My Favorite Column of All Time

Did Obama Just Throw The Entire Election Away? by Andrew Sullivan over at The Daily Beast
Answer: Yes!

Liar, Liar!

Courtesy Michael Ramirez

The Consequences of Leading From Behind

September 11, 2012

Ambassador Chris Stevens

 September 11, 2013?

Jerusalem

Online Background Checks

If you've spent any time wandering the Internet lately you've seen the pop-up and pop-under ad by a company selling its background investigative services. They can determine criminal records, financial standing, school records, all the basic stuff you'd like to know before hiring an employee, for instance.

Well, I wonder; is it too late, or could we still run Barack H. Obama? I really would be curious to learn if he has the credentials to be President other than the obvious, the ability to talk his way into the office.

What Mitt Should Do - NOW

The Romney campaign and Republican National Committee have more money than God, too much to waste to continue doing things the way they've always done. Now is the time to step out in a way that not only gets his message out over the heads of the Obama media but also draws an enormous amount of attention. Now is the time to swing for the fences.

How? Spend a handful of those millions on hand to buy 30 minutes of simultaneous airtime on all three (or four or five) of the major broadcast networks. Do it now, before the debates. That will maximize the audience and the impact. It will change the dynamic of the debates and the relative standing of the candidates.

Romney is in a position to assume the leader's position in the campaign. The timing is perfect, as Mr. Obama has been stumbling through issues and events.

In one fell swoop, Mr. Romney can:

• Get his message across to 40-50 million voters, unfiltered by the media;
• Propagate an impression of leadership;
• Suck all the attention in the world into his campaign, leaving his opponent with nothing to do for several days but carp an be negative;
• By selectively emphasizing the issues he'd most like to highlight, facilitate the echoing Internet buzz leading into the debates.
• Potentially set the agenda for the debates themselves.

This one act can have a far greater effect than all the 30- or 60 second commercials in the world. It has the potential for turning the entire election on its head.

It would seem every bit as forward-leaning as his selection of Paul Ryan. For an even larger impact, consider asking Mr Ryan to co-present.

Obama's Middle East: He Built It, He Broke It, He Owns It

Where are the Libyan Bodies, Part II

The Obama representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Rice, tells ABC News that the U. S. had a "substantial security presence" at the consulate at Benghazi.

Fine. OK. Given a "substantial" security presence that allowed four Americans to be killed, again, I ask, "Where are the bodies?"

Where are the Libyan Bodies?

Our ambassador to Libya was guarded by two retired SEALS. In life threatening circumstances that ended in four deaths at the hands of what is purported to be an undirected mob, they apparently did not use force to defend themselves.

Libyan bodies should have been stacked like cordwood. Where are the dead and wounded attackers?

Were the ambassador's security detail unarmed?

The attack was an act of war, for which we should retaliate. But if the State Department ordered the SEALS disarmed, we should be investigating a crime by Americans against Americans.

Where are the bodies?

The Piano Man Plays One Night at the Star Wars Cantina

The Democratic National Convention was a musical tragedy composed in three acts.

Tuesday night was the gathering of special interests and professional victims from every corner of the known universe, the most toxic group of economic and spiritual vampires since the mass gatherings in the early 18th century. If any suffering portion of the American subculture missed their turn at the bar, I missed it. It seemed that every ethnic, cultural, sexual group in the country with more than three members put in at least a cameo appearance, as did the community organizers, union bosses, government employees and all the others who make their living off the taxpayer. Each group had their chance, ordering drinks for the house, all on the tab.

Wednesday night's highlight was watching and listening to Mr. Bojangles himself, remixing songs from his top hits albums, humming the tunes when he couldn't remember his words. Older, greyer, thinner but still wildly attractive to many of the women and some of the men in the audience, still driving thrills.

By its final night, nostalgia had worn thin, replaced by a sense of sadness and loss. By next morning I was humming the tune from Piano Man. Though the words had changed just a bit, the feelings evoked were the same. Too much smoke, too much loneliness. The evening before an hour's respite from reality, weighed down with the absolute certainty that reality would return in full force, and the illusion would be gone.

It's ten o'clock on a Thursday
The regular crowd shuffles in
There's a former President sitting next to me
Makin' love to the brunette like a sin 

The audience chipped in, they felt the heat of their friends

Sing us a song you're the piano man
Sing us a song tonight
Well we're all in the mood for a melody
And you got us feeling alright

They knew what they wanted to hear, and they heard it, though it never was sung

They said, "Son, can you play us a memory
I'm not really sure how it goes
But it's sad and it's sweet and we knew it complete
When you wore a younger man's clothes." 

And the piano man sang them a song

Now Joey B. at the bar is a friend of mine
He gets me my drinks for free
And he's quick with a joke or to light up your smoke
But there's someplace that he'd rather be
He says, "Barry, I believe this is killing me."
As the smile ran away from his face
"Well I'm sure that I could be a President myself
If I could get out of this place"

He looked around with a jaundiced eye, always looking for his main deal

It's a pretty good crowd for a Saturday
And the chairman gives me a smile
'Cause he knows that it's me they've been comin' to see
To forget about life for a while

And the piano, it sounds like a carnival
And the microphone smells like a beer
And the press sit at the bar and put bread in my jar
And say, "Man, what are you doin' here?" 

It's a sad morning, I must say. A hangover I'm not anxious to face. But partying to excess has a price and it's almost time for the tab.

This is the original Billy Joel video, my favorite. Apologies to him for the parody.

Obama Gave a Good Speech...

Too bad his brother couldn't be here to share it.

Can't Quite Trust God's Sense of Humor

Democrats in Charlotte removed any mention of God from their party platform. Caught in a very public political squeeze, they then voted three times whether to put God back in. Each time, the vote to reinstate God failed. Finally, the chair of the convention ignored the vote and declared that God is back. The same day, Barack Obama decided that the risk of a lightning strike is too high for him to speak on an outside stage. Smart fellow!

Democrats Find God!

The Democratic National Convention has reversed Tuesday's unanimous vote to remove God from its platform, voting by a two-thirds majority of the (fifteen or so) delegates on the convention floor at the time.

Not only did they find God, but they also rediscovered Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

The Obama team is fighting for their political lives and, as you've heard, there really aren't any atheists in the trenches.

Trust These Folks to Run a Government? They Can't Even Run a Convention.

It's 3PM ET on the opening day of the Democratic National Convention and they still haven't released their speaker schedule for today, let alone the rest of their convention. It's a little like the Obamacare bill, where we had to wait until it was history to find out what was in it.

So, are they shuffling deck chairs? Negotiating between interest groups? Jacking up the bids? Incompetent? Leading from behind? Or, all of the above?

Here, one hour before the official 4PM kickoff, is the official DNC Convention Schedule.

 

That's all, folks!

Israel About to Go Nuclear, Iran to Re-enter Stone Age

Dateline: Tel Aviv

From this moment the State of Israel declares a state of war exists between the State of Israel and the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Because Israel views the threats by the government of the IRI in conjunction with its efforts to develop nuclear weapons and means of delivery as existential threats, Israel will  take all actions necessary, specifically including unilateral and preemptive military action, to protect its citizens from the threats posed by representatives of the government of the IRI and to assure Israel's continued survival. 

To minimize civilian casualties, the population of Iran should immediately and permanently evacuate populated areas within the IRI. We intend to demolish the government of the IRI and its current leadership and to permanently destroy the capacity of the Islamic Republic of Iran to manufacture weapons of mass destruction and to reduce, for generations, its capacity to manufacturer modern weapons.


Unfortunately, our actions will have widespread and lasting effects. We recognize that the anticipated costs are extraordinary, both to those whom will die as a direct consequence, which number we have worked to minimize, but also those whose lives and whose children's lives will forever change. However, we cannot consider these costs in a vacuum. If we do nothing, Israeli's will die. Israel will die. For more than a generation, we've asked the civilized nations of the world to intercede, to prevent this threatened second holocaust. Their efforts have failed. We can not, we will not fail in our mission.


Israel does not have the power of sanctions. We do not have the luxury of accepting the eventual insanity defense upon which the government of IRI must eventually mount its justification of its genocide. By then all talk will be too late. Because we're required to take these madmen seriously, we do. We take them at their word.


There is but one circumstance that might prevent the action we contemplate as a consequence of this announcement. If the people of Iran, the citizen's of the Islamic Republic of Iran, immediately replace their government, cease all nuclear development and open their land to inspection, we shall forbear. With this, the people of Iran can retain their civilization and the State of Israel will offer its hand in peace. We stress that such action must be immediate. Without these three steps, this war will be devastating to the citizens of Iran.


To the government of the Syrian Arab Republic, we say: from this moment forward, any attack against the northern border of the State of Israel, any attack from the territories of Lebanon or Syria, any rockets or missiles fired from those territories will be considered by us as an attack by Syria against Israel. We will respond directly. Our goal will be to demolish the Syrian regime.


We recognize that this announcement is likely to increase verbosity from world leaders and that much of it will be condemnatory toward this announcement and our intent to take unilateral action to protect the Jewish people. We wish to remind those leaders of the decades' of words, generations of words, which have gone before, to no effect. The time for words has passed. We look forward to peace we create.

After decades of effort, Iran's nuclear infrastructure is nearly impervious to a conventional attack. Its processing sites are scattered, redundant and deeply buried. Their protection against attack from the air, already substantial, is increasing almost weekly, most recently with the activation of four batteries of the newest-generation Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missile, which is capable of downing airplanes, cruise missiles and ballistic warheads.

Traditional thinking focuses on a three or four day attack composed of a combination of long-range cruise missiles, special forces and waves of aircraft. They would be tasked first with the destruction of Iran's air defense capabilities and its limited long range delivery systems. When the defenses have been adequately suppressed, more cruise missiles plus bombers launched from secret bases in Saudi Arabia would deliver precision and so-called bunker busting rounds to close, to bury, the nuclear facilities. Game theory suggests that these aircraft would continue to sortie over Iran for several days, bouncing rubble until either the Israelis are convinced they've done as much as possible to retard nuclear development or until world opinion forces a stepdown.

There is an alternative that would very likely result in almost no battle casualties on either side. It would permanently destroy Iran's ability to manufacture or export WMD's. It would destroy the government Islamic Republic of Iran and its leadership and destroy its ability to export terrorism or support terrorists, including those forces facing Israel across the northern border and Gaza. It would remove Iran from contention for any leadership role in the middle east. It would minimize, perhaps eliminate, the risk of radiation leaks from the facilities already charged with nuclear materials. Rather than a futile attempt to "dig out" or "bury" the buried facilities, Israel can depower them.

By using no more than six low-yield EMP (electromagnetic pulse) weapons in two waves separated by just a few minutes in order to take out the emergency and backup generators, Israel could destroy nearly 100% of Iran's sophisticated electrical infrastructure, the power plants, electric transmission lines and on-site generators dedicated to powering the research centers. If triggered in daytime, there would be few noticeable effects of the weapons' detonations themselves. If centered in the north-central part of the country, effects on neighbors would be minimal. The flash and blast effects, 20 to 30 miles above the surface, would be almost invisible from the ground. There would be no physical blast effects, no buildings destroyed or monuments damaged. Pedestrians might notice a slight tingling, similar to the feeling that nearby lightening creates, but not otherwise harmful in and of itself. Within seconds, however, lights would go out across much of the country and every centrifuge would stop, permanently frozen. Desert laboratories would lose all cooling, fresh air would stop circulating in the underground bunkers. Elevators and delivery systems would grind to a halt. Fuel transport trucks, needed to keep the turbine generators turning, would stop in their tracks. As would aircraft.

Because of the physics of EMP, the largest consumers of electricity would take the biggest hit. The largest users in Iran are its secret nuclear labs.

Because the Iranian regime has buried so many of its nuclear facilities near population centers, many of them on the outskirts of Tehran or even underground at the center of the city, it is impossible to target only military infrastructure with any hope of success, no matter the demolition tools chosen. With EMP, the citizenry of Tehran, Tabriz, Qom and other cities would avoid blast and radiation effects but lose all municipal services. There would be no water transmission or storage, no sewer, no autos or trucks for delivery, no functioning hospitals. The eventual death toll might become substantial, depending first on the willingness of Iran's population to heed the warning of an attack by evacuating to lesser developed locations and further depending on the willingness of Iran's friends and neighbors to jump in to help with relief and infrastructure rebuilding.

Iran would be returned to a pre-Shah level of material civilization from which it would take a decade to return. Other rogue nations might take the message that development of WMDs is not a risk-free endeavor, that words have consequences.

We can re-establish the conversation, perhaps more productively, in a generation or two. But, first we end the threat.


UPDATE: Bumped from August 2010.

I believe that Mr. Obama's dithering has made an EMP attack more likely; that the odds favor such an attack within six weeks from now. If Israel wants:

to be absolutely certain of destroying Iran's capability for war; while
retaining and reserving its main battle forces for the defense of the state from other threats; and,
minimizing the potential for confrontations with Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Syria and the U.S. that would be caused by overflights; then

A three- shot ballistic missile nuclear EMP is the only option open to the State of Israel.

I would urge the Israeli Knesset to declare a state of war with Iran now. I would further urge Israel to directly warn the Iranian people of the impending attack so that they can make their own preparations to re-enter the stone age, including immediate evacuation to other states.

Then shoot.

"The Emperor Has No Chair!"

Sometimes it takes a kid by the side of a parade.

Sometimes it takes an American icon.

Clint Eastwood's brilliant skit made it clear to all, what everyone knows but none could say.

Barack Obama is a completely fictional man, the president who never was.

The Ramrod Starts a Stampede; Media Gets Trampled!

The first time ever I saw his face he was playing Rowdy Yates in the early-1960's hayburner "Rawhide," a long-running TV series about the adventures of drovers herding 3,000 head of cattle to market up the Sedalia trail from San Antonio, Texas.

Less taciturn than his later characters, still soft-talking early on, Clint Eastwood already exuded more talent than the small black & white screen could use.

It seemed every episode of the show featured at least one stampede, when 1,500 tons of beef on the hoof would stream at top speed whatever direction they thought best.

From time to time it was the good guys who wanted and started a stampede; perhaps to outrun rustlers or beat a storm. When a stampede was called for, Clint's character, the ramrod Rowdy Yates, got the task.

Keep movin, movin, movin
though they're disapprovin,
keep them doggies movin
Rawhide

In recent days too many of the talking heads, whether left or right or in between have tried to talk down Clint Eastwood's skit at the RNC. "He's too old." "It was disjointed." "It wandered." The Hollywood crowd has been the worst.

You'd think they'd know better. They're talking and writing about one of the very best story tellers of all time but have missed the point: The audiences loved it.

In just two days, the Eastwood skit has been viewed on YouTube by nearly 2 million people. 

Eastwood wasn't trying to convince the audience in the hall, he was using them as a prop to tell his story. And the media folks, the talking heads, are his Greek chorus, offstage left, by their comments echoing Clint's points that skewer like beef bound for the BBQ. With every ever so smart comment, they remind the audience of the empty chair, the low characters and supposedly lofty intellects that are the set pieces of the current administration.

Two million viewers in 2 days. That's a blockbuster.

Heck, that's a stampede. Nice going, Mr. Eastwood!

Terribly Inconvenient

If Obama were to be re-elected, won't it be terribly inconvenient for him to have to blame the previous administration for the sad state of the economy that he's just inherited?

Did You Know...

That Barack Obama and the Senate Democrats haven't passed a single budget since before the iPad was born?

Jeez. We need some adults in D.C.

I happen to know where we can find a couple, two men who will actually take responsibility.

h/t: Mary Katherine Ham

The Ryan - Biden Debate

Joe Biden has got to be puking into his morning cereal.

Every day.

How to Teach a President

Here is six minutes of Paul Ryan talking directly to Barack Obama.

He's respectful, direct, and powerful.

This should be a great election, one of ideas and forceful arguments.

I think it will be, at least on one side.