Maggie's Farm

MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute) brings us an exceptional debate in Kuwait over whether a performance in Kuwait of the internationally enjoyed song Hava Nagilah, performed by all races and nationalities, should be forbidden as legitimizing Israel.

What makes the debate exceptional is that, for a change, more than one side is heard in an Arab country.  Highlights of the debate are below the fold. Worth reading. (Or, be doomed to endlessly dance to the Macarena.)

Meanwhile, here’s Harry Belafonte sharing the song’s joy with an audience in Italy in 1988.

Translation of the objectionable lyrics:

Let's rejoice
Let's rejoice
Let's rejoice and be happy.

Let's sing
Let's sing
Let's sing and be happy.

Awake, awake brothers!
Awake brothers with a happy heart.

One of the songs mocking the old daily, then weekly, then merged, then gone, Worker, “Our Line’s Been Changed Again”, referred to the slavish contortions of its adherents as the approved line from Moscow veered and twisted to fit whatever was deemed its current self-preservation.

Such genuflective transmutive party line writing today is steered from Washington where its anointed leader is in the White House, its main apologist is Ezra Klein at the Washington Post – and its disappearing irrelevant Newsweek, and its dissemination is via his network of quick parroters assembled at Klein’s secretive JournoList of Left writers at blogs and major media.

Their God -- that is failing, again -- is that the Democrat Party and its President is the most progressive force to alter mankind and its institutions, and that this end justifies the means of increased central power over the economy and individuals’ lives.

Five years after graduating college with a political science degree, with no work experience except for writing, Ezra Klein churns out advocacy that excuses the latest line or attacks uncomfortable facts, and his disciples echo his sleights of hand.

In rebuttal one might hear that other writers are slavish to the Republican Party or have a following.  That smacks of old attacks on the fractious Trotskyists, Republicans actually containing disparate and battling interests, political figures, and writers, inherently unable to cohere around any line except vague restraints on central power.

Neither socialists nor Trotskyists brought down communism or Moscow.  Rather, communism and Moscow were unable to maintain their spin in the face of their flailing failures recognized and rejected by the true masses living in the real world when coupled with firm resistance from those with power.

Today’s Tea Partiers lack a manifesto except for crying out “BS” to the transparent excuses of any – Democrat or Republican -- who go along with Washington’s self-serving funny business as usual. Those – either Democrat or Republican – who are seen to pay lip service but not consistency and will to actually reversing statism’s growth are not trusted.

As with any revolution from below, the big question remains of whether anyone will emerge to lead and be followed who will not waver, accommodate or sell out.

As with the Worker and their "God That Failed", there is no question that those who align themselves with state power will find new “progressive” rallying points for their same-old, same-old.

Ezra Klein will become an obscure footnote in the tedious history of the Left. So may the Tea Partiers as a temporary insurrection join the Trotskyists in the dustbin of history.

But, the real masses never will submit, and stand ready – armed by the vote in a democracy -- to emerge in strength when their primary interest in personal freedoms is  trampled. The powerful or monied who are wise enough to see their fate as tied to the masses need to step up to the podium and to contribute heavily to the pot of clarifying insurrection before their narrow self-interests are eliminated.  Their feeding at the trough in Washington will not save them, but transform them into lackeys.

(There are too many allusions and references above to weigh down with links, footnotes, and detailed explanations.  Enjoy the learning experience, unless repeating the past is preferred.)

Some sauce:

San Diego’s tourism industry leaders are in panic, and some politicians too, as some Arizonans cancel their summer trips due to the San Diego City Council and School Board condemning Arizona’s illegal immigrant enforcement law.

The summertime influx of Arizonans to San Diego’s balmier weather is a major source of tourism revenue. Tourism is one of San Diego’s main industries, off during this recession.

Tourism officials are advertising in Arizona an open letter urging Arizona residents to overlook local politics and come to San Diego just as they always have to escape Arizona's summer heat.

The San Diego Union-Tribune report remarks:

In some cases, it appears that Arizona residents misconstrued the votes taken by San Diego’s elected leaders as calls for an actual boycott of Arizona as opposed to statements of opposition.

The reporter should look back a few days to her paper's own reporting:

At the urging of board Vice President John Lee Evans, the board eliminated an Arizona travel warning that President Richard Barrera had proposed for students and their families out of concern they may be subject to harassment or racial profiling. However, the San Diego Unified School District will develop a policy restricting travel and participation in conferences in Arizona.

The San Diego School Board is in the hands of union tools.  It schools, mostly poorly, a high percentage of immigrants, 44% of its students are Hispanic, 75% ethnic minorities.  The School Board President says, “Certainly, we know how important tourism is to San Diego, and it wasn’t my intent to impact the tourism trade.” The tourism industry employs many immigrants.

Seems the School Board voted to place the parents of some of its students in the unemployment line.  The School Board should have stuck to the Three “Rs” and not the “I” that tourism officials call “political posturing.”  Similar for the City Council, not paying attention to the City’s severe budget deficits, largely the result of pensions for unionized workers.  One hotelier comments:

“I understand the City Council was being passionate about their politics, but I don’t think they thought it through,” Holladay said. “If it negatively impacts hotel revenue, it impacts the transient occupancy tax, and that goes right into the general fund, so they’ll have less money for their programs.”

P.S.: So far, 93% of those voting in the LA Times online poll oppose similar "posturing" by the LA City Council.

Congressman Joseph Cao, elected to replace "Ice Box" Jefferson in Louisiana, faces an uphill battle to keep the seat.  Cao is unafraid of speaking up for what he believes.

Recently, the Vietnamese government asked him to arrange meeting with the US Vietnamese community for Hanoi to present its case.  As Cao replies, Hanoi has no case.

In his reply letter, Congressman Cao says the premise for the request is misguided.  The Vietnamese left their homeland because they rejected tyranny. Until the government of Vietnam demonstrates real changes, respecting human rights and freedom, it will not be taken seriously by the Vietnamese-American community: release political prisoners, stop oppressing democracy activists and religious freedom, respect the rule of law.

That's just a quick summary. Read Cao's entire letter for much more.  It is eloquent, heartfelt, and quite an education for those not familiar with the conditions in Vietnam.

The California Republican primary on June 8 will decide the nominee for Governor and for US Senator.

Sarah Palin just endorsed Carly Fiorina as best chance to unseat Barbara Boxer.  Congressman Tom McClintock endorsed Steve Poizner to take on former governor Jerry Brown who is trying to leave his Oakland exile (mayor) for Sacramento again.

Most California Republicans have a weak preference among the primary contenders, according to the polls. Heck, even Hugh Hewitt, of California, who usually has a sharp political opinion on most things has not written at his blog about Republican US Senate contenders DeVore, Campbell or Fiorina.

This lack of excitement is due to having to make hard or distasteful choices.

Some of those opposed to Arizona’s new illegal immigrant enforcement law, which by the way is consistent with federal law that those not citizens must carry proof of legal entry, want the MLB All-Star Game to be moved from Phoenix.

Commissioner of major league baseball, Bud Selig, is in a difficult position.  As is Arizona’s population, about 30% of MLB players are Hispanic.

If any player wants to express an opinion, that’s their right.  If Selig wants to express an opinion, however, that is his right but not his job.

Any player from another country who wants to play in another country should try that, but otherwise is bound to play where they are told.  Bud Selig, as well, should find another job if he is not up to avoiding the politicization of baseball.

Even this sports analyst, opposed to Arizona’s law, says:

Selig’s job, as the commissioner of baseball, is to help protect his players. When a player signs with an organization, he has a legitimate reason to be in this country. That doesn’t take away the reality that he may be forced to carry proof in his pocket.

I’m afraid Selig’s only potential response to that is, “Sorry, fellas, it’s the world we live in.”

And, this is the United States of America, with legitimate borders and laws.  If Selig wants to open the gates at all baseball games to unrestricted free entry, that would do more for the sport.

Bud Selig’s phone number is (212) 931-7800.

Relaxation

And other stretches to limber up for a busy day:

The June issue of Chief Executive magazine confirms that while my residence in California has wonderful climate and well-educated people, otherwise I live in a state ranked by 651 chief executives across the country as the worst state to do business.

How is it that the nation’s most populous state at 37 million, one that is the world’s eighth-largest economy and the country’s richest and most diverse agricultural producer, a state that had the fastest growth rate in the 1950s and 1960s during the tenures of Democratic Governor Pat Brown and Republican Governors Earl Warren and Ronald Reagan, should become the Venezuela of North America?

Californians pay among the highest income and sales taxes in the nation, the former exceeding 10 percent in the top brackets. Unemployment statewide is over 12.2 percent, higher than the national average. State politics seems consumed with how to divide a shrinking pie rather than how to expand it. Against national trend, union density is climbing from 16.1 percent of workers in 1998 to 17.8 percent in 2002. Organized labor has more political influence in California than in most other states. In addition, unfunded pension and health care liabilities for state workers top $500 billion and the annual pension contribution has climbed from $320 million to $7.3 billion in less than a decade. When state employees reach critical mass, they tend to become a permanent lobby for continual growth in government.

No surprise, the other states at the bottom of the barrel for governments deemed unfriendly to business: New York, Michigan, New Jersey, Massachusetts.  The states whose business friendliness has declined most in the past five years: Illinois, Ohio, Minnesota, Wisconsin, New Jersey. The states most friendly toward business: Texas, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Nevada.

With 2010 census reassignment of Congressional seats coming up, there are consequences:

Little wonder then that while Texas gained over 848,000 net new residents in the last 10 years, according to the Census  Bureau, California lost 1.5 million. New York State’s net loss exceeded 1.6 million - the highest of any state. High-tax, big- government New Jersey ranked fourth, with a net loss of almost 460,000, enough to drop it from 10th to 11th place in population.

Good.

But not so good for taxpayers in the states unfriendly to business.

The political elites in the states that dismiss out-migration trends overlook the radical demographic adjustment underway. As higher-income earners leave, they are more often replaced by those with lower incomes and lower skills, many needing public assistance. Gone too are the entrepreneurs and risk-takers, off seeking regions where their job creating abilities are rewarded.

Another more daunting reality is in store. The so-called de-leveraging of America hasn’t reached government. U.S. cities and states have issued over $2 trillion in new debt since 2008, with another $1 trillion scheduled this year. The problem is that state revenues in real terms may not reach 2008 levels until late in 2012, according to John Thomasian of the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices. As he emphasizes in his paper, “The Big Reset: State Government  after the Great Recession,” states will have to rethink and redesign government in terms of what is essential and what can be made more efficient if their citizens are to have much of a future.

Investors Business Daily adds:

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, astute and able as he is in tempering the more extreme elements within the Obama administration, may still be enabling while trying to  slow the rot in our hull.

Yesterday, Gates, as the Wall Street Journal reports, “Shoots Across Navy’s Bow” in a budget speech. Gates, also, aimed fire at the Marine Corps amphibious assault vehicles. 

Gates points are well made: both our Navy and Marine Corps must rely less upon traditional large ships and subs, and landing craft, respectively, to meet the capabilities and challenges from missiles and killer subs. Gates points out that the US Navy has more sea and air assets than the rest of the world combined, but is somewhat vulnerable to dangers from swarming speedboats, for example. The Navy and Marine Corps should, instead, gear more toward agility and effectiveness in countering and overwhelming the threats from or within smaller nations.

Gates is correct.

However, the premise is, while realistic, shortsighted.  The premise is that in a time of tight budgets, our defense cannot afford the same, not to mention larger, levels of defense spending, especially when current and proposed arms are so expensive.

US defense spending, in sum or by comparison to the rest of the world, is larger than all others combined.  Yet, it is also at the lowest point as a portion of GDP, excluding 1999-2000, since the end of the Cold War.

Meanwhile, it is other federal expenditures, mostly of the welfare and entitlement varieties, that has exploded.

Meanwhile, other nations, like Britain, cut their defense spending, while others, like China, greatly increase theirs.

There is obviously high need for other nations allied with the US, or of complementary interests, to increase their spending and coordination, and to stop free-riding upon the US.  Still, there is no other nation than the US with reach and will to keep the sea lanes open and nations in the lee of expansionist powers, like China and Iran, from being swept aboard their crafts.  And, other nations are more likely to follow the US lead in whether they increase or decrease their own contributions to global defense objectives.

Gates is on target that a failure to reform and modernize US arms priorities may result in future defeats as well as waste.

From the Huffington Post:

State-sponsored anti-Semitism... in 2010? ... in VENEZUELA? On the surface, it didn't make sense.

But as we continued our investigation, the evidence continued to build. There was the anti-Semitic graffiti sprayed on the synagogues and businesses owned by Jews; there was the police raid on the Jewish school Hebraica that was based on a "tip" that the school was involved in an assassination plot [no evidence was ever found]; there were the frequent publications in the state-run media calling for the expulsion of the Jews; and there was even the anti-Semitic rhetoric of President Hugo Chavez himself.

Perhaps it is this last example that Jewish Venezuelans fear the most. When your own president is comparing Zionists to Nazis on national television, and insinuating that it is people of your religion that have all the wealth in the world ("the descendants of those who crucified Christ"), and then publically expels the ambassador of Israel during a war that your country has nothing to do with, I can understand why you might start to feel nervous.

But why? What could possibly be the motivation?

Maybe that is most shocking of all....

Below is the preview.  What will be the conclusion? 

A small island group near the coast of mainland China, Quemoy, gave us lessons that we need to remember in dealing with Iran. There cannot be an analogy between geographies, actors, and the times. But lessons can be insightful to current circumstances of the primacy of recognizing US interests, the difference between friends and foes, and acting accordingly or failing through dithering and fecklessness.

Few remember the history shaping role in the 1950s of Quemoy.

The defense of Quemoy by Nationalist forces against an invasion from newly Communist China in 1949 effectively stymied mainland China’s objective to take Taiwan and, in the face of world defeatism, demonstrated that the Asian march of communism could be defeated.

The same mistaken line drawn by the Truman Administration placed South Korea and the Taiwan Straits outside the US containment perimeter. This encouraged the Soviet and Chinese support of North Korea’s invasion of the South in 1950.

Preoccupied in Korea, and following an inclination toward stalemate being enough for containment, the US 7^th Fleet patrolled the Taiwan Strait to prevent either Communist China or Chang Kai-shek’s rump in Taiwan from attacking the other.

In 1953, President Eisenhower, though believing Quemoy to be indefensible and believing the French position in IndoChina would not hold, allowed Taiwan to heavily reinforce Quemoy, raising the threat level to distract and deter China.

In 1954, however, the Chinese, not to appear deterred, unleashed thousands of artillery strikes upon Quemoy, took another small island over 200 miles north of Taiwan, and skirmishing occurred along and on China’s coast.

Last week I was at a Memorial Service where the song “Wind Beneath My Wings” was very fittingly sung about the lessons she transmitted to her family with her life.

Since, it has been running about my mind, what song would I want sung at my Memorial Service (besides “Hit The Road Jack”).

Yesterday, while driving I was listening to a local AM station that has classic songs of the ‘40s and ‘50s.  I was struck by the rendition of “We’ll Meet Again”, sung by Anne Murray. As an older father, I try to communicate to my sons the optimism, positive thinking and perseverance that I have lived and believe will be central to their futures, and hope that will guide them and serve as their remembrance.

The words seem to ably sum it up:

We'll meet again
Don't know where
Don't know when
But I know we'll meet again some
sunny day.

Keep smiling through
Just like you always do
and Til the blue skies
Drive the dark clouds far away.

So will you please say hello
To the folks that I know.
Tell 'em I won't be long.
They'll be happy to know
That as you saw me go,
I was singin' this song.

We'll meet again
Don't know where
Don't know when
But I know we'll meet again some
sunny day.

So will you please say hello
To the folks that I love.
Tell 'em I won't be long.
They'll be happy to know
That as you saw me go,
I was singin' this song.

We'll meet again
Don't know where
Don't know when
But I know we'll meet again some
sunny day.

I know we'll meet again some sunny
day.

Research has it that the song was one of the most popular in Britain during its dark days during World War II. The songstress, Vera Lynn, “The Forces Sweetheart”, recorded the Ross Parker/Hughie Charles song in 1942 while making the film of the same name.  It became one of the emblematic songs during the war.

Since, many have recorded the song. My selections below the fold -

Thirty-five years ago, South Vietnam fell to the communist North. Twenty-eight years ago, President Reagan addressed the British Parliament at Westminster in his famous “Ash Heap of History” speech, to where tyrants will be sent by those valiantly defending freedom.

Yesterday, I went to Orange County’s “Little Saigon”, Westminster, to attend a forum marking the 35^th anniversary of the fall.

Before the forum, attendees went outside in the Sid Greenstein Freedom Park for a minute of silence before the war memorial there, the only one in the US honoring US and Vietnamese who fought together.

I knew three of the speakers well (and two others less from shared personal experiences, more as acquaintances, but major figures) from many years of collaboration and friendship to not let the Vietnamese and American sacrifices be in vain, to educate new generations in the lessons personally witnessed and learned...

Now that ObamaCare restricts the pay of all at health care firms to $500k, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie – struggling with the huge deficits that are causing states to cut basic services -- wants to restrict the pay to executives of non-profits that provide services to the state for aid to 1 million needy families.

Depending on size, pay will be limited to between $105,850 and $141,000.

Further:

Executives are not the only target for contract changes, according to the memo:

• State money shall no longer be used for any employee seeking reimbursement for tuition, textbooks and supplies "unless such courses are required by the contract, licensing certification and Medicaid standards."

• Agency officials must seek state permission before they buy a new vehicle. They must justify its use to fulfill the state contract, demonstrate they have sought three bids, and shall not to exceed $25,000 unless they are buying a passenger van or vehicle for disabled people.

• Agency officials must seek state approval before spending more than $250 per person, per event on travel expenses.

• State money may not be used to defray severance costs unless the employee served more than a year with the company. And that would be capped at two weeks of severance pay and benefits.

Executives can try to make more from private contributions targeted to their salaries, bonuses and benefits.  That should be interesting.

As if the US didn’t already have enough lawsuits, and as if excess litigation isn’t one of the prime drivers of medical costs, and as if the Democrats didn’t garner 90% of tort lawyers’ contributions, ObamaCare will create a new boom in lawsuits.

A Qui Tam action is brought by a private citizen against a company for fraudulent claims on a federal agency in violation of the False Claims Act.  If triumphant, the claimant gets part of the court award.

To now, it was necessary for the claimant to be the provider or original source of otherwise unknown information.  If not, the claim was denied court jurisdiction.

Now, the failure to be the provider or original source will not deny jurisdiction, and should there be such dismissal the government can oppose the dismissal and allow the court case to proceed.

Maggie's Farm poster girl Marianne asked me to search out a cut from Harry Belafonte's 1958 album "Harry Belafonte sings the blues."  The closest I could find was this, from 1959:

To which I'll add this other chestnut from Harry, with love to Marianne:

We'll forgive the artist for his voice and verve transcending his sometimes errant politics.

Blues is not about sadness.  Blues is about releasing the energy of true feelings.  Blues is about sharing your soul.  Nina Simone was one of the best.

Last night's Chuck ending scene melded Nina Simone's Feeling Good with the feelings shared by Chuck and Sarah (IMHO, the hottest, realest woman in any TV series).

You can catch it after the 41st minute:

http://www.nbc.com/chuck/video/chuck-versus-the-honeymooners/1222679/

For the whole Feeling Good, try this YouTube:

Far be it for me to be a profound social critic but the brouhaha over the censoring of Southpark’s depiction of Mohammed reminds me of the musical Cabaret.

A central progression in Cabaret is the audience transforming from enjoying the subversive cultural progressivism to its jolly enjoying the triumph of Nazism.

Southpark has led in revealing the inanities and contradictions of almost everything.  Yet, it became too much for Comedy Central to allow Southpark to depict Mohammed and Comedy Central also censored Southpark's defiance of self-censorship to avoid the wrath of ideologic gangsters.

Comedy Central features the funniest and the most vile forms of comedy, never before to my knowledge censoring itself in targeting or revealing cultural inanities and contradictions or denigrating cultural pieties.

Yet, now Comedy Central reveals itself in allowing the takeover of its Cabaret by thugs, becoming itself complicit.

Comedy Central reveals itself as enjoying the profits of decadence until its lack of spine  collapses upon itself. Comedy Central transforms from the presenter of any irreverence to become the channel of self-imposed cultural decadence that refuses to resist and indeed joins in capitulation to thugs.

Are we to be that Cabaret audience?

Other takes, from Memeorandum:

Ross Douthat / New York Times:

Hot-button issues like immigration, ObamaCare, bailouts, taxation, national security, faith divide us mostly along what has been labeled conservative-liberal.

At root, however, the differing views are more rooted in who gives and who takes.

Our “betters” are largely insulated from the consequences of their views, catering to themselves and our “lessers.”  Then, there’s the “rest of us.”

The primary divide is between the rest of us who struggled, strived and gave versus those whose advantages parachuted them into powerful positions they abuse for their own wealth and to then take away the more meager advantages earned by others to give to the lessers who haven’t.

The rest of us favor immigration by those willing to work, but not to those who aren’t able or who just demand benefits.

The rest of us favor aiding the truly poor or disabled to adequate health care, but not to those who waste their money on frills and then demand providers to impoverish themselves and us not be allowed to make our own life decisions.

The rest of us favor business creating jobs and opportunities, but not lazy management and crazy schemes then feeding at the taxpayer trough.

The rest of us voluntarily pay our more than fair share, but not basic services being cut to enrich politicians and government workers who create more ways to tax in order to feather their own nests by creating more dependent lessers.

The rest of us support and serve in danger to preserve our freedoms and protect others’, but not to be frittered away through lack of priorities or will.

The rest of us thank G-d for our being and opportunities, but not to tolerate those who would deny us or others theirs.

The rest of us may become polarized but at root are not.  The rest of us just feel caught between those who consider themselves our betters, who perpetuate themselves by allying with the lessers without due claim upon us, whether at home or abroad.  These betters denigrate the legitimate concerns of the rest of us, but their scorn is hollow, ludicrous,  and, indeed, energizing.

Our parents and grandparents were great generations whom we identify with because they were the inspiration for the rest of us.  My baby-boomer peers have largely been the selfish punk generation of wastrels. Coming again, the generation of the “rest of us.”  Those who want to lead, who deserve leadership, are recognized as authentic in being of, by and for the rest of us.

An ideologue is attached to an ideal regardless of facts.

A cynic believes that selfish self-interest is the primary motivator, especially of others.

A skeptic habitually doubts or questions conclusions of others.

A critic develops judgments based on the merits of the situation or argument.

A freeman uses civil and political rights and liberties, to enjoy life.

These categories may to some extent co-exist in each individual.  But, to the extent any of us move predominantly from freeman or tolerant critic to habitual skepticism, or to being a cynic or ideologue, even when moved by others’ intrusion into our rights and liberties, we surrender some or much of our enjoyment.

The trick is to retain our focus on being a freeman (or freewoman, but I’ll use freeman here throughout).

If we don’t, we become susceptible to manipulation of ourselves or becoming manipulators of others.  One can’t be securely free when others are not.

Soldiers volunteer knowing that life-and-death choices determine their and others’ fate.  In effect, they are determined to be freemen.

The really religious know that opening their heart to G-d gives them freedom to enjoy themselves and others.

The true citizen participates and demands that chosen leaders respect all as freemen.

Look at history.  Those whose names and legacy are most treasured were freemen.

Look at yourself.  What are you? Really.

If not a freeman, you've surrendered.

Today, modern Israel’s 62^nd birthday, is a good time to ask the question, “What if there wasn’t an Israel, would things be different in the Middle East?”

The world would still be dealing with and suffering from MidEast extremists: First of the Soviet proxies, but without Israeli intelligence penetrating them and its military defeating them, exposing the Soviet Union as an unworthy sponsor; Then of the Islamist haters suppressing its peoples and fighting each other while harboring attackers of the West, but without Israel’s development and democracy serving as an unavoidable contrast to the potentials of freedom and sanity and its military and technology exposing the fundamental weakness of their self-created backwardness.

No one in the Middle East takes seriously that the Arab-Israeli or Palestinian-Israeli conflicts are the primary, secondary, tertiary or lesser cause of MidEast instability or its threats to the West.

Outside the Middle East, however, we have the core delusion among many of those raised on the puerile pap created by the Left that the modernity and successes of Western civilization somehow oppress the natural decency and advancement of Third World countries.

President Obama is the poster boy.  But he is not the cause.  He is merely the product.  He and those who follow him, thus, fall back on the false premise that Israel is the problem.

No, the problem is their core delusion that we can escape history by denying it, even reversing it, though that still would leave the real root cause of MidEast instability, regional petty satraps, backward hatefulness, and those outside powers – from the EU to Russia to China – who benefit from retaining rule or access to oil.

If the initial thrust of President Bush’s strategy of spurring democratization in the Middle East proved hollow, then our subsequent neutralization of Iraq’s WMD potential and funding of terrorists and our struggling effort to retrieve Afghanistan from being ruled by  as much a threat is at best a holding action.  We, as Secretary of Defense Gates admitted, lack a strategy toward even containing Iran, its imminent nuclear armaments, its support for those who kill our soldiers and Iraq’s and Afghanistan’s and their peoples.

The exaggeration by Saddam Hussein of his own WMDs was to counter Iran.  The US and initial allies entering Iraq missed the proper focus then as we do now.

Weakening Israel is not a strategy for peace in the Middle East but another abdication of what could reduce the dangers of the Middle East.  The US administration and apologists are blaming the “salamis” for the failure to ice the botulism.

President Obama and followers are not the root cause of Israel’s current dilemma.  They are the natural extension of the escapism that infects Western thought, that undermined President Bush’s brash, perhaps fruitless, but correct focus that peace can only come from shattering Middle East excuses and delusions and providing more fertile ground for the emergence of rulers more concerned with the betterment of their own peoples’ lots.

Israel shows the way, not the barrier. The barrier is the purposeful misfocus, the dangerous inanity, of the avoiders of truths. Isn't 62 years enough time to prove that if modern Israel didn't exist the catering to Middle East tyrants would still be the core cause of dire oppression there and threats to the West's security and prosperity?

I came into this world a few months before Israel; we’re both 62. I’ve had a life thankful to the security in the United States for me and my immediate family who escaped Europe’s persecutions and murders, and for the opportunities in the US.  I’ve relied upon my exertions to give back in service and sacrifice, in appreciation and selfish preservation of these conditions.

Similarly has Israel.  From Israel’s intellectual and military might the world benefits in the sciences, in inventions, and in manning the front-lines against the avowed armed enemies of the West and modern civilization.

Tomorrow, April 20, 2010, is Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israel Independence Day, the day in the Hebrew calendar that corresponds to May 14, 1948.  It fittingly begins the moment that ends Israel’s Memorial Day, Yom Hazikaron, Remembrance Day for Israel’s Fallen Soldiers and Victims of Terror.  The two are that interlinked.

In my youth in the early 1950’s, it was a common question whether American Jews owed first loyalty to the US or Israel.  As bigotry declined in the US and Israel was seen as our firm ally during the Cold War, that question evaporated.  Until a new bigotry arose among the extreme Left, viewing the elimination of Israel as another way to deteriorate the West, and the extreme semi-isolationist Right, viewing Israel as no longer worth the alliance in the new Cold War against Islamist terrorism and its national bases.

Many American Jews, incubated within accustomed safety and advancement in the US, have lost sight of their essential link to Israel, viewing it as remote from domestic – mostly liberal -- priorities and respect for their position in American society.  There is some awakening due to the open hostility toward and undercutting of Israel by the Obama administration.  But, the pain of an open break has thus far been only hinted at  from the perversion of their caring liberalism by Obama’s imposed statism and his administration’s abdication of the US’ priority traditions of international morality and security – of recognizing the difference between an ally and an adversary.

Hillary Clinton’s best wishes to Israel on its Independence Day notably breaks with UN Resolution 242 that Israel is entitled to “secure” borders, instead calling only for “recognized” borders, which to Israel’s foes and weaklings in the West means retreat to the 1967 lines that Henry Kissinger called the “Auschwitz Line” because they  leave Israel so imperiled.

So, I’m actually glad to resurrect the question from my youth of whether my first loyalty is with the US or Israel.  It is inextricably to both, and the weakening of Israel is the weakening of the US, and vice versa.  I’m not loyal to any administration but to my and our security, here and there and elsewhere. Period.  Any thing else is irresponsible sophist escapism that will only create the worst consequences for the US and Israel.

My elder son Jason's 10th birthday was last Wednesday.  His wish: field 1st baseline seats at Petco for the Padres (vs the Braves).

It was Military Appreciation Night.  (Half-price tickets but still ripped off for refreshments.) The opening pitch was by the CG at Camp Pendleton; sadly a worse pitcher than Obama.

Padres 2nd baseman David Eckstein and 3rd baseman Chase Headley came by to sign a ball for Jason.  Jason also caught a foul ball later, and was on TV with a giant grin.  We were surrounded by Marines and sailors, but this honey only had eyes for Jason as our other finests' tongues hung out.

I double-checked online, and I did only pay two-bits for seats, including double-headers, at Ebbetts Field, and a dime for a hot dog.  Duke Snider and Gil Hodges would come out after a game and play stick ball with us in the street.  OK, Jason's 10th added up to $120, but priceless.

Congressman Henry Waxman, who never met a federal tax or mandate he didn't like to ram down Americans' throats, even when he discovers that the law he backed actually requires corporations to quickly report the negative financial impacts of ObamaCare, has decided to focus his attention on Americans' throats.

The Hill reports: Waxman calls on Major League Baseball to ban chewing tobacco.

From the Comments:

"On behalf of the American people, I would like to submit an earmark for the next major piece of legislation, called "Bubble gum for Bubbas." This is to request $75 billion to buy smokeless tobacco from MLB athletes and to exchange it with bubble gum, just like we buy guns from people in inner cities to get those guns off the street. This legislation includes a rider for their third-party medical insurance plan that pays for any additional dental expenses that may in the course of this contract and for any reasonable time after the completion thereof be incurred by replacing said chewing tobacco with chewing gum."

And:

"The nanny state marches on. Since the government is now responsible for your healthcare, and can't afford the expense, be prepared for a rash of new restrictions. Obesity will be outlawed, alcohol consumption and lack of exercise will be next. Do you have any risky habits? Ride a motorcycle, sky dive, fly a light aircraft or hang glider? Dangerous and society should not be responsible to take care of you if you take these risks, so the government will say. Auntie Sam will take care of us all. Let's all take our morning "happy pill" and drone on like slaves."

There's another law he backed that Waxman forgets: Such a ban would have to be negotiated with the Players Union.

Can't wait to see the LA Dodgers and other teams send bottles of warm brown spit to Waxman's office.