How does a single mom, home alone with her infant child, protect herself from a knife-wielding attacker? Here in the U.S., she has the option of arming herself for her own protection. In the U.K., she just screams while the assailant stabs her and her child to death.
Remind me again how that gun ban’s working out for ya’.
Good news! Obama has announced his administration’s national security strategy. We’re in for a rough ride.
The Obama administration has unveiled a new national security strategy, saying armed conflict should be a last resort when diplomacy is exhausted.
Newsflash: this isn’t a new policy. America’s policy has always been “diplomacy first, war last.” The Democrats’ favorite whipping boy didn’t just decide one day to roll over Iraq. Saddam Hussein spent the decade after the end of the first Gulf War violating the very conditions that ended the war and refusing to comply with U.N. WMD inspections. I probably shouldn’t bother mentioning the latter, as the U.N. is a uselessly corrupt entity, but it only added to the justification of war prompted by the former. Years of diplomacy by the U.S. and other nations had zero effect. War was, in fact, the last and necessary resort.
The document also advocates innovation, economic stability and prosperity as essential to America’s wider security aims.
The left always comes back to economics as the cause of all evil. There is a massive failure to recognize that the leaders and planners—as well as most of the terrorists themselves—of the 9/11 were the product of Saudi Arabian wealth, not poverty. Osama Bin Laden himself is from a very wealthy royal family—the son of privilege, not hardship. The threat of radical Islamic terrorism, which the administration has a wee bit of a problem acknowledging, has nothing whatsoever to do with poverty. “Economic stability and prosperity” are not going to make al Qaeda go away.
“To succeed, we must face the world as it is,” says the document, in what is seen as a formal break from the go-it-alone Bush era.
“The world as it is” is endangered by violent, radical Islam, against which only America and a few of her closest and bravest allies have stood tall. Please face it.
As for “go-it-alone,” the left appears to forget the many nations which joined America in both the Afghan and Iraqi wars, among them some of the best friends and staunchest allies any country could be honored to have. A president who has consistently insulted and mistreated our friends while cozying up to our critics would do well to remember that.
The Obama administration’s new doctrine also reiterates the Obama’s determination to try to engage with countries like Iran and North Korea, but warns that they face deepening isolation if they do not respond to international pressure to come clean on their controversial nuclear programmes.
Translation: he’s going to do a lot of talking and precious little else, while Iran—the world’s largest exporter and supporter of terrorism—forges ahead with its nuclear program. Diplomacy, diplomacy, diplomacy…BOOM!
Other key initiatives outlined in Mr Obama’s strategy include the dismantling of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Not new.
The document describes the security of Israel and peaceful Israeli and Palestinian states living side by side as among the main interests of the US.
Not new, though largely contradicted by his shameful treatment of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.
“We are shifting from mostly direct exercise and application of power to a more sophisticated and difficult mix of indirect power and influence,” America’s top diplomat [Secretary of State Hillary Clinton] said.
Translation: he’s going to do a lot of talking and precious little else, while Iran—the world’s largest exporter and supporter of terrorism—forges ahead with its nuclear program. Diplomacy, diplomacy, diplomacy…BOOM!
In her speech, Mrs Clinton also reiterated that democracy, human rights and development remained central to American foreign policy.
Yes, while we continue to prop up the U.N. with billions of our hard-earned tax dollars while they elect terrorist states and egregious human rights violators to the Human Rights Council.
Earlier, John Brennan, Mr Obama’s counter-terrorism adviser, said the new strategy also explicitly recognised the threat posed by “individuals radicalised here at home”.
“We’ve seen individuals, including US citizens, armed with their US passport, travel easily to terrorist safe havens and return to America, their deadly plans disrupted by co-ordinated intelligence and law enforcement,” Mr Brennan added.
First, anyone who travels to a “terrorist safe haven” for training and indoctrination is not “radicalised here at home.” This is not home-grown terrorism, but evil imported from the radical Islamic world. But you can’t acknowledge that, can you?
Second, the thwarted plans of the most recent terrorists was not “disrupted by co-ordinated intelligence and law enforcement” in any way, shape, or form. Fort Hood? Successful attack by a radical Muslim. The Fruit-of-Kaboom bomber? Couldn’t get his panties to light. Times Square? A fortunate case of incompetence.
Bill Clinton did not mention the domestic terrorism issue in his 1998 strategy, despite the Oklahoma City bombing three years earlier, while George W Bush made only passing reference to the issue in his 2006 document.
That would be because the bombing of the A.P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City was the act of a lone nutjob. It was a completely isolated event rather than an ongoing existential threat.
In May this year, New York City police defused a car bomb parked in Times Square, one of the city’s busiest tourist areas.
Yes, but only because Shahzad screwed up and bought the wrong ingredients for his bomb.
The truth is that over the past year we’ve been very, very lucky. Hope that luck holds, because Obama’s new strategy is a recipe for disaster.
The UK must be so proud of its ban on private ownership of handguns. How is an 89-year-old woman supposed to defend herself from an attack by a 28-year-old home invader? She can’t. She simply gets raped.
Repeat the leftist mantra: “Handguns are bad. They kill people.” Yeah, whatever. Just be honest about it. You hoplophobes would rather have society suffer atrocities than allow people to protect themselves from animals like this.
The Greek government is broke. No big news there, as it’s been a top international headline for months. Now there are major strikes planned for this week to protest the massive budget cuts required in order to right the sinking Greek ship of state. Who’s striking?
Government employees.
Clue: Government does not create wealth. Government siphons wealth off of its productive citizens and channels that money to people who don’t produce anything tangible. Some provide valuable services, e.g., the military, police, firemen, and (some) teachers. But none of the government’s employees actually produces anything that generates revenue. So, when the government is broke, there are only two options: increase taxes on the citizens who are productive, or cut pay for those who are not. In the case of Greece, there aren’t enough of the former to support the latter. Here in America we are moving all to quickly toward the same situation. There’s a lesson here somewhere.
The man who purchased the SUV used in the attempted bombing in New York’s Times Square this weekend was arrested at JFK Airport as he prepared to board a flight to Dubai. He is a naturalized U.S. citizen. His name is:
If you guessed 1-3 you’re a freaking idiot. There’s a very good reason to use racial/ethnic/national profiling for certain types of law enforcement work and for exercising extra scrutiny when granting immigrant visas. Can’t wait to see all the details on this cretin.
A flight from Washington, D.C. to Denver was disrupted last night when a passenger lit a cigarette onboard, creating a disturbance that resulted in an F-16 escort and the attention of the TSA, BATFE, and FBI.
Quiz time. The man’s name was:
Turns out the perp is a diplomat from Qatar and so can’t be charged with anything. Shamefully, the current White House has not insisted that the man be escorted permanently outside our borders. Diplomatic immunity is not intended to protect this type of criminal activity—it is to prevent the summary execution of diplomats caught in the act of espionage. We should be insisting that the Qatar embassy either wave his immunity or close its doors and leave the U.S.
It’s a sad day when I have to quote a socialist government in order to make a common sense point.
experts say the lack of a credible plan threatens to push up interest rates and undermine the recovery.
Duh. It’s really pretty simple. You have to spend less than (or at worst equal to) what you take in. The real lefties are starting to get it. When will ours?
Wonder why some of us refuse to watch CNN? Hacks like Christiane Amanpour, who deliberately misstate the facts in order to push a liberal agenda. Here, for example, she insists that the water torture of the Khmer Rouge—which resulted in thousands of murders—is identical to the waterboarding employed by the CIA under Bush (starts around 4:15). Regardless of where you stand on waterboarding, the methods of the CIA and the Khmer Rouge aren’t even similar (except in their use of water) much less identical. She may be correct in abhorring waterboarding, but that doesn’t justify the quite intentional falsification she employs. She’s entitled to her own opinion. She’s not entitled to her own facts. That’s simply propaganda, not journalism.
An 82-year-old woman was stabbed 9 times in London Monday while walking home from shopping. How is she supposed to defend herself against such an attack by a man much younger and stronger? In the UK she can’t, as she’s not allowed to own a handgun for self-defense. Another victim of senseless gun control laws.
The BBC reports that a man with two pistols shot another man in the leg in a London restaurant. We all know, however, that this could not possibly have happened because private ownership of handguns is illegal in England.