'Mona Bone Jakon'

Seems like Monday morning quarterbacking; trying to figure out what happened in Sunday's game. Team Obama is wondering how the underdogs were able to get past their defenses and score (big).

On the (flat) gridiron each team has an even chance; on the diamond, the team that goes second gets last dibs; on the track, the better horses are sometimes physically handicapped (by adding weights to their saddles); in golf... We understand all that. But this here is not a game, Mr. President. This is not about being fair. This is about winning the war against Islamic terror (which you claim doesn't exist).

If we can agree, though, that this is a war against al-Qaeda (as you now claim), know that al-Qaeda has no single banner to signify a particular region. Members can be found anywhere and everywhere. Only their target is specific: Israel, America, and anybody who does not wholeheartedly and openly advocate for Israel’s total destruction.

Democrats have put so much stock in thought crime legislation over the years. It is no longer enough to kill somebody to qualify for punishment. No, you must also shout hateful epithets while you are doing it (and you must either admit to it, or someone must have heard you). I’m sure they’re already working on trying to figure out how to punish someone in advance of the crime; i.e., on evidence of hateful thoughts alone. It was on that basis returning war veterans, pro-lifers and others were targeted by Homeland Security last year. Just because they were laughed out of the room does not mean they’ve forgotten what they meant by it.

Barack Hussein Obama finally admitted that we are engaged in a war. It is not a war he feels comfortable in fighting. Quite frankly, he would much rather engage in fighting Republicans, white people, rich people, accomplished people… (We’ve been over this list far too often before. I agree it has all the earmarks of ‘forever’ and would give anyone who is not Obama a thin line to tread. In fact, anyone in Yemen or anywhere in the Middle East, except Israel, may have a better chance of escaping Obama’s contempt than just plain, ordinary, garden variety Americans).

Be that as it may; the question arises, why don’t we apply hate (or thought) crime legislation to the various plotters, bombers, inciters, supporters, battlefield captives, etc.; then we could be certain of quick conviction and an appropriately satisfying, maximum penalty to be carried out with all pomp and circumstance. Let’s at the same time perfect our ability to discern the guilty thought before the actual crime can occur (as the Democrats claim they are on the verge of being able to do) and we would surely be sitting on top of the world. No one could hurt us - except we ourselves. …and that is precisely why it’s not on this president’s agenda.

Getting back to how we could have missed it – let the panty bomber on the Detroit bound plane in the first place despite so many clues - allow me to relate a personal story: I must admit to being a huge fan of Cat Stevens. At some point I found myself wandering around 'Landmark Books' at Citi Centre Mall in Chennai. I noticed a Cat Stevens CD on the shelf; one, ‘Mona Bone Jakon’, that seemed to have escaped my attention. I bought it and brought it home. There I tried to listen to it. I soon gave up, trying to figure out how this CD could be so bone-crushingly bad. It was only then that I noted the picture of a garbage can on the cover.

People Starving in Africa

It seems the press is forever caught flat-footed. During most of the Bush administration, major media types practically wore out the once legitimate word, 'unexpected'. Every positive development (and there were many) re the economy was 'unexpected' - the subtext, of course, being always the same: How can things be going so well with an absolute moron in the White House?

Now with Obama safely ensconced and wielding ultimate power, the press still hasn't been cleared to jettison the word 'unexpected'. Every measurable weekly, monthly, quarterly tally since Obama took office is cratering, obvious proof of a systemic failure in government policy. It is consistently reported as 'unexpected' – subtext, again, being: How can economic data be so dismal with our boy genius in the White House?

It’s an interesting tactic by the White House to blame everything on people who would want the POTUS to look bad. This sets up all kinds of possibilities for Obama: War against talk radio; internet; bloggers; returning veterans of foreign (lost) wars, legal immigrants; tea party revelers; emigrants; people with money, people with jobs, people with families; meat eaters; accomplished people; people with talent; private sector people; anybody even a smidgeon to the right of Karl Marx; non-union people; people who exhale more than their allotted share of CO2; etc.

There is of course the lingering possibility – gaining in credibility every time Congress meets with the president’s blessing – that what we view as failure, he views as success. After the back of the Great Satan is broken, who will take credit; who’ll get the blame? It’ll be interesting to see how the greatest train wreck in human history will be evaluated after everything is said and done.

This puts me in mind of the very first lie I was subjected to as a child. “Clean your plate,” I was told. “There are people starving in Africa.”. It was a veiled threat by which I was made to feel somehow guilty. Today I know that the lack of food in Africa or anywhere was not because I might have eaten more (or less) than my share, but because food in the affected areas was used as a weapon by ruthless dictators who wanted to keep their populations in check.

Give us...

Obama, like the panty bomber, also thought he'd never have to deal with any of this. He thought that when he became president everyone around the world would immediately and happily join his fan club. That, at any rate, was what he was told would happen. It’s the 72 virgins promise tailored to entice disgruntled Americans. It is what progressives believe - and narcissists, who insist the world turns solely around them; that even if unintentional evil should (God forbid) happen, they themselves are responsible, through careless oversight of subordinates. Get out the sackcloth; the seeds and sprouts. Return to the Puritan ways of no joy.

The rest of the world, after all, is pure as the driven snow. The fault is likely to extend to the rest of the clan that would include everyone who poses no threat. It is they who can be heroically manipulated without risk. It is they who will obediently crouch atop the stone slab to be bled.

Beyond the clan, only appeasement works: the offering of the first-born; the most beautiful; one's most valuable; a fine blond scalp; the sacrificial blood of one's own. It's the Chicago way of gang initiation: a permanent scar, a tattoo, a finger; it's LA, Brooklyn, Camden (NJ); it's south of the border, throughout most of Central and Latin America; it's tribal, winner takes all; winner makes the rules; winner is drunk with power - finds himself trapped within 'the heart of darkness'; Kutz, Hitler, Ahmadinejad, Mugabe, Chavez... four of nine muses (plus one) with Pegasus.

Poor POTUS; really thought he had the ticket and was willing to shell out all he had for the glory of having brought the white man’s system to its knees; that white house with the pillars on the National Mall for eternity. (“Barack won’t allow you to go back…”) He can't understand why his natural allies are all laughing at him. ‘I'm one of you!’ he pleads. ‘You are not. You are a pretender, and a traitor to boot. You must give us much more to prove your worthiness.' ‘Give us Israel!’ shout the Arabs. ‘Give us Taiwan!’ shout the Chinese. South Korea, Kashmir... ‘Give us the wealth of your own nation on a platter of finely crushed skulls. Give us your people so we might enslave them - and maybe, just maybe, we will let you live.’

Whistling Past the Graveyard

John Brennan, it seems, is in charge of Washington's war of words on the terror front. It is both a hopeful and disturbing clue as the current administration continues to reveal itself. It is hopeful insofar as the administration appears content not to fundamentally change anything and to just use different words to talk about it. If this assessment holds true for every other initiative Obama has promised, we can be reasonably confident that a future administration will find a way to reverse any resulting damage relatively easily. It is also disturbing in that verbiage alone seldom changes the fundamental nature of a problem. Thinking it does, would rather serve as a lethal diversion at the very time when the world does not stop (rushing into a vacuum) and actual events threaten to overtake us.

A similar problem exists with Republicans. They smugly feel they must do nothing as the Obama administration happily implodes. ‘Nothing’ is static; everything else is dynamic and requires us to be on our toes at all times to be able to react and anticipate appropriately. The world is one of action where elbows are constantly in motion for the purpose of cutting in line. I said 'elbows', not 'words'. Words are not heard when everybody's shouting. Refusing to elbow assures one of being last in the queue (which could easily translate into much worse than lost time). ”Sorry, we just ran out.”

We run a high risk by being unwilling or unable to engage. Any working system requires a constant flow of energy to maintain its momentum. Otherwise, entropy sets in and the system winds down and dies. Words alone, though they do no harm, cannot provide the energy needed to sustain it. Otherwise we could do away with eating and subsist just on talking alone. There is, of course, an additional danger in talking too much. Words can hamstring legitimate processes to the point of kindling cancers - which, again, atrophies elbows.

So far, most of us have assumed that Barack Hussein Obama’s veil of words does nothing but attempt to hide ineptness. It allows us to ignore Obama’s elbows. We have basically never come to terms with the reality that the office of the POTUS is a powerful post; that its power could some day be used against us. Today, every one of us who gripes and complains with varying degrees of aplomb and cheerfulness is merely ‘whistling past the graveyard’. This was especially true during the Bush administration. It brought us Obama. “Buffoon” still remains the all-time favorite in our lexicon of expressions relating to our government. As “Marxist stooge” begins to vie for second place, it is perhaps time for us to begin asking where we might have gone wrong.

Best Intentions

>...(a) myriad jihadi movements, all having the same strategic objective of humiliating the US, destroying Israel and forming an Islamic Caliphate.<

BAHUKUTUMBI RAMAN builds a convincing case that our assumptions re Al-Qaeda may not necessarily be right. One of these, however, is dead-on and cannot be disputed: 'destroy Israel'. From there follows, ' humiliating the U.S.', because we are there, conspicuously protecting Israel. Whether the desire to cleanse the region of Israel constitutes the fulfillment of religious prophecy (to establish an Islamic Caliphate) or merely to allow regional players to determine their own political destiny – Tehran vs. Riyadh; Sunni vs. Shiite; etc. – without what is seen as undue outside interference, holds little relevance to the argument (except for the bloviating class).

My guess (as one who has been known to bloviate) it’s the latter rather than the former. Israel has been an irritant in the Middle East since its formation. Irritants, in the eye for example, demand immediate removal of the foreign object. Any delay in treatment invites infection which may spread and ultimately result in the loss of the eye. There can be little doubt that the fact that the U.S. has doggedly worked to protect and sustain the Jewish State in the midst of an overwhelmingly Islamic region has affected U.S.-Arab relations adversely.

No peoples of any region take kindly to interlopers. Peaceful, tolerant, neutral Switzerland recently voted to ban the building of additional mosques. (There are four so far.) We here in the U.S. have aptly demonstrated that we too do not take kindly to having alien influences shoved down our throats and that we are prepared to fight to keep it from happening.

I am not suggesting that we abandon Israel. The moment we (the U.S.) decided to advocate for Israel’s right to exist, we committed ourselves to getting it done. When our parents give us the money to enroll in a college or university program, it is understood that we will do our utmost to graduate. It’s the same with a nation publicly committing itself to anything: going to the moon; tackling terrorism; nation building; eliminating poverty, crime, ignorance; finding cures for diseases; etc. No less than that nation’s credibility is on the line. It must be done wholeheartedly, seriously, and with the expectation of succeeding.

We are failing in many of the goals we have set out for ourselves. No doubt, there have been set-backs. And it’s time to ask why. Perhaps we’re over-extended. Perhaps promises we’ve made in the past are no longer enforceable. Perhaps conditions have changed. Perhaps what had initially come under the header of ‘good intention’ has morphed into something else: extortion, perhaps, of which we now find ourselves to be the victim. Perhaps we need to reset and re-calculate where we stand. Perhaps we need to assess our weaknesses going forward. Perhaps there are battles that need to be put to rest – one way or another. Perhaps we should refrain from adding to our obligations for a while.

Have we become overwhelmed by our own ‘good intentions’? Have we bitten off more than we can chew? Or are we being sabotaged by a clever enemy who knows how to fight us in our own houses by turning our own weapons against us – an enemy who knows precisely how to overload our systems; overwhelm our capacities; create confusion and distrust and leave us at the mercy of silver-tongued tyrants?

The Clinton Legacy

I am just now beginning to see how the Bush presidency was doomed from the start. My clue came in an off-hand remark made by my wife. “Clinton was the one who damaged America’s standing in the world,” she said. This had never occurred to me, especially since he is routinely held up as the gold standard of American politics by the mainstream media. Yet, what he did - what he will forever be known for - was so outrageous; it blindsided everyone. Any corporation executive, anywhere in the world, could not have survived a similar situation ten minutes. Any self-respecting wife would have walked away. Any court would have been justified in sending Bubba to prison.

None of this happened. Republicans were too cowardly to act. Those assigned to the matter were ceaselessly attacked. Meanwhile the Clinton spin machine went into overdrive, besmirching America’s founders one by one. “See, what Bubba did wasn’t so bad” went the drumbeat day in and day out on the front pages of newspapers and on network TV. It went on for years; the public felt hurt and humiliated; ashamed that the man, in whom they had placed their trust, would act like a cad. They felt sorry for his wife and especially for his daughter. Eventually everyone would get tired of this sordid business and tried to pretend it never happened – just like they do now with respect to 9/11.

The entire world watched in disbelief as Bill Clinton continued to be defended by his party. The effort continued throughout the Bush/Cheney years: In order to excuse the inexcusable, the man who would come after (Bush) had to be destroyed. It was the only chance the Clinton legacy (as well as the Democrat party) would ever have for redemption.

Selected, Not Elected

The weather, certainly, is not cooperating. I've taken note of the apologists. Could it be that it was only the sin of poorly chosen words that brought 'global warming' down? Could new verbiage resurrect the issue?

At one time, a significant number of breadwinners in our town worked for Bell Labs which would subsequently morph into Lucent, and then into Lucent-Alcatel. The grounds and the old buildings are unique and magnificent. The lobby has been nicknamed the ‘Darth Vader Building' because of its helmet-like roof. Inside it’s palatial, in the art deco style. Sadly, the place looks increasingly deserted.

Bell Labs in its heyday built the satellites that were launched in response to Sputnik. Its brain trust was legendary. This industrial complex was singularly responsible for the development and upkeep of at least three suburban towns. When I bought their stock, I honestly thought it couldn’t go any lower. I thought, by the sheer power of the good will and wishes of the three communities the fortunes of the company were sure to turn around. All it needed was good faith and time. Today, my investment is worth one-tenth what I paid for it. Naturally, I never sold. Visually alone, the edifice seems too big to fail.

The Left too has bet heavily on the ‘global warming’ hoax. They didn’t know it was a hoax, of course. They thought of it as just another justification for imposing their ideology on the rest of us. Even now that the whole thing has been exposed as a fraud, they are still unwilling to let it go. They’re ignoring the damning revelations and pretending it never happened. They’ve had considerable support from the media of course.

As the goal of the Left is to completely re-make America into a communist Utopia, they had hoped to forestall or even avoid the obligatory revolution with the ‘global warming’ gambit. People, they thought, would be quite willing to go along with having to cede their property and liberty to the State if it meant saving the planet from certain destruction. That fig leaf is now gone. The revolution, when it comes, is apt to be the old-fashioned kind; one, in which heads roll.

The Left is hoping it will have built up enough resources to end up on top after the dust has settled. One thing is for certain; their final thrust must come soon. With Barack Hussein Obama in office and Democrats controlling both legislatures, there might never be another chance to set the whole thing in motion. It must happen now and it must be for keeps.

Should the ‘global warming’ ploy fail spectacularly, there are other irons in the fire. The amputation will proceed, but now quite possibly without anesthetic. The single most useful event is for the American economy to collapse. There might also be an international incident requiring lock-downs at home. There might be domestic uprisings by obstinate citizens (or it could be made to look that way) that could postpone or cancel elections. There could be election fraud so audacious that no one would dare question it. Why would you think our elected representatives appear no longer to respond to our wishes? While we shout ourselves dry, threatening to turn them out of office, why do they seem so unconcerned? Could it be they know something we don’t?

Who will remain to question what the dictator wants after tongues have been surgically removed by government health care workers? Who will dare to go up against Him? Who would be brave enough to stand up and say, “I was intimidated at the polls.” Who would complain about a slate of loser opposition candidates? The words for the election ruse already exist: ‘selected not elected’. It didn’t stop Bush (or Karzai). You can bet the farm, it won’t stop Obama.