In it we learn that neo-conservatives philosophy is based on Machiavellianism. It’s the elitist mentality that neo-cons know what is good for all citizens and can morally (in their eyes) use all means necessary to reach that perceived good. We also learn that the roots of neo-conservatism come from the left.

Now that Usama bin Laden nightmare is dead the neo-conservatives need a new nightmare to justify the continued global war on terror. At first they tried to spread general fear about a retaliatory strike. This is a real and genuine fear; however, it isn’t quite enough for them. They need a face of terror–a single person. Initial indications are this new face of terror will be Usama’s 20 year old son Hamza. He already has a nickname, “The Crown Prince of Terror” as evidenced in this recent article from The Telegraph:

Hamza, thought to be the youngest of the Saudi-born warlord’s sons, has been described as the “crown prince of terror”. He featured on an extremist website to mark the third anniversary of the July 7 London bombings in which 52 people died. He read a poem called for “destruction” of America, Britain, France and Denmark.

Intelligence agencies believe he was being groomed as a possible future leader of al-Qaeda.

He was implicated in the assassination of moderate Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto in 2007.

Well, it didn’t take them very long did it? Hopefully it won’t take 10 years, billions of dollars, and countless lives, to find bin Laden 2.0. No doubt we will begin hearing about how the son is even more evil than the parent was.

In any case, I long for the day when our troops can come home from all over the world and we can expend our resources on true defense and better intelligence-gathering rather than the expensive nation-sitting we do now.

I don’t agree with a lot of what Herman Cain says, but I have to admit he has charisma that will give him a lot of support. Expect the other candidates to start attacking him if his poll numbers go up. I think they will.

Gary Johnson did very well with a few odd moments. If I’m looking at him through social-con or neo-con eyes voting for him would likely be impossible. He did come off as a very honest “make the hard choices” candidate. Sort of like Cain without the charisma.

Pawlenty seems to be channeling John McCain a bit too much and Santorum just comes off as angry. Both seem to be going after the George W. Bush voting block; however small that is these days.

Enjoy the entire debate below.

…how about we get the hell out of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and everywhere else and save some money we don’t have?

The most likely scenario will be that we will be told how we now need to be extremely alert due to the potential for retaliation so we’ll need to send more troops and spend more money on the never-ending war on a tactic.

More thoughts to come as more information is spoon-fed to us via an untrustworthy media.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dK8Y2nO_8TM

Compare that interview with the rather hard-hitting tough journalistic interview Judge Andrew Napolitano did last night with The other Donald:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-cqq-WxhRM

And here is the Judge after the interview, saying that Rumsfeld described the interview as the “toughest” he’s had. I’m thinking he wishes he’d rather be asked if he’s a lizard by Louis CK than be interviewed by the Judge again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpYe0MgEsI0

Higgs writes:

In discourse about public affairs, words matter much more than most people appreciate. We live immersed in language so twisted and abused, in part by the design of interested parties and in part by the sloth of inattentive speakers and listeners, that we often fail to notice or object to linguistic miscarriages that pass for intelligent expression. The examples are legion, but here I have in mind a particular turn of phrase that American conservatives, especially neocons, have employed in recent years as a counterstrike against critics of U.S. foreign and defense policy:  They describe such critics as “blaming America” or sometimes as “blaming America first” for attacks against this country or its citizens abroad.

Thus, for example, those who fault U.S. Middle East policies for creating the conditions that caused Muslim fanatics to attack Americans, both at home and overseas, are said to be blaming America for what the policy’s defenders’ take to be the unprovoked acts of terrorists bent on imposing Sharia on the United States, destroying this country’s freedoms, or attaining another such farfetched objective.

Applications to earlier events and policies include use of the expression to fend off the arguments and evidence of those who maintain that the Roosevelt administration waged economic warfare in 1940-41 to provoke a Japanese attack that would justify and lead directly to full-fledged U.S. engagement in World War II; and use of the expression against those who argue that the Truman administration bore at least partial responsibility for the onset of the Cold War. People accused of blaming America are commonly called “America haters.”

Although this riposte to criticism is the rhetorical tactic of first resort for the more simple-minded, flag-waving species of self-anointed patriots, it is by no means their exclusive property. Neocons writing in such elevated outlets as the New York Times and the Washington Post have not been bashful about smearing their critics as people who “blame America.” I noticed this linguistic resort most recently in a commentary by an intelligent, reasonable economist and was shocked that he would embrace this trope while suggesting that “pacifists” and others who criticize U.S. foreign and defense policies are unrealistically imagining that international disputes and warfare can somehow be eliminated from human affairs.

In my view, replying to policy critics by accusing them of “blaming America” is worse than linguistically crude and ideologically twisted; it is stupid.

Read the rest of Higgs at The Independent Institute.

http://ohmygodronpaulwilleatallofourbabiesandourbabiesbabiesandtheirbabiesbabiesuntiltherearenobabiesleft.com/

————————–

By Richard Deekbag

What a joke! All these idiots complaining about their junk being touched by the TSA. I say we should just stand there and take it like real men. I say, “If it’s for national security then TOUCH MY JUNK, PLEASE!!” It’s the patriotic thing to do. If you opt-out of the junk-touching then the terrorists win, pure and simple. If you opt-out of the junk-touching then you hate America!!

I do think there is room for the TSA to improve this process though. It appears that all females get to be felt up by female TSA agents and all males get to be fondled by male TSA agents. This is a discriminatory practice. The TSA should ask the traveler if he or she is a homosexual. If the answer is affirmative then the traveler should be appropriately touched by a member of the opposite sex.

Yes, all touching in the name of national security is appropriate. Other than that small change I applaud the great work of the TSA over the past few weeks. The skies are infinitely safer and there can be no one who says they aren’t friendlier with this policy in place. In fact, they just published a children’s book to help children adapt to the new policy. Here’s is the cover:

This is a great effort by the TSA. They didn’t have to do this. In fact I heartily recommend you contact the TSA via their TalktoTSA website and let them know how much you appreciate them caring enough to do a free hernia check on children as well as adult air travelers. They are so damn good at it they don’t even ask you to turn your head and cough!

Now let’s turn our attention to the terrorist-harboring, enemy combatant-infested, treasonous organization known as Wikileaks. The bottom line is that everyone associated with Wikileaks should be waterboarded for fun and then executed. As patriotic Americans we cannot tolerate having the truth told about government lies. We must protect the lies! These bald-faced lies are crucial for national security!

The American people need to understand that truth is treason when it comes to protecting the homeland. They act like the government exists solely for them! How utterly ridiculous! They need to pay attention in the public school classroom so they learn some important lessons about their government.

Government is their God and their God is good. America is not a nanny-state as some say. It is a God-state. It always does what’s in the citizenry’s best interest whether they like it or not. Everything it touches turns into a success story! All the wars are won and over quickly. There is very little national debt. The budget is balanced year after year, when adjusted for inflation. And of course, the government protects the free market by regulating it perfectly! But I digress.

Here is something that cannot be just a coincidence. Head of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange has a curious middle name. It is a name he has in common with another man who is wrong on every damn thing. Assange’s middle name is Paul. I, am of course, talking about the crazy, kooky, and quixotic Congressman from Texas, Ron Paul.

It’s obvious that Ron Paul needs to have his head examined. Paul has come out in support of Wikileaks revealing the truth about our government. This amounts to treason. Congress recently censured Charlie Rangel for ethics violations. His violations pale in comparison to Ron Paul’s constant violations. Ron Paul should be censured and thrown out of Congress. After all he actually believes in and follows the Constitution. How utterly ridiculous!

So to recap, Americans should live by these tenets:

1. The first person to use “National Security” as an excuse, always wins!
2. Touch my junk, please! It’s patriotic!
3. Touch my junk, please! Or the terrorists win!
4. Julian Paul Assange should get a medal… tied around his neck and be dropped from a plane over the Pacific Ocean.
5. Truth is treason, government lies must remain secret! It’s patriotic!
6. Truth is treason, government lies must remain secret! Or the terrorists win!
7. Ron Paul believes in the Constitution. Censure Him!! And don’t get me started on his supporters.

America! F@%& YEAH!,

Richard Deekbag

————

They say, “To cook a frog, don’t toss it into boiling water, put it into cool water and turn the heat up slowly”.

Our government would tell us that for the right (they call it a privilege) to fly on a commercial flight, we must submit either to a dose of radiation and provide a naked rendering of our body or submit to a government groping. . . or both. Either option, would be considered a crime if committed without a claimed “government authority”. The history of airline/airport security for the past forty years clearly shows that security is not the goal

Although airline hijackings have existed since, at least, the 1930′s, they didn’t “come into vogue” until the 1960′s with demands from hijackers to be taken to Cuba or some other political venue or for the payment of a ransom. This changed in 1970 when three airliners were hijacked by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. The aircraft were forced to fly to Jordan where the passengers were ultimately released and the aircraft were destroyed. Today, this would be classified as a major “terrorist” event. In reality, they were political hijackings, which occurred only because they were allowed to occur. In 1970, as today, the existing security measures did not address the problem nor were they meant to correct the problem. At best, they were (and are) all theater meant to provide a sense of security.

Each of these hijackings could have been prevented – at minimal cost, without government involvement and without the sacrifice of personal liberties. Simple: lock and reinforce the cockpit door. Although, we’ve all been herded through metal detectors, emptied our pockets and had our bags x-rayed, nobody thought to “lock the door” for more than thirty years; until after 9/11.

IS ADDITIONAL SECURITY MEANT TO MAKE US MORE SECURE?

Prior to 1970, most passengers were either not screened or were screened by magnetometers. The magnetometers may have offered a sense of security but in reality, they offered no security. Magnetometers will not detect non-ferrous metals; knives as well as aluminum-frame handguns could walk right through.

With the development of “second-generation” metal detectors (those that detected any metal and which remain in use today), this gap could have been plugged. This equipment was/is sensitive enough that it can almost count the number of teeth on your zipper or the number of fillings in your mouth. Could, but didn’t. Anyone who flew prior to 911 probably remembers that you could walk through a metal detector with your belt on, keys in your pocket or with a pack of cigarettes. Yes, cigarettes; because of the foil wrapper, a pack of cigarettes would have the same signature as a small handgun and yet, you could walk right through. Worse yet, the government knew, the airlines knew, the airports knew and security professionals knew that the metal detectors were intentionally designed to ignore the area below the calf. Many shoes have metal toes or metal arch shanks and they didn’t want to “inconvenience” us by having us remove our shoes – that is until Richard Reid, the “Shoe Bomber” in 2001. Simply put, until 2001 if you wanted a weapon on a plane you could just put it in your boot. We were told that if we queued-up like cattle, we would be secure; but 9/11 happened, with metal weapons. Were we more secure or was this all about perceptions?

THE UNDERWEAR BOMBER & ADVANCED SCREENING or “LET ME LOOK IN YOUR PANTS”

In December, 2009 Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded a plane in Lagos, Nigeria , ultimately bound for Detroit. More than a month prior to the flight, his father reported to the CIA that his son held “extreme religious views”. He had no passport, had had trained in Yemen. and his name was on the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment. Nevertheless, he was allowed to fly, was not subjected to secondary screening and US Intelligence even requested that his visa not be revoked. Somewhere over Detroit he attempted to detonate a bomb sewn into his underwear. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano later said that “the system worked.” Really?

Within days, former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff was making the media rounds promoting new x-ray scanners for a company in which he has a financial interest. The machines were paid for with federal “stimulus” money and have never been medically reviewed. Scientists have routinely reported that x-ray screenings WILL result in increased skin cancer. Amazingly, US Intelligence could have stopped the Underwear Bomber but didn’t. The Underwear Bomber flew TO the US and most countries do not require this “advanced” screening. So even with this invasive screening in place, within the United States, his attempt would not have been prevented. Italy, after testing, has abandoned the equipment stating that it is ineffective. So, why here? Does this make us safe?

Where do we go from here? How much are we willing to endure in the name of security? There’s already been at least one terrorist bombing where the bomb was hidden in a body cavity of the bomber. Based on the government’s modus operandi. . . event = response. . . are body cavity searches next? Are we ready for that? Don’t count it out. They’re already irradiating us, seeing us naked and sexually assaulting us.

Bottom line? If someone wants to take down an aircraft they can still do it. People are screened but parcels aren’t. And, routinely parcels are loaded onto commercial aircraft. If someone wants to use an aircraft as a “weapon”, why bother with a commercial flight – private and charter flights aren’t screened. At best, we’re being queued-up, irradiated, viewed naked, groped, questioned and our rights violated for perceptions only, not security. Theater, at our expense.

We’re the frogs. Do you feel the heat?

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. – Benjamin Franklin

———————————————————-

Craig Hensler is a co-developer of second-generation weapon detection systems, has screened international flights and conducted demonstrations for US air carriers, the FAA, New York Port Authority and US Sky Marshals.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-24-o_9fw

And of course, he’s spot on as usual. Note that the picture associated with this post was not released by Ron Paul as part of the press release.

“The President’s announcement that all U.S. combat troops have left Iraq is no more believable than the ‘Mission Accomplished’ declaration was in 2003.

“Once again, we are being told the mission has been accomplished and our brave men and women are coming back home. Though the people are hopeful they remain skeptical, and rightfully so.

“The biggest problem is that success in Iraq is undefinable since the mission was never defined. The reasons given for the invasion were based on misinformation. Now, the war has cost us hundreds of billions of dollars and this has contributed significantly to our economic woes.

“Forty-four hundred Americans are dead, thirty thousand severely wounded, and more than a hundred thousand are suffering from serious health problems related to Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. This alone should tell us that it was not worth the investment and the needless sacrifice of our young people and the taxpayers.

“It is deceitful to imply we will avoid hostilities with this new policy. We still have to contend with:

• the 50,000 troops carrying weapons remain in Iraq
• the 100,000 contractors that remain with more expected to go to Iraq
• the 9,000 special ops personnel trained in assassinations that remain in Iraq
• a huge embassy, bigger than the Vatican, that will remain
• Dozens of military bases that will stay
• Al Qaeda organizations that did not exist before the war
• Muqtada al Sadr, a strong nationalist who has gained much political power
• The fact that Iran benefits tremendously with the Shiites now in power in Iraq and is a close ally of al Sadr

“Osama bin Laden wins by ‘proving’ that America has an agenda of occupation in the Middle East. And, we continue to walk into his trap and hand him up his best recruitment tool in his efforts to incite hatred and terrorism against the United States.

“What’s worse, President Obama made it clear last night that the troops and resources leaving Iraq will not come home to defend our country or ease our economic woes. They will instead be diverted to Afghanistan, perhaps also Pakistan and, I fear, even Iran.

“From my viewpoint we are the losers in this fool’s errand of endless war. Tragically, this new policy is not one of peace but merely a charade that will severely undermine our national security and continue us down the path to bankruptcy—a threat that we best not long ignore.”

To paraphrase what I heard in Barack Obama’s speech earlier tonight…

- We’re bringing our combat troops home from Iraq…  and sending them to risk death in other no-win wars.

- But we’re gonna keep about 50,000 troops in Iraq to… do what they’ve already been doing since around 2005… nation-building.

- Sometime in 2011 we will remove all U.S. military troops from Iraq (yeah right) but we will leave behind a private “force” to continue our nation-building there.

- Though George W. Bush was a patriot and we may have disagreed on a bit of foreign policy minutia we are in large agreement that we must continue breeding hatred for all things America by shifting our focus toward different faux-monsters to destroy in far away lands.

- Yes, like George W. Bush, I have trouble going to sleep at night because there are terrorist monsters under America’s bed. I don’t care if you can’t see them when you turn on the light and look. They are there! I swear!

- We spent far too much money on the Iraq War so we must bring it home and spend it on entitlement programs then borrow perhaps another trillion or so to copy our Iraq effort in Afghanistan and who knows maybe we’ll do the same in Iran or Pakistan a bit later. This will be sure to help our economy here at home.

- Our troops are great.

- The Military-industrial complex will remain intact as long as I’m around!

- God Bless America because we need all the help we can get with me as your president.

- You should have all voted for Ron Paul. Let’s hope you get another chance in 2012.

—————–

That about sums up what I heard from President Barack Obama tonight. The non-paraphrased version is available too. I assure you there is not much different than my condensed version except for maybe that last Ron Paul bit.

Please take some time to watch video of the debate embedded below. It truly demonstrates the dividing line between non-intervention and intervention. Both Fein and Kuhner provide excellent arguments, however I feel that Fein missed an opportunity to point out a serious flaw in Kuhner’s interventionist logic.

First, Kuhner does not dispute and therefore admits Fein’s assertion that the war on terror is a perpetual war. Later, Kuhner cites putting the Japanese in interment camps during WWII was a necessary and temporary evil. He argues that during times of war we must be willing to sacrifice some of our liberties so that we can be more free down the road once the fighting is over.

Fein could have jumped on this point by asking Kuhner the following question:

If we are in a perpetual war aren’t the civil liberties sacrifices we are making also permanent?

Equating the war on terror with WWII is like saying Coca-cola and orange soda taste the same. I bet Kuhner and his interventionist peers would be unhappy if they ordered a Coke and were brought orange soda instead.

httpvp://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=60EDBA3CAFE9867F

William Kristol and Redstate.com’s, Erick Erickson are among those calling for Steele’s resignation. Here is what Steele said that drew their ire:

“Keep in mind again, for our federal candidates, this was a war of Obama’s choosing,” Steele said. “This is not something the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in.”

“It was the president who was trying to be cute by half by flipping a script demonizing Iraq, while saying the battle really should be in Afghanistan,” Steele said, referring to Obama’s insistence during the presidential campaign that the U.S. should be focused on Afghanistan instead of Iraq.

“Well, if he’s such a student of history, has he not understood that, you know, that’s the one thing you don’t do, is engage in a land war in Afghanistan? All right, because everyone who has tried, over a thousand years of history, has failed. And there are reasons for that. There are other ways to engage in Afghanistan.”

First of all, these remarks seem quite benign to me, especially since Steele clearly does not want to bring the troops home. He just disagrees with the method by which the war is being fought. However, it also seems to me that he’s going a bit Ron Paul here. He did pick up a copy of Paul’s “End the Fed” at CPAC earlier this year. Perhaps that is what his fellow neo-conservatives hear in his words. We all know how much they despise the truth, er… I mean, Ron Paul.

The Left (and Right) are attacking Steele too, for saying “this was a war of Obama’s choosing.” As much as they may not want to admit it, that statement is also true. The U.S had a presence in Afghanistan during the Bush years, but all the effort was happening in Iraq. The U.S. was doing little more than occupying Afghanistan at the time Obama was campaigning on taking the “necessary” fight away from Iraq and into Afghanistan and Pakistan. Then he followed through on that promise by increasing the forces in Afghanistan to nearly 100,000. Calling Steele a liar for saying it was a war of Obama’s choosing is willful ignorance.

I suppose politics wouldn’t be politics if politicians didn’t get fired (or forced to resign) for telling the truth.

Kristol ends his “Steele must resign” public letter with the following words:

There are, of course, those who think we should pull out of Afghanistan, and they’re certainly entitled to make their case. But one of them shouldn’t be the chairman of the Republican party.

Maybe one of them shouldn’t be the chairman of the neo-conservative wing of the Republican Party, but one of them most certainly should be the chairman of the Republican Party as a whole.

Neo-conservatives are the domestic terrorists of politics. They hijacked the conservative and traditional “Old Right” Republican Party from Taft, Goldwater, and Reagan. They were able to culture a Wilsonian foreign policy within the GOP ranks in the aftermath of 9/11.  Having a GOP chairman who’d like to pull American troops out of Afghanistan would mark the end of this Wilsonian, neo-conservative, hijacking. Keep in mind Steele never said he wanted to “pull out of Afghanistan”. This is an intellectually dishonest pre-emptive attack by Kristol. How appropriate for a neo-conservative.

For your further consideration:

Below you will find audio of conservative radio talk show host Jason Lewis excellently defending Steele and the “humble foreign policy” of our Founders on Independence Day (July 2nd). He even later name-drops Ron Paul as an example of a conservative who gets it.  If you’d like to listen to more of Lewis (and I highly recommend you do) see his “on demand” page. For those with little time, I’ve pulled some audio from his July 2nd show here:

Download audio file (jasonlewis-conservative-foreignpolicy-07022010.mp3)

Some may take issue with myself or Lewis including Ronald Reagan as one who practiced a “humble foreign policy”. In fact, many neo-conservatives idolize Ronald Reagan as a war hawk. But was he really a hawk?

For your further consideration, Jack Hunter on Reagan’s “hawkishness”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZICDg0FOUI

Even if Michael Steele is not going down the conversion process toward Ron Paul on foreign policy, the fact that these attacks and discussions are happening at all suggest the neo-conservatives may be shrinking in number with their backs against the wall.

Perhaps Obama’s plan for “change” will create change in a way he had not unintended. Maybe his brand of socialism and corporatism is clearing the way for  “Old Right” conservatives to grow in number and eventually wrestle the Republican Party back from its neo-conservative hijackers.

Yes, the day may come when we’ll see more and more lawmakers give speeches like this recent one from Ron Paul:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ij8x2issnpA