o/o/ Jihad Bells! o/o/

ADL: Helen Thomas is a vulgar anti-Semite.

Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director, issued the following statement:

Helen Thomas has clearly, unequivocally revealed herself as a vulgar anti-Semite. Her suggestion that Zionists control government, finance and Hollywood is nothing less than classic, garden-variety anti-Semitism. This is a sad final chapter to an otherwise illustrious career. Unlike her previous, spontaneous remarks into a camera, these words were carefully thought out and conscious. It shows a prejudice that is deep-seated and obsessive.

The ADL's Press Release can be found here.

I love Hannukah

Hanukkah marks the last time the Jews won a war and nobody griped about it being "an injustice".

Thank you Prime Minister Harper. A mighty fine speech!

"Harnessing disparate anti-Semitic, anti-American and anti-Western ideologies, it targets the Jewish people by targeting the Jewish homeland, Israel, as the source of injustice and conflict in the world, and uses, perversely, the language of human rights to do so.

We must be relentless in exposing this new anti-Semitism for what it is...when Israel, the only country in the world whose very existence is under attack - Is consistently and conspicuously singled out for condemnation, I believe we are morally obligated to take a stand. Demonization, double standards, delegitimization, the 3 D's, it is a responsibility to stand up to them.

I know, by the way, because I have the bruises to show for it, that whether it is at the United Nations, or any other international forum, the easiest thing to do is simply to just get along and go along with this anti-Israeli rhetoric, to pretend it is just about being even-handed, and to excuse oneself with the label of "honest broker."

There are, after all, a lot more votes - a lot more - in being anti-Israeli than in taking a stand. But, as long as I am prime minister, whether it is at the UN or the Francophonie or anywhere else, Canada will take that stand...Not just because it is the right thing to do, but because history shows us, and the ideology of the anti-Israeli mob tells us all too well, that those who threaten the existence of the Jewish people are a threat to all of us."

-- Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Taxation without representation

Today is election day; a day that reminds us that our republic was founded on the slogan of: "Taxation without representation is tyranny". Indeed, no matter how you view Republicans, Democrats and their respective philosophies on taxation and spending, we get to vote them in and out of office every so often.

This year, we have the phenomenon of the "Tea Party"; a party of conservative "pure constitutionalists" who can probably speak for themselves better than I can with regard to what they stand for. For the most part, with no exceptions that I am aware of, the "Tea Party" candidates are all Republicans theoretically from the more conservative wing of the party.

Therein lies the problem with the "Tea Party" for in the end, these are the same Republicans who voted in George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush to the White House without protest. It puzzles me. After all, the "Tea Party" appears to be named after the "Boston Tea Party" which was for all practical purposes, a militia attack against an English ship carrying Tea which bore a tax that the colonists objected to. "Taxation without representation is tyranny", that's what the Boston Tea Party was about, but today, things are much different.

Today, the prime example of taxation without representation is the illegal and tyrannical manipulation of world petroleum prices by the Saudi-led OPEC cartel. The amount of wealth being siphoned off the industrialized countries is staggering. The OPEC cartel serves as the greatest threat to America's freedom and independence since the World War II. The horrific impact that this oppressive tax has on developing countries is devastating literally in terms of malnutrition and disease that these countries cannot control due to their petroleum bill. Yet for all the cruel tyranny the OPEC cartel inflicts upon us all, nowhere during the political debate have I seen this "Tea Party" address OPEC's oppressive taxation without representation. Given the fact that all the "Tea Party" candidates are Republican, it leaves me to wonder whether they're any different than the same old politicians we already have.

It might feel good to vote Tea Party candidates in office today and I don't discourage you from doing so if that is your wish. I'll merely point out to you that two years from now, you're likely to be thinking "We've been here and done that before. Why did we think it would be different this time?"

I can't wait til tomorrow (Election Day 2010)

All my deceased ancestors in Chicago miraculously come to life for the day.

Bill O'Reilly, FOX News and the Ground Zero Mosque Problem

It's too bad Americans can't articulate their instincts. When Bill O'Reilly tried to defend his opposition to the Ground Zero Mosque on "The View" he said 70% of Americans oppose the Ground Zero Mosque. He got kicked and scratched by a bunch of girls until he apologized. (See debbieschlussel.com for more information.) Then some other FOX news clod, Brian Kilmeade says that "all Muslims are terrorists" and then apologizes (as he should). What people typically don't know is that 7% of FOX News is owned by Prince Al-Waleed, a Saudi gazillionaire who proves yet again that we get the best news money can buy. Is it any wonder that O'Reilly and Kilmeade back down under pressure and fail to explain themselves in a truly convincing manner.

So if you're reading this blog and this column, you know that I'm the "real deal". There's no 10-second sound bites to limit what I say. I don't post 3-5 columns a day blathering like an idiot (See http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com for a fine example.) demonizing Muslims. That's not me! I don't hold any illusions, but I count some Muslims as long-term personal and professional friends. I don't believe they're looking for new and creative ways to hurt my fellow American citizens. But I digress.

Here's the problem folks. Whether you're talking about FOX news' talking heads or just the average daily American, few people can articulate why Americans are so wary of this Ground Zero Mosque and all this talk about "Moderate Muslims". Let me assure you, FOX News ain't helping. So let me take a stab at this with the realization that this is a BLOG and I can always change my mind later if someone makes a really compelling argument to the contrary.

You see, in spite of a whole list of stuff Americans are upset about, the opposition to the Ground Zero Mosque boils down to something Americans know but can't articulate any better than Bill O'Reilly did on "The View". That "something" is the reaction of the Muslim world to the 9/11/01 attacks. That reaction can be summarized in three theses, all of which are insulting to Americans. Yet Muslims offer 2/3 of them freely without the faintest idea of how insulting they are. One of these theses is pretty obvious and results in people like Bill O'Reilly (and so many in the mainstream news media) retreating into the "They were radical Muslims" mode. If that were the only problem, few would oppose the Ground Zero Mosque.

So let me offer the three theses that make up the sum of opinion in the Muslim world (Naturally, there are a exceptions, but I'll touch on that later). They are:

1. High fives Osama bin Laden! The Jihad must continue.

2. The 9/11 attacks were terrible. There is no excuse for Muslims doing this. However, if the United States didn't have such a huge laundry list of transgressions against Muslims, the attacks never would have happened. I'm afraid the Jihad will continue.

3. The 9/11 attacks were terrible. No Muslim would do such a thing. Therefore, the attacks were actually carried out by the United States and/or their Zionist allies to justify waging war against us. Muslims must resist. Jihad is how we resist.

Thesis number one probably doesn't need much explanation. We know that lots of Muslims overseas feel that way about the United States. We saw news footage of Muslims celebrating the 9/11 attacks that were hastily removed by news bureaus in order to appease their Saudi/OPEC patrons. Still, the word got out and Americans weren't all that surprised.

Thesis number 2 is the darling of "moderate Muslims" as well as the extreme left. Basically, it's another version of "The beatings will continue until morale improves". Thesis number 2 tells us that America need only concede to Muslims on their list of grievances and we'll never have to worry about 9/11-type attacks again. Unfortunately, this doesn't explain the massive bombing attacks against Egypt, Indonesia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Algeria etc; all Muslim nations.

But hey! The leftwingers embrace thesis 2. It must be true! After all, most terrorist attacks in Muslim countries are usually tucked away in the back pages of the newspapers and treated as unimportant.

The 3rd thesis boggles the mind of the average American. Some Americans are at least a little bit aware of thesis 3 and it's popularity in Muslim countries. We also know that there are all kinds of "9/11 truthers" running around pushing this thesis here in America. Some of these "truthers" are extreme leftwingers; others are from other parts of the political spectrum including (but certainly not limited to) the extreme right. That being said, most Americans are not fully aware at how popular thesis 3 is in Muslim countries. The "truthers" may seem whacky by American standards, but most Americans are unaware that thesis 3 is quite popular in Muslim countries.

So you might be saying to yourself: "Hey! I know Muslims that don't hold these three theses. They know who attacked us on 9/11 and don't believe for a millisecond that attacks like this would stop if America were to suddenly satisfy every grievance that exists in the Muslim world." I would hastily acknowledge a similar observation. There's only one problem: those whose views fall outside the three theses, are too few and far-between to form a critical mass of opposition to the rest. Americans can't articulate it, but we know this instinctively and THAT is why there is opposition to the Ground Zero Mosque.

FOX News, (and other mainstream news media outlets) cannot tell us WHY Americans oppose the Ground Zero Mosque. Nor can they articulate the fact that there's no critical mass of Muslims opposed to these three theses. Even if they could, they wouldn't dare. Their OPEC patrons would intervene and they know it.

That is FOX News' "Ground Zero Mosque Problem" and they are hardly alone in the mainstream news media. It need not be YOUR problem.

Two Rules for Two Peoples (Ground Zero Mosque - Part II)

Last Monday (8/30/10) I watched NBC Nightly News as they interviewed our President. The subject of the Ground Zero Mosque came up and our President did a fine job of defending the right of ANY faith to build a house of worship there. The President said that no American would dream of prohibiting the building of a church or synagogue there, so let's extend the same rights to Muslims.

If only he had left out the word "synagogue"! In that one word, our President reminded me that it was just a few short months ago (March 2010), his administration had the gall to tell me that Jews can't build homes in Jerusalem because we're Jewish. Apparently, American values of freedom and tolerance do not extend to Jews living in the Jewish State on our ancestral land.

One has to wonder the mindset of a President and a country that elects him, when there's "Two Rules for Two Peoples". I hope I do not need to elaborate further on the hypocrisy at work here.

The Ground Zero Mosque

For all that is being said, I don't support the Cordoba House. I think Muslims have a right to build it. They have a right to build it right there at Ground Zero where they can insult the United States. The problem is this: they could NOT build it there or anywhere if they didn't have MONEY gained from the illegal manipulation of petroleum prices by Saudi Arabia and OPEC.

The strategic path to victory in the war against Islamic terrorism is the elimination of petroleum as the prime mover of our transportation system. As long as that doesn't change, Muslims will continue to receive enormous amounts of cash to do with as they wish. They'll buy our politicians; newspaper editors, college professors, judges, supreme court justices, bureaucrats, city councils, zoning boards, corporate executives etc. They'll build skyscrapers wherever they want. At the going rate, they'll have enough money to buy majority shares in the Fortune 500 in a few years.

The Cordoba House plan is merely a symptom of the disease. At best it can be delayed. As long as the wealth of the Western World continues to flow into the hands of Saudi Wahabbists, Muslims will buy whatever money will buy.

There are solutions to this problem in our hands today. They are discussed elsewhere in this blog. Unfortunately, those who are in the pocket of Saudi Arabia have mounted a furious public relations effort to oppose these solutions.

Why Jews vote predominantly for Democrats

A lot of people wonder why American Jews vote predominantly for Democrats particularly in Presidential elections.  For example, Barack O’Bama recorded 77% of the Jewish vote in 2008 in spite of considerable concern regarding his pastor, Jeremiah Wright  and his association with other people known for their hostility toward Jews.  Even now, with President O’Bama’s popularity dropping, 47% of Jewish Americans recently polled said they would vote to re-elect him if a Presidential election was held today.

Some people shake their head in amazement.  They wonder how this can be given some of the foreign relations problems, particularly with regard to U.S.-Israel relations, that have occurred during President O’Bama’s first 18 months in office.  I won’t list those problems here, but I think most of my readers are familiar with at least a few of those issues.

There are a lot of theories about why American Jews vote for Democrats and lean toward liberal views.  I’ve heard a lot of them and I understand these theories.  I also dismiss them.  I have my own theory that I’d like to share with you.

The vast majority of Jewish-Americans are descendants of a wave of immigration from Eastern Europe that occurred between 1890 and 1927.  Most of these Jews lived in the “Pale of Settlement” of Eastern Europe.  This region was ruled directly or indirectly by the Czar of Russia for most of this period.

It would be an understatement to say that the Russian Czars were anti-Semitic.  Moreover, the last Russian Czar, Nicholas II was fully willing to use anti-Semitism to divert public discontent away from his critics and toward a common scapegoat.  Nicholas II was the last Czar to rule Russia and was overthrown in 1917 by a coalition of Socialists, Social Democrats, and of course Communists. 

Thus, during the period of Jewish immigration, the primary opposition to the hated and anti-Semitic Czar were leftists and those who at the very least, sympathized with the leftists’ opposition to the Czar.  When the new Americans came ashore and looked around, the party that best resembled the opposition to the Czar was the Democratic Party.  Thus came a natural relationship between Jewish-Americans and the Democratic Party; one that has transcended several generations. In other words, Jews vote predominantly Democratic because the Democratic Party best resembles the traditional opponents of the Czarist regime from which our ancestors fled.

This theory might not be so evident to you, but it became evident to me in the 1990’s when I formulated it.  During that period, there was a second, smaller  wave of Jewish immigration to the United States from the former U.S.S.R.  Anti-Semitism  in the Soviet Union didn’t die with Czar Nicholas II.  It remained a manifest policy of state.  The Soviet Union's open assistance to  those wishing to destroy the Jewish State are a matter of fact.  While Soviet Jews assimilated under the force of the Communist regime, they still faced considerable discrimination regardless of their efforts to be good citizens.

The primary opposition to the Communist regime in the U.S.S.R. were those who supported free market economics in conjunction with personal political freedom.  To these opponents of the Communism, personal political freedom could not come about in the U.S.S.R. without economic freedom.

When the U.S.S.R. dissolved, its Jewish population left in droves.  Most went to Israel where there were relatives and government programs in place to absorb them.  Others came to the United States where there were also relatives and a significant mixture of private and public programs in place to help them start their lives anew.

These new Jewish-Americans identify with those who opposed the anti-Semitic Communist regime in the U.S.S.R.  As they looked around the American political landscape, they found that it was the Republican Party that best resembled the opposition to the old country’s repressive regime.  To nobody’s surprise, these new Jewish-Americans are attracted to the political party that best resembles the opposition to the repressive Communist regime.  That is why these new Jewish-Americans from the former Soviet Union predominantly vote Republican.  I do not find that surprising.

In summary, my thesis is that Jewish-Americans tend to support the Democratic Party because it best represents the opposition to the government from which our ancestors fled.  This thesis is re-enforced by the phenomenon that Jewish-Americans who have fled the former Soviet Union tend to support the Republican Party because it too, best represents the opposition to the government from which they fled.

What do you think?

With the right to do evil...

With the right to do evil and no recourse from the law (or Gd), people do it gleefully.

- Ahoylibs

This is one of the most profound things a friend of mine has said to me in a long time. 

CNN fires Middle Eastern editor

The firing of Octavia Nasr, CNN’s Senior Editor for Middle East Affairs, came and went with little fanfare.  That shouldn’t surprise any of us because the rest of the news media probably doesn’t want to cover this story on account of their own vulnerabilities.

You see, Octavia Nasr was fired shortly after she posted a comment on Twitter eulogizing a Hezbollah leader, who recently died.  The eulogy is all over the internet, I need not repeat it here.  You can find other fine stories on the subject from my friends at Tundra Tabloids and Debbieschlussel.com. 

For those of you uninformed, Hezbollah is on the U.S. State department’s list of terrorist groups.  If the U.S. State Department isn’t credible enough for you (I would understand that.) consider some of the awful attacks Hezbollah is known for:

1.  April 1983, U.S. Embassy bombing (by the Islamic Jihad faction).

2.  October 1983, U.S. Marine barracks bombing in Beirut, Lebanon

3.  June 1985, torture and murder of Col. William F. Buckley in Lebanon

4.  June 1985 hijacking of TWA 847 and the torture/murder of U.S. Navy Seal Robert Stethem.

5.  March 1992, bombing of the Israel embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina killing 29  people.

6.  July 1994, bombing of the Jewish Cultural Center in Buenos Aires, Argentina killing 85 people.

The list goes on and on.  It includes the unrestricted firing of thousands of rockets into Israeli civilian areas over a period of several decades culminating in the 2006 South Lebanon War.  The list I have provided is rather short and hardly describes the depth of Hezbollah’s rampage of murder. 

It goes without saying that Hezbollah holds a manifest anti-Semitic policy.  As such, you might think that Octavia Nasr’s open support for Hezbollah embarrassed CNN due to its Jewish audience.  Why I’ll bet you thought that Nasr was fired because she rattled Jewish sensitivities.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  If that were true, Nasr would have been gone long ago.

The pressure group she angered was the Saudi Petrochemical Lobby.  That’s because Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy.  Hezbollah is a Shiite Arab terrorist group and quite unique among Arab terrorist organizations.  The enmity between Shiite and Sunni Arabs is well known and the House of Saud does not take kindly to those who support Iranian (Persian) terrorist proxies in the Arab world.  Hezbollah is a serious threat to Sunni Arab regimes throughout the Persian Gulf.  Nasr was allowed to use CNN to demonize the Jewish State for years without repercussions.  Once she rattled the Saudis a little, she was given the boot so fast; she didn’t know what hit her. 

That is another reason Octavia Nasr’s firing isn’t making many headlines.  "The Jews" aren’t responsible for it and therefore, it isn’t news.

We are PEACE ACTIVISTS

Yah... right!  How many times have I heard some version of THIS:

We are European peace activists.   We are peace activists because we say we are.  If you disagree, we will brand you a "racist" and have you arrested for hate speech, so beware!

Why Evangelical Christians Support Israel

I have had the great pleasure of working with Christian Zionists and have found the REAL reason Christians support Israel on a religious basis. I shall now plaigerize the book STANDING WITH ISRAEL - WHY CHRISTIANS SUPPORT THE JEWISH STATE by David Brog.

In Genesis 12:3, God promises Abraham that, "I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you." The "you" employed here is a plural, referring to Abraham and his descendants, that is Israel. To a dispensationalist, therefore, Genesis 12:3 practically commands philo-Semitism and Zionism. Genesis 12:3 is Christian Zionism in a nutshell.

This then, is the REAL reason why many American Christian evangelicals support Israel. They believe it is a Gd-given commandment.  I just thought you should know.

Israel Strikes "Mother Lode" of Natural Gas

If there's one thing anti-Semites hate, it's empowered Jews. That is why they hate Israel so much. If there's one thing they hate more than Israel, it's an Israel empowered with overwhelming financial wealth.

Well folks! It looks like worldwide anti-Semitism is about to experience their worst nightmare because Israel has discovered it's second pool of natural gas in two years. This one is the "mother lode" and will likely turn Israel into a natural gas exporting country.


Leviathan gas find spurts optimism (Jerusalem Post)

“The Leviathan exploration has the potential of being twice the size of Tamar, which was the largest gas discovery globally in 2009,” Richard Gussow, a research analyst at Deutsche Bank, said Thursday.

In addition, Noble Energy confirmed Thursday that the Tamar project remains on schedule for sanction in 2010 and first gas production sales in 2012. Noble Energy on Wednesday increased its expectations for gross recoverable gas resources at Tamar by 33% to 8.4 trillion cubic feet as a result of updated reservoir studies.

“This year we have undertaken significant capital projects to help maintain a high Mari-B deliverability through 2012, and we are working hard to enable Tamar first gas sales late in that same year,” Davidson said.

Noble Energy’s discoveries could provide about 35 years of Israel’s natural-gas needs at projected 2012 demand rates. The capital investment for Tamar is estimated at $2.8 billion.

“With the Tamar project expected to supply Israel with its natural-gas needs for the next three decades, a discovery at Leviathan, should there be one, would be earmarked for export,” Gussow said.

Therefore, Israel is now energy independent and soon will be poised to be a net energy exporter. I have long pointed out that over the years that Israel, with 1/4 the population of Saudi Arabia has a GDP of approximately half of Saudi Arabia. Moreover, Israel achieved this economic strength with no petrochemical wealth. Now, combined with petrochemical wealth (Reports say there may be petroleum underneath the Leviathan gas field.) Israel's economy could become the the single largest in the region.

The Basic Concern About Barack O'Bama

On public forums and blogs, I keep hearing the same hysterical rant from Conservatives; many of them my friends. It's all rather meaningless name-calling and resembles much of the nonsense I heard from Liberals about President Bush.

When we see the current O'Bama Administration embracing Hugo Chavez, Conservative commentators froth at the mouth. The Administration says it was just being polite to another foreign leader. When we see Administration policy that supports "affordable health care", Conservatives holler "SOCIALISM". The Administration replies that they are pursuing policy widely supported during the 2008 election. When the President appoints people like Van Jones, well... Conservatives go ballistic, but they can't articulate why others should be concerned.

Yet there's one basic concern about President O'Bama that my Conservative friends fail to articulate time and time again; hard as they try. That basic concern is this: During his formative years as a young adult, Barack O'Bama kept close company with people who hold America in VERY low esteem.

Therein lies the basic concern many in "middle America" have with our President. Too bad Conservatives can't articulate it and explain it effectively to the American public.

I support Israel

I don't support EVERY Israeli policy, but by and large, they do a fine job of maintaining and running a productive and modern democracy. They are also quite friendly toward the US; something that can't be said of most of the nations in the region. Their technological contributions to the world economy far exceed what can normally be expected of their small population.

I know people hate Israel because it's a Jewish State. Yet Israel's national sins pale in comparison with much of the evil in the world. Moreover, Israel is the only nation who's national sins (real, imagined and mostly invented) carry a routine recommendation of remediation by permanent national destruction. That is a very unique remedy and it is largely due to anti-Semitism. After all, in a world that is void of anti-Semitism, the War Against Israel could not exist.

Israel: a unique nation

Let's face it folks!  Israel is the only nation where the recommended remedy to its national sins (real, imagined and mostly invented) is permanent national destruction.

I've been saying that for many years, but thought I'd mention it now for the record.

C ya,

TINSC

About the Breakup of Al and Tipper Gore

I voted for Al Gore.  I voted for Clinton twice.  Unfortunately, I was never liberal ENOUGH because I don't hate Israel.

In his day, Al Gore was a heck of a good public servant.  When he lost the 2000 election, he lost his marbles.  He went insane.  I knew it because I loved him. 

Perhaps it was best that he lost that election.  In September 2001, when he showed up to President Bush's address to the joint session of Congress, he was bearded and had obviously gained a lot of weight. 

George Bush delivered his address, basking in the glory of support from a nation rallying around our President.  Al Gore was irrelevant and he knew it.  It ate at him. It tore at his self-identity.

In the following years, Al Gore sought relevancy in the American policy-making field by pushing his "global warming" fear.  It led to an Academy Award and a Nobel Peace Prize.  It was not enough!  It was not enough to sooth his loss of sanity.  Indeed, his loss of sanity had led to the herculean effort to bring the irrational fear of "global warming" to the forefront of national and international policy making. 

Having won all the accolades and adoring attention of throngs of followers, it is only natural that all this made his insanity worse.  I saw the signs; others did not.  But now, ten years later, we are finally seeing the signs that the bulletproof "Gorebot" is a man of flesh and blood; susceptible to all the things that fame, fortune and international attention provide.  Who knows!  Perhaps we'll find that he's another "Tiger Woods".  Or maybe it's just that his insanity became too much for Tipper to bear.  Eventually, we'll find out the details.

In the mean time, I'm not gloating over this.  I just think it's important to say that I saw Al Gore crumble badly after the election of 2000.  I'm not entirely surprised this happened, but I wish it hadn't. 

Mark Twain Wisdom For Today's World

"If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the newspaper, you're mis-informed."


--Mark Twain

Building a house in Jerusalem

Why is it that I can't build a house in Jerusalem?  I'm Jewish!  Jerusalem is the eternal capital of the Jewish People.

Nobody questioned whether a black man could move into the White House, the capital of the United States.  Certainly not Jewish-Americans, 77% of whom voted for Barack O'Bama to be our President.

So why does this administration have such a problem with Jews building homes in Jerusalem and moving to the eternal capital of the Jewish People?  Archaeological evidence shows that Jews founded Jerusalem 3000 years ago.  Our liturgy mentions Jerusalem early and often as the capital of our people.  It's only natural for Jews to live in Jerusalem.

I don't get it!  Certainly in the history of mankind, far more cruel acts against humanity have been perpetrated than the mere building of houses.  And let's face it!  If someone said that blacks couldn't build homes in a neighborhood where they wanted, we'd hear a never-ending complaint of "racism" consistent with the American movement against segregation.  That would be the morally correct position; one I would strongly support.

But for some reason, when Jews build homes in Jerusalem, it's a big federal case.  Anti-Semitic Arabs get upset and our State Department thinks that this means that the Jews are causing a problem.  This is an embrace of anti-Semitism by our State Department.  I have a problem with that.

Even if someone were to say that Arabs have a sovereign right to forbid Jews to build houses in their country, it would be no less anti-Semitic.  Why does the United States government embrace this attitude?

It is wrong; morally wrong.   I would like the government of the United States to change it's policy to reflect our own American values that says people can build houses where they want to.   

If the United States State Department felt insulted by Israel building homes in Jerusalem, let me make it clear that I feel no less insulted by the United State State Department when they tell me that I can't build a house in Jerusalem because I'm Jewish.

The Silver Bullet to our Petroleum Crisis

I was reading a column by David Harris of the AJC the other day.  While I praise the AJC for making energy a high priority, I find them too embracing of liberal orthodoxy.  Like so many people, they've been distracted by all the talk of "greenhouse gases".  So when David Harris made the comment: "There is no silver bullet", I had to disagree.  There IS a "silver bullet".  It is the Open Fuels Standard Act of 2009.

Dr. Robert Zubrin has laid this policy out in a book called "Energy Victory".  I highly recommend you read it.  However, if you can't read it, please take the time to watch these 4 videos of his Energy Victory presentation. 

These videos can be found at the following address:

http://vimeo.com/tag:zubrin

Here's part 1 of 4


Dr. Robert Zubrin Energy Victory 1 of 4 from EcoBabble on Vimeo.

About the Armenian Massacres

A lot has been written and said about the Congressional motion to recognize the Armenian Massacres of 1915 as a genocide.  With Turkey growing ever more Islamo-Fascist by the day, there is a temptation by otherwise pro-Israel activists to jump on the left's bandwagon and bring insult to Turkey.    Apparently, some pro-Israel activists have long forgotten how many times Yasir Arafat hurled the genocide label at Israel for their treatment of Palestinian Arabs.

While the scale of murder suggests a genocide, the Armenian Massacres do not fully qualify as such. It should be noted that those who force the "G-word" on Turkey historically have been partisan leftists seeking to demonize a U.S. Ally. As such, the barbaric behavior of other Islamic nations throughout history and today are routinely ignored by these partisan leftists. It should also be noted that the Arab citizens of the Ottoman Empire participated fully in the massacre of Armenians yet escape the criticism reserved for a Cold-War ally of the United States.

Sound familiar? It should.

The same people hollering "genocide" against Turkey are those who routinely holler "apartheid" and "genocide" describing Israel's treatment of Palestinian Arabs. When you have to stand in the same boat with these people in order to hurl the "genocide" label on Turkey, ya gotta wonder just how accurate the accusation really is. 

In fact, it is because the Armenian Massacres were NOT a genocide that the exact death toll is disputed. That is because unlike the Nazis who CAREFULLY PLANNED the inhalation of Jews, the Ottomans had no statistical tracking in order to measure progress. Thus, it doesn't matter what number you pick: a) the conservative Turkish number of 600,000; b) The Armenian/leftist number of 2 million; or c) the generally accepted number of "about a million", the mere fact that nobody can get an accurate accounting of the massacre is because the Ottomans did not set up an accounting system that would have been expected from a central and strategic plan of annihilation, i.e. a genocide.

There are some other excellent resources on this subject from anti-Terrorism specialists and historians. I recommend:

http://www.meforum.org/748/revisiting-the-armenian-genocide

http://www.meforum.org/991/armenian-massacres-new-records-undercut-old-blame  

http://www.meforum.org/2114/ottoman-archives-reshape-armenian-debate

The general reason by which these horrific massacres fail to qualify as a genocide is because historians have failed to find evidence that there was a master plan developed by the Ottoman Empire leaders to totally annihilate ethnic Armenians.   The charge of genocide against the Ottoman Empire is based on the scale of the massacres, NOT the true definition of the term.

But most important, remember this! If you're going to heave the genocide label at Turkey, don't be surprise if the person standing next to you is heaving the apartheid label at Israel. The use of these words have a common tactic and if you want to be careless with them, don't be surprised if that comes back to you like a boomerang. 

Will someone explain this to me?

Let's assume that the Israelis actually were responsible for the assassination of the HAMAS terrorist gun-runner Mahmound Mahbouh in Dubai.

Why is it such a moral negative for Israel to assassinate an armed enemy of the state in a country that is at war with Israel?