1. Esoterik

   04/05/2009 at 3:51 pm

   North Korea’s test launch of their latest ICBM will now be called “Ambitious Multiple Use Technology Sales Promotion,” and Iran’s continued development of Nuclear Weapons will be relabeled “Greater Middle Eastern Alternative Energy Initiative.” Maybe we need to provide some funding for these worthy causes, like that 900 Million we are going to give to that “Community Organization Committee,” Hamas.

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2. Thomas Patrick Folan

   04/26/2009 at 11:35 am

   Excellent Post C.J.. Keep it up.
   Sincerely, Tom

   I thought readers would be interested in this from Investors’ Business Daily:

   Fair-Weather Hawks
   National Security: It was easy for key liberal Democrats to be tough on terrorist prisoners when 9/11 was fresh in the public’s mind.
   Why is it so easy for them to condemn that stance today?

   Democrats who now itch to see Bush administration officials convicted for providing legal justification for waterboarding and other enhanced interrogation techniques are chained at the ankle to those they want prosecuted.

   Speaker Nancy Pelosi, then on the House Intelligence Committee, and others
   knew of the tough methods as long ago as 2002.
   A December 2007 Washington Post story revealed that in September of that year, Pelosi attended an hour-long meeting in which she “was given a virtual tour of the CIA’s overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk.”

   Then-Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller was there too, and top Republicans. According to the Post, “on that day, no objections were raised. Instead, at least two lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder, two U.S. officials said.”

   In fact, top Democrats like Pelosi and Rockefeller sat in on about 30 such bipartisan private briefings.
   One of those in attendance, former House Intelligence Committee Chairman and former CIA Director Porter Goss, remembered: “Among those being briefed, there was a pretty full understanding of what the CIA was doing.” According to the onetime Florida GOP congressman, “the reaction in the room was not just approval, but encouragement.”

   Another official present at the early briefings told the Post, “there was no objecting, no hand-wringing. The attitude was, ‘We don’t care what you do to those guys as long as you get the information you need to protect the American people.’”

   Only the moderate former House Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Jane Harman, D-Calif., objected, in the form of a classified letter. She would later garner Pelosi’s ire for defending the Bush administration’s terrorist surveillance program.

   The Washington Times further reported this week that the Intelligence Committee’s top Democrats and Republicans “each got complete, benchmark briefings on the program” and “if Congress wanted to kill this program, all it had to do was withhold funding.”

   Statements from Pelosi and other Democrats suggest maybe they were dozing off when the briefers described waterboarding. Such excuses, if the expression can be excused, hold little water.

   The fact is clear: Top Democrats in Congress chose not to object to getting tough with terrorist prisoners because the poll ratings told them it was politically dangerous not to be an anti-terrorist hawk in 2002 and 2003.

   Today is different. These hypocrites now smell a huge political opportunity. But if the legal architects of enhanced interrogation — and, logically, former President Bush himself and his top national security staff — are on the hook for prosecution, so are Pelosi and others who knew of the harsh techniques and never raised a peep.

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3. Thomas Patrick Folan

   04/26/2009 at 12:09 pm

   C.J.
   I forgot to include this from Ivestors’ Business Daily:

   Prosecuting Heroes

   National Security: The Justice Department may launch a witch hunt against those who organized the enhanced interrogation of terrorists. That’s no way to treat people who saved so many lives.

   The American public has just seen how policy based on campaign rhetoric can come crashing into the reality of a successful past policy.

   Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair, as a retired admiral who commanded the Navy in the Pacific and served on the White House’s National Security Council, must be smarter than his recent statements make him out to be.

   In a private memo to spy agency employees last week, made public by Blair this week, he conceded that “high value information” was obtained by the enhanced interrogation techniques the Bush administration authorized the CIA to use on terrorist detainees.

   They gave “a deeper understanding of the al-Qaida network,” according to President Obama’s choice to oversee America’s network of 16 intelligence agencies.

   In a subsequent statement, however, Blair added that “there is no way of knowing whether the same information could have been obtained through other means.”

   In the original memo, he remarks that “(I) like to think I would not have approved those methods in the past, but I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given.”

   It looks like a troubling case of angst has taken hold of those charged with keeping our country safe.

   But you simply cannot have it both ways. When Blair agonizes about hoping he “would not have approved those methods,” does he not realize that not approving those methods would have meant hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Americans killed?

   “Read on a bright, sunny, safe day in April 2009, (those interrogations) appear graphic and disturbing,” Blair said. Yet those methods foiled terrorist plots, in particular Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s graphic and disturbing plan to fly a passenger jet into the Library Tower in Los Angeles, the West Coast’s tallest skyscraper.

   How can Blair really believe, as he claimed this week, that “the bottom line is these techniques have hurt our image around the world, the damage they have done to our interests far outweighed whatever benefit they gave us and they are not essential to our national security”?

   How can “image” trump the saving of lives in national security policy?

   On Tuesday, the president called it “a decision for the attorney general” whether those in the Bush administration who provided legal backing for the enhanced interrogations would be prosecuted — this after claiming he wasn’t interested in any such witch hunts.

   Meanwhile, Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich., has released a report claiming that CIA and Pentagon officials prepared groundwork for the enhanced techniques before receiving a legal OK — as if being prepared to help protect the nation constitutes a smoking gun.

   Levin contends they “bear significant responsibility for creating the legal and operational framework for the abuses.”

   Far from abuse, they were serving the nation more than the average senator. All those involved in this program are owed a debt of gratitude from all of us.

   They certainly don’t deserve to be hounded by the Justice Department or Congress.

   Pelosi’s Claims Of Powerlessness
   Posted 04/24/2009 07:22 PM ET

   Oversight: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s contention that she and other Democrats were not told about waterboarding terrorists is dubious enough. Her claim that they could do nothing anyway is blatantly false.

   The highest-ranking member of the House of Representatives says that back during the first term of President George W. Bush, when the 9/11 terror attacks were still fresh in the minds of Americans, she and other key Democrats briefed by the CIA “were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation techniques were used.”

   That contradicts the statements of others who where there, such as former House Intelligence Committee chairman and CIA director Porter Goss, plus intelligence officials interviewed on the subject going back to 2007.

   But Speaker Pelosi, who was the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee in 2002, further claimed that there was nothing she and her fellow Democrats in Congress could have done about it. “They don’t come in to consult,” the speaker said last week. “They come in to notify … you can’t change what they’re doing.”

   Funny that Rep. Jane Harman, the California Democrat who succeeded Pelosi as ranking member of the intelligence panel, and so was included in CIA briefings, didn’t feel that her hands were tied. She sent the CIA a classified letter in February 2003 objecting to the interrogations.

   In fact, Congress’ oversight powers regarding the CIA have for years gone beyond just sending private hate mail. L. Britt Snider, who served as Bill Clinton’s inspector general of the CIA, staff director of the 9/11 Congressional Inquiry and investigator on the Senate committee that probed Nixon-administration intelligence abuses, calls the CIA “perhaps the most scrutinized agency in the executive branch.”

   Snider’s 2008 book, “The Agency & The Hill: CIA’s Relationship With Congress, 1946-2004,” notes that since 1986, under the law “no funds could be spent for any intelligence activity for which Congress had denied funding.”

   To illustrate how swiftly Congress can jump into action when it discovers something the CIA is doing that it doesn’t like, consider what happened after the leaders of the two intelligence committees and other congressional leaders were briefed at the White House on the Iran arms-for-hostages initiative in mid-November 1986.

   “By the end of the year,” Snider says, “no fewer than seven investigations had been launched of what had become known as the Iran-Contra affair.” Some 300,000 documents were perused, more than 500 witnesses interviewed and 40 days of congressional hearings conducted

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4. Thomas Patrick Folan

   04/27/2009 at 9:56 am

   NE LAST THING C.J.
   FROM Investor’s Business Daily:

   The War On Terror Just Won’t Go Away

   Fighting Terror: It’s a very real threat when people who are our sworn enemies suddenly begin capturing territory at the expense of our allies. And today, that’s exactly what’s happening in Pakistan.

   ‘Taliban Militants Stay In Control Near Pakistan Capital.” That headline should send a chill through you.

   Because it means the forces of medieval darkness and terror in Afghanistan and Pakistan are gaining ground — and are perhaps just one leap away from capturing Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, and its nuclear arsenal.

   Pakistan’s government made the big mistake a week and a half ago of agreeing to let Taliban-linked groups in the North-West Frontier Province enforce Sharia, or Islamic law, in the Swat Valley.

   Since then, the Taliban and its radical affiliates have begun infiltrating members into surrounding areas, especially the Buner Valley — just 60 miles from Islamabad. They smell weakness on the part of the Pakistani regime, and are going to push until they’re stopped.

   At this rate, if unchecked, they’ll control Pakistan by year-end — not to mention the Pakistani government’s 24 to 55 nuclear weapons.

   We’re glad to see this isn’t going unnoticed.

   “Pakistan poses a mortal threat to the security and safety of our country and the world,” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said last Wednesday, in blunt remarks that took some by surprise.

   This, surely, is the “test” that Vice President Joseph Biden warned that President Obama would face early in his presidency.

   Now, the question is, recognizing the problem, what do we do?

   The answer’s unclear. True, Obama has sent 17,000 added troops to Afghanistan. And pressuring the Pakistani government to “do more” will at least put the heat on it to take the Taliban seriously.

   But what concerns us is this administration’s failure to recognize, as the previous administration did, that this isn’t only about Pakistan; it’s about Islamic extremism, a worldwide movement whose ultimate goal is to weaken, subvert, defeat and replace a demoralized West.

   Pakistan would be quite a prize for the extremists. As we said, that nation has nuclear weapons

   It lies adjacent to India, Pakistan’s most bitter enemy, one of our best allies and the world’s largest democracy.

   We agree with Clinton that this is a mortal threat. We wonder, though, how we can defeat our enemies if we can’t even bring ourselves to call them terrorists. How we can win the global war on terror when we downgrade it rhetorically to merely an “overseas contingency operation”?

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5. Thomas Patrick Folan

   04/29/2009 at 4:35 pm

   C.J I read this today and it is worth passing it on to a friend:

   THE OBAMA DOCTRINE
   HUGGING FOES, HURTING FRIENDS by Ralph Peters
   April 29, 2009

   AFTER a mere 100 days, the “Obama Doctrine” for our foreign and security poli cies has emerged. And it’s terrifying.

   The combination of dizzying naivete, dislike of our allies, disdain for our military, distrust of our intelligence services and distaste for our own country promises the worst foreign policy of our lifetimes.

   That includes President Jimmy Carter’s abysmal record of failure.

   The core tenets of the Obama Doctrine to date would make a charter member of the Weather Underground cheer:

   We’re to blame. If there are problems anywhere, they’re America’s fault. This central conviction of leftist ideology appears to have soaked so thoroughly into our president’s consciousness during his lengthy friendships with extremists that it’s now second nature to him.

   Problems can be negotiated away. From Somali pirates to Moscow’s belligerency, Obama and his Cabinet see a good chat as the best response to a challenge. Our president got to the Oval Office by talking, not doing, and his faith in his powers of persuasion is unlimited.

   An acquaintance who may have our government’s best grasp of the Russians shakes his head at the tone in Washington. The current mantra: “We have to get over our Cold War thinking.” Great — except that it’s the Russians who’ve revived Cold War hostility.

   The Taliban devours Pakistan, and we want to talk. President Hugo Chavez destroys Venezuela’s democracy, and we want to talk. Iran pursues nuclear weapons with refreshed enthusiasm . . . and we want to talk.

   Problems that can’t be talked out can be bought off. Pakistan, a nuke-armed state of 170 million Muslims seething with anti-Americanism stirred up by our “friends,” faces a crack-up as its once-monolithic military splinters. Obama’s answer? Send billions of dollars that will disappear and weapons that may soon be used against our troops.

   Secretary of State Hillary Clinton thinks the solution to piracy is a generous program to rebuild Somalia. (Been there, done that.) She’d also like to hand Hamas a billion bucks.

   The “Las Vegas law” applies: You can buy sex but not enduring love. We can’t defeat terror with welfare checks.

   Islamist terrorism doesn’t exist. The term’s even been banned from government departments. As Muslim extremists slaughter innocent victims by the thousands, we’re assured Islam’s a “religion of peace” that contributed profoundly to our country’s development. (Huh?)

   It’s as if 9/11 never happened. The “nonterrorists” drenching the greater Middle East in blood and threatening us as loudly as they can are just victims of our aggression. It’s all our fault.

   Terrorists do exist, though — among our returning veterans and amid those Americans who don’t subscribe to MoveOn.org’s revulsion at our country.

   Israel’s the obstacle to Middle East peace. Palestinians are all victims. Hamas consists of struggling community activists. The terrorists are in the Israeli military.

   Our nukes threaten world peace and we need to get rid of them. Other states only maintain or seek nuclear arsenals because we worry them. If we can get down to zero nukes, peace will reign on earth.

   Forget that only our nuclear weapons prevented World War III and that they still deter potential enemies. Just get rid of them, OK?

   Our military is dangerous. Beyond Obama’s cynically choreographed appearances with our troops, he and his coterie clearly disdain military advice and uniformed service. The administration views our troops as primitive creatures who must be collared and leashed, not as part of any solutions.

   Our intelligence services are even more dangerous than our military. The administration’s already begun to gut our intelligence capabilities. Carter at least pretended to study the problem. Obama’s plunging straight in with the demoralization of our shadow warriors.

   It’s only torture if we do it.

   Blame President George W. Bush. Should the Obama Doctrine lead to new terror attacks (sorry, Janet: I meant “man-caused disasters”) or to foreign-policy humiliations, it won’t be Obama’s fault, but Bush’s.

   We’re becoming a third-world country, succumbing to a sickening (in both senses of the word) culture of blame. And that culture is fostered by breathtaking ignorance.

   We now have a president who doesn’t know that Pakistan was founded as a democracy, a secretary of state who thinks we created the Taliban, a head of the Department of Homeland Security who doesn’t believe Islamist terrorists exist and a vice president who claims FDR gave televised speeches during the Depression.

   If Bush had made such gaffes, the media would’ve mocked him. But Obama and his entourage excite orgasmic forgiveness among journalists. Which brings us to the Obama Doctrine’s final tenet:

   Our media sluts will portray defeat as victory.

   Ralph Peters is Fox News’ strategic analyst.

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