The Team That Got bin Laden

According to Obama, this is the team that got bin Laden!

Obama and Admiral Mullen to Find Cuts in Spending Via Military Pay

I read an article at Military.com today that has absolutely infuriated me.  It seems that the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the highest ranking officer in the military, Admiral Mike Mullen  was quoted as saying yesterday that members of the armed forces will very likely see cuts in pay and benefits over the next twelve years as the military tries to come up with $400 billion in cuts to meet President Obama’s proposed budget spending cuts that are expected to largely come from the Department of Defense.

Admiral Mullen told reporters yesterday that expenses must be trimmed and that, “"Two of the big places the money is, is in pay and benefits, and so when I say all things are on the table, all things are on the table.”

Despite the fact that our Commander in Chief seemingly has at best an apathetic attitude towards our military, and at worst an outright disdain for them, I would hope that he would see the necessity of providing for and taking care of those heroic folks that have sacrificed so much in their lives by volunteering to serve and protect our nation in the military.  It is not like such men and women are getting rich from their government paychecks they receive for military service.  Further, these folks are sometimes put in harm’s way or support those good folks that are.  They damned well earn every cent they receive and every few benefit they are afforded.  They have truly earned these already pitifully inadequate paychecks and benefits.

Our President wouldn’t dream of making cuts to the welfare rolls and social safety net, despite the fraud and abuse that is rampant throughout the system there.  No, these folks are all reliable Democratic constituents by a large margin.  Never mind that there are many folks not working that could be doing so that receive any variety of tax payer funded benefits.  Cutting out the waste and fraud in this venue is taboo and strictly off the table to President Obama and the Democrats evidently.

On the other hand, since the military has traditionally been far more conservative in its voting predilections, cuts made there won’t come back to haunt President Obama and the Democrats as badly in the long run.  Never mind that we have THREE wars going on in Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Libya that is severely straining our military as it is.  Far be it to fund one of the few items that the federal government is actually CONSTITUTIONALLY mandated to fund. 

Indeed, I am certain there is some waste and unnecessary things that can be cut in the Department of Defense, but it strikes me as a slap in the face to those very folks protecting us to now tell them that their meager pay and benefits will be cut.  Why don’t we start with cutting all civilian government employees’ pay first?  Why don’t we cut pay and benefits for each and every one in the Executive Branch, including the president, and everyone in the legislative branch?  If one wants to further save money from cuts to the DoD, why don’t we start by stopping the asinine social engineering the left has championed and the millions upon millions of dollars that will have to be spent to accommodate folks in our new gay-friendly military?

The military is there to protect and defend America and its freedoms and to ensure that its interests that make those freedoms possible in the world are never put in jeopardy.  It is an insult of the highest caliber to deny those sacrificing to do so with even less than what they already are given in exchange for a honorable life of service.  President Obama and Admiral Mullen should be ashamed of themselves accordingly!

President Obama's New "Peace" Policy and Israel's Very Existence

I was deeply distressed to hear President Obama’s recent remarks calling for Israel to return to its 1967 borders as a “starting place for peace negotiations” with the Palestinians.  It has been the policy of the United States of America to defend Israel’s right to exist and to allow it to maintain a country which it is able to defend by NOT returning to the 1967 borders.  Indeed, as recently as 2005 President Bush promised Israel once again that, in exchange for other concessions, the United States would continue to NOT ever press Israel to return to those indefensible borders.  President Obama broke that pledge and dramatically changed U.S. policy in the process with his foolish and ill-considered announcement a week and half ago for Israel to return those captured lands which it won while defending its very existence against multiple Arab armies, yet again, during the 6-Day War in 1967.

The irony of all of this, and what many that disparage the “evil Jew Zionists” will repeatedly fail to acknowledge, is the fact that directly after the Six Day War the Israeli government did indeed offer to return the Golan Heights to Syria, despite the canon emplacements that Israel’s enemies placed there which look down on the Galilee and Tiberius.  Israel also offered to return the strategic Sinai peninsula to Egypt (Something that did come into being when President Carter finally brokered peace between Egypt and Israel in 1979).  Finally, Israel also offered to return the West Bank to Jordan. 

What did Israel want in exchange for the return of these captured lands?  All they asked for was an acknowledgement of Israel’s right to exist and to have peace.  At that time, all of the surrounding Arab nations responded to Israel’s offer by declaring that there was to be no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with them, and certainly no peace.  Israel kept these territories accordingly.  To return these lands to the surrounding hostile nations would return Israel to a nation where its international airport is only three miles away from the pre-1967 borders and the nation itself would be only eight miles wide at it narrowest point. 

For Israel, a nation that most of its neighbors does not even acknowledge as a rightful nation to this very day, and a country which leaders such as Iran’s President Ahmadinejad have vowed to “wipe off the face of the map” and “drive the Jews into the sea”, one can perhaps begin to understand the Jew’s hesitancy in wanting to sign their death warrants by returning these buffer lands that allow them the tenuous ability to defend their nation, and indeed their very existence.

The Palestinians have spent the last 64 years portraying themselves as the victims of the Jews.  These “refugees” have not been cared for by their Arab brothers.  The other Arab nations will not allow the Palestinian people to immigrate to their nations.  Indeed, the Arabs would rather have their Palestinian brothers live in poverty and squalor so that they can use them as a political club with which to beat the Israelis over the head with in world opinion. The Palestinian leadership has been corrupt and incompetent.  Indeed, today the Palestinian government has aligned itself with Hamas, a recognized terrorist organization whose only purpose is the destruction of Israel and the extermination of the Jewish people.
 
The United States financial support for the Palestinian people continues despite this, as we prop up a Palestinian people who wish us, “the Great Satan”, no good will either.  Indeed, many Palestinians were seen to be cheering in the streets during the horrific attacks on America on 9/11.  Further, billions of dollars that the U.S. has given in aid for the Palestinian people over the decades has been diverted to private bank accounts, particularly that of the now departed and Nobel-Peace-Prize winning terrorist Yasser Arafat’s reign.
 
The Arabs in general and the Palestinians in particular, point to how Israel treats them, and yet as Benjamin Netanyahu pointed out recently, over one million Arab citizens of Israel have been enjoying the same rights and freedoms that all Israeli people have enjoyed for decades.  The only difference is that the Arab-Israeli citizens are not required to serve a term in the Israeli armed forces, unlike their Jewish fellow-citizens.  They enjoy all of the other same freedoms otherwise.

Indeed, in Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech before congress a week ago, after President Obama’s deplorable announcement, Netanyahu put things in to proper perspective when he said, “Of the 300 million Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa, only Israel's Arab citizens enjoy real democratic rights. I want you to stop for a second and think about that.  Of those 300 million Arabs, less than one-half of one-percent are truly free, and they're all citizens of Israel!”

There are a few other passages in Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech that bear repeating.  He drew a very clear picture of Israel’s dire situation when he stated, “Now the threat to my country cannot be overstated. Those who dismiss it are sticking their heads in the sand. Less than seven decades after six million Jews were murdered, Iran's leaders deny the Holocaust of the Jewish people, while calling for the annihilation of the Jewish state.

Leaders who spew such venom, should be banned from every respectable forum on the planet. But there is something that makes the outrage even greater: The lack of outrage.  In much of the international community, the calls for our destruction are met with utter silence.   It is even worse because there are many who rush to condemn Israel for defending itself against Iran's terror proxies.”

Netanyahu continued, “So peace must be anchored in security. In recent years, Israel withdrew from South Lebanon and Gaza.  But we didn't get peace.  Instead, we got 12,000 thousand rockets fired from those areas on our cities, on our children, by Hezbollah and Hamas.  The UN peacekeepers in Lebanon failed to prevent the smuggling of this weaponry.  The European observers in Gaza evaporated  overnight. So if Israel simply walked out of the territories, the flow of weapons into a future Palestinian state would be unchecked.  Missiles fired from it could reach virtually every home in Israel in less than a minute.”

He summarized his remarks before our congress by stating, “You see, our conflict has never been about the establishment of a Palestinian state. It has always been about the existence of the Jewish state. This is what this conflict is about. 

The Prime Minister is right.  Further, with the current and seeming perpetual mindset of the Palestinians and most Arab peoples towards Israel and the Jews, a true and lasting peace will NEVER be established.  See the link for our good friend Free’s blog, John Galt for President, for the video of how this mindset is inculcated into the children of the Arabs and Palestinians.  How is peace ever to be brought forth when the Palestinian children are taught that Jews are swine and dogs, basically subhuman? 

I strongly suspect that the only peace that Israel will EVER find, the only peace that the Palestinian and Arab people will ultimately respect and honor, will come when America fully supports Israel’s right to protect itself by retaliating in a war in which they unequivocally and unconditionally destroy the surrounding Arab armies; when they do not negotiate with those they have unquestionably vanquished in war; when Israel dictates from that position of strength and power what the terms of surrender for the Arab and Palestinian people will be. 

Attempts at negotiation and Israel returning land for peace have not worked and indeed have only encouraged more terrorist attacks upon itself.  Such actions are not seen as tokens of mercy or goodwill by the typical Middle Eastern Arab.  Indeed these acts are seen as signs of weakness; a weakness that can be pressed and exploited.  Only through the horrible conclusion of an overwhelming war can Israel achieve a final lasting peace.  To continue on the path of the status quo is entirely fruitless and ultimately puts Israel’s very existence in jeopardy.

 The former Prime Minister of Israel, Golda Meir, said it well, "There will be no peace until they love their children more than they hate us."  She was right.

HT to Carrie for providing much of the research material for this article.

Contrasting the Speeches of Bush on Saddam vs. Obama on bin Laden

Excerpt from George W. Bush’s speech after the capture of Saddam Hussein:

The success of yesterday's mission is a tribute to our men and women now serving in Iraq.  The operation was based on the superb work of intelligence analysts who found the dictator's footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a brave fighting force. Our servicemen and women and our coalition allies have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in their effort to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. Their work continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank the members of our Armed Forces and I congratulate 'em.

Excerpt from Barack Obama’s speech after the killing of Osama bin Laden:

...And so shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda, even as we continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network.

Then, last August, after years of painstaking work by our intelligence community, I was briefed on a possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground. I met repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. 

And finally, last week, I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and I authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice. Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

I really don't think the stark differences between the two speeches requires any additional commentary from me.