OBAMA RELEASES 5 MORE PRISONERS FROM GUANTANAMO BAY

31 Dec

US releases 5 more Guantanamo Bay prisoners, sends them to Kazakhstan

Published December 31, 2014

FoxNews.com

gbay a

The Defense Department announced Wednesday that five more prisoners will be transferred out of Guantanamo Bay to another nation, in the latest step by the Obama administration to whittle down the prisoner population in pursuit of ultimately closing the camp.

The five men will be transferred to the Central Asian nation of Kazakhstan for resettlement, the U.S. government announced.

The two men from Tunisia and three from Yemen — who have been at the camp for a dozen years — had been cleared for release from the prison by a government task force but could not be sent to their homelands. The U.S. has sent hundreds of prisoners from Guantanamo to third countries but this is the first time Kazakhstan has accepted any for resettlement.

gbay 1

Their release brings the prison population at Guantanamo to 127, according to a Pentagon statement on Tuesday.

The transfer appears to be the latest step in the administration’s strategy to rapidly bring down the prison population at Guantanamo, potentially to under 100, so that the White House can make a more aggressive argument to Congress that the camp should be closed. Congress continues to block Guantanamo prisoners from being brought for detention on the U.S. mainland.

Many vocal critics of the administration’s push to close the camp, though, have not backed off their concerns. And the accelerated prisoner transfers have raised additional security concerns.

All the prisoners being transferred to Kazakhstan had been captured in Pakistan and turned over to the U.S. for detention as suspected Islamic militants with ties to Al Qaeda.

gbay 2

The U.S. identified the Yemenis as Asim Thabit Abdullah Al-Khalaqi, who is about 46; Muhammad Ali Husayn Khanayna, who is about 36; and Sabri Mohammad al Qurashi, about 44.

According to a 2007 Defense document, posted on The New York Times website, Al-Khalaqi was “assessed” to be part of Al Qaeda and was captured alongside an Al Qaeda commander at Tora Bora.

Al Qurashi, likewise, allegedly got “militant training” at an Al Qaeda training camp and was arrested at an Al Qaeda safe house. Both were assessed to be “medium risk.”

The U.S. identified the Tunisians as 49-year-old Adel Al-Hakeemy, and Abdallah Bin Ali al Lufti, who military records show is about 48.

gbay 3

None of the men were ever charged and a government task force determined it was no longer necessary to hold them.

The U.S. does not say why they could not be sent home but the government has been unwilling to send Yemenis to their country because of unrest and militant activity there while in the past some Tunisians have feared persecution.

Nearly 30 prisoners have been resettled in third countries this year as part of Obama’s renewed push to close the detention center over opposition from Congress. Earlier this month, four Afghan detainees were returned to their home country.

The Washington Post reported that the administration plans to “significantly reduce” the camp’s population over the next six months by transferring prisoners out. Officials reportedly are hoping other nations will accept the roughly 60 prisoners approved for transfer.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Tags: ,

Severe Flu Cases on the Rise in U.S.

31 Dec

As 36 States See High Levels of Illness, Vaccine May Not Fully Protect

flu 1

Valerie Bauerlein

The Wall Street Journal

Dec. 30, 2014 7:40 p.m. ET

This year’s influenza season started earlier than expected and is sending more patients to the hospital, raising concerns this could be a more severe outbreak than in recent years.

Thirty-six states are now experiencing high levels of flu activity, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, as this year’s flu vaccine may not fully protect against a strain known as influenza A H3N2 that is currently circulating and tends to be more severe.

Fifteen children age 18 and under have died from the flu as of Dec. 20, compared with four such deaths around the same time last year, according to the CDC. A number of hospitals are outpacing previous years, with some restricting visitors to prevent the spread of the virus.

flu 2

“Our medical director said that in his eight years at the hospital, he had never seen double digits” in the number of patients hospitalized, said Jill Chadwick, a spokeswoman at the University of Kansas Hospital in Kansas City, Kan. It had a record 25 flu cases admitted as of Monday and two deaths.

Dr. Anna-Kathryn Rye, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Palmetto Health Children’s Hospital in Columbia, S.C., said the hospital is seeing two to three times the number of flu patients as in a normal season. “We are hoping this week will be the peak,” she said.

The flu shot may not fully protect against the strain of influenza that is currently circulating around the U.S., according to the CDC.

Common Symptoms

Fever, chills

Cough, sore throat, runny nose

Muscle aches, headache, fatigue

Nausea (more common in children)

Source: CDC

flu 3

Distribution problems may be making it harder for some consumers to gain access to antiviral drugs given early in the illness. The CDC alerted pharmacies last week that there may be greater demand for these drugs earlier in the season. Agency officials said they have heard of anecdotal reports of a shortage of Tamiflu, a common antiviral medication.

CVS Caremark Corp. said some of its pharmacies may have intermittent shortages of the liquid version of Tamiflu, due to the supplier’s challenges meeting demand. But CVS said there has been no shortage of the capsule version of Tamiflu, and patients can ask their pharmacist about having the capsule versions compounded into a liquid, spokesman Michael DeAngelis said.

For patients of all ages, the hospitalization rate of flu patients so far is 9.7 people per 100,000 people in the general population, compared with 4.3 people per 100,000 last year and 5.5 people per 100,000 in the 2012-13 flu season.

Dr. Michael Jhung, a medical officer in the CDC’s flu division, cautioned that it was too soon to say whether this will be worse than recent years. “We never know how this season compares to the previous season until the end of the year,” he said.

This flu season has been dominated by the H3N2 virus, according to CDC. Vaccines configured in early February typically protect against three to four flu viruses, and this year’s included H3N2. However, the virus showed substantial changes, or mutations, in March. That means the vaccine, while still conferring some immunity, doesn’t work as well. H3N2 is associated with more hospitalizations and deaths.

flu 4

The last time the H3N2 strain of flu was widespread was two years ago, and this season’s rate of hospitalizations for people age 65 and older is already outpacing the rate for 2012-2013. CDC officials said that suggests this flu season might be more severe, although it may mean the flu is simply striking earlier.

About 40% of Americans have been vaccinated for the flu, with 140 million vaccine doses distributed, said Dr. Jhung. Children under the age of 2, people age 65 and over, and people with chronic health conditions such as asthma are most at risk of severe illness from the flu. Between 5% and 20% of Americans get the flu, with 15 million to 60 million people afflicted each year.

The CDC is still recommending that unvaccinated people get flu vaccines because they might provide protection and reduce severe outcomes such as hospitalization and death, officials said.

Joel Sawyer, a 38-year-old political consultant in Columbia, S.C., was diagnosed with the H3N2 strain of flu last week and said he’d rarely felt so sick.

“It’s like a hybrid between a terrible cold and strep,” he said. “You alternate between hot and cold, hot and cold. You can’t get comfortable.”

At Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines, Iowa, hospital officials on Christmas Eve began limiting flu patients’ visitors to immediate family. “It’s more significant than we’ve seen over the past two years,” spokesman Gregg Lagan said. “It’s even catching individuals who have the flu shot.”

David Weber, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, said what differentiates this year is the spike in cases in mid-December and the flu’s relative severity.

The UNC Health Care system, which includes the 800-bed UNC hospital complex in Chapel Hill and dozens of doctors’ offices and clinics, has had 323 patients test positive for flu so far this season. The majority are H3N2, the strain for which this year’s flu shot has proved “less than a perfect match,” Dr. Weber said. Patients, particularly very old or very young ones, are showing up more sick than they might be in an average year, he added.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Understanding Influenza (Flu) Infection: An Influenza Virus Binds to a Respiratory Tract Cell

Understanding Influenza Flu Infection: An Influenza Virus Binds to a Respiratory Tract Cell

This image illustrates the very beginning stages of an influenza (flu) infection. Most experts think that influenza viruses spread mainly through small droplets containing influenza virus. These droplets are expelled into the air when people infected with the flu cough, sneeze or talk. Once in the air, these small infectious droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people who are nearby.

This image shows what happens after these influenza viruses enter the human body. The viruses attach to cells within the nasal passages and throat (i.e., the respiratory tract). The influenza virus’s hemagglutinin (HA) surface proteins then bind to the sialic acid receptors on the surface of a human respiratory tract cell. The structure of the influenza virus’s HA surface proteins is designed to fit the sialic acid receptors of the human cell, like a key to a lock. Once the key enters the lock, the influenza virus is then able to enter and infect the cell. This marks the beginning of a flu infection

Tags: , ,

Al-Qaeda warns of more lone wolves

28 Dec

Jihadist magazine hails recent atrocities, predicts more lone wolves and gives new bomb-making recipe

 isis 2
 
 
 
 
 

Glossy Jihadist magazine hails recent atrocities predicts more lone wolves and gives new bomb making recipe

Nasr bin Ali al-Ansi, a top commander for Al Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula Photo: AFP/Getty/Site
David Millward

By , US Correspondent

The West should brace itself for more lone wolf terrorist attacks, an al-Qaeda official has warned in a magazine interview.

Gloating over a wave of recent atrocities, Sheikh Nasr Al Ansi said more were to come in an interview with a glossy Jihadist magazine, Inspire.

Slickly produced and chilling in its content, the magazine not only hails the work of the lone wolf, but also provides the recipe for another bomb which, it claims, will be undetectable at many airports.

Western intelligence experts have voiced fears at the threat posed by individual jihadists without obvious connections to Islamist militants.

Their fears appear to be well-founded, according to the interview.

“Because some deaths are caused by a thousand cuts. And a small blood clot paralyses the whole body.”

He adds: “Allah the Almighty has facilitated for them capabilities that are absent to other Muslims: reaching the heart of the enemy’s land and other targets.”

Advice for the lone wolf ranges from how to produce a bomb to how to handle the publicity from the atrocity.

Written in the style of a commercial cookbook, the “AQ chef”, describes how commercially available ingredients can be used to make a device.

The devices can be made in a kitchen, the magazine adds.

“If a Mujahid can prepare a bomb from materials used in the kitchen instead of lab material and instead of lab materials use cooking utensils, then we have a double success and we have overcome the security hurdle.

“Generally we are trying as much as possible to move the lone Mujahid from the lab to the pharmacy and the pharmacy to the kitchen.”

Tags: , ,

DOUG SMITH: MORALITY AND THE PACIFIST

26 Dec

Which perspective will history favor?

From the FSP moderator:  This is the first of a series of columns in which author and historian, Doug Smith, offers contrast between varying positions of an age-old question of morality: “Turn the other cheek” or “an eye for an eye”?

doug smith

Pale Ebenezer thought it wrong to fight, but Roaring Bill (who killed him) thought it right.

Hilaire Belloc

pac 1

I am fascinated with the question of how pacifists come to the decision never to fight.   I struggle to overcome my own fight of flight instinct.  When I am challenged, or threatened, those impulses make me want to seek safety by running, or by hurting the threat before it can hurt me.  Oh, who am I kidding? I just want to hurt them before they can hurt me.  With time and maturity, I learned to check those impulses with a soft response.  On other occasions, they led me to charge into a fight I had little chance of winning.

I admit to being in conflict when I was a Cold War sailor on a Nuclear Attack Submarine.

nuke subnuke sub 2nuke sub 3

If we carried out our primary mission, many sailors would die at once in a radioactive cloud of steam.   I empathized with those Russian sailors who faced the same risks as we did.  They knew, as we did, how the weapons deployed against us could either vaporize us, or, in a near miss, crack our hulls and send us plunging to the dark, cold bottom of the ocean, dying somewhere along the way down.  It was impossible to truly wish that death on another Submarine sailor, even our enemy.

We all hoped it might never happen to either of us.

On the other hand, I am certain that if the orders came, they were mere minutes from them sending nuclear death toward our cities or our fleets, or even us.  There would be no hesitation.  On the contrary, we would run in our skivvies and socks to battle stations.   We would be manning phones while pulling on our shirts, plotting targets while we tied our shoes, preparing weapons, and updating position data as we zipped our trousers.  We would launch quickly as we had a firing solution, hopefully before they could do the same to us, or to New York, or Washington, or our own home towns.

We had nothing in particular against those young Russian boys a few miles from us. None of us were particularly anxious for a war, nor were any, well most of us, homicidal.  But our job was to kill them, and kill them we would.

Now this brings me to Albert Einstein.  An avowed pacifist, he once said

“I am not only a pacifist but a militant pacifist. I am willing to fight for peace. Nothing will end war unless the people themselves refuse to go to war.”

pac 2pac 5

Yet his name is right there in any history of the atomic bomb along with Robert Oppenheimer. Einstein, as much as anyone, formed the Cold War battlefields into which we sailed.  Einstein’s involvement was not simply theoretical, although his theories did lead, by inevitable progression to the mushroom clouds over Trinity and Japan.

He also used his influence as a renowned scientist to write a series of letters to FDR, urging him to launch the Manhattan Project and develop atomic weapons.  An odd undertaking for a pacifist, is it not?  So what made the difference for Al?  Hitler absorbed Austria and began a war of acquisition in Europe.  There was abundant evidence of the brutality and cruelty of the Nazis, as well as indications his scientists doing research in Deuterium that could lead to their development of an atomic bomb.

“My pacifism is an instinctive feeling, a feeling that possesses me because the murder of men is disgusting. My attitude is not derived from any intellectual theory but is based on my deepest antipathy to every kind of cruelty and hatred.”

Albert Einstein

pac 4pac 3

(Einstein lied, people died! There were no WMD s in Germany. )

Maybe Einstein was in love with the idea of pacifism, until his own ox was gored.  Then he abandoned it all in a magnificent fashion.  He is hardly the first pacifist to discover in a bloody lip, or family, or country, that perhaps there ARE things worth fighting, and killing, and dying for.  Or that while dying for one’s country may be fine and noble, killing for one’s country is harder, more bitter in the mouth, yet more necessary when facing truly evil men.

He just happens to be the one whose revelation ushered in the Atomic Age.

So, when was he wrong? When he was a pacifist and would fight for peace?

And when was he right? When he was the intellectual and moral force behind the light of 10,000 suns bursting over the New Mexico desert?

An excellent question.  Stay tuned.

The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

Edmund Burke

Tags: , , ,

Mark Caserta: GOP must regroup and focus on 2015

25 Dec

It’s as if the mid-term elections never happened

Dec. 25, 2014 @ 12:01 AM
gop 1

Perhaps the GOP is suffering from post traumatic election syndrome, I’m not sure. But if they have any hopes of winning the White House in 2016 and sustaining a viable future for their party, they’d better learn how to deliver to the American people.

Unfortunately, as of right now, it’s as if the November mid-term elections never happened.

Senator Ted Cruz

Frankly, I’m disturbed the refocus on constitutional boundaries from those subscribing to the Tea Party has had such a divisive effect on Republicans. Exacerbating the issue is that leadership seems to lack the ability to coalesce its members around certain foundational principles.

Let me assure GOP leadership that anything less than a complete delineation from the progressive policies of the past six years will result in huge losses for the Republicans moving forward.

gop 3

The time has come for Republicans to regroup and focus on 2015.

Top priority is repealing Obamacare. Of course the president will veto the attempt, but with Harry Reid out of leadership, at least Obama will not be protected from having to sign bills that will elicit public opposition. Once Obama vetoes the bill, Republicans can then proceed with an incremental approach to repealing parts of the president’s healthcare law, some of which will likely garner some Democrat support, such as the employer mandate, the 30-hour work week and the medical device tax. Even if the president vetoes every single Obamacare repeal measure, the public will be incensed by higher costs and impending penalties.

John Boehner Holds Press Briefing At US Capitol Mitt Romney Interviews Former Running Mate Paul Ryan In Chicago

Another top priority of the new Congress must be securing the border. The GOP-controlled House of Representatives failed miserably in dealing with illegal immigration by passing the $1.1 trillion “Cromnibus” spending bill fully funding President Obama’s illegal executive order on amnesty. Failing to secure the borders is failing to protect the American people and our nation’s sovereignty.

Republicans must leverage their new majority in pursuing approval of the Keystone XL pipeline, which experts say will create upward of 20,000 new jobs and bring us closer to energy independence. If Obama and Democrats attempt to stand in the way of more jobs and less expensive energy, they will surely feel the voter’s rebuke.

3 YEARS LATERU.S. Customs And Border Protection Secures Tex-Mex Border From Land, Air and Seakeystone

The new Republican-controlled Senate must now leverage the same “nuclear option” invoked by Harry Reid, allowing his Democrat-controlled Senate to pack federal courts with Obama nominees with a simple majority vote. It’s crucial that our nation has conservative judges in the federal court system. As one of the three co-equal branches of government, the federal judiciary will play a vital role in our nation’s future.

debt

And it will be political suicide for conservatives not to follow through on campaign promises to begin reducing our nation’s debt, which has climbed to nearly $18 trillion. At an average of $56,000 for every American, our country cannot continue down this path.

Returning our country to its conservative roots will take time. The debilitating disease of liberalism didn’t besiege our nation overnight.

But the process must begin with Americans who still believe in the future of our nation and the 115th Republican-led Congress.

American-Flag-Facebook-Covers-2146

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

Tags:

The Cloward-Piven Strategy is Alive and Well at the Border

21 Dec

 The goal is chaos…

Jun. 10, 2014 3:45pm

John Linder

The flood of immigrants at our borders today is neither an accident nor a surprise. It is an extension of the Cloward-Piven Strategy – the goal of which has been known for 50 years.

In a 1966 article in Nation, Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, sociology professors at Columbia University, wrote that capitalism should be collapsed by overloading the government with financial demands that could not be met.

The strategy is to collapse the financial system. The tactic is chaos. If a crisis does not exist, create one. The more chaos the better. The solution is always couched in empathetic words like “fair,” “equal,” “humane” and “just.”

cp3

Women and children look through a box of cloths that were donated by volunteers at the Greyhound bus terminal, Thursday, May 29, 2014 in Phoenix. About 400 mostly Central American women and children caught crossing from Mexico into south Texas were flown to Arizona this weekend after border agents there ran out of space and resources. Officials then dropped hundreds of them off at Phoenix and Tucson Greyhound stations, overwhelming the stations and humanitarian groups who were trying to help. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri)

In 1967 Cloward and Piven founded the National Welfare Rights Organization to increase the numbers of people on the welfare rolls. Through a series of sit-ins, demonstrations, picket lines and occasional rock throwing, smashed glass and broken furniture they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. By the 1970’s there was one person on welfare in New York City for every two working in the private sector. The city declared bankruptcy in 1975.

Project Vote was formed to organize the voter’s rights movement to take up the “unfinished business” of the 1965 Voters Rights Act. ACORN and Human SERVE were formed to expand on the work of the National Welfare Rights Organization.

Those three organizations began lobbying for the Motor-Voter law to swamp our voter rolls with names that would never vote, but whose names would be on the rolls so others could vote in their stead. When President Bill Clinton signed the bill in 1993 Cloward and Piven were standing behind him.

ACORN is the most prominent of the organizations formed by Cloward and Piven. President Barack Obama was ACORN’s lawyer. They have received millions of dollars from the federal government and charitable organizations for working on the census, voter registration, affordable housing and other organizing efforts.

ACORN’s biggest success was in lobbying for the expansion of housing on behalf of the poor. The financial collapse of 2008 can be traced to government decisions. The Community Reinvestment Act of 1979 required banks to make loans in poor neighborhoods. Under pressure from the Clinton White House in 1999, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac lowered their credit standards on mortgages. Proposals by the Bush Administration to put Fannie and Freddie under closer supervision were opposed by Democrats in Congress.

U.S. Customs And Border Protection Secures Tex-Mex Border From Land, Air and Sea

A U.S. Border Patrol canine team stands nearby after they helped detain a group of undocumented immigrants near the U.S.-Mexico border on April 11, 2013 near Mission, Texas. Agents say they have also seen an additional surge in immigrant traffic since immigration reform negotiations began this year in Washington D.C. Proposed reforms could provide a path to citizenship for many of the estimated 11 million undocumented workers living in the United States. Credit: Getty Images

In response to the chaos created by the financial meltdown, $2 trillion was spent saving Wall Street from their own bad decisions, covering the salaries of public union employees and expanding welfare and unemployment benefits. The shovel ready jobs that were promised are still undone so the Left demands more spending.

After dozens of ACORN employees were indicted on charges of voter fraud, their funding dried up and they were disbanded.

Today, in keeping with the Cloward-Piven Strategy, a new crisis is being manufactured by President Obama. There is chaos at the Southern border.

Two years ago the president stopped deportation efforts of young immigrants who came to the country illegally. We have had active programs in Mexico informing those who come to our country how to apply for food stamps. The welcoming word is out regarding illegal entry also.

The New York Times reported last week that an illegal immigrant youth said: “If you make it, they take you to a shelter and take care of you.”

Central Americans Undertake Grueling Journey Through Mexico To U.S.

A mother with her child told Channel 5 News that the message being disseminated in their country is, “go to America with your child, you won’t be turned away.”

Central American immigrants ride north on top of a freight train on August 6, 2013 near Juchitan, Mexico. Thousands of Central American migrants ride the trains, known as ‘la bestia’, or the beast, during their long and perilous journey through Mexico to reach the U.S. border. Some of the immigrants are robbed and assaulted by gangs who control the train tops, while others fall asleep and tumble down, losing limbs or perishing under the wheels of the trains. Only a fraction of the immigrants who start the journey in Central America will traverse Mexico completely unscathed – and all this before illegally entering the United States and facing the considerable U.S. border security apparatus designed to track, detain and deport them. Credit: Getty Images

Children are crossing the border in astonishing numbers and an additional 230,000 children are expected over the next 24 months. Border officials fear that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The federal government is shipping illegal families to Phoenix from Texas by the planeload and illegals from Central America are being bussed from the Mexican border to Phoenix and released on the street corners. They will all overload our health care system, our welfare rolls and our schools.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said that the administration is committed to escalating lawlessness at the border.

President Obama has called it “an urgent humanitarian situation.” Attorney General Holder said that amnesty is a civil right and has initiated a program to hire an additional 100 attorneys to represent these children in the immigration process.

Richard Cloward has died. His partner and wife, Francis Fox Piven, serves as the honorary chairman of the Democratic Socialists of America. The Cloward-Piven Strategy is alive and well in the care of President Obama who is superintending the chaos on the border.

He took office promising to transform America. This will do it.

John Linder served in Congress for 18 years from Georgia. He and his wife, Lynne, have retired to a farm in Northeast Mississippi. He can be contacted at: linderje@yahoo.com

–

TheBlaze contributor channel supports an open discourse on a range of views. The opinions expressed in this channel are solely those of each individual author.

Tags: ,

Mark Caserta: Senate report fans flames of hatred of US

18 Dec

What motivation was there for its release?

intel 1

Dec. 18, 2014 @ 12:01 AM

MARK CASERTA

The day after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, hundreds of American patriots gathered at Harris Riverfront Park to mourn the loss of innocent life. As we joined in prayer and song, there wasn’t a dry eye in sight. We needed healing, and we needed answers.

In the wake of the unprecedented attack, we realized we were at war with Islamic terrorism. Americans united in an uncommon manner behind a common goal: Expeditiously track down the individuals responsible before they could mount yet another attack on the U.S. For all we knew this was a “ticking time bomb” scenario with more waves of attacks to come.

intel 2

But our country was shaken at its very foundation. This new enemy didn’t fear death, they celebrated it. This wasn’t a time for indecision or vacillation of principles. It was a time for action. We were at war, and the enemy had successfully gotten off the first deadly round.

In the following months, CIA operatives would begin strategically compiling information about Al Qaeda’s networks led by Osama bin Laden. Through enhanced interrogation techniques (EITs), information critical to defeating radical Islam was gathered. As a result, Al Qaeda would eventually be crippled and Osama bin Laden killed.

intel 4

But when Barack Obama became president he wasted no time decrying the EITs incorporated by the Bush administration. In January 2009, the president issued an executive order prohibiting any unlawful interrogation by the CIA, saying it didn’t represent America’s “values.”

And if indeed, the CIA engaged in unlawful interrogation following 9/11, one would think that after six years it would be in America’s best interest to simply “move on.” But certain ravenous politicians, sensing Americans have settled into a “surety of safeness,” have dangerously begun to chum the troubled waters of the past.

intel 3

Last week, a Democrat-loaded Senate Select Committee on Intelligence released a report disclosing the full details of the Bush administration’s EITs. Predictably, the country has since been deluged with political donnybrook questioning the motivation behind the timing of the release.

Upon the declassification of the committee’s report, President Obama told Americans “that upholding the values we profess doesn’t make us weaker, it makes us stronger…” The president went on to remind us there is “strength” in confessing our imperfections to the world.

I never cease to be amazed at what this president thinks makes America strong.

While Obama believes this “purging” of the soul will make other nations “admire” the U.S. for our forthrightness, he just served up a terrific recruiting tool for modern day Islamic terrorism. He simply doesn’t understand that rogue nations perceive his naivet as weakness and are emboldened to act.

JAME CLAPPER

This belated assertion of wrongdoing also stains the service of those commissioned by Republicans and Democrats alike to identify and destroy the enemy before they could strike again.

Releasing this report fans the flames of Islamic hatred toward the U.S. And the fact that it puts American lives in jeopardy was reason enough not to have disclosed the information.

diane 3

Tags: ,

Ex-CIA official: CIA torture report will ‘cost American lives’

14 Dec

The Hill

By Scott Wong – 12/14/14 07:00 AM EST

diane

Senate Intelligence Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein’s decision to release the CIA torture report will “cost American lives,” a former top CIA official said in a radio interview that aired Sunday morning.

“You are going to hand ISIS and the al-Nusra Front [terrorist groups] a massive information and operations victory … This is going in the end to cost American lives,” former CIA Officer and Station Chief Gary Berntsen said when asked what he would have warned Feinstein about making the report public.

diane 3

Berntsen helped lead the CIA’s response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He made his remarks on The Cats Roundtable, host John Catsimatidis’s radio show on AM 970 in New York, and they echo similar comments from CIA veterans like former Director Michael Hayden.

“It’s a devastating report in that it puts out on the table the dirty laundry of the agency … there wasn’t a balanced approach to the report,” Berntsen said. “And this is going to damage our relationships with foreign intelligence services around the world.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee report was released by Feinstein, a California Democrat, just weeks before her party hands over control of the upper chamber to Republicans. The report detailed “enhanced interrogation techniques” including waterboarding and rectal hydration, and critics including Berntsen have called the document partisan

diane 2

Tags: , ,

S. H. TOWNSEND: HAS OUR NATION’S WORKFORCE BECOME A FIELD OF BATTLE?

11 Dec

shelleye

This is part four in an ongoing series on the “War on Women” by author S.H. Townsend.

wow 5

Is there a war on women? My experiences have proven that there is indeed a war against women. Why is there a war against woman? Who is responsible for the start of this war? Who or what continues to keep this war going? I have a few theories.

Women had to fight for the right to vote. Their efforts paid off in 1920, and they were awarded the right to vote. That battle was won. What other battles have women faced since that point in time?

wow 1

We’ve all heard about the wages wars. I remember them during the eighties, when more women were joining the workforce. They made demands for equal pay. Even today, women claim that they still don’t receive as much pay as their male colleagues. I am not qualified to comment on the wage wars, as my time in the workforce was limited.

I did not leave the working world to stay home to raise the children. I have no children. My decision was due to the fact that I have hated nearly every job I have held, save for one or two, so I decided to become a writer.

wow 2

During my time in the workforce, I did fall subject to some battles in the war against women. My last employer through a job service agency was the worst. The man who owned and operated the local towing company where I was sent to work surpassed my ex-husband as King Chauvinist. He often bragged to the men who came in about how I “knew my place” in his company. He even had the audacity to compare me to other women who were previously employed there. He once announced, “The last woman they sent from Poor Excuse for Job Services* was found in the garage with Average Joe.” And the woman was fired, but Average Joe was congratulated for his conquest and he is still employed there today. Imagine that.

I’m not defending that woman. They should have both been fired for their sexual escapades on company property! That’s just how King Chauvinist ran his business.

wow 3

I worked there for less than three months. I was so angry at everything I had been put through that I ended up composing a four page letter to the company, explaining in great detail why I could no longer maintain employment with their company. I had tried to talk with Poor Excuse for Job Services about the ill treatment I was receiving from the towing company. I kept begging them to place me somewhere else, but they didn’t give a crap. When I quit, I furnished the job service agency with the four page letter. After that, I was never offered another job through Poor Excuse for Job Services Agency.

I attempted to find other jobs, but I only received calls for two job interviews in eleven months. I gave up the (lack of) job search and started writing full time.

wow 4

The only reason I stayed at that towing company for as long as I did was because my husband was unemployed, and his unemployment check paid our rent, but after that, we were left with no money for food or utilities.

Is there still a wage war against women? I couldn’t tell you. I’m not qualified to say a word about it. I’m assuming it solely depends on the company for which the women in question work.

Tags: ,

Mark Caserta: Broken promises caused election losses

11 Dec

Lying is simply part and parcel of the progressive movement

false 2

Dec. 11, 2014 @ 12:01 AM

MARK CASERTA

Apparently honesty, integrity and the rule of law have little meaning for liberals. For they would have you believe these missing qualities in the Obama administration had nothing to do with the shellacking Democrats took in the November election.

Despite the fact that the pattern of disingenuous governing by Barack Hussein Obama has become as evident as the nose on your face, liberals continue to make excuses for this president and ignore his lying in the interest of propagating progressivism.

And frankly it’s laughable for someone to blame “the poor” for not voting or the two-thirds of the voters who didn’t go to the polls, rather than ask themselves “why” would many who had previously supported this president’s policies turn on him.

false 1

Perhaps progressives should consider these presidential canards which they’ve never been able to plausibly explain to the American people.

n “If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor period. If you like your health care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan period. No one will take it away. No matter what.” This was, of course, Politifact’s “Lie of the Year” for 2014. Yet, for liberals the end justifies the means.

n “My administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in government.” But the Obama administration has set a new standard for deceptive governing. Some recall during his 2008 campaign the president repeatedly promised health care negotiations in Congress would be televised on C-SPAN. But it never happened and liberals looked the other way.

false 3

n “We agree on reforms that will finally reduce the costs of health care. Families will save on their premiums…” Barack Obama repeatedly promised Americans that Obamacare would cut the cost of a typical family’s premium by up to $2,500 a year. But as rates spike across the nation, liberals just keep marching.

n “We’ve got shovel-ready projects all across the country that governors and mayors are pleading to fund. And the minute we can get those investments to the state level, jobs are going to be created.” Obama later referenced this failed objective of his stimulus package during a jobs council meeting and joked about the promise saying, “Shovel-ready was not as… uh … shovel-ready as we expected.” Liberals just laughed it off.

n “I don’t want to pit Red America against Blue America. I want to be the president of the ‘United States of America.'” Really, Mr. President? You’ve helped renew racial tensions that are sweeping the nation! And while Barack Obama counsels with Al Sharpton for a plan to “unite” America, progressives are silent.

lie 2

Do you suppose liberals would be “deaf and mute” to this fraudulence if it was a GOP president? They simply know they can’t deliberate these points on their merits, so they predictably play the race card or the blame game. Anyone not in denial can easily figure this out.

The American people have simply had enough of this president’s lies and broken promises, and Barack Obama’s “chickens are coming home to roost.”

Tags: ,

← Older Entries
Newer Entries →