Paul Driessen
Fossil fuel and insurance company executives “could face personal liability for funding climate denialism and opposing policies to fight climate change,” Greenpeace recently warned several corporations. In a letter co-signed by WWF International and the Center for International Environmental Law, the Rainbow Warriors ($155 million in 2013 global income) suggested that legal action might be possible.
Meanwhile, the WWF ($927 million in 2013 global income) filed a formal complaint against Peabody Energy for “misleading readers” in advertisements that say coal-based electricity can improve lives in developing countries. The ads are not “decent, honest and veracious,” as required by Belgian law, the World Wildlife ethicists sniffed. Other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) make similar demands.
These are novel tactics. But the entire exercise might be little more than a clever attempt to distract people from developments that could create problems for thus far unaccountable Big Green organizations.
I don’t mean Greenpeace International’s $5.2 million loss a couple weeks ago, when a rogue employee (since fired) used company cash to conduct unauthorized trades on global currency markets. Other recent events portend far rougher legal and political waters ahead for radical eco-activists, especially if countries and companies take a few more pages out of the Big Green playbook.
India’s Intelligence Bureau recently identified Greenpeace as “a threat to national economic security,” noting that these and other groups have been “spawning” and funding internal protest movements and campaigns that have delayed or blocked numerous mines, electricity projects and other infrastructure programs vitally needed to create jobs and lift people out of poverty and disease. The anti-development NGOs are costing India’s economy 2-3% in lost GDP every year, the Bureau estimates.
The Indian government has now banned direct foreign funding of local campaign groups by foreign NGOs like Greenpeace, the WWF and US-based Center for Media and Democracy. India and other nations could do much more. Simply holding these über-wealthy nonprofit environmentalist corporations to the same ethical standards they demand of for-profit corporations could be a fascinating start.
Greenpeace, WWF and other Big Green campaigners constantly demand environmental and climate justice for poor families. They insist that for-profit corporations be socially responsible, honest, transparent, accountable, and liable for damages and injustices that the NGOs allege the companies have committed, by supposedly altering Earth’s climate and weather, for example.
Meanwhile, more than 300 million Indians (equal to the US population) still have no access to electricity, or only sporadic access. 700 million Africans likewise have no or only occasional access. Worldwide, almost 2.5 billion people (nearly a third of our Earth’s population) still lack electricity or must rely on little solar panels on their huts, a single wind turbine in their village or terribly unreliable networks, to charge a cell phone and power a few light bulbs or a tiny refrigerator.
These energy-deprived people do not merely suffer abject poverty. They must burn wood and dung for heating and cooking, which results in debilitating lung diseases that kill a million people every year. They lack refrigeration, safe water and decent hospitals, resulting in virulent intestinal diseases that send almost two million people to their graves annually. The vast majority of these victims are women and children.
The energy deprivation is due in large part to unrelenting, aggressive, deceitful eco-activist campaigns against coal-fired power plants, natural gas-fueled turbines, and nuclear and hydroelectric facilities in India, Ghana, South Africa, Uganda and elsewhere. The Obama Administration joined Big Greeen in refusing to support loans for these critically needed projects, citing climate change and other claims.
As American University adjunct professor Caleb Rossiter asked in a recent Wall Street Journal article, “Where is the justice when the U.S. discourages World Bank funding for electricity-generation projects in Africa that involve fossil fuels, and when the European Union places a ‘global warming’ tax on cargo flights importing perishable African goods?”
Where is the justice in Obama advisor John Holdren saying ultra-green elites in rich countries should define and dictate “ecologically feasible development” for poor countries? As the Indian government said in banning foreign NGO funding of anti-development groups, poor nations have “a right to grow.”
Imagine your life without abundant, reliable, affordable electricity and transportation fuels. Imagine living under conditions endured by impoverished, malnourished, diseased Indians and Africans whose life expectancy is 49 to 59 years. And then dare to object to their pleas and aspirations, especially on the basis of “dangerous manmade global warming” speculation and GIGO computer models. Real pollution from modern coal-fired power plants (particulates, sulfates, nitrates and so on) is a tiny fraction of what they emitted 40 years ago – and far less harmful than pollutants from zero-electricity wood fires.
Big Green activists say anything other than solar panels and bird-butchering wind turbines would not be “sustainable.” Like climate change, “sustainability” is infinitely elastic and malleable, making it a perfect weapon for anti-development activists. Whatever they support is sustainable. Whatever they oppose is unsustainable. To them, apparently, the diseases and death tolls are sustainable, just, ethical and moral.
Whatever they advocate also complies with the “precautionary principle.” Whatever they disdain violates it. Worse, their perverse guideline always focuses on the risks of using technologies – but never on the risks of not using them. It spotlights risks that a technology – coal-fired power plants, biotech foods or DDT, for example – might cause, but ignores risks the technology would reduce or prevent.
Genetically engineered Golden Rice incorporates a gene from corn (maize) to make it rich in beta-carotene, which humans can convert to Vitamin A, to prevent blindness and save lives. The rice would be made available at no cost to poor farmers. Just two ounces a day would virtually end the childhood malnutrition, blindness and deaths. But Greenpeace and its “ethical” collaborators have battled Golden Rice for years, while eight million children died from Vitamin A deficiency since the rice was invented.
In Uganda malnourished people depend as heavily on Vitamin A-deficient bananas, as their Asian counterparts do on minimally nutritious rice. A new banana incorporates genes from wild bananas, to boost the fruit’s Vitamin A levels tenfold. But anti-biotechnology activists repeatedly pressure legislators not to approve biotech crops for sale. Other crops are genetically engineered to resist insects, drought and diseases, reducing the need for pesticides and allowing farmers to grow more food on less land with less water. However, Big Green opposes them too, while millions die from malnutrition and starvation.
Sprayed in tiny amounts on walls of homes, DDT repels mosquitoes for six months or more. It kills any that land on the walls and irritates those it does not kill or repel, so they leave the house without biting anyone. No other chemical – at any price – can do all that. Where DDT and other insecticides are used, malaria cases and deaths plummet – by as much as 80 percent. Used this way, the chemical is safe for humans and animals, and malaria-carrying mosquitoes are far less likely to build immunities to DDT than to other pesticides, which are still used heavily in agriculture and do pose risks to humans.
But in another crime against humanity, Greenpeace, WWF and their ilk constantly battle DDT use – while half a billion people get malaria every year, making them unable to work for weeks on end, leaving millions with permanent brain damage, and killing a million people per year, mostly women and children.
India and other countries can fight back, by terminating the NGOs’ tax-exempt status, as Canada did with Greenpeace. They could hold the pressure groups to the same standards they demand of for-profit corporations: honesty, transparency, social responsibility, accountability and personal liability. They could excoriate the Big Green groups for their crimes against humanity – and penalize them for the malnutrition, disease, economic retractions and deaths they perpetrate or perpetuate.
Actions like these would improve people’s lives and make Big Green at least somewhat accountable.
5 Jul 2014
MYANMAR: PRIORITY FOR THE NEW INDIAN GOVERNMENT
Rahul Mishra
Ever since Narendra Modi assumed office as the Indian Prime Minister, speculations regarding his foreign policy priorities have been rife. Many in the Indian media suggest that since this is the first time Modi is at the helm of central government affairs, he would find it tricky to deal with the foreign policy challenges on a day-to-day basis, while vigorously pursuing the domestic agenda that not only involves revamping the economy but also improving governance in the country crippled by corruption.
Though at a purely symbolic level, Modi’s invitation to the South Asian leaders to attend his swearing-in ceremony gave signals regarding his foreign policy preferences: greater attention towards the immediate neighbourhood to ensure peace, partnership and development. Modi invited the heads of governments of of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) member countries, and Mauritius, who willingly attended the event. One may argue that like Mauritius, Myanmar could have also been invited as both the countries are, in geographical terms, part of Southern Asia.
At the substantive level, the highlights of Modi’s foreign policy were showcased in Indian President Pranab Mukherjee’s address to the joint session of the Indian Parliament on June 9, 2014. While there was no direct mention of Myanmar in the president’s speech, several issues hint at the country’s salience in Modi’s neighbourhood policy.
Promoting Inter-regional Connectivity
In his address, President Mukherjee spoke at length about inter-regional connectivity. In the recent years, India has actively pursued the idea of trans-South Asian connectivity, links with Myanmar and countries in the Southeast Asian region. Road and rail links with Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan have been worked on, with some success. In that context, India’s initiatives to connect with Myanmar have been remarkable. It has ‘travelled more than half’ to bring Myanmar along in terms of infrastructure development and road, rail, waterways and air connectivity. Inter alia, India has initiated projects such as the Kaladan Multi-modal Transit Transport Project, and revamping national waterways to link with Myanmar. In June 2014, India and Myanmar agreed on a weekly bus service connecting Imphal, Moreh, Tamu, Kalewa, Monywa and Mandalay towns. Visa-on-arrival facility will also be extended to travellers. The 579kilometer route is likely to be inaugurated in October 2014, marking the beginning of direct road links between India and Myanmar.
While it is expected that the Kaladan Multi-modal Transit Transport Project will be completed by the end of 2014, Sittwe is also being revamped. Slow progress in the Sittwe project has hurt India’s energy interests. So far, as the National waterways are concerned, with the restructuring of the Ministry of Water Resources to make it the Ministry for Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, the government has made its intentions clear on the issue of cleaning up of the river Ganga – that wasn’t just evident in Modi’s pre-election campaign speeches, but has also attracted huge funds from the central government to make Ganga and other eastern rivers fully navigable, which will also benefits hinterlands. The Chennai-Dawei Corridor is another great opportunity involving Myanmar.
Illegal immigration
Illegal immigration from the eastern flank has been a major challenge for India. Due to porous borders, lack of proper fencing along the Myanmar and Bangladesh borders, lack of requisite security apparatus and strict vigil, India has be unable to check illegal immigration. While Bangladesh has been the most prominent source, Rohingya immigrants from Myanmar have also come in hoards. According to estimates, New Delhi alone has over 5000 Rohingya immigrants while an estimated 20,000 Rohingyas are present in India.
In that context, fencing along India’s borders with Myanmar and Bangladesh is a critically important matter. India has been facing opposition along both the Bangladesh and Myanmar borders. Without addressing the problem resolutely, India’s boundary woes are not likely to be addressed.
Bringing Northeast India into the Mainstream
The central government has already initiated plans to improve connectivity within India’s Northeastern states. Developing infrastructure projects automatically involves working on energy projects. In both India and Myanmar, demand for energy far outweighs the supplies. In Myanmar, only 26% of the population has access to the electricity.
One of the most dreadful consequences of the neglect of India’s Northeastern regions has been the illegal production and sale of the narcotic substances. According to some estimates, the Northeastern region has become the hub of drug trafficking, and has become the channel for drug trade from the golden triangle.
Role of Japan and the US
At the regional geopolitical level too, Myanmar will remain a key country for the Modi government. For instance, the recently conceptualised India-Japan-US trilateral dialogue has been projected as one of the major initiatives to bring India closer to the US and Japan. Myanmar is a country of great interest for India, Japan and the US.
One may argue that while the US, President Barack Obama, played a key role in bringing Myanmar back to the international system, Japan has become one of the biggest investors and a major player in Myanmar’s economy. India, naturally, has direct stakes in Myanmar at all levels. If the three countries are able to devise a common strategy on Myanmar, it will not only help Myanmar, but will also bring India, Japan and the US closer.
Ever since Narendra Modi assumed office as the Indian Prime Minister, speculations regarding his foreign policy priorities have been rife. Many in the Indian media suggest that since this is the first time Modi is at the helm of central government affairs, he would find it tricky to deal with the foreign policy challenges on a day-to-day basis, while vigorously pursuing the domestic agenda that not only involves revamping the economy but also improving governance in the country crippled by corruption.
Though at a purely symbolic level, Modi’s invitation to the South Asian leaders to attend his swearing-in ceremony gave signals regarding his foreign policy preferences: greater attention towards the immediate neighbourhood to ensure peace, partnership and development. Modi invited the heads of governments of of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) member countries, and Mauritius, who willingly attended the event. One may argue that like Mauritius, Myanmar could have also been invited as both the countries are, in geographical terms, part of Southern Asia.
At the substantive level, the highlights of Modi’s foreign policy were showcased in Indian President Pranab Mukherjee’s address to the joint session of the Indian Parliament on June 9, 2014. While there was no direct mention of Myanmar in the president’s speech, several issues hint at the country’s salience in Modi’s neighbourhood policy.
Promoting Inter-regional Connectivity
In his address, President Mukherjee spoke at length about inter-regional connectivity. In the recent years, India has actively pursued the idea of trans-South Asian connectivity, links with Myanmar and countries in the Southeast Asian region. Road and rail links with Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan have been worked on, with some success. In that context, India’s initiatives to connect with Myanmar have been remarkable. It has ‘travelled more than half’ to bring Myanmar along in terms of infrastructure development and road, rail, waterways and air connectivity. Inter alia, India has initiated projects such as the Kaladan Multi-modal Transit Transport Project, and revamping national waterways to link with Myanmar. In June 2014, India and Myanmar agreed on a weekly bus service connecting Imphal, Moreh, Tamu, Kalewa, Monywa and Mandalay towns. Visa-on-arrival facility will also be extended to travellers. The 579kilometer route is likely to be inaugurated in October 2014, marking the beginning of direct road links between India and Myanmar.
While it is expected that the Kaladan Multi-modal Transit Transport Project will be completed by the end of 2014, Sittwe is also being revamped. Slow progress in the Sittwe project has hurt India’s energy interests. So far, as the National waterways are concerned, with the restructuring of the Ministry of Water Resources to make it the Ministry for Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, the government has made its intentions clear on the issue of cleaning up of the river Ganga – that wasn’t just evident in Modi’s pre-election campaign speeches, but has also attracted huge funds from the central government to make Ganga and other eastern rivers fully navigable, which will also benefits hinterlands. The Chennai-Dawei Corridor is another great opportunity involving Myanmar.
Illegal immigration
Illegal immigration from the eastern flank has been a major challenge for India. Due to porous borders, lack of proper fencing along the Myanmar and Bangladesh borders, lack of requisite security apparatus and strict vigil, India has be unable to check illegal immigration. While Bangladesh has been the most prominent source, Rohingya immigrants from Myanmar have also come in hoards. According to estimates, New Delhi alone has over 5000 Rohingya immigrants while an estimated 20,000 Rohingyas are present in India.
In that context, fencing along India’s borders with Myanmar and Bangladesh is a critically important matter. India has been facing opposition along both the Bangladesh and Myanmar borders. Without addressing the problem resolutely, India’s boundary woes are not likely to be addressed.
Bringing Northeast India into the Mainstream
The central government has already initiated plans to improve connectivity within India’s Northeastern states. Developing infrastructure projects automatically involves working on energy projects. In both India and Myanmar, demand for energy far outweighs the supplies. In Myanmar, only 26% of the population has access to the electricity.
One of the most dreadful consequences of the neglect of India’s Northeastern regions has been the illegal production and sale of the narcotic substances. According to some estimates, the Northeastern region has become the hub of drug trafficking, and has become the channel for drug trade from the golden triangle.
Role of Japan and the US
At the regional geopolitical level too, Myanmar will remain a key country for the Modi government. For instance, the recently conceptualised India-Japan-US trilateral dialogue has been projected as one of the major initiatives to bring India closer to the US and Japan. Myanmar is a country of great interest for India, Japan and the US.
One may argue that while the US, President Barack Obama, played a key role in bringing Myanmar back to the international system, Japan has become one of the biggest investors and a major player in Myanmar’s economy. India, naturally, has direct stakes in Myanmar at all levels. If the three countries are able to devise a common strategy on Myanmar, it will not only help Myanmar, but will also bring India, Japan and the US closer.
4 Jul 2014
DUMB AND DUMBER
Steve Deace
Now that we’re done celebrating a rare victory, it’s time to get back to work. Because if you’ve spent any amount of time perusing the arguments against free speech and religious liberty in the Hobby Lobby case, you realize there is another country flying our same flag that looks more like the U.S.S.R. than the U.S.A.
Check out this collection of “tolerance” from some on the Left.
“F-SCOTUS. F-Hobby Lobby. F-Religion. F-America.”
“I will not take my dollars or my less-than uterus to Hobby Lobby again.”
“High court rules in favor of #HobbyLobby” – what the fuck is #SCOTUS smoking? Kochcaine?”
“F-you Hobby Lobby, I hope all your stores burn to the ground.”
“Literally burn hobby lobby to the ground.”
“Hobby Lobby are scum of the earth. Burn every single one down, build a homeless shelter there instead.”
Can’t you just feel the diversity?
Then there’s Cecile Richards, an especially troubled soul, for she is one of the mucky-mucks over at Planned Parenthood, the leading child-killer in the country. She said, “It’s unbelievable that in 2014 we’re still fighting about whether women should have access to birth control.”
Um, we’re not.
Hobby Lobby already was offering its employees 16 of the 20 contraception methods Obamacare mandates before this argument arose. Hobby Lobby was simply posing the question is government allowed to violate the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion? Since Hobby Lobby’s religion teaches extinguishing innocent life is murder, and murder is against God’s Law, they claimed their freedom of religion exempts them from committing acts of murder according to their moral conscience. This battle wasn’t about access to birth control. It was about access to liberty.
Next is this post made by a liberal on my Facebook wall:
“What about the religious liberty of the employees? Besides it’s not a religious argument. Nothing in the Bible covers this topic. We get upset when anyone is denied equal protection under the law. Even you. Hobby Lobby invests in companies that make contraceptives. The height of hypocrisy.”
Here is how I replied to this gentleman:
“That is probably the stupidest thing I’ve seen said yet about this, and I’ve seen some absolutely idiotic feces spewed about this. You don’t have a religious liberty to have your behaviors subsidized by somebody else. Come on, man, please tell me you’re smarter than that. Besides, of their own free will the Greens were already offering their employees 16 of the 20 contraceptions Obamacare demands. There simply isn’t a logical argument for this, which is why they all sound dumb and amount to ‘I want to do what I want, and I want someone else to pay for it.’ As to your point about the Greens’ alleged hypocrisy, even if they were the worst hypocrites ever it wouldn’t change one word of the First Amendment. See, that’s the whole point of having the law based on a fixed standard so that your freedoms aren’t subject to the whims of fallible human beings like ourselves. This case isn’t about the Greens, it’s about the words written into the Constitution more than 200 years before Hobby Lobby was created.”
Sadly, the disputes did get dumber. Check out this email a listener sent to me after discussing this with one of his liberal friends:
“One of my liberal friends made an interesting point about the Hobby Lobby verdict. Their comment was what if you work for a Jehovah’s Witness and they deny you coverage because they don’t believe in blood transfusions? And the one I thought of was what if your boss is a Christian Scientist and doesn’t believe in doctors at all, only the power of prayer? Do they have the right to deny coverage to their employees even though the employees believe in doctors? What about the Amish?”
Here’s how I replied:
“Their argument is deeply flawed. It begins with the premise you’re entitled to any coverage from your employer, or anything else for that matter at all. You’re not entitled to anything. If you don’t like that employer and the salary/benefits they offer then don’t work there. Your employer can simply get around the Obamacare mandate altogether by having all his employees work part-time fewer than 29 hours a week, and some already are. Besides, in the example you’re citing the liberal is decrying a decision that he believes will kill people. However, not wanting to kill people is exactly why Hobby Lobby took this stand.
Ironic.
Oh, and if your sexual behavior is private then why does someone else have to pay for it?”
Finally, for the absolutely dumbest poop to flow from any pie-hole about this, look no further than presumptive 2016 Democrat nominee for president.
Hillary Clinton described the Hobby Lobby ruling as Sharia Law: “It is a disturbing trend that you see in a lot of societies that are very unstable, anti-democratic, and frankly prone to extremism,” Clinton said. “Where women and women’s bodies are used as the defining and unifying issue, because of their religion, their sect, their tribe, whatever.”
Where do I even begin?
You know why this isn’t like Sharia Law? Because Hillary hasn’t been “honor killed” for wearing a pant suit yet. The feminist icon is still alive, unlike the four dead Americans she left behind at Benghazi, but if she lived in a nation with Sharia Law she probably wouldn’t be.
Secondly, the legislation the majority of Supreme Court justices based their opinion on was signed by…wait for it…wait for it…President Bill Clinton! Justice Alito in the majority opinion specifically cited the “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” signed into law by President Clinton in 1993. Oh, by the way, that bill was sent to President Clinton’s desk by Democrat majorities in both chambers of Congress.
The Left’s hysterical reaction to the Hobby Lobby ruling shows yet again the difference between the GOP establishment and the grassroots. The establishment still wants to negotiate with these people, but we realize you cannot negotiate with people who fundamentally don’t believe in basic liberties like free speech and religious liberty. Combine those anti-American views with their entitlement mentality, and we’re essentially talking about Statists/Marxists here.
In the 1980s the Republican Party understood it couldn’t negotiate with the Statists in Moscow, but had to defeat them. I pray it will realize that about the Statists in our own nation today.
Now that we’re done celebrating a rare victory, it’s time to get back to work. Because if you’ve spent any amount of time perusing the arguments against free speech and religious liberty in the Hobby Lobby case, you realize there is another country flying our same flag that looks more like the U.S.S.R. than the U.S.A.
Check out this collection of “tolerance” from some on the Left.
“F-SCOTUS. F-Hobby Lobby. F-Religion. F-America.”
“I will not take my dollars or my less-than uterus to Hobby Lobby again.”
“High court rules in favor of #HobbyLobby” – what the fuck is #SCOTUS smoking? Kochcaine?”
“F-you Hobby Lobby, I hope all your stores burn to the ground.”
“Literally burn hobby lobby to the ground.”
“Hobby Lobby are scum of the earth. Burn every single one down, build a homeless shelter there instead.”
Can’t you just feel the diversity?
Then there’s Cecile Richards, an especially troubled soul, for she is one of the mucky-mucks over at Planned Parenthood, the leading child-killer in the country. She said, “It’s unbelievable that in 2014 we’re still fighting about whether women should have access to birth control.”
Um, we’re not.
Hobby Lobby already was offering its employees 16 of the 20 contraception methods Obamacare mandates before this argument arose. Hobby Lobby was simply posing the question is government allowed to violate the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion? Since Hobby Lobby’s religion teaches extinguishing innocent life is murder, and murder is against God’s Law, they claimed their freedom of religion exempts them from committing acts of murder according to their moral conscience. This battle wasn’t about access to birth control. It was about access to liberty.
Next is this post made by a liberal on my Facebook wall:
“What about the religious liberty of the employees? Besides it’s not a religious argument. Nothing in the Bible covers this topic. We get upset when anyone is denied equal protection under the law. Even you. Hobby Lobby invests in companies that make contraceptives. The height of hypocrisy.”
Here is how I replied to this gentleman:
“That is probably the stupidest thing I’ve seen said yet about this, and I’ve seen some absolutely idiotic feces spewed about this. You don’t have a religious liberty to have your behaviors subsidized by somebody else. Come on, man, please tell me you’re smarter than that. Besides, of their own free will the Greens were already offering their employees 16 of the 20 contraceptions Obamacare demands. There simply isn’t a logical argument for this, which is why they all sound dumb and amount to ‘I want to do what I want, and I want someone else to pay for it.’ As to your point about the Greens’ alleged hypocrisy, even if they were the worst hypocrites ever it wouldn’t change one word of the First Amendment. See, that’s the whole point of having the law based on a fixed standard so that your freedoms aren’t subject to the whims of fallible human beings like ourselves. This case isn’t about the Greens, it’s about the words written into the Constitution more than 200 years before Hobby Lobby was created.”
Sadly, the disputes did get dumber. Check out this email a listener sent to me after discussing this with one of his liberal friends:
“One of my liberal friends made an interesting point about the Hobby Lobby verdict. Their comment was what if you work for a Jehovah’s Witness and they deny you coverage because they don’t believe in blood transfusions? And the one I thought of was what if your boss is a Christian Scientist and doesn’t believe in doctors at all, only the power of prayer? Do they have the right to deny coverage to their employees even though the employees believe in doctors? What about the Amish?”
Here’s how I replied:
“Their argument is deeply flawed. It begins with the premise you’re entitled to any coverage from your employer, or anything else for that matter at all. You’re not entitled to anything. If you don’t like that employer and the salary/benefits they offer then don’t work there. Your employer can simply get around the Obamacare mandate altogether by having all his employees work part-time fewer than 29 hours a week, and some already are. Besides, in the example you’re citing the liberal is decrying a decision that he believes will kill people. However, not wanting to kill people is exactly why Hobby Lobby took this stand.
Ironic.
Oh, and if your sexual behavior is private then why does someone else have to pay for it?”
Finally, for the absolutely dumbest poop to flow from any pie-hole about this, look no further than presumptive 2016 Democrat nominee for president.
Hillary Clinton described the Hobby Lobby ruling as Sharia Law: “It is a disturbing trend that you see in a lot of societies that are very unstable, anti-democratic, and frankly prone to extremism,” Clinton said. “Where women and women’s bodies are used as the defining and unifying issue, because of their religion, their sect, their tribe, whatever.”
Where do I even begin?
You know why this isn’t like Sharia Law? Because Hillary hasn’t been “honor killed” for wearing a pant suit yet. The feminist icon is still alive, unlike the four dead Americans she left behind at Benghazi, but if she lived in a nation with Sharia Law she probably wouldn’t be.
Secondly, the legislation the majority of Supreme Court justices based their opinion on was signed by…wait for it…wait for it…President Bill Clinton! Justice Alito in the majority opinion specifically cited the “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” signed into law by President Clinton in 1993. Oh, by the way, that bill was sent to President Clinton’s desk by Democrat majorities in both chambers of Congress.
The Left’s hysterical reaction to the Hobby Lobby ruling shows yet again the difference between the GOP establishment and the grassroots. The establishment still wants to negotiate with these people, but we realize you cannot negotiate with people who fundamentally don’t believe in basic liberties like free speech and religious liberty. Combine those anti-American views with their entitlement mentality, and we’re essentially talking about Statists/Marxists here.
In the 1980s the Republican Party understood it couldn’t negotiate with the Statists in Moscow, but had to defeat them. I pray it will realize that about the Statists in our own nation today.
REFORMING IMMIGRATION REFORM
Rich Tucker
Gentlemen,” Herbert Hoover told visiting dignitaries in June of 1930, “you have come six weeks too late.” The Depression, he declared, was over. Sadly, for him and for the country, he wasn’t correct.
Still, sometimes you do arrive too late and miss all the action. Take the group of immigration reform activists who crashed Rep. Eric Cantor’s “victory” party in June. “What do we want? Immigration reform! When do we want it? Now!” they chanted. Two problems: Cantor had, like Elvis, already left the building. And because of the primary results, the former House Majority Leader will be leaving Congress in January.
Even if Cantor had prevailed at the ballot box, this would have been an odd protest. His defeat was, at least partly, because he was working to push through a “comprehensive” immigration reform measure.
Cantor spoke about immigration last year, in the midst of a long speech at the American Enterprise Institute. He touched on many excellent ideas over the course of that speech: Education reform that favors students rather than teacher unions. Reducing regulations to make new, better medicines available more quickly. Simplifying the tax code.
But he also addressed immigration.
“A good place to start is with the kids,” he announced. “It is time to provide an opportunity for legal residence and citizenship for those who were brought to this country as children and who know no other home.”
Well, that sounds an awful lot like the DREAM Act, which has been introduced some 30 times in several Congresses but never approved. President Obama, vastly overstepping his constitutional bounds, basically enacted such a policy via executive fiat in 2012. He ordered the Department of Homeland Security to defer deportation proceedings against an estimated 1.7 million illegal aliens.
The President himself had admitted that he doesn’t have the constitutional authority to implement the DREAM Act: “The idea of doing things on my own is very tempting, I promise you, not just on immigration reform. But that’s not how our system works. That’s not how our democracy functions,” he told Hispanic activists in 2011. But 2012 was an election year, and the move generated some good PR.
The problem with this approach is that it’s starting at the wrong end.
Dealing with children who’ve been brought here illegally is always going to be one of our country’s most difficult problems. So instead of getting bogged down on that while trying to pass “comprehensive” reform, lawmakers should start where there’s wide agreement: close the borders. Crack down on people working illegally. Force illegals to “tag up” in their home country before they can return here.
After these less controversial problems are solved, lawmakers could then turn to the more difficult problems, such as what to do with “the kids.”
Instead, we’re dealing with the fallout of Obama’s unilateral actions.
“Between 2008 and 2011, the number of children landing in the custody of Refugee Resettlement fluctuated between 6,000 and 7,500 per year” FOX reports. “In 2012 border agents apprehended 13,625 unaccompanied children and that number surged even more -- to 24,668 -- last year.” AsThe Economist reports, “A leaked border-agency memo based on interviews with 230 women and children apprehended in the Rio Grande Valley concluded that they had crossed the border mainly because they expected to be allowed to stay.” So we’re making the most contentious problem worse, instead of solving the problems we generally agree about.
Now the president is again vowing action. “The only thing I can't do is stand by and do nothing,” he says. So he’s asking Congress (what a concept!) for more money for detention facilities and more judges to speed the processing of those who’ve been caught here. It’s a start.
The United States is a nation of immigrants. We have always welcomed the rest of the world, and we will continue to do so. But it must be done on our terms, and to our benefit. That’s where immigration reform needs to start.
Taking reasonable steps that enjoy overwhelming approval would be far easier than trying to enact comprehensive reform. Lawmakers could the border under control. But they have to stop making the perfect (comprehensive reform) the enemy of the good.
Gentlemen,” Herbert Hoover told visiting dignitaries in June of 1930, “you have come six weeks too late.” The Depression, he declared, was over. Sadly, for him and for the country, he wasn’t correct.
Still, sometimes you do arrive too late and miss all the action. Take the group of immigration reform activists who crashed Rep. Eric Cantor’s “victory” party in June. “What do we want? Immigration reform! When do we want it? Now!” they chanted. Two problems: Cantor had, like Elvis, already left the building. And because of the primary results, the former House Majority Leader will be leaving Congress in January.
Even if Cantor had prevailed at the ballot box, this would have been an odd protest. His defeat was, at least partly, because he was working to push through a “comprehensive” immigration reform measure.
Cantor spoke about immigration last year, in the midst of a long speech at the American Enterprise Institute. He touched on many excellent ideas over the course of that speech: Education reform that favors students rather than teacher unions. Reducing regulations to make new, better medicines available more quickly. Simplifying the tax code.
But he also addressed immigration.
“A good place to start is with the kids,” he announced. “It is time to provide an opportunity for legal residence and citizenship for those who were brought to this country as children and who know no other home.”
Well, that sounds an awful lot like the DREAM Act, which has been introduced some 30 times in several Congresses but never approved. President Obama, vastly overstepping his constitutional bounds, basically enacted such a policy via executive fiat in 2012. He ordered the Department of Homeland Security to defer deportation proceedings against an estimated 1.7 million illegal aliens.
The President himself had admitted that he doesn’t have the constitutional authority to implement the DREAM Act: “The idea of doing things on my own is very tempting, I promise you, not just on immigration reform. But that’s not how our system works. That’s not how our democracy functions,” he told Hispanic activists in 2011. But 2012 was an election year, and the move generated some good PR.
The problem with this approach is that it’s starting at the wrong end.
Dealing with children who’ve been brought here illegally is always going to be one of our country’s most difficult problems. So instead of getting bogged down on that while trying to pass “comprehensive” reform, lawmakers should start where there’s wide agreement: close the borders. Crack down on people working illegally. Force illegals to “tag up” in their home country before they can return here.
After these less controversial problems are solved, lawmakers could then turn to the more difficult problems, such as what to do with “the kids.”
Instead, we’re dealing with the fallout of Obama’s unilateral actions.
“Between 2008 and 2011, the number of children landing in the custody of Refugee Resettlement fluctuated between 6,000 and 7,500 per year” FOX reports. “In 2012 border agents apprehended 13,625 unaccompanied children and that number surged even more -- to 24,668 -- last year.” AsThe Economist reports, “A leaked border-agency memo based on interviews with 230 women and children apprehended in the Rio Grande Valley concluded that they had crossed the border mainly because they expected to be allowed to stay.” So we’re making the most contentious problem worse, instead of solving the problems we generally agree about.
Now the president is again vowing action. “The only thing I can't do is stand by and do nothing,” he says. So he’s asking Congress (what a concept!) for more money for detention facilities and more judges to speed the processing of those who’ve been caught here. It’s a start.
The United States is a nation of immigrants. We have always welcomed the rest of the world, and we will continue to do so. But it must be done on our terms, and to our benefit. That’s where immigration reform needs to start.
Taking reasonable steps that enjoy overwhelming approval would be far easier than trying to enact comprehensive reform. Lawmakers could the border under control. But they have to stop making the perfect (comprehensive reform) the enemy of the good.
THE PRICE OF LIBERTY
Bill Tatro
James Madison, 4th President of the United States once said “A means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home”.
Barack Hussein Obama, 44th President of the United States said “I think it’s important to understand that you can’t have 100% security and then have 100% privacy and zero inconvenience. We’re going to have to make some choices as a society”.
Two differing opinions about the price of security and liberty. The 44th believes the Constitution was for another time and The Declaration of Independence and those so called “inalienable rights” reserved for a select few.
Troops stationed in front of one’s home, eavesdropping on private conversations, taxing for the benefit of a few (sound familiar) created such an environment that men such as Madison were willing to sacrifice their wealth, reputation, prestige, family and even life for a liberty that was “endowed by their Creator”.
The Founding Fathers knew only the security permitted by King George but were willing to make a “Declaration” for something different.
On this 4th of July it is not necessary to wonder how the Founding Fathers, including Hamilton, would have felt about the continuing decline of the liberty, that they so gallantly fought for, their words ring out loud and clear even today.
Many will take varying positions but most will couch them behind an Obamaesque pose of the trade off of liberty for security. They will say that the Founding Fathers would agree given the contemporary circumstances. After all, isn’t harassment at an airport justifiable in the face of terrorism.
However they, including the 44th, would be wrong! There was no justification for the sacrifice of liberty in 1776 nor is there any justification for that same sacrifice today.
Ben Franklin cries out 200 years later on this July 4th, 2014 and speaks for all the Founding Fathers and freedom loving Americans everywhere when he said
“FREEDOM IS NOT A GIFT BESTOWED UPON US BY OTHER MEN, BUT A RIGHT THAT BELONGS TO US BY THE LAWS OF GOD AND NATURE”
“THEY WHO WOULD GIVE UP AN ESSENTIAL LIBERTY FOR TEMPORARY SECURITY DESERVE NEITHER LIBERTY NOR SECURITY”.
James Madison, 4th President of the United States once said “A means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home”.
Barack Hussein Obama, 44th President of the United States said “I think it’s important to understand that you can’t have 100% security and then have 100% privacy and zero inconvenience. We’re going to have to make some choices as a society”.
Two differing opinions about the price of security and liberty. The 44th believes the Constitution was for another time and The Declaration of Independence and those so called “inalienable rights” reserved for a select few.
Troops stationed in front of one’s home, eavesdropping on private conversations, taxing for the benefit of a few (sound familiar) created such an environment that men such as Madison were willing to sacrifice their wealth, reputation, prestige, family and even life for a liberty that was “endowed by their Creator”.
The Founding Fathers knew only the security permitted by King George but were willing to make a “Declaration” for something different.
On this 4th of July it is not necessary to wonder how the Founding Fathers, including Hamilton, would have felt about the continuing decline of the liberty, that they so gallantly fought for, their words ring out loud and clear even today.
Many will take varying positions but most will couch them behind an Obamaesque pose of the trade off of liberty for security. They will say that the Founding Fathers would agree given the contemporary circumstances. After all, isn’t harassment at an airport justifiable in the face of terrorism.
However they, including the 44th, would be wrong! There was no justification for the sacrifice of liberty in 1776 nor is there any justification for that same sacrifice today.
Ben Franklin cries out 200 years later on this July 4th, 2014 and speaks for all the Founding Fathers and freedom loving Americans everywhere when he said
“FREEDOM IS NOT A GIFT BESTOWED UPON US BY OTHER MEN, BUT A RIGHT THAT BELONGS TO US BY THE LAWS OF GOD AND NATURE”
“THEY WHO WOULD GIVE UP AN ESSENTIAL LIBERTY FOR TEMPORARY SECURITY DESERVE NEITHER LIBERTY NOR SECURITY”.
SOMETHING TO CELEBRATE
Linda Chavez
This week marks not only the 238th anniversary of the founding of our nation, but also the 50th anniversary of the signing of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The principles contained in our founding document, the Declaration of Independence, took nearly 200 years to find their fulfillment in the Civil Rights Act. The declaration that "all men are created equal" was a radical one, more aspirational than real at a time when slavery was not only practiced but would soon be legitimated in our Constitution.
It took a Civil War, with its 750,000 dead, and decades of legal and political struggle and more deaths for those words to be given full meaning. But on July 2, 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the hard-fought legislation that would turn an abstract principle into the law of the land.
We take for granted now that anyone can take a seat at a lunch counter or register at a hotel of his or her choosing, regardless of skin color. We don't think twice about women being admitted to medical or law school or joining the police force. There are no advertisements for men's jobs or women's jobs, and employers cannot choose to pay whites more than non-whites who perform the same work.
Yet, these practices are relatively new in our nation's history and certainly would not have become the rule were it not for the legislation that banned discrimination on the basis of race, sex and national origin.
At a time when legislation has become increasingly lengthy and obtuse, the 1964 Civil Rights Act is concise and clear in its wording, if not always in the interpretations that have followed.
The act covers several areas, most prominently public accommodations, school desegregation, federal funding and employment. Ironically, equal access to public accommodations, which seems totally uncontroversial today, sparked the civil rights movement of the 1950s and '60s. In 1955, Rosa Parks, a black seamstress in Montgomery, Ala., refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on the city's segregated bus system. Her arrest sparked protests that led to a bus boycott, from which a then little-known leader emerged, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
In the years immediately preceding passage of the Civil Rights Act, protests spread throughout the South. Through King's leadership, those who wanted to test segregation laws and customs did so by practicing nonviolent civil disobedience. "Freedom riders," whites and blacks committed to civil rights, rode buses into the South to engage in sit-ins at lunch counters and marches through the streets to protest segregation. When these peaceful demonstrators were met with increasing violence -- beaten, drenched and driven back with powerful fire hoses -- the pictures that filled evening newscasts throughout the nation helped create the public momentum that led Congress to act.
By 1963, more than a thousand major protests had taken place in more than 200 American cities, spreading from the South, where segregation and unequal treatment were enshrined in law, to the North, where discrimination was widely practiced if not given legal justification. Public opinion polls of the era showed increasing support for integrating schools and neighborhoods and outlawing discrimination on the basis of race, with the overwhelming majority of northern whites, 75 percent, favoring integrated public schools.
President John F. Kennedy proposed a new civil rights law in a nationally televised speech in June of 1963. He, of course, did not live to see legislation passed, because he was assassinated less than six months later. But Congress managed, with great debate and political wrangling, to pass legislation. On Feb. 10, 1964, the House passed its version of the legislation, with a far higher proportion of Republicans voting in favor than Democrats: 138-34 Republicans to 152-96 Democrats.
The Senate followed suit only after a filibuster, which allowed unlimited debate and prevented the bill from being voted on for two months and paralyzed all other activity in the Senate, was finally ended by a vote to end debate. Again, the so-called cloture vote, which required two-thirds of senators to vote to cut off debate and bring the bill to a vote, had stronger support among Republicans than Democrats.
We are a better country today for the efforts of those who sought to outlaw discrimination. It is worth remembering their struggles as we honor our nation's founding in celebrations this week.
This week marks not only the 238th anniversary of the founding of our nation, but also the 50th anniversary of the signing of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The principles contained in our founding document, the Declaration of Independence, took nearly 200 years to find their fulfillment in the Civil Rights Act. The declaration that "all men are created equal" was a radical one, more aspirational than real at a time when slavery was not only practiced but would soon be legitimated in our Constitution.
It took a Civil War, with its 750,000 dead, and decades of legal and political struggle and more deaths for those words to be given full meaning. But on July 2, 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the hard-fought legislation that would turn an abstract principle into the law of the land.
We take for granted now that anyone can take a seat at a lunch counter or register at a hotel of his or her choosing, regardless of skin color. We don't think twice about women being admitted to medical or law school or joining the police force. There are no advertisements for men's jobs or women's jobs, and employers cannot choose to pay whites more than non-whites who perform the same work.
Yet, these practices are relatively new in our nation's history and certainly would not have become the rule were it not for the legislation that banned discrimination on the basis of race, sex and national origin.
At a time when legislation has become increasingly lengthy and obtuse, the 1964 Civil Rights Act is concise and clear in its wording, if not always in the interpretations that have followed.
The act covers several areas, most prominently public accommodations, school desegregation, federal funding and employment. Ironically, equal access to public accommodations, which seems totally uncontroversial today, sparked the civil rights movement of the 1950s and '60s. In 1955, Rosa Parks, a black seamstress in Montgomery, Ala., refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on the city's segregated bus system. Her arrest sparked protests that led to a bus boycott, from which a then little-known leader emerged, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
In the years immediately preceding passage of the Civil Rights Act, protests spread throughout the South. Through King's leadership, those who wanted to test segregation laws and customs did so by practicing nonviolent civil disobedience. "Freedom riders," whites and blacks committed to civil rights, rode buses into the South to engage in sit-ins at lunch counters and marches through the streets to protest segregation. When these peaceful demonstrators were met with increasing violence -- beaten, drenched and driven back with powerful fire hoses -- the pictures that filled evening newscasts throughout the nation helped create the public momentum that led Congress to act.
By 1963, more than a thousand major protests had taken place in more than 200 American cities, spreading from the South, where segregation and unequal treatment were enshrined in law, to the North, where discrimination was widely practiced if not given legal justification. Public opinion polls of the era showed increasing support for integrating schools and neighborhoods and outlawing discrimination on the basis of race, with the overwhelming majority of northern whites, 75 percent, favoring integrated public schools.
President John F. Kennedy proposed a new civil rights law in a nationally televised speech in June of 1963. He, of course, did not live to see legislation passed, because he was assassinated less than six months later. But Congress managed, with great debate and political wrangling, to pass legislation. On Feb. 10, 1964, the House passed its version of the legislation, with a far higher proportion of Republicans voting in favor than Democrats: 138-34 Republicans to 152-96 Democrats.
The Senate followed suit only after a filibuster, which allowed unlimited debate and prevented the bill from being voted on for two months and paralyzed all other activity in the Senate, was finally ended by a vote to end debate. Again, the so-called cloture vote, which required two-thirds of senators to vote to cut off debate and bring the bill to a vote, had stronger support among Republicans than Democrats.
We are a better country today for the efforts of those who sought to outlaw discrimination. It is worth remembering their struggles as we honor our nation's founding in celebrations this week.
A NEW EVANGELIZING FOREIGN POLICY
Brent Bozell
In the George W. Bush years, liberals were routinely shocked and awed that the Bush administration would obliterate their sacred wall of separation between church and state. They frowned on federal faith-based initiatives and worried about the bureaucracy being invaded by frightening people with college degrees from Christian schools like Liberty University, Regent University or Catholic University.
Government was no place to be spreading a dangerous Christian majoritarianism with a swaggering certitude that wouldn't tolerate opposing views and respect minority opinions. The media presented the Bushies as -- to quote a slur from NBC anchor Brian Williams -- "anti-gay, pro-Jesus and anti-abortion, and no gray matter in between."
But what happened when the Obama administration came in and imposed its own gospel, the good news of "LGBT inclusion"? Interviewing Hillary Clinton a few days ago, NPR host Terry Gross first honored her for really pushing socially leftist ideology as secretary of state, especially on transgender rights. "You added gender identity to the State Department's equal employment opportunity policy, and you made it easier for Americans to change their sex on their passport."
This spirit of the age was demonstrated at the vice president's mansion on Tuesday, where Joe Biden, who regularly boasts about his Catholic schooling (though apparently he learned nothing about Catholic thought), said hidebound old religious cultures had to be junked in every nation on the planet. "I don't care what your culture is," Biden thundered to about 100 guests, "inhumanity is inhumanity is inhumanity! Prejudice is prejudice is prejudice!"
We are counting the days until this buffoon is retired.
In this administration, there is no respect for opposing views on marriage or gender or homosexuality, especially those based on religion. They must be eliminated as "prejudice."
In 2011, the State Department created a public-private Global Equality Fund to subsidize leftist LGBT advocacy groups around the world. They boast they've "provided over $7.5 million to civil society in over 50 countries worldwide" to build an "organizational capacity for human rights documentation, advocacy, legal reform, and organizational development" and "to combat negative social attitudes and societal discrimination." How's that for a good use of tax dollars?
And that's not all. In 2013, the U.S. Agency for International Development created an LGBT Global Development Partnership that will "contribute $11 million over the next four years to advocacy groups in Ecuador, Honduras, Guatemala and other developing countries."
In his new book "Making Gay Okay," Robert Reilly offers an entire chapter on the promotion of this libertine-left agenda as a major objective of U.S. foreign policy. In El Salvador, acting ambassador Mari Carmen Aponte wrote an op-ed in a Salvadoran newspaper in 2011 titled "For the Elimination of Prejudices Wherever They Exist."
Aponte wrote: "No one should be subjected to aggression because of who he is or who he loves. Homophobia and brutal hostility are often based on lack of understanding about what it truly means to be gay or transgender," an ignorance spread by "those who promote hatred."
Which includes nearly everyone who promotes the Bible.
Around the world, the Obama administration has been thrilled to hold gay pride events at U.S. Embassies promoting the LGBT agenda, from Kenya to Laos to Pakistan. The State Department promotes the legalization and normalization of the whole libertine laundry list.
The leftist website Jezebel explained that this policy "could be seen as a new type of neo-colonialist interference by the United States." The developing world isn't developing fast enough for President Barack Obama, Biden, Hillary Clinton and now John Kerry. The U.S. message for a new American century? Religious people should just shut up, because "prejudice is prejudice is prejudice."
In the George W. Bush years, liberals were routinely shocked and awed that the Bush administration would obliterate their sacred wall of separation between church and state. They frowned on federal faith-based initiatives and worried about the bureaucracy being invaded by frightening people with college degrees from Christian schools like Liberty University, Regent University or Catholic University.
Government was no place to be spreading a dangerous Christian majoritarianism with a swaggering certitude that wouldn't tolerate opposing views and respect minority opinions. The media presented the Bushies as -- to quote a slur from NBC anchor Brian Williams -- "anti-gay, pro-Jesus and anti-abortion, and no gray matter in between."
But what happened when the Obama administration came in and imposed its own gospel, the good news of "LGBT inclusion"? Interviewing Hillary Clinton a few days ago, NPR host Terry Gross first honored her for really pushing socially leftist ideology as secretary of state, especially on transgender rights. "You added gender identity to the State Department's equal employment opportunity policy, and you made it easier for Americans to change their sex on their passport."
This spirit of the age was demonstrated at the vice president's mansion on Tuesday, where Joe Biden, who regularly boasts about his Catholic schooling (though apparently he learned nothing about Catholic thought), said hidebound old religious cultures had to be junked in every nation on the planet. "I don't care what your culture is," Biden thundered to about 100 guests, "inhumanity is inhumanity is inhumanity! Prejudice is prejudice is prejudice!"
We are counting the days until this buffoon is retired.
In this administration, there is no respect for opposing views on marriage or gender or homosexuality, especially those based on religion. They must be eliminated as "prejudice."
In 2011, the State Department created a public-private Global Equality Fund to subsidize leftist LGBT advocacy groups around the world. They boast they've "provided over $7.5 million to civil society in over 50 countries worldwide" to build an "organizational capacity for human rights documentation, advocacy, legal reform, and organizational development" and "to combat negative social attitudes and societal discrimination." How's that for a good use of tax dollars?
And that's not all. In 2013, the U.S. Agency for International Development created an LGBT Global Development Partnership that will "contribute $11 million over the next four years to advocacy groups in Ecuador, Honduras, Guatemala and other developing countries."
In his new book "Making Gay Okay," Robert Reilly offers an entire chapter on the promotion of this libertine-left agenda as a major objective of U.S. foreign policy. In El Salvador, acting ambassador Mari Carmen Aponte wrote an op-ed in a Salvadoran newspaper in 2011 titled "For the Elimination of Prejudices Wherever They Exist."
Aponte wrote: "No one should be subjected to aggression because of who he is or who he loves. Homophobia and brutal hostility are often based on lack of understanding about what it truly means to be gay or transgender," an ignorance spread by "those who promote hatred."
Which includes nearly everyone who promotes the Bible.
Around the world, the Obama administration has been thrilled to hold gay pride events at U.S. Embassies promoting the LGBT agenda, from Kenya to Laos to Pakistan. The State Department promotes the legalization and normalization of the whole libertine laundry list.
The leftist website Jezebel explained that this policy "could be seen as a new type of neo-colonialist interference by the United States." The developing world isn't developing fast enough for President Barack Obama, Biden, Hillary Clinton and now John Kerry. The U.S. message for a new American century? Religious people should just shut up, because "prejudice is prejudice is prejudice."
THE WRONG TYPE OF VALUES
Erick Erickson
When the rights of individuals clash, both sides should be willing to step back and recognize that both have rights. When in conflict, neither side is truly winning nor losing. Each gets their rights and can disagree. But the political left in America has decided its rights and values are the only acceptable ones in our republic. That they lost in the Supreme Court this past week has sent liberals in America on a weeklong hysterical binge of fact distortion and fabrication.
Last Monday, the United States Supreme Court ruled that Hobby Lobby's owners do not have to provide four abortifacient drugs in its insurance plans. Liberals pounced on this ruling and decried it as discrimination against women, which it was not. They also alleged the Supreme Court had made it possible for Hobby Lobby to deny all forms of birth control coverage, which Hobby Lobby never asked for.
The store provides coverage for 16 forms of birth control in its insurance plans. In fact, Hobby Lobby allows coverage for birth control prescriptions to be used for other issues, too. As many are aware, sometimes women are prescribed birth control for issues other than pregnancy prevention. Hobby Lobby's insurance plan covers and permits those prescriptions.
Hobby Lobby's owners are, however, Christians. They believe in the sanctity of life. So Hobby Lobby objected to the government's demands that it provide four medications that cause abortion. The four medications Hobby Lobby objects to are not prescribed for other maters. They are prescribed to induce the destruction of a child.
The Supreme Court ruled that a closely held corporation can, under legislation passed by Democrats and signed by Bill Clinton in the early 90s, avoid the government mandate because the government is able to satisfy its own requirement through means that do not impinge on the religious rights of Hobby Lobby's owners.
In other words, Hobby Lobby's female employees can still get access to abortifacient drugs without Hobby Lobby having to pay for them. The government had already given ample exceptions to its own mandate, which the Court took as evidence that there were other ways to carry out the mandate without burdening the religious convictions of Hobby Lobby's owners.
What is so striking in this case is that the left has spent the last decade demanding American corporations maintain high ethical values and treat their workers with dignity. Hobby Lobby should be a model for other corporations. The business closes earlier than its competitors so its workers can go home early to their families. The business pays well above minimum wage. It promotes its workers internally more often than it brings in outsiders to take jobs. Hobby Lobby closes on Sundays and most holidays so its workers can be at home with their families.
In fact, Hobby Lobby exhibits the behavior the left has demanded of businesses for years. It provides generous pay and benefits, including an excellent retirement plan and health care benefits. But Hobby Lobby is a closely held business. It is not publicly traded on the stock exchange. Rather, it is owned by one family -- the Green family. David and Barbara Green and their family are committed Christians.
Christians believe in a doctrine of vocation -- they believe their job is another form of ministry through which they can glorify God. The Green family made a conscious decision to operate Hobby Lobby as not just a business earning a profit, but as a ministry to preach the Gospel. Their business advertising quotes scripture. Their workplace rules are designed to support families. But because they are Christians, they are pro-life and do not want to be complicit in aborting children. Their values reflect that, too.
Unfortunately for the Green family, that one value means their entire company is an abomination to the left. Their generous pay, work hours, and benefits are all for naught because of four prescriptions they refuse to provide. Their religious values conflict with those of the left, and, but for five votes of the Supreme Court, they would pay a substantial price for having the wrong values.
The peddlers of tolerance will tolerate no dissent on this issue.
When the rights of individuals clash, both sides should be willing to step back and recognize that both have rights. When in conflict, neither side is truly winning nor losing. Each gets their rights and can disagree. But the political left in America has decided its rights and values are the only acceptable ones in our republic. That they lost in the Supreme Court this past week has sent liberals in America on a weeklong hysterical binge of fact distortion and fabrication.
Last Monday, the United States Supreme Court ruled that Hobby Lobby's owners do not have to provide four abortifacient drugs in its insurance plans. Liberals pounced on this ruling and decried it as discrimination against women, which it was not. They also alleged the Supreme Court had made it possible for Hobby Lobby to deny all forms of birth control coverage, which Hobby Lobby never asked for.
The store provides coverage for 16 forms of birth control in its insurance plans. In fact, Hobby Lobby allows coverage for birth control prescriptions to be used for other issues, too. As many are aware, sometimes women are prescribed birth control for issues other than pregnancy prevention. Hobby Lobby's insurance plan covers and permits those prescriptions.
Hobby Lobby's owners are, however, Christians. They believe in the sanctity of life. So Hobby Lobby objected to the government's demands that it provide four medications that cause abortion. The four medications Hobby Lobby objects to are not prescribed for other maters. They are prescribed to induce the destruction of a child.
The Supreme Court ruled that a closely held corporation can, under legislation passed by Democrats and signed by Bill Clinton in the early 90s, avoid the government mandate because the government is able to satisfy its own requirement through means that do not impinge on the religious rights of Hobby Lobby's owners.
In other words, Hobby Lobby's female employees can still get access to abortifacient drugs without Hobby Lobby having to pay for them. The government had already given ample exceptions to its own mandate, which the Court took as evidence that there were other ways to carry out the mandate without burdening the religious convictions of Hobby Lobby's owners.
What is so striking in this case is that the left has spent the last decade demanding American corporations maintain high ethical values and treat their workers with dignity. Hobby Lobby should be a model for other corporations. The business closes earlier than its competitors so its workers can go home early to their families. The business pays well above minimum wage. It promotes its workers internally more often than it brings in outsiders to take jobs. Hobby Lobby closes on Sundays and most holidays so its workers can be at home with their families.
In fact, Hobby Lobby exhibits the behavior the left has demanded of businesses for years. It provides generous pay and benefits, including an excellent retirement plan and health care benefits. But Hobby Lobby is a closely held business. It is not publicly traded on the stock exchange. Rather, it is owned by one family -- the Green family. David and Barbara Green and their family are committed Christians.
Christians believe in a doctrine of vocation -- they believe their job is another form of ministry through which they can glorify God. The Green family made a conscious decision to operate Hobby Lobby as not just a business earning a profit, but as a ministry to preach the Gospel. Their business advertising quotes scripture. Their workplace rules are designed to support families. But because they are Christians, they are pro-life and do not want to be complicit in aborting children. Their values reflect that, too.
Unfortunately for the Green family, that one value means their entire company is an abomination to the left. Their generous pay, work hours, and benefits are all for naught because of four prescriptions they refuse to provide. Their religious values conflict with those of the left, and, but for five votes of the Supreme Court, they would pay a substantial price for having the wrong values.
The peddlers of tolerance will tolerate no dissent on this issue.
INDIA, CHINA AND THE MOU ON BRAHMAPUTRA
Wasbir Hussain
India and China signed three Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) during the Indian Vice President Hamid Ansari’s recent five-day visit to Beijing from 26 June– 1 July. One of them was on the ‘flood data’ of the Brahmaputra River – also called the Yarlung Tsangpo in China. In the past, we have heard of similar MoUs between the two neighbours on the Brahmaputra, and it is all about the sharing of the hydrological data of Brahmaputra River during monsoons. In the latest MoU on the subject that was signed on 30 June – in presence of Indian Vice President Ansari and his Chinese counterpart Li Yuanchao – Beijing agreed to provide 15 days’ additional hydrological data—from 15 May 15 to 15 October each year.
Bluntly put, the latest MoU on the Brahmaputra flood data means nothing as an additional 15 days worth of hydrological information will not enable India to deal with the problem any differently. What India needs is input from the Chinese side on dams and other projects Beijing is pursuing or intends to pursue based on the waters of the Yarlung Tsangpo. The 510 MW Zangmu dam built at the Gyaca County in the Shannan Prefecture of China’s Tibet Autonomous Region is expected to be commissioned next year. What must be noted is that Beijing has given clearance for the construction of 27 other dams on the Yarlung Tsangpo River that flows 1625 kilometres across China, and 918 kilometres through India in its downstream course.
Moreover, China actually plans to divert water at the Great Bend, located just before where the river enters India, also known as the Shoumatan Point; and also intends to build hydroelectric power projects that could generate 40,000 MWs of power. The plan to divert the Brahmaputra is a reality because China wants to solve the water scarcity in its arid northern areas. The diversion of the water is part of a larger hydro-engineering project, the South-North water diversion scheme, which involves three man-made rivers carrying water to its northern parts. If the water is diverted, the water levels of the Brahmaputra will drop significantly, affecting India's Northeastern region, and Bangladesh. Estimates suggest that the total water flow will fall by roughly 60 per cent if China successfully diverts the Brahmaputra. Besides, it will severely impact agriculture and fishing as the salinity of water will increase, as will silting in the downstream area.
With an unprecedented mandate and a demonstrated policy to improve ties with its neighbours, the new Narendra Modi government in New Delhi can initiate setting up of something like a South Asia Shared Rivers Commission or Authority by bringing Bangladesh, Myanmar, Bhutan and Nepal on board. The Commission can begin by formulating a framework agreement among the states that share rivers for their use, development, protection, conservation and management of the water and related resources, and establish an institutional mechanism for cooperation among these states. Once such a commission emerges and a cooperative framework on the shared rivers is agreed upon by the concerned states, it can engage with China and try to bring Beijing on board. After all, eleven major rivers flow out of China to countries in its neighbourhood and there is enough commonality of interest.
Cooperation on the Brahmaputra with China is of utmost importance to India and Bangladesh. The principle of cooperation between China, India and Bangladesh—the Brahmaputra basin states—can be on the basis of sovereign equality, territorial integrity, mutual benefit and good faith in order to attain optimal utilisation and adequate protection; conservation of the Brahmaputra River Basin; and to promote joint efforts to achieve social and economic development. These actually are the guiding principles of an effective and successful Nile River Valley Cooperative Framework (NRVCF) involving Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), as well as Eritrea as an observer. The NRVCF has enough flexibility in the sense that two of the nations who are part of the Framework can have certain specific bilateral understanding or arrangements. What is significant is that every member nation must maintain total transparency on its plans about utilising the resources of the shared river and inform the states concerned of any project at hand.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has already demonstrated India’s big power ambitions by his proactive foreign policy push, will be well advised to come up with a comprehensive shared river water policy, keeping China’s plans and/or intents in mind. Delay may cost India dearly and we may have a case of non-utilisation of waters of shared rivers such as the Brahmaputra – one that has neither being tapped for hydro-power or navigation, 26 years after it was declared National Waterways Number Two.
India and China signed three Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) during the Indian Vice President Hamid Ansari’s recent five-day visit to Beijing from 26 June– 1 July. One of them was on the ‘flood data’ of the Brahmaputra River – also called the Yarlung Tsangpo in China. In the past, we have heard of similar MoUs between the two neighbours on the Brahmaputra, and it is all about the sharing of the hydrological data of Brahmaputra River during monsoons. In the latest MoU on the subject that was signed on 30 June – in presence of Indian Vice President Ansari and his Chinese counterpart Li Yuanchao – Beijing agreed to provide 15 days’ additional hydrological data—from 15 May 15 to 15 October each year.
Bluntly put, the latest MoU on the Brahmaputra flood data means nothing as an additional 15 days worth of hydrological information will not enable India to deal with the problem any differently. What India needs is input from the Chinese side on dams and other projects Beijing is pursuing or intends to pursue based on the waters of the Yarlung Tsangpo. The 510 MW Zangmu dam built at the Gyaca County in the Shannan Prefecture of China’s Tibet Autonomous Region is expected to be commissioned next year. What must be noted is that Beijing has given clearance for the construction of 27 other dams on the Yarlung Tsangpo River that flows 1625 kilometres across China, and 918 kilometres through India in its downstream course.
Moreover, China actually plans to divert water at the Great Bend, located just before where the river enters India, also known as the Shoumatan Point; and also intends to build hydroelectric power projects that could generate 40,000 MWs of power. The plan to divert the Brahmaputra is a reality because China wants to solve the water scarcity in its arid northern areas. The diversion of the water is part of a larger hydro-engineering project, the South-North water diversion scheme, which involves three man-made rivers carrying water to its northern parts. If the water is diverted, the water levels of the Brahmaputra will drop significantly, affecting India's Northeastern region, and Bangladesh. Estimates suggest that the total water flow will fall by roughly 60 per cent if China successfully diverts the Brahmaputra. Besides, it will severely impact agriculture and fishing as the salinity of water will increase, as will silting in the downstream area.
With an unprecedented mandate and a demonstrated policy to improve ties with its neighbours, the new Narendra Modi government in New Delhi can initiate setting up of something like a South Asia Shared Rivers Commission or Authority by bringing Bangladesh, Myanmar, Bhutan and Nepal on board. The Commission can begin by formulating a framework agreement among the states that share rivers for their use, development, protection, conservation and management of the water and related resources, and establish an institutional mechanism for cooperation among these states. Once such a commission emerges and a cooperative framework on the shared rivers is agreed upon by the concerned states, it can engage with China and try to bring Beijing on board. After all, eleven major rivers flow out of China to countries in its neighbourhood and there is enough commonality of interest.
Cooperation on the Brahmaputra with China is of utmost importance to India and Bangladesh. The principle of cooperation between China, India and Bangladesh—the Brahmaputra basin states—can be on the basis of sovereign equality, territorial integrity, mutual benefit and good faith in order to attain optimal utilisation and adequate protection; conservation of the Brahmaputra River Basin; and to promote joint efforts to achieve social and economic development. These actually are the guiding principles of an effective and successful Nile River Valley Cooperative Framework (NRVCF) involving Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), as well as Eritrea as an observer. The NRVCF has enough flexibility in the sense that two of the nations who are part of the Framework can have certain specific bilateral understanding or arrangements. What is significant is that every member nation must maintain total transparency on its plans about utilising the resources of the shared river and inform the states concerned of any project at hand.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who has already demonstrated India’s big power ambitions by his proactive foreign policy push, will be well advised to come up with a comprehensive shared river water policy, keeping China’s plans and/or intents in mind. Delay may cost India dearly and we may have a case of non-utilisation of waters of shared rivers such as the Brahmaputra – one that has neither being tapped for hydro-power or navigation, 26 years after it was declared National Waterways Number Two.
3 Jul 2014
OBAMA: BORDERING ON DISASTER
Brian and Garrett Fahy
Since the 1648 Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years’ War, the conception of “Westphalian sovereignty” has been understood to mean that individual nation states control the sovereignty of their borders, without meddling by neighbor states, and that separate states stand on some degree of equal footing by respecting each other’s borders. For over 350 years, the system more or less worked, as endless wars have been fought to maintain borders and re-establish borders compromised by aggressors, e.g. the Sudetenland in World War 2.
However, globalization, the development of regional political entities (the EU), the rise of international institutions (the UN), and the development of non-state actors (al Qaeda), have challenged the Westphalian paradigm. Today, porous borders pose the greatest threats to states by facilitating political upheaval, economic chaos, and worst of all, terrorism, as on 9/11.
The effects of a porous border policy magnify the weaknesses of a leader by revealing the consequences of his ineptitude in ways other failings cannot. President Obama has countless such problems, but three border conflicts clearly illustrate the consequences of his incompetence, and the effects at home and abroad.
First, Ukraine. In the fall of 2013, Ukraine, a small light for freedom in a sea of post-Soviet political darkness, stood on the precipice of NATO membership. Vladimir Putin read the political tea leaves and disliked what he saw. After taking the measure of President Obama, no doubt an emboldening experience for the former KGBer, Putin sent his special forces, the Spetsnaz, into Eastern Ukraine to foment insurrection.
President Obama, asleep at the switch amidst the false confidence of his Administration’s pathetic “reset,” watched Russia make a mockery of Ukraine’s borders as it strolled into the Crimea and annexed it before NATO knew what was happening. Since then, Ukraine has been under siege by Moscow and has been subject to military and economic assault. Putin sets the agenda as statesman provocateur, while the president lamely sends the world’s most feckless diplomat, the wind-surfing John Kerry, to scold Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov. To no one’s great surprise, Lavrov politely ignores Kerry.
Second, Iraq. President Obama conveniently withdrew troops to match the political calendar so he could boast about ending the “dumb war.” He is the only one looking foolish now, as the stability Iraq enjoyed at Obama’s inauguration has given way to sectarian civil war. Hard fought American gains from the surge were lost in mere days as cities with familiar names – Mosul, Tikrit, Fallujah – fell back under terrorist control.
After quickly and easily overrunning Iraq’s fledgling army with weapons recently provided by the American taxpayer, ISIS promptly declared the existence of an Islamic caliphate. Reaching from Syria almost into Baghdad, the succinctly named entity, “The Islamic State,” renders non-existent almost overnight Iraq’s western border with Syria. In response, the president lamely sends 500 military advisers to protect the Americans who haven’t been evacuated. Faint echoes of Benghazi, or Saigon, can be heard.
Third, Mexico. Seeking political domination through an increased Latino vote, and not trifling with that annoyingly inconvenient co-equal branch of government called Congress, the President has by executive order re-written existing immigration laws, granted de facto legal status to millions of young illegal immigrants, and encouraged an open border.
Not surprisingly, Central America heard the message loud and clear. Hundreds of thousands of people, including children as young as ten, have made the dangerous trek through Mexico and across the border to the United States. If you travel as a family, the rumor goes, Obama will allow you to stay.
To accomplish this journey, many immigrants rely on the drug cartels for passage, to which they pay upwards of $7,000 per person for transport. The money is apparently not much of a deterrent, however. “This year, Border Patrol agents across the Southwest have detained more than 52,000 unaccompanied minors, with a particular concentration along the Rio Grande border in Texas, according to federal records,” reports the Los Angeles Times. The president’s actions have separated families, created a humanitarian disaster, brought violence and crime to the border areas of Texas and Arizona, and empowered the cartels. Quite the record.
Americans understand failure when they see it, and they are seeing it aplenty across the world. Or, if you live in El Paso, Texas, Murrieta, California, or Nogales, Arizona, in your own backyard. Unsurprisingly, a clear majority of respondents in recent New York Times/CBS News and Real Clear Politics polls disapprove of the president’s handling of Iraq and foreign affairs generally. It’s not difficult to imagine even worse poll results for his handling of the immigration disaster unfolding along the country’s southern border.
An America incapable of rising to meet the challenges of globalization at home and abroad produces only one result: a more dangerous, dysfunctional world. There is no back-up to America, no plan B, no other indispensable nation. Turkey will not root out radical Islamic terrorism in the Middle East. Mexico will not secure America’s borders. Americans know this, and they are increasingly willing to take action where Washington will not.
After outraged citizens of Murrieta, California turned away buses of illegal immigrants headed for a federal immigration processing facility there, Murrieta’s mayor Alan Long stated, “Murrieta expects our government to enforce our laws, including the deportation of illegal immigrants caught crossing our borders, not disperse them into our local communities.” Americans might not vote to send troops to Ukraine or Iraq, but they know when fecklessness abroad begins to take root at home. The time is coming when Americans will no longer put up with their government’s refusal or unwillingness to protect them and America’s sovereignty by securing our borders. Perhaps, God willing, that time is already here.
Since the 1648 Peace of Westphalia ended the Thirty Years’ War, the conception of “Westphalian sovereignty” has been understood to mean that individual nation states control the sovereignty of their borders, without meddling by neighbor states, and that separate states stand on some degree of equal footing by respecting each other’s borders. For over 350 years, the system more or less worked, as endless wars have been fought to maintain borders and re-establish borders compromised by aggressors, e.g. the Sudetenland in World War 2.
However, globalization, the development of regional political entities (the EU), the rise of international institutions (the UN), and the development of non-state actors (al Qaeda), have challenged the Westphalian paradigm. Today, porous borders pose the greatest threats to states by facilitating political upheaval, economic chaos, and worst of all, terrorism, as on 9/11.
The effects of a porous border policy magnify the weaknesses of a leader by revealing the consequences of his ineptitude in ways other failings cannot. President Obama has countless such problems, but three border conflicts clearly illustrate the consequences of his incompetence, and the effects at home and abroad.
First, Ukraine. In the fall of 2013, Ukraine, a small light for freedom in a sea of post-Soviet political darkness, stood on the precipice of NATO membership. Vladimir Putin read the political tea leaves and disliked what he saw. After taking the measure of President Obama, no doubt an emboldening experience for the former KGBer, Putin sent his special forces, the Spetsnaz, into Eastern Ukraine to foment insurrection.
President Obama, asleep at the switch amidst the false confidence of his Administration’s pathetic “reset,” watched Russia make a mockery of Ukraine’s borders as it strolled into the Crimea and annexed it before NATO knew what was happening. Since then, Ukraine has been under siege by Moscow and has been subject to military and economic assault. Putin sets the agenda as statesman provocateur, while the president lamely sends the world’s most feckless diplomat, the wind-surfing John Kerry, to scold Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov. To no one’s great surprise, Lavrov politely ignores Kerry.
Second, Iraq. President Obama conveniently withdrew troops to match the political calendar so he could boast about ending the “dumb war.” He is the only one looking foolish now, as the stability Iraq enjoyed at Obama’s inauguration has given way to sectarian civil war. Hard fought American gains from the surge were lost in mere days as cities with familiar names – Mosul, Tikrit, Fallujah – fell back under terrorist control.
After quickly and easily overrunning Iraq’s fledgling army with weapons recently provided by the American taxpayer, ISIS promptly declared the existence of an Islamic caliphate. Reaching from Syria almost into Baghdad, the succinctly named entity, “The Islamic State,” renders non-existent almost overnight Iraq’s western border with Syria. In response, the president lamely sends 500 military advisers to protect the Americans who haven’t been evacuated. Faint echoes of Benghazi, or Saigon, can be heard.
Third, Mexico. Seeking political domination through an increased Latino vote, and not trifling with that annoyingly inconvenient co-equal branch of government called Congress, the President has by executive order re-written existing immigration laws, granted de facto legal status to millions of young illegal immigrants, and encouraged an open border.
Not surprisingly, Central America heard the message loud and clear. Hundreds of thousands of people, including children as young as ten, have made the dangerous trek through Mexico and across the border to the United States. If you travel as a family, the rumor goes, Obama will allow you to stay.
To accomplish this journey, many immigrants rely on the drug cartels for passage, to which they pay upwards of $7,000 per person for transport. The money is apparently not much of a deterrent, however. “This year, Border Patrol agents across the Southwest have detained more than 52,000 unaccompanied minors, with a particular concentration along the Rio Grande border in Texas, according to federal records,” reports the Los Angeles Times. The president’s actions have separated families, created a humanitarian disaster, brought violence and crime to the border areas of Texas and Arizona, and empowered the cartels. Quite the record.
Americans understand failure when they see it, and they are seeing it aplenty across the world. Or, if you live in El Paso, Texas, Murrieta, California, or Nogales, Arizona, in your own backyard. Unsurprisingly, a clear majority of respondents in recent New York Times/CBS News and Real Clear Politics polls disapprove of the president’s handling of Iraq and foreign affairs generally. It’s not difficult to imagine even worse poll results for his handling of the immigration disaster unfolding along the country’s southern border.
An America incapable of rising to meet the challenges of globalization at home and abroad produces only one result: a more dangerous, dysfunctional world. There is no back-up to America, no plan B, no other indispensable nation. Turkey will not root out radical Islamic terrorism in the Middle East. Mexico will not secure America’s borders. Americans know this, and they are increasingly willing to take action where Washington will not.
After outraged citizens of Murrieta, California turned away buses of illegal immigrants headed for a federal immigration processing facility there, Murrieta’s mayor Alan Long stated, “Murrieta expects our government to enforce our laws, including the deportation of illegal immigrants caught crossing our borders, not disperse them into our local communities.” Americans might not vote to send troops to Ukraine or Iraq, but they know when fecklessness abroad begins to take root at home. The time is coming when Americans will no longer put up with their government’s refusal or unwillingness to protect them and America’s sovereignty by securing our borders. Perhaps, God willing, that time is already here.
ISIL IS BLEEDING SOLDIERS
Japan: The Cabinet approved a change in the interpretation of the Constitution regarding Japan's right of self-defense. At an extraordinary meeting on Tuesday, the Cabinet approved the "Cabinet Decision on Development of Seamless Security Legislation to Ensure Japan's Survival and Protect its People."
The Cabinet said that until the reinterpretation, the government could only authorize the use of force in the event of an armed attack against Japan. Under the new interpretation, Japan has broadened its definition of self-defense to include the right to collective self-defense.
The Cabinet said the government has concluded that the Constitution should be interpreted to permit the use of only necessary force for self-defense under certain conditions. It said these include an armed attack on a foreign country that has close relations with Japan, which poses a clear threat to Japan's survival and which threatens a fundamental overturning of people's rights.
Comment: The decision represents a milestone in Japanese strategic thinking. The idea of collective self-defense is not new. It has been debated for many years. For at least 20 years the US has urged Japan to broaden its definition of self-defense as a means of shifting more of the burden of Alliance costs and responsibilities to Japan.
The milestone is Prime Minister Abe's political judgment that the public supports adoption of a more assertive defense policy. This means that one of the cornerstones of international relations in the Pacific region that the US laid after World War II has been overturned. Asians are taking more responsibility for Asian security.
North Korean missile launches and nuclear tests have been influential in reshaping Japanese official and public attitudes about defense. Now, if North Korea threatens South Korea and the US by threatening to shoot a missile at US bases in Japan, Japan can act in self-defense as an Alliance member without waiting to be damaged first.
This is a particularly bad day for North Korea because its strategists can no longer presume that Japan would wait to be attacked before engaging North Korea in combat.
South Korea-North Korea: The Republic of Korea issued a short, formal statement rejecting North Korea's special proposal as insincere. It said in part, "If North Korea truly wants peace on the Korean Peninsula, it should not only stop its slander and provocative threats, but also show sincerity on resolving the nuclear issue, which is a fundamental threat to peace on the Korean Peninsula."
Comment: The North Koreans knew their proposal would be rejected and the South Koreans knew they knew. This pattern of exchange sometimes is the prelude to a provocation, justified by South Korea's rejection. The North Koreans won't stage an event that would embarrass Chinese President Xi during his visit to Seoul on Thursday, but they probably will use the exchange to coach Chinese leaders that the South rejects peace proposals.
Iraq: Military. An Iraqi press source reported that a Russian-supplied Su-25 ground attack aircraft flew today over Baghdad.
Most Iraqi news sources reported continued slow government progress to recover territory north of Baghdad in Salah-al-Din Governate and in Diyala, which is northeast of Baghdad. Government forces lost no ground in Anbar, which is west of Baghdad.
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In an audio message today, ISIL's leader called on Muslims to travel to Iraq and Syria to help build an Islamic state. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi called on Muslims to immigrate to the "Islamic State", saying it was a duty. He made a "special call" for judges, doctors, engineers and people with military and administrative expertise.
Comment: ISIL is short of manpower. If government claims of ISIL casualties are close to accurate, ISIL is losing several hundred fighters a day. Government losses are understated, but ISIL does not appear capable of surviving that level of attrition.
Political. The first session of the new Council of Representatives (COR) on 1 July was supposed to be devoted to the swearing-in ceremony for 255 deputies and other housekeeping details associated with leadership. However, candidates for the posts of COR speaker, president, and prime minister were not nominated.
The session broke up in confusion and disarray. Lawmakers surfaced old grievances. Many were unfamiliar with the rules and the Constitution. Others insisted on threatening each other. After a break called to calm tempers, many Sunni and Kurdish deputies refused to return so that the session had to end for lack of a quorum.
The presiding deputy said the Council would reconvene on 8 July, provided the deputies can agree on the three leadership positions.
Comment: Several Iraqi commentators wrote that the mood was against al-Maliki, except in al-Maliki's political bloc, which is the largest single bloc in the council.
Turkey-Kurdistan-Iraq: Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said today that the Turkish Government opposes the separation of the Kurdistan Region from Iraq. He said, "Iraq should not be divided" and that "there is a state and a constitution in Iraq."
Comment: Arinc's formulation remains the official public policy of Turkey. Turkish policy appears to be disjointed. Turkey aided and abetted ISIL while it stayed in Syria. Now that ISIL refuses to recognize borders, Turkey must now oppose its proxy.
The leaders in Ankara don't seem to know what to do about the Iraqi Kurds to whom they are indebted for blocking ISIL's advance. The Islamic State claims Turkey too. If Iraq fractures, Turkey's unofficial support for a strong Iraqi Kurdistan might become official policy.
Ukraine-Russia: Russian President Putin condemned Ukraine for ending a truce with separatist rebels in the east. He said Ukrainian President Poroshenko must now bear direct responsibility for the conflict.
Putin vowed he would continue to defend ethnic Russians abroad, using all means available from humanitarian aid to "self-defense".
Putin also said the West was using the Ukraine crisis to destabilize the whole region as part of a policy to "contain" Russia. "We need some kind of insurance net around all of Europe so that the Iraqi, Libyan, Syrian - and unfortunately we have to mention the Ukrainian - scenarios do not become a contagious disease."
Comment: Poroshenko betrayed Putin. Relations are now reset. The crisis enters a new phase. Russia will even the score.
Nigeria: At least 56 people have been killed in an explosion at a market in Maiduguri in northeastern Nigeria, a medical worker said. The explosives were reportedly hidden in a vehicle carrying charcoal.
Comment: More Boko Haram work. The periodicity of attacks is daily. The frequency will soon be two or more a day.
The Cabinet said that until the reinterpretation, the government could only authorize the use of force in the event of an armed attack against Japan. Under the new interpretation, Japan has broadened its definition of self-defense to include the right to collective self-defense.
The Cabinet said the government has concluded that the Constitution should be interpreted to permit the use of only necessary force for self-defense under certain conditions. It said these include an armed attack on a foreign country that has close relations with Japan, which poses a clear threat to Japan's survival and which threatens a fundamental overturning of people's rights.
Comment: The decision represents a milestone in Japanese strategic thinking. The idea of collective self-defense is not new. It has been debated for many years. For at least 20 years the US has urged Japan to broaden its definition of self-defense as a means of shifting more of the burden of Alliance costs and responsibilities to Japan.
The milestone is Prime Minister Abe's political judgment that the public supports adoption of a more assertive defense policy. This means that one of the cornerstones of international relations in the Pacific region that the US laid after World War II has been overturned. Asians are taking more responsibility for Asian security.
North Korean missile launches and nuclear tests have been influential in reshaping Japanese official and public attitudes about defense. Now, if North Korea threatens South Korea and the US by threatening to shoot a missile at US bases in Japan, Japan can act in self-defense as an Alliance member without waiting to be damaged first.
This is a particularly bad day for North Korea because its strategists can no longer presume that Japan would wait to be attacked before engaging North Korea in combat.
South Korea-North Korea: The Republic of Korea issued a short, formal statement rejecting North Korea's special proposal as insincere. It said in part, "If North Korea truly wants peace on the Korean Peninsula, it should not only stop its slander and provocative threats, but also show sincerity on resolving the nuclear issue, which is a fundamental threat to peace on the Korean Peninsula."
Comment: The North Koreans knew their proposal would be rejected and the South Koreans knew they knew. This pattern of exchange sometimes is the prelude to a provocation, justified by South Korea's rejection. The North Koreans won't stage an event that would embarrass Chinese President Xi during his visit to Seoul on Thursday, but they probably will use the exchange to coach Chinese leaders that the South rejects peace proposals.
Iraq: Military. An Iraqi press source reported that a Russian-supplied Su-25 ground attack aircraft flew today over Baghdad.
Most Iraqi news sources reported continued slow government progress to recover territory north of Baghdad in Salah-al-Din Governate and in Diyala, which is northeast of Baghdad. Government forces lost no ground in Anbar, which is west of Baghdad.
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In an audio message today, ISIL's leader called on Muslims to travel to Iraq and Syria to help build an Islamic state. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi called on Muslims to immigrate to the "Islamic State", saying it was a duty. He made a "special call" for judges, doctors, engineers and people with military and administrative expertise.
Comment: ISIL is short of manpower. If government claims of ISIL casualties are close to accurate, ISIL is losing several hundred fighters a day. Government losses are understated, but ISIL does not appear capable of surviving that level of attrition.
Political. The first session of the new Council of Representatives (COR) on 1 July was supposed to be devoted to the swearing-in ceremony for 255 deputies and other housekeeping details associated with leadership. However, candidates for the posts of COR speaker, president, and prime minister were not nominated.
The session broke up in confusion and disarray. Lawmakers surfaced old grievances. Many were unfamiliar with the rules and the Constitution. Others insisted on threatening each other. After a break called to calm tempers, many Sunni and Kurdish deputies refused to return so that the session had to end for lack of a quorum.
The presiding deputy said the Council would reconvene on 8 July, provided the deputies can agree on the three leadership positions.
Comment: Several Iraqi commentators wrote that the mood was against al-Maliki, except in al-Maliki's political bloc, which is the largest single bloc in the council.
Turkey-Kurdistan-Iraq: Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said today that the Turkish Government opposes the separation of the Kurdistan Region from Iraq. He said, "Iraq should not be divided" and that "there is a state and a constitution in Iraq."
Comment: Arinc's formulation remains the official public policy of Turkey. Turkish policy appears to be disjointed. Turkey aided and abetted ISIL while it stayed in Syria. Now that ISIL refuses to recognize borders, Turkey must now oppose its proxy.
The leaders in Ankara don't seem to know what to do about the Iraqi Kurds to whom they are indebted for blocking ISIL's advance. The Islamic State claims Turkey too. If Iraq fractures, Turkey's unofficial support for a strong Iraqi Kurdistan might become official policy.
Ukraine-Russia: Russian President Putin condemned Ukraine for ending a truce with separatist rebels in the east. He said Ukrainian President Poroshenko must now bear direct responsibility for the conflict.
Putin vowed he would continue to defend ethnic Russians abroad, using all means available from humanitarian aid to "self-defense".
Putin also said the West was using the Ukraine crisis to destabilize the whole region as part of a policy to "contain" Russia. "We need some kind of insurance net around all of Europe so that the Iraqi, Libyan, Syrian - and unfortunately we have to mention the Ukrainian - scenarios do not become a contagious disease."
Comment: Poroshenko betrayed Putin. Relations are now reset. The crisis enters a new phase. Russia will even the score.
Nigeria: At least 56 people have been killed in an explosion at a market in Maiduguri in northeastern Nigeria, a medical worker said. The explosives were reportedly hidden in a vehicle carrying charcoal.
Comment: More Boko Haram work. The periodicity of attacks is daily. The frequency will soon be two or more a day.
NAZIS AT THE BEACH
Emmett Tyrrell
BOSA, SARDINIA -- That is right, you read "Bosa, Sardinia." Well, you might ask, how did I get into this place high atop vertiginous hills along the Temo River in western Sardinia with not another Yank for miles and only the Internet to keep me abreast of the Obama terror?
My Italian adventure began last summer in Rome. There my wife and I were sitting, having dinner with an Italian friend of 40 years, Antonio Martino, and his wife Carol. In his distinguished career he began teaching his Italian countrymen free market economics, which had he learned at the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman. Eventually, Italy came alive, and he served in the Berlusconi government as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Defense. Through the evening we had much to talk about, and when we shut down he invited us back to his summerhouse this summer.
Upon returning home my wife with superb efficiency booked our return flights for Sardinia in June and fun in the sun with the Martinos. She got an enviable discount for booking early and shortly thereafter I emailed Antonio with the good news. "Antonio," I wrote, "we arrive in Sardinia on June 21. Have a glass of red wine waiting!" Unfortunately, there was a snafu. Back came Antonio's reply, "Bob I am from Sicily not Sardinia." Alas our flights were booked. Our hotel reservations were made. My wife was adamant. We would go to Sardinia. And so here we are, and my only lifeline with America is the Internet.
Yet, Sardinia is full of surprises. All the local wine -- both white and red -- is very good and somewhat unusual. Both the whites and the reds are medium bodied but quite delicious. The fish -- after all this is a Mediterranean island -- is delicious. Finally, the pace of the island is slow -- just what we were looking for, though it would have been more amusing with Antonio.
En route to Bosa we stopped off at La Speranza, a very cozy -- if remote -- beach for a swim and a fine lunch, which reminded me again of the old apothegm: "You cannot get a bad meal in Italy." As I say, the beach was lovely and the Italians frolicking with their children made a very agreeable scene. Yet there was a discordant note. Down the beach, to the north, tucked ever so tastefully, in fact unobtrusively, into the foliage were two angry-looking concrete edifices. Upon closer observation they appeared to be concrete pillboxes with menacing slots for machine guns. I asked the jolly Italian lifeguards, members of the rising generation, what these concrete monstrosities might be. They did not know and in their insouciance did not care.
A bit later we stopped by the beachside restaurant for lunch, where the waiters were older than the lifeguards and mindful of the Italian past. One answered, "Germans." The scales fell from our eyes. These edifices were German pillboxes. They and those like them in the hills above would have made heavy weather of it for any invasion during World War II. The Sardinians had not chosen to eliminate them. It would be too expensive.
We climbed up to the two pillboxes above the beach and discovered that one was inhabited by squatters, complete with their lounge chairs and drying laundry. Once again history makes a fool out of Hitler.
These fortifications never saw action in World War II. On July 10, 1943, the Allies executed Operation Husky, choosing to invade Italy through Sicily. Sardinia was spared. Unlike the pillboxes along the coast of Normandy these pillboxes never saw action, which leaves them as silent testimonials to a terrible war -- as they peer down on the frolicking Italian families, they represent the war that might have been. Call it trouble in paradise.
BOSA, SARDINIA -- That is right, you read "Bosa, Sardinia." Well, you might ask, how did I get into this place high atop vertiginous hills along the Temo River in western Sardinia with not another Yank for miles and only the Internet to keep me abreast of the Obama terror?
My Italian adventure began last summer in Rome. There my wife and I were sitting, having dinner with an Italian friend of 40 years, Antonio Martino, and his wife Carol. In his distinguished career he began teaching his Italian countrymen free market economics, which had he learned at the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman. Eventually, Italy came alive, and he served in the Berlusconi government as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Defense. Through the evening we had much to talk about, and when we shut down he invited us back to his summerhouse this summer.
Upon returning home my wife with superb efficiency booked our return flights for Sardinia in June and fun in the sun with the Martinos. She got an enviable discount for booking early and shortly thereafter I emailed Antonio with the good news. "Antonio," I wrote, "we arrive in Sardinia on June 21. Have a glass of red wine waiting!" Unfortunately, there was a snafu. Back came Antonio's reply, "Bob I am from Sicily not Sardinia." Alas our flights were booked. Our hotel reservations were made. My wife was adamant. We would go to Sardinia. And so here we are, and my only lifeline with America is the Internet.
Yet, Sardinia is full of surprises. All the local wine -- both white and red -- is very good and somewhat unusual. Both the whites and the reds are medium bodied but quite delicious. The fish -- after all this is a Mediterranean island -- is delicious. Finally, the pace of the island is slow -- just what we were looking for, though it would have been more amusing with Antonio.
En route to Bosa we stopped off at La Speranza, a very cozy -- if remote -- beach for a swim and a fine lunch, which reminded me again of the old apothegm: "You cannot get a bad meal in Italy." As I say, the beach was lovely and the Italians frolicking with their children made a very agreeable scene. Yet there was a discordant note. Down the beach, to the north, tucked ever so tastefully, in fact unobtrusively, into the foliage were two angry-looking concrete edifices. Upon closer observation they appeared to be concrete pillboxes with menacing slots for machine guns. I asked the jolly Italian lifeguards, members of the rising generation, what these concrete monstrosities might be. They did not know and in their insouciance did not care.
A bit later we stopped by the beachside restaurant for lunch, where the waiters were older than the lifeguards and mindful of the Italian past. One answered, "Germans." The scales fell from our eyes. These edifices were German pillboxes. They and those like them in the hills above would have made heavy weather of it for any invasion during World War II. The Sardinians had not chosen to eliminate them. It would be too expensive.
We climbed up to the two pillboxes above the beach and discovered that one was inhabited by squatters, complete with their lounge chairs and drying laundry. Once again history makes a fool out of Hitler.
These fortifications never saw action in World War II. On July 10, 1943, the Allies executed Operation Husky, choosing to invade Italy through Sicily. Sardinia was spared. Unlike the pillboxes along the coast of Normandy these pillboxes never saw action, which leaves them as silent testimonials to a terrible war -- as they peer down on the frolicking Italian families, they represent the war that might have been. Call it trouble in paradise.
RESPONSIBILITY AND FREEDOM
Jackie Cushman
We declared our independence from Great Britain 238 years ago this week. It was a declaration long in coming, brought about by the overreaching rule of King George III and Britain's insistence on taxation without representation.
The taxation began in the 1760s, the Boston Massacre occurred in 1770, the Boston Tea Party in 1993 and the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April of 1775.
Patrick Henry's call to action, "Give me liberty or give me death," was the first strong public statement that, if we were to be free, if we were to have liberty, then we would have to fight Britain. Prior to Henry's speech to the gathering of Virginia delegates in Richmond, the prevailing belief was that we could negotiate with Britain.
Henry laid down the gauntlet and clearly presented his understanding of what we were facing.
Our choice was liberty or death.
Our founders chose to take the challenge and declared our Independence from Britain on July 4, 1776.
Our Declaration of Independence is a three-part document: the first a declaration of freedom, including our understanding of the natural order of authority and power; the second a long list of grievances, reinforcing the belief that there was no choice but to declare our independence as a free country; the third an acknowledgment of risk and the oath of the signers to one another.
The first section is the one that is most often quoted: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
The second part, less often referenced, lays out the reasoning for why we were seeking independence, a reasoning that included a long list of grievances against King George III.
Our founders concluded the document with the pledge to each other and an invocation of God. Knowing that their declaration would be seen as an act of treason by the king, the signers also knew that, if they were not successful, they would risk losing their lives.
This document declared us free, outlined the foundational understanding of our rights, from whom they came, and our responsibilities to maintain them.
According to a Gallup poll released this week, "the percentage of Americans dissatisfied with the freedom to choose what they do with their lives more than doubled, from 9 percent to 21 percent." (Face-to-face and telephone interviews with approximately 1,000 adults per country, sampling error ranges from plus/minus 1.7 percentage points to plus/minus 5.6 percentage points.) The same release from Gallup speculated that, "the decline in perceived freedom among Americans could be attributed to the U.S. economy."
It also speculated that, "another possible explanation for the decline in freedom is how Americans feel about their government." Gallup noted that 79 percent of Americans believe that "corruption is widespread throughout the government."
Additionally, "Americans' confidence in all three branches of the U.S. government has fallen, reaching record lows for the Supreme Court (30 percent) and Congress (7 percent), and a six-year low for the presidency (29 percent)," based on another Gallup poll (conducted June 5-8, sample of 1,027, plus/minus 4 points).
The introduction of our Declaration of Independence provides for recourse if government becomes destructive to individual rights, "to alter or to abolish it," meaning the government.
As Americans increasingly believe that our government is corrupt and cannot be trusted, our responsibility, based on our Declaration of Independence, to alter our government becomes more clear and more compelling.
Just as our founding fathers fought for our freedom more than 200 years ago, so must we continue to fight to ensure that our government remains ours and our freedoms remain intact.
We declared our independence from Great Britain 238 years ago this week. It was a declaration long in coming, brought about by the overreaching rule of King George III and Britain's insistence on taxation without representation.
The taxation began in the 1760s, the Boston Massacre occurred in 1770, the Boston Tea Party in 1993 and the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April of 1775.
Patrick Henry's call to action, "Give me liberty or give me death," was the first strong public statement that, if we were to be free, if we were to have liberty, then we would have to fight Britain. Prior to Henry's speech to the gathering of Virginia delegates in Richmond, the prevailing belief was that we could negotiate with Britain.
Henry laid down the gauntlet and clearly presented his understanding of what we were facing.
Our choice was liberty or death.
Our founders chose to take the challenge and declared our Independence from Britain on July 4, 1776.
Our Declaration of Independence is a three-part document: the first a declaration of freedom, including our understanding of the natural order of authority and power; the second a long list of grievances, reinforcing the belief that there was no choice but to declare our independence as a free country; the third an acknowledgment of risk and the oath of the signers to one another.
The first section is the one that is most often quoted: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
The second part, less often referenced, lays out the reasoning for why we were seeking independence, a reasoning that included a long list of grievances against King George III.
Our founders concluded the document with the pledge to each other and an invocation of God. Knowing that their declaration would be seen as an act of treason by the king, the signers also knew that, if they were not successful, they would risk losing their lives.
This document declared us free, outlined the foundational understanding of our rights, from whom they came, and our responsibilities to maintain them.
According to a Gallup poll released this week, "the percentage of Americans dissatisfied with the freedom to choose what they do with their lives more than doubled, from 9 percent to 21 percent." (Face-to-face and telephone interviews with approximately 1,000 adults per country, sampling error ranges from plus/minus 1.7 percentage points to plus/minus 5.6 percentage points.) The same release from Gallup speculated that, "the decline in perceived freedom among Americans could be attributed to the U.S. economy."
It also speculated that, "another possible explanation for the decline in freedom is how Americans feel about their government." Gallup noted that 79 percent of Americans believe that "corruption is widespread throughout the government."
Additionally, "Americans' confidence in all three branches of the U.S. government has fallen, reaching record lows for the Supreme Court (30 percent) and Congress (7 percent), and a six-year low for the presidency (29 percent)," based on another Gallup poll (conducted June 5-8, sample of 1,027, plus/minus 4 points).
The introduction of our Declaration of Independence provides for recourse if government becomes destructive to individual rights, "to alter or to abolish it," meaning the government.
As Americans increasingly believe that our government is corrupt and cannot be trusted, our responsibility, based on our Declaration of Independence, to alter our government becomes more clear and more compelling.
Just as our founding fathers fought for our freedom more than 200 years ago, so must we continue to fight to ensure that our government remains ours and our freedoms remain intact.
TARGET JOINS THE ANTI-GUN MOVEMENT
Michael Schaus
Well… I’m starting to run out of places to shop. Target Corporation (TGT) made the announcement on Wednesday that they have acquiesced to the Bloomberg fanatics who believe no-one should be armed while shopping. The company (politely) asked customers to keep their guns at home the next time they wander in for a DVD or Cuisinart.
Of course, it’s not all bad news. After all, a Target store in San Antonio recently booted anti-gun activists from its store. The Bloomberg inspired group, Moms Demand Action (moms I know carry .380 automatics), was asked to leave the premises as they petitioned shoppers to sign a ban on open carry.
So, when taken in the context of recent events, it kinda looks like the retail chain simply wants to be left out of the gun/anti-gun debate. And really, who can blame them? Picket signs, petition drives, and even AR-15s aren’t always good for business. I mean, sure, Target is creating a “solution” to an imaginary problem by banning gun-loving America… But they’re not exactly doing this in a vacuum.
Now, don’t get me wrong: Their decision is absurd. It’s pretty well documented that “gun free” zones tend to advertise a victim-rich environment to would-be criminals. Jack in the Box learned this the hard way when armed robbers took advantage of newly disarmed customers, mere days after the company declared their new anti-gun policy. And, if you really need proof of failure, just look at America’s favorite gun-free zone: Chicago.
A far more amicable solution might have been to allow local laws to preempt store-wide policies on firearms. But, Target is a business… And those who run it have every right in the world to make stupid, ill-informed, or even unfair decisions. Heck, they’re even allowed to make wrong decisions. But their decision does bring up an interesting point about the tactic of open carrying for Second Amendment rights:
In all honesty, recent high-profile open carry stunts have done little to help the proliferation of firearm rights. In fact, it has hurt the cause. And this isn’t the opinion of one “carry advocate” with a Townhall column… Even Open Carry Texas seems to understand that there are potential pitfalls to toting an AK around the grocery aisle of your local Super Target.
Smashburger, Jack in the Box, Wendy’s, Applebees, Chipotle, Starbucks, and even Chili’s have asked patrons to start leaving their guns at home… And most (not all) of these decisions were made Bloomberg minions rallied in response to ill-advised open carry demonstrations. Now, I’m going out on a limb here, but I have to assume that an expanded prohibition on firearm-friendly-policies is not what open carry activists had in mind when they started their organized patronage.
But, welcome to the world in which we live. Movements, people, and even activists are generally judged by their ability to affect positive change. Prior to these most recent skirmishes, many of these locations allowed carry (provided it was in compliance with local laws) on their premises. Now things have changed… And not for the better. Now, please: don’t misunderstand me… I’m a very pro-gun guy. I have a 1911 on my hip right now because – well – because I’m awake. (And even when I’m asleep, it’s not far away.) But, if we are going to judge the activist-open-carry movement by its results, it appears to be a failure.
If the goal is to expand gun rights, let’s try not to bog ourselves down in skirmishes with national retail chains who are primarily interested in avoiding controversy. After all, discriminating against law-abiding citizens is in vogue; but discriminating against the main-stream media, Michael Bloomberg, and rabid-anti-gunners is generally viewed by CEOs and investors as corporate suicide.
It doesn’t take a genius to understand that presentation goes a long way in making, or breaking, a political point. Target is absolutely (without qualification) wrong for trying to ban law-abiding armed citizens from their stores. They may, or may not, feel the pain of their decision as gun-owners begin foregoing their visits to the newly created “victim-rich” retail stores… But, Target’s main goal of avoiding prolonged exposure in the media over a controversial social issue has been achieved.
Battles are launched in an effort to win wars… So, yeah: Moms Demand Action won this battle. Target is wrong. But, it is now up to Second Amendment advocates to make sure they are taking steps that perpetuate their cause – not infringe upon the lives of sympathetic supporters.
And, just to make it clear, here’s a quick guide on how to open carry in a way that disarms the ideologically bankrupt Bloomberg groups who lobby for the dissolution of gun rights:
Well… I’m starting to run out of places to shop. Target Corporation (TGT) made the announcement on Wednesday that they have acquiesced to the Bloomberg fanatics who believe no-one should be armed while shopping. The company (politely) asked customers to keep their guns at home the next time they wander in for a DVD or Cuisinart.
Of course, it’s not all bad news. After all, a Target store in San Antonio recently booted anti-gun activists from its store. The Bloomberg inspired group, Moms Demand Action (moms I know carry .380 automatics), was asked to leave the premises as they petitioned shoppers to sign a ban on open carry.
So, when taken in the context of recent events, it kinda looks like the retail chain simply wants to be left out of the gun/anti-gun debate. And really, who can blame them? Picket signs, petition drives, and even AR-15s aren’t always good for business. I mean, sure, Target is creating a “solution” to an imaginary problem by banning gun-loving America… But they’re not exactly doing this in a vacuum.
Now, don’t get me wrong: Their decision is absurd. It’s pretty well documented that “gun free” zones tend to advertise a victim-rich environment to would-be criminals. Jack in the Box learned this the hard way when armed robbers took advantage of newly disarmed customers, mere days after the company declared their new anti-gun policy. And, if you really need proof of failure, just look at America’s favorite gun-free zone: Chicago.
A far more amicable solution might have been to allow local laws to preempt store-wide policies on firearms. But, Target is a business… And those who run it have every right in the world to make stupid, ill-informed, or even unfair decisions. Heck, they’re even allowed to make wrong decisions. But their decision does bring up an interesting point about the tactic of open carrying for Second Amendment rights:
In all honesty, recent high-profile open carry stunts have done little to help the proliferation of firearm rights. In fact, it has hurt the cause. And this isn’t the opinion of one “carry advocate” with a Townhall column… Even Open Carry Texas seems to understand that there are potential pitfalls to toting an AK around the grocery aisle of your local Super Target.
Smashburger, Jack in the Box, Wendy’s, Applebees, Chipotle, Starbucks, and even Chili’s have asked patrons to start leaving their guns at home… And most (not all) of these decisions were made Bloomberg minions rallied in response to ill-advised open carry demonstrations. Now, I’m going out on a limb here, but I have to assume that an expanded prohibition on firearm-friendly-policies is not what open carry activists had in mind when they started their organized patronage.
But, welcome to the world in which we live. Movements, people, and even activists are generally judged by their ability to affect positive change. Prior to these most recent skirmishes, many of these locations allowed carry (provided it was in compliance with local laws) on their premises. Now things have changed… And not for the better. Now, please: don’t misunderstand me… I’m a very pro-gun guy. I have a 1911 on my hip right now because – well – because I’m awake. (And even when I’m asleep, it’s not far away.) But, if we are going to judge the activist-open-carry movement by its results, it appears to be a failure.
If the goal is to expand gun rights, let’s try not to bog ourselves down in skirmishes with national retail chains who are primarily interested in avoiding controversy. After all, discriminating against law-abiding citizens is in vogue; but discriminating against the main-stream media, Michael Bloomberg, and rabid-anti-gunners is generally viewed by CEOs and investors as corporate suicide.
It doesn’t take a genius to understand that presentation goes a long way in making, or breaking, a political point. Target is absolutely (without qualification) wrong for trying to ban law-abiding armed citizens from their stores. They may, or may not, feel the pain of their decision as gun-owners begin foregoing their visits to the newly created “victim-rich” retail stores… But, Target’s main goal of avoiding prolonged exposure in the media over a controversial social issue has been achieved.
Battles are launched in an effort to win wars… So, yeah: Moms Demand Action won this battle. Target is wrong. But, it is now up to Second Amendment advocates to make sure they are taking steps that perpetuate their cause – not infringe upon the lives of sympathetic supporters.
And, just to make it clear, here’s a quick guide on how to open carry in a way that disarms the ideologically bankrupt Bloomberg groups who lobby for the dissolution of gun rights:
CHINA'S MARITIME MARCH WEST
Sonia Hukil
The recent geo-strategic positioning of China in the maritime domain has been much talked about. With this in view, the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies (IPCS), in collaboration with National Maritime Foundation (NMF), engaged few prominent dignitaries in a discussion on “China’s Maritime March West”. The seminar was chaired by Adm. Pradeep Kaushiva. Briefly, Mr. Jayadeva Ranade mentioned about China’s strategic focus in the Indian Ocean by delving into China’s pursuit for reinforcing its navy and to exert a legitimate presence in the Indian Ocean. He concluded that there is urgency for India to prepare for gear up its navy for any anomaly in the region.Cdr. Kamlesh K Agnihotri interpreted China’s maritime activities in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea. Taking the discussion further, Ms. Teshu Singh spoke on the perspectives from the littorals and explained the reactions from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Pakistan, on the maritime security. Cdr. Gurpreet S Khurana provided an analysis of the geo-strategic implications of China’s increasing presence in the Indian Ocean, both in terms of maritime security and regional stability.
Admiral (Retd.) Pradeep Kaushiva
Director, National Maritime Foundation
Given China’s geographical location, it is possible for China to access the world via three different directions: eastwards across the Pacific, westwards across Central Asia or westwards via south to the South China Sea (SCS). Historically, China went west in the first instance via the silk route and eventually reached Europe. Today, China is positioned across the Indian Ocean Region (IOR), the Mediterranean, the west coast of Africa, and continues to reach out globally. However, there has been no historical record for it to have crossed the Pacific. Furthermore, China’s dependency on Africa for its resources, West Asia’s energy lines and its stretch across the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) makes many practitioners question the strategic contours of China’s maritime engagement.
A focus on four different aspects of China’s presence in the maritime domain will help stimulate a discussion on the issue:
•China’s strategic focus in the IOR; and an analysis of China’s pursuit of reinforcing its navy and exerting a legitimate presence in the Indian Ocean.
•Interpretation of China’s maritime activities in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea (SCS).
•The perspectives from the littorals, especially reactions from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Pakistan, on maritime security.
•An analysis of the geostrategic implications of China’s increasing presence in the Indian Ocean, both in terms of maritime security and regional stability.
Jayadeva Ranade
Distinguished Fellow, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi
Since the mid 1970s, China has had a deep desire of exerting its influence in the IOR. Several Chinese articles circulating around the mid and early 1970s viewed the identification of the IOR with great scepticism. For them, the Indian Ocean should not have been termed the ‘Indian' Ocean. However, no provocation existed at that time due to negligible competition between India and China. China always had a clear ambition of establishing its dominance in the IOR, which reflected in its national policies. In the 1980s, China, pursuing its ambition of developing into a regional naval power, appointed military officials for constructing and modernising its navy. This was achieved by following two trajectories: first, while planning the construction of ships, a ground work for “Self-Reliance” in the defence field was laid, which was viewed crucial at the time. Second, a major ship building program was initiated for construction of new shipyards, where new fighter ships could be built.
China’s initial priorities consisted of building a capacity of deterring and denying the foreign powers from gaining access into the SCS. Their primary focus was on building a fleet of submarines and missiles. Over the years, a lot of progress has been made in these two arenas. Several adequate markers point to China’s maritime ambitions and capabilities, such as the entry of the Chinese Navy flotilla extensively for anti-piracy operations. Successful flotillas comprising of different ships remain present in the area, demonstrating the capacity of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) for carrying out different operations. In 2008, the first flotilla entered the IOR, followed by a navy fleet public demonstration, marking the arrival of the Chinese Navy at the international stage. In 2009, China gathered increased attention in its naval capacity and sought to develop aircraft carriers.
An aircraft carrier is a manifestation of power, which is ideal at operating in the Indian and the Pacific Ocean. In 2011, photos of aircraft carriers under construction flourished on the Chinese military websites. Another Chinese ambition was the initiation of an unmanned underwater vessels program in order to improve the quality of their control and the depth to which they could progress in the IOR.
Beijing has been determined to exert its influence in the IOR. As for its dominance in the Pacific, it remains unperturbed and has left it to the US. The allocation of the seabed for resource exploitation by the International Seabed Authority (ISA) gives China legitimacy in remaining in the Indian Ocean. Interestingly, China has ensured continued legitimacy in the region for a long period. Beijing has proposed two plans in this regard: first, a rail link between Beijing up to Madrid serving as a cargo transplant and second, a rail link from Beijing through Turkey up to London and finally to India. Chinese plans mesh very neatly with their boundless national interest. As for India, it is time for it to catch up to their counterparts. The speed with which China is reaching its objectives must be a grave matter of concern for India so as to not get overshadowed in the near future.
Commodore Kamlesh K Agnihotri
Research Fellow, National Maritime Foundation
The doctrine tactics and procedures of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) all emanate from a combined military strategy of “Active Defence.” The naval component of the “Active Defence” strategic guidelines is the off-shore defence strategy. The PLAN’s tasks have been divided into two parts: traditional (inclusive of maintaining constant combat readiness; national, defence and coastal security) and non-traditional (comprising of supporting economic and social development; rescue of oversees personnel; disaster relief; anti-piracy missions; port visits etc.). These strategies translate into maritime activities in terms of two imperatives: securing their maritime interests, endeavours and boundless national interest and also the need for a growing power to find larger operating space, and striving for greater global presence. This has enabled capacity-building of the PLAN for “Blue Water” roles for effective distant water missions. It has also resulted in a quantitative up-scaling of civilian maritime activities – an indication China’s presence and purpose.
Post the deployment of the PLAN’s 15th and 16th task force – covering Kenya, Tanzania, Sri Lanka, Tunisia, South Africa, among others – China had circumscribed the African continent. This was initiated with a well-planned vision of building linkages in West Asia, North East and West Africa. Chinese activities in the IOR consist of anti-piracy escort missions in the Gulf of Aden; participation in the ‘Aman’ maritime exercises etc. Its first ever symbolic exercise in IOR is south of the Lombok Strait.
Chinese activities in the Pacific are also significant. They comprise of regular maritime exercises beyond the 1st Island Chain; and the first ‘Three Fleet’ Joint Exercise in East China Sea; extensive work up of aircraft carrier ‘Liaoning;’ an aircraft carrier in the SCS; and naval diplomacy, among others.
China is following their economic and boundless national interest which is protected by the PLAN. As a result, India stands to be affected first and to the greatest degree since the passing PLAN ships would continuously keep them in midst of critical Indian maritime area; threaten SLOCs security; negatively affect India’s naval operations and constrain maritime space for training and other exercises. For the near future, there seems to be no scope for a short-term resolution between India and China. One can only hope for the maintenance of a stable equilibrium between the two.
PERSPECTIVE FROM THE LITTORALS
Teshu Singh
Coordinator, China Research Programme, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi
Today, a new kind of geopolitics is evolving in the IOR. The region is no more a just a highway. It has become economically, strategically and politically important for all the powers. However, the most important development is the emerging role of the IOR littoral states.
There are asymmetries of power in the region with big, small and external powers taking keen interest. Smaller powers such as, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Pakistan and Bangladesh have the flexibility to meet their national interest by playing with their strengths and the major powers’ dependence on them.
Major Powers that look at the Indian Ocean as a dynamic region – one that is vital to their power and commercial ambitions – find it difficult to sustain their stakes without some support and acceptance by smaller powers. The construction of the Indian Ocean into the IOR has therefore complicated the geopolitics of the Indian Ocean with the shift to new geographies – that enhance the representation of smaller powers and the increasing stakes of major and dominant powers in the IOR.
These developments will have serious challenges to the Indian Ocean security initiatives. An Indian Ocean Security regime is still taking shape, but it is still in a very nascent stage. In the given scenario, India and China have major stakes in the region. The new regional security architecture will have to take into account all the factors, especially that of the littorals.
IMPLICATIONS IN THE INDIAN MARITIME CONTEXTS
Commodore Gurpreet S Khurana
Research Fellow, National Maritime Foundation
While the broad contours of China’s maritime strategy is amply clear, accessing China’s increasing strategic presence in the IOR in a very objective way has become the necessity.
Social Constructivist’s view of positive-sum would help in understanding both positive and adverse implications of China’s march west into the IOR. Common stakes in the IOR are security of maritime trade/energy flow; safety of seafarers; access to natural resources (including the sea-bed) and economic connectivity – for further sustaining Asia’s ‘rise’. Salient challenges in the IOR are piracy and other maritime crimes; terrorism; adverse effects of climate change; maritime disasters; geographical constraints for economic connectivity; and naval access for China in the IOR. India encounters a similar predicament in the Western Pacific. Facilitating factors between India and China are the ongoing operational coordination and information-sharing for countering piracy and China’s quest to be a part of IOR security mechanism; enhancing cooperation on China’s ‘Maritime Silk Road’ concept; and the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar economic corridor. Possible outcomes for such cooperation would be: PLAN complementing IOR naval capacity for humanitarian missions in the region, and security cooperation leading to major sea-borne commerce and economic integration of not only the IOR but also of broader Asian region.
On one hand, maintaining the regional stability in the IOR is important for securing economic investment, markets and citizens of the region. On the contrary, intra-state separatist tendencies, economic disparity leading to socioeconomic instability and fragile political systems of the region are major challenges for maintaining stability.
Facilitating factors are China’s “historic mission” for stability and humanitarian operations in the region which will discourage it from being a ‘free-rider’ during a regional crisis – that has been the case so far. Multi-faceted regional integration in the IOR will pave the way for crystallisation of norms for regional and extra-regional stakeholders that could enhance China’s stakes in the Region – further reducing the risk of regional instability.
Viewing through the realist’s view of the Zero-Sum concept, assumptions are: China wants to displace the US’ influence and create a favourable balance of power in the region–by improving ties with India. However, China’s ‘March West’ could be also seen as answer to India’s ‘Look East’ Policy. Aggravating factors in the region are: the debate over the String of Pearls that it is just a ‘sleeper facility’ or military utility; the demonstration of Chinese naval power in the Lombok Strait and other regions; increasing focus of the US rebalance strategy in the Western Pacific; China’s disregard for international norms, Chinese arms sales to the IOR littorals guided by self-interest. Possible outcomes in view of this development are: China could draw the IOR states from democracy; regional arms race; skirmishes the between PLAN and the IOR navies; China-US conflict in the West Pacific can spill into the IOR, and India-China conflict across the Line of Actual Control escalating horizontally to the Indian Ocean etc.
In the Indian perspective, China’s presence in the IOR may lead to increased avenues of maritime and economic cooperation. However, a strong Chinese naval presence in the Region would weaken India’s overall conventional deterrence against China. Future course of action for India could be strengthening operational coordination; standing agreement for mutual assistance; development of operational compatibility among navies leading to mutual trust; code of conduct for international naval encounters at sea and building strategic deterrence vis-à-vis China. It could also reinforce its partnerships with the US and the IOR littoral states.
Question/Inputs
•Is China only focused on the IOR or they are interested in going west from north as well?
•Military bases are a double-edged sword. Military bases could be counter-productive not only in terms of opposition from local forces but also from the vulnerability of operationality.
•If China is exercising an ‘aggressive maritime strategy’ in the region, how can Beijing ignore that all the Southeast Asian countries could unite against it?
•What could be the implications of the increasing population of Chinese citizens in the IOR and Pacific Islands?
•Is there any hope for peace and stability in the IOR, when so many great powers (read US and China) are involved in pursuing their own self-interests?
Responses
•China is looking for holistic presence in all maritime hotspots. China is trying to get access to every feasible area in the region and beyond. However, they follow a dualistic policy on different platforms. On the global scene, China would like to be in a bipolar world but on the regional scene they would like to be unipolar.
•China is not going to be a world power in recent future. While they have indeed signaled their intention, translating it into capability would take many years. It would take decades for the Chinese aircraft carriers to exercise sea control in the IOR. However, China’s nuclear submarines have tremendous power and endurance, which is worrisome for India.
•Maritime peace and stability in IOR is a difficult aim to achieve due to the complexity of the region, based on different languages, cultures, religions and traditions.
•Repercussions of Chinese bases are not dependent on China’s preferences but on those of the littoral states of the IOR.
•For the first time in history, the US influence is relatively decreasing in the IOR. India has also become vulnerable in its own area. Therefore, appropriate action should be taken to secure New Delhi’s interests.
•For the next two to three decades, China will be look to establish support systems for the deployment for the security of maritime resource generation, trade and energy lines. China will have self-defendant units but they do not have capability to defend geographical areas.
The recent geo-strategic positioning of China in the maritime domain has been much talked about. With this in view, the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies (IPCS), in collaboration with National Maritime Foundation (NMF), engaged few prominent dignitaries in a discussion on “China’s Maritime March West”. The seminar was chaired by Adm. Pradeep Kaushiva. Briefly, Mr. Jayadeva Ranade mentioned about China’s strategic focus in the Indian Ocean by delving into China’s pursuit for reinforcing its navy and to exert a legitimate presence in the Indian Ocean. He concluded that there is urgency for India to prepare for gear up its navy for any anomaly in the region.Cdr. Kamlesh K Agnihotri interpreted China’s maritime activities in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea. Taking the discussion further, Ms. Teshu Singh spoke on the perspectives from the littorals and explained the reactions from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Pakistan, on the maritime security. Cdr. Gurpreet S Khurana provided an analysis of the geo-strategic implications of China’s increasing presence in the Indian Ocean, both in terms of maritime security and regional stability.
Admiral (Retd.) Pradeep Kaushiva
Director, National Maritime Foundation
Given China’s geographical location, it is possible for China to access the world via three different directions: eastwards across the Pacific, westwards across Central Asia or westwards via south to the South China Sea (SCS). Historically, China went west in the first instance via the silk route and eventually reached Europe. Today, China is positioned across the Indian Ocean Region (IOR), the Mediterranean, the west coast of Africa, and continues to reach out globally. However, there has been no historical record for it to have crossed the Pacific. Furthermore, China’s dependency on Africa for its resources, West Asia’s energy lines and its stretch across the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) makes many practitioners question the strategic contours of China’s maritime engagement.
A focus on four different aspects of China’s presence in the maritime domain will help stimulate a discussion on the issue:
•China’s strategic focus in the IOR; and an analysis of China’s pursuit of reinforcing its navy and exerting a legitimate presence in the Indian Ocean.
•Interpretation of China’s maritime activities in the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea (SCS).
•The perspectives from the littorals, especially reactions from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Pakistan, on maritime security.
•An analysis of the geostrategic implications of China’s increasing presence in the Indian Ocean, both in terms of maritime security and regional stability.
Jayadeva Ranade
Distinguished Fellow, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi
Since the mid 1970s, China has had a deep desire of exerting its influence in the IOR. Several Chinese articles circulating around the mid and early 1970s viewed the identification of the IOR with great scepticism. For them, the Indian Ocean should not have been termed the ‘Indian' Ocean. However, no provocation existed at that time due to negligible competition between India and China. China always had a clear ambition of establishing its dominance in the IOR, which reflected in its national policies. In the 1980s, China, pursuing its ambition of developing into a regional naval power, appointed military officials for constructing and modernising its navy. This was achieved by following two trajectories: first, while planning the construction of ships, a ground work for “Self-Reliance” in the defence field was laid, which was viewed crucial at the time. Second, a major ship building program was initiated for construction of new shipyards, where new fighter ships could be built.
China’s initial priorities consisted of building a capacity of deterring and denying the foreign powers from gaining access into the SCS. Their primary focus was on building a fleet of submarines and missiles. Over the years, a lot of progress has been made in these two arenas. Several adequate markers point to China’s maritime ambitions and capabilities, such as the entry of the Chinese Navy flotilla extensively for anti-piracy operations. Successful flotillas comprising of different ships remain present in the area, demonstrating the capacity of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) for carrying out different operations. In 2008, the first flotilla entered the IOR, followed by a navy fleet public demonstration, marking the arrival of the Chinese Navy at the international stage. In 2009, China gathered increased attention in its naval capacity and sought to develop aircraft carriers.
An aircraft carrier is a manifestation of power, which is ideal at operating in the Indian and the Pacific Ocean. In 2011, photos of aircraft carriers under construction flourished on the Chinese military websites. Another Chinese ambition was the initiation of an unmanned underwater vessels program in order to improve the quality of their control and the depth to which they could progress in the IOR.
Beijing has been determined to exert its influence in the IOR. As for its dominance in the Pacific, it remains unperturbed and has left it to the US. The allocation of the seabed for resource exploitation by the International Seabed Authority (ISA) gives China legitimacy in remaining in the Indian Ocean. Interestingly, China has ensured continued legitimacy in the region for a long period. Beijing has proposed two plans in this regard: first, a rail link between Beijing up to Madrid serving as a cargo transplant and second, a rail link from Beijing through Turkey up to London and finally to India. Chinese plans mesh very neatly with their boundless national interest. As for India, it is time for it to catch up to their counterparts. The speed with which China is reaching its objectives must be a grave matter of concern for India so as to not get overshadowed in the near future.
Commodore Kamlesh K Agnihotri
Research Fellow, National Maritime Foundation
The doctrine tactics and procedures of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) all emanate from a combined military strategy of “Active Defence.” The naval component of the “Active Defence” strategic guidelines is the off-shore defence strategy. The PLAN’s tasks have been divided into two parts: traditional (inclusive of maintaining constant combat readiness; national, defence and coastal security) and non-traditional (comprising of supporting economic and social development; rescue of oversees personnel; disaster relief; anti-piracy missions; port visits etc.). These strategies translate into maritime activities in terms of two imperatives: securing their maritime interests, endeavours and boundless national interest and also the need for a growing power to find larger operating space, and striving for greater global presence. This has enabled capacity-building of the PLAN for “Blue Water” roles for effective distant water missions. It has also resulted in a quantitative up-scaling of civilian maritime activities – an indication China’s presence and purpose.
Post the deployment of the PLAN’s 15th and 16th task force – covering Kenya, Tanzania, Sri Lanka, Tunisia, South Africa, among others – China had circumscribed the African continent. This was initiated with a well-planned vision of building linkages in West Asia, North East and West Africa. Chinese activities in the IOR consist of anti-piracy escort missions in the Gulf of Aden; participation in the ‘Aman’ maritime exercises etc. Its first ever symbolic exercise in IOR is south of the Lombok Strait.
Chinese activities in the Pacific are also significant. They comprise of regular maritime exercises beyond the 1st Island Chain; and the first ‘Three Fleet’ Joint Exercise in East China Sea; extensive work up of aircraft carrier ‘Liaoning;’ an aircraft carrier in the SCS; and naval diplomacy, among others.
China is following their economic and boundless national interest which is protected by the PLAN. As a result, India stands to be affected first and to the greatest degree since the passing PLAN ships would continuously keep them in midst of critical Indian maritime area; threaten SLOCs security; negatively affect India’s naval operations and constrain maritime space for training and other exercises. For the near future, there seems to be no scope for a short-term resolution between India and China. One can only hope for the maintenance of a stable equilibrium between the two.
PERSPECTIVE FROM THE LITTORALS
Teshu Singh
Coordinator, China Research Programme, Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, New Delhi
Today, a new kind of geopolitics is evolving in the IOR. The region is no more a just a highway. It has become economically, strategically and politically important for all the powers. However, the most important development is the emerging role of the IOR littoral states.
There are asymmetries of power in the region with big, small and external powers taking keen interest. Smaller powers such as, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Pakistan and Bangladesh have the flexibility to meet their national interest by playing with their strengths and the major powers’ dependence on them.
Major Powers that look at the Indian Ocean as a dynamic region – one that is vital to their power and commercial ambitions – find it difficult to sustain their stakes without some support and acceptance by smaller powers. The construction of the Indian Ocean into the IOR has therefore complicated the geopolitics of the Indian Ocean with the shift to new geographies – that enhance the representation of smaller powers and the increasing stakes of major and dominant powers in the IOR.
These developments will have serious challenges to the Indian Ocean security initiatives. An Indian Ocean Security regime is still taking shape, but it is still in a very nascent stage. In the given scenario, India and China have major stakes in the region. The new regional security architecture will have to take into account all the factors, especially that of the littorals.
IMPLICATIONS IN THE INDIAN MARITIME CONTEXTS
Commodore Gurpreet S Khurana
Research Fellow, National Maritime Foundation
While the broad contours of China’s maritime strategy is amply clear, accessing China’s increasing strategic presence in the IOR in a very objective way has become the necessity.
Social Constructivist’s view of positive-sum would help in understanding both positive and adverse implications of China’s march west into the IOR. Common stakes in the IOR are security of maritime trade/energy flow; safety of seafarers; access to natural resources (including the sea-bed) and economic connectivity – for further sustaining Asia’s ‘rise’. Salient challenges in the IOR are piracy and other maritime crimes; terrorism; adverse effects of climate change; maritime disasters; geographical constraints for economic connectivity; and naval access for China in the IOR. India encounters a similar predicament in the Western Pacific. Facilitating factors between India and China are the ongoing operational coordination and information-sharing for countering piracy and China’s quest to be a part of IOR security mechanism; enhancing cooperation on China’s ‘Maritime Silk Road’ concept; and the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar economic corridor. Possible outcomes for such cooperation would be: PLAN complementing IOR naval capacity for humanitarian missions in the region, and security cooperation leading to major sea-borne commerce and economic integration of not only the IOR but also of broader Asian region.
On one hand, maintaining the regional stability in the IOR is important for securing economic investment, markets and citizens of the region. On the contrary, intra-state separatist tendencies, economic disparity leading to socioeconomic instability and fragile political systems of the region are major challenges for maintaining stability.
Facilitating factors are China’s “historic mission” for stability and humanitarian operations in the region which will discourage it from being a ‘free-rider’ during a regional crisis – that has been the case so far. Multi-faceted regional integration in the IOR will pave the way for crystallisation of norms for regional and extra-regional stakeholders that could enhance China’s stakes in the Region – further reducing the risk of regional instability.
Viewing through the realist’s view of the Zero-Sum concept, assumptions are: China wants to displace the US’ influence and create a favourable balance of power in the region–by improving ties with India. However, China’s ‘March West’ could be also seen as answer to India’s ‘Look East’ Policy. Aggravating factors in the region are: the debate over the String of Pearls that it is just a ‘sleeper facility’ or military utility; the demonstration of Chinese naval power in the Lombok Strait and other regions; increasing focus of the US rebalance strategy in the Western Pacific; China’s disregard for international norms, Chinese arms sales to the IOR littorals guided by self-interest. Possible outcomes in view of this development are: China could draw the IOR states from democracy; regional arms race; skirmishes the between PLAN and the IOR navies; China-US conflict in the West Pacific can spill into the IOR, and India-China conflict across the Line of Actual Control escalating horizontally to the Indian Ocean etc.
In the Indian perspective, China’s presence in the IOR may lead to increased avenues of maritime and economic cooperation. However, a strong Chinese naval presence in the Region would weaken India’s overall conventional deterrence against China. Future course of action for India could be strengthening operational coordination; standing agreement for mutual assistance; development of operational compatibility among navies leading to mutual trust; code of conduct for international naval encounters at sea and building strategic deterrence vis-à-vis China. It could also reinforce its partnerships with the US and the IOR littoral states.
Question/Inputs
•Is China only focused on the IOR or they are interested in going west from north as well?
•Military bases are a double-edged sword. Military bases could be counter-productive not only in terms of opposition from local forces but also from the vulnerability of operationality.
•If China is exercising an ‘aggressive maritime strategy’ in the region, how can Beijing ignore that all the Southeast Asian countries could unite against it?
•What could be the implications of the increasing population of Chinese citizens in the IOR and Pacific Islands?
•Is there any hope for peace and stability in the IOR, when so many great powers (read US and China) are involved in pursuing their own self-interests?
Responses
•China is looking for holistic presence in all maritime hotspots. China is trying to get access to every feasible area in the region and beyond. However, they follow a dualistic policy on different platforms. On the global scene, China would like to be in a bipolar world but on the regional scene they would like to be unipolar.
•China is not going to be a world power in recent future. While they have indeed signaled their intention, translating it into capability would take many years. It would take decades for the Chinese aircraft carriers to exercise sea control in the IOR. However, China’s nuclear submarines have tremendous power and endurance, which is worrisome for India.
•Maritime peace and stability in IOR is a difficult aim to achieve due to the complexity of the region, based on different languages, cultures, religions and traditions.
•Repercussions of Chinese bases are not dependent on China’s preferences but on those of the littoral states of the IOR.
•For the first time in history, the US influence is relatively decreasing in the IOR. India has also become vulnerable in its own area. Therefore, appropriate action should be taken to secure New Delhi’s interests.
•For the next two to three decades, China will be look to establish support systems for the deployment for the security of maritime resource generation, trade and energy lines. China will have self-defendant units but they do not have capability to defend geographical areas.
THE TAHIRUL QADRI AFFAIR
D Suba Chandran
It all started during the third week of last month in Pakistan. The Punjab police raided the office of Tahirul Qadri, the maverick “Visiting” political leader of Pakistan, in the garb of clearing the encroachments made as a part of securing the Minhajul Quran headquarters of the latter. In the process, there was violence, and few supporters of Qadri were killed during the police action.
Subsequently when Tahirul Qadri decided to come back from Canada to lead a revolution in Pakistan, his flight was re-routed to Lahore, instead of landing in Islamabad. By refusing to exit from the plane, but actively engage the media sitting within the place, not only he caused considerable mayhem, but also gained significant political mileage for himself.
What makes some of our politicians, who have left the country under one pretext or another to return? What do they gain in doing so, or do they play to a different script written by someone else within the country? And in the process, do they really add value to the democratic process, or end up in becoming a nuisance for themselves and the larger nation that they profess to serve?
Certainly, Tahirul Qadri is not the first political leader in Pakistan, who has decided to return. In the recent years, Pervez Musharraf returned to Pakistan after a self imposed exile; unfortunately, the return has been a huge disaster for him. He did not get the reception he expected, or thought he deserved. There were no mammoth rallies welcoming him back to Pakistan, nor the political paradigm within Pakistan shifted. For many he was just a former dictator and responsible for many of contemporary ills of Pakistan.
Worse, for Musharraf, the cases in judiciary and Nawaz Sharif as the Prime Minister did not help at all. More than being a saviour of Pakistan, he was treated as an accused and had to be hidden in the hospital. The media did not give a positive coverage, nor did the political parties which benefitted under his rule came openly for his support. Today Musharraf is a sorry figure within Pakistan’s political landscape. He would have been better, had he not returned to Pakistan.
Another leader, who had a totally opposite reception (to that of Musharraf) within Pakistan was Benazir Bhutto. Not just once, twice she came back from an exile and both time she got a historical reception. Following the death of Zia ul Haq, the then military ruler of Pakistan, Benazir returned to Pakistan in 1988; she was received by a mammoth crowd, ultimately resulting in her becoming the Prime Minister for the first time. Though her government did not complete the full term, the reception to her return was grand.
After another exile during the last decade during Musharraf’s period, she returned to Pakistan for the second time in 2007. She got a bigger reception; in fact those who opposed her return were so terrified about her leadership and the popular support, she had to be assassinated brutally while she was leading an election campaign.
Now back to Tahirul Qadri, he is neither Musharraf nor Benazir. He has a small constituency inside Pakistan. With no stretch of imagination, this constituency of Qadri, which is a part of his educational and social welfare institutions, can help their leader lead a revolution. Though he is also the leader of Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT), a political party founded in 1989 by himself, it hardly has any popular support and will find it difficult to garner votes and win seats in any free and fair elections.
In fact, it was the police action against his Headquarters by the Punjab Police, and the diversion of his plane from Islamabad to Lahore, which has provided him a larger profile. Why did the Sharif brothers commit such a blunder? And why did Qadri decide to return in the first place?
This is not the first time that Qadri had decided to return to Pakistan from Canada. Holding the citizenship of Canada, he came immediately before the elections in 2013. His objective at that time was confusing; in fact many within Pakistan believed he is playing someone else’s agenda (read the intelligence agencies) in terms of derailing the electoral process and democracy in Pakistan. His idea of creating a “revolution” in Pakistan in 2012 envisaged a “million men march” against corruption, dissolution of Parliament and impractical electoral reforms. Less than 30,000 people took part in his million men march; however, the much abused Zardari handled the Qadri “revolution” better by allowing his march, making his “million men” claim a popular joke in electronic and social media. Qadri was engaged politically by the government, resulting in signing a declaration but ending his return to Pakistan as a comical affair.
His second return last month was dealt differently by the Sharif brothers. As mentioned above, the Punjab Police used force, which was thoroughly rebutted by the media and people. Qadri did not become a hero, but the government was seriously criticized. Worse, was the decision to re-route his flight.
Why did the government get jittery? And what did Qadri achieve in his second coming. To the first question, perhaps the government, especially the Sharif brothers smell a conspiracy in his return. During the last few months, the civil-military relations within Pakistan appear strained. The decision to talk to the Taliban, the gap between the civilian and intelligence agencies in dealing with Hamid Mir and Geo Channel and the Musharraf trial had created tension between the Prime Minister and the GHQ.
The sudden decision by Imran Khan to question the election results along with Tahirul Qadri’s proposed revolution makes a section within the government to believe that there is a conspiracy by the military and intelligence agencies against the elected government.
The role of security agencies in the return of an exiled (self or otherwise) leader is a reality in this region. However, their success is dependent on the popular support for them. This is where, the Sharif brothers over did; they could have allowed Qadri to return and organise a “million men” march with 30,000 people; except for being a nuisance value and blocking the traffic and throwing the ordinary life out of normalcy for a couple of days in Islamabad, Qadri could not have achieve much. In fact, even today, after the mis-handling of his return, there is not much support for Qadri within Pakistan. Zardari did that and made Qadri a sorrow figure; Sharif brothers did the opposite and ended up increasing Qadri’s profile.
Besides the intelligence agencies, do other factors result in the return of these leaders? Perhaps, for few, such as Musharraf, there is a self perception of a messiah, who strongly believe that they could lead their country. Musharraf’s return was more a result of his own perception about his popularity, than based on any realistic assessment. There are many such individuals, not only in political field, but also in cultural, business and sports fields, who suffer from this messiah syndrome.
Finally, the sycophants and that small section, which would benefit monetarily, also play a substantial role in boosting the ego of the leaders, resulting in their return.
But have such returns helped the country? Except for Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, there are no such case studies. This shows the need for a strong party network at the ground level and the political experience of leaders and the party as primary reasons for successful returns. Else, they will end up as disasters. South Asia has witnessed numerous such returns in different fields.
It all started during the third week of last month in Pakistan. The Punjab police raided the office of Tahirul Qadri, the maverick “Visiting” political leader of Pakistan, in the garb of clearing the encroachments made as a part of securing the Minhajul Quran headquarters of the latter. In the process, there was violence, and few supporters of Qadri were killed during the police action.
Subsequently when Tahirul Qadri decided to come back from Canada to lead a revolution in Pakistan, his flight was re-routed to Lahore, instead of landing in Islamabad. By refusing to exit from the plane, but actively engage the media sitting within the place, not only he caused considerable mayhem, but also gained significant political mileage for himself.
What makes some of our politicians, who have left the country under one pretext or another to return? What do they gain in doing so, or do they play to a different script written by someone else within the country? And in the process, do they really add value to the democratic process, or end up in becoming a nuisance for themselves and the larger nation that they profess to serve?
Certainly, Tahirul Qadri is not the first political leader in Pakistan, who has decided to return. In the recent years, Pervez Musharraf returned to Pakistan after a self imposed exile; unfortunately, the return has been a huge disaster for him. He did not get the reception he expected, or thought he deserved. There were no mammoth rallies welcoming him back to Pakistan, nor the political paradigm within Pakistan shifted. For many he was just a former dictator and responsible for many of contemporary ills of Pakistan.
Worse, for Musharraf, the cases in judiciary and Nawaz Sharif as the Prime Minister did not help at all. More than being a saviour of Pakistan, he was treated as an accused and had to be hidden in the hospital. The media did not give a positive coverage, nor did the political parties which benefitted under his rule came openly for his support. Today Musharraf is a sorry figure within Pakistan’s political landscape. He would have been better, had he not returned to Pakistan.
Another leader, who had a totally opposite reception (to that of Musharraf) within Pakistan was Benazir Bhutto. Not just once, twice she came back from an exile and both time she got a historical reception. Following the death of Zia ul Haq, the then military ruler of Pakistan, Benazir returned to Pakistan in 1988; she was received by a mammoth crowd, ultimately resulting in her becoming the Prime Minister for the first time. Though her government did not complete the full term, the reception to her return was grand.
After another exile during the last decade during Musharraf’s period, she returned to Pakistan for the second time in 2007. She got a bigger reception; in fact those who opposed her return were so terrified about her leadership and the popular support, she had to be assassinated brutally while she was leading an election campaign.
Now back to Tahirul Qadri, he is neither Musharraf nor Benazir. He has a small constituency inside Pakistan. With no stretch of imagination, this constituency of Qadri, which is a part of his educational and social welfare institutions, can help their leader lead a revolution. Though he is also the leader of Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT), a political party founded in 1989 by himself, it hardly has any popular support and will find it difficult to garner votes and win seats in any free and fair elections.
In fact, it was the police action against his Headquarters by the Punjab Police, and the diversion of his plane from Islamabad to Lahore, which has provided him a larger profile. Why did the Sharif brothers commit such a blunder? And why did Qadri decide to return in the first place?
This is not the first time that Qadri had decided to return to Pakistan from Canada. Holding the citizenship of Canada, he came immediately before the elections in 2013. His objective at that time was confusing; in fact many within Pakistan believed he is playing someone else’s agenda (read the intelligence agencies) in terms of derailing the electoral process and democracy in Pakistan. His idea of creating a “revolution” in Pakistan in 2012 envisaged a “million men march” against corruption, dissolution of Parliament and impractical electoral reforms. Less than 30,000 people took part in his million men march; however, the much abused Zardari handled the Qadri “revolution” better by allowing his march, making his “million men” claim a popular joke in electronic and social media. Qadri was engaged politically by the government, resulting in signing a declaration but ending his return to Pakistan as a comical affair.
His second return last month was dealt differently by the Sharif brothers. As mentioned above, the Punjab Police used force, which was thoroughly rebutted by the media and people. Qadri did not become a hero, but the government was seriously criticized. Worse, was the decision to re-route his flight.
Why did the government get jittery? And what did Qadri achieve in his second coming. To the first question, perhaps the government, especially the Sharif brothers smell a conspiracy in his return. During the last few months, the civil-military relations within Pakistan appear strained. The decision to talk to the Taliban, the gap between the civilian and intelligence agencies in dealing with Hamid Mir and Geo Channel and the Musharraf trial had created tension between the Prime Minister and the GHQ.
The sudden decision by Imran Khan to question the election results along with Tahirul Qadri’s proposed revolution makes a section within the government to believe that there is a conspiracy by the military and intelligence agencies against the elected government.
The role of security agencies in the return of an exiled (self or otherwise) leader is a reality in this region. However, their success is dependent on the popular support for them. This is where, the Sharif brothers over did; they could have allowed Qadri to return and organise a “million men” march with 30,000 people; except for being a nuisance value and blocking the traffic and throwing the ordinary life out of normalcy for a couple of days in Islamabad, Qadri could not have achieve much. In fact, even today, after the mis-handling of his return, there is not much support for Qadri within Pakistan. Zardari did that and made Qadri a sorrow figure; Sharif brothers did the opposite and ended up increasing Qadri’s profile.
Besides the intelligence agencies, do other factors result in the return of these leaders? Perhaps, for few, such as Musharraf, there is a self perception of a messiah, who strongly believe that they could lead their country. Musharraf’s return was more a result of his own perception about his popularity, than based on any realistic assessment. There are many such individuals, not only in political field, but also in cultural, business and sports fields, who suffer from this messiah syndrome.
Finally, the sycophants and that small section, which would benefit monetarily, also play a substantial role in boosting the ego of the leaders, resulting in their return.
But have such returns helped the country? Except for Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, there are no such case studies. This shows the need for a strong party network at the ground level and the political experience of leaders and the party as primary reasons for successful returns. Else, they will end up as disasters. South Asia has witnessed numerous such returns in different fields.
2 Jul 2014
ECONOMIC FREEDOM
Walter E. Williams
A couple of years ago, President Barack Obama, speaking on the economy, told an audience in Osawatomie, Kansas: "'The market will take care of everything,' they tell us. ... But here's the problem: It doesn't work. It has never worked. ... I mean, understand, it's not as if we haven't tried this theory." To believe what the president and many others say about the market's not working requires that one be grossly uninformed or dishonest.
The key features of a free market system are private property rights and private ownership of the means of production. In addition, there's a large measure of peaceable voluntary exchange. By contrast, communist systems feature severely limited private property rights and government ownership or control of the means of production. There has never been a purely free market economic system, just as there has never been a purely communist system. However, we can rank economies and see whether ones that are closer to the free market end of the economic spectrum are better or worse than ones that are closer to the communist end. Let's try it.
First, list countries according to whether they are closer to the free market or the communist end of the economic spectrum. Then rank countries according to per capita gross domestic product. Finally, rank countries according to Freedom House's "Freedom in the World" report. People who live in countries closer to the free market end of the economic spectrum not only have far greater income than people who live in countries toward the communist end but also enjoy far greater human rights protections.
According to the 2012 "Economic Freedom of the World" report -- by James Gwartney, Robert Lawson and Joshua Hall -- nations ranking in the top quartile with regard to economic freedom had an average per capita GDP of $37,691 in 2010, compared with $5,188 for those in the bottom quartile. In the freest nations, the average income of the poorest 10 percent of their populations was $11,382. In the least free nations, it was $1,209. Remarkably, the average income of the poorest 10 percent in the economically freer nations is more than twice the average income of those in the least free nations.
Free market benefits aren't only measured in dollars and cents. Life expectancy is 79.5 years in the freest nations and 61.6 years in the least free. Political and civil liberties are considerably greater in the economically free nations than in un-free nations.
Leftists might argue that the free market doesn't help the poor. That argument can't even pass the smell test. Imagine that you are an unborn spirit and God condemned you to a life of poverty but gave you a choice of the country in which to be poor. Which country would you choose? To help with your choice, here are facts provided by Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield in their report "Understanding Poverty in the United States: Surprising Facts About America's Poor." Eighty percent of American poor households have air conditioning. Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more. Almost two-thirds have cable or satellite TV. Half have one or more computers. Forty-two percent own their homes. The average poor American has more living space than the typical non-poor person in Sweden, France and the U.K. Ninety-six percent of poor parents stated that their children were never hungry because they could not afford food. The bottom line is that there is little or no material poverty in the U.S.
At the time of our nation's birth, we were poor, but we established an institutional structure of free markets and limited government and became rich. Those riches were achieved long before today's unwieldy government. Our having a free market and limited government more than anything else explains our wealth. Most of our major problems are a result of government. We Americans should recognize that unfettered government and crony capitalism, not unfettered markets, are the cause of our current economic problems and why the U.S. has sunk to the rank of 17th in the 2013 "Economic Freedom of the World" report.
A couple of years ago, President Barack Obama, speaking on the economy, told an audience in Osawatomie, Kansas: "'The market will take care of everything,' they tell us. ... But here's the problem: It doesn't work. It has never worked. ... I mean, understand, it's not as if we haven't tried this theory." To believe what the president and many others say about the market's not working requires that one be grossly uninformed or dishonest.
The key features of a free market system are private property rights and private ownership of the means of production. In addition, there's a large measure of peaceable voluntary exchange. By contrast, communist systems feature severely limited private property rights and government ownership or control of the means of production. There has never been a purely free market economic system, just as there has never been a purely communist system. However, we can rank economies and see whether ones that are closer to the free market end of the economic spectrum are better or worse than ones that are closer to the communist end. Let's try it.
First, list countries according to whether they are closer to the free market or the communist end of the economic spectrum. Then rank countries according to per capita gross domestic product. Finally, rank countries according to Freedom House's "Freedom in the World" report. People who live in countries closer to the free market end of the economic spectrum not only have far greater income than people who live in countries toward the communist end but also enjoy far greater human rights protections.
According to the 2012 "Economic Freedom of the World" report -- by James Gwartney, Robert Lawson and Joshua Hall -- nations ranking in the top quartile with regard to economic freedom had an average per capita GDP of $37,691 in 2010, compared with $5,188 for those in the bottom quartile. In the freest nations, the average income of the poorest 10 percent of their populations was $11,382. In the least free nations, it was $1,209. Remarkably, the average income of the poorest 10 percent in the economically freer nations is more than twice the average income of those in the least free nations.
Free market benefits aren't only measured in dollars and cents. Life expectancy is 79.5 years in the freest nations and 61.6 years in the least free. Political and civil liberties are considerably greater in the economically free nations than in un-free nations.
Leftists might argue that the free market doesn't help the poor. That argument can't even pass the smell test. Imagine that you are an unborn spirit and God condemned you to a life of poverty but gave you a choice of the country in which to be poor. Which country would you choose? To help with your choice, here are facts provided by Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield in their report "Understanding Poverty in the United States: Surprising Facts About America's Poor." Eighty percent of American poor households have air conditioning. Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more. Almost two-thirds have cable or satellite TV. Half have one or more computers. Forty-two percent own their homes. The average poor American has more living space than the typical non-poor person in Sweden, France and the U.K. Ninety-six percent of poor parents stated that their children were never hungry because they could not afford food. The bottom line is that there is little or no material poverty in the U.S.
At the time of our nation's birth, we were poor, but we established an institutional structure of free markets and limited government and became rich. Those riches were achieved long before today's unwieldy government. Our having a free market and limited government more than anything else explains our wealth. Most of our major problems are a result of government. We Americans should recognize that unfettered government and crony capitalism, not unfettered markets, are the cause of our current economic problems and why the U.S. has sunk to the rank of 17th in the 2013 "Economic Freedom of the World" report.
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