The Paladins of Police Abuse and Militarization: 3 quick thoughts on the MSM, Libertarians, and Ferguson by Max Borders

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1. The mainstream media have been lagging libertarians and citizen journalists on the issue of domestic militarization and police abuse for years.

Only with the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, has police abuse become a “story.” Thankfully it is. But where were the mainstream media when Radley Balko was reporting on police militarization in 2006—and about abuse in general for a decade? Where was the MSM while Reason was reporting on police abuse daily? Citizen activists like the Peaceful Streets Project have been trying to raise awareness for local areas like Austin. Copblock has similar awareness-raising strategies and encourages citizens to film police as often as possible. The Free Thought Project also catalogs police abuse, and I must have read a story per week like this, on average, in the lead-up to Michael Brown’s killing. Now the MSM shows up and attempts to gallop to the front, as if paladins who’d been there all along.

2. Washington Post columnist Paul Waldman is either a liar or a fool.

I don’t want to appear as if I’m going all ad hominem, but I can’t think of any other possible hypothesis for Waldman. In this article, he says libertarians have been MIA on the matter of Ferguson. Nevermind that his own WaPo colleague Radley Balko, mentioned above, covers this beat. It’s clear Waldman hadn’t done any due diligence before he wrote the piece and turned the event into a opportunity to take a cheap shot at Rand Paul. Senator Paul (R-Ky) has since published his views in Time.

As I said above, libertarians have been jumping up and down about this issue for a long time, and recent events in Ferguson are no exception (see here and here). Sometimes we’re the only ones writing about militarization. And progressives seem only to care about it when it’s going to prove the whole country is racist. It’s silly to most of us that this one instance has become so important right now because the mainstream media have decided it is important. Some combination of an information cascade and bandwagon effect was in play, I suppose. In any case, Paul Waldman simply hopped on that bandwagon and used it to pull a drive-by on the very people who have been trying to raise awareness for a long time.

Elizabeth Nolan Brown has no time for this sort of garbage, as she demonstrates over at The Dish.

3. The treatment and detainment of two journalists, Wesley Lowery of The Washington Post and Ryan Reilly of the Huffington Post, is a cakewalk compared to what other journalists and citizen journalists have endured.

Consider the case of Antonio Buehler, who was slammed to the ground by police after he filmed a New Year’s Eve traffic stop in which he witnessed two officers roughing up two young women suspected of DUI. They then threatened and arrested Buehler on felony charges, allegedly for spitting at one of the officers. Another person, quite fortuitously, filmed the Buehler incident and determined that the police had lied about the spitting. Since that time Buehler has spent considerable time and money fighting all the trumped-up charges. See his story here:

Similarly, citizen journalist Ademo Freeman had been looking at significant jail time for felony wiretapping charges. See tons of other examples at Photography Is Not A Crime, The Free Thought Project, and Copblock.org. These folks are not invisible to those who care. They have just been invisible to the MSM, who apparently circle the wagons around their own and make these practices a story when it suits them. 

MaxBordersVEsmlABOUT MAX BORDERS

Max Borders is the editor of The Freeman and director of content for FEE. He is also cofounder of the event experience Voice & Exit and author of Superwealth: Why we should stop worrying about the gap between rich and poor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Database Shows What Military Equipment Your Local Police Department Has Been Stockpiling

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of FEE and Shutterstock.

Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) Supports Using Food For Fuel While Children are Starving

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Ethanol is a farmer welfare program with the government decreeing corn based Ethanol be converted into fuel which has resulted in dramatically rising prices and conversion of huge amounts of acreage to corn production from other crops. Simply another example of government favoring one group (farmers) at the expense of consumers who now pay a lot more for corn based foods at the store and gasoline at the station.

 

Earth’s Energy in an article titled Reducing Carbon: Unintended Consequences reports:

Over the past couple of years there has been much written about how the attempt by the US to substitute ethanol for gasoline was leading to higher food prices.  The ethanol is made from corn and as the demand for ethanol shot up (largely mandated by government requirements that gasoline had to have a minimum ethanol content and corresponding subsidies to the ethanol industry), this meant less corn was available for other uses in the food chain, including the feeding of livestock. Initially the ethanol content was to be 10% but in the past year the US government has raised this target to 15%. (See, for example, Ethanol Blamed for Record Food Prices in MIT Technology Review and The Case Against Biofuels: Probing Ethanol’s Hidden Costs at Environment 360)

Senator Claire McCaskill: Are you not aware our country was developed on cheap, not expensive energy?

Are you not aware of the development of tremendous amounts of oil and natural gas taking place in the United States today by fracking? Are you not aware the reason we don’t have dramatically more production is due to the government blocking development by placing lands off limits. The government is our biggest enemy in trying to reach energy independence along with communists posing as environmentalists!

Are you not aware we have almost 200,000 miles of petroleum pipelines in the U.S.A. but the Keystone Pipeline has been blocked by your party for over 5 years for strictly political reasons? They say it isn’t safe to transport by pipeline which is ridiculous as it is the safest form of transportation. Currently the oil is coming by rail and you see how safe it is by the accidents occurring?

Are you not aware ethanol is subsidized and raises the price of gasoline to consumers and businesses alike but benefiting farmers?

Being a member of Congress I can understand how every time you decide to mandate something for the free market you muck it up. Corn should be used for food not as a fuel additive that decreases performance and harms small engines.

Turn on the TV and soon an ad appears asking for $19 a month to help feed hungry children around the world followed by another ad saying one in four children in the United States goes to bed hungry at night. If true, how can you in good conscience support Ethanol unless you are more concerned about buying votes through corn subsidies to farmers than the health of children around the world?

Where is the National Republican Congressional Committee in Maryland’s District 6 race?

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Harriet Brinker, a Facebook friend, shared with me the below letter from Dan Bongino, Republican Candidate for the U.S. Congress in Maryland 6th District. I had the opportunity to meet Dan at the 2012 Republican National Convention in Tampa, FL. I interviewed him on the radio and got to know the man up close and personal. He is the real deal.

I just pulled over about 2 hours into a trip to Allegheny County to write this. I think it’s time.

Have you heard of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC)? They exist to allegedly help Republican candidates get elected to congress. Do you know that it’s been months since my victory in the Republican primary in Maryland and I haven’t heard a peep from either them or the RNC?

Do these establishmentarians think it’s easy running as a Republican in deep-blue Maryland? Do they think that after years of having OUR party nearly taken over by cronyists, interventionists, purveyors of bad policies like TARP and grotesque levels of government spending, that outsiders like me have it easy?

I can barely knock on an Independent’s or a non-white-male-voter’s door without being thrown off their porch. Do you feel that you’ve mastered the message and it’s really people like me who are the problem? Who do you think is fighting this battle? It’s certainly not you. We’re the ones at the doors, where it matters.

What’s your reason for ignoring me, and the many others fighting for this magical country’s tomorrows? Do I not fit into your box? Is it my youth, my message, or is it that I haven’t firmly planted my lips on your rear-end?

I’m a Republican because I believe liberty matters and we should not surrender OUR party to cronyists and connected-insiders. We built this house and you don’t get to burglarize it and keep the spoils. If elected Democrats want to monopolize unlimited government and evaporating liberty then go join them in their house but stay out of ours.

Finally, thanks to the grassroots who have accepted me as one of their own, despite my recent entrance into the political arena. It’s your sweat and positive energy that keeps me going despite the willful ignorance of so many on the inside. It’s you that matters. Thank you so much.

-Dan

ABOUT DAN BONGINO

Dan began his career with the NYPD in 1995 as a member of the pattern identification unit, specializing in the identification of serial criminals, and became a full time police officer in 1997, where he graduated with honors from the Police Academy.

Dan proudly joined the ranks of the U.S. Secret Service in 1999 as a special agent in the New York Office where he was assigned to investigate computer crimes, bank fraud, and credit card fraud. His early career was marked by a number of investigative successes earning Dan a Department of Justice recognition award.

Dan moved to Maryland in 2002 to become an instructor at the Secret Service training academy. Dan was awarded a number of commendations for his work in redesigning the investigative curriculum to reflect current investigative trends.

In 2006, Dan entered into duty with the elite Presidential Protective Division in the administration of President George W. Bush. Dan distinguished himself by becoming one of the earliest tenured agents to be given responsibility for an operational section of the protective detail. Dan remained on protective duty during the change in administration to President Barack Obama, quickly becoming the highest ranking member of his operational shift of agents. With this distinction came greater responsibility and Dan rose to the challenge. He was designated as the lead agent responsible for the coordination of President Obama’s visits to Prague, Jakarta, amongst a myriad of terror threats, and finally as the lead agent responsible for his visit to an active war zone in Afghanistan. Dan was awarded a series of commendations and left the protective detail as one of their most distinguished agents.

After completing the maximum time served allowed on presidential protection duty in 2010, Dan chose to stay in Maryland, transferring to the Baltimore Office. There, he immediately made an impact on the community by breaking up one of the largest fraud rings in Maryland’s history.

Upon resigning from the Secret Service in 2011, Dan began a grassroots campaign for the U.S. Senate against the feared Maryland Democratic machine. Despite overwhelming odds, Dan defeated nine opponents in the Republican primary. Dan finished second in a three-­‐way race in the general election and continues to act as an activist within the community.

Dan is currently married with two young children. His wife Paula is a web-­design consultant. Dan is a consultant specializing in international security and corporate strategy. He has earned master’s degrees in both psychology and business administration.

PLAGIARISM: Students fail, politicians resign, but professors go back to work

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Students_in_a_computer_lab

No peeking!

The Dissident Prof has spent many an agonizing hour with the student who has insulted her intelligence by copying and pasting large pieces of text into her own paper.  She has followed the policy of the various institutions in which she has taught and punished students accordingly.  She remembers one case of a solid B student who in the midst of the rush or the excitement of the end  of the semester decided to use the cut and paste functions on her keyboard for large portions of the final paper.  Alas, I had to inform her that her paper received a zero.  Her final letter grade dropped down to the next one.  That is one reason why college professors always have boxes of tissues on their desks.

The same punishment is not meted to some tenured professors, however. 

In Minding the Campus, I write about the case of Slavoj Zizek, the Slovenian pseudo-philosopher who was discovered to have lifted entire passages from the magazine American Renaissance.  Writers jumped to his defense.  At Inside Higher Ed the worshipful Hollis Phelps contextualized the “sharing” in terms of postmodernism and death of the author, etc.–plus the fact that such a celebrity academic cannot be fully responsible for errors committed by assistants.  Zizek holds forth, sometimes bare-chested from his bed, mixing Marxism, Freudianism, Hegelianism, and pop psychology to offer what is taken as trenchant commentary.  There are entire college courses and books on Zizek. Fortunately, Professor Zizek remains covered up in his bed.

See the below video clip. It’s from one of his full-length movies in his filmography, probably The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology.

The Cabinet of Plagiarism blogger calls this “the summer of plagiarism,” and brings to our attention also the case of Professor Matthew C. Whitaker, who is Professor of History and Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy at Arizona State University, who was recently accused of plagiarizing.

Professor Whitaker:  the Cabinet has wearied of him.  No interesting defense of his actions has ever come forth.  Yet Professor Whitaker sails majestically on, writing editorials decrying the immorality of, for example, net metering (to the great delight of the Edison Institute, at whose conference he also spoke) and preparing for another semester in which he will require his students to purchase his University of Nebraska Press book — thereby inducting them into one aspect of academic scholarship, even if he is woefully unable to induct them into others.  Too big to fail at his university and press, Professor Whitaker is perhaps too small to matter to anyone else.  But….

No doubt these professors are directing their minions (a term used to describe Marxist Zizek’s student assistants) to compile syllabi in preparation for the upcoming school year.

Not only professors, but history book writers, are being accused of plagiarism this summer.  Today, we learn that New York Times/NPR darling Rick Perlstein is being accused of “sloppy scholarship, improper attribution and plagiarism” in his new book on Ronald Reagan, The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan.  The Times refers to its own “prominent book critic” Frank Rich, who in his review applauded Perlstein’s “gifts as a historian.”

Unlike the professors, it doesn’t look like Montana Senator John Walsh will escape political punishment for plagiarizing his master’s thesis at the U.S. Army War College.  He is getting pressure to resign, and Democrats seem to be talking about a replacement candidate.

In the case of Professor Whitaker, Inside Higher Ed reported that after he was found not guilty of deliberate academic misconduct, “the chair of his department’s tenure committee resigned in protest and other faculty members spoke out against the findings, saying their colleague – who recently had been promoted to full professor – was cleared even though what he did likely would have gotten an undergraduate in trouble.”  As the Cabinet of Plagiarism reported, Whitaker will likely assign his plagiarized books to students in the upcoming semester.

As for the globe-trotting, lecture-bed-hopping Professor Zizek?  He seems to be a one-man academic-industrial complex.  In 2012, Salon reported he had published over 50 books. In some years he has published four books.  But of course that cannot be too much when his Marxist ideas will be redistributed to students buying his books as they study the great man in seminars devoted to Slavoj Zizek.

How the Establishment Suppresses Independent Candidates

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I just received a phone call from a telephone number that my caller ID registered as only Sarasota and (914) 312-7514. Upon answering, the caller said they were conducting a quick one question poll. I said okay.

She said the poll question was: If the election for Governor was held today who would you most likely vote for?

A.  a Republican Candidate
B.  a Democrat Candidate
C.  Undecided

I responded by asking her why wasn’t there a choice for an Independent candidate?

She hummed and hawed and wanted to quickly get off the phone. I told her I can’t answer her poll because I would vote for a candidate other than a Republican or Democrat. In fact I am planning to vote for Adrian Wyllie, a Libertarian candidate. She said thanks and hung up.

Moral of the story:

Political polls are designed not to get to a true accounting and read out of the people’s opinions. Polls are designed to perpetuate the lies. Don’t pay attention to the results of political polling. They are pure fiction and designed to deceive and support the establishment.

It is time for the people of Florida to make 2014 the next 1860. What happened in 1860? Abe Lincoln won on a new party line, a third party. The Republican Party had been established in 1856 to challenge the Whig and Democratic parties. A Third Party won in 1860 and a Third Party can win in 2014 (if the people stop voting for the corrupt establishment that they claim to reject).

An open letter to U.S. Rep. Marc Veasey (D-TX) on the Birth Right Citizenship Act (H.R. 140)

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Dear Representative Veasey,
RE: Your Opposition to H.R. 140 – Birthright Citizenship Act of 2013-2014

Dear Marc,

I am happy you took the time to write and give me your reasons for opposing the bill. I would like to address them one at a time.

The first statement is “H.R. 140 would change the definition of “American” which is absolutely not true. What it means is a child born would have at least one citizen parent to be a U.S. citizen. You must have never learned what the definition of “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” means. Children born of illegal aliens are not “subject to the jurisdiction” of our country. They are subject to the jurisdiction of the country from where there came from. Amending the IMM & NAT ACT to require one of the parents to be an American citizen would remove a strong magnet that currently attracts illegal aliens to sneak into the country to give birth to nearly 400,000 babies a year called “Anchor Babies”. I suggest you trace back the history of the Fourteenth Amendment and Representative John A. Bingham who is referred to as the father of it. Rep. Bingham discusses Natural Born citizen and the reason for the 14th amendment.

The second statement you made was H.R. 140 if passed would have the “goal of preventing future immigration.” I don’t know what world you are living in but how you came to that conclusion is not a reasonable response, when one is warranted.

The third statement you made was “eliminating birthright citizenship would do nothing to reduce illegal immigration.” If so, why do 400,000 births a year happen to parents who are illegal aliens? They sneak in to have babies here so the child can lock them into the U.S. welfare system at the expense of American workers.

“The proposal to eliminate birthright citizenship is a distraction from fixing our broken immigration system” is an incorrect statement. Marc, I just mentioned 400,000 babies a year born to illegal aliens in the U.S. annually and you think H.R. 140 is a distraction? You also state we have a “broken immigration system” which is the statement all democrats make. There are two things promised by Congress in 1986 that were never delivered; a secure border like we have had in Korea for 60 years and a mandatory system to make sure all workers are legal workers that is E-Verify. The system you refer to is not broken; it is simply not being enforced. If Congress would have fulfilled those two promises we wouldn’t be talking about H.R. 140.

Another statement you made was “Congress should be addressing immigration issues head on by reforming our immigration laws in a way that fairly addresses the economic and labor needs of the country, unites American families, and ensures that immigrants have legal channels to enter, remain and work in the U.S.” Do you happen to know what the U.S. population is and where we rank in being the most populated? The answer Marc is we rank third in population and have over 90,000,000 that have dropped out of the labor force. Are you aware we import maids and lawn mower operators while millions of your brothers and sisters are sitting on the couch watching game shows and waiting for the next welfare check.? Blacks are most affected adversely by illegal immigration for employment yet you are for open borders.

I have three questions for you:

  1. What is the purpose of mass immigration since immigration has always been used in the past to settle virgin lands but there are none left?
  2. If mandatory E-Verify had been put into place by Congress when promised 28 years ago do you think we would have millions of illegal aliens without an income living here?
  3. Do you think if Congress would have secured the border as we have in Korea for 60 years now do you think we would have illegal aliens and drugs moving back and forth at will?

Thanks for writing Marc and feel free to contact me again.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Ineligible Illegals File Request to Get Dreamer Status, Force Obama’s Hand
Hundreds More Criminal Illegal Aliens With Brutal Records Released Onto American Streets

EDITORS NOTE: H.R. 140 – Birthright Citizenship Act of 2013-2014 amends the Immigration and Nationality Act to consider a person born in the United States “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States for citizenship at birth purposes if the person is born in the United States of parents, one of whom is: (1) a U.S. citizen or national, (2) a lawful permanent resident alien whose residence is in the United States, or (3) an alien performing active service in the U.S. Armed Forces.

Most top Islamic State [IS] jihadis were once held by U.S.

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But “incarceration was a school for jihad, and they emerged tougher, better connected and more dedicated” — so why were there no effort made during their incarceration to challenge their jihadist beliefs? Because to have done that would have been “Islamophobic.” And why were they released at all, since any fool would have known that they would return to the jihad?

“The Islamic State’s potential weakness,” by David Ignatius,Washington Post, August 14, 2014 (thanks to Ou Tis):

The Obama administration’s Iraq policy seems premised on the idea that the terrorist Islamic State is so toxic that it will be self-limiting and ultimately self-defeating. But that’s not the view of U.S. intelligence officials.

In a briefing for journalists Thursday, a panel of five U.S. intelligence officials summed up their assessment of an organization that has shown a remarkable durability because it is “patient,” “well-organized,” “opportunistic” and “flexible.” Under the leadership of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the group has rebounded from about 1,500 fighters in 2010 to more than 10,000 today — becoming a global jihadist organization that communicates in many languages.

“We don’t assess this as something that will collapse on its own,” said one of the officials, who commented based on an agreement that their remarks would not be attributed. “But with pressure and alternatives [that might draw away its Sunni supporters], it could collapse over time.” The intelligence experts cautioned that counterterrorist tools, such as drone strikes and other air attacks, wouldn’t be sufficient “to defeat it rather than just ratchet it back.”

The officials expressed skepticism that Baghdadi could be deterred from striking the United States by the threat of pulverizing attacks. “We assess that the group sees conflict with the U.S. as inevitable,” said one official. Although the group is preoccupied with its battles in Iraq and Syria, another official noted a chilling Internet statement several months ago: “America, we have not turned our gaze away from you.”

The briefing was a rare example of intelligence officials sharing information about a problem that policymakers are still debating. The group skirted direct policy questions but not their context. Asked, for example, whether the Islamic State can be contained if its bases in Syria aren’t bombed, one official said that such cross-border havens have been “a perennial challenge” in fighting insurgencies since 1945.

The portrait of Baghdadi and his Islamic State was chilling. Under its original name, al-Qaeda in Iraq, the group ferociously battled U.S. forces. Most of its leading fighters were imprisoned by U.S. occupation troops, but incarceration was a school for jihad, and they emerged tougher, better connected and more dedicated….

RELATED ARTICLES:

Islamic State has forced 1,500 Yazidis and Christians into sex slavery
Islamic State jihadis imprisoned in Iran threaten to kill Christian in same prison
Dozens of Yazidis murdered as deadline to convert to Islam passes
Syria because Allah “has commanded for the Muslims to go and fight jihad”
Threatening anti-Semitic flyers placed at Jewish-owned business near UCLA
Thousands of supporters of “Palestinian” jihad sign petition to ban Joan Rivers from UK for being pro-Israel

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is of a man about to be executed in a propaganda video released by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. The image is courtesy of the New York Daily News.

Six (only six?) examples Obama is purposefully enabling the Islamist cause

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The only plausible explanation for many actions taken by President Obama and his administration is that they are working counter to the security of the United States of America. How else can one rationalize the following:

  1. The unilateral release of five senior Taliban back to the enemy while the enemy is still fighting us.
  2. Providing weapons of support to the Muslim Brotherhood-led Egyptian government — F-16s and M1A1 Abrams tanks — but not to the Egyptian government after the Islamist group has been removed.
  3. Negotiations with Qatar and Turkey, two Islamist-supporting countries.
  4. Negotiations with Hamas, a terrorist group.
  5. Returning sanction money, to the tune of billions of dollars, back to the theocratic regime led by Iran’s ayatollahs and allowing them to march on towards nuclear capability.
  6. Obama’s evident support of Islamists in Libya.

In an operation that was again unilateral with no Congressional approval, U.S. military support and resources were given to Islamist groups fighting against Moammar Qaddafy — and we know the results of that action. Not long after, one of the groups this administration armed, Ansar al-Sharia, took responsibility for the terrorist attack and murder of our U.S .Ambassador Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Ty Woods, and Glenn Doherty at the Benghazi Special Mission Compound (SMC). Oh, and that same group claims it has established an Islamic caliphate in eastern Libya, based in Benghazi. Just two weeks ago, the United States of America evacuated the Libyan embassy in Tripoli due to security concerns.

But I guess it’s all hunky-dory there now, because according to the Washington Free Beacon, “The Obama administration has lifted longtime restrictions on Libyans attending flight schools in the United States and training here in nuclear science, according to a final amendment of the ban recently approved by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).”

“Less than two years after the deadly terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya that killed four Americans, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is poised to sign off on an amendment reversing the ban, which was enacted following a wave or terrorist attacks in 1980s and prevents Libyans from studying these sensitive trades in the United States.”

We just evacuated Libya due to security concerns. There can be no doubt that Libya is an Islamic terrorist sanctuary state, thanks in no uncertain terms to Obama, and now he wants them to come here and learn how to fly planes and understand nuclear science?

Ok Lucy, ‘splain this to me.

The Free Beacon says “the original law effectively disqualified all Libyan nationals and those “acting on behalf of Libyan entities” from training in “aviation maintenance, flight operations, or nuclear-related fields,” according to the ban. “The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is amending its regulations by rescinding the regulatory provisions promulgated in 1983 that terminated the nonimmigrant status and barred the granting of certain immigration benefits to Libyan nationals and foreign nationals acting on behalf of Libyan entities who are engaging in or seeking to obtain studies or training in,” the amendment states.”

DHS spokesperson S.Y. Lee who told the Free Beacon that the Obama administration is reviewing its policies towards Libya “to see how they might be updated to better align with U.S. interests” in light of its revolution.”

If I may interject here, Libya is not a stable country and there can be no alignment with U.S. interests as long as there are al-Qaida affiliated groups freely operating in that country.

Of course this action is taken when the House and Senate is away on a five-week hiatus from D.C. but at least the House Judiciary Committee responded by acknowledging, “The terror threat continues and numerous news reports document recent terror-related activities coming from Libya.”

Why wouldn’t the Obama administration allow Kurdish Peshmerga members to come to America and receive flight training so they could be given quality helicopter gunships and destroy ISIS? Can anyone explain what the strategy and objective is here in lifting this ban with a nation that is or should be on the terrorist watch list?

Sorry, but I can only explain this one way: Barack Hussein Obama is an Islamist in his foreign policy perspectives and supports their cause. You can go back and listen to his 2009 speech in Cairo, where Muslim Brotherhood associates were seated front and center.

All the circumstantial and anecdotal evidence points to that conclusion. The pivot away from the Middle East seems to be nothing more than an opportunity to enable Islamists and their goals. Anyone supporting this Libyan ban being lifted is indeed an enemy of this state.

The Obama administration’s foreign policy doctrine is self-described as “don’t do stupid s@#t”. But I guess that all depends on what your ultimate goal is.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on AllenBWest.com.

How Israel’s Military Bureaucracy Bungled the Terror Tunnel Threat

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Israel’s Operation Protective Edge is now in its ninth cease fire with Hamas. How long this five day truce will last is anyone’s guess. Each of the prior truces was breached by Hamas, and its terrorist partner, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, even before the ceasefire was scheduled to end. The eighth truce was broken on August 13th when rockets were fired fully 2 hours and nine minutes ahead the deadline. Then, just as hurriedly, a ninth truce was declared, this time supposedly for five days.  Hamas’ demands, aired during the discussions in Cairo, were aimed at eliminating the seven year blockade by Israel, and the more recent one by Egypt, under President El-Sisi.

Both blockades were created to eradicate the threats of subversion from Hamas, an offshoot of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas has demanded a seaport and the re-opening of an international airport, the better to facilitate weapons deliveries, no doubt.  Israel’s counter offer was to increase Gaza fishing rights in the Mediterranean and the number of daily humanitarian truck deliveries of food, construction materials and medicine.

The latest break in the conflict, which is now verging on two months, has led to rising demands in Israel for a commission to investigate why the IDF hadn’t detected and mapped the network of cross-border terror tunnels from Gaza that posed such a great threat to Israel.  By enabling Hamas terrorists to move about unseen and emerge on the Israeli side of the border, equipped to kidnap both soldiers and civilians, Israel had much to lose by not treating the tunnels as credible and imminent threats.  The all-too-real experience during Operation Protective Edge was reminiscent of the five year long captivity of Galid Schalit, abducted in 2006 and held for five years until he was exchanged for 1,037 Palestinian prisoners.

Missteps  occurred during the October War of 1973 and the 34 day Second War with Lebanon in 2006. The Agranat  and Winograd Commissions were convened by Israel’s Knesset to investigate intelligence failures and military operational problems resulting in recommendations for corrective actions. What is apparent during the current Operation Protective Edge in Gaza is that bureaucratic bungling in Israel’s intelligence and planning echelons may have contributed to the IDF casualty toll in Gaza from attacks by Hamas commandos using the terror tunnels.

We have drawn attention to the terror tunnel threat in NER/Iconoclast  articles, <Qatar’s Cyberwarfare Support of Hamas in the War with Israel.  In these articles, we noted the lack of effort by the IDF to detect and map the intricate network of tunnels and underground armories. That was coupled with the discovery that Qatar had joined Iran in funding the Hamas resurgence, including the construction of the tunnels, and equipping Hamas with cyberwarfare capabilities.

Just this past Monday, August 11th, the Jerusalem Post reported this announcement:

Is this IDF announcement a matter of too little, too late?  Could a successful tunnel detection system have been developed earlier?

The Chronicle of IDF Tunnel Detection Missteps

Dr.  Ronen Bergman is the intelligence columnist at Israeli daily, Yediot Ahronoth (YA).  (See our January 2013 NER interview with him on the Iran nuclear threat.)  He revealed the chronology of IDF military bureaucracy missteps in an August 6, 2014 YA Magazine article, “The Battle of the Gaza Tunnels”.  Bergman noted how early their investigation had zeroed in on the tunnel threat:

In July 2010, YA planned to publish a comprehensive investigative report warning of a serious military problem, of which only a handful of experts were aware at the time: Hamas’ terror tunnels.

[…]

The Defense Ministry and the IDF went to great efforts at the time to convince us that the tunnel threat was not so serious and that they were taking steps against the tunnels. Additional and even better measures, they said, would be used in no time.

We eventually decided that it was an important and fundamental issue, and published the investigative report.

Bergman observed:

The bottom line was that IDF posts and communities in the Gaza vicinity (as well as on the Lebanon border, facing Hezbollah) are exposed to terror attacks or abductions through tunnels. Further,  the defense establishment has no efficient measures against them. This despite the fact that the Defense Ministry had received proposals for tunnel-locating systems since the early 2000s.

Bergman noted this comment from IDF Col. Ilan Sabag, Engineering officer in the Southern Command:

The Southern Command is aware of the existence of Hamas infiltration tunnels reaching into our territory. As far as the Southern Command knows, these tunnels are meant to be used in due course to kidnap soldiers. The Southern Command estimates that Hamas will decide when to use the tunnels in light of considerations related to the Shalit deal, etc.

He added that the Southern Command lacked any efficient means to locate the tunnels (apart from intelligence), and that the measures deployed along the route surrounding the Gaza border were no longer in use, as they were unsuccessful.

Bergman chronicled the missteps and bungling by the IDF bureaucracy in tackling the tunnel threat.  As early as 2001, during the Second Intifada, the IDF knew that Hamas and the PIJ were bringing weapons into Gaza through smuggling tunnels. The development of tunnel detection began in earnest when Tzahal turned to the Geophysical Institute of Israel (GII) for assistance. The GII had designed a “seismic fence” composed of a network of geophones placed several meters underground to detect tunnel digging. The geophones were connected to a central computer to alert IDF intelligence of suspicious tunnel activity. These successful tests were conducted near the Kerem Shalom crossing into Gaza and reported to Tzahal.  Bergman contends that if Tzahal had pursued the development of the seismic fence proposed by the GII 13 years ago, then perhaps by 2014, they might have detected the network of Hamas tunnels, which could have enabled IDF military planners to prepare operational plans to enter and destroy them.

Bergman points out tha following a terrorist attack from tunnels in the Philadelphi corridor which Israel controlled along the Gaza Egypt frontier, the Ministry of National Infrastructure  (MNI) in 2004 wrote to Tzahal, reminding them:

“Following an initial inquiry, I am under the impression that there is the technological ability to deal with the problem, in the immediate timeframe, through active and passive means,” he said optimistically. “We are talking about available equipment which could be purchased and activated immediately”.

According to Bergman’s investigation, Tzahal basically told the MNI that they believed they were working on something better with two civilian contractors.

The IDF Ground Commander in 2004, Maj. Gen Yiftah Ron-Tal, undertook a WWII expedient.  According to Bergman, Aluf Ron-Tal sent aides to Texas to procurea machine called the Trencher capable of penetrating tunnels dug 25 meters below. Despite repeated efforts in 2005 and 2006, not much of a priority was given to development of alternatives by Tzahal to the original GII seismic fence proposal.

Bergman reports a conversation with a senior officer in Israel’s Ministry of Defense who indicated that a think tank effort on the tunnel threat had been convened. The think tank included the GII, and had been given funding to come up with viable options, following the 2010 YA investigative report.  Bergman cites a Tzahal source currently saying:

This field is relatively new and we do not have that kind of experience in it, nor is it clear in which direction we should be going or which direction will be successful. We turned to sources worldwide, and realized that no country has an effective solution to this issue.

To which Bergman counters:

Nonetheless, if you take into account the years of related activity since 2000, it’s been 14 years already. How much longer will it take?

Bergman and concerned Israelis got their answer with the Jerusalem Post report which suggested that a successful test indicated that a system could be implemented beginning in 2015.  Again, that system development is too little, too late for Operation Protective Edge. Israel’s well-known ability to develop leading edge technology in record time was ignored by the very people who would have benefited from it the most.

Is There a Hezbollah Tunnel Threat in Israel’s north as well?

Also on Monday, August 11th, the Jerusalem Post reported this statement:

The IDF does not know of any infiltration tunnels crossing from Lebanon into Israel, head of Northern Command, Major General Yair Golan, said Sunday.

Speaking to a forum of front line communities in Kfar Vradim in the North, Golan said that tunnels do not pose a strategic threat on the northern border, but that the IDF was prepared to handle the issue, despite being unable to confirm that any tunnels exist.

Notwithstanding Gen. Golan’s comments, we drew attention to intelligence as far back as 2010 that a significant tunnel threat to Israel existed under its northern frontier with Lebanon.  We noted:

he massive network of tunnels under Gaza mirrors the system of tunnels that criss-crosses southern Lebanon, which were built to avoid Israeli drone surveillance of Hezbollah’s movement of missiles across Lebanon from Syria. The IDF was warned about these Hezbollah tunnels as early as April 2010, and was also given information about cross-border tunnels that were being built at the time with assistance from the IRGC, using North Korean tunnel-building technology. Eye witness accounts reported the construction of a large tunnel that was being built to run from southern Lebanon to central Haifa, and a number of small bore tunnels that were being built, to emerge within northern Israeli towns and kibbutzim. These were designed for Hezbollah’s child warriors who would be sent heavily armed and would be instructed to fire on anyone they see once they emerge in these towns.

Corroboration of that came in an Israel National News (INN) article, “Expert Says Terror Tunnels a Threat in the Galilee”.  The editors at INN suggest that “Hezbollah could be building Gaza-esque tunnels into Israel”.  Hezbollah, as we reported, was already deeply engaged in building their complex tunnel network. At the time the INN article appeared, their network was far along in its construction. When their tunnel to Haifa, originally designed to accommodate trucks, became unusable because its air-handling system could not cope with the exhaust fumes in the 25 mile run, the tunnel was retrofitted for trains rather than trucks. The massive underground network extended northeast to the Syrian border, and honeycombed throughout southern Lebanon. It  providing storage for large missiles, ammunition, and military vehicles, as well as covert routes for the transport of materiel and men.

At the time this report was received by Israeli military intelligence in 2010, the Hezbollah network was already well-developed and was an ongoing, complex project with the deep involvement of the IRGC. The threat at the time was already credible and, from all accounts, was being taken seriously. However, the development of the technology that could have detected the construction of a tunnel 100 feet underground was apparently not available.  Its development had not been put on a fast track, as it should have been.

Here are some of the observations of the Israeli expert:

Geologist Col. Yossi Langotsky (res.) for five years was a Commander of Operational Intelligence and won the Israel Security Prize twice. Despite his expertise, however, his warnings about terror tunnels were apparently ignored.

“For nine years I raised hell, and said [terrorists are] digging tunnels into Israeli territory, and the state security system is not organized with enough seriousness required to deal with the intensity of the threat,” he recounted. This operation, he noted, is the result.

[…]

“It’s amazing to me that, less than a year ago, the Army removed the guards posted near several Gaza belt communities,” referring to a controversial IDF decision earlier this year. “It indicates that they have not internalized the real danger.”

Langotsky then turned to the threat from Hezbollah on the Lebanon frontier based on the North Korean tunnels that crossed the DMZ into South Korea.

He noted the ability of Hezbollah to build tunnels threatening the Galilee:

Geologically, the ground in the Galilee is softer and easier to dig compared to the earth in the Koreas, and added that the close relationship between Hezbollah and North Korea is already well-known. North Korea has reportedly played an important role in helping Hamas dig its own tunnels from Gaza, as well as providing them with rockets.

Langotsky concluded:

But action must be taken now, he said, before the situation in Lebanon mirrors that in Gaza.

“The facts were known,” he said, regarding terror tunnels in the Gaza belt. “The system went to sleep for a few years and did not do what needed to be done.”

One wonders whether the warnings about the vulnerability on Israel’s northern frontier might have prodded Tzahal to correct its threat reduction priorities on several fronts; tunnel detection, mapping and strategies for destroying those in existence  and those yet to come, under both frontiers. Four years later, we wonder why it didn’t.

Israel’s military faces sobering facts about weaknesses in its defense plans that must be overcome so it can faithfully protect its citizens. Langotsky told us that he had warned current IDF Chief of Staff General Benny Gantz about the threats. But sadly, something fell into the bureaucratic cracks, ignored or overlooked by the decision-makers of Tzahal in Tel Aviv.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review. The featured image is of an IDF soldier in Gaza tunnel during Protective Edge.  Source:  AP Photo.

Libertarian Movement on the Rise? by Doug Bandow

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It’s about time. We’ve tried everything else.

The New York Times wonders if the libertarian moment has arrived.

Maybe, suggested an article in the Sunday magazine.

Supporters of Rand Paul and father Ron think so. Award-winning economist turned left-wing pundit Paul Krugman is not convinced.

Unfortunately, there have been false starts before. Ronald Reagan’s election seemed the harbinger of a new freedom wave. His rhetoric was great, but actual accomplishments lagged far behind. Taxes were lower, but when he left office government looked pretty much the same as it did when he was sworn in, only bigger.

So, too, with the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress. As before, there was a tendency to confuse partisanship with philosophy. Admittedly, members of the GOP tend to toss around such phrases as “individual liberty” and “limited government.” However, their behavior in office looked little different from that of many Democrats. Like the Reagan Revolution, the Gingrich Revolution also sputtered out.

Since then there’s been even less to celebrate in America, at least. George W. Bush was an avid proponent of “compassionate,” big-government conservatism. Outlays rose faster during his administration than they had during Bill Clinton’s. No one did more to bail out business and enrich corporate America than Bush, the architect of the big-spending response to the 2008 financial crisis.

Barack Obama continued the tradition, promoting corporate welfare, pushing through a massive “stimulus” bill for the bank accounts of federal contractors, and seizing control of what remained private in the health care system. About the only good news is that incipient federal bankruptcy has discouraged Congress from adopting other massive new spending programs.

Over the last half-century, members of both parties took a welfare state that was of modest size despite the excesses of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and put it on a fiscally unsustainable basis as part of the misnamed “Great Society.” Economist Lawrence Kotlikoff figures government’s total unfunded liability at around $220 trillion. America’s annual GDP is just $17 trillion. How Uncle Sam will ever make good on all its promises is impossible to imagine.

The national government has done no better with international issues. Trillions went for misnamed “foreign aid” that subsidized collectivism and autocracy. Only the recent growth of international markets and sustained pain of domestic failure moved many poor countries to reform. And even so the foreign money continues to flow, only in renamed programs for slightly different purposes.

Moreover, trade liberalization faces determined resistance, and is often blocked by countries that enjoy the greatest benefits of global commerce. Indeed, the Left in wealthy, industrialized nations has discovered how to kill trade agreements with kindness, loading them with environmental and labor regulations in the name of the world’s poor, but guaranteed to prevent new jobs from being created for those very same poor.

Even worse has been foreign policy. The ecstasy felt by most people after the collapse of the Berlin Wall—a quarter-century ago—has been forgotten. The defense budget has turned into a new form of foreign aid for America’s populous and prosperous allies. The U.S. has been constantly at war, repeatedly proving that the Pentagon is no better at social engineering than is any other government agency. Yet again and again Washington attempts to transcend history, culture, ethnicity, geography, religion, ideology, nationality, and more to fix other societies. It turns out that war is the biggest big government program around.

Americans across the political spectrum agree that something is wrong, that the status quo is no good. But they disagree on the remedy.
However, the answer shouldn’t be that hard to discern. The definition of insanity, runs the old adage, is to keep doing the same thing while expecting different results. Today, government attempts to solve problems by doing ever more of whatever it is already doing. Thus, those who support such policies, whether on the left or right, and expect things to improve in the future should head off to see their psychiatrists. For they are exhibiting disturbing symptoms of insanity.

The economy is slowing, people are falling behind economically, freedoms are being lost, and security fears are rising? No problem. Roll out the usual failed nostrums.

More spending on old programs. Lots of spending on new programs. New and more restrictive regulations. Paternalistic crusades. Criminal penalties for violating commercial and environmental rules. Restrictions on civil liberties. Wars in new places and new wars in old places. We know what the impact of these policies will be. All we have to do is look around the world and see what has happened.

It is this reality, not new personalities, organizations, generations, or something else, that is creating a libertarian moment. Statism and collectivism have been tried and found wanting in all of their variants.

The twentieth century killed off communism and fascism as serious alternatives. They resulted in totalitarian death states capable of killing on a mass scale, but little else. Lives were squandered, liberties were extinguished, the human spirit was suppressed, and people were impoverished.

The chief competitor was not laissez-faire capitalism, as some suggested, but highly regulated and monumentally expensive welfare states. They were freer and more prosperous than their geopolitical antagonists—even a little capitalism goes a long way—but the erosion of liberty and prosperity was constant. Perhaps more debilitating was the corrosive impact on the foundational principles of a free society, such as independence, self-reliance, responsibility, accountability, and more. This assault in America continues with, for instance, the federal government recently turning health care into another massive entitlement, highlighted by pervasive regulation and income redistribution.
The obvious, and only, alternative to more government, which has failed so badly, is less government. Why blame individuals and companies for fleeing the tax mess created in Washington? Lower tax rates and rationalize complex tax systems. Why threaten America’s future by running budget-busting deficits into the future forever? Cut the wasteful looting and pillaging that is a hallmark of today’s transfer society.

Why concoct expensive development and stimulus programs? Kill unnecessary and relax unnecessarily stringent regulations, while making legitimate rules more market-friendly. Why attempt to micro-manage the world with strategies that have failed at home? Model liberty, prosperity, tolerance, and peace for others, allowing individual Americans going abroad to be America’s best ambassadors.

Has the libertarian moment arrived? The bankruptcy of statism and collectivism and all their variants is evident. So is the desperate need for liberty-minded solutions.

However, the tyranny of the status quo, as Milton Friedman termed it, remains omnipresent and powerful. Those who benefit from the politics of plunder will not yield voluntarily. As a result, the libertarian moment will not “arrive.” It will have to be brought forward, seized by those committed to a better and freer America.

dougbandow3540ABOUT DOUG BANDOW

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and the author of a number of books on economics and politics. He writes regularly on military non-interventionism.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image is courtesy of FEE and Shutterstock.

John Bolton Endorses Four Florida Candidates for Congress

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WASHINGTON, Aug. 14, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Ambassador John Bolton endorses four Florida Congressional candidates. Citing the importance of the electoral map in Florida, Bolton’s PAC also contributes to the GOP candidates’ campaigns to ensure each has the resources needed to win in November. The candidates include Rep. Ron DeSantis (FL-6), Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25), Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-27), and Carlos Curbelo running to represent Florida’s 26th district.

Bolton is committed to supporting candidates for elected office who believe in protecting the United States’ vital freedoms at home through securing American interests in a challenging world. The John Bolton PAC and John Bolton Super PAC have raised a combined $4.5 million to date with over $3 million cash on hand.

“Going into 2016, the importance of succeeding in Florida can’t be understated,” said Bolton. “I’m committed to helping Florida Republicans win this November so that come 2016 we’re able to create the change America needs.” Further statements from Bolton on each candidate endorsement:

  • Rep. Ron DeSantis (FL-6):  “As a former JAG Officer and current Navy reserve, Ron is a leader and understands the importance of a strong U.S. national security policy.”
  • Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25): “Mario has been representing South Florida for over two decades. He understand the need for strong national security policy and is the right person to represent the 25thdistrict.”
  • Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-27): “Ileana understands this is a changing and challenging world. As the former Chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, she has become a leader on American foreign policy.”
  • Carlos Curbelo (FL-26): “The son of Cuban immigrants, Carlos represents a new generation of Republican leadership that will bring new ideas and direction to Congress.”

Ambassador Bolton’s PAC has endorsed and made contributions to 17 candidates, including U.S. Senate candidates former Sen. Scott Brown (NH), Thom Tillis (NC), Ed Gillespie (VA), Rep. Tom Cotton (AR), Joni Ernst(IA), Terri Lynn Land (MI), and Leader Mitch McConnell (KY), along with U.S. House of Representatives candidates Will Hurd (TX-23), Martha McSally (AZ-2), Barbara Comstock (VA-10), Rep. Adam Kinzinger (IL-16), former Rep. Robert Dold (IL-10), and Rep. Mike Pompeo (KA-4).

ABOUT JOHN BOLTON PAC: 

The John Bolton PAC was founded by former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John R. Bolton to raise the importance of American national security in federal elections. The PAC will support and contribute to candidates who are committed to restoring strong American economic and national security policies that secure America’s interests in a challenging world.

Morsi’s wife threatens to publish letters from Hillary Clinton, exposing “special relationship” between Muslim Brotherhood and Obama Administration

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The wife of former Egyptian president Muhammad Morsi is the latest Muslim Brotherhood “insider” to threaten to expose the special relationship between Morsi and the Obama administration—a relationship the latter insists never existed.

Nagla Mahmoud, Morsi’s wife, is reportedly angry at some statements recently made by Hillary Clinton, including that Morsi was “naïve” and “unfit for Egypt’s presidency,” as reported by Arabic media.

In the words of El-Mogaz News, Morsi’s wife “is threatening to expose the special relationship between her husband and Hillary Clinton, after the latter attacked the ousted [president], calling him a simpleton who was unfit for the presidency.  Sources close to Nagla confirmed that she has threatened to publish the letters exchanged between Morsi and Hillary.”

The report continues by saying that Nagla accuses Hillary of denouncing her former close ally, the Brotherhood’s Morsi, in an effort to foster better relations with his successor, Egypt’s current president, Sisi—even though, as Nagla laments, “he [Morsi] was faithful to the American administration.”

Earlier, the son of Khairat al-Shatter—another top ranking Brotherhood member who was arrested during the June 2013 revolution that ousted Morsi—made similar assertions, threatening to expose documents that would “undermine his [U.S. president Obama’s] political future and land him in prison.”

Despite all these similar threats from Brotherhood insiders, and despite all the other evidence, the Obama administration insists that its relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood was no more special than its relationships to other Egyptian parties.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Raymond Ibrahim: The West’s Prostration to Islam
UK: Muslim daycare staff bans Christian girl from eating non-halal sandwich

EDITORS NOTE: The featured image of Hillary Clinton with Muhammad Morse is by the Associated Press.

Syrian Kurdish Fighters, not Obama, Rescue Yazidis Stranded on Sinjar Mountain

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President Obama may be dismissive of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist army, calling them flippantly in a New Yorker interview the equivalent a “JV team putting Lakers uniforms which doesn’t make them the equivalent of Kobe Bryant”. Anything for this President President to avoid calling  IS, what it is, a powerful international  force of barbarous  Salafist Jihadis. A veritable terrorist Army who now control a Caliphate covering a broad swatch of Syria and northern Iraq equipped with hundreds of millions of US and Russian arms captured from fleeing Assad and Iraqi soldiers. All financed with billions in loot and war booty from their blitz-like rampage. IS is currently engaged in ethnic cleansing of  Nineveh province.

It is conducting a patent Islamic genocide campaign dispossessing and ousting Christians and  Kurdish speaking Yazidis. Yazidis whose ancient Mesopotamian faith preceded Islam.  

Hundreds of thousands have fled into the sanctuary of  Iraqi Kurdistan.  The Kurdish regional Government (KRG) defended by tough peshmerga forces equipped with ancient Russian weapons from the regime of the late Saddam Hussein. As a result of the IS rampage, a combined humanitarian and military crisis occurred in August 2nd with the fall of Sinjar, Iraq and the flight of  tens of thousands of Yazidis. The rapid advance of IS in both Syria and Iraq was evident to most observers; the exception being the National Security Staff in the West Wing of the White House. They were deflected by the turmoil of establishing a new government in Baghdad, opposed by Shiite autocrat and PM,  Nouri al-Maliki who had deprived the Kurdish regional Government of their fair shares in oil revenues and modern US  supplied arms and weapons.  In June the President sent in 300 military coordinators and planners, since ramped up to an estimated 800 contingent.  US diplomats in the ‘green zone’ in Baghdad and some in Erbil have been flow out to Jordan.

The blame game between the U.S. broke out with sudden capture  by IS of Iraq’s second largest city Mosul in mid-June threatening the Iraqi Kurdistan and Peshmerga force. The flimsy excuse offered by President Obama for ordering the limited air assault against advancing IS forces was the threat to US several hundred military coordinators and diplomats in Erbil, the KRG capital.  Add to that  the humanitarian crisis caused by the flight of more than 45,000 Yazidis to Sinjar Mountain cut off from possible sanctuary in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Watch this WSJ report with Intelligence Journalist Siobhan Gorman on why the US Intelligence community underestimated the sudden rise of IS:

 The Presidential order of August 7th initiating limited air strikes against IS forces only dented their progress  after capturing  the  strategic Mosul Dam astride the Tigris River. The IS blitzkrieg  came within 30 miles of Erbil, the modern capital of the Iraqi Kurdistan.  Humanitarian air drops of water and food by both the US and U.K. to the cowering Yazidi tens of thousands of refugees on the arid 3,000 foot mountain, only provided a brief respite. IS forces seized hundreds of Yazidi women as sex slaves or buried them alive  as  they are considered infidel polytheists and alleged ‘devil worshippers”  under Islamist doctrine.  Iraqi Peshmerga fighters were engaged in pushback of IS forces and recapture of towns along their long frontier with the terrorist Caliphate forces.  It was left to Syrian Kurdish Peshmerga in adjacent Rojava- their homeland – to come to the rescue of the Yazidis.  By August 7th, the same day the President announced  the limited air operations and humanitarian air drops Sinjar Mountain, the Syrian Kurdish Peshmerga successfully opened a secure path for Yazidis to come down off the mountain and enter the adjacent area of Syria to safety an  eventual re-entry into  adjacent KRG.

An AP report, “Syrian Kurdish Fighters Rescuing Stranded Yazidis”, reveals the successful humanitarian corridor created by these Rojava  Kurdish Peshmerga fighters without US and UN assistance.  Note these excerpts:

While the U.S. and Iraqi militaries struggle to aid the starving members of Iraq’s Yazidi minority with supply drops from the air, the Syrian Kurds took it on themselves to rescue them. The move underlined how they — like Iraqi Kurds — are using the region’s conflicts to establish their own rule.

For the past few days, fighters have been rescuing Yazidis from the mountain, transporting them into Syrian territory to give them first aid, food and water, and returning some to Iraq via a pontoon bridge.

The desperate condition of these stranded Yazidis was described:

“The (Kurdish fighters) opened a path for us. If they had not, we would still be stranded on the mountain,” said Ismail Rashu, 22, in the Newroz camp in the Syrian Kurdish town of Malikiya some 20 miles from the Iraqi border. Families had filled the battered, dusty tents here and new arrivals sat in the shade of rocks, sleeping on blue plastic sheets. Camp officials estimated that at least 2,000 families sought shelter there on Sunday evening.

Nearby, an exhausted woman rocked a baby to sleep. Another sobbed that she abandoned her elderly uncle in their village of Zouraba; he was too weak to walk, too heavy to carry.

Many said they hadn’t eaten for days on the mountain; their lips were cracked from dehydration and heat, their feet swollen and blackened from walking. Some elderly, disabled and young children were left behind. Others were still walking to where Syrian Kurds were rescuing them, they said.

We are thankful, from our heads to the sky, to the last day on earth,” said Naji Hassan, a Yazidi at the Tigris river border crossing, where thousands of rescued Yazidis were heading back into Iraq on Sunday.

The U.N. estimated around 50,000 Yazidis fled to the mountain. But by Sunday, Kurdish officials said at least 45,000 had crossed through the safe passage, leaving thousands more behind and suggesting the number of stranded was higher.

The Syrian Peshmerga swung into action:

Syrian Kurdish officials said soon after Yazidis fled their villages, they began fighting to create a safe passage. They clashed with Islamic State fighters upon entering Iraq, losing at least 9 fighters, but by Aug. 7 had secured a safe valley passage, cramming Yazidis into jeeps, trucks and cars to bring them some 25 miles away. Some of the ill were even rushed to hospital.

“We answered their cries for help. They were in danger and we opened a safe passage for them into safety,” said military official Omar Ali. “We saw that we had to help them and protect them; they are Kurds and part of our nation.”

The AP report noted that autonomy that Syrian Kurds established in Syria that allowed them to undertake this rescue of the Yazidis after the KRG Peshmerga retreated:

In saving Yazidis, Syrian Kurds were also demonstrating their own ambitions for independence as Syria’s civil war rages on.

They announced their autonomous area of Rojava in January, and rule several far northeastern Kurdish areas of Syria. Government forces stationed in the area were redeployed over two years ago to battle rebels seeking Assad’s overthrow, Syrian Kurdish officials said.

But in entering Iraq, the Syrian fighters are also challenging their Iraqi Kurdish rivals. They say they entered after the Iraqi Kurdish fighting force, called the peshmerga, fled Yazidi villages after short battles with Islamic militants. The peshmerga say they were outgunned by the militants.

The gratitude of the Yazidis for the action of the Syrian Kurdish fighters:

For now, with the peshmerga gone and state aid ineffective, the Yazidis who survived the mountaintop ordeal were counting on the Syrian Kurdish fighters. Covered in dust among crowds at the Tigris crossing, Hassan said without the fighters all would have been lost.

“Were it not for them, no Yazidi would be saved,” he said.

If the West is serious about blunting, if not rolling back the IS Jihad blitzkrieg, it must rapidly equip and train both Iraqi and Syrian Kurdish peshmerga with basic small arms, mortars and grenades, as well advanced weapons.  The irony is that desperately needed  weaponry would be used to destroy US weapons and munitions abandoned by regular Syrian and  Iraqi Shiite forces that were slaughtered or fled in panic acquired during the IS rampage.  There is an immediate source that could be drawn immediately less than 601 miles away from Kurdistan, the U.S. War Reserve stockpile in Israel. All it takes is for President Obama to authorize the Pentagon to make those draw downs and undertake  emergency airlifts to  equip and train those tough  Peshmerga fighters on the frontlines in both Syria and Iraq.

What did Sir Winston Churchill say about U.S. lend lease efforts prior to our entry into WWII in a radio broadcast on February 9, 1941:  “Give us the tools to finish the Job”.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on the New English Review. The featured image is of a Syrian Kurdish Peshmerga fighter in Derika, Syria’s Refugee Camp. August 10, 2014 Source: AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed.

Texas: Dallas Silences “Impeach Obama” Message — Thomas More Law Center Files Lawsuit

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Another American city is attempting to silence the free speech of “Overpasses for America” activists calling for the impeachment of President Obama and for government reforms such as border security. This time, the group’s message is being stifled by an ordinance adopted by the Dallas City Council on January 22, 2014, which imposes fines of up to $500 for certain expressive activities on pedestrian overpasses over designated highways.

The ordinance makes it an offense to engage in any conduct, including holding a sign, intended to distract a motorist, or wearing any clothing intended to attract the attention of the public.

The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC), a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, late yesterday afternoon filed a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the Dallas ordinance on behalf of Overpasses for America (OfA) and its Texas State Leader, Valeria Villarreal. Joining TMLC as local co-counsel is Houston attorney, Jerad Najvar.

The lawsuit claims the ordinance violates the Plaintiffs’ constitutional rights to freedom of speech and to peaceably assemble.

Click here to read entire Federal Lawsuit

Erin Mersino, TMLC Senior Trial Counsel, who is handling the case, commented, “This is another example of a city silencing the message of a certain viewpoint in a traditional public forum without legal justification.  Here, there is no history that Plaintiffs’ speech imposed any public safety threat.  Such an invalid restriction on free speech curtails all of our free speech freedoms and wrongfully imperils one of our inalienable rights as Americans.”

OfA is a non-partisan grassroots movement which spreads a message about the need for accountability amongst our nation’s leaders. The use of pedestrian overpasses effectively allows OfA members to reach a large and diverse audience. TMLC is currently representing two Plaintiffs in a case challenging a similar ordinance in the Town of Campbell, Wisconsin.

Before the challenged ordinance was adopted, OfA had held over 75 demonstrations on pedestrian overpasses in the Dallas area, frequently organizing the events in cooperation with the Dallas Police Department and a Director of Homeland Security in Dallas.

The ordinance was passed under the guise that it was necessary for traffic safety and the safety of police officers.  However, the lack of any real safety issue was highlighted during the council debate on the ordinance when the Dallas Chief of Police, pressed by Councilman Phillip Kingston, could not point to any instance in which a OfA protest caused an accident.  Nevertheless, the council adopted the ordinance, which took effect on January 27, 2014, by a 10-4 vote.

On March 1, 2014, with the cooperation of the Dallas Police Department and a Director of Homeland Security in Dallas, Villarreal and OfA-Dallas held a successful demonstration on the Northaven overpass over the Dallas North Tollway.

However, when Villarreal called the Dallas Police Department to inform them of OfA-Dallas’ plans to hold a demonstration on March 15, 2014, she was told that the police department was now obligated to enforce the city ordinance.

Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of TMLC, stated:   “The viewpoints of a majority of Americans on crucial public issues are no longer expressed by their elected representatives.  The concerns of a majority of Americans seem to have little impact on the decisions made by politicians who are more concerned with appeasing lobbyists, special interest groups, and wealthy donors.  That’s why it’s so important to defend the free speech rights of grass roots organizations like Overpasses for America, whose members feel it’s their patriotic duty to stand for hours on these overpasses to get their message out and mobilize their fellow citizens.”

ABOUT THE THOMAS MORE LAW CENTER

The Thomas More Law Center defends and promotes America’s Judeo-Christian heritage and moral values, including the religious freedom of Christians, time-honored family values, and the sanctity of human life.  It supports a strong national defense and an independent and sovereign United States of America.  The Law Center accomplishes its mission through litigation, education, and related activities.  It does not charge for its services.  The Law Center is supported by contributions from individuals, corporations and foundations, and is recognized by the IRS as a section 501(c)(3) organization.  You may reach the Thomas More Law Center at (734) 827-2001 or visit our website at www.thomasmore.org.

Long Term U.S. Senators Rarely Visit Home: Worst offender Harry Reid

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Nick Tomboulides, Executive Director of U.S. Term Limits (USTL), has sent out a very revealing chart showing that the longer a U.S. Senator is in office the less time he or she spends in their respective state.

Tomboulides writes, “I’ve got a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore. No, this line doesn’t just apply to Dorothy in the wonderful land of Oz. It’s also true about Kansas Senator Pat Roberts, who acknowledged in February that he doesn’t actually live in the state he was elected to represent. When Roberts visits Kansas, he stays with wealthy donors at their home on a golf course (really). The rest of the time, he’s in D.C.”

Roberts’ scant visits home were recently featured in research by the Washington Examiner’s Luke Rosiak, who analyzed congressional travel records to conclude that the longer a Senator stays in office, the less likely he is to travel home. Roberts, a 34-year Washington politician, was near the bottom with only 32 trips back to Kansas in three years. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was the undisputed champ of ignoring constituents, with only 11 trips home over the same period.

As USTL President Phil Blumel commented in the Examiner piece, “When they get up in age, folks like Thad Cochran, particularly in the Senate, you really don’t ever have to leave as long as you’re breathing because you’re going to get re-elected no matter what.”

“What Phil describes is really an iron rule of politics: A majority of politicians will only serve the public when that same action will also serve themselves. In an atmosphere of non-competitive elections, a public official’s interests only line up with the people’s interest about five percent of the time. That’s roughly the competitive slice of House elections each year,” notes Tomboulides.

Congressman Kevin McCarthy in a  2010 CNN op-ed wrote, “Washington isn’t listening. The disconnect between the American people and the agenda being advanced in Washington is growing by the day. When Americans have spoken up, their voices have fallen on deaf ears. Political expedience and partisan allegiances have repeatedly trumped the priorities of the American people.”

Time for Congressional term limits?