End the Iran Deal rally on September 8th, 2015 in Washington, D.C. at the Capitol West Lawn. Remarks by Pastor Mario Bramnick, President of the Hispanic Israel Leadership Coalition.
RELATED ARTICLE: The Iran deal bait-and-switch – The Boston Globe
“The fact that so many people complained suggests there are deep-rooted, systemic problems in how the U.S. military command charged with the war against the self-proclaimed Islamic State assesses intelligence.” Indeed. It shows that it doesn’t assess intelligence at all. It shows that it isn’t really interested in fighting or defeating the Islamic State. It is only interested in creating the appearance of fighting and defeating the Islamic State, so that it doesn’t suffer politically for not doing so.
“Exclusive: 50 Spies Say ISIS Intelligence Was Cooked,” by Shane Harris and Nancy A. Youssef, Daily Beast, September 9, 2015:
It’s being called a ‘revolt’ by intelligence pros who are paid to give their honest assessment of the ISIS war—but are instead seeing their reports turned into happy talk.
More than 50 intelligence analysts working out of the U.S. military’s Central Command have formally complained that their reports on ISIS and al Qaeda’s branch in Syria were being inappropriately altered by senior officials, The Daily Beast has learned.
The complaints spurred the Pentagon’s inspector general to open an investigation into the alleged manipulation of intelligence. The fact that so many people complained suggests there are deep-rooted, systemic problems in how the U.S. military command charged with the war against the self-proclaimed Islamic State assesses intelligence.
“The cancer was within the senior level of the intelligence command,” one defense official said.
Two senior analysts at CENTCOM signed a written complaint sent to the Defense Department inspector general in July alleging that the reports, some of which were briefed to President Obama, portrayed the terror groups as weaker than the analysts believe they are. The reports were changed by CENTCOM higher-ups to adhere to the administration’s public line that the U.S. is winning the battle against ISIS and al Nusra, al Qaeda’s branch in Syria, the analysts claim.
That complaint was supported by 50 other analysts, some of whom have complained about politicizing of intelligence reports for months. That’s according to 11 individuals who are knowledgeable about the details of the report and who spoke to The Daily Beast on condition of anonymity.
The accusations suggest that a large number of people tracking the inner workings of the terror groups think that their reports are being manipulated to fit a public narrative. The allegations echoed charges that political appointees and senior officials cherry-picked intelligence about Iraq’s supposed weapons program in 2002 and 2003.
The two signatories to the complaint were described as the ones formally lodging it, and the additional analysts are willing and able to back up the substance of the allegations with concrete examples.
One person who knows the contents of the complaint said it used the word “Stalinist” to describe the tone set by officials overseeing the military’s analysis.
Some of those CENTCOM analysts described the sizeable cadre of protesting analysts as a “revolt” by intelligence professionals who are paid to give their honest assessment, based on facts, and not to be influenced by national-level policy. The analysts have accused senior-level leaders, including the director of intelligence and his deputy in CENTCOM, of changing their analyses to be more in line with the Obama administration’s public contention that the fight against ISIS and al Qaeda is making progress. The analysts take a more pessimistic view about how military efforts to destroy the groups are going.
The large number of analysts who complained to the Pentagon inspector general hasn’t been previously reported. Some of them are assigned to work at CENTCOM, the U.S. military’s command for the Middle East and Central Asia, but are officially employed by the Defense Intelligence Agency.
The complaints allege that in some cases key elements of intelligence reports were removed, resulting in a document that didn’t accurately capture the analysts’ conclusions, sources familiar with the protest said. But the complaint also goes beyond alleged altering of reports and accuses some senior leaders at CENTCOM of creating an unprofessional work environment. One person who knows the contents of the written complaint sent to the inspector general said it used the word “Stalinist” to describe the tone set by officials overseeing CENTCOM’s analysis.
Many described a climate in which analysts felt they could not give a candid assessment of the situation in Iraq and Syria. Some felt it was a product of commanders protecting their career advancement by putting the best spin on the war.
Some reports crafted by the analysts that were too negative in their assessment of the war were sent back the chain of the command or not shared up the chain, several analysts said. Still others, feeling the climate around them, self-censored so their reports affirmed already-held beliefs….
Two of the officials who spoke to The Daily Beast said that analysts began airing their complaints in October in an effort to address the issue internally and only went to the inspector general when that effort failed. Some of those who complained were urged to retire, one official familiar with the report told The Daily Beast. Some agreed to leave.
In recent months, members of the Obama administration have sought to paint the fight against ISIS in rosy hues—despite the terror army’s seizure of major cities like Mosul and Fallujah.
“ISIS is losing,” John Allen, the retired Marine general charged with coordinating the ISIS campaign, said in July.
“I am confident that over time, we will beat, we will, indeed, degrade and ultimately destroy ISIL,” Secretary of State John Kerry said in March, using the government’s preferred acronym for the group.
“No, I don’t think we’re losing,” President Obama said in May….
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This tells you all you need to know about the “refugee” crisis in Europe. It is, as I said, a hijrah: a migration for the sake of Allah, to plant Islam in a new land. If they were really refugees, the Saudis would take them. But no, they are invaders, and the Saudis are offering to make things easier for them by providing them with facilities for the invasion — remember, four separate studies since 1998 have shown that 80% of Saudi-funded mosques in the U.S. teach hatred of Jews and Christians and the necessity to replace the Constitution with Sharia.
“Saudi Arabia Offers to Build 200 Mosques for Syrians in Germany,” by Daniel Greenfield, FrontPage, September 10, 2015:
Saudi Arabia, which doesn’t permit the construction of churches but finances a mosque construction spree in the land of the infidel, will not be taking in Syrian refugees. Even though they are fellow Muslims. It will however offer to build 200 mosques in Germany for their use.
It’s a kind offer. The only proper way for Europe to reciprocate would be to send a million soccer hooligans to Saudi Arabia and then offer to build facilities to teach them of the importance of trashing the country and abusing any native they come across.
Of course the Saudis aren’t stupid enough to fall for that one. Not even if the soccer hooligans bring along the occasional woman and child to use as emotional human shields while battering their way into a country they hate in every possible way aside from its social services.
Only Westerners are stupid enough to fall for that one.
Saudi mosques have played a key role in the rise of Islamic terrorism in the West. Just think of the explosive wonders that something short of a million migrants and all the mosques they can Allah Akbar in will accomplish in Germany.
Maybe the next Caliph of the Islamic State will even shout Allah Akbar while beheading some local infidel with a German accent. Maybe that Islamic State will even be in Hamburg.
Why is it that so few people ask themselves why the Saudis are willing to build 200 mosques for these “poor, desperate refugees”, yet won’t take a single one in?
It’s the same answer to the question of why so many Muslims claim to care about “Palestinians” to the point of genocide, yet won’t take them in and give them citizenship.
These aren’t refugees. They’re armies.
Don’t take it from me. Take it from Turkey’s Erdogan, the man more popular among German Muslims than he is among his own oppressed people. Here’s the poem that the formerly secular Turkish state sent him to jail for, before it became an Islamist hellhole of minarets, Erdogan palaces and crumbling shopping malls.
“The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers.”
Saudi Arabia just offered to build 200 barracks for the 800,000 soldiers invading Germany.
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It is safe to say that “Joshua Ryne Goldberg” is a convert to Islam. How did he get the idea that his new religion called for mass murder of those who don’t believe in it? Why are the peaceful aspects of Islam that are so obvious to John Kerry and David Cameron and the U.S. Catholic bishops so hard for people like Joshua Ryne Goldberg to find, while the violent passages that Kerry and Cameron and the bishops are sure do not exist call out so insistently to young men like Goldberg?
“Florida Man Who Claimed to Inspire Garland Attack Arrested for 9/11 Memorial Bomb Plot,” by Garrett Pelican, WTLV, September 10, 2015 (thanks to Larry):
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — A 20-year-old Clay County man has been arrested on federal charges surrounding an alleged plot to bomb upcoming 9/11 memorial ceremonies in Kansas City, Mo., according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Joshua Ryne Goldberg, 20, of Orange Park, is charged with distribution of information relating to explosives, destructive devices, and weapons of mass destruction, according to a criminal complaint.
He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Reached at home, Goldberg’s father told First Coast News he was “shocked” by the allegations against his son.
Between July and September, Goldberg had been in contact online with an individual, who — unbeknownst to Goldberg — was actually an informant. Goldberg had allegedly provided the individual with details on how to construct a bomb and instructed him to fashion a pressure cooker bomb and fill it with nails, metal and other shrapnel dipped in rat poison.
According to the complaint, Goldberg directed the individual to place the bomb at a memorial in Kansas City, Mo. that was commemorating the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
Goldberg surfaced on the FBI’s radar after he claimed to have inspired the May 3 attack in Garland, Texas on the Muhammad Art Exhibit and Contest. That’s where two gunmen — later identified as Elton Simpson and Nadir Hamid Soofi — wearing body armor and carrying rifles opened fire on a police officer and security officer before they were shot and killed by police.
Ahead of that attack, Goldberg’s Twitter account — Australi Witness — posted tweets calling for an attack on the art show, posting a map of the Curtis Culwell Center where the show was staged and urging anyone nearby to attack “with your weapons, bombs and knives,” the complaint said.
The day of the attack, Twitter user @AusWitness 3 tweeted, “I’M BACK KUFFAR! DIE IN YOUR RAGE!” On the morning of the attack, Simpson’s account — Shariah is Light — retweeted that message.
In late July, the FBI told an informant to reach out to the social media user calling himself “Australi Witness” and “AusWitness,” who had posted messages on pro-Islamic State websites and claimed to be a Lebanese refugee living in Australia. In fact, it was Goldberg living in his parents’ home on Pine Road in Orange Park, according to the complaint.
In a conversation Aug. 17, Goldberg told the informant, “Hopefully there will be some jihad on the anniversary of 9/11.” Days later, when the source suggested he was willing to take part in an attack, Goldberg allegedly provided him with detailed plans to make explosives, including pipe bombs.
The instructions, according to the FBI, were “accurate” and would actually work.
On Aug. 20, Goldberg elaborated. “Have you decided what kind of attack you want to carry out on 9/11, akhi? I was thinking a bombing. … We could make pipe bombs and detonate them at a large public event… It needs to be big,” he’s quoted as saying in the indictment.
Afterward, Goldberg lobbied for his informant to fashion a bomb out of a pressure cooker, akin to the device used in the Boston Marathon bombing, the complaint said. He allegedly suggested his contact fill the device with shrapnel and poison to inflict maximum damage, saying his contact should use “shards of metal and nails. … Broken glass would probably work too. Just put as much sharp stuff as you can in there.”
He also picked out a location to stage the attack, a stair climbing event on Sept. 13 in Kansas City in which firefighters and first responders honor those who died in the Sept. 11 attacks, calling it “the perfect place,” according to the complaint. He selected the event because it would attract the largest number of people on 9/11
At some point in the discussion, Goldberg allegedly told his contact, “…Get FAR away from the bomb, brother. There’s going to be chaos when it goes off. Shrapnel, blood, and panicking Kuffar will be everywhere.”
“If you can, dip the screws and other shrapnel in rat poison before putting them in. That way, the kuffar who get hit by them will be more likely to die,” Goldberg told the informant.
Agents raided Goldberg’s home Wednesday. While speaking with investigators, he allegedly acknowledged using social media to call for attacks in Garland, Texas and providing an associate with instructions on how to produce a pressure cooker bomb….
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Back in 2013, when I attended an Office of Refugee Resettlement meeting in Lancaster, PA, government officials identified Georgia as having a‘pocket of resistance’ because the Republican Governor, Nathan Deal, had asked the feds to stop sending so many, that Georgia was overloaded. So it is no surprise that Gov. Deal is saying the same thing today. (And, it looks like his appeal to the US State Department fell on deaf ears!)
From the Atlanta Journal Constitution:
Gov. Nathan Deal’s administration doesn’t want to see the number of refugees resettling in Georgia increase, despite pleas from humanitarian officials urging the U.S. to take in substantially more Syrians fleeing their war-torn country.
In an interview with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Tuesday, Deal urged a cautious approach to the desperate refugee crisis unfolding across the Mediterranean Sea and Europe. The governor repeated his assertion – disputed by some advocates – that Georgia takes in more than its fair share of refugees.
[….]
Deal’s administration confirmed Tuesday it has asked the State Department to keep the number of refugees resettling in the Peach State “static” going into the next fiscal year.
“We will be welcoming,” Deal told the AJC. “But we want to make sure we’re not taking a disproportionately large share of them compared to other parts of the country.”
This is very interesting considering Reed has been promoting Atlanta as a welcoming city.
Deal’s wary approach to the escalating crisis was echoed by Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed, typically one of the region’s most forceful advocates of a welcoming policy to immigrants and refugees. He said he needed more time to evaluate the city’s position and that he would likely follow the lead of the Obama administration, which is weighing its options.
“I’m not going to get ahead of the federal government with regards to the Syrian refugee crisis,” he said.
[….]
The Deal administration has previously called on the U.S. State Department to sharply reduce the numbers of refugees being resettled in Georgia, citing state and local taxpayer costs associated with taking in the refugees, school budget shortfalls and other concerns.
Local resettlement agencies have long pushed back, beyond arguing that Georgia has a moral obligation to embrace refugees. They say refugees attract millions of dollars in federal aid money, form a ready pool of eager employees and ultimately create businesses and pay taxes.
LOL! A reduction of 16 refugees sure doesn’t sound like a reduction to me!
Last year, the U.S. State Department confirmed it had limited the number of all refugees coming to Georgia, based partly on the Deal administration’s concerns. The number of refugees who have been resettling in Georgia dropped by less than 1 percent over the past two fiscal years, from 2,710 to 2,694.
Deal is right here. The resettlement contractors put “natural enemies” together in some cities expecting (naively?) that the mythical magic melting pot will do its work and the lion will lay down with the lamb or some such foolishness!
“When they decide where they bring in individuals,” Deal said, “they need to do a better job of making sure they haven’t put an over-concentration of people from different countries, some of whom have been natural enemies of each other. Trying to put them side-by-side in a small community like Clarkston is not doing a service to those individuals.”
EndNote: I don’t know whatever happened with Athens, GA where the mayor (a Democrat) wanted answers from the feds before she put a stamp of approval on a refugee program for Athens. Does anyone know whatever happened? Did the contractor, the International Refugee Committee, set up shop there?
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A teenager from Texas was shocked to find out that after aborting his attempt to join the Islamic State in Syria and flying back home, he is facing charges of conspiracy and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State.
If convicted, Asher Abid Khan, 19, from a suburb of Houston, could face 30 years in prison.
Khan flew to Istanbul, planning to cross the border into Syria and join the terror organization. In a conversation with a friend on Facebook, he professed his desire to “die as a Shaheed (martyr),” saying he was “looking forward to dying in Allah’s cause and meeting Allah.”
While waiting in the Turkish airport, Khan listened to pleading messages from family members on his voicemail to return.
Khan had a change of heart, picked up his phone and said to his father, “I want to come home.” Without leaving the airport, Khan took a flight back to Houston.
Khan is one of many American youth who have been radicalized online. Since 2014, the FBI has made an arrest at a rate of one per week in connection with the Islamic State. More than 60 people have been charged with providing material support to the terror group along with other terrorism-related charges.
Unlike Europe, the U.S. has few deradicalization programs in place for cases like Khan. Moreover, because these programs have only recently been started, there is no documentation available to attest to their success or failure rates.
While time behind bars alleviates the short-term threat, it has been documented that U.S. prisons are providing fertile ground for radicalization (see our video below).
Khan’s lawyer, Thomas Berg, says that when Khan boarded the plane home, he also changed his mind about his approach to Islam. Berg is a former colonel in the Army reserves. He served in Guantanamo Bay, where he helped set up the first military commissions, and in Afghanistan.
“He came home and did the right thing,” Berg said. “If the government was smart, they would exploit that. My kid could go to the mosques and talk about redemption.”
He argues that if he is sent to jail, there is no incentive for the next young person to change his mind about joining the Islamic State, since the FBI’s approach offers no way back.
However, the FBI says that even months after Khan returned from Turkey, he told a friend to keep an open mind about the Islamic State and said that America was the “Great Deceiver.”
“We don’t know what he is going to do in three years,” a senior law enforcement official said. “We’ll let the courts sort it out.”
“It is almost like playing Russian roulette,” said Andrew Arena, a former special agent in charge of the Detroit Field Office. “If you guess wrong, you got problems.”
However, Arena also acknowledged the limits of the American approach. “You’re not going to arrest your way out of this problem,” he said.
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Bill Gates, Michael Bloomberg, Warren Buffett, the Koch brothers, Larry Ellison, Sheldon Adelson: none of them have done a thing to “provoke” this. They are not part of the U.S. government or military. They did not draw cartoons of Muhammad. Yet all too many people in the U.S. still believe that if they just do nothing to offend the Muslims, they will be spared. In reality, the jihadis are targeting everyone, without exception, and it is never justified to live on one’s knees.
“Al Qaeda Mag Urges Attack on Koch Brothers, Buffett, Bloomberg,” by Robert Windrem and Tracy Connor, NBC News, September 9, 2015:
A notorious al Qaeda magazine is encouraging lone-wolf terrorist attacks on U.S. economic leaders, including Bill Gates, Michael Bloomberg and Warren Buffett.
The list in Inspire magazine also included industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch, internet entrepreneur Larry Ellison, and casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. A prominent economist was also on the list but asked that his name be withheld. Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke was named, though not Janet Yellen, who succeeded him.
Also pictured was Jim Walton, one of the heirs to the Wal-Mart fortune, although he was misidentified in the caption as his late father, Sam Walton. Several other names on the list were misspelled.
The slickly produced magazine article begins with a photo illustration showing blood-spattered pictures of several of the leaders next to a dripping gun. Its stated goal is to derail the “revival of the America Economy.”
The article says the “economic personalities” and “wealthy entrepreneurs” can get off the list by withdrawing their money from U.S. banks, investing their wealth outside American soil, and denouncing support for Israel….
Inspire magazine is published online by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and was once edited by American-raised jihadi Samir Khan, who was killed in 2011 drone attack along with cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.
It’s best known for an article titled, “How To Make A Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom,” which provided a recipe for explosives….
RELATED ARTICLE: Canada teen jihadi: “I understand Islam better than you”
Where there were five undeclared Democrat Senators on the cusp of reconvening Congress, today there is only one, Ms. Cantwell from Washington State. Three Democrat Senators: Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Gary Price of Michigan declared for the President’s position. Two of the three Democrat Senators who declared for the President position, Blumenthal and Wyden are up for re-election in 2016, while Price is not. The lone Democrat who joined with the Republican majority to oppose the Iran Pact is West Virginia Senator, Joe Manchin.
In a statement released by his office, Manchin said, “I believe that to be a super power, you must possess super diplomatic skills, and I believe that we can use these skills to negotiate a better deal.”
That leaves possibly 58 Senators, 54 Republicans and four Democrats opposing the Iran nuclear pact. That is two shy of the required 60 votes for cloture under the current Senate Rule 22 to cut off a filibuster. A vote on the majority resolutions rejecting the Iran pact could be scheduled as early as Thursday. That is, if the promised filibuster led by Senator Minority Democrat Leader Reid doesn’t stop the vote first.
Reid unleashed the filibuster option on Saturday, September 5th. White House Spokesperson Josh Earnest said Tuesday, September 8th:
It would be a little ironic for now Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to express concerns about a tactic that he, himself, employed on countless occasions. The other thing that I’ll point out is that the 60 vote threshold is actually one that was approved by the 98 senators who voted for the Corker-Cardin legislation back in the spring.
Opponents of the Iran nuclear pact circulated a letter on Capitol Hill today signed by 15 governors including four Republican hopefuls; Jindal of Louisiana, Christie of New Jersey, Kasich of Ohio and Walker of Wisconsin. Republican majority and other opponents of the filibuster floor maneuver by minority Democrats criticize it for denying an up or down vote on the measure that Americans in leading polls taken by a 2 to 1 margin have urged Congress to reject the Iran deal. Harvard law professor emeritus, Alan Dershowitz, author of The Case Against the Iran Deal said in a Steve Malzberg Show interview on NewsMax TV, September 3, 2015:
As an opponent of the deal, a filibuster would be a good result because it would deny legitimacy to the deal. The American public is not going to accept a deal that was filibustered. Let’s remember what a filibuster is. It was a southern strategy designed to undo democracy and to offend equality.
Dershowitz drew attention to the quandary that Israel and PM Netanyahu would face if the Iran pact was approved:
I know Benjamin Netanyahu. I’ve known him since 1973. He is not going to sit back and allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons.
This deal makes it much harder for Israel to defend its people.
In a Washington Post opinion article by Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-KS), member of the House Permanent Intelligence Committee, and Constitutional lawyer, David B. Rivkin, Jr. Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies argued that the failure to deliver a side deal might void the Iran pact. Further they raised the prospect of possible litigation against the President on the grounds that the he didn’t deliver the requisite information. They were especially concerned about the IAEA side agreements with Iran to prepare a Road Map on prior military developments. Aversion of which was leaked with provisions for self inspection at the military site of Parchin, Iran. That Road Map is a condition for release of $100 billion in sequestered funds held by US and foreign financial institutions. Switzerland has already released their sanctions and Russia and China are poised to release their holdings. The EU3 component of the P5+1 are already in discussions with Tehran over billions of trade deals preventing a possible snap back of sanctions should Iran be found cheating on a sneak out to a nuclear weapon. A weapon that some believe it may already have and be able to possibly via a satellite launch.
The Pompeo- Rivkin Washington Post opinion was earlier supported by Jerome Marcus, Esq. in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece, “An Informed Vote on the Iran Deal.” Marcus suggested based on his experience as a young lawyer assisting former State Department counsel, Abraham Sofaer in the Reagan era, executive agreements like JCPOA with far reaching implications should be treated as if it was a treaty. Marcus concluded:
The lesson for today is clear: When a legislative body is deciding whether to approve an international agreement, especially one as important as the recent nuclear agreement with Iran, its members have the right to access the agreement’s negotiating record. Members of Congress should demand that record now, and they should examine it, before they cast their votes.
To bring such a suit Dr. Robert B. Sklaroff and Lee S. Bender, Esq. suggested in a FrontpageMagazine article that the Senate Majority Leader, McConnell should undertake the following steps:
Emergency Prescription for Senate: [1]—Pass rule that abolishes the filibuster; [2]—Pass resolution declaring the Iran nuke deal to be a “treaty”; [3]—Defeat the deal; and [4]—Sue President Obama to enjoin him from implementing the deal.
The procedures for initiating the first critical step, achieving cloture cutting off the threatened filibuster, are contained in two relevant Congressional Research Service reports; Considerations for Changes in Senate Rules by Richard S. Beth, January 2013 and Filibusters and Cloture by Beth and Valerie Heitschusen, December 2014.
Sklaroff heard Dershowitz at a presentation in Cherry Hill, New Jersey on September 2nd. He reported on Dershowitz’s remarks and response:
On September 2, Dershowitz, at the Jewish Community Center in Cherry Hill, N.J., amplified on this viewpoint, quoting Federalist 64: “The power of making treaties is an important one, especially as it relates to war, peace, and commerce; and it should not be delegated but in such a mode, and with such precautions, as will afford the highest security that it will be exercised by men the best qualified for the purpose, and in the manner most conducive to the public good.”
When I [discussed] with him the necessity to sue Obama, he initially raised concern that this would be discarded as a “political question.” “Who would sue?” he asked rhetorically. “Senator McConnell!” said I. “Well, it’s a possibility, because he would have standing, representing the Senate.”
Has such a suit been brought by the Senate against President Obama and the Supreme Court ruled on the matter of executive overreach of lawful authorities? There is the example of the Supreme Court June 2014 unanimous ruling against the President for his three day recess appointment of National Labor Relations Board and Consumer Protection officials in 2012 that required approval by the Senate. The original matter was brought by a Washington State bottler and a decision rendered in the DC US Circuit Court of Appeals by Judge David B. Sentelle. Note the comments of the Republican Counsel for the Senate and then Senate Majority Leader Reid from a Washington Post article:
Miguel Estrada, who represented Senate Republicans in the case, called the ruling a victory for the Senate. “The Supreme Court reaffirmed the Senate’s power to prescribe its own rules, including the right to determine for itself when it is in session, and rejected the President’s completely unprecedented assertion of unilateral appointment power,” he said.
But Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) blamed Senate Republicans for denying nominees a chance to be confirmed through a vote of the full chamber. “President Obama did the right thing when he made these appointments on behalf of American workers.”
Tomorrow, September 9, 2015, Democrat Presidential front runner Hillary Clinton former Secretary of State, embroiled in a private email server controversy, will make the case for support of the President’s position. She has previously gone on record saying:
The Europeans, the Russians, the Chinese, they’re gonna say we agreed with the Americans, I guess their president can’t make foreign policy. That’s a very bad signal to send.
Clinton will be a minor distraction from the Tea Party Patriots (TPP) Stop Iran Now Rally chaired by Jenny Beth Martin on the West Lawn of the US Capitol Building with a cast of media luminaries in the opposition camp. The event is co-sponsored by TPP, Zionist Organization of America and the Center for Security Policy. The roster of those speaking includes TPP head Martin, Republican Presidential front runner Donald Trump, fellow Presidential hopeful Ted Cruz (R-TX), Conservative talk show Hosts Glen Beck and Mark Levin, David Bossie of Citizens United, Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ), Chairman of the Congressional Israel Allies Caucus, former CIA-director, Ambassador R. James Woolsey, Chairman of the FDD, Frank Gaffney of the CSP, Sarah Stern of EMET and Mort Klein of the ZoA. This will be a media spectacle.
Late this afternoon, my colleague at 1330amWEBY Mike Bates, host of “Your Turn”, and I reviewed these developments. Listen to the WEBY audio segment here. Bates observed that the motivation behind these political maneuverings was President Obama’s objective all along to bolster Iran’s position in the Middle East as a recognized nuclear threshold state threatening traditional support for Allies in the region, Israel, Saudi Arabia, the Emirates and Egypt. Bates thought the Reid filibuster play was simply a travesty of politics as usual in Washington. In turn we both discussed the strange case of Florida US. Representative and Democratic National Committee head, Debbie Wasserman-Shultz, who has infuriated segments of her large but divided Jewish constituency. In her public statement she said tearfully that from her “Jewish heart” the Iran pact, as defective as it is, was the correct thing to do. We concurred that the filibuster if not upended by a Republican cloture to force an up or down vote would enable her and other Democrat colleagues up for re-election in 2016 to claim that there was never a vote. Political cover that comes at a high price of Iran receiving tens of billions now with promises of trillions in economic trade benefits. All while harboring secret development of nuclear weapons threatening the U.S. and Israel.
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EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in the New English Review.
“Iranian Warships Confront U.S. Navy On ‘Daily Basis,’” by Adam Kredo, Washington Free Beacon, September 8, 2015:
U.S. naval forces operating in and around the Strait of Hormuz, a critical shipping lane, are “routinely approached by Iranian warships and aircraft” on a “nearly daily basis,” according to a Pentagon official familiar with operations in the region.
During these interactions between U.S. and Iranian forces, American aircraft and ships are routinely photographed by the Iranians for intelligence purposes, according to the official, who said that most confrontations between the sides are “conducted in a safe and professional manner.”
The disclosure of these daily run-ins comes following the release of footage by the Iranian military purporting to show a reconnaissance mission over a U.S. aircraft carrier station in the Strait of Hormuz.
The clip, which was filmed at the end of August and is punctuated by dramatic music, shows U.S. personnel aboard the ship and shots of U.S. warplanes stationed on it.
Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps “drones have carried out such missions many times; although the drone remains for a long time above the [American crew’s] heads, they didn’t notice it,” Iran’s state-control media reported in Persian at the time, according to a translation by the Middle East Media Research Institute. “In some cases, [the American crew] did notice the IRGC drone awhile after the filming and tried to drive it off by sending a helicopter or fighter jet after it.”
When asked about the veracity of the clip, a Pentagon official said that Iran conducts surveillance missions on a routine basis.
“U.S. Naval forces are routinely approached by Iranian warships and aircraft as they operate in the region, with the majority of all interaction by the Iranians conducted in a safe and professional manner,” the official said. “This happens on a near daily basis.”
“The Iranians’ primary purpose for approaching U.S. forces is for ISR [Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance] so these interactions are almost always characterized by the presence of Iranian photographers capturing photos and video,” the official added.
The United States also films these encounters, the official noted.
“During these interactions we, too, capture imagery for the record,” the official said. “Safe, professional, and routine interactions are of no concern, and we are fully confident in the ability of U.S. Naval forces to defend themselves. We also publicly acknowledge those interactions with the Iranians which we consider to be unsafe.”…
“I officially declare that under no circumstances will we refrain from providing material and moral support to Hezbollah, or to any group of the resistance to the U.S. and Israel,” said Hossein Dehghan, Iran’s defense minister, in an interview this month, according to a translation of his remarks.
Iran continues “to consider the U.S. to be the ‘Great Satan’ even after the nuclear deal,” Dehghan said.
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Click on the image for a printable copy of the policy analysis.
The CATO Institute’s Michael D. Tanner and Charles Hughes in their comprehensive policy analysis titled “The Work versus Welfare Trade-Off: Europe” report:
If welfare benefits become too generous, they can create a significant incentive that encourages recipients to remain “on the dole” rather than to seek employment. Benefits in European Union (EU) countries vary widely, but in many of them, benefits are high relative to what an individual could expect to earn from a low-wage or entry-level job. For example, for a single parent with two children in 2013—
Many European countries have recognized the problem and have begun to reform their welfare systems to create a better transition from welfare to work. In fact, the United States is falling behind some European countries with regard to welfare reform.
Countries that are serious about reducing welfare dependency and rewarding work should consider strengthening work requirements, establishing time limits for participation, and tightening eligibility. Perhaps more important, countries should examine the level of benefits available and the effective marginal tax rates their welfare systems create, with an eye toward reducing disincentives and encouraging work.
Read the full policy analysis buy clicking here.
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Germany will spend around $6.6 billion to fund their own demise.
“Germany to Spend $6.6 Billion on 800,000 Refugees and Migrants,” by F. Brinley Bruton , The Associated Press and Reuters, September 7, 2015
Germany will spend around $6.6 billion to cope with some 800,000 migrants and refugees expected to have crossed into the country by the end of 2015, the government said early Monday.
The announcement by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition government came after Germany and neighboring Austria threw open their borders to the wave of refugees making their way north and west from the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere. Hungary has been letting the human tide move on after holding it up for days.
“We had to give a strong signal of humanity to show that Europe’s values are valid also in difficult times. Hungary’s handling of the crisis is unbearable,” said Germany’s Secretary-General Yasmin Fahimi.
Firefighters chat with migrants who arrived by train to the main railway station in Munich, Germany on Sunday. MICHAEL DALDER / Reuters
Emotional scenes of Germans and Austrians civilians welcomed exhausted migrants arriving in their countries have contrasted starkly with the treatment they had received in Hungary. Budapest sparked outrage after putting migrants in holding camps and a series of confrontations between Hungarian police and refugees were caught on film.
Germany, Europe’s wealthiest country, also said it would make it easier to deport asylum seekers from countries considered “safe,” such as Montenegro, Kosovo and Albania, to cope with the huge influx from war-torn states like Syria, Iraq and Eritrea.
Germany Opens Doors to Migrants As Thousands Pour In
On Sunday, a convoy of around 140 cars and vans filled with food and water left Vienna, Austria, to collect exhausted migrants, who had set out to walk the 110-mile stretch through the rain from Hungary’s capital Budapest to the Austrian border.
Onlookers clapped and chanted: “Say it loud, say it clear, refugees are welcome here,” as volunteers loaded their vehicles with food, water and soft toys.
Munich police told NBC News that 28,500 people had arrived in the city over the past week, with 17,800 on Saturday and Sunday alone. Authorities said the city was running out of beds, and would be sending people to other states within Germany much more quickly.
Also on Monday, British prime minister David Cameron said the U.K. will take 20,000 refugees from Syria over the next five years.
He told lawmakers that the country had a “moral responsibility” to resettle refugees living in camps bordering Syria, while doing all it could to end the conflict in the country. Vulnerable children would be prioritized, he said.
Earlier, French President Francois said his country would welcome 24,000 refugees, and that he and Merkel had agreed on a mechanism to spread the migrant load across Europe.
But Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orban, said he wasn’t prepared to pitch in and questioned how any EU quota system for migrants could work. He pledged to push on with the effort to build an impregnable 11.5-foot high barrier on its southern border to keep the migrants out.
Orban’s government has shrugged off the symbolism and Cold War echoes — noted by critics in western Europe — of razor-wire barriers and watchtowers along borders in formerly Communist eastern Europe.
“We are protecting Europe according to European rules that say borders can be crossed only in certain areas in a controlled way and after registration,” he said in the an interview with an Austrian broadcaster. Asked if soldiers along the frontier would get orders to shoot, he said: “It is not necessary because there will be a fence that cannot be crossed. Whoever wants nevertheless to cross the fence must be arrested and prosecuted. No use of arms will be necessary.”
The raging debate — and the fence — had not stopped migrants from moving norther. Several hundred migrants woke up in a field near the border with Serbia on Monday morning after spending a night in the cold.
Thousands of Migrants Still Streaming Into Hungary Despite Maltreatment
Some 500 people, mostly Syrians, camped in an open field at temperatures of around 46 degrees Fahrenheit because nearby transit camps were overcrowded. The police did not allow them to walk some three miles to the nearest border town of Roszke to seek shelter instead.
“The situation is very very sad,” said Amer, a student from Damascus. “Everybody here feels cold and tired and nobody wants to stay here, but there’s no buses … one bus at two hours, and there’s about 500 [people], maybe more. The situation is very, very bad.”
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EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared on PamelaGeller.com. To stay on top of what’s really happening please follow Pamela Geller on Twitter and like her on Facebook here.
This special edition of The Glazov Gang was hosted by Ari David, the host of the Ari David Show Podcast, and joined by Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center who writes the blog The Point at Frontpagemag.com.
Daniel discussed ISIS Terrorists Coming To a Neighborhood Near You, unveiling how Obama is flooding America with fake Syrian refugees.
Don’t miss it!
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RELATED ARTICLE: US airstrikes said to kill two Islamic State Sharia court judges
This video presents a straightforward analysis as to why the United States Congress should rip up the Iran deal and instead pass a Resolution rejecting the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) that was negotiated between the Obama Administration and Iran, the number one state sponsor of Islamic terror.
The rejection of the JCPOA is based up the Senator Corker Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015, signed by President Obama, which prohibits a vote of disapproval if the complete deal, including any side deals between Iran and any other parties are not handed over to Congress for their proper and professional review.
Our analysis is based upon the outstanding and extensive work of former U.S. Prosecutor, Andy McCarthy.
For an excellent summary, see Andy McCarthy’s National Review article “Obama’s Iran Deal Is Still far from Settled.”
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Clearly the jihadis are more emboldened than ever. Clearly the Islamic State’s declaration of the caliphate has been an impetus for renewed jihad terror activity in the West. That there has been and can be no honest public discussion of why this is happening only ensures that it will continue, and grow more virulent.
“There Have Been More Jihadist Terror Cases in U.S. in 2015 Than in Any Year Since 9/11,” by Michael W. Chapman, CNS News, September 4, 2015 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):
(CNSNews.com) – The “Terror Threat Snapshot” for August 2015, released by the majority staff of the House Homeland Security Committee, states the terror threat level in America is high and “getting steadily worse,” and that there have been “more U.S.-based jihadist terror cases in 2015 than in any full year since 9/11.”
The “Terror Threat Snapshot” also reported that the Islamic State “is fueling the Islamist terror” globally; that Islamist terrorists “are intent on killing law enforcement” officers and U.S. troops, as well as civilians; and that 25,000 fighters from 100 countries have traveled to Syria and Iraq to join the Islamic State.
In addition, more than 250 Americans have traveled, or attempted to travel, to Syria to fight with the Islamists.
“The terror threat level in the U.S. homeland is high, and the situation is getting steadily worse,” said the report. “There have been more U.S.-based jihadist terror cases in 2015 than in any full year since 9/11.”
In 2015 so far, there have been 30 U.S.-based jihadist cases, the committee informed CNSNews.com. In 2001, after the Sept. 11 attacks, there were only two U.S.-based jihadist cases uncovered that year, the committee said.
One of those cases involved Jose Padilla, also known as Abudullah al-Muhajir, a U.S. citizen convicted on multiple counts of criminal conspiracy related to jihadist terrorism; the second case was the Portland Seven, a group of American Muslims who were attempting to join Al Qaeda but were thwarted by the FBI.
For the August 2015 “Terror Threat Snapshot,” the majority staff of the Homeland Security Committee reported that, “In July alone, a terrorist murdered U.S. service members in Chattanooga, and authorities arrested extremists seeking to live-stream a terrorist attack on a college campus and planning to kill U.S. vacationers on the beaches of Florida.”
“The number of U.S. terrorist cases involving homegrown violent jihadists has gone from 38 in July 2010 to 122 today—a three-fold increase in just five years,” reads the Snapshot….
The Snapshot further reported that since early 2014, “there have been 55 planned or executed ISIS-linked terror plots against Western targets, including 14 inside in the United States.”
In addition, “[t]here have been nearly twice as many ISIS-linked plots against Western targets in the first seven months of this year (35) than in all of 2014,” reported the committee.
The “Terror Threat Snapshot” can be read in its entirety here.
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Could be an attempt to “strike terror into the hearts of the enemies of Allah” (Qur’an 8:60).
“Quebec – Police Investigate Pro-Islamic State Propaganda,” a translation of “Des autocollants montrant l’État islamique à Repentigny : la police enquête,” by Hadi Hassin, Le Huffington Post Québec, September 5, 2015, via Blazing Cat Fur:
The Repentigny police are investigating a case of public mischief after hate stickers were placed on cars of Valmont street and in the parking lot of a shopping center.
According to Bruno Marier, spokesman for the Repentigny police, nearly a hundred of stickers have been introduced on cars in the last twenty-four hours including the Valmont Street near a Tim Hortons and a Jean Coutu store. Cars parked near the Galeries Rive Nord were also targeted by vandals.
The stickers show what appears to be a picture of a gunman waving the flag of the Islamic State terrorist group.
“Quebec is a land of Allah. Convert or else … ” it reads.
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