President Obama addressed the UN today (September 28, 2015) using irony against Russia, for its actions in the Crimea and in Syria. During his speech he castigated "certain major powers (that) want to ignore international rules and impose order through force of military action". The New York Times (today) always selective regarding any embarrassing revelations or major USA blunders apparently failed to report the cacophony of tongue clicks and snickering which must certainly have come from the UN representatives and the observation gallery when they heard this remark. Well perhaps it wasn't irony. Did Obama really mean it? How could his speech writers put such drivel in his mouth? Was it not the USA which invaded Iraq under false pretenses! with no provocation? Our President, to his credit, did claim some USA responsibility for the chaos in Iraq and Syria, later in his speech.
However, he is still being outflanked by Mr. Putin in Syria. Mr. Putin has offered a sensible and logical approach to the Syria tragedy. The Russian PM (who wisely enlisted Iraq, and Iran into his plan) has suggested that the US join with Russia to aid the Assad government (the only legitiamate governmental entity) and its military to defeat ISIS. The Obama plan of ad hoc air attacks alone..is not working. Nor is his $500 million dollar plan to train carefully vetted Syrian fighters. That plan has been revealed to have cost $100 million dollars per soldier! This is probably the highest military training costs ever recorded in human history.
The Putin plan is certainly the first logical step in solving the political problems of a fraying, chaotic Syria-and a fragmenting Iraq. Both nations are spewing desperate, pathetic refugees onto the west trending byways and roads of Europe causing economic and social,unrest in those places too. Putin's strategy would alleviate that problem as well. Mr. Obama is a logical man, who probably knows Putin's approach has the greatest possibility of ultimate success. But our President seems unable or unwilling to make that jump into a political abyss. He would be literally crucified by our dysfunctional ideologically hide-bound Congress. Mr. Obama's hands are tied by our non- functioning system. So he makes speeches and Mr. Putin moves his pieces over the chessboard.
Monday, September 28, 2015
Thursday, September 24, 2015
WALKER WALKS: GOOD RIDDANCE AND TO MR. POTTER $$
SCOTT WALKER WALKS
Good riddance to a candidate bought and paid for by the "Mr.Potters" of our time. Walker's passing may have one good result..exposing the misuse of sinister "Potter-money" in our campaigns.
The media response to Governor Walker's exit from the Presidential race on September 21, 2015 (such as that posted in the NY Times) attribute his poor showing and rapid demise to the rise of anti-establishment candidates, such as Donald Trump and Carly Fiorina. The truth is that Walker was simply a weak and malleable candidate artificially supported from behind by affluent, powerful elites. Walker was plagued with gaffes. At his resignation speech, Walker, seemingly determined not to change course from a string of silly ideas, blunders, and faux pas--like building a 5000 mile Canadian boundary fence---ended his campaign on the unbelievable claim that he was quitting the race to "to help the party unite" against Donald Trump.
Mr. Walker's performance as a national candidate,from the time of Fox News debate on August 6, to his "I will 'suspend' my campaign" speech of yesterday, proved he was not ready for national office. His rise and ignoble fall also revealed how damaging the post-Citizen United, system of funding political elections is to both our state government and national elections. Mr. Walker as a young, ambitious rising politician plotted and schemed to attract the attention and financial largess of powerful out of state funders, whose political agenda and script he slavishly followed. He sacrificed the well-being of his state's citizenry to the rigid ideology of his reactionary masters and to his own political ambitions as he led his state into years of political turmoi, tumultuous recall-elections and economic uncertainty. Thankfully, he was exposed as a "tool" of the Koch Brothers machinery in the crucible of the first few months of the national campaign. That revelation and his own weaknesses were what actually caused his rapid decline in the polls, not his competition.
Walker was such a lackluster, ineffective candidate it is painful to contemplate his return to his old office in Wisconsin. However, one idea does buoy my spirit. As a result of Mr. Walker's poor showing on the national stage he is now useless to his former pay masters. Walker can no longer serve as the "poster boy" for radical experiments in voodoo economics of the far-right oligarchs. The affluent political funders will have little incentive to answer a call for financial support from the Governor's office in Madison. Walker is certainly cut off from that lucrative money source in his next election. The out-of-state right wing ideologues who provided the 7-1 monetary advantage in his three Wisconsin elections have abandoned him. Now he will have to face the voters, citizens, union members, teachers, librarians, police, firemen, and others of Wisconsin, whose incomes and economic well-being he sacrificed on the alter of his political ambitions on his own. I am confident these groups will evaluate Mr. Walker again, and without the benefit of his secret supporters. Perhaps the elder statesmen and women of the State of Wisconsin may even wish to reconsider a new recall election. Walker is now a very vulnerable GOP governor.
I suspect the ashen face and sad demeanor (the NY Times reported) that Governor Walker exhibited at his parting speech, was due more to anxiety concerning his future--rather than disappointment. Who will support his candidacy in his next state election? As a result, I think we will not hear much more from Mr. Walker, and that is good for Wisconsin and the nation too. As for the attempts at controlling elections and candidates by the sinister "Mr Potters"(recall the Lionel Barrymore's character in "It's Wonderful Life")of our post-Citizen's United political world, perhaps, Mr. Walker's one claim to some positive act for our struggling nation may be that his failed candidacy will underscore the chilling impact the "Mr.Potters" of our day have on our democracy. And the hope that such exposure to the cleansing light will engender a reaction by an enraged public from both the left and right to limit the ability of the Potters of our day to undermine our democracy.
Good riddance to a candidate bought and paid for by the "Mr.Potters" of our time. Walker's passing may have one good result..exposing the misuse of sinister "Potter-money" in our campaigns.
The media response to Governor Walker's exit from the Presidential race on September 21, 2015 (such as that posted in the NY Times) attribute his poor showing and rapid demise to the rise of anti-establishment candidates, such as Donald Trump and Carly Fiorina. The truth is that Walker was simply a weak and malleable candidate artificially supported from behind by affluent, powerful elites. Walker was plagued with gaffes. At his resignation speech, Walker, seemingly determined not to change course from a string of silly ideas, blunders, and faux pas--like building a 5000 mile Canadian boundary fence---ended his campaign on the unbelievable claim that he was quitting the race to "to help the party unite" against Donald Trump.
Mr. Walker's performance as a national candidate,from the time of Fox News debate on August 6, to his "I will 'suspend' my campaign" speech of yesterday, proved he was not ready for national office. His rise and ignoble fall also revealed how damaging the post-Citizen United, system of funding political elections is to both our state government and national elections. Mr. Walker as a young, ambitious rising politician plotted and schemed to attract the attention and financial largess of powerful out of state funders, whose political agenda and script he slavishly followed. He sacrificed the well-being of his state's citizenry to the rigid ideology of his reactionary masters and to his own political ambitions as he led his state into years of political turmoi, tumultuous recall-elections and economic uncertainty. Thankfully, he was exposed as a "tool" of the Koch Brothers machinery in the crucible of the first few months of the national campaign. That revelation and his own weaknesses were what actually caused his rapid decline in the polls, not his competition.
Walker was such a lackluster, ineffective candidate it is painful to contemplate his return to his old office in Wisconsin. However, one idea does buoy my spirit. As a result of Mr. Walker's poor showing on the national stage he is now useless to his former pay masters. Walker can no longer serve as the "poster boy" for radical experiments in voodoo economics of the far-right oligarchs. The affluent political funders will have little incentive to answer a call for financial support from the Governor's office in Madison. Walker is certainly cut off from that lucrative money source in his next election. The out-of-state right wing ideologues who provided the 7-1 monetary advantage in his three Wisconsin elections have abandoned him. Now he will have to face the voters, citizens, union members, teachers, librarians, police, firemen, and others of Wisconsin, whose incomes and economic well-being he sacrificed on the alter of his political ambitions on his own. I am confident these groups will evaluate Mr. Walker again, and without the benefit of his secret supporters. Perhaps the elder statesmen and women of the State of Wisconsin may even wish to reconsider a new recall election. Walker is now a very vulnerable GOP governor.
I suspect the ashen face and sad demeanor (the NY Times reported) that Governor Walker exhibited at his parting speech, was due more to anxiety concerning his future--rather than disappointment. Who will support his candidacy in his next state election? As a result, I think we will not hear much more from Mr. Walker, and that is good for Wisconsin and the nation too. As for the attempts at controlling elections and candidates by the sinister "Mr Potters"(recall the Lionel Barrymore's character in "It's Wonderful Life")of our post-Citizen's United political world, perhaps, Mr. Walker's one claim to some positive act for our struggling nation may be that his failed candidacy will underscore the chilling impact the "Mr.Potters" of our day have on our democracy. And the hope that such exposure to the cleansing light will engender a reaction by an enraged public from both the left and right to limit the ability of the Potters of our day to undermine our democracy.
Monday, September 21, 2015
JEB, GEORGE DID NOT KEEP US SAFE!
I was watching the September 16, 2015 Second Republican (CNN) debate while visiting my son, who lives frugally in a small Brooklyn, NY apartment. There was no air conditioning and the windows were wide open to encourage a faint breeze through the small windows opening onto the tiny central courtyard. Sometime during the long debate Donald Trump remarked that "JEB" Bush's brother, George ( # 43) was a "disaster as President", and was the underlying cause for the loss of the Republican majority and the election of Obama. "You know what?" Said Mr. Bush, "As relates to my brother, There is one thing I know for sure: he kept us safe". I rolled my eyes. I heard laughter and hoops and hollers drifting in on the breeze through the open window. Other families in the building were apparently listening to the debate too. Being physically close to ground zero, and only a few days after the 14th anniversary of the 9-11 tragedy, the folks in Brooklyn might have found this statement so far from reality they laughed, thinking it was a joke.
How could JEB make such a dumb response so close to the anniversary of the most tragic attack on US soil which took place on GW's watch? How could he forget the thousands who died so horribly in the flames of the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in the plane crash in that Pennsylvania farm field? The Americans who lost their lives at the hands of terrorists during the Bush Administration's disastrous eight years died because JEB's brother, GW, failed in his obligation to keep the nation safe. George Bush--enjoying a widely criticized over-long vacation in August of that year---ignored or simply did not bother to read intelligence warnings in his daily briefing book dating back to May of that year which warned of Bin Laden and Al Qaida threats. On August 6, just about four weeks before the attack, his (unread) day book title page screamed out: "Bin Laden determined to attack in US". Bush did nothing in those four weeks. He was on vacation. Then after this tragic attack, -a blotch--on the Bush family reputation. George junior went right back and compounded his first mistake of not reading intelligence reports, by staking the nation to war in Iraq. It's hard to imagine watching those towers burn and crumble, with men and women falling and throwing themselves to their deaths that there could be an even worse outcome of a President's errant decision making---but there was. After the tragic attack and horrible loss of life on 9-11, George Bush failed again to "keep the people safe" when he deceitfully chose to go to war in Iraq, using trumped up "Weapons of Mass Destruction" charges. He foolishly risked death and injury to his troops fighting an unnecessary war and against a nation which had nothing to do with the 9-11 attack.
The war in Iraq did not keep us safe...it was a horribly failed exercise in regime change and nation building which rather than making our nation safe---threatened the lives and security of Americans and untold innocents all around the world. What was the real purpose of the Iraq war? President Bush, rather than changing course, to focusing seriously on keeping our nation safe, rather he chose another course. The tragic 9-11 attack on US soil, and the loss of innocent life was to be used duplicitously as a political bludgeon by the novice Republican President. He and his advisors secretly theorized that the tragic death of over two thousand Americans would be the perfect justification to arouse the ire of a nation reluctant to go to war. Bush and his neo-con allies plotted to turn the World Tirade Center terrorist attack into a"casus belli" to initiate a transformative war in Iraq which had a domestic political aspect, an economic element and a long range foreign policy goal which would all benefit the Republican Party. Domestically it would serve to help to keep Republicans in office and secure GW's second term. Economically it was would enrich elite Republican, leaders, donors and supporters (who like VP Dick Cheney were heavy investors in the military-energy-industrial triad. These folks were planning to make huge war profits and economic gains from the conflict.). Finally, the long range policy goals were to control the Middle East oil resources and transform that region into a US economic satellite, a haven for a 19th century style capitalist democracy. In effect, to recast the whole region into a political laboratory employing the cherished unfettered capitalism of far right Republicanism. Others saw an opportunity to help to pacify the Arab-Israeli conflict not by state to state diplomacy, compromise and realignment of boundaries, but by the "back door"....by regime change in the Arab states in the ME so they would more compliant to the demands, needs and policies of the Israeli state rather than the other way around. Iraq was only the first national "victim" of their plans. Iran, Egypt, Libya, and Syria were soon to follow. None of these policies were to make us safe.
Although the nation of Iraq was not involved in 9-11, it was targeted because it was a weakened State which could be toppled easily.
[Iraq had been defeated throughly in theGulf War (1990-1991) prosecuted by JEB's father GHW Bush. Much of the Iraqi military infrastructure had been destroyed in that war in which 30,000 troops we killed, 75,000 wounded and 300,000 captured. The cost of the war to the US taxpayer was estimated to be $60 billion dollars. But almost all of that amount was paid by other Gulf countries such as Saudi Arabia, and the other Gulf monarchies. After the six month long conflict ended in 1991, Iraq remained under heavy sanctions. A US A enforced no-fly zone continued, as well as a sporadic bombing campaign designed to slowly degrade the Iraqi military potential. And most importantly the nation had been throughly vilified by the press for its "sneak attack" on Kuwait. Regime change in Iraq was viewed inside the Bush Administration as a "walk in the park". The cost to further defeat this tattered nation was viewed as negligible based on the American experience in the previous Gulf War.]
To support his proposed war Bush asserted falsely that Saddam Hussein government had "weapons of mass destruction". This as well as the oft-repeated phony claim of a US desire to "bring democracy to the Iraqi people" were the ostensible rationals for going to war. These weak and transparent reasons were seen as false and were subsequently subjected to heavy criticism both nationally and internationally. At the conclusion of the conflict, no weapons of this nature (WMD) were discovered and the "democracy" Bush brought was a cruel joke denied to the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed as a result of the war, and unavailable to the millions of refugees he created. Bush did not keep these innocent civilian Iraqis safe.
Please not another Mr.Bush!
On the 20th of March 2003, an inexperienced, untutored, novice-President George Bush took to the air waves to claim that he was sending American troops into battle to "defend the world from a grave danger". Bush took the nation to war in Iraq, simplemindedly believing his VP and neo-con advisors. He may have envisioned it would last six months, as did his father's first Gulf War and cost next to nothing. But this was a much different war--lasting almost nine years (2003-2011), and ultimately costing our nation two to three trillion dollars.. In Iraq, George Bush, DID NOT KEEP US SAFE, under direction and tutelage of his powerful VP, Dick Cheney, he squandered the lives of more than 4,500 American young men and women. In the aftermath, there were 25,000 dead with 117,000 wounded of coalition forces Bush inveigled into his war. The invasion led to the fall of the Iraqi Bathist government and the unwise disbanding of the Iraqi Army. The Bush Administration grossly mismanaged the resulting US occupation, which led to a violent sectarian war and a long, bloody and violent insurgency which engulfed the American occupiers and cost thousands of American lives. This is keeping us safe?
The nation's longest war cost trillions of dollars and ended in abject failure. Rather than "defending the world and his nation from a grave danger", George Bush's actions in invading Iraq CAUSED "grave danger" to the world, extending from the carnage in Iraq, and the creation of a more militarily safe, politically assured, technically adept and powerful Iran, to the tragic present day chaos in neighboring Syria where another civil war rages The world refugee problem of today has its direct roots in the destabilizing effects of the Bush Iraq War. George Bush once stated that "history would decide" if his decisions were wrong on Iraq. Just look at the chaos in the region today....history has decided.
Today, we see a Middle East in chaos, war ravaged, it's infrastructure, businesses, agriculture and society devastated. Millions of people are displaced in refugee camps in neighboring countries, while hundreds of thousands of refugees escaping from overcrowded camps in Jordan, Turkey and elsewhere, join those fleeing violence in Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq to clog roadways in Eastern Europe, and to strand the pitiful broken bodies of their dead children on the shores of Italy and Greece. Millions of Syrian, Iraqi, Afghanistani displaced, surge onward toward western Europe where they are corralled astride state borders with coils of barbed wire and cyclone fencing. In some places they escape the brutal police cordons as in Bosnia and Hungary, hoping to press on to find succor in the safe and affluent west. Bush, Cheney and his neocon fantasists are the underlying cause of this massive world tragedy.
So this is how George Bush "kept us safe". JEB may have been simply stating what he believed to be true or may have simply acted as the loyal, ill-informed younger brother of a failed President. But his repeated attempts to recast history for his brother, as well as his published list of advisors and supporters--a list which encompasses most of the personnel of the Bush failed foreign policy team are evidence of a return to past errors and mistake, and indicate a penchant and direction that is dangerous for our nation. We would be foolish indeed to go over that same trail. Bush's inability to divorce himself from the past, and his brother's culpability in the economic, blood-soaked disaster of the Iraq War and the blowback from those foreign policy errors which the world finds itself suffering from now, may be understandable inside the privileged Bush family circle, but is inexcusable in a candidate for public office and should exclude him as a potential leader of this nation.
One must also keep in mind JEB's personal culpability in this matter as well. Recall that were it not for his manipulation of the 2000 Florida election tally, under pressure from his bother's attorneys and campaign....there may not have been a President George Bush, or an Iraq War, or a refugee crisis in Europe. If JEB can not come to terms with the reality of his brother's geostrqtegic, military and governing failures he is part of the problem and not the solution.
JEB, YOUR BROTHER DID NOT KEEP US SAFE! Far from it !
Monday, September 14, 2015
BEN CARSON APPEAL: DESTRUCTIVE
Dr. Ben Carson, up from a youth of poverty in working class Detroit, a Yale University graduate, pediatric neurosurgeon, Head of Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins, married to one woman for forty years, author, public speaker on conservative causes, and a recent political neophyte who has risen meteorically in the polls into the top tier of a distinguished group of 2016 hopeful presidential candidates which include the wealthy scion of the most powerful GOP political family, sitting governors, former governors, illustrious U.S. Senators, a woman CEO, and one brash billionaire. Oh, yeah, did I mention? Dr. Ben is an Afro-American.
The most recent polls in Iowa and New Hampshire (September 14, 2015) put Carson in second place just a few percentage points below the wildly popular businessman, billionaire Donald Trump. Carson and Trump, both of whom have no previous political experience, have hoovered up the mass of popular votes in these two states, jointly amassing more than fifty percent of the total. The interest in their candidacies have sucked money and votes from perhaps more politically viable candidates.
What is Carson's appeal that permits him to poll five to six times above established politicians like Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Gov. Scott Walker? Carson, like all the other candidates, hews closely to conservative orthodoxy. He peppers his speeches with references to the Bible and to God. He supports lower taxes. ( He does favor a form of regressive Biblical tithing). He supports Israel with a patellar reflex. He opposes a woman's right to an abortion. He would keep Gitmo open. He abhors Obama care. He supports a robust military stance and sees Russia as our greatest foreign policy threat. And he supports the Second Amendment right to bear arms with no restrictions. His positions do not differ from the other candidates in any significant way.
So what is his appeal? Could it be related to the fact that Carson is a BLACK conservative with an appealing rags to riches, Alger Hiss biography?
I submit to you that THE CARSON PHENOMENA is a response to the ugly reality of RACISM IN AMERICA. Racism is the reality that Americans on the far right....isolated from the racial heterogeneity in big cities, living in affluent and stark white communities of the hinterlands would like to obliterate. The ugly reality of American race relations is too unpalatable for these voters to swallow. Ugly race relations confront and tend to upend most cherished myths.
Dr. Ben Carson, is a successful black surgeon, who pulled himself up from poverty. The white GOP voter think: he embodies the American Dream, just as our conservative politicians predict. He also spouts conservative dogma. They interpret it thus: "he sounds just like one of us". His demeanor is calm, non- aggressive, non-threatening. His "nice man" character overrides ugly racial stereotypes and supports the fading myth of America's racial blamelessness. In short, Dr. Carson is the embodiment of the mythological American black man, generated by the white, affluent, conservative majority. And now he stands before them in person as a candidate and asks them for his vote.
With all the recent evidence in the press and media of racism, white-on-black police brutality, institutionalized police harassment of poor black communities, so obvious in this last summer's events in Fergerson, Missouri, and elsewhere around the nation, Carson makes it possible for these GOP voters to maintain the myth that such conditions and problems are all self-inflicted by the black community. He permits them to make a transfer of blame and guilt from "me to them". It is not my fault....it's theirs. Those press and TV stories are NOT is not a part of the REAL America. Our nation is EXCEPTIONAL, we are NOT RACIST. There is no racial barrier to success.
CARSON permits them to continue to believe that the poverty, crime, family dysfunction, etc., etc. of the Afro-American community are a result of black weakness and lack of industry. He permits them to maintain and promote inequality. White, affluent GOP voters are led to feel they have no responsibility for these blotches and blemishes on our nation's reputation. And finally there is no need to ameliorate these wrongs and social problems by concerted governmental action.
Carson's dual appeal is that he assuages guilt on one hand and reinforces a cherished myth on the other. He permits a certain element of our society the satisfaction of putting the ugliness of racial discord out of their mind and reinforces their tightly held and cherished myth of American purity.
For that reason Carson's appeal and his rise in the polls is a destructive one. Besides the support and money he denies other candidates, Carson's candidacy helps to perpetuate and posit a dangerous unreality. He encourages the continuation of a destructive myth. "There is no racial discord." All is OK in America." "We are great, good, kind and exceptional." "No changes needed!" No new government programs required, and of course...NO NEED TO TAKE OUR TAX MONEY.
Dr. Ben Carson, up from a youth of poverty in working class Detroit, a Yale University graduate, pediatric neurosurgeon, Head of Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins, married to one woman for forty years, author, public speaker on conservative causes, and a recent political neophyte who has risen meteorically in the polls into the top tier of a distinguished group of 2016 hopeful presidential candidates which include the wealthy scion of the most powerful GOP political family, sitting governors, former governors, illustrious U.S. Senators, a woman CEO, and one brash billionaire. Oh, yeah, did I mention? Dr. Ben is an Afro-American.
The most recent polls in Iowa and New Hampshire (September 14, 2015) put Carson in second place just a few percentage points below the wildly popular businessman, billionaire Donald Trump. Carson and Trump, both of whom have no previous political experience, have hoovered up the mass of popular votes in these two states, jointly amassing more than fifty percent of the total. The interest in their candidacies have sucked money and votes from perhaps more politically viable candidates.
What is Carson's appeal that permits him to poll five to six times above established politicians like Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Gov. Scott Walker? Carson, like all the other candidates, hews closely to conservative orthodoxy. He peppers his speeches with references to the Bible and to God. He supports lower taxes. ( He does favor a form of regressive Biblical tithing). He supports Israel with a patellar reflex. He opposes a woman's right to an abortion. He would keep Gitmo open. He abhors Obama care. He supports a robust military stance and sees Russia as our greatest foreign policy threat. And he supports the Second Amendment right to bear arms with no restrictions. His positions do not differ from the other candidates in any significant way.
So what is his appeal? Could it be related to the fact that Carson is a BLACK conservative with an appealing rags to riches, Alger Hiss biography?
I submit to you that THE CARSON PHENOMENA is a response to the ugly reality of RACISM IN AMERICA. Racism is the reality that Americans on the far right....isolated from the racial heterogeneity in big cities, living in affluent and stark white communities of the hinterlands would like to obliterate. The ugly reality of American race relations is too unpalatable for these voters to swallow. Ugly race relations confront and tend to upend most cherished myths.
Dr. Ben Carson, is a successful black surgeon, who pulled himself up from poverty. The white GOP voter think: he embodies the American Dream, just as our conservative politicians predict. He also spouts conservative dogma. They interpret it thus: "he sounds just like one of us". His demeanor is calm, non- aggressive, non-threatening. His "nice man" character overrides ugly racial stereotypes and supports the fading myth of America's racial blamelessness. In short, Dr. Carson is the embodiment of the mythological American black man, generated by the white, affluent, conservative majority. And now he stands before them in person as a candidate and asks them for his vote.
With all the recent evidence in the press and media of racism, white-on-black police brutality, institutionalized police harassment of poor black communities, so obvious in this last summer's events in Fergerson, Missouri, and elsewhere around the nation, Carson makes it possible for these GOP voters to maintain the myth that such conditions and problems are all self-inflicted by the black community. He permits them to make a transfer of blame and guilt from "me to them". It is not my fault....it's theirs. Those press and TV stories are NOT is not a part of the REAL America. Our nation is EXCEPTIONAL, we are NOT RACIST. There is no racial barrier to success.
CARSON permits them to continue to believe that the poverty, crime, family dysfunction, etc., etc. of the Afro-American community are a result of black weakness and lack of industry. He permits them to maintain and promote inequality. White, affluent GOP voters are led to feel they have no responsibility for these blotches and blemishes on our nation's reputation. And finally there is no need to ameliorate these wrongs and social problems by concerted governmental action.
Carson's dual appeal is that he assuages guilt on one hand and reinforces a cherished myth on the other. He permits a certain element of our society the satisfaction of putting the ugliness of racial discord out of their mind and reinforces their tightly held and cherished myth of American purity.
For that reason Carson's appeal and his rise in the polls is a destructive one. Besides the support and money he denies other candidates, Carson's candidacy helps to perpetuate and posit a dangerous unreality. He encourages the continuation of a destructive myth. "There is no racial discord." All is OK in America." "We are great, good, kind and exceptional." "No changes needed!" No new government programs required, and of course...NO NEED TO TAKE OUR TAX MONEY.
The most recent polls in Iowa and New Hampshire (September 14, 2015) put Carson in second place just a few percentage points below the wildly popular businessman, billionaire Donald Trump. Carson and Trump, both of whom have no previous political experience, have hoovered up the mass of popular votes in these two states, jointly amassing more than fifty percent of the total. The interest in their candidacies have sucked money and votes from perhaps more politically viable candidates.
What is Carson's appeal that permits him to poll five to six times above established politicians like Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Gov. Scott Walker? Carson, like all the other candidates, hews closely to conservative orthodoxy. He peppers his speeches with references to the Bible and to God. He supports lower taxes. ( He does favor a form of regressive Biblical tithing). He supports Israel with a patellar reflex. He opposes a woman's right to an abortion. He would keep Gitmo open. He abhors Obama care. He supports a robust military stance and sees Russia as our greatest foreign policy threat. And he supports the Second Amendment right to bear arms with no restrictions. His positions do not differ from the other candidates in any significant way.
So what is his appeal? Could it be related to the fact that Carson is a BLACK conservative with an appealing rags to riches, Alger Hiss biography?
I submit to you that THE CARSON PHENOMENA is a response to the ugly reality of RACISM IN AMERICA. Racism is the reality that Americans on the far right....isolated from the racial heterogeneity in big cities, living in affluent and stark white communities of the hinterlands would like to obliterate. The ugly reality of American race relations is too unpalatable for these voters to swallow. Ugly race relations confront and tend to upend most cherished myths.
Dr. Ben Carson, is a successful black surgeon, who pulled himself up from poverty. The white GOP voter think: he embodies the American Dream, just as our conservative politicians predict. He also spouts conservative dogma. They interpret it thus: "he sounds just like one of us". His demeanor is calm, non- aggressive, non-threatening. His "nice man" character overrides ugly racial stereotypes and supports the fading myth of America's racial blamelessness. In short, Dr. Carson is the embodiment of the mythological American black man, generated by the white, affluent, conservative majority. And now he stands before them in person as a candidate and asks them for his vote.
With all the recent evidence in the press and media of racism, white-on-black police brutality, institutionalized police harassment of poor black communities, so obvious in this last summer's events in Fergerson, Missouri, and elsewhere around the nation, Carson makes it possible for these GOP voters to maintain the myth that such conditions and problems are all self-inflicted by the black community. He permits them to make a transfer of blame and guilt from "me to them". It is not my fault....it's theirs. Those press and TV stories are NOT is not a part of the REAL America. Our nation is EXCEPTIONAL, we are NOT RACIST. There is no racial barrier to success.
CARSON permits them to continue to believe that the poverty, crime, family dysfunction, etc., etc. of the Afro-American community are a result of black weakness and lack of industry. He permits them to maintain and promote inequality. White, affluent GOP voters are led to feel they have no responsibility for these blotches and blemishes on our nation's reputation. And finally there is no need to ameliorate these wrongs and social problems by concerted governmental action.
Carson's dual appeal is that he assuages guilt on one hand and reinforces a cherished myth on the other. He permits a certain element of our society the satisfaction of putting the ugliness of racial discord out of their mind and reinforces their tightly held and cherished myth of American purity.
For that reason Carson's appeal and his rise in the polls is a destructive one. Besides the support and money he denies other candidates, Carson's candidacy helps to perpetuate and posit a dangerous unreality. He encourages the continuation of a destructive myth. "There is no racial discord." All is OK in America." "We are great, good, kind and exceptional." "No changes needed!" No new government programs required, and of course...NO NEED TO TAKE OUR TAX MONEY.
Dr. Ben Carson, up from a youth of poverty in working class Detroit, a Yale University graduate, pediatric neurosurgeon, Head of Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins, married to one woman for forty years, author, public speaker on conservative causes, and a recent political neophyte who has risen meteorically in the polls into the top tier of a distinguished group of 2016 hopeful presidential candidates which include the wealthy scion of the most powerful GOP political family, sitting governors, former governors, illustrious U.S. Senators, a woman CEO, and one brash billionaire. Oh, yeah, did I mention? Dr. Ben is an Afro-American.
The most recent polls in Iowa and New Hampshire (September 14, 2015) put Carson in second place just a few percentage points below the wildly popular businessman, billionaire Donald Trump. Carson and Trump, both of whom have no previous political experience, have hoovered up the mass of popular votes in these two states, jointly amassing more than fifty percent of the total. The interest in their candidacies have sucked money and votes from perhaps more politically viable candidates.
What is Carson's appeal that permits him to poll five to six times above established politicians like Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, Gov. Scott Walker? Carson, like all the other candidates, hews closely to conservative orthodoxy. He peppers his speeches with references to the Bible and to God. He supports lower taxes. ( He does favor a form of regressive Biblical tithing). He supports Israel with a patellar reflex. He opposes a woman's right to an abortion. He would keep Gitmo open. He abhors Obama care. He supports a robust military stance and sees Russia as our greatest foreign policy threat. And he supports the Second Amendment right to bear arms with no restrictions. His positions do not differ from the other candidates in any significant way.
So what is his appeal? Could it be related to the fact that Carson is a BLACK conservative with an appealing rags to riches, Alger Hiss biography?
I submit to you that THE CARSON PHENOMENA is a response to the ugly reality of RACISM IN AMERICA. Racism is the reality that Americans on the far right....isolated from the racial heterogeneity in big cities, living in affluent and stark white communities of the hinterlands would like to obliterate. The ugly reality of American race relations is too unpalatable for these voters to swallow. Ugly race relations confront and tend to upend most cherished myths.
Dr. Ben Carson, is a successful black surgeon, who pulled himself up from poverty. The white GOP voter think: he embodies the American Dream, just as our conservative politicians predict. He also spouts conservative dogma. They interpret it thus: "he sounds just like one of us". His demeanor is calm, non- aggressive, non-threatening. His "nice man" character overrides ugly racial stereotypes and supports the fading myth of America's racial blamelessness. In short, Dr. Carson is the embodiment of the mythological American black man, generated by the white, affluent, conservative majority. And now he stands before them in person as a candidate and asks them for his vote.
With all the recent evidence in the press and media of racism, white-on-black police brutality, institutionalized police harassment of poor black communities, so obvious in this last summer's events in Fergerson, Missouri, and elsewhere around the nation, Carson makes it possible for these GOP voters to maintain the myth that such conditions and problems are all self-inflicted by the black community. He permits them to make a transfer of blame and guilt from "me to them". It is not my fault....it's theirs. Those press and TV stories are NOT is not a part of the REAL America. Our nation is EXCEPTIONAL, we are NOT RACIST. There is no racial barrier to success.
CARSON permits them to continue to believe that the poverty, crime, family dysfunction, etc., etc. of the Afro-American community are a result of black weakness and lack of industry. He permits them to maintain and promote inequality. White, affluent GOP voters are led to feel they have no responsibility for these blotches and blemishes on our nation's reputation. And finally there is no need to ameliorate these wrongs and social problems by concerted governmental action.
Carson's dual appeal is that he assuages guilt on one hand and reinforces a cherished myth on the other. He permits a certain element of our society the satisfaction of putting the ugliness of racial discord out of their mind and reinforces their tightly held and cherished myth of American purity.
For that reason Carson's appeal and his rise in the polls is a destructive one. Besides the support and money he denies other candidates, Carson's candidacy helps to perpetuate and posit a dangerous unreality. He encourages the continuation of a destructive myth. "There is no racial discord." All is OK in America." "We are great, good, kind and exceptional." "No changes needed!" No new government programs required, and of course...NO NEED TO TAKE OUR TAX MONEY.
Saturday, September 12, 2015
CLINTON POLLS AND HER SCANDAL TRENDLINE
CLINTON EMAILGATE
Why Has Clinton Collapsed In The Polls?
Honesty, trust, questionable judgment and a scandal regression line which suggest strongly a potential for eight more years of divisive, wasteful scandals that will interfere with effective governing.
Was it all related to her use of a private email server? Not really. What did she actually do?
She purposely circumvented State Department rules and regulations regarding her electronic communications to avoid scrutiny and potential embarrassment at some later date by setting up a private server in her own home. Although not a declared candidate...she was even at this early date making firm plans to protect her reputation for her 2016 presidential run in 2009. She used this secret system for both her private family emails, her correspondence with her husband, and her official State Department official electronic documents. As a result, both her private correspondence and her official correspondences were commingled. In doing so, she probably compromised a certain number of "secret" government communications that would not have been exposed to potential scrutiny had she used a secure government server. Furthermore she ignored the "transparency law" that requires US officials to safeguard the historicity of their formal correspondence while in office. These documents, hard copy as well as electronic, are the people's property. Clinton ignored their right to know. As her time as Secretary of State came to en end, she broke the law again by continuing to store these commingled private and official documents in unsecured locations. First on her own private server in her home, and then she moved the server to another unsecured private company for storage. In addition, she illegally passed on some of them on to her attorney (who did not have security clearance). He stored these thumb drive copies illegally in his personal safe. At some point after she left the State Department she was required to turn over all of the official correspondence. She assigned her staff to review these "60,000 pages" of commingled private and government documents, some of which we now know were classed as "top secret" and "secret" to the view of individuals with unknown security clearances . It is also likely these unknown assistant were given the critical authority to make the final decision of which was "personal" and which was "official government" materials. Here again she compromised the security of her correspondences. Then in a final act of irresponsibility and misjudgment she had her private server wiped clean.
Finally, when her entire system became public knowledge as a result of an unrelated Congressional investigation which required her to submit her formal correspondence for a given period....her Nixon-like secret system to protect her privacy was exposed.
Then, the cover up phase began with lies and deceptions. "I did it for convenience." "It was permitted." "Others did it," etc., etc., etc. ad inclintonia.
Thus, we can see from that presented above what the big fuss is about are a series of foolish decisions, poor judgement, leading to relatively minor infractions of laws and regulations committed by a secretive, plotting, public servant, who has been repeatedly investigated in the past. And who when caught red-handed, lied about it. But why has this relatively "minor bump in the road" turned into a such major "scandal". One that has changed the political landscape in a matter of a few months? Does it rise to the level of Governor Perry's: "Oops I can't remember that one."? A seemingly minor fumble that ultimately led to the collapse of his presidential aspirations. It seems that it may.
For three reasons. One, because the email controversy first and foremost calls into question the candidate's judgment. Her ability to recognize a potential problem ahead, and her decision-making processes used to solve that problem can be questioned. How would a person with this mind set respond to the famous 2AM phone call? It also gives one pause regarding her relationship to her staff and advisors. Is her style of governing such that she completely surrounds herself by "yes men and women" among whom no one had the temerity to say: "Madam Secretary you are making a grave mistake"?
Secondly, the email debacle underscores in red ink the perception that she does not tell the truth. A dormant perception that this event brings again to life. A recent Quinnipiac poll indicated that almost two thirds of the electorate think that Mrs. Clinton is not honest or trustworthy. She has a long history which reinforces and confirms these perceptions. We need not go back into the past to make the point. The mysterious appearance of Rose Law Firm documents? Travelgate? Lincoln Bedroom rentals?
Finally, Mrs Clinton has a long history with the American public. We feel we already know a good portion of the trajectory of this person's life. This last data point (email gate) fits right on line with other plotted points on her graph. It is the EXTENSION of that average line, the regression or trendline, fitted to the plotted points which is the most troublesome and off putting for the electorate.
The American voters are now more aware of the trendline for a Clinton presidency. The extension of that line for eight more years reveals the likelihood of more scandals, more sleazy revelations, more lies and deceptions, more Clintons coming up to the bounds of legality and sidling over that boundary ever so slightly to award them some unwarranted personal financial or political advantage.
The polls indicate that many in the American public do not want Mrs. Clinton in the Oval Office. This nation has too many real and pressing problems to solve and does not have the resources to waste on political and emotional effort on a tumultuous, scandal plagued and divisive Clinton Presidency.
Mrs. Clinton may be well meaning and well prepared, but unfortunately in this case the candidate's own persona is a major distraction which has a high probability of upending the efficacy of her ability to govern.
Why Has Clinton Collapsed In The Polls?
Honesty, trust, questionable judgment and a scandal regression line which suggest strongly a potential for eight more years of divisive, wasteful scandals that will interfere with effective governing.
Was it all related to her use of a private email server? Not really. What did she actually do?
She purposely circumvented State Department rules and regulations regarding her electronic communications to avoid scrutiny and potential embarrassment at some later date by setting up a private server in her own home. Although not a declared candidate...she was even at this early date making firm plans to protect her reputation for her 2016 presidential run in 2009. She used this secret system for both her private family emails, her correspondence with her husband, and her official State Department official electronic documents. As a result, both her private correspondence and her official correspondences were commingled. In doing so, she probably compromised a certain number of "secret" government communications that would not have been exposed to potential scrutiny had she used a secure government server. Furthermore she ignored the "transparency law" that requires US officials to safeguard the historicity of their formal correspondence while in office. These documents, hard copy as well as electronic, are the people's property. Clinton ignored their right to know. As her time as Secretary of State came to en end, she broke the law again by continuing to store these commingled private and official documents in unsecured locations. First on her own private server in her home, and then she moved the server to another unsecured private company for storage. In addition, she illegally passed on some of them on to her attorney (who did not have security clearance). He stored these thumb drive copies illegally in his personal safe. At some point after she left the State Department she was required to turn over all of the official correspondence. She assigned her staff to review these "60,000 pages" of commingled private and government documents, some of which we now know were classed as "top secret" and "secret" to the view of individuals with unknown security clearances . It is also likely these unknown assistant were given the critical authority to make the final decision of which was "personal" and which was "official government" materials. Here again she compromised the security of her correspondences. Then in a final act of irresponsibility and misjudgment she had her private server wiped clean.
Finally, when her entire system became public knowledge as a result of an unrelated Congressional investigation which required her to submit her formal correspondence for a given period....her Nixon-like secret system to protect her privacy was exposed.
Then, the cover up phase began with lies and deceptions. "I did it for convenience." "It was permitted." "Others did it," etc., etc., etc. ad inclintonia.
Thus, we can see from that presented above what the big fuss is about are a series of foolish decisions, poor judgement, leading to relatively minor infractions of laws and regulations committed by a secretive, plotting, public servant, who has been repeatedly investigated in the past. And who when caught red-handed, lied about it. But why has this relatively "minor bump in the road" turned into a such major "scandal". One that has changed the political landscape in a matter of a few months? Does it rise to the level of Governor Perry's: "Oops I can't remember that one."? A seemingly minor fumble that ultimately led to the collapse of his presidential aspirations. It seems that it may.
For three reasons. One, because the email controversy first and foremost calls into question the candidate's judgment. Her ability to recognize a potential problem ahead, and her decision-making processes used to solve that problem can be questioned. How would a person with this mind set respond to the famous 2AM phone call? It also gives one pause regarding her relationship to her staff and advisors. Is her style of governing such that she completely surrounds herself by "yes men and women" among whom no one had the temerity to say: "Madam Secretary you are making a grave mistake"?
Secondly, the email debacle underscores in red ink the perception that she does not tell the truth. A dormant perception that this event brings again to life. A recent Quinnipiac poll indicated that almost two thirds of the electorate think that Mrs. Clinton is not honest or trustworthy. She has a long history which reinforces and confirms these perceptions. We need not go back into the past to make the point. The mysterious appearance of Rose Law Firm documents? Travelgate? Lincoln Bedroom rentals?
Finally, Mrs Clinton has a long history with the American public. We feel we already know a good portion of the trajectory of this person's life. This last data point (email gate) fits right on line with other plotted points on her graph. It is the EXTENSION of that average line, the regression or trendline, fitted to the plotted points which is the most troublesome and off putting for the electorate.
The American voters are now more aware of the trendline for a Clinton presidency. The extension of that line for eight more years reveals the likelihood of more scandals, more sleazy revelations, more lies and deceptions, more Clintons coming up to the bounds of legality and sidling over that boundary ever so slightly to award them some unwarranted personal financial or political advantage.
The polls indicate that many in the American public do not want Mrs. Clinton in the Oval Office. This nation has too many real and pressing problems to solve and does not have the resources to waste on political and emotional effort on a tumultuous, scandal plagued and divisive Clinton Presidency.
Mrs. Clinton may be well meaning and well prepared, but unfortunately in this case the candidate's own persona is a major distraction which has a high probability of upending the efficacy of her ability to govern.
Friday, September 11, 2015
HAYDEN WRONG ON IRAN AND ARMING ISRAEL
HAYDEN WRONG ON IRAN DEAL, TORTURE, 4th, ISRAEL
"We kill people based on metadata." Michael Hayden, Johns Hopkins Symposium, 1/4/14
Michael Hayden the "credibility challenged" former CIA chief was treated to a cushy seat in front of the American TV public on the popular MSNBC "Morning Joe" show this morning, on the eventful date of September 11, 2015. Joe and Mika took on the role of unnecessarily deferential hosts, asking no serious questions or referencing this guests past foibles and controversies, but quietly listened as Hayden spouted his opposition to the President's hard-won Iran Nuclear agreement. Hayden, a torture promoter, denier of Fourth Amendment Rights, and charged with lying to Congress, did as was expected, and took the opportunity to undermine the agreement, then painted what he hoped would be a fearful picture of conflict in the coming fifteen year life-span of the agreement. But what was most terrifying and egregious was his far out and dangerous proposal to provide Israel with MOP (massive ordinance penetrator) bombs which are capable of bunker busting into underground Iranian sites. These are the very sites Obama and the P5 fought so hard to place under inspection and which are planned to be emptied of nuclear enrichment equipment. Nothing would be more likely to abrogate the agreement, end Iranian cooperation, and encourage that nation to pursue a nuclear deterrent ( a la North Korea) than adding a new dimension to increase the Israeli threat to the region ( Israel is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons both on land and in submarines). Such a proposal would be a sure way to light the fuse for a new, wider and more disastrous war in the Middle East. After delivery, the USA would have a proverbial loaded sawed-off shotgun tied to its neck with Netanyahu's finger on the trigger. We might as well hand over the President's control keys to the nuclear red box and the decision as to when to turn they key, for a foreign leader like Netanyahu would then be able to decide when or where the U.S. would go to war. Hayden has carelessly stepped into another mantrap with this statement. The iron jaws have snapped tight about his legs. If his appearance on Morning Joe to try to burnish his post Iraq War tarnished image he has just failed miserably. His foolish statement supports the most radical elements in our nation and the dangerous and unpredictable Netanyahu cabal in charge in Tel Aviv. The Israeli hardliners would certainly use such weaponry as blackmail to achieve their real goal of relegating Iran to the economic Stone Age and dragging the USA into another ME war. How dumb can one get? Perhaps you have forgotten this man's past. Since Joe and Mika were so reticent to supply his past...see below.
Michael Hayden is the former director of the CIA and National Security Agency. You would think with those credentials his pronouncements on anything dealing with US security should be listened to with respect and confidence. You would be DEAD WRONG....and perhaps using the "death analogy" is correct in this case. Hayden whose chubby, almost cherubic looks, belie his professional and military life history, is the classic chicken hawk.
Hayden, is a retired Air Force General with four stars. He rose up in through ranks beginning his career as an ROTC Reserve Air Force officer in 1969. He served almost exclusively in the "intelligence arm" of the service as "arm chair" Air Force general all of his long 41 year career. All through those years he helped support efforts to send other young men, and the children of others, into the crucible of battle while never experiencing that life and limb threatening possibility himself.
Hayden was responsible for the massive expansion of illegal domestic spying after 9-11, the expansion of extra judicial assassinations by unmanned aerial drones. Under his leadership the NSA established the now infamous massive domestic spying network ( termed the "domestic telephone call database") illegally overriding statues forbidding warrentless surveillance...the FISA statues. He lied to Congress regarding these issues. He proposed and supported another enlarged electronics domestic spy network called the "Trailblazer Project" that was so intrusive his own staff resigned rather than comply. It was shut down after investigations by the DOD inspector general and deemed unconstitutional by Congress. As any school kid knows, the Nation's Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures and requires PROBABLE CAUSE and a judges's warrant to proceed with the investigation. However, like the word TORTURE, which are not found in Hayden's vocabulary neither are the words PROBABLE CAUSE. Hayden has been video taped stating to reporters in a press conference that "probable cause" IS NOT in the FourthAmendment of the Bill of Rights. He was not truthful.
Hayden is a dedicated supporter of torture. He continues to deny the methods used by the CIA and described as "brutal and excessive" by Senate investigators should be described as "torture". Senator John McCain who experienced similar methods first hand disagreed with him. Hayden continues to claim, over the abundance of information and data to the contrary, that the use of torture gleaned from CIA detainees led to "actionable information". Senate investigators charged Hayden with" misrepresenting" the value of torture-derived information from CIA detainees. His veracity on that issue and others has been challenged over and over again.
Hayden's statements on the Iran Agreement and his proposal to arm Israel with MOP bombs will certainly not help him in his crusade to rewrite the negative view that history has recorded for this misguided man.
"We kill people based on metadata." Michael Hayden, Johns Hopkins Symposium, 1/4/14
Michael Hayden the "credibility challenged" former CIA chief was treated to a cushy seat in front of the American TV public on the popular MSNBC "Morning Joe" show this morning, on the eventful date of September 11, 2015. Joe and Mika took on the role of unnecessarily deferential hosts, asking no serious questions or referencing this guests past foibles and controversies, but quietly listened as Hayden spouted his opposition to the President's hard-won Iran Nuclear agreement. Hayden, a torture promoter, denier of Fourth Amendment Rights, and charged with lying to Congress, did as was expected, and took the opportunity to undermine the agreement, then painted what he hoped would be a fearful picture of conflict in the coming fifteen year life-span of the agreement. But what was most terrifying and egregious was his far out and dangerous proposal to provide Israel with MOP (massive ordinance penetrator) bombs which are capable of bunker busting into underground Iranian sites. These are the very sites Obama and the P5 fought so hard to place under inspection and which are planned to be emptied of nuclear enrichment equipment. Nothing would be more likely to abrogate the agreement, end Iranian cooperation, and encourage that nation to pursue a nuclear deterrent ( a la North Korea) than adding a new dimension to increase the Israeli threat to the region ( Israel is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons both on land and in submarines). Such a proposal would be a sure way to light the fuse for a new, wider and more disastrous war in the Middle East. After delivery, the USA would have a proverbial loaded sawed-off shotgun tied to its neck with Netanyahu's finger on the trigger. We might as well hand over the President's control keys to the nuclear red box and the decision as to when to turn they key, for a foreign leader like Netanyahu would then be able to decide when or where the U.S. would go to war. Hayden has carelessly stepped into another mantrap with this statement. The iron jaws have snapped tight about his legs. If his appearance on Morning Joe to try to burnish his post Iraq War tarnished image he has just failed miserably. His foolish statement supports the most radical elements in our nation and the dangerous and unpredictable Netanyahu cabal in charge in Tel Aviv. The Israeli hardliners would certainly use such weaponry as blackmail to achieve their real goal of relegating Iran to the economic Stone Age and dragging the USA into another ME war. How dumb can one get? Perhaps you have forgotten this man's past. Since Joe and Mika were so reticent to supply his past...see below.
Michael Hayden is the former director of the CIA and National Security Agency. You would think with those credentials his pronouncements on anything dealing with US security should be listened to with respect and confidence. You would be DEAD WRONG....and perhaps using the "death analogy" is correct in this case. Hayden whose chubby, almost cherubic looks, belie his professional and military life history, is the classic chicken hawk.
Hayden, is a retired Air Force General with four stars. He rose up in through ranks beginning his career as an ROTC Reserve Air Force officer in 1969. He served almost exclusively in the "intelligence arm" of the service as "arm chair" Air Force general all of his long 41 year career. All through those years he helped support efforts to send other young men, and the children of others, into the crucible of battle while never experiencing that life and limb threatening possibility himself.
Hayden was responsible for the massive expansion of illegal domestic spying after 9-11, the expansion of extra judicial assassinations by unmanned aerial drones. Under his leadership the NSA established the now infamous massive domestic spying network ( termed the "domestic telephone call database") illegally overriding statues forbidding warrentless surveillance...the FISA statues. He lied to Congress regarding these issues. He proposed and supported another enlarged electronics domestic spy network called the "Trailblazer Project" that was so intrusive his own staff resigned rather than comply. It was shut down after investigations by the DOD inspector general and deemed unconstitutional by Congress. As any school kid knows, the Nation's Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures and requires PROBABLE CAUSE and a judges's warrant to proceed with the investigation. However, like the word TORTURE, which are not found in Hayden's vocabulary neither are the words PROBABLE CAUSE. Hayden has been video taped stating to reporters in a press conference that "probable cause" IS NOT in the FourthAmendment of the Bill of Rights. He was not truthful.
Hayden is a dedicated supporter of torture. He continues to deny the methods used by the CIA and described as "brutal and excessive" by Senate investigators should be described as "torture". Senator John McCain who experienced similar methods first hand disagreed with him. Hayden continues to claim, over the abundance of information and data to the contrary, that the use of torture gleaned from CIA detainees led to "actionable information". Senate investigators charged Hayden with" misrepresenting" the value of torture-derived information from CIA detainees. His veracity on that issue and others has been challenged over and over again.
Hayden's statements on the Iran Agreement and his proposal to arm Israel with MOP bombs will certainly not help him in his crusade to rewrite the negative view that history has recorded for this misguided man.
Saturday, September 5, 2015
SYRIA, THINKING OUT OF THE BOX
THINKING OUTSIDE THE BOX ON SYRIA
The awful destruction unleashed by the Bush-Cheney wars in the Middle East is now spreading westward into Europe. Hoards of migrating Syrian refugees are pictured every day in the press, streaming across Europe and away from the bombing, destruction and despair visited on their homes and communities. Bodies of dead refugees have been found in a sealed refrigerator truck abandoned along the side of the roadside, evidence of an escape to safety gone wrong. Others perish at sea, their bodies, even those of tiny, pathetic children, to wash up on the shores of Greece, Italy and Turkey. Conflicts are brewing among the leaders of wealthy European states as to who can or should take these Moslem refugees in. Unfortunately, the burden seems to have fallen on the least responsible for the original disaster...Germany and France ....nations which resisted the entreaties of Bush and his misguided warriors to invade Iraq. Here in the USA we act in the face of these problems as if we had nothing to with it. But some astute person I overheard yesterday down in Manchester, remarked that since it was George Bush who started all this mess with his Iraq invasion....he should open up his spacious ranch in the wide open spaces of Texas for these unfortunates. Well, that will not happen soon.
We can and should assign blame for this catastrophe. President Bush and Mr. Cheney began it all with their destabilizing war in Iraq which metastasized into a brutal and bloody sectarian civil war that engulfed US forces and spread like a poisonous miasma over the whole region. Then when the unrest reached the sandy desert border of Syria, President Obama and his neocon State Department holdovers from the Bush administration rubbed their hands with glee as they anticipated the fall of Assad.. These foreign policy geniuses were wrong their desire to destabilize the Assad regime. Mr Assad is not quite as brutal as Saddam, but he is a Middle East despot in an area where a strong leader is needed. While in power, he kept a tight rein on the forces of chaos within his borders. He did so until he was weakened by (his own mistakes) and the collusion of the U.S. and the other Syria-state enemies in the region. Our neocons classed Assad as an enemy of Israel and concluded (now proved to be erroneous) that ergo Assad must be our U.S. enemy too. The goal of the Obama administration, was and remains the short sighted: " regime change in Syria". As a result, the USA ( without much deep thought on the matter) sent CIA agents, their pockets stuffed with cash to "help" the Syrian insurgents. The problem they immediately encountered was: which insurgent group of radical terrorists should we support? With the USA's collusion the conflict deteriorated into a brutal stalemate. Our leaders persisted in this unfruitful course, providing more money and more guns while attempting to support and arm what they euphemistically called the "good insurgents". But with little effect, except for further entrenching the opposition to Assad ( who remains the only potential stable leader in that nation).
, It is clear, now to all, after so many blunders and missteps, that U.S. policy in the ME is woefully short on sound judgement. We have the most powerful military the world has ever seen, but we often do not fully understand when to use it, and what we are doing with it. This is a most common US foreign policy error.
But others in the region do. I read today (NY Times Sept. 5, 2015) that Mr. Putin of Russia has announced that Assad is ready to share power with moderate opposition groups. The Times suggests that Putin is prepared to more openly support the Assad Regime--the only possible route toward a stable government in Syria -- with both military hardware and advisors.
If we were wise, instead of opposing the Russian leader in his endeavor, something that the dogma ridden, hide-bound, denizens of Foggy Bottom are surely planning to do as I write this, INSTEAD, WE SHOULD JOIN PUTIN IN HIS SUPPORT OF MR. ASSAD. IT IS THE ONLY ROUTE TO HUMANELY END THE CIVIL WAR. A peace initiative supported by both the Russians and the USA and including Mr. Assad and any of the opposing groups, moderate enough to come to the peace table with him, would go a long way to ending the chaos. Once that is achieved, the new government entIty would unite around a force that would rid Syria of the REAL THREAT TO SYRIA, THE MIDDLE EAST AND EUROPE, WHICH IS ISIL and the other radical terrorist groups. Such a scenario requires, ignoring failed dogma, opening the mind to new thoughts, or simply "thinking out of the box". Such a process would stem the awful and growing tide of refugees leaving Syria, and end their awful suffering. It would eliminate the pain and costs to the European host nations for housing, feeding, and integrating these poor souls into the various nations to which they have so painfully migrated.
d The USA aspires to be the world's leader. Here is our chance to undo some of the evil we have imposed on that part of the world. Here is an opportunity to grasp the reins of leadership again. let's not let Putin get all the credit. All we have to do is abandon our old "proved to be wrong thoughts" and think of a new A better, a humane solution. THINK!
The awful destruction unleashed by the Bush-Cheney wars in the Middle East is now spreading westward into Europe. Hoards of migrating Syrian refugees are pictured every day in the press, streaming across Europe and away from the bombing, destruction and despair visited on their homes and communities. Bodies of dead refugees have been found in a sealed refrigerator truck abandoned along the side of the roadside, evidence of an escape to safety gone wrong. Others perish at sea, their bodies, even those of tiny, pathetic children, to wash up on the shores of Greece, Italy and Turkey. Conflicts are brewing among the leaders of wealthy European states as to who can or should take these Moslem refugees in. Unfortunately, the burden seems to have fallen on the least responsible for the original disaster...Germany and France ....nations which resisted the entreaties of Bush and his misguided warriors to invade Iraq. Here in the USA we act in the face of these problems as if we had nothing to with it. But some astute person I overheard yesterday down in Manchester, remarked that since it was George Bush who started all this mess with his Iraq invasion....he should open up his spacious ranch in the wide open spaces of Texas for these unfortunates. Well, that will not happen soon.
We can and should assign blame for this catastrophe. President Bush and Mr. Cheney began it all with their destabilizing war in Iraq which metastasized into a brutal and bloody sectarian civil war that engulfed US forces and spread like a poisonous miasma over the whole region. Then when the unrest reached the sandy desert border of Syria, President Obama and his neocon State Department holdovers from the Bush administration rubbed their hands with glee as they anticipated the fall of Assad.. These foreign policy geniuses were wrong their desire to destabilize the Assad regime. Mr Assad is not quite as brutal as Saddam, but he is a Middle East despot in an area where a strong leader is needed. While in power, he kept a tight rein on the forces of chaos within his borders. He did so until he was weakened by (his own mistakes) and the collusion of the U.S. and the other Syria-state enemies in the region. Our neocons classed Assad as an enemy of Israel and concluded (now proved to be erroneous) that ergo Assad must be our U.S. enemy too. The goal of the Obama administration, was and remains the short sighted: " regime change in Syria". As a result, the USA ( without much deep thought on the matter) sent CIA agents, their pockets stuffed with cash to "help" the Syrian insurgents. The problem they immediately encountered was: which insurgent group of radical terrorists should we support? With the USA's collusion the conflict deteriorated into a brutal stalemate. Our leaders persisted in this unfruitful course, providing more money and more guns while attempting to support and arm what they euphemistically called the "good insurgents". But with little effect, except for further entrenching the opposition to Assad ( who remains the only potential stable leader in that nation).
, It is clear, now to all, after so many blunders and missteps, that U.S. policy in the ME is woefully short on sound judgement. We have the most powerful military the world has ever seen, but we often do not fully understand when to use it, and what we are doing with it. This is a most common US foreign policy error.
But others in the region do. I read today (NY Times Sept. 5, 2015) that Mr. Putin of Russia has announced that Assad is ready to share power with moderate opposition groups. The Times suggests that Putin is prepared to more openly support the Assad Regime--the only possible route toward a stable government in Syria -- with both military hardware and advisors.
If we were wise, instead of opposing the Russian leader in his endeavor, something that the dogma ridden, hide-bound, denizens of Foggy Bottom are surely planning to do as I write this, INSTEAD, WE SHOULD JOIN PUTIN IN HIS SUPPORT OF MR. ASSAD. IT IS THE ONLY ROUTE TO HUMANELY END THE CIVIL WAR. A peace initiative supported by both the Russians and the USA and including Mr. Assad and any of the opposing groups, moderate enough to come to the peace table with him, would go a long way to ending the chaos. Once that is achieved, the new government entIty would unite around a force that would rid Syria of the REAL THREAT TO SYRIA, THE MIDDLE EAST AND EUROPE, WHICH IS ISIL and the other radical terrorist groups. Such a scenario requires, ignoring failed dogma, opening the mind to new thoughts, or simply "thinking out of the box". Such a process would stem the awful and growing tide of refugees leaving Syria, and end their awful suffering. It would eliminate the pain and costs to the European host nations for housing, feeding, and integrating these poor souls into the various nations to which they have so painfully migrated.
d The USA aspires to be the world's leader. Here is our chance to undo some of the evil we have imposed on that part of the world. Here is an opportunity to grasp the reins of leadership again. let's not let Putin get all the credit. All we have to do is abandon our old "proved to be wrong thoughts" and think of a new A better, a humane solution. THINK!
Thursday, September 3, 2015
THE TRUMP PHENOMENON
TRUMP THE GENUINE ARTICLE
Everyone is talking about "The Donald". My eldest daughter, a high school teacher, who normally votes Democratic, admitted that she can't stop reading about or listening to Donald Trump interviews. "He's so entertaining and different. I can't help myself", she admitted to me the other day.
I admit to the same effects. Or is this effect some kind of "Donald" hypnotism?
What is this "Donald" paralysis that has raged across the country since August 6th? My first thought was that the reason we are so interested in Mr. Trump is that he stands way above the Republican slate of 2016 candidates. This 2016 group arrived on the scene perhaps aith expectations set too high. These candidates were touted prior to the first debate by the pundits as "the best, the smartest, most experienced field of candidates in a long time" Really? Perhaps that impression may have stood until the candidates hit the Fox News stage on August 6th. After that, their supposed "smarts", wit, charm, and plain attractiveness turned out to be simply Fox News hype. None of the candidates came up to xpectations. All their, foibles, "bumples", ignorance, and awkwardness was on display for the Nation, with one exception--Donald Trump.
Let's take a quick tour of the Republican field of candidates. The GOP has offered up a group which simply do not measure up to "presidential" stature. Among them are two freshly elected, wild-eyed Senators who will shut down the government at the drop of a pin. Another is a verified snake oil salesman from Arkansas. There is a nice Afro-American, retired surgeon, a non-politician, with a book to sell. (This latter candidate-category..the black non-political candidate..has become almost a cottage industry for Afro-Americans and is now a traditional offering of the lilly white GOP). For the female voters, the GOP is offering a past woman Fortune 500 CEO ( released by the Board for poor business judgment with a $40 million dollar golden parachute! ) This woman candidate is also bereft of experience in elected office (her only connection with politics being a Senate candidacy rejected by the voters). The GOP is also presenting several governors who have run their states into voter despair and red ink by legislating as right-wing ideologues, just to prepare themselves for these very Tea Party dominated primaries. Also running is another Bush. One would be correct to think that the nation (as well as Momma Bush) was tired of having this family name on the White House entrance door. This Bush, eschews his surname and calls himself "JEB"....for perfectly good and obvious reasons. JEB seems to be running for this office because his Pappy said he had to do it. Although he is supposed to be the "Good Bush" and was early on being preened for the Presidency, but before he could act on his father's wishes his older brother "W" sneakily slipped in ahead of him and won the 2000 nomination. "W" couldn't quite seal up the 2000 election coming up short a few electoral college votes. So JEB as Governor of Florida had to do some arm twisting on the Florida election board to actually get "W" into the big leather chair in the Oval Office.A seat JEB thought he deserved. (History has proved he was probably correct on this score. His brother managed to make an awful mess in his years in office...under the tutelage of the evil wizard Cheney) Though JEB is supposed to have been the "smart one"--he can actually converse in Spanish---he, like all the other GOP field, seems not to quite match up with his published CV. In public, he has sadly demonstrated a tendency to stumble with syntax and sound more like "W" than expected. That is, though he is claimed to be the "smart one" all of this is family-relative and compared to the average non Bush guy, he does not seem to be so sharp. As a result of these failings his cowboy-booted foot seems to be found lodged in his mouth much too frequently. Perhaps unlike his brother, he has enough self-awareness to affect his demeanor which tends, during his stump speeches, to recall the unpleasant look of a scared deer in headlights.
Then, we have the entertaining New Yorker, multibillionaire, realtor, successful businessman, entrepreneur, TV personality, and performer Donald Trump who, right now, far and away leads the pack in the opinion polls by three to four hundred percent. My first explanation of "the Donald's" popularity was that in comparison to the weak and inexperienced candidate field the American people rated Mr.Trump as top tier. In that dull group the flashy, brash, "the Donald" stood out. But with his continued phenomenal successes in the public opinion polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, and even nationally, Trump seems to be truly popular with the GOP electorate. There must be some other reason other than lackluster competition.
What is his attraction? Perhaps it is just the fact that Trump is authentic, and sincere in his patriotism and says what he actually thinks. One may not agree with his pronouncements but at least they are his own. He is not a weaselly politician. Since he is self-financed, he can say what he thinks and is confident, well informed and unafraid to state his opinions. He is forthright. He is decidedly NOT a Pinncchio, operated with strings by an unseen Gippeto. He does not have the slim smooth hand of a Koch brother stuck up his backside working his mouth. He has not been bought and sold. He is not reading a political script presented to him with his "donation" check. He does not have to run back to his donors to ask if "that was OK to say?" (unlike Scott Walker who actually had to return several times to his donor base to find out what was in his acceptable script). Walker in one instance, had to confirm with his Koch Brother handlers that he could agree with Donald Trump's idea of building a wall across the Mexican border. They must have said he could agree with Trump. But warned him that he was acting too much like a wimp and his funding might be withdrawn if he didn't "man up" to Trump.. Walker came back intending to out Trump Trump. His idea? build a 5000 mile wall along the Canadian border to match the one along the Mexican side! Walker seems to be taking lessons from his Likud mentors on this matter.
Trump on the other hand is his own man. He makes his own decisions. Why does that set him so far apart from the others? Because the American political system has been highjacked by the rich and wealthy. The New York Times reports that there are as few as "400 families" who have donated more than half of the candidate"s cash. These families can control the candidates, they control the agenda, and they are attempting to control the elections. They buy up the candidates, who then are propped up before the public to repeat the words the donors provide them with.
So Trump's popularity may be simply the fact that the American public likes the "genuine article". Trump is what he says he is. His candidacy is refreshingly open and transparent. That can not be said about the others who in order to remain viable must deal with an often secret donor base. Perhaps the American GOP voter has wisely decided that it is wiser to support an actual person, rather than the cardboard representative with mechanical moving mouth parts. That concept of freedom and honesty is very attractive to the American GOP voter and I suspect it is also attractive to others who may not always vote Republican. The Donald may become a true political phenomenon.
Everyone is talking about "The Donald". My eldest daughter, a high school teacher, who normally votes Democratic, admitted that she can't stop reading about or listening to Donald Trump interviews. "He's so entertaining and different. I can't help myself", she admitted to me the other day.
I admit to the same effects. Or is this effect some kind of "Donald" hypnotism?
What is this "Donald" paralysis that has raged across the country since August 6th? My first thought was that the reason we are so interested in Mr. Trump is that he stands way above the Republican slate of 2016 candidates. This 2016 group arrived on the scene perhaps aith expectations set too high. These candidates were touted prior to the first debate by the pundits as "the best, the smartest, most experienced field of candidates in a long time" Really? Perhaps that impression may have stood until the candidates hit the Fox News stage on August 6th. After that, their supposed "smarts", wit, charm, and plain attractiveness turned out to be simply Fox News hype. None of the candidates came up to xpectations. All their, foibles, "bumples", ignorance, and awkwardness was on display for the Nation, with one exception--Donald Trump.
Let's take a quick tour of the Republican field of candidates. The GOP has offered up a group which simply do not measure up to "presidential" stature. Among them are two freshly elected, wild-eyed Senators who will shut down the government at the drop of a pin. Another is a verified snake oil salesman from Arkansas. There is a nice Afro-American, retired surgeon, a non-politician, with a book to sell. (This latter candidate-category..the black non-political candidate..has become almost a cottage industry for Afro-Americans and is now a traditional offering of the lilly white GOP). For the female voters, the GOP is offering a past woman Fortune 500 CEO ( released by the Board for poor business judgment with a $40 million dollar golden parachute! ) This woman candidate is also bereft of experience in elected office (her only connection with politics being a Senate candidacy rejected by the voters). The GOP is also presenting several governors who have run their states into voter despair and red ink by legislating as right-wing ideologues, just to prepare themselves for these very Tea Party dominated primaries. Also running is another Bush. One would be correct to think that the nation (as well as Momma Bush) was tired of having this family name on the White House entrance door. This Bush, eschews his surname and calls himself "JEB"....for perfectly good and obvious reasons. JEB seems to be running for this office because his Pappy said he had to do it. Although he is supposed to be the "Good Bush" and was early on being preened for the Presidency, but before he could act on his father's wishes his older brother "W" sneakily slipped in ahead of him and won the 2000 nomination. "W" couldn't quite seal up the 2000 election coming up short a few electoral college votes. So JEB as Governor of Florida had to do some arm twisting on the Florida election board to actually get "W" into the big leather chair in the Oval Office.A seat JEB thought he deserved. (History has proved he was probably correct on this score. His brother managed to make an awful mess in his years in office...under the tutelage of the evil wizard Cheney) Though JEB is supposed to have been the "smart one"--he can actually converse in Spanish---he, like all the other GOP field, seems not to quite match up with his published CV. In public, he has sadly demonstrated a tendency to stumble with syntax and sound more like "W" than expected. That is, though he is claimed to be the "smart one" all of this is family-relative and compared to the average non Bush guy, he does not seem to be so sharp. As a result of these failings his cowboy-booted foot seems to be found lodged in his mouth much too frequently. Perhaps unlike his brother, he has enough self-awareness to affect his demeanor which tends, during his stump speeches, to recall the unpleasant look of a scared deer in headlights.
Then, we have the entertaining New Yorker, multibillionaire, realtor, successful businessman, entrepreneur, TV personality, and performer Donald Trump who, right now, far and away leads the pack in the opinion polls by three to four hundred percent. My first explanation of "the Donald's" popularity was that in comparison to the weak and inexperienced candidate field the American people rated Mr.Trump as top tier. In that dull group the flashy, brash, "the Donald" stood out. But with his continued phenomenal successes in the public opinion polls in Iowa and New Hampshire, and even nationally, Trump seems to be truly popular with the GOP electorate. There must be some other reason other than lackluster competition.
What is his attraction? Perhaps it is just the fact that Trump is authentic, and sincere in his patriotism and says what he actually thinks. One may not agree with his pronouncements but at least they are his own. He is not a weaselly politician. Since he is self-financed, he can say what he thinks and is confident, well informed and unafraid to state his opinions. He is forthright. He is decidedly NOT a Pinncchio, operated with strings by an unseen Gippeto. He does not have the slim smooth hand of a Koch brother stuck up his backside working his mouth. He has not been bought and sold. He is not reading a political script presented to him with his "donation" check. He does not have to run back to his donors to ask if "that was OK to say?" (unlike Scott Walker who actually had to return several times to his donor base to find out what was in his acceptable script). Walker in one instance, had to confirm with his Koch Brother handlers that he could agree with Donald Trump's idea of building a wall across the Mexican border. They must have said he could agree with Trump. But warned him that he was acting too much like a wimp and his funding might be withdrawn if he didn't "man up" to Trump.. Walker came back intending to out Trump Trump. His idea? build a 5000 mile wall along the Canadian border to match the one along the Mexican side! Walker seems to be taking lessons from his Likud mentors on this matter.
Trump on the other hand is his own man. He makes his own decisions. Why does that set him so far apart from the others? Because the American political system has been highjacked by the rich and wealthy. The New York Times reports that there are as few as "400 families" who have donated more than half of the candidate"s cash. These families can control the candidates, they control the agenda, and they are attempting to control the elections. They buy up the candidates, who then are propped up before the public to repeat the words the donors provide them with.
So Trump's popularity may be simply the fact that the American public likes the "genuine article". Trump is what he says he is. His candidacy is refreshingly open and transparent. That can not be said about the others who in order to remain viable must deal with an often secret donor base. Perhaps the American GOP voter has wisely decided that it is wiser to support an actual person, rather than the cardboard representative with mechanical moving mouth parts. That concept of freedom and honesty is very attractive to the American GOP voter and I suspect it is also attractive to others who may not always vote Republican. The Donald may become a true political phenomenon.
THE GOP "24 DAY" LIE
THE GOP "BIG LIE" REGARDING THE IRAN DEAL
This morning I watched Gov. Chris Christie, hopeful Presidential candidate, as he repeated the GOP big lie on a CNN interview regarding the Iran Nuclear agreement (Thursday September 3, 2015). Christie's mendacious words aroused me to write this short piece.
What did he say? Christie repeated a GOP falsehood repeated ad nauseum by all the GOP candidates. I call it the "24 day phony Iran rant". The Iran Nuclear Agreement signed on to by China, Russia, The UK, France and Germany includes a stipulation that Iranian nuclear facilities suspected of prohibited activities may be inspected over a period that can under some circumstances stretch out to a maximum of twenty four days. The GOP and their foreign supporters, the Likudniks, homegrown neocons, and warmongers of various stripes have all latched on to this 'twenty-four day" time span as some catastrophic weakness in the agreement. It is NOT TRUE. Nuclear scientists and the informed public all know that it would not matter if the agreement stipulated 24 days, 24 weeks, 24 months, or even 24 years! If Uranium was present--even in ultra microscopic amounts...there WOULD BE NO WAY TO HIDE IT from inspectors. Uranium decays into other elements at a very, very slow and constant rate, as it does so it gives off hIghly detectible radiation . So slow and steady is this process that it is inconceivable that its presence could not be detected. Any Uranium left behind would be easily traced for near-eternity. Uranium isotopes have a half life (the length of time it takes for one half of the atoms to decay away) of 4.5 billion years! That period of time is as long as the earth is old.
A recent, well publicized case of British nuclear detective work reveals how difficult it is to conceal radioactive elements (like Uranium). On November 1, 2006, Russian spy(?) Alexander Litvinenko met associates in a London hotel cafe where he drank tea laced with the radioactive element Polonium-210. It was a tiny amount, but enough to make Litvinenko very ill immediately and to kill him within a short time. In an eventually successful attempt to track down the assassins, the London Metropolitan Police easily found the tell-tale traces of the poison used--radioactive Polonium. They tracked it in tiny amounts all across London. The perpetrators left traces in the hotel room and bathrooms where they stayed before and after the meeting with Litvinenko. The police easily followed the nuclear laced trail in the buses and vehicles they traveled in, in the hotel cafe, on the tableware, in the used tea cup, and utensils even after these were washed and stored away. There is no hiding a radioactive element. Yet this particular Polonium isotope has a short half life...one-half of it decays away in only about 138 days! Yet the Met Police had more than sufficient opportunity to find and document its traces all over metropolitan London. Compare that with the billions of years for Uranium....which would be searched for by the IAE in the confined space of a laboratory. A mere 24 days to track down long-lived Uranium is no hindrance for the nuclear watchdogs.
Christie's practiced repetition of the phony GOP LIE signifies that he is either ignorant of the science behind the agreement, or is simply spouting what his wealthy donors want him to say. The latter is more likely. His well publicized trip to Las Vegas where he journeyed, hat in hand, to kneel before casino-mogul and billionaire Mr. Adelson is where he was presented with this mendacious script. As a candidate for President of the USA one would hope that he would be more concerned with what is best for his own nation rather than spouting the policies handed to him by Mr. Adelson.
The truth is that the Iran Nuclear Agreement renders Iran incapable of a nuclear break out...for the foreseeable future. Christie's lie about the "24 hour" window and his sycophantic adherence to his "donors script" is probably one of the main reasons the voters of Iowa and New Hampshire see him for what he is, a puppet, and not his own man. That may be the prime reason he is unable to get himself out of single digits in the polls.
But let us not just single out Governor Christie. When the other candidates spout this Big Lie..they should be taken to task for it and perhaps have their mouths washed out with brown soap...like my Momma did to me when I told a whopper. Of course my whoppers had little potential to cause catastrophic world consequences such as another Mid East War like those of these GOP culprits. ( Just see the disaster and chaos we have wrought as a result of Mr. George Bush's past military misadventures in the Middle East).
This morning I watched Gov. Chris Christie, hopeful Presidential candidate, as he repeated the GOP big lie on a CNN interview regarding the Iran Nuclear agreement (Thursday September 3, 2015). Christie's mendacious words aroused me to write this short piece.
What did he say? Christie repeated a GOP falsehood repeated ad nauseum by all the GOP candidates. I call it the "24 day phony Iran rant". The Iran Nuclear Agreement signed on to by China, Russia, The UK, France and Germany includes a stipulation that Iranian nuclear facilities suspected of prohibited activities may be inspected over a period that can under some circumstances stretch out to a maximum of twenty four days. The GOP and their foreign supporters, the Likudniks, homegrown neocons, and warmongers of various stripes have all latched on to this 'twenty-four day" time span as some catastrophic weakness in the agreement. It is NOT TRUE. Nuclear scientists and the informed public all know that it would not matter if the agreement stipulated 24 days, 24 weeks, 24 months, or even 24 years! If Uranium was present--even in ultra microscopic amounts...there WOULD BE NO WAY TO HIDE IT from inspectors. Uranium decays into other elements at a very, very slow and constant rate, as it does so it gives off hIghly detectible radiation . So slow and steady is this process that it is inconceivable that its presence could not be detected. Any Uranium left behind would be easily traced for near-eternity. Uranium isotopes have a half life (the length of time it takes for one half of the atoms to decay away) of 4.5 billion years! That period of time is as long as the earth is old.
A recent, well publicized case of British nuclear detective work reveals how difficult it is to conceal radioactive elements (like Uranium). On November 1, 2006, Russian spy(?) Alexander Litvinenko met associates in a London hotel cafe where he drank tea laced with the radioactive element Polonium-210. It was a tiny amount, but enough to make Litvinenko very ill immediately and to kill him within a short time. In an eventually successful attempt to track down the assassins, the London Metropolitan Police easily found the tell-tale traces of the poison used--radioactive Polonium. They tracked it in tiny amounts all across London. The perpetrators left traces in the hotel room and bathrooms where they stayed before and after the meeting with Litvinenko. The police easily followed the nuclear laced trail in the buses and vehicles they traveled in, in the hotel cafe, on the tableware, in the used tea cup, and utensils even after these were washed and stored away. There is no hiding a radioactive element. Yet this particular Polonium isotope has a short half life...one-half of it decays away in only about 138 days! Yet the Met Police had more than sufficient opportunity to find and document its traces all over metropolitan London. Compare that with the billions of years for Uranium....which would be searched for by the IAE in the confined space of a laboratory. A mere 24 days to track down long-lived Uranium is no hindrance for the nuclear watchdogs.
Christie's practiced repetition of the phony GOP LIE signifies that he is either ignorant of the science behind the agreement, or is simply spouting what his wealthy donors want him to say. The latter is more likely. His well publicized trip to Las Vegas where he journeyed, hat in hand, to kneel before casino-mogul and billionaire Mr. Adelson is where he was presented with this mendacious script. As a candidate for President of the USA one would hope that he would be more concerned with what is best for his own nation rather than spouting the policies handed to him by Mr. Adelson.
The truth is that the Iran Nuclear Agreement renders Iran incapable of a nuclear break out...for the foreseeable future. Christie's lie about the "24 hour" window and his sycophantic adherence to his "donors script" is probably one of the main reasons the voters of Iowa and New Hampshire see him for what he is, a puppet, and not his own man. That may be the prime reason he is unable to get himself out of single digits in the polls.
But let us not just single out Governor Christie. When the other candidates spout this Big Lie..they should be taken to task for it and perhaps have their mouths washed out with brown soap...like my Momma did to me when I told a whopper. Of course my whoppers had little potential to cause catastrophic world consequences such as another Mid East War like those of these GOP culprits. ( Just see the disaster and chaos we have wrought as a result of Mr. George Bush's past military misadventures in the Middle East).
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