Soros' Collapsing Structures

It is astounding to me: Obama and leftist Democrats are now openly advocating bankruptcy. Just as they marched in lockstep to encourage military defeat in Iraq, they are now doing everything they can to steer our nation toward insolvency. To this purpose, they are willing to take and hold innumerable hostages. The military, old people, children – all are being used as pawns to insure that there is no agreement on the budget, thus forcing a government shutdown (to be summarily blamed on Republicans). The liberal media, instead of portraying this as a welcome respite from reckless government spending, proclaim this to be no less than Armageddon, continuing to do the best they can to let liberals get their way.

While some of us are falling for the ploy, there are indications that the majority of the American people are not. They expect to see at least some glimmer of fiscal reform, and they expect it to start today. They are fully vested in seeing that our nation continue along the path on which it had been (before Obama). To them insolvency is not an option. Yet, insolvency is precisely what Obama and his Democrats are striving to achieve. Stoking fears about the 800,000 (jobless) and Yellowstone closing are merely ancillary adjuncts to grab headlines in the short run. Down the road looms default when everything - including their sainted abortion clinics - shuts down; and that, they expect, will signal that the new (world) order has crawled out of Ahmedinejad’s well.

Nobody can be quite sure what happens next. We envision pure chaos on every front. In chaos there are no longer any rules. Existing contracts and bank accounts all turn to dust and are swept away by the random breeze. This is their goal. They are convinced they can survive even that. They believe that the old system can conveniently collapse into the new one, the structure for which already stands waiting. If you’ve ever been to a union or communist rally, that’s all you hear.

Unelected George Soros knows exactly what this new structure looks like as he is the architect of it. He sees a way forward, even if the rest of us don’t. We do not have any other options. Insolvency ends it. Hence, we feel that we must take steps to avoid it at all costs. Moderate Republicans in the House and Senate do not yet appreciate the danger. They are still willing to compromise. The Dems, on the other hand, are singularly committed. They can already smell the blood in the water. Total collapse is near... and they will have won. They, and their patron saint Soros, are confident that the new structure will be there to catch them – while sweeping away all the non-believers.

At first, there was chaos; and within it (by mere chance) there was an echo, which then opened up the possibility of reproducing something exactly like the first. Then came order and all the rest.

Tell me again that communism is not a religion.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Lessons Unlearned

The next time you’re tempted to disparage somebody, Kaddafi, Mubarak, any nation, bedbugs, fleas - anything - make sure you know what you’re doing and why. (I’d be interested in knowing just how many of you still get a chance to listen to Glenn Beck since he’s been dropped from several major radio markets including mine. It’s still possible to hear his radio show on the internet. The connection is often tenuous, but it does appear to run in a continuous if erratic loop on Mercury Radio Arts.)

Anyway, today he gave one of his more lucid rants. Without necessarily meaning to, he described precisely how we got Obama. It started with Bush. Hatred for Bush and anything Republican was whipped up into a frenzy. It came to be known as ‘Bush Derangement Syndrome’. Everyone was invited to join in - and everyone did. By the time the 2008 elections rolled around anyone who was neither Bush or Republican could have been elected, no contest. And ‘anyone’ was. To this day most of us still don’t have no clue just who our man in the White House actually is.

I dare say, we no longer remember exactly why it was we hated Bush so much. Nobody has much scar tissue to show from when Bush was in office. We just hated him, for no particular reason. We hated him just to give expression to our hatred. It was cool to hate; it was the ‘in’ thing to do. The media drove it; Hollywood drove it; universities drove it - and we all went along for the ride.

In our mass-induced hypnotic state, nothing we could foresee could have been worse than Bush. We all fell for it. ‘Anybody’ would save us and cleanse us of the dirt in which we wallowed.

It was perfect. It was like using a saw to cut wood. Two separate pieces. It works every time. We never once asked ourselves who started it and why. Who stood to gain by Obama coming to power? Who supported him? Who also hated Bush so much that they were prepared to cut off their noses to spite our faces? As such we stood with the Left, we stood with Rev. Wright and his liberation theology; we stood with Ahmadinejad, we stood with Chavez and Castro. We stood with the socialists, with the jihadist. We stood with every one of America’s enemies.

What did we expect to happen? Not one of us said, “Hey! Wait a minute. What exactly is going on here?” Instead, we’re still trying to make the wicked step-sister’s foot fit into Cinderella's glass slipper.

It’s a lesson that remains unlearned. To this day we are spurred on to hate our own: Rush, Beck, Savage, Palin and anyone else who might have even a smidgeon of conservative credentials. Tea Parties in the crosshairs; Michelle Bachman, John Bolton, Clarence Thomas, Carl Rove - all strategically lined up for target practice. And shoot we will, as long as we’re served the rhetorical bullets on a silver platter by the media.

If you notice, Obama remains curiously absent the sniper’s target. No one would dare say a thing outright against him. He remains a victim - a victim of the targets he himself has set up. …and victims can never do wrong.

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The Definition of 'Crazy'

It’s always easy and entertaining to make fun of history in a Monty Python kind of way; to say what if, as if ‘if’ were some kind of Frankonian monster ripe for resurrecting at the snap of a finger. Much more difficult to see the lunacy of current policy. If Reagan had killed Kaddafi, who is to say that would have been the end of it?

Fact: For several years after we sent a package bomb into Kaddafi’s tent (killing his daughter among others) we never heard from Kaddafi again. Fact: He behaved himself for a time like a kid after a spanking. And then, we seemed to have lost the concept altogether and the likes of Kim Yong-Il, Ahmadinejad and Hugo Chavez were able to make their mischief unimpeded, turning the whole class into an uproar.

Now, nobody is learning. The teachers have fled the premises. The school is has become wildly dysfunctional and you have some version of William Golding’s “Lord of the Flies” going on everywhere you look.

Enter the 12th Imam to put a stop to it. I expect he’ll have enough buckets lined up to put out the fires that are raging; to snuff out the fuses that are burning toward setting off a nuclear holocaust. If not, it doesn’t really matter what any of us do.

For a brief while, we thought it was Obama who would fill the bill. We gave him every chance. We even called him ‘savior’. We were convinced that he was the one who would bring us together. He made quite a convincing start of it, giving speeches all around the world and drawing adoring crowds everywhere he went.

Now we know it was all just so much hot air, effectively causing the polar icecaps to melt and the bears to seek shelter inside an ever shrinking population of whales. Curiously the oceans didn’t rise as predicted and the island of Manhattan still stands (although we did our best to bring her down by other means).

As much as we make fun of Kaddafi, we still shy away from looking in the mirror to examine ourselves. The definition of ‘crazy’ is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. What we are doing in almost every aspect of our public policy is the same thing over and over again. And all it’s done is accelerate our fall from grace.

Spring is just around the corner and all of us here in the northern latitudes can put our snow shovels away and breathe a sigh of relief. Soon time to put some of the old stuff out on the curb for yard sales or for sanitation to pick up. Don’t plan on going anywhere though. Gas will likely be around $5 a gallon.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

How We Came To Be A Day Late And A Dollar Short

The following is taken from a transcript of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad’s address last Friday to mark the 32nd anniversary of the Islamic revolution as reported by AFP:

"We will soon see a new Middle East materializing without America and the Zionist regime and there will be no room for world arrogance in it."

Addressing the people of Egypt directly, he said, "They (the United States) have adopted a friendly face and saying 'we are friends of people of North Africa and Arab countries', but be watchful and united. You will be victorious.

“(The) Iranian nation is your friend and it is your right to freely choose your path. (The) Iranian nation backs this right of yours.

“(The United States is an) accomplice to the oppression by the Zionist regime.

"Come and take away the Zionist regime which is the source of all crimes... take it away and liberate the region. Free the region and give it to the people and take this regime, which is the child of Satan, out."

This is the second time Ahmadinejad has made such statements since the Egyptian protests began. The first time he proclaimed that every government in the region that has aligned itself in any way with the United States will fall.

This got me to thinking (again) that these people are serious. Their hatred for Israel is the cause they are willing to die for. Israel knows this. It has been in its interest to promote the notion that the destruction of Israel will not be the end of it; that Islamic appetites will also aim to devour Europe and even America.

Nobody has been listening. And I myself predict that once Israel has been destroyed, the West will remain quite safe for a time. Islamic hatred of the West is solely focused on the West’s recognition and support of Israel.

Today Mubarak resigned. The Muslim Brotherhood will assume power. The rest of the Middle East will fall into Islamic extremists’ hands. Ultimately, Israel will be attacked. This time, the Islamists will win.

At this point, the West will mobilize to defend itself. (It has always been in its power to do so. All it would ever have required is tapping its heels together.) There will ensue a great purge of everything Islam. At the same time, the Left - which has aligned itself with Islamic extremism - will be sent packing. The world will return to some semblance of normalcy; now, of course, burdened by the stain of momentous, insufferable guilt.

Already today, the leaders of Europe have come out with a statement proclaiming that multiculturalism is not working. It can only get worse from here.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Irish Potato Famine

“…widespread opinion among the Cairo elite that the US aided the foment”

I’d go easy on that one. If proven, it could be blockbuster. It’s like the birth certificate fracas. (Quite possibly a trap.) But, as of now, there’s nothing much there (but the obvious). I’m sure Aaron Klein will be giving us the latest on his Sunday show.

It’s funny, though, that none of us would be so reckless as to bet the farm either for or against. We should know by now that Obama dislikes Israel intensely. He also dislikes the old guard that has brought us to this point. I can’t see him sitting around with Mubarak and chewing the fat for old time’s sake. It’s born of an inferiority complex stemming from not being facile with the facts. He knows that Mubarak would immediately size him up as a lightweight. Obama would feel much more comfortable sitting down with the likes of Ahmadinejad who’s a crazy as he is.

As for JB’s contention that Egyptian Muslims share nothing in common with Iranians, I beg to differ. As I’ve said before, the one issue that cements the Ummah into one cohesive unit is its hatred of Israel. This trumps any and all differences they might have among themselves. They stand united in their desire to rid their shores of the Jewish State. Whosoever achieves it will go down in the annals of Islamic history as no less than divine. Not only is it a big issue for them; it’s the only issue.

We ourselves went through the same thing here in America. The Democrats succeeded in cobbling together a coalition of splinter groups into a powerful force to unseat Republicans during Bush’s terms. These groups may not have agreed on every issue; but, on Bush and Republicans, they stood as one. They were successful. Their differences would emerge to haunt them later.

So too, it is in the Middle East. The various factions will unite against Israel (and its supporters). Even those who remain silent regarding this issue remain at risk.

We may very well witness the coalition breaking up under traditional stresses after the dirty deed is done. But this would amount to no more than being of curatorial interest as we spend the next century re-creating the Irish potato famine.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Upsetting the Apple Cart

There can be no doubt that Apple is a hugely successful company. Their sales model works. At the moment, there is much confidence that Apple will continue to do well. No one will seriously challenge or question what Apple does as long as the company flourishes. (If it’s not broke…) Most people will agree that Steve Jobs has been instrumental in the company’s success. Consequently, there is now proper concern about Jobs’ medical condition. Successful corporate leaders, unlike American presidents, are not readily interchangeable.

Companies are much like countries. They are either successful or not. We would think twice about electing a president who smokes, for example; or one with an unsavory past. The metrics to measure a nation’s success are somewhat different however. For one thing, countries are ‘too big to fail‘. You can’t just close them down and tell the workers to go home. The failure of a country generally implies that its people are living in miserable or sub-standard conditions.

As the leaders of nations increasingly see themselves as divorced from the general population, there has been an effort underway to erase the standards by which the success or failure of a nation is defined. What remains is two classes of people: the leadership class and the led.

The leadership class is the one that generally hogs the spotlight. They tend to eclipse the led - no matter how great their numbers - in the national narrative. Furthermore, the leadership class tends to stick together. They will echo each other’s excuses and tend to support a continuance of the status quo. The led, on the other hand, are often divided and thus unable to effectively affect the issues - corruption, ineptitude, shortages, oppression, etc. - confronting them.

This is why Madeleine Albright can go over to N. Korea, smile and toast the Dear Leader while his people are starving in labor camps. This is why Robert Mugabe can continue to live in a palace; why Chavez is able to close down radio stations; why Ahmadinejad can fire live ammunition at unarmed protesters; why Hu Jintao can keep political prisoners in jail without public accusation or trial; etc.

Tunisia was a big deal because it broke protocol. The ruling class(es) - especially in the Middle East - received a wake-up call, saying that a people united are perfectly capable of upsetting the apple cart.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Assassination Prohibition

China has actually been conducting military exercises with Russia (among others) under the auspices of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) as late as September of last year. It was labeled “Peace Mission 2010”.

During the exercise certain Russian deficiencies came to light. No doubt, Russia is in the process of rectifying these shortcomings. Russia and China do not mock each other publicly as both are openly mocking the U.S. Both know that POTUS Obama has withdrawn from the game at his own peril.

The signing of the START treaty was universally seen as a public humiliation of Obama and America. Obama knows this, but does not care. He is above geopolitics. He has his own agenda. So far, we can only guess what this agenda might consist of. We might assign naiveté to Obama; we might even assign incompetence. We might allow him to play out his utopian farce until a new man can take over in orderly fashion. Both Russia and China appear to be in agreement that it won’t hold together that long. Something will happen before Obama leaves office - it will likely be something our present president won’t know how to handle. In fact, they’re counting on it. Both are seeing to it that they are prepared.

Afterwards, it’ll be a new game.
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Ever since President Ford’s Executive Order# 11905 in 1976, the option of political assassination has been pretty much off the table. A subsequent EO in this regard (Carter’s EO# 12333) reiterated the assassination prohibition. President Reagan was the last president to address the topic. At the same time, he seemed to have no problem whatsoever in sending a lethal package right into Col. Kaddafi’s Tripoli tent, killing about 100 including Kaddafi’s fifteen month old daughter, Hana. I don’t imagine he would have lost much sleep had Muammar had been killed as well. Because no subsequent executive order or piece of legislation has repealed the prohibition, it remains in effect today.

It seems to me that all this smacks of a gross double standard: faceless grunt soldiers appear to be fair game, while those who sent them out to kill are off limits. Nowhere was this point brought home to me more forcefully than watching Madeleine Albright toasting the North Korean dictator, Kim Yong-Il, while much of his nation was starving in some bestial work camp. It showed me that there appears to be an understanding among the privileged that guarantees their continuance simply by being a member of some exclusive club.

This raises the issue of just who can be considered a ‘political target‘. What exactly constitutes the threshold of political leadership. Is the unelected Hu Jintao a legitimate leader? Is the fraudulent Karzai? Is Kim Yong-Il? Is Ahmadinejad? Chavez? Mugabe? Rush Limbaugh?

Certainly, North Korea and others have been giving us huge problems. They have threatened us and predicted our immanent downfall. They are at this very moment preparing our graves. Besides the basic unfairness of the two-tier class distinction all this implies, there are also practical aspects to consider. Did Kaddafi continue to give us much trouble after his tent was hit?

We know precisely where each one of these troublemakers lives. We knew exactly where Saddam Hussein spent his nights. Yet, we mobilized an invasion at great expense, killed a lot of people (including our own) and eventually arrived at the same result. Why go through all this?

All we’ve succeeded in doing is to ignite (perhaps) a million fuses, each singularly fixated on our death by a thousand cuts, when a single 'stitch in time' would have more than sufficed.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Back To Normal

All day long, the world’s eyes are on the president of the United States. He freezes up like a deer in the headlights. The problem is that he can conceive of only one enemy: the American people (whom he has over a barrel, to be sure). Give him that much.

Meanwhile, the Chinese are saying, “Dear Mr. Obama, what more do you want? Here, we’re giving you the little pervert on a silver platter. Grow a spine! Take charge of your country! Act like a frigging leader!”

Obama doesn’t budge. Obama freezes - like a deer in the headlights.

What will it take for the American president to act? A direct attack on the lower forty-eight? We can no longer be sure what he would do. We know now no ally is worth waking the American tiger at 3:55 in the morning. Israel is ripe for the picking; so is Taiwan. India - forget it…

What would Reagan do? Remember that missile he sent right to Kaddafi’s doorstep? I don’t remember the provocation. But it sure served to shut Kaddafi up for a good number of years - killed one of his kids (or wives), I can’t quite remember.

America! Please! Get your act together! Take out Il. You know where he lives. And, while you’re at it, take out Ahmadinejad, Chavez and the rest of the lunatics. Send them a love pat and quit fooling around with Americans’ jockeys. Do something useful for a change!

Osama is a phantom. Forget about him. He’ll whither and die on the memory vine once you decide to take a stand. Take out all the vermin you know exists. Sure, we’ll bitch and moan at the UN. So what? That’s what‘s expected of us.

Reign in all your human rights groups - you know, what's left of your supporters, the NGO’s, Hollywood, the Gorebots, etc. - the ones who know how to play the media so well. Get them to re-focus their narcissistic obsession. Get your women’s groups to condemn the Taliban with the same fervor with which they condemn your best and brightest. You’ll see how fast things change - back to normal.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Dilma Rouseff: The Most Powerful Woman in the World

Cathy pines for a forgotten era. It is woman who is now celebrated in all walks of life (except homemaker). Women dominate the political scene. They are heads of corporations and institutions. They are policemen, spokesmen, and Secretaries of State.

Every time a new exciting political star pops up, it is a woman - or so it appears. To me it seems contrived and calculated. Personally, I don’t ascribe to the bias that says women are smarter or more effective than men or vice versa. What is troubling is that we as a nation seem to have reached a consensus that gender affirmative action is the way to go. And I am not a supporter of affirmative action on any level.

My most fervent wish is to be proven wrong about everything. I could turn to reading the liberal blogs, but they are despairing as well (though not for the same reasons). We seem to be caught in an eternal twilight of general nausea. It’s as if the sun has decided to rise only barely above the horizon each day, leaving us in darkness for much of the time.

One of the most significant elections will be taking place in Brazil on October 3rd. Their current president (Luiz Inacio Lula) rose to power on the strength of his effectiveness as a union organizer. His rule can be described as having been center-left. It was significant in that he managed to allow market forces just enough space to breathe to vault the country to the stature of a rapidly emerging global player.

There was always a hint of trouble (for the U.S.) on this horizon however. An avowed leftist, he joined hands with the likes of Chavez, Erdogan and Ahmadinejad. The gap between rich and poor, though improving, continues to be enormous. The well-off in his nation live in constant fear of kidnapping and assassination. Should someone blow out a tire on some lonely road, it’s advised to keep moving rather than get out to change it. Reminds of what I’ve been told about stopping for red traffic lights in Philadelphia at night.

Brazil is under intense development. There is construction everywhere. The money for this has come not so much from taxes as from its abundant natural resources. Cronyism and corruption are suspected to be epic. The new capital (Brasilia/DF) is spacious and impressive. The long-term goal was to create a center where the elites make their homes. As such, those who comprise the service sector are in the process of being quietly moved out to satellite cities where poor-on-poor crime continues to be rampant. Brasilia was envisioned as an international oasis - a hub - for global powerbrokers to strike deals.

The person who is expected to win Brazil’s election is a woman (Dilma Rouseff) who has been carefully groomed by the current president. Though initially trailing in the polls, she has suddenly - some say unexpectedly - emerged as the candidate who will win easily. She is said to be an avowed Leftist and flamethrower. Her magic formula has been simply to say over and over again that she will help the poor. Because she is appears matronly, perhaps, people believe her.

Obama has seen the writing on the wall. He’s been doing everything he can to ingratiate himself with these people. They will not accept his overtures no matter how many concessions he is prepared to grant. They will continue to portray the U.S. as an adversary to rally the home folk; to blame things on when things go wrong. The same is true for dictators all over the world. They can rest easy now, knowing that the piñata has been cracked open; that America will no longer defend itself.

This leaves America’s (former) allies in the lurch. They must now scramble to coalesce around some nation, or band together as a group of the like-mind, that will not shirk the responsibility of fighting to maintain Western ideals. Much more likely though, they will find themselves pressured to abandon their principles in favor of protection.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Obama 2; Congress 0

Notch another victory for the Obama administration. Obviously, Congress has become dysfunctional to the point of irrelevance. The ‘change’ that Obama envisioned from the outset not only pertains to our nation’s fiscal health and social cohesion, it also involves our system of governance: elections; our two-party system, the Supreme Court, checks and balances; and all the rest. Clearly, Democrats have been cajoled into rubberstamping the president’s market basket, helping to push through deeply unpopular legislation - some say illegally - thus shattering the nexus between the voter and themselves. Washington is now seen as rogue. Voter view themselves as victims without recourse to traditional means of having a say in how their nation is run. As such Democrats are expected to reap the wrath of the electorate in November.

Republicans fare no better. They were content to stand by and watch Democrats literally hang themselves. Republicans are now eagerly awaiting their 15 minutes of fame in the shadow of the gallows, hoping (as JB suggests) to divide the spoils of majority among themselves. The problem is that there are no longer any spoils to divide. The nation is bankrupt. Republicans have stood by, licking their chops; and watched as America was being depleted of its essence. It now no longer matters who wins in November. A huge Republican landslide can only serve to animate talk TV and radio hosts who will find, as time goes by, that Obama will get his way no matter what; that the moment to actually have done something constructive has long since passed.

In a WSJ opinion piece today, L. Gordon Crovitz writes about Iran’s Ahmadinejad. He might just as well have been writing about Barack Hussein Obama. Crovitz begins: “There have been rogue leaders on the world stage before. In cases such as Hitler, Stalin and Mao, people were shocked to learn they actually meant what they said.“

Crovitz asks the question: “A leader who mocks all questions (and) is thumbing his nose at (the) core beliefs of our era, including that information wants to flow freely, and that no one is above this law of increasing openness - What to do with (such) an information pariah?”

Crovitz concludes: “In today’s world, a leader who consistently mocks, lies, (blame-shifts) and threatens deserves to be set apart. We no longer have the excuse of misunderstanding. We will (only) have ourselves to blame if (he)… achieves his ambition.”

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Running Out The Clock

I don’t believe this president is ‘running out the clock’. Only someone who feels he’s on the ropes will try to run out the clock - the boxer who has lost all confidence that he can defeat his opponent with a single decisive blow. POTUS is not there yet. He still has two more years. He’s done a lot already, perhaps more (legislatively) than any other president in history.

He’s also put in place a mechanism that will make America bleed for years yet to come. He has had to give in a little from time to time - at least verbally - to throw the hounds off his trail. But he will continue to do just what he has set out to do.

Ahmadinejad works the same way, mouthing petty lies now and then as to give the Russians and others cover for continuing to honor their agreements with him - financial, technical and otherwise. We all know he’s lying through his teeth, but it’s enough to placate those who are desperate to believe in the essential goodness of evil men.

In the meantime, the clock is running unimpeded, allowing the Hitler of Iran to have his nuclear arsenal and Obama his re-making of America into a Marxist Utopia.

The reason Obama has lost his magic is because he knows that a growing number of people have become dead certain of what it is he is doing. With each apparent capitulation, his argument grows weaker in the face of what’s continues to happen.

Summers and others are gone because they too have figured it out. There’s no chance of Obama’s policies working. There’s no chance of better times returning without changing course - ...unless, of course, the president intends exactly what is happening.

The media focuses on Velma Hart as someone capable of articulating exactly what it is that has America‘s panties in a knot. She is a rabid supporter of the Obama fiction and even she has doubts.

No doubt, the media want’s Obama to change course. They can see that what this administration has put in place has not worked. Their distaste of Republicans trumps all, however. They will never support Republicans. They need Obama to change course; adopt Republican policies if need be. Even this they can handle, like counting Iraq as one of Obama’s foreign policy successes, or counting ‘jobs saved’ as his domestic triumph.

Unlike Obama, The New York Times is not necessarily unpatriotic. It is simply pro-Democrat. It defines their hopelessly entrenched tradition. They would rather go out of print than portray Obama for what he truly is. Like Obama, they will double down when push comes to shove, even while precariously perched on a knife’s edge.

I realize that, like any man of a single physical body, Obama's personality oscillates between infinite poles. I realize it is simplistic - moronic even - to ascribe a single motive to any living man. I draw my conclusions (wrongly perhaps) from what I see. America is waning under this president, whatever the reason. To deny this is no reflection on Obama, perhaps; but it is a fact. Neither will Obama’s eventual electoral defeat solve the problem. This hydra has many heads, many of which combine to define very an essence within every living American soul. Even the most virtuous among us is afflicted. And it is there that we must ultimately find the cure.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Bashing the Tea Parties

Another day, another swipe at the Tea Parties to build up your lib creds - just in case the power of legitimized corruption wins this round. It’s easy to swipe at Tea Parties - just like it was easy to swipe at Bush. There is literally no down-side. You’re practically guaranteed a ring-side seat while Mom & Pop America are being drawn-and-quartered publicly.

I didn’t even want to reply to this one. I don’t think it deserves a reply. Like I said, it’s too easy and not worthy of your talents - which may well be considerable. Besides, it’s not true. And, oh yeah, you’ll get your 30-40 comments. Whoopee! Much more of this and the JBS website will begin to approximate tumbleweeds; crickets and The New York Times.

You’re right, of course: I had a tough time explaining Tea Parties to Raman over coffee last week. I’m not sure I was able to convince him. He didn’t believe me about POTUS either. Why should he? All the Americans over here are big time libs; the papers are communist; the mayor’s name is Stalin. The principal meeting place is the Russian Cultural Center. The American Consulate is a fortress. I’m lucky Ram didn’t strike me from the mailing list.

No downside should the Tea Parties win out either. You know very well they’re not about reparations or revenge. And that, admittedly, may be a failing. A little fright night thrown into the mix wouldn’t hurt at this point.

Nothing like if the ACORN types should win out in the end. Or Erdogan. Or that little Hitler in your ancestral place. They’d surely see to it that you and me, along with everybody else, 'd have our asses in a sling. Like if the Palestinians should prevail over Israel; or AQ over everybody too fat to wear a belt.

What’s got you so upset at the Tea Parties anyway? Is it because you think that because of their civilized ways they can’t win? This could be true - but still, siding with the likely winners of this contest is not a principled stand. Remind that principle is all that some of us got left in this country.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/

Straw Dogs

What must be kept in mind is that what Obama says and what he does are two different things. In this way he resembles Ahmadinejad (who, by the way, shares the same country of birth with Valerie Jarrett). He even says one thing to one group and something else to another.

Obama knows that saying something positive about business, for instance, will get picked up and be blown out of proportion by the press to give the impression that a major new initiative is in the offing. This then serves to call off the dogs for a while in which time Obama/Ahmadinejad continue to do exactly as they want.

We all know very well what Obama/Ahmadinejad want. We just don’t want to believe it. We will literally grasp at straws to keep from believing it. And Obama/Ahmadinejad are well acquainted with straw, and the dogs they continue to fashion with it.

http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/
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Since people have asked, the above scene in the header represents the Shore Temple in Mamallapuram (formerly Mahabalipuram) in South India. It is the only temple of its kind remaining, a number of others having been claimed by the sea. It is a mere 50 km from where I sit in the hub of an extremely busy urban environment. We escape to there often on weekends, simply to chill.

Tanning Salons Be Damned

Logic tells us that Ahmadinejad has lots to fear. The same is true of Barack Hussein Obama. Obama is losing his base; alienating his opposition even further, and causing such a stir that has even the disinterested now scratching their heads. Will he moderate his stance; adjust course? No. He will press ahead with his agenda; he will double-down with the full force of his office in support. He will scatter the corrupt seed - his empty words - here and there, and those starving for truth and hope will momentarily be held off only to find that those seeds will not sprout. Yet, it will give him a precious moment to re-group in his stony desert garden, pass another (empty shell) bill with a promising name that his cabal of insurgents can define later and spin into a noose.

Is he frightened? Perhaps a little. But he is a man possessed. He sees himself as historic; a man with a mission. He would readily sacrifice himself, his family, his nation for the improbable vision he holds so dear. His fear is but a speed bump, a mere annoyance, a paper cut. There are enough urging him on; telling him he is right, that he must do more, faster.

Obama, like Ahmadinejad, represents just a sliver of the population that continues to assure him that their cause is just. As such, he lives in an impenetrable bubble of assent. All others - no matter how great their numbers - are infidels who must be brought to heel or be killed. Truth absent, there is no argument, no compromise. The time is at hand to act.

Remaking a nation is no small task. Obama cannot lose faith. The time may never come again for the possibility of a mosque at Ground Zero to even be worthy of contemplation. He is cutting against the grain. The pain he may feel, to him is ecstasy; it is the pain of birth. He is not immune to doubt or suffering. He views these as the price of justice. He cannot conceive of suffering in any other context than wrenching his own into the sun, even if by his own actions that self-same sun should turn blood red in defiance of folly. Tanning salons and democracy be damned.

Slouching Towards Serfdom

The lasting legacy, I fear, from this, loosely referred to as the Obama administration, will not be from oil gushing into the Gulf; from value evaporating from our paper currency; from American influence eroding abroad – all of which can be reversed and made to look whole again. Instead, it is the abrasion of (our) trust in elected officials.

There was a hint of it already back in the Bush administration when some people insisted that 9/11 as well as the aftermath of Katrina were part and parcel due to Bush’s evil designs: the first to provide Bush-Cheney with an excuse to invade Iraq; the second, because both men hated blacks.

The concept of the possibility of a rogue government was now out there. Clinton supporters (or even Clinton himself) enhanced its legitimacy in the political realm when they lamented that 9/11 happened during Bush’s tenure. If it had happened when Bill was in office, he could have been a great president.

“Disaster” as political tool to advance policy objectives and to strike crippling blows at the opposition was already well rehearsed by the time Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the United States. Some even claim that the pre-election fiscal meltdown was instrumental to Obama’s installation. Rahm Emanuel emblazoned the concept into the national dialogue by dropping all pretence with his “Never let a crisis go to waste” comment.

Here we are now, wondering why the oil continues to spill; why there are an ever growing number of victims? The suspicion is that, even if it wasn’t sabotage, why is it taking so long (to plug the hole)? Clearly, the outlines of a solution are beginning to emerge: The policy objective of choking off America’s energy supply seems to be gathering steam; the prospect of a large pool of money for the federal government to waste on unprofitable ventures looms large, as does the demonization of Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Nuclear, paving the way for yet another government takedown and thrusting another huge number of people onto the welfare rolls.

All this talk about Obama feeling dispirited and actively thinking of voluntarily forgoing a second term is just that: talk. Barack Hussein Obama is doing just fine (at our expense, I might add). In short order, we can expect the private sector to be just that: private Obama. We’ll all, in one way or another, be working for him. We will live or die as he decides. He will elevate those who support him, while those of us who do not will find the yoke becoming ever tighter; the load ever heavier.

We are seeing the birth of a Chavez-style total socialist takeover. Even with the systems he himself has installed failing on all fronts, I don’t see Chavez in political trouble. Castro has managed to hold on for decades. Don’t think it’s because the people are particularly enamored of them. Ditto, Kim Jong-Il; Ahmadinejad; Mugabe; etc.

We are well along on a similar path, even with a Congress of elected, essentially rubberstamp officials standing in whispered opposition. And yet, the country on the whole is continuing to say, “It can’t happen here” – like a diabetic progressing through the stages of his irreversible disease. It has happened!

'Disasters' have become political bots to keep us in line and make us depended on the good graces of whoever has the audacity to declare himself king. Don’t tell me bots don’t work. They work just fine. Bots are but tools, the extensions of human hands. Unless we begin thinking critically, we openly embrace the prospect of serfdom.

Tehran Won't Have to Lift a Finger

Even Israel’s ‘friends’ are now blaming Israel for what happened. It’s spirit broken, Israel is even blaming itself. The whole thing amounted to a huge victory for Israel’s enemies. It reminds us of how during the Iraq war every suicide attack – every death - was blamed on the U.S. At home, Democrats made sure that every American casualty accrued to Bush personally. The networks made it their business to keep a careful daily count. It is a tactic that makes it impossible for an enemy to lose.

In America, there were huge consequences. It is what brought Barack Hussein Obama - an avowed vocal critic of western values - to power. It inspired the re-write of history. It helped create a core of opposition to everything American within America itself.

In Israel, the tactic succeeds in isolating the country and making it into a pariah state. Israel is now primed for a huge military defeat. It can do nothing to help itself. Like a rat in a corner it can only bite a finger or two in anticipation of the final blow. Facts no longer matter. Nobody will ride to Israel’s rescue amidst the cheering of the bloodthirsty crowd.

Erdogan knows this. He is determined to save his nation. He will not allow himself to be caught on the losing side. His actions are designed to ingratiate himself to the Ummah. For far too long Ankara has been playing footsie with Europe to no avail. Turkey has watched both Europe and America fading in power and influence. He knows that the center of the western-style secular state has been hollowed out and cannot hold. In order for his own nation to survive, it became essential that it forge links with the strong men of the world. Currently, Tehran and Brasilia look strong.

For Turkey’s past association with the West to be forgiven, Ankara must bring something to the table. Israel is the scalp Turkey is hoping to deliver to Ahmadinejad, the Kurtz of the Middle East. Obama has been trying to do the same. As America’s influence continues to erode, you will see every nation comprising the Ummah and beyond coming forward to enthusiastically participate in this project. Tehran will not have to lift a finger.

Brutality

This morning the front pages of newspapers are all decked out with men hugging, clasping hands, and smiling broadly. The men were Tehran’s Ahmadinejad, Brasilia’s lame duck Lula, and the rising star of the Islamic world, Ankara’s Erdogan. I would think that Harare’s Mugabe, Caracas’ Chavez and Pyongyang’s Kim Jong-Il were smiling as well, only they likely couldn’t scrape enough money together to make the trip. It’s always good to see the world’s leaders smiling. It says that the rest of us will yet get to see another sunrise or two.

The occasion, of course, was to celebrate the successful diplomatic effort that allows Iran to proceed with its nuclear ambitions while at the same time satisfying UN demands to do so with outside participation. Notably absent from the merry-making was our own illustrious president, Barack Hussein Obama, who had proposed a similar roadmap only last October which Tehran promptly rejected outright and which was then left to languish in the ‘open’ file.

So much for Obama’s outreach to America’s enemies. He does not appear to understand that these have now recognized America as a toothless tiger, and that it remains in their best interest to maintain the fiction of casting us as a worthy opponent despite our having offered our unclenched fist, and made known in no uncertain terms our endless willingness to grovel.

Netanyahu will now be forced to act as he sees himself cornered. We have already fully exposed our bias against him. He knows Israel is being set up as the next domino to fall in Tehran’s bid to establish its hegemony over the entire Middle East and East Asia.

The larger lesson to be learned from this is that the dollar is no longer the dominant currency governing geo-political adventurism; that it has now been replaced by brutality. It is now clear that all those whose primary concerns are centered on tolerance, freedom, ecological purity, democratic participation, human rights, racial and gender equality, etc. have drawn the short straw. From now on we can expect the crane hooks to be wheeled back out into the market square - the knives sharpened, the holes dug, the stones at the ready - to signal the perhaps less-than-optimistic start of oppression, enslavement, feudalism, arbitrary law enforcement, threats and coercion. The death of the dollar means that economic laws have failed; that sharia – which in itself is a throwback to Hammurabi’s Code – is now back in style.

How much Obama had wanted to be a part of this deal! Instead he’s been left on the outside, looking in. What else can a poor man do? He’s already driven a wooden stake through our economy. He’s already succeeded in perverting the functioning of our constitutional republic. He’s already managed to beggar his constituents. What more indeed!

We can be certain that he’ll think of something. His only real enemy is the American people themselves. It is they who will bear the brunt of his frustrated flailing. Obama has been described as a racialist. It’s not a good time to be born white in America – or black for that matter. Zimbabwe is the model for what can happen. Once it was the bread basket of Africa. But that wasn’t good enough. Now its people are starving.

Ahmadinejad Never Wears a Tie

Were it that easy; to simply write a wish list and consider it done. Bush had the chance to wash his hands. Saddam Hussein was toppled. “Mission Accomplished.” Yet, he did not walk away. Saddam Hussein Obama (if we can take his word) will walk away after - what? After the stars have aligned in a certain way? Just before U.S. presidential elections? After Iraqi election results have managed to establish some sort of pecking order in the new kleptocracy?

Eighty parties, each one sporting a fax machine; six thousand candidates? We have enough on our plates with only two and six. And even in the relative simplicity of our own civic exercise we have been getting it wrong.

I see no reason for hope in Iraq. The election process there could have been simplified by handing out blindfolds and darts. The name of the game is ‘Pin the Tail on the Donkey”. Children can do it. Anyone can win. The result is never merit based.

I attended a concert by the middle schoolers of a prestigious private academy at one of our local churches last week. It featured a boys’ choir, a girls’ choir and string ensemble. What struck me was that 80% of the of the string ensemble was comprised of Asians. They were also very good. The choirs were only fair to middlin’, made up of what you’d expect: white, upper middle class kids. They sang without enthusiasm. They seemed strictly ‘affirmative action’.

I took note that Iraq’s affirmative action candidates wore (what Indians would refer to as) their ‘monkey suits’ as targets. Has anyone ever noticed that Ahmadinejad never wears a tie?

Kissing Cousins

Today, the similarities between Barack Hussein Obama and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are striking. Both men are ideologically driven; neither has the support of his people; and each one has vowed to ram through his agenda despite the lack of wider support. As such, both men see themselves as greater than consensus, and uniquely chosen – one by God, the other by history – to single handedly usher in the next new age that, according to each, has been denied to mankind by the evil it commits or condones.

Obama took no exception at being labeled the ‘messiah’ while he was running for office. He gave no indication that he thought some of his more ardent supporters might be wrong when they claimed that he could walk on water. It’s not as if he gently deflected their clearly premature adulation as Jesus did, saying, “You say so.” No, he donned the multi-colored mantle and paraded it proudly before a world audience, ecstatic and smiling. And he came to believe that his mere presence would automatically realize any ‘what ifs’ he had memorized from the wish lists of his leftist university mentors.

Ahmadinejad too is a product of his nation’s increasingly insular elite. He was schooled in Islamic Bible stories. As Allah is said to be stern, ruthless and without mercy, Ahmadinejad too has become a reflection of the god he both loves and fears.

Both leaders have their backs to the wall. Neither one can countenance compromise. Indeed, neither one respects others enough to give them a fair hearing. Ahmadinejad brutalizes his opposition while Obama belittles his. This cannot end well.

What did the Fuehrer do when the war appeared lost; when more and more of his own generals began to plot against him? He doubled down and took increasingly more reckless chances. “The German people have failed me,” he was said to have declared before taking his own life. In his own mind he could never hold himself personally responsible for the eternal shame he had brought to his nation.

Similarly, both Obama and Ahmadinejad will never yield. They will do whatever it takes to force the foot into the glass slipper. Even after the carriage has turned into a pumpkin, they will still be desperately trying to crush bone and hack off toes. I predict, they’ll have to be physically pried away from the sharp-edged illusions that grip them.

Democrats are not stupid. They can see where it’s going. The party is imploding. They are trying to put as much distance as possible between themselves and the bomb. Unlike Obama, they still envision that the nation can survive the blast and float into some safe harbor for repairs.

The GOP is Toast

So too, the Dems (in this country) will collapse 'from the top'. Already we see the fault lines emerging between those who want to moderate and those who want to radicalize even more. The danger is that the radicals will win; that they will come to recognize the instability within their own ranks and resort to fascism.

It’s odd, that the party that Bill Clinton effectively hollowed out to the point of permitting the “hate America first” crowd to take it over, today seems more alive than the GOP. As I see it, the Republicans are completely shut out of the political process well into the next century.

Both, JB and Arlen Specter know the GOP is effectively barred from regaining power forever. Both have mapped out survival strategies for themselves. Republicans have sealed their fate by refusing to fight (and refusing to lead when they were winning). Only their most viscous supporters think they will be able to simply waltz in after declaring America’s experiment with socialism a failure.

Ahmadinejad too may be failing his people in many critical areas, but I don’t see his opposition in the position of ever coming forward and turning things around.