THE MESS IN SYRIA—DONT MAKE IT WORSE—GET OUT!

I read today—sadly with no surprise—that the Pentagon is resisting the President’s wishes regarding Syria.  He had wisely noted his intention to “get out of Syria, very soon”.  The deep state, the neocons, the military industrial complex (John McCain and his ilk)  and all the other forces that simply love war, killing innocents, and selling armaments are opposed to that very logical intention of Mr. Trump.  
The fact is that the US presence in eastern Syria was and remains a mistake.  We have already done so much damage to Syria—in our idiotic Obama policy of helping to generate and sustain the Civil War—that it is now apparent to everyone that it is time that we bring our troops home, and focus on rebuilding America and American infrastructure.  Let’s leave the rebuilding of Syria to the Syrians.

The phony propaganda  games that the Pentagon, CIA, the neocons, war hawks in DC play is all too apparent for anyone who reads the news from that part of the world.  These war mongers are opposed to a US troop pull out since they are opposed to ending any military conflicts.   They oppose the sensible, humane, reunification and pacification of Syria.  In the face of the blatant failure of pro-insurgency policies by Obama and others they continue to encourage chaos and instability.   US policy is stuck on preventing the Russians and the Iranians from the sustainig the influence they won by defeating ISIS and other terrorist groups as they supported the Assad regime in that war torn nation.

 Those are the facts.  We supported the losing side.  The Russians and the Iranians supported the legitimate government of Syria (whether we like Assad  policies or not).  Let us face the facts.   No amount of USA money spent, troops deployed,  or “involvement” will change the facts that “our side” lost.  We have no viable “allies” in eastern Syria.  The rag tag group of “moderate” terrorists we supported are all dead or have joined up with ISIS and are breathing their last.  The Kurds are soon to be defeated by the Turkish forces which rightly see them as an existential threat to Turkey.

Making the phony claim that we are attempting to “contain” ISIS after it is apparent that they are fully defeated does not stand up to facts on the ground.  And preventing the Assad forces from reclaiming the eastern part of the ancient territory of Syria is simply counter productive. It only exacerbates the mistakes we made in encouraging and supporting the  insurgency.  It retards the stabilization of that part of the Middle East and continues an economiccay damaging low grade insurgency that will only keep the region in chaos and cost more lives.  From the beginning it was plain that there was no reasonable alternative to Assad.

Now is the time to pack up and go home.  (Where we have many of our own problems to solve.). Mr. Trump has a refreshing way of pushing aside the BS, tossing out the window dressing, and stating the unvarnished truth.  He is right: “We should get our troops out “very soon”.

EU PROTECTS BEES FROM NEO-NIC PESTICIDES—NOW THE USA!

BEES FINALLY GET SOME PROTECTION FROM THE EU

Over the last decade or longer I have observed a sharp decline in honey bees visiting my garden and flower beds.  There were times late in summer when my flowering sedum and other fragrant garden flowers were swarming with honeybees.  The hum of their wings was so loud I could hear them from my back porch.   Then, scrambling among the busy honeybees  I would find  only a few of the slower,  bigger, black and yellow bumble bees.  But over the last two decades or so honey bees have literally disappeared.  The only bees now seen in my garden are our native clumsy, slow, bumble bees,  

My local observations were mirrored and coincident with a world-wide documented massive decline in honeybees and other pollinators.  Commercial bee keepers all across the USA and in Europe complained of  die offs of their bee colonies.  They reported that their hives collapsed when worker bees flew off from the hive but did not return.  The result was the death of the queen the collapse of the hive.   They termed this phenomena: “Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD).  Bee keepers and some USA investigators at first attributed the “alarming” die off to a variety of causes: the parasitic mite (Veroa mite) which attaches it self to worker bees, a virus which sickens and kills bees, and a gut parasite.  Few in the USA made the obvious connection between the widespread introduction of a new and widely-used neurologically active pesticide applied to crops that bees visited—-and the contemporaneous “alarming” die off of bee colonies.     

Honey bees are useful not only for producing honey—that is simply a sweet byproduct of their actual importance to man.  Bees are responsible for  pollinating  90% of our commercial food crops which require insect pollinators....such as apples, peaches, pears, avocados, plums, lemons, and grapes.  And “vegetables’ like squash, broccoli, carrots, okra, lima beans, peas, green-beans, are all pollinated by bees, as well as  essential vegetable cooking oil crops like  rapeseed (canola), and don’t forget coffee, and many many others. 

The repeated poor harvest and failure of my little garden crop of summer squash, zucchini and grapes was no doubt in part the result of fewer insect pollinators and that effect was probably happening all over the world.

Recently, the European Commission’s (Standing Committee on Plants and Animals, Food and Feed)  an influential  arm of the EU, has drafted new regulations that if passed* would ban from outdoor use a whole class of pesticides that affect domestic and wild honeybees.  The commission has made this decision based on a series of intensive studies on the impact of certain very popular and widely used chemical pesticides  called “neonicotinoids” (“neonics”) on wild bees and butterflies in EU crop fields. The studies confirmed that the pesticides have a detrimental effect on bee and butterfly survival. 

These chemicals mimic the effects of the biologically active chemical in tobacco—nicotine.  Nicotine as every smoker and former nicotine addict knows affects the nervous system.  Nicotine and nicotine-like chemicals used as plant pesticides are effective against a wide array of insect pests which attack crops. 

Neonicotinoids (literally: “new nicotine-like pesticides “) affect the way animal neurons (nerve cells)  transmit electrical impulses by blocking what might be termed the neuron’s “cut off” switch (a chemical known as acetylcholinesterase functions in this manner).  The pesticide neonic mimics the “cut off switch” of neurons and its presence at the juncture between neurons permits these affected neurons  to continue firing off impulses.  Such an effect can cause an insect to go into a form of convulsion or at lower doses interfere with many of its bodily functions controlled by the nervous system .  

Unlike higher organism (such as mammals and humans) insects have nervous systems which are essentially “hardwired”. In higher organism nicotine can alter the way nervous impulses are generated or transmitted.  They might change the heart rate or increase nerve transmission but do not pose an existential threat   In more primitive neurologically simpler organisms like insects  altering the way the nervous systems works can cause the effected organism to go into convulsions, or perhaps in lesser doses stop its chewing actions of its mandibles, stop it form burrowing into a plant tissue, or as in honey bees, alter its nervous  system so that it does not fly back to its hive. 

These neonicotinoid are not sprayed on to crop plants.  They are “systemic poisons”  incorporated as a coating on the seed and as the seed germinates and the plant grows the chemical spreads throughout the entirety of the growing plant’s tissues.  The roots, tubers, stems, leaves, flowers and fruit of these plants are all laced with the pesticide. Thus the plant is effectively protected from insect “grubs” which attack the roots, others which feed on the leaves and others which burrow into and attack the fruit.  The nectar and pollen of neo-nic treated plants upon which bees feed are also contaminated with this pesticide and this is the route by which bees are affected.  

These chemicals are highly popular with farmers who for certain crops can simply plant the seeds and wait for harvest,  assured that the young plant will not fall prey to some very common bugs.  They need not spray the crop intensively with other costly surface-active insecticides.  Over the last 20 years this group of pesticides —the neonics” have become very widely used and for the above reasons understandably  popular with farmers.  Naturally the well-connected and politically powerful pesticide industry producers like Bayer and Syngenta and Nippon who created these chemicals are also in favor of their continued sale and continued profits from these sales.  

But the last 20 years of more and more widespread use of these chemicals has resulted in the shocking decline of many species of pollinators—honeybees and butterflies—which are clearly effected by ingesting the neonic laced flower nectar and the neonic laced pollen.  

Finally after two decades—something is being done to save our honey bees and all the crops that they so effectively pollinate.  And who knows what effects the long term ingestion of these chemicals incorporated into the plant tissues and oils of crop have on humans?  Are they biologically concentrated in plant oils?  The producers and farmers are not concerned about these questions.  We must thank the EU Commission on agriculture for their persistence and interest.  

Now it is time for the US Department of Agriculture and the EPA to act in concert with the EU Commission and BAN THE USE OF THIS  PESTICIDE

SAVE THE BEES AND BUTTERFLIES. 

 *The proposal passed on April 27, 2018.

ON REFUGEES, MEXICO AND ECONOMIC MIGRANTS

OUR SOUTHERN BORDER IS BEING PENETRATED BY CARAVANS OF  “REFUGEES”

THESE FOLKS WANT TO CLAIM POLITICAL ASYLUM AND SOME SAY WE CAN NOT RETURN THEM TO MEXICO BASED ON EXISTING REFUGEE PROTOCOLS

BUT THEY HAVE MIGRATED THROUGH MEXICO WITH THE AID AND ENCOURAGEMENT OF THE MEXICAN GOVERNMENT.  THEIR LIVES  ARE NOT THREATENED IN MEXICO. THEY CAN BE RETURNED TO MEXICO

THEY WOULD SIMPLY PREFER TO RESIDE IN THE USA.

ACTUAL REFUGEES FROM ECUADOR ARE MEXICO’S RESPONSIBILITY

World nations have been granting asylum to refugees for hundreds of years.  Wars, natural disaster, political persecution have all caused people to seek asylum elsewhere.  Providing asylum is a humane and just policy.  Since the Bush-Obama wars in the Middle East,  we have seen a massive surge of refugeees from those affected nations.  The UN (See: UN.org) estimates there are at present some 65 million displaced people around the world.  Of those, about a third or 22 million are actual refugees.  The tragic war in Syria alone has generated nearly 6 million refugees from that country.

In the United States, our southern border has been overrun for years on end with mostly economic migrants.  These are people who are seeking opportunities for employment and and a better life.  They cross the border illegally and become illegal immigrants (not “undocumented” immigrants).  But these are not refugees threatened with death, torture or imprisonment.  They migrate for economic reasons.  There are specific laws which correctly and justifiably  protect those who are escaping from war-torn regions or from natural disasters.  Recently, some in the political realm have tried to embarrass the new Trump Administartion by attempting to use these protocols for refugees as a political brickbat by claiming to designate Equadoran (and others) economic migrants as real “refugees”.

The convention which controls how refugees are treated had its origin in the  post WWII era.  In 1951 the UN agreed upon and published  a “Convention on the Status of Refugees”.  It was revised in 1967. Other related laws have further codified this protocol , such as the Universal Declaration of Human rights, The American Declaration of Rights and Duties of Man and others.  All of these agreements leave it up to the individual states as to determine wether a person appearing at the border of a state meets the defitinition as a refugee.

NON-REFOULMENT
A common tenet of all these “refugee” laws and general agreements is the prohibition of “refoulment”  (or return).   This means that the state to which the refugee appears has an obligation not to return a valid refugee to the “frontiers of territories where his or her life would be threatened by their race, religion, political opinion or membership in a particular social group”.  Such and action would be clearly at odds with the humanitarian focus of the refugee agreements.  No one disagrees on that.

But the exceptions to refoulment are very important.

EXCLUDED INDIVIDUALS
Refugees may be excluded from protected status and refoulment (and be returned) if there is serious reason to suspect that the applicant has committed serious crimes.  Another cause for exclusion is for those  who have traveled through a third country,or received protection in a third country.    For example, the caravans of Ecuadorians attempting to enter the USA after passing through Mexico are no longer fleeing persecution.  They are not threatened in Mexico.  They are NOT refugees when they reach our border.  Another reason to deny refugee status is if the individual has aid from the third country.  In the case of the Ecuadorians they have received tacit and direct protection from Mexico to move northward toward our border.  These people  are no longer fleeing conditions which threaten their lives,  but are simply attempting to make a “quality of life” choice:  “Where would I prefer to live north or south of the Mexican-American border? “  These folks are NOT refugees in the legal sense described above.

These migrants have enetered Mexico’s southern border, have received aid and assistance from Mexico on their migration north.  They are not refugees but economic migrants.  We should not be forced to accept them at the border. If Mexico designates thee immigrants as refugees seeking asylum from persecution in Ecuador,,,they become the responsibility of Mexico, not the USA.

If however they want to go through the process of all legal immigrants...they should do so.

BLOOMBERG VIEW ON IRAN: COMPOUNDING ERRORS

BLOOMBERGS VIEW: COMPOUNDING STUPIDITY ON IRAN

The USA has a hatred for Iran.  Perhaps it is because Iran as it exists today is a constant reminder of our failed foreign policies in that region.  After all in 1953 our CIA instigated the assassination of a popular and democratically elected moderate PM— Mohammed  Mossaddegh.  (Perhaps he is just the kind of person who we would prefer today. ). He was assassinated in favor of the so-called and self-described “Shah” of Iran: Reza Pahalvi.  Pahlavi was a tool of the CIA who ran the nation for the financial benefit of himself and his family and to avoid assassination himself he studiously followed the US line on foreign policy. Under his corrupt and brutal rule the nation descended into social and economic chaos.  That disaster of US “foreign policy”  led to the 1973 revolution which in turn resulted in the installation of the “Ayatollahs”..we also love to hate.   

Today(April 24, 2018)  in a Bloomberg opinion piece by Eli Lake entitled: “Trump, Macron, Merkel have an opportunity in Iran crisis” we learn of more stupidity on Iran.  In this opinion piece, author Eli Lake suggests we neither fix nor exit from the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by President Obama, but continue the uncertainty of the present.  Lake’s third option is to “keep the deal in limbo”.  Lake argues that such a policy would  discourage foreign investment and help encourage the collapse of the Iranian government.    Lake suggests his plan would permit us to help  “insurgents in the USA” install another Iranian government we might like better.  “Just let the regime crumble” suggests Lake.  Does this all sound a little familiar?  This opinion is a bit painful to read since underscores the fact that our “journalists” have apparently learned nothing over the last two decades. 

After reading his piece, one must assume that Mr. Lake was much in favor of the tragic human, economic and political disasters initiated by, caused, or instigated in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen—creating an historically unprecedented regional arc of destruction, death, poverty and chaos.  Those wars of choice by Presidents Bush and Obama not only destroyed nations of the Middle East but they generated either directly or indirectly millions of displaced peoples and refugees who surged into Greece, Italy and central and Northern Europe where they are today causing economic and social disruptions of massive proportions. 

If there is anything wrong with the deal that President Obama signed....let’s hear it.  Let us in good faith attempt to renegotiate to a better deal...if we can.  But our best interests (and those of the world we inhabit) is certainly not another failed state in the Middle East.  

Not a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. 

Not another regional war.  

Not a nuclear war.

GAZA:SHOOTING FISH IN A BARREL—EMBARRASSING

GAZA: 

ON BANTUSTANS, SHOOTING FISH IN A BARREL, BLOCKADES AND BOYCOTTS

The Benjamin Netanyahu government is at it again— brutally shooting and gassing  Palestinians trapped behind the Israeli fence of the Gaza ‘bantustan” created by the Israeli government.  

 In the process, the Israelis again expose themselves to legitimate criticism from the world at large and at the UN.  In the UN, our embarrassing hypocrite, US Ambassador Niki Haley has (again) cast a security council veto to prevent rightful UN condemnation of Israel—while just minutes after using her position to condemn other nations for alleged similar crimes.  But having no internal restraint for the use of blatant double standards, —-she remains embarrassingly  mum on Israel’s brutality.  The Netanyahu government’s actions at the Gaza fence, characterized accurately by some as “shooting fish in a barrel”  are indefensible.  Since 2007, the Israelis have continued an illegitimate and brutal blockade of Gaza.  Their  policy prevents the  Gazans from leaving or entering the tiny, poverty-stricken territory, resulting in horrible, inhuman, living conditions, scarcities of food and water, limited health care, and only a few hours of electricity a day.  

The demonstrations in Gaza are the legitimate right of an oppressed people.  The demonstrations  also bring attention to the plight of the Palestinians in the West Bank  and in Israel proper and remind the world of the Nakba (exodus) of 1948 when hundreds of thousands were displaced from their homes in what is now Israel.

It is essential to understand  that these demonstrations are taking place WITHIN the fenced borders of the Gaza territory—where the captive Palestinian population is confined in essentially an outdoor prison.  The demonstrators have been attacked by Israeli snipers, and by troopers  lobbing canisters of tear gas into crowds of protestors.  The protestors are located within the fence.  Over the last few days,  the Israelis  have killed twenty-nine  Palestinian demonstrators (men women and children) and gravely wounded 300 others.   All the killed and wounded were participating in demonstrations, not in Israel, but  behind the Gaza fence and on their own farms and roads.  

The US press should be reporting this story—but the Gaza saga remains in the journalistic stage of rough AP  ticker tapes —-abandoned on newsroom floors .  Here in the USA, there is little knowledge of and sympathy for the besieged Palestinians. And massive perverse restraint in newsrooms limits the knowledge in the USA concerning the gross misuse of force by the powerful Israeli army against a group of trapped civilians armed only with rocks and primitive slings.  Just like the rope sling used by the biblical David in his attack against Goliath.  Today the Israelis are the Goliaths.  The tables have turned.

It is worth noting that the Netanyahu government is always ready to remind the world (when it suits its purposes) of the true and tragic history of the Jewish people at the hands of other even more vicious and brutal regimes.  One wonders how, with the sad history of injustices and brutality the Israelis have experienced over the years, that they can stand mute in the face of the tragedy of other people, and elect and reelect the brutal Netanyahu government—which habitually engages in  atrocities such as we are witnessing now at the Gaza fence line.

One is forced to the conclusion that the only solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conundrum is an economic one.  The Netanyahu regime  would abandon its brutal “rules of engagement” which permit  Israeli snipers to shoot innocent unarmed people trapped behind a fence 

—within 24 hours —- if the world’s nations supported the  the several  divestment and boycott movements growing in strength in certain religious groups and on college campi.  We know form the history of the South African Africanns Regime that bantustans, brutality and blockades can be countered effectively with economic boycotts.

We here in America are eager (some are almost gleeful) to “send a message” in the form of bombs or economic sanctions to nations, which in pursuit of their national aims go beyond the pale of the acceptable, but our close ally Israel always escapes our corrective measures and our “messages” to Israel only encourage self defeating and destructive behavior.

 Our failure to act as  “honest-broker” demeans both nations. 

ON PANGOLINS, EXTINCTIONS AND ANIMAL HUSBANDRY

ON PANGOLINS, EXTINCTION AND ENVIRONMENTAL HUSBANDRY

I can bet that most of you don’t know what a Pangolin is.  I’m a trained biologist and was just barely familiar with the term.  I didn't know either that the Pangolin (Smutsia gigantea) (this is one of the at least eight species) is a thirty pound insectivorous mammal which ranges (or used to) over much of sub Sahara Africa and parts of the Middle East.  What is so remarkable is that the Pangolin, an animal of which so little is known, is the most poached and trafficked wild animal in the world.  Biologists estimate that more than a million of these mammals have been poached from the wild and illegally traded in the last decade. At that rate of killing and removal  the Pangolin will become extinct long before its name is recognizable by a few more people than it is now.

The cause of its “popularity for extinction”is often attributed to the rise of affluent Asians who have a dangerous and perverse predilection for wild animal parts to use as exotic food or for imagined aphrodisiac properties of those parts.  That is only one of the motivations for the criminal poaching and trafficking of this species...and other well known critters such as rhinos and elephants. But the underlying cause is the loss of habitat, and distractions to the natural world wrought by the earth’s dominant and most destructive species—man. 

We all know of the plight of African elephants which are killed at the horrible rate of one every 15 minutes.  Their deaths are for no other purpose than to collect their tusks—-to make worthless trinkets again for the Asian market.  Once this magnificent species existed in the millions over all of Africa—now their populations are down to a tiny fraction—perhaps 400,000.    We know too that elephants have a two year gestation cycle and can not possibly replace their losses to poaching by natural reproduction.  The math is simple, the remaining elephant herds are slowing but surely being reduced to zero.  Without huge effort and persistent protection extinction is a sad but sure-bet certainty.

The story is the same for the Bengal tiger, the African lion, the African wild dog, the rhino and many many other species on the road to certain extinction—-like the pangolin—a species which most of us simply don’t even know existed.  The problem is not restricted to the terrestrial environment either—-all of our creatures— birds, fish and mammals are under similar threats.  Many marine critters  are on the verge of extinction—and like the Pangolin, we don’t even know of them when they are gone.  The beautiful diversity of the gene pools of these species which took  half a billion years to evolve will be gone in a only few decades..  

The problem is not localized in the land of the Pangolin but in all of Africa, South America, Asia and North America—as well as the world oceans.  Extinction, loss of habitat, destruction of environment, pollution are all global phenomena.    Wherever we look, whether in our suburban backyards, or the once vast and untouched jungles of Brazil, urbanized Homo sapiens has become the intruder, the dominant species which alters the environment to suit its perverse needs— it kills—-it disposes its wastes, exploits soli, forests, land and water.  It exterminates native species, it displaces, and irreplaceably alters the habitat of all other species.  The only habitats this species creates and increases are niches for the ubiquitous Norway rat, the cockroach, and the various commensal and parasitic bacteria and viruses which inhabit and prey on the physical body of Homo sapiens.    

So if we are to maintain the habitability of this planet—-the only one we have—or will ever have—we must staunch the unrelenting destruction of the living planet, the biosphere of which we are an integral part and upon which we (unknown to most of us) depend for our lives.  For whether we understand the complexity of biological interactions or not we are all part of a vast web of life that is today under terminal existential threat.  We must all be aware of our impact on our environment and each of us must strive to become better husbands of the natural world around us.  

All our future actions must in some way help the survival of the diverse life our our planet.  We must turn from harmful destructive habits—-to actions which are environmentally sustainable and positive for the survival of our fragile environment.

We must all turn toward modifying our lifestyles to help support life—other life—- like the Pangolin.  For all around us other species  are desperately struggling to survive.  

They have a right to existence—-as much as we have—-in some cases more!  

ON FAKE NEWS, GAS ATTACKS, MANIPULATING PRESIDENT TRUMP

GAS ATTACKS IN SYRIA— TOO TIMELY, TOO FREQUENT, TOO OBVIOUS 

Only a week has passed since President Trump shocked the Pentagon, the military, our “intelligence’ establishment (and some of our ME allies) by announcing his intention to “bring the troops home from Syria”.  The response from the military-espionage-deep state was swift and clear.  Although the nation as a whole agree that Mr. Trump was right in his intentions to end our misguided involvement in Syria—but the “deep state” makes its living perpetrating covert attacks and fighting wars—-and are against withdrawal of troops anywhere— for any reason. Foreign players too have the means and powerful motives to drive the President into actions which suit their national interests and strategies.   They of course do not benefit Americans—and as we have learned about the last trillions of dollar “Bush” wars, they generate only negative economic impacts for our citizenry. 

Lo and behold only a week after the President’s announcement, we hear reports of another unconfirmed poison gas attack on Syrian civilians.  Frightening pictures  of children with foaming mouths appear on our TV screens.  Videos of first responders—suspiciously wearing no protection gear as they handle and treat victims —are streamed repeatedly across cable news outlets.  The circumstances and timing of these new “gas attacks” are so timed and so advantageous to the strategies of unknown foreign agents and terrorist groups (and are so similar to  previous “alleged” gas attacks) that they sharply spike one’s suspicions of a manipulated or fake news story.  Mr. Trump’s previous precipitous, “knee jerk” reaction to a similar gas attack report in which he bombed an air base in Syria only add to the suspicion that terrorist groups or foreign agents believe that he could again be goaded into an attack beneficial to the Syrian insurgency (or others) with faked or staged gas attacks.    

The timing, motives and circumstances simply do not add up to a credible charge against the Syrians or Russians.  Think of it. 

Syrian government forces have after all these years of fighting, in effect, won the war. Small  pockets of resistance remain here and there in western Syria, but those places are mostly surrounded by government troops.  It would be a monumental miscalculation for Assad to even consider using chemical weapons when he has won.  It is simply not credible.   

As for the Russians...they have been recently smeared and humiliated around the world as a result of a still unproven charge of poison chemical use in the attack on Sergei Skripal in Salisbury UK, which the Russians  have hotly denied again and again.  Why would they purposely stir up similar charges—in a war in Syria in which their client state is winning handily.

No, this is not a likely move from the former head of the USSR’s formidable KGB.  Putin is too good of a chess player to make such a move.  

But the world is a dangerous and complex place—and the ME is the epicenter of Byzantine imbroglio.  I suggest that we look elsewhere for the perpetrators. There are many other groups here in the USA, and around the world that would profit from “jiggering” the US President into a foolish attack on Syria.  which could blow up into a regional conflict that upend the President’s entire domestic agenda.  The timing and motives suggest that Syrian terrorists, ISIS, al Qaida and other elements of the Syrian insurgency, would have the opportunity and motive to STAGE such an  ATTACK..  That holds true for  the Kurds, and other dangerous “players” in that region, the Saudis, Israelis (who have powerful motives) and others as well who would profit hugely by a staged “gas attack’.  

It is uncontested by anyone that there is no confirmed evidence of who was behind the attacks if they indeed occurred. It is also uncontested that a costly, bloody war with Syria and Russia would put an end to the promises  of the domestic agenda the populist Mr. Trump was elected to enact.   For the USA to act precipitously and without proof and without due diligence is foolish and very dangerous.  It would only underscore the calumny heaped on this President before the election.

I can see the Democrats, the neocons, the scary McCain war hawks, Mr. Mr. Brennan, Mr. Clapper, Mr. Mueller, Mrs Clinton, and the resistance movement all rubbing their hands with glee were President Trump to permit himself to be manipulated, jiggered and controlled with obviously fake news that would destroy the promise of this presidency. 

TRUMP CORRECT: TROOPS TO USA BORDER , TROOPS OUT OF SYRIA

PRESIDENT TRUMP DESERVERS SUPPORT FOR HIS AMERICA FIRST POLICIES

 TROOPS MUST COME HOME FROM SYRIA

 TROOPS (STATE MILITIA) NEEDED ON BORDER

 YES, GET OUT OF SYRIA.
 As I have stated before in this blog before—we have nothing to gain and much to loose in Syria. Assad has support of more than 60% of the Syrian population and almost fully controls the habitable western part of the Syria. Trying to unseat him is not a viable proposition. Russia is well placed in Syria and will not be easily dislodged. Both Russia and our NATO ally, Turkey want us out of Syria—and will work toward that end when they can.   Obama’s foolish and failed policy of supporting a rag-tag element of Syrian insurgents has come to its bitter and tragic end.  It was a failed policy that only served to extend the civil war.

Our own US troops are ensconsed in a circumscribed and small western segment of the nation, ostensibly in support of a Kurdish insurgency. This group our ally Turkey correctly views as an existential threat to their nation. Turkey is a nation with a large and restive Kurdish minority. The Kurds in Syria are their enemies.  The USA currently has more than 2000 troops there—supporting the Kurds who are viewed as terrorists by our NATOally Turkey.  Not a good situation.  . In addition simply keeping these troops in place costs us nearly two billion (with a “B”) dollars annually (@ 1 million per trooper).

We literally have nothing to gain and much to loose by keeping our forces there. President Trump—our non politiician-executive—who often sees thing more clearly than the self-serving politicians in the DC swamp—who interpret every issue only on how it effects their relelction. President Trump clearly stated  early in this week (April 2, 2018?) His intention that our troops “will be coming home very soon from Syria”.

His statement caused an uproar in the Pentagon, the military industrial complex, and among the neocon war-hawks, and the anti-Trump media. All of these groups are bound together in an economic symeconosis in which every world conflict is seen as aa place to test out the newest killing machines or as a sales-showcase for their death-dealing hardware. Consequently, these are constantly “sending a message” to some presumed enemy or other with American-made bombs and think little of the human or economic consequences to the nation’s welfare as a whole. Military adventurism does little to generate meaningful jobs for US workers or re-build communities shattered by wrong headed trade policies of the past 40 years.

Thankfully, the man who sits in the Oval Office today..has the concerns and economic needs of our middle class workers close to his heart. Interestingly, he—a multibillionaire business man— has a better feel for the pulse of America than any of our “professional” politicians. The folks inside of the Beltway, once they get there, focus too commonly not on their constituent needs, but only on how to feather their own nests and assure that they stay inside the swamp. We can thank the Founders and our Constitution which—only in America— has made Mr.Trump’s election possible.

 Americans who want to see a better economy at home, a better future for our children and thriving heartland communities again should all support and encourage President Trump to bring our troops home. Let us spend those billions of hard earned tax dollars not in the barren desert sands of Syria, but in building up America. Syria’s leaders and the Syrian people must come to their own accommodations and don’t need the USA to direct their future.

ON MEXICO

 YES SEND THE TROOPS TO THE MEXICAN BORDER

ACTION OF PUEBLO SIN FRONTERAS ONLY UNDERSCORES THE NEED FOR BORDER WALL

 In regard to the Mexican border and the Honduran Caravan which is attempting to march thousands of “refugees” from Honduras into the USA. These folks know how to manipulate the system. But President Trump has stepped up to the plate. He has used his authority to send troops to the border to help the border patrol. Let us hope that sanity prevails among the governors of our border states. We must have secure borders so we can control who has access to our nation.

 Mexico has no right to encourage, facilitate and accommodate the hoarders of refugees traveling north to OUR border. If they are actually fleeing a war zone or some other events which threaten their lives—-international rules indicate that Mexico must accept them as refugees. Mexico must not shunt them north to the Texas border. President Trump is absolutely correct in threatening our unappreciative, disrespetiful and recalcitrant southern neighbor to act responsibly in regard to these illegal hordes of refugees. They must NOT be allowed to enter.

 This action of the “Pueblo Sin Fronteras” (People without Borders) movement which has encouraged and organized the Honduran caravan only underscores the need for an actual physical barrier—a REAL wall—where appropriate— along the border which can not be breached.

UK CHEMISTS: ITS NOT NOVICHOK ,CAN’T IDENTIFY SOURCE; PROBABLY NOT RUSSIANS

UK’S MAY WAXED HYSTERICAL, FINGERING “NOVICHOK” AND RUSSIANS WITHOUT EVIDENCE SHE CAUESD A MAJOR AND DANGEOURS DIPLOMATIC RIFT—EXACERBATING COLD WAR-LIKE—TENSIONS AND ENCOURAGING CONFLICT WITH A POWERFUL NUCLEAR ARMED NATION—-ALL WITHOUT EVIDECNE AND WITHOUT NEED. NOW THE TRUTH STANDS AS AN EMBARRASSMENT TO HER AND HER NATION. It was just about a month ago that Col Sergei Skripal (a former Russian intelligence agent—then British spy) and his daughter were found in a catatonic state on a park bench in the village center of Salisbury, UK. It soon became apparent that the duo were poisoned. It was British Prime Minister Theresa May who jumped to the conclusion that the Russians did it. She claimed the poison was “Novichok” a volatile nerve poison known to have been produced by the USSR (now defunct Soviet Union) during the Cold War era. Mrs. May pointed her finger with little evidence to support her charges, at Mr. Putin and the modern Russian state. It may have served her immediate political purposes to do so. Her charges were seen, in the current state of tension between the USA, EU and Russia, as politically astute. But now, with the recent evelation about the way in which the poison was administered and the chemical and physical properties of the substance, derived from her own nations chemists, she seems unhinged and hysterical. Not characteristics one would prefer in the leader of a nuclear armed state. May, without any firm evidence of culpability and many reasons to suspect otherwise, continued to blame the Russians. She jumped into a punative response, expelling 23 Russian diplomats (claimed as spies) diplomats from the nation. President Trump who, at first showed some judgement and spine claiming he would wait for proof of Russian involvement before he acted, but soon gave in and in like manner expelled 60 Russian diplomats. Other nations around the world like lemmings followed suit. Perhaps 150 Russians were sent home. It was a humiliating for Mr. Putin. He will retaliate. This was not what we would hope to see from our diplomatic corps. It is dangerous in a nuclear armed world. The sophisticated and vaunted British chemists at Porton Down Near Salisbury in the UK have just determined, after a month of investigation, that the poison used to sicken Colonel Skripal, the former turncoat Russian spy, and his daughter WAS NOT IDENTIFIABLE AS TO SOURCE, AND (IT WAS NOT STATED BUT IMPLIED) NOT NOVICHOCK. The revelation suggest strongly that the Russians had nothing to do with the Skripals’ poisoning. Several facts revealed during the intensive British investigations make that clear. It appears now, as a result of professional British investigations that Skripal and his daughter (and a British police officer) were poisoned with a now “unknown” subsstanc “smeared” on the front door handle of the Skripal’s home. They were poisoned when one of them touched the front door handle. The British police officer seems to have been infected at the same place when he returned to the Skripal home to conduct an investigation after they had been rushed to the hospital. After coming in contact with the poison, the pair left their home, dined at a local pizza restaurant, then spent time at a local pub. They became only became ill after several hours of contact with the so-called “nerve agent”. They finally succumbed to the poison on a near by park bench. The described circumstances suggest something other than Novichok..a nerve active agent which would be readily absorbed though the skin or its vapors inhaled and affect one almost immediately. The detective and about 20 other first responders and investigators were also poisoned by the same substance. So far all of those affected have either been released from care or had little response and are now alive and well. Only Skripal himself is still comatose. These facts and the report from Porton Down obviate the rushed conclusion by PM May and her advisors that the substance was Novichok. That chemical would have killed instantly. It would not have been able to be used to smear on a door handle. The active substance has been reported (yesterday) to have been “unidentifiable” as to source nation and suggesst the lab may have no knowledge of its origin. Now with the awful and dangerous bruhaha that PM May has generated with her careless and unsubstantiated charges against Russia, how will the truth ever be revealed? A full honest accounting is too embarrassing and thus not likely. The story will be buried by the British who have the only samples of this poison and are not sharing the substance with anyone. Mr.Trump should take notice as well. His planned meeting with PM Putin is a good idea. Perhaps these two can lessen the dangerous tensions between two powerful nations armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles.