Liberty or Death

2009-01-23T14:41:00.000-05:00

What the Economy Could be

The economy will be worse in May. We have not hit bottom yet. We can afford another trillion as long as people and the world still have confidence in the dollar. No one can predict where that amount is. There is no precedence that large. My prediction is that the world believes the US economy will remain solvent give or take a few more trillion. Where else are they going to go?

There is an unexplained fundamental problem underlying the economy that keeps us locked to about 2% growth in GDP per year. The ups and downs average out. We should have no downs. People have just grown to accept them. This down is going to be large and long because the congress made a huge mistake giving mortgage money to people who were unable to pay back. Greedy capitalist on Wall St. bought up a bunch of these squishy packages spreading the cancer through the wholesale financial market. The losses in the stock market erased 7 trillion in wealth that won't be invested.

The question is where do investors go? The US stock market for the long haul. Real estate for the mid term and traditional short term packages like bonds and treasury paper. Treasury paper is worth nothing today because the interest rate is near zero. Wait four years. Foreign investment is still coming here. I will tell you an anecdotal happening now. Two years ago I tried to sell my 2 timeshare weeks for 5000 each. I paid 7500 for each. Not a single call. Yesterday I got an offer from an investment firm for 51,000. The money is coming from the middle east.

I am convinced the underlying problem with the economy is taxes, especially corporate taxes and capital gains taxes. They are a large part of the flight of big business from the US taking jobs with them. If we want jobs we need to eliminate the corporate taxes. They account for 1/3 of the revenue today. If we open up public land to mineral prospecting the royalties will more than make up the difference in the corporate losses. If we sit on the public land until alternative energy is financially viable, 25 years, we forfeit 10 trillion in revenue forever. The greens and the tree huggers have held sway for 30 years now. Obama is one man who can break the stranglehold. I think he is smart enough to do it.

Dave

2008-11-19T14:27:00.000-05:00

Global Warming Creditability Crisis

As Al Gore gains more proponents for his global warming theory such as Bush, McCain and Obama the underlying data that supports global warming is evaporating in light of better science. Al Gore bases his theory on NASA’s Hansen temperature data. This data is collected by land-based thermometers. Hansen is the 800 lb. gorilla of world-wide temperatures. He is famous for the hockey stick graph below with a big increase in recent years; hence global warming due to industrialization.

NASA's (Hansen) data (April 13, 2008)

The second most used land based data comes from Britain’s Hadley Center for Climate Studies. Hadley shows a different picture than Hansen, especially in 2007. Hansen and Hadley use different base years. See below.

Hadley's data (April 13, 2008)

Notice the big drop off in 2007. Hansen’s data disagrees with this. The difficulty is that long term land based temperature readings have to be adjusted. Hansen calls it analysis. Over time cities encroach on the monitoring stations and contaminate the data. How you adjust this contamination can result in contested data depending on the scientist.

The strange part about Hansen’s data is it is land based and done by NASA? It is even stranger when you factor in lower atmosphere temperature monitoring NASA satellites over the last 10 years that are far more accurate than land based thermometers. Why would NASA ignore the more accurate data? Because it contradicts Hansen’s data. See below.

1998-2008; University of Alabama (UAH)

Note that the temperature drop all but erases Hansen’s global warming. We can’t have that! Also there is an independent ocean based temperature collecting network ( ARGOS) now up and running. Since we are 2/3 water measuring water temperature makes more sense. What does their data look like? See below.

1998-2008; Remote Sensing Systems (RSS)

The two charts, ARGOS and the satellite data look remarkable alike. So why does NASA ignore its satellite data and permit Hansen to be the leading scientist on Global Warming? Follow the money. There is zero money for saying global warming does not exist. Case closed, no more money. There is 10 billion per year provided world wide for saying it does exist and organizations such as the UN’s IPCC. They would all be out of a job.

Liberty or Death

2008-06-19T15:18:00.000-04:00

The Coming Oil Crisis

Below is a dialogue I had yesterday with one of the premier members of Jack Wheeler's forum. MercuryTraveller is a self-made millionaire in entrepreneur who made most of his money in the steel industry in your, jumping him without a dime. He net has a lot of contacts in big business in Europe and the Middle East and the United States. He also has no agenda of his own. But he does supply a number of insider facts about the oil business.

If you don't want to read my drivel at least read his. I followed his responses with two quotes from Pelosi and Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY). I think you will find them illuminating. Policy clearly lays out the left-wing liberal agenda on oil. She shamelessly uses outright lies to bolster her case.

The moron Maurice Hinchey (D-NY actually believes that the oil companies are controlling the supply of oil at the oil refineries, unbelievable. One wonders how stupid our congressional leaders can get. But the Democrats are talking seriously about nationalizing oil refineries to keep big oil from controlling the supply of oil to us. All this in response to Bush's timid announcement that we ought to drill more.

From Liberty or Death

MercuryTraveller good to hear from you. We desperately need your help.

I agree with you 100%, in fact I believe you're understating the problem and did not comment on the enormity of the effort it will take to mitigate this disaster that's coming. $10 gas is only two years away, somewhere between now and then the economies of the world particularly the US and Europe will collapse.

We all know the reasons how we got in this mess, Jack Kelly has stated them well. We know we have a Congress and administration that either wants the price to go higher, in the case of the liberals, or are sitting on the sidelines with their thumb in there ear like Bush. We cannot expect any help this government nor based on the words of Obama and McCain, any help from the next administration or even OPEC who is screwing us.

If we are to avoid falling off the cliff it is going to take a major organized initiative by industry to move the country on a crisis basis beginning today. I would propose the following:

Build a consortium of leaders of big oil, transportation, manufacturing, gas, electric, automobile manufacturers, the trucking industry, pharmaceuticals, plastics in all other key businesses that use petroleum. This consortium has two purposes, first to inform the American people. This must be overwhelming and without government help. I would propose several 30 minute infomercials geared to scare the hell out of the American people, which won't be hard because it will be the truth. I am already scared at four dollars a gallon. The leaders of these key people should make these infomercials as a group showing solidarity of all the American business community. That should be followed by putting the key people on every talk show in the country to hammer home the theme that we are in big trouble and are headed for a serious fall. This will come as such a shock that the American people will believe it and the weasels in Congress won't dare to stand the way of the consortium's solution.

Second the consortium needs to present both a long-term and near-term plan to mitigate the coming disaster. The long-term plan, 10 years, is more drilling and more infrastructure for transporting and processing oil. This problem is not going away and 10 years. We need coal gasification and coal to oil conversion to begin immediately.

The near-term plan is multifaceted and needs to be completed in three years. You and other of Jack's followers can think of more solutions than I but I'll offer a few. We need electric cars and fuel efficient larger vehicles in three years. We need to convert every household and business on gas and oil to electricity within the next 18 months. We need to convert every oil fired and gas-fired electric plant to coal in the next two years. This entails new boilers that can use the same turbines. You are correct nuclear would've helped 20 years ago but takes too long today with the exception of expanding existing nuclear plants which is far faster and is occurring today in the nuclear plant in Southern Maryland.

By end running the government, the industry consortium will take control of the execution of the recovery plan. After a few infomercials government will be prepared to help. The consortium should ask them for two things, first $1 trillion in startup money in year one, the elimination of all moratoriums and for government to get out of the way of industry including passing tax incentives such as one year depreciation write-offs. Government also has two spend one to 2 trillion to assist the American people to convert to the fuel-efficient automobiles in three years and convert gas and oil furnaces to electric.

Will this work? Absolutely, but not without pain we waited far too long to get out of this mess painlessly, but we need to minimize the damage. We have the coal to make this happen beginning today. Can the American economy support an additional 3 trillion on our deficit, absolutely. We can have an unlimited supply of electricity for homes, businesses and electric cars. I realize the electric car three years now will be a dog, but it will work in an urban environment. If it comes heavily subsidized the American people will buy into it. Of course they will have to because gas will be at $10 a gallon and the economy will be headed into the tank.

I am completely open to any other ideas that are more efficient than mine. My real concern is the complacency of the American people, industry and our government. MercuryTraveller, you and another big industry leaders know the train wreck is coming, and soon. I will do anything I can to help, but it will take those who know the insiders like yourself to light a fire under industry to form the consortium.

MercuryTraveller, please rattle your contacts one more time. Enlist Jack's help and any others you know to go with you. This needs to happen before November's elections. Lay out the plan. The government is too stupid and too slow to do anything and will get out of the way when industry demands it. With the help of the American people big business will get everything it needs out of Congress or get voted out in November.

From MercuryTraveller

In principle you are right, but not in this case. By personal experience I know the oil industry was caught with their pants down by the raising consumption of China, India and others. I told vice presidents of the oil industry to expect this already in 1995. They textually replied that they hoped to God I was right but they couldn't see it. I even had a big argument with Premier Oil from the UK when they closed a gas field in Pakistan, not intresting enough at those low prices.
That field would take today 4 years to produce.
Occidental told me exactly the same and sold several old fields, "not intresting enough at those prices".
The growth of China, India, Pakistan and others is exponential and their GDP grows at approx. 8 %. This figure means minimum 3% growth in oil consumption. There is no oil producer in this world who can raise the production by 3% per year, none.
Forget the speculators, you cannot speculate the same commodity for 2 years without taking a profit, it would be extremely dangerous to hold a speculative position for 2 years and this shortage market has now created its own momentum. Prepare yourselves for a big bust when the world economy cannot stand the oil price anymore and grinds to a halt. Then of course will you have overproduction, created by a flat economy. But boy will there be pain in the world markets.
The only solution would have been nuclear but it is too late now, the nuclear power plants will never be on stream in time.

From MercuryTraveler

The policy of the big US oil companies has been, since WW2, to use first the foreign oil reserves and have the US reserves, if possible, intact. This dates from the time everybody thought the oil reserves would deplete by the turn of the 20th century. I told here before that since WW2 new wells were drilled and immediately capped for decades.
Today the strategic importance of oil is even bigger than in those days, China and India would choke to death without oil.
The powers that be know this and calculate each step in that direction. That's why the price is less important than the strategy behind it, and that's why the price will never again drop below 50 US$/bbl
BTW the politicians have absolutely no control over this and the administration which would try to change this strategy would immediately face more rising oil prices by the actions of producers worldwide.
The Bush family is right in the middle of this strategy, together with others, less publicly known.

From Pelosi’s web site
Pelosi Statement on Bush Call for End to Ban on Offshore Oil Drilling
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Contact:Brendan Daly/Nadeam Elshami, 202-226-7616
Washington, D.C. -- Speaker Nancy Pelosi released the following statement today in reaction to the President’s comments at the White House urging Congress to end a federal ban on offshore oil drilling and open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil exploration:
“Oil companies are sitting on 68 million acres of public lands they have already leased, but President Bush and Senator McCain want to award them with even more.
“Americans are suffering under the Bush-Cheney-McCain policies that were written by Big Oil: $4 a gallon gasoline; $134 per barrel oil; increased reliance on foreign sources of energy and on hydrocarbons that contribute to climate change.
“Americans use one quarter of the world’s oil consumption every day and we possess less than 2 percent of the world’s supply. We cannot drill our way to energy independence.
“Our nation must move toward a new, cleaner, and more affordable energy future that focuses on renewable and increased energy efficiency. The New Direction Congress has already passed innovative energy legislation and will continue to develop other proposals to address high energy costs and shift our nation to a more energy efficient economy.
“We look forward to having a President in the White House whose energy policy can no longer be described as ‘drill and veto.’”

Fox News quotes from Capital Hill 6-19-2008
Per Pergram-Capitol Hill
House Democrats responded to President's Bush's call for Congress to lift the moratorium on offshore drilling. This was at an on-camera press conference fed back live.
Among other things, the Democrats called for the government to own refineries so it could better control the flow of the oil supply.
They also reasserted that the reason the Appropriations Committee markup (where the vote on the amendment to lift the ban) was cancelled so they could focus on preparing the supplemental Iraq spending bill for tomorrow.
At an off-camera briefing, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said the same. And a senior Republican House Appropriations Committee aide adds that "there were multiple reasons for the postponement" including discussion on the supplemental. But the aide said there was the thought that Democrats may wish to avoid a debate today on energy amendments.
Here are the highlights from briefing
Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), member of the House Appropriations Committee and one of the most-ardent opponents of off-shore drilling
1115
We (the government) should own the refineries. Then we can control how much gets out into the market.

Liberty or Death

2008-05-21T14:52:00.000-04:00

How to get Democrats to open fossil fuel mining
White Paper

With gasoline approaching four dollars a gallon it would be an easy sell for the Republicans to gather in mass at a press conference and tell the American people they are paying an additional $2.50 per gallon because the Democrats will not allow oil companies to drill oil, mine coal or recover natural gas. The environmentalists who vote almost all Democratic cause the Democrats stance on fossil fuels. The environmentalists have a fantastic PR engine that has got the American people, especially the young to value the life of one polar bear over energy independence from the Middle East. This is abetted by selfish states such as Florida and California who won't let us drill offshore from their states. China and Cuba are now drilling in the Gulf of Mexico where Florida refuses to allow American drilling.

But alas, our current crop of Republicans are too weak kneed and stupid to hold such a press conference. Additionally, Bush, Newt Gingrich and John McCain are in the tank on global warming.

If you think that over time cooler heads will prevail and fossil fuels will be open for drilling in the near future, think again. The Democrats will gain seats in 2008 and it may be 20 years before the Republicans regain the House and Senate if ever.

So what should the Republicans do? They should do what they do best, knuckle under to Democrats in order to save their jobs. What can they offer the Democrats that would allow drilling of fossil fuels? The answer is money! There is one thing the Democrats value above all else and that is money that they can control and give to who they wish.

Almost all people believe are fossil fuels will not perish and will be there when we need them. The American people are sadly mistaken. Fossil fuels in the ground have no value until they are mined and sold at a profit. What if a cheap alternative energy source was found that made the fossil fuels too expensive to mine and make money? Science fiction? Not hardly. At 90 plus dollars a barrel biomass and other alternatives become profitable. But more importantly is the practical implementation of a breakthrough science. And what is that? Fusion Power. What you say? Not going to happen for 50 or more years. Guess again. Under the radar the US and France have been working on a joint project to produce practical fusion. The largest current experiment is the Joint European Torus [JET]. In 1997, JET produced a peak of 16.1 MW of fusion power (65% of input power), with fusion power of over 10 MW sustained for over 0.5 sec. In June 2005, the construction of the experimental reactor ITER, designed to produce several times more fusion power than the power put into the plasma over many minutes, was announced. The production of net electrical power from fusion is planned for DEMO, the next generation experiment after ITER. Expect fusion power to be available economically in less than 50 years. What then happens to the fossil fuels? They will become worthless.

The US alone has $35 trillion in oil reserves, $2 trillion in natural gas reserves and $42 trillion in coal reserves. The profit on $80 trillion is conservatively $16 trillion. We have sat on new drilling in the last 30 years. The clock is ticking. If we start drilling now we can recover most of the oil and gas and half the coal for they become obsolete. These reserves are all on federal land controlled by the Democrats.

The message to take to the Democrats is that they can have it all if they open up drilling now. And if you don't start now it will become worthless. Therefore you can have $16 trillion for Social Security Medicaid and Medicare as well as universal health care if only you allow drilling. The $16 trillion is yours to spend. This is a win-win, the Democrats get 16 trillion which they covet more than polar bears and the Republicans get cheap fuel for the American people and all they have to do dangle the carrot of 16 trillion in front of the eyes of the Democrats.

Liberty or Death

2008-02-21T14:46:00.000-05:00

National ID card, a good thing or bad thing?

A lady on Action Alert was all concerned about a national ID card, or what the Homeland security office has direct to the states to provide drivers license information to the federal government. Is it a good thing or bad thing? Come back with your comments, I've given you mine below.

This lady's concerns as highlighted in this statement below are surveillance, privacy and identity theft. Her additional concern is the government would use his information against innocent people.

The federal effort to create a national identity card, called the Real ID card, would take us one step closer to a surveillance society, erode our right to privacy and put our personal information at risk.

Okay, I understand that. However her assumption is that the national ID card would provide the government with more information and a more efficient means to track individuals. A fair question.

Let's begin with what information the average citizen gives away voluntarily to governments and commercial industries.

1. When you are born you give the government your legal name, your birthdate, the legal names of your parents and over the last 20 years or so biometric information such as footprints. This information is stored by the government as a birth certificate.

2. Before you are one-year-old your parents must apply for your a Social Security number for you because of an IRS mandate. You give the Social Security office your legal name backed up your birth certificate. The Social Security office stores this information and assigned to a number.

3. When you register for gradeschool, high school and college you provide them a great deal of private information. They store this in a government database along with a transcript of your grades from grade 1 through college.

4. When you get a job you supply the employer your personal information and your Social Security number. They store this information in a database.

5. In most states, personal property specifically cars boats and livestock must be registered with the county that you live in. This is linked to your Social Security number, your address and your legal name.

6. If you apply anywhere for credit whether it be at a department store or a credit card you must supply all your personal information including your Social Security number. This information is again stored in a database with a credit lender.

7. If you were my age, you required to register for the draft again supplying and updating personal information in a Social Security number. In my case I also had to take an intelligence test any medical physical. All this information was stored in a database.

8. If you work for the government, military or private company that requires a clearance then you have to supply all the personal information again and also provide your fingerprints which are stored in a database in the government and in the company.

9. If you buy a house, the information about the house including its assessed value location, address your legal name as the owner. This information is stored in a public database available for anyone to look at. Fairfax County where you live as this database online. Just type in your address and it will come back with the name of the owner, you.

10. If during your lifetime you get credit or a mortgage of any type all your personal information including your Social Security number ends up in the hands of the three major credit bureaus. Again this information is stored in a database and Current on almost a daily basis. This was done without your knowledge or consent. And what do these three credit bureaus do with your information? Why they sell it to people who are in the credit business. They also provide the inquirer your Social Security number and your credit scores and details on any problems that you have been credit past and present.

11. If you receive medical assistance at any facility they will collect your personal information and your Social Security number. Again they will store this in a database.

12. If you get a library card you must supply your legal name and address and prove that you live in the jurisdiction of the library. They store this in the database and assign you a number.

13. If you apply for a driver's license you need to supply a per certificate proving who you are. Then your name, address, height, weight, eye color and hair color or recorded on the license and in a database.

14. Google knows of anything you've written and placed on the Internet. Type in my name them watch what comes out. They also know your phone number and your address. Everyone in the world can do a reverse lookup on your phone number and get your address. God knows what other information they have.

15. If you apply for a passport you need to supply a birth certificate, a picture and all your personal information. They store the second database.

16. When you get married you supply your personal information and also take a blood test. This information is stored in the database.

17. If you commit a crime, the information about that crime and your legal name and I believe your address is made public. Anyone can ask for, newspapers do it regularly and report it in their police column for everyone to read.

I'm sure you can think of many other instances where you have voluntarily provided information to, I have listed enough.

First point. The commercial and governmental agencies that have your personal information that you voluntarily gave to them share information to other governmental agencies and companies with a right to know. And that's just about everybody. Where they do with this information? Stored in a database. So you're personal information exists in databases all over the country and even throughout the world. If you are worried about personal information getting in the hands of government and private and industry, you are too late you a more provided it unless you were born in the backwoods and never signed for or applied for anything. Therefore we already live in a surveillance society. If the government or criminal wants to find you they/he will, you cannot hide.

Second point. The ladies concerned about privacy. Privacy of what? Half the world knows the important things about you, the things that can be used to find you order go after your possessions and money.

Third point. Personal information at risk. Get real. With all your information is stored in dozens if not hundreds of databases both paper and electronic do you really think you have protection from identity theft. I have a personal experience with that, my son's credit card was used by someone else to run up thousands. It's a major hassle to get that straightened out. The problem is that every time you provide anyone access to your cards or IDs your information is at considerable risk and in many cases is stored by who you gave it to. Wal-Mart anyone?
Your point, Innocent citizens. If you falsify any of the information talked about above then you're no longer innocent so I have to assume that the information you provide is accurate so that you could be an innocent citizen.

So what harm will a national ID card and related database cause you over and above the harm that started been provided to many institutions by you voluntarily? I can't think of any.

On the other hand, I can see some real value to the country in knowing that anyone's identification has been backed up by the best source data possible so that it can be proven that you are an innocent civilian. A national ID card will not make any more information available to the government that it doesn't already have. The critical thing is the information while the pedigree.

This pedigree associated with an ID is actually a boon, it allows those in the marketplace that will provide you credit or job greater assurance that you are you. Same thing in legal situations. Being able to prove who you are can be of great benefit to the police to prove you are innocent.

However if you are guilty of fraud or crime you will have great concern. I for one want those who commit fraud and crimes to be caught more easily because I am the one paying for the police to find the bad guys.
Comments are encouraged.

Liberty or Death

2007-12-26T15:58:00.000-05:00

The Current US System of Government is Fatally Flawed and Cannot be Fixed

This is a two-part paper. Part one below addresses our current governmental system and its fatal problems. Part two, in a separate paper will provide some possibilities on how to solve the problems.

If you had to describe the two biggest problems with the way citizens regard their elected officials what would you choose? My choice would be that the citizens no longer believe that their politicians are acting in their behalf and that these same politicians are controlled by big money. How did this happen? Has the system been perverted or hijacked by self-serving politicians? Regrettably, the answer is no. The government we have today is the natural progression of the system that our forefathers created in the 1700s.

So what would the founding fathers that created our government think of our current situation if they were alive today? As much as they may lament the results they cannot say that the current government is not consistent with the intent of the founding fathers. Did the founding fathers create the wrong government? No, they created a government for far less than 50 million people. It's only in the last 100 years or so that population and government has gotten beyond the control of the people or in fact anyone. It is a creation with no master and no accountability. Our country has gotten big (populous) very quickly. Along with population growth has been the phenomenal growth of corporate and personal wealth. Massive population means that citizens are further disconnected from their federal, state and even local politicians. Fairfax County with one million people is larger than many of our nation states. Are the people of that county on a first name basis with any of their politicians even dogcatcher? Seizing the citizen disconnect Big money chooses who our elected officials are and dictate what they do. The people are now the victims of their own government, which they cannot control and cannot change.

The current government is massive and getting larger with no checks and balances. It's a runaway. Some examples. In 2004, the expenditures of the federal government were $2.3 trillion. In the same year, expenditures of state and local governments were $1.45 trillion. The combined value of federal, state, and local expenditures in FY 2004 was $3.75 trillion. Of the 2.3 trillion federal dollars only $695 billion was used for the common good meaning that which is used for everyone's benefit. That's only 30%. The other 2/3s is mandated by law to be redistributed to “special” groups of citizens. These mandates are tied to the runaway population growth and therefore grow without control. Most, like social security are going to go bankrupt, but still must be paid. It’s the law!

All three branches of government are growing unabated. Growth takes two forms, new laws and increased seizure of money. New laws are passed every year, but when is the last time you heard of a law being deleted? They just keep accumulating.

The Executive branch. Just one executive branch department the IRS now manages 5M words of law requiring 232.6B per year. Here is an anecdotal story on HUD, “HUD was well-known in the 1980s for rampant corruption. Catherine Austin Fitts wrote that when she arrived at HUD as head of operations of the FHA program in 1989, it was comparable to a "sewer" for all the mortgage fraud that had occurred during the '80s: "My favorite description of HUD was to come many years later [in 2000] from staff to the Chairman of the Senate HUD appropriation subcommittee — Senator Kit Bond. When asked what was going on at HUD, the Congressional staffer said, 'HUD is being run as a criminal enterprise.'"[7] She wrote:
"After issuing $9 billion in mortgage guarantees, HUD/FHA was to lose something approaching 50% of the value of the portfolio — a level of losses hard to explain with mortal logic. When my staff approached me with a proposal to bail out a mortgage company so they could continue to lose money for us, I asked why we should spend money to lose more money in a way that would harm communities. After a long silence during which 30 staff members intently studied their feet, one brave soul explained to me that the mortgage bank was owned and run by a major Republican donor. Shocked, I said. 'I am a major Republican donor,' and pointing to my presidential cufflinks that were adorning my French cuffs, 'I got a pair of cuff links. You get cuff links. You don’t get $400 million of federal credit to throw down the drain.' My staff looked at me like I was so naive and clueless that there was no point in trying to communicate with me — better to let me learn the hard way."[7]

Congress, which is capped at 100 senators and 454 congressmen, appears to be stagnant but that is an illusion. They currently hire over 40,000 staffers and this number increases each year. Add to that the Library of Congress and the Congressional Accountability Office.

The judicial branch of government has accumulated the same ills as the other two branches. They are aware that there is no accountability to the people or even to the Congress of the states or the nation. They can do whatever they want. This is led to judicial activism meaning they change the laws that Congress makes through corruptive interpretations, which replace the existing law. Take a simple example, the First Amendment to our national Constitution, which reads, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Seems pretty simple. Even the common citizen can understand this law. But our judges could not leave this alone, so we have progressed from this simple sentence to the separation of church and state and removal of mangers from government property. Does anyone interpret this law in that way?

It’s no wonder that very few citizens still participate in these political processes. Lately the trust in government has all but disappeared and the American people are fed up with big government and big politicians. Perhaps this is why in exit polls from the last election following was said, “Possibly the most arresting single statistic in the exit polls was the finding that a plurality of voters — 40 percent — believe that the next generation of Americans will experience a life “worse than today,” while only 30 percent expect it to be better and 28 percent about the same. This means that voters are discouraged not only about America’s present but also its future. The message of the exit polls is that the country wants its politicians to stop serving their paymasters and start serving the citizens and restore the American dream.

This is not going to happen. That is why the problem is fatal. Politics is a function that is diverging in the wrong direction at an ever-faster rate. Individual Americans are totally disconnected with those who make their laws and control their money. Americans cannot identify with their politicians. Almost none of them can name their county supervisor, state delegate or senator nor can they name their federal congressman and either senator. When people on the street are shown pictures of the top officials in the US government, very few can name anyone. This ignorance creates apathy which allows politicians to ignore the public be responsive to their paymasters, big-money donors.

In presidential elections 55% of eligible voters vote. And this is in a good turnout year. In an off election, one for congressmen and senators 37% is a good turnout. We just had a special election for the congressman of Virginia's first District. Just 13% of eligible voters voted. The American citizen needs a civic lesson. The president makes no laws and cannot independently spend a dime. It is the senators and congressmen who control our lives. We have our electoral concern backwards. Worse when we do vote the overwhelming majority vote on either name recognition, which highly favors the incumbents or they go in and pull the lever for either all Republicans or all Democrats. Few if any voters know where any candidates stand on the issues and vote accordingly. Politicians know this and use Wall Street marketing techniques vice their position on the issues to get elected without saying anything.

Where else does this apathy come from? Another sign of the People's unhappiness with the system is the disapproval rating of our public officials. 64% of the people disapprove of the president's job performance. 66% disapprove of congressional performance. Approval ratings are much lower. These numbers are getting worse each year and are an indicator of public disillusionment. Several additional factors underline the people’s apathy. First, most believe that their vote doesn't count. Almost always true, except Florida in 2000. In most cases none of the candidates are acceptable and therefore one is forced to choose the lesser of evils, even though all are unacceptable. Another factor is that the individual citizen cannot connect to any of his elected officials. Since he is just one of millions, no one cares what he thinks and no one will respond. Just try writing something to the president or your federal officials. If you live in a small county you are lucky if your supervisor will return your call.

Yet the major reason for apathy is we are waking up to the fact that our elected officials respond to big money and can care less about the little people. The numbers bear this out. Let's first talk about those who are trying to get elected today. For the 2008 election, the money collected so for the house is 242 million, the Senate 113 million, the presidential race 420 million. Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi has collected 1.4 million so far and Senator Dick Durbin has collected 5 million so far. And this is one year before the election! This money pours in foremost from large corporations, then special interest groups like lawyers and next through a variety of loopholes such as PACs, 527, and charities. Additional money pours directly into the two political parties to be parceled out to the politicians, the Democrats getting 195 million so far and the Republicans getting 186 million. Additionally, hundreds of millions are spent on political ads by advocacy groups. Do you think your two dollars is going to buy you anything?

But elections are but just one way for big money to buy politicians. The really big money comes in every year to the incumbents from professional lobbyists to the tune of $2.6 billion per year. That's 4.8 million for each politician each year. Is it any wonder that once a politician gets in office he can stay for life? In 2006, which was a big turnover year between parties, only 6% of the incumbents were defeated. All others retired or quit. With this money a politician can buy votes with what is called pork. For 2007 Congress will spend 29 billion of your money on pet projects most of which go back to same 2.6 B dollar political donors with little or no strings attached. That is a 10 to 1 return on investment. You certainly are not going to see a dime.

Still another reason for apathy is the constant bickering in Washington. There is a complete duplication between the congress and the executive so they are constantly fighting with each other. The Congress and big media blame the president both Democrat and Republican for everything that goes wrong. They never point out that Congress passes all the laws and doles out all the money. Many of these laws are called unfunded mandates. What that means is the executive branch is ordered to do something but given no money to do it. This is been going on so long that fair accountability of the executive branch means absolutely nothing. Yet the blame game continues daily. The media hysterically pounds the average citizen with constant negative news particularly about the executive branch that makes no sense to the average citizen. Congress spends over half of its time investigating the executive branch and the executive branch spends half of its time responding to Congress. This sounds innocent or just annoying except that half the time means half the money. That is 50% of the Congressional and executive budgets and time are wasted pointing fingers and haggling about money.

Where did the enormous size of the United States come from? When the founding fathers created our government our country was tiny. Politicians were people that you knew. The first census was taken in 1790 and we had 3.9 million people in 13 states. The country did not reach 100 million until 1915, or 125 years later. It reached 200 million people in 1970, or only 55 years later. Today in 2007, just 37 years later we have 303 million people. Our system of government just does not scale and is totally overwhelmed by 303 million people.

Where did all these people come from? Today, native-born Americans have a -10% growth rate. That means Native Americans are not replacing themselves. Naturalized immigrants have a positive 35% growth rate. And every year 4- 5 million new immigrants both legal and illegal enter the country. By failing to control population we have guaranteed that our system of government will collapse.

This whopping size has allowed the politicians to tie their allegiance to big money and not the people, with little risk. Big money buys ads, which creates name and face recognition and reelection. In 1859 Abraham Lincoln won his party's nomination by speaking at the Republican convention in May. Afterwards he did no campaigning and gave no speeches. The party machinery in each state and the media were the only way the people ever heard of him. Today presidential candidates spend two years and hundreds of millions of dollars getting their face plastered on the TV as much as possible. Hillary has been running for President for seven years.

There is a big difference between the way Americans feel about local issues as compared to national issues. Just go to a school board meeting or a rezoning decision meeting. The will of the citizens square off equally with big-money interests. You will see yelling and screaming and occasionally fistfights. People are passionate about these issues because they understand them and believe what they say is being heard. However, Americans, traditionally have become too trusting of our state and federal government and politicians because they have no idea what goes on. Herein lies the kernel of the solution. The real power needs to be in the hands of officials who feel that must respond to the people before they respond to big money. I will address how this could work in the next paper.

Dave

2007-11-24T14:53:00.000-05:00

A New Vision for the Governance of Iraq

Background

The American army is bringing a semblance of peace to the Iraqi people by eliminating Al Qaeda and the insurgents and marginalizing the militias. They have also won the confidence of the local tribal leaders who are using their militias to prevent the return of Al Qaeda and the insurgents. As good as this military progress is it can be totally undone by the totally incompetent Iraqi government. The governmental system in Iraq is totally broke and cannot be fixed by Band-Aids but requires open-heart surgery.

The problem began when Bush forced democracy on a culture that will not support a central government elected by a plurality of the people. Bush failed to consider the culture of the Iraqi people when forming the government. An American-style or British style government is not for everyone, especially the Middle East. The cultures are radically different. First Iraqi has three distinct and independent cultures, Sunni, Shia and Kurds. Although all are Arab they could not be more different. A government elected based on population works in the United States because we share a common culture. In Iraq a population-based government where one culture will always be dominant will not work.

The Iraqi people are first and foremost tribal. The nation is divided into provinces that provide no value and finally a new central government. Currently the tribes are the backbone of the governance of the Iraqi people. The central government is Shia dominated and utterly corrupt. This will always be true. Additionally there's a problem of the distribution of oil among the cultures. So what is to be done?

Current governmental problems that cannot be fixed with time or by our military

The local police forces do not reflect the tribal system. The national police force is a bunch of thugs that need to be marginalized or disbanded and start all over. Distribution of resources by the central government is both erratic and corrupt. The Shia dominated parliament provides too much power to the President/Prime Minister.

How to build a government that supports the culture of Iraq

The central government needs to be abolished and a new form of government established that reflects the culture of Iraq and equality of the cultures. The Constitution needs to reflect this new form of government.

The secret is to take advantage of the cultural strengths of the Iraqi people in particular their long-standing tribal leaders and tribal governance. The authority of the tribes needs to be significantly increased. This can be done by having a police force and judicial system that reports to the tribal leaders. The tribal leaders should have control over the local government, local facilities such as schools, and be able to make laws consistent with the laws of a central government and the Constitution.

A small cultural government, Sunni, Shia and Kurd should be established to distribute the central government resources to the tribes and the appointment of an independent appellate judicial system. A National Guard would report to this cultural government. This cultural government should take the form of a council whose members are appointed by the tribes. All tribes within the culture would be participate equally.

The central government should be divided into two separate powers with unique authorities. First would be a central council that was appointed by the cultural councils. There would be an equal number of representatives from each of the cultures. The authority of the Central Council would be the governance of all internal affairs. This will include taxes, regulation of commerce, development of common infrastructure, the passing of laws, management of a Justice Department, commerce inspectors, treasury and other internal regulatory bodies and the appointment of an independent Supreme Court. Additionally, the national police would report to the Justice Department and only would be responsible for enforcing laws and pursuing criminals across tribal boundaries and protection of the national borders. They would have no responsibility within the tribal boundaries.

The office of the President/Prime Minister would be to manage external affairs of the country. He would be responsible for diplomacy including national defense, maintenance of the Army and the management of other agencies that support external affairs such as a Port Authority.

The cultural Council, the Central Council members and the President/Prime Minister would all have term limits defined by the Constitution. This would help limit the corruption that is common among Arab cultures.

Bush is critical for making this work

The first thing he should do is admit that he was wrong. This will be something new and hard for him. Second he needs to bypass the State Department who is useless and use the military to gain the support of the Iraqi people for a new government. Our military already has daily contact with the tribal leaders. The tribal leaders have far greater respect for the American military than they do for their own central government. Once they see the new governance proposal they would be ecstatic.

Once he gains the support of the tribal leaders Bush has to have the backbone to disband the current government and constitution. This can be phased in starting with the tribal leaders, the establishment of cultural councils and finally the two branches of the central government. This would be documented in a new constitution written and ratified by the Central Council. One should expect this process to take at least three years.

Who will enforce the change? The American soldiers who will still be required for at least three years. They can enforce the new governance and the disestablishment of the old government. At the same time the sorry Iraqi army should gain some semblance of competence. After that three brigades of Americans should remain in Iraq for the next 10 years. One brigade would be a tripwire for Iran one brigade would be a tripwire for Syria and Hamas and the third brigade would be the nucleus of the training force of the Iraqi Army. Contractors paid for by the government Iraq would supplement this brigade.

I realize this is just an outline and I welcome any comments or criticism or additional depth.

Dave

2007-11-07T12:16:00.000-05:00

Help; is anyone out there a fair tax expert?

What is the fair tax? If you haven't been following the arguments, some basic understandings or at the following websites:

I need help understanding whether the fair tax is revenue neutral with regard to the rich. Since they pay all the taxes today, this is a critical question. What happens to the wealth of the rich while they own it and when they pass it on to their heirs? I need your help your.

www.fairtax.org

http://50reasons.blogspot.com/

What concerns me about the fair tax is whether the advocates of fair tax’s argument on revenue neutrality for the rich who can pass on their wealth to their children is real?

The following is a give-and-take between a doubter named Graetz and the fair tax expert Dr. Kotlikoff.

Graetz misstatement: “Tax reform should not reduce taxes on the very well off.” He contends “that it is hard to do that [tax the wealthy] without keeping some tax on income.”

FairTax rebuttal: Graetz does not acknowledge that a tax on consumption taxes not only current income when it is spent but also accumulated wealth when it is spent. The FairTax, as a consumption tax, is the only tax reform plan that taxes accumulated wealth.
According to Dr. Kotlikoff, “Taxing consumption is effectively the same as taxing wages
plus taxing wealth. The logic is simple if you consider the most straightforward way of taxing consumption, namely via a retail sales tax. In this case, when people spend their wages or their assets on goods and services, they pay sales taxes, meaning they end up with less to consume. This is no different from having the wages and wealth directly taxed, but facing no sales tax. But what about saving one's wages and wealth and spending these funds plus accumulated interest in the future? Doesn't this avoid the consumption tax? No. You end up paying consumption taxes not just on the original sums, but also on the accumulated interest. The same holds if you save your wages and wealth and give it to your kids. When they spend it, they pay consumption taxes on both P&I [principal and interest].” Source: “The Case for the ‘FairTax,’” by Laurence J.
Kotlikoff, Ph.D., The Wall Street Journal, March 7, 2005.

I understand Dr. Kotlikoff’s argument on how accumulated wealth ends up in future consumption. But his answer does not adequately address all the revenue neutral issues related to wealth. Since the rich and the very rich pay all the taxes under the current system the fair tax system needs to capture 23% of the money accumulated by the rich and the very rich to be revenue neutral.

The fair tax assumption is that accumulated wealth will be spent on taxable consumption. The rich spend only a small percentage of their annual income and consumption. They invest the rest. The fair tax system does not tax this investment. When this wealth is passed on to their children the fair tax assumption is that it will be spent on consumption. There is no argument for this assumption. The children could behave like a parent and spend only a fraction of the accumulated wealth.

Also the fair tax system does not tax consumption of used products. What the fair tax website does not address is buying a “used” company. Typical behavior of the wealthy.

If you remove this enormous amount of wealth that is currently taxed, but would not be taxed under the fair tax system, I have difficulty understanding how the fair tax system will be revenue neutral?

Liberty or Death

2007-10-01T08:42:00.000-04:00

A CEO’S VIEW OF IRAQ

First let me say that I am a strong supporter of the war on terror but I have great concerns about what is going on in Iraq. My concerns stem from the fact that we have no idea what is going on in Iraq and never have. Ever since the pacification started there have never been established metrics that measure all facets of our and our Iraqi allies efforts to rebuild their country. Instead of getting a detailed measurable account of all the activities what we have continually been bombarded with is anectdotals both good and bad. How many reports have we listened to in the last six months? We had the blue ribbon report, we've had dozens of congressional delegations and their reports we get monthly updates from General Patraeus, we had the general accountability office report, we had the national intelligence estimate and now we have heard the long awaited September report from General Patraeus and Ambassador Crocker. What do we know? Does anyone believe they have an in-depth understanding of what's going on?

Let's look at it from another direction. Put yourself in the place of a CEO listening to the status reports of your vice presidents. If they presented what you've heard over the last six months is they’re any of you that wouldn't fire them all. In no area do we have a complete picture of our success or failure when compared to realistic metrics. And they give you some examples.

We hear of success in Anbar province. So what? What we should be hearing is how many provinces there are in Iraq and what is the status of each province. Have you heard that? Never.

We hear reports of reduce violence against Americans as well as Iraqi citizens. What is that mean? It is the same as saying that we have fewer murders in Los Angeles compared to last year. Those statistics alone are meaningless unless we know the reason why. Are there fewer insurgents? Does anybody even though how many insurgents there are? Does anybody know how many there were last year or the year before? Did they just go home? Is that why violence is down? What about Al Qaeda? We hear that we have driven them out of Baghdad and Anbar. Did they go home? Or did they move to areas that are easy pickings because there are no Americans in that area. Based on what we've heard does anyone have a clue?

We heard General Patraeus talk about the success of the Iraqi army he told us that battalions were now fighting against whom? He didn't tell us that. There are 350,000 in the Iraqi army. We heard about battalions. What about the rest of them? We heard him say there are some problems in manning and unit effectiveness. What does that tell us? Nothing. What we should've heard was how many Iraqi units there are and the status and reliability of each of those units. Why didn't we hear that? What about the national police? We heard from him that there are some unreliable units that need to be disbanded. Is that a meaningful report? Tell me how many units there are and the status and reliability of each of those units. Does anybody know this?

What about local police units? Same questions? How many of us are aware that there are 150,000 protective service personnel that protect the Iraqi government. Why aren't they involved in protecting their country?

The Iraqi government. They were given goals and failed to meet all but three. But we heard from Ambassador Crocker that he believes great progress will be made in the near future. Why should anyone believe him? Whose side is Iraqi government on anyway? We should know that.

Of all the billions that we send to the Iraqi government for reconstruction of their country do we know for each of these dollars went? How many millions or billions have the Iraqi government stolen from us? Don't you think that should be measured and reported? We know that the Iraqi government is totally ineffective. We know that Iraq has three major sectarian groups. Do we know the progress of each of these groups with regard to supporting their government? Has anybody asked? We also know that the real power in Iraq are the local tribal leaders. How many are there? How many support us? How many support the Iraqi government? We don't have a clue because nobody tells us.

What of our ability to seal the borders with Syria, Jordan Saudi Arabia and Iran? Is anybody telling us how many are being stopped and how many are getting through? What about materials? We heard General Patraeus say that he expects the number of IED's and EFPs going to the Shiites to increase. Why don't we fire our border leaders? What is going on with the Shiites? They used to be on our side and now they are more and more killing Americans. Do we know how many? Do we know whom? Do we know why? No. We did not hear any of this.

These are about a few examples. In every case if we heard what we have heard in the last six months from our vice presidents we would fire them all. Not because they're not fighting hard but because they can't provide even a half decent report of what's going on. You have to ask why? General Patraeus would never accept these half measured reports from his lieutenants. Why do we Americans have to be fed such crap?

Liberty or Death

2007-10-01T08:16:00.000-04:00

IEDs and Iraq a losing game

Most of you probably don't read the Washington Post. It is not normally worth reading but today there was an excellent three-page article on the history of IED use in Iraq from 2003 until today. This time period is marked with moves and countermoves but the bottom line is still the same a handful (26 cells) of guys are causing two thirds of all the casualties in Iraq. This is not counting the greater number of Iraqi casualties. You can read the whole article at the following URL

http://www.washingtonpost.com/

Be patient is not easy to navigate this article. You should find a number of videos talking about IED's. The one that impressed me the most was narrated by a sergeant who is in a JERV a 26 ton truck built to withstand IED's. He was describing how 100 pound bomb went off directly underneath his truck creating a 7 foot deep crater that was 14 feet wide. It blew the truck 4 feet into the air at its slammed back down more or less intact in with nobody inside injured.

I've included here a few of the quotes that provide the statistics of how we are doing it is not good.

more than 81,000 IED attacks have occurred in Iraq, including 25,000 so far this year, according to U.S. military sources.

IEDs have caused nearly two-thirds of the 3,100 American combat deaths in Iraq, and an even higher proportion of battle wounds. This year alone, through mid-July, they have also resulted in an estimated 11,000 Iraqi civilian casualties and more than 600 deaths among Iraqi security forces. To the extent that the United States is not winning militarily in Iraq, the roadside bomb, which as of Sept. 22 had killed or wounded 21,200 Americans,

Yet bombs continued to detonate, and soldiers kept dying. The 100 or so daily IED "events" -- bombs that blow up, as well as those discovered before they detonate -- have doubled since the 50 per day typical in January 2006. The 3,229 IEDs recorded in March of this year put the monthly total in Iraq above 3,000 for the first time, a threshold also exceeded in May and June.

Two particularly deadly IEDs now account for about 70 percent of U.S. bombing deaths in Iraq: the explosively formed penetrator, an armor-killing device first seen in May 2004, and linked by the U.S. government to Iran, and the "deep buried," or underbelly, bomb that first became prominent in August 2005.

Our government has not been sitting still, they are developing vehicles with improved armor that can withstand in roadside bombs. The cougar at 12 tons is the lightest of the class and the Buffalo at 24 tons is obviously more substantial. The two URLs below give you more detailed information on this new class of vehicles including the cougar in the Buffalo. I could not find any reference to the JERV on the net. It must be too new. What is sad is that these vehicles will not get there in quantity before this war is over. Our guys are in the continued to die due to relatively small bombs.

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htarm/articles/20070930.aspx

http://www.defense-update.com/features/du-3-07/feature_mrap.htm

Note. Since their deployment to Iraq in 2003 the Cougar and Buffalo vehicles employed with explosive ordnance disposal teams and engineers units have taken about 1,000 IED hits without a loss of life, said Wayne Phillips, a company vice president in charge of Marine Corps programs.

Liberty or Death

2007-08-18T06:51:00.000-04:00

World War II US Pacific Strategy Against Japan

This paper is of keen interest to those who love strategy over tactics. How many of you readers believe that the US’s Grand Strategy/Strategy in the Pacific was a good one if not a great one? I did before I did the following research. How many even know what the strategy was? Monday morning quarterbacking reveals what happened, and to some extent why. This paper investigates more of the why more than the what. I will even indulge myself in providing my own strategy for which I invite criticism.

Before you can evaluate any strategy, you need to establish unbiased benchmarks that all strategies can be measure against. Unbiased is subjective when you propose your own strategy so please be critical of what I say. To keep it high level I will use Sun Szu as my source for the following:

1. Know your enemy before doing anything. Today it is called intelligence, capabilities and intentions at all levels, political as well as military.
2. Use any and all means at your disposal to defeat your enemy. The best strategy is one that gets your enemy to surrender without a fight. Sun Szu goes on from there enumerating alternative axioms if plan A is not possible.
3. Beat your enemy with the minimum of effort. Use the psychological instead of force wherever possible. Convince your enemy to just give up by defeating his will to fight.
4. Identify the enemy’s center of gravity. Defeat that center of gravity if at all possible. Center of Gravity is that thing or things that once eliminated will cause your opponent to surrender. Example, convince your enemy that it is impossible to win. Note: wars are started when one side is convinced he can win.

Given these measures lets evaluate the US and Japanese prewar strategy and the post Japanese attack adjustments that had to be made. Japan achieved all of it’s objectives before May of 1942, so before we did anything after the fall of the Philippines and all the Island South of the Philippines and East of Midway. Pearl Harbor was never part of their prewar strategy until the last moment when Yamamoto was convinced it was possible. The Navy strategy was documented in Plan Orange which was conceived in 1897 and updated annually. Plan Orange essential was to drive out the Japanese by going through the Central Pacific ending with the defeat of the Japanese home islands. I don’t know the name of the army strategy, but its key point was to hold the Philippines and use it as a base to drive North. The Army strategy had to be revised somewhat when the Japanese pushed MacArthur all the way South to Australia. The Army strategy was then adjusted to use Australia as the base vice the Philippines. Drive North from that point when sufficient forces were available.

So what did the US know of the prewar Japanese intentions? We had the advantage of watching the Japanese war against China and Russia. In China the Japanese were there to play. Against Russia they quickly sought peace after being clocked by Russian armor. The US also learned very quickly at Guadalcanal the fanaticism of the Japanese soldiers and officers. This played significantly in expected casualties. The US knew that the Japanese imported a lot of raw resources, but were only dimly aware of their aims to establish an Empire in the Far East. One with no Westerners. Japan missed out in the land grab the Westerners waged in the 1800’s and in the 1930’s they believed it was their right to get a piece of the pie. Racial superiority played a role in this thinking.

The Japanese never planned to defeat the US, British Empire and the Dutch unconditionally. There aims were limited. Once they grabbed what they wanted their strategy was to seek peace. They believed this was possible based on their analysis of the character of the American people, who were strongly isolationist and were believed to be culturally inferior. This was extrapolated to the US military, who they believed would not fight and could not fight as well as the Japanese. Once the Japanese defensive perimeter was established, America would beat its head on the Japanese wall; then give up. Note, a defensive perimeter of a bunch of worthless islands makes little sense to you until you calculate the effect of putting land based air on the islands to cover the shipping lanes. Both sides rightly knew air power was the key to the geography of the Western Pacific.

The US never planned to start a war, but they did plan to finish it if one started. Essentially, the Plan was to totally defeat the Japanese military forces by frontal attack, used little finesse, but choosing to use a bigger hammer. Final result both sides miscalculated as to the other’s intentions.

Both sides knew the capabilities of the other, although the US was surprised by the superiority of the Zero. Both sides had the same command problems, the Army and Navy acted independently and fought over resources and strategies throughout the war. Japan had a government that let the military do as they pleased. FDR was a serious player in the prosecution of the war and made many of the high level decisions including key personnel. MacArthur and Nimitz were his hand picked guys, which lead to two independent wars being fought in the Pacific. MacArthur had limited naval support (Marines and ships) and Nimitz had little Army support, a couple of divisions. Both had their own air force. Marshall was also FDR’s hand picked guy, whereas King was utterly brilliant and a blunt speaker. He came up through the ranks. This became significant in the key decision to attack or bypass the Philippines and Okinawa versus Formosa. In both cases the Army plan was accepted.

So how do the Japanese and American strategies stack up against Sun Su’s principles? The Japanese plan was to defeat the will of the US. It rates high on paper, but when one looks deeper the plan was a good one for all the wrong reasons. It was conceived by working backwards. They could not defeat the Americans militarily so they had to rely on defeating the US will to win. This required the US to behave exactly as expected. Sun Szu would puke at this logic. A deeper understanding of the Americans, which was readily available before the war would have produced a different reality, but one that was not what they wanted, so it was dismissed.

The US strategy was abysmal, but guaranteed to succeed. It was abysmal because it required far more blood and treasure than was necessary. It was also poor in that no adjustments were made to reflect the reality of the fanaticism of the Japanese soldier.

The war went basically as the US planned. The MacArthur or South West Pacific front began from Australia and Island hopped to the Philippines. Side note, I always thought Guadalcanal was a navy operation. Marines were used, but the operation was under the control of Dug Out Doug. I no longer feel bad about calling it stupid.

Nimitz followed Plan Orange beginning with minimal island hopping through the Central Pacific starting with the Gilberts and Marshalls. He also waited until November of 1943 to start when he had a whole new navy, a fleet train, troop transports, amphibious assault craft and sea going floating dry docks for major repair. However, he made a major deviation from the plan by not taking Wake, but instead took a whole string of Islands in the South West before getting to his Plan Orange objective of the Marianas. From there the two fronts merged and Okinawa was taken by Nimitz as a prelude to invading the Japanese home Islands which would be primarily an Army affair. MacArthur invaded 39 major islands and Nimitz invaded 17. Most of these were bloody affairs where the Japanese fought to the last man. That is what happened.

What should have happened? At this point lets look at the strengths and vulnerabilities of Japan in May 1942 and rethink the strategy of how to defeat them economically rather than bludgeon them to death. All of this was known before the war and should have been factored into the planning. Strengths: fanatical militaristic culture with years of current war experience and a sufficiently large and experienced army. Weaknesses: a weak military industrial complex, slow R&D, cities made of wood, a country of 10 Islands requiring a lot of merchant traffic and self-sufficiency in food and almost nothing else especially oil and coal. Therefore, they required a lot of merchant traffic over very long distances.

Based on just these facts what would a Sun Szu Grand strategy look like? First choice; eliminate their will to fight. That would be the right choice, but a tuff one considering the culture of the Japanese people. How do you do that? Kill enough civilians and destroy enough infrastructure? Not likely. It did not work with Germany and the Japanese culture could endure far more pain than the Germans. But wait a minute; didn’t the atomic bombs end the war? Yes and no. Bombing was only part of the equation at best.

The alternative to bombing would be to starve them economically and food wise. First, Japan had an industrial society. Eliminate their raw materials and their industry would shut down. It would take three years or more to convert to a pre-industrial economy. You can’t grow horses and oxen overnight. Also most of the population either worked at a factory or in an industry that required factories to exist. In three years their society would totally collapse.

What about food? They were self sufficient before the war. As the war progressed they imported more and more food. Why, we will discuss later. Additionally, although self sufficient in food overall, not all 10 islands were self-sufficient. This required ships to move food between islands.

Based on these facts you can see the best choice for a grand strategy, eliminate their merchant and inter-island shipping (lots of san pans). Checkmate. Whether they surrendered or not is academic, they would be eliminated as a viable military force and become a third world economy. Their war ships and planes would sit do to lack of oil. In 1945 they imported no oil. Oil tankers were all sunk.

So how do you sink all their merchant ships? To see lets look at what happened. Sinking the Japanese merchant fleet was a secondary objective of the Navy. How can you tell? Look at Nimitz’s build plan. He built only 203 subs in the entire war. All were of the same pre war class, no R&D. 53 were sunk, or 26%. So what did they accomplish? 2,345 merchant ships totaling 8.6 million tons were sunk during the war. Subs and sub laid mines accounted for 64% of the losses. That is 1,500 ships sunk by approximately 176 subs. That was accomplished with the worst torpedo of any country in the war, and almost no R&D to improve it.

How does that compare to the Germans, who took merchant shipping seriously in spite of shortages in all other categories? The German’s built 1141 subs and 785 were lost. They sunk 3,843 merchant ships totaling 17 million tons. Germans had excellent R&D and a very good torpedo.

So lets look at efficiencies. The US: 5.5M tons with 176 subs or 31K tons per sub. Germans 17 million tons with approximately 750 subs or 23K tons per sub. How can an inferior US sub and torpedo out sink the Germans? Geography and an unplanned for Japanese strategic flaw. Japan had longer sailing distances and a lack of escorts because the destroyers were needed for fleet action. The island occupation and airfields, though a good naval interdiction strategy, they were a far greater liability. The Japanese had to resupply the garrisons scattered over the Pacific. At first they used merchant ships; they were sunk. Then they switched to subs and destroyers, which reduced the number of escorts, and subs sinking US merchants. An absolute disaster.

So this leads to an economical strategy that could have been foreseen in April 1942. First define your grand strategy to putting the Japanese people back in the Stone Age vice unconditional surrender. Develop your force structure and axis of advance to achieve this goal. How?

First build a lot more subs and focus them on merchants. Use the large modern fleet aircraft to sink additional merchants and draw out the Japanese fleet. This would have accelerated the demise of Japan sooner with very few casualties.

Second, eliminate the entire MacArthur front. It accomplished nothing towards attacking the Japanese center of gravity.

Third redirect Nimitz keep to Plan Orange. We did not need Nimitz to take 17 Islands in order to put bombers and Naval Forces in range of Japan. Skip the Gilberts and Marshalls. Take Wake Island. Then take 2 islands in the Bonins, skipping the well-defended Marianas. 2 Islands would be sufficient to put land-based air in range of Japan. The range would be shorter than the Marianas. That’s a total of 3 Islands vice 17 for Nimitz and 0 vice 39 for MacArthur. But what of the risks? Japanese land based air and naval convoy raiders. Using the Midway, Wake, Bonin axis would have put our convoys out of Japanese reach except in the Bonins, which would appear to be vulnerable to the Marianas. In truth repositioning the massive army air that MacArthur had to the Bonins would eliminate the air threat and Nimitz’s massive superiority in fleet ships and escort carriers would have eliminated the raider sub threat.

In the real war and as a secondary objective we destroyed the Japanese economy and the people were starving. What if we made this plan the primary objective?

Footnote concerning the MacArthur front. First, he had massive assets, 1/3 of all the US army divisions in the war supported by massive army air power. 27 divisions and equivalent air forces. Also level bomber could not hit ships worth a darn and the army had no dive-bombers. The had a small number of attack a/c fitted to sink merchants, which was MacArthur’s total contribution against the center of gravity. Dug Out Doug also made Montgomery look fast. He spent from March 42 till November 1944 taking New Guinea, a worthless jungle covered rock north of Australia with no resources need by Japan. Also he never did eliminate the Japanese garrison in the Philippines, they surrendered after the war.

I used World War II by John Ellis for my facts, for which I am thankful. It is an incredible collection of data.

Liberty or Death

2007-07-27T12:56:00.000-04:00

Colonel David Hunt's New book "On the Hunt"

You may have seen Col. Hunt on Fox News. He is by far the best military analyst in the news. Don't know much about him, he has written several books and is well respected by insiders, so he gets a lot of first hand poop.

His latest book is a riot to read. Lots of new facts and colorful language. He pulls no punches. Below are some excerpts from the book to get you interested. Read the book you will love it.

Liberty or Death

“The truth is that the Afghan military is not something we can fix in this lifetime. Without the Americans there, the army doesn't exist; it is just a bunch of guys we trained who will go home. We knew this-or should have known this. You can't take a group of people with a stoneage mentality and turn them into a military force in a short period of ' time. We have learned this from experience. For example, we have been in South Korea, training its armed forces, for more than fifty years and they are still not even close to our standards of fighting. We knew this but weren't honest about it, and now everyone is paying for it.

Given all this, it's no surprise that we've failed miserably when it comes to disbanding and gaining control of the militias. Afghanistan has 65,000 to 80,000 militia members roaming around. This makes any of our efforts to venture into more and more of the country too dangerous. The reality is that the country is slipping out of our control.

Even though we need right-now-on-the-ground-happening intelligence, we're sending in CIA personnel on ninety-day tours, and our State Department guys are assigned there for no more than six months. In ninety days, some people in the CIA can't even locate their position on a map, never mind build relationships with the people in that country. In six months, State Department employees barely have time to unpack their paper clips before it is time to come home.

We need a change in assignment policy. CIA and State Department personnel should be assigned to these places for a minimum of one year-just like in the military. When all the government agencies that are designed to fight this war are not on the same.

A few years ago the North Koreans perfected the counterfeiting of U.S. currency to the point that the U.S. Treasury Department could not discern the forgeries. North Korea uses this phony-money capability to buy things and undermine governments. Oh, don't forget that Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has declared that "Israel must be wiped off the map." The range of the missiles Iran bought from North Korea is 3,500 kilometers-that gets them to Israel, and parts of Western Europe too.

Five years into an undeclared War on Terror and we have not increased the size of the military and only recently started to talk about beefing up our overall strength. Any questions? These guys are not serious-not in the way of winning serious, not in a way anyone who wants to fight terrorism recognizes.

If how poorly prepared we are for the War on Terror scares you-and it should-then the war in Iraq should really make your hair stand on end. We have gone from a great victory in Iraq, in which we lost fewer than 160 of our great soldiers and marines, to an insurgency and then to a civil war in which we have had more than 23,000 men and women killed or wounded. What the hell happened? We attacked and kicked Saddam Hussein's ass because he supposedly had weapons of mass destruction (WMDs), was building nuclear weapons, and had barrels of chemical agents. We saw satellite pictures of trucks running around the desert with nasty stuff inside-except when we went in and looked for them, we found nothing. For two years, 1,500 experts ran around trying to find anything that even remotely looked, smelled, or tasted like a nuke, chemical weapon, or biological agent. At the end of this mad search, we were told the stuff ain't there-they don't know if it was ever there, and even if it was there, they have no idea where or when it went elsewhere.

I would have backed the war in Iraq if our government had said it was about influence in the Middle East, putting bases near Iran and Syria, and stopping Saddam from training terrorists at the secret Salman Pak facility. As the CIA and FBI have confirmed, this facility was a training facility.

In a great book, Cobra II, Michael R. Gordon and Bernard E. Trainor show us that Rumsfeld controlled almost every aspect of the deployment to Iraq. He was in charge. He made the decisions. The buck stopped with him. Rumsfeld was presented with a workable plan, but he told the generals to tear it up and make one designed for a smaller force. He then rejected every other plan that was presented to him until the troop numbers were what he, and not the generals, wanted.

PowerPoint slides and protect their own asses. General John Abizaid, the MFFC (main motherfucker in charge), has two days of actual fighting in Grenada. General George Casey, the head guy in Iraq, has ... hold on, let me count them ... zero days in combat.

It took less than three weeks for our soldiers to get to Baghdad. Many of my great friends, soldiers with whom I served, were among the first into Iraq and Baghdad, and they have told me over and over that there was no plan for the peace. I have heard this from guys at all different levels and in all different services: generals, colonels, captains, sergeants, Navy SEALs, Special Forces soldiers, you name it. To a man, they say they weren't given a scintilla of guidance on what to do once they won the war. They never had any doubt that we would win, but none of them was told what to do the morning after.

Garner, a retired three-star Army general, was given the job to fix Iraq-specifically, as head of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). But he was given no money, no staff, and no power. He began reconstruction efforts in March 2003 with plans to hold Iraqi elections within ninety days and to quickly pull U.S. troops out of the cities to a desert base. Garner should have known better than to take this or any job under those circumstances. The guy in charge must have control over the money and have tasking authority. Garner had neither; he also lacked the guts to tell Rumsfeld to stick it. Garner's can-do spirit and ego got in the way, and it had the predictable result-failure. He was replaced by L. Paul Bremer on May 11, 2003.

Therefore, dismantling the Iraqi army and police was the number one dumb idea in a war that has seen a legion of dumb ideas. Some military Iraqi units had disappeared, but some had not. Some cops had run away, some had not. The looting did not help, but we had planned to deal with it by using the Iraq police and military until Bremer showed up, panicked, and signed a piece of paper dismissing them all. This yielded the predictable result-chaos.

Recently, at a graduation ceremony for the Iraqi military, the newly commissioned soldiers were told that they would be sent to Fallujah and not
their hometown. The soldiers responded by resigning and stripping off their uniforms right there on the parade grounds. Two steps forward, how many back?

We need to announce to the world that we are withdrawing in six months and leaving 50,000 troops in three bases. Divide Iraq into thirds and let the Shia keep one section, the Sunnis take another, and the Kurds keep the north. Will giving the Kurds territory piss off the Turks? You bet-but they deserve it for not allowing us to use the northern approach from Turkey during the initial invasion in March 2003, and also for their persecution of the Kurds for decades. Put a U.S. military base in each third to continue influencing and watching Iraq, Syria, and Iran. This will help us finish the job we started-that is, to achieve a stable and secure Iraq. We should ensure that there is power sharing within a centrally located Iraqi government and that oil revenues are shared.

Jordanian journalist Fouad Hussein revealed the plan after interviewing top al-Qaeda lieutenants for his 2005 book Al-Zargawi: Al-Qaeda's Second Generation. The terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is now dead, of course, but make no mistake, the grand plan remains in place.

Here's how these seven phases roll out:

Phase 1, "The awakening": The terrorists use attacks like 9/11 to provoke the United States into declaring war on the Islamic world, which will mobilize Islamic radicals, getting them to rally around al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda considers this phase complete.

Phase 2, "Opening eyes": During this period, which Hussein said would last until the end of 2006, the terrorists continue to form their secret battalions and show Muslims how to wage war on the "infidels" and the "Western conspiracy."

Phase 3, "Arising and standing up": This phase, which should last until 2010, will bring increasingly frequent attacks against secular Turkey and archenemy Israel. The aroused Muslims will go to war against the infidels, and the devastation that Israel will face will force world leaders to negotiate with al-Qaeda.

Phase 4, "The downfall": This period will last until 2013 and will see the fall of hated Arab regimes, including Saudi Arabia and Jordan. Oil suppliers will be attacked and the U.S. economy will be targeted with cyberterrorism. Al-Qaeda will control the Persian Gulf, the oil, and most of the Middle East, giving them enough power and resources to attack the U.S. economy and military forces.

Phase 5, "The caliphate": Sometime between 2013 and 2016, al-Qaeda will establish the caliphate-that is, one government for all Muslim nations. All Western influences will be eliminated from the Muslim world. The caliphate will organize an army for the next phase.

Phase 6, "Total world conquest": Beginning in 2016, the Islamic army will begin the "fight between the believers and the nonbelievers" that Osama bin Laden has predicted. By 2022, the rest of the world will be conquered by the mighty and unstoppable armies of Islam.

Phase 7, "Definitive victory": By 2025, the army of "one and a half billion Muslims" will have proven their superiority. All the world's inhabitants will
be forced to convert to Islam or be ruled by the caliphate as second-class citizens.

The first thing we need to do is modify our vehicles to resist the effects of EFPs-something we could do if the private sector threw money at the problem. But we could also deal with the source of the problem, Iran. We have tools in our political arsenal that could deal with Iran, at least at this level of weaponry.

Our police, fire, and National Guard can't talk to each other. Hell, they can't talk to themselves on any single emergency frequency. This is after five years of spouting about how "we are safer."

Care to guess who has come up with a fix? It's none other than a Democrat, a senator from Delaware named Joe Biden. The fix is rather complicated, but simply put, it would require an expansion of the channels designated for public safety. By converting the analog signals to digital, we'd make many more channels available and would secure certain channels for the exclusive use of the responders. In other words, they would be able to talk to one another and messages would get through. Also, the signal quality would be significantly improved. Biden proposed this as early as 1997 as part of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. The 9/11 Commission also urged Congress to take steps to ensure greater communication capacity. So let's get it done. For crying out loud, what are we paying Homeland Security for? I don't care who fixes this stuff or how much it costs as long as it gets fixed, and gets fixed now.

We can also install sensors inside containers in order to track their movements. General Electric has developed a sensor called CommerceGuard that can be mounted inside a cargo container and can tell government officers if a container is opened at any time en route from factory to stores. This provides protection during the most vulnerable leg of any container's journey: the trip from the factory abroad to a foreign port. We can do lots of things. All of it takes money and a change in attitude-that is, being serious about our national security. We need
to get serious.

Nearly 8 million containers come through our ports each year; of those, only about 6 percent are inspected closely. This leaves us incredibly vulnerable. Not a single, solitary open-water or river port in the United States of America is adequately secured. None! Sea and river ports are difficult but not impossible to secure. Ports cover large open areas and provide many varied ways of entering-the water on which they are based, the land next to the water, and the vast road networks needed to support the port facility. It is a lot of area to cover.

Want to get some idea of how bad this can get and just how vulnerable we are? Let's look at the Port of Tampa. No one expects Florida to be hit. We tend to think that the terrorists are stupid and that they will try to hit D.C. or New York again. But Tampa has a population of 320,000. Tampa is a tourist hub. It is also Florida's busiest port in terms of raw tonnage of cargo. Half of Florida's cargoes
include hazardous materials such as anhydrous ammonia, liquid petroleum, gas, and sulfur. Tampa has a nuclear power facility. Tampa is also home to Central Command (CENTCOM) and MacDill Air Force Base, where the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and any other place in the Middle East that might have to be conquered or disturbed, are headquartered. Any serious attack on the Port of Tampa will cost us billions in commerce and kill untold numbers of people.

Since the beginning of the Iraq war more than 18,000 U.S. troops have required medical air transport out of Iraq due to disease.' The Army doesn't know what diseases we're talking about or why the number is so high. Might be nice to know, don't you think?

By 2006, more than 850 soldiers in Iraq had been diagnosed with a parasitic skin disease.

Toward the end of World War II, we got lazy and stupid. It seems we lost our way, and it is reflected in the other battles we have had to fight: Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Lebanon, Bosnia, Kosovo, and the failed Iranian hostage rescue. Somewhere along the way, between technological advances and arrogance, we started to believe we could do war without casualties. The officers of the corps lost its sense of purpose by taking on the roles of briefers, writers, and career men; they were no longer soldiers. They did not appear to care about their men, only about themselves and their futures. These are the people in charge today.

We can't win the War on Terror with this current crop; nor can we win with the
current way of thinking and doing things.

A sterling example of a commendable leader is Colonel, David Hackworth. He was given eight Purple Hearts, ten Silver Stars, and two Distinguished Service Crosses. Colonel Hackworth earned each honor he was granted. He had all the values of a true leader, the same ones he wrote about in his book Steel My Soldiers' Hearts. The values are courage, perseverance, communication skills, and teamwork. Hackworth had a feel for battle; he loved his men. He was innovative, selfless, and an amazingly brave soldier and leader.

Losers. Want a name? How about this one: General Tommy Franks. Franks' job was to face, chase, and kill the enemy. A good leader does this because that is what he has trained his troops to do; he knows his men, and he knows that doing his job involves putting them at risk. You tell them that, and you go with them when and wherever you can. But Franks did not have the courage to put his men at risk to get Osama bin Laden; he refused to send 900 Rangers in to capture the terrorist. He didn't want his easy victory in Afghanistan to be tarnished by
disaster or the loss of life.

The Pentagon undercut the Army to make their point. They leaked in, formation on Shinseki, they ridiculed his numbers (which, by the way, the Army staff had produced), and then they announced his successor fifteen months before Shinseki was set to retire, which of course made him a lame duck.

Army Secretary Thomas White was fired in April 2003 after ex pressing his agreement with Shinseki's assessment of the needed troop levels in Iraq. According to USA Today, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld "was furious with White when the Army Secretary agreed with Shinseki." In an interview after leaving the Pentagon, White said that senior Defense officials "are unwilling to come to grips" with the scale of the postwar U.S. obligation in Iraq, adding, "It's almost a question of people not wanting to 'fess up' to the notion that we will be there a long time and they might have to set up a rotation and sustain it for the long term."

McMaster knows too that part of being a leader is being up front with the troops and witnessing firsthand the reality of the situation on the ground. While on active duty, he wrote the definitive piece of criticism on the Vietnam War, Dereliction o f Duty.

There were provisions that already existed within the law for these kinds of situations. There was a super-secret court created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. The FISA court was available to the government-at any time-to go over the evidence to determine whether there was probable cause to eavesdrop. If you thought there were not enough judges available to do the work in a timely fashion, you thought wrong. The number of FISA court judges was increased from seven to eleven in 2001 upon the passage of the Patriot Act, and no fewer than three must reside within twenty miles of the District of Columbia. I am betting you think doing a wiretap or bugging someone does not happen fast
enough. Well, that's not true. It takes hours and sometimes days to do it right; it must be checked and rechecked. So the good guys have plenty of time to get the FISA court's approval. Plenty of time.

The FISA court also had a pretty good track record as far as this stuff was concerned. Hell, when compared to other government institutions or programs like the Department of Homeland Security, it attains superstar status. According to statistics compiled from the Department of Justice, the FISA court did not reject a single warrant application from its beginning in 1979 through 2002. In 2003 it rejected only four applications. Count them, one, two, three, four. Four, quatro.

That's A few years ago, the Pentagon actually got it right and founded a secret unit called Able Danger. This unit brought together the best military operators, intelligence officers, technicians, and planners from the Special Operations Command, the Army, and the Defense Intelligence Agency to focus on al-Qaeda. Their goal was to discover information about al-Qaeda and then use that information to prepare intelligence and military operations designed to detect, monitor, and-when the timing was right-destroy al-Qaeda.

The guys who found this info said, "Hey, we need to tell the FBI and have these guys picked up." The Pentagon lawyers said, "No!" Then they ordered the information destroyed. Why? Well, because of the big wall that separated foreign intelligence gathering from domestic intel gathering. And because these agencies didn't like to share.

Former FBI director Louis Freeh has told us that the Bureau could have prevented 9/11 if it had been given this information. We had information
that could have saved 3,000 lives, and not only did we not act on it, we destroyed it. Lost to us now are the profiles and methodologies used to identify Atta. They are all gone. Why? Petty bureaucratic turf wars and the lack of interagency cooperation and coordination created this mess.

Provisions of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. This act allows us to deport foreign-born individuals without charge or trial. You preach violence, you leave. You advocate killing us in the public square, you go home. You associate with terrorists, you can leave; in fact, we will help you leave on a slow tramp steamer with lots of work to do on the voyage home. Things have changed. The terrorists are on our soil. We have to protect ourselves. Will the courts here uphold these policies? We'll see, but so far, so good.

The government has responded to the Hamdi decision by passing, the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which sets up a system of military trials for suspected terrorists. Of course, we aren't sure how this will work in practice, or even if the courts will rule that it's constitutional. It'll probably take years before we know any of this. The bottom line is that we're still not dealing with the issue.

An estimated 50 percent of all' combat injuries are blast injuries resulting in traumatic brain injury; that's a 30 percent increase in traumatic brain injury from other wars. So could we get our guys better helmets to protect them against such blasts? You bet. But they're probably hard to find and ridiculously expensive, right? Uh, guess again. According to Operation Helmet, the necessary
shock-absorbing helmet pads are commercially available. And they cost under $100!

The speech followed weeks of the political equivalent of rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. The entire team leading or rather, not leading, in Iraq has been canned, reshuffled, moved around, fired, lessened, or made to retire. From the political leadership in Iraq, with the change of Ambassador Kalaziaid, to the head military guy in Iraq, General Casey, to General Abazaid, the CENTCOM boss, to Mr. Negroponte, the first and so far the worst National Intelligence Director, all have been changed.

None of this will help. Success in Iraq, which I continue to hope for but increasingly see as lost, rests with a political and economic success, as it
has for the past three years. Changing a few generals and an ambassador without drastic policy changes will not work. My bottom line is no more soldiers should die in Iraq. No more soldiers should lose their body parts for a country and a people that will not stand up for themselves. On a recent visit to Iraq, I was once again shown how great our servicemen and women are, how brave, how dedicated, and how they have given enough. Our great military did their job. Now, it is beyond time for our politicians to do the same.

THE THREATS-AND HOW WE'RE FIGHTING THEM

Improvised Explosively Formed Projectile deployed in Iraq. The weapon is filled with high explosives and an inwardly dished steel or copper plate is fitted to the front of the canon. It is this plate that is formed into the projectile when hit by the detonating wave from the explosive.

The number of aliens other than Mexican ("OTMs") illegally crossing the border has grown at an alarming rate over the past several years. Based on U.S. Border Patrol statistics there were 30,147 OTMs apprehended in FY2003, 44,614 in FY2004, 165,178 in FY2005, and 108,025 in FY2006. Most of them were apprehended along the U.S. Southwest border.”

2007-07-27T12:38:00.000-04:00

Al-Qaeda in Iraq

Well we have done it again, shot ourselves in the foot. How so? A news item that got almost zero attention was on Lou Dobbs this week. “ 50% of Al-Qaeda fighters are Iraqi citizens.” How can this be? We are there to help the Iraqis.

Yea, well don’t forget the little factoid that, “40% of young Iraqi males are unemployed. That is a lot of pissed off heavy testosterone people. If it does not make sense at first, follow the money. Al-Qaeda is funded mostly by Saudi Arabia. Al-Qaeda pays Iraqis money to kill Americans. It does not get better than that. Americans don’t pay. But if you get shot or injured the Americans will take you to a hospital and patch you up. A job killing people with health benefits, what a deal.

Liberty or Death

2007-07-10T14:22:00.000-04:00

IRAQ: Fairy Tales JK Rowling’s latest book, with Liberty or Death comments.

July 10, 2007: The war in Iraq is notable not because it is against guerillas or terrorists, but because of the large number of armed opposition groups that are, for all intents and purposes, criminal gangs. Such organizations have been around here for thousands of years, but Saddam made them more powerful by incorporating the loyal ones into his security organization. Maybe it was something he learned from the Russians (the KGB loved to work with gangsters), but it left post Saddam Iraq awash in criminal gangs. Sunni Arab gangs grew rich, Kurd and Shia gangs got constant heat. Many quickly discovered that there was money to be made by giving yourself a nationalistic or Islamic name and declaring loyalty to the cause of Sunni Arab supremacy. Al Qaeda and Saddam's old allies had cash and cachet that made the gangs more powerful. All they had to do was support the bombing program and attacks on cops and soldiers (local and foreign). Since many of these attacks were paid for, the gangs treated it like another bit of business, even if 90 percent of the attacks on U.S. troops failed. Their paymasters understood.

American troops, especially reservists whose civilian jobs were as big city cops , noted the gang aspects of the situation over three years ago. Since American combat divisions and brigades were given a lot of freedom to innovate, some U.S. troops began importing gang fighting techniques from back home. Mainly, this consisted of intelligence gathering techniques, and specialized software used by some police organizations. The newly formed Iraqi police got into this as well, but they were not as effective, because of the pervasive corruption. Unfortunately, the Iraqi police had the manpower on the street, that U.S. forces lacked. Iraqi cops spoke the language, and could quickly size up where a neighborhoods loyalties were. But the Iraqi police or army never had enough first rate units to take on the gangs.

The American databases of Iraq's Most Wanted grew year by year. The databases were eventually merged, and the picture of who was who in the Gangs of Iraq became clearer. Then came the idea that, with enough additional American manpower, one could conduct a targeted gangbusters campaign. The key to making this work long term was the desire of ordinary Iraqis to be done with the gangs. Over the last three years, life had become intolerable in many parts of Iraq, as the gangs began spending most of their time getting rich and, worst of all, doing whatever they liked. The stories of gang atrocities began to sound like stuff you'd only encounter in a horror movie. But then, U.S. intel troops knew that the horror stories of Saddam's street level enforcers were true. With that in mind, the new horrors seemed familiar. But now the Sunni Arabs were most often on the receiving end, as the gangs sought to insure the loyalty of those they lived among. The gangs had no trouble recruiting. There was little reconstruction going on in Sunni Arab areas. While Iraq's economy, overall, has been growing quickly in the past four years, it's been unending recession in Sunni Arab areas. The gangs offered young Sunni Arab men a job, and a license to do whatever the hell they wanted. Most Sunni Arabs now wanted the gangs gone, and were in an appreciative mood when American troops came in and took on the outlaws.

The deal was simple. We will run the local bad guys out, killing or arresting those we catch. In return, the local tribe and clan leaders will support recruiting for the local police force, and the tribe will recognize the Shia dominated government. If that happens, then American, or Iraqi, troops will be available if the bad guys try to return and reassert control. Thus peace will return, along with economic growth and a lot less violence in the streets.

The gangs have not taken this new program well. Of the hundreds of gangs in Sunni Arab areas, about half are now banged up and in flight, or essentially destroyed. Still lots of bad guys running around, but without their safe houses, stockpiles of weapons, or piles of cash. When the U.S. troops move it, they start getting lots of anonymous, or not-so-anonymous tips about where the bad guys, and there stuff, is. Even without the tips, the presence of American troops makes other ploys possible. Like the use of many UAVs at night, looking for people moving and burying weapons and other stuff (explosives, radio gear, cash). Raids and car chases follow. Many U.S. troops prefer working the night shift. There's more arrests, the night vision gear is fun to use, and it's not nearly as hot.

The gangs are united by common needs, common enemies, and a desire to see Sunni Arabs running Iraqi again. The chatter among the gangs is that something spectacular needs to be done now, to prevent the gangs from being hammered into a state of marginalized ineffectiveness. That's where the talk of a "Tet Offensive" comes from. This would emulate the suicidal attacks South Vietnamese guerillas and North Vietnamese troops made in 1969. The idea then was that such a broad offensive would encourage the South Vietnamese population to rise up in support of the communists. Most South Vietnamese were anti-communist, but the communists had convinced themselves otherwise. Militarily, the attacks were a major defeat for the Viet Cong (the South Vietnamese guerillas) and a big setback for the communist effort to take over South Vietnam. But the American media declared it a U.S. defeat, and U.S. government support for South Vietnam declined, reached the point where, in 1975, the second North Vietnamese attempt at taking South Vietnam via conventional invasion worked, because the American Congress had halted even ammo shipments to South Vietnam.

Of course, the situation is different this time. While an Iraqi Tet would also result in a great slaughter against the "guerillas," the only neighboring country capable of invading and taking over is Iran. But Iran is the traditional foe of the Sunni Arabs. So what do the Sunni Arabs expect to achieve by attempting a general uprising? Well, it seems that the Sunni Arabs are still very full of themselves and believe that, if they can force American troops to leave Iraq, they will be able to outsmart and outfight the Kurds and Shia Arabs, and regain control. To understand what's going on in Iraq, you have to understand that fantasies like that are taken very seriously.

Liberty or Death Comment.

Most Americans do not hate the war, they hate losing. Our ROEs prevent us using our huge tecnological advantage. Symmetric warfare is attrtional warfare and we can't win that one, even with a 10 to 1 kill ratio. We have no successful strategy against snipers except our snipers. Again symmetric warfare. We have no defense against IEDs and EFPs except jammers that also jam our equipment. IEDs and EFPs used to account for 85% of the casualties. That down to 70-75% with the increase in snipers. Snipers are ideal weapons against Gen Patraeus's "neighborhood strategy". Small size units holding previously swept neighborhoods. Choosing not to be mobile is a snipers dream. When you look at the casualty figures on the news at night, even the hostile press is too stupid to know the real numbers. They understand dead. They understand wounded, but they forget to ask about disease. 18,000 have been sent to back the states because their disease could not be cured in country.

Patraeus's hearts and minds strategy will work, but not in the next 5 years. He has till September, with an interim report in July which will show that the Iraqi government has not met a single goal. Not one. The significant objectives are political, not military. We are losing both. Our troops win every fight, 100%; but are losing the war. We are spending 12B per month in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is unsustainable.

I disagree that Rowling adds any value by identifying the bad guys as gangs. Iraq is suffering from 100s of loosely organized groups, Sunnis, Shia and Kurds; as well as foreign insurgents and Al-Qaeda. Label them what you wish. They are still bands of killers. Labeling them as gangs suggests we know how to effectively deal with gangs. We don't. It is all about money. No money; no gangs, tribes, groups or other bunches of bad guys. Gangs in the US get their money through crime. Is the author implying that the gangs of Iraq get their money through crime like the Afghans?

We have two choices in Iraq; write it off in Sept. or make Draconian changes. Eliminate the Iraqi government. Disband the police. They are participating with the bad guy groups, even leading them. Split the army up along ethnic lines and create 3 separate states with a loose Federal government (start with a dictator) that regulates commerce and oil revenue.

Most importantly stop treating Iraq and Afghanistan as specific objectives. Get back to the big picture of defeating Islamic Jihadis. Forget borders, they do. The key to every organization no matter what its objective is; its money. No money, no organized groups. Money provides salaries, food, weapons and ammo and local citizen indifference. Are we going after the money? No. Most it comes from Saudi Arabia, Iran and Syria in that order. Yes Saudi Arabia is by far our biggest long-term enemy. They create the ideologues and supply most of the money, especially Al-Qaeda.

We have our most effective weapon sitting on the sidelines; the US Treasury Department. Unlike State which is worse than useless, Treasury is eager to fight. The US controls 58% of the world currency exchange which is a 3 trillion per day business. The West controls up 90%. The Arabs 0. Want to get anyone's attention, block them from currency exchange. No bullets required.

2007-06-06T22:34:00.000-04:00

Why Military Experts and Historians Detest what is happening in Iraq and Afghanistan

You won’t hear it in the media or from most of the military pundits, but the current American Strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan violates the most fundamental maxim of military doctrine.

If your not a military student and most are not I won’t bore you with the details. Simply said doctrine is sum total of all the wisdom our military imparts to our soldiers. Its written, it takes advantage of our technology, everyone trains to it. In the heat of battle soldiers automatically execute the doctrine because it becomes a part of him or her. Our doctrine plus technology is what makes the American military far superior to any other in the world. Quite simply our military can act faster than the enemy can detect and react. The enemy is always 2 steps behind in the decision cycle; which is sure defeat.

So how is it that we can crush the Taliban and Iraqi military twice with virtually no loses and now we are having our butts handed to us by 3rd world militias and insurgents? Quite simply, this president is using our finest warriors in a police action, which strips our military of their doctrinal and technological advantages. The bad guys actually have all the advantages. We are non-Arabs in uniform while they look and dress exactly like the civilians we are trying to protect. We sanctify life while they sanctify death.

Back to doctrine. There are thousands of pages, but I will address just one principle. Doctrine is based on military principles that are timeless. Sun Tsu was written thousands of years ago and is still valid to day. Clausewitz is 100 years old and still valid. One of the most important principles is based on the game rock, scissors paper. The game used in the movie Tremors. Paper covers rock, rock breaks scissors and scissors cut paper. One wins completely the other loses completely. Rock on rock is not permitted. The military calls this asymmetric warfare. Our military is the best in the world at applying this principle. If a guy has a gun you hit him with an artillery shell. If a guy has a tank you hit him with a smart bomb from 20 thousand feet. Bad guys die good guys live. More importantly, the bad guys never have a chance.

Back to Iraq. Put all these rag tag Islamists in an open field and we could kill them all without a single casualty. Put them among civilians who won’t rat them out and our advantage disappears. Why? ROEs. Our culture and media won’t stand for high civilian casualties, even complicit civilians. So what is Patraeus doing with our finest warriors, our guys with guns kick open doors and shoot it out with their guys with guns. Its called symmetric warfare. No more “suspected nest of bad guys, call in the artillery; all good guys live.” Now good guys die.

In fact it is worse, the bad guys are the ones using asymmetric warfare on us. Suicide bombers and IEDs/EFPs cause 75% of the casualties with no loss or 1 loss to the enemy. Why? We are in known places traveling up and down predictable roads. Want an analogy you can relate to. Picture all the scumbags in New York or Washington shooting the cops from ambush. The scumbags would have a kill ratio of 10 to one. Why? In less than a second he goes from innocent civilian to killer by whipping a gun out of his pocket at point blank range. It is only the extraordinary skill of our soldiers that keeps our kill ratios at 10 to 1. If the bad guys changed their tactics from hot head shoot outs to pure “sneak attacks”, their kill ration will jump dramatically. What is a sneak attack? Walk past a US patrol, pull a grenade out of your robe and toss it over your shoulder as you duck down an alley and run like hell. Unstoppable with our rules of engagement.

So how do you kill insurgents that hide among complicit civilians without taking loses. With our sanctity of life culture you don’t. It is not a military solution; it’s a political solution. Our military should have left in 2003. Their job was over. The state department’s should have begun, but didn’t. Why? The military takes orders, the State Department does what it wants and does not do what it does not want. State was dead set against this war and is dragging their feet with bureaucratic skill. So Bush is doing what all presidents have done in recent history, he dumps a diplomatic problem on the military, calls a police action a “war” and scams the American public.

Liberty or Death

2007-06-06T16:25:00.000-04:00

The Perfect Hispanic Storm

At the bottom you will find the Hertitage’s comments on the current immigration bill. It is excellent and I won’t add to it here, but I will address the coming impact on the American Taxpayer.

The Heritage foundation is this country's leading expert on immigration. Their recent study report provided to congress focus on the real issue, money. Immigrant households with less than a high school education cost we taxpayers 20K annually in federal and local taxes. Blacks Whites and Asians cost much less. Their upward mobility success is near zero, in part because they refuse to assimilate. Their kids have the highest drop out rate, teen pregnancy rate and crime rate. All part of the 20K.

There are more Hispanic immigrants in the US then all other cultures (except English) combined in the history of the US.

If we don't stop Spanish immigration dead the country will be bankrupt in 20 years as 40 million Hispanics not only cost us 2.2 trillion annually in our tax dollars but they will be hitting social security with this bill just when the system is going broke. The poor will get poorer and the rich richer. The middle class will all but disappear. We will become a third world country, rich and very poor, middle class gone, jobs outsourced.

Then there is the significantly more important cultural impact on America. We will become a multi - cultural state with Hispanics bringing and retaining their culture rather than assimilate. There is very little to admire about that culture other than hard work of first time immigrants. Their kids are arrogant, lazy and violent. Their treatment of women is second worst only to Arabs. They bring with them a disrespect for law and personal responsibility, no use for education, and MS 13, the largest gang in the world. They have no problem with fake IDs, driving without insurance and not paying taxes.

In 10 years they will own the states of California, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and North Carolina. California is currently 49% Hispanic. It will go first. What does own mean? Will they become part of Mexico? Hell no. They are not that stupid. They will own the state and local governments and totally control the culture and morals of these states. White flight will accelerate this process. But they will stay a part of the US so the American taxpayer can continue to pay their entitlements.

Who wants this nightmare? The American people are pissed, they live with this problem every day. Why is it being allowed? Simple, a perfect storm. First, big global businesses getting cheap and taxpayer subsidized labor. They are totally insulated. Second, the Democrats got 67% of the 2006 Hispanic vote up from 50% in 2004. They own 90% of the black vote, which they bought with entitlements. They will own 90 percent of the Hispanic vote in 10 years. Combined with a bunch of Republicans like McCain and Kyl who think 33% is better than no percent and could care less about the American people. They will be gone in 10 years. Of course, you will never find a ghetto in Ted Kennedy's back yard. Third, bleading heart organizations like the Catholic Church and other do gooders who support illegals and call all opponents racists and anti diversity. They coupled with big media create the victim image the American people are being silenced with.

What will happen when the burden becomes to great on the taxpaying voters? Washington politicians will start taxing big business. That will be very popular with the people. The fools in Washington can't see or chose to ignore that Big business is mobile. They will escape the taxes by fleeing the country. In short these 3 groups are looking at short term success and could care less about the long term. They know the real scewies, our children and grandchildren don't vote.

Will there be a solution. Yes but it will require a revolution akin to civil war of the net productive people rebel against the net takers. This will bring about a third party that caters exclusively to net taxpayers.

Liberty or Death

Q & A on Immigration Reform

Compiled by Heritage Foundation policy analysts
June 4, 2007

Question: Supporters say this bill does not provide amnesty to illegal immigrants. Why does Heritage disagree?
Answer: Because we’ve read the bill. It grants amnesty. Immediately.

· The provisional Z visa acts as a magic wand, instantly conveying legal status on illegal immigrants. With a provisional Z visa in hand, immigrants are instantly protected from deportation and authorized to work anywhere in the country.
· The bill stipulates that the federal government can start issuing provisional Z visas immediately upon enactment, and must start issuing them within six months.
· The bill grants illegal immigrants massive benefits (subsidized college tuition rates, free legal counsel for agricultural workers, etc.) in return for a token fee--$3,000 for an individual, $5,000 for a family of five.

Question: Why does Heritage believe this bill would actually slow down immigration enforcement measures?
Answer: Because the bill effectively puts the immigration justice system on ice.

· ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents are barred from detaining anyone who may be eligible for a Z visa. Instead, they must give those they apprehend a chance to apply for the visa. It’s like turning the Drug Enforcement Agency into a needle-exchange program.
· Immigration judges are required to close any deportation proceedings against illegal aliens if it appears they may be eligible for the Z visa.
· Even absconders who have flouted previous deportation orders can avoid deportation by showing that it would result in “extreme hardship” for himself or a family member—a loophole so huge you could drive a truck through it.

Question: Does this bill strengthen U.S. border security?
Answer: No, it does virtually nothing new to secure U.S. borders.

· Its “proposals” to increase security personnel, surveillance technology, and crossing obstacles at the border are mostly already required by laws like the Secure Fence Act of 2006. Repeating the same requirements strengthens nothing.
· Instead, the bill assures illegals of amnesty before security is tightened. Amnesty provisions would take effect as soon as the 700-mile fence required in the 2006 act is 47% complete.
· The bill uses false metrics to measure security. It repeats requirements to take security measures (additional border Patrol Agents, expanded detention facilities, vehicle barriers and fencing) without requiring any reduction in the number of illegal entries. Border security performance standards are lacking.

Question: Should Americans be worried that some of the bill’s enforcement provisions will violate their privacy?
Answer: Yes, Americans should be deeply troubled.

· The bill requires that all 7 million U.S. employers use an electronic ID system for all job applicants—even their own relatives.
· Anyone that wants a job will have to first be logged into a massive, government database so employers can verify their eligibility.
· This expensive approach raises serious concerns about invasion of privacy and identity theft.

Question: What are the fiscal costs of this legislation? How will it impact taxpayers, both in the short-term and long-term?
Answer: The proposal will generate tremendous demand for costly public services and assistance programs.

· Just paying for the retirement portion of the amnesty provision of the bill will generate a net cost of some $2.3 trillion dollars on U.S. taxpayers.
· Amnesty recipients are likely to impose a net cost (benefits received, minus taxes paid) on U.S. taxpayers throughout most of their lives.

Question: Does the bill adequately address the issue of guest worker programs?
Answer: Not really.

· While the bill includes many provisions that would help create a viable Temporary Worker Program, it unfortunately requires a cumbersome, bureaucratic approach to placing guest workers in jobs.
· Specifically, it would require the U.S. Labor Department to certify the need for each job opening.
· Worse, it would require guest workers in a variety of private sector occupations to receive “prevailing wages.” Why should non-citizens be guaranteed “prevailing wages” higher than the federal minimum wage for citizens?

Question: Does the bill currently being debated in the Senate parallel the failed immigration reform law passed in 1986?
Answer: Yes. The 1986 law granted immediate legal status to individuals unlawfully in the United States, as does this proposal.

· Like the current proposal, the 1986 law included additional conditions such as a criminal background check, payment of application fees, and acquisition of English language skills. The core of the law was nevertheless an amnesty that excused the intentional violation of American laws.
· About 2.5 million individuals applied for legalization under the 1986 law. Now the unlawfully present population in the United States is estimated at five times that number.
· The framers of the 1986 Act promised rigorous enforcement of immigration laws. This included an employer verification system and a focus on workplace enforcement. These efforts failed to stem the growth of the undocumented workforce. Nevertheless, the authors of the current bill propose a similar strategy.

Question: Will this bill adequately strengthen workplace enforcement laws and penalize employers who hire illegal aliens?
Answer: The bill requires every employer to use an invasive, unreliable employment verification system that civil libertarians and personnel executives view as hopelessly impractical.

· The bill would spend $400 million to build a new Electronic Employment Verification System—a monster database that would collect biometric data, photos, Social Security information and financial and licensing records for everyone seeking employment.
· Every employer would have to screen every job applicant—immigrant, citizen, even relative—through this system or face steep penalties.
· Unfortunately, EEVS will be based on a much smaller, error-plagued program (BASIC PILOT) established by a 1996 immigration law. A 2002 evaluation of that program determined it failed to protect employee privacy from inappropriate access by employers, government agencies and outside interests.
· BASIC PILOT is also plagued by frequent “false positives,” erroneous information that cost innocent workers their jobs. The law prohibits judicial review of such mistakes, making it virtually impossible to challenge errors or recover lost wages.

Question: What new rights and privileges will illegal immigrants applying for a Z visa obtain under this legislation?
Answer: It bestows all the rights and privileges sought by legal immigrants, as well as some privileges unavailable to them… and unavailable to U.S. citizens.

· Receipt of even a probationary Z visa instantly changes an illegal immigrant’s status to “legal.” They are free to seek employment, enroll in schools, travel throughout the country, etc., ahead of those individuals who played by the rules and await the opportunity for legal entry.
· They are eligible for in-state tuition rates at state universities, thereby entitled to tens of thousands of dollars worth of taxpayer subsidies. Meanwhile, those on regular student visas, as well as out of state citizens, must pay tuition rates three-to-four times higher.

Question: Many have expressed concerns about how this bill was put together and the short amount of time being allotted for full Senate debate. Are those concerns legitimate?
Answer: Yes.

· The bill was written in secret, by only a handful of Senators, and brought to the floor without any meaningful scrutiny.
o The “final” draft bill wasn’t available until after the bill was introduced. (Last year’s failed bill was used as a “dummy” bill during the initial votes.)
o Meanwhile, Senators were working off different versions of the bill, promoting error and confusion.
o Even the “final” draft featured major omissions and errors.
· There have been no committee hearings, no expert testimony given, and no significant opportunities for debate. To date, there have been only seven amendment votes, despite the fact that hundreds have been introduced.
· The American people have not yet had a chance to study the bill fully. The Senate should let them digest it, and make their views known, before taking up this bill.

2007-05-17T15:33:00.000-04:00

The Idiots Guide to Global Warming

Want to beat your head against the wall? Try to understand the science relevant to global warming. Good luck. There are literally 10s of thousands of scientific reports of all qualities and deeply divided support. Bottom line scientists agree on very little. The scientist have divided into two camps advocates and skeptics. I choose these names because global warming is the most political science on the globe. Why? Money. We can blame Bush senior and Margaret Thatcher. When he came to office spending on climatologic was 150M. When he left office it was 10B. Global warming is big business. 10s of thousands of people are making a living on global warming papers. Each yea their proposals need to be shriller to get additional funding. You also have to recognize that large political organizations have jumped on the issue and are using for their political goals, the environmental movement, moveon.org and Anti growth Marxists.

After 30 hours of researching the scientific and political crap I will try to guide you to make your own conclusions. There are few facts and lots of agenda oriented papers on both sides of the issue.

Lets start with the few facts. Global warming in the last 100 years is a fact. The earth’s atmosphere has risen 0.7 degrees Celsius. Everyone agrees. Check the graphs:

The other Temp. Graph you need to know. It is taken from the now famous Antarctic ice core samples, which were also used to calculate CO2 levels. Both numbers have a degree of error but the shape of the graph is meaningful. The blue cooling periods represent the ice ages and the red, the intervening warming periods. Note the max temp variation, from –9.5 to near +3 degrees. This is the most important graph in earth climatology because it is caused by the 800 lb gorilla of earth climatology, orbital mechanics. The earth wobbles and tilts in cyclical patterns known as Milankovitch cycles. See the backup for more detail. No matter what else happens, greenhouse gases, nuclear winter, ice ages are going to happen every 100K years. Yea, and it is going to warm in between. Fact. But since 100K years is a long time, nobody cares.

The other fact you need to know is what are green house gases. An honest answer from Answers.com is:

The major natural greenhouse gases are water vapor, which causes about 36-70% of the greenhouse effect on Earth (not including clouds); carbon dioxide, which causes 9-26%; methane, which causes 4-9%, and ozone, which causes 3-7%. It is not possible to state that a certain gas causes a certain percentage of the greenhouse effect, because the influences of the various gases are not additive. (The higher ends of the ranges quoted are for the gas alone; the lower ends, for the gas counting overlaps.)[2][3] Other greenhouse gases include, but are not limited to, nitrous oxide, sulfur hexafluoride, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons and chlorofluorocarbons (see IPCC list of greenhouse gases).

Notice the wild variation. What do you want for 10B dollars? Notice the two 800 lb gorillas above, water vapor and clouds. Wait a minute clouds are not green house gases. True, but clouds effect weather more than any other atmospheric variable. Why are some places deserts? No water vapor and no clouds, just intense solar radiation. Very hot, but it’s a dry heat. Want cooler temperatures you need clouds. The IPCC does not even list water vapor as a greenhouse gas. What is an IPCC? The UN International Panel on Climate Control. But more on that later.

That all you need to know. Huh? The other 10 million pages are hotly contested by scientists on both sides of the issue. Don’t want to read poorly written jargon filled crap, how about some videos. You can find Al Gore’s speech on “An Inconvenient Truth” to moveon.org. The last 20 minutes is all Bush bashing. The DVD released to schools cost $25. Want to know what your kids are being taught; the curriculum guide to the video is here. Want to hear the other side, see the video “The Great Global Warming Swindle”. Both videos can be found backup .

Well there is one more thing you need to know, what is going to happen? Who knows? The same scientists who can’t tell if it is going to rain tomorrow are predicting temperature and climate effects 100 years from now with 3 digit accuracy. The only thing that is certain is that the biggest effect will be in the Northern Hemisphere. Effects will vary greatly, but it is certain that places with moderate weather will get even nicer weather. The north will get warmer and more productive agriculturally. But deserts will get a lot hotter. The Middle East and Northern Africa are screwed.

Politicalization of Global Warming. There is a significant and loosely organized anti human growth crowd in the world. They want the industrialization of the west reversed and the industrialization of Africa prevented and the increases in India and China stopped. After the fall of the Soviet Union and Communism was no longer popular, the commies took over the anti growth movement, and other Global organizations such as the Sierra Club, Moveon.org, Peta and Greenpeace as well as the UN. Patrick Moore cofounder of Greenpeace left because of the anti capitalist influx. With 10B dollars on the table annually, it is no wonder that this crowd is into Global Warming big time. The goals of global warmers are the same as the anti capitalists – stop growth. To quote Al Gore, “there are 3 factors creating environmental catastrophe 1. Population explosion 2. Scientific and Tecnological Revolution. 3. Our way of thinking.” Sounds like an anti growther.

These guys are also fighting each other. The greatest reduction of man made CO2 would occur if oil and coal fired electric plants were replaced by nuclear plants. But the enviromentalist wacos want no nukes. They have won for the last 30 years. Environmentalists have also shut down refineries in the US for the last 30 years. How do you get alternative fuels, you need refineries. Want to destroy the US economy, destroy all the refineries. 100M people would be out of work. It would take 3 days to walk to the unemployment office. No trucks means no food. We would all starve. The anti growth wacos would win.

Liberty or Death

2007-05-17T11:36:00.000-04:00

Global Warming Backup to the Above Post

The following marerial backs up the summary above called the Idiot's Guide to Global Warming.

From Site:
What causes the earth’s climate to change?The level of Carbon Dioxide in the atmosphere is closely related to global temperature. Carbon Dioxide ConcentrationCarbon Dioxide (CO2) is a “greenhouse gas.” It absorbs energy from the Sun and then releases it back into the atmosphere. This “greenhouse effect” keeps the Earth warmer than it would be if this process did not occur. Throughout most of the past 425,000 years the concentration of CO2 has ranged between 180 and 280 parts per million (ppm). When the concentration was at its highest the world was warmer. The Antarctic ice cores that provided evidence of ancient temperatures also contain tiny air bubbles that were trapped as snow accumulated. These bubbles have been analyzed and provide a record of CO2 concentration over time. There is a close correspondence between average global temperature and CO2 concentration.

Are the changes in CO2 concentration causing changes in temperature or is it the other way around? It’s both.A major reason for the drop in atmospheric CO2 as temperatures decrease is that colder oceans are able to dissolve more CO2. There is a constant exchange of CO2 between the atmosphere and the oceans. Gas is dissolved and also released into the atmosphere. The balance is determined largely by temperature. You can see this effect for yourself. Open a bottle of carbonated water or soda. Pour some into each of two glasses. Put one in the refrigerator and leave one at room temperature. Come back in about an hour and take a drink from each. The one in the refrigerator has retained more bubbles. The fluctuations in CO2 level in the atmosphere are part of the Carbon Cycle, a complex process by which carbon moves between the atmosphere, biological organisms, the Earth’s crust and the oceans. The drops in CO2 concentration do not always begin until after a cooling period has begun. Then, as an ice age is ending, the concentrations may remain low for some time into the warming period. This means that the CO2 changes can not be the driving force in initiating these major climate shifts. But as the climate cools, the concentration of CO2 drops and this has a further cooling effect. And as the climate is warming, more CO2 is released into the atmosphere, further increasing global temperatures. This is called a positive feedback loop.

From Site:

Ice Ages the Milankovitch_Cycle

Milankovitch cycles are the collective effect of changes in the Earth's movements upon its climate, named after Serbian civil engineer and mathematician Milutin Milanković. The eccentricity, axial tilt, and precession of the Earth's orbit vary in several patterns, resulting in 100,000 year ice age cycles of the Quaternary glaciation over the last few million years. The Earth's axis completes one full cycle of precession approximately every 26,000 years. At the same time, the elliptical orbit rotates, more slowly, leading to a 21,000 year cycle between the seasons and the orbit. In addition, the angle between Earth's rotational axis and the normal to the plane of its orbit changes from 21.5 degrees to 24.5 degrees and back again on a 41,000 year cycle. Presently, this angle is 23.44 degrees.
The Milankovitch theory of climate change is not perfectly worked out; in particular, the largest observed response is at the 100,000 year timescale, but the forcing is apparently small at this scale, in regards to the ice ages. Various feedbacks (from carbon dioxide, or from ice sheet dynamics) are invoked to explain this discrepancy.

From Townhall.com Politics of Global Warming

It is a sign of how politicized global warming has become when a father's push for his daughter's junior high school science class to present both sides of the global warming controversy becomes a national story -- with the father being portrayed as the villain.

To recap, Frosty Hardison, the parent of a seventh-grader who attends school in Federal Way, Wash., was troubled to learn that science teacher Kay Walls had planned on showing her class Al Gore's global-warming pic "An Inconvenient Truth" -- without presenting any contrary information.

Former U.S. Vice-President Al Gore speaks before he presents Britain's Prince Charles with the Global Environment Award from the Harvard Medical School in New York January 28, 2007. REUTERS/Stephen Chernin/Pool (UNITED STATES)
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Hardison is an evangelical Christian who, as The Washington Post reported, sees global warming as "one of the signs" of Judgment Day. That is, Hardison fits the sort of stereotype bound to attract national media attention under the rubric: religious zealot fights science in schools.

The school board put a moratorium on showing the movie -- since lifted -- while it investigated whether Wells was violating a school policy requiring that, when class materials "show bias," educators "point out the biases, and present additional information and perspectives to balance those biases."

On the one hand, it is a sad commentary that districts see a need to restrict teachers' ability to communicate -- and that this country has become so sensitive that parents feel a need to muzzle what teachers can say in class. On the other hand, we've all seen teachers who think their political views are gospel.

In this case, Walls told The Washington Post that she could not find any authoritative articles that counter "An Inconvenient Truth" -- other than a 32-year-old Newsweek article. CNN apparently went to the same school as Walls, as it aired a segment in which University of Maryland Professor Phil Arkin asserted, "I don't think there is legitimately an actual opposing viewpoint to the 'Inconvenient Truth' film."

Allow me to present a few names. Massachusetts Institute of Technollogy's Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology Richard S. Lindzen complained to the Boston Globe about the "shrill alarmism" of Gore's flick. Neil Frank, who was considered authoritative when he was the director of the National Hurricane Center, told The Washington Post that global warming is "a hoax." Hurricane expert William Gray of Colorado State University believes the Earth will start to cool within 10 years.

UN IPCC Report Rajendra Kumar Pachauri (chairman)

Climate Change 2007, the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chair, said at the briefing that the report's broad participation gives it "the stamp of acceptance of all the governments of the world … that really provides the credibility of this massive scientific undertaking."

Hundreds of climate experts and government representatives from 113 countries labored all week in Paris to reach unanimous agreement on the wording of each sentence in the 20-page summary for policymakers.

Rajendra Kumar Pachauri (born August 20, 1940, Nainital, India) was elected chief of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2002. In 2001 he supported a consumer boycott of ExxonMobil for its stance on global warming, saying it was "a good way to put economic pressure on the US." At that time he was serving as the Director of the Board of the Indian Oil Corporation. [1] [2] He has said:
The Third Assessment Report (TAR) of the IPCC clearly states that the risks associated with climate change have the potential to undermine progress towards sustainable development, such as, damages from extreme climate events, water shortage and degraded water quality, food supply disruptions and hunger, land degradation, and diminished human health. [3]
Pachauri also serves as the head of The Energy and Resources Institute, a developing-country institution devoted to sustainable development.
He obtained an M.S. in industrial engineering in 1972, a Ph.D. in industrial engineering, and a Ph.D. in economics from North Carolina State University.
In acknowledgement of his environmental contributions, Pachauri was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2001 -- one of India's highest civilian awards that recognizes distinguished service to the nation.
Pachauri was criticized for his comparison of Bjorn Lomborg with Adolph Hitler.

Note: the scientists were not in charge the bureaucrates were. The made the final edits and deletions. This issue is too important to leave to the scientists.

By Debra J. Saunders Tuesday, February 6, 2007 UN IPCC Report

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report released last week was billed as 100 percent proof positive that global warming is real, modern man is to blame and anyone who doubts that is a bad human being.
Readers should be aware that the IPCC Summary for Policymakers was not exactly the work of disinterested scientists completely divorced from politics. Manning explained that the final draft was based on peer-reviewed research, then reviewed "line by line by government delegates."
The fact they are heavy-handed, of course, doesn't mean that they are wrong. It's no problem if you over-hype global warming. The IPCC summary issued a prediction for how much sea level would rise -- by 7 to 23 inches by 2100 -- a big drop from the 20 feet that former Vice President Al Gore warned about in "An Inconvenient Truth." Where's the scorn?

By Jonah Goldberg Friday, February 9, 2007

You get it already. But in the history of trade-offs, never has there been a better one than trading a tiny amount of global warming for a massive amount of global prosperity. Earth got about 0.7 degrees Celsius warmer in the 20th century while it increased its GDP by 1,800 percent, by one estimate. How much of that 0.7 degrees can be laid at the feet of that 1,800 percent is unknowable, but let's stipulate that all of the warming was the result of our prosperity and that this warming is in fact indisputably bad (which is hardly obvious). That's still an amazing bargain. Life expectancies in the United States increased from about 47 years to about 77 years. Literacy, medicine, leisure and even, in many respects, the environment have improved mightily over the course of the 20th century, at least in the prosperous West.

Global Warming: The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus
Richard S. Lindzen

Richard S. Lindzen is the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Most of the literate world today regards "global warming'' as both real and dangerous. Indeed, the diplomatic activity concerning warming might lead one to believe that it is the major crisis confronting mankind. The June 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, focused on international agreements to deal with that threat, and the heads of state from dozens of countries attended. I must state at the outset, that, as a scientist, I can find no substantive basis for the warming scenarios being popularly described. Moreover, according to many studies I have read by economists, agronomists, and hydrologists, there would be little difficulty adapting to such warming if it were to occur. Such was also the conclusion of the recent National Research Council's report on adapting to global change. Many aspects of the catastrophic scenario have already been largely discounted by the scientific community. For example, fears of massive sea-level increases accompanied many of the early discussions of global warming, but those estimates have been steadily reduced by orders of magnitude, and now it is widely agreed that even the potential contribution of warming to sea-level rise would be swamped by other more important factors.
To show why I assert that there is no substantive basis for predictions of sizeable global warming due to observed increases in minor greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, and chlorofluorocarbons, I shall briefly review the science associated with those predictions.
Summary of Scientific Issues
Before even considering "greenhouse theory,'' it may be helpful to begin with the issue that is almost always taken as a given--that carbon dioxide will inevitably increase to values double and even quadruple present values. Evidence from the analysis of ice cores and after 1958 from direct atmospheric sampling shows that the amount of carbon dioxide in the air has been increasing since 1800. Before 1800 the density was about 275 parts per million by volume. Today it is about 355 parts per million by volume. The increase is generally believed to be due to the combination of increased burning of fossil fuels and before 1905 to deforestation. The total source is estimated to have been increasing exponentially at least until 1973. From 1973 until 1990 the rate of increase has been much slower, however. About half the production of carbon dioxide has appeared in the atmosphere.
Predicting what will happen to carbon dioxide over the next century is a rather uncertain matter. By assuming a shift toward the increased use of coal, rapid advances in the third world's standard of living, large population increases, and a reduction in nuclear and other nonfossil fuels, one can generate an emissions scenario that will lead to a doubling of carbon dioxide by 2030--if one uses a particular model for the chemical response to carbon dioxide emissions. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Working Group I's model referred to that as the "business as usual'' scenario. As it turns out, the chemical model used was inconsistent with the past century's record; it would have predicted that we would already have about 400 parts per million by volume. An improved model developed at the Max Planck Institute in Hamburg shows that even the "business as usual'' scenario does not double carbon dioxide by the year 2100. It seems unlikely moreover that the indefinite future of energy belongs to coal. I also find it difficult to believe that technology will not lead to improved nuclear reactors within fifty years.
Nevertheless, we have already seen a significant increase in carbon dioxide that has been accompanied by increases in other minor greenhouse gases such as methane and chlorofluorocarbons. Indeed, in terms of greenhouse potential, we have had the equivalent of a 50 percent increase in carbon dioxide over the past century. The effects of those increases are certainly worth studying--quite independent of any uncertain future scenarios.
The Greenhouse Effect.
The crude idea in the common popular presentation of the greenhouse effect is that the atmosphere is transparent to sunlight (apart from the very significant reflectivity of both clouds and the surface), which heats the Earth's surface. The surface offsets that heating by radiating in the infrared. The infrared radiation increases with increasing surface temperature, and the temperature adjusts until balance is achieved. If the atmosphere were also transparent to infrared radiation, the infrared radiation produced by an average surface temperature of minus eighteen degrees centigrade would balance the incoming solar radiation (less that amount reflected back to space by clouds). The atmosphere is not transparent in the infrared, however. So the Earth must heat up somewhat more to deliver the same flux of infrared radiation to space. That is what is called the greenhouse effect.
The fact that the Earth's average surface temperature is fifteen degrees centigrade rather than minus eighteen degrees centigrade is attributed to that effect. The main absorbers of infrared in the atmosphere are water vapor and clouds. Even if all other greenhouse gases (such as carbon dioxide and methane) were to disappear, we would still be left with over 98 percent of the current greenhouse effect. Nevertheless, it is presumed that increases in carbon dioxide and other minor greenhouse gases will lead to significant increases in temperature. As we have seen, carbon dioxide is increasing. So are other minor greenhouse gases. A widely held but questionable contention is that those increases will continue along the path they have followed for the past century.
The simple picture of the greenhouse mechanism is seriously oversimplified. Many of us were taught in elementary school that heat is transported by radiation, convection, and conduction. The above representation only refers to radiative transfer. As it turns out, if there were only radiative heat transfer, the greenhouse effect would warm the Earth to about seventy-seven degrees centigrade rather than to fifteen degrees centigrade. In fact, the greenhouse effect is only about 25 percent of what it would be in a pure radiative situation. The reason for this is the presence of convection (heat transport by air motions), which bypasses much of the radiative absorption.

What is really going on is schematically illustrated in Figure 1. The surface of the Earth is cooled in large measure by air currents (in various forms including deep clouds) that carry heat upward and poleward. One consequence of this picture is that it is the greenhouse gases well above the Earth's surface that are of primary importance in determining the temperature of the Earth. That is especially important for water vapor, whose density decreases by about a factor of 1,000 between the surface and ten kilometers above the surface. Another consequence is that one cannot even calculate the temperature of the Earth without models that accurately reproduce the motions of the atmosphere. Indeed, present models have large errors here--on the order of 50 percent. Not surprisingly, those models are unable to calculate correctly either the present average temperature of the Earth or the temperature ranges from the equator to the poles. Rather, the models are adjusted or "tuned" to get those quantities approximately right.
It is still of interest to ask what we would expect a doubling of carbon dioxide to do. A large number of calculations show that if this is all that happened, we might expect a warming of from .5 to 1.2 degrees centigrade. The general consensus is that such warming would present few, if any, problems. But even that prediction is subject to some uncertainty because of the complicated way the greenhouse effect operates. More important, the climate is a complex system where it is impossible for all other internal factors to remain constant. In present models those other factors amplify the effects of increasing carbon dioxide and lead to predictions of warming in the neighborhood of four to five degrees centigrade. Internal processes within the climate system that change in response to warming in such a manner as to amplify the response are known as positive feedbacks. Internal processes that diminish the response are known as negative feedbacks. The most important positive feedback in current models is due to water vapor. In all current models upper tropospheric (five to twelve kilometers) water vapor--the major greenhouse gas--increases as surface temperatures increase. Without that feedback, no current model would predict warming in excess of 1.7 degrees centigrade--regardless of any other factors. Unfortunately, the way current models handle factors such as clouds and water vapor is disturbingly arbitrary. In many instances the underlying physics is simply not known. In other instances there are identifiable errors. Even computational errors play a major role. Indeed, there is compelling evidence for all the known feedback factors to actually be negative. In that case, we would expect the warming response to carbon dioxide doubling alone to be diminished.
It is commonly suggested that society should not depend on negative feedbacks to spare us from a "greenhouse catastrophe.'' What is omitted from such suggestions is that current models depend heavily on undemonstrated positive feedback factors to predict high levels of warming. The effects of clouds have been receiving the closest scrutiny. That is not unreasonable. Cloud cover in models is poorly treated and inaccurately predicted. Yet clouds reflect about seventy-five watts per square meter. Given that a doubling of carbon dioxide would change the surface heat flux by only two watts per square meter, it is evident that a small change in cloud cover can strongly affect the response to carbon dioxide. The situation is complicated by the fact that clouds at high altitudes can also supplement the greenhouse effect. Indeed, the effects of clouds in reflecting light and in enhancing the greenhouse effect are roughly in balance. Their actual effect on climate depends both on the response of clouds to warming and on the possible imbalance of their cooling and heating effects.
Similarly, factors involving the contribution of snow cover to reflectivity serve, in current models, to amplify warming due to increasing carbon dioxide. What happens seems reasonable enough; warmer climates presumably are associated with less snow cover and less reflectivity--which, in turn, amplify the warming. Snow is associated with winter when incident sunlight is minimal, however. Moreover, clouds shield the Earth's surface from the sun and minimize the response to snow cover. Indeed, there is growing evidence that clouds accompany diminishing snow cover to such an extent as to make that feedback factor negative. If, however, one asks why current models predict that large warming will accompany increasing carbon dioxide, the answer is mostly due to the effect of the water vapor feedback. Current models all predict that warmer climates will be accompanied by increasing humidity at all levels. As already noted, such behavior is an artifact of the models since they have neither the physics nor the numerical accuracy to deal with water vapor. Recent studies of the physics of how deep clouds moisturize the atmosphere strongly suggest that this largest of the positive feedbacks is not only negative, but very large.

Not only are there major reasons to believe that models are exaggerating the response to increasing carbon dioxide, but, perhaps even more significantly, the models' predictions for the past century incorrectly describe the pattern of warming and greatly overestimate its magnitude. The global average temperature record for the past century or so is irregular and not without problems. It does, however, show an average increase in temperature of about .45 degree centigrade plus or minus .15 degree centigrade with most of the increase occurring before 1940, followed by some cooling through the early 1970s and a rapid (but modest) temperature increase in the late 1970s. As noted, we have already seen an increase in "equivalent'' carbon dioxide of 50 percent. Thus, on the basis of models that predict a four degree centigrade warming for a doubling of carbon dioxide we might expect to have seen a warming of two degrees centigrade already. If, however, we include the delay imposed by the oceans' heat capacity, we might expect a warming of about one degree centigrade--which is still twice what has been observed. Moreover, most of that warming occurred before the bulk of the minor greenhouse gases were added to the atmosphere. Figure 2 shows what might have been expected for models with differing sensitivities to a doubling of carbon dioxide. What we see is that the past record is most consistent with an equilibrium response to a doubling of about 1.3 degrees centigrade--assuming that all the observed warming was due to increasing carbon dioxide. There is nothing in the record that can be distinguished from the natural variability of the climate, however.
If one considers the tropics, that conclusion is even more disturbing. There is ample evidence that the average equatorial sea surface has remained within plus or minus one degree centigrade of its present temperature for billions of years, yet current models predict average warming of from two to four degrees centigrade even at the equator. It should be noted that for much of the Earth's history, the atmosphere had much more carbon dioxide than is currently anticipated for centuries to come. I could, in fact, go on at great length listing the evidence for small responses to a doubling of carbon dioxide; there are space constraints, however.
Consensus and the Current "Popular Vision''
Many studies from the nineteenth century on suggested that industrial and other contributions to increasing carbon dioxide might lead to global warming. Problems with such predictions were also long noted, and the general failure of such predictions to explain the observed record caused the field of climatology as a whole to regard the suggested mechanisms as suspect. Indeed, the global cooling trend of the 1950s and 1960s led to a minor global cooling hysteria in the 1970s. All that was more or less normal scientific debate, although the cooling hysteria had certain striking analogues to the present warming hysteria including books such as The Genesis Strategy by Stephen Schneider and Climate Change and World Affairs by Crispin Tickell--both authors are prominent in support of the present concerns as well--"explaining'' the problem and promoting international regulation. There was also a book by the prominent science writer Lowell Ponte (The Cooling) that derided the skeptics and noted the importance of acting in the absence of firm, scientific foundation. There was even a report by the National Research Council of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences reaching its usual ambiguous conclusions. But the scientific community never took the issue to heart, governments ignored it, and with rising global temperatures in the late 1970s the issue more or less died. In the meantime, model calculations--especially at the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory at Princeton--continued to predict substantial warming due to increasing carbon dioxide. Those predictions were considered interesting, but largely academic, exercises--even by the scientists involved.
The present hysteria formally began in the summer of 1988, although preparations had been put in place at least three years earlier. That was an especially warm summer in some regions, particularly in the United States. The abrupt increase in temperature in the late 1970s was too abrupt to be associated with the smooth increase in carbon dioxide. Nevertheless, James Hansen, director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, in testimony before Sen. Al Gore's Committee on Science, Technology and Space, said, in effect, that he was 99 percent certain that temperature had increased and that there was some greenhouse warming. He made no statement concerning the relation between the two.
Despite the fact that those remarks were virtually meaningless, they led the environmental advocacy movement to adopt the issue immediately. The growth of environmental advocacy since the 1970s has been phenomenal. In Europe the movement centered on the formation of Green parties; in the United States the movement centered on the development of large public interest advocacy groups. Those lobbying groups have budgets of several hundred million dollars and employ about 50,000 people; their support is highly valued by many political figures. As with any large groups, self-perpetuation becomes a crucial concern. "Global warming'' has become one of the major battle cries in their fundraising efforts. At the same time, the media unquestioningly accept the pronouncements of those groups as objective truth.
Within the large-scale climate modelling community--a small subset of the community interested in climate--however, the immediate response was to criticize Hansen for publicly promoting highly uncertain model results as relevant to public policy. Hansen's motivation was not totally obvious, but despite the criticism of Hansen, the modelling community quickly agreed that large warming was not impossible. That was still enough for both the politicians and advocates who have generally held that any hint of environmental danger is a sufficient basis for regulation unless the hint can be rigorously disproved. That is a particularly pernicious asymmetry, given that rigor is generally impossible in environmental sciences.
Other scientists quickly agreed that with increasing carbon dioxide some warming might be expected and that with large enough concentrations of carbon dioxide the warming might be significant. Nevertheless, there was widespread skepticism. By early 1989, however, the popular media in Europe and the United States were declaring that "all scientists'' agreed that warming was real and catastrophic in its potential.
As most scientists concerned with climate, I was eager to stay out of what seemed like a public circus. But in the summer of 1988 Lester Lave, a professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University, wrote to me about being dismissed from a Senate hearing for suggesting that the issue of global warming was scientifically controversial. I assured him that the issue was not only controversial but also unlikely. In the winter of 1989 Reginald Newell, a professor of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, lost National Science Foundation funding for data analyses that were failing to show net warming over the past century. Reviewers suggested that his results were dangerous to humanity. In the spring of 1989 I was an invited participant at a global warming symposium at Tufts University. I was the only scientist among a panel of environmentalists. There were strident calls for immediate action and ample expressions of impatience with science. Claudine Schneider, then a congressman from Rhode Island, acknowledged that "scientists may disagree, but we can hear Mother Earth, and she is crying.'' It seemed clear to me that a very dangerous situation was arising, and the danger was not of "global warming'' itself.
In the spring of 1989 I prepared a critique of global warming, which I submitted to Science, a magazine of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The paper was rejected without review as being of no interest to the readership. I then submitted the paper to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, where it was accepted after review, rereviewed, and reaccepted--an unusual procedure to say the least. In the meantime, the paper was attacked in Science before it had even been published. The paper circulated for about six months as samizdat. It was delivered at a Humboldt conference at M.I.T. and reprinted in the Frankfurter Allgemeine.
In the meantime, the global warming circus was in full swing. Meetings were going on nonstop. One of the more striking of those meetings was hosted in the summer of 1989 by Robert Redford at his ranch in Sundance, Utah. Redford proclaimed that it was time to stop research and begin acting. I suppose that that was a reasonable suggestion for an actor to make, but it is also indicative of the overall attitude toward science. Barbara Streisand personally undertook to support the research of Michael Oppenheimer at the Environmental Defense Fund, although he is primarily an advocate and not a climatologist. Meryl Streep made an appeal on public television to stop warming. A bill was even prepared to guarantee Americans a stable climate.
By the fall of 1989 some media were becoming aware that there was controversy (Forbes and Reader's Digest were notable in that regard). Cries followed from environmentalists that skeptics were receiving excessive exposure. The publication of my paper was followed by a determined effort on the part of the editor of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Richard Hallgren, to solicit rebuttals. Such articles were prepared by Stephen Schneider and Will Kellogg, a minor scientific administrator for the past thirty years, and those articles were followed by an active correspondence mostly supportive of the skeptical spectrum of views. Indeed, a recent Gallup poll of climate scientists in the American Meteorological Society and in the American Geophysical Union shows that a vast majority doubts that there has been any identifiable man-caused warming to date (49 percent asserted no, 33 percent did not know, 18 percent thought some has occurred; however, among those actively involved in research and publishing frequently in peer-reviewed research journals, none believes that any man-caused global warming has been identified so far). On the whole, the debate within the meteorological community has been relatively healthy and, in this regard, unusual.
Outside the world of meteorology, Greenpeace's Jeremy Legett, a geologist by training, published a book attacking critics of warming---especially me. George Mitchell, Senate majority leader and father of a prominent environmental activist, also published a book urging acceptance of the warming problem (World on Fire: Saving an Endangered Earth). Sen. Gore recently published a book (Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit). Those are just a few examples of the rapidly growing publications on warming. Rarely has such meager science provoked such an outpouring of popularization by individuals who do not understand the subject in the first place.
The activities of the Union of Concerned Scientists deserve special mention. That widely supported organization was originally devoted to nuclear disarmament. As the cold war began to end, the group began to actively oppose nuclear power generation. Their position was unpopular with many physicists. Over the past few years, the organization has turned to the battle against global warming in a particularly hysterical manner. In 1989 the group began to circulate a petition urging recognition of global warming as potentially the great danger to mankind. Most recipients who did not sign were solicited at least twice more. The petition was eventually signed by 700 scientists including a great many members of the National Academy of Sciences and Nobel laureates. Only about three or four of the signers, however, had any involvement in climatology. Interestingly, the petition had two pages, and on the second page there was a call for renewed consideration of nuclear power. When the petition was published in the New York Times, however, the second page was omitted. In any event, that document helped solidify the public perception that "all scientists'' agreed with the disaster scenario. Such a disturbing abuse of scientific authority was not unnoticed. At the 1990 annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences, Frank Press, the academy's president, warned the membership against lending their credibility to issues about which they had no special knowledge. Special reference was made to the published petition. In my opinion what the petition did show was that the need to fight "global warming'' has become part of the dogma of the liberal conscience--a dogma to which scientists are not immune.
At the same time, political pressures on dissidents from the "popular vision'' increased. Sen. Gore publicly admonished "skeptics'' in a lengthy New York Times op-ed piece. In a perverse example of double-speak he associated the "true believers'' in warming with Galileo. He also referred, in another article, to the summer of 1988 as the Kristallnacht before the warming holocaust.
The notion of "scientific unanimity'' is currently intimately tied to the Working Group I report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued in September 1990. That panel consists largely of scientists posted to it by government agencies. The panel has three working groups. Working Group I nominally deals with climate science. Approximately 150 scientists contributed to the report, but university representation from the United States was relatively small and is likely to remain so, since the funds and time needed for participation are not available to most university scientists. Many governments have agreed to use that report as the authoritative basis for climate policy. The report, as such, has both positive and negative features. Methodologically, the report is deeply committed to reliance on large models, and within the report models are largely verified by comparison with other models. Given that models are known to agree more with each other than with nature (even after "tuning''), that approach does not seem promising. In addition, a number of the participants have testified to the pressures placed on them to emphasize results supportive of the current scenario and to suppress other results. That pressure has frequently been effective, and a survey of participants reveals substantial disagreement with the final report. Nonetheless, the body of the report is extremely ambiguous, and the caveats are numerous. The report is prefaced by a policymakers' summary written by the editor, Sir John Houghton, director of the United Kingdom Meteorological Office. His summary largely ignores the uncertainty in the report and attempts to present the expectation of substantial warming as firmly based science. The summary was published as a separate document, and, it is safe to say that policymakers are unlikely to read anything further. On the basis of the summary, one frequently hears that "hundreds of the world's greatest climate scientists from dozens of countries all agreed that....'' It hardly matters what the agreement refers to, since whoever refers to the summary insists that it agrees with the most extreme scenarios (which, in all fairness, it does not). I should add that the climatology community, until the past few years, was quite small and heavily concentrated in the United States and Europe.
While the International Panel on Climate Change's reports were in preparation, the National Research Council in the United States was commissioned to prepare a synthesis of the current state of the global change situation. The panel chosen was hardly promising. It had no members of the academy expert in climate. Indeed, it had only one scientist directly involved in climate, Stephen Schneider, who is an ardent environmental advocate. It also included three professional environmental advocates, and it was headed by a former senator, Dan Evans. The panel did include distinguished scientists and economists outside the area of climate, and, perhaps because of this, the report issued by the panel was by and large fair. The report concluded that the scientific basis for costly action was absent, although prudence might indicate that actions that were cheap or worth doing anyway should be considered. A subcommittee of the panel issued a report on adaptation that argued that even with the more severe warming scenarios, the United States would have little difficulty adapting. Not surprisingly, the environmentalists on the panel not only strongly influenced the reports, but failing to completely have their way, attempted to distance themselves from the reports by either resigning or by issuing minority dissents. Equally unsurprising is the fact that the New York Times typically carried reports on that panel on page 46. The findings were never subsequently discussed in the popular media--except for claims that the reports supported the catastrophic vision. Nevertheless, the reports of that panel were indicative of the growing skepticism concerning the warming issue.
Indeed, the growing skepticism is in many ways remarkable. One of the earliest protagonists of global warming, Roger Revelle, the late professor of ocean sciences at Scripps Institution of Oceanography who initiated the direct monitoring of carbon dioxide during the International Geophysical Year (1958), coauthored with S. Fred Singer and Chauncy Starr a paper recommending that action concerning global warming be delayed insofar as current knowledge was totally inadequate. Another active advocate of global warming, Michael McElroy, head of the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard, has recently written a paper acknowledging that existing models cannot be used to forecast climate.
One might think that such growing skepticism would have some influence on public debate, but the insistence on "scientific unanimity'' continues unabated. At times, that insistence takes some very strange forms. Over a year ago, Robert White, former head of the U.S. Weather Bureau and currently president of the National Academy of Engineering, wrote an article for Scientific American that pointed out that the questionable scientific basis for global warming predictions was totally inadequate to justify any costly actions. He did state that if one were to insist on doing something, one should only do things that one would do even if there were no warming threat. Immediately after that article appeared, Tom Wicker, a New York Times columnist and a confidant of Sen. Gore, wrote a piece in which he stated that White had called for immediate action on "global warming.'' My own experiences have been similar. In an article in Audubon Stephen Schneider states that I have "conceded that some warming now appears inevitable.'' Differences between expectations of unmeasurable changes of a few tenths of a degree and warming of several degrees are conveniently ignored. Karen White in a lengthy and laudatory article on James Hansen that appeared in the New York Times Sunday Magazine reported that even I agreed that there would be warming, having "reluctantly offered an estimate of 1.2 degrees.'' That was, of course, untrue.
Most recently, I testified at a Senate hearing conducted by Sen. Gore. There was a rather arcane discussion of the water vapor in the upper troposphere. Two years ago, I had pointed out that if the source of water vapor in that region in the tropics was from deep clouds, then surface warming would be accompanied by reduced upper level water vapor. Subsequent research has established that there must be an additional source--widely believed to be ice crystals thrown off by those deep clouds. I noted that that source too probably acts to produce less moisture in a warmer atmosphere. Both processes cause the major feedback process to become negative rather than positive. Sen. Gore asked whether I now rejected my suggestion of two years ago as a major factor. I answered that I did. Gore then called for the recording secretary to note that I had retracted my objections to "global warming.'' In the ensuing argument, involving mostly other participants in the hearing, Gore was told that he was confusing matters. Shortly thereafter, however, Tom Wicker published an article in the New York Times that claimed that I had retracted my opposition to warming and that that warranted immediate action to curb the purported menace. I wrote a letter to the Times indicating that my position had been severely misrepresented, and, after a delay of over a month, my letter was published. Sen. Gore nonetheless claims in his book that I have indeed retracted my scientific objections to the catastrophic warming scenario and also warns others who doubt the scenario that they are hurting humanity.
Why, one might wonder, is there such insistence on scientific unanimity on the warming issue? After all, unanimity in science is virtually nonexistent on far less complex matters. Unanimity on an issue as uncertain as "global warming'' would be surprising and suspicious. Moreover, why are the opinions of scientists sought regardless of their field of expertise? Biologists and physicians are rarely asked to endorse some theory in high energy physics. Apparently, when one comes to "global warming,'' any scientist's agreement will do.
The answer almost certainly lies in politics. For example, at the Earth Summit in Rio, attempts were made to negotiate international carbon emission agreements. The potential costs and implications of such agreements are likely to be profound for both industrial and developing countries. Under the circumstances, it would be very risky for politicians to undertake such agreements unless scientists "insisted.'' Nevertheless, the situation is probably a good deal more complicated than that example suggests.
The Temptation and Problems of "Global Warming''
As Aaron Wildavsky, professor of political science at Berkeley, has quipped, "global warming'' is the mother of all environmental scares. Wildavsky's view is worth quoting. "Warming (and warming alone), through its primary antidote of withdrawing carbon from production and consumption, is capable of realizing the environmentalist's dream of an egalitarian society based on rejection of economic growth in favor of a smaller population's eating lower on the food chain, consuming a lot less, and sharing a much lower level of resources much more equally.'' In many ways Wildavsky's observation does not go far enough. The point is that carbon dioxide is vitally central to industry, transportation, modern life, and life in general. It has been joked that carbon dioxide controls would permit us to inhale as much as we wish; only exhaling would be controlled. The remarkable centrality of carbon dioxide means that dealing with the threat of warming fits in with a great variety of preexisting agendas--some legitimate, some less so: energy efficiency, reduced dependence on Middle Eastern oil, dissatisfaction with industrial society (neopastoralism), international competition, governmental desires for enhanced revenues (carbon taxes), and bureaucratic desires for enhanced power.
The very scale of the problem as popularly portrayed and the massive scale of the suggested responses have their own appeal. The Working Group I report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggested, for example, that a 60 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions might be needed. Such a reduction would call for measures that would be greater than those that have been devoted to war and defense. And just as defense has dealt with saving one's nation, curbing "global warming'' is identified with saving the whole planet! It may not be fortuitous that this issue is being promoted at just the moment in history when the cold war is ending.
Major agencies in the United States, hitherto closely involved with traditional approaches to national security, have appropriated the issue of climate change to support existing efforts. Notable among those agencies are NASA, the Department of Defense, and the Department of Energy. The cold war helped spawn a large body of policy experts and diplomats specializing in issues such as disarmament and alliance negotiations. In addition, since the Yom Kippur War, energy has become a major component of national security with the concomitant creation of a large cadre of energy experts. Many of those individuals see in the global change issue an area in which to continue applying their skills. Many scientists also feel that national security concerns formed the foundation for the U.S. government's generous support of science. As the urgency of national security, traditionally defined, diminishes, there is a common feeling that a substitute foundation must be established. "Saving the planet'' has the right sort of sound to it. Fundraising has become central to environmental advocates' activities, and the message underlying some of their fundraising seems to be "pay us or you'll fry.''
Clearly, "global warming'' is a tempting issue for many very important groups to exploit. Equally clearly, though far less frequently discussed, are the profound dangers in exploiting that issue. As we shall also see, there are good reasons why there has been so little discussion of the downside of responding to "global warming.''
A parochial issue is the danger to the science of climatology. As far as I can tell, there has actually been reduced funding for existing climate research. That may seem paradoxical, but, at least in the United States, the vastly increased number of scientists and others involving themselves in climate as well as the gigantic programs attaching themselves to climate have substantially outstripped the increases in funding. Perhaps more important are the pressures being brought to bear on scientists to get the "right'' results. Such pressures are inevitable, given how far out on a limb much of the scientific community has gone. The situation is compounded by the fact that some of the strongest proponents of "global warming'' in Congress are also among the major supporters of science (Sen. Gore is notable among those). Finally, given the momentum that has been building up among so many interest groups to fight "global warming,'' it becomes downright embarrassing to support basic climate research. After all, one would hate to admit that one had mobilized so many resources without the basic science's being in place. Nevertheless, given the large increase in the number of people associating themselves with climatology and the dependence of much of that community on the perceived threat of warming, it seems unlikely that the scientific community will offer much resistance. I should add that as ever greater numbers of individuals attach themselves to the warming problem, the pressures against solving the problem grow proportionally; an inordinate number of individuals and groups depend on the problem's remaining.
In addition to climatologists, are there other groups that are at risk? Here, one might expect that industry could be vulnerable, and, indeed, it may be. At least in the United States, however, industries seem to be primarily concerned with improving their public image, often by supporting environmental activists. Moreover, some industries have become successful at profiting from environmental regulation. The most obvious example is the waste management industry. Even electric utility companies have been able to use environmental measures to increase the base on which their regulated profits are calculated. It is worth noting that about 1.7 trillion dollars have been spent on the environment over the past decade. The environment, itself, qualifies as one of our major industries.
If Wildavsky's scenario is correct, the major losers would be ordinary people. Wealth that could have been used to raise living standards in much of the world would be squandered. Living standards in the developed world would decrease. Regulatory apparatuses would restrict individual freedom on an unprecedented scale. Here too, however, one cannot expect much resistance to proposed actions--at least not initially. Public perceptions, under the influence of extensive, deceptive, and one-sided publicity, can become disconnected from reality. For example, Alabama has had a pronounced cooling trend since 1935. Nevertheless, a poll among professionals in Alabama found that about 95 percent of the participants believed that the climate had been warming over the past fifty years and that the warming was due to the greenhouse effect. Public misperceptions coupled with a sincere desire to "save the planet'' can force political action even when politicians are aware of the reality.
What the above amounts to is a societal instability. At a particular point in history, a relatively minor suggestion or event serves to mobilize massive interests. While the proposed measures may be detrimental, resistance is largely absent or coopted. In the case of climate change, the probability that the proposed regulatory actions would for the most part have little impact on climate, regardless of the scenario chosen, appears to be of no consequence.
Modelling and Societal Instability
So far I have emphasized the political elements in the current climate hysteria. There can be no question, however, that scientists are abetting this situation. Concerns about funding have already been mentioned. There is, however, another perhaps more important element to the scientific support. The existence of modern computing power has led to innumerable modelling efforts in many fields. Supercomputers have allowed us to consider the behavior of systems seemingly too complex for other approaches. One of those systems is climate. Not surprisingly, there are many problems involved in modelling climate. For example, even supercomputers are inadequate to allow long-term integrations of the relevant equations at adequate spatial resolutions. At presently available resolutions, it is unlikely that the computer solutions are close to the solutions of the underlying equations. In addition, the physics of unresolved phenomena such as clouds and other turbulent elements is not understood to the extent needed for incorporation into models. In view of those problems, it is generally recognized that models are at present experimental tools whose relation to the real world is questionable.
While there is nothing wrong in using those models in an experimental mode, there is a real dilemma when they predict potentially dangerous situations. Should scientists publicize such predictions since the models are almost certainly wrong? Is it proper to not publicize the predictions if the predicted danger is serious? How is the public to respond to such predictions? The difficulty would be diminished if the public understood how poor the models actually are. Unfortunately, there is a tendency to hold in awe anything that emerges from a sufficiently large computer. There is also a reluctance on the part of many modellers to admit to the experimental nature of their models lest public support for their efforts diminish. Nevertheless, with poor and uncertain models in wide use, predictions of ominous situations are virtually inevitable--regardless of reality.
Such weak predictions feed and contribute to what I have already described as a societal instability that can cascade the most questionable suggestions of danger into major political responses with massive economic and social consequences. I have already discussed some of the reasons for this instability: the existence of large cadres of professional planners looking for work, the existence of advocacy groups looking for profitable causes, the existence of agendas in search of saleable rationales, and the ability of many industries to profit from regulation, coupled with an effective neutralization of opposition. It goes almost without saying that the dangers and costs of those economic and social consequences may be far greater than the original environmental danger. That becomes especially true when the benefits of additional knowledge are rejected and when it is forgotten that improved technology and increased societal wealth are what allow society to deal with environmental threats most effectively. The control of societal instability may very well be the real challenge facing us.

Jerry Taylor is a senior fellow specializing in energy policy and environmental protection.

The first (and sometimes last) stop in the global-warming debate is the question, Is it real? The answer seems to be yes. Ground-based and oceanic temperature records show warming of about three-quarters of a degree Celsius in the last century. About half of that warming, however, occurred before World War II and is widely thought to be related to solar activity. Satellite and weather-balloon records, which do not go back as far, show less warming in the late 20th century than the land-based stations.
What's causing this warming? We don't know. As the vice president of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Yury Izrael, wrote bluntly last month, "There is no proven link between human activity and global warming." Given the extreme variability of global temperature, warming might simply be statistical noise. It might result from solar and/or volcanic activity. It might be caused by industrial emissions. And it might come from some combination of the three.
What do most scientists suspect is going on? The best way to ascertain the "scientific consensus" is to look at the latest report of the IPCC (released in 2001), which purports to summarize the state of scientific knowledge on global warming. Here's what it says: "Most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations." The report finds that it is "unlikely (bordering on very unlikely) to be entirely the result of internal variability," and that "natural forcing alone [i.e., solar and/or volcanic activity] is unlikely to explain the increased rate of global warming since the middle of the 20th century."
The promiscuous use of such vague terms as "likely" and "unlikely" by scientists who are trained in precision speaks volumes about how much is unknown. At the very least, such language makes it impossible to accept the Greens' claim that "the debate is over," particularly given all the uncertainty -- fully discussed in the IPCC report -- regarding long-term climate records and important data on atmospheric feedbacks. In fact, uncertainty about future climate conditions is greater in the 2001 IPCC report than it was in the 1995 IPCC report.
Should we worry about such modest warming? From an ecological perspective, probably not. Because water vapor is responsible for 94 percent of the natural greenhouse effect, industrial greenhouse gases have a greater impact in dry air masses than in wet ones. Fully 78 percent of the warming has been concentrated in the driest air masses, which are primarily found during the winter (when 69 percent of the warming has occurred), at night, and in the northern latitudes.
The fact that winter nighttime lows in the Northern Hemisphere aren't quite as cold as they used to be need not cause anyone to panic -- and there seems not to be an increased incidence of the destructive weather events that would follow from warming in wet air masses. According to the IPCC, "[T]here is little sign of long-term changes in tropical storm intensity and frequency," and "no compelling evidence" that local severe-weather events are on the rise. Most important, "no significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected." Precipitation in the northern hemisphere has likely increased by a meager 0.5-1 percent a decade, but "no comparable systematic changes in precipitation have been detected in broad latitudinal averages over the Southern Hemisphere."

My Notes on Al Gores “An Inconvenient Truth”

IPCC is the most accurate scientific assessment.

Global Warming is caused by human activity.

Casualties of global warming: glaciers will all melt.

Medevil warming period is not correct.

Graph of temp and CO2 “looks like they go together”

CO2 higher today than in 400,000 years.

Antartic Ice melt in the past made sea levels rise 23 ft (Al your IPCC Report is claiming 19-23 inches, oops)

Alaskan temperatures have gone up 8 degrees.
1 degree change at the equator = 12 degrees change at the Noth Pole which will make climate more violent.

CO2 will not just double but go up 4 times causing 60% loss of soil moisture
Greenhouse gases = CO2 (Al read the IPCC report there are a few more )
US reponsible for more greenhouse gases than S. America, Africa and China combined.
Why people don’t believe – a massive and well organized disinformation campaign lavishly funded by polluters.

Pretending there is disagreement in the scientific community about a broad based consent.

Scientist are taking money from big industry to say global warming is not a fact.
Republican talking points – scientific uncertainty is an issue.
Bush has Industry suing the government to reduce funding for global warming.

Notes on the “ Great Global Warming Swindle”

Little Ice Age occurred in the 14th century.

Medevil warming period occurred from 1100 – 1300

IPCC states that the warmest period was the Holocene Maximum 4-8000 years ago. Polar bears survived this warming period.

Patrick Michaels Uva. Current temp rise of 0.7 degrees celsius mostly occurred before 1940.

1940-1975 temp went down as industrialization went up. OOPs.
Carbon dioxide in atmosphere today = 0.054% total.

Water vapor = 95%.

Climate variability is a result of the temp variation between the equator and the noth pole. The greater the difference the more violent the global weather that year. 64 % of Global Warming occurs at night in the nothern latitudes. Therefore global warming will result in less violent weather. Sorry Al.

Richard Lidzen MIT warming should occur first in the troposphere 10-12 miles up.

John Christie NASA lead IPCC author If greenhouse gases cause global warming the temp should increase as you go up to 10 miles, but surface temps are warmer. Therefore surface temp rise is not due to greenhouse gases.
Al gore forgot to mention that CO2 rises lag 800 years after temp increase.
Volcanoes produce more CO2 than humans.

Animals and bacteria produces even more. Dying vegetation more.

The ocean is the biggest storage of CO2 and the biggest emitter.

Carl Wunsch MIT changes in ocean teps lag 800 years from the cause due to the mass.

Past 150 years the ocean temp has risen 0.5 degrees celsius.

Edward Mornder, astronomer, Sun Spots result in higher solar energy emmissions.

little Ice Age had fewer sun spots.

Eigel Fris-Christensen 1991 Danish Meterorlogical Inst.

400 years of sun spot data. Solar emmission increases with the number of sun spots.
Clouds produce a cooling effect. Formed by sub atomic particles from cosmic rays (protons)

High solar wind results in less cosmic rays. 500M years of recorded congruence.

Tim Ball U of Winnipeg, all climate models are based on man made CO2 increases.

John Christy UAB 1000 years ago Greenland was warmer did not cause significant melting.

Permafrost melting in Russia was greater years ago than today.

Syun – IchiAkasofu massive melting and refreezing of ice caps recorded by NASA in the 1990s.

Sea level changes caused by rising and falling land mass.

Paul Reiter Pasture Institute Paris mosquitoes can survive in very cold temps even in the Arctic. Sorry Al. Archangel Russia had 30 malaria deaths.

Liberty or Death

2007-03-17T06:39:00.000-04:00

Where our Strident Politics Comes From

The current struggle with militant Islam has caused a great many Americans to learn as much as they can about the religion called Islam. A great many of Islam’s beliefs and practices are repugnant to Christians, Jews, Deists, Agnostics and every other religion in the US. Why? Besides details such as the vile treatment of women, there is the tenant that religion; life style and government are inseparable. Most Muslims believe that Sharia law (The Sharia extends beyond what Westerners consider law. It covers the totality of religious, political, social, including private life and makes no distinction between sin and law) should govern Muslim nations. To view an extreme application of this tenant one only has to look at the society under the rule of the Taliban. Muslims both moderate and radical want every nation to be Muslim; they just disagree on the means. Muslims in America are actively seeking to form a Nation of Islam governed by Sharia.

Most people can’t understand Muslims or believe anything will happen soon, so lets change the premise to abortion. Do you care now? You betcha. Abortion is the most divisive word in politics today. Close to being as divisive as slavery was, but not quite. Here are some other examples, euthanasia, illegal aliens, death penalty, gun control, political correctness, drugs, alcohol, smoking, animal rights, the environment, global warming, embryos and Christian symbols on government property.

What makes some issues rise to the level of implacability and finally a national crisis? First, it takes one side to consider the issue non negotiable. How does that come about? Dogmatic belief and the will to take action. What is dogma? It is an authoritative principle, belief, or statement of ideas or opinion, especially one considered to be absolutely true. Second the other side must at least consider the action unjust and therefore must be resisted on principle. The harder one pushes, the harder the other pushes back. How does a strident issue become politicized? When the dogmatic side decides to abandon persuasion and solicits the federal government to make their belief law and therefore enforced by guns and punishable by jail time or death.

Can it get that bad? We fought a civil war over a divisive principle. The North sought the strong arm of federal law to force their views on the South. The South used violence to oppose the enforcement of emancipation. Dogma met principle and hundreds of thousands died. How does religion play a role? Religion is a unified set of the beliefs. Some of those beliefs are non negotiable. Either you believe them or you can’t belong. These are very strong beliefs. Christians are required to die rather than renounce a dogmatic belief. Islam and other religions have equally strong beliefs. But what about secular issues, why do some people resort to violence and murder to further a cause such as environmentalism or animal rights. The motivations are less strident than religion, and can be varied, such as true belief, power or control. The causes are the means for strident people to act stridently.

Lets examine two examples in our history with opposite outcomes. First slavery. In this case the dogmatic North was successful in getting the votes to impose emancipation. Most of the North was altruistic, but opportunists who sought out power or control were equally committed to the cause. Why did it broil into civil war? There was no escape from the threat of federal law. No outlet for the anger of the South, it was either submit or fight. Next look at alcohol. This issue was just as strident as slavery. The cause attracted the usually hot heads to both sides. Again federal law was used by the dogmatics to impose prohibition on the whole nation. But why no civil war? Oh, there was plenty of violence. Many died on both sides, but there was a relief valve. Those who “had” to drink took advantage of bootlegging. Same can be said of illegal drugs. Take away the relief valve, truly enforce the law and you will see violence on a massive scale.

The key to keeping a dogmatic issue below the boiling point is a relief valve. But why all of a sudden does there seem to be an explosion of issues the rise to the level of dogma? Several ingredients. Intellectual laziness is a critical ingredient. Dogmatic beliefs are/can be good things. Most are altruistic. Those who believe have a moral obligation to persuade as many non-believers as possible. But zealots are easily frustrated today and persuasion is abandoned for activism. The use of federal power to force non-believers into compliance is strident activism. It is intellectually lazy or put another way, expedient to use the power of the federal government to enforce your belief on everyone. But that has been around since 1800, why the explosion of dogmatic issues over the last 25 years? What new is the alliance of big money, big media, big corporations and big issue oriented organizations. Key word, big. This combination is very effective in threatening politicians. Politicians make laws. Laws are enforced by police with guns. Stop paying your taxes and you will soon meet a Fed with a gun. Politicians have also been caught up in our country’s stridency. They reflect our polarizing non-negotiable tactics. Politics is less and less about the persuasion of ideas and more and more about use of force; personal attacks and political correctness, enforced by big media.

There is one more ingredient that has caused the explosion of implacable issues, big government. The federal government, congress and the Supreme Court is one stop shopping for dogmatics. Why because there is almost nothing that can’t be made a federal law. The constitution is routinely corrupted by congress and activist courts. Also the constitution can be changed. Despite the declaration of independence no right in our society is inalienable in our legal system. Your rights are what ever the lawyers say they are.

Is there a way out of this mess? Well there is always the possibility that common sense and moderation will break out. But try to convince an evangelical to moderate his stance on abortion. Try to persuade a cokehead to give up drugs. What do we do? The key is a relief valve. Our nation is a potpourri of dogmatic and semi dogmatic believers. Use of the federal government to enforce one view on all 300M people is too much power in too few hands. Solution, return the social authority to the states. This gives people 50 chances of finding a state that supports their pet rock and you can flee a state that imposes an unacceptable dogmatic belief. When an issue comes to the boiling level at the state level, the state can push the authority down to the counties. Will this work? For a while. First, 50 state relief valves, and then thousands of county relief valves will buy us many years of tranquility. Has it been tried? Ever been to a bar in Texas? Want to have an alcoholic beverage? In one county it is illegal, in the next one over drink away. Drive 10 miles. The prohibition hot heads and the drinkers can live in peace.

Liberty or Death

2007-03-10T11:34:00.000-05:00

General Patraeus Names Names

On Wednesday 7 Mar., General Patraeus held a public news conference and stated the following (I am paraphrasing), “ The military forces cannot defeat the insurgency alone”. This is a frank and apolitical statement coming from the country’s best general and our last hope for success. Generals don’t make frank statements without consulting with his political boss, SECDEF Bob Gates or he is falling on his sword for the troops. He is still there today, so he had the ok from Gates.

There are only two reasons for Patraeus and Gates’s message to Bush. One Bush asked for it, a “back channel” message (back channel in DoD speak is one that a politician asks to be sent so he can use it to beat someone up) or Bob Gates who is demonstrating that he is a no nonsense straight shooter who is not going to take one for Bush, but rather he is going to stick up for the troops. If a “back channel message”, then who is the target? Look around and see who is not carrying their weight. It’s not the guys in uniform so it has to be the civilian agencies and their contractors. For four years now, reconstruction in Iraq by our civilian agencies, particularly state and treasury has been an abject failure. Nothing works, not the oil production facilities, not the electricity, nor the banking system. We still can’t speak the local language and therefore have no idea what is being said in our name. If the bureaucracies are stonewalling Bush, look for him to tongue lash the culprits soon. If the problem is Bush’s inability to make the system work, which I suspect it is, then we are doomed.

Why do I think Bush is incompetent? One has only to look as far as Katrina. After a year New Orleans is a disaster even with an unlimited amount of money. Why? Certainly, the state and local governments are incompetent. Just look at the success in Mississippi. But FEMA was always a competent agency. What happened? Bush created a super bureaucracy called Homeland Security. How did Tommy Thompson staff this new beast so quickly? He allowed the best and brightest from the lower agencies including FEMA to staff his beast. Now he had a lot of chiefs but no Indians. It takes years to recover from this kind of stupidity. Tommy Thompson is a bright guy, he saw his mistake and put his parachute on. Bye, Bye. Bush is holding a bag of crap. The state department is a different problem. State wanted nothing to do with the Iraq war. Powell could see a loser when he saw one. State is staffed with career Liberals who hate war and, given a chance will do everything they can to make it fail. Powell did the honorable thing, he put on his parachute. Bye, Bye.

I worked in DoD for 32 years. I saw it all. DoD, for all of its problems is competent. So were many of the other agencies. To partially excuse Bush, the destruction of our civilian agencies began under Clinton. He loaded up the bureaucracies with agenda oriented liberals. They ran havoc for 8 years. DoD was spared because no promising liberal would be caught dead in DoD, a career-ending move. Clinton had to staff SECDEF with a Republican, because none of his liberal buddies would take the job.

So what does all this mean for Iraq? We are screwed. No competent aspiring politico wants to be associated with a loser. If General Patraeus can’t pull a rabbit out of the hat and do everyone’s job including his, we fail.

We need the enemy to be stupid. So far he has been brilliant. True, some of the hot heads want to go toe-to-toe with our guys. They die. But the smart ones are willing to hit soft targets, trucks and Humvees. They have us dancing to their tune. First came IEDs and RPGs. Unarmored vehicles were toast. So DoD and the troops put armor on the vehicles. The enemy came up with EFPs, armor piercing explosives. More of our guys die. DoD goes to helicopters to avoid the roadside bombs. The enemy creates helo ambush teams, more of our guys die. Back to armored vehicles. More EFPs, six 82nd airborne guys die in one ambush this week.

Patraeus begins the surge. Sadr flees the country and his guys go to ground, not 1 shot fired. The Sunni insurgents melt away, no toe-to-toe assaults. Do they quit? No. Truck bombs and suicide bombers. Unstoppable. Almost one a day. More Iraqis in pine boxes.

There are only three ways to stop an insurgency. Patraeus is trying the hardest way. Clear a block and leave troops behind to hold it. But there are a lot of blocks. Baghdad is as big as Los Angeles. I wish him well. Success by November, no chance. The other way is to interdict the support going to the insurgents. In a word, kill all the Baathists. Bush won’t do it and won’t let Maliki do it. The third way is a massive conventional assault. Lots of collateral damage. Bush does not have the guts.

So what is left? A political settlement. Only Maliki can accomplish that with Patraeus’s help. If Condi Rice gets involved, look for total failure. So, more of same till we pull out? Nope. It is going to get worse. Our good friend Putin is doing everything he can to make things tuff for us. He is moving his most modern weapons to Syria and Iran. Syria has stated privately that if we attack Iran they will (Hezbollah) conduct bio attacks in the US. That is a very creditable threat. Saddam's WMD went to Syria and the Hezbollah cells are already here, having strolled across the Mexican border. But Iran will be safe anyway. Look for Putin to form a military alliance with Tehran in the next 6 months. Checkmate.

What is our only hope? Cheney resigns and is replaced by Gulliani. Bush resigns. A new team takes over.

Liberty or Death

2007-03-07T09:05:00.000-05:00

There is no Bush Military Solution in Iraq, But There is a Solution

Recent intelligence releases, followed by pundit analysis have proved that with out a doubt, Bush and his advisors did not have a clue about Islam and what was going to happen when he went into Afghanistan and Iraq. He did not expect the current sectarian violence and the degree of Iraqi hatred of Americans. He expected the Taliban to fold forever. Our military admits that we attacked with a small mobile conventional force, equipped and trained to crush the Iraqi Army. Complete success. Then came random acts of violence by certain tribes followed by Al-Qaeda seizing an opportunity and finally sectarian militias and death squads. Our military was caught with their pants down and has been reacting ever since to convert to an army of occupation and insurgency. Problem is we had enough troops to whip their army but we needed 300-400,000 troops for a successful occupation. We don’t have them. Make no mistake most Iraqis appreciated us for getting rid of Saddam. But interviews and polls have now proven that the Iraqis expected us to leave. We did not. Worse we helped create a government that the Iraqi people saw as “made in America”. Is there any doubt as to why this government can’t gain the support of the people?

With regard to Islam, Bush today still believes Islam is a religion of peace. All creditable authors disagree. I will pick one to make my point.

Marshall Frank’sFrank’s “Brutally Frank: Militant Islam in America”. Highly recommend you read this. He says 20% of Muslims are militant and embrace violence. Everyone agrees with that. 80% are so called moderate, they believe in the same goals as the militants (expansion of Islam), they don’t agree with the use of violence. But that does not mean they are not a threat. They allow the militants to live among them in silence. This provides significant cover and makes detection 10 times more difficult. This applies to America, Europe, Iraq and Afghanistan. Some quotes from Frank’s book tell us how naïve our government is:

“Moderate Muslims

According to Dr. Ali Sina, author and former Muslim:

"The only disagreement between a moderate and terrorist Muslims is when and how the jihad against the infidels should take place. Otherwise, all the Muslims, whether moderate or extreme, believe in the same book. That book calls for waging war against the non-Muslims until they are subdued and humiliated."

Muzammil H. Siddiqi is a Harvard-educated imam, highly regarded as a moderate among Muslim and non-Muslim circles, including the president of the United States. He stood with G.W. Bush during the post 9/11 services at the National Cathedral in 2001 to represent the Muslim faith and to condemn the attack against America. Weeks later, he was an honored guest of the president at the White House where Mr. Bush was given a copy of the Quran.

However, during a rally one year before, Siddiqi had given a speech across from that same White House where he and other Muslim leaders praised Palestinian terrorists and issued a warning to Americans to side with Palestinian Muslims against the Jews, or face Allah's punishment. Compared to notorious terrorist, Abu Musab al Zarqawi, he might be considered moderate. At least, he doesn't chop off heads from infidels.
In 2003, Siddiqi issued a fatwa, or religious decree to the Fiqh Council of North America:

"... As Muslims we should participate in the (American) system to safeguard our interests and try to bring gradual change. We must not forget that Allah's rules have to be established in all lands, and all our efforts should lead in that direction."

Omar M. Ahmad is another moderate Muslim leader who helped to establish the Council on American-Islamic Relations, (CAIR) a powerful lobbying group based in Washington. He also had been an honored guest at the White House, and invited by the president to join the day of mourning at the National Cathedral after 9/11.This is what the so-called moderate Muslim said at an Islamic conference in Fremont, California in 1998:
"Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith but to become dominant. The Quran should be the highest authority in America and Islam the only accepted religion on earth."

Imam Siraj Wahhaj is an American black who converted to Islam and became a recognized leader in the Muslim community, particularly in Brooklyn where he does most of his preaching. Dubbed a moderate by government officials, Wahhaj holds the honor of being the first Muslim ever to give opening prayer in the U.S. Congress. He was the recipient of commendations from police for helping to drive out crime in the neighborhoods. Brooklyn authorities proclaimed a day in Wahhaj's name for his giving of "outstanding and meaningful achievements."

How can government officials be so fooled? Or perhaps, they are blind from burying their heads so deep in the sand. The same year he led the prayer in congress, 1991, he gave a speech to Muslims in Texas where he predicted that America would fall unless it accepts the Islamic agenda.

In another speech in New Jersey, Wahhaj was heard to say,

"Take my word for it, if six to eight million Muslims unite in America, the country will come to us."

This so-called moderate Muslim hosted the blind Sheikh, Omar Abdel-Rahman at his Brooklyn mosque, the same man convicted of the first World Trade Center bombing. He even appeared in court as his character witness.”

There is an emerging 3rd group of Islamists called Reformists who actively denounce violence and will point the militants out. 2 were interviewed on Glenn Beck recently, 1 on Bill Maher and 1 cited in Frank’s book. But they are very few in number and some have been killed for speaking out.

So what? Get over it Liberty or Death, you can’t change the past. I agree we need to go forward from where we are today, warts and all. I only regurgitate the past to ask this question, “Do we know what to do now in order to win?” Do we even know who our enemy is? Remember they picked us.

With only 1/3 the number of troops needed, Patraeus has define an achievable goal, capture and occupy the mixed Sunni/Shia neighborhoods in Baghdad. Declare success and turn the mess over to Iraqi Army.

What about the rest of Sunni Land, with the insurgents and Al-Qaeda? They will melt away and we are not going to catch them without Iraqi Sunni help. What happens if we leave? We have a 10% chance of diplomatic success. With our state dept. that may be less. The prophesy of all the hand wringers is that Armageddon will break out with Iran backing the Shia and Saudi Arabia and Jordan backing the Sunnis. From the president on down throw this out without challenge. Certainly for Iraq it will be Armageddon. So what? A stable Iraq is not a primary goal on the war on terror. In the big picture all of the Middle East countries are our enemies. Anyone who thinks any of them will support us does not read the facts. To put it simply, a poll of the Middle East shows that way more than 50% of the people hate us, and Saudi Arabia is at the top of the list at over 80%. See the post directly below. We should be doing everything we can to get these guys shooting at each other. Does not mean we have to leave, just get out of the way and protect the oil.

But, back to the current plan. President Bush is wishful thinking. No body on the Republican side of the aisle believes there is a reasonable chance the Iraqis will be ready to take over in November. Lindsey Graham Sunday called it the “last best hope”. Certainly not high praise from a Bush supporter. Does that mean we are going to lose? With the current plan, yes. What plan will work?

We came with an overwhelming conventional force, lets use it conventionally, not as policemen. But we have no clearly defined target? The bad guys blend in with the non combatants denying us the use of our superiority weapons. Its rifles against rifles and IEDs and EFPs. The enemy is dictating and we are reacting. There is no clearly identifiable enemy for a conventional attack, to do what we do better than anyone else, an all out offensive. In order to do that you have to have a clearly definable enemy.

Well, It has been there all the time, the Baathists. Guess where the money comes from, guess where the weapons and training come from? Been there the whole time. Maliki wanted to go after them but our state department is leaning on Maliki to stop the de Baathification. We are our own worst problem.

So what do we do? What it really means is that we are going to have to play political hardball with the Maliki government and local leaders throughout Iraq. It is time for Rice to earn her pay. What is our message? General Patraeus will build a block wide corridor across Baghdad, splitting the Shia from the Sunni. This block wide corridor will be bulldozed flat. The people will be relocated. Where? Hundreds of thousands of professional Iraqis and another hundred thousand poor are refugees in Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. There is plenty of empty housing. In November the Iraqi army will take over policing no mans land. Anyone who enters no mans land by any means other than through checkpoints will be shot on sight. Sunnis and Shia who find themselves on the wrong side of the ditch will be given an opportunity to relocate. If we draw the line with care that will be an equal number in both directions.

To the Shia local leaders. Accepting money and arms from Iran will be punished. We will provide the money and you don’t need arms, the Iraqi Army will protect you. All militias will be disbanded. Already happening. New twist, Sadr you are persona non grota. Stay in Iran.

To the Kurds, don’t piss off Turkey. No incitement or arming of Turkish Kurds. 5-year time out to get Iraq stabilized.

To the Sunni, moderate leaders (the only ones invited), privately identify the Baathists, and others who are harboring the insurgents and Al-Qaeda. It can be anonymous, drop names in the hat. No Americans watching. American will be coming to your neighborhoods. Going door to door. Secretly point out the location of your hot heads.

To Maliki. Get the oil deal completed. Divide up the police. Sunni in An-Bar, Shia in the south and Kurds in the North. Provide more equal power sharing for the next 5 years, then have free elections.

To the American state department et al. Get serious about reconstruction and jobs creation or get fired. The last 3 years you have been stonewalling.

What about the insurgents and Al-Qaeda. You have 3 months to get out, and then we are coming to get you. No police action, a full military attack, using artillery and Air Support. Targets, all the blocks, towns and camps identified by the moderates. Oh by the way that includes all Baathists.

Why will this work? The insurgents, foreigners and Al-Qaeda have to eat, sleep, get paid and resupplied with ammunition and bombs. They have all the comforts of home. That will stop. Who is supplying the ammo, living quarters, money and intelligence? The Baathists. Who is supplying the fuel, electricity, water and food? We are!!! After three months all support to the identified bad guy areas will be cut off.

Saddam had a police state. That is actually good news. It means that all Iraqis have decent, verified identity papers. All the Baathists are identified. Any one in An-Bar without papers, you are arrested or shot. All male Baathists over the age of 12, you are gone to Syria. Take your families if you want.

After 3 months without food, water, electricity and fuel, the bad guys will be highly motivated to fall back on support, i.e. Syria. Anyone male remaining in the bad guy zones, kill them on sight. After, allow the poor moderate Sunnis to populate the nice Baathists homes.

This is a mission the American army can execute expeditiously with the troops it has now. The ROEs will be like a pitched battle. There will be collateral damage. There was when we invaded and were fighting the Iraqi Army. The difference will be that we gave them 3 months to get out of the way.

All travel into An-Bar and out of An-Bar must go through checkpoints. Sunnis going to Shia land better have a good reason. Same with the Shia going to An-Bar.

Realism check. After the surge, expect the Iranians to filter back into Shia Land and Al-Qaeda into Sunni Land. We are going to be there a long time.

Liberty or Death

2007-02-22T09:33:00.000-05:00

The New Islamic Mindset

The Islamic mindset is varied, complex and sometimes contradictory like everyone else. What sets them a part are their aspirations. Muslims want the whole world to be Muslim. The difference in methods to achieve these aspirations are what defines the western labeling of different Muslim groups, Radicals or extremists, moderates, reformists and suicide bombers. What is new is the success of groups such as Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas and many others against the West. When the Ottoman Empire was crushed in WW I, the Infidels of the world surpassed the Islamists in technology, education, wealth, and military power. This put a damper on Islamic aspirations. The success of tiny Israel against the combined armies of Islam was devastating. But the Islamist view of the world today is very different. High priced oil has brought wealth and education to Islam. A constant string of military success by extremists against the West and it’s super power, America has rekindled resolve among all Islamists that Islam can compete with the Infidels. The 9-11 attack was viewed as an atrocity by the West. However, Islamists all over the world but especially in the Middle East were dancing in the streets by the millions. Europe is in denial, Russia was beat in Afghanistan and cannot defeat Chechnya, and the Great Satan continuously retreats from determined confrontation. When the US is “thrown out of Iraq” the confidence of the Islamists will soar.

How did I get here? This is what’s new.

1. While surfing the web I came across this interesting article. What makes it a must read is the insight the very experienced documentary journalist provides into the psychology of suicide bombers. His conclusion is the same as mine the only thing you can do to stop them is kill them.

He is also the first writer to provide a coherent description of the difference between moderate and extremist Muslims:

“The main difference between moderate Muslims and extremists is that moderate Muslims don't think they will see the absolute victory of Islam during their lifetime, therefore they respect other beliefs. The extremists believe that the fulfillment of the Prophecy of Islam and ruling the entire world as described in the Koran, is for today.”

2. This collaborates the poll taken in the large Muslim community in Deerborne Michigan where 90% stated that Muslim nations should be ruled by Sharia law.

What is so frightening is similarities of moderate and extremist Muslims. That explains why moderate Muslims do not speak out against extremists, they share the same goals but not the same methods. The real threat to Americans and the west is Sharia law. In this, there is no difference between moderates and extremists. It also dovetails with goals of certain Muslims who do not support either the moderates or extremists. They call themselves reformists. As seen on Glenn beck over the last 2 months, reformists want an Islam of peace and equality and tolerance for others. They are a small minority just getting organized. They are the only ones that speak out against violence.

3. Let me throw in the results of a Gallop poll taken across the Middle East and reported in Times Online. Here are some highlights:

Percentage with unfavourable view of US in 2005 (all increased since 9/11 except where indicated:
79% Saudi Arabia
65% Jordan
49% Morocco
52% Iran (down from 63 in 2001)
65% Pakistan (down from 69 in 2001)

Gallup’s Centre for Muslim Studies in New York carried out surveys of 10,000 Muslims in ten predominantly Muslim countries. One finding was that the wealthier and better-educated the Muslim was, the more likely he was to be radicalised.
The surveys were carried out in 2005 and 2006. Along with an earlier Gallup survey in nine other countries in 2001, they represent the views of more than 90 per cent of the world’s Muslims.

A large number of Muslims supported the Western ideal of democratic government. Fifty per cent of radicals supported democracy, compared with 35 per cent of moderates.

Religion was found to have little to do with radicalisation or antipathy towards Western culture. Muslims were condemnatory of promiscuity and a sense of moral decay. What they admired most was liberty, its democratic system, technology and freedom of speech.

While there was widespread support for Sharia, or Islamic law, only a minority wanted religious leaders to be making laws. Most women in the predominantly Muslim countries believed that Sharia should be the source of a nation’s laws, but they strongly believed in equal rights for women.

This finding indicates the complexity of the struggle ahead for Western understanding. Few Western commentators can see how women could embrace the veil, Sharia and equal rights at the same time.

“We find that Muslim radicals have more in common with their moderate brethren than is often assumed. If the West wants to reach the extremists, and empower the moderate majority, it must first recognise who it’s up against.”
“ There is no significant difference in religiosity between moderates and radicals. In fact, radicals are no more likely to attend religious services regularly than are moderates.”

But it is the radicals who earn more and stay in school longer.”In fact, the surveys found that the radicals were more satisfied with their finances and quality of life than moderates.

Genieve Abdo, a senior Gallup analyst and author of Mecca and Main Street: Muslim Life in America After 9/11, said “We have to assume that these Islamic parties and movements that are coming to power are popular and have a large constituency. People are not just voting for a party, they are voting for a religion, a way of life.”

“a vote for Hamas was a vote against the former Palestinian government of Arafat rather than a vote for the extreme religious position of the new government.”

Liberty or Death

2007-02-14T06:02:00.000-05:00

Unity 08 - an Alternative to the current Bums

An interesting idea for an alternative party, one that has realistic goals and a novel process to allow every member to be engaged electronically. Their website is http://www.unity08.com/. Check them out, I think you will be impressed. I have included two sections of their main page for a quick look.

What is intriguing is the opportunity to participate, and everything will be done on-line so everyone goes to the convention and votes. Besides the disaffected in both parties, and we know they are legion, there is a great opportunity to pick up a portion of those who never vote, because many are internet surfers who would participate online but not physically. The college crowd will go nuts. 20M voters is not unrealistic. Depending on the platform there is an opportunity to attract a lot of independents.

Also good news is that you don't have to give up your current part membership to participate.

Any alternative to this sorry pack that is running in both parties is welome news.

Goals

We have set three specific goals, and are exploring how best to achieve them.
1. Goal One is the election of a Unity Ticket for President and Vice-President of the United States in 2008 – headed by a woman and/or man from each major party or by an independent who presents a Unity Team from both parties.
2. Goal Two is for the people themselves to pick that Unity Ticket in the first half of 2008 – via a virtual and secure online convention in which all American voters will be qualified to vote.
3. Goal Three, our minimum goal, is to effect major change and reform in the 2008 national elections by influencing the major parties to adopt the core features of our national agenda. With a group of voters who comprise at least 20% of the national electorate, we feel confident that our voters will decide the 2008 election.

Why Unity08 Will Succeed

Here are four reasons we believe the Unity08 movement will succeed:
1. The American people know that the current political system is broken and that the time is short to fix it.
2. A solidly-funded movement of up to 20,000,000 Americans can be built online in order to nominate a Unity Ticket of their choice for 2008.
3. Seeing the numbers, leaders in both parties will see that a Unity Ticket in 2008 represents the jolt the political system needs to get back on track.
4. The tens of millions of Americans who have not been voting out of cynicism toward the current system are likely to rally to new leadership with a new approach.

Liberty or Death

2007-02-05T10:01:00.000-05:00

The Iranian Connection in Iraq Made Clear

Lou Dobbs had a panel of experts, 1 Feb. 2007 that provided the most insightful analysis on Iran’s involvement in Iraq to date. I have provided excerpts below in blue and the the full transcript at:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0702/01/ldt.01.html

This is the first time that anyone has solved the riddle of how Iranian weapons get to the Sunnis. I would like to highlight some of the facts in my words.

1. The Sunnis, insurgents and Al-Qaeda acting in loose coordination are creating 99% of the US casualties.

2. 70%, down from a high of 90% last year of US casualties are from sophisticated IEDs made in Iran. Snipers do 20% and fire fights 10%.

3. The Sunnis are as opposed to Iran as they are opposed to the Iraqi Shia.

4. ABRAHAMIAN: “Yes, I think actually, so far, ironically that Iran and the United States have been on parallel paths. Both have been supporting -- SCIRI and Dawa, who have formed the main Baghdad government.”

5. A critical observation, WOW! GERGES: “I just come from the Middle East. I cannot tell you the transformation that has taken place in the Sunni-dominated Arab world, anti-Shiite and anti-Iranian sentiment is becoming deeply hardened in the region. I mean, there is a major internal, intensive struggle in the Middle East...The anti-Shiite and anti-Iranian sentiments in the Sunni Arab-dominated world. And to put -- it's amazing. In the Arab world, the thing is Iran... And, in fact, most -- I mean, a majority of Sunnis believe that the United States and Iran are basically allied together against the Sunni, the Sunni minority in Iraq. And this is the irony, the paradox of the situation in Iraq.” Obviously we are not in concert with Iran, just the opposite, but we are supporting the same people in Iraq in the eyes of the Sunnis.

6. Suicide bombers, the major killer of the Shia, are all Sunnis. Shia culture does not glorify suicide like the Sunnis.

Analysis

The Iranians are supporting the Sunnis/insurgents/Al-Qaeda with weapons and IEDs. And last week we saw the introduction of the SA-7 downing American helicopters. Obvious Russian weapons involvement. Wealthy Baathists are responsible for the insurgents who are mostly Sunni Iraqis and some foreigners. But the Iranians are not supporting them directly. Then how? Black market, maybe, but all roads lead to Syria. I don’t see anyone trucking weapons to the Sunnis through hundreds of miles of Shia Iraq when the Shia are targets of those weapons. If Syria, then it is Hezbollah. Syria is not going to have their fingerprints on the weapons directly, but certainly they are allowing it to happen. Connect the dots…. Iran – Hezbollah/Syria – Wealthy Iraqi Sunnis – cheap fighters of all types including Kurds but not Shia.

Conclusion

The Bush plan as stated can’t succeed. We can kill all the fighters we want, they are easily replaced. What about the wealthy Baathists? They are supported by all of our so-called regional allies who are Sunni. If we eliminate the wealthy Baathists our allies will freak. We can’t attack Iran. Why? Bush does not have the political capital and his speeches so far have been incredible weak. He has made no case against Iran except nukes. We can’t attack Syria for the same reason as Iran, no political capital and no case made to the American people. Who does that leave? Hezbollah. The good news is they are Shia. They are also going to bring down the democracy in Lebanon and will be the launch site for Iran to nuke Israel, which I wrote about before. The president needs to connect the dots for the American people; Hezbollah is complicit in the 99% American casualties and all of the Shia casualties. They are not our best target; Iran and the wealthy Baathists are, but they are a politically correct target. Our allies would strongly support us; it would re-stabilize Lebanon and take away Iran’s best proxy. Bush could claim hot pursuit when the Hezbollah flee to Syria and follow them there, wiping out them and any Syrians stupid enough to get in the way.

Transcript Excerpts

Joining me now, three leading authorities on Iran, Iraq and Iran's military ambitions. Fawaz Gerges, professor of Middle East and international studies at Sarah Lawrence College. And Ervand Abrahamian is a history professor at Baruch College, and we thank you for being here. General David Grange, one of the country's most distinguished military commanders, and it's always good to have you with us, Dave.
DOBBS: Ervand?

GERGES: Lou, one point must be made very clear. The Sunni-led insurgency is responsible for the death of almost 99 percent of American and coalition forces in Iraq. And the Sunni-led insurgency is as opposed to Iran and the Shias as it is opposed to basically the American military presence.

ABRAHAMIAN: Yes, I think actually, so far, ironically that Iran and the United States have been on parallel paths. Both have been supporting -- SCIRI and Dawa, who have formed the main Baghdad government. So their support has gone basically to them. So I think the idea that somehow Iranians are supporting insurgents, Sunnis against -- killing Americans, it could be possible. But it's very unlikely. I would say it's in the realm of absurdity.

GERGES: I just come from the Middle East. I cannot tell you the transformation that has taken place in the Sunni-dominated Arab world, anti-Shiite and anti-Iranian sentiment is becoming deeply hardened in the region. I mean, there is a major internal, intensive struggle in the Middle East...The anti-Shiite and anti-Iranian sentiments in the Sunni Arab-dominated world. And to put -- it's amazing. In the Arab world, the thing is Iran... And, in fact, most -- I mean, a majority of Sunnis believe that the United States and Iran are basically allied together against the Sunni, the Sunni minority in Iraq. And this is the irony, the paradox of the situation in Iraq.

GRANGE: Lou, you know, first of all, the Iranian influence in Iraq does not only support Shia death squads or militia or whatever, it also supports Sunni insurgents. In other words, their common enemy is the Americans. They still fight each other. If two out of three Americans die from IEDs, most of the IEDs are triggered or initiated by devices made in Iran, then their influencing the death of the American soldiers regardless of who pulls the trigger.

ABRAHAMIAN: It just is not possible in the Middle East context to think that Iranian officials would be providing lethal materials to Sunni, Baathist fanatics who kill other Shias. It's just not possible.

GERGES: But it doesn't make sense. It's against common sense. I can understand, for example, if Iranian arms are sold on the black market. I can understand if Syria supports some of these Sunni resistant groups. But truly Iran, it's against its interests to do so.

Liberty or Death

2007-01-22T07:22:00.000-05:00

Assault on the American Culture

A recent article from Australia. These are Muslims, but the lesson applies to America with regard to the Mexican Diaspora.

Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out of Australia, as the government targeted radicals in a bid to head off potential terror attacks.

A day after a group of mainstream Muslim leaders pledged loyalty to Australia and her Queen at a special meeting with Prime Minister John Howard, he and his Ministers made it clear that extremists would face a crackdown. Treasurer Peter Costello, seen as heir apparent to Howard, hinted that some radical clerics could be asked to leave the country if they did not accept that Australia was a secular state, and its laws were made by parliament. "If those are not your values, if you want a country which has Sharia law or a theocratic state, then Australia is not for you", he said on National Television.

"I'd be saying to clerics who are teaching that there are two laws governing people in Australia: one the Australian law and another Islamic law that is false. If you can't agree with parliamentary law, independent courts, democracy, and would prefer Sharia law and have the opportunity to go to another country, which practices it, perhaps, then, that's a better option", Costello said.

Asked whether he meant radical clerics would be forced to leave, he said those with dual citizenship could possibly be asked to move to the other country. Education Minister Brendan Nelson later told reporters that Muslims who did not want to accept local values should "clear off. Basically people who don't want to be Australians, and who don't want, to live by Australian values and understand them, well then, they can basically clear off", he said.

Separately, Howard angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by saying he supported spy agencies monitoring the nation's mosques.

Quote: "IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It. I am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali , we have experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians."

"However, the dust from the attacks had barely settled when the 'politically correct' crowd began complaining about the possibility that our patriotism was offending others. I am not against immigration, nor do I hold a grudge against anyone who is seeking a better life by coming to Australia .." "However, there are a few things that those who have recently come to our country, and apparently some born here, need to understand." "This idea of Australia being a multi-cultural community has served only to dilute our sovereignty and our national identity. And as Australians, we have our own culture, our own society, our own language and our own lifestyle."

"This culture has been developed over two centuries of struggles, trials and victories by millions of men and women who have sought freedom"

"We speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to become part of our society, Learn the language!"

"Most Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian, right wing, political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women, on Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented. It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world as your new home, because God is part of our culture."

"We will accept your beliefs, and will not question why. All we ask is that you accept ours, and live in harmony and peaceful enjoyment with us."

"If the Southern Cross offends you, or you don't like "A Fair Go", then you should seriously consider a move to another part of this planet. We are happy with our culture and have no desire to change, and we really don't care how you did things where you came from. By all means, keep your culture, but do not force it on others.

"This is OUR COUNTRY, OUR LAND, and OUR LIFESTYLE, and we will allow you every opportunity to enjoy all this. But once you are done complaining, whining, and griping about Our Flag, Our Pledge, Our Christian beliefs, or Our Way of Life, I highly encourage you take advantage of one other great Australian freedom,

'THE RIGHT TO LEAVE'."

"If you aren't happy here then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come here. You asked to be here. So accept the country YOU accepted."

My friend L said “Personally, I don't really want to adopt Australian culture. Can't we stick with the founding principles of the United States of America?

The right question but the answer is in doubt. We can if we are willing to protect our borders and society. American values as you say are more than words on paper. They are the beliefs of the citizens. Those citizens used to be Americans. But we now have an invasion underway that will take your rights away from you depending on where you live. The model has already been established in small towns in Texas. "Legal Mexicans, either real or with fake IDs" move in until they become the majority of the population. They become the legal government by block voting. They declare Spanish the official language of the town and change the laws to suit their culture.

Three active Mexican "groups" have openly declared they intend to take back all the land we stole from them in the Mexican war. The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF), the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan (MEChA) and the National Council of La Raza (La Raza) – not only share a revolutionary agenda of conquering America's southwest, but they also share common funding sources, notably the Ford and Rockefeller foundations? ''California is going to be a Hispanic state," said Mario Obeldo, former head of MALDEF. "Anyone who does not like it should leave." And MEChA's goal is even more radical: an independent ''Aztlan,'' the collective name this organization gives to the seven states of the U.S. Southwest – Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas and Utah. They even have a name for this new "land" it is called Azlan.

This is a numbers game. This Democratic congress supported by many Republicans has vowed to declare amnesty to all the illegals. Bush would eagerly sign the bill. That is 12M. Based on the last amnesty, the Simpson Mazolli act, after the dust settles 3 times the illegal population ends up being legal. That is 36M. Clearly, based on the numbers Texas, New Mexico and California will go Mexican in the next 5 years. Give them 5 more years to become politically savvy and cities; town, counties and state governments will be Mexican. This will be hastened by White and Black flight.

What happens when they take over? Form a new country? Of course not. They would be stupid, and they are not. They know how to game the American laws to their advantage. They already have free education, emergency room health care and aid to dependent children. Remember they become American citizens. After amnesty they will get welfare, food stamps and Earned Income Credit, Social Security, and free breakfast and lunch programs. These programs are taxpayer funded but administered locally by the new Mexican state and local governments.

If you want to know what the new culture will be like look at Mexico today. Mexico excels at corruption, poverty, high crime rates, teen birth, high school drop outs gangs and kidnapping. Who are running across our borders, the Rich, professionals, middle class? No. It is the poorest of the poor bringing with them all the ills I just described.

This is a very short statement. There is tons of backup, but that requires another blog. I will leave you with some recent quotes from the LA Times

1. 40% of all workers in L. A. County (L. A. County has 10 million people) are working for cash and not paying taxes. This was because they are predominantly illegal immigrants, working without a green card.

2. 95% of warrants for murder in Los Angeles are for illegal aliens.

3. 75% of people on the most wanted list in Los Angeles are illegal aliens.

4. Over 2/3's of all births in Los Angeles County are to illegal alien Mexicans on Medi-Cal whose births were paid for by taxpayers.

5. Nearly 25% of all inmates in California detention centers are Mexican nationals here illegally.

6. The FBI reports half of all gang members in Los Angeles are most likely illegal aliens from south of the border.

7. Nearly 60% of all occupants of HUD properties are illegal.

8. 21 radio stations in L. A. are Spanish speaking.

9. In L. A. County 5.1 million people speak English. 3.9 million speak Spanish (10.2 million people in L. A. County).

Mexico is run like a dictatoship. The police routinely kill the poor. Their laws strongly favor the rich. What will happen when this poverty diaspora is governed by soft American law?

Liberty or Death

2007-01-18T06:05:00.000-05:00

Update to “Time to Reassess the War on Terror”

Based on comments, I obviously needed to do a better job explaining why I wrote a 2002 plan in 2007. The major difficulty with participating in the dialogue with any president is that he has significantly better intelligence than you do. But eventually the facts come out. I am guessing that the intelligence we know in 2007 is as good as Bush knew in 2002. Pick your dates but we are always behind the latest classified intel. My second purpose was to establish a baseline for discussion. If you disagree with the assumptions no dialogue can be useful.

With regard to Bush's surge plan, it will accomplish the goal defined, pacifying the mixed neighborhoods (1.5M people). Nothing else before November. We are sending 5 brigades starting in Feb and 1 a month there after. Full compliment in 6 months. 3 months of fighting at full strength. Not going to accomplish anything additional by November. The question is will accomplishment of this goal advance our cause in the bigger war (eliminating threats to America.). We have eliminated the threat to America from Iraqi WMD and Saddam. The relevant question in November 2007 is whether a pro American democracy is achievable, and at what price in time and treasure. This choice should not be made in a vacuum, but always against the metric of reducing the threat to America. The two greatest threats to America are disruption of oil and major attacks on the civilian population or infrastructure. How will a stable Iraq advance our goals? I submit that a stable Iraq will make things worse. We have enticed the enemy to make Iraq a decisive battleground. This is a very good thing. No threat to the US mainland and no threat to the oil.

If Iraq remains unstable what is the worst-case scenario? Shia killing Sunnis and vice versa. Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iran getting involved on both sides. And this is bad because? It is not the moderates killing moderates. It is hot heads killing hot heads and moderates. Fewer hot heads is a good thing. Eventually the moderates will say enough is enough and take up arms against the hot heads. This is a very good thing. Our primary goal should be to get the hot heads to focus on Iraq; it is of very little strategic value.

Our second goal should be to minimize the enemy's strength, unconventional warfare and to maximize our strength conventional warfare. I chose a defensive perimeter in the open, but you can offer other suggestions, the how is not important. But we need to remain close to the action so that if events are not going our way we can intervene.

One of the assumptions that no one questions is that a stable democracy in Iraq will be pro US. What proof of this is there? The Iraqis and all Middle Easterners are inherently against us because we are infidels. They will use us until they no longer need us. In the long term we will have achieved nothing for a trillion dollars.

Do I think my 2002 plan is still valid? Absolutely. First and foremost is eliminating our dependency on Middle East oil. No serious military action can take place till this happens. Second goal is to keep the fighting in the Middle East and out of the US. 3rd goal is to kill all the hot heads. I believe this has to be done by the moderates. We can surgically remove the hot heads without a 30-year unconventional war. Totally unacceptable. Better to nuke them all, equally unacceptable.

In summary, the Bush plan will succeed, but accomplish nothing. If it is incredibly successful the hot heads will choose another place to fight. Is there another place you would prefer to fight the hot heads? I can't think of one.

Liberty or Death

2007-01-15T07:31:00.000-05:00

Time to Reassess the War on Terror

It has been 5 years since the President’s state of the Union address in Jan 2002. The US and the World were waiting to hear how the US would respond to a major attack on US citizens in the US. We know now as much intelligence today as Bush did in 2001. In Bush’s speech 11 Jan. 2007, he admitted to some small mistakes and resolved to prosecute a new plan. Today we can all be as informed as the President, and go back to Jan 2002 and assess his actions with the same intelligence that he had. I will only talk about the significant players, but there are many more. I have presented what I would have done based on the same intelligence and capabilities that Bush had in Jan 2002.

Intelligence Assessment

US – Clinton left Bush with a severely depleted military. 500,000 less troops. Significant shortages of material. Forces deployed all over the world. Navy down to 300 ships. 12 carrier groups vice 15. Economy very dependent on middle east oil.

The American people had no clue who the enemy was. Had no understanding of the Middle East culture, strategic goals and capabilities. Al-Qaeda was not a household name. Many had heard of Osama.

Congress and the American people were looking to our commander in chief to inform us and to lay out a plan of action. They would support anything required to win.

UN – Corrupt, do nothing, hostile to the US. Adverse to any military action. US pouring Billions a year in dues and receiving nothing for our investment.

Afghanistan – Very hostile to the US. Islamist Taliban harboring major Al-Qaeda camps and leaders.

Iraq – Defying all UN resolutions, shooting at Americans. Thought to have WMD and prepared to provide them to our enemies, leading to another attack in the US.

Iran – At war with the US since 1979. Very hostile. Weak economy. Major supplier of arms and money to our enemies. Has Syria as a surrogate. Has Hezbollah as a military action arm. Has billions in oil revenue to fund their goal for ever increasing dominance of the Persian Gulf region and all of it’s oil. Very motivated. Government hostile. People angry at its own government.

Palestinians – The trailer trash of the Middle East. Millions of young frustrated males with no future and ready to follow any cause that would allow them to lash out at those responsible for their condition, Israel and the US. Several armed militant organizations, Fatah and Hamas being the 2 largest. Hostile to the US. People hate us.

Saudi Arabia - Lots of money and rich citizens. Weak government that will provide some support to the US. People split into two camps, moderates and Islamists. Very hostile clerics. Biggest purveyors of hate against the US. Run Madras schools all over the world teaching hate for America to kids 6-18. Rich citizens funding hate and arming radicals all over the Middle East.

Lebanon – War torn, divided country dominated by Hezbollah. Very weak government. Under control of Syria and therefore Iran.

Pakistan – Nuclear power. People hate us. Fragile government, led by a military dictator. Country divided into moderates and Islamists who would like to see their dictator dead. Exporter of nuclear technology.

Russia – Nuclear power. Resurgent nationalism and imperial ambitions. Run by defacto dictator oppressing freedom and exporting arms and technology to our enemies. Weak economy. Organized crime. Cannot account for 1000 nuclear weapons. Army, but no navy. Covertly hostile to the US.

China – Nuclear Power. Imperialistic. Covertly hostile to the US. Weak economy, very dependent on US to fund their economy. Exporter of arms and technology to our enemies.

Balance of the Persian Gulf Oil Countries – Weak governments that will support the US. Populations split into moderates and Islamists. Lots of foreign workers with no rights that form a dangerous threat to the indigenous people and governments. Not a serious threat to the US.

Vulnerabilities and Capabilities Analysis

US – A medium size Army, undefendable boarders, economy highly dependent on imported oil, ethics limit scope of action, fractious political system. Superb, mobile military, strong economy, limited world political influence.

UN – Totally dependent on member dues, action can be vetoed.

Afghanistan – Weak conventional army, weak economy, undefendable boarders. Land locked. Very determined fighters, fanatics. No ethics limitations. Significant source of trained an armed unconventional forces.

Iraq – Large but poor quality army, oil based economy, sectarian population, modest dependency on imported food, determined fighters. WMD. Supports terrorists. No ethics limitations.

Iran – Poor medium size army, very large palace guards, oil-based economy, highly dependent on food imports, medium dependency on technology imports. Sectarian but compliant population, palace guards are fanatical fighters, strong Middle East political network. Supports Middle East violence. Fanatical Government, no ethical limitations.

Palestinians – Weak government, militia armies, no economy, fractious political system, fanatical fighters, suicide bombers, dependent on foreign money, and food imports, no ethical limitations.

Saudi Arabia - Oil based economy, large private wealth, weak government, modest army, politically fractious, politically well connected in Middle East, dependent on food imports, mix of ethics.

Lebanon – Very weak government. Sectarian but compliant population, very weak army, weak economy, occupied by highly skilled foreign controlled militia, mix of ethics.

Pakistan – Nuclear power, strong but fragile government, medium size army, missiles, sustainable economy, sectarian population. No ethical limitations, fanatical fighters.

Russia – Nuclear power. Weak economy. Strong army, missiles, Strong government, dependent on food imports, sectarian population. No ethical limitations. Strong world political connections.

China – Nuclear Power, sustainable economy, very dependent on US trade. Large army, strong government, compliant population, no ethical limitations, overpopulated, growing water shortage. Strong world political connections.

Balance of the Persian Gulf Oil Countries – Weak governments, small armies, oil based economies, compliant population, fanatical fighters, dependent on food imports.

US Threat Analysis Homeland undefendable to unconventional attacks. Al-Qaeda determined to kill us. Iran determined to kill us, Iraq source of WMD to unconventional forces to use against us, Russia and China actively supporting our enemies, Wealthy Saudi Arabian nationals funding our unconventional enemies, purveyors of Islamist hate, Madras schools exporting hate for America. Russia and China providing technology to our enemies, blocking our political goals. Middle East oil very vulnerable to conventional and unconventional and political disruption. Sudden loss of oil would destroy the economy. Islamists in all Middle Eastern countries serious unconventional threat when financed, armed and trained. Islamists cannot be separated from moderates. Islamist clerics motivators of hate.

2001 capabilities. Undefeatable conventional and nuclear forces, limited army size. No practical financial limits. Very mobile conventional forces. Small allied support.

My 2001 Action Plan. Based on intelligence, threats and capabilities eliminate foreign oil dependency by 2007. Add 500,000 additional ground troops by 2005. Since defense is very limited, go on continuous offense. Long term goal, eliminate financed, armed and trained Islamists, by killing the Islamists and eliminating funding, arms and training. Continuously educate and motivate the American people by clearly identify enemies, identify seriousness of the threat, stress that we must be prepared to go it alone, stress victory will be long term, but winning will be continuous, warn that other attacks like 9 –11 are unstoppable in the near term. Massive funding and unwavering by-partisan public support is essential. Provide monthly national addresses to report progress and identify obstacles, launch massive propaganda campaign to bolster American resolve and weaken our enemies. Eliminate all Middle Eastern immigrants and remove all Middle Eastern nationals from the country.

Near term goals, begin significant expansion of domestic oil and parallel alternative fuels, bio, coal and shale degasification, nuclear power. Advise allies to do the same. Stop all UN funding. Attack Al-Qaeda to get cheap victory and bolster public support. When militarily ready eliminate Iraq WMD capability and put American military presence in the center of the Middle East. When achieved, move military out of populated areas. Build strong defensive position in the open with a port and airfields. Remove all nationals from inside our perimeter. Build airfields if necessary. Bulldoze a 5-mile flat kill zone around our perimeter.

When oil independence is achieved, instability in the Middle East is a good thing. Use military to control flow of Middle Eastern Oil. Use military to control movement of food into the Middle East. Demand that Middle Eastern nations kill their Islamists, kill Islamist clerics. Eliminate Islamist funding, arms and training. Eliminate Madras schools. Do it or face economic ruin and starvation. If still uncooperative foment instability, by funding and equipping 5th columns, especially in Iran. Play off of tribal, sectarian and religious hatreds to provoke internecine violence. Get our enemies to kill our enemies. If still uncooperative, threaten Muslim holy sites. This will encourage them to attack us in our open prepared defenses with no unconventional advantages. Reward cooperation with food and oil. Punish resistance by stopping same.

Use economic threats and if necessary boycotts to get Russia and China to stop aiding our enemies.

Liberty or Death

2007-01-11T09:31:00.000-05:00

Military Analysis of the New Bush Iraq Plan

Below is a quick analysis of the military aspects of the President’s new plan. More to come as details of the operations are briefed to congress. I have listed the pertinent pieces in three groups, Assumptions, the Iraq Plan and the regional Plan. Bush’s words are in bold, my comments are not. I have changed the order of the paragraphs to make them easier to understand since Bush mixed his thoughts. If you listened carefully you will have noticed that what he spoke is different from the written text. The speechwriters must have been apoplectic. For example, early in the speech he again used the phase “War on Terror.” Bush should fire his speechwriters and himself. This speech was a disaster. Listen to it again. Pretend you are Joe six pack in the American Heartland. More importantly pretend you are the Iraqi people listening to the one last vision of this President. This speech was not written for them. It was written for a college-educated audience. Did this inspire anyone? It was delivered in a monotone voice like a college professor coupled with a child who just came from a beating behind the woodshed. The feeling I took away was that he was not comfortable and by no means is he enthusiastic about this plan.

Assumptions

Victory will not look like the ones our fathers and grandfathers achieved. There will be no surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship. But victory in Iraq will bring something new in the Arab world — a functioning democracy that polices its territory, upholds the rule of law, respects fundamental human liberties, and answers to its people. A democratic Iraq will not be perfect. But it will be a country that fights terrorists instead of harboring them — and it will help bring a future of peace and security for our children and grandchildren.

Victory still equals a functioning democracy that can provide it’s own security.

The most realistic way to protect the American people is to provide a hopeful alternative to the hateful ideology of the enemy — by advancing liberty across a troubled region. It is in the interests of the United States to stand with the brave men and women who are risking their lives to claim their freedom — and to help them as they work to raise up just and hopeful societies across the Middle East.

“Provide a hopeful alternative to the hateful ideology of the enemy”,

The consequences of failure are clear: Radical Islamic extremists would grow in strength and gain new recruits. They would be in a better position to topple moderate governments, create chaos in the region, and use oil revenues to fund their ambitions. Iran would be emboldened in its pursuit of nuclear weapons. Our enemies would have a safe haven from which to plan and launch attacks on the American people. On September the 11th, 2001, we saw what a refuge for extremists on the other side of the world could bring to the streets of our own cities. For the safety of our people, America must succeed in Iraq.

True. He should have thought of that before going into Iraq. Iraq provided stability in the region by provided a significant buffer to Iran and keeping a large Shia population in check. He destroyed that stability, and has determined to replace it with a democracy supported by all Iraqis living side by side in peace. A risky goal because the Americans do not have control of the outcome. It depends on the Iraqi people and government.

We will use America's full diplomatic resources to rally support for Iraq from nations throughout the Middle East. Countries like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf States need to understand that an American defeat in Iraq would create a new sanctuary for extremists — and a strategic threat to their survival.

They know that already. This sounds more like a plea for help that he won’t get. The Saudis are not going to stop funding the insurgents and Al-Qaeda. There security rests with a viable and rich Sunnis population in Iraq.

From Afghanistan to Lebanon to the Palestinian Territories, millions of ordinary people are sick of the violence, and want a future of peace.

True, but they are being crushed to silence by the Jihadists.

Most of Iraq's Sunni and Shia want to live together in peace — and reducing the violence in Baghdad will help make reconciliation possible.

What proof of this has he seen that we have not? Has anyone heard one shred of evidence to support this claim?

Only the Iraqis can end the sectarian violence and secure their people. And their government has put forward an aggressive plan to do it.

True, but Iraqi plans are just words. Their actions have always been quite different.

Our past efforts to secure Baghdad failed for two principal reasons: There were not enough Iraqi and American troops to secure neighborhoods that had been cleared of terrorists and insurgents.

True then and true with this plan.

And there were too many restrictions on the troops we did have. Our military commanders reviewed the new Iraqi plan to ensure that it addressed these mistakes. They report that it does. They also report that this plan can work.

True. Why did he say this so weakly? Who did he convince with this statement? “Unnamed commanders report”. Has all the passion of a weather report.

Our military forces in Anbar are killing and capturing al-Qaeda leaders — and they are protecting the local population. Recently, local tribal leaders have begun to show their willingness to take on al-Qaeda. And as a result, our commanders believe we have an opportunity to deal a serious blow to the terrorists.

Have begun to show a willingness???? Success depends on the Iraqis and this is the evidence that they are willing to step up to the challenge???

The most urgent priority for success in Iraq is security, especially in Baghdad. Eighty% of Iraq's sectarian violence occurs within 30 miles of the capital.

True for the moment. The bad guys have a right to change where they fight if we get tuff in Baghdad.

Bush's Iraq Plan

There will be 18 Iraqi Army and National Police brigades committed to this effort — along with local police. These Iraqi forces will operate from local police stations — conducting patrols, and setting up checkpoints, and going door-to-door to gain the trust of Baghdad residents.

So I have committed more than 20,000 additional American troops to Iraq. The vast majority of them — five brigades — will be deployed to Baghdad.

This time, Iraqi and American forces will have a green light to enter these neighborhoods — and Prime Minister Maliki has pledged that political or sectarian interference will not be tolerated.

For a while. The Iraqi government needs to play along for a while. But November will be here in a heart beat.

To establish its authority, the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq's provinces by November. And to allow more Iraqis to re-enter their nation's political life, the government will reform de-Baathification laws — and establish a fair process for considering amendments to Iraq's constitution.

Not a chance. Increase the Baathist share of the government??? These are the same guys that are harboring the insurgents and funding their own militias. What assurance does Bush have from the Baathists that they will give up a winning military strategy for a minority piece of the shaky government? What do the Baathists tell the insurgents, go home we are going to become peaceful??? The die is cast. Even Bush does not believe this.

So I have given orders to increase American forces in Anbar Province by 4,000 troops.

1 Stryker brigade is supposed to inspire the local tribal leaders to risk their lives and power.???? What if all the Baghdad bad guys move to An Bar? Will the 60 Baghdad brigades follow. Or will they hold what they have in accordance with the plan.

After the speech, a Fox military analyst outlined the plan for Baghdad. 55 Iraqi brigades and 5 American brigades. He circled the mixed Shia and Sunnis neighborhoods on a map of Baghdad where 1.5M people live in constant fear of death squads. When asked if this is enough troops, the general stated that it exactly fits the 1 to 50 ratio the Gen Petraeus wrote in his counter insurgency manual. Of course this requires the Jihadists to stay and fight to the death in these neighborhoods. Hello, does anyone believe the Jihadists are that stupid? The Jihadists can move freely throughout Western Baghdad and An-Bar province. Does this plan address the Rich Baathists in Western Baghdad and An-Bar? Does it stop them from funding death squads or harboring insurgents?

Regional Plan

Succeeding in Iraq also requires defending its territorial integrity — and stabilizing the region in the face of extremist challenges. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.

We are also taking other steps to bolster the security of Iraq and protect American interests in the Middle East. I recently ordered the deployment of an additional carrier strike group to the region. We will expand intelligence sharing — and deploy Patriot air defense systems to reassure our friends and allies. We will work with the governments of Turkey and Iraq to help them resolve problems along their border. And we will work with others to prevent Iran from gaining nuclear weapons and dominating the region.

This is the most important part of the speech. It is Bush’s first public statement that he is going to attack the Iranian logistics lines to Iraq. He is going to kick the hornet’s nest and finally challenge the Iranians. We now know the purpose of the 3 carrier battle groups and why Admiral Fallon.

Summary

Did this speech inspire anyone? Are Iraqis now eager to charge into the streets, or do they even have a clue what Bush said. If I were an Iraqi citizen and heard that weak speech delivered by an unenthusiastic president I would be scared to death. When we desperately needed a Patton speech we got a Yale commencement address.

The American military will do their part. Will Maliki do his part? If he were enthusiastic, Bush would not have had to publicly give him an ultimatum of November.

What was Bush’s message to the bad guys and the Shia death squads? Lay low, go elsewhere, be patient until November. Maliki play along until November. Sadr, go to ground and be a good boy.

Will the Bush Baghdad plan succeed? Absolutely. Will it in the end make the slightest difference in establishing a peaceful democracy? Not a chance. Will Maliki swear off supporting Shia death squads after November? Will he arrest and hang Sadr? He may put him under house arrest until November, but that is it. Bush laid out a plan that will succeed by November. He will declare victory. But this success will be meaningless in the big picture of Iraq. It also is clearly not Maliki’s plan. Maliki knows it is the Baathists who are the source of all the trouble in Iraq. The Bush plan is to give them more political power! And that will do what? After November Maliki will do the correct thing and go after the Baathists and the insurgents. Bush is giving safe harbor and more power to the one group that is causing 95% of all the violence.

This plan would work if the Americans had the forces to do the job themselves. The American military could clean up Iraq with 500,000 troops. But we don’t have close to that number. We are totally dependent on 150,000 Iraqi troops and police for success. Our objectives are extremely limited and therefore, success will contribute nothing to the final outcome in Iraq.

The only ray of hope is that Bush will finally get us in a shooting war with the real threat, Iran. Bush will deploy Patriot Missile Systems to counter the significant Iranian Silkworms and Scuds. This war at sea will require an entire Blog post of its own. But let me leave you with these thoughts. Iranians do not require missiles or ships to wreak havoc on the oil tankers. The greatest American navy weakness has always been mine sweeping. It is a mission the Navy has fought since I was there in 1969. That is why you see an increase in British and Australian ships. Flood the Persian Gulf with cheap mines like Saddam did in 1991 when he almost sunk one of our carriers that hit 2 mines and broke the keel. This in spite of mine sweeping helos leading the way. Additionally, speedboats and wooden fishing boats carrying hand held missiles will do nicely.

All the oil stops, including the Iranian oil and half of the Saudi oil. Iran will engage the West in an economic game of chicken. Whose economy will collapse first, theirs or ours?

Liberty or Death

2007-01-08T13:59:00.000-05:00

The Solution for Baghdad

The key to pacification of Iraq, if that is your goal, and it is certainly Bush’s goal before he leaves office is Baghdad. With 6.5 million people and a mix of Sunni and Shia neighborhoods it is the key to breaking the will of the insurgents. Who are the insurgents? They are a mix of Sunni Baathists and foreign volunteers, nominally run by Al-Qaeda. When the war ended, the Baathist civilian population was left in tact. Moreover the disbanding of the army returned unemployed Baathist leaders and unemployed privates back to their Sunni Baathist neighborhoods. The Baathists had 30 years of experience in terrorizing the local population. After the war it was business as usual except for killing Americans. What the Baathists had at the end of the war were weapons and money. Remember they were the rich. Rich, experienced, armed out of work Baathists are able to use money, intimidation and kidnapping to create a very capable guerilla operation. James Dunnigan sums it up very well in his article on Baathists. “However, the only Iraqi Islamic radicals that support al Qaeda are the Sunni Arab ones, and these are a minority of the Sunni Arab (20 percent of the population) minority. Moreover, most of the muscle, and money, for anti-government violence comes from Sunni Arab supporters of the Baath Party.” The Baathists with the aid of the foreign insurgents, Al-Qaeda types, are the backbone of the insurgency. Well armed, well led, experienced and well financed. A formidable enemy. The Baathists supply the ambushes and the Al-Qaeda supply suicide bombers. An outstanding force when you through in the hysterical American media.

The war can be broken into 2 parts that have radically different tactics. One is defense. Keeping the good guys alive and reacting to ambushes, IEDs and the latest tactic, snipers. The other part is offensive, going out and rooting out the bad guys where they live. Most Americans picture our guys fighting it out on the streets with armed bands of bad guys. Nothing can be further from the truth. That may be what you see in the drive by media, but the real work is being done house to house. An article written by Marine non coms gives you an in depth understanding of how the Marine Corps accomplishes pacification. It is a must read for everyone. A critical insight is that the Baathists shoot and scoot while the foreigners don’t care if they die.

Last we have George Will weighing in today on expectation of what the surge will look like. It is not very optimistic, mostly concentrating on why it won’t work. He sums it up with,” Baghdad today is what Wayne White -- for 26 years with the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, now with the Middle East Institute -- calls ``a Shiite-Sunni Stalingrad.'' Imagine a third nation's army operating between -- and against -- both the German and Russian forces in Stalingrad. That might be akin to the mission of troops sent in any surge.”

I propose a solution to win. First, I agree with the Bush administration that they made a big mistake clearing out a section of a city and moving on. The shoot and scoot Baathists just move back in. Baghdad is 6.5 million people. A rough guess is that means 4.5 million Sunnis a minority of which are Baathists. Lets assume a high number of 1 million Baathists.

The key to any war, including an insurgency is money. The Baathists have a bunch. The insurgents are externally funded. We also have a good prediction of how the bad guys will react to a surge. The Baathists will shoot and scoot and the foreigners will fight to the death. Lets forget that Bushes latest number of 20,000 troops against 4.5M, 1M of whom are hostile is a joke. But we have the help of the Iraqi Army. We don’t need them to fight; we just need them to occupy the sections we clear, block by block. We leave the Shia blocks alone. We tell Sadr to take a holiday. All we want from him is local advisors to separate the Shia from the Sunni in the mixed neighborhoods. Second you have to provide separation between the Sunnis and Shiites. You create an uninhabited DMZ, bulldozing all the buildings and adding land mines. See how below. Have monitored checkpoints to allow some commerce to flow.

If all we do is shoot at those who shoot at us, the Baathists will melt away taking their money and weapons with them. Our first goal will be to remove all the Baathists, men, women and children. How do you tell if they are Baathists? Former Saddam records, Shia informers and everyday Sunnis. You pack the Baathists in their cars or army trucks, take their money and send them packing to Syria. You lean on the commoner Sunnis to finger all the Bathists in their block. If they don’t cooperate, they also go on the trucks. They will quickly get the picture. Next you round up all the unemployed Sunni males of fighting age. This will be a bunch because unemployment is very high. They go on the trucks. Any household of “means” and the well to do neighborhoods, you round them all up. The key is to get the Baathist money out of Iraq, that is what is buying the fighters from the ranks of the unemployed. Of course, you kill all of the foreigners. The common Sunnis have to finger them as well. It is very simple to identify the foreigners because Iraq was a police state based on the Russian model. Everyone was required to carry extensive identification. No identification, you go on the trucks. If they are foreigners, you shoot them.

How will Syria react? Syria is run by the Baathists. They will gladly take in the Baathists and they all will have cars and will disperse into the Syrian society. What about the common Sunnis? Syria will balk at taking them. Use an armored division to clear out 20 miles of space and set up a tent city for 2.5M people. Provide food, water, medicine and shelter. We are already doing this now. Give Syria 3 months to take over maintenance of the camps. Seal the borders? How? A combination of Iraqi troops and landmines. Did you say landmines! Yep, take a lesson from the Pakistanis who are mining their border with Afghanistan. But we would do the humanitarian thing to string 2 barbwire fences, enclosing the mines, with warning signs every 10 feet. When we finish with Syria, we mine the boarder with Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Iran, the major sources of foreign insurgents. Time required, one year. Move on to other Sunni cites and repeat the process in the second year.

Liberty or Death

2007-01-04T09:04:00.000-05:00

Iraq, a Solution by Col. Tom Snodgrass
and comments by Liberty or Death

Col. Tom Snodgrass posted an article on the Free Republic web site that provides, so far the best analysis of our situation in Iraq and offers his version of a military solution, sorta. I say sorta because he ends the article by basically saying it is too hard. Read his article before reading the rest of my piece.

I would disagree with several of the Colonel's points. His quoting from Clausewitz is appropriate. In my words, "will and capabilities". He proceeds to discuss conventional military solutions to the current asymmetric guerilla warfare by militarily attacking the conventional components of insurgents; that is supply of war material. This sounds like an offense, and it is at the tactical level but at the strategic level it is defensive, that is removing the enemy's war material.

I submit that this is containment not winning. The enemy still exists, his will is untouched, he can still wait patiently for American loss of resolve to recall our troops and they are back in business.

He sites Vietnam as an analogy. It's a poor fit but lets discuss his points. He states that we lost in part because we failed to disrupt the resupply of the North Vietnamese. He talks about the asymmetry of the enemy's tactics but goes on to talk about our capabilities in conventional terms. Those that have read any of my posts know that I am a fanatic adherent on asymmetric warfare. Winning in Vietnam or Iraq didn't/will not happen by applying overwhelming force to the resupply capabilities of either North Vietnam or Iraq. He even mentioned bombing the sources of supply in Iraq's neighboring countries, as if they were maintaining supply dumps like we do. That is not the case in Iraq. Asymetric but not realistic. It was the case in Vietnam only because we let them get away with it. Had we bombed their supply dumps, they would have dispersed them. Lets take the Colonel's thought to the extreme. Assume we could have eliminated 90% of the North Vietnamese resupply; war over? Nope. A significantly reduced capability, but not zero. More importantly Uncle Ho was never attempting to defeat us militarily. He correctly reasoned our will could be defeated in time with propaganda. Same is true in Iraq. The enemy is attacking our will to fight with propaganda and time.

We will always lose the propaganda war for the foreseeable future because of the leftist control of the "image" media. Conservatives can control 100% of talk radio and win every written argument, but will fail to win over a single open minded person because our culture is one of images and sound bites.

Ultimately time and winning are the critical variables. Fight too long without clear images that we are winning and the left will wear the American resolve down to dust.

So, any American Commander in Chief needs to take these two variables into account before committing troops to any endeavor. Any president automatically gets about six months to do anything he wants before the forces of the left get mobilized and their message gains traction with the American people. This time limit can only be extended by a clear perception that we are wining. Schwartzkopf was a master at controlling images. Daily he flooded the American people with images of our forces winning. He was more charismatic than all the CNN repoters.

The American people insist that we not only win, but that we are constantly winning. Scwarzkoph gave the American people what the wanted to see. CNN whining from Baghdad was ignored, we were clearly winning. Vietnam and Iraq were/are not losses but did evolve from winning to containment, which to the American people is a stalemate. Americans hate stalemates worse than losing. Just as in Vietnam, they prefer packing up our marbles and going home to a stalemate.

Surprisingly, even as a super hawk, I agree with that sentiment. Stalemates are more hateful than pulling out. Pulling out is not a loss in the mind of Americans; it means we just don't want to play anymore.

But what about asymmetry? I didn't forget. Never fight by the enemy's rules. He wants to pit his guerrillas against our foot soldiers. He eliminates our tech advantage by hiding amongst the so-called friendly people. He knows our culture won't allow us to bomb western Baghdad and its entire people into dust. So how does one employ asymmetry? Don't play on his field or by his rules. Attack his will not his means. How do you do that? You can't just snuff out the will of anyone to fight. Recall what it took in WW II. So what do you do? You give him a problem that he cannot ignore and that will accomplish two things simultaneously. One, it will refocus his war fighting capability to solving the more urgent problem and two it undermines his will to fight.

What could possible cause the Iraqi bad guys to change focus? The Sunni people. What you say? The Sunni people are the center of gravity for the insurgents. They harbor the remaining Bathists and 95% of the insurgents. They feed the fighters and tend to their wounded. Get rid of them. What! You can't just kill them. Of course not, but you can do something even more effective. Drive them out of Iraq and into Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan and Kuwait. If they refuse to go, load them on trucks and drive them to the border. Give these four countries a major migraine of millions of Sunni refugees. Along with the Sunnis, you also drive out the Bathists and insurgents. Seal the borders. All 4 countries are Sunni and they will be forced to spend their war fighting capability caring for their displaced brothers.

But they will starve or get sick on the trip, unacceptable! Drop them food, water and medicine till they are over the border. Once there, not our problem. Do not let any Iraqis enter the void. Keep it void so that anyone in the void is automatically an enemy combatant.

Do not let any American food supplies reach the Sunnis directly or indirectly through the UN. Make China, Russia and Iran feed them. They are aiding and abetting the Sunnis anyway. There are a lot of Sunnis. You can be certain that this method will cause incredible hardship on these 4 countries for years, the same way the Palestinians overwhelmed Jordan after the Arab Israeli wars.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-26T14:02:00.000-05:00

Enemy Nations and Friends, where is the Moral Clarity?

There is an email floating around worth commenting. It is attributed to an anonymous author, but it can stand on its own.

From: harbachd@gdls.com [mailto:harbachd@gdls.com]

WOULDN'T IT BE GREAT TO TURN ON THE TV AND HEAR ANY U.S. PRESIDENT, DEMOCRAT OR REPUBLICAN GIVE THE FOLLOWING SPEECH?

My Fellow Americans: As you all know, the defeat of Iraq regime has been completed.

Since congress does not want to spend any more money on this war, our mission in Iraq is complete.

This morning I gave the order for a complete removal of all American forces from Iraq . This action will be complete within 30 days. It is now time to begin the reckoning.

Before me, I have two lists. One list contains the names of countries which have stood by our side during the Iraq conflict. This list is short. The United Kingdom , Spain , Bulgaria , Australia , and Poland are some of the countries listed there.

The other list contains everyone not on the first list. Most of the world's nations are on that list. My press secretary will be distributing copies of both lists later this evening.

Let me start by saying that effective immediately, foreign aid to those nations on List 2 ceases immediately and indefinitely. The money saved during the first year alone will pretty much pay for the costs of the Iraqi war.

The American people are no longer going to pour money into third world Hellholes and watch those government leaders grow fat on corruption.

Need help with a famine? Wrestling with an epidemic? Call France .

In the future, together with Congress, I will work to redirect this money toward solving the vexing social problems we still have at home. On that note, a word to terrorist organizations Screw with us and we will hunt you down and eliminate you and all your friends from the face of the earth.

Thirsting for a gutsy country to terrorize? Try France , or maybe China .

I am ordering the immediate severing of diplomatic relations with France , Germany , and Russia . Thanks for all your help, comrades. We are retiring from NATO as well. Bon chance, mes a mis.

I have instructed the Mayor of New York City to begin towing the many UN diplomatic vehicles located in Manhattan with more than two unpaid parking tickets to sites where those vehicles will be stripped, shredded and crushed I don't care about whatever treaty pertains to this. You creeps have tens of thousands of unpaid tickets. Pay those tickets tomorrow or watch your precious Benzes, Beamers and limos be turned over to some of the finest chop shops in the world. I love New York .

A special note to our neighbors Canada is on List 2. Since we are likely to be seeing a lot more of each other, you folks might want to try not pissing us off for a change.

Mexico is also on List 2. President Fox and his entire corrupt government really need an attitude adjustment. I will have a couple extra tank and infantry divisions sitting around. Guess where I am going to put em? Yep, border security.

Oh, by the way, the United States is abrogating the NAFTA treaty - starting now.

We are tired of the one-way highway. Immediately, we'll be drilling for oil in Alaska - which will take care of this country's oil needs for decades to come. If you're an environmentalist who opposes this decision, I refer you to List 2 above: pick a country and move there. They care.

It is time for America to focus on its own welfare and its own citizens. Some will accuse us of isolationism. I answer them by saying, "darn tootin."

Nearly a century of trying to help folks live a decent life around the world has only earned us the undying enmity of just about everyone on the planet. It is time to eliminate hunger in America It is time to eliminate homelessness in America . To the nations on List 1, a final thought. Thank you guys. We owe you and we won't forget.

To the nations on List 2, a final thought: You might want to learn to speak Arabic.

God bless America . Thank you and good night.

If you can read this, thank a teacher. If you are reading it in English, thank a soldier.

(Please forward this to at least ten friends and see what happens! Let's get this to every USA computer!)

P. commented:

No I don't think that I want to hear any president give that speech. That is the "either you with us or against us" speech. That is the "we don't need anyone else" speech. That is the "attitude that got us where we are" speech.

I looked up the foreign aid for 2004 it break down like this in billions of dollars

Iraq 18.44
Israel 2.6
Egypt 1.87
Afghanistan 1.77
Columbia 0.57
Jordan 0.56
Liberia 0.21
Misc ~1.5

That comes to about $27B, that would cover only not quite 7 months of the war, not anywhere close to paying for it. Which of these countries do you think does not deserve the aid? Most of it is for military assistance which we think is in our national interest. It is a LIE to say that the US is subsidizing un-supportive countries around the world. Your message is mean spirited and based on false assumptions. Our aid in the past has been more humanitarian, but nothing of the size that you want us to believe.

Why should the US or any country refuse to deal with any other country on the basis of disagreement on a particular issue? My inference from your statements are that we are the bully on the block and anyone who disagrees on any issue can just take a hike.

The war in Iraq was a mistake, based on false information, and executed badly. We failed why do we now need to divide the world in list A and list B? The world changes, situations change. Germany, Japan, China, and Russia were all mortal enemies at one time. Now we deal with them as world partners. Vietnam was the last country to kick our butt, now we want to develop trade relations.

We cannot go it alone, and there is no reason to try.

Liberty or Death Commented:

P., do you think I wrote that? It came from the liberal Andy Rooney. I don't agree with some of it, but it was meant to be humor, not policy. But you made a few statements that I would like to comment on. We could quibble about your aid numbers, but they are illustrative. What kind of return do you think we get in good will, 10%, any? Egypt is the second largest producer of Islamic Jihadists behind Saudi Arabia, who is clearly number 1.

Aid to any nation other than military aid is Irrational and unproductive. When our government gives money to other nations there are always strings attached. Most of it is seen as US meddling. We should stop democratization and all forms of humanitarian meddling. Charity should be personal not a mandate of law. The US people are the biggest givers in the world. Aid for aids sake is charity, therefore not a government function.

I am not an Isolationist, but I strongly believe that nations should cooperate on common interests, and agree to disagree on other interests. I prefer "a live and let live foreign policy". I disagree with Art Rooney on that one but he was using hyperbole as satire.

Your list of mortal enemy countries is curious. Mortal enemy should not be a statement of our foreign policy, but rather recognition of other countries intent towards us. Intent and capabilities determine those who wish to harm us. We have no enemies of our own. We are willing to work with everyone. Talk is always a good thing. But some nations choose to harm us. It is they, not us who make themselves enemies.

Foreign policy including war is the means to stop other nations from harming us. So lets look at your list, Germany, Japan, China, and Russia. China and Russia clearly are our enemies. They are imperialistic, arm those who wish to harm us and oppose any attempt we have in foreign policy such as sanctions on Iran. China is waging economic warfare as well as shooting at us (laser hits on our satellites). China is intentionally engaging in unfair trade practices such as arbitrarily fixing their currency exchange rate low. Japan's culture considers trade as means of warfare, and with their government policy to intermix government and big business the policies of their businesses are the policies of their government. So their unfair trade practices are considered warfare. This is not how we perceive them, but how they perceive us. We are not in the enemy business anymore. Our last enemies were Mexico, Spain and Great Britain. We chose them. We seized land from all three and have not given it back. Germany and Japan were not our enemies, we were their enemies. What did we do to them after we crushed their ability to harm us? We spent our treasure to rebuild their countries. We took nothing and allowed them to be free states. What would Hitler and Tojo do to us if they won?

The US has the most ambiguous foreign policy of any nation in the world. We call those who wish to harm us like China and Russia friends. We have no friends. In fact the word "friend" and "enemy" are labels that confuse Americans. It is no wonder we no moral clarity when it comes to foreign policy. We treat foreign policy as just another domestic political issue. They see our president calling China our friend, even though they are shooting at our satellites, and doing everything the can to help those who wish to harm us.

Our bipartisan government for the last 60 years is totally responsible for this lack of moral clarity. We had moral clarity in WW II. The entire country rallied behind our government. In fact we have not declared war on anyone until today when we have a declared war on terror. Who the heck is terror, how do we stop him from harming us? Is the country united behind the president today? Nope. Moral clarity is out the window. It's Bush's war, it is the Republicans war. Can you say Bosnia and Darfor, then you can say it is Clinton's war. Darfor is a proposed liberal war. Lack of moral clarity is a bipartisan mistake.

When you label a nation as a friend or enemy you conjure up a certain picture in the minds of the people. The American people use every day context to define what that means. A friend, therefore is someone you can accept even though the occasionally harm you. You don't militarily attack a friend. Chuck the labels if you want moral clarity and therefore the bipartisan support of the American people. Define harmful behavior of any nation or society or group as harmful. When it gets to the point where we must act diplomatically to stop the harm, the president needs to clearly define the harmful behavior. Next he needs to get the consent of the American people that is time to act and what action is appropriate. Is this possible? People understand harmful behavior. They have raised kids. It is an easy analogy for them to understand. It is far easier to get moral clarity on a harmful behavior, than on an entire nation. This also allows us to seamlessly include the behavior of Islamic Jihadists as harmful even though they are not a nation, not a specific organized group but groups of people and individuals that are seeking mortal harm on us. They want us dead.

While the Islamic Jihadists grow stronger and more strident, we are dissolving into partisan bickering and are losing the will to act. Will we act when one of our cities is nuked? Yes. Why do we as Americans have to wait till we are brutally attacked? A brutal attack galvanizes the American people to act and the look to the president to clearly define the harmful behavior and who the perp was. Bush never made the connection between Islamic Jihadists and Iraq. In fact he is yet to define Islamic Jihadists as harmful. First it was "terror" and "Axis of Evil". Recently it was "Islamofacists", a term he made up without a detailed explanation of what that means. Now the term of the day is "extremist". Get a picture in you head who an “extremist” is? Sorta. If we all took a quiz, would we come up with same answer? Nope. It is no wonder that as a people we still lack moral clarity on what will eventually correctly labeled as Islamic Jihadists.

Oh, and every nation should prepare to go it alone. Seek common interest where you can, but if you can't go it alone you are on the extinction list. Just a matter of time.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-20T09:45:00.000-05:00

Comments on Fred Kagan's Plan for Success in Iraq

On 14 December Fred Kagan posted a plan for success in Iraq on the American Enterprise Institute for public Policy Research. Below are his recommendations in italics followed by my comments.

There is a way to do this.
o We must change our focus from training Iraqi soldiers to securing the Iraqi population and containing the rising violence. Securing the population has never been the primary mission of the U.S. military effort in Iraq, and now it must become the first priority.

Agree with Fred.

o We must send more American combat forces into Iraq and especially into Baghdad to support this operation. A surge of seven Army brigades and Marine regiments to support clear-and-hold operations starting in the spring of 2007 is necessary, possible, and will be sufficient.

Fred needs to understand how the Military Industrial Process works. There are 3 or more states of readiness, I am a Navy Aviation man, we have three. Readiness means functioning equipment, manpower at strength levels, personnel trained and spare parts and tools available. The highest level of readiness is in deployed forces, usually around 90%. The second level is the about to be deployed, readiness begins at 60-75% and increases to 90% when its time to ship out. This is a one year cycle in today's environment. Very short. The third category is all other units not in the first 2. There readiness ranges from 30%-50% in war time. Why so low? The military robs Peter to pay Paul. This is required because there is never enough money for everyone to be at 100%. This has been true for the last 36 years that I participated in supporting forces. No president in my 36 years ever asked for a war supplement that would get all forces to 90% or better. This is purely political. Additionally, the military robs the present to fund the future. War supplements are an opportunity to reshuffle the annual budget. Primary use is to fund overruns in the procurement process so the new stuff can be delivered.

Bottom line, there are not 7 brigades (3-4 if he is lucky) in any condition to be deployed by spring. Lead time to surge procurement of equipment, recruit bodies, train the bodies and ship the hardware to Iraq, 1 year minimum after funding is provided. Why? Procurement lead times including hiring more workers, Depot repair lead time including hiring addition mechanics, training time, class room and field. You will also have to increase the number of trainers, who require trainers. 1 year is very optimistic.

o These forces, partnered with Iraqi units, will clear critical Sunni and mixed Sunni-Shia neighborhoods, primarily on the west side of the city.

Doable once the forces are there.

o After the neighborhoods have been cleared, U.S. soldiers and Marines, again partnered with Iraqis, will remain behind to maintain security.

A good idea. Will work as long as we are there. What happens when we leave. Remember we are no longer training Iraqi forces.

o As security is established, reconstruction aid will help to reestablish normal life and, working through Iraqi officials, will strengthen Iraqi local government.

No chance. First it requires new funding from the Democrats, very iffy. Other than the military, all other US governmental agencies in Iraq have been disasters. Newt stated this on Meet the Press Sunday. War supplements for the aid agencies, ain't none. Reconstruction progress to date in Kurdistan, outstanding. In Sunni and Shia land very little. After 3 years the oil is not at 100% and electricity and water/sewerage is none existent in some areas less than 100% each day everywhere. Won't happen in the next 2 years if ever.

This approach requires a national commitment to victory in Iraq:
o The ground forces must accept longer tours for several years. National Guard units will have to accept increased deployments during this period.

This is just plain uninformed. Not only do the troops suffer, 2 years in urban combat (the most stressful combat possible, 12 hours a day seven days a week where a bullet can come at any time from anywhere) will destroy many of the troops mentally. And what about the families, 2 years means busted marriages and lots of problems with single parent kids.

o Equipment shortages must be overcome by transferring equipment from non-deploying active duty, National Guard, and reserve units to those about to deploy. Military industry must be mobilized to provide replacement equipment sets urgently.

OK Fred you are going to take equipment from units at 30-40% readiness. At best you will have to rob 2 units to equip one unit. Tell all the governors that their guard units have no weapons, so don't ask them to do anything for 2 years. Politically impossible and in the age of eminent attack on the homeland who you going to call? Ghost Busters?

o The president must request a dramatic increase in reconstruction aid for Iraq. Responsibility and accountability for reconstruction must be assigned to established agencies. The president must insist upon the completion of reconstruction projects. The president should also request a dramatic increase in CERP funds.

Fred, you wan to give more money to the same agencies that have failed miserably in Iraq for the last 3 years. Plus you can't reconstruct in a war zone. Total loss of an idea.

o The president must request a substantial increase in ground forces end strength. This increase is vital to sustaining the morale of the combat forces by ensuring that relief is on the way. The president must issue a personal call for young Americans to volunteer to fight in the decisive conflict of this age.

Fred this is essential, recruiting is not a problem with money. But building new units require lots of money and can take up to 3 years. Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last month that it would take two years to recruit, train and equip a new division. Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri and Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, Democrats on the House and Senate armed services committees, say the extra 10,000 troops alone would cost the Pentagon about $1.2 billion a year. Boot camps graduate all but useless privates. Where do all the other ranks come from? You have to rob the front line troops and backfill with what, raw recruits? Who do the front line troops give up? There worst troops of every rank. Insane. We did that in Vietnam and the rookies were more a danger to themselves than the enemy. You have to give them 1 year of field training and advanced schools. Oops, we can't do that because we took all the equipment. So no training until new equipment arrives.

In summary, nice thought but can't happen in time. All the tasks you propose are serial. Timeline, get lots of money from a Democratic congress. 50-50 you won't get anything. But lets assume 3 months. Procurement lead time, including hiring and training, 18 months. Field training of recruits and reshuffling of 1000s of other ranks, 1 year (very generous). Shipping lead time for Humvees and Helos 3 months. Pacify bad guys, 6 months. Reconstruction 2 years, if ever. Total timeline 69 months. This assumes a favorable Democratic congress and a new president who is willing.

Oh Fred, if you are creating more units where are you going to put them? What fully operational bases are empty? None. Can we put them in the bases that are empty because the troops are over seas? Yes, but where to do put the families, base housing is already full.

Oh, and Fred, tell the bad guys in the rest of the world we need a 2-3 year time out. We took all the equipment from units not in or going to Iraq.

I am not army, but very experienced in Naval Aviation helicopter procurement and deployment. I have stood up 10 new squadrons from the ground up. 3 years is very fast. Normally five, because facilities and housing is a 5 year money process.

Ever wonder why we have 150,000 troops in Iraq and we surge with 8,000 troops? The military claims not enough troops. That is code speak, not enough means not enough of the right troops. What are needed are infantry with urban warfare training. Subtract the Air Force, they don't carry guns. Subtract the Armor units. You can grab a few infantry companies and support troops but then your Armor unit is then useless. Subtract the companies with tanks and Bradleys from the mechanized units. Pull out the infantry companies and support troops. Again the Mechanized units are now useless. Same is true in the US. Subtract the artillery battalions, can't fire in the city. Fred where are you going to get 50,000 urban warfare trained infantry? Do they even exist?

Liberty or Death

2006-12-19T11:31:00.000-05:00

The Analysis that Should Have Happened after 9-11

The purpose of this post is to get you to think like a strategic analyst. Our government and private organizations have thousands of them that are better trained than I am. Since it appears that Bush ignored the advise of the analysts it is important that everyone understand the basics. If I succeed you will have a new way to look at geopolitics.

9-11 caught us totally by surprise in two ways. One, the capability of a small organization to execute a sophisticated attack. Two, the will or moral clarity to attempt the attack. Up until 9-11 we treated small groups as terrorists to be handled by the FBI in CONUS and Embassy assets O CONUS.

Strategic planning cycles assess enemy nations and match them with US vulnerabilities. They addressed capabilities and intentions. We never planned for a handful of dedicated guys to do big time damage to the US or its interests. Bombing an embassy is chunk change. Bombing the Cole is more serious. The perp was easy to identify, Osama bragged about it. Who were the ground troops? Saudis who were willing to die for their cause and Allah. That is serious motivation. I won’t go into the strategic and military mistakes Bush made in response to 9-11, but I will say he did everything wrong. What should he have done? You should have some ideas when I am finished.

First, all of our planning models needed serious revision. Our vulnerabilities needed total overhaul, since our commerce, infrastructure and citizens were now targets, not just our military. Enemies now were less than nations. So we needed to add organizations and taking a page from Israel, individuals or very small groups. Who was our fundamental enemy? Islamic Jihadists; people willing to die to kill us were the foot soldiers, Al-Qaeda was the small organization that provided, planning, training, weapons, travel documents and money. These are the same skills as enemy nations, so our model is OK we just needed to serious reassess who the new enemies are. From the bottom up the smallest threat is a single individual. What is his profile? An Islamic Jihadist who could be highly educated, or not (Richard the Shoe Bomber). Where are these Jihadists? How do they become enabled to harm us? Using Al-Qaeda as a model, it was small, Islamist, had money, weapons, training facilities and cover ( very difficult to find) churning out Jihadists. But where did they come from? All over the Middle East scattered amongst a population that was not a threat to the US. What makes an ordinary member of Islam a Jihadist? Motivation. Where did that come from? First, a religion that glorifies death, Clerics and schools that indoctrinate children to grow up hating Americans and Jews (Educated Jihadist potentials) and disenfranchised Moslems with no future, the massive unwashed of the Middle East including most Palestinians (Uneducated Jihadist potentials). How does a potential become a real Jihadist? Money, training, weapons, travel documents and cover. Who provides that? Small and large organizations, and nations. Can these organizations manufacture weapons and money? No, they get the weapons from nations and the money from rich people, organizations and nations.

We can now load our model with more than nations.

1.Uneducated Islamic Jihadists individuals or small groups capable of shooting, bombing and IEDs.
2.Educated Islamic Jihadists individuals or very small groups capable of sophisticated attacks, from destroying infrastructure all the way to WMD attacks.
3.Small and large organizations, Al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, Fatah, organized crime and many others.
4. Nations that want to harm us directly ( Iran ) or indirectly, Korea, Russia, China, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are the biggies. Pakistan is special in that the government is indirectly hostile (nuclear proliferation), worse only one man keeps it from being a serious nuclear threat.

This list is not exhaustive, but you get the point. Next lets assess capabilities. I will address only some examples. Iran is a serious threat to the whole Middle East and especially Israel. It can stop the flow of Persian Gulf oil for months if not a year. It facilitates organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas. It has chemical weapons. When it acquires nukes it can use them or give them to organizations. Korea, Russia and China are major arms exporters. Russia and China have imperialist ambitions. Saudi Arabia plays both sides of the fence. The government wants to get along but it does not control the people. Radical clerics do. Wahabbists, now called Salafis churn out potential Jihadists through Madras schools that are all over the world including the US. They are funded by Rich Saudi donors. You know what the others can do.

US capabilities. Almost anything. Unlimited military force, bribe money, covert operations, naval blockades, high seas seizures, embargoes of all types including food, economic threats such as loss of most favored nation status, loss of all trade, and diplomacy (creditable threats). We can bankrupt China for example by stopping all trade.

One other concept is vital to understand. Anytime you tinker with the world, you may achieve your goals, or not but there always unintended consequences. Those are hard to calculate but it is essential that you do. Let me provide some examples. We can nuke Saudi Arabia off the map eliminating the largest source of Jihadists, bad guy money, and Madras schools. This is a push of a button and it is done. But what would be the reaction of the world and our own people? The losses would exceed the gains. Non-Starter. What about Iraq? Much more complex but understandable. Choose regime change, destruction of their army, and democratization. Bush’s choices. What were the benefits; possible stopping of WMD proliferation, stopping of military, and financial assistance to organizations such as Al-Qaeda? A potential stable democracy in the Middle East that leans west. What are the down sides? WMD moved to Syria, eliminating the only army that was a check to Iranian imperialism, democracy has enabled sectarian civil war, Insurgents harbored by the Sunnis, and the flight of 150,000 educated middle class professionals. Net plus or minus? A huge minus. Bad idea. Smashing the Taliban, and Al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. Helps some. Negatives, Taliban and Al-Qaeda ran south to safe havens in Pakistan and the mountains of Afghanistan. Occupying Afghanistan creates targets for the cheap Jihadists and some nationals that got away. A small net plus.

What is wrong with this picture? In five years we have done nothing to curb the creation of Jihadists, the most serious threat to American citizens and infrastructure. First, we have eliminated only a handful of potentials. Second we have done nothing to disrupt the creation of fully trained, armed, financed and documented Jihadists. What about organizations? Nothing. They are stronger today than five years ago. What have we done in five years to reduce the threat to America? Almost nothing. What could we have done? Lots of things and simultaneously. I’ll pick just one. Squeeze the Saudis. Threaten to topple their government. We won’t if you seize the private money going to organizations, seize the radical clerics, and shut down the Madras schools. Cost, nothing. Net plus, significant reduction of Jihadists. If you want to use military force, roll through Lebanon and Syria. Trash the Shia part of Lebanon, Kill Hezbollah. Chase the remnants into Syria. Trash Syria, the Bathists and the rest of Hezbollah. LEAVE! No targets for the Jihadists. Pluses, Hezbollah crushed, lots of Shia dead, a Jihadist supporting nation destroyed. Down side, world condemnation. Big deal. What did world condemnation do to the Soviets when they invaded Czechoslovakia? Nothing.

Smart readers will have come to this conclusion, how do we eliminate the Jihadists, are not they are the real threat? Short of nuking the Middle East, we can’t eliminate them or even seriously reduce them in the next 10 years. Who can? Only the moderate Muslims can eliminate the Jihadists. I will leave it to you to determine a plan to accomplish that.

Oh, by the way. Wouldn’t it be reassuring that our government can name the real threat. But in 5 years we have gone from “terror” and axis of evil to Islamofacists, a term that does not exist in Islam. Moral Clarity? Nope. Is Bush that dumb? Nope. He doesn’t have the answer.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-18T09:06:00.000-05:00

If You Want to Play in the Middle East you Have to Play like a Middle Easterner

America’s biggest failure in Iraq is doing things the American way. And worse we insist the Iraqis also do things the American way. American democracy, American goals, American methods. When one culture conquers a nation of 3 cultures that it does not want to rule forever, you have to make choices that make sense to the conquered. Saddam could make three cultures play together as one nation because he was a ruthless dictator. When the American military smashed that dictatorship it also smashed the means of cohesion. Worse it established itself as the new government, and only later asked the people to elect a democratic Iraqi government, but do it the American way. Democracies require the consent of the governed. Did anyone ask the Iraqis if the wanted one nation under a democratic system? No, we imposed an America way of governing and expected the governed to act as Americans would. Iraqis are not Americans, they are Middle Easterners.

Middle Easterners do no not think, behave or dream like Americans. Their culture is one of families, extended families, tribes, sectarianism, and lastly nations. Religious fundamentalism is very strong, and is weakly controlled by the Persian Gulf secular dictatorships. Turkey, a democracy, is the only exception. And it suffers the sectarian strife similar to Iraq today. Iran and Afghanistan’s history is one of sectarian dictatorships that were recently hijacked by theocrats and warrant special consideration. Middle Eastern societies function, but not anything like the American society. They have a thousand year history of religion, nepotism, bribery, tribal loyalty and inter-tribal and sectarian strife. They have an innate distrust if not outright hatred of infidels.

Newt Gingrich said it well on Meet the Press Sunday when he said, the day the statue fell is the day an interim Iraqi government should have taken charge and been the only voice to the Iraqi people. We failed; Paul Bremer was the voice of authority. The liberation we sought quickly turned into an occupation by Infidels. Worse, peace was in the hands of American soldiers using American methods vice an Iraqi Army that the people understood and could function with. Domestically, we disbanded the army and instantly created 60% unemployment among young men. A recipe for disaster in the strongest country.

OK we did everything wrong in Iraq. What can we do better the next time? Use of American military might destroys the institutions and fabric of the society we crush. If our goal is disruption then nobody can do it better than the American military. If your goal is a moderate American leaning secular government one must realize that the military can't do that by itself. This is an extremely difficult task, and one that the State Dept. and other non-military agencies were totally unprepared to pick up. Why? The military doesn’t question why, they do what the commander in chief orders. But the commander in chief is not a commander to the civilian organizations like the State Dept. He is just another boss. They are entrenched bureaucracies, with their own visions of how things should be. Does anyone believe Bush got the buy-in and support of the bureaucracies before he went into Iraq? Powell’s resignation should have been a red flag.

Can the president accomplish anything in the Middle East with just the military besides kill and destroy? Surprisingly, the answer is yes. Except for Iran the rest of the Middle East oil nations, and they are the only ones that matter strategically to the US, are moderate dictatorships/kingdoms. They all have armies. We have had senior-to-senior contact with these armies of the Middle East for many years. For every general they have we have generals who know their guys on a personal, first name drinking buddy basis. Many are patriots, with loyalties to their country but are not happy with current state of affairs. Some are totally loyal to the current dictator.

Newt Sunday revealed another characteristic about Middle Eastern leaders and diplomats. They lie in private and speak the truth in public. American and the rest of the world are the opposite. They speak the truth in private and lie in public. Wow is that a revelation! How can we exploit the differences? The key lessons learned in Iraq are that military destruction causes chaos and that the commander in chief can only trust the military. A significant handicap or is it? If you think like an American it is, but if you think like a Middle Easterner there are opportunities. There is a great deal of internal tension in the moderate Middle East. Islamism, theocratic leadership is on the rise. Saudi Arabia is the worst case. The government is run by the House of Saud, but the people are controlled by the theocrats. This works because the House of Saud is afraid to crack down on the radicals but rather pays off the theocrats with oil money. This is great for Saudi Arabia but not so great for America. The radicals are now well funded and led, so are perfectly happy to kill Infidels (Americans) rather than their own leaders.

We have learned from the Iraq debacle that American troops are the worlds finest at destroying things, but the Middle East will never accept occupation or rule by infidels. So what can America do? If you do not want to smash the secular nations like Iraq and leave chaos then you have to do things the Middle Eastern way. What is that? Middle Easterners also know that we speak the truth in private. Use the friendship of our generals with their generals to enable a coup. What do we offer? A Middle East solution, lots of money and what ever support they request. Forget the senior staff they are already well bribed, but do not directly control any troops. Who does? The brigade commanders and below. That’s why lots of money. For a coup to work the commander needs to buy the loyalty of his underlings. Promise the brigade commanders it will be their country to do with, as they wish, no strings except one, crush the Islamist radicals. Would they do that? In a heartbeat. The theocrats would be as big a threat to them as they are to the current leaders.

This is a win-win. It is impossible for our military to go into a Middle Eastern country and root out the bad guys and not kill any good guys. As infidels we would get even less support from the public than we are getting in Iraq. The people would hate us; and they are the only ones who know who the radicals and their financial patrons are. But their own military would be accepted by the people and the moderate people would be more than willing to help their own soldiers find the radicals where they would never help infidels. Radicals gone and no American boots on the ground or American casualties. Moderate military, now millionaires and in charge of the oil owing nothing to anyone once the rid the place of radicals.

But Liberty or Death their military would not coup their leaders. Stop thinking like an American; think like a Middle Easterner. Is their loyalty to the current dictator? No. What about their oath to the constitution? What constitution? Their loyalties are family, extended family, personal friendships, tribe and sect then country and dictator.

Fact of life, any military solution will involve massive civilian casualties. Why? It is not the armies but the people of the Middle East countries that are our enemy. If we don’t kill a lot of civilians we fail. But the panty wetting American public and drive by media would never accept this. So lets get the Middle Easterners to solve our problem for us. But we need to move quickly, before the whole Middle East is a theocracy.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-15T07:10:00.000-05:00

A Muslim who Share America’s Values

M. Zuhdi Jasser is a Phoenix physician and chairman of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy. He can be reached at his blogsite. Dr. Jasser is a Muslim who believes in American values, which makes him rare. He is also trying to organize like-minded Muslims to speak out against Radical Islam, the Islamists. That makes him very rare indeed. Please show him some support. Moderate Muslim Americans are essential to our personal safety. Only they can spot a radical in our midst. If they are not encouraged to “drop a dime” we are in for some ugly times.

Thank You Dr. Jasser

Liberty or Death

2006-12-15T06:55:00.000-05:00

A salute to Donald Rumsfeld

I like to beat up on Rummy as much as the next guy, but on his last day it is time to recognize his accomplishments and stop the beatings. Rummy is not a military war leader. He never pretended to be. He is an administrator and in that capacity he has excelled. He has reorganized the military to a lighter more effective force that will serve this nation well in the war against Jihadists. Having worked in DoD for 32 years, I know how difficult changing the military can be. He has done more than any other Secretary in this regard. For more thoughts go Andrea and Mark’s blogsite.

Thanks Mr. Rumsfeld, your contribution will not fade away.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-14T09:12:00.000-05:00

Controlling the Agenda of Public Discourse, Learn from the Left

Bush needs to connect the dots in his last two years and do something good for the country. At the same time he needs to control the agenda of the liberal drive by media. Liberty or Death you must be on drugs how can the media that hate Bush control their agenda, especially when the new congress will put him in a political coffin? 2 simple things. Learn from the left. The left control the media in two ways. Hit their hot buttons, which are usually the same as the left and more importantly be outrageous. Yea, but they will catch on and cut him off. That brings us to the second simple thing, Presidential Executive Orders. Ah, remind me what are those? It is document providing a direct order to a part of the Executive Branch. It must be obeyed. Ignoring a direct order from your boss is insubordination. Those of us who have worked in civil service as supervisors know that it is impossible to fire someone who is incompetent, but it is very easy to fire someone on ethics violations and insubordination. Well ok, but what are the rules? Isn’t the power of the president very limited? Congress makes the laws you know and the president cannot make laws. True but he can interpret the laws and provide orders where no law exists. Read Wiki for a more complete explanation. He can also repeal previous president’s orders.

So how has Bush used this power? He has issued 209 so far, on a pace to exceed Clintons 263. Want to see them all. Go to the Federal Registry. Remember any? Nope, me neither. Remember Clinton aiding North Korea’s nuclear program? EO 12997. Clinton issued 29 Executive orders restricting use of land in behalf of the environment. How many have been revoked by Bush? None. Yikes, a closet tree hugger! When Hillary becomes president you can be certain she will revoke the executive orders of every conservative president.

The power of Executive Orders is limited, but in the history of the presidency only 2 have been overturned, and they were obvious. So what should Bush do? First he should revoke every executive order a liberal president issued. This will start the media firestorm. Second he should issue orders directing regulatory agencies how to interpret congressional laws that have killed the building of nuclear power plants and oil refineries. One example. In fact he should issue orders interpreting every law congress has passed that create unnecessary paperwork for American business. This will be seen as outrageous by congress. Tuff. Force them to override his order. A new law that he can veto. Good luck getting 67% of the house to overturn the veto.

What else should he do? Issue executive orders that touch every hot button of the left and the media. Ensure they are conservative and well thought out. The media and the left will go crazy. When they do be bolder, issue orders that will eventually be overturned by the Supremes. So what, it will take them forever. Remember the important thing is to control public discourse. The media has one Achilles heal, time. You can only cram so much in a 24-hour period and prime time, when America is listening is very short. Go on the offensive. Make conservative issue reality. Force the left and media to defend stupid leftist positions. In essence control the agenda the American public hears. Every hour on a subject Bush cares about is an hour that cannot be devoted to liberal issues.

Imagine an American president controlling the agenda of the liberal press and more importantly getting his message to the American people in prime time. This is real power. It has always been there for the taking. All you need is guts.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-13T12:52:00.000-05:00

Creating the Amman Accords

In this era of the Islamic Jihadi who intentionally use their own people as human shields, refuse to wear uniforms, torture any westerner the can get their hands on, it is past due to revisit the Geneva Convention or the Geneva Accords? The more you look, the more you realize the conventions were intended for a different time and for warfare fought by nations. Most people in the US believe the Geneva Conventions are a fixed set of rules for the conduct of war. Nothing could be further from the truth. Beginning in 1863, there have been four significant conventions and new protocols as late as 2005. Then you have those who signed and whether the conventions bind nations at war with non-signature nations. You can also sign with stated caveats. A second significant set of conventions called the Hague conventions beginning in 1907 established more rules on the conduct of war. Again some nations signed and some nations did not. Some had caveats. Some Hague articles were adopted into later Geneva conventions. All these conventions were germinated by atrocities and responsible nations attempting to address these atrocities with international regulations. There are also many other lesser-known conventions and treaties that have those who signed and those who did not. What consists today is a massively confusing and sometimes contradictory set of rules that can only be sorted out by lawyers. The American people have no idea what laws apply to us and in what circumstances. We rely on our politicians and the media to sort them out for us. A very risky thing to do.

These rules are more than guides. There are very serious penalties to violators, who are charged with war crimes. For example Slobodan Milošević found himself in clutches of a war crimes tribunal.

What are some common themes in the rules. First they govern signature nations. Look at the dates. What were the cultues of the world 120 years ago? The world was dominated nations. Warfare was conducted by nations. What else is there? Morality. Our nation expresses this culutural characterictic in a term called a just war. How extreme can these views be, see this site. Its severe restrictions are not legally binding but have an impact on the mindset and resolve of the American people. The rules of Geneva, Hague and just war weigh heavily on the rules of engagement that military is controlled by and held accountable. Violations are punishable offenses.

Jump forward to 2006, what is the nature of enemy combatants that threaten the lives of US citizens. Iraq and Iran are exceptions. A hostile Iraq no longer exists, it has been temporarily replaced with a domacracy that we support. But we are still fighting in Iraq. If not Iraqis who are we fighting? We are on record as fighting foreign insurgents, non Iraqis that are not nations and not even under the banner of recognized terror groups except Al-Qaeda.

But future conflicts will require the US to respond to more and more attacks by unrecogonized groups and groups that are recognized as terroists. They don’t recognize any nation, fly no flag but are definitely dependent on nations and private benefactors for money, arms, training and cover (travel documents). Our good friend Hugo is mass producing legal documents for any and all thugs who want to attack American citizens. Techically these would combatants treated as criminals if they were US citizens, which they are not.

But what about the culture of those who wish us dead? When someone wants you dead you had better understand who they are and what motivates them. Bush now calls them Islamofacists, a non legal term with regard to the Geneva convention. Also the term has no meaning in Islam. In fact Islamic groups, organizations, state sponsors and Geneva non signiture nations reside in a legal vacuum.

So lets all take a short course in all thing Islam. Islam is a religion, a monotheistic religion based upon the teachings of Muhammad, a 7th century Arab religious and political figure. It is the second-largest religion in the world today, with an estimated 1.4 billion adherents, known as Muslims. Today, Muslims may be found throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East, North Africa, and South and Central Asia. Only about 20 percent of Muslims originate from Arab countries.[5] Islam is the second largest religion in many European countries, such as France, which has the largest Muslim population in Western Europe, and the United Kingdom.[6][7]

Islamism is a set of political ideologies that hold that Islam is not only a religion, but also a political system that governs the legal, economic and social imperatives of the state according to its interpretation of Islamic Law. For Islamists, the sharia has absolute priority over democracy and universal human rights.” Wahhabism is an Orthodox Islamic movement, named after Muhammad ibn Abd al Wahhab (1703–1792). It is the dominant form of Islam in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and recently Western Iraq. It is now intellectual obsolete and has been replaced with Salafism. Salafis view the first three generations of Muslims, who are Muhammad's companions, and the two succeeding generations after them, the Tabi‘in and the Taba‘ at-Tabi‘in, as examples of how Islam should be practiced. This principle is derived from the following hadith by Muhammad: The people of my generation are the best, then those who follow them, and then whose who follow the latter (i.e. the first three generations of Muslims).

The closest analogy to Christians and Jews is Orthodoxy or the extreme groups within these cultures. So far we have Islam that dominates the culture of the Middle East. We also know that Islam is not monolithic. Like Christianity a great schism occurred early on resulting in Sunnis and Shiites. The word Sunni comes from the word sunna, which means the tradition of the Prophet of Islam, Muhammad. They represent the branch of Islam that came through the caliphate, which started with Abu Bakr.
Shiites Shi'a believe that at any given time, a certain leader titled The Imam of Time, is the Guardian of all Muslims.

A Twelver Shi'a Imam is a Guide in all religious and worldly matters, and is believed to have been Divinely appointed. A Sunni Caliph, on the other hand, is appointed by a part of the community, and is mostly a temporal ruler, where the Quran is taken to be the only authority in all matters pertaining to religion.
Within Shi'ism, there are various sects that differ over the number of Imams, or path of succession. The issue of who is the rightful Imam has led to the growth of 3 sects within Shi'ism including: Twelvers, Ismailis & Zaidis. Twelver Shi'as cite various references from the Qur'an and reports, or Hadith, from Muhammad and the twelve Shi'a Imams with regards to the reappearance of Muhammad al-Mahdi who will, in accordance with God's command, bring justice and peace to the world by establishing Islam throughout the world. The prophet Muhammad is reported to have said:

"During the last times, my people will be afflicted with terrible and unprecedented calamities and misfortunes from their rulers, so much so that this vast earth will appear small to them. Persecution and injustice will engulf the earth. The believers will find no shelter to seek refuge from these tortures and injustices. At such a time, God will raise from my progeny a man who will establish peace and justice on this earth in the same way as it had been filled with injustice and distress."

Shi'as believe that when Muhammad al-Mahdi will reappear, the prophet Jesus will also reappear and that he will pray behind al-Mahdi. Sunni Muslims do not consider Muhammad al-Mahdi to be the Mahdi. Many scholars even doubt that he existed at all and hold that the 11th Imam died at the age of 28 years without leaving any offspring, though some other believe that he existed. [8]

What we have is a culture that is definitely not monolithic. Only 18% of Muslims live in the Arab world. 15% of all Muslims are Shi'a. Today there are an estimated 130 and 190 million Shi'a Muslims[2] (including Twelvers, Ismailis, Zaydis) throughout the world, about three quarters of whom reside in Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan and India. Were it not for Radical Imams, the twelvers highjacking Iran there would be no Muslim nation seeking our demise. Approximately 80% of Shi'a are Twelvers and they are the largest Shi'a school of thought, predominant in Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and Bahrain.

How strong is the rift between Sunnis and Shia.

“On the other hand, similar fatwas have not been issued by many prominent Sunni scholars or universities. A number of contemporary Sunni scholars such as Shaykh Dr Khaalid ibn ‘Ali al-Mushayqih (who released a fatwa regarding praying with the Shi'a) maintain that Shi'a are not considered as Muslims, unless they deny certain beliefs found in a number of Shi'a hadith books like al-kafi that are accepted by the majority of twelver Shi'a.”

Finally we come to the concept of Jihad, a very misunderstood term. What is known:

1. Ibn Rushd, in his Muqaddimāt, divides Jihad into four kinds:

"Jihad by the heart; Jihad by the tongue; Jihad by the hand and Jihad by the sword." He defines "Jihad by the tongue" as "to commend good conduct and forbid the wrong, like the type of Jihad Allah (swt) ordered us to fulfill against the hypocrites in His Words, “O Prophet! Strive hard against the unbelievers and the hypocrites” (Qur'an 9:73). So the Prophet (s) strove against the unbelievers by sword and against the hypocrites by tongue[1]

Jihad by the sword (jihad bis saif) refers to qital fi sabilillah (armed fighting in the way of God, or holy war), the most common usage by Salafi Muslims and offshoots of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Also known as Physical Jihad: This relates to the use of physical force in defense of Muslims against oppression and transgression by the enemies of Allah, Islam and Muslims. Allah commands that Muslims lead peaceful lives and not transgress against anyone. If they are persecuted and oppressed, the Qur'an recommends that they migrate to a more peaceful and tolerant land:

"Lo! Those who believe, and those who emigrate (to escape persecution) and strive (Jahadu) in the way of Allah, these have hope of Allah's mercy..." (2:218). If relocation is not possible, then Allah also requires Muslims to defend themselves against oppression by "fighting against those who fight against us." 2 The Qur'an states: "To those against whom war is made, permission is given [to defend themselves], because they are wronged - and verily, Allah is Most Powerful to give them victory." (22:39) [3]

2. Islamic scholars agree that Jihad should not be undertaken to gratify one’s whims nor to obtain wealth and riches. Many also consider that it must also not be undertaken to conquer territories and rule them or to acquire fame or to appease the emotions of communal support, partisanship and animosity. On the contrary, it should be undertaken only and only for the cause of Allah as is evident from the words.[3] As in Qur'an:

Those who believe, fight in the cause of Allah, and those who disbelieve, fight in the cause of Satan. So fight you against the friends of Satan. Ever feeble indeed is the plot of Satan

3. The Salafi jihadist movement has attracted rootless and or committed internationalist militants. They fight for the jihad, seeking to re-create the Muslim ummah and shariat to build an Islamic community. Simultaneously conservatives and radical, they form a global network that has attracted Muslims from around the world to fight jihad in Kashmir, Bosnia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and the Philippines. The salafi-jihadist movement in Central Asia and the Caucasus is more localized -- an expression of identity in areas such as Ferghana, villages in Daghestan, and upper Gharm valley. In Central Asia, the term "Wahabi" refers to fundamentalists who come from Pakistan or Afghanistan, but they are not necessarily a political movement. For example, Wahabis in Tajikistan do not recognize themselves as a political alignment. However, most Central Asian regimes use the term Wahabi more broadly to describe Islamic religious movements outside the states' control.

It is important to distinguish between the following groups, thought of (perhaps) as concentric circles or from the most extreme to the least:

· "Jihadist Salafis" - such as the followers of al-Qaeda and like-minded local groups;
· "Salafis" - those who believe that the imitation of the behavior of the Salaf-us-Saliheen (Prophet's Companion's Followers, and those who goes after them) should be the basis of the social order,
· "Islamists" - a still broader category,which includes anyone who thinks that the precepts of Islam - however interpreted - should be fundamental to the political and social order; and,
· "Discontented Muslims" - people who identify themselves as Muslims,and who are unhappy with their life prospects, with the justice of their societies,and/or with the state of the wider world

What else do we need to know. We had all better know who Hamas and Hezbollah are since they have become well organized, trained and equiped by Iran and Hezbollah acquitted themselves very well against Israel.

Hamas (Arabic: حركة حماس‎; acronym: Arabic: حركة المقاومة الاسلامية‎, or Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya or "Islamic Resistance Movement"; the Arabic acronym means "zeal") is a Palestinian Sunni Islamist organization that currently (since January 2006) forms the majority party of the Palestinian National Authority.[1]

Hezbollah[1] (Arabic: حزب الله‎ ḥizb-allāh,[2] meaning "party of God") is a Shi'a Islamist militant and political organization based in Lebanon. It follows a distinct version of Islamic Shia ideology developed by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran.[3][4]
Hezbollah began to take shape during the 1982 Lebanon War; on February 16, 1985 Sheik Ibrahim al-Amin publicly declared the group's manifesto, which included three goals:
· Eradication of Western imperialism in Lebanon,
· Transformation of Lebanon's multi-confessional state into an Islamic state,
· Complete destruction of the state of Israel.[5][

Hezbollah was largely formed with the aid of the Ayatollah Khomeini's followers in the early eighties in order to spread Islamic revolution[49] and follows a distinct version of Islamic Shi'a ideology (“Willayat Al-Faqih”) developed by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran.[3][38]

Is there anyone who believes the Genava and Hague accords apply to to conflict between western cultures and Islamic cultures? I use culture vs nations because all the middle east arab Islamic nations are secular, except for Iran. Our enemies are Non nations, a mixture of Orthodox and moderate adherents, using suicide bombers as a tool against civilians. One thing it is not is clash between nations. It is a clash between cultures. Why did Khomeni choose to call Israel the little satan and the US the Great Satan. After reading the above you should be able to answer that youself.

Bush has a golden opportunity to Write a treaty that addresses the conduct of hostilities between cultures. I would invite everyone to Amman Jordan to develop new rules that both cultures will accept. If that is a blank sheet of paper, so be it. The west can write their own and sign them. The rules can never be the same, our cultures are miles apart. Do Islamic have a set of rules for war? Yes. See this site. A few are worth listing:

1. Sunni muslims believe that jihad can be declared by a political leader with the sanction of religious authorities, however the lack of such a central authority has created problems with the general acceptance of these declarations. The Shia hold that only a just Imam can declare jihad because he is infallible and will properly guide and ensure it's justness.[1]

2. Javed Ahmed Ghamidi writes in his book Mizan that after Muhammad and his Companions, there is no concept in Islam obliging Muslims to wage war for propagation or implementation of Islam. The only valid basis for Jihad through arms is to end oppression when all other measures have failed. Islam only allows Jihad to be conducted by a Government[2] with at least half the power of the enemy.[3][4][5] Some Islamic scholars consider the later command only for a particular time.[6]

4. The 20th Century Muslim scholar, Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi writes, "...the exegetists and jurists have drawn the principle that those who are non-combatants should not be killed during or after a war."
"'No prisoner should be put to the sword' is a very clear and unequivocal instruction given by the Prophet...'The Prophet has prohibited the killing of anyone who is tied or is in captivity.'"[9]

5. From the hadith:
· "You are neither hard-hearted nor of fierce character, nor one who shouts in the markets. You do not return evil for evil, but excuse and forgive." - Bukhari, Volume 6, Book 60, Number 362
· "Do not kill any old person, any child or any woman" (Abu Dawud).
· "Do not kill the monks in monasteries" or "Do not kill the people who are sitting in places of worship" (Musnad of Ibn Hanbal).

6. Civilians
Islam expressly prohibits the killing of non-combatants, civilian women, children and the elderly, during war. The Quran states "make (them) prisoners, and afterwards either set them free as a favor or let them ransom (themselves) until the war terminates" (Qur'an 47:4). A discussion of the Islamic treatment of enemy prisoners of war can be found below.

7. Declaration of war
Islam prohibits surprise attacks and invasions. The Quran states,
If thou fearest treachery from any group, throw back (their covenant) to them, (so as to be) on equal terms: for Allah loveth not the treacherous. 8:58
This verse is interpreted to mean that Muslims must make a proper declaration of war prior to taking military action against trangressing enemies. This rule is not binding if the adversary has already started the war.[7]
Furthermore, the Quran recounts the declaration of war of Muhammad to the pagans,
(This is a declaration of) immunity by Allah and His Messenger towards those of the idolaters with whom you made an agreement.

So go about in the land for four months and know that you cannot weaken Allah and that Allah will bring disgrace to the unbelievers. (Quran 9:1-2)
Muslim scholars note that this verse expressly gives the enemies of Muhammad the time period of four months to reconsider their position and negotiate. Muslims are prohibited from opening hostilities without exhausting possibilites for peace.[8]

We are not going to use suicide bombers. But there can be reciprocity. That if you insist on suicide bombers we can use xxxxx. If western civilians are legitmate targets then Westerners need not be confined to surgical methods to separate Islamic combatants from true civilians.

We have two years to create this accord. Or do we? Was the Iranian president two letters to Americans, one to the people the other to the government our 4 month warning? Baring a war in 4 months, when we leave Iraq absolute chaos will errupt.

These accords will be the greatest legacy any president can leave his successor, to remove the shackles of the obsolete accords from both our military and the moral clarity of the American and Western people.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-11T07:09:00.000-05:00

Environmental Wacos In Confusion

Holy moley Batman, or should I say holy bat crap. I seems we have been looking up the wrong rear ends for green house gases. Just when the wacos have us convinced that it is not the termites, but gas-guzzling SUVs that are destroying the environment along comes two studies that point us in another direction. So whose exhaust is the culprit now? After studying the exhaust systems of cows and humans, The Independent posted two articles giving us the real poop. Cows are clearly the main culprits, “Livestock are responsible for 18 per cent of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming, more than cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together.” “Livestock also produces more than 100 other polluting gases, including more than two-thirds of the world's emissions of ammonia, one of the main causes of acid rain.” “And their wind and manure emit more than one third of emissions of another gas, methane, which warms the world 20 times faster than carbon dioxide.” Yikes, batboy get your calculator 18% of polluting gases. That means that CO2 is only part of the other 82%. Just for simplicity we will say it is all of 82% and forget that nasty ammonia. Being an expert on bats I can speak with authority about birds that produce crap that is very rich in ammonia. I will stack up bird manure to cow pies any day. But I forgot farts. Do birds fart? What about insects? They may make small poops but there are trillions and trillions of them. I will bet my bat mobile on termites. Wild bears? We obviously need to study crap more. These two articles just scratch the surface, or should I say rake the muck. Muck? Gosh, there are a lot of horses too.

Thank God the Bat mobile and bats are still the good guys. But on the same day the Independent provided some clarity of the human contribution by measuring British citizens, “A study by the government-funded Carbon Trust puts the annual carbon footprint of the average Briton at 10.92 tons of CO2 - roughly half of the 19 tons of CO2 produced each year by the average American. You know this is a creditable study because the Americans are properly vilified for creating twice the problem. We have the most cows too. The research also demonstrates that our leisure and recreation pursuits - activities as diverse as watching a football match or taking a trip to the seaside - account for most of our emissions, rather than a lack of insulation or a predilection for 4x4 cars.” In fact commuting contributes only half of horsing around.

Bats, cows, birds, insects and humans horsing around is there anything else? Yup, misguided Ebola bacteria. No credit to Ecoli who are helping to kill humans eating spinach and horsing around at Taco Bell. The Independent is alarmed at Ebola wiping out gorillas. These pesky murders have got the wrong animal; it’s the cows stupid, not gorillas. Wonder if Ebola and Ecoli produce crap? Has anybody measured the amount of crap they produce? We won’t know if they are going to save the planet or destroy it if we can’t measure their crap. What about farts, do they fart?

Liberty or Death

2006-12-09T13:17:00.000-05:00

Can America ever Repeat the Sacrifices and Will to Win like WWII?

Thursday on CPR The co-host Mark Vance asked on Pearl Harbor remembrance day whether this country had the morale clarity to ever fight a an all out war like World War II? He correctly pegged the right problem, “it is a matter of morale clarity”. His concern is whether this country has the morale fortitude to endure heavy casualties for 5 years and see a conflict through to victory. His concern is well stated by Doug Giles. A good question on the day that Baker released his cut and run study report, followed by a whole hour of Meet the Press 10 December; half devoted to Baker and Hamiton explain why their report was bipartisan mush and foreign policy experts giving us the real story. Read the whole transcript. But a complex question for anyone to answer in advance, because no one can get into the minds of 300M people real time. So what is moral clarity? It is the collective mindset of the people, both civilian and military. Where does that come from? It comes from a nations culture, the righteousness of the cause and the victory conditions defined by the leader. You should not accept that on faith. So where is the proof? Before I answer that, we first need to understand how culture reacts to war. Culture affects the 3 psychological factors of war, winning and losing, casualties and enemy civilian casualties. These values can be measured and can be manipulated by the press and psychological warfare.

Lets begin with the topic of the day, World War II. American moral clarity was never tested. America supplied the economic might and the British Empire and especially the Russians supplied the bodies. Because our population was small compared to its awesome economic power this made good sense. America tried to use high tech to defeat Germany and Japan. It worked on Japan but not Germany. Germany was high tech too. We lost only 500,000 dead compared to many millions lost by the other combatants. Of course when the fighting got tough France and Italy surrendered. But it was a fight to the death for Japan and Germany. We tried to bomb Germany into oblivion, but the accuracy of bombing was miserable until 1945. The best we could do was hit a city. In 1940-1941 the British could not even do that. Yes, they missed entire cities. How did it end? Germany literally ran out of manpower. They could not replace their casualties as early as 1944. Britain was also decommissioning divisions to fill the vacancies in remaining units. American manpower was only tested, but not even close to exhausted. However, we did not have the population to win a war of attrition against Germany or Japan. The Russians did. All we need to do was supply the war material, America’s strength.

Germany did not lose the will to fight until Hitler killed himself. But from 44 on the German Army and people new the war was lost. Japan was defeated by high tech. It was the Navy and Army Air Force that defeated Japan. Most people believe Japan surrendered because we annihilated their military forces. Not even close. We barely scratched their ground forces. Except for American stupidity, no American or Japanese ground forces would have been lost after 1942. In early 1942 two diverse Pacific war plans were submitted to FDR. One by Dug out Doug, the loser of the Philippines, which detailed slugging it out island by island all the way to Japan. The navy plan was to wait to build a massive fleet, then by pass the defended Islands and destroy the Japanese navy and in particular it’s merchant fleet. Japan was extremely vulnerable without a massive navy. To make matters worse they chose a navy of capital ships when their lives literally depended on merchant ships and escorts. Japan had to take 100’s of Islands all over the Pacific for raw materials and move massive amounts of raw materials from Korea and China across water to replace their war losses. Worse they did not have the food to feed their population. Japan is a nation of Islands. Not all those Islands were self sufficient in food production. They required massive inter-island food transfers to keep from starving. FDR for political reasons chose Dug out Doug’s plan. So we slugged it out island-by-island including the Philippines all the way to Okinawa where our Japanese home Island invasion force was being assembled. But while the navy supported Doug’s plan it also pursued its own plan. The Japanese navy was sunk and in particular all of their merchant fleet. The navy even sunk the fishing boats and all of the inter-island junks. Wooden ships. Without fish and rice Japan was facing starvation. Still Japan kept its will to fight. Their basically intact Army was moved to the home Islands where it would have inflicted an estimated million American casualties had we invaded.

Fortunately, FDR and his unconditional surrender policy died. Truman was left with the decision to use the atomic bomb. Politically he had no choice. People think he agonized over the decision. It was a no-brainer. He correctly reasoned that the American people would have lynched him after the war when they found out we had the bomb that could end the war and did not use it but sent 1M Americans to their death. Bombs away. Japan surrenders. Nope. Even fewer people know that the 2 atomic bombs did not end the war. Diplomacy won it. A back channel message that was dropped from the Potsdam Declaration Article 12, from Truman to the Emperor ended the war. Well that, and the fact that the Russians declared war. We offered that the Emperor could remain the symbolic head of Japan if he surrendered. Given that his people faced starvation and he knew had a way to save his hide and save face for Japan, he ordered Japan’s surrender. Bottom line, the contrast in cultures in WW II and their consequences on conducting war could not be starker.

What were lessons to be learned from WW II? The first lesson is that culture is a very significant factor in how a people fight, how they perceive casualties, both their own and the enemies and what their reaction is to winning and losing. How these factors affect morale clarity or the will to fight is critical. The contrast between Germany and Japan vs. France and Italy could not be starker. France and Italy surrendered as soon as things started going bad. Japan murdered civilians and tortured prisoners and committed untold atrocities. But every man was willing to die for the Emperor a deity, and those who had the chance, did. For the first time ever we faced people willing to strap on bombs and fly them into our ships. Even though they were losing, they were prepared to fight to the last man.

But what do we know about the WW II American culture? Before the war we were far more isolationist then we are today. But once American blood was spilled, especially in such a cowardly way, Americans accepted thousands of our own military casualties and the death of every German and Japanese including millions of civilian casualties in both Germany and Japan. But given a choice between 1M American GI deaths and the starvation of the Japanese people, the American people would have kissed the Japanese civilization good bye. One other extremely important lesson learned is that America has to be wining. Where as Germany and Japan will fight a losing war to the bitter end, and France and Italy will fold quickly, But America is none of these cultures. The Patton speech was right on the money:

“Men, this stuff that some sources sling around about America wanting out of this war, not wanting to fight, is a crock of bullshit. Americans love to fight, traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle...Americans play to win all of the time. I wouldn't give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That's why Americans have never lost nor will ever lose a war; for the very idea of losing is hateful to an American.”

Patton was talking about the ability of the American military to win battles, not it’s civilian leadership. Has our culture changed today? Yes and no, winning is still everything today. But the keywords in Patton’s speech are not just win but, “play to win” America will fight if we are playing to win. America expects not only to win but must see itself winning. But what about American and enemy civilian casualties? America’s reaction to massive casualties which could occur in a large scale nuclear exchange has never been tested. The American people did not give a damn about enemy civilians during WW II. If enemy civilians died in the fighting, it was unavoidable. No American general resigned in protest or was court marshaled for the firebombing of civilians in Dresden and Tokyo.

And today? Has America changed? The American people are still willing to accept significant American casualties. Huh? Remember the Military predictions before the 1991 Iraq war. 40,000 dead. Did the American people say no? Nope. They perceived that we were there to win, had a righteous cause and clearly defined victory conditions. Moral clarity. In Vietnam The American people suffered 50,000 casualties, but at a very high price. The Army was close to mutiny; the American people were in the streets in the millions. What lessons did the American people learn from this war? Did the American people and our military perceive that we were playing to win? No. Did we have clear obtainable victory conditions? No. And for the first time Americans saw enemy civilians dying in living color, right in their living rooms every night.

So what do we know so far about the American culture? We love/are willing to fight, we must play to win and we are willing to accept American casualties. Enemy civilian casualties are still a complex thing. We have had two contrasting examples.

After Iraq I and Iraq II, America saw high tech quick victory was feasible. We could win and win big. We never needed American casualties like WW II, Korea or Vietnam. What about enemy civilian casualties? Did Vietnam sour the American people? Yes and No. In Iraq I there were 1000s of military and civilian Iraqi casualties. Americas threw a victory parade. In Iraq II more enemy civilians and less American casualties occurred during the first 21 days in Iraq than all of the next 3 years. America cheered up till the final historic moment when Saddam’s statue was pulled down despite 1000s of civilian casualties. Had we pulled out and gone home the next day, Iraq would view us as liberators. Bush would have been a hero. Americans would have thrown another victory parade. Maybe. Enemy civilian casualties like American military casualties are a complex issue. Complex in that they are not independent of the other factors. Based on the last two wars it appears that American will accept enemy civilian casualties in the “shock and Awe” phase, but not in the occupation phase.

So what is souring the American people’s will to fight in the war in Iraq today? Is it American body bags? No. If it is American resolve then what undermines American resolve? Do Americans no longer want to fight? One hundred and forty years ago, British philosopher John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) wrote:
“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things: the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth a war, is much worse... A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for, nothing which he cares more about than he does about his personal safety, is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.”
Fortunately for America our military is still recruiting talented courageous people. In fact our military is the finest and smartest in history. I have a cousin who graduated from college and volunteered to be an officer in the Marine Corps this summer. He was turned down because his grade point average was too low. The same marines that are taking the brunt of the casualties In Iraq can pick and choose among America’s finest young people. He is now going to Paris Island as an enlisted marine. Go to Bethesda and Walter Reed, our guys and gals are strapping on artificial limbs and are pleading to go back. In spite of our failure in Iraq there are more than enough high quality young to fill the ranks of the military. If we have enough fighters where is the problem? It has to be the American people.

Lets check our metrics. Americans feel a war must be just. After 9-11 that box was checked. After 21 days in Iraq our military won or did they? We achieved the victory conditions, “Saddam gone and the WMD gone” that Bush announced before the war but we did not crush the enemy’s will to fight. We thought we did. Had we gone home then we could claim we crushed the enemy’s will to fight. What happened? Bush added a new strategic goal mid course, that being to establish a stable Democracy in all of Iraq. An iffy and long term goal. By trying to achieve this surprise goal he exposed the fact that we had not crushed the enemies will to fight. It has now been three years of our finest going man to man in the streets of Baghdad, while our high tech sits on the sidelines and still no victory in sight.

After Vietnam the American people know a quagmire when they see one. The American people believe the American military can’t win by going toe to toe with the insurgents. We are killing them at a 10 to 1 ratio, but more keep coming. There seems to be an endless supply. There is. Our high tech is sitting on the sidelines because the civilians are no longer part of the enemy but Iraqi citizens Bush promised to protect. Americans can only see endless fighting on the enemy’s home turf and all our high tech neutralized. Americans will never accept that as winning. In fact more than 50% of Americans call it losing. Our New SecDef calls it losing. Ever since we started nation building the American generals seem to be doing everything wrong. We did not have enough troops to pacify Baghdad and secure Iraq’s lengthy borders with hostile nations. The insurgents are still pouring across the borders from all directions. One begins to wonder when Bush informed the generals about nation building? Killing insurgents is much harder than killing Japanese. Both are fanatics who will fight to the death but the insurgents won’t wear uniforms and hide among so called civilians and can only be shot at when they pick up a gun, which is at a time of their choosing. Meanwhile our military ride over IEDs. But what about new goal of a stable democracy in the Middle East? Americans no longer believe that is possible, if they ever did, since they were not consulted before the war. In fact they were deceived. Now we have civil war and an Iraqi government that is talking to Iran. Miliki has not won the hearts and minds of the American people, In fact it is unclear whose side he is own. This war sucks.

Moral clarity of the American people is gone, but it is not that they have given up. They feel betrayed by this president. He has snatched defeat from the jaws of victory by adding a surprise goal and forcing our military to go toe to toe with an unlimited supply of Jihadists for an unspecified amount of time. Bush changed morale clarity to dissolution.

But ask yourself; did Bush ever instill America with morale clarity? After the very confusing 9-11 attack the American people were fighting mad. But more than ever they needed our president to provide us with morale clarity. We knew nothing about the Middle East or Islam, what ever that is. Who was the enemy? What is his culture? How and where should we fight him? What are goals of this enemy? How can we crush his will to kill us? What was Bushes answer? “This is a war on terror”. What and who is that? “Islam, the culture of most of the Middle East is a peaceful religion”. Nothing could be further from the truth. “We need to fight the axis of evil”. What did Iran, Korea and Iraq have to do with 9-11 and suicide bombers? The perps were all Saudis and Al Qaeda. Where was the clarity the American people were seeking in our president’s speech? None. But the American people have since gotten smarter on their own, no thanks to Bush. What has been Bush’s contribution to clarity in the last 5 years? He changed the word terror to Islamofacists. Who ever they are? Bush has not even made that clear. He failed miserably on clarity and attacking Iraq was fuzzy on moral.

What should he have said that would have infused Americans with moral clarity? One 30 second film clip would have galvanized our nation like no other time in history. Arab people dancing in the streets of every country in the Middle East as the World Center Towers fell. There was our enemy. He should have said our enemy is Islamic Jihadists and a rogue government that high jacked Iran. He could have show a fifteen second clip of millions of Iranians shouting “death to America”. What is Islam and what are Jihadists? Bush is yet to tell us. Jihadists are warriors commanded by an Islamic cleric to fight Jihad against a people. What does that mean? It means a fight to the death or submission to Islam. Are they serious? They are more serious than Japan. They value death more than life. Death in Jihad for Allah is rewarded by 70 virgins. The Jihadists won’t give up till we are all dead. Men, women and children. Dead. They have as many people willing to be suicide bombers as the Japanese.

Our troops will soon be coming home. We lost another one. Why? Mark is right, lack of moral clarity. But not because the American people are giving up. Bush failed to provide us with moral clarity, deceived the people on the goal of the war in Iraq and put our troops in a position where they cannot win. After we leave, the Shiites will go after the Sunnis. Iran will increase their aid to the Shiites. Saudi Arabia and Jordan are freaked about the Iranians and will enter the war on the Sunni side. Armageddon begins.

We have the best players in the game and the worst coach. So what do we do? Fire the coach. America will back this team with a new coach and a new game plan. 9-11 was a moral imperative. A major attack against Israel is another moral imperative. Another attack on the US like 9-11 or worse will be another moral imperative. But if the new president makes the correct case for clarity the American people will follow without a new moral imperative.

The new coach will have the opportunity to properly define the enemy, not this axis of evil crap. Our enemy is a loose collection of Jihadists sprinkled in a huge Arab population and one rogue state, Iran that also sponsors two well-organized surrogates in Hezbollah and Hamas. But our enemy requires money that begins with oil but filters through human beings down to the Jihadists. Second the president needs to make it absolutely clear that this fight is to the death. Either they die or we die. Moral clarity. He also needs to clearly define our strategic risks. The foremost risk being that it impossible to defend a free society with open borders from attacks by bad guys in rental trucks who won’t wear uniforms. Second our economy can be ruined by the loss of control of 30 miles of water in the Persian Gulf. Given the total lack of defense the American people would understand we have to have a very aggressive offense, but it must be continually winning. Pound the enemy continuously, never let him go on offense. Use our high tech to the max. It is also impossible to protect the Persian Gulf. So we must embark on a crash program to be independent of Persian Gulf oil in 5 years. If Bush asked for that in 2001 we would already be there. Moral Clarity.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-07T07:12:00.000-05:00

What it Means to be an American.

What is wrong with being called American with no qualifier? It is not the callers that demand use of the qualifier; it is the called. The majority were happy to call minorities epithets if they called them anything. The never called a German a German American. They called them Germans. Germans insisted on German American. Although they quickly dropped German because they truly wanted to be just an American like everyone else. Those who continue to insist on being a qualified American are saying that they want their original origin to be recognized as different. They don't want to be like everyone else. They expect special status. Of course they are urged on by the media and the left to insist on this special status. The left have created laws, affirmative action to reward those who want to retain recognition of their minority status. The left do not want everyone to be the same. Special groups can be bribed with government handouts. This goes for the poor as well. Black people are so confused that most believe poor means Black. They don't recognize that of the poor they are a minority. There are more poor whites than blacks. Soon there will be more poor Hispanics than Blacks. The left can exploit these special groups. So they do what they can to keep them content to remain special. Cultural diversity is celebrated as something greater than American. Many really believe that crap. Those that insist on being called African American, and consider Black derogatory fall into this leftist trap. Their foolishness permits opportunists such as Jackson and Farakan to become rich. Jackson's rainbow exploits diversity and Farakan exploits those who want nothing to do with whites.

What does it mean to be an American? Is it citizenship in a nation? Of course not. Is it belief in the constitution and the declaration of independence? No but they were the spark plugs. What truly defines an American from any other person in the world, especially the Europeans that formed our nation, is belief in the American dream. What is that? Wiki definition. My definition. The American dream is that a person regardless of his or her birth status can be anything they want to be. It took the constitution, the declaration of independence and a new country to germinate that belief, but that belief is what truly makes us American. Those who believe this dream see only opportunity in the world. Where others see chains that prevent them from achievement, Americans see obstacles to be overcome. Where some believe that failure is cause for giving up, Americans see failure as lesson to learn from and move on. Americans were the first to dream this dream. It requires self-reliance and hard work. Something that was in abundance in early America. It is a belief that achievement must be taken, and expect nothing to be given.

Leftists by definition do not share in this dream. And they are winning. On the Glenn Beck show 7 Dec Glenn stated "only 50% now believe in the American Dream. I am not talking about Democrats or liberals but only those exploit the American Dream for their personal success but do not want anyone else to dream that dream. They believe in "Animal Farm" where they are in power over the masses. For Animal Farm to work, you need masses, most of the poor and special minorities with hyphenated American names. Those who dream the American Dream want nothing to do with labels or handouts. Those who do not; share the Animal House dream are more than willing to accept handouts and privileges based on minority status. The left will do anything to keep these people believing in the Animal House dream. That is why they use big government to engender dependency. That is why they invented political correctness, which really means there is only one right answer and that answer can only be provided by the left. Prosperity is anathema to the left. Prosperous people turn away from the dreams of the left and begin to dream the American Dream. So leftist use every legal means to seize the money of the prosperous and use it to buy the loyalty and dependency of the masses.

America is coming to a critical decision point in its history. America has never been so prosperous. But two other forces are growing even faster, globalization and the invasion of the poor. The left is uniquely poised to seize these opportunities. For the first time in history the left are in charge. They did this by hijacking the Democratic Party and marginalizing the liberals and the moderates. Globalization is the brainchild of large multinational businesses that see national boundaries, customs and laws as impediments to their growth. The left are playing along because it also furthers their goals. Global institutions like the UN are run by the left. How often now do unions get praise from the left? Almost none. They were getting to powerful and were creating a prosperous middle class. They are no longer useful and have been dumped by the left.

The invasion of the poor in massive numbers is overwhelming the historical process of assimilation. The left see this as a golden opportunity to be exploited to achieve Animal House. If this Hispanic invasion can be bought by entitlements then the left can own their votes. Blacks already vote 90% Democratic and therefore left. Hispanics voted 54% Democratic in 2004 and 67% in 2006. Amnesty will create 35M-50M new poor voters in 3 years. These people will vote 90% Democratic thereby further empowering the left who own the Democratic Party. The magic number is 67%. With 67% the left can change any law they wish. With 75% they can change the constitution to further the Animal House Dream.

The Globalists don't care about political ideology their wealth and power is global. If the left are stupid enough to try and seize the US Globalists wealth then they will flee. When this happens the group that pays 90% of the money (taxes) that the left uses to buy loyalty and dependency will be gone. At that point entitlement programs will go broke, including social security. The left will seize the wealth of the working rich, the professionals. But it won't be enough; our economy will collapse.

How can this be? Athenian democracy collapsed when the majority 51%, realized they could vote themselves anything they wanted and make the 49% pay. Our founding fathers realized this fault and raised the magic number to 67% for laws, 75% for constitutional changes. Not 75% of the people but 75% of the states. Interesting the Hispanic invasion is currently affecting red states, so 75% will not be an impossible number.

What can disrupt this tidal wave? Only one thing; state’s rights. Towns, cities and states are inacting their own immigration laws. The left and their action wing the ACLU vehemently oppose this. The Supreme Court will shortly decide the fate of America.

How could Republicans who had control for the past 6 years have let this happen? First they were arrogant and saw the left as a negative for the Democratic Party. They were wrong. Secondly Rhinos are Globalists. The Rhinos controlled the senate and are still there. It was conservatives who lost in 2006.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-04T06:40:00.000-05:00

What President Bush wants for Christmas?

I have posted 3 Comments from below. My reply is at bottom of the three.

1. Liberal Percy has left a new comment on your post "12/04/2006 03:40:00 AM":
What is ridiculous, Mr. Death, is the idea that all problems would be solved if we just offed a few leaders - including elected ones like Chavez. Would the US go away if OBL succeeded in offing the top 5-10 US leaders?

And you think something like this could be kept quiet? Asteroids? Not even Rush Limbaugh could hawk that one with a straight face - and he makes a living lying.

Consequences? War in Korea, a target on every American overseas, war with half the world and complete disgust from the rest. Bush would be confirming everyone's worst fears about Amercia - and the rest of the world would be right in condemning us.

Sorry, everyone. Mr. Death here isn't on any drugs we could obtain for our pleasure. He's just gone insane all by his little deranged self.

2. Farkington has left a new comment on your post "12/04/2006 03:40:00 AM":
Are you kidding? The Navy is never going to deploy non-nuclear submarine fired missiles that are comparable in size to outgoing strategic weapons.

Why?

Because they aren't stupid. A non-nuclear cruise missile looks just like a nuclear one. The Navy is quite aware of this, now you are too.

The Russians would freak out if they spotted a submarine launch, as would many other nuclear powers. Mostly because submarines are second strike weapons, not toys in your personal videogame.

If you want to shove depleted uranium up the collective assholes of everyone on your "do not like" list, that's fine, use surface ships. Just don't suggest a course of action that is absolutely braindead.

You want to know what would destablize South America? Killing all the drug cartel leaders. You know what would destabilize the Middle East? Killing all the Wahhabi clerics & Iranian revolutionary guard leaders.

Creating power vaccuums is a terribly way to conduct foreign policy. Overt acts of war are even worse.

3. Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "12/04/2006 03:40:00 AM": I realize you like the big toys but do you really think it would be a good idea for Mossad to be the brain for our brawn. Israel may be an ally but our nations' international interests come nowhere near overlapping 100% let alone 50%.

Liberty or Death response
OK guys you caught me at a poor attempt at humor. Santa Claus and asteroids are ridiculous. My list of leaders is just a list; my choices were to elicit response. Pick your own list or none at all. I would not kill Kim IL. His worst enemy is himself. When its time to marginalize Korea, the way to do it is to eliminate Kim’s access to foreign cash and goods. If he stops buying off his key supporters, his own generals will do the job and we won’t be to blame. Liberal Percy, the one bunch I would definitely want gone are the Iranian thugs who hijacked a whole country in 1979 and are using its wealth to further personal ambitions that include “wiping Israel of the map”, and “Death to America.” They rule by violence and torture of their own people. They have 200,000 Revolutionary Guards to protect them from their own people and the Army. They are racist. The murders and other abuses they are inflicting on the million Arabs that live along their west coast is a human rights disgrace. The Persians hold all the power, but they are only 51% of the 69M Iranians. The minorities hate the Persians and are punished for it. The Persians have a significant number of young people who don’t remember the Shaw, who use the internet and see how the rest of the world lives and they reject living in the 7th century. Eliminating these theocratic thugs would allow the people of Iran to take their country back.

There are two kernels in my post that I was trying to convey; killing leaders where it would make a difference and the need for a device that is both lethal and has minimal collateral damage. Pick your method; I chose a hypothetical one. The missile obviously does not exist today and there may be more effective ways to do it.

On the other hand you provided some thoughts that are worth debating. I will begin the debate. I don’t believe there is one right answer in human discourse. Also I will let you present your ideas unedited to the readers.

1. Liberal Percy, running around killing all the bad guy leaders whole sale. No. I would be very selective. It would have to make a difference. Your analogy to America or any other free democratic society is weak because leaders in a free society are easily replaced with little disruption and by a process that the people support. There are cases where the leaders rule by force, abuse their own people and those people have no say in their replacements. If they disappeared, the country would be better off. Iran is the best case at the moment.

2. Farkington. Pick your own weapons and methods as long as it arrives within 30 second warning and does very little collateral damage I will use yours. But the use of mothballed SSBNS to launch kinetic missiles is not as far fetched as you say. ICBMs look a likes are launched all the time. The shuttle, satellite launches. Large boosters that use non-air breathing engines have unique thermal signatures that are picked up by spy satellites. Lots of countries launch these boosters on a frequent basis. What keeps the nuclear powers from freaking out, as you say, is handled by protocols established when nuclear missile testing was common place on both sides. In my case, we just notify Putin when there is no time left for him to warn our target. Between the Russians and Americans one missile is not going to freak out anyone. I was careless and implied a simultaneous massive launch. Your right; that would be reckless.

SSBNs vs. surface ships. Not a good trade off. Do SSBN launched missiles and surface launched missiles look different to thermal spy satellites? You can’t launch a 130,000 lb missile from a surface ship unless you built a special ship for it. The SSBNs already exist with nothing to do in mothballs. They are already designed for Tridents. Even though I was musing, I was trying to practical.

I need to separate your concept of destabilizing countries and your examples; they are two different thoughts. There are conditions where destabilization is desirable. Let me start with an obvious extreme. Germany under Hitler was a very stable country before 1 Sept 1939. He pulled his country from depression to prosperity. He eliminated the worst oppressions of the World War I treaty. I will forget the human rights violations against his own people and the use of violence to achieve power. But after Sep of 39 there was no doubt that this very stable country was a serious threat to world peace. Destabilizing 1939 Germany would have been a highly desirable thing to do. Offing the drug cartels would cause no destabilization because when there is billions to be had there is an unlimited supply of thugs to take their place. Wasted effort. But help me to understand how the drug cartels are a stabilizing force? Just because they bring money into their country and hire a bunch of out of work locals? They also bring large-scale crime and corruption of the government. What is the life expectancy of an honest government official in these countries? Less than a year. Is this a desirable stability? Let the government take over the drug trade and eliminate the crime. That would be a more desirable stability for them. I don’t blame other countries for our drug problems. It is our fault.

“Creating a power vacuum is a terrible way to conduct foreign policy”. Maybe not desirable, but in what way is it terrible foreign policy? There are cases when a vacuum and instability would be far preferable. If national leaders are committed to the destruction of other people for their own selfish motives, then by all means disrupt them before they act. Iran has been conducting an undeclared war against Israel through Hezbollah. The rockets that hit Israel and the Israeli ship were provided free of charge from the Iranians. Russia was a supplier as well. Iran is openly arming and training Hamas with the same effective weapons. What has Israel done to Iran, nothing. Do you think that the Iranian leaders are a more stabilizing world force alive or dead? I prefer dead before these wacos have serious nukes.

3. Anonymous. Of course you are correct. But the Semitic Israelis can melt into the Arab populations like no other nation can. I would use them in these circumstances. All we would be asking for is observation and a phone call. Nothing covert. They are doing this already.

I will admit that this post was over the top. The hyperbole was intentional. It began a healthy debate, which was my goal. For the record, I am not a reckless warmonger. I also do not believe in imposing democracy wherever we go. I am a nationalist, but I am a strong believer in non-interference. Leave me alone; I will leave you alone. But when you are a threat to the life and liberty of America I believe in pre-emption. I also believe using the military should be a last option. But when it is the only thing left, use it with overwhelming force and get out. No nation building. Remove or marginalize the threat to America and get out. I have zero imperialistic goals for America. I have zero interest in meddling at all. We do far too much meddling today, and it is by partisan. I would never have attacked Iraq. I would have wacked the Taliban, but I would have pulled all troops out within 6 months. I would pull our entire overseas troops home. Last week a Marine was convicted of rape in Okinawa. Do you think the people of Okinawa like America more because we have troops there?

I welcome your replies.
Liberty or Death

What President Bush wants for Christmas?

A new missile. What you say, we have lots of missiles? Not like this one. Let’s call it the super cruise missile or maybe the decapitator. It will have the same footprint as the Trident II D5 see below:

Trident II D-5 Fleet Ballistic Missile

6,000nm (6,900mi; 11,000km)
Greater than 4,000 nautical miles (4,600 statute miles, or 7,360 km)

1st and 2nd stage burn times are 65 seconds each
3rd stage burn time is 40 seconds

44 feet (13.41 meters)

130,000 pounds (58,500 kg)

This missile will have the flight characteristics of a supersonic cruise, stealth, a new GPS guidance system with 3 foot accuracy, a pop up terminal phase where it goes up to 70-100 thousand feet and come straight down at very high mach. You could swap some of the fuel for warhead mass. We don’t need even half the range. What type of warhead? Certainly not a nuke, not even an explosive warhead at all, but a rod of depleted uranium like our tank rounds. A kinetic round of say 20,000 lbs, maybe 10,000 lbs. I’ll leave it to Santa Claus to pick the right size. Could come in multiple sizes to suit the target. The super cruise would launch from a SSBN (missile submarine) which were designed and do carry the Trident II today. No mods to the subs required. What you say, these SSBNs are needed for our nuclear deterrence? We have treaties with the Russians to limit our fleet! Well Santa knows all, and is aware we are decommissioning 4 SSBNs as we speak, so they have nothing else to do. Since our warhead is kinetic, no boom, no treaty violation. Picture a rod of depleted uranium coming straight down at very high mach and hitting your target with a 3-foot error. Gosh, it would look like and behave just like an asteroid. Only better because depleted uranium is far denser than an iron asteroid. The important thing is that it would be detectable for only 20-30 seconds. Not enough time to escape even if you knew exactly what it was. What would it do to the target? Remember the movie Armageddon? Coming straight down with no explosion it would have minimal collateral damage but could go through hundreds of feet of concrete or rock with devastating results.

What would Bush do with 4 SSBNs loaded with these missiles? Our Islamic enemies are blessed with very charismatic leaders that their loyal followers believe are invincible. These targets, oops I mean leaders have to be somewhere at all times. Who knows where these guys are at any given time. Certainly not the CIA, they did not know where the Chinese embassy was in Yugoslavia when it was on a street map. The Mossad knows. When any of our friends are in their government building or sleeping in their residences the Mossad could give us real time notice. The subs would be parked off shore in international waters, but still be very close to any person in the Middle East. The first salvo would take out the leaders (top 5 –10 guys) of Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas, and Korea, the leader of Darfor, and a very special guy named Hugo Chavez. Since none of these guys believe in Santa Claus the must think these missiles are punishment from God. Bush could act dumb, almost no acting required. He would offer the vast resources of the US to determine where these asteroids were coming from. Of course Putin and the Chinese would know. We want them to. But why Hugo? First he is a thug who is destroying his country and destabilizing the South America, second we would want all leaders in the world to know that Bush really is a cowboy and no person on earth is safe.

Oh I forgot to tell you the SSBNs could be cleaned up and reloaded. Who is next? Nuclear bomb making facilities, Wahhabi clerics, drug cartel leaders, Iranian revolutionary guard leaders. Pakistani and Chinese nuclear missile silos. The dead leader’s replacements. With two years left on Bush’s term it could be a very long list that Santa could deliver a lump of coal to.

Merry Christmas, not a creature was stirring not even a rat.

Liberty or Death

2006-12-02T17:10:00.000-05:00

Contract with America 2006

This is not my idea but I strongly endorse it. It is the genius of Chris Core, a talk show host on WMAL 630 in Wash DC and all credit goes to him. You can listen to Chris on audio stream at Chris Core

The following was developed with the input of the audience of the Chris Core Show on Wednesday,

October 11, 2006:

THE CONTRACT WITH AMERICA 2006 WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, AS LISTENERS OF THE CHRIS CORE SHOW ON 630 WMAL,PLEDGEOUR SUPPORT FOR THE CONTRACT WITH AMERICA 2006.

AND WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, AS CANDIDATES FOR CONGRESS, PLEDGE TO BRING TO THE
FLOOR OF CONGRESS THE FOLLOWING SUGGESTIONS, WHICH WE BELIEVE ARE WIDELY
SUPPORTED BY THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. FURTHERMORE, WE PLEDGE TO VOTE FOR, AND TO
DO OUR BEST TO HAVE THE FOLLOWING ENACTED INTO LAW.

1. IMMIGRATION REFORM AND CONTROL:

The southern border between the United States and Mexico must be secured within one year by fence, personnel and/or electronic devices in order to stop illegal entryinto the United States. Any children who have been born in the United States of parents who are illegally in this country (commonly known as "anchor babies") will be permanently disqualified for American citizenship.

2. PROTECTION OF THE AMERICAN CULTURE AND ELECTORAL PROCESS:

English shall be designated as the official language of the United States. All ballots for elections shall be printed only in English. Anyone who wishes to vote shall be required to provide verified proof of U.S. citizenship at the polling booth.

3. ENERGY INDEPENDENCE:

This Congress will set a maximum of ten years by which time the United States must become fully independent of any foreign sources for its energy supply. This will include, but not be limited to, expanded oil
exploration and refining, and production of alternative sources such as nuclear power, ethanol, natural gas, solar, and/or wind.

4. CONGRESSIONAL REFORM:

As the American people rightfully expect action from their leaders, we
promise that:
1) All bills must be approved or rejected solely on their own merit (that is, nothing unrelated to the intent of
the original bill may be added).
2) We will never engage in the stalling practice known as a "filibuster."
3) All presidential appointments will receive a confirmation or rejection vote within 120 days of their nomination.
4) No public office-holder may do business with, or try to influence, the vote of elected officials(lobbying) within 5 years of having left public office. 5) We promise to address, openly debate, and vote on the concept of term limits for members of Congress.

5. A LEVEL PLAYING FIELD:

All laws that apply to the rest of the country shall apply equally to Congress.
This includes such laws as those enacted by the EEOC and OSHA. Furthermore, so that members of Congress may better relate to the average American, the Congressional pension plan shall be ended, and Congress will pay into, and receive, the same Social Security benefits as any other American, and shall receive no health care benefits that it cannot offer to each and every other American citizen.

To these goals, we pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. Any failure to pursue these goals should be considered as a condition for our termination as members of Congress at the next election.

CADIDATE for OFFICE _______________

Liberty or Death

2006-12-02T16:58:00.000-05:00

Expect Constrained Democratic Governance for the next Two Years

H. Says

House Speaker-to-be Nancy Pelosi picked a leading
Hispanic congressman Rep. Silvestre Reyes, (D-Texas)
today to head the powerful House Intelligence
Committee, her office announced this morning. Pelosi
sidestepped two more senior intelligence committee
members -- Reps. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) and Alcee
Hastings (D-Calif). -- by picking Reyes, currently the
third-ranking Democratic member of the committee.

After serving in the Army during 1966-1968 as a
helicopter crew chief and gunner, including 13 months
in Vietnam, Reyes joined the U.S. Border Patrol in
1969. He retired after almost 27 years with the
Border Patrol in December 1995 and sought elected
office. Now in his fifth term, Reyes became the first
Hispanic to represent the 16th District of Texas,
which includes the city of El Paso and surrounding
communities, in 1996.

Do you get the feeling that the Bush Adminstration
will be having a long last two years in office?

PS: I hope everyone in the Bush Adminstration has
been fully briefed on the laws against perjury.

Liberty or Death Reply

Do you ever consider why Democrats cannot speak of any ethnic person as an American? This guy has been here 40 years. He deserves to be an American not a hyphenated American. Could it be that Democrats believe being part something else, anything else is better than being an American? Why not American Hispanic? Part of what defines a liberal is guilt for being an American. They think Americans are greedy, have too much of the world's wealth, cause global warming and every other ill in the world. When is the last time you heard a liberal say I am proud to be an American? I love America. America is the greatest, most caring, and most generous nation on earth by far. But liberal elites don't see this America as their utopia. Utopia is where the elite liberals rule with unlimited power to change America to what they want it to be. Only the elite are enlightened to know what the masses need.

Until they achieve this goal america will be spelled lower case and only her ills are spoken, never praise, accept for praise for change. Liberals celebrate diversity even though disparate culture has been and still is the main reason for strife in the world. But they can't see this strife because anything in their utopia is always good. That is why they are busy rewriting the history books for our children. Pick one up. You’re an historian. You won't recognize it.

Liberals want a two-class society, elites and the masses. The masses are poor, ignorant and complacent. They are totally dependent on the elites to tell them what to do and take care of them. Remember the book Animal Farm? Some tell Liberals if you don't like America leave. No way. This is the nation with a governmental system that will allow them to achieve their goals. Once they control 2/3rds of the vote they can change anything they want including the constitution. They can seize the wealth of the rich and enhance their power.

Ever wonder where the american communists went when it was no longer useful to be labeled a communist? The leaders were less communist than elite. They hijacked PETA, the ACLU, women's groups, our universities and other well meaning but leftist causes. Why did they do that? These causes gave them cover, organization, a platform to speak, but most of all a source of money.

The elitists invented political correctness. This is their most brilliant success to date. It allows them to control public discourse. Only certain speech is permitted in public. Incorrect speech (conservative and religious) is vilified. Conservatives that try to speak on college campuses are shouted off the stage by the new brown shirts. Jim Corsi last month, all on tape, and Tom Tancredo at Michigan State just this week. Also on tape. Religion is the rival of Elites. It allows conservatives to control the minds of the masses. This can't be. So elitist’s causes are driving out selected religious speech using political correctness and the courts. Another example. Why are they so vigorous in going after the Boy Scouts? Because that organization is male dominated, patriotic and worse teaches self-reliance and affirms God. Self-reliance and faith in God are the two biggest threats to Elitism and the establishment of Animal Farm in America.

My observation of Pelosi since the election is that she is an extreme leftist elitist, but also a brilliant politician. She recognizes that the far left politicians are champing at the bit to enact their life long dreams. The far left has never been in power before. The 30 year reign of the democrats in 60-94 was moderate controlled. What I think she is doing in choosing committee chairman based on their ability to set aside their own leftist causes and tow the part line. Loose cannons and those with baggage like Alcee Hastings and John Murtha are being marginalized. One more loose cannon to get rid of, Howard Dean.

I have been watching Barney Franks for years. He is extremely articulate, smart but agenda oriented. He is very confidant even affable in a hostile environment. He is a frequent guest on Bill O’Reilly’s show and was on this week. He is very vocal about his causes, but you would never have recognized him. When O’Reilly baited him on income redistribution, one of his favorite causes, he was tight-lipped, silent, but you could tell he was mad. The most O’Reilly could get out of him was raising the top tax bracket to 39%. Why the change? He wants to be a committee chairman controlling the tax code. His controlled silence speaks volumes of Pelosi’s strategy. Senate democrats will be like church mice for the next two years. Pelosi and Hillary will set the agenda for the next two years. That agenda is to establish the Democrats as responsible and moderate. They will cherry pick causes like minimum wage to bring to a vote that won’t reveal their liberal stripe. Amnesty is a sure thing to come up because McCain and Bush will support it making it Bi-Partisan.

Yes there will be investigations. They will be civil and lead to nothing. Their purpose being to keep republican failures in the news for the next two years. Pelosi wants to showcase the Democrats as responsible leaders. Their goal is 2008. Hillary as president and a clear majority in both houses.

H. I hope you are right, that Liberal Democrats are foolish enough to try to lynch the Bush White House. But I fear that they won’t. I hope they behave like the left wing nuts that they are, but Pelosi will not allow it. Also do not expect any Democratic plan for Iraq. They want Bush’s stupid strategy to continue. And based on the talks with Miliki and leaks about the Baker commission Bush is still too stubborn to change. Iraq will continue to slide into anarchy. Americans will still continue to kill and arrest insurgents by the 5’s and 10’s. Yes ARREST. The ROE has the world’s finest military force acting as police. The worst misuse of military power possible.

2006-11-29T12:02:00.000-05:00

What should Bush tell Miliki today?

Chris Core of WMAL in Wash. D.C. asked what would you advise Bush today when he speaks to Miliki?

An excellent question today Chris. The answer is “I am hear to help you, what do you want the US to do”? You mentioned Al-Sadr as the most dangerous man in Iraq today. Well, we made him a hero to his Shiite people. He is standing up to the Sunnis. At the same time we marginalized the moderate voice of Sistani, the most revered Shiite cleric in Iraq. What does Sadr want? He wants the Bathist, insurgent-harboring Sunnis neutralized. If you have time read the interview between Foreignpolicy.com and Sadr's number 1 guy Baha al-Araji. Go here:

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3595&fpsrc=ealert061127

Sadr wants us to support the Shiites. Miliki wants us to support the Shiites. Sadr is willing to let the Kurds alone. Sectarian violence is a reality. We have to choose sides. Sitting on the fence means no one will listen to us anymore. The police and army have picked sides along sectarian lines.

Bush's goal to create stability in the Middle East was a correct one. His policies in Iraq won't achieve that. Stability in the Middle East means one thing; check the expansionist goals of Iran. That is what the moderate states fear the most. The choice is clear. Throw every resource we have behind the Shiites. Back them to the hilt, but let them do the fighting. Make a deal with Sistani, he is the real power behind the throne. We will help you if you cut Iran loose. Publicly support him. This will marginalize Sadr. When we removed Saddam we eliminated the only force checking the Iranians. If we leave with the Shiites under the influence of Iran, the Middle East will fall to Iran. They will have a new surrogate, or at worst a neutral in the Iraqi Shiites that we armed and trained.

That is the worst thing we can let happen and it does not have to be.

Liberty or Death

2006-11-29T07:38:00.000-05:00

The Economic war of Terrorism

An article in USA Today reminds us of the old Pentagon shell game. It has been practiced since before I began working there in 1969. In order to hide the true cost of war every president defers maintenance to keep the costs down. But the bill comes due eventually. Everyone thinks the Persian Gulf is mostly sand. Not so. It is a fine dirt, the consistency of talcum powder, a substance that wears out equipment, especially engines quicker that any other in the world. The bill below is way understated but gets the message across.

By Matt Kelley, USA TODAY
“The Pentagon needs $50 billion to $60 billion to re-equip and restore units returning from Iraq, says Leon Panetta, the former Clinton White House chief of staff and member of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group”.

It should remind us that wars fought in many ways. The enemy is fighting the “little war”, the meaning of guerrilla warfare. Little means cheap. Our enemies are trying to drive us out of the Middle East, and will soon succeed. But they would be foolish to do so. We fight with the finest equipment in the world, lots of vehicles, helicopters, aircraft and electronic gear. Very expensive and it wears out. Our enemy fights with home made bombs, IEDs, and AK-47s. They cost next to nothing compared to our stuff. Less than 1 spy satellite.

A smart enemy would keep this war going as long as possible. At 80B for the war and a maintenance bill of 60B every year or so we will go broke or worse, do as all presidents do, defer maintenance and have the bill come do all at once. What happens? We have a defacto stand down. Everything stops and we spend 2 years repairing our equipment. Worse, while equipment is being repaired our units cannot train properly. 5 years of intense operations, robbing state side units to equip front line units, and minimizing training puts our military in a deep financial hole. I watched this Pentagon shell game in Vietnam and under the Carter and Clinton drawdowns.

But what about the navy? They should be fresh and ready to go. Nope, the pentagon robs Peter to pay Paul. In order to train you need to sail. But sailing costs a fortune in oil and maintenance wear. So one bright accountant 20 years ago figured out if you just keep the ships in port, you could save a fortune.

A smart enemy would make us put every ship we own at sea all the time and do to our ships what they are doing to our AFVs, wearing them out. How can you do that for next to nothing in cost? Simple, sink one or two oil tankers a year anywhere in the world. How? Use ocean going speedboats and hand held missiles. Costs nothing. Who did it? Could be anybody. Could be hired mercenaries. What happens? Two things. The cost of insurance skyrockets driving up the cost of gas and our Navy sends everything we have to protect oil tankers. Think a 2 million dollar tank is expensive to operate. Try multibillion-dollar ships.

Our enemy is very patient, they know from experience they can wear us down. Its called asymmetric warfare. It is more than body bags. It is also money.

Liberty or Death