New to shooting, a TIME writer learns respect for guns and for the marksman's art. EFL:
Guns aren't moral agents, they're machineselegant, superbly efficient, made to fit the human hand. I now think it entirely possible that the American gunsmith John Moses Browning "sitteth," as his admirers say, "at the right hand of God." Shooting for sport isn't, as I once thought, the desperate outlet of sad Hemingway types, but a fiendishly difficult art. As Peter, a former naval officer, says, "It's got all the Zen you could want." Trying to hit a bullseye smaller than a saucer from a distance of 100 m or moreand do it over and over againdemands things of you, and gives things to you. You have to align yourself not just with the gun and the target but with your surroundings: light must be taken into account (people tend to aim lower in dim light), temperature (on a hot day the bullet flies faster and higher), and wind. "Three minutes," says Ian, an Army weapons instructor turned lawyer. He means that to counter today's stiff easterly, he'll move his horizontal sight three-60ths of a degree to the left. Shooting is all about precision, he says. And consistency. And tenacity, says David, an engineer who won a U.S. sniper-rifle championship last year. "Don't let anything faze you. Breathe. Relax. If you do a bad shot, forget it. Put everything you've got into the next one." The reward of total concentration: total relaxation. Even when I score poorly, shooting makes me forget everything else in the world.
Golf has targets just as small and distantand makes people just as obsessive. The difference with shooting is that, well, you do it with guns. And bullets. Which were invented for one purpose: war. Beyond the shooting range's black-and-yellow targets hover ghosts. My club, Sydney's Royal Australian Naval Reserve Rifle Club, has its origins in the military. Most of the 170 members are civilians, but every Saturday, builders, bankers, surgeons, ex-servicemen, chiropractors, chefs and electriciansmen and women, from teenagers to 80-year-oldscompete in honor of some milestone in military history: last week it was the German surrender in 1945. Among those waiting to shoot or scoring at the targets, you'll hear talk about how 19th-century Zulus thought bullets flew like spears and so aimed their rifles too high, why creeping artillery barrages didn't work in the First World War, whether it was Kokoda or the Battle of the Coral Sea that saved Australia from the Japanese. Not all the members think about this stuff. But it's hard to shoot, even at a cartoon, and not be reminded of what you owe all the people who've served as targets on your behalf.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/16/2006 12:12 ||
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#1
Knock me over with a feather! I never would have dreamed seeing something like this in such a place. Has Time discovered a world of potential subscribers outside of Manhattan?
#2
I doubt this signals a change of heart at Time. It signals the plumeting market share of printed publications. They should have been publishing this stuff 20 years ago.
I still wouldn't urinate on a journalist if they were on fire.
Posted by: SPoD ||
05/16/2006 13:27 Comments ||
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Rarely has the world been afforded such a clear glimpse into the unholy alliance between Islamic extremists and secular radicals in the West. Thats exactly what it got last week when the foremost Imam of the radical Left, Noam Chomsky, bestowed his blessings on the worlds largest terrorist army, the Shiite jihad outfit sponsored by Iran and known as Hezbollah (Party of God.)
Following a meeting with Hassan Nasrallah, the Lebanese terrorist groups secretary general, Chomsky announced his support for Hezbollahs refusal to disarm. Then, in an echo of Nasrallahs recent declaration that President Bush is the worlds top terrorist, Chomsky pronounced his own fatwa on the United States, calling it one of the leading terrorist states. It was a meeting of murderous radical minds.
In many ways, Chomskys newly forged friendship with Hezbollah -- the most recent entry in a lifetime befriending Americas most deadly enemies -- is the logical continuation of the professors longstanding admiration for global terrorists and Jew-haters. In fact, Chomsky devoted most of the nineties to touting Hezbollah as a resistance movement (which occasionally committed misguided acts against civilians) while singing its praises as a crusader for peace and social justice.
Typical was Chomskys 1996 book, World Orders Old and New. Citing with approval a journalists observation that Hezbollah is not a terror organization, Chomsky explained that the terrorist who blew up 243 U.S. Marines in Lebanon and murdered untold citizens of Israel was only engaging in legitimate resistance against an oppressor and avoids striking civilians except in retaliation for Israeli attacks on Lebanese civilians.
Elsewhere in his book Chomsky claims that, in launching its attacks against Israel, Hezbollah carefully avoided civilian areas and assured his readers that Hezbollah attacks were always retaliatory. Israel through Chomsky's eyes presented quite a different story. Dispensing altogether with the studied euphemisms that marked his descriptions of Hezbollah, Chomsky unequivocally denounced Israel for using terror weapons to commit atrocities such as targeting civilians with no provocation.
The resulting effort bore little resemblance to fact. Rather than consider well-documented reports of Hezbollahs repeated shelling (at its Iranian masters' prompting) of Northern Israel, killing women and children in the process, Chomsky rejected the reports as so much American and Israeli propaganda. How after all, could the Great and Little Satans be telling the truth?
Rather than reflect on the fact that Hezbollah terrorists deliberately entrenched themselves among Arab civilians to cause the casualties so that Chomsky could protest, Chomsky falsely charged that the Israeli military targeted the civilians, a claim which no reasonable human being could make. Even the anti-Israel UN felt compelled to acknowledge that Hezbollah had resorted to using civilian areas to provide a human shield for its terrorist activity.
In Chomskys version of the Elders of Zion, Israel is always the instigator, while the attacks of terrorists, whose declared objective is the establishment of an Islamic state on Israels grave, are invariably defensive. Chomsky blames an upsurge in Hezbollah terror, for example, on Israels 1992 assassination, of Hezbollah leader (and mass murderer) Sheikh Abbas Mussawi. Yet Chomsky neglected to mention that Mussawi, speaking on behalf of Hezbollah, openly proclaimed his genocidal goal: We are not fighting so that the enemy recognizes us and offers us something. We are fighting to wipe out the enemy.
In Chomskys writings about Hitlers heirs, the genocidal roles are always reversed. When Hezbollah broke an informal 1995 agreement to suspend attacks against civilian targets, Chomsky condemned Israeli military strikes, again omitting the fact that the complete annihilation of the Jewish state was Hezbollahs stated goal.
In his 2000 book Fateful Triangle, Chomsky complained about media coverage that described Hezbollahs shelling of the so-called Israeli security zone in Southern Lebanon as terrorism. Chomsky insisted that it was instead an act of indigenous resistance to the rule of Israel and its proxies. As usual, Chomsky was lying. Hezbollahs attacks were against civilians inside the security zone not military targets. In a typical projection, Chomsky maintained in the face of the facts that it was Israel who was killing civilians, and (another lie) that Israels official policy was to attack villages and civilians in Lebanon.
Today, as its Iranian patron calls on the Muslim world to exterminate the Jews and finish Hitlers job, Hezbollah is blessed by the embassy of Americas most prominent leftist, and better still, a self-hating Jew. While the international community and even the United Nations (whose resolutions Chomsky has repeatedly used as a sledge hammer against Israel), demands that the terrorist Party of God which is an occupying army in Lebanon -- lay down its weapons, Chomsky provides the occupiers with a moral defense. According to Professor Chomsky there is a persuasive argument that the weapons should be in the hands of Hezbollah as a deterrent to potential aggression and there is plenty of background and reasons for that. (Many Lebanese are not persuaded. Commenting on Chomskys visit, a Lebanese observer pointed to the professors ignorance of the fact that the Hezbollah arms scare the Lebanese people more than the Israelis.")
In fact, of course, the only potential aggression comes from Chomskys friends. In 2004, Hezbollah inked an agreement with Hamas similarly dedicated to the extermination of Israel -- to continue their joint terrorist attacks against Israel. Hezbollah has also provided political support and weapons training to Hamas and al-Qaeda. In 2004, Hezbollah also launched an unmanned aerial vehicle that crossed Israeli airspace before crashing.
Hitler concealed his genocidal agendas from the German people and from his Chomsky-apologists. Hezbollah is more fortunate. In pursuing a second Holocaust of the Jews, it can count on Muslim support and apparently the support of American radicals as well. Therefore it makes no secret of what it intends. Its 1985 manifesto contains a section titled The Necessity for the Destruction of Israel that spells out the evil it seeks: Our struggle will end only when this entity is obliterated. We recognize no treaty with it, no cease-fire, no peace agreements. Like true jihadists, Hezbollahs genocidal plans are not reserved for the Little Satan only but are its agenda for the Great Satan too. In 1993, Chomskys host Nasrallah declared: Death to America was, is, and will stay our slogan.
As his pilgrimage to Hezbollahs mecca confirms, it is Noam Chomskys life-dream as well.
#1
Chomsky's parents must have made it their hobby to mindfuck little Noam.
Posted by: ed ||
05/16/2006 8:24 Comments ||
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#2
Most reports seem to indicate that Chomsky's parents were well within the normal range -- Chomsky has nobody to blame for his moral failings but himself. Besides being self-hating as a Jew, Chomsky is self-hating as an American while continually providing attempted exculpations for groups as evil as the genocidal Khmer Rouge, one suspects simply because they were anti-American. It's not so shocking that someone could hold his views; what's truly repellent is that he has so many respectful readers in the European and US left.
#5
When I moved to Manhattan 3 years ago I met Kenny and Elaine. (majormediabypass.com) Two veteran activists who absolutely fascinated me with their full palette of moonbattery, fresh out of the Western Desert as I was. They spoke about the support Noam Chomsky had given them, which amazed me given how little sense they made, all questions of right and wrong aside.
There is a lot of just plain pandering to a market in Chomsky. I don't doubt that he believes his spiel, but on a certain level- the bottom line- it sells.
#6
Also, the Islamic movement is always on the lookout for official, exemplary "spokespeople" for their movement in order to affect general thinking. It is an understood strategy and they routinely attempt to make friends with "higher ups" and then groom them for the movement. Those who go along with it never know about the strategy or that they were "marks."
#1
I'm sick of this gasoline price bullshit in reference to Bush. The stuff trades on the open worldwide market, there isn't a thing in the world he can do about it. If they are that worried about it why don't they pass some legislation to open new areas for exploration and drilling? Ever hear of ANWR???
Good evening. I have asked for a few minutes of your time to discuss a matter of national importance the reform of Americas immigration system.
The issue of immigration stirs intense emotions and in recent weeks, Americans have seen those emotions on display. On the streets of major cities, crowds have rallied in support of those in our country illegally. At our southern border, others have organized to stop illegal immigrants from coming in. Across the country, Americans are trying to reconcile these contrasting images. And in Washington, the debate over immigration reform has reached a time of decision. Tonight, I will make it clear where I stand, and where I want to lead our country on this vital issue.
We must begin by recognizing the problems with our immigration system. For decades, the United States has not been in complete control of its borders. As a result, many who want to work in our economy have been able to sneak across our border and millions have stayed.
Once here, illegal immigrants live in the shadows of our society. Many use forged documents to get jobs, and that makes it difficult for employers to verify that the workers they hire are legal. Illegal immigration puts pressure on public schools and hospitals ... strains state and local budgets ... and brings crime to our communities. These are real problems, yet we must remember that the vast majority of illegal immigrants are decent people who work hard, support their families, practice their faith, and lead responsible lives. They are a part of American life but they are beyond the reach and protection of American law.
We are a Nation of laws, and we must enforce our laws. We are also a Nation of immigrants, and we must uphold that tradition, which has strengthened our country in so many ways. These are not contradictory goals America can be a lawful society and a welcoming society at the same time. We will fix the problems created by illegal immigration, and we will deliver a system that is secure, orderly, and fair. So I support comprehensive immigration reform that will accomplish five clear objectives.
First, the United States must secure its borders. This is a basic responsibility of a sovereign Nation. It is also an urgent requirement of our national security. Our objective is straightforward: The border should be open to trade and lawful immigration and shut to illegal immigrants, as well as criminals, drug dealers, and terrorists.
I was the governor of a state that has a twelve-hundred mile border with Mexico. So I know how difficult it is to enforce the border, and how important it is. Since I became President, we have increased funding for border security by 66 percent, and expanded the Border Patrol from about 9,000 to 12,000 agents. The men and women of our Border Patrol are doing a fine job in difficult circumstances and over the past five years, we have apprehended and sent home about six million people entering America illegally.
Despite this progress, we do not yet have full control of the border, and I am determined to change that. Tonight I am calling on Congress to provide funding for dramatic improvements in manpower and technology at the border. By the end of 2008, we will increase the number of Border Patrol officers by an additional 6,000. When these new agents are deployed, we will have more than doubled the size of the Border Patrol during my Presidency.
At the same time, we are launching the most technologically advanced border security initiative in American history. We will construct high-tech fences in urban corridors, and build new patrol roads and barriers in rural areas. We will employ motion sensors infrared cameras and unmanned aerial vehicles to prevent illegal crossings. America has the best technology in the world and we will ensure that the Border Patrol has the technology they need to do their job and secure our border.
Training thousands of new Border Patrol agents and bringing the most advanced technology to the border will take time. Yet the need to secure our border is urgent. So I am announcing several immediate steps to strengthen border enforcement during this period of transition:
One way to help during this transition is to use the National Guard. So in coordination with governors, up to 6,000 Guard members will be deployed to our southern border. The Border Patrol will remain in the lead. The Guard will assist the Border Patrol by operating surveillance systems analyzing intelligence installing fences and vehicle barriers building patrol roads and providing training. Guard units will not be involved in direct law enforcement activities that duty will be done by the Border Patrol. This initial commitment of Guard members would last for a period of one year. After that, the number of Guard forces will be reduced as new Border Patrol agents and new technologies come online. It is important for Americans to know that we have enough Guard forces to win the war on terror, respond to natural disasters, and help secure our border.
The United States is not going to militarize the southern border. Mexico is our neighbor, and our friend. We will continue to work cooperatively to improve security on both sides of the border ... to confront common problems like drug trafficking and crime ... and to reduce illegal immigration.
Another way to help during this period of transition is through state and local law enforcement in our border communities. So we will increase federal funding for state and local authorities assisting the Border Patrol on targeted enforcement missions. And we will give state and local authorities the specialized training they need to help federal officers apprehend and detain illegal immigrants. State and local law enforcement officials are an important resource and they are part of our strategy to secure our border communities.
The steps I have outlined will improve our ability to catch people entering our country illegally. At the same time, we must ensure that every illegal immigrant we catch crossing our southern border is returned home. More than 85 percent of the illegal immigrants we catch crossing the southern border are Mexicans, and most are sent back home within 24 hours. But when we catch illegal immigrants from other countries, it is not as easy to send them home. For many years, the government did not have enough space in our detention facilities to hold them while the legal process unfolded. So most were released back into our society and asked to return for a court date. When the date arrived, the vast majority did not show up. This practice, called catch and release, is unacceptable and we will end it.
We are taking several important steps to meet this goal. We have expanded the number of beds in our detention facilities, and we will continue to add more. We have expedited the legal process to cut the average deportation time. And we are making it clear to foreign governments that they must accept back their citizens who violate our immigration laws. As a result of these actions, we have ended catch and release for illegal immigrants from some countries. And I will ask Congress for additional funding and legal authority, so we can end catch and release at the southern border once and for all. When people know that they will be caught and sent home if they enter our country illegally, they will be less likely to try to sneak in.
Second, to secure our border, we must create a temporary worker program. The reality is that there are many people on the other side of our border who will do anything to come to America to work and build a better life. They walk across miles of desert in the summer heat, or hide in the back of 18-wheelers to reach our country. This creates enormous pressure on our border that walls and patrols alone will not stop. To secure the border effectively, we must reduce the numbers of people trying to sneak across.
Therefore, I support a temporary worker program that would create a legal path for foreign workers to enter our country in an orderly way, for a limited period of time. This program would match willing foreign workers with willing American employers for jobs Americans are not doing. Every worker who applies for the program would be required to pass criminal background checks. And temporary workers must return to their home country at the conclusion of their stay.
A temporary worker program would meet the needs of our economy, and it would give honest immigrants a way to provide for their families while respecting the law. A temporary worker program would reduce the appeal of human smugglers and make it less likely that people would risk their lives to cross the border. It would ease the financial burden on state and local governments, by replacing illegal workers with lawful taxpayers. And above all, a temporary worker program would add to our security by making certain we know who is in our country and why they are here.
Third, we need to hold employers to account for the workers they hire. It is against the law to hire someone who is in this country illegally. Yet businesses often cannot verify the legal status of their employees, because of the widespread problem of document fraud. Therefore, comprehensive immigration reform must include a better system for verifying documents and work eligibility. A key part of that system should be a new identification card for every legal foreign worker. This card should use biometric technology, such as digital fingerprints, to make it tamper-proof. A tamper-proof card would help us enforce the law and leave employers with no excuse for violating it. And by making it harder for illegal immigrants to find work in our country, we would discourage people from crossing the border illegally in the first place.
Fourth, we must face the reality that millions of illegal immigrants are already here. They should not be given an automatic path to citizenship. This is amnesty, and I oppose it. Amnesty would be unfair to those who are here lawfully and it would invite further waves of illegal immigration.
Some in this country argue that the solution is to deport every illegal immigrant and that any proposal short of this amounts to amnesty. I disagree. It is neither wise nor realistic to round up millions of people, many with deep roots in the United States, and send them across the border. There is a rational middle ground between granting an automatic path to citizenship for every illegal immigrant, and a program of mass deportation. That middle ground recognizes that there are differences between an illegal immigrant who crossed the border recently and someone who has worked here for many years, and has a home, a family, and an otherwise clean record. I believe that illegal immigrants who have roots in our country and want to stay should have to pay a meaningful penalty for breaking the law to pay their taxes to learn English and to work in a job for a number of years. People who meet these conditions should be able to apply for citizenship but approval would not be automatic, and they will have to wait in line behind those who played by the rules and followed the law. What I have just described is not amnesty it is a way for those who have broken the law to pay their debt to society, and demonstrate the character that makes a good citizen.
Fifth, we must honor the great American tradition of the melting pot, which has made us one Nation out of many peoples. The success of our country depends upon helping newcomers assimilate into our society, and embrace our common identity as Americans. Americans are bound together by our shared ideals, an appreciation of our history, respect for the flag we fly, and an ability to speak and write the English language. English is also the key to unlocking the opportunity of America. English allows newcomers to go from picking crops to opening a grocery from cleaning offices to running offices from a life of low-paying jobs to a diploma, a career, and a home of their own. When immigrants assimilate and advance in our society, they realize their dreams ... they renew our spirit ... and they add to the unity of America.
Tonight, I want to speak directly to Members of the House and the Senate: An immigration reform bill needs to be comprehensive, because all elements of this problem must be addressed together or none of them will be solved at all. The House has passed an immigration bill. The Senate should act by the end of this month so we can work out the differences between the two bills, and Congress can pass a comprehensive bill for me to sign into law.
America needs to conduct this debate on immigration in a reasoned and respectful tone. Feelings run deep on this issue and as we work it out, all of us need to keep some things in mind. We cannot build a unified country by inciting people to anger, or playing on anyones fears, or exploiting the issue of immigration for political gain. We must always remember that real lives will be affected by our debates and decisions, and that every human being has dignity and value no matter what their citizenship papers say.
I know many of you listening tonight have a parent or a grandparent who came here from another country with dreams of a better life. You know what freedom meant to them, and you know that America is a more hopeful country because of their hard work and sacrifice. As President, I have had the opportunity to meet people of many backgrounds, and hear what America means to them. On a visit to Bethesda Naval Hospital, Laura and I met a wounded Marine named Guadalupe Denogean. Master Gunnery Sergeant Denogean came to the United States from Mexico when he was a boy. He spent his summers picking crops with his family, and then he volunteered for the United States Marine Corps as soon as he was able. During the liberation of Iraq, Master Gunnery Sergeant Denogean was seriously injured. When asked if he had any requests, he made two a promotion for the corporal who helped rescue him and the chance to become an American citizen. And when this brave Marine raised his right hand, and swore an oath to become a citizen of the country he had defended for more than 26 years, I was honored to stand at his side.
We will always be proud to welcome people like Guadalupe Denogean as fellow Americans. Our new immigrants are just what they have always been people willing to risk everything for the dream of freedom. And America remains what she has always been the great hope on the horizon an open door to the future a blessed and promised land. We honor the heritage of all who come here, no matter where they are from, because we trust in our countrys genius for making us all Americans one Nation under God. Thank you, and good night.
#2
We must always remember that real lives will be affected by our debates and decisions, and that every human being has dignity and value no matter what their citizenship papers say.
Certainly. And those we didn't invite here can go have dignity and value where they were born. It's not about them being less than human, it's about them obeying the same damned laws everyone else is subject to.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
05/16/2006 9:59 Comments ||
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#3
Miss. Too little too late to make the base happy.
#4
Sorry. Not impressed. Looks like the main points are amnesty, no matter what he calls it, and not pissing off Mexico.
Where's he been for six years?
#5
I was pretty PO'd immediately after the speech - and the President's press people making the rounds apparently were as tone deaf as the President is, in terms of a REAL FENCE. It seems the whole speech is there to setup his amnesty program -- and its amensty no matter how he chooses to rephrase it - lipstick on the pig still leaves it being a pig, and an illegal being in the country is still an illegal being in the country.
And the followup interviews last night were even worse:
(Juline Myers DHS) "Well, in terms of actual fencing, I think they're still looking at kind of what makes most sense in terms of surveillance and manpower and actual infrastructure."
In other words, the SAME things they've been saying for the past 5 years about the fence. Meaning NOTHING changed.
So here's the one thing that saves this whole thing for me this morning:
(From Hugh Hewitt) "I have confirmed with a senior White House source this morning that the president is for robust fencing in urban areas --as exists in El Paso and San Diego-- and for vehicle barriers in rural areas."
Why the hell didn't Bush say so in the first place? I swear, this administration is the most incompetent bunch of morons when it comes to getting the good message out. Winning the war in Iraq, the daily heroism of our great troops aroundthe world in this fight, the necessity and legality of the NSA programs, the great economy wiht low unemployment and low inflation and (now) high quality jobs being created, etc. NONE of that they get across effectively at all.
And now this screw up by not emphasizing that there will be extensive fencing put up - they consistently fail to get the message across or else get the wrong message across.
Dubya, hire a fricken PR firm that knows what it's doing! For God's sake they market phony medicine (Smiling Bob for Enzite) better than you do your real successes!
But at least this latest word on a real fence has me stopping my stockpiling of ammo and MREs in preparation for President Hillary and a Dem Congress.
Dubya, get the damn word out!
And smack Pork spending down hard for your next action - veto ANYTHING that comes with earmarks.
The follow up with a pile of solid conservative (non-activist) judges, and push the senate HARD to get the approved this shummer - Squash Specter like a bug if he gets in your way.
#6
OldSpook -- when I see your name in the sidebar -- I just click cause I so value your words. However, I did hear Bush say fences last night.
From his speech just above:
At the same time, we are launching the most technologically advanced border security initiative in American history. We will construct high-tech fences in urban corridors, and build new patrol roads and barriers in rural areas.
#7
He lost my vote when he called them 'Illegal Immigrants'. Even more then he called them 'law abiding'.
FYI - When President Bush talks about illegals having to 'wait at the end of the line' he means the 'citizenship' line not the immigration line. Yes! They get to 'cut in line' in front of the real law abiding people who have been patiently waiting for even their immigrant visa.
If America is a great 'melting pot' it seems Bush and Fox are hell bent on shitting in it with their Amnesty. And that is what it is - anything less then making them go back to their country of origin and waiting in line like everyone else is A-M-N-E-S-T-Y. If it would be a hardship for them then TOUGH SHIT! I am not the one who decided to break the law. The people waiting in line LEGALLY are not the ones who decided to break the law.
The immigrant who are 'law abiding' and who 'make this country what it is today' are waiting in line LEGALLY while President Bush pissed on them in order to score a few points.
#8
MISS. My wife came from Eastern Europe the right way. Followed all the rules. Took years dealing with feckless bureaucrats to get her permanent residency.
No fence? No deal. SSDD.
The illegals would self-deport within 3 months if there were no benefits, jobs, or ability to send money to Mexico.
#9
Sherry, the problem was the emphasis in the speech seemed to be more on Amnesty than it was on security. Title 32 Activation of the Guard would have been a start (this allows them to operate as law enforcement officers including pwoers of arrest - under the direction fo the individual state governors).
As put by others I heard and thoughts I have myself, the big problem for Bush is he's forfeited the trust of the base with a series of boneheaded moves, going from Harriet Miers to the Dubai Ports deal to this, and it wasn't necessarily that the moves were all wrong. (Dubai Ports deal was fine if you examine the real facts concerning port security). But the White House has just blown off our concerns aboutthos things until it was way late int he game - indeed the Myers mess is a prime example of jus thow deaf/arrogant (you decide) this Administration has become. And the result is that people aren't willing to cut them any slack, they aren't willing to take a sort of trust me attitude on this or anything else coming out of the Bush administration. And so they're going to have to *act*,, and *do* things -0 accomlisht things, and they're going to have to follow through, and they can't just wait until the attention has passed, and then let is slide. Thats what they ahve been doing (waiting and letting it slide) liek a schoolboy slacker, which I think is what everybody fears they're going to do. And that's what has Bush in such low ratings and low regard across the board.
This i his last chance to dig out - secure the border - talk up the fence and law enforcement, not the guest workers. Kill the pork,, veto the pork laden bills and demand that the Senate and house kill off Earmarks for the corruption they cause, and finally, get the judges into the system and get them confirme - take no excuses from the old country club Republicans in the senate.
Do those 3 things, and he will be over 50% approval by August.
#10
The high tech virtual fence in Georgespeak is cameras and aerial patrols. National Guard troops are actually to be comprised of Engineering Battalions, support groups, not boots on the ground...no arrest powers, probably not armed either. See something, call the Border Patrol for the catch and release bus. George may have cleared this scam with Vicente, but he's going to lose another 10 points in the polls by June, and the deaf Congress will compound the problem being 'fair' to illegal voters. Platitudes don't cut it.
#11
I'm a big fan of George Bush. I don't expect my leaders to be gods and he's done an amazing job of staying the course with excellent results.
The speech was a miss. That swooshing sound you hear is the wind created by every single supporter he ever had in his entire presidency turning their back on him, myself include. And the left still bitterly hates him too.
The people of the U.S. do not want "virtual" fences. We want a real concrete and steel huge-ass berlin frickin' wall backed by no-shit Border Control and U.S. mil fully armed to arrest or repel invaders. We don't want amnesty for ILLEGALS either. We want them sent home and put back in the immigration line *not* the citizenship line. JHC, our politicians are A-Number-One pussies. Do we follow the rule of law or the rule of man? BTW - companies that cannot survive w/out illegal labor do not deserve to survive. If their love of the dollar out weighs their love of U.S. sovereignty then they need to be shut down.
Guest workers is a big mistake. We don't need second class non-citizens.
Failure to defend the border is a big mistake. Canada is also an issue as far afaiac.
Illegal aliens should get NO breaks. Let them be treated like any one else, no better, now worse, if they can get back to their homeland to apply for legitimate entry. Let them be treated like lawbreakers if they are caught here.
I'll believe tougher enforcement of employers when I see convictions.
#17
I don't think he did as badly as most here seem to, but I think he failed in two significant areas: the guest worker notion, which is a sham that will hurt everyday Americans' wage base, and the 6000 (non-enforcement) troops on the border plan, which will have little effect on illegal immigration.
He tried hard to find reasonable common ground between two extreme sides, an admirable effort, but usually a losing battle. I think his Achilles heel in this was in yielding to Fox's yiping about militarizing the border. He should have pointed out that Mexico enforces its southern border militarily, and the US will, too.
#18
The Constitution defines the military's duties as securing the borders. Case closed.
First, secure the borders.......check
Second, we must create a temporary worker program.....(let them work, but not vote)...check
Third we must inforce a way of identification......check. (uses employers to flush them out)not a bad idea.
Fourth, there are too many to send back, so we'll send only the problem wetbacks......check
Fifth, they must learn to speak and understand english.......check.
And, implied, they can't vote unless and until they become citizens......check
#19
Another missed opportunity for an administration that lately runs out of tissue every time it sits on the loo. Not only did they fail to persuade the advocates for an enforcement first policy, in some ways they helped make their case. They offered no new compelling argument as to why there cant be a solution to the porous border without a comprehensive plan. In fact, his Despite this progress, we do not yet have full control of the border statement is an admission that there is absolutely no proof that a guest worker component is necessary. And by asking Congress for additional funding and legal authority under the current system further drives home that point.
To make matters worse, Bush tipped his cards showing he is beholden to corporate interests and global trade on this issue. Giving employers that exploit an illegal workforce a free pass due to difficulty of document verification is a flat out insult. And Mexico is our neighbor and our friend without publicly holding them to account is an affront to even the most casual observer.
#20
I don't know about elsewhere, but when that home builder and his subcontractors were raided in Northern Kentucky last week, there were several follow-up articles in the local newspaper about illegals staying home from work, keeping the children home from school, and in general preparing to flea back to the homeland. Also that the raids were the result of a two-year investigation. Recently there have been a lot of reports of arrests of illegals and their employers; I think there is going to be a quiet exodus if this keeps up, as there was when Muslim men were required to register post-9/11.
In summary, for our study population of 55,322 illegal aliens criminals, we found
that:
* They were arrested at least a total of 459,614 times, averaging about
8 arrests per illegal alien. Nearly all had more than 1 arrest. Thirty-
eight percent (about 21,000) had between 2 and 5 arrests, 32 percent
(about 18,000) had between 6 and 10 arrests, and 26 percent (about
15,000) had 11 or more arrests. Most of the arrests occurred after
1990.
* They were arrested for a total of about 700,000 criminal offenses,
averaging about 13 offenses per illegal alien. One arrest incident may
include multiple offenses, a fact that explains why there are nearly
one and half times more offenses than arrests.[Footnote 6] Almost all
of these illegal aliens were arrested for more than 1 offense. Slightly
more than half of the 55,322 illegal aliens had between 2 and 10
offenses. About 45 percent of all offenses were drug or immigration
offenses. About 15 percent were property-related offenses such as
burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and property damage.
About 12 percent were for violent offenses such as murder, robbery,
assault, and sex-related crimes. The balance was for such other
offenses as traffic violations, including driving under the influence;
fraud--including forgery and counterfeiting; weapons violations; and
obstruction of justice.
* Eighty percent of all arrests occurred in three states--California,
Texas, and Arizona. Specifically, about 58 percent of all arrests
occurred in California, 14 percent in Texas, and 8 percent in Arizona.
#25
Looks like GW has choosen to spend the last two years of his administration fighting off investigations from the Dems who'll control Congress next year. I guess he needs something to fill his time. Non-aligned voters like me are not interested in voting if they're just the different side of the same coin.
BTW George, the problem and solution is in Mexico City not Washington and until someone is willing the use a big 2x4 to get their attention, nothing is going to change.
"We've got to protect our phoney-baloney jobs." - Gov. William J. Le Petomane, Blazing Saddles
#26
Heck, I think we can start deporting people, lots of people, as well as fining and shutting down companies that harbor illegals. However, we won't because our politicians are a bunch of sissys and it's not popular to talk about rounding up folks for mass deportation (which tells me it's prolly the right thing to do) but I believe it can be done if we had any backbone. (and if our govt had any nads, which it truly doesn't.) Sometimes I can't believe I went to Iraq to defend these f*cking cowards. Maybe it's time for another revolution.
1. Stop making it easy to get over and back - meaning once you get here, you don't leave unless you plan on never coming back.
2. Keep the money in the US. Put a tax on all money transfers from retail sources to target nation banks and agencies (ex: Western Union) - money that leaves the country. Put a confiscatory tax (escalating from 25% to 80%) on aggregates of more than $5000 a year (enough to allow legitimate money moves but cleans out any incentive for sending large sums of money home).
3. Enforce employement identification. Arrest and deport those causght working illegally. Jail those working with forged documnets. Fine and jail the employers. Make the cost of the program fall on the employers, who canthen charge higher prices for the product to make up for it - its a cost of doing legitimate business.
4. During arrests, check citizenship. If an aresstee is not a citizen, non-felony non-violent charges are held (i.e. traffic tickets etc), they do jail time for the ticket/etc, then are deported.
5. Any time anyone is deported, their family is deported as well unless they are here legally and are of legal age. No more "anchor" babies.
These 5 things, along with a solid border fence and internal enforcement will drive out the illegals, since they will have fewer jobs available, fewer employers willing to take the risks of jail time, less money they can send back to Mexico, and less of a chance of being able to do the "over and back" they repeatedly do now.
Bush will not be reelected in 2008 no matter what he does. States constantly countermand the Feds on border issues, primarily this means Senators calling off Border patrol enforcement from businesses but there are numberous precidents. Bush has no political capital left to use on this topic or really any other. Really all he can do is give a speach and hope the House and Senate take his suggestions and/or his poll numbers go up which is basically what he did.
Nothing to see here, move along. He should have built a wall on Sept 12, while he was formulating the energy policies, and waiting for the military to provide plans for the overthrow of Syria/Iraq/Iran/Afghanistan using US airpower and local insurgent groups.
Ive read the speech. I was unavoidably out for the broadcast.
Picking a round number, if there are ten million illegals already in the country, how many of them are just trying to make a living. Id guess 9,900,000. Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) would like you to believe that illegal immigration predisposes you to other crimes such as murder, rape and barratry. Piffle!
As difficult as it is for the bloggers at the Corner to believe, there are a great many people who believe you can deport all the illegals, or make their lives so miserable that they self deport. Let me ask you to think about the issue by itself for a moment. If we find a way to deny employment and services to ten million illegals, what happens? They cannot work, they cannot get services, they cannot afford a bus ticket home. We just went from 100,000 illegals as criminals to 10 million as criminals. Yeah, thats an idea we want to push!
We cannot lock them all up. We cannot make their lives so miserable that they go home without creating a massive criminal class. So, as unpleasant as it might be to the nativists, we have to find a way for the vast majority of honest, decent, hard-working illegal immigrants to remain here legally.
The nativists are no different than the Know Nothings. Assimilation takes time. If it were so damn easy, there would never have been a Chinatown or a Little Italy or a Brighton Beach. If you really, really demand assimilation, why dont you start with the Cubans in Miami? Oh, wait, theyre good aliens. As are the Hmong. And so on. Nativists dont see that all the exceptions to the immigration rules make the rules merely political, not any sort of practical immigration policy.
Find a way to keep the people who want to work in this country.
#31
Miss. Too much compassion and not enough conservative.
I keep remembering the Cuban exiles we intercept and ship back to Castro. Cubans are some of our most patriotic Americans. They flee from tyranny, not just for economic benefits.
First term was good, the second term is very rocky. Still better than donks.
Posted by: Captain America ||
05/16/2006 16:22 Comments ||
Top||
The Speech I Would Write
This is the speech that would raise the president's poll numbers.
My fellow Americans. My poll numbers are in the shitter. I don't have to worry about getting elected again so I have decided to do what's right.
To the congress: If you send me another bloated piece of shit legislation I will veto it.
Trent Lott does not need to have us move a railroad track. If Mississippi needs to have it moved, let them pay for it themselves.
Senator Stevens does not have to have a $200 million bridge to an island that has only 50 people.
We've given enough money to New Orleans. Half of it will wind up into the pockets of corrupt politicians anyway.
The people elected us to shrink the size of government, not expand it. I can understand Senator Byrd wanting another building in West Virginia named after him. He's a Democrat. I expect that from him. But I do not expect that from small government Republicans.
When did our party turn into the Democratic Party? What happened to the revolution of 1994? We need to quit spending like drunken sailors and I need to start wielding the veto pen.
Now I want to talk about illegal immigration. What part of illegal is so hard to understand? If they are here illegally, they are breaking the law. Before we can talk about an amnesty or guest worker program we need to get immigration under control. We tried an amnesty program in 1986. It didn't work.
Putting troops on the border will not solve the problem. We need to build a fence. A big fence. A fence that runs from San Diego to Texas. My fellow Americans we will build that fence.
After we build that fence, any illegal Spanish speaking alien will be sent back to Mexico. I don't care if you're Mexican or not. If you are here illegally and you speak Spanish we'll put you on the Mexican side of the fence. You think our laws are bad? Wait until you see how Mexico treats illegals.
Only after we get the illegal immigration problem under control will we start talking about an amnesty program.
To President Fox: I don't give a shit if you don't like this. Maybe if you would fix the problems in your Third World shithole country your people wouldn't want to live here. What the fuck do you do with all of your oil money and tourism dollars? I think you ought to give us free oil since we are taking care of so many of your citizens.
That is my plan. Good night and God bless America.
Sigh! I know I'm just dreaming. That speech will never get delivered. Tancredo for president!
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/16/2006 16:25 Comments ||
Top||
#33
Miss. Anything that allows the illegals to stay in this country in violation of our laws gnaws at the entrails of the Republic.
#34
the guest worker notion, which is a sham that will hurt everyday Americans' wage base,
This type of argument should be viewed with a grain caution: Higher wages will not necessarily ensure that people will be better off, especially as things stand right now in the US economy. If you are willing to take a huge chunk of people out of the US labor market right now, you will drive up inflation and interest rates, ceteris paribus. And then who will you blame when it becomes 'it's the economy stupid'?
Give the pols in Washington a little credit for realizing this. You trusted them with Iraq and pretty much everything else, why not trust them with the economy?
#35
You trusted them with Iraq and pretty much everything else, why not trust them with the economy?
Wow. Aren't you the little trust bunny. The fact that we believed that we were better off to depose Saddam and establish a foothold in the middle east to fight the WOT has nothing to do with what we think is the best way to handle illegal immigration or the price of lettuce in CA.
Some of us can think for ourselves and believe that our representatives are supposed to work for us, doing what we think best, not the other way around.
#36
Make a GREAT WALL Amusement Park the length of the border. Put Dial Soap in charge. They could have over-priced rides and food just like in the National Parks they run.
#37
If you are willing to take a huge chunk of people out of the US labor market right now, you will drive up inflation and interest rates, ceteris paribus.
What does getting rid of a bunch of labor inputs have to do with expanding the money supply relative to output? Or are you suggesting a change in the velocity of money?
#39
...has nothing to do with what we think is the best way to handle illegal immigration or the price of lettuce in CA.
Then I still hope you're voting Republican.
What does getting rid of a bunch of labor inputs have to do with expanding the money supply relative to output? Or are you suggesting a change in the velocity of money?
Pro-illegal Immigrants mostly mean well and someday they may vote and damnit we want them to vote for our party and not the other guys. They also provide cheap labor so that your lettuce is a few cents cheaper, along with car washes, gardening, and some other manual labor. They probably have a huge effect on the construction industry. The money they send back to Mexico is a huge boon to the Mexican economy and the drugs and sex/slaves that occasionally cross with the illegals are considered recreational by many Americans.
Con -Illegal immigrants flaunt our laws by sneaking across, they send a chunk of our economy into Mexico. They force cities to use resources such as teachers, hospitals, and prisons to support them without actually adding much to the tax base. They take jobs that Americans once did (such as construction, gardening and carwashes) causing the wages for such jobs to drop to the point many Americans can no longer survive on those jobs. The money they send back has prevented Mexico from reforming and becoming a serious country that might actually become first world in time, and there is the drugs and sex workers thing again along with possible terrorists crossing with the illegals.
I'm sure there are some additional issues but that about covers the main ones I've heard.
#42
Thanks rj. That was great. T o me the economy thing is of real concern as it is siphoning resources out of the country cuz' they don't pay taxes, is that right? Also, is the radical "we will take back the US for Mexico" part of it, and also, is Bush doing this to secure a distancing from Chavez? Is that even likely to work?
Because I wasn't sure what you were getting at, and with macroeconomics all bets are off.
In the short run an increase in the rate of money growth affects mostly output, not inflation. In the long run, there is also no tight relation between the growth rate of money and inflation. The reasons for this involve shifts in the demand for money.
Otoh, a labor market is a market like any other. Reducing the supply of labor has a direct effect on producers' costs. And costs drive up inflation.
#46
SnU - You are spewing uninformed blather are caught up in the weeds and losing sight of the big picture. You are fussing around down in the weeds when if you keep the horizon in sight, this isn't really that hard of a problem to solve. The problem is that the politicians are putting the votes before doing what is right for the citizens of this country.
I will vote Republican - only because the dems are such wacked out losers. But I'll be including pesos in any RNC requests for money and a party that has people voting for them only because the other guy is worse isn't a good thing.
Really? LOL. You are welcome to refute what I said. Please expand. Maybe I'll learn something new.
It is you who is losing sight of the broader picture, unfortunately, choosing instead to go for short term emotional gratification. I dare say the pols have it right on this one. Bush always did. I have a feeling that he will be judged unfairly by history and people on both sides.
What is happening with Guantanamo? We hear President Bush say in Berlin that he would "like to close Guantanamo," but is "awaiting the Supreme Court to make a decision." What would he do with the detainees? "Put them on trial," according to the President. In fact Mr. Bush needs to be briefed that Military Commissions -- on hold for months while U.S. courts made glacial progress -- are finally underway as you read this. Detainees standing in front of the Commissions this week include the only white detainee in Guantanamo, Australian terrorist David Matthew Hicks, a veteran of the Pakistani LET, the Kosovo Liberation Army, and al Qaeda.
I recently debated one of the attorneys for some of the detainees on BBC radio. Clive Stafford-Smith, a hard-left human rights lawyer who seems to find desirable clients principally from among the oppressed anti-American terrorist community, wistfully hoped that the "innocent" detainees would only get a "fair hearing." An admirable desire to be sure, and one that I personally wish would also be applied by irrational critics to America's actions -- practically alone -- in combating Islamofascism worldwide, including the need to detain and interrogate these thugs in places like Guantanamo.
Not to be outdone by the President's expressed wish, the British government's top legal advisor, Lord Goldsmith, meanwhile issued a pontificatory statement informing us that "the existence of Guantanamo is unacceptable." One wonders if his Lordship would prefer that the fewer than 490 terrorists now detained at the facility take up residence in his Parliamentary district. Since at least two of the detainees have advanced degrees in economics from the London School and are proficient in terrorist money laundering and fundraising, they could have useful skills. No doubt in some areas of the UK that are already rapidly undergoing Islamification the idea of terrorists relocating to the neighborhood might be more than a hypothetical possibility.
Meanwhile in the real world, the part that looks askance at the idea of taking hundreds of the "worst of the worst" terrorists and turning them loose again, the efficacy of Guantanamo needs to be discussed in more practical, serious tones. Consider if you will the artificial "wall" that Clinton-appointed Assistant Attorney General Jamie S. Gorelick erected to enforce a separation between law enforcement and intelligence gathering agencies is by now well known. It was loudly but hypocritically condemned by the 911 Commission since wall architect Gorelick was, herself, a member of the Commission. Not only did she fail to recuse herself from discussion of the aberration that she created, but some say she ought to have been subpoenaed to testify. Nevertheless the point was made: intelligence and law enforcement missions have become blurred and overlapping in this war. Information sharing must be conducted in a timely manner. It follows that analyzed material derived from interrogations and operational data sharing must take place as well.
But is that happening? Word in the intel community seems to indicate that necessary exchanges are not taking place in a timely manner.
Even more significantly since the missions of various agencies conflict with one another, focus is naturally on the needs of the particular agency perhaps to the detriment of others that ought to be involved.
Disposition and handling of individual terrorist detainees has brought this issue to a head. This is an historical, not recently emerging issue. For example, back in the highly confused first few months of 2002 when Guantanamo Bay was hastily opened as a detention/interrogation center for enemy combatants captured for the most part in Afghanistan and Pakistan, several agencies were interested in these thugs, each for its own reasons.
Primarily domestic-focused, law enforcement agencies such as Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation and major cities' police agencies were out to build cases against individual detainees that would stand up in the harsh light of a criminal court. They were concerned with niceties of a highly refined American legal system preoccupied with defendant's rights, rules of procedure, and evidentiary processes. While they were properly concerned with potential future attacks, FBI and other similar groups were focused in large part on alleged past criminal acts for which they could prosecute.
Military and Central Intelligence Agency interrogators, on the other hand, were less focused on building a court case than they were in what would be properly classified as national security or military intelligence information. In a phrase they were out to learn the capabilities and intentions of the enemy especially regarding current operations and future attacks. They wanted to know everything about the al Qaeda organization, training, recruiting, financial processes, tactics, personalities, alliances with outside states and movements, technical and tactical proficiency, and planned operations. They were considerably less focused on prosecution of an individual and sought more to defeat a movement.
Analysis of these early, admittedly confused months in Guantanamo shows that all too often the "wall" still existed and was a great impediment to proper interrogation of the detainees. Agencies operated without an overall, coordinated interrogation plan and with few common objectives. The result was akin to researchers conducting multiple science projects in the same Petri dish: each participant ruined the other participants' projects. On several occasions, according to present day Gitmo interrogators, detainees actually complained about the unprofessional nature of these early interrogations and some astoundingly even offered advice to the interrogators on how to conduct a more effective session. Some actionable information was derived but how much was lost is impossible to say.
In these early days the interrogators argued and competed among themselves. Not only did they not share information, plans, and acceptable techniques but it was rare that they even discussed the situation civilly with each other. Principals in each competing agency exerted absolute control over their people. So rather than having unity of command -- the first principle in the art of war -- each organization stove-piped right down to the actors on the spot. Exacerbating the problem was that even within the military jurisdiction over the detainees was initially split between two Task Forces, TF-160 and TF-170.
It was during these early months that accusations of abuse -- real and fabricated -- emerged from the fog of Guantanamo. FBI agents were unfamiliar with the latitude that military interrogators had, and CIA interrogators played their own secret hand. Partially as a result, a few poorly prepared FBI agents -- never briefed or trained to deal with wartime enemy combatants but accustomed to Mirandized accused criminals in a Stateside environment -- panicked and sent hysterically overstated "reports" back to the U.S. One of those emails made the floor of the Senate as Senator Dick Durbin (D, IL) used it as a political club to smack the Administration, tangentially attacking American troops. He carelessly, thoughtlessly besmirched our soldiers' worldwide reputations along with that of his country.
But that was then, this is now. These issues have been long resolved and for several years Guantanamo interrogations have been extraordinarily professional and effective, a success totally ignored by the legacy media. Investigations such as that conducted independently by Admiral Church and his committee and by former Defense Secretary Schlesinger and his blue-ribbon, bipartisan panel, have given Joint Task Force Guantanamo the highest marks for humane treatment and proper interrogation procedure.
But despite this amazing progress we still have evidence of the artificial wall keeping agencies apart and hampering American efforts. We are not so well off in our intelligence efforts against al Qaeda and other terrorists that we can afford to squander the small amount of precious human intelligence that we can access. Yet because of our "walls" we are doing exactly that. At this stage of evolution, Guantanamo is highly controlled, under intense scrutiny including 24-hour International Committee of the Red Cross oversight, and is functioning as the most effective detention/interrogation platform in the world.
Yet we are using it for only a tiny number of those who merit proper interrogation, most especially the cell members and terrorists who have been apprehended and in many cases tried and convicted, in American courts. If someone like Sammi al-Arian is sentenced to jail time he ought to be assigned to Gitmo to fill out that time. During his confinement he can be properly interrogated. Otherwise he and the others such as John Walker Lindh, Zaccarias Mousaoui, the Beltway Snipers, the Lackawanna Six, and every one of the others who are just rotting in Federal prison cells while the information inside their heads is forever secret.
Every terrorist captured abroad deemed sufficient threat or to possess actionable intelligence information ought to be evacuated and kept at Guantanamo. Similarly every terrorist convicted in American domestic courts should be assigned to Gitmo to serve their sentences. Our needs for this information are too great to give it up voluntarily in time of war by ignoring these potentially rich intelligence sources.
Gordon Cucullu is a former Green Beret lieutenant colonel and author of Separated at Birth: How North Korea became the Evil Twin.
#1
I think we should declare them POWs associated with whatever nation we can (with Al Queda big wigs as the exception) and pass them along to said country as soon as practical.
So when Afghanistan stabalizes any Afghan prisoners could be transfered to Afghanistan to continue their encarcaration.
As far as Al Queda hardcores we might consider simply handing them over to Israel or India who have both been enemies of Jihadists longer than us and probably more willing to go medieval.
Sorry guys, but he failed tonight to give the speech he needed to give.
IMHO the only thing that can save him now: coming out STRONG for a fence to begin construction IMMEDIATELY, like in the House bill. In the morning. with a strongly worded press release that "clarifies" his speech. Otherwise he is DONE.
Article link goes to a summary page - thaere are a few others that think this was a good thing but in the long run, its a failure of the first magnnitude.
National Guard is temporary - and they aren't even going to be enforcing the law, just carrying clipboards for the Border Patrol, sho still have mexican-driven political leaders. If he was serious he would have called for Title 35 deployments, which allow the NG troosp to arrest given the power from the state governor - just like during Katrina.
Nothing about a fence. NOTHING about a REAL permanent fence. Jsut the same old technology horsepucky he peddled back in 2004 - which hasnt done dick to date. Hey Dubya, when you put up a VIRTUAL fence around the Whitehouse and your house is when I'll believe those things work. Till then, your lack of putting up real barriers to canalize the illegals into observable and contrallable routes will leave gaping holes in the security for the border, meaning EVERYTHING else you do will be moot.
The "worker programs" is an amnesty no matter how he tries to wrap it unless they have to LEAVE before they can get into that program from a consular office in MEXICO - and I didnt hear that at all.
Finally not a damn thing about inland enforcement being increased. Just the ID card, but nothing about punishing those who hire illegals.
Links to assorted Conservative blogophere reactions:
Hugh Hewitt: Memo to Tony Snow: The blogosphere/talk radio callers/e-mailers are turning against this speech in a decisive fashion. They simply do not believe the Administration is really committed to border enforcement, and the spokespeople sent out to back up the president's message aren't doing that job. Period.
Michelle Malkin: The only good thing about watching the speech was getting to watch it in the Fox News green room with Colorado GOP Rep. Tom Tancredo, a stalwart immigration enforcement advocate. It was nice to have someone to shake heads along with as empty platitude after platitude was laid on thick. Too little, too late.
Passionate America: Bush you just killed the rest of your political career and any chance for the Republican Party to win in 2006 and 2008!
Right Wing News: This was not an impressive speech. He said he'd send the National Guard to the border for a year, where they wouldn't be actually apprehending any illegals, but everything else is the same old, same old. So, in my view, this isn't even an olive branch to people who are serious about defending this border and dealing with illegal immigration. Overall grade for the speech: F
Captains Quarters: Two possibilities exist. Either Bush doesn't care about border security, or the White House couldn't coordinate its policy spokespeople to stay on message, or perhaps both. None of these options build confidence in this administration.
Powerline: He had his chance and he blew it. President Bush doesn't have many chances left to salvage his second term. After tonight, he might not have any.
Tapscott: So we must ask: If things have gotten so bad in the most recent two years despite the actions initiated in 2004 that Bush is now calling out the National Guard, is that a confession of failure of the measures detailed above, including especially those high-tech measures that were again presented tonight as the key to protecting our borders?
Bryan Preston at Hot Air:The president had the chance to show some leadership on the illegal immigration issue tonight, but in my opinion he failed. Terrorists could slip across that border tonight. The president and his team have had five years to do something about that, and they have stubbornly refused [again] (to act quickly)
Un-Reserved: Without the real fence in the speech, the troops-to-the-border call will seen by most of his base as an insulting ploy, insulting to the intelligence of the American people and insulting to the soldiers, soldiers families and employers who will pay in lost time and money for yet another deployment.
EckerNet: I give Bush an F. Told us almost nothing new....6K National Guard troops does not warrant a primetime speech from the Oval Office. He did nothing to win over conservatives who want him to get serious. He proposed nothing that will even begin to solve the problem.
Freedom Folks: It is offensive to me to hear my president praise those who've broken the law to get here. I'm certain some are very decent people, howevah, we know some are monsters, in fact the ten to twenty thousand MS-13 members didn't get a shout out from their homey the president. Aren't they some of the exciting crop of "New Americans" or is that designation only good for dishwashers and gardeners? Nice try Mr. Bush, we ain't buying.
And last but not least - Dick Durbin who I f**king HATE for the crap a lies he has spread about our troops gave the response, of which I coudl only bear to see a little. Dick Durbin is now on the right of President Bush, how about THAT? He quotes the 9-11 commission saying we need to secure the border. So at the risk of my head exploding I have to agree, why haven't we secured the border Mr. President? Where the hell is the FENCE President Bush?
I'm going to go have a stroke - I'm agreeing with Dick Dubin on something having to do with national security. Sheesh. Good night all - Im drinking myself into oblivion. The Nightmare is just beginning thanks to Bush being feckless like his old man.
Dubya, you had a chance to do it right tonight and you f**king failed miserably by trying to split the middle. No better than CLinon't triangulation.
You are your father. Country Club Republicans. And like him you have thrown the Republicans and Conservatives out of power for many years. And the damage that will result to the nation will be almost irreperable.
Thanks Dubya - Democrat Congress and President Hillary, here we come. War in Iraq, there we go, all my frineds that died thrown away because you didn't have the balls to do the right thing and stand up to Mexico and guard our borders. I hope you enjoy your impeachment proceedings next year George. You brough them on yourself.
You bastard.
Feel free to counter me - I hope somone can.
(Yes Im very pissed. Right now I'm feeling that tonight Bush sold out me and others in the military and conservative side of things for his buddies that run the business that use illegals and "guest workers").
#1
FYI - this was written last night right after I heard the Hugh Hewitt interview with Julie Myers, who bascially appeared to be blowing off the fence completely, and emphasizing the Guest Worker aspects.
I am still unimpressed with the speech and its intent, as well as the followup.
But there was a ray of sunshine this morning in that the Administration may have finally woken up when they said: "confirmed with a senior White House source this morning that the president is for robust fencing in urban areas --as exists in El Paso and San Diego-- and for vehicle barriers in rural areas."
As far as conservatives, and security minded folks go, so far, it's not looking good for the President. Almost the entire reaction across the blogosphere has been pretty negative. The quotes are running the gamut from the President has blown it to looking for more specifics on the fence, not impressive. John Hawkins, Right Wing News, overall grade, F. Michelle Malkin, not surprisingly, said, "too little, too late."
Back on the Sunny side of things - Sen Frist has FINALLY realized they are way behind on this and need to act decisevly - and it loooks they like evenhave the right tool to do it: Sen Sessions Amendment:
Over the next ten days, 20 amendments will be offered by Republicans. Many of these amendments if passed by the full Senate would strengthen the border security and interior enforcement provisions of the bill. We must secure our borders first. An amendment that will be introduced by Senator Jeff Sessions would meet the demand for real fencing, constructing an additional 370 miles of triple-layered fencing and 500 miles of vehicle barriers along the areas of our border with Mexico that are most often used by smugglers and illegal aliens. This fencing is to be constructed immediately and will be completed within two years of the passage of this border security legislation. This fencing mileage, combined with provisions in the bill on the Senate floor that authorize other technologies asked for by the border patrol to keep our borders fully surveyed so they can intercept those who cross the border as quickly as possible, will go far to enhancing our border security and keeping America safer
Now lets see if they can actually get the job done instead of just talking about it like they have for the last 5 years.
#2
So maybe you can hold off on the fork until we see what they actually do - and what the President says about the pork loaded bill coming up (VETO!) and how he handles getting MORE judges in the nominations hopper - and getting them confirmed quickly evne if it means running over Specter who has become even more of an obstructianist than the Dems.
#3
RANT -
He refuses to recognize that the arguments being made for illegal, guest and H1B visa holders are among the ones the South made in support of Slavery!
What do slaves, H1B visa holders, Illegal Aliens and Guest Workers have in common?
1) They can have their lives turned upside down upon the whim of their bosses.
Slaves can be killed or sold or mal-treated.
H1B visa holders, Illegal Aliens and Guest Workers can be kicked out of the US at the whim of their boss who only needs to call the INS and ask for their exit. (slavery in a different guise)
2) They all receive substandard wages for their efforts. In some respect the slaves might do a tad better here as they were property who's value the owner did not want to degrade faster than their depreciation schedule.
/RANT
#4
Give endless credit to Bush. He is above the obvious debate because he is looking at the big picture, which I haven't seen mentioned anywhere.
That is, consider immigration in light of the following:
1) Mexico is facing an upcoming election where a popular candidate may become a close ally to Chavez of Venezuela. A tough immigration bill right now might turn Mexico into a dangerous leftist regime. Possibly a civil war with millions of refugees.
2) The Free Trade Agreement of the Americas is one of the US's, and Bush's biggest diplomatic initiatives ever. Adamantly opposed by Chavez and the other SA leftists, Mexico is one of the biggest proponents of the FTAA. It could open up enormous markets throughout the entire SA continent to the US. With Mexican help.
3) Mexico is a major producer of oil and natural gas, vast amounts of the latter supplying much of the energy of southern California. And while their crude oil isn't the best, it could be very valuable in the absence of Gulf and Venezuelan crude.
4) Already western agriculture is feeling a pinch from a shortage of migrant labor. If the US issued a green card to most illegal aliens, it would barely be enough to maintain current production, and at significantly higher cost. Most vegetables and fruits would have a 50% price hike overnight. Without migrants at all, perhaps 300-500% price increase in most of the country. An apple for $3?
5) Many of the proposed solutions and non-solutions to the problem are very radical, or extremely unreasonable, from expelling 30 million people from the US, to completely open borders. There is a forced sense of extreme urgency to a problem that has existed since the 1960s, powerful interests that wish to keep the status quo, and bizarre lobbying efforts (many of which are nothing more than 'attack Bush' efforts). The bottom line is that Bush is not a dictator, so any real solution must come with the help of Congress, as reasonable or as wacky as they want to be.
6) In addition, there are many other linkages that would come into play, some major, many minor. All have to be considered by Bush. He deserves much support for whatever he decides.
#6
If Bush had any balls, Chavez would have an accident, and the border wall would be build about 100 miles south of the border.
Next time, we'll take 200 miles.
#8
Anonymoose: Most vegetables and fruits would have a 50% price hike overnight. Without migrants at all, perhaps 300-500% price increase in most of the country. An apple for $3?
I seriously doubt that. Korean apples cost 80 cents each. This is using farmland that costs $100,000 an acre. Upstate New York farmland costs $2,000 an acre. Stateside Mexican labor costs the same as Korean labor. I understand that you like the idea of looser immigration controls with respect to Mexico, but the numbers cited need to be a little more thought out. Note also that domestic produce growers don't exist in a national bubble - if their prices skyrocket, we can just as easily import these things from abroad. Europeans have very little farm land, comparable wages, don't have huge numbers of illegal immigrants, and their produce prices aren't five times our own. Again, a little rigor would be nice. Domestic farmers aren't free to raise their prices at will. We can import the things they grow here from Australia, China, Argentina, Chile, et al.
#9
2) The Free Trade Agreement of the Americas is one of the US's, and Bush's biggest diplomatic initiatives ever. Adamantly opposed by Chavez and the other SA leftists, Mexico is one of the biggest proponents of the FTAA. It could open up enormous markets throughout the entire SA continent to the US. With Mexican help.
Don't we already have NAFTA and CAFTA ?
What help can we get from the Mexicans ?
They seem uninterested in bettering their country.
3) Mexico is a major producer of oil and natural gas, vast amounts of the latter supplying much of the energy of southern California. And while their crude oil isn't the best, it could be very valuable in the absence of Gulf and Venezuelan crude.
I am under the impression that their petroleum rresources would be of some use regardless of venezuela.
Why don't they pump it and sell it to us and feed their little starving garbage hunting children ?
4) Already western agriculture is feeling a pinch from a shortage of migrant labor. If the US issued a green card to most illegal aliens, it would barely be enough to maintain current production, and at significantly higher cost. Most vegetables and fruits would have a 50% price hike overnight. Without migrants at all, perhaps 300-500% price increase in most of the country. An apple for $3?
Migrant farm workers are not the problem. They are the ones who will hopefully get "temporary worker" cards.
There are millions MILLIONS not working on farms at all.
If you are say, a roofer, by trade it doesn't matter how much lettuce costs, you can't outcompete foriegn slave-labor and you are SOL.
#11
Mexico has needed serious reform for a century. If that reform comes after a Marxist idiot destroys their economy so be it. Sometimes folks have to hit rock bottom before they can recover.
On the other hand there is a time and a place for an FDR infrastructure rebuilding and that's what Mr Mayor Marxist is planning so perhaps they'll turn themselves into a little Sweden. Peaceful, socialist, and economically sinking with a smile.
It'll be nice to have a secure border during the worst parts of their collapse.
#13
ZF: We can import the things they grow here from Australia, China, Argentina, Chile, et al.
And by the time that orange gets here, it has gone up in price, and down in taste. Not to mention the loss of income for an American producer, and more money flowing out of the US. Yeah sure, I guess you could say it's great for the global economy.
jim: If you are say, a roofer, by trade it doesn't matter how much lettuce costs, you can't outcompete foriegn slave-labor and you are SOL.
It matters if the roofer consumes lettuce. And it also matters to McDonald's, one of the biggest purchasers of lettuce.
#14
BTW, anyone else finds it ironic that not so long ago Bush could do no wrong on the WOT, but now the very same people who supported him are planning his downfall over a non-islamofascist issue? What's the deal here? Is illegal immigration more important than Iraq and Afghanistan?
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/16/2006 18:34 Comments ||
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#16
"What's the deal here? Is illegal immigration more important than Iraq and Afghanistan?"
They're equally important. How can one justify globetrotting with the military while simultaneously leaving the borders essentially unguarded? Further, how can one use 9/11 as justification for such globetrotting while simultaneously NOT fixing the very same immigration tracking system that had no clue of the whereabouts of many of the hijackers who had filled out the appropriate forms at one time but over-stayed their welcome without penalty?
I was (and remain) a Bush supporter, but he is being willful and stubborn in regard to this issue. Its (at least) 5 years past time to fix the border and to fix the system responsible for tracking the non-citizens we allow into our country.
#17
Remeber Rome? Spent their coin and manpower in wars with the Persians who were no direct threat to them, but allowed hundreds of thousands if not a million Goths through the Rhine frontier cause they didn't have enough military resources [both bodies and money] to cover it. Then there was a manpower shortage so they started employing the Goths as auxilary troops, who inturn learned the Roman system. Kept to themselves they did, not like the Iberians or Gauls who 'Romanized'. Eventually, it was the Goths who owned Rome.
#18
The only thing going for Geroge and the Rebublicans is I will not vote for a Democrat because we can't afford top lose thjis war we are in.
Bush has dropped the ball on this and lost the media war a long time ago. He just never fought them with the same energy that came from their hate of him.
Message to Republicans. Turn on your radio and listen to the AM band in California. More spanish language stations then english language ones. Why? Oh that's to keep the illegals enterained and informed. Those "jobs no one else will do" my ass it's. My job they are doing. It's your rich counrty club Republican friends hiring them.
If we were not in a war we can't afford to lose I would turn you out in a heartbeat. Unemployeed since 1999. Mexicans are doing the work I qualify for. The Republican Party can bite me.
Posted by: SPoD ||
05/16/2006 19:54 Comments ||
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What do they call it in Soccer when even the defense cross the centerline and gets into the offense? I think its soccer, when you pray nobody gets a good long kick into your open goal.
The Heritage Foundation is the flagship of conservative think tanks in Washington. That it was chosen first by Foreign Minister KM Blameworthy and, more recently, by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz should perhaps not have surprised anyone since neither can be accused of revolutionary tendencies. God forbid.
Washington is a city full of lobbyists and think tanks. Tanks of course dont think: they merely pulverise whatever stands in their way. Then there are tanks of the other kind, such as those in which you keeps fish. And if you are Dr No, you keep piranha, which you hope will one day dine on James Bond 007.
I go to Heritage Foundation whenever I want to know what the twice born are thinking about the rest of the world, especially the dangerous lunatic fringe on the Left and, currently, the Islamists, a word of recent coinage, for which we need to send a note of thanks to OB Laden, which is what he should be called because his full name is too long for a headline. Shafiq ur Rehman called Muhammad Shah Rangeela, MS Rangeela, so why not OB Laden?
I was at the Heritage Foundation this week to hear someone I had always associated with the Guardian because that was the paper she used to write for when I was living in London. Of course, I had not realised that she had left the Guardian years ago and fallen head over heels in love with everything right-wing. For the last five years she has written a column for the London tabloid Daily Mail, which is to the Guardian what Al Qaeda is to the FBI.
Melanie Phillips was here to launch her book Londonistan, which, according to her, is what England has become since those bad jihadi Muslims made it their home. And why did they make it their home? Because of a spineless, pusillanimous, appeasing British Labour government, which has turned its back on European civilisation and way of life.
She said she was not an expert either on Islam, or on terrorism or on Islamic groups, but she spoke on all three with an authority that only ignorance and prejudice can foster. What had happened, she said, was that British culture and values had come under threat because of the disastrous policy of multiculturalism and the refusal of the British judicial system to deal with terrorism as it should be dealt with.
She warned her American hosts that while Tony Blair was a staunch ally some say poodle of George Bush, there was no guarantee that his successor would be the same. She stopped short of suggesting that Bush should take steps to make Blair prime minister for life. She called Great Britain the weakest link in the war against Islamic terrorism. She said Britain had been enfeebled because of its continued adherence to the rule of law and human rights when it came to Islamist terrorists. She said there had been an erosion of British identity.
Ms Phillips lamented that after the 7/7 attacks, the explanations given by the British establishment and media were entirely wrong. It was said that the fault lay with us because we had failed to integrate Muslims in British society and we also suffered from Islamophobia. She said the real reason was that Britain had been too hospitable to those who poured into the country in the 1990s from the Middle East and North Africa after the end of the Afghan war.
Then there were the Pakistanis, whose country had been colonised by Saudi Wahabism. She said concepts like freedom of speech and human rights should not be applicable to such elements whose sole mission was the destruction of the Infidel West.
I asked her after she was done what she proposed should be done to deal with the situation. Should all British Muslims be thrown out and a ban placed on further immigration of Muslims to Britain? While there was little doubt that this is what she would wish, she said it should be made quite clear that minorities could not dictate to the majority. While everyone was free to practise his religion, including Islam, no one could be permitted to sabotage the essential Western values of British society.
She said Britain had lost self-confidence and come to believe in supranational ideas such as the UN and the International Criminal Court rather than in its nationalist ideology. Minorities were seen as victims. She said the younger generation of British Muslims was torn between the beliefs of their elders and what it saw as the depravity and temptations of the West. She added the standard disclaimer that it was not her intent to demonise all Muslims although at one point she suggested that there was something intrinsically the matter with Islam when it came to violence.
I have since found that among the admirers of Ms Phillips book are the likes of Islam-baiter Daniel Pipes, unabashed Zionist Natan Sharansky (whom President George Bush admires) and Iranian imperialist Amir Taheri. Wrote Sharansky, This book is powerful and frightening, but also courageous. In dictatorships, you need courage to fight evil; in the free world, you need courage to see the evil.
Pipes piped in with, In contrast to the overwhelming majority of her British compatriots, who prefer to avert their eyes from the radical Islamic horror growing in their midst, Melanie Phillips has compiled a unique record that fearlessly, brilliantly and wittily exposes this problem.
And according to Taheri, Melanie Phillips pieces together the story of how Londonistan developed as a result of the collapse of British self-confidence and national identity and its resulting paralysis by multiculturalism and appeasement. The result is an ugly climate in Britain of irrationality and defeatism, which now threatens to undermine the alliance with America and imperil the defence of the free world.
All I would suggest is that the Orwell Prize for Journalism that Ms Phillips received in 1996, she should surrender because the association of her name with that of Orwell is an insult to that great man and his memory.
Khalid Hasan is Daily Times US-based correspondent. His e-mail is khasan2@cox.net
Posted by: john ||
05/16/2006 00:00 ||
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#1
I glanced thorough her book. It was a bit to mild for my tastes. This reviewer is an A-hole.
#2
And a muslim no doubt
.
pee up a rope for the profit.
Posted by: SPoD ||
05/16/2006 2:20 Comments ||
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May 14, 2006
Mr Hasan's distortion
Last Wednesday, I spoke on the themes of my book Londonistan to a meeting of the Heritage Foundation think-tank in Washington. After my presentation finished, I was asked a question by a Pakistani journalist. What was I suggesting, he asked sarcastically: that all British Muslims should be deported? This was the gist of my reply to him (you can hear what was actually said in the video recording on the Heritage website).
I said I was certainly not suggesting anything of the sort, and that the question illustrated precisely the kind of mischievous misrepresentation to which arguments like my own were repeatedly subjected. I said that I had repeatedly emphasised in my book that British Muslims should not all be tarred with the brush of extremism, that across the world Muslims were the most numerous victims of Islamist terrorism, and that it was very important to give truly moderate, reformist Muslims our support and protection. I believed that Britain should be delivering the message that Muslims were welcome in Britain to practise their faith, which should be respected, but at the same time Islamism whereby the religion was being used to inspire hatred and violence against the British state or against America, Israel and the Jews would not be tolerated. Britains current failure to draw this important distinction, I suggested, was not only endangering British society but undermining truly reformist British Muslims, since Britains appeasement of Islamist extremists was cutting the ground from under the moderates' feet in their own attempt to defeat them.
The following, however, is what this journalist, Khalid Hasan, has written in his newspaper the Daily Times of Pakistan:
This grossly misrepresents what I said in my remarks and in my reply to Mr Hasan. He has ignored what I said in my reply to him and provided instead an untrue and defamatory gloss, imputing to me a view which I do not possess. I also did not make any reference in my remarks indeed, I specifically say in the book that this is a matter on which I do not express a view at all to any intrinsic characteristic of Islam.
Mr Hasan is of course entitled to his opinions about my views, and he is also free to make the kind of unpleasant remarks about Zionists which he includes in his article. However, he is not entitled to distort a public presentation liked this, and the Daily Times of Pakistan might like to note that he has badly misrepresented what I said.
Posted by: john ||
05/16/2006 6:57 Comments ||
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#4
Agreed, this is an hit piece from an islamo-correct pov.
From Jewish World Review
By Dennis Prager
Last week, professor Noam Chomsky went to Lebanon to speak at the headquarters of Hezbollah. As described by the BBC, not a media friend of Israel, "Hezbollah's political rhetoric has centered on calls for the destruction of the state of Israel," and Hezbollah has been "synonymous with terror, suicide bombings and kidnappings." The terror group's views on the need to annihilate the Jewish state are identical to those of Hamas and Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Chomsky announced his support for Hezbollah and its need to be militarily strong.
Also last week, an ultra-Orthodox rabbi from Vienna, a member of a [tiny and powerless] Jewish sect [that has been condemned by the entire fervently-religious world] called Neturei Karta, went to Stockholm to meet with a Palestinian Hamas official to help raise funds for Hamas. Hamas is, of course, dedicated to annihilating Israel, as is Neturei Karta, an Orthodox Jewish fringe group that believes no Jewish state should exist unless founded by G-d. It therefore supports Palestinian and other Muslim groups that murder Jews in Israel.
In March, a group of five Neturei Karta rabbis from Britain and the United States went to Tehran to lend their support to the Iranian regime in its calls for the annihilation of Israel. The group said nothing about the Iranian regime's repeated denials that there was a Holocaust.
This week, the University of California at Irvine Muslim Student Union is sponsoring a series of lectures under the heading, "Holocaust in the Holy Land" and "Israel: The Fourth Reich." Featuring activists committed to Israel's destruction, its lead speaker is a Jew named Norman Finkelstein, a professor who devotes his life to attacking Jewish communities and Israel. Also appearing is Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss from the above-mentioned Neturei Karta.
Tony Judt, a widely published New York University professor, recently wrote that "Israel, in short, is an anachronism," and should therefore cease to exist. The Jews of Israel should live under Arab/Muslim rule. Note that of all the countries of the world, Judt who the Jewish newspaper The Forward identified as "raised in the heavily Jewish East End section of London by a mother whose parents had immigrated from Russia and a Belgian father who descended from a line of Lithuanian rabbis" has advocated the disappearance of one country, the Jewish one. Why, for example, does Judt not write that Pakistan, a Muslim state carved out of India, is an "anachronism"?
Jews siding with the Jews' enemies or even actually fomenting Jew-hatred has a history that long predates Chomsky, Finkelstein, leftist Jewish professors and the Neturei Karta. Karl Marx, though baptized a Christian, was the grandson of two Orthodox rabbis but wrote one of the most anti-Semitic tracts of the 19th century, "On the Jewish Question." In it he wrote, among other anti-Semitic charges, that "Money is the jealous god of Israel, beside which no other god may exist."
How is one to explain these Jews who work to hurt Jews?
I think the primary explanations are psychological. As I wrote in a previous column, it is almost impossible to overstate the pathological effects of thousands of years of murder of Jews culminating in the Nazi Holocaust, when nearly all Jews on the European continent were murdered have had on most Jews.
It is not coincidental that Norman Finkelstein's parents went through the Holocaust or that Yisroel Dovid Weiss's grandparents were murdered in the Holocaust. But even Jews who lost no relatives in the Holocaust fear another outbreak of anti-Jewish violence, and given the Nazi-like anti-Semitism in the Muslim world today, that is not exactly paranoia.
One way to deal with this is to side with the enemy. Consciously or not, the Jew who sides with those dedicated to murdering Jews feels that he will be spared. He becomes the "good Jew" in the anti-Semites' eyes. How else to explain the visit of a Jew named Noam Chomsky to Lebanon to support Hezbollah or the fact that Chomsky wrote the foreword to a French book denying the Holocaust? How else to explain Norman Finkelstein telling cheering German audiences that the Jewish state is morally the same as the Nazis? How else to explain rabbis visiting Tehran to extol the Holocaust-denying regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran that seeks to exterminate Israel?
The other psychological explanation is related. The Jew specifically the radical Jew who sympathizes with Jew-haters wishes to announce to the world that he is not really like other Jews. While the other Jews are moored in provincial Jewish ethnic or religious identity, he is a world citizen who no more identifies with the Jews' fate than with the fate of Iroquois Indians.
The prevalence of Jew-hating Jews would be no more than an interesting study of psychopathology were it not for one additional fact: All these [born-]Jews (except for the fringe Neturei Karta rabbis) also hate America. And they do the same damage to this country aiding the enemies of America just as they do the enemies of the Jews.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
05/16/2006 13:08 ||
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#1
Unfortunately true, at least about these fringe idiots. However, I would prefer to think that I have not been rendered pathological by my parents' experiences as European Jews in Germany, Holland, Latvia and British Mandate Palestine during World War II. And let's not forget that most American Jews, unlike me, descend from those who migrated here long before Europe succumbed to fascism, and so are much less affected by that experience. I think the anti-Zionism is simply the result of going along with the crowd, loathesomely simpleminded, self-rightious anticolonialists that they all are.
#2
Ms. TW, a while back I posted this article on the subject of pathological trends in the jewish psyche, from FrontPage mag; you might find the book discussed there interesting.
#3
In every ethnic group there will be cowards/liberals. There is no doubt in my mind, these will sacrifice their wives and children in order to save their own butts.
#4
This is a major theme in anti-semitic circles. They believe that certain Jews actively helped Hitler in eliminating the European Jewry. For reasons of conveniance (if you are an anti-semite you most likely are anti-American also) these certain Jews happen to be American Jews. I thought this was a whacko conspiracy theory, but it seems maybe not. Or maybe it's just spun in the right way.
New Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has announced that Israel will take unilateral steps to establish its own geographical boundaries during the next four years of his administration. His plan, as described during the recent Israeli election and the formation of a new governing coalition, would take about half of the Palestinian West Bank and encapsulate the urban areas within a huge concrete wall and the more rural parts of Palestine within a high fence. The barrier is not located on the internationally recognized boundary between Israel and Palestine, but entirely within and deeply penetrating the occupied territories.
The only division of territory between Israel and the Palestinians that is recognized by the United States or the international community awarded 77% of the land to the nation of Israel and the other small portion divided between the West Bank and Gaza. Only about twice the size of Washington, D.C., Gaza is now a politically and economically non-viable region, almost completely isolated from the West Bank, Israel and the outside world.
West Bank dissected
The Olmert plan would leave the remnant of the Palestinian West Bank with the same unacceptable characteristics. Deep intrusions would effectively divide it into three portions. The prime minister has also announced that Israeli soldiers will likely remain in the Palestinian territory, which will be completely encapsulated by Israel's control of its eastern border in the Jordan River valley.
It is inconceivable that any Palestinian, Arab leader, or any objective member of the international community could accept this illegal action as a permanent solution to the continuing altercation in the Middle East. This confiscation of land is to be carried out without resorting to peace talks with the Palestinians, and in direct contravention of the "road map for peace," which President Bush helped to initiate and has strongly supported.
Although former prime minister Ariel Sharon and the Israeli government rejected the key provisions of the road map by the Quartet of negotiators the United States, European Union, United Nations and Russia it has been endorsed unequivocally by the moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Israel's government had adopted carefully negotiated agreements at Camp David in 1978 and in Oslo in 1993. Israeli leaders Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres received Nobel Peace Prizes for these major steps toward peace, along with their Arab counterparts. The basic terms of both of these historic accords would also be violated by Olmert's plan, as would all of the U.N. Security Council's resolutions on which the agreements were predicated and the nation of Israel was founded.
What is the alternative to this ill-advised move toward the unilateral confiscation and colonization of a major portion of the West Bank?
A better course
Good-faith negotiations should be initiated under the auspices of the international Quartet with President Abbas. During recent days, Abbas has been making the rounds of international capitals calling for the opportunity to find a path to permanent peace in the Holy Land. Although the recently elected Hamas legislators will neither recognize nor negotiate with Israel while Palestinian land is being occupied, Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh has expressed approval for direct Olmert-Abbas peace talks. He said, "The problem is not the Palestinian side or its consent to negotiations. ... If the (Palestinian) Authority chairman, as the elected president, wants to get the negotiations moving, we have no objection to that. If what Abu Mazen (Abbas) presents to the people as a result of negotiations serves its interest, then we too will redefine our position."
Presumably, these talks would be monitored and orchestrated by the United States, and any successfully negotiated terms of the road map would subsequently be approved by both Israelis and Palestinians. Such approval of a final peace agreement was an important facet of the Camp David Accords.
It would be a mistake to underestimate the difficulty of finding a mutually acceptable agreement, but many Israelis, Palestinians and international representatives are familiar with what must be its ultimate basic terms. They include reasonable border compromises based on the swapping of land, which could leave a substantial number of Israeli settlers undisturbed on Palestinian land.
A mutual Israeli-Palestinian agreement would undoubtedly result in full recognition of Israel by all Arab nations, with normal diplomatic and economic relations, and permanent peace and justice for the Palestinians.
It would also remove one of the major causes of international terrorism and greatly ease tensions that could precipitate a regional or even global conflict.
Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter is founder of the non-profit Carter Center, advancing peace and health and rainbows and magical ponies worldwide.
#1
Jimmy put a sock in it and choke to death, mmmkay?
Posted by: SPoD ||
05/16/2006 0:23 Comments ||
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#2
The PA and by extens the Palestinian people whom elected the PA has failed utterly to stop the armed violence against Israel - a wannabe state that can not or will not protect either itself or its neighbors from the most anarchistic or extremist elements existing /entrenched within its borders is not a state. UNTIL IT DOES, ISRAEL HAS EVERY RIGHT TO PRIORITIZE ITS INTERESTS OVER THE PA's.
#3
"A mutual Israeli-Palestinian agreement would undoubtedly result in full recognition of Israel by all Arab nations, with normal diplomatic and economic relations, and permanent peace and justice for the Palestinians."
Gag, gasp, gulp, crash (falling out of my chair as the sheer absurdity of such a position). Can anyone really swallow the idea that Arab governments like the Saudis are ready to recognize Israel - and even if they did, they'd end up like Sadat. Can anyone envision peace & justice for Palestinians, when "self-government" means rule by a gang of corrupt thugs?
"It would also remove one of the major causes of international terrorism and greatly ease tensions that could precipitate a regional or even global conflict."
Jimmy almost made it through the whole editorial without mentioning terrorism. I guess he felt he could try to pass it off with a reference in the last paragraph. Ah yes, and he mentions the "causes of international terrorism." Some people apparently are still desperate to believe that this whole world-wide Jihad thing is only about the Gaza strip a couple square miles in the West Bank and making Israel unilaterally adhere more closely to the conditions of this or that diplomatic accord. Sigh
#4
Well, Jimmuh, this would probably be considered really important...if anybody still cared about what you thought. I think we shut that thought pattern off about 1980.
#5
Jimmy, it's called "the spoils of war". Israel won. They're just slow in collecting.
"It is inconceivable that any Palestinian, Arab leader, or any objective member of the international community..."
Well, Jimmy, at least you can distinguish between the three. That's the best I've seen from you in a long time.
#7
I think that Israel should just give Gaza back to Egypt and the rest of the West bank back to Jordan. Afterall, they tried war and lost, Israel gave back the Siani. Build the wall and say, okay, Jordan that bit's yours to do with as you want; Egypt you got Gaza. Pip, pip and have fun.
Is Iran closer to testing a nuclear weapon than we think? Last week officials from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) revealed that samples of machinery taken from a former Iranian research center showed traces of weapons-grade uranium. On Sunday, Tehran rejected out of hand a package of incentives offered by the EU in exchange for Iran halting its enrichment of uranium. But intelligence agencies have assured us that Iran is years from testing a nuclear weapon. The latest publicly known estimate is that they are about a decade off. So nothing to worry about yet, right?
Consider the track record of these estimates. When have they ever been correct? Usually when a country tests a nuclear weapon, the event shocks the world. This was true of India in 1974 and Pakistan in 1998. As well with Chinaan August 1964 National Intelligence Estimate of the chances of a Chinese nuclear detonation noted that a test site was being prepared at Lop Nor, and would be ready in two months. However, the CIA stated that the Chinese would not have the necessary fissionable material to finish a bomb, so they doubted anything would happen for the rest of the year. Sure enough, two months later, on October 16, 1964, the Chinese successfully tested a nuclear weapon. Something to keep in mind when the lack of fissionable material argument comes up with respect to Iran.
The most noteworthy failed atomic forecast was the Soviet case. The CIAs Office of Reports and Estimates (ORE) was given the task of making this prediction. OREs earliest analysis, in 1946, saw the Soviet bomb coming sometime in the 1950-1953 timeframe. Over a series of subsequent reports, the ORE settled on mid-1953 as the most probable date for a Soviet nuclear test. This estimate was published August 24, 1949; five days later, the Soviets tested their first a-bomb.
One reported diplomatic response to the Soviet atomic test was the belief that since Moscow had the bomb the Communists would not feel as threatened and would be more willing to seek agreements to limit nuclear power. I am sure we will hear that kind of nonsense about Iran too, if we have not alreadythat possessing nuclear weapons will give them the sense of security they need to act as arbiter of peace and stability in the Middle East. However, the Soviet atomic test was the start of the most dangerous and expensive arms race in history.
Analysts who make these estimates look at a variety of factors, focusing chiefly on the known physical capacity to produce such weapons. Quantifiable variables such as these adapt well to creating timelines. Take the amount of fissile material needed to have a weapon, divide by the estimated rate of production (based on the number of reactors, for example), and you have a timeline. However, Irans supposed material constrains may not be as important as the intent of the regime to acquire the weapons. Highly motivated countries that devote their national energies to projects of this type tend to find ways to get them done.
Case in point: The United States went from no nuclear weaponsthat is, no nuclear weapons in all of human historyto the Trinity test at Alamogordo, New Mexico, in about four years. It is hard to believe that today, with the widespread knowledge of nuclear theory; 60 years of experience with nuclear weapons in various countries around the world; the availability of former Soviet scientists and technology; the assistance of rogue states like North Korea; underground networks of the type put together by A. Q. Khan to build Pakistans nuclear weapon; the incredible surplus wealth being pumped into Iran daily due to inflated oil prices; and a highly motivated regime that seeks to develop nuclear capability as soon as possibleit is hard to believe that it would take Iran a decade to obtain a nuclear weapon.
Maybe in this case my analytical method can be summed up as common sense, but given the experts record of accomplishment we should admit there are things we cannot know, and plan for the worst case. It is risky business basing critical policy decisions on timelines that are certain to be wrong.
James S. Robbins is senior fellow in national-security affairs at the American Foreign Policy Council, a trustee for the Leaders for Liberty Foundation, and author of Last in Their Class: Custer, Picket and the Goats of West Point. Robbins is also an NRO contributor.
Posted by: Steve ||
05/16/2006 16:38 ||
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From WSJ Opinion on line. Some of this stuff we have discussed before on RB.
Current diplomacy isn't working. Here's Plan B.
BY BRET STEPHENS
What can the Bush administration do to persuade Iran's leaders that their bid to develop nuclear weapons will exact an unacceptable price on their regime? What can it do, that is, short of launching air strikes?
Begin by shelving the current approach. For three years, the administration has deferred to European and U.N. diplomacy while seeking to build consensus around the idea that a nuclear-armed Iran poses unacceptable risks to global security. The result: Seven leading Muslim states, including Pakistan and Indonesia, have joined hands with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to affirm his right to develop "peaceful" nuclear technology. China and Russia have again rejected calls for U.N. sanctions. The Europeans are again seeking to sweeten the package of technical, commercial and security incentives the mullahs rejected last year. And that's just last week's news. The EUniks have negotiated and appeased for years now. Even the MMs are bored with playing this fish in a rain barrel.
Today, the international community is less intent on stopping Tehran from getting the bomb than it is on stopping Washington from stopping Tehran. That's something the administration may not be able to change. But there are steps it can take independently to alter Iran's calculations. Here are four. The international community is consumed with hate for Bush, so they are willing to commit suicide to destroy the President and neutralize the US government. This does nothing for the fact that Iran will have a nuke and will give it to proxies. This is insane, but we already know that.
Take the diplomatic offensive. "Western countries must push the internal conflicts inside the Iranian government," says Mehdi Khalaji, an Iranian journalist and visiting scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
Mr. Khalaji proposes that President Bush write an open letter to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, specifying the conditions under which the U.S. would be prepared to negotiate. By addressing Mr. Khamenei this way, Mr. Bush would bypass and humiliate Mr. Ahmadinejad, aggravate the regime's internal frictions and explain to the Iranian people why theirs is a pariah state. Two can play the game as well as one. Make conditions that are reasonable, but unacceptable.
"The administration could say, 'If you halt enrichment, we can negotiate. If you stop supporting Hamas and Hezbollah, we can negotiate. If you release the following political prisoners, we can negotiate. If you stop meddling in Iraq, we can negotiate.' This would provoke a controversy inside the government. Some would say, 'OK, we can give up on these prisoners. We can back away from our relationship with Hamas. And so on.'" If nothing else, we can expect ranting and seething, which can be used for Rantburger amusement and calibration of RB instrumentation, like the ACME Seethe-o-meter.
Mr. Khalaji also urges the U.S. government to recast the content of its Farsi-language radio station, known as Radio Farda. The station's programmers, he says, "misunderstand the young generation of Iran, which is very political. The quality is not appropriate for a serious audience. The news isn't professional the way the BBC is." Offering a serious journalistic alternative to the Beeb ought to be an administration priority. We need some pros in this arena.
Target the regime's financial interests. "In many ways, the Islamic Republic of Iran has become the Islamic Republic of Iran, Inc.," says Afshin Molavi, the Iranian-American author of "Persian Pilgrimages." Between 30% and 50% of Iran's economy is controlled by the bunyad, so-called "Revolutionary Foundations" run by key regime figures answerable only to Mr. Khamenei. Hard-line Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi, considered to be Mr. Ahmadinejad's spiritual mentor, controls the sugar monopoly, while former President Ali Rafsanjani is said to be the richest man in the country. Heh, duplex reticule, wink wink.
Since Mr. Ahmadinejad came to power, these ayatollah-oligarchs have been running for financial cover: Capital outflows from Iran surpassed the $200 billion mark in the past year alone. Much of that money has made its way to banks in the United Arab Emirates, many of which have correspondent banks in the U.S. "We are preventing financial transactions going to the Palestinian Authority because banks are scared they'll be hit by U.S. terrorism-financing laws," says a source who closely tracks the Iranian economy. "Why can't we do the same thing with Iran?" Why not? The flow of funds from the MMs to the terrorists. Don't forget the flow of funds from Saudi Princes to the terrorists, too.
Support an independent labor movement. On May Day, 10,000 workers took to Tehran's streets to demand the resignation of Iran's labor minister. And despite last year's $60 billion oil-revenue bonanza, the Iranian government routinely fails to pay its civil servants, leading to chronic, spontaneous work stoppages. Got to back labor orgs that produce, not the ones who will steal your money, promise the world, and don't give jack.
Workers' rights got a boost in January when Tehran's bus drivers went on strike to demand the release of their imprisoned and tortured leader Mansour Ossanloo. In a state that bans independent labor unions, the strike was an unprecedented event, calling to mind the 1980 Gdansk dock strike that became Poland's Solidarity movement. That movement succeeded largely thanks to the support of Lane Kirkland's AFL-CIO, which in turn received funding from the National Endowment for Democracy. The same model needs to be energetically applied to Iran today.
"The neat thing about the labor movement is that wherever it goes, it's welcomed," says a source familiar with Iranian workers' groups. "It actually makes America look good." And now, the Rantburg Plan:
Threaten Iran's gasoline supply. Iran is often said to have an oil weapon pointed at George Bush's head. Rob Andrews, a Democratic congressman from New Jersey, notes the reverse is closer to the truth: Because Iran lacks refining capacity, it must import 40% of its gasoline. Of that amount, fully 60% is handled by a single company, Rotterdam-based Vitol, which has strategic storage and blending facilities in the UAE. The regime also spends $3 billion a year to subsidize below-market gas prices.
With Illinois Republican Mark Kirk, Mr. Andrews has introduced legislation calling for the quarantine of gasoline imports should Iran continue to flout Security Council resolutions. "If gas prices were to soar in Iran," he says, "the regime would be destabilized, the possibility of internal change would increase and the regime would find a way to back away from the precipice." No more 36 cents per gallon gas, the locals will go box of frogs mental.
One objection: A gas quarantine may require the naval blockade of Iranian ports, which is legally tantamount to an act of war. Not a problem, says Mr. Andrews: "I think the development of a nuclear weapon in violation of an international treaty is an act of war, too." Calling for the destruction of the US and Israel, threatening to unleash 40K suicide bombers is an act of war, too. You threaten to kill someone, you get arrested or taken out.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
05/16/2006 14:16 ||
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#4
I wish we could remedy the Moolahs without losing blood and treasure, but it is quite simple:
AhMad wants nuke weapons to wipe out Israel, et al.
We can't let him have it.
So, do onto Irant before they do onto us.
Posted by: Captain America ||
05/16/2006 17:01 Comments ||
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#5
A gas quarantine may require the naval blockade of Iranian ports, which is legally tantamount to an act of war. Not a problem, says Mr. Andrews: "I think the development of a nuclear weapon in violation of an international treaty is an act of war, too."
AAAAHAHAHA! Give that man a cluebat! Also, telling another member of the UN that you are gonna wipe them off the map is an act of war, funding terrorists against said nation is an act of war, but who is counting since it is against the JOOOOOOs?
#6
We have a friggin SOCOM ARMY. Let's turn them loose with orders to wreak havoc throughout Iran. Turn off their electricity, water, gasoline, everything. Scare the piss out of them. Bombs everywhere, but blowing up things, not people.
Include a massive propaganda campaign from a brand-new "secular organization" that calls for killing every Imam and Mullah in the country.
Base it on the secret societies. The Carbonari in Italy, or the Young Turks. Of course it doesn't really exist, but what you try to do is convince the government that no only does it exist, but that it is so powerful that it is just about to overthrow the government and cut off all of their heads.
Make it a self-fulfilling prophecy. Make it attractive to the young, but like a forbidden fruit. Since nobody belongs to it, nobody will admit to belonging to it, or be able to say anything about it, even under torture. The secret police will nail the few lying braggarts, who will implicate all sorts of innocent people in hopes of saving their own asses. It will snowball.
Ideally, many of the young people in Iran will *want* to belong to it. So that when and if the government is overthrown, it will become the new government. These people will actually be expats who are in on the gag, and ready to return to Iran in glory to be greeted with hundreds of thousands who want to join their secular movement.
No American niceties about allowing the Mullahs a place at the new Iranian government table. Allow the new government to drive them back into their rat holes, and shame them out of politics for generations. No government money for religion, and madrassas being strictly controlled.
#7
Agreed. Enough of this negotiating nonsense. It's pointless to negotiate with people you can't trust to uphold their end of a deal, and Iran hid their nuclear program for 18 years. Stop enrichment with bombs -- now.
The recent letter from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to President Bush needs to be considered on several levels. It can be treated as a ploy to obstruct U.N. Security Council deliberations on Iran's disregard of its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. This consideration, and the demagogic tone of the letter, merited its rejection by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. But the first direct approach by an Iranian leader to a U.S. president in more than 25 years may also have intentions beyond the tactical and propagandistic, and its demagoguery may be a way to get the radical part of the Iranian public used to dialogue with the United States. America's challenge is to define its own strategy and purposes regarding the most fateful issue confronting us today.
The world is faced with the nightmarish prospect that nuclear weapons will become a standard part of national armament and wind up in terrorist hands. The negotiations on Korean and Iranian nuclear proliferation mark a watershed. A failed diplomacy would leave us with a choice between the use of force or a world where restraint has been eroded by the inability or unwillingness of countries that have the most to lose to restrain defiant fanatics. One need only imagine what would have happened had any of the terrorist attacks on New York, Washington, London, Madrid, Istanbul or Bali involved even the crudest nuclear weapon.
These are the introductory paragraphs to a fairly thorough analysis by Kissinger about our negotiations with North Korea and Iran. The rest is at the link.
#2
The issue before the nations involved is similar to what the world faced in 1938 and at the beginning of the Cold War: whether to overcome fears and hesitancy about undertaking the difficult path demanded by necessity. The failure of that test in 1938 produced a catastrophic war; the ability to master it in the immediate aftermath of World War II led to victory without war.
#3
"The world is faced with the nightmarish prospect that nuclear weapons will become a standard part of national armament and wind up in terrorist hands."
The reality is that its only a matter of time before this happens, although I prefer latter then sooner.
#4
The world community doesn't want us involved in this, we arent in range of Iran, and if we are involved Russia and China will try to spoil the deal on purpose to screw us. Let the EUniks do what they want and give Israel the backup they need to handle this.
#6
Kissinger is a one trick pony who insists on seeing everything through his personal biases.
Iran is NOT a normal political state. Statements like "... radical part of the Iranian public used to dialogue with the United States. " are an example of Kissinger trying to see this conflict through his "rational actors" paradigm. This isn't a rational enemy like the USSR this is a theocracy with a death cult mentality.
Where is his analysis of the call to convert to Islam that is prescribed by Mo-ham-head as the precursor to war?
This is a very blinkered European view and if it prevails will get us all killed or enslaved.
Counter-terrorism agencies are facing a new strategic threat to which they do not have a response and they are unlikely to have a satisfactory response in the short and medium terms. This threat is likely to continue till the US-led coalition succeeds in pacifying Iraq and Afghanistan and restores normalcy there.
This threat arises from individual Muslims--mostly the youth--angered over the stories of the sufferings of their co-religionists--whether it be in Palestine or Iraq or Afghanistan--taking to suicide terrorism in order to give vent to their anger. They were not members of any identified jihadi terrorist organisation. They were not motivated into resorting to suicide terrorism by any organisation or madrasa or religious cleric or state-sponsor of terrorism.
They were self-motivated. The decision to kill and destroy was their own, though they might have sought the assistance of well-known organisations such as Al Qaeda or madrasas or cleric or a State-sponsor after they had taken the decision in order to enable them to have it executed.
The four British youth, three of them British citizens of Pakistani origin, who carried out the London explosions of July 7, 2005, seem, in retrospect, to be such self-motivated youth who, after deciding to commit an act of suicide terrorism, sought help from elements close to the International Islamic Front (IIF) in Pakistan for executing their decision.
Despite many detentions of suspects belonging to the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) and the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), the Bangalore Police seem to be still groping in the dark in their efforts to identify the person who opened fire indiscriminately at a conference of scientists in January this year and establish his motivation. One should not be surprised if this also turns out to be a case of an individual, not belonging to any organisation, resorting to terrorism in order to give vent to his anger.
I had drawn attention to this new threat from, what I characterised as, "free-lance jihadis" in a paper titled 'From Internet To Islamnet---Net-Centric Counter-terrorism" presented by me at a conference jointly organised by the State Islamic University (UIN) of Jakarta and the Institute for Defence Analyses (IDA) of Washington DC at Bali, Indonesia, from October 19 to 21, 2005. A copy of this paper is available here.
I had stated in that paper as follows:
""The military operations by the US-led coalition in Afghanistan after 9/11 not only deprived the Al Qaeda and other jihadi organisations associated with it of their training infrastructure, but it also damaged the ability of their leadership to personally interact with their cadres and motivate them. The scattered remnants of the Al Qaeda and other jihadi organisations found themselves forced to split into small groups and take shelter in different places in Pakistan as well as in other countries such as Iran, Bangladesh, Yemen etc. The post-9/11 security measures made travel to other countries difficult, thereby drastically reducing the possibility of personal meetings. This period also saw the emergence of the phenomenon of free-lance jihadis--individual Muslims angered by the actions of the US and other Western countries in Afghanistan and Iraq waging an individual jihad, either alone or in association with like-minded co-religionists, without necessarily belonging to the Al Qaeda and other member-organisations of the IIF. The free-lance jihadis also made their presence felt in the WWW."
The gravity of the threat posed by the free-lance jihadis arises from the fact that very often they come to the attention of the intelligence agencies only after they had committed an act of suicide terrorism, though in the case of the London explosions the persons of Pakistani origin would appear to have come to the adverse notice of the British intelligence even before they committed their act of suicide terrorism, but it did not take seriously the possibility of any threat from them.
Intelligence agencies already face considerable difficulty in penetrating terrorist organisations and collecting preventive intelligence. Many, if not most, of their successes are based on technical intelligence (TECHINT). It would be a very uphill task for them to identify individuals or small groups of individuals, not belonging to any organisation, who decide to resort to an act of suicide terrorism to give vent to their anger and to prevent them before they succeed.
The dilemma posed by these free-lance jihadis has been highlighted in the annual "Country Reports on Terrorism" for 2005 submitted by the US State Department to the US Congress in the last week of April, 2006. It refers to them as the new phenomenon of "Micro-Actors" and says as follows: " Increasingly, small autonomous cells and individuals drew on advanced technologies and the tools of globalisation such as the Internet, satellite communications and international commerce. When combined with the motivation to commit a terrorist act, these technologically empowered small groups represented micro-actors, who were extremely difficult to detect or counter."
It draws attention to the emergence of a "more diffuse world-wide movement of like-minded individuals and small groups, sharing grievances and objectives, but not necessarily organised formally. While Al Qaeda linked trainers or facilitators often acted as catalysts for terrorist activity, this was no longer strictly necessary in functional terms and self-sufficient cells have begun to emerge.
"This new generation of extremists, some of whom are self-selected and self-radicalised, is not easy to categorise. Some cells are composed of individuals from the same ethnic group, often an insular band of brothers that is difficult to identify or penetrate. Others become radicalised virtually, meeting in cyberspace and gaining their training and expertise in part from what they glean from the Internet. Just as some groups in the flattened global terrorist movement are ethnically defined, other cells are mixtures, such as the July 7 London bombers, who included a convert along with second generation British citizens of South Asian descent."
It concludes: "This trend means there could be a larger number of smaller attacks, less meticulously planned and local rather than transnational in scope. An increasing number of these attacks could fail through lack of skill or equipment, in the same way that the July 21 London attack did."
While the emergence of this new threat from micro non-State actors has been identified and described, the State Department's report is silent on how to deal with it. The scope for HUMINT and TECHINT in respect of the micro non-State actors is even more limited than in the case of formally structured non-State actors. The only way of picking up indicators of the emergence of such informal cells, not associated with any terrorist organisation, is through intense police-community relations.
As the threat from Al Qaeda, the IIF and other jihadi terrorist organisations dramatically increased since 1998, the military approach to counter-terrorism has acquired greater importance than the police approach.The same importance has not been paid to strengthening the counter-terrorism capabilities of the Police force as has been paid to those of the armed forces. Police-community relations no longer receive the attention they deserve and which they used to receive in the past.
This state of affairs has to be corrected and the important role of the police in counter-terrorism has to be restored. Fortunately, in India, the Police still enjoys an important role and is viewed as the weapon of first resort in counter-terrorism. But it is not so in many other countries.
The downgrading of the role of the police by successive military regimes in Pakistan is an important cause of Pakistan's degeneration into the world's most worrisome epicentre of terrorism of different hues.
B. Raman is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai.
Posted by: john ||
05/16/2006 00:00 ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
