of the West have paid scant attention to the role of private property in the annals of America and Europe. “If you look for the word ‘property’ in the index of American books dealing with evolution of American [and European] attitudes you tend to find nothing there,” says Pipes.

(Property and Freedom is cited in Into the Cannibal’s Pot.)

You already know what this writer thinks. It should be, life, property, liberty. In that order. Property trumps liberty, for liberty can be variously defined. Our government insists we are free so long as we can vote. We know this to be untrue. Property, moreover, is harder to redefine by the state. If our rights to property were fully upheld—the same state that tells us to consider ourselves free (and be grateful) would be unable to control huge areas of our lives—bedroom, boardroom, deathbed, you name them.

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UPDATED: Jingoism Trumps ‘Jingle Bells’ in Nov. 22 Republican Debate

Elections, Foreign Aid, Foreign Policy, Homeland Security, IMMIGRATION, Iran, Israel, Military, Nationhood, Republicans

CNN’s co-sponsors of the Republican debate from Constitution Hall, in the nation’s capital, were the Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute. That fact set the jingoistic, interventionist tone for the evening. There were lots of leading questions from scholars of these respective special interests. Implicit in all these questions was the demand for a better-defined role (read war) for America in Iran, Syria (“no fly zone”) and Sudan (all the better to inflame and focus the local Al-Qaeda chapter).
Mitt Romney ended this long, two-hour session by cementing the position of all the Republican candidates, bar Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman to a lesser degree: American exceptionalism means asserting America’s military superiority. Unclear was how that position coincided with US economic bankruptcy.

In the next hour, I will be teasing out the details of the debate for you with the analysis you’ve come to except here at BAB (donation buttons to the left of you).

Humorous highlights (all the more essential given the fact that these are dead-end debates; the resignation written all over Ron Paul’s face says it all):

Herman Cain (Chairman/CEO, Godfather’s Pizza) calls Wolf Blitzes “Blitz,” and firmly tells him, “No, Blitz.”
Michele Bachmann (U.S. Representative, Minnesota, State Senator; Attorney) about Pakistan: “It is too nuclear to fail.”
A scrappy Ron Paul (U.S. Representative, Texas, Physician) shouts half-way through the first hour: “How about the rest of us?” “Blitz ignores Paul, and his own promise at the onset to allocate fair time to all.

UPDATE: Okay to the meat of the exchanges:

Introductions: Rick P. touted the bliss of marriage and the beauty of his wife. Newt Gingrich sucked up to the hosts and think tanks named above. MB blew kisses to the troops. Ron Paul said what needed saying: “I am convinced that needless and unnecessary wars are a great detriment. They undermine our prosperity and our liberties. They add to our deficits and they consume our welfare. We should take a careful look at our foreign policy.”

Patriot Act: Ron Paul sustained the momentum by calling the thing unpatriotic, advocating that one prosecute cases as the crimes they are. Paul also warned about sacrificing liberty for security in pursuit of total safety and a total police state. The other candidates, with the exception of Jon Huntsman, plumped for an extension and an expansion of the Act.

The Nation’s Paid Pimps: Paul was not asked about the Transportation and Security Administration. Perry has moved to criminalize the TSA’s pat downs in his state of Texas, but here the governor spoke primarily about privatization, getting rid of the unions, and doing better counterintelligence, as if the government could do anything better. Rick Santorum spoke to the Israeli model. This meant what I call “rational profiling” (“Cabbies Do It Too). Ron Paul stepped in it (it was a matter of time, I guess). First Paul quite correctly called the other candidates on their circular reasoning: They all kept calling for Patriot-Act type preemption against dem “terrorists.” However, until you bring a case against someone, he is but a suspect. After that fabulous point, Paul went and ruined it all by saying something stupid like “don’t profile.”

Pakistan/Afghanistan: Newt Gingrich stood out in his quest to effect a sort of American coup in both Pakistan and Afghanistan—I thought we had already done so; semantics, really—take over operations and run these places like we need to. G-d help us. Mitt wants nation building. For a clever man he sure sounded stupid claiming that divesting from these hell holes forthwith would threaten the gains and investment in blood and treasure made so far. Perry had taken his meds for this debate. No pennies for Pakistan was his position. He also spoke of encouraging the region’s countries to trade. It’s probably as good as talking to the hand, but it’s sure worth suggesting barter over boycotts and bombs. Jon repeated his best lines from the CNN/Tea Party Debate in Tampa, Florida, where he advocated for divesting from these crap countries.

Interspersed were questions from the pompous audience about sanctions on Iran (more, more), possible attacks on A-Jad, and requests for foreign aid. The last position was advanced by no other than Bush’s Paul (Dundes) Wolfowitz. Naturally, now that Wolfy is president of the World Bank, he’d like to secure a supply of US funny money with which to sustain his new fiefdom.

I’m getting terribly bored. This whole competition will end badly. My report will commence tomorrow, if your interest is sustained. But Let me end with immigration, an issue on which they all sucked mightily, and should read “Suicide of A Superpower” and its sequel).

Like most Americans (except for us immigrants), the candidates, in their call for more special visas for highly skilled individuals, proved that they know close to nothing about America’s labyrinthine visa programs. They advocated for fixing the immigration system so that the US could import many more brilliant individuals, as if there was a limit on, or an impediment to, such immigration.

THERE are no limits on the number of geniuses American companies can import.

America already has an “Extraordinary Ability” Visa. In exchange for my spouse’s exceptional abilities and qualifications, he was awarded the O-1 visa. And we, in short order, gained green cards.

The primary H-1B hogs—Infosys (and another eight, sister Indian firms), Microsoft, and Intel—are forever claiming that they are desperate for talent. But, in reality, they have unlimited access to individuals with unique abilities through the open-ended O-1 visa program.

I believe that before the article titled “Why Aren’t The H-1B Hogs Satisfied With The O-1 ‘Extraordinary Ability’ Visa?” was written, no immigration expert had made the simple point above.

That’s right: The O-1 visa program enables the importation of as many geniuses as a company can find, from every corner of the world.

War-Party Prattle

Elections, Iran, Israel, Middle East, Republicans, War

Other highlights (or lowlights, rather) from the CBS/National Journal GOP Debate, which may elicit rhetorical reprisals from my readers:

IRAN: Newt Gingrich exercised his wit in suggesting that Obama had exhausted all the ways to be dumb about Iran. I disagree, but then I am not a neoconservative, and I do not experience a vicarious delight when my country’s military and government bombs, boycotts, and generally bullies barely developed countries. As a prelude to war, Newt was willing to entertain covert operations, co-operation with Israel, but war to break the Iranian regime would be best.

Ron Paul reminded all that war powers were vested in the congressional cockroaches, and warned against Iraq-like war propaganda against mad A-Jad. Still a peculiar idea, if to judge by the facilitator’s facial expression.

Rick Perry, who had taken his meds for the occasion, wanted to shut down the Iranian economy (all the better to starve its people). Good going for a goon.

The Other Rick advocated funding the pro-democracy movement. (With what? Monopoly money?) Santorum also believes that foreign aid creates jobs (although not in Iran). (By logical extension, RS, can you perhaps explain why Republicans assert that the assorted stimulus initiatives have failed to create jobs? How does their source of funding differ from that of foreign aid? Oops; you’re talking to the hand, Ilana Mercer. Not that his inquisitors would ever ask, but RS is incapable of explaining away that “minor” lapse in logic.) RS liked the idea of covert activity targeting Iranian scientists, and advocated the only thing with which I agree: the unleashing of computer viruses on nuclear programming. (See “Cyber-Warfare: Is It Libertarian?”)

Water-boarding babe Michele Bachmann warned of a nuclear conflagration involving Israel. As much as libertarians prefer to pretend otherwise, this is a reality the tiny country should entertain, as no one else is willing to face it, and many even delight in it.

MORE to come.