The Front Page Cover
2016 The turth is the gold of today
Featuring:
Two Weaknesses Could Undo
the Islamist Movement
Daniel Pipes
.
~~~
.
nObama's Gun Actions Lack Teeth, but Set Bad Precedent
One of the cardinal lessons of shooting a firearm is to be aware of what's behind your target. In other words, don't fire down range if there's anything there you don't want to hit. It's clear from newly announced executive actions that Barack nObama knows exactly what's down range, and he's aiming for it — that would be you, law-abiding gun owner, as well as the constitutional restraints on his office. But take heart; it's not all bad news, and even the bad isn't as awful as it could be. nObama just needs to prove he's not a lame duck by doing something — anything — about those dreaded guns.
As we noted yesterday, the Gun Salesman of the Decade has resolved to spend much of this year focused on guns, thus perpetuating the trend of more Americans buying firearms. His focus could also turn out to be very bad for his own side, both at the ballot box in November and for the advancement of more stringent gun restrictions, such as magazine capacity limits, outright bans and the like, none of which he actually tries to achieve with this series of actions.
That isn't to say there's nothing to see here. Two items in his list bear particular focus: Mental health considerations and expanded background checks.
nObama plans to allow health care providers to provide information about mentally ill patients to the FBI for its background check system. No one wants a mentally ill and potentially violent person to be able to buy a firearm in order to hurt or kill people, but we expect that nObama telling states and agencies to violate HIPAA and snitch on patients isn't going to survive in court. The sticking point has always been what constitutes sufficient mental problems to override Second Amendment rights. Furthermore, nObama's implied assertion that this will deter "gun violence" is dubious. -The Patriot Post
.
GOP Sends nObamaCare Repeal to nObama's Desk Fulfilling a promise made by Republicans in 2010, House Speaker Paul Ryan has dodged and weaved through congressional rules and is on the verge of passing a bill that would repeal nObamaCare and deny federal funds to Planned Parenthood. For the first time, an nObamaCare repeal — by way of a bill called Restoring Americans' Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act — will arrive on Barack nObama's desk. By waiting until the New Year, GOP lawmakers could use the process of budget reconciliation, a process that can be used only once a year because it dodges filibuster efforts from the minority.
"This is our best shot to stand up for our principles on behalf of the American people," read a statement from Ryan's office. "'You can use this bill once a year, and we're using it for this,' Speaker Ryan said recently on Bill Bennett's show. In doing so, we're forcing the president to confront the failures of this law once and for all."
For actual nObamaCare repeal, the bill will accomplish little other than important election-year symbolism. Republicans have not passed a replacement for nObamaCare, nor do they have enough votes to overcome the inevitable nObama veto. The Congressional Budget Office said Monday the bill would trim the nation's deficit by a half-trillion dollars over 10 years. Furthermore, at a time when nObama is guiding the national debate through his gun control executive orders, Ryan is focusing on nObama's failed policies ahead of the 2016 election.
-The Patriot Post
.
Saudi Arabia and Iran Grow Heated as U.S. Steps Back
The Middle East is splitting (again) along sectarian lines. Saudi Arabia and its allies United Arab Emirates and Bahrain severed diplomatic ties with Iran over the weekend. It's part of a trend where Middle Eastern countries can no longer trust the United States to provide the stability it has provided in decades past. On Saturday, Saudi Arabia, a predominantly Sunni country, executed a Shia Sheikh, Nimr Baqr al-Nimr. The predominantly Shia Iran reacted violently, as a mob ransacked and set fire to the Saudi Embassy in Tehran. In the midst of this, the Obama administration, fresh off "ensuring peace" in the region through the Iran nuke deal, backed away from this squabble. "I guess the point is there's plenty of blame to go around," Barack Obama's spokesman Josh Earnest said, "and what we would like to see is all sides begin to take the kinds of steps that will deescalate and not inflame the tensions that are obviously pretty raw right now." But this kind of hands-off approach is exactly what got the region to this point in the first place. Commentator Charles Krauthammer noted that America's modern relationship with the Saudis dates back to the 1930s, when the two countries agreed to trade oil for security. Now that nObama has emboldened Iran by giving it billions of dollars and dropping sanctions, Saudi Arabia must ensure its own peace. "I think they are acting fairly desperately," Krauthammer said. The net effect will be greater insecurity for the West. While Middle Eastern counties focus on each other, the terrorism cells in the region can operate with greater freedom to carry out their aspirations. As Mark Alexander said in his essay on the Iran nuke deal, "Terror does not tolerate a power vacuum." -The Patriot Post.
.
Sen Jeff Sessions- Immigration Imploding US,
Adding Population 25X Los Angeles
Rick Wells
.
.
‘The Incredible Bulk’ is Alive and
Not So Well in North Korea
Lt. Colonel James G. Zumwalt, USMC (Ret.)
.
.
The delusional self-importance
of the liberal media
David Limbaugh.
{wnd.com} ~ I have long marveled at liberals’ air of superiority and lack of self-reflection, which have always been particularly evident among liberal media elites and journalists... They tend to view themselves as sacrosanct and above scrutiny. Perhaps this attitude sprang from the British and, later, American tradition that the press is the Fourth Estate. It doesn’t just serve to inform the people and make them better contributors to the democratic process. It is the virtual fourth branch of government, operating as a watchdog on the formal branches to further check their potential abuses of power. It is a heady concept to believe you function to keep the powerful in check. It is even more so when no one has ever told you that you, too, need to be kept in check. As a result, some journalists seem to believe that what they do is so important that nothing will deter them from ambitiously exposing to the public every titillating morsel of information, even if that information might unnecessarily harm people or the national interest. To some of the most self-righteous among them, catering to the public’s “right to know” is like an unbending religious ritual that transcends every other value in the universe and justifies the vomiting of all information, no matter its actual value to the public or its likelihood of gratuitously harming others. http://www.wnd.com/2016/01/the-delusional-self-importance-of-the-liberal-media/
.
Officials Confirm Construction of
First Domestic Chinese Aircraft Carrier
Sam LaGrone
.
.
Terrorism is the symptom,
ideology the disease
John R. Bolton.
.
US Criminalizing Free Speech?
Judith Bergman
.
.
Hilly rolls out secret weapon, Bubba
can you spare a dime?
Jeff Dunetz
.
.
GOP Candidates React to nObama's
Gun Control Plans
Natalie Myers
.
.
Cal support for Terrorists
David Horowitz
.
.
Iranian-Saudi Tensions May Distract
Iran's Efforts to Attack Israel
investigativeproject
.
{investigativeproject.org} ~ The dramatic escalation in the Iranian-Saudi Arabian rivalry poses critical potential ramifications for Israeli national security, according to the former head of Israel's National Security Council, Yaakov Amidror... Amidror – also formerly the head of Israeli military intelligence – told the Jerusalem Post that he expects the Iranian-Saudi crisis to prolong the Syrian civil war, leading both sides to increase support for their respective proxies in that country. Such a scenario can intensify Israeli concerns of unpredictable and radical terrorist organizations consolidating bases of operations on the Jewish state's northern borders..
.
Two Weaknesses Could Undo
the Islamist Movement
Daniel Pipes
.
{danielpipes.org} ~ The Islamist movement may appear stronger than ever, but a close look suggests two weaknesses that might doom it, and perhaps quickly..
Its strengths are obvious. The Taliban, Al-Shabaab, Boku Haram, and ISIS take Islamism – the ideology calling for Islamic law to be applied in its entirety and severity – to unbearable extremes, rampaging and brutalizing their way to power. Pakistan could fall into their hands. The ayatollahs of Iran enjoy a second wind thanks to the Vienna deal. Qatar has the highest per capita income in the world. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is becoming Turkey's dictator. Islamist operatives swarm the Mediterranean toward Europe.
.But weaknesses within, especially squabbling and disapproval, could undo the Islamist movement.
.
.
Infighting became vicious in 2013, when Islamists abruptly stopped their prior pattern of cooperation among themselves and instead began internecine fighting. Yes, the Islamist movement as a whole shares similar goals, but it also contains different intellectuals, groups, and parties with variant ethnic affiliations, tactics, and ideologies.
Infighting became vicious in 2013, when Islamists abruptly stopped their prior pattern of cooperation among themselves and instead began internecine fighting. Yes, the Islamist movement as a whole shares similar goals, but it also contains different intellectuals, groups, and parties with variant ethnic affiliations, tactics, and ideologies.
.
Its internal divisions have spread fast and far. These include Sunnis vs. Shiites, notably in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen; monarchists vs. republicans, notably in Saudi Arabia; non-violent vs. violent types, notably in Egypt; modernizers vs medieval revivalists, notably in Tunisia; and plain old personal differences, notably in Turkey. These divisions obstruct the movement by turning its guns inward.
Its internal divisions have spread fast and far. These include Sunnis vs. Shiites, notably in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen; monarchists vs. republicans, notably in Saudi Arabia; non-violent vs. violent types, notably in Egypt; modernizers vs medieval revivalists, notably in Tunisia; and plain old personal differences, notably in Turkey. These divisions obstruct the movement by turning its guns inward.
.
The dynamic here is ancient: As Islamists approach power, they fight amongst themselves for dominance. Differences that hardly mattered when in the wilderness take on great importance as the stakes get higher. In Turkey, for example, the politician Erdoğan and the religious leader Fethullah Gülen cooperated until they dispatched their common enemy, the military, from politics, when they turned against each other.
The dynamic here is ancient: As Islamists approach power, they fight amongst themselves for dominance. Differences that hardly mattered when in the wilderness take on great importance as the stakes get higher. In Turkey, for example, the politician Erdoğan and the religious leader Fethullah Gülen cooperated until they dispatched their common enemy, the military, from politics, when they turned against each other.
.
Unpopularity, the second problem, may be the biggest peril for the movement. As populations experience Islamist rule first hand, they reject it. It's one thing to believe in the abstract about the benefits of Islamic law and quite another to suffer its deprivations, ranging from the Islamic State's totalitarian horrors to the comparatively benign emerging dictatorship in Turkey.
Unpopularity, the second problem, may be the biggest peril for the movement. As populations experience Islamist rule first hand, they reject it. It's one thing to believe in the abstract about the benefits of Islamic law and quite another to suffer its deprivations, ranging from the Islamic State's totalitarian horrors to the comparatively benign emerging dictatorship in Turkey.
.
Signs of this discontent include the large majorities of Iranians who reject the Islamic Republic, the wave of exiles out of Somalia, and the massive Egyptian demonstrations of 2013 protesting a single year of the Muslim Brotherhood in power. As with fascist and communist rule, Islamist sovereignty often leads to people voting with their feet.
Should these two tendencies hold, the Islamist movement is heading for trouble. Some analysts already see the Islamist era having ended and the emergence of something new from its wreckage. For example, the Sudanese scholar Haidar Ibrahim Ali argues that a "post-Islamization" era has begun, when Islamism's "vitality and attractiveness have been exhausted even among the most ardent of its supporters and enthusiasts."
Signs of this discontent include the large majorities of Iranians who reject the Islamic Republic, the wave of exiles out of Somalia, and the massive Egyptian demonstrations of 2013 protesting a single year of the Muslim Brotherhood in power. As with fascist and communist rule, Islamist sovereignty often leads to people voting with their feet.
.
.
The enemies of Islamism have much work ahead. Muslims must both fight this movement and develop a compelling alternative to its goal of implementing Islamic law, explaining constructively what it means to be a Muslim in 2016. Non-Muslims can serve as their helpful auxiliaries, providing everything from applause to funds to guns.
The enemies of Islamism have much work ahead. Muslims must both fight this movement and develop a compelling alternative to its goal of implementing Islamic law, explaining constructively what it means to be a Muslim in 2016. Non-Muslims can serve as their helpful auxiliaries, providing everything from applause to funds to guns.
.
Islamism's mounting problems offer grounds for confidence but not for smugness, as another reversal in course could take place at any time. But if current trends hold, the Islamist movement will have been limited, much as fascism and communism before it, damaging Western civilization, not destroying it.
Islamism's mounting problems offer grounds for confidence but not for smugness, as another reversal in course could take place at any time. But if current trends hold, the Islamist movement will have been limited, much as fascism and communism before it, damaging Western civilization, not destroying it.
.
Whatever the trend, defeating Islamism remains the challenge.
Whatever the trend, defeating Islamism remains the challenge.
.
Comments