Current Events - Actual things on the News

[RocDoc]

^ craziness. sad craziness.

and who'd jump at the chance to be a detroit cop?
huh?

~

<sub>East Europe Feels Ignored by NATO, Report Says

By JUDY DEMPSEY
Published: May 16, 2010

BERLIN — NATO is ignoring the security concerns of its Central and East European members to such an extent that several of those countries are pursuing separate bilateral security arrangements with the United States, says a report issued by a group of experts on the eve of the presentation of a major new proposal on strategy for the alliance.

If the alliance continues to play down the security concerns of the region, several of these countries will remain reluctant to conduct NATO missions outside Europe because they do not feel safe at home, says the report, published by the Center for European Reform, an independent research institute in London.

“If they feel secure at home,” the report says, “they will have less need to invest in equipment needed for self-defense and have more reasons to buy the hardware needed for far-off missions such as Afghanistan.”

The report was issued as Madeleine Albright, a former U.S. secretary of state, was preparing to propose on Monday a new strategic concept for NATO, the first major review of the alliance’s goals for more than a decade.

Over the past nine months, Mrs. Albright has led a team of defense and security experts to examine what NATO has to do in the coming years to deal with new challenges, remain relevant, decide how far it should enlarge and whether to include such countries as Georgia and Ukraine.

“Some of the allies worry that NATO would not be able to come to their defense in a crisis,” said Tomas Valasek, one of the authors who is also advising Mrs. Albright’s team.

Some NATO member states believe Russia could provoke small, regional conflicts, which are hard to plan against or deter, the report says.

NATO was unprepared for Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2008, the report continues. It lacked intelligence sharing and a sophisticated crisis management mechanism. It has also ignored nonmilitary forms of intimidation such as cyberattacks, including one faced by Estonia two years ago.

The report says that sense of insecurity among East European countries, and members like Norway and Iceland, will make it more difficult for the Alliance to “reset” its relations with Russia, which is the ambition of the NATO secretary-general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen. NATO is divided over reassuring its eastern members or resetting its relations with Russia, the experts said.

“It is a false dilemma,” the report says. “It should have a dual track strategy that accomplishes both.”</sub>


russia's going to pull more shit, guaranteed.

even an accounting of their blame for that WWII polish massacre has echoes of calculation somehow.
perhaps i'm wrong but to them (ie putin) there IS no such thing as an empty (or selfless) gesture.

[RocDoc]

he lays it out pretty well, imo.
down to hamas' explicitly stated 'purpose'.
but the loss of life (re their 'defensive' raid) was a human blunder of BIG proportions...but given the circumstances would've been hard to imagine having gone well...so should it simply be broken without ANY alternate?

Blockade of Gaza rational and legal

<sub>Charles Krauthammer

June 7, 2010

WASHINGTON — The world is outraged at Israel's blockade of Gaza. Turkey denounces its illegality, inhumanity, barbarity, etc. The usual U.N. suspects, Third World and European, join in. The Obama administration dithers.

But as Leslie Gelb, former president of the Council on Foreign Relations, writes, the blockade is not just perfectly rational, it is perfectly legal. Gaza under Hamas is a self-declared enemy of Israel — a declaration backed up by more than 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli civilian territory. Yet having pledged itself to unceasing belligerency, Hamas claims victimhood when Israel imposes a blockade to prevent Hamas from arming itself with still more rockets.

In World War II, with full international legality, the United States blockaded Germany and Japan. And during the October 1962 missile crisis, we blockaded ("quarantined") Cuba. Yet Israel is accused of international criminality for doing precisely what President John F. Kennedy did: impose a naval blockade to prevent a hostile state from acquiring lethal weaponry.

Oh, but weren't the Gaza-bound ships on a mission of humanitarian relief? No. Otherwise they would have accepted Israel's offer to bring their supplies to an Israeli port, be inspected for military materiel and have the rest trucked by Israel into Gaza — as every week 10,000 tons of food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies are sent by Israel to Gaza.


Why was the offer refused? Because, as organizer Greta Berlin admitted, the flotilla was not about humanitarian relief but about breaking the blockade, i.e., ending Israel's inspection regime, which would mean unlimited shipping into Gaza and thus the unlimited arming of Hamas.

Israel has already twice intercepted weapons-laden ships from Iran destined for Hezbollah and Gaza. What country would allow that?

But even more important, why did Israel even have to resort to blockade? Because, blockade is Israel's fallback as the world systematically delegitimizes its traditional ways of defending itself — forward and active defense.

(1) Forward defense: As a small, densely populated country surrounded by hostile states, Israel had, for its first half-century, adopted forward defense — fighting wars on enemy territory (such as the Sinai and Golan Heights) rather than its own. Where possible (Sinai, for example) Israel has traded territory for peace. But where peace offers were refused, Israel retained the territory as a protective buffer zone. Thus Israel retained a small strip of southern Lebanon to protect the villages of northern Israel. And it took many losses in Gaza, rather than expose Israeli border towns to Palestinian terror attacks.

But under overwhelming outside pressure, Israel gave it up. The Israelis were told the occupations were not just illegal but at the root of the anti-Israel insurgencies — and therefore withdrawal, by removing the cause, would bring peace.

Land for peace. Remember? Well, during the past decade, Israel gave the land — evacuating South Lebanon in 2000 and Gaza in 2005. What did it get? An intensification of belligerency, heavy militarization of the enemy side, multiple kidnappings, cross-border attacks and, from Gaza, years of unrelenting rocket attack.

(2) Active defense: Israel then had to switch to active defense — military action to disrupt, dismantle and defeat (to borrow President Barack Obama's description of our campaign against the Taliban and al-Qaida) the newly armed terrorist mini-states established in southern Lebanon and Gaza after Israel withdrew.

The result? The Lebanon war of 2006 and Gaza operation of 2008-2009. They were met with yet another avalanche of opprobrium and calumny by the same international community that had demanded the land-for-peace Israeli withdrawals in the first place.

(3) Passive defense: Without forward or active defense, Israel is left with but the most passive and benign of all defenses — a blockade to simply prevent enemy rearmament. Yet, as we speak, this too is headed for international delegitimation.

But, if none of these are permissible, what's left? Nothing. The point of this relentless campaign is to deprive Israel of any legitimate form of self-defense.

The world is tired of these troublesome Jews, 6 million — that number again — hard by the Mediterranean, refusing every invitation to national suicide. For which they are relentlessly demonized, ghettoized and constrained from defending themselves, even as the more committed anti-Zionists — Iranian in particular — openly prepare a more final solution.

Washington Post Writers Group

Charles Krauthammer is a syndicated columnist based in Washington.

[e-mail]</sub>

[strat-0]

OK, as one who has a close connection and has enjoyed for many years all aspects of the Gulf coast in four states, and lives in one, I am incensed by the disaster of this oil spill. But in the current annoying media feeding frenzy, some are calling it "the worst environmental disaster in US history." Not wishing to try to diminish the significance of the this terrible disaster, but isn't this perhaps just a little overblown? I think the Dust Bowl in the Southwest in the 30's killed and injured many, many more people, along with displacing, ruining, starving, and otherwise unemploying many thousands of people, and destroyed more plant and animal life, as well as having a greater environmental impact overall. I mean, with the state-covering dust storms blotting out the sun over cities and towns (and everything else) from Texas, Kansas, Oklahoma, and others, all the way to NYC and choking people to death and hospitalizing and/or permanently disabling others? How many billions in adjusted dollars did that take, and for how many years to try to fix that one? I'm just throwing it out that I think this is slightly hyperbolic here. Opinions?

[phil]

"the worst environmental disaster in US history."

It certainly qualifies in the *Man Made* category...

Right along Bhopal and Chernobyl!

[strat-0]

But the Dust Bowl was man made, too. Collectively, by poor farming practices (although drought was also a main factor). This spill is bad enough, for sure, but I hate this media tendency to characterize everything that comes along as the "biggest," the "worst," etc. It doesn't have to be the "worst in history" to be bad enough. I wish one of the expert talking heads would point this out to the media circus.

[strat-0]

"Worst oil spill in US history" isn't bad enough. Has to be "the worst environmental disaster."

[phil]

Five crucial moves by BP: Did they lead to Gulf oil spill disaster?

In a hearing Thursday, House Democrats investigating the disaster suggested that BP made five cost-saving decisions that might have contributed to the Gulf oil spill.

BP made five crucial decisions in the name of saving money that may have contributed to the catastrophic Deepwater Horizon oil spill, according to top Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

Prior to the April 20 disaster, the Deepwater Horizon rig was behind schedule in drilling BP’s Macondo well, according to internal e-mails and documents examined by committee staff. This may have increased pressure on executives to take shortcuts so the well would be producing as soon as possible.

According to a June 14 letter to BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward from Committee chairman Rep. Henry Waxman (D) of California and investigations subcommittee chairman Rep. Bart Stupak (D) of Michigan, the five important decisions made by BP that lawmakers are investigating are:

1. Well design

On April 19, BP installed the final steel tubing in the well, according to House investigators. They chose a cheaper approach which involved dropping in a full string of casing that lined the well from top to bottom. A BP plan review in mid-April had recommended a more involved approach that would have installed the casing in sections and used “tiebacks” to help prevent gas from seeping up around the steel tubes.

2. Insufficient 'centralizers'

When installing the final steel casing, it is important to run the tube down the center of the wellbore hole, to ensure ease of sealing the casing around its entire diameter. BP used only six centralizers to accomplish this task, as opposed to the 21 recommended by subcontractor Halliburton, according to the House letter to Hayward.

3. Failure to run a key test

BP did not run a nine- to 12-hour procedure called a “cement bond log” to assess the integrity of the cement seal around the well casing, according to the House panel, despite a Halliburton prediction of severe gas flow problems. A crew from subcontractor Schlumberger was on the Deepwater Horizon rig on the morning of April 20 to carry out this test, but they left after BP officials told them they were not needed.

4. Improper mud circulation

Wells are generally filled with weighted mud during drilling. According to the House, the American Petroleum Institute recommends that oil firms fully circulate the mud from the bottom of the well to the top prior to beginning the process of cementing the tube. This allows the testing of the mud for gas influxes and debris removal. BP conducted only a partial circulation of the drilling mud, according to the House Energy panel.

5. Failure to secure wellhead

The wellhead on the sea floor was the last barrier to a dangerous upward-rising flow of gas. BP did not secure the wellhead with a lockdown sleeve that would have prevented it from being blown out by pressure from below, according to the House.

The House Energy and Commerce panel’s letter to BP's Mr. Hayward concluded that “time after time it appears BP made decisions that increased the risk of a blowout to save the company time or expense.”

Asked about these conclusions at a Thursday House hearing, Hayward declined a specific answer, saying that he would await the results of thorough investigations before drawing his own conclusions.

“We need to determine what were the crucial decisions,” said Hayward, adding that the five areas identified by House investigators “are legitimate areas for concern.”

[RocDoc]

predicted by haliburton. there's an interesting irony...when there's people not trying to shoot their asses dead, they're capable of something resembling expertise.

[phil]

ÔÔPS!!

The earth shaked an hour ago...

So did the house, the furniture, pictures/paintings on the wall, the plants...

Poor Jules still refuses to leave his cage!

He does that too during a thunder storm...

[Ayinger]

How was that for you Phil? Have experienced a couple here in the Midwest and it's a dawn wierd feeling!

[phil]

Thankfully, it was very gentle and very short.

The quake epicentre was almost 300 miles west from where we live and the house is built on a stone foundation which acts like Jello in cases like this!

Twenty some years ago, when we were still living in Québec city, we had a less powerful earthquake but we were living in the third storey of an old appartment building...

Now... that one was kinda scarey and we ran outside as fast as we could.. like everybody else on our street!!

[phil]

So... Who's going to win the 2010 World Cup?

Does anybody care?

I hope Netherlands takes it!



"Rugby is a game for barbarians played by gentlemen.
Football is a game for gentlemen played by barbarians."

[RocDoc]

So... Who's going to win the 2010 World Cup?

Does anybody care?


i'll betcha maarts does!

i sure hope you're in holland til after the cup's over...that country must be going nuts right now!

[RocDoc]

Interesting reading...

<sub>The General and the Community Organizer

by Paul R. Hollrah
June 24, 2010

Channel-surfing from ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN through MSNBC and Fox News, the inside-the-beltway pundits had a field day trying to get inside the heads of Barack Obama, Joe Biden, General Stanley McChrystal, and McChrystal's top aides. The one thing common to all of the analyses, by the most famous and highly-paid talking heads in the Western World, was that they are all wrong… dead wrong. What is certain is that they all owe General McChrystal and his senior aides an apology for assuming that they are lame-brained numbskulls.

The facts of the McChrystal case are not in dispute. General McChrystal and his senior officers allowed a reporter for Rolling Stone Magazine, Michael Hastings, to have almost unprecedented access during an extended stay in Paris. The extended stay was due, in part, to an excess of atmospheric ash from Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano, keeping the McChrystal party grounded for days.

In an interview with CNN, Hastings reported that he had a tape recorder in his hand most of the time and that McChrystal was "very aware" that his comments would find their way into print. He said, "McChrystal and his people set no ground rules for their conversations, although they did ask that some parts of their conversations were off the record." Hastings subsequently published a lengthy profile of General McChrystal on June 22, titled, The Runaway General.

As Hastings wrote in his profile, McChrystal thought that Obama looked "uncomfortable and intimidated" by the roomful of military brass during their first meeting. Of their second meeting, an advisor to McChrystal quoted the general as saying that it was "a 10-minute photo op." He went on to say, "Obama clearly didn't know anything about (McChrystal), who he was. Here's the guy who's going to run his f_ _ _ing war, but he didn't seem very engaged. The Boss was pretty disappointed."

As General McChrystal flew from Afghanistan to Washington to face Obama in the Oval Office, the almost unanimous opinion of the talking heads was that the comments made by McChrystal and his staff were off the cuff and inadvertent. But to believe that is to totally ignore who these men are.

General McChrystal and his top officers are not simple-minded, knuckle-dragging brutes. To the contrary, they are intelligent, thoughtful, highly educated, patriots… graduates of West Point and other fine universities… who are dedicated to duty, honor, and country. To think that such men would be so careless as to speak unflatteringly of Obama, Biden, and other top administration figures, in the presence of a reporter for a notoriously left wing publication, defies logic… at the very least. To think that men who are trained to be careful and deliberate in everything they do, could do something so careless and so unguarded is simply beyond comprehension.

I would argue that McChrystal and his aides knew exactly what they were doing.

From the day that he became the handpicked "spear carrier" for Obama's unique brand of warfare… playing at being Commander in Chief while playing to his far left constituency… McChrystal's life had been one of constant frustration. After telling Obama exactly how many troops he needed to carry out his mission, Obama dithered for months before deciding to give him just half the troops he requested. McChrystal could not have been happy about that.

The Obama team insisted on new Rules of Engagement designed to reduce collateral damage (civilian casualties). Obama's ROE required that U.S. troops must be able to see the enemy with weapon in hand before they were allowed to return fire. One videotape circulated on the Internet showed a platoon of Marines pinned down by enemy sniper fire. But since the enemy was firing from some distance behind the open window of a building, the Marines could not actually see the weapon being fired. Although they were taking deadly fire, they were prohibited by the ROE from putting small arms fire or an RPG through the window opening.

Under Obama's politically correct ROE, our soldiers and Marines were required to fight with one hand tied behind their backs. McChrystal could not have been happy about that.

A strict new interrogation policy, dictated by Attorney General Eric Holder, required that prisoners must be delivered to an Interrogation Center within twenty-four hours of being captured or be released. A great deal of actionable intelligence was lost as a result and battle-hardened enemy fighters were returned to the field to kill Americans. McChrystal must have found that to be incomprehensible.

But the greatest insult to our troops in the field, and to the officers who lead them, may be a new battlefield medal designed by the Obama team. It is called the Courageous Restraint Medal and is awarded to soldiers and Marines who demonstrate uncommon restrain in combat by not firing their weapons even when they feel threatened by the enemy. Would we be surprised to learn that the preponderance of these medals were awarded posthumously? McChrystal must have found that to be an insanity.

I suggest that, having his best military judgments subjected to the White House political sieve for nearly a year and a half, McChrystal decided that he'd had enough. And when he announced to his senior staff that he was prepared to retire they decided to push back… to make the most of a bad situation. It was clear that, if McChrystal were to simply take off his uniform and walk away, his retirement would be page-twenty news for a day or two before the mainstream media and the American people forgot all about him.

They had to make the most of his retirement because it provided a one-time opportunity to show the American people, as well as our enemies and our allies, that the man who claims the title of Commander in Chief of the U.S. military does not command the respect of our men and women in uniform. To make the most of that opportunity they had to choose their messenger very carefully.

They knew that, by openly showing their disrespect for Obama in front of just any newsman, they may not attract the attention they desired. Like any astute observer of the MSM, they knew that most reporters would turn on their own mothers if it meant a good story. But they could not take a chance that a mainstream media reporter might suffer a rare pang of conscience when confronted with the prospect of ruining the careers of some of the most senior officers in the War on Terror. They had to fix the odds as much as possible in their favor so they chose to use Michael Hastings and Rolling Stone Magazine.

During the long hours that General McChrystal was in the air between Kabul and Washington, Obama knew that he had just two choices… both bad. He could declare McChrystal to be an irreplaceable asset in the war effort, give him a public reprimand, and send him back to Kabul. Or he could fire McChrystal, sending a clear message that, at least in his own mind, he was the Commander in Chief.

In the former case, he was certain to appear weak and ineffectual… a man not totally in charge. In the latter case, he might at least win a few rave reviews from the Kool-Ade drinkers in the mainstream media. He chose the latter of the two options.

But what is now lost in all of the hand-wringing and speculation is the fact that McChrystal and his people have succeeded in doing exactly what they set out to do. They wanted to plant the seed in the minds of the American people that Obama is not up to the task of being Commander in Chief and that he does not command the respect of the men and women of the uniformed services… from the newest Private E-1 up to the top four-star generals and admirals.

That seed is now firmly planted and it cannot be unplanted.

From this day forward, no one will have to tell the American people that Stanley McChrystal is a true warrior, a man's man, and that Barack Obama is nothing more than a… community organizer. Well done, General!</sub>

[RocDoc]

this was a fwd sent to me by a friend titled 'read it and weep'.
sledgehammered 'facts' through much of it but there is a seriously THICK veneer of truth to what the consequences here MIGHT be:

<sub>WAYNE ALLYN ROOT: Overwhelm the system


Barrack Obama is no fool. He is not incompetent. To the contrary, he is brilliant. He knows exactly what he's doing. He is purposely overwhelming the U.S. economy to create systemic failure, economic crisis and social chaos -- thereby destroying capitalism and our country from within.


Barack Obama is my college classmate ( Columbia University , class of '83). As Glenn Beck correctly predicted from day one, Obama is following the plan of Cloward &Piven, two professors at Columbia University . They outlined a plan to socialize America by overwhelming the system with government spending and entitlement demands. Add up the clues below. Taken individually they're alarming. Taken as a whole, it is a brilliant, Machiavellian game plan to turn the United States into a socialist/Marxist state with a permanent majority that desperately needs government for survival ... and can be counted on to always vote for bigger government. Why not? They have no responsibility to pay for it.

-- Universal health care. The health care bill had very little to do with health care. Â It had everything to do with unionizing millions of hospital and health care workers, as well as adding 15,000 to 20,000 new IRS agents (who will join government employee unions). Obama doesn't care that giving free health care to 30 million Americans will add trillions to the national debt. What he does care about is that it cements the dependence of those 30 million voters to Democrats and big government. Who but a socialist revolutionary would pass this reckless spending bill in the middle of a depression?

-- Cap and trade. Like health care legislation having nothing to do with health care, cap and trade has nothing to do with global warming. It has everything to do with redistribution of income, government control of the economy and a criminal payoff to Obama's biggest contributors. Those powerful and wealthy unions and contributors (like GE, which owns NBC, MSNBC and CNBC) can then be counted on to support everything Obama wants. They will kickback hundreds of millions of dollars in contributions to Obama and the Democratic Party to keep them in power. The bonus is that all the new taxes on Americans with bigger cars, bigger homes and businesses helps Obama "spread the wealth around."

-- Make Puerto Rico a state. Why? Who's asking for a 51st state? Who's asking for millions of new welfare recipients and government entitlement addicts in the middle of a depression? Certainly not American taxpayers. But this has been Obama's plan all along. His goal is to add two new Democrat senators, five Democrat congressman and a million loyal Democratic voters who are dependent on big government.

-- Legalize 12 million illegal immigrants. Just giving these 12 million potential new citizens free health care alone could overwhelm the system and bankrupt America . But it adds 12 million reliable new Democrat voters who can be counted on to support big government. Add another few trillion dollars in welfare, aid to dependent children, food stamps, free medical, education, tax credits for the poor, and eventually Social Security.

-- Stimulus and bailouts. Where did all that money go? It went to Democrat contributors, organizations (ACORN), and unions -- including billions of dollars to save or create jobs of government employees across the country. It went to save GM and Chrysler so that their employees could keep paying union dues. It went to AIG so that Goldman Sachs could be bailed out (after giving Obama almost $1 million in contributions). A staggering $125 billion went to teachers (thereby protecting their union dues). All those public employees will vote loyally Democrat to protect their bloated salaries and pensions that are bankrupting America . The country goes broke, future generations face a bleak future, but Obama, the Democrat Party, government, and the unions grow more powerful. The ends justify the means.

-- Raise taxes on small business owners, high-income earners, and job creators. Put the entire burden on only the top 20 percent of taxpayers, redistribute the income, punish success, and reward those who did nothing to deserve it (except vote for Obama). Reagan wanted to dramatically cut taxes in order to starve the government. Obama wants to dramatically raise taxes to starve his political opposition.

With the acts outlined above, Obama and his regime have created a vast and rapidly expanding constituency of voters dependent on big government; a vast privileged class of public employees who work for big government; and a government dedicated to destroying capitalism and installing themselves as socialist rulers by overwhelming the system.

Add it up and you've got the perfect Marxist scheme -- all devised by my Columbia University college classmate Barack Obama using the Cloward and Piven Plan.

Please forward!</sub>


to 'overwhelm the system' (despite some of the arguably far-fetched motives mister root ascribed to his columbia U. classmate) is precisely what IS happening, isn't it?