We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
One of the better blogs to emerge over the past few years is Bookworm Room. The blogger lives deep in the blue land of Marin County, and even has to contend with a liberal leaning husband. Out of the upbringing of children and her love of America, she felt compelled to defend both from the inanities and threats that challenge both. With a law degree, and a higher degree of common sense, she writes some of the most literate and engaging commentary you could find.
Now, she has published an e-book from out of her 9000 posts, "A Secret Conservative in Liberal Land." For just $4.99, you can carry these 100,000 words of earned wisdom around with you on your Kindle or other mobile reader, and dip in and out at leisure. Whether living in Liberal Land or saner conditions, you'll be delighted. Even more delightful would be gifting a copy to your liberal friends.
The divide between Inside Beltway Republicans and the conservatives of Mainstreet while not as large is the widest today since the Goldwater revolution of 1964.
Now, as then, the less polished but more pointed and demanding cries of Mainstreet were derided or neglected by the establishment Republican Party. But, the insiders now have less holds on power. Now, as distinct from then, the Inside Beltway Republicans more realize that their positions depend upon Mainstreet. It makes for a difficult and tenuous relationship.
Formerly, it was the business, press and politicians of the Northeast that dominated the Republican Party. Barry Goldwater, and the electoral shift to the Sunbelt and West, started an end to that, and Ronald Reagan completed the rout.
Republican leaders rooted in the failed Goldwater campaign of 1964 and the successful Reagan rule of the 1980’s came to prominence in the Republican Party. However, many, most who found position and wealth in Washington, pay lip service to Mainstreet while cozying up to fountains of money from Inside Beltway lobbyists and false praise from the Northeast liberal media when they compromise with their similarly corrupted Democrat brethren.
In their defense, usually by themselves, they call themselves “mature” Republicans. Maturity means playing within the 30 or 40 yard lines, sometimes mouthing ambitions for policies at the goal lines but arguing that only short runs are possible or realistic against determined and organized liberals.
The Obama administration, although through a fraudulent 2008 campaign, is stocked with leftist radicals from top to bottom, however, who have gone for the long pass. Sure, it has bred and fueled a widespread rebellion that has seriously weakened their hold on Congress. The Mainstreet rebels are epitomized by the Tea Party who have earned wider support from less activist Republicans and from Independents who are repulsed by the Democrats’ legislative extremism. The rebels seek a more daring game plan. Meanwhile, many entrenched establishment Republicans and their media allies denigrate the voices calling for more aggressive moves downfield.
They have some good reasons. The liberal establishment is very powerful and controls more levers of power, and most centrist Americans are fragile allies and heavily influenced by the traditional liberal media.
Nonetheless, it is irrefutable that the defensive establishment Republicans would not have their comforts without the conservative rebels, and the conservative new media will not let them hide behind their excuses or corrupted transgressions.
One may argue that the radicals who control the Democrat Party have overstepped, which is now recognized by most voters. Yet, they have accomplished many of their goals, from an increasingly entrenched ObamaCare to economy-stifling environmental extremism to displaying un-American timidity and counter-productiveness abroad and undermining our allies.
Most of these extremist laws, regulations and policies are either fait accompli or will take decades to ameliorate, at least if business as usual continues in Washington.
On the other hand, as with the Paul Ryan budget program moving the goal posts, if the establishment Republicans coalesce around and firmly push for radical reforms, the alliance of Mainstreet with the Republican Party may accomplish a quick and real turnaround of the United States’ fate, from decline to revived robustness and confidence.
Myself, I tend toward the wonkish and well appreciate the defensive arguments of establishment Republicans for practicality and restraint. I don’t watch talking head TV and only listen to a few minutes a day of talk radio. Still, it is an inescapable reality that it is these conservative voices that have and continue to lead the conservative revolution and, by carryover, the Republican electoral victories.
While over-the-top extremism must be avoided and refuted for conservative and Republican respect and viability, it is inescusable for establishment Republican voices to attack leading conservative voices as altogether irresponsible. This is false, indeed a slander, and really only serves the interests of the left and of crony-capitalists who place their feeding at the D.C. trough above the ongoing welfare of the country. They must recognize that their Inside Beltway position papers are but waste- and toilet paper without the backing of Mainstreet, and that Mainstreet will not settle for much more.
I’m not naming names, as I don’t want to contribute to the divide. Either Washington Republicans will stand up for where their – and our -- bread is really buttered or just continue to seek pats from interests less nourishing to America’s future. If they don’t resolutely stand up, their and our opportunities for America’s revival will be squandered. Do they care more for lucrative after-careers courtesy of the K-Street lobbies or for America? The next year will tell.
As her victory speech becomes a "never mind", and leftist commentators' heads explode, Ms. Kloppenburg has gone from winner to loser in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race. All her winged monkeys (disguised as unionists) couldn't save her.
Notice any resemblance to her precursor in plans gone awry?
My friend and, often, mentor Ye Olde Crabbe, is really Sol Sanders. Now well into his eighties, he and his sharp mind are as honed as ever, as he synthesizes in columns on today's issues his six-and-a-half decades of experiences as a globe-trotting correspondent and columnist for leading publications like US News & World Report, Business Week, UPI. His weekly column now appears at the Washington Times.
Sol Sanders is fond of saying he never met a bridge he didn't burn before himself, since he has never hidden his views behind a bushel or self-interest.
Sanders just started a new blog, appropriately named Ye Olde Crabbe. He has already loaded dozens of his columns on most every of today's world hotspots or areas of unrest that influence, like it or not, us in the US. In our frequent conversations, I'm always blown away and my consciousness raised by his precise memory of history changing anecdotes and famous people he encountered during his travels.
Read the columns already up at the site, and return again and again for his new blog postings. Sol welcomes Comments. You'd better know what you're talking about, as fools are not coddled. Take it from me, if you want to see my own lash marks delivered by Ye Olde Crabbe.
In a blind test of which is which, even art students could only choose the most famous works of the most famous modern artists 62% of the time compared to the squiggles of children, chimpanzees and elephants.
...nobody ever had to do an experiment to find out whether people can tell the difference between a painting by a monkey and a painting by Monet. Nobody ever looked at a Rembrandt and wondered if, just perhaps, some merry prankster had given a pack of paints to a pachyderm and told it to go to town.
From the Washington Post this graphic shows the gross difference between the Obama budget and the comprehensive reforms proposed by Republicans in the House. Go to the link to see the differences between specific areas of the budget.
If not now, when? This is the domestic duel of the century that will shape your and your children's and grandchildren's future, as well as the future of peoples around the world who may not have a strong US to rely upon.
Listening to Hugh Hewitt on the radio Tuesday afternoon, he makes the important point that if Republicans are backed down in this week's haggling over miniscule budget cuts to the 2011 spending, then we've lost the fight for the larger reforms in the 2012 federal budget and programs.
...And check Kimberly Morin, "Violent rhetoric from AFL-CIO union rally in Boston": "’And to the Republican party of Massachusetts, if you think this is gonna happen here, it is going to be over thousands of dead people’s bodies. If you think Wisconsin was anything, we need to stop these guys in their tracks now and kill their bills at the State house.”
Another fine example of civility brought to you by a union boss (who is also a Democrat). Death threats from a teacher in Wisconsin ; AFSCME threatening businesses; and a male Wisconsin Democrat State Legislator telling his Republican colleague ‘You’re f*cking dead’ because she voted YEA on Governor Walker’s budget bill . Is this the new tone of the Democrat Party? Or is this just the typical behavior that the Left and unions have been using for decades?
Why isn't this violent tone being reported by the main stream media?
At college campuses across the US, student organizations that attack Israel have become more and more active, and obnoxious, over the past decade. The members are drawn from some of the Moslem students and their far leftist companions. Most students are there to get an education, or at least get their degree ticket punched. While there's little evidence these anti-Israel groups have much support, through their activism they load student governments and with their loud voices they usually dominate campus debates.
Over the past year or so, at many campuses Jewish groups have formed to counter this vileness. Others of sound minds have joined in.
The University of California, San Diego is one of the top-ranked academic campuses in the country. This week a group of professors joined together to call BS on the anti-Israel groups.
Dr. David Feifel, a professor at UCSD and Vice President of the UCSD SPME (Scholars for Peace in the Middle East) chapter, wrote a powerful editorial about the hypocrisy on campus relating to the Arab and Muslim students' focus on Israel Apartheid Week and their failure to acknowledge the suffering of the Arabs being murdered for demonstrating for democracy in Arab countries. Shockingly, the UCSD Guardian newspaper after an initial acceptance, at the final hour refused to run the editorial. So, the professors had to take out a full page ad which today featured the editorial with 28 signatures of UCSD Professors.
The editorial is below the fold. It is quite educational, and directly confronts the hypocrisy of the on campus anti-Israel groups for actually not giving much of a darn for oppressed Arabs but, instead being preoccupied with vilifying Israel.
These strong counters need to be spread to every other college campus. Please distribute this post to students and professors at other campuses.
Our crack(ed?) technical team at Maggie’s Farm (actually another secret CIA “farm”) has intercepted a secret personal letter just sent by former President George Bush to President Barack Obama.
Dear President Obama:
I’ve kept a respectful public silence about your administration, as you’ve kept silent in contacting me for my experience or any advise. But, I can no longer restrain my urge to thank you for vindicating many of my policies which you criticized during and since your campaign for the presidency.
Yes, I made some mistakes, and corrected some of them. You too have made some mistakes. I wish you the best of luck to correct them.
I must admit that I envy the better position that you are in to do so. I had to manage against a Democrat Congress and hostile press. You now have fewer Democrats to deal with in Congress, many more Republicans now there who are eager to support you with needed policies, and a press which has proven its loyalty to whatever you say.
May I suggest several areas in which you might take advantage of this favorable situation:
The newfound fervor for human rights among liberal supporters of President Obama’s “kinetic” enterprise in Libya might be better turned to Vietnam. Instead, ignoring the persecution of minorities there and ongoing – indeed, increasing – repression of dissent, they fall into line with US businesses profiting from cheap Vietnamese labor to look away. We ally with Middle East foes of freedom and abandon real seekers of freedom in Vietnam.
During the Vietnam War, the Montagnards -- Vietnam’s Central Highlands hill people, a distinct ethnic and cultural group different than the majority lowland Vietnamese – became strong allies in fighting against the communists. They had long wanted autonomy within Vietnam, and seeking their support Saigon granted them many of their requests.
Since 1975, the communist government of Vietnam has ruthlessly persecuted the Montagnards, imprisoning, torturing, murdering many and taking their lands for roads, plantations and mines, denuding the forests for valuable woods, moving the Montagnards from poverty to rootless impoverishment and loss of culture. Together with many within the government, those with connections and Chinese state businesses profit.
Many Montagnards are devout Protestants, Degar, whose churches are not recognized by the state and whose members come in for particularly harsh punishments. The Montagnard Foundation is their voice in the West, documenting and exposing their persecution. Few listen and fewer care, least of all the US government. Under both presidents Bush and Obama, the US government has looked away, with the myth that somehow Vietnam would be a counterweight to China but actually favoring US businesses that also profit from trade with Vietnam.
I’ve frequently written about this. (See, for example, these at a previous website.) My friend Scott Johnson is a lawyer, writer and human rights activist focusing on tribal peoples from South East Asia. His latest article, awaiting publication, focuses on cables from our ambassador to Vietnam that came to light in the WikiLeaks. The cables in question are from US Ambassador to Vietnam Michael Michalak titled, Vietnam Religious Freedom Update. “Essentially the leaked confidential cables are a testament of betrayal as they blatantly fail to mention the hundreds of tribal Christian Montagnards or Degar people imprisoned in Vietnam….It’s as if the hundreds of Montagnard prisoners never existed….”
Richard Goldstone's report For the UN on Israel's Cast Lead incursion into Gaza in December and January 2008-2009 has been used by those antagonistic to Israel to charge that Israel acted wantonly against civilians. In Goldstone's Emily Litella moment, his op-ed in the Washington Post says "never mind." As summarized at CNN: "On Gaza, Goldstone essentially says that if he'd known then what he knows now, the report would not have been nearly so hard on Israel." William Jacobson sums that up: "Richard Goldstone Confirms He Was A Useful Idiot."
At the time, Israel and fair-minded governments and individuals carefully exposed the Goldstone Report's bias, distortions and reliance on pro-Hamas sources. This website presents the facts, ignored by the Goldstone Report. The New Republic, a liberal magazine, in a lengthy evaluation of "The Goldstone Illusion", concludes with:
The Goldstone Report as a whole is a terrible document. It is biased and unfair. It offers no help in sorting out the real issues. What methods can Israel--and other countries in similar situations--legitimately apply in the defense of their citizens? To create standards of morality in war that leave a state without the means of legitimate self-protection is politically foolish and morally problematic; but real answers to these real problems cannot be found in the Goldstone Report. What should Israel do when Hezbollah’s more lethal and accurate missiles strike the center of Tel Aviv, causing hundreds of civilian deaths? It is a well-known fact that these missiles are in Hezbollah’s possession, and, when they are fired, it will be from populated villages in Lebanon.
We'll not be holding our breath for apologies from the UN or leftist commentators who praised the Goldstone Report. Indeed, they'll hurl the same spurious charges next time, as every time.
P.S.: Tell us what you really think, John Podhoretz:
That Richard Goldstone did not know in 2009 that Hamas is a terrorist monstrosity which functions parasitically off civilian populaces while Israel is a beacon of war-fighting restraint in a manner practically unknown in the course of human history suggests even more plainly than the report itself that he is a dupe, a fool, a clown, and a worldwide embarrassment. Not to mention a special kind of reprehensible and appalling figure of inglorious, hideous shame to his own people through the delivery and promulgation of a false document that helped anti-Semites everywhere feel themselves justified.
He was then, and is now, an entirely despicable public figure—and so is his op-ed, by the way, which continues to act as though it is appropriate to draw parallel inferences about Hamas and the state of Israel. It would be right for world Jewry that his name be hereafter summoned as we summon Benedict Arnold’s, or Tokyo Rose’s.
On the other hand, or in addition, see this. But, if Goldstone was ignorant or dumb enough to be "rolled" he didn't belong there in the first place, and his mea culpa while nice to have doesn't undo the damage he wrought and furthered. -- Following Goldstone's recent speaking tour at Berkeley, this observation:
Attempting to justify his decision to proceed with the report, Goldstone has claimed to have been given a revised mandate by the rotating UNHRC president. This is clearly false. Of the "36 incidents" investigated by Goldstone, not one relates to the thousands of Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza, each a war crime targeting Israeli citizens....In his Berkeley presentation, Goldstone reportedly stated that "the powerful don't like to be looked at and judged." Goldstone is a powerful individual, and in failing to address the overwhelming and substantive criticism -- and moving far too slowly, if at all, to correct the enormous damage that he has caused -- Judge Goldstone continues to abuse his power.
Millions Throng Middle East Plazas To Thank The US For Its Military Protecting Muslims From Tyrants
Democrat Senators And Congressmen Agree With Republicans On Deep Cuts In Entitlements To Protect Core Government Services And Assistance To The Poor
New Constitution In China Mirrors US, As Aged Chinese Leaders Decide They Have Enough Loot To Retire To Their Villas
SEIU Leaders Urge Majority Vote By SEIU Members To Cut Their Pensions To Keep Their Jobs
Arianna Huffington Buys Weekly Standard To Add Balance To Her New AOL/Huffington Empire
Major US Christian And Jewish Denominations Eliminate Funding To Third World NGOs That Support Violence Against Christians And Jews
US Colleges Eliminate Gender And Ethnic Studies Departments To Steer Students Into Getting Skills That Will Land A Job After College; Restaurants Panic At Loss Of Servers
Wall Street Firm Presidents Pledge To Buy For Personal Portfolios The Same Investments They Sell To Public
Europe’s NATO Countries Increase Defense Budgets By 50% To Meet Their International Humanitarian Demands Now Filled By US Military
New York City And Detroit Distribute Free Air Conditioners To Persuade Residents Not To Move Elsewhere; Air Conditioners Sold For Air Fare
Misogynistic Maggie’s Farm Writers Seek Puritanistic Females To Become Fellow Bloggers
The New York Times reports that the Palestinian Center for Human Rights “took the unusual step this week of condemning the building and storage of anti-Israel rockets in densely populated areas, a practice that has led to injuries and deaths of civilians.”
“Unusual” isn’t quite the word for it. The Palestinian Center for Human Rights also supports Hamas and its affiliated terrorists “resistance” to Israel, and regularly condemns Israel for militarily reacting. In 2008, this NGO, financed by Western NGOs, also criticized the stockpiling and firing into Israel from populated locations in Gaza. Less populated areas in Gaza should, instead, be the depots and firing positions.
What’s missing from the Palestinian Center for Human Rights criticism, and from the New York Times report?
The Palestinian Center for Human Rights doesn’t condemn the rocket and mortar firing into Israel, and the New York Times doesn’t mention that.
The increased import of longer-range rockets into Gaza now land in the large city of Beersheba, and, as seen in the latest firings last week, now puts the southern area of Tel Aviv and Israel’s major port at Ashdod into range. They may soon reach to Jerusalem. See this map.
Even Human Rights Watch, a consistent severe critic of Israel, condemns the rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel: “Deliberate or indiscriminate attacks against civilians are serious violations of the laws of war. Such attacks committed willfully - that is, intentionally or recklessly - are war crimes.” (more here) The New York Times report, also, doesn’t mention that.
For now, Israel doesn't want to serve as an excuse for anti-Israel propagandists to distract from the revolts against Arab satraps. Eventually, however, Israel will have to take more serious measures against the Gaza sanctuary for indiscriminate rocket and mortar attacks. You can be sure that pro-Palestinian NGOs, their funders and supporters in the UN, and the Western media will condemn Israel for “over-reaction” or “disproportionate use of force” or “civilians killed in Gaza” and such, as they did when Israel last went into Gaza to suppress Hamas and the firing sites. Seldom if at all mentioned will be that Hamas brought it upon itself and Gazans or that Israel had no other realistic alternative, at least if it wants to protect its own civilians and survive.
Oh, BTW, don't forget the almost 1000 weapons depots, bunkers and OP sites in 250 villages in southern Lebanon set up by Hezbollah -- answering to the same Iranian armers as Hamas, and likely to act in concert with Hamas when Israel enters Gaza again.
Facebook finally has faced up to its responsibility and rules to not allow pages that incite violence. After denying that the Facebook page incites a violent Third Intifada against Israel, but facing an outpouring of criticism for avoiding the obvious, Facebook has now taken down the page. (More here and here, and CNN.) Instead, anyone trying to go to that page is redirected to their own personal page.
Thank you to our readers who joined into the call to complain to Facebook.
The supporters of violence against Israel among the many Facebook users in the Middle East have already set up a new Third Intifada page. The fight, of course, continues by those determined not to have our freedoms abused by those who would kill them. For those who don't get it, Intifada Means War on Israel.
P.S.: MEMRI has the translation of the Third Intifada Facebook page.
The unusual ad hoc mixture of supporters of the US military involvement in Libya can cause heads to explode among those with other principles. I count myself as having a shattered skull.
The weird mixture of automatic supporters of Obama’s usual muddle and wrong-headed policies together with many neocons who automatically endorse humanitarian foreign interventions even when our national security is not seriously threatened have provided cover for a descent into madness.
Heads are exploding among those of us who require clearer goals that further our national interests and demand the will and means to achieve them. But, as Congressman Duncan Hunter points out in this op-ed, the Constitution does not really restrict President Obama’s military intervention. Only the uproar of Americans against Obama’s dangerous flailing and specific restrictions that may be passed by Congress can save the US from further squandering our servicemembers’ lives, our strapped wealth, and our credibility in the world as the actor who has the will and means to accomplish serious goals.
If one wanted to find a country where civilians have been and are currently being slaughtered by a minority despot who also directly supports the most dangerous armed foes of the US and its MidEast allies -- Hezbollah and Hamas, armed by Iran, go no further than Syria.
Junior Assad, of the splinter Allawite Shia sect, faces uprisings by majority Sunnis throughout Syria. He is brutally murdering the rebels. See the map at the link.
Assad has virtually subjugated Lebanon, squashing its Cedar Spring and helping its Hezbollah ally to turn Lebanon into a launch pad for missiles that have and will again reach throughout northern Israel. Syria serves as a way-station to send longer-range missiles to Hamas in Gaza, that now are launched into southern zones of Tel Aviv and into the major port at Ashdod. Syria has served as a privileged sanctuary for terrorists and trainers killing Americans and Iraqis in Iraq. Syria is a reliable ally of the region’s archfoe, Iran. In short, Syria is an immediate and severe threat to peace and to US interests throughout the Middle East.
Assad’s air force could relatively easily be destroyed, and his ground forces meted irreparable damage, by similar actions as we’re now taking in Libya.Assad’s minority regime could not survive. That would be a worthwhile goal, within our means, if the Obama administration actually had the sense and will to put US national security interests above all.
P.S.: Also see this analysis from JINSA, "Syrian Turmoil Could Benefit the Region." --Also see "Secretary of Defense Robert Gates Urges Syria Regime Overthrow Against White House Policy." -- Two more links: Elliott Abrams in the Washington Post, "Ridding Syria of a despot," and Michael Ledeen on Iranian snipers caught shooting Syrian rebels.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the United States deplores the violence in Syria, but does not expect intervention in the Middle East country.
"There's a difference between calling out aircraft and indiscriminately strafing and bombing your own cities, than police actions which frankly have exceeded the use of force that any of us would want to see," Clinton said Sunday on the CBS program "Face the Nation," comparing the situations in Syria and Libya.
Senator Lieberman, Chair of the Homeland Security Committee, however, is a bit clearer on whether the US should intervene against the Assad slaughter of rebels:
Lieberman told host Chris Wallace that if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad begins to slaughter his own people he could face an international coalition willing to implement a no-fly zone as they have done in Libya.
Lieberman said he would support U.S. intervention "if Assad does what Qaddafi was doing, which is to threaten to go house to house and kill anyone who's not on his side."
"There's a precedent now that the world community has set in Libya and it's the right one," Lieberman said. "We're not going to stand by and allow this Assad to slaughter his people like his father did years ago and in doing so we're being consistent with our American values and we're also on the side of the Arab people who want a better chance for a decent life."
Senator Lieberman must be missing the slaughters that Assad is already committing. Intervention in Syria should be put on the front-burner of the Obama administration, as more analysts correctly raise the issue of priorities and national security. Secretary of Defense Gates remarked that Libya is not a "vital interest" for the US.
Despite the heavy involvement of U.S. forces and the rising costs of the Libyan operation, Gates said that Libya did not rank high on the list of U.S. national security concerns.
There would be proper concern as to what may follow Assad. However, as the Sunni majority would be in control, instead of Assad's Shia Alawite sect, it is unlikely that Syria would continue as a paw for Iran or arming Hezbollah and Hamas. That's a victory in itself.
P.P.P.S.: Ed Morrissey lashes into the Obama administration and Senator Lieberman. "In Syria, our national interests and security interests are much more clear — as they are in Iran." -- Martin Indyk, usually a parrot to liberal hopes that coddling Middle East tyrants will further peace, finds the correct road now, to Damascus.
“There’s much more upside than downside for the U.S.,” said Martin S. Indyk, the vice president for foreign policy at the Brookings Institution. “We have an interest in counterbalancing the advantages Iran has gained in the rest of the region. That makes it an unusual confluence of our values and interests.”
A Facebook webpage was created calling for a Third Palestinian Intifada against Israel. It is mostly in Arabic. The creators of this page are calling for the violent uprising against the State of Israel. The "Third Palestinian Intifada" Facebook page has amassed more than 310,000 supporters or "likes," it keeps increasing by the hour, and includes inflammatory anti-Israel language calling for supporters to build on the previous two intifadas, while sending users to Twitter, YouTube and elsewhere for more information.
The Second Palestinian Intifada was responsible for thousands of casualties and deaths through a campaign of terrorism against Israel that included suicide bombings of public places like restaurants, buses, dance clubs and cafes.
Directions to ask Facebook to remove the page:
JUST click on the link below to reach the Facebook page.
Then scroll down the left side of the page where you will see "Report Page" in tiny print. Click on 'report page' and Choose "Contains hate speech" You can then choose a further option of 'targets a race or ethnicity' or "violence or harmful behavior" Then click 'submit'.
If you don't have a Facebook account, and even if you do, please forward this message to others.
America's largest newspapers--The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The L.A. Times--all wrote richly detailed obituaries for Elizabeth Taylor, the Hollywood icon who died of heart failure this week, at 79. But no matter how richly detailed, every single one of these papers didn't say a word about Taylor's conversion to Judaism when she was 27. Why? Is it not chic among the MSM to be so dedicated to Israel as Elizabeth Taylor?
In 2000, Elizabeth Taylor was recognized by Queen Elizabeth as a “Dame”, the equivalent of knighthood.Like a good Dame, she lived her life fully, with gusto and passions. Today, at 79, her heart gave out. Before then, it stood firmly with Israel.
In 1959, Elizabeth Taylor converted to Judaism. Some said at the time it was because of her marriage to famous Jewish entertainer Eddie Fisher.Elizabeth Taylor denied that, saying she had been long attracted to Judaism. During and following her marriage to Fisher, Elizabeth Taylor was unwavering in her support for Israel.
The Zionist Organization of America issued this eulogy:
The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) mourns the passing of legendary American actress and ardent Zionist, Elizabeth Taylor, who has passed away, aged 79. Ms. Taylor, who enjoyed a long and hugely successful career in Hollywood, was converted to Judaism in 1959 by the Rabbi Max Nussbaum, who served as National President of the ZOA from 1964 to 1966.
Among Elizabeth Taylor’s outstanding work on behalf of Israel and Jewish causes was her participating in raising $840,000 for Israel in a 1967 London gala and purchasing personally $100,000 in Israel Bonds in 1959. The same year, she cancelled a visit to Moscow after the Soviet Union lashed out at Israel after the June 1967 Six Day War. In 1975, she was one of 60 prominent women to sign a statement to then-U.N. Secretary General Kurt Waldheim, condemning the U.N. General Assembly’s infamous Zionism-is-Racism resolution. Taylor offered herself as a hostage when 104 hostages aboard an Air France airbus were hijacked by PLO terrorists and held at Uganda’s Entebbe Airport, from which they rescued in a spectacular Israeli commando mission on July 4, 1976, America’s 200th birthday. Taylor frequently visited Israel and met with its leadership, including Prime Minister Menachem Begin in 1983. In 1987, she signed a petition seeking the release from Soviet incarceration of leading refusenik, Ida Nudel.
The Jewish Bible is full of miracles from G-d. Yet, in the Book of Esther, G-d’s intervention is not mentioned.Rabbinic commentary says that the hand of G-d is hidden but manifest in the saving of the Jews from the genocide plans of Haman.That may well be so. However, if there was divine intervention, it took the trembling will and the actions of a few of his earthly humans to bring about the good outcome.
Reminds me of this story. On January 1, G-d tells a very good, pious and observant man that in reward he will win the lottery that year. The man waits and waits, and on December 31 asks G-d why he hasn’t won the lottery yet. G-d answers, “meet me halfway, buy a ticket.”
It is up to us, each and everyone of us, regardless of religion, to buy a ticket, to speak and act for safety from sworn enemies and to further justice in this world. This year, the reading aloud in our synagogues of the Megillah, the scroll of the Book of Esther, is on Saturday and Sunday. Haman’s name is drowned out by noisemakers, groggers, and Mordechai and Esther’s names are cheered. Purim is accompanied by celebrations for the children – to fix the meaning of Purim in their minds, and the adults giving food packages to the needy and to friends – to build community and spread blessings of plenty and caring.
In an apparent connection made by Hitler between his Nazi regime and the role of Haman, he stated in a speech made on January 30, 1944, that if the Nazis were defeated, the Jews could celebrate "a second Purim".[51][50] Seconds before he was hanged, Streicher called out "Purim Fest 1946!"[51]
Haman exists in every generation, and must be confronted, or allowed to prevail. We are G-d’s hands.
Purim is a fun holiday, so here’s SpongeBob’s version of the Megillah.
My friend Mark Safranski's blogZenPundit is one of my favorites. Its focus is on foreign policy, and more specifically on military affairs. The breadth and eclecticism of its links and discussions, agree or not, are of the highest order and center on rational discussion of complex issues. Most of us value the rational discussions we have, unfortunately though not often enough, because all parties come away with new appreciations and better understandings.
I found this graphic there, a flowchart of whether you are having a rational discussion.
From Vietnam to today, the majority of US public opinion has supported confronting active threats to US security. And, naturally, Americans sympathize with the oppressed and their human rights. However, as the costs rose, time elapsed, and foreign policy dilettantes recoil from the realities of armed intervention, other firmer supporters increasingly bemoan the restrictions imposed by the half-hearted and the saboteurs of winning that not only cost more US military lives but place the end-goals in jeopardy.
In short, the inherent contradiction in US foreign policy is between those willing to undertake the burdens and those who undermine that will. This leads to initial enthusiasms that fade to regrets, and has created a new isolationism among many who favor strong actions but – having paid the price -- are unwilling to become wasted cannon fodder. This is particularly felt among many veterans who have felt the anguish of their efforts being undercut and frittered.
Most – but not all – of the usual advocates of an assertive US foreign policy argue for the US to be clearer and more forthright in standing by those in the Middle East fighting against its satraps – whether allied to or opponents of the US. The situation in Libya is the current front, while those in Tunisia and Egypt fade from the short attention span of the front pages.
The incoherency of President Obama’s foreign policies, from inauguration to now, however, undermines from the get-go the expectations of focus, perseverance, adequate means, and thus favorable results. The only consistent behavior shown by the Obama administration has been weak and dithering resolve to protect US interests coupled with rewarding enemies and undercutting allies.
There is nothing in the Obama administration’s handling of the current revolts in the Middle East that indicates a meaningful learning or reversal of this course.
Indeed, the ongoing dithering and waffling in the face of events only reinforces the view of an administration at best adrift in confusion, ignorance and denial, and at worst purposely dangerous in furthering US interests abroad.
There are good arguments to be made for the US intervening more actively and forcibly in the Middle East revolts, but in my view they pale before the lack of confidence that the Obama administration has labored so hard to deserve.This is especially so given the likely outcomes just enmeshing the US further in the Arab world’s self-inflicted dysfunctionality, with not even any worthwhile gratitude to result.
It is not easy nor consistent with our decency to see innocents or rebels slaughtered. It is less easy to send our sons and daughters into the cauldron created by the Arabs themselves, with only slightly marginal lasting results the best outcome and more likely not even that.
P.S.: Andrew McCarthy at National Reviewgoes into more detail. Read it all, and think, think, think.
The carnage meted out upon the rebel forces in Libya is terrible. However, it does not come anywhere near to a genocide in scope or in numbers. Libya itself is not a strategic concern of the US, although there are implications in the severity of repression encouraging other extremely repressive regimes like Iran and Syria who are foes of the US. US or European military intervention would most likely garner little lasting thanks among radicalized Arabs or among the Arab satrapies that wink in private but enrage their publics. And, the US military is stretched enough already. We still have the capabilities to mount a no-fly operation, the weak Europeans as usual requiring US forces to do much effective, but there is no compelling national interest really to do so.
I've been searching for indications and information that the Arab states themselves could handle a no-fly zone, after their Arab League endorsed one but did not say they would undertake one. At Real Clear World this morning is a piece from a Dubai, UAE think tank that says they should do the job themselves and can do it, A Joint Arab Force Could Better Enforce a Libya No-Fly-Zone. Worth reading, and repeating regardless of who argues the US should do it.
