LGBT NEWS: Transvestite shot at NSA, a Muslim Bakery, Indiana and Apple’s CEO [+Video]

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Have you ever wondered why the acronym LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) discriminates against lesbian women? Why are homosexual men given the title of “gay” and lesbian women not included? Why isn’t the acronym Lesbian, Homosexual, Bisexual, Transgender (LHBT) or Gay Lesbian, Gay Homosexual, Bisexual, Transgenders (GLGHBT)?

Are lesbians less gay than homosexuals? Why are bisexuals included in the acronym at all? Part time sodomites are not worthy of inclusion. Where is the ideological purity in the LGBT or LHBT or GLGHBT movement? But I digress.

Well members of the LGBT movement have been prominently in the news this past week. The breadth and depth of their making national news and headlines to the exclusion of many other, perhaps more important matters, is worthy of note.

Not long ago I wrote a column titled “The good homosexual versus the bad homosexual — Assimilation versus Radicalization“. In that column I lauded Apple CEO Tim Cook (pictured above, can you tell which is Tim?) for being a good homosexual (not radicalized). I now take that back, he has joined the ranks of the bad radicalized homosexuals.

How did Tim fall from grace? Why he made it his business to stick his nose into other people’s businesses, like a Muslim baker in Dearborn, Michigan (story covered in below video) and Memories Pizza in Indiana. It seems Tim just hates any fellow businessperson, especially those of the Christian, Muslim and Jewish faith, who do not think, like him, that sodomite marriage is okay.

Well it appears that for Memories Pizza business is good. Memories Pizza of Walkertown, Indiana has received over $842,000 in crowd funding because it supports traditional marriage over sodomite marriage. So Tim Cook, stick that in your iPad and smoke it. Or Goggle it if you wish.

Then we have the queer, as in weird, story of two men dressed as women crashing into the gate of the National Security Agency on March 31st. No they weren’t Muslim men wearing burquas shouting Allahu Akbar, while waving the flag of the Islamic State, that’s a different story not covered by the media. Sophie Jane Evans and Michael Zennie and Christopher Brennan for Dailymail.com and the Associated Press reported:

The FBI has identified two people who were shot outside the National Security Agency’s headquarters on Monday after allegedly stealing an SUV they were driving from a motel. Kevin Lamont Fleming, 20, and his friend Ricky ‘Maya’ Shawatza Hall, 27… Hall, identified by the FBI Tuesday, died at the scene, though police have not said how she [or is it he] died.

Her [or is it his] lawyer said that Hall was a transgender individual who identified as a woman and had a long criminal record, according to the Wall Street Journal. She had previous convictions for armed robbery, assault, theft and prostitution. The prostitution conviction was from 2007, according to court records. She received a year’s probation. She had also been charged with stealing a bottle of methadone from a woman’s pocket last year.

Read more.

What is interesting is Democrats have been submitting legislation to allow those who “identify as a woman” to enter public bathrooms clearly marked for women, and little girls. Wouldn’t it have been grand to have Ricky ‘Maya’, a convicted prostitute, robber and thief, go into a public bathroom with your little girl or wife or girlfriend? The Florida legislature has introduced a bill to prevent this from happening. Perhaps they should call the bill the Ricky ‘Maya’ Shawatza Hall bill?

Finally we have Bakergate! What is it with homosexuals going into a bakery, or pizzeria, and demanding the business owner service them, pun intended. Watch what happens when Steven Crowder, host of Louder with Crowder, goes into a Muslim owned bakery and asks for a gay wedding cake in Dearborn, Michigan:

Gee, I wonder if a LGBT person walked into an Islamic State owned bakery and asked for a sodomite wedding cake? Would they be forced to read the Quran and convert to Islam? I know, they would get thrown off of the roof and then stoned, no not with marijuana. Ignoring the “big burqua elephant” in the room is something the media does not want to address, so we and Steven Crowder will.

Here’s a final note. Christians are looking for a traditional family to join for their beliefs. They know Democrats are any thing but a traditional family, they are progressives, you know like allowing Ricky ‘Maya’ into public bathrooms, depending on his/her self-image as a man, women or other. Republican’s used to have a home for the traditional family but that is now in question.

That’s this weeks edition of LGBT NEWS. Stay tuned for more homosexual absurdities.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Rick Santorum: Should gov’t force gay print shop owner to make ‘God hates f*gs’ signs?

Gay Group Demands Christian Churches Be SHUT DOWN for Opposing Same-Sex Marriage

Gay Totalitarianism and the Coming Persecution of Christians

The Religious Freedom Debate Explained in 90 Seconds

How to Talk About the Indiana Law With Your Liberal Relatives at Easter

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The $15 Billion Failure to Store Nuclear Waste

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“The American people have spent 30 years and $15 billion to determine whether Yucca Mountain would be a safe repository for our nation’s civilian and defense-related nuclear waste.” That’s a quote of Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) reported in the April issue of The Heartland Institute’s Environment & Climate News.

Compare that with the one year and 45 days it took to build the Empire State Building or the five years it took to build the Hoover Dam in the depths of the Great Depression. In the first half of the last century, Americans knew how to get things done, but the rise of environmentalism in the latter half, starting around the 1970s, has increased the cost and time of any construction anywhere in the U.S. In the case of Yucca Mountain it has raised issues about nuclear waste that is currently stored is less secure conditions.

As reported by CNS News in January, “The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has released the final two volumes of a five-volume safety report that concludes that Nevada’s Yucca Mountain meets all of its technical and safety requirements for the disposal of highly radioactive nuclear waste.” Five volumes!

So why the delay? The NRC says the Department of Energy “‘has not met certain land and water rights requirements’ and that other environmental and regulatory hurdles remain.”

Harry ReidA Wall Street Journal editorial on March 30 asserted that It is not about environmental and regulatory hurdles. It is about a deal that Nevada Senator Harry Reid, the former Senate Majority Leader, cut with President Obama to keep Yucca Mountain from ever opening for use. In return, Reid blocked nearly all amendments to legislation to shield Obama from having to veto bills. He virtually nullified the Senate as a functioning element of our government.

“Since there is no permanent disposal facility, spent fuel from the nation’s nuclear reactors—‘enough to fill a football field 17 meters deep’ according to a 2012 Government Accountability Office report—is currently being stored at dozens of above-ground sites. The GAO expects the amount of radioactive waste to double to 140,000 by 2055 when all of the currently operating nuclear reactors are retired.”

The United States where the development of nuclear fission and its use to generate electrical energy occurred is now well behind other nations that have built nuclear facilities and are adding new ones. As Donn Dear, an energy expert with Power For USA, points out “there are only four new nuclear power plants under construction, all by Toshiba-Westinghouse LLC. One other plant, Watts Bar 2, whose construction was held up for several years, is being completed by TVA.”

Meanwhile, as Dear notes, “South Korea is building four nuclear reactors in the United Arab Emirates. The Russian company, Rosatom, is building power plants in Turkey, Belarus, Vietnam, and elsewhere. The China National Nuclear Corporation is scheduled to build over twenty nuclear power plants.”

These represent jobs and orders for equipment that are not occurring in the United States, along with the failure to utilize nuclear energy to provide the growing need for electricity here. The same environmental organizations opposing construction here are the same ones supporting the Environmental Protection Agency’s attack on coal-fired electrical plants. The irony is, of course, that nuclear plants do not produce carbon dioxide emissions that the Greens blame for the non-existent “global warming”, not called “climate change.”

A cynical and false propaganda campaign has been waged against nuclear energy in the U.S., mostly notably with the Hollywood film, “The China Syndrome” about a reactor meltdown. If you want to worry about radiation, worry about the Sun. It is a major source. Three incidents, Three Mile Island in 1979 and Chernobyl in 1986, added to the fears, but no one was harmed by the Three Mile Island event and Chernobyl was an avoidable accident.

More recent was the March 11, 2011 shutdown of the Fukushima reactor in Japan as the result of an earthquake and subsequent tsunami. Three of its cores melted in the first three days, but there have been no deaths or radiation sickness attributed to this event. That’s the part you’re not told about.

CarterIn the end, all it takes is one ignorant President to set progress back for decades. In this case it was President Jimmy Carter for not allowing reprocessing of nuclear waste, a standard practice in France where only one-fifth of spent fuel requires storage. In the 1980s there were three U.S. corporations leading the way on the introduction and use of nuclear energy to produce electrical power; General Electric, Westinghouse Electric, and Babcock & Wilcox. Today only Babcock-Wilcox continues as a fully owned American company.

Thanks to President Obama, we have lost another six years on the Yucca Mountain project. That fits with his refusal to permit the Keystone XL pipeline. No energy project that might actually benefit America will ever see his signature.

Some are arguing that America is a nation in decline and they can surely point to the near destruction of our nuclear energy industry as one example. That decline can begin to end in 2017 with the inauguration of a new President.

© Alan Caruba, 2015

A Legacy of Propaganda

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We’ve seen the way the Associated Press skews its commentaries, and this latest approach to delegitimize the State of Israel is to challenge her democratic values amid an expanse of dictatorships. After Benjamin Netanyahu’s re-election to his post of Prime Minister, Dan Perry, AP’s Middle East editor, writes, “with the occupation of the West Bank grinding on toward the half-century mark, and with Netanyahu’s election-week statement that no change is imminent, hard questions arise.” His question and answer are, “Is Israel a democracy?  The answer is not so straightforward.”

Editor Perry’s premise is an immediate indictment against Israel, crafted to set the reader’s mind in motion to join in the attack.  Surely, he calculatedly omits the history that explains why these Arabs (now renamed Palestinians) remain in the West Bank.  Not only did he fail to recap that it was because Israel was attacked by Jordan and won that war that she acquired this territory, but he also excluded the fact that Israel offered land for peace on eleven separate occasions. The Palestinian leaders emphatically rejected the idea. Their strategy was to keep these Palestinians as pawns for as long as it takes to change world opinion and paint Israel as the aggressor and punishing “occupier,” until they succeed in hijacking all of Israel for Islam.

Thus, these Palestinians became the world’s eternal ‘victims” of oppression, set up to receive perpetual support monies from the United Nations, Europe, America, and Israel, even as the original victims have long been replaced by succeeding generations. Meanwhile, the new Palestinians wage evermore-creative wars against Israel, including increasingly lethal rocket and human attacks; and myriad propagandist accusations of apartheid, illegal housing and roads; accusing Israelis of causing floods, droughts, and shortages. One effective accusation was the Jenin “Massacre that wasn’t,” when the majority of 52 dead were combatants, and Doctors Without Borders confirmed that Palestinians had disinterred old corpses for authentic scenography.

is dollPerry doesn’t remind his readers that just as non-citizens’ living outside of America have no voting rights within America, so non-citizen Palestinians’ living outside of Israel have no voting rights in Israel. The two million Palestinian Arabs who are citizens of Israel, of course, have the same voting rights as other Israelis, Jew and non-Jew alike.  If these Palestinian Arabs ever show themselves to be civilized enough to lay down their weapons and seek peace, and to create their own democratic state, they may one day be able to vote for their own leadership. Unfortunately, Palestinian parents and teachers are coaching their small children to hate and to kill – to even practice beheading skills on dolls.  Surveys show that the majority of Muslims worldwide prefers Islamic law, Sharia, which is antithetical to democracy, so that these long suffering people will be more harshly ruled than ever by their authoritarian clergy and perhaps never experience an authentic election.

The author makes at least three off-the-wall accusations that show a decided, preconceived effort to blemish the Jewish state.

  • The first was his expectation that non-citizens have the right to vote in their occupiers’ elections.  When the United States and our allies occupied Japan and Germany after winning the Second World War (and the U.S. still maintains military bases in Japan), neither Axis voted in the elections of the victors.
  • The third bears mention because it is so ludicrous.  Perry must accuse Israel as “indirectly” dominating Gaza because Israel completely vacated Gaza in 2005.  Gazan Palestinians are occupied and dominated by Hamas, terrorists whose activities consistently put the civilians in harm’s way and inhibit the potential for democracy.

gazaSecond, Perry claimed that Israelis are concerned that the West Bank Palestinians have no voting rights for Israel’s parliament. There are no such foolhardy concerns. The West Bank is Judea and Samaria, long acknowledged as the original Jewish homeland by the United Nations. Israelis know the unfeasibility of a two-state solution as long as the Palestinians adamantly maintain their enemy status. A handshake for peace requires two hands.

Associated Press is notorious for its false accusations against Israel, America’s ally, while defending Islamic countries, those that produce terrorists who maim, kill, and enslave innocents by the thousands, the same countries that vow Israel’s and America’s destruction. Perry is one of numerous unethical journalists who are willfully dishonest and unreliable. They use selective inattention (or willful blindness) straight from the Muslim playbook. Rather than write that the Arab nations control their people to such a degree that torture and death are commonplace, that hangings and beheadings are done in the public arena, that children begin their lessons of hate and acceptance of death with Kindergarten, he falsely accuses Israel of violating human rights.

One can’t help but wonder if these degenerate journalists comply with Associated Press’s directives to consciously misrepresent the facts for their own biases or gain, or that they are habitual liars who actually come to believe the untruths they spew. Contrary to what Perry himself concluded, I think the answer is quite straightforward.  They are in collusion: it is AP and its journalists.

Florida and Georgia: A Tale of Test Cheating Scandals in Two States

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Disparity: Convictions in Atlanta, Impunity in Miami-Dade Schools.

On Wednesday, an Atlanta jury convicted 11 teachers on racketeering charges, with mixed verdicts on theft and false statement charges, in connection with the massive test cheating scandal in the Atlanta Public Schools.

The defendants, including teachers, a principal and other administrators, were accused of falsifying and altering test results to collect bonuses (incentive funds) and/or to keep their jobs.

One teacher was acquitted and 21 others took plea deals. The 35 educators were indicted in March 2013 by a grand jury.

Prosecutors claimed and successfully argued that the educators conspired to cheat on standardized tests as far back as 2005 after feeling pressure from school district officials to meet federal and local testing standards.

The educators said the pressure came from their supervisors, including former Superintendent Beverly Hall, who died of breast cancer last month.

Hall, who was superintendent for more than a decade, and her lawyer had argued she was too sick to stand trial.

In their report, investigators wrote that Hall “created a culture of fear, intimidation and retaliation” that allowed cheating to go on for years.

Hall maintained that she hadn’t done anything wrong, but resigned during the investigation.

Jurors deliberated for more than eight days. The racketeering charges could carry up to a 20-year prison sentence, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Sentencing is scheduled for April 8, 2015.

“This is a huge story and absolutely the biggest development in American education law since forever,” said University of Georgia law professor Ron Carlson. “It has to send a message to educators here and broadly across the nation. Playing with student test scores is very, very dangerous business.”

Logically, Mr. Carlson seems correct as the former Superintendent of El Paso, Texas schools, Lorenzo Garcia, was sent to federal prison, and five teachers and four principals were arrested in Philadelphia over the past year for test cheating with more arrests expected.

Yet, logic is being defied in Miami-Dade County, Florida, as citizen journalist and school library media specialist Trevor Colestock uncovered a massive test cheating scandal, Adobegate, at Miami Norland Senior High School; his findings verified by the Final Miami-Dade OIG Report; and the strange firing of one teacher and suspension of the other who was equally involved.

Mrs. Muchnick returned to Norland High in early January 2014.

To date, the teachers involved, Mr. Emmanuel Fleurantin and Mrs. Brenda Muchnick, were never arrested, charged, booked, and/or prosecuted as the State Attorney, the Florida Attorney General, and Governor Rick Scott refused to acknowledge this massive test cheating scandal and the almost $250,000 paid out through federal and state incentives to the faculty for an “A” grade for the 2011-12 school year tainted by cheating.

Each teacher at Miami Norland Senior High School received $1730.41.

Though the teachers got paid, the big winners from Norland’s academic successes tainted by cheating were school and district administrators: Reginald Lee went from being an assistant principal over the vocational department in which the cheating took place to the principal of Charles Drew Middle School and then Norland in November 2012; Luis Solano went from being the principal at Norland to the Associate Superintendent, Curriculum & Instruction at Collier County Public Schools in Naples; Nikolai Vitti went from being the Assistant Superintendent of the Education Transformation Office (ETO) at M-DCPS to the Chief Academic Officer of M-DCPS and then became the Superintendent of Duval County Public Schools in Jacksonville; and Superintendent Alberto Carvalho became the Florida and National Superintendent of the Year shortly thereafter.

Also, the Florida Department of Education recently released information that revealed that Miami Norland SHS had 96 FCAT/EOC test invalidations over the past three school years.

Interestingly, 25 other public schools, all high schools, had more test invalidations that Norland, with 20 of the schools being in Miami-Dade, most of them in the Education Transformation Office.

The breakdown for the 26 schools, all high schools, in the graphic: 21 from Miami-Dade (96 at Norland-275 invalidations at North Miami Senior); 2 from Broward (97, 134 invalidations); 2 from Palm Beach (99, 100 invalidations); and 1 from Duval (110 invalidations).

For more information on how this information was obtained, please read pages 38-40 of the Test Score Validation Process manual proffered by Pearson.

Furthermore, the FBI declined to investigate as they deferred to the USDOE OIG who dismissed Colestock’s complaints and took no action.

Simply put, Florida and federal officials, unlike former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, passed the buck.

Perhaps politics played a part as Florida is, and has been, the epicenter of standardized testing since instituting the first high school graduation test in 1976, and reports of test cheating undermine the politics and profitability of standardized testing.

Former Gov. Jeb Bush, a Common Core and standardized test proponent, is in lock-step with President Barack Obama on these issues.

During his tenure as Florida governor, Bush expanded testing significantly, with lucrative contracts for testing and scoring going to Pearson, while creating the school grading system through his A+ Plan.

Beverly Hall served as the Atlanta Public Schools superintendent for more than a decade and was named Superintendent of the Year by the American Association of School Administrators in 2009. She was credited with raising student test scores and graduation rates, particularly among poor and minority students.

However, the award quickly lost its luster and was tarnished as the cheating scandal began to unfold when The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that some scores were statistically improbable.

Likewise, Miami-Dade Superintendent Alberto Carvalho was named the state and national Superintendent of the Year over the past year and lauded for the same accomplishments in test scores and graduation rates.

Could it be that Adobegate and high number of test invalidations on the FCAT and/or EOC exams over the past three school years went unanswered and unpunished to protect standardized testing and spare Mr. Carvalho, who like Beverly Hall is close to President Obama, from going down in flames like Ms. Hall and Mr. Garcia by the state and federal governments respectively?

A reasonable person may assume that Miami-Dade County Public Schools “created a culture of fear, intimidation and retaliation” when it chose to transfer and retaliate against Mr. Colestock for reporting, exposing, and publishing articles about the test cheating while returning Mrs. Muchnick to Norland and never seeking her or Mr. Fleurantin’s prosecution.

The implied message to teachers in Miami-Dade seems to be “keep your mouth shut about test cheating lest you want to end up like Mr. Colestock.”

The lack of inaction by the federal and state governments seem to condone M-DCPS’s actions and test cheating in general.

Like Atlanta, the victims in Miami-Dade County, Florida, besides the taxpayer, are low-income minority (mostly black) school children who are being denied the remedial help they need as false and misleading test scores suggest otherwise.

Where are the talking heads and advocacy groups who decry events in Brooklyn and Ferguson when it comes to test cheating in Atlanta and Miami? Why are they silent on these issues?

Question: Why is Florida rewarding test cheaters while Georgia, Texas and Pennsylvania are punishing test cheaters?

RELATED ARTICLE: Whistleblower Principal, Adell Cothorne, on the Atlanta Cheating Verdict

Whistleblower Principal, Adell Cothorne, on the Atlanta Cheating Verdict

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It may have happened in April Fools Day, but it was certainly no joke.

On April 1, 2015, 11 Atlanta educators were convicted of racketeering related to their roles in what has come to be widely known as “the Atlanta cheating scandal.” I first read of the verdict in the New York Times:

…A jury here (in Atlanta) on Wednesday convicted 11 educators for their roles in a standardized test cheating scandal that tarnished a major school district’s reputation and raised broader questions about the role of high-stakes testing in American schools.

On their eighth day of deliberations, the jurors convicted 11 of the 12 defendants of racketeering, a felony that carries up to 20 years in prison. Many of the defendants — a mixture of Atlanta public school teachers, testing coordinators and administrators — were also convicted of other charges, such as making false statements, that could add years to their sentences.

The New York Times article linked above also refers to the Atlanta cheating scandal as, “what has been described as the largest cheating scandal in the nation’s history.”

I’m not so sure about that.

I think the under-investigated, test score “erasure” situation during former DC chancellor Michelle Rhee could top the Atlanta cheating scandal– if the situation is ever properly investigated.

In my book, A Chronicle of Echoes, I offer a detailed discussion of the events surrounding Rhee’s questionable test score gains, including the shallow “investigation” into erasures and the test score plummet that occurred once Rhee was no longer DC chancellor.

I also discuss the involvement of former DC principal, Adell Cothorne, who refused to keep silent when she encountered DC teachers altering student test documents and who demanded heightened security for her school’s tests.

On April 2, 2015, I asked Cothorne if she would weigh in on the Atlanta verdict.

She agreed.

The remainder of this post is Cothorne’s initial reaction to the Atlanta verdict. I have invited her to expand upon her initial reaction once she has had some more time to ponder the situation, so stay tuned.

Adell Cothorne

Adell Cothorne

On April 1, 2015, 11 Atlanta educators were indicted in a cheating scandal that has captured public attention for the last three years. One of the defendants called the judge’s decision to have the educators immediately sent to jail “unnecessary and vindictive”. Many argue – via social media – that the judge was too harsh and only handed down such a stern decision because the defendants were African-American.

There will be many people who weigh in during the next few days, weeks, and even years about what this verdict means. Some pundits will have had zero experience in education but feel they can wax poetic about the virtues of merit pay, testing, and the “plight” of educating urban children.

Let me take a moment to deliver a brief synopsis of mycredentials:

  • I have been an educator for over 20 years and spent the bulk of my ACTUAL classroom and administrative experience in elementary (Kindergarten – 5th grade) and Kindergarten – 8th grade (K – 8) settings
  • My Masters in Administration and Supervision was earned at Johns Hopkins University and I am currently in the process of completing my doctorate
  • Recently, I worked for a Harvard project based in Baltimore City supporting various schools and school stakeholders
  • Most importantly, I am the FORMER District of Columbia (DC) principal who uncovered a cheating scandal and made the decision to file a whistleblower’s lawsuit against DC Public schools.

So when I tell you I have the experience and expertise to respond to the Atlanta verdict, it is not by happenstance.

I agree with Judge Jerry Baxter – these people are convicted felons and should be treated as such.

Do I condone what they did in reference to manipulating students’ tests? No I do not – in any way, shape, or form.

Do I understand why they participated in these egregious acts? I do!

Society as a whole has turned a blind eye to the incessant destruction of public education. Pretty much the way we ignored union bustingand the corporate takeover of teaching hospitals– we have ignored the dismantling of public school systems. All too often, the collective “we” trust that those with the “expertise” make the most logical decision based on the “good of the group.” Education reform (and everything that comes along with it) has illustrated that there is only one thing considered when a society-altering decision is made – money!

A large component of education reform is merit pay. Many feel that merit pay is a fair way to reward teachers. Merit-pay isn’t really about rewarding teachers who teach effectively and increase student achievement. Merit pay is holistically about creating a mechanism to prove teachers aren’t teaching effectively. Why, you ask? A teacher who is proven ineffective can be terminated and not receive a pension. Not allowing as many people to receive pensions is a real money saver for those persons in powerful (and financially wealthy) positions. I won’t go on too much about merit pay here. I’ve written about how merit pay is calculated in one school district in another piece.

I believe many were coerced into changing student test answers. I have firsthand knowledge and experience of being bullied, harassed and professionally threatened. It is not an easy situation. Yet, at the end of the day I could not become complicit in acts that robbed hundreds of children of opportunity. The test scores did not match the student ability I observed. I had eighth-grade students in my building who could not compose a paragraph. Some of these eighth-grade students were 15 years old!

In my time as a DC principal, I had staff members who not only could not deliver effective instruction but were actuallyphysically and emotionally abusive to students. Yet these staff members did not fear retribution because they felt protected by certain DCPS executive staff members. My reprimands and written admonishments fell on deaf ears.

My frustration in trying to do right by my students in DC brings me to the issue of the former Atlanta school superintendent Beverly Hall denying she had any knowledge of cheating. I can say with complete confidence – that was a lie! Anyone in education knows that the current state of affairs in education, with its “data-driven reform,” calls for all school stakeholders (specifically teachers, administrators and central office staff) to look at student data on a regular basis (at least monthly). This data many times is all-inclusive and ranges from attendance to achievement to how many students receive free and reduced meals.

As a former administrator, I was taught (as many of my counterparts were) to question any huge gains in data. A huge gain is usually equivalent to a score increase of 7 percent or more. So even though Ms. Hall may not have given a directmandate for schools to improve scores by any means, she was complicit in her silence.

Please do not think doing the right thing comes without a price. As I sit here typing this response, I am unemployed. I have interviewed for a few positions (with public school systems and in the private sector). Many times I get called back for a second or third interview only to be sent an email basically saying, “Thanks, but no thanks.” Both my gut and some brave souls willing to commend my action tell me that– because of my decision to advocate for thousands of students and be a voice– I have to take some hits.

I’m okay with that.

This is part of my journey.

And I won’t stop talking!

–Adell Cothorne

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is of former Atlanta Public Schools School Research Team Director Tamara Cotman, center, is led to a holding cell after a jury found her guilty in the test-cheating trial on April 1 in Atlanta. Source: Kent D. Johnson/Atlanta Journal-Constitution/AP.

Senator Rubio: Iran framework a ‘colossal mistake’

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The team of Kerry and Obama view Iran as though it is a common cold; whereas it is a deadly virus.

This is at least the third Obama deadline that has been missed in the nuclear negotiations with Iran. Deadlines are in the nature of ‘red lines’. Each time Obama’s red line is breached it sends a clear message to Iran and U.S. allies that nothing the Obama White House says can be relied on or trusted.

Worse it says to Iran that Obama’s fixation with a nuclear deal can be used to extract more concessions until there is virtually nothing left. Iran already knows Obama is ready to offer ‘Unconditional Surrender’. Iran also knows it can breach any agreement any time and in any way because short of military action which they know Obama has taken off the table there will be no repercussions.

In the past Kerry announced that an agreement if entered into will not be legally binding on anyone. Obama and Kerry have offered America a charade in place of a binding agreement. More extensions are almost a certainty because Iran’s game plan is to keep its centrifuges spinning while talks continue and Obama’s game plan is to kick the problem down the road until he is no longer president.

Who will save humanity?

Obama’s policy is like trying to befriend and contain a suicide bomber who murders innocents in the name of Allah.

In the past over the objection of the U.S. and members of the P5+1 countries, Israel destroyed nuclear weapons facilities in Iraq and Syria. To date no one has said thank you. We do not know if Israel has the capacity to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities but we can all pray it does..

It is ironic that one of the smallest and most maligned countries in the world may be the only hope civilization has to stop Iran’s nuclear weapons program and to prevent a nuclear arms race followed by Iran’s final apocalyptic battle with its enemies as predicted in its scriptures.

President Obama called the Iran framework “historic” in a Rose Garden speech today, April 2, 2015. New Jersey Democratic Senator Bob Mendez thinks differently and by thinking differently he is under attack by the leader of his own party and was forced to step down from his position as ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. That in and of itself is historic.

Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL)  issued the following statement after President Obama’s appearance:

“I look forward to hearing from administration officials what specific terms Iran has agreed to as part of what was supposed to be a comprehensive framework agreement, but the initial details appear to be very troubling. Through more than a decade of efforts to resolve international concerns about Iran’s nuclear program, this regime has consistently lied about its ambitions and hidden the true nature of its efforts from the world. Among other issues, allowing Iran to retain thousands of centrifuges, keeping facilities such as Fordow open and not limiting Iran’s ballistic missile program indicate to me that this deal is a colossal mistake.

“This attempt to spin diplomatic failure as a success is just the latest example of this administration’s farcical approach to Iran. Under this President’s watch, Iran has expanded its influence in the Middle East, sowing instability throughout the region. Iran’s support for terrorism has continued unabated without a serious response from the United States. The regime’s repression of the Iranian people and its detentions of American citizens continue. And now Tehran is gaining international acceptance of its nuclear ambitions and will receive significant sanctions relief without making serious concessions.

“I intend to work with my colleagues to continue to ensure that any final agreement, if reached, is reviewed by Congress and that additional sanctions continue to be imposed on Iran until it completely gives up its nuclear ambitions and the regime changes its destructive behavior.

“Our message to Iran should be clear: until the regime chooses a different path, the United States will continue to isolate Iran and impose pressure. Today’s announcement takes us in the opposite direction, and I fear it will have devastating consequences for nuclear non-proliferation, the security of our allies and partners, and for U.S. interests in the region.”

RELATED ARTICLES:

Defeatist Obama’s deal with the devil

The Iran Deal’s Fatal Flaw

Obama’s Iran deal falls far short of his own goals

What Will Legal Marijuana Cost Employers?

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What effect will legalized marijuana have on employers?  National Families in Action, a drug policy and education organization, is releasing a White Paper that examines problems employers are facing in states that have legalized marijuana for medical or retail use. 

The paper addresses how marijuana laws are changing, how these laws will affect employers’ ability to conduct business, and what employers can do to protect that ability. It was written by Sue Rusche, president and CEO of National Families in Action and Kevin Sabet, Ph.D., president and co-founder of Smart Approaches to Marijuana. Guided by an advisory group of experts representing diverse fields, from employment law to occupational nursing to company executives to drug policy, the White Paper asks tough questions informed by events transpiring in legal marijuana states.

The paper addresses issues such as:

    •    Will employers be able to maintain a drug-free workplace?
    •    How will employers accommodate employees who use medical marijuana?
    •    How can employers with employees in multiple states comply with drug laws that differ from state to state?  
    •    Will employers be able to shift employees who use marijuana to other jobs?
    •    Will employers have an adequate supply of qualified workers?

Lawsuits have already begun in states with legalized marijuana as employees try to establish various rights that clash with employers’ commitments to maintain drug-free workplaces mandated by federal funding and federal contracts, to conduct business with conflicting laws from state to state, and to protect employees and the public from the consequences of increased marijuana use and related problems.

The White Paper examines some of these lawsuits and provides a scientific evaluation of the consequences of marijuana use to alert employers about what lies ahead if marijuana is fully legalized. It also suggests steps employers can take to protect safety, productivity, and the bottom line. 

What Will Legal Marijuana Cost Employers can be found on National Families in Action’s website here.

VoteTocracy Chrome Extension Makes Congress Just a Click Away

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VoteTocracy LogoNEW YORK, April 1, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — VoteTocracy, the online citizen voting site for bills in Congress, announced the launch of its new Google Chrome extension. The VoteTocracy extension allows users to view decision makers and bills discussed in news articles and immediately and directly contact government representative without leaving the article.

Once the Chrome extension is installed, users are automatically prompted to place their cursor over the name or bill in an article, enabling a small engagement box to appear. For example, if an article had the names Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, John Boehner, Harry Reid, Elizabeth Warren or any other Congressmen, those names would be highlighted. From there, users can directly email members of the legislature directly or vote Yes or No on the bill itself. The VoteTocracy extension allows citizens’ voices to be heard, while having a positive, timely impact on legislation.

votocracyRecently with the continued migration from offline print to online media, there has been an increase in political interest among Americans. Everyone has an opinion regarding our nation’s problems, however, speaking out on social media sites and utilizing hashtags is not an effective form of advocacy. In fact, “hashtag activism” has no long term impact on serious political and social issues.

Ironically, even as people become more polarized or vocal online about political issues, political participation has been lackluster. Some statistics about voter turnout:

  • Only 58% of eligible voters voted in the 2012 presidential election.
  • The midterm elections in 2014 garnered the lowest voter turnout since World War II at 36.4%.
  • Voter turnout has been consistently falling since the 1964 elections.

A 2008 report by the Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) found that 200 million messages are sent to Congress every year. Election turnout may be dismal, but the report finding proves that it is not because the public doesn’t care. Until VoteTocracy there has not been a way to measure influence and outcomes. VoteTocracy closes that the loop by holding elected officials accountable; their dashboard measures the effectiveness of Representatives or Senators against an individual’s preferences. This focus on outcomes is what differentiates VoteTocracy. Scoreboards keep track and aggregate sessions to one simplified visual: https://www.votetocracy.com/congressmen/114/scoreboard

“People are frustrated with Congress yet at the same time feel powerless. Approval ratings for Congress are at an all-time low,” says VoteTocracy CEO David Kraljic. “VoteTocracy can provide Americans the opportunity to truly impact our elected officials whose decisions affect our lives.”

“People are most activated about an issue or an action taken by a Senator or Representative when they are consuming media,” continues Kraljic. “They might read an article about a new piece of legislation and be angered or supportive of it. It is at that moment that they need to take action, and the VoteTocracy Chrome extension allows them to do just that.”

For a demo of how the VoteTocracy Chrome extension works, visit https://www.votetocracy.com/browser-extension/

VoteTocracy will also be releasing a Safari and Firefox version of the extension in the near future. The extension is available for download at https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/votetocracy/noibadhiddocgldphdjlfgeolemofgmp

About VoteTocracy

VoteTocracy is citizen powered Congress. Citizens and organizations vote on real bills and they tally the results against Congressional outcomes. Founded in 2009, VoteTocracy exists to level Main Street and K Street. For more information, visit www.votetocracy.com

TEA Party Hero refuses to cave on GOP’s Omnibus Funding Bill [Video]

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An elected Combat Veterans For Congress, Congressman James Bridenstine, Lcdr-USNR (R-OK-1), is one of the principled members of Congress who votes his conscious against very bad legislation, in support of the US Constitution, and regardless of the consequence.

Regardless of the possibility of retribution, Congressman Bridenstine voted his conscious against the Omnibus Funding Bill that provided funding for the budget thru September 2015 for the Obama administration illegal Executive Order that will effectively give Work Permits and Social Security Numbers to 5 million Illegal Aliens.  Cong Bridenstine also voted against re-electing the Speaker of the House of Representatives because the Speaker sought Pelosi’s help in getting her Democrat members to help the Speaker pass the Omnibus Spending Bill against the votes and will of the majority of Republican Congressmen.  Following his votes of conscious, Congressman Bridenstine was removed from the House Rules Committee by the Republican leadership.  That action was uncalled for and we oppose that type of vindictive retribution against a Patriotic Congressman who votes to protect and defend the US Constitution..

Please read the below article about Congressman Bridenstine, listen to his interview with Joe Miller on the Joe Miller Show. In the interview, Congressman Bridenstine refuses to back down from his principled stands and his votes to protect and support the US Constitution, regardless of future consequences.  We and all Americans are fortunate to have a Representative in the House with integrity like Congressman Bridenstine representing the voters.  We wish more Congressmen were as principled as Congressman Bridenstine; we will continue to support him in any way we can, and encourage all American citizens to financially support Cong Bridenstine’s re-election campaign in 2016.

Congressman Bridenstine: Tea Party Hero Refuses to Back Down from GOP Leadership

In an exclusive interview with Joe Miller Show, Congressman Bridenstine talked about his stand against the GOP Leadership and the critical need to fight Obama’s unconstitutional power grab. Listen to this patriot discuss his modern day fight against the Tories of our time:

Congressman Jim Bridenstine was endorsed by the Combat Veterans for Congress and was elected in 2012 to represent Oklahoma’s First District, which covers Washington, Tulsa, Wagoner Counties plus portions of Rogers & Creek Counties. Bridenstine serves on the House Armed Services Committee and the Science, Space and Technology Committee.

From the start, Cong Bridenstine has been widely recognized in the House for his integrity, commitment to principles, and willingness to uphold the rule of law. He has become an effective member of Congress by focusing on three specific areas: National Security, Economic Freedom, and Constitutional Integrity. Jim supports moving toward a balanced budget through spending control, tax reform, and financial measures and policies promoting free markets.

Bridenstine has focused on the elimination of Obamacare and reform of laws and regulations that present a huge burden on the economy. He has introduced legislation and supported a strong national defense, religious freedom, protection of life, free speech and restoration of the balance of power within the branches of the federal government consistent with the Constitution.

On April 1st, Bridenstine achieved a remarkable accomplishment and became the first freshman on the Science, Space and Technology Committee to author and pass legislation this session. The Weather Forecasting Improvement Act (HR2413) will enable technology development to save lives and protect property from severe weather, including tornadoes, without adding to the budget or debt. The measure received tremendous bipartisan support and passed on a voice vote.

Bridenstine’s background includes a triple major at Rice University, an MBA from Cornell University, 9 years of active duty in the United States Navy, and he is an Eagle Scout. Cong Bridenstine began his Naval aviation career flying the E-2C Hawkeye off the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln. It was there that he flew combat missions in Iraq and Afghanistan and gathered most of his 1,900 flight hours and 333 carrier arrested landings. While on active duty, he transitioned to the F-18 Hornet and flew at the Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center, the parent command to TOPGUN. He is currently a Lieutenant Commander in the U.S. Navy Reserve where he flew the E-2C Hawkeye in America’s war on drugs before becoming a member of Congress. He and his wife Michelle live in Tulsa with their three children, ages 7, 5, and 2.

Read more.

EDITORS NOTE: Click here to learn more about Combat Veterans for Congress: http://www.CombatVeteransForCongress.org

President Obama Pins Fading Legacy Hopes on Doomed UN Climate Conference

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President Barack Obama is looking for a stunning feather to place in his legacy cap. He has his eyes set on the United Nations climate conference (COP 21) in Paris, France to make it happen.

The grand confab of world leaders is set for November 30 to December 15 this year. The White House goal is to have a consensus climate agreement that it will then use to signify President Obama’s coronation as the global leader who saved the planet from mankind’s climate changing CO2. At least that’s the plan.

Unfortunately, no comprehensive mandatory international agreement is forthcoming; far from it. There are many reasons for why the gathering in Paris will not produce the results the global warming community seeks and may be doomed at the outset:

  1. Results from the recent contentious UN climate negotiations in Lima Peru (December 2014) sent a clear message to all – only a voluntary agreement can be had in Paris, at best.
  2. President Obama has effectively gutted any meaningful agreement among the major industrialized nations, by having granted to the planet’s largest CO2 producer, China, free license to build as many coal power plants as they wish, and emit as many gigatons of greenhouse gases as they wish until 2030.
  3. India’s economic plan is for record future coal usage not a reduction. They will demand at least equal treatment to the Chinese and probably more. In fact, as reported by the Wall Street Journal just yesterday, India is expected to consume 170 million tons of coal in 2015. At current growth rates, they may eclipse China in the next few years as the top coal powered nation on the planet.
  4. Russia is hardly eager to sign on to anything President Obama asks for without monumental concessions by the U.S., even for a voluntary agreement. I fear U.S. friends and allies may pay the price of such a deal.
  5. There is a simmering anger from the third world countries. They have not received their promised billions of dollars from the US and other developed nations to help them manage climate change. This may resurface in Paris as most of the wealthier nations that made commitments, are struggling with flat to meager economic growth, mounting deficits, and thus inability to honor their promises.

Importantly, the attendees will be forced to ignore that the Earth’s climate is indeed changing – to a new potentially dangerous cold one. Many scientists are now convinced that the Earth is heading into a prolonged cold era with Russian climatologists saying a new ‘Little Ice Age’ may have already begun.

These cold climate predictions are well supported by global temperature trends. For example, there has been no global warming for eighteen long years! There is now impressive on-going growth in global sea ice and colder temperatures within the Arctic and the Antarctic. Yet another brutal winter in 2014 and 2015 saw thousands of new snow and cold records worldwide especially in the northeast U.S. This comes at a time when the global warming crowd had predicted there would no longer be any snow by now, much less shattering cold temperature records over 100 years old. It’s a good thing the conference is in Paris and not Boston.

To help set the stage for the UN conference, we should expect the President’s science agencies, will once again predict that this year will be the warmest on record. Every extreme weather event will take center stage in the media. White House climate staffers must be secretly hoping for a hurricane to hit Miami.

President Obama’s real legacy, however, will be lost among the celebrations and media-hyped accolades being preplanned for the UN climate conference.

Years from now, as crops worldwide are destroyed by the new cold climate, and the world’s people scramble about for food in a much colder, more insecure world, who will remember the U.S. President who reveled in and was praised for leading the fight to save the world from man-made global warming.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Backlash Against Obama’s Committing U.S. to International Climate Agreement

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of Winslow Townson/AP.

An Analysis of President Obama’s Middle East Policy: The Blind, Misleading The Blind

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Hubris: From Greek Hybris, meaning wanton violence, insolence, outrage; originally presumption toward the gods. 

Introduction

These days, we’re looking at spectacular displays of hubris, on steroids.  Scan the horizon in any direction, and there lies a threat, and/or a maturing scandal.  For those with eyes to see, the façade has slipped, and the mystery of iniquity is no longer hidden by shadows, or confined to once-secret rooms.  Rather, we are being openly misled, as we witness an overt, deliberate and intentional campaign of disinformation, distraction and deception, on both the domestic and foreign-policy fronts.

Despite cascades of evidence to the contrary, we are constantly reassured by Obama and Company, Inc., that all is well in the Middle East, not to mention here in Wonderland, and that we are more secure than we have ever been in our history.  Like the self-indulgent ruler and his faithful enablers in the Emperor’s New Clothes, it would be comical, if it wasn’t so dangerous.

As citizens, the only antidote to this relentless campaign of disinformation, distraction and deception is to stay constantly engaged, remain ever vigilant (alert), and keep our eyes fixed on the values embedded in our founding document, the Constitution.  No longer can we indulge in the passive assumption that our government is entirely benign, deriving its ‘just powers from the consent of the governed,’ nor can we safely presume that our current form of government could never ‘become destructive of these ends.’

For example, when at first 47 Senators, then 367 members of the House wrote formal letters expressing their concerns about ‘grave and urgent issues’ (vis-à-vis the impending nuclear deal with Iran), we were informed by the White House that the President was embarrassed.  Not cooperative, not responsive – as any reasonable person would expect – but ‘embarrassed.’  This was followed with a display of contempt from the Executive branch that no single generation of Americans has ever seen.  Meanwhile loyal members of the Democratic Party responded with their own barrage of condescension and derision, while describing the entire effort as ‘amateurish.’

Nonetheless, as Michael Flynn said recently:

“We’re not all going to suddenly wake up and peace is going to be breaking out in the Middle East.  We’re going to face increasing complexity in the Middle East and the escalation of this sectarian civil war.  And what seems to be a ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ when it comes to Iran isn’t that at all, but it’s a train, and it’s heading in our direction.”

President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu

As with so many of the byzantine policies of this Administration, the recent 30-car pile-up between President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu didn’t just suddenly erupt with unexpected, spontaneous violence, right in the middle of the heated Israeli elections.  Quite the contrary, the tectonic shift leading to the pile-up began years ago, well before the latest well-choreographed flurry of official declarations about ‘divisive rhetoric,’ ‘racism’ and ‘evaluating our approach’ were released for public consumption.

Referring to statements Mr. Netanyahu made on the last day of the Israeli elections, U.S. State Department Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf summed it all up so nicely on March 19, 2015, when she opined:

“When you say things, words matter.  And if you say something different two days later, which do we believe?  It’s hard to know.”

So true, Ms. Harf!  These days, it really is hard to know exactly who (or what) we should believe…

Oddly, then, from their commanding perch, way up in the lofty, panoramic heights of moral clarity, it seems the Administration somehow managed to overlook all of the ‘Words Matter’ statements made by Fatah and/or Saeb Erekat and the Palestinian Authority in the lead-up to the Israeli elections.  Or, perhaps the State Department thought it was all just harmless rhetoric, or merely a passing mirage?

Should we believe them, Ms. Harf, or you?  It’s really hard to know…

Note: Just this past January, I observed that “If the first postings on the Fatah and/or PA official websites provide any indication, we will see a steady stream of violent anti-Israel propaganda in 2015.”  Boy, did that turn out to be true (see more on this below).

Meanwhile, in addition to Fatah, et al., the Administration had several other excellent opportunities to miss an opportunity (thanks, Abba Eban) in the days and weeks pre- and post the elections, vis-à-vis a cascade of other ‘Words Matter’ statements made by the PLO, and Hamas, and One Voice / V-15 and J-Street.  In the permissive environment of this Administration, even Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is participating in the verbal festivities, and has thrown his hat into the ring for the title of World Champion Liar and Deceiver.

So many spectacular displays of hubris, on steroids!  Should we believe all of them, too, Ms. Harf, or not?  Apparently not, since not a single barbed, pithy admonition has been directed toward any of them, either.  Maybe such an effort would be just a ‘waste of time’?

Among many of the ironies embedded within this whole bizarre (cynical) fiasco, Ms. Harf made her authorized ‘Words Matter’ statements on the fifth anniversary of Obamacare (remember ‘You can keep your doctor’?) and the twelfth anniversary of the founding of the Department of Homeland Security.

Are we safer now, then we were before 9/11?  Again, it’s hard to know…

Sadly, it seems that much of this multi-faceted nuanced irony is lost to our elected custodians of freedom and democracy, who spend their time floating around in the self-contained bubble of D.C.  For, on the one hand, they are obviously capable of decisive, high-speed action (remember the 2013 WWII Memorial shutdown?), and of using direct, pointed criticism…if/when they want to.

On the other hand, despite their ‘deep concerns‘ about Mr. Netanyahu’s rhetoric, they remain remarkably (dangerously) myopic and childish, especially when you consider their chronic, deliberate & intentional efforts to minimize the malevolent threats coming daily from individuals and organizations who plainly express their intention to destroy us and our friends (i.e. Israel).

Apparently, Obama and Company, Inc., doesn’t realize what a gigantic Freudian slip this is, as they publicly treat their friends like their enemies, and their enemies like their friends, while pretending to be competent.

Background – Where Did This All Start?

First, I’d like to suggest three recent articles that summarize macro ‘turning point’ events preceding the March 2015 elections in Israel.  The first article is entitled A Statement On The Crisis In The U.S.-Israel Relationship.  The second is entitled The Religious Dogma of Palestinian Statehood, and the third is entitled Obama-Netanyahu Hostility Is ‘Unprecedented’ In History.

The first article includes these insightful observations (vis-à-vis policies toward Israel and Iran):

The relationship between the United States and Israel is in jeopardy because, from the moment his administration began, Barack Obama has consciously, deliberately, and with malice aforethought sought to jeopardize it.  He did so in part because he is committed to the idea that Israel must retreat to its 1967 borders, dismantle its settlements, and will a Palestinian state into existence.  He views Israel’s inability or unwillingness to do these things as a moral stain. But the depth of Obama’s anger toward Israel and Netanyahu suggests that there is far more to it than that.  Israel stands in the way of what the president hopes might be his crowning foreign-policy achievement: a new order in the Middle East represented by a new entente with Iran.  Netanyahu’s testimony on behalf of his country and his people is this: A nuclear Iran will possess the means to visit a second Holocaust on the Jews in a single day.  His testimony on behalf of everyone else is this: A nuclear Iran will set off an arms race in the Middle East that will threaten world order, the world’s financial stability, and the lives of untold millions.  Simply put, Obama finds the witness Israel is bearing to the threat posed by Iran unbearable.

President Obama Enters The Scene

Many of the bitter seeds of today’s failing official Middle East Policy, as well as the festering conflict between President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu, were planted in the aftermath of the failed July 2000 Camp David Summit.  As Robert Malley* described it: Nowhere was this [failure to reach a ‘Peace Agreement’] more evident than in the case of what is known as the Haram Al-Sharif to Palestinians and the Temple Mount to Jews…In the end, the Palestinians would have nothing of it: the agreement had to give them sovereignty [of Haram Al-Sharif], or there would be no agreement at all.  Mr. Malley also observed that, according to Yasser Arafat, “there was no [generous Israeli] offer; besides, it was unacceptable; that said, it had better remain on the table.”

NOTE: See more on Robert Malley below.

Fast forward to August 12, 2008, and we find the same no-deal scenario played out again, only this time between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.  According to Mr. Abbas, this offer was rejected because [1] it did not provide for a contiguous Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, and [2] showed a “lack of seriousness,” despite the fact that Israel had pledged to return 93 percent of the West Bank and all of the Gaza Strip (which Hamas had inconveniently seized from Fatah in June of 2006).

Another major turning point came on May 18, 2009, when Mr. Obama held a White House press conference together with Mr. Netanyahu and declared that “Settlements have to be stopped in order for us to move forward.  That’s a difficult issue.  I recognize that, but it’s an important one and it has to be addressed.”  Netanyahu responded to this demand by announcing a 10-month settlement freeze, while for the next nine months, Mahmoud Abbas refused all invitations (from the US and Israel) to negotiate.  Afterward, President Obama offered this astute analysis: “Although the Israelis, I think, after a lot of time showed a willingness to make some modifications in their policies, they still found it very hard to move with any bold gestures.”

Next, we’ll transition to President Obama’s June 04, 2009 major policy speech at Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt, where he stated “That is why I intend to personally pursue this outcome with all the patience that the task requires.  The obligations that the parties have agreed to under the Road Map are clear.  For peace to come, it is time for them – and all of us – to live up to our responsibilities.”

So far, so good.  However, in the same speech, Mr. Obama went on to express sympathy for the Palestinians by referring to the “daily humiliations, large and small, that come with occupation.”  These reassuring public comments left the Palestinians (and Arabs across the Middle East) in a jubilant mood (i.e., more ‘Hope & Change‘), but offended many Israelis after he went on to declare that the “United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.  This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace.  It is time for these settlements to stop.”

Less than a year later (on July 13, 2009), President Obama met in the White House with about a dozen leaders of the American Jewish community, where Malcolm Hoenlein, the Executive Vice Chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, told him, “If you want Israel to take risks, then its leaders must know that the US is right next to them.”  Apparently, Mr. Obama’s reply caught them all off-guard: “Look at the past eight years.  During those eight years, there was no space between us and Israel, and what did we get from that?  When there is no daylight, Israel just sits on the sidelines, and that erodes our credibility with the Arab states.”

A few months later (January 21, 2010), Mr. Obama declared during an interview with Time Magazine that he intended to continue “moving forward…we are going to…work with both parties to recognize what I think is ultimately their deep-seated interest in a two-state solution in which Israel is secure and the Palestinians have sovereignty and can start focusing on developing their economy and improving the lives of their children and grandchildren.”

Any uncertainty about what Mr. Obama really meant by ‘moving forward’ were dispelled on March 12, 2010, when Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton informed Mr. Netanyahu that his March 08, 2010 announcement of plans to build 112 new housing units in East Jerusalem sent a “deeply negative signal” about Israeli-American relations, adding that it had harmed “the bilateral relationship.”

According to (unnamed) ‘Administration officials,’ Mrs. Clinton was relaying the anger of President Obama at the announcement.  As she pushed aside Mr. Netanyahu’s diplomatic apologies, Mrs. Clinton maintained that she “could not understand how this happened, particularly in light of the United States’ strong commitment to Israel’s security.”  Meanwhile, Vice President Joseph Biden added his own emphatic condemnations to the proposed housing plan.

And now we come to May 19, 2011, the most decisive turning point in the relationship between Mr. Obama & Mr. Netanyahu (if not Israel and the pro-Palestinian West).  In a well-advertised policy speech at the U.S. State Department (given on the very eve of Mr. Netanyahu’s scheduled visit to Washington), Mr. Obama officially declared his support for a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict based on the pre-1967 borders, when Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights and Sinai Peninsula.  “The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine.  We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.”

Mr. Obama added that “The recent announcement of an agreement between Fatah and Hamas raises profound and legitimate questions for Israel – how can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist.  In the weeks and months to come, Palestinian leaders will have to provide a credible answer to that question.”

Note: Four years later (and counting), not a single Palestinian leader has provided a credible answer to ‘that question.’

In response, Mr. Netanyahu announced that Israel viewed Mr. Obama’s proposal as “unrealistic” and “indefensible,” while adding that Israel still intended to build 1,500 new housing units in east Jerusalem.  Seizing the opportunity, Palestinian officials quickly declared that peace negotiations with Israel were now ‘pointless,’ since Mr. Netanyahu had openly rejected Mr. Obama’s call to base any future peace talks on the pre-1967 borders.

At the same time, Fatah officials announced they would defy Mr. Obama, and seek UN recognition of Palestine as an independent state.  On November 29, 2012, the UN General Assembly approved the de facto recognition of a sovereign Palestinian state, despite threats by the US and Israel to withhold funds for the West Bank government.  Just prior to the vote, Mahmoud Abbas used the UN podium to demonstrate his world-class diplomacy and statesmanship, by denouncing Israel for its “aggressive policies and the perpetration of war crimes.”

Ms. Harf, once again, I am so glad you reminded us that “When you say things, words matter.  And if you say something different two days [months/years] later, which do we believe?  It’s hard to know.”

Now…let’s fast-forward six more years, to the events surrounding the 2015 elections in Israel.  Aside from President Obama and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who were the other major players in this drama?

Fatah, Palestinian Authority (PA), PLO and Hamas

In the weeks and months before the March 2015 elections were held, Fatah and the Palestinian Authority (PA) continued working to isolate and delegitimize Israel through political/diplomatic means, while continuing non-stop their official incitement of the Arab populations in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank.

Here is a chronological sample of just a few official Fatah/PA postings from January 2015 thru the March elections:

01-02-15               Fatah Promotes Violence and Martyrdom-Death To Mark Its 50th Anniversary

01-21-15               Abbas’ Fatah To Hezbollah: We Are In The Same Trench, And Are Resisting The Same Enemy

01-21-15               The PA And Fatah Paved The Way For Today’s Stabbing Attack In Tel Aviv

01-21-15               Fatah Calls Stabbing Attack Self-Sacrificing Operation

01-21-15               Fatah Facebook Page Incites Terror Hours After Stabbings

02-09-15               Abbas’ Fatah: Martyrdom-Death Is A Destiny We Assume Willingly And Serenely

02-09-15               Abbas’ Fatah Threatens Rocket Attacks And The End Of Israel

03-04-15               Abbas’ Fatah Promotes Rocket Attacks

03-10-15               Fatah Celebrates Murder Of 80 (sic) Israelis In Most Lethal Palestinian Terror Attack

03-10-15               On International Women’s Day Fatah Praises Female Terrorist Who Lured Israeli Youth To His Murder As O Glorious One

03-11-15               Collect Your Body Parts And Leave!

03-13-15               PA TV Host Lauds Poem: “Jaffa, Acre and Haifa…Leave, Leave.  This Land Is My Land”

03-26-15               PA Schooling: Fight The Jews, Kill Them, And Defeat Them

03-30-15               PA Mufti, Top Religious Leader: Muslims Have Religious Obligation To “Liberate Palestine”

After the elections, Mahmud Abbas declared that a two-state solution would be ‘impossible with a new government led by Mr. Netanyahu,’ adding that it was clear from Netanyahu’s campaign pledges that there was ‘no prospect of a negotiated settlement with him.’  Mr. Abbas also stated that “Netanyahu’s statements against a two-state solution and against a Palestinian state…are proof, if correct, that there is no seriousness in the (future) Israeli government about a political solution.”  Finally, Mr. Abbas also declared that the Palestinians would continue to “demand international legitimacy.  It is our right to go to anywhere in the world to achieve international legitimacy.”

All this, despite the fact that Mr. Abbas has not held elections since 2009, ‘does not take anyone into account, and is not accountable to any institution.’  Since there is no functioning Palestinian parliament, the only legislative decision-making body is the PLO Central Council.  However, its policy decisions can only be activated by the PLO’s Executive Council – which answers exclusively to Abbas.

Apparently, Zionist Union leaders Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni agreed with Mr. Abbas, publicly blaming their six-seat loss on Mr. Netanyahu’s racist statements, while insisting that his re-election was a “victory of hatred and fear,” and that Mr. Netanyahu was extreme in his warnings against a “government led by Tzipi and Buji [Herzog] backed by the Arab List.”

According to Chief PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat, Netanyahu’s victory “Show[ed] the success of a campaign platform based on settlements, racism, apartheid and the denial of the fundamental human rights of the Palestinian people.”  On March 18, 2015, Mr. Erekat also told Voice of Palestine radio that “It is clear Israel has voted for burying the peace process, against the two-state choice and for the continuation of occupation and settlement.”

Not to be outdone, Izaddin Al-Qassam (the armed wing of Hamas) used an election-day Twitter campaign urging all Palestinians to vote for Aymen Odeh, head of the Joint Arab List, in hopes that the party would garner 20 seats and bring about an “end to the occupation” and lead to a “majority representation” of Arabs in the Knesset.  This action (by a foreign power aka terrorist group) prompted Mr. Netanyahu to post a Facebook video, warning Israeli voters that “The right-wing government is in danger.  Arab voters are going en masse to the polls.  Left-wing NGO’s are bringing them on buses.”

As the outcry from the Arab leaders and leftists from around the world (including the US Administration) gained in volume, Mr. Netanyahu later clarified that “What’s wrong is not that Arab citizens are voting, but that massive funds from abroad from left-wing NGO’s and foreign governments are bringing them en masse to the polls in an organized way, thus twisting the true will of all Israeli citizens who are voting, for the good of the Left.”

The Likud Party

Israel’s multiparty political system is based on forming (and maintaining) coalitions of ‘like-minded’ parties that represent specific groups such as Israeli Arabs, Russian immigrants, Sephardic (i.e., non-European) Jews, and a wide spectrum of observant (‘religious’) Israelis.  Mr. Netanyahu leads the Likud Party (‘The Consolidation Party’), which has a strong base among middle-class Israelis (many who emigrated from the Arab world).  In general, ‘Likudniks’ tend to be politically conservative, protective of a homeland for the worldwide Jewish community, and supportive of an aggressive policy towards terror attacks.

On December 02, 2014, after a series of disagreements with centrists in his coalition, Mr. Netanyahu fired Finance Minister Yair Lapid and Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, then immediately called for the dissolution of Parliament and early elections, which were then held on March 17, 2015.  According to the final official tally, Likud won 30 seats in the 120-seat Parliament, while the leftist opposition Zionist Union party came in second with 24 seats.  The parties that followed were the Joint Arab List (13), Yesh Atid (11), Kulanu (10), Bayit Yehudi (8), Shas (6), United Torah Judaism (6), Yisrael Beytenu (6) and Meretz (5).  After the Central Election Committee released the final election results on March 25, 2015, Israeli President Reuven Rivlin officially assigned Mr. Netanyahu the task of forming a new coalition government.

On the last day of pre-election campaigning (March 16, 2015), the NRG site published a video interview with Mr. Netanyahu.  During the interview, he said, “I think that anyone who is going to establish a Palestinian state today and evacuate lands is giving attack grounds to radical Islam against the state of Israel.  Anyone who ignores this is sticking his head in the sand.  The left does this time and time again.  We [i.e., Likud] are realistic and understand.”  When Mr. Netanyahu was then specifically asked whether a Palestinian state would not be established if he were reelected Prime Minister, he answered, “Correct.”

Back in Washington, the Obama Administration chose to respond to the preposterous situation (i.e., active attempts to influence the elections from both terrorist groups and foreign leftist groups) by announcing on March 18, 2015 that the US government was “deeply concerned about Mr. Netanyahu’s campaign rhetoric against Arab voters,” adding that the US would not only “convey its concerns,” but would now have to “reevaluate its position on Mideast peace process.”

From there, things went from bad to worse, when US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki held a press briefing on the same day and stated, “Based on the Prime Minister’s comments, the US is in a position going forward in which we will be evaluating our approach with regards to how best to achieve a two-state solution,” adding that “the fact that he has changed his opinion certainly has an impact on US decision-making moving forward.”

Apparently, a reasoned, rational response to Mr. Netanyahu’s reality-based concerns was just too much for some of us to hope for.  Mr. Netanyahu did not say ‘never,’ just that the two-state solution would not be possible ‘today.’  We were also told that Mr. Netanyahu reiterated that fine point during a telephone phone call with the President, and that Mr. Obama didn’t believe him, adding that “I indicated to him that given his statements prior to the election, it is going to be hard to find a path where people are seriously believing that negotiations are possible,” while ignoring the Prime Minister’s post-election attempts to walk back [explain] his comments.  Instead, Mr. Obama has repeatedly made it clear – along with senior members of his administration – that now they all believe Mr. Netanyahu is opposed to the creation of a Palestinian state.

To complicate things even further, on March 19, 2015 (two days after the elections), the Administration declared that it could ‘take a tougher stance’ toward Mr. Netanyahu following his election victory, saying ‘there will be consequences for his sudden reversal on the idea of an independent Palestinian state.’  Senior officials also said that the Administration was ‘still evaluating options,’ and suggested that the US could ease its long-held official opposition to allowing the UN Security Council to create a Palestinian state.  “There are policy ramifications for what he said,” one official said of Netanyahu’s election campaign rhetoric rejecting the creation of a Palestinian state. “This is a position of record.”

Truth be known, this ‘tougher stance’ just reiterated an earlier Administration position, when it became evident that President Obama would not meet with Mr. Netanyahu before (or after) his March 03, 2015 speech to Congress.  According to White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest, the decision not to meet with Mr. Netanyahu was made partly out of a stated desire not to influence Israel’s elections, and partly because what he described as a ‘departure from protocol.’  At the same time, anonymous background sources had let it be known that Mr. Obama, Joe Biden and John Kerry would all shun Mr. Netanyahu during his visit to Washington, stating that “There are things you simply don’t do.  He spat in our face publicly and that’s no way to behave. Netanyahu ought to remember that President Obama has a year and a half left to his presidency, and that there will be a price.”

The U.S. State Department (John Kerry and Hillary Clinton)

On February 25, 2015 (during the volatile lead-up to Mr. Netanyahu’s March 03, 2015 speech before Congress), John Kerry testified at a hearing of the House Committee on Homeland Security, where he offered the following opinions about Mr. Netanyahu (vis-à-vis Iran and Iraq): The Prime Minister “may have a judgment that just may not be correct here,” while adding that Mr. Netanyahu, “was profoundly forward-leaning and outspoken about the importance of invading Iraq under George W. Bush.  And we all know what happened with that decision.”

On March 19, 2015, the Administration restated and clarified (?) its position, stating that the relationship between Israel and the U.S. would remain strong, but would no longer be managed by President Obama.  Instead, Secretary of State Kerry, will take over, along with Pentagon officials who handle the close military alliance with Israel.  “The president is a pretty pragmatic person and if he felt it would be useful, he will certainly engage.  The premise of our position…has been to support direct negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians.  We are now in a reality where the Israeli government no longer supports direct negotiations.  Therefore we clearly have to factor that into our decisions going forward.”

Along with what was discussed earlier in this article, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton publicly stated that she was “often the designated yeller,” as she represented the Administration’s efforts to force Mr. Netanyahu make concessions for the sake of ‘peace.’  According to Alon Pinkas, who was Israel’s Consul General in New York when Mrs. Clinton was a Senator from New York, “Her relationship with [Netanyahu was] very bad, just not as toxic as Obama’s.”

The United Nations

After the election, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon called Mr. Netanyahu and urged him to renew Israel’s commitment to a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, while informing Mr. Netanyahu that the “two-state solution was the only way forward,’ while urging him to renew Israel’s commitment to that goal.”

One Voice International (OVI) / V15

According to media reports, Paul Begala, who is ‘one of the prime architects of President Bill Clinton’s political victories,’ went to Israel to consult for the campaign of the Zionist Union party, led by Yitzhak Herzog.  Along with Mr. Begala, several other well-known political strategists who are closely-affiliated with Mr. Obama – led by field organizer Jeremy Bird – travelled to Israel to work with One Voice International, a ‘non-profit’ organization that fiercely opposed Netanyahu (just like their mentor, Mr. Obama).  Some of these same individuals will probably join the (prospective) Hillary Clinton presidential campaign.

Though it remains to be seen whether this deceitful abuse of officially-endorsed authority will rise to the level of a major scandal, on March 18, 2015, 20 members of Congress wrote a letter urging the State Department and Obama affiliates to answer questions regarding the possible use of US tax-payer dollars in the anti-Netanyahu campaign.  This isn’t the first time something like this has happened, either. Two of Bill Clinton’s former campaign strategists, including his pollster Stanley B. Greenberg and strategist James Carville, went to Israel in May of 1999 to help Ehud Barak defeat Mr. Netanyahu.

For the sake of convenience, here is a brief chronological sample of One Voice International / V15 articles:

12-17-14               2015 Israeli Elections: Critical Decisions Ahead

01-01-15               Likud Accuses Anti-Netanyahu Electoral Campaign Of Illegal Donations

01-26-15               Foreign Funding Bankrolls Anti-Netanyahu Campaign – Flies in 5-Man Obama Team

01-26-15               Obama Backs Campaign To Defeat Netanyahu In Israeli Elections

01-26-15               The Obama Campaign Strategist Who Could Break The Israeli Elections Wide Open

01-27-15               State Department-Funded Group Bankrolling Anti-Bibi Campaign

01-28-15               V15 – Look Who Is Behind The New U.S. Democratic-Style Campaign In Israel

01-29-15               Obama Funding The Anti-Bibi Campaign

01-28-15               State Department Funded ‘Obama Army’ On Ground In Israel To Defeat Prime Minister Netanyahu

01-29-15               Watchdog Slams Use Of American Taxpayer Funds To Finance Anti-Netanyahu Campaign

01-30-15               V15 US Political Operative marinated In Hate-Israel Activism

01-30-15               Likud Asks Elections Panel To Bar Campaigning By Organization Affiliated With Obama Strategist

02-01-15               US Taxpayers Funding Anti-Netanyahu Campaign?

02-02-15               Anti-Netanyahu Campaign Under Fire In Israel, United States

02-05-15               Memo Reveals Plan Of US-Funded Groups to Influence the Israeli Elections

02-09-15               US Embassy Met With Group Trying to Influence Israeli Elections

02-09-15               V15 Group Won’t Be Investigated Before Elections

J-Street, James Baker and Dennis McDonough

Finally, we come to J-Street, another part of the leftist kaleidoscope, which was founded ‘to promote meaningful American leadership to end the Arab-Israeli and Palestinian-Israel conflicts peacefully and diplomatically.’  On March 23, 2015, James Baker gave the keynote address at a J-Street Conference in DC, where he expressed support for the Administration’s ongoing talks with Iran, but was very critical of Mr. Netanyahu.  Mr. Baker stated, “Frankly, I have been disappointed with the lack of progress regarding a lasting peace – and I have been for some time,” adding that “in the aftermath of Netanyahu’s recent election victory, the chance of a two-state solution seems even slimmer, given his reversal on the issue.  I still remain cautiously optimistic – and I stress cautiously – because it seems to me that Israel’s future, absent a two-state solution, could be very difficult at best.”

Dennis McDonough

On the same day, White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough gave the keynote address, where he made the following comments: “An occupation that has lasted for almost 50 years must end, and the Palestinian people must have the right to live in and govern themselves in their own sovereign state.  Israel cannot maintain military control of another people indefinitely, that’s the truth.”  Mr. McDonough went on to say that the “United States will never stop working for a two-state solution and a lasting peace that Israelis and Palestinians so richly deserve,” adding that Mr. Netanyahu’s rejection of a Palestine state and approval of illegal settlements in the occupied territories for the strategic purpose of changing the borders was “so very troubling.”  Mr. McDonough concluded his comments by stating “In the end, we know what a peace agreement should look like.  The borders of Israel and an independent Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps.”

Oddly, nothing was said about Fatah’s March 11, 2015 warning for Israelis to “Collect your body parts and leave!”

Conclusion

Mr. Obama appears determined to keep pushing the reset button in the Middle East, despite the obvious failure of such an approach.  While using his global allies on the Left for political cover, it also appears that Mr. Obama will continue pressuring Mr. Netanyahu to make concessions for the sake of peace, while allowing the Palestinians to continue their campaign of incitement.

At the moment (March 31, 2015), the diplomatic crisis between Israel and Obama & Co., Inc., has been characterized as ‘the most vicious and public yet among only a handful of crises that have marred the close, long-running relationship.’  According to Israeli historian Jonathan Rynhold, the bad blood between Mr. Obama and Mr. Netanyahu is ‘unprecedented.’  Mr. Rynhold also observed that “the public nature of the mutual hostility is a new low.  I don’t think we’ve ever had as bad a relationship between a President and a Prime Minister, and of course that has policy consequences.”

On March 25, 2015, the Administration released a 386-page report entitled Critical Technological Assessment in Israel and NATO Nations, which includes a detailed description of Israel’s advanced military technology and infrastructure research during the 1970’s and 1980’s.  Politically, the timing of the revelation coincided with Mr. Netanyahu’s March 03, 2015 address in Congress, where he warned against any US-backed agreement that leaves Iran with nuclear breakout capabilities.

On March 29, 2015, House Speaker John Boehner appeared on CNN’s State of the Union program, where he said “I think the animosity exhibited by our administration toward the Prime Minister of Israel is reprehensible.  And I think that the pressure that they’ve put on him over the last four or five years has, frankly, pushed him to the point where he had to speak up.  I don’t blame him at all for speaking up.”  Mr. Boehner concluded the interview by stating “There are serious issues and activities going on in the Middle East, and I think it’s critically important for members of Congress to hear from foreign leaders…to get a real handle on the challenges we face there.”

In closing, on March 30, 2015, a dozen Jewish House Democrats met with Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes Obama and his aides, where they made it clear that the Obama Administration ‘had to stop acting as if the…Prime Minister’s comments are the only thing holding up a peace process, that’s been abandoned for a year, while not expressing a word of disappointment about Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.’  All this, [while] ‘openly toying with allowing the Palestinians their provocative recognition bid at the United Nations.’

According to the report, one (unnamed) aide told the group that Mr. Obama and his aides now believe it’s up to Mr. Netanyahu to repair a rift that they stress is only about the peace process, not the larger commitment to Israel.  “We’ve made our point.  The message has clearly been received,” a White House official said.  “The next move is theirs, presumably after the new government has been formed.”

As Americans, what can we expect in the weeks, months and years ahead?  Without a doubt, the challenges we face will go beyond anything ever seen before.  Some, perhaps even many of us, may be asked to stand up for those constitutional ‘truths that we hold to be self-evident.’  Despite the fact that our Founding Fathers had the foresight to design be remarkably flexible system, even a rubber band can only stretch so far before it breaks.  Will we find a way to ‘disenthrall ourselves, ’ or will the time eventually come ‘when necessity constrains us to alter our former Systems of Government’?

RELATED ARTICLE: How America’s Next President Can Lead on Foreign Policy

Obama’s War on Israel by Jerry Gordon and Ilana Freedman

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When the polls closed in Israel on March 17, 2015 for election of a new government, Israel’s Parliament, the Obama White House was poised for a result far different from the stunning victory of Prime Minister Netanyahu. His Likud Party list won a plurality of 30 seats, far ahead of his nearest rival, the Zionist Union, which secured only 24 seats. Although Israel’s second leading party, led by Labor MK Yitzhak Herzog, had been in a tight lead in the exit polls, they failed to achieve the victory over Likud.

The election results turned up another surprise as the party that finished third in the polling was the Joint Arab List (JAL), which claimed 14 seats. JAL is led by charismatic Haifa lawyer and City Council member, Ayman Oded of Hadash, a far left party that includes the Israeli Communist Party and drew votes from leftist Jewish extremists groups like B’Tselem and Peace Now.

While exit polls showed the Zionist Union with a narrow one seat lead, the polls proved to be dead wrong. Many Israeli voters were angered by both the yellow journalism tactics of the major opposition Israeli media, Yediot Ahronoth and Israeli TV channels 2 and 10, and the leaks about the blatant interference by foreign groups allied with President Obama and leftist EU NGOs. Just weeks before the election, it was reported that these groups had spent huge amounts of money to defeat Netanyahu’s party. But the large get-out-the-vote effort in the Israeli Arab community, which had been orchestrated by Obama’s campaign organizers, failed to unseat the beleaguered Likud party. Centrist voters cast their votes for Netanyahu’s party, and even the Israeli Bedouin communities voted overwhelmingly for Likud.

In the end, the vote was clearly a solid win for the Netanyahu camp. As a result, Israeli President Reuven Rivlin, in accordance with Israeli election law, invited various party leaders to come for consultations to identify possible partners in a new ruling coalition. On March 24th, he gave the nod to Netanyahu, who had cobbled together a coalition majority of Knesset seats, 67 of which came from a right center-religious coalition of parties.

The President Takes Revenge  

President Obama’s outrage at the election results was immediately apparent. At first, he refused to follow the basic diplomatic custom of calling the newly re-elected Prime Minister to proffer his congratulations. Instead, he waited for several days, and when he finally did make the call, he scolded Netanyahu for his positions rather than congratulating him for his win. Not satisfied with lecturing Netanyahu on alleged racist remarks about Arab voters, he also berated the PM for his remarks rejecting a two-state solution, the centerpiece of Obama’s “peace talks” between Israel and the Palestinians.

It is not altogether clear when the rift between Obama and Netanyahu began, but it certainly dates back to a series of diplomatic slights by the President during several visits by the Prime Minister to the White House.

Most recently, however, Netanyahu’s address before a joint meeting of Congress fanned the flames of Obama’s discontent. The purpose of Boehner’s invitation had been to give Netanyahu the opportunity to present Israel’s position on the danger posed to both Israel and the United States of a nuclear Iran to the members of Congress. This had been made necessary by the President’s own secrecy, keeping Congress in the dark about the ongoing negotiations. But Obama saw the invitation – and Netanyahu’s acceptance – as an affront to him personally, and rather than welcoming this as an opportunity to clarify the issues surrounding Iran’s quest for nuclear development, he took the dysfunction between himself and Netanyahu to a new level.

In his speech, Netanyahu presented the possibility of a nuclear Iran as a security threat to the US, and an existential threat to Israel, calling the P+5 impending deal a “very bad deal,” because it would allow Iran, a terrorist-supporting state, to become a threshold nuclear power. Obama, however, saw Netanyahu’s speech as a challenge to his P5+1 initiative. The now highly politicized negotiations with Iran to lift international financial sanctions against its highly controversial nuclear program had become central to an out and out assault on Netanyahu and the upcoming elections in Israel.

Prior to the PM’s speech, Obama showed his anger by making it clear that he would not “have time” to meet with Netanyahu while he was in Washington, claiming as well that it would give the appearance of interfering in Israel’s upcoming elections on March 17.

In the end, and quite possibly because the President had made such a big issue over it, the Prime Minister gave his speech to a packed House. Ten times the number of people who crowded into the gallery had to be turned away for lack of seating. The speech received international coverage, carried live, complete and uninterrupted, on several international networks. Netanyahu was called “Churchillian” by more than one commentator.

The Prime Minister’s speech was taken very seriously by many in Congress. Only days later, Sen. Tom Cotton (AK-R) authored a letter, co-signed by 46 Senate Republican colleagues, and addressed to the Leaders of the Iranian Islamic Republic. Sent via Twitter, the letter explained the Constitutional requirements for Senatorial advice and consent on treaties and certain executive agreements.

The response to the letter by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei mocked America’s “treachery.” Foreign Minister Zarif’s response went further, revealing that the Administration’s strategy was to sideline Congressional review by seeking a UN Security resolution for the deal with Iran, since the agreement was multilateral. That contention roiled Obama’s Congressional opponents even more. They warned the President not to sideline the US Congress in the Iranian negotiations.

Simultaneously, the bi-partisan US Senate Permanent Investigations Committee called for an investigation into possible violations of U.S. funding laws by those involved in the effort to unseat Netanyahu in the Israeli elections. The alleged non-partisan “get-out-the-vote” campaigns by the Abraham Fund, One Voice, and the Israeli group, V-15, under the leadership of former Obama Campaign field director Jeremy Bird of 270 Strategies, was now coming under scrutiny in Washington.

The Administration responded to these actions by Congress with an unprecedented attack on Israel, involving allegations that Israel had spied on the Iran negotiations and had given classified information to members of Congress. Presidential aides demanded the end of a “50 year occupation” at a J Street Conference in Washington, suggesting that it would support Palestinian statehood.

Israel Surrounded by Muslim States

The Administration further expressed its anger in an unprecedented move by permitting the Pentagon to declassify and release a secret, 1987 report on Israel’s nuclear program, despite a long-standing mutual agreement between the two allies to keep it secret. It was understood that to declassify the secret report would expose the Jewish nation’s known but unrevealed nuclear weapons capabilities, making it vulnerable to further political attack. The release, which was occasioned by a Freedom of Information Act request by the virulently anti-Israel Institute for Research -Middle East Policy, only related to Israel’s nuclear program. Those of other countries, contained in the report, were all redacted. The 386-page top-secret memo, titled, “Critical Technological Assessment in Israel and NATO Nations,” goes into great detail about how Israel turned into a nuclear power in the 1970s and 80s.

Although the details of Israel’s program may be, by now, dated, this unilateral action by the Obama Administration will no doubt bring renewed international pressure on Israel to become a signatory of the UN Non-Proliferation Treaty and be subject to intrusive UN IAEA inspections. A further consequence of the Administration’s declassification of the secret report on Israel’s nuclear program is it could provide a targeting file on possible attack scenarios in any retaliatory exchange with rogue nuclear states. This action is seen by many analysts as further evidence of the revenge campaign, unleashed by the Obama White House to further undermine Israel in the President’s uncompromising push for an agreement with Iran.

Incredulous Americans are now increasingly concerned that the Administration wants to achieve a rapprochement with Iran, ending 36 years of isolation, while marginalizing our closest ally in the region. Even as the Administration continues to placate and appease Iran, its developing anti-Israel policy is taking firm root in the White House and State Department. By negotiating with terrorists, even as a crescendo of cries of “Death to America” are broadcast from the lips of the Ayatollah himself, Obama has created a new reality in the Middle East that is more likely to lead to war than to peace.

Iran’s Expanding Role in the Middle East  

One particularly dangerous aspect of the Obama Iran rapprochement is the latter’s emerging hegemony over Arab States in Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Lebanon. The presence of its Quds Force commander, General Qassem Suleimani, in Iraq is particularly worrisome, as he orchestrates campaigns to wrest the city of Tikrit from ISIS, and further entrenches the Iranian presence there.

Following the collapse of the US-supported Yemeni government of President Hadi to a coalition of Shiite Houthi rebels supported by Iran, a new battleground has been created between Iran and Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and ISIS, unfettered by a pro-West government and a US military presence, which was suddenly and shamefully removed on orders from Washington. The new fighting in Yemen triggered an almost immediate Saudi response. No longer waiting for a US initiative, Saudi Arabia began reinforcing its southern frontier with Yemen with troops and tanks, and deterring cross border assaults by Houthi fighters.

Obama’s naive  paradigm of a geo-political equilibrium between Shia Muslims led by Iran and Sunni Arabs led by Saudi Arabia foundered with the dramatic intervention by the Saudi Air Force on Wednesday March 25, 2015. Attacking Houthi rebels in northern Yemen, the capital, Sana’a and targets near Aden, the Saudi operation “determination storm” began, opening a new page in Middle East history.

The Saudis gave less than one hour notice to the Pentagon and the White House of the launch of the air campaign. The Administration wasn’t consulted. That effrontery to the leader of the free world was in evidence at the 26th Summit of the Arab League in the Egyptian resort of Sharma El-Shaik. Abd-Rabbu Hadi, the ousted US-backed President of Yemen, who had fled from Aden to Saudi Arabia, accused the Houthi of being “stooges” for Iran. He refused any offer of a cease fire while the Saudis and Emirati air units continued attacking Houthi forces. Iran warned the Saudi and Emirate allies of “bloodshed,” if attacks continue, but the Saudis mobilized 150,000 ground forces for possible action.

Secretary General of the Arab League Nabil Al-Araby said the Arab states would “join ranks and look into taking pre-emptive and defensive arrangements to maintain the Arab national security,” and stressed the dire need for “necessary measures to counter them.”

The Washington Post reported Arab leaders had effectively announced a “joint military force to intervene in neighboring states grappling with armed insurgencies.”

All of us underestimated the Saudis. Now they have emerged at the top of a Sunni coalition against Iran–limited for the moment to the Houthi insurgency in Yemen, the most impressive piece of diplomacy in the Sunni world since Nasser, and perhaps in modern times. That attributes a lot of importance to a coalition assembled for a minor matter in a small country, but it may be the start of something important: the self-assertion of the Sunni world in response to the collapse of American regional power, the threat of Sunni jihadist insurgencies, and the Shi’ite bid for regional hegemony.

Obama’s policy of leading from behind has clearly failed to stem the tide of radical Islamic extremists both Shiite and Sunni. Instead, Saudi Arabia has assumed leadership of its own coalition of at least ten Arab states to fight the menace of Iran-led Shia armies.

Against this background, the Obama administration has unleashed his deliberate attack against the only reliable ally in the Middle East, Israel. Surrounded by enemies, including Iranian proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas, Quds Force, and IRGC troops astride the Golan frontier with Syria, Israel faces the possibility of an imminent war greater than any in the past. Reports of ISIS units actively fighting Assad’s forces in southern Syria, and suggestions that ISIS cells have now infiltrated Gaza, Sinai, and the PA in the West Bank only make the situation for Israel more tenuous and dangerous.

The Controversy and the American Jewish Community

Late on the night of Israel’s election returns, Charlie Rose of the eponymous PBS Show convened a panel of leftists to comment on the Netanyahu victory. The Charlie Rose panel was composed of Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic, Ari Shavit of Ha’aretz, Ronen Bergman Military Intelligence Columnist of Yedioth Ahronoth, Yousef Munayyer of the US Campaign against Palestine Occupation and Jerusalem Fund advocate for Anti-Israel BDS, and Lisa Goldman of the leftist +972 Magazine and Israel–Palestine Fellow of the New America Fund. The composition of Rose’s panel was unbalanced, to say the least, but, it could be argued, reflected the strong opposition to Israel represented by the left.

Ronen suggested that only the international BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanctions) campaign against Israel could change things by hitting Israelis in their back pockets, calling out Netanyahu as the virtual unbeatable “Caesar from Caesaria.” Goldberg, who has virtually unlimited interview access to the Obama West Wing, predicted that a narrow right-wing government would fall in a year with new elections and that relations with the Obama administration will get even worse. Shavit bemoaned the progressive peacenik failure on the Left in Israel, Israel losing its soul, portending looming violence – a reference to a Third Intifada – and demographic problems ahead. Munayyer hewed to his usual pro-Palestinian anti-Israel stance calling it a tribal election. Goldman in her comments praised the Joint Arab List’s third place showing in the Knesset elections as an important development for “Palestinian Israelis.” Watch the Charlie Rose panel discussion.

Yossi Halevy of the Shalom Hartman Institute was the only voice of reality. He said, “Israelis believe that a Palestinian State may be both an existential solution and a threat, given the impasse over negotiations.” Halevy conveyed the view that Israelis across the spectrum view an Obama consummation of an Iran nuclear deal as an existential threat. Halevy quoted left wing author David Grossman, saying that the Obama Administration on the Iran nuclear deal is “criminally naive and perilous for Israel.

The Obama-led disputes have clearly divided the American Jewish community. Using the Soros-backed J Street, a strident, anti-Israel not-for-profit masquerading as a pro-Israel organization, as a vehicle for airing their anti-Israel rhetoric, the assault turned even more vitriolic. Today, Israel looks more like an enemy to the Obama West Wing than terror-supporting Iran.

The rabbinic leadership of Reform and Conservative Jewish denominations chastised the Netanyahu campaign for campaign remarks about “droves of Arab voters” being driven to the polls in a deliberate attempt to unseat him in programs funded by foreign interests. The Jewish Telegraph Agency (JTA), a leftist media outlet supported by Jewish Federation news outlets in America, reported how Rabbi Rick Jacobs, a close ally of J Street, condemned Netanyahu for his remarks, taken out of context, of why a Palestinian State was not a realistic prospect under current conditions with a corrupt PA led by President Mahmoud Abbas in a unity government with Hamas.

Not to be outdone, the Rabbinic Assembly of the Conservative Movement, whose leadership at the flagship Jewish Theological Seminary has been an active partner in Jewish Muslim dialogues with Muslim Brotherhood front groups, released a statement accusing Netanyahu of undermining “the principles upon which the State of Israel was founded.”

Further evidence of the American Jewish community divide over the Netanyahu election was reflected in a Ha’aretz report which quoted several American Reform rabbis who sharply criticized Netanyahu for remarks he had made at the end of his campaign.

Daniel Sokatch of the leftist organization the New Israel Fund, who had been taken to task by Netanyahu in campaign remarks, said in a statement issued by the group, “When the Prime Minister urged his base to come out and vote to counter ‘Arabs coming in droves to the ballot box,’ I knew, as you did, that this pandering to fear and prejudice could only exacerbate the divisions between Arab and Jewish citizens.” That the remarks had been taken out of context was ignored and painted a picture of Netanyahu as a bigot who was opposed to Arabs and peace.

In contrast to the liberal Jewish outrage, the ZOA’s Executive Director Mort Klein expressed solidarity with Netanyahu’s positions, saying, “I’m proud that the Israelis chose reality and security over fantasy and a phony hope in change.” Klein blamed the Palestinian Authority for “forcing” Netanyahu to make his video promise not to allow a Palestinian state because “they’ve aligned themselves with Nazi-like Hamas.” Malcolm Hoenlein, Executive Vice Chairman of the Presidents of Major American Organizations, also cast his lot supporting Netanyahu and Israel. He said, “We know that politicians in the heat of campaigns in the U.S. and in Israel say things they may not mean to stick with in the long term. [Netanyahu] did not say that he gave up on the two-state solution, but rather that Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas “does not appear ready to negotiate.”

The Wall Street Journal published a lead editorial with the title, “Obama’s Israel Tantrum,” suggesting that “the leader of the free world takes revenge on an ally.”  “Even if you believe the main challenge in the region is getting Israel to cede more territory to the Palestinians, that day won’t happen until Israelis feel secure. But Israelis can be forgiven for feeling the opposite with a raging civil war in Syria, Islamic State and an offshoot of al Qaeda operating near the Golan Heights, Iranian General Qassem Soleimani leading Shiite militias in Iraq, and a U.S. Administration sounding and acting as if Iran can be a more constructive partner for peace than Israel.” (Read More)

Another Wall Street Journal article, “Israel Spied on Iran Talks,” suggests that accusations of spying by Israel on American negotiations with Iran is yet another effort by the Obama Administration to isolate and blame Netanyahu for damaging the prospects for a P5+1 political agreement with Iran (an agreement that even the French criticize for not being “fool proof”). While senior US officials admit they knew about Israel shadowing the Iran talks, they were incensed when Israel took what information they acquired from various sources, including Iran and other P5+1 participants, to brief Congress on the realities of how bad a deal was emerging.

It is clear that President Obama has unleashed revenge on Israel and PM Netanyahu, outraged that the Jewish nation would not succumb to his version of foreign policy and Israel’s need to comply with his wishes. He ignores Israel’s inherent obligation to assert its sovereign right to defend its people against the existential threats by Iran and its proxies, whose rising nuclear hegemony threatens the Middle East and the US.

America’s truculent president brooks no interference in his program. By attempting to marginalize Netanyahu’s legitimate objections to America’s rapprochement with Mahdist Iran, to US cooperation with Iran in the war against ISIS, and to concluding a political agreement that will enable Iran to achieve nuclear breakout, Obama has placed Israel in an untenable position.

As the Middle East continues to devolve into chaos, Israel remains the only stable democracy in the region. Israel’s future is tied closely to America’s. Often compared to “the canary in the coal mine,” any attack on Israel, which the Iranians call “the little Satan,” will be the precursor to a major attack on the US. That Obama refuses to acknowledge this, and continues to attack and threaten Israel, bodes ill for both countries.

It is not a stretch to say that as the chaos in the Muslim nations surrounding Israel continues to grow, America’s ability to withstand being drawn into another Middle East war will decrease exponentially. Only a strong and sound foreign policy that recognizes our true allies and our true enemies will enable the US to turn this escalating disaster around.

The next war will be more terrible than we can imagine. We cannot avoid it by ignoring the warning signs all around us. Time is running out.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. Also see Jerry Gordon’s collection of interviews, The West Speaks.

#IStandForReligiousFreedom — It’s a Basic Human Right

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The Founding Fathers understood basic human rights. They understood that the basic human rights of life, liberty and property come from God and not government. There are various groups that want to establish government over God in America. Among these groups are the Human Rights Campaign, the American Civil Liberties Union and Southern Poverty Law Center. All promote, protect and defend homosexuality in all of its forms. These organizations believe that homosexual behavior is a basic human right equal to the color of ones skin. The problem is the color of one’s skin is immutable, homosexuality is mutable.

These groups want government to impose anti-Christian policies and laws, which impede individual free exercise of religion guaranteed under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Recently Indiana joined 19 states that have passed their own state-level Religious Freedom Restoration Acts. 

Kelsey Harkness in her column “These 19 States Have Religious Freedom Laws Similar to Indiana’s. Here’s What That Means” writes:

Gov. Mike Pence gained national attention when he passed the Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act into law last week.

It caused the Twitter hashtag #BoycottIndiana to go viral and triggered Apple CEO Tim Cook to pen a Washington Post op-ed calling “pro-discrimination” laws “dangerous.”

Yet, despite the uproar, Indiana isn’t alone in enacting legislation that seeks to protect the religious freedom of its citizens.

Religious Freedom Restoration Acts—or what critics call “pro-discrimination” laws—have been around for over two decades.

Religious Freedom Restoration Acts first came about after the Supreme Court’s 1990 decision in Employment Division v. Smith, which narrowed protections for the free exercise of religion.

In response to the court’s ruling, Congress sought to restore religious freedom by passing the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, popularly known as RFRA.

The legislation won unanimous support in the House, passed 97-3 in the Senate, and was signed into law by then-president Bill Clinton.

Since then, in addition to Indiana, 19 states have passed their own state-level Religious Freedom Restoration Acts: Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.

Another 11 states have RFRA-like protections provided by state court decisions.

Read more.

Ryan T. Anderson in his column “Apple CEO Tim Cook Is Wrong About Indiana Religious Freedom Law” writes:

Apple CEO Tim Cook has taken to The Washington Post to tell the nation that, in the words of the headline, “Pro-discrimination ‘religious freedom’ laws are dangerous.”

Notice the scare quotes around “religious freedom.” But the reality is that the only person in favor of discrimination in this debate is Tim Cook.

It is Tim Cook who favors laws that discriminate against people of faith who simply ask to be left alone by government to run their businesses and their schools and their charities in accordance with their reasonable belief that marriage is the union of a man and a woman. It is Tim Cook who would have the government discriminate against these citizens, have the government coerce them into helping to celebrate a same-sex wedding and penalize them if they try to lead their lives in accordance with their faith.

Read more.

Tony Perkins from the Family Research Council notes, “Indiana is more than the ‘crossroads of America’ — it’s the crossroads of the entire religious liberty debate. The Left made sure of that, fabricating all kinds of baseless outrage over the state’s new Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). What started out as a harmless affirmation of the First Amendment turned into a blow-up of national proportions — with ‘truth optional’ journalism leading the way… Like most states, Indiana doesn’t think the federal or state governments should force Americans to violate their faith. Is that controversial? The media seems to think so. They believe — as the President does — that surrendering your beliefs is just the price of doing business.”

If you believe religious freedom is fundamental then share on your social media #IStandForReligiousFreedom.

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Don’t be an April ‘Earth Month’ Fool

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The annual calendar is filled with days and months designated for the purpose of calling attention to some event, personality, or cause. The U.S. celebrates the birthdays of Lincoln and Washington that fall close together. There’s Mother’s and Father’s Day, Labor Day and Veteran’s Day, Valentine’s, Independence Day, Thanksgiving, Easter and Christmas.

But who decided that April was “Earth Month” or that April 22 is “Earth Day”?

Why are we expected to worship the planet that was here billions of years before we showed up and will likely be here long after we manage to destroy ourselves with cataclysmic wars. And it is worship that is at the heart of these two events. That alone should tell you how essentially pagan they are.

This Earth Month will celebrate its 45th anniversary, having begun in 1970 and, not surprisingly, its theme is “Our planet in peril.” Our planet is not in peril. It’s been around for 4.5 billion years and short of a rogue asteroid or our getting sucked into a black hole, the planet will be around several billions of years more. The galaxy in which we live is relatively predictable and stable, so the notion that the Earth is in peril borders on idiocy.

Well, idiocy, if you think that it is in peril from us, the human species. This is at the core of the environmental mindset. It appears that merely using the Earth as a place to live is reason enough to hold us responsible for everything that naturally occurs to it.

Environmentalists do not like the human race and will not hesitate to tell you there are too many of us. They do what they can to reduce the population through disease by, for example, banning DDT and any other chemicals that protect us from insect and rodent pests that are major vectors for the transmission of disease.

According to the 2015 Earth Month Network, Inc. announcement “There are literally hundreds of problems and issues plaguing our global environment, i.e., climate change, global warming and their effects; and the continuation of polluting our delicate ecosystem just to mention a few.”

Which is it? Climate change or global warming? There hasn’t been any dramatic global warming in the past 19 years during which the planet has been in a natural cooling cycle, along with the Sun which we depend upon to warm us. So anyone claiming the Earth is warming is blowing smoke up your skirt.

As for climate change, that has always been occurring. Short term it’s called the four seasons. Long term it takes the form of ice ages, major glaciations that have occurred every 140 million years, and other eras such as the Great Permian Extinction, the largest in Earth’s history that wiped out an estimated 95% of every kind of life-form on Earth. It was one of four mass extinctions over the course of the 3.5 billion years that life has existed on Earth. Remember the mammoths? They died a mere 11,500 years ago.

Last year, the Earth Month theme was “Returning to Nature.” Do you really want to return to nature? No electricity. No shelter other than a nice cave. No food except for the animals or fish you would have to catch for dinner. No vegetables or fruits except those you could find wherever you lived. That’s right, no supermarkets! And, if you want to go anywhere, you will have to walk.

Yes, nature sounds wonderful and, in its own way, is wonderful, but the human species has devoted a great deal of time to finding ways to survive it.

I was reminded that April was Earth Month when I received an email from the Saybrook Point Inn & Spa which said this Connecticut site was “excited to offer a special package to honor Earth Day.” It is “a Certified Green Hotel” and you will be treated to a “unique Ecotourism Getaway” that provides an “environmentally friendly stay without sacrificing comfort.” Why would you want to pay them for their special package if it didn’t include comfort and lots of it? Mostly what Saybrook Point wants is your money, just like any other perfectly ordinary inn and spa that isn’t “certified.”

One can be confident that we are going to be regaled with all manner of “environmental” messages and events throughout April, all of which have the same theme: the Earth is in danger from YOU!

Do yourself a favor. Ignore them. Get in your car and go where you want. Go to the supermarket and don’t worry about the plastic packaging or the plastic bags. Set the temperature in your home or apartment to a level of comfort that you like. It’s your life and you pay good money to benefit from all the conveniences of modern life.

Let’s appreciate the Earth, not worship it.

Environmentalism is one of the great scams of the modern era. Its emphasis on “renewable energy” has been a huge, expensive failure. Its claims of disappearing forests are bogus and its demands for the reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions will only harm all vegetation everywhere. The Earth needs CO2 in the same way you and all other living creatures need oxygen.

Let’s celebrate mankind’s mastery of the Earth in the form of agriculture, ranching, sophisticated shelters from the log cabin to the skyscraper, the channeling of rivers to produce energy and the technology that provides clean water for us. And, yes, manufacturing. You can’t even imagine what the world was like before the discovery of coal, oil, and natural gas.

The Earth is not in peril, only the truth and common sense are.

© Alan Caruba, 2015

Religious Illiteracy Hampers West’s Response to Radical Islam

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We are faced with a multicultural elite that freely slanders and disparages Israel, Jews, Christians and western values, but which tends to excuse Islamist extremism or contextualize it disingenuously.

It seems that some lessons are difficult to learn. As ISIS was busy slaughtering Yazidis, Coptic Christians and western hostages, burning fellow Muslim alive, and destroying ancient pre-Islamic artifacts, President Obama was denying its spiritual pedigree and planning a White House summit on violent extremism that would deny any connection between radical Islam and terrorism.

The very use of the term “violent extremism” minimized the terrorist threat by obscuring its ideological motivations. And by using neutral terminology to mask its doctrinal character and goals, the president didn’t simply ignore the religious connection – he affirmatively denied it and thus facilitated Islamist dissimulation.

He also attempted to shift blame for terrorism by legitimizing Muslim grievances against the West and attributing the actions of religious extremists to economic privation.  With other world leaders and moderate Muslims finally acknowledging the threat, President Obama’s steadfast refusal to do likewise seems pathological.  His denial of the religious foundation for much of today’s terrorism – and for Iran’s nuclear ambitions – is a slap in the face of reality and an insult to Israel and all other U.S. allies that are targets of Islamist aggression.  Moreover, it demonstrates either ignorance of history or an affinity for those committed to religious totalitarianism.

Mr. Obama’s coddling of extremist organizations and rogue regimes stands in sharp contrast to his hostility for Binyamin Netanyahu and duplicitous treatment of Israel.  Furthermore, any discussion that misrepresents Islamist terror as “violent extremism,” or fails to acknowledge that its primary targets are Jews, westerners, “infidels” and “heretics,” serves only to camouflage the problem.

There can be no understanding of radical Islam without recognizing its historical antecedents and theological underpinnings, according to Rabbi Dr. Richard Rubenstein and Pastor Dr. Mark Durie, who spoke at a recent program in Massachusetts entitled, “Responses to Jihad from Christian and Jewish Theological Perspectives.”  Dr. Rubenstein is an academic theologian with degrees from the University of Cincinnati, the Jewish Theological Seminary and Harvard University.  A former university president, he is the Distinguished Research Professor of Religion in the College of Public and International Affairs at the University of Bridgeport and the author of numerous books on theology and history, including, “After Auschwitz” and “Jihad and Genocide.”

Dr. Durie is a Christian theologian, human rights activist and Anglican pastor, as well as a Shillman-Ginsburg Writing Fellow at the Middle East Forum and Adjunct Research Fellow of the Centre for the Study of Islam and Other Faiths at Melbourne School of Theology.  He has published an array books and articles, including, “The Third Choice: Islam, Dhimmitude and Freedom,” and numerous meditations on Christian-Muslim relations and religious freedom.

According to Dr. Rubenstein and Dr. Durie, western society’s inadequate response to Islamic radicalism arises from religious illiteracy and ignorance of history.  Gaps in popular knowledge exist because of the secular progressive penchant for belittling domestic religious traditions, criticizing western culture’s global influence, and suppressing history that contravenes liberal sensibilities.  A common ploy for minimizing the threat of radical Islam is to compare it to Christian or Jewish religious traditions in order to present it as somehow less extreme by association.

Such intellectual artifice does not withstand critical scrutiny, particularly in light of the post-reformation, post-enlightenment evolution of Christianity and the lack of an evangelical impulse in Judaism.  Christianity differs greatly from Islam, and neither tradition is squarely comparable to Judaism, in which national identity and religious obligation are merged and the Covenant remains binding on successive generations through common history and descent.

Though Christianity has a missionary tradition, and while its persecution of Jews was institutionalized by Constantine and later codified by Theodosius and Justinian, it did not begin to engage in holy wars until almost a thousand years after its birth.  In contrast, followers of Islam have engaged in jihad, which is explicitly referenced in the Quran, from its earliest days to the present in many parts of the world.  This is not to ignore the Christian mistreatment of Jews throughout the generations or the anti-Semitism that persists in many quarters today, but conditions ameliorated comparatively after reformation and enlightenment.  Indeed, many Christians today are unwavering supporters of Israel.  The Islamic world, however, has not experienced the same kind of reformative change.

The ability to understand religious differences is essential for understanding the conflict between Islamist radicalism and western values.  By way of illustration, Dr. Rubenstein recounted an interaction he had with a Muslim cleric who opined that Islam would ultimately predominate because “[we] love death, while you love life.”  According to Dr. Rubenstein, this observation is indicative of a master-slave worldview in which those in control do not fear death, but rather prefer it over the loss of mastery and freedom, while the slave accepts his lowly status in order to preserve life.  This Weltanschauung does not recognize universal human rights and accords “nonbelievers” only two choices: dhimmitude or death.

Dr. Rubenstein likened this view to Hegel’s master and slave dialectic, and said it explains why subjugated peoples are willing to live in dhimmitude.  Those who value life are more likely to accept subservience than those who are willing to kill or die to advance their ideology and preserve their mastery.

The western mainstream’s knowledge of Islam is generally limited and is colored by its own cultural perspectives.  Few actually read the Quran, Hadith and Sira, and fewer still seem to have any awareness of how non-Muslims were habitually treated in Islamic society.  Observant Jews who bridge the knowledge gap are capable of seeing how Islamic tradition deviates from their own.  So are believing Christians.  However, secular people with little connection to religion do not have the same frame of reference, and thus often do not see where different faiths diverge.

Secular westerners tend to eschew religious belief in favor of liberal political values and often fail to confront radical beliefs for which they have no theological sense of perspective.  It is difficult to analyze religious extremism in the absence of a countervailing belief system against which to compare.  When confronted with Islamist ideology, some progressives attempt to accommodate it in the name of multiculturalism, or to deem negative reactions to it as bigoted and insensitive.  Such responses are certainly informed by religious illiteracy, but are also shaped by moral relativism and ignorance of history.

Dr. Durie attributes the prevalence of religious illiteracy to the success of secularism and enlightenment.  Though liberal democracy certainly affords rights and liberties that are unheard of in dictatorial theocracies, the trivialization of religion has made it difficult to discuss matters of faith cogently.  Those who believe all religions are fundamentally the same often have little understanding of their own traditions and thus have no standard for determining how extremism deviates from normative faith.  Some believe that all religions are benign and peaceful, while others believe they are all reactionary.  But informed analysis becomes difficult when mainstream religious knowledge is reduced to generalized concepts of little substance.

According to Dr. Durie, Christianity has the capacity for critical self-reflection; and, indeed, Christian views regarding Jews and non-Christians have evolved in ways that have no analogue in the Islamic world.  In addition, Dr. Durie believes that Christian and Jewish religious identities are shaped by relational covenants with G-d rather than the master-slave dynamic. He does not believe there is a parallel perspective in Muslim scripture.  The lay ability to discern such distinctions, however, decreases as society loses sight of its own religious traditions.

In addition to being hampered by religious illiteracy, progressive society tends to view Islamism from a morally relativistic perspective and to ignore the historical role of holy war in spreading the faith.  Though the left falsely accuses Israel of being a colonial creation – ignoring the native Jewish presence that long predated all other claimants and usurpers to the Jewish homeland – it has amnesia regarding the history of jihadist conquest and colonialism.

The White House is of like mind in its refusal to acknowledge the Islamist basis for much of today’s terrorism – or for that matter to recognize Jewish ancestral rights in Israel.  Despite terrorist acts committed throughout North America, including assaults, murders and the attack on the Canadian Parliament, and regardless of the increasing numbers of ISIS and al-Qaeda sympathizers arrested in the U.S., Mr. Obama refuses to concede any links to radical Islam.  This refusal has become a meme of his administration, often leading to absurd results, such as designating the Fort Hood shooting as workplace violence and referring to terrorism perpetrated by Muslims as “man-caused disasters.”

Those who refuse to make the connection must deny the long history of jihadist colonialism in the Mideast, India, Africa, Asia and Europe, where fanatical armies subjugated indigenous peoples, destroyed their sacred places, and exterminated those who refused to submit.  In extolling the virtues of an idealized Muslim tolerance that never really existed, secular apologists from the president on down – liberals and conservatives alike – are simply parroting back dissimulation that is fed to them.

But how many in the secular mainstream have the background to understand that ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Boko Haram are engaging in modern jihad and have no desire for peaceful coexistence?  This is precisely the scenario envisioned by Samuel P. Huntington in “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order,” which seems all the more prescient in light of current events.

Interestingly, this isn’t the first time the West has been confronted with Islamist aggression.  Jihad came to the Iberian Peninsula in the eighth century and spread to the Balkans and other parts of Europe thereafter.  As brutal as the Crusaders were to Jews, their campaigns against Muslims were reactions to the jihad that had been unleashed on Europe centuries earlier, and which was not finally quashed until the Battle of Vienna in 1683.

The United States, too, had early experiences with doctrinal militancy, as alluded to in the Marine Corps Hymn, which begins with the verse: “From the Halls of Montezuma, to the shores of Tripoli.”  These words refer to the First and Second Barbary Wars precipitated by Muslim pirates from North Africa, who began attacking and ransoming American and European ships in the late eighteenth century.  Thomas Jefferson and John Adams met in London in 1785 with Sidi Haji Abdrahaman, the envoy from Tripoli, who explained to them:

It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every Muslim who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise. He said, also, that the man who was the first to board a vessel had one slave over and above his share, and that when they sprang to the deck of an enemy’s ship, every sailor held a dagger in each hand and a third in his mouth; which usually struck such terror into the foe that they cried out for quarter at once. (“Jefferson, American Minister in France,” p. 413, the Atlantic Monthly, Volume 30, Issue 180, October 1872.)

The First Barbary War ended when the United States agreed to pay annual ransom to ensure safe passage.  But the cessation of tribute in 1801 triggered the Second Barbary War, which ended with the U.S. Naval bombardment of Algiers.  Unfortunately, American school children no longer learn this history, as progressive educators have jettisoned subject matter deemed culturally offensive or insensitive.

This cultural dumbing down is an inevitable consequence of the theological illiteracy and politicization of education about which Dr. Rubenstein and Dr. Durie spoke, and which have compromised western society’s ability to understand religious extremism.  The problem is exacerbated by a multicultural elite that freely slanders and disparages Israel, Jews, Christians and western values, but which tends to excuse Islamist extremism or contextualize it disingenuously.

Whatever the reasons for this state of affairs, western society has not responded effectively because it refuses even to identify the problem.  However, mislabeling Islamist terrorism “workplace violence” or “violent extremism,” or falsely comparing it to the lawful political activities of religious conservatives, only inhibits the ability to confront it.  The situation will not change until westerners reclaim their own religious traditions, relearn their history, and take control of the dialogue from those who believe that religious terrorism is an understandable reaction to European and American chauvinism.

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EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on Israel National News.