Morning Posting.
- Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity situation Fiji 5.2 !More info here.
- Obama blows off Congress: President says he won’t abide by spending bill he signed.(WT).BY Emely Miller.When the president of the United States signs a bill into law, it’s expected that he will abide by it. That’s not the case with President Obama, who has a sudden interest in novel legalistic interpretations getting him off the hook from laws he doesn’t like.On Friday, the president signed the $1 trillion omnibus spending bill, which funds the government for the remaining nine months of the fiscal year. Afterward, he released a statement saying he won’t abide by the law because the Justice Department had advised that certain provisions are “subject to well-founded constitutional objections.”House Speaker John A. Boehner’s spokesman Kevin Smith told The Washington Times, “This president used to condemn the type of signing statements he is now embracing to ignore the will of Congress and the American people.”One of the presidential pet peeves is that Capitol Hill put the kibosh on his czars. Those high-level White House appointments aren’t confirmed by the Senate but are central to implementing Mr. Obama’s liberal agenda. Lawmakers specifically blocked funding for salaries and offices for four of his nine czars: health care (who coordinates Obamacare), automobile industry (“car czar”), urban affairs and climate change.The president protested that defunding those positions “could prevent me from fulfilling my constitutional responsibilities, by denying me the assistance of senior advisers and by obstructing my supervision of executive branch officials.” Thus, he’s going to interpret the law as he sees fit.The commander in chief is opposed to new restrictions on foreign relations and national security, especially a new requirement that the defense secretary notify congressional appropriations committees in advance of military exercises that cost more than $100,000 for construction.Also at issue is a restriction on funding United Nations peacekeeping missions that put U.S. armed forces under the command or operational control of foreign nationals. Mr. Obama said he’s only going to apply those provisions he deems constitutional. The same flexibility with the law apparently will be enjoyed in relation to 14 separate provisions that limit foreign aid to certain governments.The president protested that “once again” he has been stopped from transferring terrorist detainees from the U.S. facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, onto the U.S. mainland. He claimed this law could “violate constitutional separation of powers principles.” He vowed to interpret it to keep executive powers supreme and work to repeal the ban on bringing these dangerous outlaws stateside.On top of all this, Mr. Obama took umbrage at unnamed but “numerous” omnibus provisions that limit the executive branch from spending money without the approval of congressional committees. He wrote, “These are constitutionally impermissible forms of congressional aggrandizement in the execution of the laws.” The chief executive warned that his administration will notify the relevant committees in advance and listen to their recommendations, but “our spending decisions shall not be treated as dependent on the approval of congressional committees.”The American system of government is based on a separation of powers, not presidential fiat. Mr. Obama should abide by every word of the 1,200-page bill passed by Congress and signed by his own hand.Hmmmm.........Dictator.[dɪkˈteɪtə] n 1. (Government, Politics and Diplomacy) a. a ruler who is not effectively restricted by a constitution, laws, recognized opposition, etc.Read the full story here.
- Washington Times Writer Implies Obama a Domestic Enemy.(BN).Actually, Robert Knight's piece in the Washington Times calls Obama a 'Trojan Horse' president without mentioning the latter's name.I was thinking about writing a novel about what might happen if a man who hates America and wants to bring it down is somehow elected president. What would he do?
I sketched out a few plot elements, and you can decide whether this will fly.
First, the Trojan Horse president would initiate unprecedented spending, driving the debt up by more than $4 trillion just in the first three years. Much of the money would go into the pockets of political supporters and people who donate heavily to his campaigns.
He would ram through an unreadable law allowing the federal government to seize the health care system, which would transform citizens into beholden subjects.
He would cut out private lenders and federalize student loans.
He would go on a world apology tour, letting America's friends and foes know that he is doing whatever he can to make sure America becomes a third-rate power and is brought to heel under a growing world government headed by the United Nations. While on the tour, he would praise Islam and denigrate America's Christian heritage.Read it all because there is much more. Under this 'fictional' scenario Knight lays out, the president to which he is referring warrants impeachment, a Senate trial, and removal from office. The part Knight doesn't get to in his novel idea, involves a hyper-partisan Congress that has essentially neutered itself and hasn't the political will to do the right thing thanks, in large part, to a president who possesses the nefarious ability to exacerbate division.By referring to a president of the United States, whether real or fictional, as a 'Trojan Horse,' Knight is essentially identifying such a president as a 'Domestic enemy.' Via the Tenth Amendment Center, here is the oath of office every member of Congress must take upon being sworn in:Do you solemnly swear that you will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that you will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that you take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that you will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which you are about to enter: So help you God?The response is two words: 'I do.'If this hypothetical president were to succeed in destroying America, Congress would be to blame for allowing him to do so; it is the body that is responsible for dealing with any such reality. That leads me to the response then Republican whip, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) gave to a questioner in the audience at the Heritage Foundation on May 4, 2010.Cantor was asked what it would take for Obama to be defined as a 'domestic enemy.' His answer carries with it a very, very serious indictment of the legislative branch of government to which he belongs, if that answer was wrong.Read the full story here.
- Nameless terrorists kill nameless victims.(IsraelMatzav).In its continuing efforts to deny the reality of Islamic terrorism, the Obama administration issued the following statement on Christmas Day after Islamic terrorists murdered 39 Christians in Nigeria. "We condemn this senseless violence and tragic loss of life on Christmas Day. We offer our sincere condolences to the Nigerian people and especially those who lost family and loved ones. We have been in contact with Nigerian officials about what initially appear to be terrorist acts and pledge to assist them in bringing those responsible to justice."The Zionist Organization of America commented: The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has expressed concern that President Barack Obama's official statement about this horrific massacre of Christians at three different churches by a group of Muslim terrorists mentions neither the Muslim perpetrators nor the Christian victims when clearly the intentional aim of the Islamist terrorists was to murder Christians at several churches. The attacks in Nigeria over the Christmas period resulted in the murder of 39 Christians and the maiming of dozens more, the majority of those killed dying on the steps of a Catholic church that was targeted as congregants were exiting following mass. The Nigerian terrorist assaults were perpetrated by the Boko Haram (meaning 'Western culture is forbidden') Islamist group, sometimes referred to as the 'Nigerian Taliban.' The Boko Haram has been responsible for the deaths of of 504 people this year alone.... The statement... gave literally no clue as to the Muslim identity of the perpetrators or to the fact that Christians were deliberately murdered.This avoidance of any mention of the Muslim identity and inspiration of various terrorists who have assaulted non-Muslims, including the United States, has been a worrying staple of President Obama. Presidential statements on the anniversaries of the 1983 killing of 242 U.S. servicemen in Lebanon by Hizballah or the 1979 seizure of the U.S. embassy in Tehran, both failed to mention the perpetrators of these acts. The U.S. report on the Fort Hood massacre of 13 U.S. soldiers by Islamist killer, Dr. Nidal Hassan, the was no reference to either Hassan's Muslim identity or his adherence to jihadist doctrine.Obama Administration officials generally speak of particular terrorist attacks as being the work of isolated extremists, even when Islamist terrorist connections (for example, between Fort Hood sniper Nidal Hassan and the American-born Al-Qaida in Yemen leader, Anwar al-Awlaki, who advised him) were readily traceable. Also, the Administration has refused almost uniformly to refer to 'Islamism,' 'radical Islam' and 'jihad.' John O. Brennan, Obama's chief national security adviser for counterterrorism, has even explicitly refused to refer to 'jihad' of 'Islamists,' even though the doctrines of jihad and Islamism are the direct inspiration for the attacks in question. Brennan said, "describing our enemy in religious terms would lend credence to the lie propagated by al Qaeda and its affiliates to justify terrorism, that the United States is somehow at war against Islam ... Nor do we describe our enemy as jihadists or Islamists because jihad is holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam meaning to purify oneself of one's community."Hmmmm.........."I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction."Read the full story here.
- SOPA is the end of us, say bloggers.(Politico).The conservative and liberal blogospheres are unifying behind opposition to Congress’s Stop Online Piracy Act, with right-leaning bloggers aruging their very existence could be wiped out if the anti-piracy bill passes.“If either the U.S. Senate’s Protect IP Act (PIPA) and the U.S. House’s Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) become law, political blogs such as Red Mass Group [conservative] and Blue Mass Group [liberal] will cease to exist,” wrote a blogger at Red Mass Group.Some have asserted that the controversial measures would criminalize pages and blogs that link to foreign websites dedicated to online piracy. In particular, this has concerned search engines like Google, which could face massive liability if some form of the bill passes, some say.“Of course, restrictions of results provided by Internet search engines amount to just that: prior restraint of their free expression of future results. Google and others, under SOPA, are told what they can or can’t publish before they publish it. Kill. The. Bill,” conservative blogger Neil Stevens argued at RedState.Liberals had their own spin on it, cheering on the fact that corporate support for SOPA was starting to subside.In particular, GoDaddy, a domain registration firm, suffered a spectacularly bad round of PR when it came out in support of the measures. But after a grass-roots campaign to boycott the firm, driven by Reddit, an online community, and others, GoDaddy reversed course and renounced its support.“Some good news on the SOPA front: Its corporate base of supporters is starting to crumble,” David Dayden wrote at Firedoglake. “GoDaddy is not alone. Scores of law firms are requesting their names be removed from the Judiciary Committee’s official list of SOPA supporters.”In the blogosphere, the trajectory of the bill seemed set — that it is destined for failure if the pressure of the online community is kept up.“The dynamic is clear. Once SOPA — and its Senate counterpart, Protecting IP Act, or PIPA — became high-profile among the Internet community, the lazy endorsements from companies and various hangers-on became toxic. And now, those supporters are scrambling, hollowing out the actual support for the bill. Suddenly, a bill with ‘widespread’ corporate support doesn’t have much support at all,” Dayden said.Conservatives took a slightly different tact, though with similar disdain for the anti-piracy measures.Indeed, blogger Erick Erickson said that he would encourage a primary for any Republican who supports the bill.“I love Marsha Blackburn. She is a delightful lady and a solidly conservative member of Congress. And I am pledging right now that I will do everything in my power to defeat her in her 2012 reelection bid” due to her co-sponsorship for SOPA, Erickson wrote at RedState. “Congress has proven it does not understand the Internet. Perhaps they will understand brute strength against them at the ballot box. If members of Congress do not pull their name from co-sponsorship of SOPA, the left and right should pledge to defeat each and every one of them.”Read the full story here.
- EPIC Sues DHS Over Covert Surveillance of Facebook and Twitter.(Epic)(HT:Cryptogon). EPIC has filed a Freedom of information Act lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security to force disclosure of the details of the agency's social network monitoring program. In news reports and a Federal Register notice, the DHS has stated that it will routinely monitor the public postings of users on Twitter and Facebook. The agency plans to create fictitious user accounts and scan posts of users for key terms. User data will be stored for five years and shared with other government agencies.The legal authority for the DHS program remains unclear. EPIC filed the lawsuit after the DHS failed to reply to an April 2011 FOIA request.Read the full story here.
- 'Palestinians' claim Obama 'administration' suggests releasing convicted terrorist to compete in elections.(IsraelMatzav).If this story is true, and unfortunately I suspect that it is, it shows just how low the Obama administration has sunk.Palestinian media are reporting based on Israeli sources (not reported yet in any Israeli media that I have seen) that the United States has 'suggested' to Israel that it release convicted terrorist Marwan Barghouti (one of the 'heavy' terrorists that Israel refused to release in the 'terrorists for Gilad' deal) from jail so that Barghouti can compete in the 'Palestinian elections' against Hamas (link in Arabic). Barghouti is serving multiple life sentences for murder.The following is an untouched Google translation of the link. Palestine Today - Gaza . Israeli sources said that the U.S. administration is concerned about the prospects for the victory of Hamas in Palestinian elections in the event of future conduct in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.The radio said, the occupation army from those sources that concern the U.S. is increasing in light of certain information received from Arab countries on the determination of the Palestinian president to leave office and not to run for president, opening the door to the Hamas victory, even in the presidential election and full control over the Palestinian situation.Meanwhile, Israeli sources said that the American delegation discussed the important role during the last few months and down with officials in Tel Aviv, the idea of releasing a member of the Central Committee of Fatah, Marwan Barghouti from prison so that the occupation of the movement's leadership in the face of Hamas in the upcoming elections.The sources pointed out that Netanyahu rejects the idea of releasing Barghouti, considering it an extension of the late Palestinian leader 'Yasser Arafat' where he helped the two together in planning to kill dozens of Israelis during the second intifada, according to those sources. The sources pointed out that many mediums, including an Israeli Knesset member Binyamin Ben-Eliezer and former Defense Minister Amir Peretz and some leaders of security agencies and Mossad, the former does not oppose the release of Barghouti, considering him one more Palestinian commitment to peace with Israel.If he ever had one, Barghouti no longer has any commitment to peace with Israel. Ben Eliezer and Peretz are both Labor party MK's who were both failures as Defense Minister (Peretz should never have gotten the job in the first place). And if Obama is willing to make an outrageous demand like this one during an election campaign, imagine what he will demand if God forbid he is reelected.Hmmmm.........."I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction."Read the full story here.
- IDF strikes Gaza; Islamic Jihad operative killed.(Ynet).One terror operative was killed and 10 people were injured Tuesday in two IAF strikes in Gaza Strip. Shortly afterwards, a Qassam rocket was fired from northern Gaza at Israel. The projectile exploded on the Palestinian side of the border.The PA's Maan news agency reported that an Israeli military aircraft targeted a car driving in the center of Gaza City on Tuesday night, injuring at least eight people, who were rushed to the Strip's Shifa Hospital. Two of the injured are said to be in critical condition. The IDF said that IAF aircrafts targeted a World Jihad terror cell gearing to execute a terror attack on the Israel-Egypt border. According to the military, the cell included former Hamas operative Rami Daud Kufarneh, and Hazam Saadi al-Shuker, also a former Hamas operative.Earlier Tuesday, Palestinian sources in Gaza said that an Islamic Jihad operative was killed and two other people were injured in an IAF strike in the Strip's north. The IDF confirmed that a Gaza terror cell was targeted as part of the joint IDF-Shin Bet operation. According to the report, Abdulla Talbani, an al-Quds Brigades operative, was killed while riding his motorcycle in a northern neighborhood in Gaza. The injured were rushed to the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza. "The IDF will not tolerate any attempt to harm Israelis and IDF soldiers and will continue to operate against any element which exercises terror against Israel," a military statement said.Tensions in the southern sector are high: Egyptian border patrol officers fired at smugglers trying to cross over to Israel on Monday night. The exchange took place as IDF forces were patrolling the sector, leading to initial reports suggesting that the Israeli troops had come under fire.The incident was quickly determined as one confined on the Egyptian side of the border. Read the full story here.
- Iran: no oil will be allowed to pass through Strait if West applies sanctions.(AlArabiya).No oil will be permitted to pass through the key oil transit Strait of Hormuz if the West applies sanctions on Iran’s oil exports, Iranian Vice President Ali Rahimi warned on Tuesday.The threat was reported by the state news agency IRNA as Iran conducted navy wargames near the Strait of Hormuz, at the entrance of the oil-rich Gulf.“If sanctions are adopted against Iranian oil, not a drop of oil will pass through the Strait of Hormuz,” Rahimi was quoted as saying.“We have no desire for hostilities or violence ... but the West doesn’t want to go back on its plan” to impose sanctions, he said.“The enemies will only drop their plots when we put them back in their place,” he said.The threat underlined Iran's readiness to target the narrow stretch of water along its Gulf coast if it is attacked or economically strangled by Western sanctions.However, Gulf OPEC delegates told Reuters that Iran would harm itself if it disrupts the flow of oil from the Strait of Hormuz,.“If they do shut down Hormuz this would harm Iran’s exports not only the Gulf producers,” said a Gulf OPEC delegate.Another delegate added that Iran would be “shooting itself in the foot” if it does go ahead with the threat. “For now any move in the oil price is short term, as I don’t see Iran actually going ahead with the threat,” the second OPEC delegate added. More than a third of the world’s tanker-borne oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz.The United States maintains a navy presence in the Arabian Gulf in large part to ensure that passage remains free.Iran is currently carrying out navy exercises in international waters to the east of the Strait of Hormuz.Ships and aircraft dropped mines in the sea Tuesday as part of the drill, according to a navy spokesman.Although Iranian wargames occur periodically, the timing of these is seen as a show of strength as the United States and Europe prepare to impose further sanctions on Iran's oil and financial sectors.The last round of sanctions, announced in November, triggered a pro-regime protest in front of the British embassy in Tehran during which Basij militia members overran the mission, ransacking it.London closed the embassy as a result and ordered Iran’s mission in Britain shut as well.Hmmmm.......What would be the result of a nuke in the Strait of Hormuz?Read the full story here.
- Are the French enemies of Islam?(HurriyetDaily).By Burak BEKDİL.Borrowing the phrase from a wire service, “Turkey told France to block the genocide bill, or else.” France has chosen “else.” And hell broke loose – ironically, in Turkey, not in France. The first set of deadly blows came from the state football betting company, which displaced French games from its regular list of bets, and from the mayor of Ankara, Melih Gökçek, who promised to erect an Algerian massacre/genocide monument right across the French Embassy compound in Ankara. Mr. Gökçek should think twice, or else half of Turkey’s diplomatic missions across the world may have to face Armenian genocide monuments soon. As for the betting blow, hats off to the creative Turkishness. Not even the devil could have thought about such a punishing sanction. Poor French... With the de-listing of their football games on Turkish betting sites, they may soon lose their G-7 membership.And Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek prophesied that “those countries who recognize Armenian genocide will one day come one by one and apologize to the superpower-to-be Turkey.” If that is a good guess, why panic? Why play the offended boy who fetches his football and threatens never to play with the neighborhood lads? Cool down, honorable ministers, and just wait for the day when the world will queue up to apologize to you.And according to Labor Minister Faruk Çelik, “if the French King Francois lived today he would have chopped off [French President Nicolas] Sarkozy’s tongue.” Chopping one’s tongue off in the 21st century? That may be a socially acceptable practice in some parts of the world in 2011, but certainly not in Mr. Sarkozy’s France. Watch out, Minister Çelik, you are unwillingly revealing your cultural/political codes.But, as always, the super-hero of all Turkish super-heroes in the most trendy Turkish pastime “who hates Sarkozy/the French the most” was Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan who accused Sarkozy/the French for “enmity against Muslims.” Are Sarkozy and the French enemies of Islam because the French Parliament (not yet the Senate) passed a bill that criminalizes the denial of Armenian genocide? A plausible answer to that question should not require hundreds of tiring scientific tests and research. Just look around the “Muslim world,” Mr. Erdoğan, and you can see for yourself. How many Muslim countries officially and/or publicly condemned and retaliated against the Danish cartoons which Muslims deemed were hostile to their faith? Ah, yes, so many. And how many countries officially and/or publicly condemned and retaliated against the French Parliament’s decision to make genocide denial a crime? None, other than Turkey. Will Muslim Syria, Mr. Erdoğan’s ex-love affair, for example, impose sanctions on France because of that bill? Will Egypt, Mr. Erdoğan’s new love affair, do so? Pakistan? Libya? Iraq? Saudi Arabia? Tunisia? The Arab League? Indonesia? Or why did the president of the mullah regime in Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, pay a heartfelt state visit to Yerevan on the same day when the French Parliament passed the bill that criminalizes the denial of a Muslim (and caliphate, too!) genocide against Christians? Is Iran not a Muslim country? Are the Shiite Muslims collaborating with the enemies of Islam? To sum it up, Mr. Erdoğan should explain why over 99 percent of the Muslim world does not view Sarkozy/the French as enemies of Islam because their Parliament passed the genocide denial bill.Mr. Erdoğan can always find those answers in another Muslim vs. Christian dispute in which Turkey remains the solitary Muslim player: Cyprus. Why would, Mr. Erdoğan should think, not a single Muslim country, other than Turkey, recognize the Turkish Cypriot statelet? Where is the Muslim solidarity?Too many questions... But they ought to be asked. And there are even more – coming Friday. Read the full story here.
- Shariah was made for man.(HurriyetDaily).By Mustafa Akyol. As Islamist parties emerge victorious from Arab ballots, some are having second thoughts about the Arab Spring. The widespread concern is that post-dictatorial Middle Eastern states will turn into illiberal democracies rather than liberal ones. And while the threat of illiberal democracy is valid for any late-democratizing country – just look at Mr. Vladimir Putin’s Russia – the Middle East bears an additional and unique risk: Islamic law, or the shariah, which might imply corporal punishments for criminals, degradation of women, and persecution of perceived impiety, blasphemy or apostasy.In the face of this risk, a remedy is often hoped for in the power of pragmatism. For example, Egypt’s triumphant Freedom and Justice Party, an extension of the Muslim Brotherhood, will ruin the country’s tourism industry if it bans alcohol. Incumbent Islamists who will have to deliver to their people will face such challenges, the hope goes, and be forced to soften some of their rigid standards.Besides pragmatism, however, there is another source that the more progressive Islamists such as Rached Ghannouchi, the leader of Tunisia’s Ennahda, seem willing to utilize for modernizing their future vision: simply a non-literalist approach to the shariah, which will focus on its “intents” rather than the medieval means that were used to serve those intents.The basis for this non-literal approach goes back to Imam Shatibi, a scholar from 14th-century Muslim Spain. In his magnum opus, “Higher Objectives and Intents of Islamic Law,” Shatibi studied the whole shariah carefully, and concluded that all its decrees could be rendered as the protection of five fundamental values: life, religion, property, progeny and reason.If these intents (maqasid) of Islamic law are taken as its ever-valid content, but the means of these intents are allowed to vary according to time and milieu, as some theologians suggest, then there opens ample ground for reform. Corporal punishments, for example, can be explained as resulting from historical necessity: In seventh-century Arabia, there were neither any correctional facilities nor any bureaucracy to run them. But now we live in a different world.Or the seemingly misogynistic sayings of Prophet Muhammad, such as his advice that women should not travel alone, can be explained as reasonable precautions in his historical context: In seventh-century Arabia, an unprotected woman wandering in the desert would easily fall prey to brigands. In the modern world, however, both law enforcement and means of travel have improved immensely – and therefore the Saudi ban on women’s driving can be declared absurd.These fundamentalists who disregard these nuances do not realize that their blind literalism could lead them to follow the letter of the law, but betray its intents. For example, the Quranic requirement to bring four witnesses to prove an accusation of adultery, whose explicit purpose is to protect women from libel, could turn into a protection for rapists in Pakistan. Western civilization is familiar with a version of this problem from its own canon: The frequent criticism that Jesus brings in the New Testament to the Pharisees, a conservative and literalist Jewish sect of that time, is very relevant. The Pharisees, Jesus noted, were obsessing about the minute details of religious law but leaving undone “the weightier matters of law” such as “justice, and mercy, and faith.” “The Sabbath was made for man,” Jesus also proclaimed, turning the Pharisee mindset upside down, “and not man for the Sabbath.”The future of freedom in Islamic civilization partly lies in a similar insight – that the shariah was made for man, and not man for the shariah. Luckily, the sources that will help nurture that insight are more abundant in Islamic tradition than what is often thought.Read the full story here.
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