One of the families of the USS Cole bombing is an active blogger. The Swenchonises were one of the families that was devastated to hear that President Obama would be dismissing the charges against one of the terrorists, Al-Nashari.
For more than eight years Gary and Debbie Swenchonis have mourned the loss of their son, Gary Graham Swenchonis Jr., who was killed Oct. 12, 2000, along with 16 other sailors, when terrorists attacked the USS Cole in Port Aden, Yemen. The parents of the 1994 Rockport-Fulton High School graduate have fought gallantly to see their son's killers, who are being held in Gitmo (the facility which holds terrorists in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba), as well as those who still run free in Yemen, brought to justice. Enter the politics: The Swenchonises were told this month there would be no hearing, only three days after Obama told the Cole families he was dismissing charges against Al-Nashari. "We were told last Monday the hearing is off. It's all politics," said G. Swenchonis. "He (Leahy) does not want the Cole attack brought up, especially with Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State."
Obama's announcement to close Gitmo, and to change the way terrorists are treated in the legal system, took all but a small breath of wind out of the Swenchonises' sails. Disgusting.
#1
Memo To World: Attack the United States and kill it's citizens and do between 3 and 7 years in a lush tropical island paradise with 3 halal meals/day and the world's best free medical care.
Upon release with a new set of clothes and a new waistline, go back home to an adoring nation for a free house, car, living expenses and an underage bride or four. So act now. Opportunities are limited.
Posted by: ed ||
02/24/2009 10:48 Comments ||
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Theoretically, "smart power" is supposed to encourage other nations to aid the United States in international conflicts and create brotherhood. In an obnoxiously smug ivory tower kind of way, it's supposed to be true; however, recent experience proves that smart power must be exercised upon a reasonable constituency.
Posted by: Age Of Pericles ||
02/24/2009 00:00 ||
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For a student, the author seems to know far more about the way the real world works than most "educated" politicians on Capitol Hill and the sycophants in the media intelligentsia who get them elected.
Will Swat restructure the sub-continent? Will it have a domino effect on the entire region to create a South Asian Union modelled on the European Union?
By Rajinder Puri
"There is virtual civil war in Afghanistan. There are three million Pashto speaking Afghan refugees in Pakistan. If the Afghan crisis is prolonged, both Afghan and NWFP Pashto speaking tribes might be expected to make common cause and revive the call for a Pashtunistan comprising areas of present day Afghanistan and Pakistan.
"If that happens, Sind and Baluchistan will not lag behind. Already there are incipient freedom struggles in both states.
"A war between Pakistan and Afghanistan, or even civil war within Pakistan, were it to come, would not remain confined to Afghan and Pakistani territories. Inevitably, it will spill over and involve India. In that unfortunate event, the painful process of war will confront the leaders of South Asia with the same challenge that they stubbornly refuse to face during peace: how to restructure the subcontinent and undo the legacy of a most unnatural Partition, and to establish in its place a new arrangement more natural to the character and genius of Hindustan.
"Let us understand that the day of reckoning is not far. If not by the wisdom of our leaders, then despite their follies, if not by peaceful negotiation, then by painful war, the artificially contrived and grotesquely maintained fragmentation of the subcontinent must end. Nature has already begun to re-assert itself.
"The people of India, most particularly the people of the Punjab, must prepare for the change. The best among them must work for it. Revolutionaries can create history only if they first learn to anticipate it."
This passage was published twenty years ago in a book authored by this scribe. The intervening period condemned him to isolation, criticism and ridicule. Now, at long last, may one dare hope that the restructuring of the subcontinent has begun? Consider recent events in Pakistan.
The Pakistan government has allowed the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) to be governed by Islamic law. In other words, the Pashto speaking areas now controlled by gun-toting Taliban will be administered by laws different from those prevailing in the rest of Pakistan. There is worldwide dismay and alarm over this development. Pakistan's Dawn columnist Murtaza Razvi has asked in his column: "How could you have two parallel justice systems running in the same country?" Good question. It needs to be followed by its logical corollary: Is Pakistan one nation? Nationhood is tested if people stay united voluntarily. That is possible only in democracy. Pakistan has yet to pass that test.
The adverse reaction to developments in Pakistan could of course be hasty. The agreement was brokered by the NWFP provincial government. It was approved by President Zardari. It was announced immediately following President Obama's envoy Richard Holbrooke's departure from Pakistan after his talks with Zardari. The Pakistan government said that introducing Islamic law in the territory was not a concession to Taliban. The measure would be implemented only after peace prevailed in the region. Sufi Mohammed, the mentor of the Pakistani Taliban, has expressed confidence about persuading the Taliban to abjure violence. For the world, the most urgent objective is to separate local Pashtuns from Al Qaeda's Arabs and other foreign mercenary terrorists. Bereft of ground support Al Qaeda would become vulnerable.
The present agreement is about a ten-day cease-fire in the first instance. It is being hoped that it becomes perpetual. The agreement was brokered by the National Awami Party (NAP) which governs the NWFP province. Asfandiyar Wali Khan, Abdul Ghaffar Khan's grandson, presides over NAP.
In 2002 he recalled two basic lessons his grandfather taught him about the superiority of nonviolence. Asfandiyar stated: "My grandfather said that violence needs less courage than nonviolence. Second, violence will always breed hatred. Nonviolence breeds love." In 2007 Asfandiyar said: "The Taliban is not the creation of Pashtun society, but the creation of the Pakistan army."
On assuming power in NWFP the first change Asfandiyar introduced was to pass a resolution in the NWFP assembly to rename the province as 'Pakhtunwa'. Only the national assembly can approve the name. Later, NWFP coalition partners and the opposition proposed the name 'Afghana' for the province. According to the 100 year unimplemented Durand Line Treaty, which lapsed in 1993, the FATA territory was to be ceded to Afghanistan. The conflict over the proposed new name for the province suggests that the Pashtuns are torn between Pakistan, Afghanistan and independence.
Unless peace is restored US action against Al Qaeda and the Taliban will mount. President Obama has just sanctioned 17000 additional troops for Afghanistan. The people of the region desperately want peace. Peace is the first priority. Liberation from a medieval lifestyle can wait. There is no quick-fix formula to modernize medieval societies. Once peace prevails, this can be accomplished gradually and democratically. The Pashtuns for the first time in over a century have been offered the prospect of legitimized self-rule based on tribal identity. They will get this if they dissociate from terrorism and Al Qaeda. That is how the carrot and stick might work. Will they respond positively?
It is unlikely that the Pashtuns will easily surrender the prospect of their newfound tribal unity cutting across the borders of Pakistan and Afghanistan. If terrorism ends, several things could happen. The FATA area could be incorporated into a larger Afghanistan as outlined in the Durand Line Treaty. That could destroy Pakistan as we know it. Or, the Pashtun areas of Afghanistan could merge into Pakistan, leaving the Uzbeks and Tajiks in the north to merge with Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. Afghanistan, as we know it, could then disappear. Or, there could be a sovereign, independent Pashtunistan. That would cripple both Pakistan and Afghanistan. Or, the present international borders of Pakistan and Afghanistan could remain intact as both nations arrive at a confederal arrangement that allows Pashtuns of both countries to intermingle freely and live as one people. Obviously the last would be the best arrangement. If it does emerge it could have a domino effect on the entire region to create a South Asian Union modelled on the European Union. Like the Pashtuns, the Kashmiris are divided between India and Pakistan, the Punjabis are divided between India and Pakistan, the Bengalis are divided between India and Bangladesh, and the Tamils are divided between India and Sri Lanka.
At midnight on August 15, 1947 Pandit Nehru spoke in Parliament: "Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially ." After the leaders of the Congress Party betrayed their own commitments, their own followers and Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, by accepting the Partition, the Frontier Gandhi, who sought merger with India but was spurned, gave the call for an independent Pashtunistan. Today, his grandson wrestles with the crisis in NWFP. Apart from Nehru, others too in India and Pakistan made their own trysts with destiny. Has the time come for them to redeem their pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but substantially ?
Critics may dismiss such expectations as nonsense.They could be right. But one makes a humble submission. Wait for this year to end before passing final judgment.
Posted by: john frum ||
02/24/2009 15:21 ||
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#1
Puri should lay off the strong stuff
Posted by: john frum ||
02/24/2009 16:53 Comments ||
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Heres the thing about India. When people talk about the mysterious east in mystic tones, its usually about yogis and inner navel-gazing truths and the Kama Sutra, that kind of thing. Hindus and Jains and Sikhs and Sufis and Shiites, along with Christians, Jews and tribal animists. All pretty exotic and mysterious. Greater mysteries and contrasts are much easier to find, lying around in plain view, significantly less than navel-deep. The subcontinent is one of the most beautiful and terrible places on Earth. Quick semi-informed, impressionistic tour. (My credentials, which are superficial, include a couple of weeks in Delhi and Indian-held Kashmir and a couple of weeks in Lahore, Islamabad and Pakistani-held Azad Kashmir in Indias estranged sibling nation as a reporter, a job that offers quick, intensive studies. Also, three years as a boy in Dacca and various parts of Bangladesh, when it was still known as East Pakistan; a fair amount of reading; and many, many years in the company of the fine people of the great South Asian diaspora, from Thailand to the Middle East to the United States, at various social levels. For our purposes well consider India and Pakistan part of the same thing, though different things, as there are as many similiarities in these conjoined nations as there are important political, cultural and social differences.)
A Lonely Planet edition a few years ago compared public sanitation conditions in Pakistan to London in the 16th century. This is more or less true. A lot of things about India and Pakistan are in the 16th century, from sanitation to the social order and social customs, and its a good place to go if you want to see what life was like was like then. Large parts of the subcontinent, in fact, are probably better described as being in the Middle Ages or maybe even pharoanic times. It is a place where 21st century technology, such as cell phones and computers, butts right up against timeless industries such as blacksmithing, basketweaving, woodcarving and painstaking stone-chiselling of everyday goods and equipment, in hole-in-the-wall workshops that make the notion of cottage industry sound grand. India has a space program, and India and Pakistan both have nukes, of course. In both places, you can still see animal and human dray labor, and in India, the domestically produced autos, when you get under the hood, look like they were hammered out in one of those hole-in-the-wall shops, which parts of any older model Ambassador sedan probably were.
India is a country where abject poverty is an industry. First thing that happens when you get off the plane, you get mobbed by professional beggars, who are very adept at making nuisances of themselves until you pay them off. A former British Raj policeman who was a family friend told of busting in on someone who was crippling a prospective beggar back in the 1940s. I dont know whether that still goes on, but a lot of other dark sides persist, according to news report, so I dont know why that one shouldnt. In the space of two weeks, my accommodations ranged from the $400-a-night five-star Oberoi in Delhi we figured the company could swing a couple of nice nights for us as we had been living rough and had been shot at to a $5 a night inn in a Himalayan resort town which had both electrical and plumbing fixtures, but neither worked, so I berated them down to $2.50, and I know we were still paying more than anyone else in the place. During that brief time, I witnessed two violent canings by businessmen running public nuisances off their premises and no fewer than eight people relieving themselves in plain view. I dont mean peeing, I didnt count that. In India the myth is that cows wander the street because they are holy and no one can interfere with their whims. There is probably some truth to that, but there and in Pakistan, the fact is that barnyard animals of all kinds and mangy curs go where they will. Travelling across country, I noticed that the mud-walled and thatched villages of my Bengali youth were present in the Punjab and elsewhere, and that, much like the previous 1,000 years, not much had changed in my absence. Its noteworthy that while the subcontinent in home to more than 120 languages, it also has broadly unifying elements, and I recognized Bengali words from my youth in the conversation of Urdu and Hindi speakers. Not such a surprise, I suppose, when you consider that the English borough and German burg is linguistically related to the Indian pore and Thai buri. . . .
Stepping away from the ancient animosities, the people of the subcontinent are truly delightful. Their art, ancient and modern, is intricate, astonishing, often breathtaking. Some people think Bollywood productions are a joke. Much like American B flicks. But if youve seen Channel [V], you may have seen some remarkable, highly sophisticated fusions of western and eastern art and music. Indians and Paks are highly industrious and clever people. When graced with education, they can be brilliant, often far outperforming first-world scholars. In the Middle East, if you need to get something done, and you want it done well, you engage an Indian or a Pak for the job, and he will energetically and creatively pursue your goal. Which is why, in addition to cost factors, many, many tech and finance firms have gone to India for support services. The same is often true in the United States, as well, where the medical and high-tech fields, as well as scientific research fields are heavily loaded with Indians and Paks. They are also among the shrewdest businessmen in the world, vying historically with the Chinese in Asia as both economic cogs and powerhouses. As a result, much like the Chinese, they have often been resented and even hated in the nations to which they have spread.
I dont know how the predicted ascendancy of India is going to play out over the coming decades. I do know that I welcome it as something that may bring those vast swaths of medieval India into the 19th, 20th or even the 21st century, while Indias ideals of democracy and multicultural unity if not perfect in execution are world-class values, as well as free enterprise, as India attempts to break away from the trappings of socialism, imperialism and feudalism. We could do a lot worse for partners in the 21st century, and looking at the predicted rise of the authoritarian Peoples Republic China, we may well do worse.
Posted by: Mike ||
02/24/2009 08:13 ||
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D *** NG IT, INDIA > WE HAVE AIRCRAFT CARRIER PLANES, THUS OF COURSE WE HAVE NO AIRCRAFT CARRIER!
This is in response to articles by Shireen Mazari on these pages on Feb 4 and 11. She has written that the Iranians are upset over the presence of Jundullah in Baluchistan. This outfit has been involved in terrorist activities in Iran and its presence in Pakistan is clearly damaging the country's relations with Iran. I completely agree. The government of Pakistan must make sure that no terrorist activity on Iranian soil is facilitated by or originates in our side.
But, often, Ms Mazari and most other analysts do not mention an equally if not more serious factor that has been creating bitterness in the relationship between the two countries for years: the targeting of Shias in Pakistan and the failure of the state to protect them. They are citizens as well and it is the intitutional responsibility of the state to protect the lives and properties of its Shia citizens. If the state fulfills its responsibility, a strong reason poisoning the relationship of Pakistan with Iran will be removed.
In NWFP and FATA the killers of Shias (and of course of Sunnis) are Taliban, especially those linked with the Punjab based sectarian outfits. Why have successive governments of Pakistan failed to protect its Shia citizens? There are two perceptions among Pakhtuns. One is that sectarian outfits (both Taliban and non-Taliban) are linked with powerful Wahabi elements in Saudi Arabia whom the government of Pakistan does not want to displease by coming down hard on the outfits. To this, is added the perception among some that the military establishment does not want to eliminate these outfits either because they may be of use in jihad in Afghanistan and India. These Pakhtun are angry at governments in Pakistan for allowing both Iran and Saudi Arabia to fight their proxy ideological war on Pakistani soil.
Many Pakhtun argue there has never been any Shai- Sunni problem among them and what we saw were tribal rivalries which were given a sectarian color in the heat of the moment. They argue that they can manage their tribal or sectarian problems within the tribal code of Pakhtunwali, if both Saudis and Iranians leave them alone or the government of Pakistan fulfills its constitutional obligation and counters the deadly ideological interventions of the two countries in Pakistan.
Shireen Mazari says that existence of Al-Qaeda safe havens in FATA is just as much a 'reality' as were the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq that warranted the US invasion of the country. The fact of the matter is that Al Qaeda does not have pockets, so to speak, of safe havens in FATA but rather the whole of FATA's territory is a sanctuary for Al Qaeda and Taliban. FATA is now occupied territory nothing less and the occupiers (Arabs, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Punjabis and Pakhtuns) are hell bent upon writing off the Pakhtun culture of the area.
I recently interviewed a singer from Waziristan for my documentary film on the area. With tears in his eyes he told, it is his culture that is under harshest assault by the Al Qaeda and Taliban militants. His brother has been killed by the Taliban, because his brother, he said, was a brave man and challenged the high handedness of Al Qaeda and Taliban militants in his village. The singer has received many death threats for singing Pashto music. He lives as an internally displaced person in another place in Pakistan. He told me he will never give up singing. This, he said, is his 'cultural Jihad' with which he will continue to defy the Al Qaeda occupation of his homeland.
Ms Mazari has urged the prime minister and the president to go to Swat and FATA to see the fate of their people they have left unsecure against attacks by the US. What attacks? If she means drone attacks, there has never been any drone attack on Swat, although people of Swat have been praying for the US drones to attack the headquarters of the Swat Taliban. Moreover, I have already explained in my article of Feb 17 how the people of FATA see the drone attacks not quite what is depicted in the mainstream media. I would urge Ms Mazari and other analysts as well to go to FATA to see the reality there.
As for her argument that the current approach of the government towards FATA is military-centric and that there should be a political framework, one is in agreement. However, there is a caveat to this, and that is that the political framework must be formed in consultations with the tribes, not Taliban or Al Qaeda. Also, it should be remembered that no political framework can function without a territory. The state has lost territory in FATA. Where shall the political framework be implemented when there is no territory in state control for the purpose? First the territory has to be retaken to be followed by a political framework to be implemented. Unfortunately the territory has to be retaken by force. Al Qaeda and Taliban are not going to give up the territory they have conquered or was willfully surrended to them.
The writer is a research fellow at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Gender Research, University of Oslo, and a member of Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy
Posted by: john frum ||
02/24/2009 00:00 ||
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By Caroline B. Glick
Who can recall the olden days when Kadima was young and proudly proclaimed its identity as the one Israeli political party that stands for nothing? Two days before the 2006 elections, Kadima's Meir Sheetrit grandly announced that his party was the only party in Israel that "has disengaged from ideology."
But look at Kadima now. As far as its leader Tzipi Livni is concerned, ideology is all that matters. Never mind that her ideology - of surrendering land to the Palestinians - was completely discredited by Hamas's electoral victory and subsequent seizure of power in Gaza. Never mind that Kadima's assertion that establishing a Palestinian state is the key to solving all of Israel's problems has been overtaken by Iran's rise as a regional hegemon and aspiring nuclear power dedicated to the eradication of Israel.
As Livni put it Sunday as she rejected Prime Minister-designate Binyamin Netanyahu's request that Kadima join his government as a full partner, "If we compromise and concede our ideology by joining a government with a path that is not ours, it would violate the trust of our voters."
To try to coddle Kadima into setting aside its newfound ideological fervor, Netanyahu harkened back to its past as party that in Sheetrit's words was "unburdened by ideological baggage" and "looking only to the future." Netanyahu argued that since today there is no chance of establishing a Palestinian state that will live at peace with Israel, Kadima can set aside its differences with Likud and cooperate on preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, overthrowing Hamas's regime in Gaza and protecting Israel's economy from the global economic meltdown. But Livni would have none of it.
SINCE LIVNI has been a post-Zionist radical ever since she underwent her ideological conversion from Right to Left in 2004, her position is understandable. Less understandable is her opportunistic party members' willingness to back her up. What accounts for their readiness to leave their cushy ministries for the Knesset's back benches?
Since the election, Kadima's leaders, their fellow leftists in Labor and Meretz and the media have all proclaimed that Netanyahu's rightist coalition is unsustainable. Knesset speaker Dalia Itzik even suggested that Kadima shouldn't discard its campaign literature since new elections will be declared within a year.
On their face these assertions make little sense. A rightist coalition will be comprised of 65 members of Knesset who have nowhere else to go. What possible reason would they have to agree to new elections?
But Livni and her colleagues have three formidable assets giving credence to their claim: The Obama administration, President Shimon Peres, and the IDF General Staff under Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi. If these forces act in concert to oppose Netanyahu, his ability to govern and remain in office will indeed be significantly diminished.
Over the past week, the Obama administration has taken a series of steps that show that it plans to push the traditional US policy of pressuring Israel to make unreciprocated concessions to its Arab neighbors to an entirely new level. Whereas the Bush administration rejected the legitimacy of the Iranian-supported Hamas terror group, the Obama administration gave three signs this week that it is willing to recognize a Hamas-led Palestinian regime. First, its surrogate, Senator John Kerry, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, visited Hamas-controlled Gaza and so effectively accepted Hamas protection. While there, he accepted a letter from Hamas to President Barack Obama and duly delivered it to the US consulate in Jerusalem. So the Big O is fundamentally willing to throw Israel under the proverbial bus....bottom line.
Second, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that she will participate in next month's Egyptian-sponsored conference which aims to raise money to rebuild Hamas-controlled Gaza in the aftermath of its unprovoked missile war against Israel. This is the first time that the US has willingly participated in raising money for Gaza since Hamas seized power in June 2007. Thus enabling Hamas and draining our treasury by aiding and abetting terrorists.
Finally, Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas has decided to participate in negotiations aimed at reestablishing the Hamas-Fatah unity government. Abbas claims that the US now supports such a government that would again render Fatah Hamas's junior partner. US recognition of such a government would constitute US recognition of Hamas as a legitimate actor. They are certainly an actor, and as a result of Gaza elections, a legitimate actor, in the eyes of the Paleos. Unfortunately, negotiating with Hamas assumes that they are willing to compromise with Israel. This, on the part of the liberal world, is delusional thinking.
Then there was Kerry's visit to Syria. Not only did Kerry indirectly praise Syria for its support for Hamas by extolling its willingness to support a Palestinian government in which Hamas plays a leading role, he called for the abandonment of the Bush administration's decision to withdraw the US ambassador from Damascus after the Syrians oversaw the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri in February 2005.
OBAMA'S WILLINGNESS to treat with Hamas and Syria is part and parcel of his apparent belief that the principal reason that the Arab and Islamic worlds are hostile towards the US is because the US supports Israel. The notion that Obama blames Israel for the Arab and Islamic hatred of the US gained credence this week when it was reported that Obama intends to appoint former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia Chas Freeman to serve as the director of the highly influential National Intelligence Council.
Freeman is known for his virulent animus towards Israel. In numerous public statements he has placed all the blame for Arab and Islamic hostility towards the US on Israel and argued that the US's conflicts with the Arabs will disappear the minute the US abandons Israel.
In one such statement in 2007, Freeman, who extols Hamas as "democratically elected," said, "Those in the region and beyond it who detest Israeli behavior, which is to say almost everyone, now naturally extend their loathing to Americans. This has had the effect of universalizing anti-Americanism, legitimizing radical Islamism, and gaining Iran a foothold among Sunni as well as Shiite Arabs."
By refusing to submit to its Arab enemies, Freeman argues that Israel has earned their wrathful retaliation, which Freeman claims, also places Americans in danger. In his words, "Such retaliation - whatever form it takes - will have the support or at least the sympathy of most people in the region and many outside it. This makes the long-term escalation of terrorism against the United States a certainty, not a matter of conjecture."
President Shimon Peres for his part doesn't share Washington's enthusiasm for Syria or its animus towards Israel. But he does believe that Israel can and must do more to establish a Palestinian state. As the uncontested leader of the Israeli Left, on Friday Peres came out in favor of the so-called "Saudi peace plan." In an indirect, fawning interview with Ma'ariv's political commentator Shalom Yerushalmi, Peres embraced the Saudi initiative, which calls for an Israeli withdrawal to the indefensible 1949 armistice lines and acceptance of millions of hostile foreign Arabs as part of the so-called "right of return."
Both in the interview and in his remarks in the lead-up and the aftermath of the elections, Peres has established himself as the bulwark against a non-leftist government that hopes to place the issue of Palestinian statehood on the back burner. Like Livni, in spite of the fact that there is no Palestinian leader willing to live at peace with Israel, Peres insists that Israel's most pressing challenge is to establish a Palestinian state.
IN THEIR BID to discredit the Netanyahu government, Peres and Obama will apparently enjoy the support of the IDF General Staff. According to a report in Ma'ariv on Friday, IDF Chief of General Staff Gabi Ashkenazi has embraced defeatism as a national strategy. Ma'ariv's diplomatic commentator Ben Caspit reported that Ashkenazi claims that while it is true that Israel has military capacity to set back Iran's nuclear program significantly, there is no point in doing so.
According to Caspit, as far as Ashkenazi is concerned, rather than removing the immediate threat to its survival, Israel should appease Iran's Arab puppet - Assad. Ashkenazi reportedly believes that Israel should leave Iran alone, and beg Obama to convince Assad to accept the Golan Heights from Israel. Once Assad has the Golan, Ashkenazi argues that he will stop pointing his missiles armed with chemical and biological warheads at Israel, stop supporting Hamas and Hizbullah and generally become a member in good standing of the Western alliance. Why Syria would do such a thing, when it would owe an Israeli surrender of the Golan Heights to its alliance with Iran, is a question that Ashkenazi hasn't seen fit to consider.
Ashkenazi is extolled by the leftist media as non-political, but this is untrue. The Chief of General Staff is exceedingly close to former IDF chief of General Staff Amnon Shahak, who signed the post-Zionist Geneva Initiative in 2004 and has established business partnerships with Fatah leaders.
As chief of General Staff during Netanyahu's first term as prime minister, Shahak openly rebelled against the government by refusing to meet with the prime minister or attend cabinet meetings. Shahak announced a failed bid to unseat Netanyahu as prime minister shortly after retiring from military service in 1998.
Ashkenazi, who brought Shahak on as his "professional coach" after replacing Dan Halutz as Chief of General Staff in 2007, clearly shares his political views. He opposed fighting Hamas until missiles began raining down on Ashdod, supports signing a new ceasefire with Hamas today that will give Israeli legitimacy to the terror group, and supported ending Operation Cast Lead without first toppling or even significantly degrading Hamas's ability to control Gaza.
Ashkenazi is also extremely close to former IDF OC Military Intelligence Uri Saguy. Since the mid-1990s, Saguy, who owns large tracts of land in the Galilee, has been one of the greatest champions of an Israeli surrender of the Golan Heights. Like Shahak, Saguy serves in the unofficial role of Ashkenazi's professional mentor.
Caspit claimed that right after Netanyahu forms his government, Ashkenazi intends to tell him that the IDF rejects the notion of attacking Iran. That is, according to Caspit, upon entering office, Netanyahu will find the IDF General Staff standing arm and arm with Obama and Peres in a bid to overthrow him.
No wonder Kadima has now found ideology.
IF NETANYAHU wishes to survive in office and actually accomplish the clear aims he has set for his government, he must begin aggressively selling his agenda to the public. By doing so, he will build the kind of public credibility he will need to prevent Ashkenazi from rebelling against him. With Ashkenazi sidelined, Peres and Obama will have less direct ability to prevent Israel from attacking Iran.
During the campaign, Netanyahu chose to keep a low profile in the hopes of neutralizing the media's criticisms by denying them headlines. At the time, there was some justification for that policy. But now that he is forming the next government, the public must know why he wants to do what he plans to do and why we must support him. Otherwise, Kadima is right. There is no reason to join his government. All these things together shows that the US govt has no interest in the survival of Israel, but in the belief in the meme that Israel is the problem. Israel needs to make unilateral concessions to their enemies in the hope that their enemies will be nice to Israel. If Netanyahu does not project strength, and Israel wanders down this appeasement path, there will be a nuclear war and Israel, plus Iran, Syria, et al, will cease to exist..
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
02/24/2009 16:14 ||
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Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said in testimony today before the Senate Banking Committee that there is a 'reasonable prospect' that the current recession will end in 2009 and that the economy will recover in 2010 but only if actions taken by the Obama administration, Congress and Federal Reserve are successful in restoring 'some' financial stability.
Bernanke warned, however, that the Federal Open Market Committee's dire January economic forecast (2009 GDP at a central tendency between -0.5% and -1.25%) 'is subject to considerable uncertainty, and I believe that, overall, the downside risks probably outweigh those on the upside.'
One risk he points to is the global nature of the slowdown, which he said could worsen U.S. exports and financial conditions beyond what is already expected. Another is the so-called adverse feedback loop, in which weakening economic and financial conditions become mutually reinforcing. 'To break the adverse feedback loop, it is essential that we continue to complement fiscal stimulus with strong government action to stabilize financial institutions and financial markets,' Bernanke said.
As for the Fed's role going forward, Bernanke said little more than that it would use 'all available tools to stimulate economic activity and to improve financial market functioning.' He repeated the FOMC's stance in keeping the federal funds rate at exceptionally low levels 'for some time' and noted that the Fed will soon begin to extend loans through the recently announced Term Asset Backed Securities Loan Facility (TALF).
'If financial conditions improve, the economy will be increasingly supported by fiscal and monetary stimulus, the salutary effects of the steep decline in energy prices since last summer, and the better alignment of business inventories and final sales, as well as the increased availability of credit,' Bernanke said in his annual Humphrey Hawkins testimony.
#1
Obviously somehow Obama's got Beranke by the balls.
"You squeak when I tell you to" (Squeeze) AAAAugh
Posted by: Rednek Jim ||
02/24/2009 17:15 Comments ||
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#2
Pfft. More likely Bernanke's trying to happy-talk the economy to counter the Obamanable Collective's apparent determination to doom-and-gloom the stock market into the mid-fives.
I don't know, this week the economy's felt like the Mines of Moria just before the diggers found Durin's Bane. A sort of sense that maybe there's an abyss below the bottom of this hole.
But hey, if Ben wants to claim we've hit rock-bottom, that's his look-see. Me, I'm trying to think of ways to stock up on Balrog repellent.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
02/24/2009 17:51 Comments ||
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#3
CBO said this was probable WITHOUT the porkulus bill.
#5
I Wish Banker Ben would grow some Balls and tell us that Barrys plan to have federal Bureaucrats Break private contracts Between Banks and Bad loanees is a Bad idea and Bodes Bad things for economic recovery. Bad things, man.
Posted by: Mike N. ||
02/24/2009 19:30 Comments ||
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#6
It'll be another prime example of bureaucratic newspeak in which having exhausted the bulk of the damage the 'rate' of decline will move from double digit to lower single digit and therefore will be officially declared end of the recession. Just altering the narrative, not the facts.
As a teacher, I agree with her point. So many of these designated days and months to commemorate something get shoved into the schedule according to the calendar, rather than the natural flow of the topic. When we home schooled, we read Benjamin Banneker's biography in our study of early America; we read Frederic Douglass during his part in history, and read African American literature in proper chronological sequence with the rest of American Literature, for example. Same with Women's History; and we were able to devote a full school year to Pre-Columbian and Modern Western Hemisphere other than the US.
Some 80 years later, Woodson's Negro History Week -- now Black History Month -- has come to seem quaint, jarring, anachronistic. The country has undergone such seismic cultural shifts in the intervening eight decades that it is sometimes difficult to recognize the landscape into which Woodson was born. Suffice it to say that the nation of Tiger Woods, Oprah and Barack Obama no longer needs a Black History Month.
It's not merely that a short month set aside to commemorate black achievement is a curious and old-fashioned appendage, like rabbit ears on a TV or a rotary dial on a telephone. It's worse than that: The commemoration is a damaging form of apartheid, setting the contributions of black Americans aside as separate and unequal. It sends the wrong signal to all Americans, black, white and brown.
The history of America's black citizens cannot be segregated from the nation's history because black people have been here from the very beginning. The nation's past is one huge tapestry woven from the threads of many peoples, many cultures, many lives. From Crispus Attucks to buffalo soldiers to Tuskegee airmen to Ralph Bunche to Condoleezza Rice, the story of black Americans is America's story.
#3
At my employer, they are really hitting Black History month. The cafeteria is plastered with posters commemorating famous African Americans - George Washington Carver, Thurgood Marshall, etc.
Conspicuous by her absence is Condeleeza Rice - the first black female Secretary of State. I wonder why?
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
02/24/2009 19:34 Comments ||
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If you watched last night's Academy Awards show on ABC, you likely saw sponsor Coca-Cola's commercial patting itself on the back and you for drinking Coke, because the company takes some of its profits and gives college scholarships.
But you know what would have been a more truthful and less effective commercial? Coke telling Coke drinkers how some of those college scholarships go to illegal aliens who should be deported, not given a free ride to college by law-abiding Americans who support secure borders and didn't know their soft drink choice was funding the exact opposite.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
One of the families of the USS Cole bombing is an active blogger. The Swenchonises were one of the families that was devastated to hear that President Obama would be dismissing the charges against one of the terrorists, Al-Nashari.
