MSMer warns GOP not to repeal ObamaCare:

http://www.eyeblast.tv/public/eyeblast.swf?v=hd6UkUqG2G

Krauthammer observes the meaning of returning a US ambassador to Damascus:

…what does the administration do? It sends an ambassador in return for absolutely nothing. Returning an ambassador after withdrawal is a sign of conciliation and, in this case, appeasement. There is nothing, there is no reason to do it. Obama had a dream that if he sweet-talked Assad he would get Syria to break its relations with Iran and Hezbollah and become an ally of the United States. It [the Obama administration] gave all kind of inducements. It was humiliated by Assad’s response. He expressed contempt for these inducements — [and] the United States offered it in return, the return of an ambassador! It’s appeasement of the first order.

One could call it cowardice, but it doesn’t rise to that honorable an action – this is just plain and simple stupid. This is the action of a President with a completely academic background – a man who does not understand how the world works. And its worse than that – given the way Obama’s actions have been going, we can only presume that what he got out of college, the world view he has, is a combination of John Lennon’s Imagine and warmed over Saul Alinsky. A “lets join hands and sing” mentality coupled with a rote hatred of all things American.

Syria is a minor power – something we could, if we wanted to, overthrow in a week or two. In the grand scheme of things the contemptible regime in Damascus is worth only secondary American attention. But here we are, treating Syria as if they should have any other attitude towards us other than supplicant – Syria should only be worried about one thing: that we’ll decide to destroy the regime tomorrow. But Obama treats Syria as if it is Great Power…and ties our policy to what Syria desires and that, in turn, means that Iran is calling the tune in that area of the world.

Great job, Barry – Bush had Iran boxed in and Syria on the ropes…you’ve now given them a new lease on life. This is the “smart diplomacy”, I guess…

Terrible attack in Egypt:

A powerful bomb, possibly from a homicide attacker, exploded in front of a Coptic Christian church as a crowd of worshippers emerged from a New Years Mass early Saturday, killing at least 21 people and wounding nearly 80 in an attack that raised suspicions of an Al Qaeda role.

The attack came in the wake of repeated threats by Al Qaeda militants in Iraq to attack Egypt’s Christians…

I am fully aware of my Christian duty to love my enemies – including those who did this. I am fully aware of my duty to pray for the attackers. I am fully aware of the prohibition against my wanting to take revenge for this and other savage attacks on my brothers and sisters. But I still ask: how long are we Christians to endure this?

While I am commanded to turn the other cheek, that responsibility is laid up me, as an individual, if another individual strikes me. I can’t hold that it means I’m to stand aside while the innocent are murdered. The barbarians who carried out this attack must be prevented, if at all possible, from doing it again.

These are not brave men we contend with; these are not even religious men. They are wicked men, bent on winning for themselves power and wealth and their chosen instrument to achieve their design is insane violence. And so we see attack after attack on un-armed, peaceful and quite defenseless Christians. And they will keep on doing it until brave men take the field and pursue the wicked to death.

But our will is frozen – our leaders don’t act. Tied up in moral knots by liberal sophisticates who on one hand find excuse for every Moslem outrage while on the other hand condemning outright any attempt to answer fire with fire. Even while our best and bravest fight the enemy in Afghanistan we have liberal leaders here in America arguing in favor of a mosque at Ground Zero; who repeat every anti-American slander issued by groups like CAIR; who do everything they can to ensure our response is muted, short lived and pointless.

With the confusion between right and wrong, we have grown to doubt ourselves – the descendants of Christian knights; of men who stood firm at Tours, who fought like lions at Lepanto and scattered a raping and pillaging foe outside Vienna act now as if afraid of their own shadows. Unwilling to fight, unwilling to die; do we then consign ourselves to slaver?

We once had the spirit to do what is necessary:

It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace– but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death! – Patrick Henry, 1775

Will we ever find it, again?

Over at Zero Hedge, Tyler Durden notes that economists for Goldman Sachs and BofA are asserting a 4% GDP growth for 2011. Durden also goes in to some of the reasons why he thinks the economists have got it wrong – singling out the massive US debt as a big problem. I agree with that analysis – out debt load is crushing us and if it doesn’t usher in a collapse and Great Depression in 2011 its because it will happen in 2012 or 2013 (2015 or so at the latest, unless we swiftly get control of the debt). But what strikes me about the whole exercise is just how anyone can look at things and come forth with a happy prediction.

If you put the brightest face on it, unemployment is just as bad as it was on January 1, 2010. Since that date at least a million homes have been foreclosed on. Long term unemployment has become so bad over the past year that the government is having to develope new ways to track it. Businesses still aren’t hiring, for the most part, and when they do its all too often a temporary job.

Meanwhile, energy and food costs rose all year long. Gasoline was $2.65 a gallon on 1/1/10, now its $3.05. We’re supposed to get some stimulus out of the payroll tax cut, but my bet is that whatever boost we get from that (and its only for a year, anyway) will be absorbed by higher food and gas prices. People are having to use more of their disposable income for the basics, thus less demand for those things which are likely to really drive us out of recession – new homes, new appliances, new autos. I know that the “experts” are lauding the holiday shopping season, but please note that it was clothing which led the way while appliances and electronics were flat or down…and it took huge discounting to get people to shop, at all.

Maybe I’m wrong – maybe I’m too doom and gloom about the economy – but with our debt rising, China starting to feel the inflation pinch, Europe on the verge of sovereign default and our own debt, unemployment and hollowed-out manufacturing sector, I just don’t see much room for optimism. No way, that is, where I see us getting 4% growth – in other words, the sort of growth we need to really get out of this mess.

Here’s to a bit of hope for 2011…but I’m not confident of the result.

California is bankrupt – can’t do a dratted thing right; the richest State in the richest nation in human history is a political and economic basket case. But, as a consolation, they’ve got 725 new laws taking effect as of today. 725 laws! There isn’t even a tenth of that number, if you broke it down piece by piece, in the entire United States Constitution. If you’ve got that many laws, you’ve got enough, already…but not in liberal California! 725? That’s just for starters.

Now, what absolutely vital, everyone-will-die-if-we-don’t-do-it laws are taking effect in California today? Well, you can’t use trans-fats and it is now illegal to impersonate someone at a social networking site. I’m telling you, that is cutting edge – how on earth did human civilization ever live and grow without a ban on trans-fats? Thanks goodness for California liberals: I was worried that someone would impersonate me in a social networking site…

Just utter feces – but, the Californians wanted it. People get the government they deserve, and they usually get it good and hard. California is America’s Greece and when the collapse hits, hopefully a majority will wake up to the fact that liberalism is a failure.

Goodness, it is great to get past 2010 – I hope that 2011 will be better, though I’m fearful that it will be even worse than 2010. But regardless of how it comes out, we are given by God what we need to have…and if it is time for us to suffer a bit, then it is just for our good that we do so.

I do hope that all had a joyful holiday season and my wish is for peace and love for everyone in this coming year.

Brothers and sisters:

When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son,

born of a woman, born under the law,

to ransom those under the law,

so that we might receive adoption as sons.

As proof that you are sons,

God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts,

crying out, “Abba, Father!”

So you are no longer a slave but a son,

and if a son then also an heir, through God. – Galatians 4:4-7

(Never suspected the song was that long!)

…or would the Ivy League poison the military? Colman McCarthy, a professor of absurd “peace studies” (there’s a course requiring intellectual rigor, I’ll bet…) has written an article claiming that having ROTC on campus would wreck “the intellectual purity of a school”. Victor Davis Hanson notes:

…What does “the intellectual purity of a school” mean in 2010? That was tragically lost a long time ago in the 1960s when “relevant” courses (particularly -studies courses) became deductive, with preconceived ends that justified biased means of teaching. Examine questions of free speech, intellectual diversity, and tolerance for minority opinion on an average campus, and the notion of “intellectual purity” is rendered Orwellian.

A reader over at Instapundit noted yesterday that our military force has been led magnificently by officers who come out of State colleges. Why risk leavening this with the sort of people who would even want to go to the Ivy League? And, think about it: if the kids of the Ivy League go in to the military, we’ll have junior officers just like President Obama (Columbia, ’83). Thanks, but if I’m to go to war, I’d like Lt. Col. Allen West (Univ. of Tennessee, ’83).

The sad fact of life is that our prestige universities – outside of some of the hard science disciplines – are just breeding grounds for the Ruling Class. People aren’t taught to think at places like Harvard and Yale; they are indoctrinated to believe in a certain way, and believe themselves to be an intellectual and moral elite. One wonders if any random Ivy League graduate of the past 20 years could give a quick sketch of the Battle of Lepanto and its effects; or if such a person would have any notion of who Cavour was, or what Polk did.

McCarthy is worried about the intellectual purity of the schools – and he’s probably right do to so, but for the wrong reason. The purity of Ivy League intellect is that it is completely wiped clean of anything smacking of thought or independence. Putting someone in there who is of the caliber of an army officer would disturb the sublime void which is elite education – and we can’t have any of that. Someone at Harvard starts thinking and the first thing you know, people might start questioning the liberal world view. Worse than that, however, having a crop of officers of Yale quality would mean a military lead by people who think they are inherently superior to the middle and lower class soldiers they command…”fragging” might become a reality in such a situation.

So, maybe we should just leave the elite schools alone – and let them eventually wither on the vine. Could be the best of both worlds here.

Popular Mechanics has an excellent scenario of what might happen if China were to decide to make a military play for Taiwan – with both a good ending and bad ending (as far as America is concerned) scenario. It is a great look at the technological aspects of both the Chinese and American military and how they match up against each other. But I do think it misses a larger point.

In the scenario, China is just trying to grab Taiwan and figures that a swift, hard blow at American power in the western Pacific would deter us from further action while also convincing Taiwan to surrender without a fight. The only time I’m aware of in history where an intact national military force gave up without a fight was in the matter of Czechoslovakia in 1938 – abandoned by their western allies, the Czechs threw up the sponge, an event which still astounds even after the passage of 7 decades. Such acts of national cowardice cannot be expected to repeat. China would have to reckon on Taiwan fighting – doubly so if we showed in any way, shape or form that we would fight along side them.

Also, even the most severe blow to American power – some thing like, say, the sinking of two aircraft carriers – would not convince us to quit but, instead, convince us to fight until the American flag flies over Beijing. A surprise attack on America is the one, sure thing to get all of America in to the war in short order, with dissent stifled and resolution the name of the game. And the thing is, I believe the Chinese understand this – to a certain extent.

They understand it enough to know that an attack on Taiwan means war with the United States – and war to the finish. But they still think they can win such a war. Like Germany and Japan in the past, China is convinced that America’s day has passed – that we are weak, divided, addicted to ease and luxury and simply lack the spirit to go toe to toe in a long, slogging war with high casualty lists. What the Chinese fail to realize (and this failure is shared with some of our own American Ruling Class) is that the weak part of America makes the headlines, but the strong part just goes on getting things done.

People don’t seem to realize that when we went in to WWII we really didn’t all kick up our heels and joyfully go to war. Sure, the propaganda put it out like that and the historians have recorded it as such, but the reality is that there were still plenty in America who shirked the war…but that weakling part of America didn’t matter as the strong part of America took the field and crushed America’s enemies. So it will be, again, if China attacks.

Because China miscalculates both its strength relative to the United States as well as our national spirit, there is a strong chance of war with China. They burn to regain Taiwan and become at least the regional super power of east Asia – with some of the more arrogant Chinese dreaming of replacing America at the head of world affairs. Therein lies our problem – not fully understanding what war with the American republic means, China may let lose war. Our task is to strangle this war before it can get started – but that can only be done by clearly letting China know that war with America means the destruction of China.

To this end, we should be building and strengthening alliances with nations all around the Chinese periphery. India, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand should be bound to America with hoops of steel…and we should make whatever contingent agreements we can with Russia, Vietnam and Burma (these jackals will join in attacking China if they think that America has got the upper hand). And we should be greatly strengthening our military forces in the western Pacific – to firm up our diplomacy (nothing so convinces someone to ally with you than a strong military force ready to hand) as well as to give pause to Chinese militarists who think that China – a decidedly second-rate power – can challenge the United States.

The worst thing we can do is allow things to drift – to not build alliances, not build up our military forces and just go on as if nothing is happening. The longer we do that, the stronger China will become and the more convinced they will be that they can try military conclusions with us…and that is just setting the stage for a disastrous World War Three. Acting now with prudence and force we can nip this in the bud – failing to act now means we are digging the graves of millions of people.

Ed Morrisey notes the shocking news about Fresno, California – a city of half a million set smack dab in the center of what is perhaps the richest agricultural land in the world:

…Monica Showalter reports that the region that once fed the world now faces widespread hunger as a result:

Local newspapers and Fresno County officials are trying to rally Facebook users to vote for Fresno in a corporate contest sponsored by Wal-Mart for $1 million in charity food donations for the hungry. Fresno, a city of 505,000, has taken the national lead because 24.1% of Fresno’s families are going hungry…

It simply isn’t possible that the people of Fresno can go hungry – in any normal world, such a city might suffer any manner of disaster, but never hunger. So, why are they hungry? Because the government came along to help.

At the behest of city bred, liberal pinheads, water was cut off in the Central Valley in order to save a fricking guppy. They call it a “Delta Smelt” because they know that if they called it what it is – a bait fish; a guppy – they’d have been tarred and feathered. People are going hungry so that a perfectly worthless fish can have a bit more water (worthless? Yes, because we’ll never run out of them – its a guppy, darn it. As I said, they’ve given it a special name because they know they can’t justify doing what they are doing unless they lie about it…so, a guppy has been selected, called a separate species, declared endangered and there we go…).

This is what government does – though, more than that, this is what happens when liberals run government. Why are we not making, mining and growing things? Because of host of people who don’t make, mine or grow anything have decided that they know what is best for everyone – sitting in Los Angeles and San Francisco, clueless about how the very food on their table gets there, they have passed judgment and decided that a fish (which 99.9% of them probably couldn’t describe if you pointed a gun at their head) must take precedence over human beings…and its all ok because they don’t live near those redneck hicks who have lost everything thanks to liberal government.

This just burns me up – and it has to be changed. The people who do the useful work of America must be given precedence over those who don’t…and even more precedence over the alleged environmental needs of some dratted fish. We’re killing ourselves at the command of people who don’t do useful work, have vast amounts of time to spare and feel themselves superior to everyone. Time to put a stop to this nonsense.

The GOP is poised to do just that – from The Fiscal Times:

Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., has a message for federal regulators the next time they’re inclined to write a new rule: Be prepared to defend it before a congressional committee.

“One of the things I’ve found about federal bureaucrats is [that] a lot of them are very smart . . . but they don’t like working in the spotlight,” DeMint, a leading conservative and Tea Party champion, said recently. “If they thought they were going to have to come over to testify in front of a bunch of congressmen and senators, they’d be a lot more careful about what they’re writing.”…

Excellent idea and it should be pursued with vigor – not a single bureaucratic rule should fail to get a hearing. Let’s hear the bureaucrats justify what they’ve been doing in back rooms – often at the behest of economic and political pressure groups who are using regulatory fiat to gain advantages for themselves.

We can expect this to have a backlash, however – you just watch: all of a sudden, Obama will find that he really needs a lot of Executive Privilege in these matters. And liberals will suddenly discover that a President needs to be able to keep some things confidential. Hypocrisy will run wild.

But we should still press the issue – even to the point of forcing testimony. Make a fight of it – the people vs the powerful and why are you guys afraid to talk in public? I think we’d win that fight – and we’d also be doing good for our nation because, at the very least, we’d slow down the regulatory meat grinder.