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JULY 2,  2011

NO NEWS IS... – AT 9:33 P.M. ET:  Unless someone plans to attack us, July 4th weekend is very slow on news.  Stuff happens overseas, where July 4th is just another day, but the usual headliners seem to stay home, maybe realizing the American media is operating light for three days.

So maybe it's a good time to reflect on the title of the holiday we're about to mark.  It's Independence Day.  Not Freedom Day.  Not rights day.   Independence day.  Whenever July 4th is mentioned, Americans understandably reflect on their freedoms.  That's fine.  But we sometimes forget the "independence" part.  America would not be America if it were not independent.  We run our own country, we have our own foreign policy.  We control, more or less, our own economy.

And yet there are some Americans, headquartered largely in universities and the media, who kind of frown on this "independence" thing.  They used to be called "one worlders," although the one worlders simply wanted greater American engagement with the world.  The people I'm talking about think a chunk of our foreign policy should be handed over to "international" institutions like the UN, and that we should be subject to "international" scrutiny like, say, Iran.  Our Supreme Court, they think, should employ foreign laws at times.  They haughtily reject American exceptionalism, which is nothing more, or less, than the notion that we have a unique standing in history, which we emphatically do.

These people are wrong.  They dream of an America that is more like Europe, all the while ignoring that Western Europe is in decline, economically strapped, culturally compromised, and defended by paper-think armies.  They think there's nothing special about America, while, every day, they enjoy all the things that make the country special. 

If we lose our independence, if we refuse to insist that immigrants become Americans in every sense, we will lose the uniqueness that makes up the American character.  We have not historically been called the last great hope of mankind for no reason.  We are that hope, if only we can, in the face of trendy pressures, hang onto it.

July 2, 2011      Permalink

A REMINDER – AT 9:16 A.M. ET:  A reminder that our freedom isn't free, and that American operations around the world continue in the face of growing threats.  It is also a reminder to neo-isolationists here at home that isolationism has never worked, ever, ever.  It only kicks the can down the road and leads to a greater conflict in decades ahead.   From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON — The clandestine American military campaign to combat Al Qaeda’s franchise in Yemen is expanding to fight the Islamist militancy in Somalia, as new evidence indicates that insurgents in the two countries are forging closer ties and possibly plotting attacks against the United States, American officials say.

An American military drone aircraft attacked several Somalis in the militant group the Shabab late last month, the officials said, killing at least one of its midlevel operatives and wounding others.

The strike was carried out by the same Special Operations Command unit now battling militants in Yemen, and it represented an intensification of an American military campaign in a mostly lawless region where weak governments have allowed groups with links to Al Qaeda to flourish.

COMMENT:  At a time when "come home America" seems to be all the rage in some circles, we should note that the war against terror is going to be very long, and very hard.  We have a choice:  We can fight it through to some kind of victory, much as we fought the Cold War (which had its hot moments).   Or we can turn delusional, as we were before World War II.

Leadership will determine that choice, which is one reason why the 2012 election will be so critical.

July 2, 2011      Permalink

OUR STRUGGLING ECONOMY – AT 8:38 A.M. ET:   The AP, in a refreshingly direct story, points out that the American economy is still struggling, two and a half years into Obama's presidency.  Our national strength is based heavily on our historically strong economy.  Economic distress is sapping not only our physical strength, but our national will.  It is a dangerous, volatile situation:

WASHINGTON -- This is one anniversary few feel like celebrating.

Two years after economists say the Great Recession ended, the recovery has been the weakest and most lopsided of any since the 1930s.

After previous recessions, people in all income groups tended to benefit. This time, ordinary Americans are struggling with job insecurity, too much debt and pay raises that haven't kept up with prices at the grocery store and gas station. The economy's meager gains are going mostly to the wealthiest.

Workers' wages and benefits make up 57.5% of the economy, an all-time low. Until the mid-2000s, that figure had been remarkably stable -- about 64% through boom and bust alike.

Executive pay is included in this figure, but rank-and-file workers are far more dependent on regular wages and benefits. A big chunk of the economy's gains has gone to investors in the form of higher corporate profits.

"The spoils have really gone to capital, to the shareholders," says David Rosenberg, chief economist at Gluskin Sheff + Associates in Toronto.

Corporate profits are up by almost half since the recession ended in June 2009. In the first two years after the recessions of 1991 and 2001, profits rose 11% and 28%, respectively.

And an Associated Press analysis found that the typical CEO of a major company earned $9 million last year, up a fourth from 2009.

COMMENT:  I'm afraid that's correct.  We can call it "free enterprise," but a number of economic observers, many of them quite conservative, have another name for it:  crony capitalism.  Those who truly believe in free enterprise, and that includes me, must finally realize the enormous danger in the growing gap between rich and non-rich in America, and in the nest feathering that goes on in the executive suite.  Eventually, if the rising tide doesn't lift all boats, there can be great social instability, and the election of radical elements.  Think the 1960s, times ten. 

We see the riots that are taking place in European countries, especially Greece, as governments are forced into austerity because of economic recession.  That can happen here as well.  We must figure out a way for the average American to benefit from economic recovery, if in fact there's a recovery at all.  Obama has failed miserably in managing the economy.  Republicans don't seem to have any great ideas of their own.  "No new taxes" isn't much of a policy.

We are not in good economic shape.  And one senses a growing anger that can easily boil over.  We're told that "the economy" will be the major issue in next year's election.  Add to that a national "rage."  Fail to recognize it, and 2011 might look like a picnic.

July 2, 2011       Permalink 

DEFENSE BATTLES AHEAD – July 4th weekend is a good time to reflect on this quote by Ronald Reagan:  "Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the United States was too strong." 

Several days ago, in The Wall Street Journal, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumseld warned against irresponsible cuts in the defense budget.  The warning came at the right time.  On both left and right, there are those who can't wait to take an ax to our defenses, the better to free the funds to support their favorite causes.

We have just changed defense secretaries, with Leon Panetta having taken over the Pentagon yesterday.   Panetta is a serious man, and he's now defending his approach to his new job.  From The Hill:

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta took over at the Pentagon on Friday and immediately promised the budget cuts he will oversee will not produce a “hollow force.”

Panetta acknowledged the Defense Department will be forced to make “tough budget choices,” but called it a “false choice” that fiscal discipline means weakening national security.

“Even as the United States addresses fiscal challenges at home, there will be no hollow force on my watch,” Panetta said in a statement released after he was sworn in at 8:48 a.m. in his new Pentagon office. “That will require us all to be disciplined in how we manage taxpayer resources.

“Throughout my career in public service ... I have focused on achieving that balance,” Panetta said. “I will continue that approach at the Pentagon.”

The statement touched on a number of issues, from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to the meaning of Independence Day, but the inclusion of his budget vow was his first shot back at critics — many pro-defense GOP House members — who have speculated that he was sent to the Pentagon to usher in deep budget cuts.

Those critics have pointed to Panetta’s background as House Budget Committee chairman and Office of Management and Budget director as evidence President Obama was sending him across the Potomac River to do a deep dive into the Defense budget. What’s more, they note he was White House chief of staff in the 1990s, when the Clinton administration slashed Defense spending.

“Mr. Panetta's tenure begins just as President Obama and bipartisan majorities in Congress are insisting on deep cuts to defense spending,” former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld wrote Friday in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. “It will be tempting to accede to the White House's proposal to carve out $400 billion, if not more, from the national security budget by 2023. It would also be a grievous mistake.”

COMMENT:  It's been pointed out that we have cut the defense budget, sometimes substantially, whenever it's announced that "peace" has broken out, and each time we have lived to regret it. 

I suspect that Panetta will try to enact responsible budget cuts, but he is under the thumb of a president who, if he wins a second term, may well revert to his true leftist beliefs and demand the gutting of the Pentagon.  Ordinarily, we could count on Congressional Republicans to stand in the way, and, as the story suggests, there are Republicans prepared to do just that.  Sadly, though, other members of the GOP have reverted to becoming a party of green eyeshades, and their commitment to national defense has gone wobbly.  Our children will pay.

July 2, 2011     Permalink

JULY 1,  2011

A CASE COLLAPSES – We're at least fortunate here in New York that the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance Jr., has some class and some respect for his profession.  His handling of the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case is a model of what an ethical prosecutor must do.  Vance is the son of the late Secretary of State Cyrus Vance.

Today, after weeks of being the victim of a journalistic lynch mob, similar to the academic and journalistic mob that almost destroyed three lacrosse players falsely accused of rape at Duke University, Strauss-Kahn was released on his own recognizance, and had his bail returned.  There is even talk that he will eventually be able to resume his career as one of France's most respected statesmen, and might even run for president of France, something in the works before he was yanked off a plane at JFK International Airport, based on the accusation of a hotel housekeeper. 

The news that the case against Strauss-Kahn is in pieces has stunned France, but there has been surprisingly little anti-Americanism in the reaction.  Indeed, Vance's ethical behavior will help to undo a great deal of French anger.

Strauss-Kahn is free to travel about the United States, but cannot leave the country yet.  The case against him has not been formally dismissed, but it is crumbling.  When a prosecutor like Vance says openly that his office has doubts about the credibility of the only witness to the alleged sexual assault, he is pretty much throwing in the towel.  Yes there is presumably DNA evidence of a sexual encounter with the housekeeper, but that could have been consensual.  Also, "evidence" has to be defined.  The mere presence of some DNA, like hair or skin cells, on the body of the accuser is not persuasive.  She's a housekeeper.  She had access to Strauss-Kahn's clothing, dirty laundry, hairbrush and other items that contained his DNA.

The case against the now-resigned head of the International Monetary Fund began to falter when the DA discovered some stunning evidence, as reported by The New York Times, which is doing a much finer job here than it did in the Duke case.  It involved a recorded phone call:

When the conversation was translated — a job completed only this Wednesday — investigators were alarmed: “She says words to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I’m doing,’ ” the official said.

It was another ground-shifting revelation in a continuing series of troubling statements, fabrications and associations that unraveled the case and upended prosecutors’ view of the woman. Once, in the hours after she said she was attacked on May 14, she’d been a “very pious, devout Muslim woman, shattered by this experience,” the official said — a seemingly ideal witness.

Little by little, her credibility as a witness crumbled — she had lied about her immigration, about being gang raped in Guinea, about her experiences in her homeland and about her finances, according to two law enforcement officials. She had been linked to people suspected of crimes. She changed her account of what she did immediately after the encounter with Mr. Strauss-Kahn. Sit-downs with prosecutors became tense, even angry. Initially composed, she later collapsed in tears and got down on the floor during questioning. She became unavailable to investigators from the district attorney’s office for days at a time.

And...

Suspicions of the woman’s associations arose relatively quickly: within a week of Mr. Strauss-Kahn’s arrest, the authorities learned of a recorded conversation between the subject of a drug investigation and another man, who said his companion was the woman involved in the Strauss-Kahn matter, according to another law enforcement official.

COMMENT:  The presumption of innocence is one of the most sacred principles in our law.  It was never accorded to the three boys at Duke.  It was not accorded to Strauss-Kahn.   

In both cases, there were racial overtones  –  an African-American accuser at Duke, an African-Caribbean accuser in New York.  This clearly complicates a case as the press, perhaps for understandable historical reasons, wants to tread carefully and avoid humiliating the accuser. 

This story is far from over.  My own gut feeling, and I have no independent evidence to back this up, is that it may grow as we learn more about the accuser's international associations.  When he was first arrested, Strauss-Kahn was said to have theorized that this was an internationally inspired set-up.  People laughed.  There isn't any reason to laugh any longer.

July 1, 2011       Permalink

AND ANOTHER GUY TO WATCH – AT 10:06 A.M. ET:  We've been urging the Republican Party to skip a generation and pick an exciting, winning presidential candidate, like Marco Rubio.  The guy has it.  From NRO:

Earlier this month, Sen. Marco Rubio made an auspicious debut.

Unlike so many first turns in the upper chamber, Rubio’s stirring remarks, which celebrated American exceptionalism, caught fire. The Florida Republican’s words were cited by Senate colleagues and championed by conservatives. To no one’s surprise, the push to put Rubio on the 2012 ticket only increased, even though the charismatic freshman continues to swat away the chatter.

Look for the Rubio buzz to continue. In an interview with National Review Online, he says that he will take to the Senate floor for his second speech this week — and this time he will have President Obama in his crosshairs.

Rubio tells us that he will respond to Obama’s recent press conference, where the president reveled in class-warfare bluster. “Quite frankly, I am both disappointed for our country and shocked at some of the rhetoric,” he says. “It was rhetoric, I thought, that was more appropriate for some left-wing strong man than for the president of the United States.”

“Talking about corporate jets and oil companies,” Rubio says, missed the point. “Everybody here agrees that our tax code is broken,” he says, and he is open to discussing tax reform. “But don’t go around telling people that the reason you are not doing well is because some rich guy is in a corporate jet or some oil company is making too much money.”

Watching Obama brandish such talking points made Rubio wince. “Three years into his presidency, he is a failed president,” he says. “He just has not done a good job. Life in America today, by every measure, is worse than it was when he took over.”

“When does it start to get better?” Rubio asks. “When does the magic of this president start to happen?”

COMMENT:  Well said.  Rubio is a superb speaker and a guy with solid values that don't change with the passing breeze.  Yes, he's only a freshman senator, but he was speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, and has more experience than Obama had when he was elected.  The Dems therefore can't use the experience argument against him.

I'd love to see Marco Rubio eventually jump in.

July 1, 2011       Permalink

FASCINATING – AT 9:28 A.M. ET:  There's a new presidential candidate in town.  From The Politico:

Thaddeus McCotter will file paperwork on Friday to become the eighth Republican candidate for president, a McCotter adviser told POLITICO.

Thaddeus who?  Although we have an exceptional readership, many readers might not be instantly familiar with the name.  Well, get ready.  This is one of the smartest members of Congress, and he actually can write!  And, I have to say, I love the name:  President Thaddeus McCotter.  I can see Henry Fonda in that role. 

McCotter spent four days in Iowa this week and came away “feeling positive” about his reception, the adviser said. His presidential campaign website will go live around noon tomorrow, allowing the four-term Michigan congressman to kick off his long-shot bid on the first day of the new fundraising quarter.

His presidential committee, dubbed McCotter 2012, will start out with funds in the six figures, according to the source. The campaign will not have to file a full fundraising report until the fall. McCotter had nearly half a million dollars in his House campaign account at the end of March.

The source said that former Iowa House Speaker Chris Rants will serve as McCotter’s senior adviser in the first-in-the-nation caucus state.

Rants, who endorsed Mitt Romney early in the 2008 cycle, confirmed that he spent the week introducing McCotter to Iowans and the state of the race.

Note this:

Even before formally launching his presidential bid, McCotter has not shied from firing shots at those already in the presidential race. When frontrunner Mitt Romney visited Michigan earlier this month, McCotter declared that “struggling families, entrepreneurs and workers can’t afford policies that make Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama less than rivals, and more like running mates.”

In an interview with POLITICO last month, McCotter previewed some of the themes of a potential presidential run: “The challenge of globalization, the war for freedom against terrorists, the rise of Communist China and whether moral relativism erodes a nation built on self-evident truth.”

Now there's a guy I can admire.  Watch him.  His campaign may be a long shot, but McCotter has substance, and one day he may well go the distance.  The intellectual level of the Republican field just doubled.

July 1, 2011       Permalink

OTHERS WANT AN INDEPENDENCE DAY, TOO – AT 8:58 A.M. ET:  Syria is still boiling while Western nations do some tut-tutting, and little else.  From Reuters:

AMMAN - Tens of thousands of Syrians took to the streets nationwide on Friday shouting that President Bashar Assad should "leave", extending a protest wave despite a military assault on restive northwestern towns, witnesses and activists said.

Demonstrations ranged from the suburbs of Damascus to the Lebanese border, the desert bordering Iraq and Idlib province, where tank assaults on hill villages near Turkey killed three civilians overnight, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

That raised the death toll to at least 14 villagers in the last two days, it said.

"Bashar get out of our lives," read placards carried by thousands of Kurds who marched in the northeastern city of Amouda, according to a YouTube video taken by a resident.

The renewed protests come after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday said Syria is running out of time to reform and will face more organized resistance if it does not.

Speaking at a news conference in Lithuania, she also said she was disheartened by the Syrian government's decision to allow one opposition meeting in Damascus was not sufficient.

Asked about the apparent contradiction between permitting the meeting while pursuing a tank offensive in the north, Clinton said: "It doesn't appear that there's a coherent and consistent message coming from Syria.."

COMMENT:  The fact is, there's no sign that the regime is even thinking of ending its crackdown.  Reportedly, more than 1,400 people have been killed thus far.

Hmm.  That number, 1,400, is about the same as the Gaza death toll in the Israeli defensive operation against Hamas several years ago, an attempt to silence the rocket launchers that had sent 11,000 rockets into Israel.  Remember the uproar against democratic Israel by the international Marxist left?  Notice the silence of that same left in regard to the Syrian dictatorship. 

Instead, a gang of Western leftists is next week sending a "relief" convoy to Gaza, where two luxury hotels are being built, where loads of large-screen TV's are being imported, and where two major shopping malls just opened. 

When will some medical school diagnose the mental illness that is the international left?

July 1, 2011       Permalink

HOLIDAY ALERT! – AT 8:40 A.M. ET:  As you begin your holiday weekend, we present this as a public service so that you don't feed the beastly, fascistic, mindless right-wing propaganda machine, hovering over us to snatch your children, soul mates and even your orthodontists.  Read this and LEARN what's being done to you.  The villains have names like WASHINGTON, JEFFERSON, and the heinous BEN FRANKLIN:

Democratic political candidates can skip this weekend's July 4th parades. A new Harvard University study finds that July 4th parades energize only Republicans, turn kids into Republicans, and help to boost the GOP turnout of adults on Election Day.

I knew it!  The whole thing is a conspiracy.  The Declaration of Independence was written by...by...Karl Rove.

"Fourth of July celebrations in the United States shape the nation's political landscape by forming beliefs and increasing participation, primarily in favor of the Republican Party," said the report from Harvard.

"The political right has been more successful in appropriating American patriotism and its symbols during the 20th century. Survey evidence also confirms that Republicans consider themselves more patriotic than Democrats. According to this interpretation, there is a political congruence between the patriotism promoted on Fourth of July and the values associated with the Republican party. Fourth of July celebrations in Republican dominated counties may thus be more politically biased events that socialize children into Republicans," write Harvard Kennedy School Assistant Professor David Yanagizawa-Drott and Bocconi University Assistant Professor Andreas Madestam.

Their findings also suggest that Democrats gain nothing from July 4th parades, likely a shocking result for all the Democratic politicians who march in them.

"There is no evidence of an increased likelihood of identifying as a Democrat, indicating that Fourth of July shifts preferences to the right rather than increasing political polarization," the two wrote.

COMMENT:  Well, there goes the White House's celebration of the 4th of July, not that they were too enthusiastic about the idea in the first place.

I wonder who paid for that "research."

July 1,  2011     Permalink