Showing posts with label foreign policy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label foreign policy. Show all posts

Sunday, September 30, 2012

More useful clarity on President Obama's Libyan Lies, Misrepresentations & Misadventures: Obscure film was NOT responsible for riot there, security was lax in Benghazi, U.S. Marines were NOT there during consulate attack, and FBI agents are still NOT there two weeks later, a fact that ABC News' Friday evening newscast continued to neglect to mention



senatorcorker video: Appearing on Fox News Channel, Tennessee Senator Bob  Corker, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, sounded-off on the lack of information and cooperation the Comm. is receiving re the Benghazi attacks on September 11th. Corker believes the Obama administration's response to Libya consulate attack is "Nothing Short... of Benghazigate." "Both Democrats and Republicans want answers to what happened." Uploaded September 27, 2012. http://youtu.be/wLk6o3N8cB8 
More useful clarity on President Obama's Libyan Lies, Misrepresentations & Misadventures: Obscure film was NOT responsible for riot there, security was lax in Benghazi, U.S. Marines were NOT there during consulate attack, and FBI agents are still NOT there two weeks later, a fact that ABC News' Friday evening newscast continued to neglect to mention
And on Friday, sixteen days after the death of four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador Christoprher StevensABC News national newscast devoted ZERO time to Obama's serial lies about what happened in Libya, not mentioning Libya even once.

No, instead, the lead story was on TSA agents pilfering airline passenger goods. Really?
Yes, nothing at all about no FBI agents being in the country more than two weeks later to investigate.


The Washington Post

In Libya, security was lax before attack that killed U.S. ambassador, officials say
By Ernesto Londoño and Abigail Hauslohner
September 29, 2012 at 2:12 PM
On the eve of his death, U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens was ebullient as he returned for the first time in his new role to Benghazi, the eastern Libyan city that embraced him as a savior during last year’s civil war. He moved around the coastal town in an armored vehicle and held a marathon of meetings, his handful of bodyguards trailing discreetly behind.
But as Stevens met with Benghazi civic leaders, U.S. officials appear to have underestimated the threat facing both the ambassador and other Americans. They had not reinforced the U.S. diplomatic outpost there to meet strict safety standards for government buildings overseas. Nor had they posted a U.S. Marine detachment, as at other diplomatic sites in high-threat regions.
Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/in-libya-security-was-lax-prior-to-deadly-attack/2012/09/29/a56ffca0-0992-11e2-afff-d6c7f20a83bf_story.html


The Weekly Standard

Our Fearless Misleader
By Stephen F. Hayes
October 8, 2012, VOL. 18, NO. 04
After more than two weeks of obfuscation and misdirection from the Obama administration, the American public is coming to understand what the U.S. intelligence community learned in the 48 hours immediately following the September 11 attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Among the important new details:
Read the rest of the post at
https://www.weeklystandard.com/print/articles/our-fearless-misleader_653228.html


New York Times
Security Fears Hobble Inquiry of Libya Attack
By David D. Kirkpatrick, Eric Schmitt and Michael S. Schmidt
Posted online September 27, 2012
BENGHAZI, Libya — Sixteen days after the death of four Americans in an attack on a United States diplomatic mission here, fears about the near-total lack of security have kept F.B.I. agents from visiting the scene of the killings and forced them to try to piece together the complicated crime from Tripoli, more than 400 miles away.
Investigators are so worried about the tenuous security, people involved in the investigation say, that they have been unwilling to risk taking some potential Libyan witnesses into the American Embassy in Tripoli. Instead, the investigators have resorted to the awkward solution of questioning some witnesses in cars outside the embassy, which is operating under emergency staffing and was evacuated of even more diplomats on Thursday because of a heightened security alert.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

#MUSLIMRAGE - 2010 video is perfect follow-up to my last post on problems associated with Muslim immigration to Sweden, inc. inability or unwillingness to adopt Western norms re free speech, are proven in video thru use of heckler's veto to stop performance, attack caricaturist Lars Vilks in Uppsala


BeTheBalls video: The Muslim attack on noted Swedish caricaturist Lars Vilks in Uppsala, Sweden 2010 - "the Entire Event". Uploaded May 27, 2010. http://youtu.be/lbpyk1uHNWY
Be sure to watch the woman in the second row wearing the multi-colored sweater, holding cell phone. This was captured by the TV operation of newspaper Upsala Nya Tidning in Uppsala.


I knew that I had the links to this video somewhere saved in Draft on my Gmail account, it's just that it wasn't yesterday when I really needed it to buttress my points in my blog post that eventually got around to the subject of Muslim immigrants' assimilation in Sweden, which is not going so well, owing mostly to the fact that many new refugees, mostly male, think they can out-smart the system that demands they make an honest effort to do several things, including adopting the norms of the country they're now living in, not being held hostage to the ones of the country they left behind in the rear-view mirror.
re Fouad Ajami's Washington Post essay: Why is the Muslim world so easily offended?; What Muslim "moderates"?; Målmo as the European canary-in-the-coal-mine doesn't auger well for the success of Muslim "moderates" or assimilation efforts; #MUSLIMRAGE
http://www.hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/re-fouad-ajamis-washington-post-essay.html

This 2010 video of a rather shocking display of anti-democratic behavior by Muslims attending an event in Uppsala that I heard about a day or two after it first happened, serves as a friendly yet-chilling reminder that unlike authoritarian regimes in Muslim-controlled countries around the world, when you live in a real democracy, like the U.S. or Sweden, it doesn't mean that you have a right to NOT have your personal feelings or religious sensitivities hurt, nor do you have a right to prevent other citizens from exercising their guaranteed rights, like freedom of speech.

You can always choose to not attend events that will be upsetting, but you get the sense in watching the video that the whole thing was almost pre-meditated if not pre-ordained, given the reaction that you can see for yourself.

Unfortunately, as we have seen for the past week with respect to the protests/riots in Egypt and Libya, and the premeditated murder of the U.S. Ambassador to Libya, this concept of tolerance continues to elude both many Muslims who leave the Middle East, as well as ones who stay there and who seem to go out of their way to continuously be outraged.

That's made worse by many in the American Mainstream Media who ought to know better, but who instead of dealing with them realistically, and call them on what they say and do, instead, coddle them, like ABC News' Christiane Amanpour, wife of a former Clinton State Dept. spokesman, Jamie Rubin, now an executive editor at Bloomberg News.


Breitbart's Big Journalism
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: WEST IS EXTREME, NOT ISLAMISTS
by William Bigelow  
15 Sep 2012 




ABCNews video: Christiane Amanpour, Martha Raddatz, and Brian Ross join guest host Jake Tapper to discuss political issues sweeping across the Middle East. Uploaded September 16, 2012. http://youtu.be/A0wPXV-BL5k



ABCNews video: Muslim Violence, Anti-American Protests, Fallout From Middle East: 'This Week' Roundtable. Uploaded September 16, 2012. http://youtu.be/miqHPq5l3SE

Monday, July 30, 2012

Wow! Hallandale Beach is in The Washington Post: WaPo's Jason Horowitz ponders Jewish-American voters' feelings towards Mitt Romney and President Obama's treatment of Israel thru the prism of Hallandale Beach. HB's Sage Bagel as the NEW poor man's Algonquin Round Table!



View Larger Map
Above, looking east from in front of the RK Sage Plaza retail strip at Hallandale Beach Blvd. (State Road 858) and S.E. 8th Avenue in Hallandale Beach, FL, home of Sage Bagel and Deli. In the distance is one of the three condo towers from The Related Group's The Beach Club on the beach and State Road A1A. Google Maps' Street View, circa 2011.
Wow! Hallandale Beach is in The Washington Post: WaPo's Jason Horowitz ponders Jewish-American voters' feelings towards Mitt Romney and President Obama's treatment of Israel thru the prism of Hallandale Beach. HB's Sage Bagel as the NEW poor man's Algonquin Round Table!
The Washington Post
Jewish voters ponder Romney
By Jason Horowitz
July 30, 8:57 PM
HALLANDALE BEACH. Fla. — Moments after Mitt Romney completed his ode to Israel in front of Jerusalem’s old stone walls on Sunday, reporters asked Sheldon Adelson, the casino mogul and a financial rabbi for the presidential campaign, whether the speech would convince Jewish voters back home to vote for the Republican.
“If they hear it,” answered Adelson, who was with Romney in Israel and has pledged tens of millions of dollars to pro-Romney super PACs. “Yes, for sure.”
Read the rest of the article at:

Hmm-m... could our very own Sage Bagel become the new Versailles, the "The World's Most Famous Cuban Restaurant" on Calle Ocho and the place where all U.S. presidential candidates and state-wide candidates are required to visit when they campaign for the first time in South Florida, for a press op, drinking café con leche?

Yes, more powerful than any law, it's a South Florida political and media tradition!
The mind reels at the possibilities!

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Sage Bagel and Deli
800 E. Hallandale Beach Blvd.
Hallandale Beach, FL 33009 
(954) 456-7499

View Larger Map

Versailles Restaurant
3555 S.W. 8th Street,
Miami, FL 33135 
(305) 444-0240

Friday, April 27, 2012

Sen. Marco Rubio's thoughtful speech on the future of U.S. foreign policy before The Brookings Institution -more muscle, less 'realism' dithering! #rubio


Sen. Marco Rubio video: Sen. Marco Rubio's speech on the future of U.S. foreign policy before The Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. April 25, 2012.
http://youtu.be/9Hb31bEa0mg


Sen. Marco Rubio's thoughtful speech on the future of U.S. foreign policy before The Brookings Institution -more muscle, less 'realism' dithering!


See summary of remarks at http://www.brookings.edu/events/2012/0425_rubio.aspx 
or the full transcript at http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/events/2012/0425_rubio/20120425_rubio.pdf



The Washington Post
Marco Rubio’s foreign policy speech stakes out a middle ground in GOP
By Karen DeYoung
Published: April 25, 2012
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) took another step onto the national stage Wednesday with a foreign policy speech that positioned him squarely in the middle between a dying breed of GOP moderates and his partisan brethren who have condemned President Obama as an international weakling.
“The easiest thing for me to do here today is to give a speech on my disagreement with this administration on foreign policy,” Rubio told a packed auditorium at the Brookings Institution. “I have many.”


The Washington Post

PostPartisan blog
Marco Rubio’s foreign policy message for the GOP
By Michael Gerson
Posted at 03:32 PM ET, 04/26/2012
Sen. Marco Rubio’s speech on foreign policy at the Brookings Institution was not oversold. It deserved the designation “major” for its courage, skill and moral seriousness. 
The courage came in criticizing a drift toward isolationism within the Republican Party.
Read the rest of the post at:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/marco-rubios-foreign-policy-message-for-the-gop/2012/04/26/gIQANTAcjT_blog.html


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http://www.brookings.edu/


http://www.foreignpolicy.com/


http://www.foreignaffairs.com/


http://www.youtube.com/user/SenatorMarcoRubio


http://www.heritage.org/

Syria bleeds while dithering O 'condemns' -Charles Krauthammer calls out Obama's ineffectual foreign policy on Syria that's unsatisfactory to GOP, Democrats AND our overseas allies

Trycket%20p%C3%A5%20Syrien%20%C3%B6kar%20fr%C3%A5n%20omv%C3%A4rlden
Above, the segment that Channel 4 News in Sweden ran this morning on Syria, as the United States continues "to condemn."
How's that working out so far?
It’s time for President Obama to back up his rhetoric with firm action.




The Washington Post
While Syria burns
By Charles Krauthammer
Published: April 26, 2012
Last year President Obama ordered U.S. intervention in Libya under the grand new doctrine of “Responsibility to Protect.” Moammar Gaddafi was threatening a massacre in Benghazi. To stand by and do nothing “would have been a betrayal of who we are,” explained the president.
In the year since, the government of Syria has more than threatened massacres. It has carried them out. Nothing hypothetical about the disappearances, executions, indiscriminate shelling of populated neighborhoods. More than 9,000 are dead.
Read the rest of the column at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/while-syria-burns/2012/04/26/gIQAQUC0jT_story.html


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For more on Obama's failed foreign policy re Syria, see my previous posts on the subject:


April 29, 2011 blog post titled, Marco Rubio is crystal clear in Foreign Policy magazine - "How America Must Respond to the Massacre in Syria
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/marco-rubio-is-crystal-clear-in-foreign.html


March 20, 2011 titled, Marco Rubio on dithering O: “So if Russia doesn’t care and China doesn’t care and we care but won’t do anything about it, who’s it up to, the French?
http://hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/marco-rubio-on-dithering-o-so-if-russia.html


It's completely impossible for me or any of my like-minded friends to think of any time since he's been in the U.S. Senate when 'nice guy' Bill Nelson has said anything nearly as pointed or effectively as what Rubio has done repeatedly on Syria since last year.


My vote for Senate will be FOR people with similar intelligent and articulate views and AGAINST someone who wants to be a U.S. Senator because they think it would be cool.
That completely eliminates Connie Mack IV and puts George LeMieux back in the U.S. Senate.


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http://www.foreignpolicy.com/


http://www.foreignaffairs.com/


http://www.youtube.com/user/SenatorMarcoRubio


http://www.heritage.org/

Saturday, March 31, 2012

Peggy Noonan thinks dithering & detached "O" has now become "creepy. "Obama increasingly comes across as devious and dishonest." She's right, of course.


Audiobook: What I Saw At the Revolution -A Political Life in the Reagan Era by Peggy Noonan. http://youtu.be/nDvF7SispPU

Peggy Noonan thinks dithering & detached "O" has now become "creepy. "Obama increasingly comes across as devious and dishonest." She's right, of course.

In this installment from the audio version of the book I bought the first day it was available in 1990 at The Trover Book Shop on Capitol Hill, where I spent hundreds of hours over the years, Peggy Noonan recounts the end of an era of innocence in the days before the 1960 Presidential election on Massapequa , Long Island.Noonan shoots and she scores with: "[Obama's] hermetically sealed inner circle, which operates with what seems an almost entirely abstract sense of America."


From personal experience I can tell you that when you are seated just a few feet away from her and she starts talking about these sorts of cultural issues in that lilting voice of hers, it's positively mesmerizing.

After reading/listening to her impart a little bit of what she saw and remembers that Fall of 1960 about what America was about, you know exactly why her criticism of Obama and his myopic cronies rings so true and causes so many heads to nod in agreement, which is precisely why I placed the audio here for you to listen to yourself. 
The proof is in the pudding.

And even the Europeans have finally come to see him for what he is, esp. the Poles.
Unreliable.


American Crossroads: Operation Hot Mic
http://youtu.be/-Czo5Vf8KZs


Wall Street Journal
Declarations
Not-So-Smooth Operator
Obama increasingly comes across as devious and dishonest.
By Peggy Noonan
Updated March 30, 2012, 6:35 p.m. ET,
Something's happening to President Obama's relationship with those who are inclined not to like his policies. They are now inclined not to like him. His supporters would say, "Nothing new there," but actually I think there is. I'm referring to the broad, stable, nonradical, non-birther right. Among them the level of dislike for the president has ratcheted up sharply the past few months.

It's not due to the election, and it's not because the Republican candidates are so compelling and making such brilliant cases against him. That, actually, isn't happening.
Readers comments at:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303816504577312043447691520.html#articleTabs%3Dcomments
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http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/168909-1 
C-SPAN: In Depth with Peggy Noonan. March 3, 2002. Three hours.
When this first aired, I made videocopies of it for friends overseas.

Archive of Noonan's WSJ columns at:
http://online.wsj.com/search/aggregate.html?article-doc-type={Declarations}

http://online.wsj.com/public/page/peggy-noonan.html

http://peggynoonan.com/
Read the rest of the column at: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303816504577312043447691520.html

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Ben Stein: "Arab Spring" is a fraud; David Rothkopf: Obamamandias: the great shrinking superpower in the Middle East



CBS News Sunday Morning video- Ben Stein: "Arab Spring" is a fraud. May 15, 2011.
"Arab Spring" is a fraud. Says street movements in Middle East mean U.S. is losing valuable allies - and Iran is reaping a "gigantic regional coup"
-----

Did you happen to catch Ben Stein's spot=on comments on Sunday's CBS News 'Sunday Morning' TV program?
It's long been a personal favorite of mine from the day it started due to its smart, lengthy essays on subjects and people that often received little public notice, but who were doing some very interesting things.
If you didn't catch it, the video above will correct that situation toute-de-suite.

Stein is largely right that President Obama's bewildering and feckless Mid-East policy seems to constantly profit Iran at the West's expense, and Israel in particular, as he channels Prof. Obama and lectures everyone, issuing threats to Libya and Syria to change their methods or consider leaving, threats that are completely ignored but which would've been mocked by the U.S. Mainstream Media if Bush 43 had made them.

The very same condescending crowd in the news media, academe and the foreign policy desk of Comedy Central who said that Bush & Co.'s contention that democracy would work in Iraq after the U.S. invasion, were crazy, but who now play the role of Obama sycophants and valets for his bewildering policies that never seem to quite result in anything positive or tangible for the people.
Or did you forget how quiet Obama was when there were genuine street protests for reform, democratic institutions and fair elections in Iran two years ago, and everyone, esp. The American Left, wanted to know why it took Obama so long to recognize what was happening and say something of substance?
I haven't.

Not that I was ever a fan of former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, per se, but he's undeniably a very, very smart and savvy guy who knows how to handle himself.
(I mean he wasn't a federal judge for nothing.)
Well, he's bailing out as Obama's Mid-East policy czar, trouble-shooter and general explainer of things that make no sense coming out of C Street, the U.S. State Dept.
Who's his replacement?

Don't expect to get that answer soon or even any educated guesses anytime soon in the Herald or Sun-Sentinel.

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Foreign Policy magazine blog
Obamamandias: the great shrinking superpower in the Middle East
Posted by David Rothkopf Wednesday, May 18, 2011 - 4:06 PM


Foreign Policy magazine blog
Another major policy speech on the Middle East? Yawn
Posted by Stephen M. Walt Thursday, May 19, 2011 - 10:44 AM


Foreign Policy magazine
Discord in the Rebel Capital
Benghazi may seem like an island in the storm, but beneath the surface lies confusion and disharmony.
By Portia Walker
May 18, 2011




New York Times video: New York Times Op-Ed columnist Roger Cohen's hopes for President Obama's Middle East peace efforts.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

The predicate for Obama's foreign policy in Libya of multi-lateral 'Meals on wheels -with guns' - President Reticent



Comedy Central video:
Daily Show host Jon Stewart discusses the bombing in Libya with Aasif Mandvi and muse over President Obama's efforts to proceed without Sen. Richard Lugar's say-so.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-march-21-2011/odyssey-dawn---unconstitutional-war


Stanley Kurtz
recounts the role of present-day
National Security Council advisor Samantha Power on Candidate Obama in the National Review Online, and how we now have gotten to the present point where our foreign policy seems to include what I can only call "Meals on wheels -with guns."
But it's likely that the Irish-born
Power, given her own background, probably doesn't know too many of the delivery drivers -the instruments of that policy she has helped formulate.

My guess is that Power probably doesn't care that many of the military personnel involved there DON'T KNOW why they are there, how long they'll be there, or even how they'll even know whether or not they are successful in their mission.
Seems like I recall someone once saying THAT sort of situation would never ever exist if he were in charge.

I guess Power will just email them the details later, after she's gotten a bite to eat after work, since she's clearly a 'Big Picture' woman who doesn't want to get bogged down in the minutia.


And when are we going to hear what George Clooney thinks after Obama has ignored what's taken place in The Sudan?



ABC News video: George Clooney Hopes Satellites Will Shed Light on Sudan, January 2, 2011.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/george-clooney-hopes-satellites-shed-light-sudan/story?id=12523421


Stanley Kurtz's
closer is classic:

As with health care, Obama’s talk isn’t working because he cannot afford to specify broader ideological motivations he knows the public won’t buy.
Precisely!


National Review Online

President Reticent
By Stanley Kurtz
March 22, 2011 10:26 A.M.

Obama doesn’t tell you what he’s thinking. He keeps his motives to himself. Cherished long-term ideological goals are advanced as pragmatic fixes to concrete problems in the present. Now we’re seeing the familiar domestic pattern in foreign policy as well.


Few Americans realize that Obama has had a longstanding interest in multilateral efforts to combat war crimes and genocide. Obama would like to see a more constraining international legal regime on war crimes, even at the cost of national sovereignty, not to mention the blood and treasure of the countries doing the enforcing.


Read the rest of the post at:
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/262725/president-reticent-stanley-kurtz

Meanwhile, almost nine years ago...
Audio of Samantha Power discussing her Pulitzer Prize-winning book, "A Problem From Hell" on NPR/WAMU-FM's Diane Rehm Show, March 27, 2002
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2002-03-27/samantha-power-problem-hell-basic

Audio of Power on NPR's Fresh Air, which I heard at the time, June 5, 2003, when I was still living up in the Washington area:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1287149


Fort Wayne Journal Gazette

Lugar calls for debate on U.S. role in Libya
March 22, 2011 3:00 a.m.
http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20110322/NEWS04/303229937

Monday, March 21, 2011

Rejecting Pixie Lott's 'Boys And Girls' together policy paradigm, Obama's Cabinet was "Boys against girls" over military intervention in Libya



Pixie Lott - Boys And Girls
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7y1MdlXclM

Rejecting Ambassador Pixie Lott's 'Boys And Girls' policy paradigm, two reporters at the New York Times and POLITICO's Ben Smith on his blog say that it was actually a case of "Boys against girls" over Libya in the Obama Cabinet.

IF this sort of story had happened under Bush 43, David Brooks would be saying that misplaced sentimentality had weighed-in at the worst possible moment, when clear-headed logic and action was what was necessary.
But it's Obama, so...


POLITICO.com
Boys against girls over Libya?
By
Ben Smith
March 20, 2011
pol

There's been quite a bit of chatter today about the notion that a cadre of human-rights-minded women -- Susan Rice, Samantha Power, Hillary Clinton -- fought and won an internal debate over Libya. But White House officials and close observers outside government pushed back hard on the idea of a crucial internal split Sunday, arguing that Obama was pressed to action not by the internal dynamic but by the situation on the ground.

Read the rest of the post at:

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0311/Boys_against_girls_over_Libya.html

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New York Times
Obama Takes Hard Line With Libya After Shift by Clinton

By Helene Cooper and Steven Lee Myers

March 18, 2011


WASHINGTON — In a Paris hotel room on Monday night, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton found herself juggling the inconsistencies of American foreign policy in a turbulent Middle East. She criticized the foreign minister of the United Arab Emirates for sending troops to quash protests in Bahrain even as she pressed him to send planes to intervene in Libya.


Only the day before, Mrs. Clinton — along with her boss, President Obama — was a skeptic on whether the United States should take military action in Libya. But that night, with Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s forces turning back the rebellion that threatened his rule, Mrs. Clinton changed course, forming an unlikely alliance with a handful of top administration aides who had been arguing for intervention.

Read the rest of the article at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/19/world/africa/19policy.html

But if it fails, will Susan Power ever be seen again on TV news chat shows while Obama is president? Or will that be blamed on Gen. Mullen?

Hmm-m...


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By the way,
since it was NOT mentioned in the South Florida news media -and I looked- in the ramp-up to Obama's Latin America trip, Brazil abstained on the U.N. vote on Libya.
It had a chance to do something of significance-it blinked.
Again
.

And this is the country that actually wants to be a Permanent Member of the U.N. Security Council?

Nej tack!!!

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/03/19/v-fullstory/2123799/obama-opens-new-chapter-in-relations.html

That my friends is why despite its large size and immense resources, Brazil remains firmly seated at the children's table, not the adult table, until further notice, no matter what the Miami Herald's reporters and columnists churn out by the barrels about their alleged grandness.

That perpetual adolescence plus, well, it's too self-congratulatory nature, and, frankly, being a country that most Americans could really care less about -because it has done so little that most Americans care about or respect, much less, what well-informed Americans care about or respect.
Brazil is a very large Belgium, and Americans care not a whit about Belgium, either.


I will soon tell you in this space about a simple test those self-evident, self-promoting Herald reporters and columnists won't dare do publicly because it would so easily show the absurdity and emptiness of their grand pronouncements about Brazil.
Like so many of their previous overwrought words about the importance of South America to the U.S. in the future, it just doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

http://www.youtube.com/user/PixieLottVEVO

http://www.youtube.com/user/pixieofficial
http://www.youtube.com/user/pixielott
http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/

REMIX


Pixie Lott - Boys And Girls - Remix Version

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S_NdMyf9j0

I once knew a girl from Essex...

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Marco Rubio on dithering O: “So if Russia doesn’t care and China doesn’t care and we care but won’t do anything about it, who’s it up to, the French?”



Sen. Marco Rubio questions William J. Burns about President's Obama's "Puzzling Inaction" over Libya at Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the dithering approach to foreign policy and confuses both our allies and our enemies.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Brn-7fOGGY

Marco Rubio
: “So if Russia doesn’t care and China doesn’t care and we care but won’t do anything about it, who’s it up to, the French?”

Or, "How Obama Turned France Into a Leading World Power" -and saved Nicolas Sarkozy.




Sen. Marco Rubio Questions U.S. Involvement In U.N. "Charade" at confirmation hearing of
Joseph Torsella to be U.S. Representative to the United Nations for U.N. Management and Reform. March 16, 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcC0ChGuXSk

Marco Rubio's
performance at these Senate Foreign Relations hearings, so many of which I attended when I lived in the D.C. area for almost 15 years, with Jesse Helms or Joe Biden as Comm. Chair, are exactly why I enthusiastically voted for him last November over Charlie Crist and Kendrick Meek, neither one of which was capable of doing that in so effective a manner.
So Florida would have a voice for common sense, effectively articulated.
Just like I repeatedly said last year, no?


It's completely impossible for me or any of my friends to think of any time since he's been in the U.S. Senate when 'nice guy'
Bill Nelson has said anything nearly as pointed or effectively as what Rubio did twice this week, even when he needed to.
Just saying, compare and contrast.

Next year, my vote for Senate will be FOR people with similar intelligent and articulate views and AGAINST someone who wants to be a U.S. Senator because they think it would be cool.
That completely eliminates most of the announced candidates thus far -Connie Mack IV or the perpetually ethically-challenged Mike Haridopolos.
They are
OUT!


And reformer Paula Dockery looks even better qualified than she did before this week.

And please don't publicly call what
President Obama does in foreign policy 'dithering' or sleepwalking, call it quiet reflection or walking with his eyes closed -or something else.

To do otherwise hurts his supporter's feelings.
Especially his supporters in the American news media.


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USA Today
On Libya, how have global players done?

By Justin Paulette

On the eve of a possible war in Libya, the major players on the world stage have taken their turns and staked out their positions. Yet many players have postured themselves in ways that seem to be reversals of their usual roles. This shift in global strategy is largely the domino effect of a shift in American self-identity under President Obama, and an omen of the future under his new foreign policy for America.


The United Nations: Though espousing lofty principles of international peace and security, the U.N. has largely proved an ineffective millstone around the world's neck over the past half-century. As recently as January 2011, a U.N. report uncritically praised Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi's human rights record.


Read the rest of this Op-Ed at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2011-03-19-paulette18_ST_N.htm


The American Spectator
How Obama Turned France Into a Leading World Power
By John R. Guardiano on 3.20.11 @ 11:08AM

One of the more sadly amusing spectacles of the American-European-Arab dance over Libya is the complete and utter role-reversal that has taken place. Indeed, the Europeans are leading; the Americans are following; and the Arabs are applauding -- publicly!

Read the rest of this post at:
http://spectator.org/blog/2011/03/20/how-obama-turned-france-into-a


From Krishnan Guru-Murthy writing in Channel 4's Snow Mail this afternoon:


It is now more clear than ever that the Americans are in command of the attacks against Libya. And the coalition is already in trouble tonight with the Arab League chief condemning the airstrikes. The European-led narrative had been executed very well - the French jets got maximum worldwide publicity for leading the onslaught. But shortly afterwards it was American cruise missiles that did the bulk of the work against Libyan air defences. A British submarine and Tornado jets were involved too. This morning the American Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen declared the operation a success. Libya claimed sixty four people had been killed. Russia called for an end to what it called indiscriminate attacks by the coalition. And then a diplomatic bombshell from the Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa - saying he wanted civilians protected not bombed. It is hard to imagine what he thought he was signing up to yesterday in Paris - but by the time he got back to Cairo the tune was different. So it is now down to countries like Qatar and UAE to demonstrate that there is still Arab support for the action - that was a crucial part of the justification of military action for many. Tonight we'll have the latest from Tripoli, Benghazi and beyond.

You can watch the last seven days of Channel 4 News on their catch up player - available on iPhones and iPads too: http://www.channel4.com/news/catch-up/



Channel 4 News Foreign Affairs correspondent Jonathan Miller in Tripoli.
http://bcove.me/jnx5ex02


Channel 4 News Internation editor Lindsey Hilsum in Benghazi

http://bcove.me/ngr3ij6w


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See also: Congressional Hearings Offer Opportunity for U.N. Budgetary Scrutiny
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2011/03/Congressional-Hearings-Offer-Opportunity-for-UN-Budgetary-Scrutiny

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/
http://www.youtube.com/user/SenatorMarcoRubio
http://www.heritage.org/

Friday, March 11, 2011

Terminal velocity? Mexico is in free-fall and the Miami Herald is STILL playing catch-up to a story it should be owning

WikiLeaks Reveals ‘Devastating X-Ray’ of Power in Mexico; the fear that many Mexicans have of a U.S. invasion.

"...in the battle against organized crime, there is a serious lack of coordination between the Army, the Attorney General's Office and the Public Security Secretariat; and that these agencies are infiltrated by those whom they are supposed to be fighting."

-U.S State Dept. cable leaked by WikiLeaks
For a newspaper that has long prided itself on being an influential player in Latin America, whether that's still true or not, or even been true since the first Sandinista regime in Nicaragua -given that you can buy the Miami Herald in certain Latin capitals and large cities- the Herald's surprising lack of compelling stories and insight info Mexico's downward spiral is pretty amazing.
And a grim reminder of how far things have fallen.

I might even have to go back to, if not exactly reading the Los Angeles Times every day -like I used to do when I lived in the Washingon, D.C. area, and paid one dollar for the ad-free Washington edition, with a GREAT foreign affairs news section on Mondays- at least reading it every other day. And for more than just the entertainment industry news, since I already get their daily industry news emails every day, plus the odd look at what they've got in the Sunday magazine.

http://www.latimes.com/
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/

I found out some things on Monday about Mexico that I don't recall reading anywhere else and certainly NOT in the Herald.
Not that the Times isn't without its known and suspected political biases and agendas like the ones I've detailed here about the Herald, but honestly, the writing at the LAT on foreign affairs is just SO much clearer and sophisticated, which is why it's long been one of its acknowledged and industry-admired strengths, regardless of who was the Executive Editor, especially the foreign affairs reporting of
Kim Murphy.

See the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter's work here:

http://www.latimes.com/search/dispatcher.front?Query=%22Kim+Murphy%22&target=adv_article
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La Jornada, Mexico
WikiLeaks Reveals 'Devastating X-Ray' of Power in Mexico

"The U.S. diplomatic cables present an image of power in Mexico that is as bleak as it is deplorable. … They show that warnings about the loss of national sovereignty made by the most apocalyptic critics were not exaggerated. And they remind us that the struggle for national liberation is not the outdated nostalgia of nationalists, but a necessity that is the order of the day."

By Luis Hernandez Navarro
Translated By Florizul Acosta-Perez
March 1, 2011

On February 16, La Jornada published a news item outlining the doubts of U.S. Consul in Monterrey Bruce Williamson, on the effectiveness of the Mexican Army in their fight against narco-trafficking. "The military presence," he asserts in a confidential cable on July 29, 2009 - "is not a panacea for Nuevo Leon." The dispatch also states that in the battle against organized crime, there is a serious lack of coordination between the Army, the Attorney General's Office and the Public Security Secretariat; and that these agencies are infiltrated by those whom they are supposed to be fighting.
Read the rest of the post at:
http://worldmeets.us/lajornada000139.shtml#axzz1GGd33qs6

See also:
http://worldmeets.us/ -
WorldMeets.US provides accurate English translations of international news and views about the USA.