One caveat: Platforms are less important today than they used to be. While in the past, presidential candidates tended to reflect the party’s stances, modern presidential candidates tend to shape the party’s stances.

That said, platforms are still important in that they reveal what a party and its standard-bearer believe. In rummaging through winning GOP platforms dating back to 1860, a handful of large, enduring, recurring themes emerge.

Economic Freedom over Statism

The winning platforms of the past emphasize the importance freedom—and especially freedom from onerous and confiscatory taxation.

The 1924 platform, for instance, called for “progressive reduction of taxes of all the people.”

Parts of the 1952 platform could be used in the 2012 platform verbatim: “The administration has praised free enterprise while actually wrecking it. Here a little, there a little, year by year, it has sought to curb, regulate, harass, restrain and punish…Neither small nor large business can flourish in such an atmosphere.”

The 1968 platform urged “an expanding free enterprise system to provide jobs” and condemned the incumbent’s “economic mismanagement of the highest order.”

That charge certainly hits the mark in 2012. Compared to President Obama, LBJ looks like a miserly accountant. As The Wall Street Journal recently reported, President Obama’s term includes the highest spending years since 1946. During President Obama’s term, Washington has added $5 trillion in debt.

Noting that “private property ownership is the cornerstone of American liberty,” the 1980 platform derided the federal government as “an aggressive enemy of the human right to private property ownership.”

Again, that charge is just as true today—and so is the remedy put forth in 1980. “Our foremost goal here at home is simple: economic growth and full employment without inflation,” Reagan’s platform-writers explained.

In 1952, the platform concluded that Washington had “deprived our citizens of precious liberties by seizing powers…hampered progress by unnecessary and crushing taxation…violated our liberties by turning loose upon the country a swarm of arrogant bureaucrats.” That sounds exactly like the sentiment that unleashed the Tea Party in 2009 and then triggered the historic midterm chastening in 2010.

The 1980 platform made a “case for the individual” and offered an indictment of statism: “They believe that every time new problems arise beyond the power of men and women as individuals to solve, it becomes the duty of government to solve them, as if there were never any alternative…Our case for the individual is stronger than ever.”

A Rejection of Government Control 

Of course, liberty is about far more than property rights and taxation. “Because we treasure freedom of conscience,” the 2000 platform vowed, “we oppose attempts to compel individuals or institutions to violate their moral standards in providing health-related services…We oppose using public revenues for abortion and will not fund organizations which advocate it.”

That brings us to today’s debate over nationalized healthcare and the spinoff debate over ObamaCare’s alarming encroachment on religious liberty.

The president’s healthcare law required all employers offering health insurance to include coverage for “preventive health services.” HHS later defined this to include contraceptives and abortion-inducing drugs like the morning-after pill. Many observers hoped the president would direct HHS to provide a broad exemption for religious employers—and for good reason: In 2009, the president spoke eloquently about the need to “honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion” and said he was open to “a sensible conscience clause.”

But those hopes were dashed, as we now know. HHS initially exempted only those organizations that employ people of the same faith, serve people of the same faith and focus on religious teaching as their main mission. Universities, primary and secondary schools, hospitals, nursing homes, food kitchens and virtually all religious charitable organizations would not receive a conscience-clause exemption from HHS, which explains the firestorm that erupted in January.

“This is first and foremost a matter of religious liberty for all,” Cardinal Dolan explained. “If the government can, for example, tell Catholics that they cannot be in the insurance business today without violating their religious convictions, where does it end?”

Dolan wasn’t the only religious leader to come to that conclusion. The National Association of Evangelicals, Southern Baptist Convention, LutheranChurch (Missouri Synod) and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America have all condemned the ruling. Federal lawsuits have been filed by numerous religious employers.

Reacting to the backlash, the president proposed a compromise that would allow religious employers not to include contraceptives and abortion-inducing drugs in their health-insurance plan as long as they make sure their employees have insurance alternatives that provide contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs and the like. The White House also offered “a one-year transition period for religious organizations while this policy is being implemented.”

Below is Colonel Allen West’s speech at the Freedom Center’s Wednesday Morning Club on October 21, 2011. He is first introduced by David Horowitz. To see the video of the introduction and speech, click here.

David Horowitz: Colonel Allen West, one of the bravest and wisest members of Congress, and already — even though he’s only a freshman still — a leading voice in the Republican Party.

Colonel West is also the number-one congressman the Democratic National Committee has targeted for defeat.  In the coming national election, which promises to be the ugliest in our lifetime, he will be a prime focus of the Democrats’ incoming fire.

Have you noticed that the Republicans most viciously targeted by the Democrats are women and blacks?  There’s a reason for that.  Democrats will tell you that it is because they care about women and blacks.  But that just tells you what you already know — that Democrats are hypocrites and liars.

Democrats control the school systems of every major inner city in America, from Harlem to Detroit to South Central Los Angeles.  They control them 100 percent and have for more than 50 years.  There is no greater oppressor of poor black and Hispanic Americans than those responsible for these failing schools.  Democrats run them as a jobs program for adults and a cash cow for their leftwing union base.  Every year, the lives of millions of poor black and Hispanic children are destroyed by the Democrats who run these schools and fail to teach in their classrooms.  But Republicans are too polite to mention it.

Democrats view politics as war conducted by other means, a fact that Allen West is the only Republican I have known to recognize.  Democrats view women and blacks as cannon fodder in their war.  They are not ends in themselves, but a means to power.

If Democrats lost just 10 or 20 percent of the black vote nationally, they would lose virtually every state in the Union.  That’s why they hate and fear Colonel West.  They hate him because he is black, and they fear him because he will not fold under fire.

Democrats have stamped everyone in this country with a racial or gender tag, doled out privileges on the basis of the tags, and deployed the so-called race card as a weapon of choice.  “Race card” is a euphemism for the reflexive racism that is the Democrats’ first and last resort.

Republicans respond by pretending not to notice race.  Or gender, for that matter.  The Republican Party of California does not have a single female elected official.  How politically obtuse is that?  Why are there so few black elected officials in the Republican Party?  Because Republicans think that they are above noticing race or gender and make no sustained effort to recruit blacks or women.  That would be acting like Democrats.

Well, politically speaking, if you want to understand the art of political combat, study the Democrats.  They are very good at it.  Democratic attacks are always directed at rich, white Americans and their Republican defenders, and are always conducted on behalf of poor Americans and minorities, particularly black Americans, the victims.

Here’s why Democrats are terrified of an articulate black Republican like Colonel West, who will not be intimidated by their racist tactics.  He will blow their cover and destroy their game.

I loved it when Colonel West joined the Congressional Black Caucus, uninvited.

In effect, he said — you’ve got a race club, and I’m the correct race, so here I am.

Until that moment, the Congressional Black Caucus was a group of extremist left-wingers, which said to Americans the Left cares about black people, and the Democrats represent black people, and Republicans don’t.  In one gesture, Colonel West blew the lid off this charade and said — well, no.  Actually, black people can make up their own minds, just like everyone else.  And this black man understands that Democrats are bad news for African Americans, as they are for all Americans.

In an event last night, Colonel West pointed out that the head of the Congressional Black Caucus recently said that if Obama, a black Democrat, wasn’t in the White House, they would be marching on Washington.  Why?  Because while the nation is suffering from a disgraceful 9 percent unemployment rate, as Colonel West pointed out, 17 percent of black Americans are out of work — 20 percent of black males and 45 percent of black teenagers.  Obama and the Democrats have pursued policies that have devastated the black community.  But most Republicans are too proper, too above-it-all, to mention that black America has suffered more from Democratic policies than any other group; that Democrats’ policies have racial consequences.

Republicans are very good at talking about the current economic crisis in terms of numbers and ratios and deficits.  But they are very poor at talking about it in terms of the people that Democratic policies hurt.  They know that the subprime mortgage crisis was created by Bill Clinton and Barney Frank, and Obama’s ACORN criminals.  That’s a good beginning.

But what about the victims?  Who are the number-one victims of the Democratic housing tsunami?  They are poor, largely black and Hispanic Americans who were snookered into buying homes they couldn’t afford, and then lost them.  How traumatic is that?

But even worse is the devastation visited on the black middle class.  If you are rising on the economic ladder in America, your chief investment is your home.  That’s where your money is.  And because of the mortgage crisis created by Bill Clinton, Barney Frank and Obama’s ACORN, home values have dropped 30 percent.  In this crisis, middle-class African Americans have lost $100 billion.  Democrats don’t want any Republicans, and especially articulate black Republicans, telling black America that.

I’ve introduced many speakers on this platform, and many elected officials, but none who’ve inspired me or given me such confidence in the American future as Allen West.  Colonel West was born into a military family in Atlanta, Georgia, the home of Martin Luther King.  Four generations of the West family have served in the United States military, defending our country.

Colonel West joined the army after graduating from the University of Tennessee, and also has a master’s degree in political science from Kansas State.  In the army, he was a member and training officer in the 325th Airborne Battalion Combat Team, and then assigned to the First Infantry Division, where he was a commanding officer in the 6th Field Artillery Regiment.

During this service, he was promoted to captain and was then deployed to Iraq during the Gulf War, where he participated in Desert Shield and Desert Storm.  He returned to the United States to participate in the Reserve Officers Training Program and was named ROTC Instructor of the Year in 1993.  He was then assigned to the 2nd Infantry Division and promoted to major.  He was then made the executive officer of the 377th Field Artillery Regiment.  In 2002, he was promoted to colonel and made a battalion commander in the 4th Infantry Division.  He was then deployed to Iraq for the final battle against Saddam Hussein and his monster regime.

While in Iraq, Colonel West was nearly court-martialed for attempting to pry information out of an Iraqi police officer who was suspected by an intelligence specialist of participating in a plot to ambush Colonel West and his men.  Colonel West’s crime was using rough methods to get information which might save the lives of his men.  This included the charge that he fired his weapon next to the man’s head and threatened to kill him, a method which immediately produced the information.

Colonel West was eventually fined $5,000 by his own government for the incident and retired after 22 years of service.  At his hearing, Colonel West was asked if he would act differently if the same circumstances came up again.  He said — if it’s the lives of my soldiers at stake, I would go through hell with a gasoline can.

The most important characteristic of a political leader is his moral fiber.  If our leaders can’t stand up under fire, if they won’t protect us and our country, we are lost.

Allen West was nearly court-martialed during a Republican administration, which was already folding under the attacks from the Left.  After voting for the war, the Democratic Party turned against it and conducted a five-year scorched-earth campaign against our men and women in arms.  They portrayed their own country as an aggressor without principle and their Commander-in-Chief as evil — a man who launched a war for no reason and lied to get hundreds of thousands of men and women killed.  The Democrats accused their country of wantonly murdering Iraqi civilians and of deceiving the American people to lure them into a war against an adversary who was no threat.  And no Republican fought back.

The Commander-in-Chief remained silent and never defended himself.  The Democratic saboteurs who conducted a psychological warfare campaign against their own military and their own country, who called their commander a traitor and their military personnel torturers and killers, got away with it, with no consequences.

With leaders on the one side who will attack our country and on the other who will not defend it, we are lost.  We have a long way to go and a lot to make up to get back to an America that we can be proud of, to an America that is proud of itself.  If there are men and women who can lead us back and restore our nation, Colonel Allen West is certainly one of them and is a model to others and to all of us.

Colonel West.

Allen West: Thank you.  Thank you so much.

You know, it is really an honor to be here.  And, you know, having gone to the University of Tennessee, and now being in Beverly Hills, I kind of understand how Jed Clampett felt when he finally got to move to Beverly Hills.

This is special.  Because four years ago this time, I was packing up my gear, getting ready to end a two-and-a-half-year assignment in Afghanistan down at Qandahar.  Here today, I’m standing before you all, here in Beverly Hills.  And I just want to tell you — that is a testimony to the greatness and exceptionalism of the United States of America.  Because parents who were born in 1920 and 1931 in South Georgia probably never thought that their young son, who was born in 1961 in that inner city, would ever have the opportunity to be here at the Four Seasons Hotel, speaking to such a distinguished group of Americans here in the city, which everyone recognizes as the capital of the entertainment industry of the world.  So, that’s what we must never forget, is the greatness of this nation.

But today, we’re here to talk about — how do we secure the greatness of this nation?  And I want to thank Mike so much for bringing me here to the Horowitz Freedom Center, to have this opportunity to speak to you all.  And I just want to understand one simple thing — the moxie that it takes to make an ideological pivot, which is what Mr. David Horowitz did.  To sit now and be such a strong champion of conservative values, to publicly denounce the things that you once stood passionately for — that’s not easy.  Because now he has taken on that great liberal establishment in places where its foothold is the strongest.

But I know one simple thing about Mr. David Horowitz — that he is committed to ensuring that our young people — the future of this United States of America, these great states, this great Constitutional republic — enjoy the freedom, and decide for themselves what they can believe in.  And he recognizes how crucially important it is that our schools and universities be places that are wholly and deeply welcoming for all perspectives, and not just those of the Left, the center Left and far Left.

So David, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for what you’re doing.

Before I get started, I want to give everyone a framework about our discussion today about national security.  Cuts to military [in strength] — today, the United States Army has 569,400 soldiers.  With the force budgets that we put in place, about $478 billion over the next 10 years, that will take the military, the army, down to 481,000.  If the Super Committee does not do their job, it will take the United States Army down to 426,000.  The United States Marine Corps today sits at 202,000 Marines.  Under the current force structure and budget cuts, they will go down to 173,000.  If the Super Committee does not do their job, they will go down to 145,000.

In 1990, the Army had 172 combat maneuver battalions.  Today, we have 100.  Under the current funding, we will go to 78.  If the Super Committee does not do their job, we go down to 60 to 70.

Naval warships — in 1990, 546.  Today, we have 285.  We’re going to go down to 263.  And if the Super Committee fails to do their job, we will go down to 238.

United States Air Force fighters — 4,355 in 1990.  Today, we have 1,990.  We could go down to 1,512.  Strategic bombers — in 1990, we had 282.  If the Super Committee fails to do their job, we will go down to 101.  Strategic and tactical airlift — in 1990, we had 872; with the current funding, 572.  And if the Super Committee fails to do its job, we will go down to 494.

Those numbers are what is happening in the United States of America when we talk about our national security.  And for those of you that don’t know, I do sit on the House Armed Services Committee.  I sit on two subcommittees — the Military Personnel and Emerging Threats and Capabilities, which does have the oversight of our Special Operations forces.

So with that being said, came here to talk to you about what I think is still the most important issue for the United States of America.  And that’s our national security.  How do we stand strong in the face of internal and external threats that seek to tear us down?  There are those who are uncomfortable talking about the threat of radical Islamic terrorism.  But I think it’s critical that we have that conversation.

You see, our enemies believe that the things which make us great — they think it actually makes us weak.  They see us as tolerant, pluralistic and inclusive.  And they believe that those values will be our undoing.  If we avoid mentioning the dangers we face for fear we’ll offend someone, then we let our oppressors win.  Because when tolerance becomes a one-way street, it will lead to cultural suicide.  And if we continue to show them that they’re right — and that we are weak and unable to defend ourselves — then we are not holding true to our American way.

We must not fall prey to the need of being PC, politically correct, to those who are morally devoid.  Instead, we must demonstrate that we can still be strong when it comes to protecting those principles and values for which we stand — that we are doubly capable of rooting out evil and bringing it to justice.  Our values animate us and give us the legitimacy that allows us to exist in this republic — and that far from bringing about the downfall of this great experiment in democracy that we call America, those are the reasons why we thrive.

We must be ever-vigilant, for there will always be those who are seeking to bring about our destruction.  And for us to believe otherwise would be foolish, and totally unbefitting of what we tend to be, which is a superpower.

But vigilance requires realism on our parts — not blowing the threat of terrorism out of proportion, but accepting it for what it is — a very real danger to our cherished way of life.  There should be no question whatsoever on the lips of the world about America’s commitment to eradicating evil.  And it must be absolute.

And the first step in combating evil is being honest with ourselves about the scale of that which we are facing and who’s behind it.  We have to now understand that it is an Islamic totalitarianism, a great black cloud that stains our age, and it’s up to us to rise to the occasion of defeating it.  We must come to the grips with a theocratic political ideology that is fundamentally the antithesis to our American principles, way of life, and our values.

In our Declaration of Independence, it says — we hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights — among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  And if we fail to protect the first of these rights, we fail to protect them all.  Because without your life, there is no other safeguard that will matter.  And that is why national security is, and must remain, America’s number-one priority.

And we have to do a better job in supporting our men and women on this present 21st century battlefield.  That means not just with bumper stickers, but with proper funding and supplies, with assistance for their families, with high-quality healthcare when they’re injured, and with good-paying jobs for them when they come home, when their tours of duty are complete.  Because an 11.7 percent unemployment rate for our veterans is unacceptable.  It is reprehensible, and we should not allow that to happen.

It is easy in the aftermath of conflict periods to become complacent, to lose sight of the reason for investing in our troops.  And we have seen this play out in our history.  We have seen it after the World Wars.  We saw it after the Cold War.  And we’re again seeing it today.  We spend and spend as the wars rage on, and then watch as our military atrophies for the lack of funding as soon as they’re over.  We cannot continue with the practice that I call the peaks and valleys of military readiness, where we try to ramp up for an operation and then, as soon as we believe that that operation’s complete, we look to the military to be the bill-payers for the fiscal irresponsibility of this nation.  And we put their readiness and their preparedness at stake.  That type of thinking cannot be any more misguided.

The bottom line is this — if you wait until your forces are called upon to fight before you think about their needs, then the war is already over.  You’ve already lost it.  Our servicemen and -women are the very embodiment of everything that’s right about America.  And after 22 years of serving beside them, after having a father who served in World War II, an older brother who served in Vietnam, and a nephew who is serving now, I think I know a little bit about the steel and the spines of the American fighting man and woman.

The young people who comprise the armed forces of the United States are, without a doubt, today the strongest and most competent soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines and coastguardsmen the world has ever known.  They serve willingly and with valor.  And they are imminently deserving of our gratitude and our support.  As long as we are faithful to the cause and to those who fight it, as long as we recognize what we are up against and resolve that we will not be defeated, there’s no doubt in my mind — and should not be any doubt in any of your minds — that we will come out on top.  Because there’s a resiliency in the American fighting spirit that cannot be broken, even in the face of the impossible.

We are a nation that was forged in the heat of a revolution, that has truly been through hell and back, that has been through civil wars, world wars, regional combat conflicts.  But the flame of our fighting spirit continues to burn as bright as ever.  Even through the darkest days and the deadliest terrorist attack on American soil, we somehow rose to that challenge.  And that is why I have great faith in our ability to weather any storm.  Because that is, after all, the American way.

But for some, that means just weapons and ammunition.  But what I have to tell you today — it means strategic foresight.  American troops, when you study our history, have never lost at the tactical level on the ground.  But if we do not have leaders that can provide for them well thought-out objectives, they can win every single battle, but we will still lose the war in the end.  For those who served in Vietnam, they can tell you that is exactly what happened.

So let me ask you a question — when was the last time you heard anyone, any leader, over the past 10 years or so, say — these are our strategic objectives as we prosecute this war?  War on terror is a horrible misnomer.  Terror is a tactic.  A nation cannot fight a tactic.  But yet, we are [ruttle a ship].  Because when you read the most recent national security strategy coming out of the Obama Administration, it talks more about global warming, and it never mentions radical Islamism, jihadism or violent Muslim extremism.  It wants our soldiers and sailors and airmen and marines to fight the weather.

See, the problem is you haven’t heard that.  You haven’t heard anyone talk about this new 21st century battlefield, which is so different from the battlefield that I participated on in 1991 as a young captain in Desert Shield-Desert Storm.  We have to recognize the emergence of the non-state, non-uniform belligerent that does not respect borders and boundaries.  We have to understand that we must move away from a Cold War-era forward-deployed military, and get back toward a power projection military that can go into all of these geographic areas of responsibility and deny the enemy sanctuary, to cut off his flow of men, material, resources and supplies.  It means that we have to go back to those numbers that I gave you first and foremost.

And we’ve got to do something that we have not done since the collapse of the Soviet Union.  We’ve got to go geographic area of responsibility by geographic area of responsibility, and look  at the requirements that are necessary based upon an analysis of the enemy and an intelligence assessment that sets our capability and our capacity for the next 20 to 30 years.

But I can tell you, that’s not what happened after the collapse of the Soviet Union.  When you read things like Francis Fukuyama, who wrote that this is the end of the world as we know it in all type of ideological conflict — he had it absolutely wrong.  If you had instead read Samuel Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order” — Huntington had it right.  But yet, once again, we saw the military as the bill-payer of such things such as midnight basketball.

We have to get away from nation-building and occupation-style warfare, and understand that it’s the strategic mobility and maneuverability that is the strength of these great United States of America and our military, so that we can then be in those places where the enemy is not suspecting us to be, and we can strike him quickly, and we can pull back.  On this modern-day battlefield, we don’t have any need to think that it’s our responsibility to rebuild.  Because that’s not what this enemy understands nor respects.  They understand strength, they understand you going in, they understand you kicking his tail and then being ready to kick his tail again.  That is what strategic-level thinkers need to be considering.

We need to look at our rules of engagement.  When we have rules of engagement that say we cannot engage the enemy until he shows you some hostile intent — well, having been in a few firefights, in two to three seconds, someone starts to lose their life.  And if you’re telling our fighting men and women that they have to wait those two to three seconds, that they have to wait for this enemy to show that he is a bad guy, that he has hostile intent, then we do not have the initiative on this battlefield.  We have to have the rules of engagement that allow our men and women to be able to be successful on the battlefield, and be on the offense.  Because you don’t win on the defense.

It means that we must starting sitting back and looking at all of these different countries.  We must look at Iran and understand that we’ve been at war with Iran since they took our hostages, that Iran is the one that is the number-one state sponsor of terrorism.  They are the center of this Islamic totalitarianism.  And the fact that now we have had a President that says we’re going to zero out our combat force in Iraq — I can tell you that Muqtada al-Sadr, the Mahdi Army, are just waiting for 1 January.  And it will be a bloodbath.

We have to understand that now the Kurds in Northern Iraq will once again look and say — we’ve been abandoned for the second time, just the same as we did after Desert Shield-Desert Storm.  That affects your credibility as a strategic superpower.

We need to look at Afghanistan and Pakistan, and understand that you will never have a secure Afghanistan until you contend with the enemy that has sanctuaries over in Pakistan.  The Hikani network is now far more powerful than al-Qaeda is.  And we know where their sanctuaries are.  If they don’t respect the borders and boundaries, then we must not, either.  And the ISI are not on our side.  But yet, we continue to spend and send $3 billion of aid over to a Pakistan which really is deteriorating into a radical Islamist state.

We have to look at China and understand that we are already in an economic war with China.  When you have a China that owns 27 percent of your national debt, that affects your foreign policy, that affects your national security.  And the trade and balance that China now has is not going towards building up a better infrastructure, the standard of living for the Chinese citizen.  Just recently, their first aircraft carrier rolled out.  Their strategic air force is being built.  And a lot of that technology they’re starting to get from us, even.

We have to understand that China poses an economic threat to us which will eventually become a military threat.  Because, don’t forget — when was the last time a major Asian nation invested in its naval force?  I think we all remember what happened then.

We must understand that Russia is still more so Soviet Union than it is a modern Russia.  And if you are to be fooled, Vladimir Putin is still KGB.

We must understand that you have a Stalinist regime in North Korea.  But once again, they are able to act out and continue to have international extortion because they believe that China has their back.  And as long as China owns 27 percent of our debt, they will continue to act out.  We must understand that Taiwan is very nervous about the military growth and development of China.

We must understand in Egypt that since Hosni Mubarak has been deposed, nothing has gone right in Egypt.  Ask the Coptic Christians.  Ask Israel what is happening.  The number-one strongest political entity in Egypt is the Muslim Brotherhood.  A lot of people are cheering today about Muammar Khadafi losing his life.  But what happens next?  Someone tell me, where are the chemical weapons, the biological weapons, the 30,000 shoulder-fired [man pas] that are missing from that country?  My concern is that somehow they will make it through Egypt, and the next thing you know, they’ll be over in Gaza Strip.

We must look at Syria and understand that that is still a satellite of Iran.  And they do not want to see that fall.  Because so goes Syria, then so may affect that link to Hezbollah.

We have to look at what is happening south of our border, in Mexico.  Illegal immigration is a national security issue.  Because there are certain elements that are coming across our border that are not favorable to us.  And we know that Iran was working with drug cartels to execute this assassination in Washington, D.C.  And the drug cartels are getting stronger and stronger.

We must be concerned about Venezuela, and the influence that they are having in South America, as well as the alliances that they are developing with Iran.  We must be concerned about Turkey.  Prime Minister Erdogan is taking that country down the road of being a radical Islamist.  And the deteriorating relations that we see between Turkey and Israel should cause us a lot of concern.

We must be worried about Yemen and Somalia.  Because we are playing whack-a-mole with this enemy, who will always try to establish himself anywhere that he can find a volatile, unstable situation.

We must understand that a threat to freedom anywhere is a threat to freedom everywhere.  And freedom is under attack every day on faraway streets.  We have to be fearless in our support of our closest ally in the Middle East, which is the modern-day state of Israel.  Because anything less –

Anything less will weaken Israel, and there are threats from all sides.  Israel and America are united by a common enemy — this Islamic totalitarianism and terrorism.  And our shared commitment of liberty and freedom, and freedom of worship and democracy, are what brings us together.  But I am concerned, when you look at Gaza Strip and you see what happens with Hamas and Hezbollah.  Because the UN Mandate 1701 is not being strictly enforced.  So now you have 50,000 rockets and missiles that are stationed in Southern Israel, all pointed south toward Israel — Southern Lebanon, I’m sorry — pointed toward Israel.

And I must admit there’s an incredible precedent that has been established, when you trade one soldier for 1,037 terrorists.  If the recidivism rate is 10 percent, think about what that brings about.  We have now told a terrorist organization that a modern-day nation state is willing to go into negotiations.  That is not a good thing.  What happens if they get two soldiers next time?

We are better than them. When all the other arguments for why we can’t fight back have been exhausted this is the one that remains in the background presenting our moral exceptionalism as the reason we shouldn’t fight to protect ourselves.

“Fight back? But then we’d be no better than them?” If we waterboard then we are no better than the headchoppers and mutilators. If we profile then we are no better than the genocidal jihadists. If we treat our friendly Pakistani and Saudi visitors the way they would have been treated a century ago– then we would be guilty of being un-American.

But is that really the difference between us, that we treat everyone equally even when they are cutting our throats, and the moment we deviate from the standards of the Trial Lawyers Association then we’re no better than the Taliban or Al-Qaeda? Does our exceptionalism derive from our laws, in which case if we compromise our laws then we give up the only worthwhile thing about us and there is nothing more to fight for– or are our laws the means by which we protect our individual and national exceptionalism?

We are better than they are, is the argument put forward so often by those who do not truly believe that we are, and even when they do they don’t understand why we are.  The Bill of Rights did not spring full-grown out of a barbaric culture, nor did any of the same judicial rulings and quotes so often used by advocates of the 10 percent defense plan.

We are not better than they are because we guarantee civil rights to our enemies– we are better than they are because of Michelangelo, the microchip and universal education. We are better than they are because of Shakespeare, the space shuttle and the World Trade Center. We are better for all the reasons around us, the accomplishments, the achievements, the knowledge we have gained and the society we have built.

Our laws were crafted to protect these achievements, the exceptionalism of the individual from the government, and that of the nation from internal and external enemies. The laws have no individual life apart from the culture of the nation that created them and maintains them. It would be possible to transpose the United States Constitution to Indonesia, Libya or Pakistan and it wouldn’t last a single day there. No mere document can safeguard rights and freedoms that a culture does not value, and no culture that does not value them is deserving of their protection if such protection has the cumulative effect of destroying those same rights and freedoms.

Freedom isn’t just defended on the battlefield, by the time things get that bad then the damage will be hard to contain. We defend it every day by defending the culture that makes it possible. Against external enemies there is the war of armed conflict, economic competition and geographic positioning. Against the internal enemy there is the culture war, the war of ideas and institutions.

Who we are is seen in the connections that define our culture and those connections tell us who we are. Rewire the human brain so that its connections are no longer streamlined and identity breaks down into fragments of things that no longer make sense. The same is true of a culture, lose the connections and you end  up celebrating holidays you don’t understand and fighting for things that feel intuitively right, but no longer seem to fit into the new order of things. It is the task of the culture warriors to rebuild those connections so that the culture understands itself.

Connections don’t just store information, they define priorities by reminding us which thing is dependent on the other. They remind us that governments sre instituted to keep laws and laws are implemented to keep the people. Governments serve the law, but the law serves the people.

And the people are not some random mass, they are not defined by passports and identity cards or place of birth– the people are the keepers of the flame of their culture. This need not be a matter of birth, immigrants can be among the greatest heroes and natives among the greatest traitors. But no one who is committed to the destruction of the culture, in concrete or abstract terms, in the immediate present or the indefinite future, can enjoy the protection of legal codes that exist to protect the freedom of the individual within the integrity of a free culture.

President Obama’s new defense secretary, Leon Panetta, has bought into the myth that Israeli inflexibility is the source of the Palestinian conflict. He is publicly saying that the ball is in Israel’s court, and it is now the Jewish state’s responsibility to advance the peace process. He warns that it is becoming more isolated, and Israel must be a better partner in the region. In other words, Israel is to blame.

On Sunday, Panetta said, “[T]he question you have to ask: Is it enough to maintain a military edge if you’re isolating yourself in the diplomatic arena? Real security can only be achieved by both a strong diplomatic effort as well as a strong effort to project your military strength.”

In what the Associated Press called an “edgy warning,” he said that Israel must try to rescue its relations with Turkey and Egypt. Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan interpreted Panetta’s statement to mean that the U.S. was taking Turkey’s side in its confrontation with Israel. Playing off of Panetta’s words, Erdogan said, “Israel has chosen isolation by losing a friend like Turkey.” Erdogan has reduced Turkey’s ties to Israel because of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s refusal to apologize for the controversial Gaza flotilla raid last year. Panetta also said that the U.S. should not cut the amount of taxpayer money given to the Palestinian Authority to retaliate for its provocative bid for U.N. membership.

“There is a need and an opportunity for bold action on both sides to move towards a negotiated two-state solution,” Panetta said during his press conference with Defense Minister Ehud Barak. He urged both sides to restart negotiations, without acknowledging that Israel has always been willing to negotiate. On Sunday, Israel said it wanted to restart direct negotiations, just as Panetta insisted. As a matter of fact, Netanyahu offered to immediately meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas during his speech at the U.N. on September 23.

“In two and a half years, we met in Jerusalem only once, even though my door has always been open to you. If you wish, I’ll come to Ramallah. Actually, I have a better suggestion. We’ve both just flown thousands of miles to New York. Now we’re in the same city. We’re in the same building. So let’s met here today in the United Nations,” Netanyahu said.

If Abbas had said what Netanyahu did, the international community and world media would have been electrified. Yet, Netanyahu was met with a collective silence. On the same day as his speech, Al-Jazeera interviewed a member of the Fatah Central Committee. The official, Abbas Zaki, unequivocally stated that negotiations based on two states are only an interim, practical step towards destroying Israel. “Everybody knows that the greater goal cannot be accomplished in one go,” he said.

“If Israel withdraws from Jerusalem, evacuates the 650,000 settlers, and dismantles the wall—what will become of Israel? It will come to an end,” Zaki said. He previously said the same thing as the Palestinian ambassador to Lebanon in May 2009. And he admitted that the Palestinians were keeping quiet about this strategy.

“If we say that we want to wipe Israel out…C’mon, it’s too difficult. It’s not [acceptable] policy to say so. Don’t say these things to the world. Keep it to yourself,” he said.

One of the more peculiar twists in the caliphate’s tale is that a sizable amount of the funding for Islamic propaganda aimed at Americans comes from Muslim-owned defense contractors.

Sabtech Industries recently made the news when it lost its security clearance after some suspicious donations to Muslim charities cost its president, Rahim Sabadia, his security clearance. Sabtech’s work on upgrading the Navy’s AEGIS system on warships put it at the nerve center of one of the most important defense technologies in the United States.

The real question, though, is not how Rahim Sabadia lost his security clearance, but how he got it in the first place.

via The Defense Contractors of Islam | FrontPage Magazine.

We knew this was coming. No American victory in this day and age, not even the long-overdue death of terror mastermind Osama bin Laden, is safe from political hijacking by the useful idiots of the Left.  Within hours of hearing the good news, left-wing Daily Beast flunky Peter Beinart took to the keyboard to declare that the War on Terror is finally over.

Wow, what a relief! So that means Iran’s nuclear program is kaput? Er, no. Well, maybe it means the UN Security Council has stopped playing nice with Middle Eastern thug regimes. Wait, that didn’t happen, either. I know – peace between Israel and the Palestinians is finally in sight! Nope, try again. Um, then maybe anti-American sentiment among Muslim populations is waning? Uh-uh.

If none of that’s the case, then what does Beinart mean?

I don’t mean that there is no threat of further jihadist attack. In the short term, the threat may even rise. I don’t mean that we should abandon all efforts at tracking terrorist cells. Of course not. But the war on terror was a way of seeing the world, explicitly modeled on World War II and the Cold War. It suggested that the struggle against “radical Islam” or “Islamofascism” or “Islamic terrorism” should be the overarching goal of American foreign policy, the prism through which we see the world […] It made East Asia an afterthought during a critical period in China’s rise; it allowed all manner of dictators to sell their repression in Washington, just as they had during the Cold War; it facilitated America’s descent into torture; it wildly exaggerated the ideological appeal of a jihadist-Salafist movement whose vision of society most Muslims find revolting.

Bin Laden’s death is an opportunity to lay the war on terror to rest as well. Although President Obama avoids the phrase, its assumptions still drive our war in Afghanistan, a crushingly expensive adventure in nation building in a desperately poor country whose powerful neighbor wants us to fail. Those assumptions fuel anti-Muslim racism in the United States, where large swaths of the Republican Party have decided they are at risk of living under Sharia law. And they blind us to the differences among Islamist movements, allowing Glenn Beck and company to depict Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood as al Qaeda’s farm team.

Instead, we can now take on real problems, like debt and China. Because Barack Obama has been such a crusader on those issues so far.

I’m struggling to decide what the most contemptible part of this screed is. Is it the insane implication that Obama taking one problem less seriously will lead to him taking the others more seriously, despite his manifest unseriousness towards both? The way he relies on his own past smears of conservatives as Islamophobes to prop up his latest thesis? Where he casually says, oh by the way, the Cold War was no big deal either?

I don’t know what the sleaziest element is, but it’s easy to see which one is the most dangerous:

The war on terror is over; Al Qaeda lost.

This has perhaps been no greater point of contention between hawks and doves since the September 11 attacks: is the War on Terror simply an effort to destroy the terrorist organization under whose banner 9/11 was carried out, or is it a larger struggle against the broader ideological movement of which al Qaeda was but one part?

I hate to break it to you, but despite the loss of their leader, al Qaeda has by no means been neutered, and either way, they’re far from the only Islamofascist game in town. Extremists have won a string of governments throughout the Middle East, and in particular, NRB’s Moshe Phillips notes that Hamas is still kicking. Indeed, learning where bin Laden was hiding—right under the noses of our Pakistani “allies”—should be enough to illustrate why it’s a bit early to herald a new era of U.S.-Mideast relations.

Then again, it’s not as if any of the above would change Peter Beinart’s mind—recall that according to him, the War on Terror has never been a war. Whether Osama bin Laden’s relaxing in a compound or sleeping with the fishes means nothing to him; he’d be saying it’s time to pack up regardless. In that sense, his entire column is a farce—bin Laden’s death is just the latest pretext of seriousness he’s using to whine, “are we there yet?”

In 1938, the leaders of Britain, France and Germany met in Munich to decide the fate of Czechoslovakia. Czechoslovakia was not invited. The three conferees agreed to strip the targeted nation of the Sudetenland, whose population consisted largely of ethnic Germans, and transfer that territory to German control. This deprived the victim state not simply of land but of those areas – mountainous, fortifiable - necessary for Czechoslovakia to be able to defend itself.

Today, the same three nations are doing the same vis-a-vis Israel. They are discarding UN Security Council Resolution 242, passed unanimously in the wake of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and since then the cornerstone for all Middle East negotiations. They are ignoring the language of the resolution and the explicit declarations of its authors that Israel should not be forced to return to the pre-1967 armistice lines; that those lines left defense of the country too precarious and should be replaced by “secure and recognized boundaries” to be negotiated by Israel and its neighbors.

Lord Caradon, Britain’s ambassador to the UN at the time and the person who introduced Resolution 242 in the Security Council, told a Lebanese newspaper in 1974: “It would have been wrong to demand that Israel return to its positions of June 4, 1967, because those positions were undesirable and artificial. After all, they were just the places where the soldiers of each side happened to be on the day the fighting stopped in 1948. They were just armistice lines. That’s why we didn’t demand that the Israelis return to them, and I think we were right not to…”

Arthur Goldberg, the American UN ambassador, made much the same point, stating that the reference to “secure and recognized boundaries” intentionally pointed to the parties negotiating new lines entailing a less than complete Israeli withdrawal and that “Israel’s prior frontiers had proved notably insecure.” Lyndon Johnson, then President, declared Israel’s retreat to its former lines would be “not a prescription for peace but for renewed hostilities.” He advocated new “recognized boundaries” that would provide “security against terror, destruction, and war.”

Subsequent American presidents have reiterated Israel’s right to defensible borders.

The dangers for Israel of a return to the pre-1967 cease-fire lines are evident from even minimal consideration of the region’s topography. Such a withdrawal would not only reduce the nation to a width of nine miles at its center but would entail Israel’s handing over to people who continue to call for her ultimate dissolution control of hill country entirely dominating the coastal plane that is home to some 70% of Israel’s population.

It would also give potential hostile forces beyond the Jordan River untrammeled access to those heights.

This was what the drafters of Security Council Resolution 242 sought to preclude. And this is what the Munich Three now choose to ignore by calling upon the Quartet or the UN to abandon the emphasis on negotiations between the parties and to present a plan of its own based on Israeli retreat to the pre-1967 lines.

In the wake of the 1938 Munich agreement, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain declared, of course, that the parties had achieved “peace in our time.” But Britain and France also offered solemn promises that, should Germany unexpectedly violate the agreement and move against what remained of Czechoslovakia, they would come to the rump nation’s defense.

Less than six months after Munich, Hitler conquered the rest of Czechoslovakia. Britain and France did nothing.

So far, the analysis of President Obama’s deficit speech has focused largely on its vagaries, obfuscations, and outright lies.  Charles Krauthammer rightly blasted Obama’s speech as “shallow … hyper-partisan … intellectually dishonest.”  He cited Obama’s “numbers suspended in mid-air with nothing under them with all kinds of goals and guidelines and triggers that mean nothing.”  Krauthammer wasn’t alone – many commentators ranging from David Limbaugh to Larry Kudlow have targeted Obama’s woefully un-mathematical statistics, his fiscal magical thinking, and his utter inability to move to the center with regard to deficit reduction.

But the true heart of Obama’s speech wasn’t the faulty budgetary analysis or the demagoguery of attacking Paul Ryan personally.  It was Obama’s soaring rhetoric.

Obama is an odd politician.  Most politicians see the cloudy phraseology of their speeches as mere throwaway stuff, cotton candy for the simple-minded.  Obama sees such gibberish as the soul of his agenda.  If we want to examine where Obama truly stands, we must delve into his soaring rhetoric.

And the soaring rhetoric is unvaryingly drawn directly from Saul Alinsky.

As Andrew Breitbart makes clear in his fantastic new book, Righteous Indignation, the father of the contemporary  left is Saul Alinsky.  Alinsky was an intensely clever fellow with no compunction about exploiting popular sentiment to achieve his ends.  One of his favorite methodologies was to use America’s founders to back his own Marxism.  As Breitbart writes, “Alinsky’s clever merging of fake founding philosophy with his own Marxism led him to internal contradictions that would have sunk a lesser ego.  While championing ‘freedom,’ for example – he hated the idea of individual freedom the Founders loved – he [pushed for] ‘communal freedom,’ which is to say tyranny led by the government.”

Obama was raised in the Alinsky tradition, and he speaks with Alinsky’s forked tongue.  Thus, for example, Obama opened his speech by stating that Americans have historically “put our faith in free markets and free enterprise as the engine of America’s wealth and prosperity … we are rugged individualists, a self-reliant people with a healthy skepticism of too much government.”

So far, so good.  But Obama continues: “But there has always been another thread running throughout our history – a belief that we are all connected; and that there are some things we can only do together, as a nation.”  This is un-American, and it is a lie.  American unity doesn’t occur in opposition to free markets, but in defense of them.

This is typical Alinsky.  By purposefully confusing principled individualism with principled communitarianism, suggesting that Americans are characterized by both, Obama begins the slow march to fascism.  In this section of his speech, Obama essentially turned Americans into corporatists – free marketeers ready, willing, and able to turn over that free market to a well-organized state.

Self-professed “urban monastic” Evangelical Leftist Shane Claiborne has publicly announced his withholding 30 percent of his taxes to protest all U.S. defense spending.  A strict pacifist who was in Baghdad in 2003 to protest the U.S. liberation of Iraq from Saddam Hussein, Claiborne is an icon for young evangelicals opposed to the American “empire.”

“While I am glad to contribute money to the common good and towards things that promote life and dignity, especially for the poor and most vulnerable people among us, I am deeply concerned that 30 percent of the federal budget goes towards military spending, with 117 billion going to support the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq,” he explained in his recent letter to the IRS.

It’s not clear where Claiborne got the 30 percent figure.  U.S. military spending in 2011, including Iraq and Afghanistan operations, is supposed to be about $671 billion out of an over $3.8 trillion budget.  So the military will consume under 18 percent of federal spending.  Maybe Claiborne is playing the usual game of excluding “entitlement” spending from the total.

Claiborne, who sports dreadlocks and a frequent hoodie, is a very popular lecturer and author among especially hip, young evangelicals.  Operating a Philadelphia “Simple Way” commune in an impoverished neighborhood, he is understandably hailed for his concerns about the poor.  But he evidently does not want the poor or anybody else protected from terrorism or foreign aggression.  A pacifist absolutist, Claiborne represents the rising generation of neo-Anabaptists so popular today in America’s seminaries, where Utopian ideals often prevail over both reality and historic church teaching.

“My Christian faith and my human conscience require me to respectfully reserve the right not to kill, and to refrain from contributing money towards weapons and the military,” Claiborne told the IRS.  He added that if the military’s share of deficit spending were included, he would have to withhold about half his taxes, once again exaggerating defense expenditures.  “Entitlements” grab most of the federal budget, which the Left would prefer to ignore.  Defense of life and liberty in a chaotic world evidently does not qualify as an “entitlement.”

Claiborne earnestly informed the IRS that he will donate 30% of his tax bill to a “recognized US nonprofit organization working to bring peace and reconciliation,” which he did not name.  “My faith also compels me to submit to the governing authorities, which is why I am writing you respectfully and transparently here,” he added.  “May we continue to build the world we dream of.”

On the Daily Beast, Leslie Gelb, Assistant Secretary of State under Jimmy Carter, has an analysis of the situation which liberals eager to give Obama cover might find useful: the neocons made him do it!

Neocons and liberal interventionists stampeded Obama into imposing a no-fly zone against Libya—despite the absence of vital U.S. interests there […]

The manufactured crisis in Libya is a prime case in point. No foreign states have vital interests at stake in Libya. Events in this rather odd and isolated land have little bearing on the rest of the tumultuous Mideast region. Also not to be dismissed, there are far, far worse humanitarian horrors elsewhere. Yet, U.S. neoconservatives and liberal humanitarian interventionists have trapped another U.S. president into acting as if the opposite were true.

Obama’s been “trapped” into ordering airstrikes? How?

Once this terrible duo starts tossing out words like “slaughter” and “genocide,” the media goes crazy. Then, the chorus begins to sing of heartless inaction by the U.S. president, blaming him for the deaths. White House common sense crumbles into insanity. The reason why neither President Obama nor his coalition partners in Britain and France can state a coherent goal for Libya is that none of them have any central interest in the outcome there. It is only when a nation has a clear vital interest that it can state a clear objective for war. They’ve all simply been carried away by their own rhetoric.

The drama usually starts when leaders and thinkers are seduced by the feeling they must do good. Sometimes, they essentially ignore the killings, even as deaths climb into the hundreds of thousands, as in Rwanda and millions as in Congo. Other times, the deaths number in the hundreds or so, as in Libya—and the guy doing the killing is someone they have good reason to dislike, and so they want to do good and stop him. It was just so with the irresistible trio of Senators—John McCain, John Kerry, and Lindsey Graham—and with their counterparts in foreign-policy land.

And just like that, interventionists insist there’s “no time to deliberate,” and the president helplessly complies with their calls to arms.

There are a couple problems with this theory, though. First, polls show that, on the whole, Americans approve of the action now that we’re in it, but their support is far from overwhelming. On Capitol Hill and among the Tea Party, the battle lines are similarly muddied, with politicians of Obama’s own party blasting him for intervening while his sworn enemies in the Tea Party are more open to the idea. So if Obama really thought getting involved was a bad move for the United States, there’s certainly enough political cover for him to withstand interventionist condemnation for staying out.

Second, and more importantly, Barack Obama is the President of the United States. The Commander in Chief. It’s ultimately his decision whether or not to commit the US military to action, not the talking heads. It doesn’t matter how many people are screaming for action; if you don’t think it’s in the nation’s best interests, you don’t do it. President George W. Bush caught a lot of flak for calling himself “the decider,” but he was right: if a president lacks the fortitude to make tough decisions based on his own best judgment, then he’s unfit for the office.

Though there’s much to condemn in Barack Obama’s handling our role in Libya so far, there are credible defenses of his core policy. What Leslie Gelb proposes is not one of them. You simply cannot suggest that a president has sent American servicemen into battle against his wishes while maintaining that he deserves to stay in the White House.

Last week, The Heritage Foundation’s second annual “Protect America Month” came to a close.  The program was designed to express commitment to America’s national security, advocate for increased defense spending, point out the constitutional basis for government’s role in protecting America, and to examine the threats to the United States.  John Ashcroft, former Attorney General of the United States, delivered the closing speech.

Attorney General Ashcroft began by asserting his belief that “the defense of America is tantamount to the defense of freedom.  And freedom is worth defending.”  He astutely reviewed his understanding of the definition of freedom, and how American exceptionalism plays a vital role in contributing and sustaining freedom around the globe.

He rejected the common argument that freedom and national security must be balanced.  Rather, freedom is the highest value with no parallel.  However, in order to maintain it, it must be secured.  Therefore, the two are not counterweights to each other.  Rather, national security protects America’s freedom, and ensures that freedom stays intact.

Ashcroft explained that the ability to engage in the pursuit of happiness increases freedom, while the provision of happiness by the government impairs freedom, and often comes at a high cost.  In other words, when needs are converted into rights, freedom shrinks.  Most importantly, the imposition of that which is not wanted constitutes the denial of freedom regardless of the virtue of that which is being imposed.

Freedom is under attack.  Nine years after September 11, 2001, Americans have become complacent.  Many have a false sense of security.  But the former Attorney General encouraged the audience not to surrender to the terrorist threat, and always be mindful of those who sacrificed their lives for the cause of freedom.

Ashcroft believes that the number one responsibility of the federal government is to protect its citizens.  The way he believes national security is enforced is through the rule of law, so that people are on notice of what they can and cannot do.

In analyzing habeas corpus doctrine, the use of military tribunals and indefinite detention, Ashcroft reviewed numerous Supreme Court cases including Hamdi, Quirin, and Eisentrager.  He also discussed the DC Court of Appeals case, titled Maqaleh v Gates.

When asked about his positions on specific policy and legal matters, he emphasized the reasoning process that should support these decisions.  They included the following:

• Be aware that policies send a message that can deter behavior or invite behavior;
• Determine if the conduct in question constitutes a war crime or merely violates a domestic criminal statute;
• Ensure that all three branches of government are acting within their appropriate constitutional limits;
• Know that the executive branch can make faster decisions to ensure the protection of America’s national security than can the legislative branch;
• Acknowledge the fact that military tribunals, while operating under different rules than federal courts, still result in outcomes that are fair and respect the true facts;
• In deciding whether a defendant should be tried in a military tribunal versus a federal court, determine your objective.   If national security information in involved, minimize the release of this information to our enemies;
• If a person with US citizen status is fighting against the US with America’s enemies, perhaps he should be treated as an enemy;
• Laws should be clear and certain.  If the geographical location of the occurrence doesn’t provide clear rules, then look to the circumstances surrounding the case;
• America should make sure that she runs prisons only in locations where she can maintain control of what occurs within them;
• Finally, Americans should distinguish between detention for the purpose of punishment and detention for the purpose of removing enemy combatants from the stream of battle.

The former Attorney General also noted that America’s reckless financial conduct will have grave national security implications for future generations who might be unable to finance their defense.  Moreover, if America reveals a lack of self-sufficiency to the world by becoming a debtor to the world, it signals America’s weakness.  Funding national security should be one of government’s main priorities.

America’s current Attorney General, Eric Holder, appears to have no clear rules guiding his decisions in reference to which defendants go to a military tribunal versus a federal court.  His decisions appear to be arbitrary and capricious.  Though he is the head of the Department of Justice, national security does not seem to be his paramount priority.  He refuses to acknowledge the Islamist ideological threat, favors the closing of the Guantanamo Bay Detention Center, opposes the Patriot Act (responsible for disrupting numerous terrorist plots in the US) and is critical of enhanced interrogation techniques.  Instead, he has stated that engagement in “dialogue” with the Muslim community is a priority for his Department, as is the prosecution of so-called “hate crimes.”  Though he is not an expert in Islamic theology, he nevertheless asserts with seeming authority the claim that that those who commit terrorist acts in the name of Islam behave in a way that is “un-Islamic” and contrary to Islam’s actual teachings.

By contrast, John Ashcroft led America through its toughest times after the largest terrorist attack on US soil following September 11, 2001.  He made fighting terrorism his number one priority.  He reorganized DOJ to ensure that suspected terrorists were prosecuted when the evidence warranted it.  Under his leadership, DOJ dismantled numerous terrorist cells throughout the US and over 150 plots throughout the world.  Ashcroft’s role in the execution of the War on Terror was one of the most difficult of any cabinet member.

Ashcroft’s speech at the Heritage Foundation expressed a love of freedom, an appreciation of American exceptionalism, an understanding of the threats to liberty, respect for the law, Judeo-Christian values, and a deference to “we the people.”  The Left, of course, has consistently expressed its venom toward John Ashcroft and the entire War on Terror. But Ashcroft’s speech reminded me of the time after September 11, 2001, when, however briefly, the country came together to face our common enemies.  Our government united us in the cause for freedom and our shared American values.  My, how things have changed.

Despite international criticism against Israel following a calamitous IDF raid on an aid flotilla to Gaza, it appeared Monday that Hamas was the one preventing the goods brought by the flotilla from entering the Strip.

The army announced Monday that the humanitarian aid brought by the ships had been mostly unloaded, and estimated that the task would be completed in the next few days.

However Hamas continues to insist that the shipment not be brought in through the land crossings, and in the meantime the goods continue to pile up in the army's warehouses.

Major Or Elrom, of the office of the Coordinator of Government Activities in the (Palestinian) Territories, said there was nothing on board the flotilla's ships that Gaza's residents did not already have.

"All of these goods have been previously conveyed there, and we hope we can do the same in this case," she said.

A Defense Ministry facility adjacent to the Tzrifin army base has been turned into a temporary warehouse over the past few days, containing beds, mattresses, couches, medical supplies, shoes, clothing, and medicine - some of which has reportedly expired.

Eitan Kosto, who heads the Defense Ministry's logistics corps, said the cargo had not been loaded onto the ships according to professional guidelines and therefore some of the goods were damaged during the unloading.

"We had to work for a long time and devote many resources to unloading it all," he said. "The fact that it wasn't properly organized caused damage to some of the goods, but finally we succeeded in organizing everything so it could be transferred to the Strip."

Much of the equipment so far unloaded from the ships - mostly shoes and electric carts - was secondhand, while other products were apparently donated by various organizations and civilians, Kosto said.

He added that his personnel had not yet unloaded the cement and building materials on board, which would have to undergo security checks before entering the Strip.

However it remains unclear whether Hamas will allow the materials to enter. Last week the group kept out eight trucks carrying humanitarian supplies, which were attempting to enter through the Kerem Shalom crossing.

Iskenderun (AsiaNews) - Today at 4pm local time the funeral will take place of Msgr. Padovese, killed by his driver, Murat Altun, strangely "crazed" last June 3. Meanwhile, new details have emerged on the dynamics and motives of the killing that has prostrated the Turkish Church.

The funeral ceremony will be held in the Church of the Annunciation, with the participation of the apostolic nuncio, Mgr. Antonio Lucibello, the Latin bishops of Istanbul and Izmir, the Armenian Catholic Bishop of Istanbul, as well as the priests in Turkey and representatives of international embassies.

There will also be a delegate of the Conference of Bishops of Europe present. The presence of bishops from other countries, particularly Italy, are not expected: After the funeral, in Iskenderun, the body of Mgr. Padovese will be brought to Milan, Italy, where he will receive other funeral. The funeral in Italy is likely to take place on Monday, June 14. The delay is due to the fact that the Italian courts have asked to do an autopsy on the body of the martyred bishop.

As the days pass, new details emerge on the story of murder and the alleged "insanity" of the assassin.

The doctors who performed the autopsy reveal that Mgr. Padovese had knife wounds all over his body, but especially in the heart (at least 8). His head was almost completely detached from his neck, attached to his body by only the skin of the back of the neck.

Even the dynamics of the killing is clearer: the Bishop was stabbed in his house. He had the strength to go out the door of the house, bleeding and crying for help and there he was killed. Perhaps only when he fell to the ground, was his head cut off.

Witnesses said they heard the bishop cry out for help. But more importantly, is that they heard screams of Murat immediately after the murder. According to these sources, he climbed on the roof of the house shouted: "I killed the great Satan! Allah Akbar! ".

This call coincides perfectly with the idea of beheading, making sense that it is like a ritual sacrifice against evil. This correlates with the murders of ultranationalist groups and Islamic fundamentalists who apparently want to eliminate Christians from Turkey.

Moreover, according to a Turkish newspaper, Milliyet on June 4, the murderer had told police that he his actions were the result of a " divine revelation."...

Muhammad had one of those, too, interestingly: "Therefore, when ye meet the Unbelievers (in fight), smite at their necks..." (Qur'an 47:4). Does Muhammad get an insanity defense?

In the early hours of May 31st, Israeli Defense Forces boarded ships claiming to bring humanitarian aid to Gaza. Since 2007, Israel has maintained a defensive naval blockade to prevent rocket supplies and terrorists from reaching Hamas and fortifying advanced offensive positions close to Israeli citizens.

Convoy captains ignored orders to divert to the nearby port so passengers and contents of the vessels could be inspected. Israel assured the volunteers that, after proper search, supplies of humanitarian nature would reach Gaza inhabitants, but the boats continued on their course.

Determination to force entry to Gaza justified Israeli commandos boarding the main vessel, where they were attacked by the “peaceful” pro-Palestinian representatives armed with knives and pipes. According to early reports, one of the Gaza-bound workers seized an Israeli gun and began firing. Several volunteers and Israeli soldiers were killed in the ensuing exchange. Eventually, the subdued “missionaries” and their ships were brought to Ashdod.

From start to finish, the Humanitarian flotilla was a textbook operation in the chief war against Israel, the war of global opinion. Those who organized the convoy were well aware that, arriving in proximity to Gaza, they would be stopped by Israeli Defense Forces. The purpose of the convey was to choreograph another drama in which Israel would be obliged to choose between being cast on the international stage as the evil starvers of innocent, trapped women and children, or avoiding the censure by allowing ships, possibly carrying weapons and warriors, into Gaza.

For Israel to survive, she needs the moral and physical support of the United States. The Leftist strategists trying to sever this support are using lessons learned about us during the last wars we have fought; wars are won or lost by the microphone and the camera. A still-shot of “heartless” Israelis denying food, clothing, and Kleenex to a camp population is Oscar Worthy and is more lethal than the rockets stowed under the bandage rolls. It is an image stolen from real occupation, an image intended to confuse the victims with the perpetrators and provoke universal outrage against innocent Isralis and extort pity for people who elected genocidal terrorists to run their government.

The Israel Haters Club will howl and get their poignant video footage from Al Jazeera, who, as always, just happened to be on hand. The knife-brandishing doves will have purchased at the cost of lives they hold so cheaply another opportunity to wail the Occupation Narrative.
The knives are already sharpened over at the Huffington Post:

“Israeli commandos on Monday stormed six ships carrying hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists on an aid mission to the blockaded Gaza Strip, killing at least 10 people and wounding dozens after encountering unexpected resistance as the forces boarded the vessels.”

The operation in international waters off the Gaza coast was a nightmare scenario for Israel that looked certain to further damage its international standing, strain already tense relations with Turkey and draw unwanted attention to Gaza’s plight.

“These savages are killing people here, please help,” a Turkish television reporter said. The broadcast ended with a voice shouting in Hebrew, “Everybody shut up!”

If the attempt to elicit sentimental universal condemnation of Israel is to be thwarted, the only real weapon is fact. Discover the Networks provides information crucial to dispelling the “founding myths,” of “Palestine.” Israel 101, Does Israel Have the Right to Exist? Does the United States?, and What Really Happened in the Middle East, give extensive and irrefutable documentation that the victims in the war are the citizens of Israel, and the aggressors are the terrorists who wish to annihilate them. As Joseph Klein reports in How Hamas Tortures Gaza, the chant of Hamas, upon its takeover of Gaza in 2006 was and remains:

“The earthquake in the Zionist towns will start again and the aggressors will have no choice but to prepare their coffins or their luggage.”

It is no surprise that examination of the “Relief Boats” exposed shipments of weapons, undoubtedly destined for use by Hamas to shake the earth.

The international political consensus, the media, and even “un-biased” UN NGO’s form their own blockade around the truth. We can win the battle for support for Israel here by running this blockade, by educating ourselves and those we know about the reality of the War on Israel.

(And if you're not sure how to find me, I look like the cartoon above. Maybe I myself am an image of Muhammad, and thus haram.)

Did the U.S. State Department ever condemn "Piss Christ" or Chris Ofili's dung-encrusted portrait of the Virgin Mary? Of course not. They're only condemning the Motoons because of the anti-free speech campaign of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, which kicked into high gear in response to the original Danish cartoons of Muhammad. So the U.S. State Department is demonstrating that violence and intimidation work -- which only ensures that we will see more of it.

And with its fig-leaf defense of the freedom of speech below, issued in the context of deploring and denouncing the Motoons, amounts to a call for self-censorship. Now, self-censorship is something we all do all the time, in innumerable contexts: if everyone always said what he thought, there would be a lot more broken relationships and lost jobs, etc. But politeness and respect are not what are at issue here, and the point of publishing the Motoons is not to cause offense, although they will certainly do that. The key fact is that the cartoons arouse in Muslims not only murderous rage but attempts to restrict the freedom of speech through legal avenues. As such, self-censorship amounts only to self-imposed dhimmitude, and to acquiescence to the supremacy and rule of Sharia.

That's why the Motoons are not a stunt, not a joke, not a raspberry to anyone, not an exercise in obnoxiousness or gratuitous offense. The Motoons are rather the foremost battleground in the defense of the freedom of speech today. Every newspaper in the country should be printing them today, to show they are not cowed and will defend free speech. The State Department should be explaining what I am explaining now. Instead, this.

"US slams blasphemous Facebook images," from the Daily Times, May 22 (thanks to Neil):

WASHINGTON: The US has deplored blasphemous images of Prophet Muhammed (PBUH) on Facebook as "deeply offensive to both Muslims and non-Muslims alike", saying America does not condone expressions that lead to violence or hatred. The US State Department also expressed respect for any actions that need to be taken under Pakistani law to protect their citizens from offensive speech, but expected a balance between restricting offensive material and ensuring flow of information for the Internet users. "Obviously, this is a difficult and challenging issue. Many of the images that appear today on Facebook were deeply offensive to Muslims and non-Muslims alike," Philip J Crowley, assistant secretary of state, said.

Hoping to win more hearts and minds in Afghanistan, the U.S. and its NATO allies are planning a commendation to recognize “courageous restraint” among troops in the field. According to a NATO statement, the goal would be to “celebrate the troops who exhibit extraordinary courage and self-control by not using their weapons.”

What an apt metaphor for the Age of Obama. If there is a coherent theme to President Obama’s foreign policy, it seems to be constraining and restraining American power.

Consider the “New START” agreement. From Moscow’s perspective, New START will constrain the U.S. from building and deploying additional missile defenses. New START, according to the Russian interpretation, will “be viable if the United States of America refrains from developing its missile-defense capabilities quantitatively or qualitatively.”

Where would the Russians get that idea, if not from the administration? And if this is so, then it means the administration is unable to recognize that missile defense is, by definition, defensive. In other words, the goal of missile defense is to constrain America’s enemies.

Then there’s the related issue of the Obama administration’s Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), which is all about constraining the United States. Among other things, the NPR pledges that the United States:

• Will not conduct nuclear testing, and will seek ratification and entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty,

• will not develop new nuclear warheads, and

• will not use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapons states that are party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and in compliance with their nuclear nonproliferation obligations.

Obama’s NPR also removes the protection afforded by what Defense Secretary Robert Gates calls “calculated ambiguity.” “If a non-nuclear-weapon state is in compliance with the nonproliferation treaty and its obligations,” Gates explains, “the U.S. pledges not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against it.” Instead, such an enemy “would face the prospect of a devastating conventional military response”—even if that enemy “were to use chemical or biological weapons against the United States or its allies or partners.”

“Calculated ambiguity” has kept America’s enemies on notice and off balance for decades—and, not coincidentally, has kept America and American forces safe from nuclear, biological or chemical attack. As Eisenhower counseled at the beginning of the nuclear age, quoting Gen. Stonewall Jackson, “Always surprise, mystify and mislead the enemy.”

Obama clearly doesn’t subscribe to that commonsense view. In fact, he recently took a huge step in the opposite direction by revealing the size of America’s nuclear arsenal.

Meanwhile, the likes of North Korea and Iran play games with the world—and appear to be under no constraints whatsoever.  For instance, in the past 12 months, North Korea has detonated a nuclear weapon, test-fired long-range missiles and blown a South Korean ship out of the water, killing 46 sailors.

Likewise, Iran has shown no restraint in response to Washington’s restraint. Last summer, as the Iranian people rose up against a sham election and as Ahmadinejad’s henchmen crushed the popular revolt, the President was virtually silent. The sad irony of the President’s restrained reaction to the Twitter Revolution was that it answered his own rhetorical question of a year before, albeit in a manner his supporters would never have imagined. “Will we stand for the human rights of…the blogger in Iran?” he asked during his 2008 rock-concert speech in Berlin. Last summer provided the answer.

And it gets worse. When evidence of a secret Iranian nuclear-fuel plant came to light last autumn, there was no reaction from the White House. In fact, it was French president Nicolas Sarkozy who spoke up: “Since 2005, Iran has violated five Security Council resolutions…An offer of dialogue was made in 2005, an offer of dialogue was made in 2006, an offer of dialogue was made in 2007, an offer of dialogue was made in 2008, and another one was made in 2009…What did the international community gain from these offers of dialogue? Nothing.”

Perhaps nowhere is the policy of restraint and constraint on better display than in Afghanistan itself. German forces, for instance, refer to a seven-page guidebook before engaging the enemy. Until mid-2009, they were even required to shout warnings to enemy forces—in three languages—before opening fire. The joys of coalition warfare.

The president has told us, over and over, that Afghanistan is a “war of necessity.” It was so important, as the New York Times reported, that the president gave his military commander “extraordinary leeway” and “carte blanche” control to choose “a dream team of subordinates.”

But when Gen. McChrystal asked for the resources necessary to win this war of necessity, the president balked. Then, after a lengthy re-review of his own policy, the president concluded that “it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan,” before promising that “after 18 months, our troops will begin to come home.”

Of course, vital national interests don’t have expiration dates, and letting the Taliban know when the U.S. military will end its offensive won’t make victory any easier to achieve. But victory is probably not the goal in this era of constraint and restraint. As the constrainer-in-chief himself puts it, “I’m always worried about using the word ‘victory.’”

That brings us back to NATO’s “courageous restraint” idea.

The notion that there needs to be a commendation for restraint is based on the false and faulty premise that U.S. forces haven’t used restraint to date. In fact, as Lt. Col. Tadd Sholtis told Navy Times, “Our young men and women display remarkable courage every day, including situations where they refrain from using lethal force, even at risk to themselves, in order to prevent possible harm to civilians.”

Indeed, the U.S. military is so self-restrained that the world doesn’t even notice. Just think about what happens when the U.S. military makes what we civilians, from 7,000 miles away, call a mistake: It court-martials people, changes target sets, scrubs missions, orders bombing pauses, investigates, apologizes and invests in ever-more precise weapons to prevent mistakes.

The fact is, the American military of today is the most lethal force in history, which makes its self-restraint so impressive. U.S. forces could flatten Kandahar, kill anything that moves in Waziristan, erase all the Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden and all the terror camps in Syria, eliminate the North Korean and Iranian thugocracies, and turn Mosul into glass—all in less than 24 hours. But they don’t do those things. The reason? Thankfully, the means are as important as the ends to Americans and their military.

This is not an argument for shooting first and asking questions later or for countenancing battlefield brutality. Rather, it’s a reminder that U.S. forces in Afghanistan are already holding their fire enough. They already think twice before squeezing the trigger. We shouldn’t expect them to think three times.

The people who know best—those who have served—worry about the unintended consequences of rewarding and thereby encouraging “courageous restraint.” As Clarence Hill, national commander of the American Legion, observes, “Too much restraint will get our own people killed.”

Veterans of Foreign Wars spokesman Joe Davis adds, ominously and presciently, “The creation of such an award will only…put more American and noncombatant lives in jeopardy. Let’s not rush to create something that no one wants to present posthumously.”

Alan W. Dowd writes on defense and security issues.

It’s bad enough that mainstream conservatives like Gov. Sarah Palin and Erick Erickson have endorsed Ron Paul’s son Rand in Kentucky’s Senate race.  But now that two more major conservative leaders—Dr. James Dobson and Sen. Jim DeMint—have done the same, the Right should be very troubled by the mainstreaming of the Paul family’s near-total abandonment of America’s national defense.

In particular, both Pauls might as well be de facto press secretaries for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.  The national defense page on Rand’s website only mentions Iran once, calling it “a serious threat” in this ad, but not saying what he’d do about it.  Campaigning for his father in 2008, however, Rand said that “our national security is not threatened by Iran having one nuclear weapon,” (hat tip: Lisa Graas) and defended their pursuit of nukes, blaming America for tension between the two nations:

He [Ron] thinks the buildup for war with Iran’s already begun, and all the discussion of saying they’re responsible for a lot of these weapons—there haven’t been any congressional hearings, there’s been no [inaudible] knowledge other than people claiming these are Iranian weapons.

Unfortunately, the “people claiming” Iran is giving weapons to America’s enemies happen to be the Pentagon.  Given what we know both about Iran’s generosity with conventional weapons and their desire for nuclear ones, no politician can responsibly ignore the very real possibility that Iran would share whatever nuclear weapons it develops with jihadist groups.  That Rand downplays the threat is, at best, a sign of deadly naiveté.

The other point is, that Iran feels threatened because we got troops in Iraq, and we have troops in Afghanistan, and we don’t wanna say the guy isn’t a, I think, loose cannon, their president, but we don’t want to—we have to understand their perspective that they feel threatened.

Sure, that must be the answer—it can’t possibly have anything to do with Ahmadinejad’s stated desire to destroy Israel, his jihadist sympathies, or a good old-fashioned desire for power. Nope, they’re obviously terrified of the country that couldn’t even stand up for Iran’s disenfranchised voters, and the president who downplayed the Iranian threat on the campaign trail, who has bent over so far backwards to appease them that he released the “Irbil Five,” Iranian commanders responsible for hundreds of American deaths (presumably using those weapons that didn’t really come from Iran), and who didn’t object to Iran’s seat on the UN Women’s Rights Commission.

Rand is, of course, following in the footsteps of his crackpot father.  In 2007, Ron claimed that the U.S. government was going to manufacture a phony crisis that would give them an excuse to invade Iran. As Ace (of Spades HQ) observed, Ron had no problem suggesting “that the US will phony up a fake attack by Iran on our troops (probably killing Americans, as we may have done on 9/11) in order to have a pretext to bomb the mullahs,” ensuring that “if Iran actually does fire on American warships, his supporters will know it’s actually all a contrivance by the US government,” yet it’s completely beyond the pale to notice Paul’s flirtations with the 9/11 Truth movement?

In January 2008, Ron reacted to a confrontation between US and Iranian ships in the Strait of Hormuz by taking Iran’s side: “It reminds me of what happened in the Gulf of Tonkin. We went to war there, then, later on, found out there was a lot of false information.” At the time, Gov. Mitt Romney responded by noting that “Congressman Paul should not be reading as many of Ahmadinejad’s press releases.”

In his own words, Ron “wouldn’t do that much about” Iran getting nukes, and to rationalize that position, he has disgracefully told several lies on Iran’s behalf.  Allahpundit’s October 2009 deconstruction of Tehron Paul’s spin demands to be read in full, but here are a couple of the worst examples:

3. An excellent point: He notes that U.S. intel apparently knew about the secret Qom site even before the infamous 2007 NIE declaring that Iran had halted its weapons program was released. Not so excellent: The conclusion he draws from this, apparently, is that the Qom site is nothing to worry about rather than the much more likely conclusion that evidence of Iranian weaponization was withheld from the NIE in a politicized bid to deny Bush any reason to take military action against Iran. Oh, also? No mention here that classified portions of that very same NIE declared that Iran had an estimated 10 to 15 secret nuclear sites. How come, Doctor?

4. “What does the law say?” wonders our hero, declaring Iran innocent of any international violations. In fact, IAEA chief Mohammed ElBaradei acknowledged just this morning that Iran had broken the law. (In Paul’s semi-defense, this clip was recorded three days ago.)

5. He asserts that the IAEA has never found Iran’s nuclear program to be at fault, which (a) overlooks point 4 above and (b) ignores the fact that the IAEA has been credibly accused by western intel agencies — and not just America’s — of suppressing evidence that incriminates Iran in order to avoid military conflict. In fact, ElBaradei himself is an Iranian stooge of such longstanding that we’ve been writing about it since practically day one of Hot Air. The fact that even he’s been forced to get tough-ish is all the proof you need that Tehran’s in flagrant violation of its international commitments.

Prominent Republicans might have been drawn to Rand Paul’s candidacy out of a misguided infatuation with Washington “outsiders,” but by embracing them, they are also embracing something very different. Rand and his father represent nothing less than a rejection of the Right’s commitment to engaging and assessing the world as it really is, rather than as we would like it to be, and an embrace of the Left’s belief in appeasement and anti-Americanism.  If we abandon one of the last differences that remain between Right and Left—our moral fortitude & intellectual seriousness when it comes to protecting America from her enemies—we will have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that we are unworthy to resume the reins of leadership.  Once again, the words of an actual “true conservative” are worth repeating:

“You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness.”

- Ronald Reagan

_____

Hailing from Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, Calvin Freiburger is a political science major at Hillsdale College.  He also writes for the Hillsdale Forum and his personal website, Calvin Freiburger Online.

Richard Goldstone, author of the notorious Goldstone report, did not become a South African judge in the post-Apartheid Mandela Era, as The New York Times and other media have erroneously reported.  He accepted a judgeship during the worst days of Apartheid and helped legitimate one of the most racist regimes in the world by granting the imprimatur of the rule of law to some of the most undemocratic and discriminatory decrees.

Goldstone was–quite literally–a hanging judge. He imposed and affirmed death sentences for more than two dozen blacks under circumstances where whites would almost certainly have escaped the noose. And he affirmed sentences of physical torture–euphemistically called “flogging”– for other blacks. He also enforced miscegenation and other racist laws with nary a word of criticism or dissent. He was an important part of the machinery of death, torture and racial subjugation that characterized Apartheid South Africa. His robe and gavel lent an air of legitimacy to an entirely illegitimate and barbaric regime.

It is no surprise that Goldstone kept this part of his life secret from academic colleagues, friends and the general public. I recall him at the lunch and dinner tables in Cambridge describing himself as a heroic part of the struggle against Apartheid.  Now it turns out he was the ugly face of Apartheid, covering its sins and crimes with a judicial robe. How differently we would have looked at him if we knew that he had climbed the judicial ladder on whipped backs and hanged bodies.

Now that his dirty secret has been exposed to the world, he has invoked the defense raised by German judges at Nuremberg: “I was just following the law.” This cowardly defense was rejected at Nuremberg and by the international law that Goldstone claimed to be applying against Israel in the Goldstone report. It should be resoundingly rejected by the court of public opinion.  Goldstone’s friend and former judicial colleague,  Arthur Chaskalson, has rushed to the defense of his fellow South African judge, saying that it was “better to have an honest judge on the bench than another kind.” Putting aside the issue of whether Goldstone was an honest judge–his Goldstone Report strongly suggests he is “another kind”–the German judges offered precisely that argument at Nuremberg. “I did it to help the Jews. ” In the film Judgment at Nuremberg, based on a real case, the judge argued that by unjustly sentencing one Jew to death, others might be helped.  He also said he had no choice but to apply unjust laws. He was convicted. Goldstone may have persuaded himself and other judges who served the Apartheid regime that by hanging and torturing some blacks, they would be helping other blacks, but the only ones that were helped were the racists who ran the Apartheid regime and Goldstone himself, who used his Apartheid judgeship as a stepping stone and career booster.

It is interesting that Goldstone made a similar argument to friends as to why he accepted the chairmanship of the investigative commission offered to him by the United Nations Human Rights Council.  He acknowledged that the Council was biased against Israel. Indeed, it treats Israel much the way Apartheid courts used to treat Black Africans: Just as there was special justice (really injustice) for blacks, so too there is special justice (really injustice) for Israel. Goldstone claims he took the job “to help Israel,” just as he took his previous job to help blacks.  In both cases he cynically hurt those he said he wanted to help while helping only himself.  In both cases he was selected to legitimate bigotry.  In both cases, better people than him refused to lend their credibility to an illegitimate enterprise.  But Goldstone accepted, because it was good for his career.

Goldstone  is an ambitious opportunist who lacks the courage of his convictions– if he ever had any. He has always put personal advancement over principle. He is a master of rationalization and self justification. This time he has run out of excuses. He’s been exposed as a poseur who will sell his integrity for a careerist opportunity. Fortunately he now has little integrity left to sell.

The Left constantly claims the mantle of being Pro-Women’s Rights. Yet, they prove time and time again that it is lip service only. In fact, they are often either misogynists or misogyny apologists themselves, all in the name of some sort of  call for a perverted version of “diversity” and “tolerance.”

They’ve recently gone so far as to condone genital mutilation. They have defended child rape in the case of Roman Polanski.  They are silent on Iran gaining a seat on the United Nation’s Commission on the Status of Women. Why? Because it’s never actually about people to them. It’s all agenda-driven, always.

The latest instance, specifically Amanda Marcotte’s defense of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ recent decision to embrace genital mutilation is beyond infuriating. It is twisted, sickening and disturbing beyond belief. How can anyone in their right mind defend such an inhumane thing? Granted, “right mind” is the operative term there, but still.

The AAP, like the UN, started referring to female genital mutilation as merely “cutting” because mutilation sounds icky and may be offensive and insensitive to other cultures. Boo hoo. I’m sorry you are offended that sane people define the acts of clitoridectomy and excision as what they are: mutilation. Now, the AAP has gone one further and said a “little nick” is a nice compromise. No big whoop! Sacrifice girls and allow a misogynistic practice to occur, all in the name of appeasement. I don’t think the girls who are barbarically maimed feel very appeased, do you?

Not so, says Marcotte! Marcotte used the standard and oh-so-lame talking point of “but what about US? We are meany pants and awful too!”  Leftists/Progressives always say “but what about US?” in an attempt to act as apologists, due to their religious fervor and zealotry for the nebulously defined “multi-culturalism.” They invent an example of a perceived American wrong, one that is usually both idiotic and utterly irrelevant to the topic at hand. And, you know, cuckoo pants.

As Jenn Q. Public pointed out in her article, Marcotte had this to say, in defense of the AAP’s decision:

And it’s not like Western culture is so free of blatantly misogynist traditions, either.  Part of me wishes that we had a two minute nicking at the doctor instead of the entire painfully misogynist wedding tradition that persists in the name of tradition.

See, pointing out true evil doesn’t fit the “progressive” meme. Instead, subjugation and misogyny must be invented out of whole cloth regarding things like marriage, but the very real—and often deadly—subjugation of women under Islamic law must be tolerated and ignored. The hypocrisy and cognitive dissonance have reached epic levels.

Oh, just a little two minute nicking, says Marcotte. It’s not like it’s as awful as getting married and sharing your life with a loving partner! I can maybe see where Marcotte is coming from, personally. As self-loathing as she is, she must feel that marriage is a horrid punishment—for the man. I’d have more to say in response to Marcotte, but it makes me feel a little cheap because it’s so easy to refute the intellectually defenseless.

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BEIRUT: Lebanese President Michel Sleiman said the government cannot ask Hizbullah to give up its arms at a time of heightened Israeli tension and before agreement on a national defense strategy was reached.

Israeli allegations last month that Syria had transferred long-range Scud missiles to Hizbullah fuelled security concerns, although Lebanon and Syria both denied the charge, while Hizbullah's leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah has refused to comment.

Hizbullah is on the United States' terrorism blacklist, but it is also part of the Lebanese government.

Syria says it only gives Hizbullah political backing and that Israel may be using the accusation as a pretext for a military strike.

Israel launched a 34-day war against Lebanon in the summer of 2006 during which the powerful group fired thousands of mostly short-range rockets against Israel.

"To demand now, in this regional atmosphere full of dangers and the drumbeats of war that Israel is banging everyday, and before we reach an agreement on a national defense strategy to protect Lebanon, we cannot and must not tell the resistance ... 'Give us your weapons and put it under the state's command,'" Sleiman was quoted as saying in the Ad-Diyar newspaper on Saturday.

The current government, led by Sunni Muslim businessman Saad Hariri, has backed Hizbullah's right to keep its weapons to deter Israeli attacks, an issue that has been at the heart of Lebanon's political crisis over the past five years.

Sleiman has chaired periodic National Dialogue sessions but politicians have been unable to agree on a national defense strategy, in which Hizbullah's weapons would be integrated into the Lebanese Army, to protect Lebanon from Israel.

Israel is worried the Iranian-backed resistance group has replenished its arsenal to attack it on Iran's behalf should Tehran's nuclear sites come under attack.

Resistant to what?

Security Council Resolution 1701, which halted hostilities between Israel and Hizbullah in 2006, calls for a stop to arms smuggling. It bans all unauthorized weapons between the Litani River and the Blue Line, the UN-monitored border between Israel and Lebanon.

The Israeli state has criticized the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, UNIFIL, for not stopping weapons it says are flowing to Hizbullah. The United Nations says that is the responsibility of the Lebanese authorities.

UN Security Council Resolution 1559, sponsored by the United States and France and adopted in 2004, demanded that all Lebanese militias be disarmed. Hizbullah is the only group to have kept its arms since the 1975-1990 Civil War.