As we witness surging Muslim violence against non-Muslims in Afghanistan, Egypt and even here, the response seems increasingly that the victims must apologize to the perpetrators. In particular, the United States government – from President Obama on down – has been assiduously seeking forgiveness for giving offense to Islamic sensibilities by accidentally burning Qurans. This was felt necessary even in a case where the books had been defaced by captured Afghan jihadis as a means of encouragingtheir comrades to further acts of violence against us.
It seems that Christians are also widely considered to be at fault for having churches, Bibles and religious practices that offend the ascendant Islamists in Egypt, Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East. Certainly, no apologies are forthcoming when the Christians are murdered or forced to flee for their lives, their churches and sacred texts put to the torch, etc.
And in America last week, a Pennsylvania judge felt the need to dress down a man assaulted for parading in a Halloween costume he called “Zombie Mohammed.” Far from punishing the perpetrator, a Muslim immigrant, Judge Mark Martin sympathized with him for the offense caused, noting – seemingly without objection – that it was a capital crime to engage in such free expression in some countries.
Worse yet, the judge suggested that the victim in this case had exceeded the “boundaries” of his “First Amendment rights.” Such a view seems to track with the Obama administration’s collaboration with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in fashioning international accords that would prohibit “incitement” against Islam.
This is a short step from – and enroute to – the OIC’s larger goal of banning and criminalizing any expression that offends Muslims or their faith. As such, it poses a mortal peril to the Constitution’s First Amendment guarantees of freedom of speech.
What is going on in country after country, in international forums like the UN Human Rights Council and even in some American courts is a calculated effort, backed by terrifying violence or its threat, to make us “feel subdued,” as the Quran puts it. The idea is to use Western sensibilities and civil liberties, notably, respect for the free practice of religion, to deny the rest of us our fundamental freedoms. These include the freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and, yes, freedom of religion.
The trouble is that when we accommodate such demands, it is seen by Islamist enemies of liberty as evidence of our inevitable submission. According to the doctrine of shariah, they must, under such circumstances, make a redoubled effort to achieve their ultimate triumph, including through the use of violence.
So, far from alleviating the threat posed by shariah’s adherents when we accommodate, apologize and appease, we are actually exacerbating it, at home as well as abroad.
In short, we find ourselves in what is, properly understood, the civil rights struggle of our time. Those who stand up for freedom against shariah are quite literally protecting the rights of women, children, people of faith, homosexuals and other minorities sure to be abused by its misogynistic, intolerant and domineering doctrine. That means protecting, as well, Muslim Americans who have come to this country to escape the long arm of shariah law. In due course, though, shariah’s repressive strictures would not simply be a threat to these communities. They would be a toxic blight upon all of us.
Ironically, today it is defenders of our freedoms who are being denounced as “racists,” “bigots” and “Islamophobes.” Such terms are, in truth, being used in much the same way and for precisely the same purpose as the Ku Klux Klan’s members reviled an earlier generation of civil rights activists for loving Negroes: to defame, threaten and isolate their opponents. We cannot, and certainly must not, tolerate the Islamists’ intolerance.
Muslims are, of course, free to practice their faith in America like anyone else – provided they do so in a tolerant, peaceable and law-abiding way. What they are not entitled to do, in the name of religious practice, is subvert our Constitution, deny us our rights or engage in sedition without facing concerted opposition – if not prosecution.
Today, every bit as much as in the civil rights struggles of the past, there are those who are prepared to go along with what they know is wrong, in order to get along. Now, as then, the few who recognize that any such accommodation makes more certain the ultimate triumph of evil, may be vilified and even harmed. But now, as then, more and more Americans are emerging who see the danger posed by our time’s totalitarian threat – shariah – and who will do their part to secure freedom against it, both here and, as necessary for that purpose, elsewhere.
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is President of the Center for Security Policy (www.SecureFreedom.org), a columnist for the Washington Times and host of the nationally syndicated program, Secure Freedom Radio, heard in Washington weeknights at 9:00 p.m. on WRC 1260 AM.
Tag Archives: Barack Obama
How will the 2013 Defense Budget Cuts Affect Americas Economy?
Washington DC February 23, 2012: Last week, the Obama administration presented its 2013 budget to Congress, with projected defense budget cuts, described by Rep. Howard P “Buck” McKeon, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee as “over $45 billion less than the President’s request for last year.”
To assist community leaders and citizens in understanding how these defense budget cuts may affect their local businesses and jobs, the Center for Security Policy launched detailed reports for estimated economic impacts of the defense budget cuts on cities, counties, congressional districts and states at forthecommondefense.org. These Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports will be updated monthly with new data and specific program cut impacts, as Congress debates the proposed 2013 budget.
The Defense Breakdown Economic Impact reports have received media coverage in industry and national publications, as well as local stories in radio, television and print in Ohio, Arkansas, Colorado, Washington DC and many other states. To view local and national press coverage about the Defense Breakdown reports, click here.
A Summary Report (2 pages) for your state can be downloaded here. Highlights for that report are below. A non-technical FAQ explaining data sources, methodology and future plans for the Defense Breakdown can be read here. To compare the national average estimate for your community to the proposed 2013 budget, see the Department of Defense Office of the Comptroller.
The Defense Breakdown Detailed Reports are estimates that show the potential state-wide economic impact of defense budget cuts on cities, counties, congressional districts, minority-owned businesses, veteran-owned businesses, and other small business categories, organized with over 2,700 “Contractor location” reports. The additional set of over 26,000 reports released today shows estimated defense spending cut impacts at the “Place of Performance” – a closer measure for potential job losses – for cities, counties and states, with three separate reports for each location: spending by weapon system, by government contracting office, and by products and services.
Frank J. Gaffney Jr., President of the Center, stated:
A weaker national defense threatens the security of the United States and its allies. Furthermore, to the extent that those in favor of cutting the defense budget argue that such cuts are necessary to strengthen the economy, this report shows the opposite to be true. Drastic cuts to defense of 9% – and under the “Sequestration” cuts required for 2013, at least 18% – will cause irreversible damage to America’s industrial base and R&D capabilities.
Local employers, citizens and communities will bear the brunt of these cuts. The Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports will allow them to prepare for this impact and to enlist their elected officials in mitigating it.
Highlights from the National Summary Report
National businesses will not escape the 9% and 18% cuts
- Public data for 2010 shows American businesses earned over $344 billion supporting America’s defense.
- But under these 10-year defense cuts of at least 9%, American annual business losses could be greater than $30 billion. American businesses may have to fire workers.
- And at the “Sequestration” level of at least 18% in defense cuts, American annual business losses could be greater than $61 billion. Some American businesses may have to shut down.
American Businesses Projected Revenue Reductions Based On National Average
The Center’s “Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports” are part of a broader 2012 initiative, the Coalition for the Common Defense, to educate and engage the American public on the importance of maintaining a strong national defense.
About the Coalition for the Common Defense
The Coalition for the Common Defense is an alliance of like-minded individuals and organizations who believe that without provision for the “common defense,” as articulated by the Founders, the freedom that has allowed unprecedented opportunity and prosperity to flourish in this country would soon be imperiled. In this new age of budgetary cuts, the Coalition rejects the false choice between military strength and economic health contending that economic prosperity depends on a strong national defense. Through a series of events and strategic partnerships, the coalition is calling on elected officials, candidates for office and others who share our commitment to the common defense to uphold these principles. We must return the United States to sensible fiscal principles without sacrificing our national security. A full statement of principles can be located here. The Coalition of the Common Defense can be found online at forthecommondefense.org.
About the Center for Security Policy
The Center for Security Policy is a non-profit, non-partisan national security organization that specializes in identifying policies, actions, and resource needs that are vital to American security and then ensures that such issues are the subject of both focused, principled examination and effective action by recognized policy experts, appropriate officials, opinion leaders, and the general public.
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CPAC 2012: Is Disarming America Smart Politics? The Security and Economic Costs of Obama’s Policies
The Center for Security Policy convened an all-star panel to discuss the negative impacts of President Obama’s defense cuts at CPAC 2012:
Is Disarming America Smart Politics?
The Security and Economic Costs of Obama’s Policies
Featuring
- Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., President, Center for Security Policy
- Joel Arrends, Executive Director, Veterans for a Strong America
- Mackenzie Eaglen, Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
- Major Gen. Al Zapanta, President and CEO, U.S.-Mexico Chamber of Commerce
- Lt. Gen. Jack Klimp, President, National Association for Uniformed Services
Click here for a video playlist of all speakers at the event
Blind Ideology
Last week, President Obama feted Communist China’s Xi Jinping, the man who hopes to lead his country as it emerges as the world’s next superpower. Mr. Xi must have been delighted to see press reports that his host is poised to end America’s claim to such status – at least with respect to the traditional means of measuring it: nuclear weaponry.
According to a story first reported by the Associated Press, Mr. Obama has directed the Defense Department to come up with plans for reducing the U.S. nuclear arsenal by as much as eighty percent. Evidently, he is prepared to take such a step unilaterally in order to encourage by our example other nations to join in his longstanding ambition to “rid the world of nuclear weapons.”
It is unclear whether the topic came up during the various meetings the PRC’s vice president had with his White House and other interlocutors. Even if it did, Xi presumably would not have disclosed a closely held Chinese secret: How many missiles and warheads have been squirreled away in 3,000 miles of hardened tunnels that make up what has been called the “Underground Great Wall of China.”
The Obama administration continues to assume that the People’s Liberation Army has only a few hundred nuclear weapons – approximately the level to which our Commander-in-Chief would like to reduce the American arsenal. A radically different estimate was recently provided, however, in a Georgetown University study led by former Pentagon strategic forces expert, Prof. Phillip Karber. To the fury of arms controllers in and out of the U.S. government, Dr. Karber’s team concluded that, based on the vast infrastructure China has created to conceal its missiles, it may have as many as 3,000 nuclear weapons.
Unfortunately, China is not the only nuclear state or wannabe that is engaged in a feverish build up. Last week, Russia’s autocratic Vladimir Putin unveiled a $770 billion military modernization plan that he says would introduce 400 new intercontinental ballistic missiles presumably equipped with state-of-the art nuclear warheads.
Pakistan, North Korea and Iran are also among those who may wish us ill and are spurning President Obama’s exemplary, unilateral efforts at nuclear disarmament. With the help of such regimes or in response to their threats, others in the Far and Middle East are likely to see the need for their own deterrents. That is especially true as confidence in the reliability of America’s security guarantees collapses along with its once-mighty “nuclear umbrella.”
So outlandish, so reckless is President Obama’s ambition to disarm the United States that thirty-four members of the House of Representatives last week forcefully urged him to reverse course. In a letter dated February 17 and headlined by the chairmen of the House Armed Services Committee and its Strategic Forces Subcommittee, Reps. Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-California) and Michael Turner (R-Ohio), respectively, these legislators described it as motivated by nothing less than “blind ideology.” They insisted that such blindness not be allowed to “drive a matter as important as U.S. nuclear forces over reality.”
What is particularly vexing to these legislators is that this marks the first time “a President has directed specific force levels as part of a review of the Nation’s nuclear employment strategy.” They observed that, instead, “…Such a review should begin and end with one question: What levels of U.S. nuclear forces are necessary to convince our enemies and adversaries that they cannot succeed in an attack on this country or its allies?”
It is not just that President Obama is blindly driving for ideological reasons the numerical evisceration of U.S. nuclear forces. As Congressman Turner pointed out earlier this month in introducing legislation aimed at holding the administration to commitments made during the consideration of the New START Treaty in 2010, the administration is also walking away from its promises to modernize what remains of our deterrent. Over time, the practical effect of combining the draconian nuclear cuts Mr. Obama seeks and his failure to arrest and reverse the atrophying of the obsolescing arsenal will leave us functionally disarmed.
Barack Obama’s true colors are showing. His blind ideology is not only at work in gutting America’s deterrent. That impulse, not new-found budget discipline, is the driving force behind his hollowing out of the rest of the U.S. military, too.
These data points vividly underscore, even as they advance, the true Obama Doctrine: “Embolden our enemies. Undermine our allies. Diminish our country.” Unless reversed, the world will be an infinitely more dangerous place for this nation and other friends of freedom.
It is an astonishing insight into the President’s commitment to “fundamentally transforming the United States of America” – in the worse sense of the phrase – that he is willing to take such steps in the midst of his reelection campaign. Imagine what he would do if the last vestiges of restraining accountability are removed in a second term.
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is President of the Center for Security Policy (www.SecureFreedom.org), a columnist for the Washington Times and host of the nationally syndicated program, Secure Freedom Radio, heard in Washington weeknights at 9:00 p.m. on WRC 1260 AM.
How will the 2013 Defense Budget Cuts Affect Americas Economy?
Washington DC February 23, 2012: Last week, the Obama administration presented its 2013 budget to Congress, with projected defense budget cuts, described by Rep. Howard P “Buck” McKeon, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee as “over $45 billion less than the President’s request for last year.”
To assist community leaders and citizens in understanding how these defense budget cuts may affect their local businesses and jobs, the Center for Security Policy launched detailed reports for estimated economic impacts of the defense budget cuts on cities, counties, congressional districts and states at forthecommondefense.org. These Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports will be updated monthly with new data and specific program cut impacts, as Congress debates the proposed 2013 budget.
The Defense Breakdown Economic Impact reports have received media coverage in industry and national publications, as well as local stories in radio, television and print in Ohio, Arkansas, Colorado, Washington DC and many other states. To view local and national press coverage about the Defense Breakdown reports, click here.
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A Summary Report (2 pages) for your state can be downloaded here. Highlights for that report are below. A non-technical FAQ explaining data sources, methodology and future plans for the Defense Breakdown can be read here. To compare the national average estimate for your community to the proposed 2013 budget, see the Department of Defense Office of the Comptroller.
The Defense Breakdown Detailed Reports are estimates that show the potential state-wide economic impact of defense budget cuts on cities, counties, congressional districts, minority-owned businesses, veteran-owned businesses, and other small business categories, organized with over 2,700 “Contractor location” reports. The additional set of over 26,000 reports released today shows estimated defense spending cut impacts at the “Place of Performance” – a closer measure for potential job losses – for cities, counties and states, with three separate reports for each location: spending by weapon system, by government contracting office, and by products and services.
Frank J. Gaffney Jr., President of the Center, stated:
A weaker national defense threatens the security of the United States and its allies. Furthermore, to the extent that those in favor of cutting the defense budget argue that such cuts are necessary to strengthen the economy, this report shows the opposite to be true. Drastic cuts to defense of 9% – and under the “Sequestration” cuts required for 2013, at least 18% – will cause irreversible damage to America’s industrial base and R&D capabilities.
Local employers, citizens and communities will bear the brunt of these cuts. The Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports will allow them to prepare for this impact and to enlist their elected officials in mitigating it.
Highlights from the National Summary Report
National businesses will not escape the 9% and 18% cuts
- Public data for 2010 shows American businesses earned over $344 billion supporting America’s defense.
- But under these 10-year defense cuts of at least 9%, American annual business losses could be greater than $30 billion. American businesses may have to fire workers.
- And at the “Sequestration” level of at least 18% in defense cuts, American annual business losses could be greater than $61 billion. Some American businesses may have to shut down.
American Businesses Projected Revenue Reductions Based On National Average
The Center’s “Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports” are part of a broader 2012 initiative, the Coalition for the Common Defense, to educate and engage the American public on the importance of maintaining a strong national defense.
About the Coalition for the Common Defense
The Coalition for the Common Defense is an alliance of like-minded individuals and organizations who believe that without provision for the “common defense,” as articulated by the Founders, the freedom that has allowed unprecedented opportunity and prosperity to flourish in this country would soon be imperiled. In this new age of budgetary cuts, the Coalition rejects the false choice between military strength and economic health contending that economic prosperity depends on a strong national defense. Through a series of events and strategic partnerships, the coalition is calling on elected officials, candidates for office and others who share our commitment to the common defense to uphold these principles. We must return the United States to sensible fiscal principles without sacrificing our national security. A full statement of principles can be located here. The Coalition of the Common Defense can be found online at forthecommondefense.org.
About the Center for Security Policy
The Center for Security Policy is a non-profit, non-partisan national security organization that specializes in identifying policies, actions, and resource needs that are vital to American security and then ensures that such issues are the subject of both focused, principled examination and effective action by recognized policy experts, appropriate officials, opinion leaders, and the general public.
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Shariah’s Police?
Over the weekend, a drama with potentially horrific consequences for freedom-loving Americans played out half-a-world away.
A Saudi newspaper columnist named Hamza Kashgari was detained in Malaysia, reportedly on the basis of an alert by the International Criminal Police Organization, better known as Interpol. Reuters quotes a Malaysian police spokesman as saying that, “This arrest was part of an Interpol operation which the Malaysian police were a part of.” It was apparently mounted in response to a “red notice” (or request for help apprehending an individual) issued by Saudi Arabia. Kashgari was then sent back to Saudi Arabia where he faces almost certain death.
Mr. Kashgari’s crime? He criticized the founder of Islam, Mohammed, on his Twitter account. According to press he reports, he addressed the man Muslims call theProphet directly, writing: “ I have loved things about you and I have hated things about you. There is a lot I don’t understand about you….I will not pray for you.”
The reaction in Saudi Arabia has been characteristically over-the-top when it comes to such alleged “blasphemy” against Islam. Clerics have denounced Kashgari for apostasy, a capital offense under the totalitarian Islamic code known as shariah. And tens of thousands of his countrymen have expressed indignation, with some 13,000 signing an online petition calling for the columnist’s execution.
Interpol is basically, an international coordination mechanism for national police authorities that is supposed, as Jago Russell, the chief executive of the British NGO Fair Trials International told The Guardian, “to respect human rights and free speech” and steer clear of “religious or political cases.” So why, if the Malaysian police are telling the truth, did it apparently violate all such guidelines?
An Interpol spokesman insists that his organization had nothing to do with Hamza Kashgari’s apprehension in Malaysia and involuntary return to Saudi Arabia. What is clear at this point is that the Saudis sought help apprehending the man who fled their not-so-tender mercies. It seems likely that the Saudi red notice to Interpol provided the Malays a pretext for intercepting and extraditing a columnist who dared to exercise free speech.
If Interpol is now being used, in effect, to enforce shariah blasphemy laws, it is not just somebodyelse’s problem. It is ours.
After all, in a December 2009 executive order unveiled on a Friday afternoon in the run-up to the Christmas holidays, President Obama issued Executive Order 13524. It amended an earlier order by President Reagan that conferred on Interpol some – but not all – of the privileges of a foreign diplomatic mission.
Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor and one of the finest legal minds and essayists of our time, wrote on the occasion that Obama’s amendments would have the effect of establishing here “an international police force immune from the restraints of American law.” He added that, thanks to the Obama executive order:
“This international police force (whose U.S. headquarters is in the Justice Department in Washington) will be unrestrained by the U.S. Constitution and American law while it operates in the United States and affects both Americans and American interests outside the United States.”
There has been a lot of anxiety across the country lately about the possibility that provisions of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act could be used to have the military arrest American citizens and detain them indefinitely without due process. Like Andy McCarthy and Charles Stimson, the author of a new study from the Heritage Foundation on the subject, (http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/02/facts-about-the-national-defense-authorization-act-and-military-detention-of-us-citizens), I believe such concerns to be unfounded.
It appears, however, that pursuant to President Obama’s directive, “red notices” issued by foreign powers against U.S. citizens could result in their apprehension by or with the help of Interpol, and perhaps lead to their surrender to hostile foreign powers. Whether something similar happened in this instance to a Saudi citizen remains to be clarified. But we need toknow: Could the carte blanche inexplicably given Interpol by Mr. Obama lend itself to such abuse against Americans in a future case?
What makes all this particularly worrying is that the Obama administration is currently helping the Saudis and the multinational lobby they host in Jedda, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), in a longstanding campaign to criminalize expression that offends Muslims. The so-called “Istanbul Process” is inexorably translating into legitimization of shariah blasphemy laws – and a threat to those not only in Muslim nations but in Europe, Canada and even the United States, who flout them.
The more the so-called “international community” accedes to clearlyanti-constitutional restrictions on freedom of expression, the more an international police force is empowered to act in extra-constitutional ways, the more certain it becomes that the Constitution of the United States risks becoming a dead letter. Or at least our Constitution will no longer be “the supreme law of the land,” as its Article VI declares. Instead, we will have conceded an equal, if not superior, place to shariah and put at risk all who dare toresist its tyranny.
Congress needs to enact legislation countermanding Executive Order 13524 and servingnotice that America remains the home of those free to speak their minds, and brave enough to resist Interpol’s – or anybody else’s – efforts to keep them from doing so in what amounts to submission to shariah.
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. is President of the Center for Security Policy (www.SecureFreedom.org), a columnist for the Washington Times and host of the nationally syndicated program, Secure Freedom Radio, heard in Washington weeknights at 9:00 p.m. on WRC 1260 AM.
Obama’s rhetorical storm
The Obama administration is absolutely furious at Russia and China. The two UN Security Council permanent members’ move on Saturday to veto a resolution on Syria utterly infuriated US President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and UN Ambassador Susan Rice. And they want us all to know just how piping mad they really are.
Rice called the vetoes "unforgivable," and said that "any further blood that flows will be on their hands." She said the US was "disgusted."
Clinton called the move by Moscow and Beijing a "travesty." She then said that the US will take action outside the UN, "with those allies and partners who support the Syrian people’s right to have a better future."
The rhetoric employed by Obama’s top officials is striking for what it reveals about how the Obama administration perceives the purpose of rhetoric in foreign policy.
Most US leaders have used rhetoric to explain their policies. But if you take the Obama administration’s statements at face value you are left scratching your head in wonder. Specifically on Syria, if you take these statements literally, you are left wondering if Obama and his advisers are simply clueless. Because if they are serious, their indignation bespeaks a remarkable ignorance about how decisions are made at the Security Council.
Is it possible that Obama believed that Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin would betray Bashar Assad, his most important strategic ally in the Middle East? Is it possible that he believed that the same Chinese regime that systematically tramples the human rights of its people would agree to intervene in another country’s domestic affairs?
Outside the intellectual universe of the Obama administration – where stalwart US allies such as Hosni Mubarak are discarded like garbage and foes such as Hugo Chavez are wooed like Hollywood celebrities – national governments tend to base their foreign policies on their national interests.
In light of this basic reality, Security Council actions generally reflect the national interests of its member states. This is how it has always been. This is how it will always be. And it is hard to believe that the Obama administration was unaware of this basic fact.
In fact, it is impossible to believe that the administration was unaware that its plan to pass a Security Council resolution opposing Assad’s massacre of his people – and so jeopardize Russian and Chinese interests – had no chance of success. The fact that they had to know the resolution would never pass leads to the conclusion that Obama and his advisers weren’t trying to pass the resolution on Syria at all.
Rather they were trying to pass the buck on Syria.
We have two pieces of evidence to support the view that the Obama administration has no intention of doing anything even vaguely effective to end Assad’s reign of terror that has so far taken the lives of between five and ten thousand of his countrymen.
First, for the past 10 months, as Assad’s killing machine kicked into gear, Obama and his advisers have been happy to sit on their hands. They supported Turkey’s feckless diplomatic engagement with Assad. They sat back as Turkish Prime Minister Recip Tayep Erdogan employed the IHH, his regime-allied terror group, to oversee the organization of a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated Syrian opposition.
Second, the administration supported the Arab League’s farcical inspectors’ mission to Syria. That mission was led by Sudanese Gen. Muhammad al- Dabi. Dabi reportedly was one of the architects of the genocide in Darfur. Clearly, a mission under his leadership had no chance of accomplishing anything useful. And indeed, it didn’t.
AND SO, after nearly a year, the issue of Assad’s butchery of his citizens finally found its way to the Security Council last month. Many in the US expected Obama to use the opportunity to finally do something to stop the killing, just as he and his NATO allies did something to prevent the killing in Libya last year.
Ten months ago Obama, Rice, Clinton and National Security Council member Samantha Power decided that the US and its allies had to militarily intervene in Libya to ensure that Muammar Gaddafi didn’t have the opportunity to kill his people as Assad is now doing. That is, to prevent the type of human rights calamity that the Syrian people are now experiencing, Obama used the UN as a staging ground to overthrow Gaddafi through force.
Sadly for the people of Syria, who are being shot dead even as they try to bury their families who were shot dead the day before, unlike the situation in Libya, Obama has never had the slightest intention of using his influence to take action against Assad. And faced with the rapidly rising public expectation that he would take action at the Security Council to stop the killing, Obama opted for diplomatic Kabuki.
Knowing full well that Putin – who is still selling Assad weapons – would veto any resolution, rather than accept that the Security Council is a dead end, Obama had Rice negotiate fecklessly with her Russian counterparts. The resolution that ended up being called to a vote on Saturday was so weak that US Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, issued a statement on Friday calling for the administration to veto it.
As Ros-Lehtinen put it, the draft resolution "contains no sanctions, no restrictions on weapons transfers, and no calls for Assad to go, but supports the failed Arab League observer mission," and so isn’t "worth the paper it’s printed on."
She continued, "The Obama administration should not support this weak, counterproductive resolution, and should also reconsider the legitimacy that it provides to the Arab League – an organization that continues to boycott Israel – when it comes to the regime in Damascus."
But instead of vetoing it, the administration backed it to the tilt and then expressed disgust and moral outrage when Russia and China vetoed it.
The lesson of this spectacle is that it we must recognize that the Obama administration’s rhetoric hides more than it reveals about the president’s actual policies.
THE FIRST place that we should apply this lesson is to the hemorrhage of administration rhetoric about Iran.
For the past several weeks we have been treated to massive doses of verbiage from Obama and his senior advisers about Iran. The most notable of these recent statements was Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s conversation with The Washington Post’s David Ignatius last week.
Panetta used Ignatius to communicate two basic messages. First, he wanted to make clear that the administration adamantly opposes an Israeli strike on Iran’s nuclear installations. And second, he wanted to make clear that if Iran strikes Israeli population centers, the US will come to Israel’s defense.
The purpose of the first message is clear enough. Panetta wished to increase pressure on Israel not to take preemptive action against Iran’s nuclear weapons program.
The purpose of the second message is also clear. Panetta spoke of the US’s obligation to Israel’s defense in order to remove the justification for an Israeli attack. After all, if the US is obliged to defend it, then Israel mustn’t risk harming US interests by defending itself.
When taken together, Panetta’s message sounds balanced and responsible. But when examined carefully, it is clear that it is not.
It is far from responsible for the US government to tell its chief ally that it should be willing to absorb an attack on its population centers from Iran. No government can be expected to sit back and wait to be attacked with nuclear weapons because if it is, the Americans will retaliate against its attacker.
Panetta’s message was not just irresponsible. It was obnoxious.
And this leaves the first message. Since Obama was elected the US has devoted most of its energies not to preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, but to pressuring Israel not to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. And Panetta’s remarks to Ignatius were consistent with this mission.
Some have argued that the US’s stepped-up naval presence in the Persian Gulf is evidence that the US is itself gearing up to attack Iran. But as retired US naval analyst J.E. Dyer explained in an essay last month at the Optimistic Conservative blog, the US posture in the Persian Gulf is defensive, not offensive.
The US has not deployed anywhere near the firepower it would need to conduct a successful military campaign against Iran’s nuclear installations. The only thing the US deployment may serve to accomplish is to deter Israel from launching a preemptive air strike against Iran’s nuclear installations.
It is true that to a certain extent, Israel has brought this escalating American rhetorical storm on itself with its own flood of rhetoric about Iran. Over the past week nearly every senior Israeli military and political official has had something to say about Iran’s nuclear program.
But this stream of words does not reflect a change in Israel’s strategic timetable. Rather it is a function of the rather mundane calendar of Israel’s annual conference circuit. It just so happened that the annual Herzliya Conference took place last week. It is standard fare for Israel’s security and political leadership to bloviate about Iran’s nuclear program at Herzliya. They do it every year. They did it this year.
And in truth, no one said anything at the conference that we didn’t already know. We learned nothing new about Iran’s program or Israel’s intentions. Had there been no conference last week, there would likely have been no flood of Israeli statements.
We only know three things for certain about Iran. It is getting very late in the game for anyone to take any military actions to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Iran will not stop its nuclear weapons program voluntarily. And Obama will not order US forces to take action to stop Iran’s nuclear project.
What remains uncertain still is how Israel plans to respond to these three certainties. The fact that Israel has waited this long to strike presents the disturbing prospect that our leaders may have been confused by the Obama administration’s rhetoric. Perhaps they have been persuaded that the US is on our side on this issue and that we don’t have to rely only on ourselves to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power.
But as the foregoing analysis of the administration’s very angry words on Syria and very sober words on Iran demonstrates, Obama and his deputies use rhetoric not to clarify their intentions, but to obfuscate them. Just as they will do nothing to prevent Assad from continuing his campaign of murder and terror, so they will do nothing to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.
Originally published in The Jerusalem Post.
On Obama’s watch
On February 5th, President Obama provided his own Super Sunday show. In some respects, it was almost as bizarre as Madonna’s performance at half time.
In particular, in his interview with NBC’s Matt Lauer, Mr. Obama responded oddly to concerns raised last week by leaders of the U.S. intelligence community. They testified on Capitol Hill that the Iranian mullahs appear to be planning attacks on the United States. Yet, the President told Lauer that, "We don’t see any evidence that they have those intentions or capabilities right now."
Now, anyone with an IQ above room temperature has noticed lately plenty of evidence of both hostile Iranian intentions and the capabilities to act on them. Consider a few examples:
Last fall, the Obama administration announced that it had intercepted an Iranian plot to blow up a popular eatery in Washington’s Georgetown section in order to kill the Saudi ambassador who frequents it. They did so with the knowledge that more 150 Americans would be murdered in the process. Just last week, Senate Intelligence Committee chairwoman Dianne Feinstein used the occasion of a rare open hearing to vouch strongly for the quality of the evidence implicating the regime in Tehran, despite the seemingly unprofessional nature of the assassination plan.
The Iranians have also established a formidable foreign legion in their terrorist proxy, Hezbollah. This Lebanese "Party of God" has already killed Americans elsewhere. And we know that they have established a presence in Latin America, notably under the protection of Iran’s ally in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. There are increasing indications that Hezbollah is also now embedding itself in Mexico, doing business and making common cause with narco-trafficking drug cartels there. Such ties facilitate these jihadists’ ability to penetrate the southern U.S. border that Team Obama seems determined not to secure.
What is more, we know that Hezbollah already has active cells in place in the United States. They have been involved here in illicit cigarette trafficking, money laundering and fundraising for the mother ship. It would be dangerously naïve to think that Hezbollah’s operatives inside this country are not also preparing for acts of terror. The same goes for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps’ al Quds paramilitary units the Obama Pentagon has warned are operating with Hezbollah in our hemisphere.
Even U.S. intelligence is now coming around to another ominous reality: Iran cooperates with al Qaeda.
The evidence is indisputable that Shiites and Sunnis can, when in pursuit of a common foe, overlook differences about particulars of their respective practices of Islam and the bitter enmity that has flowed from them for centuries.
A federal judge recently found that the mullahocracy in Tehran assisted Osama bin Laden’s operatives in planning and executing the murderous attacks of 9/11. And Iran’s "house arrest" of his family members and top al Qaeda operatives since then is now increasingly recognized as tantamount to providing safe haven, not imposing involuntary incarceration.
That being the case, one must add the capabilities of al Qaeda and its proliferating franchises to the ayatollahs’ potential strike packages against this country. Never mind those official assurances that "al Qaeda core" has been diminished by years of drone strikes and Special Forces missions against their leadership. Iranian state-sponsorship ensures that we will face a continuing and growing danger from those terrorists and others committed to imposing worldwide the Islamist doctrine of shariah.
(Interestingly, in his congressional testimony last week, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper actually called this pan-Islamic front the "global jihad movement." This would appear to be a violation of clear Obama administration guidance that no association can be made between "violent extremism" and the Islamic impetuses behind nearly all of it. It also marks a considerable improvement over Clapper’s preposterous declaration a year ago that the Muslim Brotherhood is a "largely secular organization" that has "eschewed violence.")
What about the reported agreement between Iran and Venezuela to base some of the former’s ballistic missiles on the latter’s territory? The timing of this deployment and the speed with which it metastasizes into a new Cuban Missile Crisis cannot be determined at this point. Still, the intent to threaten the United States certainly is evident, even if this particular capability to act on that intention thankfully has yet to be achieved.
Finally, Iran appears to have developed all but one of the ingredients needed to mount what has been described as a "catastrophic" attack on the United States: a strategic strike unleashing a high-altitude electromagnetic pulse. All that is lacking is a working nuclear weapon that can be launched aboard even a short-range missile from a ship off our coast.
Successive government and independent studies have established that such an attack would disrupt for a protracted time, and possibly destroy, our electrical grid and all the infrastructures that rely upon it.
Without them, our society and population simply cannot be sustained – giving rise to the distinct possibility of achieving Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s stated goal of "a world without America."
President Obama’s statement that "we don’t see any evidence" of Iran’s intentions and capabilities to attack us is either witless or deceptive. Either way, it is as strong an argument as any for his defeat in November – assuming the mullahs have not acted in the meantime on their well-documented desire to eliminate us and our friends in Israel.
Fool me twice
Former US congressman Robert Wexler is a man worth listening to. Wexler served as then-senator Barack Obama’s chief booster in the American Jewish community during the 2008 presidential campaign. He appeared everywhere and said anything to convince the American Jewish community that the same man who sat in the church pews listening to Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s anti-Semitic vitriol for two decades, and listed among his closest friends and associates a host of Israel-haters as well as former terrorists, was the greatest friend Israel could ever have.
Once Obama was elected, Wexler continued to serve as his Jewish shill. Wexler traveled to Israel multiple times in the early months of Obama’s presidency, to pressure Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to submit to Obama’s demand and embrace the cause of Palestinian statehood. After Netanyahu finally announced his support for Palestinian statehood at his speech at Bar-Ilan University in September 2009, Wexler returned with a new demand – that Netanyahu enact a moratorium on Jewish property rights in Judea and Samaria.
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post at the time, Wexler promised that Israel would be richly rewarded if it took the unprecedented step of denying Jews the right to their property in Judea and Samaria simply because they were Jewish. Even if the moratorium were temporary, Obama would view the discriminatory measure as proof of Israel’s good intentions.
Moreover, Obama would expect the Palestinians and the wider Arab world to respond to Israel’s move by taking steps to normalize their relations with Israel.
For instance, Wexler claimed that Obama had demanded that the Arabs respond to an Israeli moratorium on Jewish property rights by among other things opening trade offices and direct economic ties; conducting cultural and economic exchanges; and permitting Israeli airplanes to overfly their territory.
And in the event that the Arabs refused to rise to the occasion, Wexler proclaimed, "You can rightly say that all bets are off."
Wexler continued, "I want to call their bluff. I want to see, if Israel makes substantial movement toward a credible peace process, whether they are willing to do it. And if they are not, better that we should find out five or six months into the process, before Israel is actually asked to compromise any significant position."
In the event, Netanyahu bowed to Obama’s demand and enacted a temporary ban on the exercise of Jewish property rights in Judea and Samaria. And in the aftermath of his stunning move, the Arab world did nothing.
Amazingly, far from calling their bluff, Obama doubled down on his pressure on Israel.
Among other things, since squeezing the first temporary ban on Jewish property rights out of Netanyahu, Obama has demanded that the moratorium be made permanent and be extended to Jerusalem.
As for his vision of the "peace process," Obama has demanded that Israel accept the 1949 armistice lines as the basis for negotiations.
He has used the US veto at the UN Security Council as a means of pressuring Israel to make further unreciprocated concessions to the Palestinians.
And the "pro-Israel" US president has demanded no similar concessions from the Palestinians.
THIS WEEK, Wexler, now the head of the far-left S. Daniel Abraham Center for Middle East Peace, was back in town. Speaking at the Herzliya Conference, he said that Israel should consider extending the ban on Jewish property rights to within the 1949 armistice lines. Wexler based his claim on then-prime minister Ehud Olmert’s 2008 peace offer to Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas.
Olmert’s offer, which Abbas rejected, involved a "land swap," in which in the framework of a comprehensive peace deal, Israel would give the Palestinians land from within its 1949 boundaries in exchange for land in Judea and Samaria that Israel would permanently retain. According to media reports, Olmert offered Abbas 4.5 percent of Israeli territory in exchange for a similar amount of land in Judea and Samaria.
While Wexler appeared at the Herzliya Conference as the president of a nonpartisan nonprofit organization, his continued intimate relationship with Obama is well known. Last fall, Commentary’s Omri Ceren documented that Zvika Krieger, Wexler’s vice president at the Daniel Abraham Center, authored documents for Obama’s reelection campaign. Among other things, those documents cited articles authored by Krieger and Wexler in which they championed Obama’s record on Israel from their nonpartisan perch at the Daniel Abraham Center.
Given Wexler’s close ties to Obama, it is reasonable to assume that his suggestion that Israel cease exerting its national sovereignty over its sovereign territory in the interests of the peace process is not simply his personal view.
There is much to criticize about Wexler’s suggestion. But more important than its arrogant, insulting absurdity, and more disconcerting than Wexler’s own hypocrisy, is what his suggestion tells us about the dangers inherent in Netanyahu’s current negotiations with the Palestinians.
To understand the connection we need to recall the nature of Olmert’s offer to Abbas.
Olmert’s negotiations with Abbas were based upon the proposition – repeated ad nauseam to the Israeli public – that "nothing is agreed to until everything is agreed to."
The idea was clear. True, on the one hand, the prime minister was conducting negotiations far from the spotlight, and refusing to tell the public what was on offer. But on the other hand, we could rest assured that that nothing he offered would have any significance whatsoever unless the Palestinians agreed to a final-peace deal with Israel. If they rejected peace, then everything Olmert said would become null and void, and be tossed down the memory hole.
In accordance with this basic proposition, when Abbas rejected Olmert’s offer, and made no counteroffer, it was naturally assumed that Olmert’s proposal was rendered null and void.
Yet four years later, here is Wexler, Obama’s surrogate, advocating a policy of unilateral abrogation of Israeli sovereignty over 4.5% of its national territory in order to enable the eventual implementation of an offer that was predicated on the notion that "nothing is agreed to until everything is agreed to" and as such is null and void.
THIS BRINGS us to the current negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. For the past month, under the aegis of the Middle East Quartet, Netanyahu’s representative attorney Yitzhak Molcho has been conducting negotiations with Abbas’s representatives in Amman, Jordan. Last week, Molcho reportedly outlined the government’s general positions on lands it is willing to cede to the Palestinians.
Without presenting any maps, Molcho reportedly said that a permanent agreement would involve most of the Israelis living in Judea and Samaria remaining in Israeli territory. The media interpreted this to mean that like Olmert, Netanyahu expects for Israel to retain perpetual control over large blocks of Israeli communities that take up less than 10% of the overall landmass in Judea and Samaria.
For his part, Netanyahu this week reiterated his position that Israel must maintain a long-term military presence in the Jordan Valley. This has been interpreted to mean that Netanyahu is willing to cede sovereign rights to the area to the Palestinians.
Taken together, what Molcho’s statement and Netanyahu’s statement indicate is that at a minimum, in exchange for peace, the Netanyahu government is willing to expel some portion of the 350,000 Jews living in Judea and Samaria from their homes and to transfer sovereignty over a significant portion of the territory to a Palestinian state.
From the vagueness of what has been reported, it is apparent that Netanyahu has been far less specific about the scope of the territorial concessions he is willing to undertake than his predecessor was. But then again, Olmert made his offer after conducting negotiations with Abbas for over a year. Netanyahu only entered these talks a month ago.
And while no one in or out of government believes that these negotiations have any chance of leading to a peace deal, the fact is that Netanyahu is feverishly working to ensure that the talks continue. He spent a good part of his day on Wednesday speaking on the phone to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and meeting with Quartet envoy Tony Blair and UN Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon, begging the foreign leaders to convince the Palestinians not to abandon the negotiations.
As he put it in his joint press conference with Ban, "You cannot complete the peace process unless you begin it. If you begin it, you have to be consistent and stick to it."
For his part, Abbas is doing everything in his power to make clear that he does not wish to negotiate, and that even if negotiations continue, he will never cut a deal with Israel. To underscore his bad faith, next week Abbas will travel to Egypt to meet with Hamas terror chief Khaled Mashaal. The two men are set to discuss the means of implementing the unity government deal they signed last May.
Netanyahu is obviously under great pressure to continue with these talks. A day doesn’t go by without some US official or European leader talking about the need for talks, or a leftist politician or political activist at home blaming Netanyahu for the absence of peace. But none of this pressure can justify the damage that is done to Israel’s position by continuing to engage in these negotiations.
As Netanyahu’s own experience with Obama (and Wexler) shows, concessions never bring a respite from the US leader’s pressure. They only form the baseline for demands for further concessions.
Beyond the narrow confines of Obama’s personal hostility towards Israel, Netanyahu’s current engagement in negotiations with the Palestinians is devastating to Israel’s position in two ways.
First, it makes it impossible for Israel to extricate itself from the lie of PLO moderation and to start telling the truth about its Palestinian "partner."
Quite simply, as Abbas’s continued courtship of Hamas and his open embrace and glorification of mass murderers such as the murderers of the Fogel family make clear, the PLO has returned to its roots as a terrorist organization. It is no longer credible to claim that the PLO has abandoned terror in favor of peace.
By engaging in peace talks with the PLO, Netanyahu renders it impossible to make this critical claim. Consequently, he damns Israel to a situation in which we continue to empower and politically legitimize a terrorist organization committed to our destruction.
The second way continued negotiations devastates Israel’s position is by eroding our ability to claim our rights to Judea and Samaria and so extricate ourselves from this fake peace process with terrorists. As Wexler made clear, from the international community’s perspective, everything that Israel offers at the negotiating table is catalogued. Regardless of Palestinian bad faith, irrespective of actual prospects for peace, every theoretical Israeli concession becomes the new baseline for further negotiations.
American "friends" like Wexler and Obama play Israel for a fool again and again.
In truth, we should thank Wexler for coming here this week and reminding us of his bad faith, and the bad faith of the president he serves. But it is up to Netanyahu to draw the appropriate lessons.
Originally published in The Jerusalem Post.
Center releases reports on potential economic impacts of proposed defense cuts
The Center for Security Policy is very proud to provide as a member of the Coalition for the Common Defense a tool for American taxpayers and communities – and their elected representatives – to anticipate not only the national security impacts, but the economic ones, arising from impending reductions in U.S. defense spending.
Our goal is to encourage and empower a more informed discussion about the economic impacts, as well as the national security impacts, of the impending defense cuts. We want to help bring this discussion to the local employers, citizens and community and business leaders who will need to prepare for possible job losses and business failures.
To accomplish this, we have provided summary reports – two pages each – for all fifty states and the District of Columbia, and additional detailed reports for all states and territories. All reports can be viewed at www.forthecommondefense.org/reports.
Center for Security Policy Releases Reports on Potential Economic Impacts of Proposed Defense Cuts
Washington, DC February 1, 2012 – The Center for Security Policy today released their “Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports,” a collection of 2,750 online detailed reports and 51 Summary Reports presenting a “National Average” estimated economic impact from projected defense cuts, for cities, counties, states and territories.
The Center launched the reports in advance of the February 13, 2012 release of the Obama administration’s 2013 defense budget. The purpose of the “Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports” is to help citizens, local businesses and their employees, and local governments prepare for the economic impact of these probable defense cuts under the Budget Control Act of 2011 and the sequestration mechanism.
In 2012, President Obama limited U.S. military capability to fighting one “regional conflict” and one “holding action.” Defense budgets for 2013-2021 were cut $487 billion – a 9% cut at a minimum. “Sequestration,” required by law with passage of the Budget Control Act in 2011, mandates $500 billion more in 2013-2021 defense cuts – an 18% cut, at a minimum. President Obama has stated he will veto any attempt by Congress to reverse these cuts.
These reports shows how “National Average” defense budget reductions of at least 9% and 18% could affect cities, counties, states, congressional districts and categories of business owners (ethnic, women-owned, veteran-owned etc), using actual 2010 data for revenues received by local defense contractors. The Defense Breakdown Reports are meant to be used as a benchmark for communities to gauge the actual local economic impact of the Obama administration’s proposed defense cuts on businesses and jobs.
The summaries and online reports are available at: www.forthecommondefense.org/reports.
The Center’s “Defense Breakdown Economic Impact Reports” are part of a broader 2012 initiative, the Coalition for the Common Defense, to educate and engage the American public on the importance of maintaining a strong national defense.
Frank Gaffney, President of the Center for Security Policy remarked:
“The Center for Security Policy is very proud to provide as a member of the Coalition for the Common Defense a tool for American taxpayers and communities – and their elected representatives – to anticipate not only the national security impacts, but the economic ones, arising from impending reductions in U.S. defense spending.”
“In so doing, we are mindful that such spending is invested to secure the United States, its people and vital interests, and not as an employment measure. That said, the reality is that there will be real and, as this product illustrates, in some cases draconian impacts on both jobs in and the economies of states, counties and cities across the country and on the viability of various businesses, as a result of the direct and indirect effects of such cuts.”
“It is our hope that by bringing this information to the local employers, citizens and community and business leaders who will bear the brunt of this tsunami, they will be better able to prepare for it – and, ideally, to help stave it off.”