Obama cynically decries our (increasing) energy dependence on foreign sources and yet he and his tree hugging cronies have thwarted virtually every means of effectively addressing this. He has directly and indirectly blocked the drilling for oil on land and sea and the usage of our vast coal deposits yet in the same sentence doesn’t acknowledge this.
Our dependence on foreign sources is dangerous, imprudent, unnecessary and financially destabilizing. Exacerbating the situation is that much of this oil is under the direct control of a cartel of corrupt dictators and tyrants who can use this resource for political leverage and power. They can also funnel the proceeds to fund terrorism and anti-American activities.
In the specious argument of “saving the environment”, the Left and environmental radicals are empowering and enriching tyrannical regimes that are killing hundreds of thousands of people (or more) and exporting their hatred, destruction and terrorism here.
Ironic, isn’t it?
Oil Dependence: An Unnecessary Security Risk
Herman Cain 03/30/2011
In the early 1970s, America's dependence on foreign oil was a little over 20%. Today, our dependence on foreign oil is over 65%. We have become more and more energy dependent because we have never had a serious energy independence strategy, and we still do not have one.
Energy independence is within our grasp because we have plenty of energy natural resources. We have billions of barrels of oil, plenty of natural gas reserves, more coal than any other country in the world, lots of places we could build dams for hydroelectricity and some of the safest nuclear power technology in the world.
Wind and solar energy development is not going to get us to energy independence. Studies such as the Department of Energy's "Billion Ton Study" have shown that those two sources could at best provide 5% of our energy needs combined.
But by maximizing all of our other domestic energy resources, we could become energy independent. This would not only help to keep down the cost of gasoline and the cost of nearly everything we buy, but it would also be a boost to our economy and create hundreds of thousands of new jobs.
But most importantly, energy independence would keep us from being vulnerable to the current instability in the Middle East or the whims of OPEC.
But to become energy independent, we would have to reject the false premise that America's high energy consumption is at odds with conservation, or that we will cause irreversible harm to our planet. To say that we will cause irreversible harm to the planet by using our natural resources responsibly is like saying that man never should have discovered fire in the first place.
Natural resources are there for a reason. Use them! That's why they are natural! The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), oil reserves off our own continental coasts, oil shale areas out West and even nuclear power development can create a path to energy independence.
The area proposed for production in ANWR, for example, comprises only 0.08% of the 19 million acres of the refuge, and it is estimated to contain at least 16 billion barrels of recoverable oil. Allowing drilling there would not be an environmental hazard using today's technology. And if any caribou got lost near that less-than-two-acre carve-out of ANWR, I seriously doubt that they would even notice or care.
And yes, accidents do happen in these various sectors of our energy economy. We usually learn from them to help minimize future accidents. That's common sense. But we do not need to go overboard with excessive regulations after an unfortunate accident to make the approval processes even slower.
Exploration and production of natural gas from shale oil deposits represent another huge, untapped opportunity. The technology to safely extract natural gas from our enormous oil shale reserves has never been better. But here again, the environmentalists always scream that it's the end of the world, and then some gutless elected officials kowtow to their wishes for more regulations.
So why are we not on a path to energy independence? It's simply because of too many regulations that slow down the process and discourage businesses to invest. Illogical moratoriums, excessive federal regulations and environmental extremists who influence weak legislators are holding America hostage to foreign oil.
A revitalized and responsibly unleashed energy sector could be a significant economic stimulus to our economy right here at home.
Working families can't afford to spend more of their discretionary income on gasoline and energy costs, especially in a stalled economy. America can't afford to continue spending billions of dollars to buy something that we can produce right here at home if we stop sitting on it. We must stop making other countries rich at our expense.
It's not just economic. It is common sense and a matter of national security.
In probably the most egregious act of the Obama Administration and as far as we can tell, the most perfidious, it secretly agreed to provide Russia with classified information regarding Great Britain’s nuclear capabilities – against that nation’s will and demand. The reason for this unmitigated treachery was to persuade Russia to sign the START Treaty which is so one sided in favor of that country to begin with.
Not only did Putin et. al. crush the abjectly incompetent, naïve and traitorous Obama with this abomination of an agreement, but he also obtained the additional benefit of procuring priceless information about its other enemy’s nuclear weapons.
The START Treaty negates our marked nuclear advantages over Russia – offensively and defensively – and places all Americans as well as citizens in numerous countries around the world in much greater danger. All for a signed piece of paper which, unbelievably, they can still invalidate under certain circumstances.
As for selling out our closest ally, Great Britain, this is a most despicable, inexcusable and treacherous act that is light years worse than any of the other abhorrent acts Obama that has committed against them. Obama has made it a habit to sabotage, undermine and derogate our long time allies – like Great Britain, Israel, Poland, Australia, etc. while coddling up to and appeasing our mortal enemies who are further emboldened by his interminable weakness, incompetence and naivety.
Obama must pay and pay big time for such treason!
Obama's actions warrant impeachment and this MUST be pursued.
Obama is dangerous and must be removed from office ASAP or our and the world’s future is bleak.
He is facilitating conditions for a nuclear Apocalypse.
WikiLeaks cables: US agrees to tell Russia Britain's nuclear secrets
The US secretly agreed to give the Russians sensitive information on Britain’s nuclear deterrent to persuade them to sign a key treaty, The Daily Telegraph can disclose.
HMS Vanguard is Britain's lead Trident-armed submarine. The US, under a nuclear deal, has agreed to give the Kremlin the serial numbers of the missiles it gives Britain Photo: Tam MacDonald
Matthew Moore, Gordon Rayner and Christopher Hope Feb 4, 2011
Information about every Trident missile the US supplies to Britain will be given to Russia as part of an arms control deal signed by President Barack Obama next week.
Defence analysts claim the agreement risks undermining Britain’s policy of refusing to confirm the exact size of its nuclear arsenal.
The fact that the Americans used British nuclear secrets as a bargaining chip also sheds new light on the so-called “special relationship”, which is shown often to be a one-sided affair by US diplomatic communications obtained by the WikiLeaks website.
Details of the behind-the-scenes talks are contained in more than 1,400 US embassy cables published to date by the Telegraph, including almost 800 sent from the London Embassy, which are published online today. The documents also show that:
• America spied on Foreign Office ministers by gathering gossip on their private lives and professional relationships.
• Intelligence-sharing arrangements with the US became strained after the controversy over Binyam Mohamed, the former Guantánamo Bay detainee who sued the Government over his alleged torture.
• David Miliband disowned the Duchess of York by saying she could not “be controlled” after she made an undercover TV documentary.
• Tens of millions of pounds of overseas aid was stolen and spent on plasma televisions and luxury goods by corrupt regimes.
A series of classified messages sent to Washington by US negotiators show how information on Britain’s nuclear capability was crucial to securing Russia’s support for the “New START” deal.
Although the treaty was not supposed to have any impact on Britain, the leaked cables show that Russia used the talks to demand more information about the UK’s Trident missiles, which are manufactured and maintained in the US.
Washington lobbied London in 2009 for permission to supply Moscow with detailed data about the performance of UK missiles. The UK refused, but the US agreed to hand over the serial numbers of Trident missiles it transfers to Britain.
Professor Malcolm Chalmers said: “This appears to be significant because while the UK has announced how many missiles it possesses, there has been no way for the Russians to verify this. Over time, the unique identifiers will provide them with another data point to gauge the size of the British arsenal.”
Duncan Lennox, editor of Jane’s Strategic Weapons Systems, said: “They want to find out whether Britain has more missiles than we say we have, and having the unique identifiers might help them.”
While the US and Russia have long permitted inspections of each other’s nuclear weapons, Britain has sought to maintain some secrecy to compensate for the relatively small size of its arsenal.
William Hague, the Foreign Secretary, last year disclosed that “up to 160” warheads are operational at any one time, but did not confirm the number of missiles.
Now that the Republicans will control the House of Representatives, we finally will have some serious discussions within the government regarding the issue of Muslim radicalization and terrorism. Representative Peter King (R-NY), the incoming chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, has vowed this to be the case.
For too long, the Obama Administration including Attorney General Eric Holder and Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano as well as Congressional Democrats have gone to great lengths and recklessly denied any possible connection between Islam and terrorism. This is an absurdity that defies logic but also places our nation at greater risk.
Finally, we can expect a rational assessment and some concrete suggestions that may afford us more protection and preparedness.
Incoming House Homeland Security Chair Plans Hearings on Muslim Radicalization
Wes Barrett Dec. 20, 2010
Representative Peter King (R-NY) says he'll call for hearings into the radicalization of Muslim Americans when he takes over as chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security in the new congressional term.
In an interview on FOX's "America Live," King said "We have to break through this politically correct nonsense which keeps us from debating and discussing what I think is one of the most vitally important issues in this country. We are under siege by Muslim terrorists and yet there are Muslim leaders in this country who do not cooperate with law enforcement."
And he also notes a rise in terrorist recruitment in the United States saying, "We have the reality that Al-Qaida is trying to recruit Muslim-Americans, and yet we have people in the Muslim community who refuse to face up to this."
King cites foiled terror plots to bomb Times Square and the New York Subway, the 2009 Fort Hood shootings, and arrests of who he calls "homegrown Muslim terrorists" in Texas, Chicago, Virginia, New Jersey, San Diego and Portland, Oregon as examples of the type of radicalization on which the hearings would focus.
But some Muslim groups have said such hearings would be an anti-Muslim witch hunt and lead to an era of McCarthy-type hearings.
"Rep. King has dedicated years of his career peddling extremist rhetoric and baseless claims concerning the Muslim community and its leadership," said Faiza Ali, community affairs director of the New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations [1].
"Instead of promoting counterproductive strategies that risk alienating partners within the community, Rep. King would better serve our nation if he actually engaged mainstream American Muslim leaders and organizations on issues related to national security."
But the congressman says he'll use the hearings to drill deeper into the divisive issue and points out that Muslims themselves are most susceptible to being victims of terrorism. "The immediate victims are Muslims themselves, whose sons and daughters could end up being killed as suicide bombers," he said.
We are being herded like sheep through airport security with Big Brother subjecting us to privacy robbing humiliating inspections either through digital means (and irradiating us as well) or multiple digit means (government sanctioned sexual assault). This is government imposed soft tyranny all in the name of security where we are all supposed to be treated equally.
Wrong!
There is an element of subjectivity that allows for inappropriate targeting of victims (see Baywatch babe for example) which clearly violates one’s personal rights.
The Obama Administration and Democrats support this egalitarian approach so as not to offend “Muslims” – the same group of people who have been shown to have a near total monopoly worldwide on terrorism.
They are blatantly stating that it is OK to offend, humiliate and violate the rights of tens of millions of innocent American travelers instead!
This is an abhorrent and perverse abuse government power and we should not continue to acquiesce.
Outrageous as this is, new evidence reveals that we have been duped all along regarding the true level of true security realized by these combined approaches despite the abuses and dehumanizing sacrifices that we have had to make in return. Independent research has revealed that these scanners can miss massive quantities of explosives such as PETN which could easily be smuggled aboard a plane and used to cause catastrophic damage.
The following article details these findings and the false sense of security that the scanners provide.
Journal Article: New Graphic TSA Scanners May Not Detect Powerful Explosive
Jonathon M. Seidl December 12, 2010
A new peer-reviewed journal article by a pair of University of California-San Francisco researchers reveals that the TSA’s new x-ray body scanners may not be as safe as the government agency wants the public to think. In fact, the scanners might not even detect pancake-sized bombs containing PETN, the explosive used in the failed “underwear bomb” last Christmas.
According to Leon Kaufman and Joseph W. Carlson in the Journal of Transportation Security, the scanners could miss PETN bombs if they were taped to a person’s body in a flattened, rounded manner.
The researches write about their findings in the article “An evaluation of airport x-ray backscatter units based on image characteristics.”
From the introduction:
We show that the body is exposed throughout to the incident x-rays, and that although images can be made at the exposure levels claimed (under 100 nanoGrey per view), detection of contraband can be foiled in these systems. Because front and back views are obtained, low Z materials can only be reliable detected if they are packed outside the sides of the body or with hard edges, while high Z materials are well seen when placed in front or back of the body, but not to the sides. Even if exposure were to be increased significantly, normal anatomy would make a dangerous amount of plastic explosive with tapered edges difficult if not impossible to detect.
The article goes on to explain the pancake explosive theory:
It is very likely that a large (15–20 cm in diameter), irregularly-shaped, cm-thick pancake with beveled edges, taped to the abdomen, would be invisible to this technology, ironically, because of its large volume, since it is easily confused with normal anatomy. Thus, a third of a kilo of PETN, easily picked up in a competent pat down, would be missed by backscatter “high technology”. Forty grams of PETN, a purportedly dangerous amount, would fit in a 1.25 mm-thick pancake of the dimensions simulated here and be virtually invisible. Packed in a compact mode, say, a 1 cm×4 cm×5 cm brick, it would be detected.
The article, as is common in journals, is rather technical. But the conclusion remains: the “backscatter” technology has its limits and its loopholes, and may not be the savior of airport security.
The Washington Times goes as far as to call the new scanners a “fraud” in an editorial last week.
“Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano insists the public should trust her when she says the expensive airport scanners are safe and effective,” the editorial says. “Until now, there has been no way to verify this claim because the TSA and the scanner manufacturers have cloaked key operational data behind a veil of purported ‘national security.’”
It continues:
The researchers pointed out that the manufacturers of airport scanners positioned contraband like guns, knives and drugs in unnatural ways to conceal the limitations of their device. For example, the simulated drugs are always packed into tight rectangles that show up distinctly on the machine. TSA employees would have a far more difficult time spotting less tidy terrorists. “The eye is a good signal averager at certain spatial frequencies, but it is doubtful that an operator can be trained to detect these differences unless the material is hard-edged, not too large and regular shaped,” Mr. Kaufman and Mr. Carlson wrote.
The editors’ conclusion calls for the scanners to be scrapped:
In the end, this false sense of security creates a blindness that real terrorists will exploit. Continuing to rely on this fundamentally flawed technological crutch makes air travel more dangerous. The plug must be pulled on these invasive and ineffective machines.
For a long time we have been stating that not only has Obama been negligent regarding securing our borders with Mexico in particular but he has also willfully adopted the position of allowing it to remain porous for political reasons to the detriment of national security and individual safety. Thousands of Americans have been needlessly murdered or subjected to other violent and non-violent crimes perpetrated by these invaders as a direct result of such wanton neglect. (The now convicted murderer of Chandra Levy, the high profile incident occurring in Washington in 2001, was himself an illegal alien.)
We strongly feel that Obama’s incompetence and arrogant, selfish motivation for consciously preventing our borders from being secured from illegal aliens, terrorist, and Mexican narco-gangs and even suing Arizona for taking actions that comport with federal law in order to protect its citizens, are strong grounds for impeachment. He has wantonly violated a basic responsibility of the Presidency.
Gov. 'Blackjack' Perry?
Investor’s Business Daily 11/19/2010
As Mexico buckles, Rick Perry's warnings are starting to sound like prophecy.
Border: As lawlessness spreads in Mexico, the governor of Texas speaks of sending in U.S. troops — a dramatic statement underscoring the fact that the region needs help and isn't getting it.
Attending a conference of governors in San Diego on Thursday, Rick Perry startled some by saying defeating Mexico's cartels may require U.S. military intervention.
"You have a situation on the border where American citizens are being killed," he told MSNBC. "I think we have to use every aspect of law enforcement that we have, including the military. I think you have the same situation as you had in Colombia. Obviously, Mexico has to approve any type of assistance that we can give them."
That may sound extreme, but it underlines that Washington has shortchanged Mexico on even military aid that would help it win its drug war. It has also done little for border states such as Texas and Arizona that bear the brunt of the war, other than deliver lawsuits.
To Washington, the only motive for states' efforts to resist the violent drug cartels is racism, not security.
But Perry knows what he's talking about.
A day earlier, spillover from the war in Mexico took on a quite literal meaning when a dead body clad in cartel-style combat gear washed up on the U.S. bank of the Rio Grande near Salineno, Texas.
According to the Monitor daily in McAllen, police had no idea who he was. But it's likely he's another hash mark to the 31,000-plus death toll of Mexico's war since 2006.
Meanwhile, just eleven blocks away from the Texas town of Roma, hundreds of war refugees from Mier, Mexico, huddle in the town of Miguel Aleman after being forced from their town by the brutal Los Zetas cartel, which vandalized and looted the town.
Los Zetas want Mier for reasons barbarian marauders do — the town sits at a strategic choke point of highways to large cities on both sides of the border. Whoever controls Mier controls routes to them. The Zetas, made up largely of Mexican military renegades, think in military terms.
That's why Mier and this region keep coming up in the news.
Thursday, Mexican troops blew away 11 Zetas in the area and the Zetas took five military men hostage. Mexico watchers noted that the directness of the battle in Mier suggests the Zetas mean to control that town at all costs. Their intensity was seen last month just north of Mier at the Falcon Reservoir, where an American jet-skier was killed and the Mexican police official investigating was beheaded.
The nearby Falcon Dam was also threatened by Zetas with destruction last April, which if carried out would have flooded both sides of the border and displaced 6 million people.
If these realities and other outrages don't wake us up to the fact that our border is now a war zone, what will? War zones require a military response, and as Gov. Perry makes his warning, the prospect of an expedition against the bandits, similar to the ones Gen. John J. "Blackjack" Pershing led in 1916 and 1917, grows more likely.
That's doubly so as the war gets bigger.
Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, speaking by conference call Thursday, said the Obama administration has yet to present a "comprehensive and credible plan" to address national security threats along the border.
Plan Merida, a $1.4 billion package of training and equipment aid to help Mexico fight the cartels, remains largely unspent, with only 9% delivered, according to a 2009 report. That's negligence.
Meanwhile, a 44-page "Broken Neighbor, Broken Border" congressional field investigation, released Friday by Rep. John Carter of Texas, warns that law enforcement agencies in Texas and Arizona are being overwhelmed by the Mexican war's spillover, spending a third of their budgets and manpower on it.
Worst of all is the condescending attitude of the Department of Homeland Security's Janet Napolitano, who snidely told Perry that if he wants border protection, it's up to him to pay for it with Texas National Guard troops. Is she saying border protection isn't her job? If so, that's dereliction of duty.
As Mexico buckles, Washington fails on every front to admit the problem. It raises the possibility that troops really will have to be used — as a last resort. Perry's warning in that case will be prophecy.
The “aggressive” pat downs by TSA agents at airport security stations have been fodder for much commentary as well as humorous angles. The following video is a skit on the TV program Saturday Night Live.
Attorney Eric Holder’s combined level of incompetence, arrogance and intransigence has been elevated to obscene and uncharted territory. His involvement in all areas of responsibility has been disastrous and destructive for our country’s security, personal liberties and rights and race relations.
We have long called for his resignation or firing despite knowing that the hauteur and ideological intransigence of the two potential individuals who could effect this (the other being Obama) would never consider Holder’s body of work to be anything less than stellar.
Of course, we also wish that Obama would leave along with his menagerie of incompetents including Janet Napolitano and Timothy Geithner.
Fire Eric Holder
Investor's Business Daily 11/19/2010
The AG: One finding of guilt, 284 acquittals — not bad for government work.
War On Terror: The acquittal of a Gitmo detainee of the murder of 224 people shows the stupidity of civilian trials for those at war with us and the blind incompetence of an administration that believes in them.
Attorney General Eric Holder should be fired. Failing that, he should have the decency to submit his resignation, which should be promptly accepted. He is the architect of a policy that treats mass murder like a bank robbery and gives perpetrators the functional equivalent of a slap on the wrist.
Like Peter King, the soon-to-be House chairman on Homeland Security, we are "disgusted at the total miscarriage of justice" in which Guantanamo detainee Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani was convicted of one count of conspiracy to blow up government buildings, specifically our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, while being acquitted of helping murder the people inside.
Ghailani, a Tanzanian, was indicted in 1998 for those bombings, which killed 12 Americans. Prosecutors say he helped build one of the bombs. He began his career delivering bomb parts on a bicycle and rose through the terrorist ranks to become Osama bin Laden's bodyguard.
Placed on the FBI's Most Wanted list in 2001, Ghailani was identified by Attorney General John Ashcroft in May 2004 as one of seven plotting another terrorist attack on America. Two months later the terrorist was captured after an eight-hour battle with Pakistani police in the town of Gujrat.
In 2006 he was brought to Gitmo.
Ghailani bought the explosives used to blow up our embassy in Tanzania in 1998. He helped buy the truck that was used to carry the bomb, and gas tanks that were placed inside the truck to intensify the blast, the evidence showed. He also stored an explosive detonator in an armoire he used, and his cell phone became the "operational phone" for the plotters.
Ghailani was the administration's test case. This trial was supposed to prove that civilian trials of enemy combatants were right and effective. As we and others warned, the necessities of war do not mix well with the rules of civil justice, and the feds' case quickly collapsed when U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled that a key witness' testimony was inadmissible.
The witness, a Tanzanian named Hussein Abebe, was prepared to tell the jury he sold Ghailani the explosives used to destroy the U.S. Embassy in Tanzania in 1998. But his identity was learned during the enhanced interrogation of Ghailani, which Ghailani's lawyer said was torture, so his testimony was not allowed.
There was a reason military tribunals were set up and enemy combatants were sent to Guantanamo. We are at war. It is not an "overseas contingency operation," and the destruction of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were more than "man-caused disasters."
You can't Mirandize enemy combatants when their information is critical to analyzing prior attacks and in preventing future ones, as we did with the Christmas bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutal-lab after his failed attempt to destroy Northwest Airlines Flight 253 over Detroit. You can't let these monsters lawyer up or tell them they have the right to remain silent.
The Justice Department may crow that Ghailani was convicted on one count that could net him as little as 20 years. That equates to 32 days for each person he helped kill.
Holder wanted to try 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Muhammed in another civilian court in New York City within blocks of where the World Trade Center once stood.
Today, nearly a decade after 9/11, no one is on trial in any venue for that attack on America. This is shameful. Eric Holder must go.
Print This Post
Subscribe to Our RSS Feed
Follow Us on Twitter
Comments