Syria: Just Wag The Dog

Published Eurasia Review on 16 June 2013
By Lawrence S. Schneiderman

LBJ had Vietnam, Clinton had Kosovo, and now Obama has Syria. Those good anti-war liberal Democrats and unremitting interventionist Republicans are at it again. These wars of obfuscation are predicated on lies. The Gulf of Tonkin, Kosovo genocide, and Syrian chemical weapons, are all fictitious ruses for partir en guerre.

You want to know why the United States is in decline? It is because our Government is corrupt. Our once great country is awash with the least of us for whom a free lunch and cell phone elects the worst among us, and the guilt-ridden who believe the sins of their fathers can be rectified through political largesse. Unfortunately, there is no free lunch. And as a result, we the people are now paying the ultimate price for this foolishness. And you outside of the United States don’t think for a minute you are not affected.

Abraham Lincoln wrote:

"Our safety, our liberty, depends upon preserving the Constitution of the United States as our fathers made it inviolate. The people of the United States are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts; not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution."   

And, Theodore Roosevelt wrote:

"It is the duty of all citizens, irrespective of party, to denounce, and, so far as may be, to punish crimes against the public on the part of politicians or officials."   

Indeed, today a corrupt and scandalous government is putting America and the world in jeopardy to cover up its own failings.  It was Monica who got us into Kosovo. This time it is guns to Mexican drug cartels; Benghazi / a cover up of Islamic terrorism; IRS targeting political free speech; Justice Department spying on Journalists; NSA spying on all Americans; and IRS Commissioners, Hillary Clinton (Secretary of State), James Clapper (Director of National Intelligence), and Eric Holder (Attorney General), all lying under oath to Congress; that is responsible for getting us into a civil war in Syria.

Now as the Obama Administration feels the heat rising from an America in tatters, and dropping polls, it starts a war.  And, as has been the case during this Presidency, suddenly the mainstream media is chirping about Syria and what he wants to babble about.

As if on cue, Obama made headlines worldwide on Thursday by claiming that the Syrian government has used chemical weapons against the rebels "multiple times;” and that the United States was prepared to assist the rebels with more than just fancy camouflage outfits. Never mind that multiple international organizations have disputed this claim. And that in fact, some have found that it was the rebels who first used chemical weapons.

This practice is nothing new. It’s the old canard. Trump up some false catastrophe -- then lie, obfuscate, intimidate, and malign. All the while a complicit mainstream media reports and editorializes the validity of your scam.  

For the Obama Administration and its media sycophants, Syria presents a golden opportunity to change the subject. There are no coincidences.  There is no road to perdition this administration will not go down. The timing of this announcement is not an accident.

Just wag the dog!

Lawrence S. Schneiderman is an International Consultant and Dr. of Public Policy, Vanderbilt University. The views expressed are the author’s own.

Monday is Memorial Day

Published Eurasia Review on 27 May, 2013
By Lawrence S. Schneiderman

Monday, May 27, 2013, is Memorial Day in the United States. Memorial Day is dedicated to the men and women of the United States Armed Forces who gave their lives in service to their country.

General George S. Patton understood well the meaning of Memorial Day:

It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died.

Rather we should thank God that such men lived.

President Barack Hussein Obama has another understanding of Memorial Day. Mr. Obama, Commander-in-Chief, doesn’t believe the freedoms that Americans enjoy today are worth fighting (for).  

On Thursday, May 23, 2013, at the National Defense University, Mr. Obama said:

This war (the War on Terrorism), like all wars, must end. That’s what history advises. That’s what our democracy demands.

While that may be Mr. Obama’s reading of history, in the classrooms I attended, he would have failed the course.

A war ends when you either win it or lose it. Not when you pronounce its end. Furthermore, when you withdraw without having vanquished your enemy – be assured you have lost that war, and your enemy lives to fight another day.

Mr. Obama may capitulate to Islamic terrorism, but I don’t believe the American people will. A Commander-in-Chief willing to knuckle under, raise the white flag, or throw in the towel, is “absent without official leave” (AWOL). Such a Commander-in-Chief is not fit for command, and should be relieved. 

And parenthetically, a mass media that will not report the important events of the day, is itself AWOL, and no longer deserves our attention or respect. They are no better than any dictatorial Orwellian lackey, e.g. Pravda. As one astute pundit recently opined, the “pathological stupidity of Western news services,” is reason for profound concern.

Monday is Memorial Day.

If, said Churchill, a mad dog makes a dash for my trousers I shoot him down before he can bite.

Monday is Memorial Day.

It was another wise Englishman who said:

For all we have and are,

For all our children's fate,

Stand up and take the war,

The Hun (Jihadist) is at the gate!

Monday is Memorial Day.

Lawrence S. Schneiderman is an International Consultant and Dr. of Public Policy, Vanderbilt University. The views expressed are the author’s own.

 

Cyprus: Russia’s Bloodless Victory Over Europe

Published by Eurasia Review 25 March 2013

By Lawrence S. Schneiderman

The Western "powers that be," manipulate the financial markets to disguise their failures. They are destroying Western economies, the middle class, and the wealth of nations, to perpetuate a sham. Their political strategies vis-à-vis the Euro and America’s debt crisis are embarrassments to Western thought. 

Cyprus is the canary in the mineshaft. It’s a warning not simply to failed economic and political deliberation and banking mismanagement, but to unbridled conceited vainglory.

The Russian Bear is back – thanks to the moronic, egotistical, self-obsessed, thoughtless, greedy elites in Brussels and Washington. Their latest Cypriot scheme to placate Reich Chancellor Merkel and her reelection is nonsensical and shameful. Cyprus is a drop in the bucket in terms of the Euro Zone’s banking crisis. The size of its illiquidity is not even real money in today’s ecomony. So why create this crisis.

Let me tell you how it is. Frau Merkel is just playing the same game she has since the Euro scam began to unravel. ‘Germany and the German taxpayer will not bailout the irresponsible countries of Southern Europe (to buy German goods) unless they agree to severe measures of austerity and self-deprivation – blah, blah, blah. We must have guarantees! We want it in writing!’

In the end, Frau Merkel agrees to one form of bailout or the other. It's all about the bankers, money managers, and Frau Merkel’s reelection. The rest is window dressing -- pour la galerie.

But this time, the élites may have screwed the pooch.

This will not end well for Europe and America. On June 28, 1914, in Sarajevo, the capital of the Austrian – Hungarian  province of Bosnia, a spark was fired in the proverbial mineshaft that led to the destruction of a large part of Europe. On March 15, 2013, in the day’s last hours, European finance ministers “fired” their conditions for bailing-out Cyprus’s banking system. A levy imposed on all depositors, i.e. savers, rich or poor. As of the moment, the European élites, with open lines to Washington, are meeting in Brussels to fix the damage they have done and avert catastrophe.

But, as my astute seven-year-old grandson once said after giving me a particularly difficult task – good luck with that. And, I say to Europe’s élites, lacta alea est.

What is equally important here, is Russia is immediately jumping on an opportunity, aka the Cyprus banking fiasco. Russia understands, and correctly, Europe’s and America’s failures to deal honestly with their financial crises,  results in an inability to commit resources to its national defense, which in turn weakens the West. Concomitantly, they view Mr. Obama, the guardian of Western civilization, as a weakling. Russia understands that with Mr. Obama, politics trumps everything – including fiscal solvency, national defense, and security.

Indeed, for Russia and China, it’s all too easy. Who needs missiles when you have the European and American political class? 

Author: Lawrence S. Schneiderman is an International Consultant and Dr. of Public Policy, Vanderbilt University. The views expressed are his own.

L'Affaire Petraeus: Pour La Galerie

Published by Eurasia Review 13 November 2012
By Lawrence S. Schneiderman

There is no paucity of reporting in today’s Main Stream Media on l’affaire Petraeus. The Director of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has admitted to having an extramarital affair with a married woman. And, one should not be surprised to learn of further revelations of transgressions on his part. However, while the avalanche of reporting on General Petraeus’ extramarital affair sells newsprint and fills the airwaves with prurient curiosity, it’s window dressing -- pour la galerie.

As America’s great General, George S. Patton, once said (it would seem appropriate to quote a General here): "If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking." What then is l’affaire Petraeus all about?

The extramarital affair is a red herring. Its purpose is to cover up the Obama Administration’s failures in Benghazi and its cover up of those events. Four Americans under diplomatic protection, including the US Ambassador to Libya, were murdered in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11^th, 2012, by Islamic terrorists. The date was the 11^th Anniversary of the 9/11 Islamic terror attacks upon the United States in New York City and Washington, D.C.

The Obama Administration and its accomplice the Main Stream Media, willing or duped, is using a personal extramarital affair to deflect the public from the real questions of an attack on a US Consulate in North Africa.

• Why did the Obama Administration allow its Ambassador and State Department personnel to be put in jeopardy, knowing in advance that Benghazi was an extremely dangerous environment
• Why did the US State Department, under the direction of Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, leave the consulate without adequate protection against a terrorist attack on the Anniversary of 9/11?
• Why was a US Consulate not provided security by US Marines, as is standard operating procedure”?
• Under what authority is the CIA responsible for the protection of a US Ambassador and Consulate Office?
• Who made the decision to “contract out” security of a US Consulate to private civilian contractors who may be connected or compromised by terrorist groups in a country without a legitimate central government?

Indeed, there are many questions to be answered, but none more important in my view than these:

• Why did the Obama Administration not come to the rescue of its Ambassador and diplomatic personnel when it had real time information on the attack of its Consulate, and military assets capable of neutralizing the attack less than two hours away in Sigonella, Italy?
• Who knew what and when? Mr. Obama, President of the United States; Mrs. Clinton, Secretary of State; Mr. Leon Panetta, Secretary of Defense; Gen. M. Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Gen. Petraeus, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; and Mr. James R. Clapper, Director of National Intelligence; and yet to be named White House functionaries?
• Who made the decision(s) not to send military support to Benghazi?    

In the last analysis, one would hope that the Congressional Leaders of the United States and the Main Stream Media would see the events of Benghazi as the real story that needs to be investigated, and not Gen. Petraeus’ extramarital affair. Until then, here’s what the officials and pundits wish us to think: no conspiracy; the timing of Gen. Petraeus’ resignation just a coincidence; just a sordid extramarital affair, but we need to be sure no vital intelligence was compromised; nothing to see here folks – just wag the dog! 

Benghazi: Obama’s Watergate

Published by Eurasia Review 11November 2012

If you have not been paying attention for the past two months, or if you get your news from the Main Stream Media (MSM), then you may not understand the significance of the tragedy in Benghazi (Libya) on September 11, 2012.

In my view, Benghazi is the equivalent of Watergate*, yet much worse. In Benghazi, America’s credibility in the world, and in the Middle East in particular, was irretrievably compromised. As a result, America is in far greater peril than it has ever been before.

The Wall Street Journal**, one of the few media outlets willing to report on this story, succinctly summarized the significance of Benghazi: “The episode reflects directly on his (Mr. Obama) competence and honesty as Commander in Chief.”

Why did Mr. Obama and his Administration cover up what happened at Benghazi? The short answer is – we have yet to be told. Which begs the question, why did the CIA Director, David Petraeus, resign?

Here’s the reason why:

1. CIA Director David Petraeus' affair is at least 5 yrs old. Yet, he was appointed head of the CIA last year (September 6, 2011).

   Ergo, this scandal was in the can, waiting to be opened in a crisis.

2. Bill Clinton's 11th hour push to re-elect Mr. Obama was not an altruistic act of party unity. On the contrary, as the campaign flagged, Clinton's assistance was critical. With the Clintons there is always a quid pro quo.  In this case, Petraeus and the CIA are thrown under the bus for Benghazi rather than Mrs. Clinton and the US State Department. 

   Ergo, Mrs. Clinton’s political career (US Presidential Election 2016) is alive and well.

3. Mr. Obama, or probably someone on his behalf, tried to blackmail Petraeus and we can assume instructed him to lie under oath and take responsibility regarding the calamity in Benghazi. In return, the Obama Administration will keep quiet about his extra-marital affair. Petraeus we can again assume refused to play ball and resigned rather than lay the blame and shame on his agency (CIA).

   Ergo, his legacy and the credibility of his Agency are tarnished and compromised, but not irreparably so.

4. The unfortunate upshot for the United States: more Benghazis and more blood on the horizon.

Watergate was a break-in of a political office in a commercial building and a cover up by the Nixon Administration. Benghazi is an act of war against the United States of America, the murder of a US Ambassador on foreign soil, and a cover up by the Obama Administration. Mr. Nixon was forced to resign his Presidency. We should expect nothing less from Mr. Obama.

Author: Lawrence S. Schneiderman is an International Consultant and Dr. of Public Policy, Vanderbilt University. The views expressed are his own.

* The Watergate scandal was a political scandal that occurred in the United States in the 1970s as a result of the June 1972 break-in at in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement. The scandal eventually led to the resignation of Richard Nixon, the President of the United States, on August 9, 1974, the only resignation of a U.S. President. The scandal also resulted in the indictment, trial, conviction and incarceration of 43 people, including dozens of Nixon's top administration officials (Wikipedia)

** “The Fog of Benghazi,” The Wall Street Journal, 3-4 November 2012, sec. A, p.14, cols. 1-2.

Low Hanging Fruit: The Nobel Peace Prize

The Nobel Peace Prize* was awarded October 12, 2012, to the European Union (EU). The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded the prize to the EU for keeping the peace in Europe for the past sixty years. A worthy honor or another “kick in the leg”?**

Criticizing the Nobel Committee is like shooting fish in a barrel. In other words, it’s too easy. With a few exceptions, the awards recipients are pacifists, appeasers, apologists, environmentalists, authoritarian socialists, communists, terrorists, UN Organizations and apparatchiks, and at least one liar. The Committee never fails to underwhelm with their selection. Who then is the Nobel Committee?

The Nobel Committee is a five-member committee appointed by the Norwegian Storting. The Storting is Norway’s unicameral legislature. Therefore, and make no mistake about this, the Nobel Committee represents the people of Norway and its social and political culture. That begs the question, what do we know about Norway?

Quickly to the point, contemporary Norway is a duplicitous country. As Churchill stated in a speech at St. James’s Palace on June 12, 1941 – “A vile race of quislings*** to use the new word which will carry the scorn of mankind down the centuries.”

Founded in the 11th Century by King Olaf II, Norway was a free frozen isolated nation for all of 200 years. In the 13th century, the Danes ruled Norway until the 19th century. Then the Swedes took control under a Union until 1905. Well, there you have it. Not around for the Renaissance, the Reformation, and not even the Enlightenment. Is it any wonder that they admire Lenin and Stalinist Russia, the Soviet Union, Authoritarian Socialism, and Communism?

This is Norway, where recently (August 24, 2012), Anders Breivik a Norwegian, who murdered 77 people last year, was sentenced to a mere 21 years in prison. And if you think the Norwegian penal system is no walk in the park – think again. His lawyers say, ‘Mr. Breivik will spend his confinement in a prison outside Oslo in a three-cell suite of rooms equipped with exercise equipment, a television, and a laptop, albeit one without Internet access.’ Oh my, the inhumanity! No Internet! In other words, you can without contrition gun down 77 unarmed fellow citizens and get 21 years in prison. 

Now, returning to the Committee’s 2012 selection of the EU. Thorbjorn Jagland, the former Norwegian Prime Minister, and chairman of the Committee awarding the prize, said: “The stabilizing part played by the E.U. has helped to transform most of Europe from a continent of war to a continent of peace,” Sounds good, but it’s delusional.

The EU keeping the peace for sixty years is quite a feat – since the EU has only been a political entity for the last twenty years, beginning with the signing of the Maastricht Treaty on November 1, 1993. But hey, who’s counting. Mr. Obama was awarded a Nobel Prize after being in office less than two weeks when nominations came due: from January 20 to February 1, 2009; and, only eight months until the Committee’s announcement in October 2009.

Yet, the most important reason to be mystified with this award is that it was the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) that has kept the peace in Europe since World War II. NATO was founded on April 4, 1949, by twelve western nations, and funded essentially by American taxpayers.

So, if the Nobel Committee is awarding the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize to those who have kept the peace in Europe, sans the Balkans, for the past sixty years – it should go not to the EU, but to NATO and the taxpayers of the United States of America.

Lastly, we historically know that the Norwegian intellectual elite whom comprises the Nobel Committee like to send a message to the least of us. But alas, a lie (that the EU has kept the peace in Europe for the last sixty years) does not change reality (that Europe is in crisis and the unelected self-serving technocratic elitist of the EU and Euro zone are the problem and not the solution).

If, Alfred Nobel, a Swede, had not thrown these frozen goobers**** the 5th portion of the Nobel Prize to administer (the other four belong to Sweden), we would never hear from them. But he did -- and so we do – and as a result, every year or so we have to put up with their insult, called the Nobel Peace Prize.

Peace!

* "Peace, They Say" by Jay Nordlinger, is an excellent history and a fair and thought provoking account of the Nobel Peace Prize and its recipients.

** In 2002 the Prize was awarded to Jimmy Carter. In his explanation for the award going to Mr. Carter, Committee Chairman Gunnar Berge stated that award “should be interpreted as a criticism of the line the current administration (George W. Bush) has taken (with Saddam Hussein). It’s a kick in the leg to all who follow the same line as the United States.” Apparently, “kick in the leg,” is the Norwegian expression for “slap in the face.”

*** Vidkun Quisling, leader of Norway in 1940, who cooperated and collaborated with the Nazis when Germany invaded Norway in 1940.

**** A person who has extremely annoying personal habits that annoy the hell out of everyone. Examples are: bad breath; chews gum extremely loud with mouth open; always wears pants that are slightly too short or sleeves slightly too small; squints a lot; has trouble controlling the volume of his or her voice; interrupts others to tell uninteresting stories; atheistic about everything; and, a heavy mouth breather.

 

The Wrong Side of Everything: US and EU Foreign Policy

Published by Eurasia Review,  October 4, 2012

The people of the Republic of Georgia went to the polls Monday (October 1, 2012), and threw out of office the incumbent party (United National Movement) that has led (or some say ruled) this small nation since the Rose Revolution of 2003. The winner is a coalition of small political groups called the Georgia Dream Party, led and founded by businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili.

What is important, and fully reported by the western media, is that the democratic election process worked. But not being reported, and equally important, in my view, is the fact that the United States of America (US) and the European Union (EU) bet on the wrong horse again.

In the past couple of years, Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton, Messrs. Barroso and van Rumpuy and Lady Ashton, have backed the loser in every transitional election, and supported the overthrow of every regime with ties to the west or providing a stable force in an unstable region.

Here’s the record:

·      Georgian Election – The US and EU did everything they could (billions in economic aid) to support Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili’s continued role as President and/or Prime Minister (the two positions are separate and the latter is appointed by Parliament). Mr. Saakashvili lost because he is an arrogant authoritarian jerk; who was suckered by Russia and led his country into war (2008 Georgian-Russian War) that it could not win, and then lied about how it happen; terrorized political opponents; and in spite of massive foreign aid and opportunity presided over a failed economy. He is not the “democratic leader” the sycophantic western media wish him to be. Being educated in the West does not ensure western principles and values. Egyptian leader Mohammed Morsi, of the Muslim Brotherhood, was educated at a California university, and he certainly doesn’t endorse western values.

      Serbian Election - The Serbian people, on May 20, 2012, elected a new President, Tomislav Nikolic, in a "surprise victory." Surprise to whom – apparently to western journalists and tendentious pollsters. The Serbian people are telling the EU imperialist technocrats that they had enough of their malarkey. Serbs will not be serfs.

 ·   Egyptian Election - On June 17, 2012, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate Muhammad Morsi won Egypt's presidential election. The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Egypt in 1928. Its slogan is “Islam is the solution.” The Brotherhood’s stated goal is to instill the Qur’an and Sharia Law as the foundations of an Islamic government. There should be little dispute that Egypt is now an Islamic state. Does foreign policy Establishments of the US and EU not remember the naïve and foolish policy of the Carter Administration with the Shah and Iran, and the outcome of that decision? Surely, they must. We are living today with the horrendous consequences of that foreign policy failure, and the consequences may prove catastrophic. The US now wants to double down.

·       Iraq - The inability to fashion a sensible accord between Iraq’s three sectarian groups, resulted in the immediate and ongoing sectarian warfare. There has been no peace. The result has been diplomatic malpractice by both the Bush and Obama Administrations, and their principle foreign policy chiefs, Condoleezza Rice and Hilary Clinton. With al – Maliki and his Shi’a control of Iraq’s central government, Iran will continue to exert untoward influence. It is Iran who is attempting to steer policy in Iraq. Mr. al - Maliki is simply the puppet. Iraq is an artificial state. To believe that Kurds, Sunni, and Shi’a can live peacefully together contradicts realty. Just as Bosnia became a failed state when Muslims, Serbs, and Croatians, were provided with the means to choose the conditions under which they wished to live - similarly the Kurds, Sunni, and Shi’a, are doing so in Iraq today.

·       Tunisia – The Tunisian Revolution, the first of the so-called “Arab Spring,” began on December 18, 2010, and led to the removal of longtime President (had ruled since 1987), Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, on January 14, 2011. Today the ruling Islamist party has been strongly criticized for failing to clamp down on Tunisia’s Muslim extremists, who have carried out numerous acts of violence since last year’s revolution. For those in the west who believe that Tunisia has established a “moderate Islamic regime” – not so fast.

 Libya – The Libyan Revolution began in February 15, 2011, and ended on October 20, 2011, with the capture and killing of Libyan dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, who had ruled Libya since a bloodless military coup in 1969. The revolution would not have succeeded without the direct military involvement of the United States, England, and France. On September 11, 2012, the United States Ambassador to Libya and three of his staff were murdered by ·      an Islamic mob in Benghazi. At no time did the security forces intervene to protect US personnel or property in accordance with International Law. In short, Libya is a foreign policy failure. We removed a secular dictator, who had renounced terrorism and a nuclear weapons program, to give birth to an Islamic terrorist nation.

·     Syria – The Syrian Revolution (Civil War), began on March 15, 2011, and continues to this day. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on March 27, 2011, that the U.S. would not intervene militarily in Syria as it did in Libya, and drew a distinction between Libya's Muammar Qaddafi and Syria's Bashar Assad. The latter, she explained, is seen as “a reformer.” Yet, today, she wants his head. This is not foreign policy – this is schizophrenia.

    Why are the US and EU clueless to the will of the people in each of these situations? Why do they support the losers in pivotal elections? Why do they support revolutionary forces that wish to do harm to the West? Why do they push nation states away from the West and into the arms of Mr. Putin, Iranian Ayatollahs, and Chinese Communists?

The addle US State Department and European Union elitists seem to equate rhetoric and fawning with principle. The people of other nations who have to live under failed leadership know better. The people of other nations whose views and voices are not represented in the hysterical reporting of today’s tendentious mainstream media are not being represented. And, apparently, you no longer can buy them off. They have seen what the West is selling – and won’t sell out to be a part of it.

The real story is not only the upheavals that are sweeping the world. Rather, the real story is also the failure of Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton, and the leaders of the European Union, to understand what the hell is going on out there. Their record of failures are not individual acts of misjudgments, but repeated acts of institutional incompetence that manifest itself in indefensible ignorance.

Lawrence S. Schneiderman is an International Consultant and Dr. of Public Policy, Vanderbilt University. The views expressed are the author’s own.