Posts Tagged ‘syria’

Obama’s advisors

Friday, April 25th, 2008

Obama has had a parade of advisors depart the campaign after various gaffes. First there was economic advisor Austan Goolsbee who tried to reassure the Canadians that anti-free trade talk by Obama was just for the consumption of the bitter “rubes” of the Rust Belt. Then there was foreign policy advisor Samantha Power who thinks the Iranian nuclear program is a figment of Bush’s imagination.

The war scare that wasn’t stands as a metaphor for the incoherence of our policy toward Iran: the Bush Administration attempts to gin up international outrage by making a claim of imminent danger, only to be met with international eye rolling when the claim is disproved. Sound familiar? The speedboat episode bore an uncanny resemblance to the Administration’s allegations about the advanced state of Iran’s weapons program–allegations refuted in December by the National Intelligence Estimate.

A common theme among Obama advisors is antipathy to Israel. Joseph Cirincione is the Obama nuclear advisor. Here is Cirincione’s opinion of the Syrian nuclear site before it was proven to be a North Korea-built reactor.

This story is nonsense. The Washington Post story should have been headlined “White House Officials Try to Push North Korea-Syria Connection.” This is a political story, not a threat story. The mainstream media seems to have learned nothing from the run-up to war in Iraq. It is a sad commentary on how selective leaks from administration officials who have repeatedly misled the press are still treated as if they were absolute truth.

Of course, we now know the reactor was not “a lie.” And Cirincione is still advising Obama.

This is what passes for wisdom on the political left these days.

I am coming to the conclusion that Democrats realize Obama may be another McGovern. They are willing to lose the election since the loss can be blamed on racism, further binding blacks to the Democratic Party. The alternative, nominating Hillary, would split the party.

A loss is a tactical retreat and can be used to further demonize Republicans to the blacks who are knee-jerk Democrat voters.

“[T]he vast, vast majority of voters who would not vote for Barack Obama in November based on race are probably firmly in John McCain’s camp already,” he says.

Yup. There it is. No mention of the racists in Rev. Wright’s church.

Syria, Iran and North Korea

Thursday, April 24th, 2008

Hearings today in Congress may finally reveal what happened last summer in Syria when Israel attacked a desert site. The best summary of what happened is here but it is still mostly speculation based on reports at the time. Now we are hearing reports that video tape exists that shows North Koreans at the site. There also appears to be evidence that it was a reactor essentially identical to North Korea’s Yongbin site. The New York Times hints, inadvertently, why the secrecy may have persisted.

The timing of the administration’s decision to declassify information about the Syrian project has raised widespread suspicions, especially in the State Department, that Vice President Dick Cheney and other administration hawks were hoping that releasing the information might undermine a potential deal with North Korea that would take it off an American list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Why in the world would we take North Korea off such a list if they are providing WMD to Syria and Iran ?  Senate hearings were scheduled   for this week but the information may still be kept secret, at least as secret as anything can be kept once Senators hear of it.

I expect to hear everything soon.

Revenge for the Marines

Wednesday, February 13th, 2008

UPDATE #3 This is an interesting take on the event, as it sounds like even the Arabs are cheering the result.

UPDATE #2: I do workers compensation reviews so maybe this is in my line. It looks as though it was a “work accident” after all. He was building a car bomb to prevent the March 14 Forces from holding a rally to mark the third anniversary of the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Al-Hariri.Oh. Dangerous work, that.

UPDATE: After denying his existence for years, Hezbollah is now celebrating his death as a martyr. So much for denials.

The mastermind of much Hezbollah terrorism, including the Marine Barracks bombing in 1983 and the 1985 TWA hijacking in which Navy Diver Robert Stethem was murdered, has been blown up. The Syrians had been protecting him and the Iranians considered him a major asset. No doubt Nancy Pelosi will volunteer to give a eulogy.

Belmont Club points out that the assassination was a day before the anniversary of Syria’s assassination of Harari. Bill Roggio says the Israelis are probably responsible but I wish we were capable of neat and clean operations like this. No doubt the New York Times would blow the operation sky high, probably the day before it was scheduled like one of their reporters did a couple of years ago.

Of course, to AP, he is a “militant” , not a terrorist. Is there any enemy of the US that AP doesn’t love ? Reuters is not a US company but AP used to be.