Why are conservatives having such a hard time with the Iraq question that pretty blond Fox host skewered Jeb with? Surely it's not so hard to opine that knowing what we know now failure to plan properly for a post hostilities world will surely squander whatever good those hostilities won you - we can't know for sure whether or not the invasion made sense because the occupation was so badly mishandled by both Bush and Obama - who knows what Iraq would look like right now had those mistakes not been made.  Sure, given how it appears now that Sunni and Shia cannot rise above their hatred and distrust of each other one can make an educated guess that maybe the invasion was not the best way to go about trying to fix the problems that roil that part of the world - but that's still just a guess.

I suppose conservatives are being tripped up by, if you reason through things as above, you end up having to admit that WMDs were just a pretext for the invasion - not that Bush lied, as liberals like to go on about - pretty much everyone believed Saddam had a WMD program - but that was just a pretext for a much more grandiose [and poorly thought out] plan to significantly alter the Islamist math that brought us to those two towers turning to dust. And the fact remains: if mistakes had not been made, it might have worked - we can't know - certainly, in the direct aftermath of 9/11, it seemed to make a lot more sense than 20/20 hindsight would now suggest.

Well - with Obama's recent attack on Fox News for being apparently a polluted fount of lies because Fox does not share [bow down before] his worldview he is basically making an argument in favor of government control of the press. Wow - the guy isn't even trying to hide it anymore - he wishes he was a dictator, he longs to be one, and apparently feels nothing but contempt for those too unenlightened to understand how deserving he is of our love and servitude. Is this just the expression of an ego and arrogance spinning out of control? Or is this just a cynical politician willing to say anything no matter how false and twisted it is just so long as it pushes an agenda forward? Other than extremely dangerous and misguided I'm not exactly sure what that agenda would be, but better pray it's the latter and not the former because if this is his ego slipping the bounds of sanity then I gotta believe that wouldn't be a good thing.  

The pattern is clear - modern liberalism is increasingly hostile to democracy - liberals are all for some vague, highly idealized and ultimately unworkable notion of 'cultural diversity' but when it comes to diversity of beliefs or ideas and the debate that comes with it they have no use for that - indeed, they see such a thing as offensive and threatening [microaggression! The bad man's ideas are hurting me!].

But of course they're right regardless of how wrong they are - for an absolutist belief system, which modern liberalism is, there's nothing more dangerous than a fact or truth that does not fit the narrative so assiduously being constructed - therefore free speech and debate are things to be feared. The idealist begins with what they want to believe is true and then sets about making up the 'proofs' to demonstrate it; the empiricist starts with what is and then sets about acquiring the facts to understand and explain it.

Clearly, modern liberalism is increasingly absolutist and driven by a need to believe certain things regardless of whether or not those things are true according to some reasonable and objective norm - reasonable objectivity is of no use to the mindset and agenda of progressives - and thus their increasingly irrational and intolerant behaviour.

Look at recently unearthed letter from former EU officials urging the current EU foreign minister and Kerry to ignore the results of the election in Israel and force a resolution on Netanyahu and to hell with what the Israeli voter thinks - apparently a democracy is only a true democracy if it agrees with what liberals want to believe - otherwise, liberals reserve the right to impose their will on it - these people simply cannot abide the notion that their worldview may be wrong, misguided, ill conceived - they cannot tolerate the thought that they may be wrong about something which is why they're so quick to embrace an intolerance masquerading as enlightenment in order to get their way.

What is the problem with Jeb saying that knowing what we know now he would still have invaded Iraq? Sure, he probably didn't mean it the way he said it - but if you believe that the invasion was the right move then what he said is accurate - knowing what we know now, ie that the post invasion stabilization plan or lack thereof would be key, then Jeb is speaking truth to people who believe that the problem wasn't the invasion but rather the botched occupation. Which means Jeb is right and Christie who has jumped in to criticise him is wrong - assuming of course that Jeb meant it the way I'm suggesting - which I don't think is the case - so there ya go.

The Halperin interview of Cruz yet further evidence of how completely the liberal hive mind has been taken over by identity politics - their ideology is no longer about debating ideas [if it ever was] and indeed it's the exact opposite of that: it's about shutting down debate by shaming and demonizing those who dare hold opinions that do not fit the progressive worldview - identity politics is a perfect tool for overcoming the limits of democracy if your goal is to impose your will on people who do not agree with you. And so it makes perfect sense to people like Halperin to believe that you're not really Latino if you're against open borders, you're not really a woman if you're not pro choice, you're not really a black man if you don't blame everything bad in the world on rich white guys, you cannot even be a true young person if you have a problem with gay marriage or don't unquestioningly believe in global warming. Look at Baltimore - it's a perfect manifestation of the insane tyrannical animus of identity politics - the place is controlled by blacks and far left thinking and yet they're blaming their problems on racism. Why? Because it's a perfect way to shut down debate on what's really the problem with Baltimore - a real conversation about what's wrong with Baltimore would threaten the central tenets of the progressive worldview and we can't have that. Or look at Michelle Obama's recent speech on how hard it's been being the first black family in the White House - on the surface of it you think that's just idiotic whining - but then you realize she's setting up the narrative that will excuse her husband's failed presidency: it's all about racism - Barack tried to save the world but those evil white guys kept getting in the way.

What to say about the the cartoon Muhammed controversy? Ahhh... that it's absolutely astounding that there's even a debate about who's the bad guy here? I mean it almost seems unreal that there's a debate going on about this. Modern liberalism has completely taken leave of its senses - and where it's leading us, I dunno, but it can't be someplace good. The American left painting Geller as being the problem here and not Islamist thinking, which is essentially antithetical to the founding principles of Western civilization, amounts to the left saying to Islamists everywhere that if you think the West needs to be brought down we agree with you so have at it boys. I swear, if the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor because of an 'offensive' cartoon depiction of Hirohito modern liberalism would have met such a challenge by saying "oh, that's okay, we deserve it - if we put the cartoonist up against a wall and shoot her will you forgive us?"

Is it that liberals don't understand that implied by the idea of free speech is the potentiality to offend and therefore speech that is not allowed to offend is not actually free - or is it that the modern liberal no longer believes in free speech because it no longer serves their agenda? Since the former is a pretty easy concept to understand it must be the latter - which is why the modern progressive is truly a dangerous animal. If moderate, saner liberals do not start pushing back in a determined way against these zealots it will break the country apart because separation will be the only way for conservative states to protect themselves against the predations of a progressively addled executive. The beginning of the end will be when liberals try to truncate religious freedoms by forcing those who do not believe in gay marriage to perform gay marriages in their church - then conservative states will have to respond, probably by taking government out of the marriage business altogether - indeed, I've been arguing for awhile that the coming of gay marriage pushes the redefinition of marriage begun by the pill and women entering the workforce en masse to such a degree away from a family paradigm based on procreation that it no longer makes sense for government to involve itself in marriage - if marriage is now primarily about 'love' and not the making of babies, then what business is it to the government whom I choose to love and how I choose to express that love? 

Great little mild mannered 'rant' by Mead re media bias and the stagnant ideological bubble world the press inhabit that has disabled their critical faculties - these people have spent so long hemmed in by a leftist worldview that they are simply at this point incapable of objective reasoning - and in some cases this incapacity is deliberate as ideologues as a matter of course misreport and twist 'facts' - for ideological purists, facts are only those things that seem to fit with a 'truth' predetermined by them - anything that doesn't fit that agenda is by definition wrong and therefore not worthy of consideration and so can legitimately then be suppressed or excluded, and thus the growing intolerant homogeneity and group think that characterises much of the progressives' bubble world.

Mead still thinks there's free speech in America, it's just been rendered inept and misguided by an entrenched bias. I dunno - free speech is about disagreement and argument and debate - its very nature is adversarial and full of conflict - and therefore it cannot exist in a world where the only disagreement permitted is that between like minded people - that is a sham free speech - that is allowed speech and therefore inherently dictatorial - and therefore it's not at all surprising that American campuses and the left in general are increasingly manifesting a fondness for autocracy - in their ideologically fevered minds they are absolutely convinced that if you don't agree with them there must be something wrong with you.

I agree with Mead and have been saying such for a long time: the deleterious effects of this entrenched bias enables bad thinking which leads to bad and deeply flawed policies and strategic postures which produces bad and very dangerous outcomes - proof of this is popping up all over the place, overseas and at home. And I don't see how you fix it - liberals act as if it doesn't matter that Obama is an awful president, they act as if the bad outcomes are beside the point - they act as if the only outcome that matters is the country being pushed left. How can you fix something like that? As the saying goes, you can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into - and the progressives' mindset is not governed by reason, it's governed by a blinding ideological zeal that the media and press seem incapable of or unwilling to push back against. And thus we stumble towards the abyss.

I don't understand why people aren't pointing to the obvious here with the cops in Baltimore being charged - there was another prisoner in that van - if a 'murder' took place by means of a 'rough ride', then this other prisoner is a material witness to that 'murder' - which means that either he has denied the rough ride scenario and these charges are a grotesque miscarriage of justice and a disturbing capitulation to mob rule - or he has confirmed the rough ride scenario and the most important question now becomes is he lying to save his ass or telling the truth? Yes, the other prisoner wasn't in the van for the entire trip - but he's already said he heard Gray banging against the wall of the van, which means Gray's spine had not yet been damaged, which means if it was damaged by a rough ride the other prisoner would have been a witness to that - so it all comes down to what he has already said in statements to whomever and whether or not what he has said is true - and if it isn't true, is there any way to prove that.

The other thing to consider is: on and off the record comments by Baltimore cops suggest they feel they're being screwed over and the charges are political - and that's either an alternative narrative they're trying to establish in order to protect themselves - or it's true - and if true and statements made by that other prisoner corroborate that, then watch for those statements to be leaked.

Are we seeing the end of America? Hyperbole, sure - but look at the twin absurdities of Hillary becoming president and Baltimore and you've really got to wonder.

Hillary has one accomplishment in her life relative to putting her near the pinnacle - she married one of the slickest and craftily cunning politicians ever - that's it - if not for slick Willy Hillary's just another smart person with a law degree. She has zero accomplishments or attributes aside from her marriage and the fact she's a woman that would justify or rather simply explain why in the hell she should be considered presidential material - and when as Secretary of State she actually had a chance to accomplish something her record is full of errors and emptiness - add to that the emerging storyline that she and her husband are corrupt self serving liars using a 'charity' as a cover for enriching themselves - add to that that regardless of her penchant for lying she's actually, unlike her husband, a pretty awful politician - add it all up and how can one not shake their head in despairing disbelief that there's a very good chance she'll be president, especially since we've already had to sit through two acts of this piece of crap movie with Obama?

Then there's the insanity of Baltimore. The city and the state have been run by left wing monopolies for more than a generation now so the place is a withering indictment of 'blue model' thinking and governance - and yet the narrative being pushed is this is all about racism which is another way of saying it's all the fault of conservatism - Baltimore is a majority black city with a black mayor and a majority black city council and a majority black police force in a state that has been governed by left wing thinking for a very long time - and yet it's all the fault of those evil white conservatives.

I mean, really, how can one not shake their head in despair?

The chaos in Baltimore once again makes clear what I've said before: since the black community and white liberals seem convinced that the only problem with black America is racist cops who apparently wake up in the morning with a burning desire to kill young black males, then the obvious solution is to stop policing black neighbourhoods - problem solved. I mean, if liberals are right, pulling back these ostensibly racist cops should produce a bounteous harvest in black communities, no? Because that's what the endless grievance mongering of liberals suggests. 

What's one to make of US moving some heavy hitting naval assets to Yemen in order to interdict an Iranian arms shipment? In one sense, Obama has no choice if he wants to stop this thing from turning into an actual shooting war between the Saudis and Iran rather than just its proxies - on the other hand, you're essentially drawing a red line and we know Obama's record with red lines - if Iran seeks to push against that line, Obama might be forced to decide between backing down or sinking one of their ships and sinking any dreamed of nuke deal with it. To say the least, I do not trust Obama to make the right decision.

* and right on cue - so on cue it's both funny and disconcerting - right on cue the Obama admin sends out conflicting statements about what the mission of the added naval assets is - the Pentagon seems to think it's about stopping Iranian arms shipments to Yemen - Obama spokespeople seem to want to say it's just about keeping shipping lanes open. Does this incoherence surprise anyone? 

Why did Dempsey say what he said about Ramadi? Is it what he really thinks? Was he thinking in some limited strategic sense which caused his answer to be 'misunderstood'? Or were his thoughts merely a reflection of what the Obama administration has instructed him to say - or rather a reflection of his attempt to make sense of Obama's policy without sounding like a complete idiot? Therefore: Ramadi falling to ISIS would obviously be a bad thing so now I have to try and find some way to talk about it as if that isn't the case. I'm guessing that's it - if you have a flawed policy and Ramadi reveals that yet you have no intention of altering the policy then you really have no choice but to act as if Ramadi is not that big a deal. You see the same song and dance with Iran - they can't admit that they're wrong, they have no intention of altering policy, so they just keep changing the definition of what a successful deal will look like - we're making so many concessions that eventually Iran agreeing to limit its future nuclear arsenal to a parity with Israel's will be celebrated as an historic success. I mean shit Obama just yesterday opened the door to lifting all sanctions on the signing of a deal - exactly what Iran has been demanding since the 'framework' stipulating a gradual lifting of sanctions was released. Obama seems to be putting an absolutely ridiculous amount of faith in 'snapping' back on the sanctions if [when] Iran cheats - but the guy is such a cynical self serving schemer and serial fabulist that I wouldn't be surprised if he intends to squirm away from responsibility for this mess by blaming the failure of others to 'snap' back on those precious sanctions for things going awry - you just know this guy has his excuses already lined up. That's the way people like him are: it's always someone else's fault - has to be that way - an absolutist ideology is a house of cards: you dare not admit to even a single flaw for fear the whole illusion comes tumbling down. This is why dictatorships suppress dissent - they can't defend their policies and ideas so all that's left to them is to insist on the illusion of perfection - and if anyone challenges that perfection you put a bullet in their head. Don't doubt for a second that progressive elitists like Obama would love to wield the kind of power Stalin did - if the far left had their way people like me would be marched into re-education camps [thought prisons that increasingly America's universities resemble] - ultimately suppression of free speech and dissent are the only sure means progressives have to protect the illusion that sustains them. Media bias is nice, fine, and is certainly the enabler of a lot of idiocy from the left - but media bias isn't a guarantee and unfortunately there are still some ill mannered reporters and thinkers out there who actually value integrity and objective analysis. Nope - it's tough running a leftist state without gulags and firing squads - such limitations must bother Obama no end.

This nails the obvious about the framework to a framework to a proto-agreement to a deal non-deal re Iran's nukes - what's startling is how many simply can't bring themselves to see or acknowledge the obvious - Obama is lying, has been lying all along and even if one gives absolute benefit of the doubt to his version of what's been agreed to you still only get a best case scenario that merely delays by a decade or so Iran getting the bomb - but in reality, as Kissinger pointed out, there are so many problems with Obama's fact sheet you're not gonna get anywhere near that best case scenario even if Iran were to agree to what's stipulated in the fact sheet, something which Iran has already made clear they have no intention of doing. And yet people still treat this farce as if somehow it's legitimate. Remarkable.

Rouhani - the moderate - once again declares that no deal gets signed without the removal of all sanctions - what people are not saying about this is that Rouhani is making these declarations on state controlled media which means this is the precise message they want getting out to the Iranian people - which means how and the hell can Rouhani accept anything less - which means how and hell can these 'negotiations' end in a deal that makes any sense whatsoever?

Can the Obama administration possibly be this farcically incompetent? Or is this just the consequence of Dear Leader thinking he could sneak by an Iran policy that has always been secretly about containment and not disarmament?

As I've said before, this is the clusterfuck you get when you have a president who believes that a far left agenda is plenty worth lying for and a media that happily endorses this abuse as it genuflects before him.

What's the most dispiriting thing re the sad state of democracy made manifest by Hillary's 'van' tour to Iowa and her eating at a Chipotles? How disgustingly transparent an effort this is to make her seem like something she absolutely is not? Or the fact that the average voter is so stupid that it might work?

Obama is getting upset with people who disagree with him re Iran exhibiting the insufferable impudence of actually thinking they have a right to express this disagreement - don't know if this contempt also extends to left leaning or 'independent' pundits, some whom have even served in his administration, who share in the deep scepticism being directed at the non-agreement agreement to a framework of a framework - but right now the peevishness seems targeted mainly at conservatives. It's tempting to see this peevishness as just another manifestation of arrogance from Dear Leader, but rather I think it's probably yet one more in an endless line of political ploys - ie the Republican response is so unhinged and over the top and unprecedented that it must be... and then let people fill in the blanks with 'they're racists'. Obama wants to shame Democrats in the senate who might be thinking of joining the ranks of those racists by signing onto the sanctions bill so that he can drag this thing out to June where it seems he must still think he can get a deal that he can at least sell as legitimate regardless of whether or not it actually is - or in June we'll get an announcement of more talks and another deadline months down the road - or Iran will walk away having gotten essentially what they want and knowing that eventually Obama will beg them to come back by offering still more concessions - what we definitely will not have come the end of June is a viable deal that stops Iran from becoming a nuclear power. As Kissinger expertly pointed in his WSJ article even if all the steps in the 'fact sheet' on the non-agreement agreement come true - something which is impossible for a variety of reasons, many of which Kissinger lays bare - but even if an absolute best case scenario plays out you're still left with Iran becoming a nuclear power approximately 12 years down the road - and since that will also be the opinion of the Saudis Obama will essentially have set in motion a nuclear arms race in the most dangerous and unstable neighborhood in the world.

Again, there's only two ways to stop Iran from nuking up - through crippling sanctions you force them to dismantle their militarized nuclear infrastructure - or we do it for them. That's it. Any deal that doesn't explicitly spell that reality out will be a sham. Since Obama is pursuing a deal that very clearly does not acknowledge that reality, what that tells the Iranians is that force is not on the table, walking away from the table is not on the table, and therefore 'negotiations' for them merely become about: one, a means to undermine the sanctions regime; two, a way to undermine American strategic interests because the talks are not linked to Iran's behavior in the region - Iran is using the the talks to strategically tie one hand behind Uncles Sam's back; and three, as a means to keep Israel on the sidelines since if Israel is indeed serious about a unilateral military option the assumption is they would never do so while negotiations are ongoing - although I think that's a flawed assumption since if Israel is serious about a unilateral strike against Iran that would mean that they judge a nuked up Iran as such a primary existential threat that the imperative of stopping such a thing would trump all other considerations - ie Obama's negotiations might delay but not stop them making a move, if they are indeed serious about a unilateral strike. 

Can I say that there is possibly nothing that annoys me more than the referencing of public opinion polls when it comes to foreign policy? I don't give a god damn shit what the average person thinks when it comes to foreign policy - that's like asking what the average person thinks when it comes to running a fortune 500 business - or hell any business - the average citizen is a fucking moron when it comes to complex esoteric problems like those that vex foreign policy. One can legitimately argue about what that means when it comes to the efficacy of democracy etc etc - but the fact remains that the average citizen does not have a clue what the hell they're talking about when it comes to foreign policy and therefore polls are meaningless when it comes to making decisions - which is exactly why Obama and his minions often reference public opinion when trying to defend their god awful foreign policy - if you're wrong best to ask for blessings from those too stupid to realise just how wrong you are. 

And now Rouhani, who the leftist American media still think is some kind of moderate - just because he's more 'moderate' than the commander of the IRGC doesn't mean he's moderate in any meaningful way re Western democratic norms - whatever, now Rouhani comes out and says all the sanctions come down before Iran signs anything. I mean, this is farcical. Ask yourself, why would Iran, virtually from the moment the non-agreement was agreed upon, be acting as if it relishes the idea of making Obama look like an absolute chump? Because he is? Because they don't fear him at all? Because they know his true goal all along has been the fantasy of containment and rapprochement? Because as a true left wing ideologue they know Obama is utterly loathe to being forced into actions that legitimate the idea and need of overwhelming American power and therefore will agree to just about anything in an attempt to avoid such a scenario? Because they've taken the measure of the man and know that as a member in good standing of the arrogant progressive elite Obama is incapable of admitting to or even just imagining the notion that he's not nearly as clever as he thinks he is?

I get it - when the liberal elite has been telling you for years that you could be the greatest human being ever born with the possible exception of Christ, I get that that sycophantic idolatry can spoil ya a wee bit - but let's face it, it's not just Obama, the entire progressive elite exhibit this same absolutist arrogance of they're of course right, anyone who doesn't agree with them is of course wrong, and therefore little things like debate, argument, tolerance of others' ideas, culpability are really none of their concern.

And he does it again - he's telling so many lies they're starting to spin back on him - in interview with NPR Obama admits that his 'deal' in a best case scenario only delays Iran's ability to nuke up - and then tries to make the argument that that's the reason why this deal is so necessary - I mean, c'mon - if we cannot trust Iran to change its ways [which obviously we can't] then it follows that if you want to truly prevent Iran from getting the bomb the only way is by destroying or forcing Iran to dismantle elements of its nuclear infrastructure that in any way point to a military application - which means Obama's deal is not self evidently good, it's rather self evidently bad. This administration is nothing more than absurd political spin at this point - and it's frightening how many are willing to buy into it.

[actually, what may be more frightening is that this isn't spin - what if Obama really thinks he's doing something good? After all, liberals do have a messianic tendency to think they are by nature right and everyone who doesn't agree with them inherently wrong. Look at his defense of bypassing congress with executive action on the Iran deal - he says it will only be a temporary thing if the next president is so foolish as to not agree with what he has done - in other words, if the next president is really smart like Obama they'll keep the deal, if not he can't be held responsible for that. I mean, the man is absolutely shameless - and again, the scary part is this may not be spin - he may actually believe in what he's saying - anyone who disagrees with him is by definition an idiot. Amazing]  

And yet more proof - Obama declares Netanyahu's idea that Iran acknowledge Israel's right to exist before any agreement move forward a no go because it would imply Iran change its nature which is too steep a hill to climb - this argument only makes sense if the 'deal' you're signing with Iran is ironclad - if the deal isn't a sure thing then this argument makes no sense whatsoever - in other words, it's a lie, disingenuous obfuscation - like I said, Obama's gonna spend the next year and a half doing nothing but lying in service of his agenda - and he's doing this because he believes media bias will allow him to do it.  

This post by Theissen expertly but simply makes clear the central problem with Obama's framework to a framework to a proto deal to a nuke deal with Iran - it's all based on assumptions which will never come true. Which points to another huge problem - even if every assumption by Obama came true you've still got an intact nuclear tech infrastructure left behind - the only deal that makes sense is one that demands Iran destroy that infrastructure because that's the only way to protect yourself against Iran's inevitable subterfuge - nothing in Obama's proto deal does that. It's a flat out farce - or, more accurately, a lie. Obama makes clear this lie in his interview with the NY Times where he says 'Iran will never become a nuclear power during his presidency' - this is deliberately misleading language which tells us Obama fully expects Iran to become a nuclear power just not during his presidency - like I said, the man is going to spend the rest of his term abjectly lying for the purposes of pushing the country as far left as he possibly can.

Proof of what I'm saying - Obama tells NY Times he'd view a weakened Israel as a result of his actions as a failing, a moral flaw - either the man is delusional or this is proof of what I'm saying: unmitigated lies will be at the foundation of Obama's remaining time as president. The man overtly tried to topple Netanyahu in recent elections and yet Bibi flourished - why? Because Israelis view America under Obama as more enemy than friend and are right for doing so. The man is either delusional or an abject liar - I'm not sure which would be worse - although, it's true, socialists who resort to lying to defend their misbegotten ideas do do so out of a delusional fixation on how brilliant they consider themselves to be - so could be both.     

Obama's Iran no deal nuke deal, the framework to a framework of a possible consensus towards a deal of sorts, maybe - it's something, that we can say for sure - although it's clear the Iranians think it's a very different something than we seem to think it is - but I guess like a cloud of smoke you can shape it however the hell you want to shape it just so long as in the end you don't start thinking it's anything other than a cloud of smoke - but that being said, what this mess makes clear is how dangerous a thing media bias is - Obama is now governing as if it simply doesn't matter how grotesquely estranged from truth and reality his words and actions are because he clearly believes the media will protect him - the Washington Post, as stalwart of an Obama apologist as there has been, has called the 'deal' an obvious capitulation - but it's too late, they and all the other biased 'news' sources out there helped make this monster and now belatedly stepping up and taking a stab at truth is not going to be enough to unmake him - unconstrained by the need to win another election Obama is clearly going to spend the next two years pushing the country as far left as he possibly can behind a phalanx of unmitigated lies - he doesn't care about the constitution, he doesn't care about congress, he doesn't care about public opinion or the will of the people - and that's because he believes and probably rightly so it seems that no matter what come the end of the day the media and the 47% who are ready and willing to believe whatever lie you wanna feed to them will be there to protect him and preserve the illusion of the progressive wonderland.

We're now into the 'break a few eggs to make an omelette' phase of uber liberal madness - doesn't matter how the country is pushed left - the lies and missteps and gross incompetence and corruption and if the left could get control of the military the sure as shit to follow gulags and firing squads, all that doesn't matter - just so long as the country is pushed left - because even if you don't get that omelette, absent an Orwell willing to break ranks and ask why not,  you can always lie about it. And that is exactly how Obama is governing.

People like me have been saying for a couple of years that the Iran nonsense was going to play out exactly how it has played since Iran knew Obama needed a deal more than they needed a deal because he was not being sincere when he said force was an option - they knew that Obama's aversion to American power left him with little leverage if the sanctions were not enough to force concessions from Iran - but when Obama offered to ease sanctions long before there was any need to do that, Iran knew they had him - it was a clear admission that force was never an option, just like walking away from the table was never an option. This has been clear to anyone willing to look for a very long time - and the liberal media refused to look. That they're sort of doing so now is too late. All Obama wants now is a 'deal' that he can 'portray' as legitimate - it doesn't matter one little bit to him if it actually is since his policy objective all along as been the fantasy of containment and rapprochement with Iran and a foreign policy that was as far removed from Bush's as he could possibly get. Didn't matter if in objective terms it made sense or not - objectivity is for losers. Revolutionaries can't be wasting their time worrying about 'objective truths'. What kind of egg breakers would Stalin and Mao et al have been if they'd tolerated impertinent questions about truth and common sense. Jezz. Obama has broken one hell of a lot of eggs in search of his omelette - and he's perfectly happy lying about whether he's managed to make one or not. The best egg breakers are also always the best liars.

Please please - of course the supposed putative ostensible nuke deal with Iran is a bunch of bullshit - only a fool would have expected anything else from this most atrocious of leaders Obama - but this is not something we really need to discuss - just watch what Saudi Arabia does - if this "deal" with Iran is as bad as it certainly seems to be the Saudis will be moving towards acquiring a nuclear capability of their own and that will tell you all you need to know. 

The almost unbelievably absurd outrage from the left over Indiana's religious freedom bill lends credence to my contention that the only way to protect free speech from the utterly illiberal insanity of modern liberalism, which gay marriage is nothing but a front for, is to get the gov't out of the marriage business - marriage should be nothing more than a private agreement two people acknowledge in whatever way they choose - once gov't is out of the marriage business a Catholic priest will have the right to refuse to marry two lesbians just as he has the right to refuse to preach Islam from his pulpit - and what's more, once the gov't is out of the marriage business the political value or utility of gay marriage, which is the very reason it is such a cherished 'cause' for the left, will vanish, and that will be a good thing for free speech.

Finally somebody states the obvious - and in the Washington Post no less, which shocks the hell out of me - of course force is not only a credible option when it comes to Iran, it may in fact be the only option. If you do not recognize this then you are not thinking clearly about the problem - if one can legitimately imagine a scenario should Iran become a nuclear power that is much worse than what might happen if force is used to stop such a thing then force is quite obviously a credible option - what's more, if one believes that dangerous countries that seek the bomb covet that thing so dearly that no reasonable argument or action short of violence can dissuade them, then force indeed becomes your only option if you sincerely wish to stop an escalation of 'bad things' that could get truly frightening.

This has been obvious to me for awhile - people who deny the logic of it are delusional. Obama and his team of like minded sycophants are delusional - what has also been obvious to me for quite awhile is that Obama never had any intention whatsoever of using force to stop Iran which is why, one, Obama has convinced himself of a 'truth' that serves no other purpose than to protect the things progressives want to believe from a reality that insists otherwise - and two, it is why Iran has had the upper hand in these 'negotiations' all along and has probably felt confident throughout that in the end they will get exactly what they want.

Needless to say, if the unfortunate victims of the Chapel Hill atheist nutbar had been Hasidic Jews or Mormons or born again Christians or turbaned Sikhs there'd be no outcry about how intolerant and racist etc etc America is - but because the victims were Muslims the Islamic world goes nuts and the progressives start blaming it all on Fox News even though there's zero proof they were targeted specifically for being Muslim and the perpetrator expressed political views that are decidedly left wing in their nature, not right wing. Wow. You really just wanna pull a Thoreau, no? Build your little cabin in the woods a leave this nonsensical idiocy behind.

So let me get this straight - millions of Muslims can engage in, endorse, support, subscribe to in the name of fealty to their creed behavior that is very much antagonistic even hateful towards Western values and in the case of extremists like ISIS and AQ etc etc engage in behavior that would very much like to topple and burn the modern world for the greater glory of Allah, and you dare draw conclusions about such a thing that calls into question the kind of culture engendered within Muslim polities - that amounts to a completely unacceptable attack on all Muslims by evil white Islamaphobic racists as if simply asking questions is an utterly intolerable offense - so, someone like Erdogan can insanely float antisemitic conspiracy theories about how Israel was behind the riots in Turkey or blame the rise of ISIS on Western hatred of Muslims or Iran can threaten to nuke Israel into oblivion or Hamas can hold as a central principle the desire to drive every Jew into the sea or the Saudis can flog someone for writing a blog or throw a woman in jail for driving a car or stone her to death for adultery or how it's the 21st century and blasphemy is still through much of the Muslim world considered a crime etc etc etc and if I dare suggest that this behavior and much more, ya know, kinda begs the asking of certain critical questions regarding Muslim culture, well, that makes me an Islamaphobic racist whose right to free speech needs immediately to be shut down because the drawing of empirically logical conclusions amounts to an insult of all Muslims - but one atheist wacko kills three Muslims for reasons that are not at all clear and the Islamic world feels it's completely legitimate to indict all Americans [but really just the right leaning white ones] as intolerant, Islamaphobic racists - the Muslim world is literally collapsing into violent, dysfunctional chaos for reasons which clearly have something to do with Islamism because 'trouble' is a cultural manifestation and in closed theocratic societies religion drives culture - but you dare try and draw general conclusions from that reality concerning the nature of Muslim polities and that makes you an Islam hating racist.  Case closed. Now shut up.

Wow. I really need to get my Thoreau on. Gonna build me a cabin...

This speech by Rubio is fascinating - I've talked about him before as someone to watch, not simply because he's young and a Latino with a great backstory, but because he's one of the best if not indeed the best contender out there when it comes to public speaking - especially when it comes to foreign policy. Now, foreign policy usually doesn't play a big role in elections, namely because the average voter spends little time thinking about it since it's a complex subject difficult to understand - but way things are going, could be a big if not huge factor in 2016, and that favors Rubio - and if speeches like this succeed in shaming enough Democrats into not boycotting Netanyahu if he does indeed go through with an address to Congress, then Rubio's stock rises sharply [although I still think he's running for the VP slot]. I gotta believe this speech is playing extremely well in Israel.

But what about Ukraine? Perfect example of what strategic incompetence gets ya - Europe pushed east without ever it seems stopping to consider what they were gonna do if Russia pushed back - the epitome of strategic myopia revealed by fact that every Western leader was shocked when Putin went into Crimea, shocked when Putin then stoked upheaval in eastern Ukraine - that they we're shocked by these developments screams strategic incompetence [an idiot like me predicted both of those things] and now there are few good options if any. With the recent signing of the ceasefire looks like Putin gets what he wanted all along: Crimea, autonomy in eastern Ukraine that he can continue to exploit and a show of power that exposed how weak, feckless and irresolute Western leadership is at the moment.

Those arguing to arm Ukraine, that seems like a mistake to me - that would not undo the original mistakes, just compound them - Putin has too much to lose here, he'll call your bluff, and if you're not willing to acknowledge the consequences of that reality, you'll get beat. I don't think it was ever Putin's goal to actually invade Ukraine because the sanctions that would follow such a move would truly devastate Russia's economy - but it was his goal certainly to stoke upheaval and convince the West that they should indeed fear such a thing. He wins. All you can do now is accept that you fucked up, learn your lessons and compensate before Putin acts again. Will they? Not with Obama in the White House - and all the bad players out there know it, which is why the next two years could get pretty god damn messy.

Doesn't Obama sending ISIS related AUMF to Congress contradict all those bad things people like me have been saying about his practice of foreign policy? We'll see how it plays out, but I'd say no - so far to me looks like yet another political ploy on his part - he's trying to get Republicans to sign off on his limited approach, thinking that will shut them up - if they don't sign off on it, then he gets to blame them for whatever failures that follow - it's a political ploy, far as I can tell - not dissimilar from his Afghan surge, which had much more to do with politics than it had to do with winning the war. The AUMF has a time limit and stipulates no offensive ground forces aside from special ops - that essentially amounts to the status quo and won't get the job done without the deployment of a rather large and mobile Arab/Turkish/Kurdish army under American command - don't see that happening, but even if it does it raises more questions than it answers - how competent and committed would this army be? Would it really be up to the task of urban warfare? Are they really gonna send troops into Syria, and if they do, would it be to topple or prop up Assad? Can't see a Sunni army looking to prop up Assad, so... what then? Will the al-Nursa Front also be on the target list? What about Iran? They may want to get rid of ISIS too but at the expense of the Saudis becoming a regional power in Syria and Sunni Iraq? That's a big no. But let's allow for possibility this works and you 'win' the war - without American troops how do you stabilize what you've won? If Mosul turns into another Fallujah, not only do I not believe this putative Arab army would be up to fighting such a war - but even if they pull it off who occupies the city and surrounding territory afterwards in order to secure the victory?

Nope, this has political ploy written all over it - especially since we've seen this kind of cynical politicking from Obama before - he's free to prove me wrong, but my guess is once the dust settles it will look like another reiteration of leading from behind and nothing much changes - except that Obama will now have two more things he can blame stuff on - the GOP if they don't sign off on the AUMF - and the Sunni Arab states if they refuse to send troops in or if they do and perform horribly.

[John Yoo in a nice article points to another aspect of the AUMF that seems to confirm that it's all about cynical political ploys - if Republicans agree to the 'sunset clause' of a three year deadline on the authorization they'll basically be setting a precedent that undermines the war making powers of the executive branch, something the Democrats will surely throw in their face next time a Republican president goes to war. The AUMF is nothing  more than a devious bit of politicking and I agree with Yoo, the Congress should just ignore it - if Obama truly wants to take the fight to ISIS he already has all the power he needs to do that - but of course any objective observer realizes Obama has no serious intent when it comes to ISIS, so no point allowing yourself to become the object of yet another partisan political stunt by Obama - of course Obama will then blame Republicans for the failures to come, at which point you just have to forcefully reiterate that if he's serious about about confronting the threat he should send Congress an AUMF that reflects that seriousness]

Exactly - as said before, either Obama and his team of sycophants are hardcore ideologues drowning in the delusions of their beliefs and thus incapable of seeing the folly of their ways or of even simply acknowledge the possibility of such - or, so dependent throughout his political rise on an acquiescent media which allowed him to spout bullshit and outright lies non-stop because they treated his nonsense as gospel, Obama simply doesn't know how else to behave - to him, false narratives spun by an adoring media is how you lead, is how you govern - and apparently he's just gonna try and lie and bullshit his way right to the end of his term.

Or both are true. Either way, the pathology of the man's governing style, ethos is you will, is on clear display when it comes to Iran - he's been lying all along either because he embraced the idea of deterrence and the fastasy of detente with the theocracy a long time ago and refuses to doubt for a second that he, the smartest president ever, could possibly be wrong about something - or because plan B, a military strike on Iran, was anathema to an enlightened soul like him and therefore the thinking was or has been for awhile 'we'll try for a deal that kinda looks viable regardless of whether or not it actually is - but if that doesn't work at least endless negotiations can allow us to run out the clock on this thing and keep Bibi that war mongering prick in check'.  And so you lie - and of course the 'deal' keeps getting watered down and watered down because Iran knows they have Obama over a barrel.

I mean, look at the dust up over Netanyahu's speech to congress - a perfect sampling of Obama's mode of governing - you lie, you get the New York Times to dutifully parrot that lie and flesh out the narrative, and then for good measure you play the race card and with that the story magically morphs into how the GOP and Netanyahu are racists playing politics with our national security - the man and the catamites who serve him are absolutely shameless - and you'd have to be, because their whole theory of governing is shamefully in keeping with the 'gotta break a few eggs to get an omelette' thinking that the leftists trying to defend Stalinism used to spout - lie, count on the media to enable the lie, then with that foothold and blinded by ideological certainty enact policies that push the country irretrievably to the left - if a few eggs get broken, well, don't sweat it because it'll all be worth it. And how do they know this? Because they're brilliant progressives - and how can a brilliant progressive possibly be wrong? Even facts, even reality give ground before such brilliance.

If Iran tests a nuke tomorrow, not only will Obama and his spokespersons say that has nothing to do with mistakes made by the administration - I think there's a good chance they'll actually believe it has nothing to do with something they got wrong - and they'll believe this because for them what really matters is redrawing the contours of American power to bring it in line with the progressives' worldview - that's the omelette - or the figment of one, rather.

[I should add, I get obviously that politicians lie, it's one of their chief attributes, and so Obama should not necessarily be condemned for excelling at it - the problems are, one, the media endorsing the lies, which can be nothing but bad for your democracy - and two,  the lies being divorced from any reasonable, reality based 'good' - the deceptions are all about ideological dogmatism that acts as if specific outcomes don't matter just so long as the general goal of pushing the country leftward is served - so with something like Obamacare it doesn't matter if healthcare has not been made better and less expensive as was claimed would be the case - all that matters is that the media enabled lie pushed the country leftward - and it's one thing to have this pathology infect your domestic policy - that harm can possibly be undone or corrected - when it comes to foreign policy, though, the monsters you create with your fantasies do not disappear because someone finally had the good sense to turn on a light]  

Great analysis by Mead of problems with Obama's Iran policy, criticisms and concerns that resonate when considering his entire approach to foreign policy and the seemingly grossly misguided worldview embraced by he and his inner circle. And Mead is right - the Obama administration's refusal to address in any realistic or coherent way the concerns, now increasingly also coming from the left, just stokes worries about what the hell Obama thinks he's doing.

So one can say this mess is a reflection of one of three things way I see it: Obama and his maenads are convinced they and their worldview are in the right and arrogance has cemented that belief in place and firmly locked the door of the echo chamber; or, admitting to flaws in their thinking or simply just acknowledging doubts would also amount to admitting to reality that American power and leadership are indeed essential things of vital importance to Western interests and that is something uber liberals of Obama's ilk are absolutely loathe to do - so they just blindly push on; or, terrified or disgusted by the the thought of a military confrontation Obama is simply trying to either run out the clock and pass the mess on to the next administration or looking to sign any deal bypassing Congress's concerns or input or approval and then when that deal inevitably falls apart blame that outcome on nefarious forces - Israel, neocons, American hegemony, Bush - whatever.

Gotta be one of those three - and none of the options leave one feeling very comfortable about how this will all play out.

In what may be the most odious equivocation ever, Obama attempts to explain away Islamic extremism by throwing out the tautology that, hey, Christian states did bad things too - is the man an idiot? Does he think we're all idiots? Does he actually believe the nonsense he spouts? No reasonable and reasonably educated person denies the point Dear Leader is making - but once you've admitted that, absent countervailing forces, absolutist belief systems [which all religions are] tend towards bad behavior especially when tied to political ends, the next question to ask is, and it's the only question that matters in this context: why did the Christian West evolve out of this behavior while the Muslim world has not? As said before, the answer as far as I'm concerned is that Islam is an inherently political religion while Christianity, although often used for political purposes in the past, is not - there's a strong motivation in Islam to keep the system closed - to achieve that end requires a robust and repressive political/social component which by it's very nature will be extremist. Of course all religions share more or less in this motivation to 'purity' and dogma - problems arise when this motivation is necessarily tied to a political component, which is the case with Islam but was not with Christianity.

But of course Obama does not follow the logical consequences of his statement - he just throws out the absurd equivocation and moves on as if all problems have been quelled. Has a great nation ever been led by a more pathetic leader than this guy? I'm sure some Roman emperors fit the bill - but my god, this is just getting sad to watch. Think about it, if you're not willing to pursue the logical consequences of making such a statement [which should be the sole reason for making such a statement] then why make the statement? What on earth does he think he's accomplishing with it? The frightening thought is that it isn't just him spouting more empty rhetoric but rather that he does think it accomplishes something - as if he thinks there's no problem in the world that can't be solved by the first black/sort of black president apologizing for all the horrible things those evil white capitalists have done. I dunno - can he really be such a deluded left wing ideologue that he actually believes that statement in and of itself expresses some profound truth?

[of course having said all that it is legitimate to ask if there is a point to being honest about why the Muslim world is the way it is - reform is needed but we can't force it upon them - indeed, even if reform comes it will no doubt be accompanied by much upheaval - that may be what we're seeing with ISIS - still, I don't see how in any sound way you can strategically position yourself against a threat if you can't be honest regarding the true roots of the threat - the almost universal failure of Western leaders to understand the Arab Spring and foresee how it would play out is clear example of this - Obama's embrace of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt another - Europe's indulging of Islamist thinking and the problems that has given rise to another  - the myopic antipathy directed at Israel by both Europe and Obama another - Iran - one could go on. Even if one believes that the invasion of Iraq was the worst foreign policy decision ever - which the liberal elite en masse do believe - if you're being intellectually honest - which the liberal elite en masse seems incapable of doing - you still have to admit that it revealed something very important: our understanding of the Muslim world, on both the left and the right - but especially the left - falls far short of the clear thinking required to form a workable strategy against the threats rising out of it - and there may be no better manifestation of this failing than the singularly abysmal practice of foreign policy under Obama]

[as for me saying an inability to with honest objectivity analyze the threats against us will leave us incapable of forming a coherent strategic posture against those threats, this at Commentary fills the idea out with some nice sarcasm - and it's true, anyone surprised by how awful a president Obama is has not spent much time listening to the liberal academy arrogantly expound with utter delusion on foreign policy - I like how Mendel snarks that given his intellectual pedigree it's a wonder, bad as he is,  that Obama isn't actually worse - I don't know if you could get worse - again, understanding the intellectual milieu Obama crawled out of none of this is surprising - these people live in a world of vainglorious concepts utterly detached from reality and held unsteadily aloft by one single conviction: a disgust for American power and the ignorant instruments - capitalism and the military - that deliver it - everything they do, think and say is twisted through that prism]

Why are people taking Jordan's vow to 'destroy' ISIS seriously? Sure they can sort of go to war against them by stepping up sorties etc etc - but they're not sending troops into Iraq or Syria and therefore they're not gonna 'destroy' anything - the only way you get remotely close to a serious attack on ISIS is if you see a broad Sunni coalition ready to make actual war and not just spew angry rhetoric and even with that you'd still need to have Turkey at the head of such a thing since only they have the military assets required - and none of that is going to happen for a variety of reasons chief of which is this fantasy coalition goes nowhere without a strong American commitment backing up this would be 'war' and who believes for a second Obama would sign off on something like that? Such a commitment would mean American troops on the ground - it would mean making a decision on what to do about Assad - it would mean American troops taking the lead if [when] this Arab/Turkish amalgam falls apart - and it would mean a reoccupation of Sunni Iraq bringing you into direct conflict with Iran, which increasingly holds sway over Shia Iraq. Oh, and it would probably mean if you decide to dethrone Assad Hezbollah coming to his aid by launching an offensive on Israel which would to say the least stir the pot in ways that a reluctant warrior like Obama would have no ability or desire to deal with.

So what dream world are people living in that they take Jordan's rhetoric seriously? Hell, you could argue that ISIS committed the act of brutality for this precise reason - to lay bare divisions and make clear that there is no authority or power in the region willing or able to take them on. Jordan in a sense has thrown down a gauntlet that I doubt in the extreme can or will be backed up by significant action - which may have been exactly what ISIS was looking for. People are looking at the execution of the pilot as it were an act of senseless brutality - but much more likely is that there was a point to it - military history is full of such behavior and thinking - Genghis Khan committed atrocities with what seemed like a near reckless abandon, but in reality there was a purpose to it. Caesar as well amongst the Gauls. Napoleon in Russia - although that backfired - but one gets the point.

[Krauthammer makes my point but of course with a concise expertise that is beyond my humble efforts - but the crux of his point and mine is that those who look at ISIS and see nothing but a 'death cult' are making a big mistake - these guys may engage in barbaric acts, but they're strategic thinkers - and sad, hell pathetic as it is to acknowledge, their strategic thinking is much more coherent and reality based than Obama's - although as I've said before Obama indeed has a strategy, it's just not even remotely in touch with reality or coherence - it's the kind of 'strategic' thinking you'd hear tossed around the faculty lounge of an Ivy League school - sounds nifty, but then you leave the room and the harsh lights of the world turn it to dust]

It's simple - if your starting premise is that American power is bad then everything you do is an attempt to conceptually fill in the void left by its absence - concepts - that's how Obama and his little team of catamites govern - they've conceptualized what the world should look like and how it should behave absent American power and its cognate 'white privilege' but those are only ideas supported by little or no empirical evidence and these people aren't empiricists, they're idealists, and idealists are not good when it comes to questioning the validity of their starting premises - which is why when the facts don't say what they want them to say idealists simply ignore the facts or through equivocation, rationalization, twisted logic or just flat out lying attempt to subvert them. That in a nutshell is the Obama presidency, especially when you're talking about foreign policy.  

Since the election loss a few months ago Obama has been acting in a detached from the realities of governing way that had always obviously been an integral part of his ideological makeup but which has now stepped forward in such a pronounced form that even left wing partisan stalwarts are having trouble ignoring it - he talks as if something is necessarily true if said by him regardless of whether or not it actually is true - that's pretty much the way he's governed since taking office but the fact that he doesn't have to bother with winning another election has unleashed the full monty of prevarication and misdirection and obfuscation.

Now, I'm not suggesting he actually believes he's a master of some god-like infalability - although, who knows, maybe he is nuts - no, these are the actions of a zealot, a person who is utterly convinced that left wing thinking is inherently good and right wing thinking is inherently bad and therefore even if a progressive says something wrong or misguided or ill-founded or outright false it doesn't matter since if they're motivated by 'the forces of good' they cannot possibly be wrong when measured against the evils of conservatism. That's how zealots behave - that's why he so cavalierly ignores the election results - for zealots, elections are only legitimate if they endorse what the zealots believe to be right since anything that falls outside the sanctity of those convictions must by its very nature be wrong - and this is why he can so cavalierly ignore objective standards of truth as if they don't matter and consistently talks as if he's the only reasonable person in the room - zealots, no matter how outlandish or extreme their actions, always think they're the most reasonable person in the room because as far they're concerned you either agree with them or by not agreeing with them become necessarily mistaken. Hell, I'm sure Mao, as he was condemning millions of his own people to death, was utterly convinced of the reasonableness of his actions.

It's quite disturbing seeing the supposed greatest democracy on earth being led by such a man. But this is the way he's governed since day one, as if bullshit isn't bullshit if it's liberal bullshit - and he's gotten away with it because when you combine the cluelessness of the average voter with a media bias that protects and encourages such behavior, you've got yourself a problem.

[Seth Mendel at Commentary makes much the same point but uses apt image of 'Potemkin politics' - which fits my point nicely - for communist zealots lying was perfectly acceptable because objective notions of 'truth' did not matter - all that matters to a zealot is what they want to believe is true - this is how Obama has governed and is increasingly unguarded about it because he no longer has to fool the soft middle of the electorate into voting for him - in fact you'd almost think that he's being so brazen about this because he's trying to start a left wing rumble that opens the door for Liz Warren, a zealot just as committed to the cause as him - instinctively you'd think such ideological dogmatism would be a bad thing for whoever the Democratic nominee is - but look at Obama's approval rating still hovering around 50% which is just absurd and think about how that possibly could be - whether it's Warren or Clinton in 2016 they're gonna have the same built in advantage to exploit as Obama: the media does not treat bullshit like bullshit if it's liberal bullshit - and that is especially true if the bullshit is coming from someone whose is not a white, english speaking male]

[and Hanson over at NRO using Obama's foreign policy as example makes same point but much more effectively than a plodder like me - those who look at Obama's  practice of foreign policy and see bumbling incompetence lacking a strategy are missing the point and are allowing themselves to be fooled into thinking Obama really is a reasonably hesitant pragmatist and not a dogmatic left wing ideologue doing exactly what he intends - the man absolutely does have a strategy, he's just not being honest about it, and that's because it revolves around one simple uber liberal conceit - less American power is a good thing - that is his strategy and all gestures and policies that fill the void left behind become rationalizations meant to prop up the presumed rightness of that thinking because for a zealot like Obama that thinking cannot possibly be wrong even if facts on the ground say otherwise - and so of course you lie, you misdirect, you obfuscate, you throw up rhetorical smoke screens and you push on - for Obama his actions in Iraq will never be the cause of bad outcomes because the only truly wrong thing there was the use of American power in the first place - in his mind even if he's wrong he can't possibly wrong since his motivations are guided by a purer light - ask him, putting Bush's mismanagement of the war aside, how exactly the Mideast would be a better place with Saddam still in power and what that might say about the dysfunction endemic to Muslim polities and he'll brush the question aside as being beside the point - which is why counter narrative outcomes don't matter to idealists like him - facts are ephemera that get in the way - Obama's whole approach to Iran is predicated on the abstract conceit that American power is bad and therefore if the negotiations end with the 'negative outcomes' I fully expect to see Obama and his ilk will never acknowledge that they were wrong since they can never admit that their guiding principle was wrong i.e. that American power is bad - if manipulation of Obama through these negotiations results in Iran becoming a threshold nuclear power or an actual nuclear power this outcome will simply be rationalized away by being blamed on American hegemony or some other nefarious evil influence or propped up as a 'good' thing when compared to all the other options since all the other options would have involved in one way or another the clear expression of American power, which is the original sin from which all others flow] 

People supportive of or incensed by Netanyahu stepping past the White House to accept an invitation to speak to congress are missing the very simple either/or point of it - if you believe Obama is serious about stopping Iran then, sure, you may have a point in being upset about it being unhelpful and also maybe even have a point in seeing in the action nothing but contempt for Obama on the part of Republicans and the Israeli right - on the other hand if like me you think Obama is lying about stopping Iran and long ago either 'secretly' embraced a policy of containment and a jejune fantasy of detente with the theocracy or is just simply trying to run out the clock so he can hand the problem off to someone else, then the actions by Boehner and Bibi make perfect sense - you can't simply just come out and call Obama a liar, but you can act as if that's what you believe - and that's what this is. What Congress and the Israeli right are saying to Obama and the American and Israeli people is: we no longer are going to enable this charade by pretending the President has credibility on this issue.

What's involved is just too important, the threat too grave, especially for Israel - if you think Obama is lying about what his true intentions are when it comes to Iran, and if you think those true intentions are perilously misguided and naive, then you have no choice but to act out. This isn't like Obama lying about his healthcare law, which he clearly did - the GOP can repeal that if they can ever manage to figure out a way to win back the White House - but once Iran has the bomb you can't repeal that and all the bad that flows from it cannot be stopped. As Vic Hanson says about what's implied by Obama's seemingly anti-American approach to the practice of foreign policy - Après moi, le déluge:

Obama is abetting five new empires that believe their reactionary autocracy, anti-Americanism, and growing military power should earn them greater material rewards and global influence. To paraphrase the Roman historian Tacitus, where Obama has helped to create chaos, he calls it peace.

We are witnessing empire-building unlike anything seen since the 1930s and early 1940s. What is different this time around is not just the older themes of American isolationism, indifference, and appeasement, but also a new, bizarre twist. The Obama administration feels almost as if these rising suzerainties have a more legitimate right to carve out regional empires than the United States has to stop them.

So, wait a second, Kerry is saying that a putatively false linking of Islam to the violence done in its name might offend the Islamist sensibilities of Muslims and therefore hinder our ability to combat a 'violent extremism' engendered amongst Muslims that apparently noted theologian Kerry claims has nothing at all to do with Islam? I see. Clear as mud.

Progressives are people who will without blinking an eye lampoon fundamentalist Christians or ridicule the Pope's stance on birth control etc etc and not for a second think that they're insulting or besmirching all Christians or all Catholics - but suddenly when it comes to Islam no negative opinions can be countenanced because that would be an offense to all Muslims. The very fact that you have to contort yourself into such illogical word games and manufacture some special safe zone unpolluted by free speech in order to ostensibly 'protect' Muslims is a near perfect demonstration of the fact that obviously there's a problem with Islam - you can argue about what the problem is - an inherent incompatibility with values we in the West view as central to modernity is where I'd start - but whatever, point is if you have to jump through so many absurdly illogical hoops and engage in such abstruse word games in an attempt to rationalize a belief you hold as true then that belief probably ain't true.

Again, I get that there's a practical side to this 'cultural sensitivity' - that without the willing cooperation of Muslim countries you can't fight the extremism therewith engendered - still, to me that's fighting a war with one hand tied behind your back, that's fighting a war that makes little sense. It's the same misguided illogic that doomed the invasion of Iraq and the practice of COIN in Afghanistan - this refusal to acknowledge that you're in these countries because the prevailing culture was dysfunctional and gave rise to a menace - if your goal isn't to change that culture, to address the roots of the dysfunction, then what are you fighting for? And how do you expect to win? Nazism wasn't an aberration of German culture - it was a natural, albeit extreme byproduct of German nationalism as it existed at the time and had existed for several hundred years - tell me how you were going to defeat it without laying bare and attacking the root cause? I'd argue that all extremist behaviour is a natural outgrowth of a precondition that in and of itself may not be dangerously extreme but given the right circumstances can germinate into something that is - for Germany the right circumstances were its nationalist pathology running up against the humiliation and poverty brought on by the Treaty of Versailles and Hitler's clever leveraging of this dynamic against the perceived threats of communism and impure non-Aryan elements degrading the culture.

For those who want to argue that extremism is an aberration of some hermetically sealed 'true' version of Islam I'd simply say look at Turkey, supposed poster child of a progressive Muslim country, and see what devout Islamist Erdogan is doing to it - and with the consent of devout Turkish Muslims who obviously see democracy, true democracy and all that comes with it as a threat. This is not aberrant behavior - indeed it's expected behavior given the history of Muslim countries. For Islam there's a pronounced antipathy for and fear of the modern world as expressed through the attributes of Western culture - you marry the parochialism born out of that fear to the political machinations embraced by Islamists and you've got yourself a problem - and the right circumstances for the rise of extremist ideologies.

[I should add that I find it astoundingly myopic and remarkably hypocritical that the left would never think of excusing examples of Western 'extremism' as mere aberrations having little to do with a prevailing culture - no, things like slavery and colonialism etc etc are all original sins and endemic to the evil doings of a white y chromosome capitalist driven culture - but when it comes to Islamist extremism that's just an aberration and has nothing to do with a prevailing culture. You can't have it both ways - but that's just another example of the left living in denial of any facts that do not fit their narrative. Of course the depredations of colonialism and the extreme behavior it often exhibited were a natural extension of a culture that prevailed at the time - but here's the key: the fact that we evolved out of that behavior was also an extension of that culture. To argue that the same rules of exegesis do not apply when it comes to analyzing the culture of the Muslim world and the dysfunction and extremism that roil it today is a hypocritical absurdity] 

In this article about the left's petulant hatred of a movie that is both quite popular and full of good will towards the military this sentence probably captures the key as to why progressives and good foreign policy are virtually mutually exclusive concepts, a disturbing dynamic clearly made manifest during Obama's run as Commander-in-Chief:

Leftists simply can’t digest the fact that their own safety is predicated on the willingness to fight of courageous men they openly disdain.

The left hates the military, they dislike, object to, disdain the 'types' that make it great, the ideas that motivate it and the cold reality it is a reflection of and resent the feeling of being dependent on such people and things - and so out of this resentment of a truth that cannot be reconciled with what they want to believe is hatched foreign policy thinking that, swathed in delusion and fantasy, attempts to delegitimize that power, to render it unimportant or at least less significant or fundamental to our security than some would have - resentment of a truth they cannot abide forces them artificially with clever conceits to try and elevate what they fancy as 'smart ' power over what I guess they'd scornfully label 'brutish' power - we know it otherwise as 'leading from behind' - but LFB is not smart power, it's a naive self-serving rationalization utterly detached from reality - and that pretty much sums up Obama's performance when it comes to foreign policy.

[this reminds me of the whole 'bring back our girls' farce - those left wing celebs holding up their little signs for a photo op and having no clue, no conception whatsoever of what it would take to go into a country like that and actually bring those girls back - the hypocrisy of it was just astounding - the left despises gun loving god fearing white boys from middle America but that's precisely who would have been called on to pull off such an impossible mission - that's left wing foreign policy for you: a weepy slogan and a selfie - and a completely delusional detachment from reality]

A word on latest crisis roiling the waters twixt Israel and the Obama administration - that word is predictable. Obama policy all along when it comes to Iran has been to dissemble while moving incrementally to the inevitability of 'containment' - all that talk about all options being on the table, i.e. the use of force, to stop Iran from going nuclear? A lie. All that talk about Rouhani being a moderate and a true partner for peace? Lies [remember Obama started talks with Iran and offered to cut sanctions before Rouhani was elected]. All that talk about the negotiations moving forward. albeit slowly, to something viable? Lies. The policy all along has been containment and everyone in Israel knows this, any unbiased observer has known this, the powers that be in Iran surely know this, Russia and China know this. Obama has had one goal here, to avoid at all costs the use of force, either by the US or Israel - and then eventually you get to a defacto policy of containment. Draw out the negotiations for as long as possible and that gets you two things: it keeps Israel stuck on the sidelines till it's too late to act; and then, regardless of whether a deal is signed or not, when Iran eventually breaks the 'trust' and moves on nukes anyways, Obama will be at or near the end of his term and can then 'argue' that he tried to fight the good fight but Iran cheated and with that simply pass the problem on to whoever takes over the White House. Obama has had one goal: avoid the use of force which necessarily means embracing containment. He may also have harboured an illusion about forging a detente with Iran and forming a new strategic relationship with them - that's possible - but that delusion would have been born out of the central theme: avoid the use of force.

And this is why Obama cannot abide any talk about the renewal of sanctions nor any gestures which undermine the appearance of negotiations being legitimate - it's too soon - Iran has all the leverage here because they see exactly what Obama's game is - they can walk away which will put Obama in a very bad spot with still two years left in his term - at which point he probably caves and signs any deal in a desperate attempt to keep the lie viable just long enough for him to leave. Sure, he can blame republicans if the talks fall apart, and he will - but in the end he's still the one who has to act and that's exactly what he's trying to avoid. And Iran knows it.

So you see, all predictable - you try and spin lies like this about something with such huge strategic implications and with this dissembling essentially undermine the security concerns of two key allies, Saudi Arabia and especially Israel, it's delusional to think the charade can be maintained - eventually responsible people are going to push back, they have no choice - Obama can throw his temper tantrums [releasing falsified Mossad briefings] and poison the water further - but the buck still stops on his desk and he'll be stuck with two options: cave on the deal, or get tough - fully expect it to be the former.

Of course there is one other way this goes - senate Democrats wimp out, bow to Obama's demands, making the sanctions bill no longer veto proof - and then we're back to the charade - but now with everyone's cards on the table and Obama's bluff having been exposed. At that point I think maybe Iran ignores Obama's veto and still threatens to walk out knowing that they really have the upper hand - Obama absolutely needs one of two things: a deal that 'looks' viable even though it isn't, or negotiations that drag on and on - and so Iran may use the threat of renewed sanctions to really turn the screws on Obama.

Eli Lake in an article makes point that when it comes to isolating Islam from the extremist behavior it tends to generate Bush was just as bad as Obama - but for a practical reason - you couldn't fight the extremists without the help of Muslim states and therefore you had to pretend that the extremism was just an 'aberration'. Obama's motivations are different I would argue since he clearly believes that if the Muslim world is at odds with modernity that's somehow America's fault.

But aside from how practical or not this politically correct 'wordplay' is the onerous fact remains: closed theocratic societies will generate extremist behavior - that's not an anomaly, that's to be expected because by their very nature closed systems must be extreme since they are fixated on dogmatic purity. If we're going to continue to deny this central fact then I don't know how we protect ourselves against the dangers that will necessarily crop up - the extremism closed societies naturally evince can easily metastasize into something quite dangerous if the threat the extremist oppression is intended to defeat or suppress cannot adequately be suppressed. What's the threat aggravating the parochialism of the muslim world? Western freedoms, Western culture - unless you completely shut yourself off from the world it's impossible to stop the impact of Western culture on your closed system - unless of course you destroy the West or at the very least constantly portray it as the inherently evil enemy. Thus the rise of a virulent form of Islamism.

So you see the extremism we're witnessing is simply the natural consequence of a closed system against all odds desperately trying to keep itself closed. And we've seen this before - we saw it with Nazism and Stalinism and Maoism - it mattered not one little bit when countering the threat of communism that most Chinese were not devout Maoists - all that mattered was that Mao was a devout Maoist and his extremist actions were a completely natural consequence of a closed system's absolutist need for control and purity. Thus it is with Islamism. Doesn't matter whether or not most Muslims share in the extremist vision - the young woman wanting to drive a car in Saudi Arabia has very little power - the guy screaming in the madrassa that no way that's gonna happen has much - that's how closed systems work, and that's all that matters.

My God I am so sick and tired of hearing people reference Obama's use of drones as proof that he's tough on terror - and it's not just liberals making this claim in defense of their chosen one, conservatives do it too as a means of trying to say something positive about Obama's approach to foreign policy - does it really not occur to any of these people that that's exactly why Obama has embraced such a small footprint, in the shadows, leading from behind tactic? So that he can pull America back as a leader of the free world while pretending that's not exactly what he's doing? That is the whole point of his embrace of drones - liberals like him see American power as a bad thing, as something that must be suppressed, a sentiment which is behind their absurd refusal to refer to Islamic extremism as Islamic extremism - reliance on drones is an utterly insufficient approach to such a large threat - but they don't want to acknowledge the threat because that acts as justification for the use of American military might - so rather than upgrading the response they downgrade the threat. Over reliance on drones is a perfect reflection of Obama's disdain for American power - and for the life of me I do not understand how it is so many people fail to grasp this. Drones are tactical instruments meant to serve a strategic end - but Obama has no strategic end aside from leading from behind and pulling America back - therefore his use of drones is virtually pointless, unless of course you see it for what it is: a shell game, a show he's putting on to convince the gullible that he isn't exactly what he is - a feckless uber liberal who disdains conventional conceptions of American power.

And he's not gonna change - so all those people out there anxiously wringing their hands in expectation of that are fooling themselves - people like him are not amenable to change - indeed there may be nothing more resistant to change than vain ideologues fuelled by the fancies of an arrogant idealism - such people are not only convinced of their superiority their philosophies are absolutely dependent on that conviction because their beliefs are a house of cards that cannot admit to a single doubt for fear the whole presumptive fantasy comes tumbling down - that's why people like this are so good at surrounding themselves with sycophants who ruthlessly keep truth from the door. There's nothing more frightening to the vain delusions of the idealist than empirical facts.

Why do you think Gates and Panetta said what they said in their books? They know this guy is not fit to be Commander in Chief of a superpower like America - they know that his inner circle, Jarrett and Rice etc, the only people he apparently deigns to listen to, are utterly misguided in their foreign policy thinking and practice and probably just parrot the nonsense they know he wants to hear - they probably felt or hoped that by speaking up they could bring about some kind of change - no way, just don't see it - pigs will fly first. At best, at best you'll see some theatrics meant to counter the image of weakness - but that's all it will be, political theatre designed to do one thing: protect Obama.

Is there any way we can make this mayor of Rotterdam president of the US? I mean it's just amazing how many Western leaders cannot bring themselves to express this very simple but absolutely fundemental thought when it comes to Islamism - the West is about empowerment of the individual, the rule of an independent and secular law, and freedom - chief among which is the freedom to say and think what you want - if you're not comfortable with those things then why are you here? If you move to a Western democracy the obligation is upon you to adapt, not for it to start re-writing its traditions and principles and history in order to accommodate whatever backward notions and cultural sensitivities you may have brought with you. Very sad days when the President of the United States for christ sake refuses to be seen as a staunch and adamant defender of a freedom that lies at the very heart of what made America great - never mind that American universities and other bastions of ostensibly enlightened liberalism increasingly seem to have a view of open and free debate more in keeping with Iran's mullahs than the Founding Fathers.

I'm getting a kick out of people slamming Obama for not going to Paris for the 'protest' against terrorism [really, we need to march for things so fucking obvious as terrorism is bad and free speech is good? Seems to me this was just another empty 'bring back our girls' type gesture - although at least the French are actually referring to it as Islamist terrorism] - but I'm getting a kick out of criticism directed at Obama because most of it seems to be of the opinion that this slight was some kind of 'tone deaf' or 'ham-fisted' mess up - why is no one saying that maybe this was a deliberate expression of Obama's uber left ideological sympathies? The uber left abhors the idea of calling the extremism Islamic because they want to blame the West in general and America in particular for this behavior and that's hard to do if you lend credence to the notion there's something inherently Islamist about what's going on - idiotic, sure, but then idiocy is the air they breathe in the delusional echo chambers of the left.

All this time gone by and people still want to think of Obama as this pragmatic moderate - the man is an uber leftist who skillfully uses his protected status with the media to spin false representations and narratives to the contrary - like his uber liberal comrades in the Academy the idea of taking part in a march where terrorism might be linked to Islamism is unthinkable. I mean, c'mon people, wake up - this is the man who labelled the terrorist attack on Fort Hood 'work place violence' and did it with a straight face - there's a reason he sat in Reverend Wright's church all those years - he may not be as radical as Wright [although I would't rule it out] but he's certainly sympathetic to the point of view. Examine the man's words and actions with a clear mind and what you see is an Alinskyite leftist who with cynical cunning knows that if Americans know that's what your are you ain't getting elected or, if you do manage to fool the people into voting for you thanks to a media corrupted by bias, you won't be able to govern because once you've spun a lie that big everything afterwards becomes a function of that falsehood, that deception - which is why he has lost his majority and is now simply going to rule like a King. 

And this whole line of 'reasoning' by liberals that suggests or wants to contend that only speech that does not offend should be 'free' is absurd - the whole point of free speech lies in its ability to offend because otherwise without that potentiality it ceases being free speech and instead becomes allowed speech - and who then will be so ordained to judge what's allowed and what isn't? What august authority draws that line? Hell, since liberals take offense to almost anything conservatives say according to the logic of this Obama would then be justified in unilaterally shutting down Fox News.

Likewise this contention that somehow a person is free to criticize or lampoon Christianity or Judaism or Mormonism or Buddhism but not Islam is equally absurd - because what you're saying or implying with that is that Islam is beyond reproach, perfect - because what logically follows a denial of the right to criticize something is the assumption that there's nothing there that can be legitimately criticized - and that's just manifestly idiotic and an abuse of common sense. According to this logic the entire Protestant faith is a mistake that should never have been allowed to happen since Luther was offending catholics.

[this related story is quite revealing - not only regarding the meaning of free speech but also how it shows that even 'Westernized' Muslims struggle with acceptance of the core values that make and made the West the West - possibly chief among which were all those things in Western culture that led to us having the right to think and say what we want]    

Liberals insistence on trying to pretend that Islamic extremism has nothing to do with Islam is not just an expression of naïve delusion but also a desperate attempt to preserve the viability of their worldview, a view which is strongly motivated by a dislike of America and a lingering hatred of the capitalist driven colonialist past of the west now often simply referred to pejoratively as 'white privilege' - by pretending or convincing themselves that Islamic extremism is an aberation and not rather a to be expected manifestation of Islamist thinking they are essentially laying blame at the feet of all those things about western culture and America that they hate - the chickens coming home to roost as Obama's America hating pastor once put it. This motivation has been clearly on display in the wake of the terrorist attack in Paris where we've seen the liberal media either overtly or by insinuation try to blame the victims for having the nerve to express their right to free speech or in attempts to excuse or rationalize the terrorism with the now stock liberal complaint of how racism bred the hatred and therefore the violence is in a sense justified - chickens coming home to roost.

Liberals see everything through this jaundiced prism of a contempt for working class white culture, a contempt for capitalism, a contempt for the military, a contempt for those aspects of Western history that they find regrettable and so on and so forth. This subverting of reality in order to safeguard their delusional ideological givens when it comes to the clear problems evinced by Islam regarding integration with Western value systems and the modern world [just look at what's going on in Turkey for a glaring example of how western notions of freedom and Islamism do not play well together] was also recently on display with the Ferguson shooting where liberals deliberately ignored objective truths in order to spin their ideological fantasies - for them if the facts do not support their philosophical prejudices and sympathies then the facts must be wrong and can therefore be ignored.

It does not bode well for the republic or western culture in general that the liberal elite, which controls so much of our media output and therefore controls much in the way people vote, is becoming increasingly estranged from a coherent notion of objective analysis and wedded to an agenda that with seeming ease is willing to put ideological preferences ahead of the truth.