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Monday, July 6, 2009

It seems that that's the new American foreign policy. Looks like a good time to recycle a classic:

A time for choosing:

...Those who would trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state have told us they have a utopian solution of peace without victory. They call their policy "accommodation." And they say if we'll only avoid any direct confrontation with the enemy, he'll forget his evil ways and learn to love us. All who oppose them are indicted as warmongers. They say we offer simple answers to complex problems. Well, perhaps there is a simple answer -- not an easy answer -- but simple: If you and I have the courage to tell our elected officials that we want our national policy based on what we know in our hearts is morally right.

We cannot buy our security, our freedom from the threat of the bomb by committing an immorality so great as saying to a billion human beings now enslaved behind the Iron Curtain, "Give up your dreams of freedom because to save our own skins, we're willing to make a deal with your slave masters." Alexander Hamilton said, "A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one." Now let's set the record straight. There's no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there's only one guaranteed way you can have peace -- and you can have it in the next second -- surrender...

Barack Obama, the anti-Reagan...In Iran: Report: U.S. to block Iran sanctions at G8 summit

The United States is opposed to enacting a new set of financial sanctions against Iran that are due to be discussed in the G8 summit next week, diplomatic officials in New York reported Friday...

...American officials expressed concern that a decision to enact harsh steps against Iran during the G8 meeting could badly hurt the prospect of Tehran agreeing to renew negotiations with the permanent Security Council members...

...In addition to U.S. reluctance to enact fresh sanctions, G8 members Russia and China have been known to oppose any punitive steps against Tehran...

And, Tehran Needs to Stop Meddling -- Iran Goes Abroad in Search of Westerners to Destroy

...For a generation, Iran has spread unrest around the world both directly and through proxies like Hezbollah and Hamas. Tehran's leaders have held conferences, issued edicts, and provided arms to strategically undermine its political foes. Iran has sponsored attacks on U.S. soldiers and citizens...

...Tehran, in short, has a long record of exporting terror and destabilization to other nations. Washington remained on the sidelines of Iran's election controversy because President Barack Obama insisted that "it's not productive . . . to be seen as meddling." Indeed, Obama and his Western counterparts have failed to support the Iranian protests that could help bring an end to the dangerous theocracy that has ruled Iran since 1979, and is itself a meddler par excellence.

In other words, the West is not stopping the Islamic regime from repressing its own citizens. Instead, it is the people of Iran who are finally giving the ayatollahs a taste of their own medicine.

In Honduras: Will Obama blackmail Honduras into installing a bullying would-be dictator?

Last Sunday, Honduras removed its would-be dictator, Mel Zelaya, who flouted court rulings by using intimidation to try to get Hondurans to change their constitution to allow him to extend his tenure in office. The country's Supreme Court issued an arrest warrant for Zelaya, which the military enforced by seizing Zelaya and kicking him out of the country. The country's legislature then voted almost unanimously to replace him with its legislative speaker, in accord with the country's constitution.

Now, Obama, who knows nothing about Honduran law, is ignorantly claiming that Zelaya's removal was "illegal," and demanding that Zelaya be reinstated as president. His demand is joined in by the Organization of American States, many of whose leaders, like Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez, have either violated their own countries' constitutions, or likewise seek to eliminate term limits contained in their own countries' constitutions. ("A senior Obama administration official said the United States would probably move to suspend economic development and military assistance" to Honduras, one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere)...

And, Honduras at the Tipping Point -- Why is the U.S. not supporting the rule of law?

Hundreds of emails from Hondurans flooded my in-box last week after I reported on the military's arrest of President Manuel Zelaya, as ordered by the Supreme Court, and his subsequent banishment from the country.

Mr. Zelaya's violations of the rule of law in recent months were numerous. But the tipping point came 10 days ago, when he led a violent mob that stormed a military base to seize and distribute Venezuelan-printed ballots for an illegal referendum.

All but a handful of my letters pleaded for international understanding of the threat to the constitutional democracy that Mr. Zelaya presented...

...This is a moment when the U.S. ought to be on the side of the rule of law, which the Honduran court and Congress upheld. If Washington does not reverse course, it will be one more act of appeasement toward an ambitious and increasingly dangerous dictator.

And here at home? USA, now more Czars than Russia

Taxpayers for Common Sense has complied a list of all the the "Czars" the Obama administration has created. At 31, the number is the highest in history and is more than in the entire history of Imperial Russia...

4 Comments

From Ha'aretz, this is the bottom line (especially the last sentence):

In addition to U.S. reluctance to enact fresh sanctions, G8 members Russia and China have been known to oppose any punitive steps against Tehran.

snip

New sanctions could include forbidding western oil companies from maintaining commercial ties with Iran.

***

Energy independence anyone? We've got to find alternative sources of fuel - not just for the US but for the nations of the world.

Meanwhile I guess the people of Iran (and Darfur -et.al.) will have to suffer. And we'll be tacitly endorsing the oppression - the global economy continues hostage to our need for petroleum - the environment suffers - I guess this is "realism".

PS: this is our idealistic new leadership?

Change my foot.

Energy independence anyone? We've got to find alternative sources of fuel

The US has plenty of energy sources. Plenty of maritime oil fields; just have to permit exploiting their exploitation - West Coast, East Coast(Florida), Caribbean (Cuba is permitting the Chinese to exploit this region not too far from Florida - in a way this is something like those who want the US to stop producing to cut CO2 while China and India are now generating more CO2 than ever before and in greater quantities than the US).
Nuclear - The French generate more than 75% of their electricity this way.
Coal, shale.
The problem is that there are too many people foolish enough to stop using what is available right now in the hope that they will get by with alternative energy sources still lacking decades of technological advances to be cost effective.

exploiting their exploitation
Ooooooops!

Hi Cynic - yes as soon as I wrote the words "energy independence" I figured the question of existing hydrocarbon resources would arise.

However there are serious problems with those as you know.

I think nuclear energy, properly handled and with appropriate safeguards, may be the better way to go as we develop alternatives.

Maybe there is a way to make hydrocarbons less damaging to the environment?

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