Posts Tagged ‘FBI’
2012 PRESIDENTIAL RACE, ALTERNET, AP, BARACK OBAMA, BAY OF PIGS, BBC, BERLIN WALL, BILL CLINTON, BRUCE GREENWOOD, BUZZFEED, CARLOS MARCELLO, CBS NEWS, CIA, CIVIL RIGHTS, CLIFF ROBERTSON, CNN, CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, DAILY KOS, DAVID HALBERSTAM, DONALD J. TRUMP, FBI, FIDEL CASTRO, FRANK SINATRA, ICH BEN EIN BERLINNER SPEECH, INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE, J. EDGAR HOOVER, JAMES MARSDEN, JOHN F. KENNEDY, JOSEPH MCCARTHY, JOSEPH P. KENNEDY, LYNDON B. JOHNSON, MAFIA, MALCOM X, MARTIN LUTHER KING, MARTIN SHEEN, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MOVIES, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NEWT GINGRICH, NIKITA KHRUSHCHEV, NPR, NUCLEAR TEST BAN TREATY, POLITICO, PT-109, RAW STORY, REUTERS, RICK PERRY, ROBERT F. KENNEDY, ROBERT S. MCNAMARA, SALON, SAM GIANCANA, SANTOS TRAFFICANTE, Sarah Palin, SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, SOVIET UNION, THE ATLANTIC, THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST, THE BUTLER, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE MISSILES OF OCTOBER, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE RAT PACK, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, THE WASHINGTON POST, THIRTEEN DAYS, TIME, TWILIGHT ZONE, TWITTER, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, VIETNAM WAR, WILLIAM DEVANE, WILLIAM PETERSON
In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on November 9, 2023 at 12:10 am
November 22, 2023, will mark the 60th anniversary of the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy in Dallas, Texas.
Today—62 years after he took office—millions of Americans bitterly contrast his memory with the character of the most hated President in American history: Donald John Trump:
JFK – A decorated war hero
DJT – A five-times draft-dodger
JFK – Youthful (43 upon taking office) and handsome
DJT – Old (77) and overweight
JFK – A fervent anti-Communist
DJT – Elected with support from Russian Communist Intelligence
JFK – Witty, self-mocking
DJT – Humorless, self-bragging
JFK – Optimistic, well-informed, appealing to the best in Americans
DJT – Doom-saying, uninformed, appealing to the “darker side” of his Right-wing base
Some have called the Kennedy administration a golden era in American history. A time when touch football, lively White House parties, stimulus to the arts and the antics of the President’s children became national obsessions.
John F. Kennedy
Others have called the Kennedy Presidency a monument to the unchecked power of wealth and ambition. An administration staffed by young novices playing at statesmen, riddled with nepotism, whose legacy includes the Bay of Pigs, the Vietnam war and the world’s first nuclear confrontation.
The opening days of the Kennedy Presidency raised hopes for a dramatic change in relations between the United States and the Soviet Union.
But detente was not possible then. The Russians had not yet experienced their coming agricultural problems and the setback in Cuba during the Missile Crisis. And the United States had not suffered defeat in Vietnam.
Kennedy’s first brush with international Communism came on April 17, 1961, with the invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. This operation had been planned and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency during the final months of Dwight D. Eisenhower’s term as President.
The U.S. Navy was to land about 1,400 Cuban exiles on the island to overthrow the Communist government of Fidel Castro. They were supposed to head into the mountains—as Castro himself had done against the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1956—and raise the cry of revolution.
The invasion would occur after an American air strike had knocked out the Cuban air force. But the airstrike failed and Kennedy, under the pressure of world opinion, called off a second try.
Even so, the invasion went ahead. When the invaders surged onto the beaches, they found Castro’s army waiting for them. Many of the invaders were killed on the spot. Others were captured—to be ransomed by the United States in December, 1962, in return for medical supplies.
It was a major public relations setback for the newly-installed Kennedy administration, which had raised hopes for a change in American-Soviet relations.
Kennedy, trying to abort widespread criticism, publicly took the blame for the setback: “There’s an old saying that victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan….I’m the responsible officer of the Government.”
The Bay of Pigs convinced Kennedy that he had been misled by the CIA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Out of this came his decision to rely heavily on the counsel of his brother, Robert, whom he had installed as Attorney General.
The failed Cuban invasion—unfortunately for Kennedy—convinced Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev that the President was weak.
Khrushchev told an associate that he could understand if Kennedy had not decided to invade Cuba. But once he did, Kennedy should have pressed on and wiped out Castro.
Khrushchev attributed this to Kennedy’s youth, inexperience and timidity—and believed he could bully the President.
On June 4, 1961, Kennedy met with Khrushchev in Vienna to discuss world tensions. Khrushchev threatened to go to nuclear war over the American presence in West Berlin—the dividing line between Western Europe, protected by the United States, and Eastern Europe, controlled by the Soviet Union.
Kennedy, who prized rationality, was shaken by Khrushchev’s unexpected rage. After the conference, he told an associate: “It’s going to be a cold winter.”
Meanwhile, East Berliners felt they were about to be denied access to West Berlin. A flood of 3,000 refugees daily poured into West Germany.
Khrushchev was embarrassed at this clear showing of the unpopularity of the Communist regime. In August, he ordered that a concrete wall—backed up by barbed wire, searchlights and armed guards—be erected to seal off East Berlin.
As tensions mounted and a Soviet invasion of West Berlin seemed likely, Kennedy sent additional troops to the city in a massive demonstration of American will.
Two years later, on June 26, 1963, during a 10-day tour of Europe, Kennedy visited Berlin to deliver his “I am a Berliner” speech to a frenzied crowd of thousands.
JFK addresses crowds at the Berlin Wall
“There are many people in the world who really don’t understand, or say they don’t, what is the great issue between the free world and the Communist world,” orated Kennedy. “Let them come to Berlin.”
Standing within gunshot of the Berlin wall, he lashed out at the Soviet Union and praised the citizens of West Berlin for being “on the front lines of freedom” for more than 20 years.
“All free men, wherever they may live,” said Kennedy, “are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words, ‘Ich ben ein Berliner.’”
ABC NEWS, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, ARTHUR M. CUMMINGS, ” 9/11, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BBC, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHRISTIANITY, CNN, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOS, FBI, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HARVARD UNIVERSITY, HUFFINGTON POST, ISLAM, LEBANON, MEDIA MATTERS, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MUNICH OLYMPICS MASSACRE, NBC NEWS, NEW REPUBLIC, NEWSDAY, NEWSWEEK, NPR, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RACIAL PROFILING, RAW STORY, RELIGION, REUTERS, SALON, SAMUEL P. HUNTINGTON, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TERRORISM, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE INTERCEPT, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW YORKER, THE SPECTATOR, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, WINSTON CHURCHILL, WORLD TRADE CENTER
In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on October 26, 2023 at 12:11 am
There is a famous joke about racial profiling that’s long made the rounds of the Internet. It appears in the guise of a “history test,” and offers such multiple-choice questions as:
In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by:
- Olga Korbut
- Sitting Bull
- Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by:
- Lost Norwegians
- Elvis
- A tour bus full of 80-year-old women
- Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
During the 1980s a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by:
- John Dillinger
- The King of Sweden
- The Boy Scouts
- Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by:
- A pizza delivery boy
- Pee Wee Herman
- Geraldo Rivera
- Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
On September 11, 2001, four airliners were hijacked. Two were used as missiles to take out the World Trade Center; one crashed into the Pentagon; and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers. Three thousand people were killed by:
- Bugs Bunny, Wiley E. Coyote, Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd
- The Supreme Court of Florida
- Mr. Bean
- Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
* * * * *
It’s well to remember the bitter truth behind this joke, especially in light of comments by Arthur M. Cummings, the FBI’s former executive assistant director for national security.
Cummings had no use for such Politically Correct terms as “man-caused disasters” in referring to terrorism. Nor did he shrink from terms such as “jihadists” or “Islamists.”
“Of course Islamists dominate the terrorism of today,” he said bluntly. “I had this discussion with the director of a very prominent Muslim organization here [Washington, D.C.]. And he said ‘Why are you guys always looking at the Muslim community?’
“I can name the homegrown cells, all of whom are Muslim, all of whom are seeking to kill Americans,” replied Cummings. “It’s not the Irish. It’s not the French. It’s not the Catholics. It’s not the Protestants. It’s the Muslims.”
One man who did foresee the present conflicts with stunning clarity—and had the courage to say what has since become Politically Incorrect—was Samuel P. Huntington.
Samuel P. Huntington
A political scientist, Huntington taught government at Harvard University (1950-1959, then at Columbia University (1959-1962). He returned to Harvard in 1963, and remained there until his death in 2008.
The author of nine books, in 1996 he published his most influential one: The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. Its thesis was that, in the post-Cold War world, people’s cultural and religious identities would be the primary sources of conflict.
Among the points he makes:
- Modernization does not mean Westernization.
- Economic progress has come with a revival of religion.
- Post-Cold War politics emphasize ethnic nationalism over ideology.
- Civilizations are fundamentally differentiated from each other by centuries-old history, language, culture, tradition, and, most important, religion.
- As the world becomes smaller, different civilizations increasingly interact. These intensify civilization consciousness and the awareness of differences between civilizations.
- Economic modernization and social change separate people from age-old identities (such as hometowns and familiar neighbors). Religion has replaced this gap, providing a basis for identity, socialization and commitment that transcends national boundaries and unites civilizations.
- The West, at the peak of its power, is confronting non-Western countries that increasingly have the desire, will and resources to shape the world in non-Western ways.
- Cultural characteristics and differences are less mutable and hence less easily compromised and resolved than political and economic ones.
The most controversial part of The Clash of Civilizations focuses on Islam. Huntington points out, for example, that Muslim countries are involved in far more inter-group violence than others.
And he warns that the West’s future conflicts with Islamic nations will be rooted in the Islamic religion:
“Islam’s borders are bloody and so are its innards. The fundamental problem for the West is not Islamic fundamentalism. It is Islam, a different civilisation whose people are convinced of the superiority of their culture and are obsessed with the inferiority of their power.”
Huntington argues that civilizational conflicts are “particularly prevalent between Muslims and non-Muslims.” Among the reasons for these conflicts: Both Islam and Christianity have similarities which heighten conflicts between their followers:
- Both seek to convert others.
- Both are “all-or-nothing” religions; each side believes that only its faith is the correct one.
- The followers of both Islam and Christianity believe that people who violate the base principles of their religion are idolators and thus damned.
Other reasons for the Western-Islamic clash are:
- The Islamic revival, which began in the 1970s and is manifested in greater religious piety and in a growing adoption of Islamic culture, values, dress, separation of the sexes, speech and media censorship.
- Western universalism—the belief that all civilizations should adopt Western values—infuriates Islamic fundamentalists.
These are not differences that will disappear—overnight or even over the span of several centuries. Nor will they be sweet-talked away by Politically Correct politicians, however well-meaning.
ABC NEWS, ABRAHAM LINCOLN BRIGADE, ADOLF HITLER, AFGHANISTAN, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, AP, ARTHUR CUMMINGS, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BBC, BENITO MUSSOLINI, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CNN, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, ERNEST HEMINGWAY, ETHIOPIA, EUROPEAN COMMISSION, EUROPEAN UNION, FBI, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL, HAILE SELASSIE, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HUFFINGTON POST, IRAN, IRAQ, ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCES, JOHN DOS PASSOS, MEDIA MATTERS, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MUSLIMS, NBC NEWS, NEW REPUBLIC, NEWSDAY, NEWSWEEK, NPR, PALESTINIANS, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REFUGEES, REUTERS, RONALD KESSLER, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SHIITE MUSLIMS, SLATE, SPAIN, SPANISH CIVIL WAR, SUNNI MUSLIMS, SYRIA, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TERRORISM, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE INTERCEPT, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW YORKER, THE SECRETS OF THE FBI (BOOK), THE SYRIAN OBSERVATORY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THE WORLD POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UKRAINE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, WONKETTE, WORLD WAR 11
In History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on October 19, 2023 at 12:07 am
On February 24, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a massive invasion of Ukraine.
To Ukrainians, it was a matter of life-or-death.
To Americans, Europeans and Westerners generally, it was a horrific, unfolding tragedy.
But to nonwhites—and especially Islamics—the sympathies of these nations was a sign of racism and Islamophobia.
One reason many Westerners feel greater sympathy for Ukrainians than Arabs: Islamics have routinely blamed the West—especially Americans—for their own internal conflicts.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights—which is safely located in Great Britain—the total number of dead from the Syrian civil war is more than 600,000 people.
The Observatory blamed the West for this Islamic self-slaughter:
“The silence of the International community for the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Syria encourages the criminals to kill more and more Syrian people because they have not found anyone that deter them from continuing their crimes that cause to wound more than 1,500,000 people; some of them with permanent disabilities, make hundreds of thousands children without parents, displace more than half of Syrian people and destroy infrastructure, private and public properties.”
In short: It’s the duty of non-Muslims to bring civilized behavior to Islamics.
And why are all these murderers eagerly slaughtering one another? Because of a Muslim religious dispute that traces back to the fourth century.
Yes, it’s Sunni Muslims, who make up a majority of Islamics, versus Shiite Muslims, who comprise a minority.
Shiite Muslim women
Each group considers the other takfirs—that is, “apostates.” And, in Islam, being labeled an apostate can easily get you murdered.
This is, in short, not a conflict that can be resolved by driving an aggressor country out of another. It will never end—because both Sunnis and Shiites believe “God is on our side” in an inner-religious war that dates back centuries.
“We are wondering, why were Ukrainians welcome in all countries while we, Syrian refugees, are still in tents and remain under the snow, facing death, and no one is looking to us?” asked Syrian refugee Ahmad al-Hariri, who fled the war in his country for nearby Lebanon 10 years ago.
In an ideal and rational world, factors like religion, economics and race would not matter when large numbers of people are threatened by war. But this is not a rational and ideal world, and human emotions and prejudices usually play a deciding role in people’s behavior.
People identify and feel comfortable with those who most resemble themselves. In prisons, black inmates sit with blacks; whites with with whites; Hispanics with Hispanics.
Most Ukrainian refugees are highly-skilled and -educated Christians—meaning they will easily meld into the populations that make up most of Europe. Many of them already have relatives scattered throughout such countries as Poland, Hungary and Romania. Which means they can call on those relatives for support while settling in.
Much has been made—by nonwhites—of the fact that Ukrainians are Caucasians. This is undoubtedly one factor that leads other Caucasians to identify with their plight. But when Syrians identify with Palestinians, no doubt their own shared skin color and religion apply just as much.
Another reason why this conflict has riveted the attention of the world: Millions believed that the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 ended the Cold War.
Vladimir Putin
Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
But Vladimir Putin has brutally notified the world that it’s on again. Europeans—and Americans—fear that Putin’s attack on Ukraine, like Adolf Hitler’s attack on Poland, is simply the first of a series of conquests to come.
In 1935, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini set out to create a second Roman Empire by invading Ethiopia. The conflict pitted poorly-armed Ethiopian forces against Italians armed with radio, bombers and even mustard gas. Even ambulances and hospitals became targets for Mussolini’s air force.
Ethiopia’s emperor, Haile Selassie, appealed in person to the League of Nations for aid in repelling the invasion. His plea was greeted by laughter from the Italian and German delegates—and ignored by the rest of the world.
The war ended in 1937 with an Italian victory.
Haile Selassie
By contrast: The Spanish Civil War proved a magnet for international commitment. The conflict pitted Fascists under General Francisco Franco against the new Spanish Republic. Adolf Hitler and Mussolini sent troops and planes to aid Franco.
Tens of thousands of volunteers from about 50 countries poured into Spain to support the Republican cause—among them, the Abraham Lincoln Brigade from the United States.. Writers Ernest Hemingway and John Dos Passos lent their propaganda talents to the Republic.
American liberals sensed that this civil war was a testing ground for the weapons of Fascism—as it proved to be. By 1939, the superior numbers and weapons of Franco and his allies prevailed.
When Hemingway returned to the United States he tried to warn all who would listen that a far greater war was coming: World War II.
People see conflicts in the light of their own priorities. No two conflicts are the same—and will never be seen the same. What was true for the ones in Ethiopia and Spain remains true for the ones in Syria and Ukraine.
ABC NEWS, ABRAHAM LINCOLN BRIGADE, ADOLF HITLER, AFGHANISTAN, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, AP, ARTHUR CUMMINGS, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BBC, BENITO MUSSOLINI, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CNN, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, ERNEST HEMINGWAY, ETHIOPIA, EUROPEAN COMMISSION, EUROPEAN UNION, FBI, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL, HAILE SELASSIE, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HUFFINGTON POST, IRAN, IRAQ, ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCES, JOHN DOS PASSOS, MEDIA MATTERS, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MUSLIMS, NBC NEWS, NEW REPUBLIC, NEWSDAY, NEWSWEEK, NPR, PALESTINIANS, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REFUGEES, REUTERS, RONALD KESSLER, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SHIITE MUSLIMS, SLATE, SPAIN, SPANISH CIVIL WAR, SUNNI MUSLIMS, SYRIA, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TERRORISM, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE INTERCEPT, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW YORKER, THE SECRETS OF THE FBI (BOOK), THE SYRIAN OBSERVATORY FOR HUMAN RIGHTS, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THE WORLD POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UKRAINE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, WONKETTE, WORLD WAR 11
In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on October 18, 2023 at 12:43 am
On February 24, 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a massive invasion of Ukraine.
To Ukrainians, it was a matter of life-or-death.
To Americans, Europeans and Westerners in general, it was a horrific, unfolding tragedy.
But to nonwhites—and especially Islamics—throughout the world, the sympathies of these nations was a sign of racism and Islamophobia.
The day after the invasion began, CBS News senior correspondent in Kyiv Charlie D’Agata said: “This isn’t a place, with all due respect, like Iraq or Afghanistan that has seen conflict raging for decades. This is a relatively civilised, relatively European – I have to choose those words carefully, too – city where you wouldn’t expect that, or hope that it’s going to happen.”
CBS
On social media, his comment was strongly criticized as dehumanizing non-white, non-European peoples.
One Twitter user wrote: “Atrocities start with words and dehumanization. Atrocities unleashed upon millions in the ME [Middle East], fueled by dictators labeled as reformists in the west. The racist subtext: Afghans, Iraqi & Syrian lives don’t matter, for they are deemed inferior—’uncivilized.'”
In fact, conditions in Ukraine have been relatively peaceful. Afghanistan has never actually been a nation, simply a patchwork of feuding warlords. This has been true from the time of Alexander the Great to the Taliban today. Dictators have always been the rulers of Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.
On February 25, Sky News broadcast a video of people in the central Ukrainian city of Dnipro making Molotov cocktails, explaining how grating Styrofoam makes the incendiary device stick to vehicles better 
A Twitter user wrote: “If this was done by Palestinians, Afghanistan or other nations resisting occupation, it would be terrorism. And during Mandela’s anti-apartheid era, it was also dubbed terrorism. For Europeans facing similar situations, it is resistance! Western duplicity knows no bounds.”
“Terrorism” is defined as “The unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political aims.”
Defending one’s country from attack by another country is not terrorism. In fact, from ancient times, it has been seen as the highest virtue, calling forth loyalty and courage.
Palestinians have repeatedly targeted civilians—not soldiers of the Israeli Defense Forces—for death. In Afghanistan, women and children have been routinely massacred by warring factions.
There are solid reasons for fears of Islamic terrorism.
In his 2011 book, The Secrets of the FBI, Ronald Kessler notes the refusal of the Islamic community to identify known or potential terrorists within its ranks.
Said Arthur M. Cummings, then the Bureau’s executive assistant director for national security: “I had this discussion with the director of a very prominent Muslim organization here in [Washington] D.C. And he said, ‘Why are you guys always looking at the Muslim community?’”
“I can name the homegrown cells, all of whom are Muslim, all of whom were seeking to kill Americans,” replied Cummings. “It’s not the Irish, it’s not the French, it’s not the Catholics, it’s not the Protestants. It’s the Muslims.”
On BFM TV, France’s most-watched cable news channel, journalist Philippe Corbe said: “We’re not talking here about Syrians fleeing the bombing of the Syrian regime backed by Putin, we’re talking about Europeans leaving in cars that look like ours to save their lives.”
This was heavily criticized: “This war is just revealing the western hypocrisy and racism at its peak.”
There is a difference between a Syrian dictator waging war against his own citizens, and a nuclear-armed country waging all-out war on a smaller, democratic nation. The skin color of the peoples involved has nothing to do with either action.
“These are not the refugees we are used to… these people are Europeans,” Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov told journalists of the Ukrainians. “These people are intelligent, they are educated people…. This is not the refugee wave we have been used to, people we were not sure about their identity, people with unclear pasts, who could have been even terrorists…
“In other words,” he added, “there is not a single European country now which is afraid of he current wave of refugees.”
Kiril Petkov
President.bg, CC BY 2.5 BG <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/bg/deed.en>, via Wikimedia Commons
This was treated as racism by Islamics: “A refugee is a refugee, whether European, African or Asian,” Syrian journalist Okba Mohammad said.
In fact: By early 2021, 10 years after Syria’s civil war erupted, European Union states had taken in one million Syrian refugees and asylum seekers; Germany alone took more than half. In 2016, the European Union paid billions of euros for Turkey to continue hosting 3.7 million Syrians.
On February 6, 2016, The World Post carried this story: “Geneva III: The Stillborn Conference and the Endemic Failure of the International Community.”
The first paragraph read:
“While approaching the fifth anniversary of the Syrian civil war on March 15 — which claimed more than 300,000 lives, approximately 700,000 wounded, 4 million fled the country, and another 6 million displaced within Syria — the international community has failed to put an end to bloodshed in this war-torn country.”
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights—which is safely located in Great Britain—the total number of dead by 2023 is more than 600,000 people.
And who did the Observatory—and The World Post-–blame for this Islamic self-slaughter?
Why, the West, of course.
9/11 ATTACKS, ABC NEWS, AFGHANISTAN, ALAN KURDI, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BARACK OBAMA, BASHAR AL-ASSAD, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CNN, COUNCIL ON AMERICAN-ISLAMIC RELATIONS (CAIR), CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, FBI, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, IRAQ, ISALM, ISLAMICS, JAMES COMEY, KUWAIT, LIBYA, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MUSLIMS, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NPR, OMRAN DAQNEESH, PBS NEWSHOUR, PENTAGON, PEW RESEARCH CENTER, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, QTAR, RAW STORY, REAL ID ACT, RELIGION, REUTERS, SALON, SAUDI ARABIA, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, SUICIDE BOMBERS, SYRIA, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TERRORISM, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TWITTER, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UNHCR, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, UNITED NATIONS, UPI, USA TODAY, WORLD TRADE CENTER
In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on October 13, 2023 at 12:13 am
Americans are suckers for children. Even if many of them might come wrapped in suicide vests.
On September 2, 2015, the body of a three-year old Syrian boy named Alan Kurdi washed ashore on a beach in Bodrum, Turkey.
He and his family had boarded a small rubber boat to reach Europe amid the carnage of the Syrian civil war. The boat capsized.
The resulting photo flashed around the world and triggered international demands by humanitarian organizations that the West “do something.”
Drowned Alan Kurdi lies on a Turkish beach
Only eight days later, on September 10, 2015, the administration of President Barack Obama announced that it would take in at least 10,000 displaced Syrian refugees over the next year. That was in addition to the 2,000 Islamic refugees the United States had already accepted.
Almost one year later—on August 17, 2016—another photo captured the world’s attention.
It depicted a five-year-old Syrian boy named Omran Daqneesh sitting in an ambulance. Covered head to toe in dust, his face bloodied, he seemed dazed. He had been pulled out of a building hit by an airstrike in Aleppo, Syria.
Once again, demands arose among liberal interventionists, especially in the United States: “We must do something.”
All of which overlooks the increasing threat posed to the United States by Islamic terrorism.
According to U.S. Census data, America legally welcomes about 100,000 Muslim immigrants each year. This represents the fastest growing segment of immigrants coming to the United States.
The Pew Research Center estimates there are 2.5 million Islamics in the United States. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) puts the figure at seven million.
Meanwhile, the FBI is being overwhelmed by the demands of countering Islamic terrorism against the United States.
On July 8, 2015, then-FBI director James Comey testified before Congress about the increasing burdens his agency faced in combating terrorism.
“We are stopping these things [Islamic terror plots] so far through tremendous hard work, the use of sources, the use of online undercovers. But it is incredibly difficult. I cannot see [the FBI’s] stopping these [plots] indefinitely.”
The FBI has only 35,000 agents and analysts—against seven million potential suspects. And only a portion of those agents and analysts are charged with investigating terrorism.
And even children, for all their supposed innocence, are not to be ignored as potential weapons of Islamic terrorist organizations.
On August 20, 2016, a suicide bomber aged between 12 and 14 attacked a Kurdish wedding party in Gaziantep, Turkey, killing at least 51 people. Preliminary evidence indicated that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was behind the attack.
Palestinian child suicide bomber
America may well become a similar target for child suicide bombers. Especially since children are not required to submit to through screenings at airports as adults are.
How did all of this come to be?
On March 15, 2011, protests broke out in Syria, with demonstrators demanding political reforms and the ouster of dictator Bashar al-Assad.
These protests, met with government repression, continued to grow into a wholesale civil war. By March, 2023, an estimated 503,064 to 613,407 Syrians had so far died in the conflict.
Put in a positive way:
- More than a half-million potential or actual Islamic terrorists will never again pose a threat to the United States or Western Europe.
- Additional thousands are certain to follow their example.
- And the United States cannot be held in any way responsible for it.
But Americans and Europeans have chosen to see these positives as negatives.
The United Nations refugee Agency, UNHCR, estimated that the number of forcibly displaced and stateless people in Europe rose to 21.8 million by the end of 2022,
And while the West has thrown open its doors to fleeing Syrians, the reaction of neighboring Islamic nations has been entirely different.
This was brutally but accurately depicted in a cartoon of wealthy Arab rulers looking on indifferently at the body of Alan Kurdi.
While European nations are being swamped by hundreds of thousands of these uninvited “guests,” the Arab world’s wealthiest nations are doing almost nothing for Syria’s refugees.
According to Amnesty International, the “six Gulf countries—Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain—have offered zero resettlement places to Syrian refugees.”
These nations are far closer to Syria than are Europe and the United States. And they contain some of the Arab world’s largest military budgets and its highest standards of living.
Note the contradiction: Democratic, non-Islamic countries are exposing themselves to increasing numbers of potential—if not actual—Islamic terrorists.
Meanwhile, the Arab world—awash in petrodollars and land—is closing its own doors to Syrian refugees.
The Arab world’s wealthiest nations are doing next to nothing for Syria’s refugees – The Washington Post
* * * * *
During the 1980s, the United States saw the terroristic acts of Islamic nations as mere crimes, and not acts of war.
The September 11, 2001 terror attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center changed that.
For the last 22 years, the United States military has actively fought Islamics in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. And now Syria.
To be admitting huge numbers of a population with which the United States is now waging all-out war is worse than stupid. It is a guarantee of national suicide.
2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, ABC NEWS, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, ASSAULT, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BLACK LIBERATION ARMY, BLACK LIVES MATTER, BLACKS, BLOOMBERG, BURGLARY, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CNN, CRIME, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, DARREN WILSON, DONALD TRUMP, DRUDGE REPORT, DRUGS, EMERYVILLE, FBI, FELONIOUS ASSAULT, FELONY SEX CRIMES, FERGUSON POLICE DEPARTMENT, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GEORGE FLOYD, GRAND LARCENY, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HISPANICS, HUFFINGTON POST, JASON BLAKE, JESSE JACKSON, KENOSHA COUNTY, MANSLAUGHTER, MARTIN LUTHER KING, MEDIA MATTERS, MICHAEL BROWN, MISDEMEANOR ASSAULT, MISDEMEANOR ASSAULT AND RELATED OFFENSES, MISDEMEANOR SEX CRIMES, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MURDER, NBC NEWS, NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT, NEWSWEEK, NON-NEGLIGENT MANSLAUGHTER, NPR, OAKLAND, PBS NEWSHOUR, PETIT LARCENY, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, PROACTIVE PROPERTY CRIMES, RAPE, RAW STORY, RESTRAINING ORDER, REUTERS, ROBBERY, ROBERT DALEY, RUSTEN SHESKEY, SALON, SAN FRANCISCO, SAN JOSE, SEATTLE TIMES, SEX CRIMES, SEXUAL ASSAULT, SHOOTINGS, SLATE, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TARGET BLUE: AN INSIDER'S VIEW OF THE NYPD (BOOK), THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, WALNUT CREEK, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on October 12, 2023 at 12:10 am
On August 23, 2021, Jacob S. Blake, a 29-year-old black man, was shot and seriously injured by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
The shooting occurred as officers attempted to arrest him. Blake was tasered as he scuffled with police. When he opened the driver’s door to his SUV and leaned in, Officer Rusten Sheskey fired seven shots, striking him four times in the back.
Blake is now paralyzed from the waist down, and may never walk again.
Protests followed.
Kenosha County declared a state of emergency overnight on August 24 after police vehicles were damaged, a dump truck set on fire, and the local courthouse vandalized. Police urged 24-hour businesses to close owing to armed robberies and shots being fired. Up to 200 members of the Wisconsin National Guard were deployed to maintain public safety.
At the time of the shooting, Blake faced a criminal complaint charging him with third-degree sexual assault in connection with domestic abuse on July 6.
The officers had come to arrest Blake for violating a restraining order stemming from that complaint. A 911 call on August 23 alerted them that Blake was at the home of his alleged victim.
A sample restraining order
The restraining order stemmed from a criminal complaint, which accused Blake of breaking into the home of a woman he knew and sexually assaulting her in May. The victim told police she was asleep when Blake broke in at 6 a.m. and said, “I want my shit.”
After Blake left, she realized her keys were missing and “immediately called 911,” the complaint said.
An arrest warrant was issued on July 7.
On August 9, 2014, a similar police/media incident had occurred.
Michael Brown, an 18-year-old black man, was fatally shot by a white police officer named Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis.
Brown’s 22-year-old friend, Dorian Johnson claimed that Wilson shot him in the back. Wilson claimed he shot Brown after the latter charged at him.
An FBI investigation found that there was no evidence that Brown had his hands up in surrender or said “don’t shoot” before he was shot. It also found that Brown was struck six times, all in the front of his body.
The shooting ignited nationwide protests.
Yet many of the media “covering” the story refused to note that, shortly before his shooting, a video camera taped Brown robbing a grocery store and manhandling its owner.
Michael Brown (left) roughing up a store owner
Had this been more widely noted, “Saint Michael” would have been seen as a mere thug who learned that assaulting an armed cop wasn’t the same as attacking an unarmed store owner.
On May 25, 2020, George Floyd, a former black security guard, was murdered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. While Floyd was handcuffed and lying face down on a city street during an arrest, Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis police officer, kept his knee on the right side of Floyd’s neck for eight minutes and 46 seconds.
Death of George Floyd
Across the nation, cities were convulsed by protests—including those in the San Francisco Bay Area. Among these: Oakland, San Jose, Emeryville, Walnut Creek and San Francisco itself.
On May 30, an initially peaceful protest march exploded into looting shortly before 9 p.m. as looters broke off and began smashing shop windows and ransacking stores in Union Square and on Market Street.
Among the stores looted: A Sak’s Off-Fifth Avenue, an Old Navy clothing store, a Cartier Boutique and a Coach store. Looters especially targeted CVS and Walgreens drugstores. Liquor stores and a BevMo were also hit.
“Thirty businesses were looted or destroyed,” said David Perry, from the Union Square Business Improvement District.
Undoubtedly many of victims of those looters and arsonists had been horrified by the Floyd killing. But many of them undoubtedly lost sympathy for the Black Lives Matter movement as they surveyed the wreckage of their stores.
Store owners were infuriated at having to replace stock that had been stolen or destroyed. And employees resented having to clean up the wreckage. Some stores no doubt were forced to close, leaving their former employees suddenly jobless.
And President Donald Trump quickly moved to capitalize on that resentment. His brand of “divide and rule” politics had brought him to the White House in 2016. And he was determined to play on white fears of further black crime to win a second term.
White fears of black crime are reflected in the crime rate statistics for New York City.
While Blacks make up 14.2% of New York City’s population, they comprise:
- 57.8% of its murder and non-negligent manslaughter arrests;
- 40.5% of its rape arrests;
- 38.2% of its known other felony sex crime arrests;
- 65.5% of its robbery arrests;
- 52.3% of its felonious assault arrests;
- 50.9% of its grand larceny arrests;
- 67.1% of its shooting arrests;
- 50.7% of its drug felony arrests;
- 42.2% of its drug misdemeanor arrests;
- 46.2% of its felony stolen property arrests;
- 52.9% of its misdemeanor stolen property arrests;
- 58.6% of its violent crime suspects;
- 59.8% of its juvenile crime complaint arrests.
This is admittedly unfair to those blacks who are law-abiding citizens. But the fear factor will continue until crime rates among blacks start falling dramatically.
2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, ABC NEWS, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, ASSAULT, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BLACK LIBERATION ARMY, BLACK LIVES MATTER, BLACKS, BLOOMBERG, BURGLARY, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CNN, CRIME, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOZ, DARREN WILSON, DONALD TRUMP, DRUDGE REPORT, DRUGS, EMERYVILLE, FACEBOOK, FBI, FELONIOUS ASSAULT, FELONY SEX CRIMES, FERGUSON POLICE DEPARTMENT, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GEORGE FLOYD, GRAND LARCENY, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HISPANICS, HUFFINGTON POST, JACOB BLAKEOB, JASON BLAKE, JESSE JACKSON, KENOSHA COUNTY, MANSLAUGHTER, MARTIN LUTHER KING, MEDIA MATTERS, MICHAEL BROWN, MISDEMEANOR ASSAULT, MISDEMEANOR ASSAULT AND RELATED OFFENSES, MISDEMEANOR SEX CRIMES, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MURDER, NBC NEWS, NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT, NEWSWEEK, NON-NEGLIGENT MANSLAUGHTER, NPR, OAKLAND, PBS NEWSHOUR, PETIT LARCENY, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, PROACTIVE PROPERTY CRIMES, RAPE, RAW STORY, RESTRAINING ORDER, REUTERS, ROBBERY, ROBERT DALEY, RUSTEN SHESKEY, SALON, SAN FRANCISCO, SAN JOSE, SEATTLE TIMES, SEX CRIMES, SEXUAL ASSAULT, SHOOTINGS, SLATE, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TARGET BLUE: AN INSIDER'S VIEW OF THE NYPD (BOOK), THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, WALNUT CREEK, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on October 11, 2023 at 12:10 am
On May 16, 2022, a white supremacist shot and murdered 10 people and wounded three others at the Tops Supermarket in Buffalo, New York.
Eleven victims were black; two were white.
The mass shooting once again ignited calls for gun control and a national dialogue on race.
Undoubtedly the motivation for the killings was race. But the sensationalistic publicity given this crime obscured a brutal truth ignored by liberals—and blacks:
Blacks kill far more blacks than whites do. And blacks are responsible for a disproportionate portion of crimes.
In 1993, this was publicly acknowledged by no less than Jesse Jackson, the famous civil rights activist, Baptist minister and former disciple of Martin Luther King, Jr.:
“There is nothing more painful to me at this stage in my life than to walk down the street and hear footsteps and start thinking about robbery, then look around and see somebody white and feel relieved.”
Blacks make up 14.2% of the American population in 2023, according to the Pew Research Center.
But they committed 52% of homicides between 1980 and 2008, according to the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics. Only 45% of whites were offenders in such cases.
Blacks were disproportionately likely to commit homicide and to be the victims.
In 2008 blacks were seven times more likely than whites to commit homicide. And they were six times more likely than whites to be homicide victims.
According to the FBI, blacks were responsible for 38% of murders, compared to 31.1% for whites, in 2013.
From 2011 to 2013, 38.5% of people arrested for murder, manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault were black.
In 1971, Robert Daley, a reporter for the New York Times, became a deputy police commissioner for the New York Police Department (NYPD).
In that capacity, he saw the NYPD from the highest levels to the lowest—from the ornate, awe-inspiring office of Police Commissioner Patrick Murphy to the gritty, sometimes blood-soaked streets of New York.
He spent one year on the job before resigning—later admitting that when he agreed to take the job, he got more than he bargained for.
For the NYPD, 1972 proved to be a tumultuous year. Among those challenges faced were the murders of several police officers, committed by members of the militant Black Liberation Army.
Two of those murdered officers were Waverly Jones and Joseph Piagentini. Jones was black, Piagentini white; both were partners. Both were shot in the back without a chance to defend themselves.
Writing about these murders in a bestselling 1973 book—Target Blue: An Insider’s View of the N.Y.P.D.—Daley noted:
- Jones and Piagentini were the sixth and seventh policemen—of ten—murdered in 1971.
- About 18 men were involved in these murders. All were black.
- The city’s politicians knew this—and so did Commissioner Murphy. None dared say so publicly.
“But the fact remained,” wrote Daley, “that approximately 65% of the city’s arrested murderers, muggers, armed robbers, proved to be black men; about 15% were of Hispanic origin; and about 20% were white [my Italics].”
The overall racial breakdown of the city was approximately:
- Whites 63%
- Blacks 20%
- Hispanics 17%
Stated another way: Blacks, who made up 20% of the city’s population, were responsible for 65% of the city’s major crimes.
Or, as Daley himself put it: “So the dangerous precincts, any cop would tell you, were the black precincts.”
That was 50 years ago.
In 2018, the Bureau of Justice Statistics of the U.S. Department of Justice found:
- Blacks were disproportionately represented among homicide victims and offenders.
- Whites committed 8% of the reported murders of blacks.
- Whites murdered other whites in 80.7% of the cases.
- Blacks were responsible for 15.5% of white murders.
- Blacks were responsible for 88.9% of the murders of blacks.
- Half of all robbery offenders were black.
- Blacks were responsible for a third of aggravated assaults.
- More than a fifth of blacks were responsible for simple assaults.
- Blacks made up 22% of those arrested for rape or sexual assault.
Now, consider the following statistics released by the NYPD for “Crime and Enforcement Activity in New York City” in 2022:
Murder and Non-Negligent Manslaughter Victims
Murder and Non-Negligent Manslaughter Suspects
Murder and Non-Negligent Manslaughter Arrestees
Rape Victims
Rape Suspects
Rape Arrestees
NYPD Headquarters at One Police Plaza
Other Felony Sex Crimes Victims
Other Felony Sex Crime Suspects
Other Felony Sex Crime Arrestees
Robbery Victims
Robbery Suspects
Robbery Arrestees
NYPD officers
Nick.Allen, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Misdemeanor Assault Victims
Misdemeanor Assault Suspects
Misdemeanor Assault Arrestees
Felonious Assault Victims
Felonious Assault Suspects
Felonious Assault Arrestees
Grand Larceny Victims
Grand Larceny Suspects
Grand Larceny Arrestees
Firearm Arrest Population
Shooting Victims
Shooting Suspects
Shooting Arrestees
Drug Felony Arrest Population
Drug Misdemeanor Arrestees
Misdemeanor Sex Crime Victims
Misdemeanor Sex Crime Suspects
Misdemeanor Sex Crime Arrestees
Misdemeanor Stolen Property Arrest Population
Felony Stolen Property Arrest Population
Petit Larceny Victims
Petit Larceny Suspects
Petit Larceny Arrestees
Misdemeanor Criminal Mischief Victims
Misdemeanor Criminal Mischief Suspects
Misdemeanor Criminal Mischief Arrestees
Reported Crime Complaint Juvenile Victims
Juvenile Crime Complaint Suspects
Juvenile Arrest Population
Violent Crime
ABC NEWS, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BARACK OBAMA, BBC, BILL CLINTON, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BORDER WALL, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHARLES SCHUMER, CHRIS CILLIZZA, CHRIS MATTHEWS, CNN, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOS, DANIEL ISSA, DAVID BROOKS, DEBT CEILING, EXECUTIVE ORDERS, EXTORTION, FBI, FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HOUSE SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER, HUFFINGTON POST, INSIDER, JOSE ANDRES, JOSEPH R. BIDEN, KEVIN MCCARTHY, LEN BLAVATNICK, MATT GAETZ, MEDIA MATTERS, MITCH MCCONNELL, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MSNBC'S "HARDBALL", NANCY PELOSI, NAZI GERMANY, NBC NEWS, NEGOTIATING, NEW REPUBLIC, NEWSDAY, NEWSWEEK, NEWT GINGRICH, NPR, PAP SMEARS, PBS NEWSHOUR, PLANNED PARENTHOOD, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, R.I.CO. ACT, RAFEAL “TED” CRUZ, RAW STORY, REINHARD HEYDRICH, REPUBLICAN PARTY, REUTERS, ROBERT PAYNE, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS, TALKING POINTS MEMO, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HAMILTON PROJECT, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE INTERCEPT, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOK), THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW YORKER, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TITLE X, TRANSPORTATION SAFETY ADMINISTRATION (TSA), TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED STATES SENATE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, WARREN BUFFETT, WILBUR ROSS, WINSTON CHURCHILL, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 6, 2023 at 12:11 am
Republicans are already gearing up for their next extortionate threat: Do what we want or we’ll shut down the Federal Government.
Among the consequences:
“If you don’t send out Social Security checks, I would hate to think about the credit meeting at S&P and Moody’s the next morning,” said Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway
“If you’re not paying millions and millions and millions of people that range in age from 65 on up, money you promised them, you’re not a AAA” credit rating.
But this does not have to happen.
REMEDY 2: THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SHOULD INDICT FOR EXTORTION THOSE HOLDING THE GOVERNMENT HOSTAGE.
President Joseph Biden could order the Justice Department to invoke the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act.
Passed by Congress in 1970, as Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1961-1968, its goal was to destroy the Mafia.
The United States Department of Justice
RICO opens with a series of definitions of “racketeering activity” which can be prosecuted by Justice Department attorneys. Among those crimes: Extortion.
Extortion is defined as “a criminal offense which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either money, property or services from a person(s), entity, or institution, through coercion.”
And if President Biden believed that RICO was not sufficient to deal with Republicans’ extortion attempts, he could rely on the USA Patriot Act of 2001, passed in the wake of 9/11.
In Section 802, the Act defines domestic terrorism. Among the behavior defined as criminal:
“Activities that…appear to be intended…to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion [and]…occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.”
The remedies for punishing such criminal behavior were now legally in place. President Biden needs only to direct the Justice Department to apply them.
PROBLEM: This would require a Democratic President and Justice Department to act courageously—which would be a rarity for either.
Example: 147 Republican Congressional members voted to invalidate the Electoral College vote count of the 2020 Presidential election. To this date, not one has been indicted for treason.
REMEDY 3: PRESIDENT BIDEN SHOULD ATTACK THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AS A THREAT TO NATIONAL SECURITY.
Numerous Republicans have taken “campaign contributions”—i.e., bribes—from Russian oligarchs linked to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
One Russian oligarch—Len Blavatnik—has given millions of dollars to top Republican leaders such as Senators Mitch McConnell (Kentucky), Marco Rubio (Florida) and Lindsey Graham (South Carolina).
Putin’s monies have been well-spent: About 90 House Republicans—out of a total of 213—attended Volodymyr Zelensky’s address to Congress on December 21, according to CQ Roll Call. Some who did spent much of the speech on their phones.
Many Republicans—such as former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who in 2021 received about $255,000 from Blavatnik—have openly threatened to end all funding for Ukraine’s heroic struggle against Russian aggression.
Kevin McCarthy
Even some “Reagan Republicans”—such as James Kirchick, a conservative foreign correspondent and author—have openly denounced this treason.
Thus, the White House could ignite an internal conflict within the Right by pitting Republicans against each other.
PROBLEM: Democrats rarely find the courage to attack their enemies as traitors, even when the treason is manifest—as it was when Donald Trump was elected President with the support of Vladimir Putin.
REMEDY 4: CITIZENS WHOSE LIVES HAVE BEEN DRASTICALLY HARMED BY REPUBLICAN POLICIES COULD CHOOSE “THE HEYDRICH SOLUTION.”
Reinhard Heydrich was second-in-command of the dreaded Schutzstaffel, or Protective Squads, better known as the SS. Among his his multitude of crimes Designing “The Final Solution to the Jewish Question,” resulting in the slaughter of six million men, women and children.
In 1941 he was appointed “Reich Protector” of Czechoslovakia, which Nazi Germany had absorbed in 1938. The Czechs were growing restive under brutal Nazi rule, and Heydrich’s mission was to stamp out that unrest.
Reinhard Heydrich
The Czech government-in-exile, headquartered in London, decided to assassinate Heydrich.
Two British-trained Czech commandos—Jan Kubis and Joseph Gabcik—parachuted into Prague—where they got unexpected help from Heydrich himself.
Supremely arrogant, like today’s Republican leaders, he traveled the same route every day from home to his downtown office, refusing to be escorted by armed guards. He claimed that no one would dare attack him.
He was wrong.
On May 27, 1942, Kubis and Gabcik waited at a hairpin turn in the road always taken by Heydrich. When Heydrich’s Mercedes slowed down, Gabcik raised his machinegun–which jammed. Rising in his seat, Heydrich aimed his revolver at Gabcik—as Kubis lobbed a hand grenade at the car.
The explosion drove steel and leather fragments of the car’s upholstery into Heydrich’s diaphragm, spleen and lung.
Adolf Hitler dispatched doctors from Berlin to save the Reich Protector. But infection set in, and on June 4, 1942, Heydrich died at age 38.
ADVISORY: While this remedy is not suggested, it remains an extremely real possibility. Those who have lost access to food, housing and/or medical care for themselves or loved ones under “screw-the-poor” Republican policies could easily decide to follow the advice of Winston Churchill.
When England seemed threatened with a German invasion in 1940, his daughter-in-law, Pamela, asked: “But, Papa, what can I do?”
Replied Churchill: “You can always get a carving knife from the kitchen and take one of the bastards with you.”
ABC NEWS, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BARACK OBAMA, BBC, BILL CLINTON, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BORDER WALL, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHARLES SCHUMER, CHRIS CILLIZZA, CHRIS MATTHEWS, CNN, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOS, DANIEL ISSA, DAVID BROOKS, DEBT CEILING, EXECUTIVE ORDERS, EXTORTION, FBI, FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HOUSE SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER, HUFFINGTON POST, INSIDER, JOSE ANDRES, JOSEPH R. BIDEN, KEVIN MCCARTHY, LEN BLAVATNICK, MATT GAETZ, MEDIA MATTERS, MITCH MCCONNELL, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MSNBC'S "HARDBALL", NANCY PELOSI, NAZI GERMANY, NBC NEWS, NEGOTIATING, NEW REPUBLIC, NEWSDAY, NEWSWEEK, NEWT GINGRICH, NPR, PAP SMEARS, PBS NEWSHOUR, PLANNED PARENTHOOD, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, R.I.CO. ACT, RAFEAL “TED” CRUZ, RAW STORY, REINHARD HEYDRICH, REPUBLICAN PARTY, REUTERS, ROBERT PAYNE, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS, TALKING POINTS MEMO, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HAMILTON PROJECT, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE INTERCEPT, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOK), THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW YORKER, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TITLE X, TRANSPORTATION SAFETY ADMINISTRATION (TSA), TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED STATES SENATE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, WARREN BUFFET, WARREN BUFFETT, WILBUR ROSS, WINSTON CHURCHILL, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 5, 2023 at 12:10 am
One reason why a handful of House Republicans threatened to shut down the Federal Government by October 1: Calling themselves “budget deficit hawks,” they demanded huge cuts in non-military spending.
Among the programs these cuts would have devastated: Food safety, education, law enforcement, housing, public health, Head Start and child care, Meals on Wheels.
Their attitude toward budget deficits had been vastly different while Donald Trump was President.
On August 2, 2019, Trump signed into law a two-year budget deal that raised spending by $320 billion over existing spending caps set in a 2011 law—and boosted military and domestic spending.
The bill also lifted the debt ceiling, which is the legal limit on the amount of debt the federal government can have.
The bill threatened to push the budget deficit to more than $1 trillion in 2019 for only the second time since the Great Recession of 2007-2008 and add $1.7 trillion to the federal debt over a decade.
Donald Trump
By January, 2021, the national debt had risen by almost $7.8 trillion during Trump’s four years in office. It amounted to about $23,500 in new federal debt for every person in the country.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) praised the Republicans’ massive contribution to the national debt.
Now, with a Democratic President in office, Republicans—invoking the my-way-or-else “negotiating” strategy of Adolf Hitler—were threatening to plunge the United States into financial ruin unless their extortion demands were met.
The casualties of a government shutdown would include:
- Seven million vulnerable mothers and children would stop receiving monies for food under the Women and Children (WIC) program.
- All active-duty military personnel and law enforcement officers would be forced to work without pay until appropriated funds became available.
- If additional catastrophes occurred, FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund could be depleted, thus complicating new emergency response efforts.
- Critical research on diseases like cancer and Alzheimer’s would stall because the National Institutes of Health would be forced to delay new clinical trials.
- Air traffic controllers and Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) officers would be forced to work without pay. The added stress they would face from being unable to meet rent and food payments could dangerously affect their job performance.
- Most EPA-led inspections at hazardous waste sites as well as drinking water and chemical facilities would stop.
- The Food and Drug Administration would be forced to delay food safety inspections for a wide variety of products across the country.
Here’s what Republicans demanded in return for not shutting down the government:
- Severe cuts would be made to Social Security by increasing the age of future retirees.
- Disabled Americans on Medicare would be forced to wait longer to receive benefits.
- Medicare would be turned into a voucher system—which would remove the guarantee for seniors to have access to affordable medical care.
- Taxes would be cut for the wealthy and corporations.
- More requirements would be imposed on the poor trying to obtain social services.
- “Regulatory reforms that increase economic growth” (i.e. allowing corporations to ignore laws protecting employees, customers and/or the environment) would become law.
- Further funding to defend Ukraine against continuing aggression by Russia would end.
By a last-minute compromise between House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Democrats, this latest Republican extortion attempt was averted.
But current funding will expire on November 17. And then the country will face yet another date with financial disaster.
Fortunately, there are several ways to permanently address these exercises in political criminality.
REMEDY 1: LEGALLY REQUIRE CONGRESS TO STAY IN SESSION UNTIL A BUDGET COMPROMISE IS REACHED.
The federal government’s fiscal year ends every September 30. Before this deadline, Congress must write and pass the budget for the next fiscal year. If a budget agreement is not reached in time, funding for federal agencies lapse and the government shuts down.
Yet with the shutdown deadline looming, on July 29, the House and Senate broke for their annual August recess. The Senate remained in recess until September 5; the House remained in recess until September 12.
Congress had to enact all 12 appropriations bills or pass a Continuing Resolution (CR) to keep the federal government funded and avoid a shutdown on October 1.
NEEDED: A law requiring Congress to remain in session until a budget compromise is reached. Any Congressional member who leaves before this occurs would be immediately discharged and never allowed to return.
PROBLEM: This would require Congressional members to impose restrictions on themselves—which they are unwilling to do.
REMEDY 2: THE JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SHOULD INDICT FOR EXTORTION THOSE HOLDING THE GOVERNMENT HOSTAGE.
President Joseph Biden could order the Justice Department to invoke the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act.
Passed by Congress in 1970, as Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1961-1968, its goal was to destroy the Mafia. But in United States v. Turkette, 452 U.S. 576 (1981), the Supreme Court held that RICO applied as well to legitimate enterprises being operated in a criminal manner.
After Turkette, RICO could also be used against corporations, political protest groups, labor unions and loosely knit-groups of people.
RICO opens with a series of definitions of “racketeering activity” which can be prosecuted by Justice Department attorneys.
These activities include a Republican favorite: Extortion.
ABC NEWS, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BARACK OBAMA, BBC, BILL CLINTON, BLOOMBERG NEWS, BORDER WALL, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHARLES SCHUMER, CHRIS CILLIZZA, CHRIS MATTHEWS, CNN, CROOKS AND LIARS, DAILY KOS, DANIEL ISSA, DAVID BROOKS, DEBT CEILING, EXECUTIVE ORDERS, EXTORTION, FBI, FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION, FEDERAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HOUSE SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER, HUFFINGTON POST, INSIDER, JOSE ANDRES, JOSEPH R. BIDEN, KEVIN MCCARTHY, LEN BLAVATNICK, MATT GAETZ, MEDIA MATTERS, MITCH MCCONNELL, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, MSNBC'S "HARDBALL", NANCY PELOSI, NAZI GERMANY, NBC NEWS, NEGOTIATING, NEW REPUBLIC, NEWSDAY, NEWSWEEK, NEWT GINGRICH, NPR, PAP SMEARS, PBS NEWSHOUR, PLANNED PARENTHOOD, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, R.I.CO. ACT, RAFEAL “TED” CRUZ, RAW STORY, REINHARD HEYDRICH, REPUBLICAN PARTY, REUTERS, ROBERT PAYNE, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS, TALKING POINTS MEMO, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HAMILTON PROJECT, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE INTERCEPT, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOK), THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE NEW YORKER, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TITLE X, TRANSPORTATION SAFETY ADMINISTRATION (TSA), TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED STATES SENATE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, WARREN BUFFETT, WILBUR ROSS, WINSTON CHURCHILL, WONKETTE
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 4, 2023 at 12:15 am
Republicans have repeatedly utilized the same my-way-or-else “negotiating” strategy as Nazi Germany’s Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler.
And Democrats—out of cowardice or an ignorance of history—have repeatedly refused to publicly make this comparison.
By studying Adolf Hitler’s mindset and “negotiating” methods, we can learn much about the mindset and “negotiating” style of today’s Republican party.
Robert Payne, author of the bestselling biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler (1973), described Hitler’s “negotiating” style thus:
“Although Hitler prized his own talents as a negotiator, a man always capable of striking a good bargain, he was totally lacking in finesse.
“He was incapable of bargaining. He was like a man who goes up to a fruit peddler and threatens to blow his brains out if he does not sell his applies at the lowest possible price.”
Republicans have repeatedly threatened to shut down the government unless their constantly escalating demands are met.
A shutdown occurs when Congress fails to approve funding for federal agencies.
In November, 1995, Newt Gingrich, then Speaker of the House of Representatives, carried out his threat to shut down the government. Gingrich unwisely admitted that he did so because President Bill Clinton had put him in the back of Air Force One during a recent trip to Israel.
The shutdown proved a disaster for Republicans. Clinton was handily re-elected in 1996 and Gingrich suddenly resigned from Congress in 1998.
Still, the Republicans continued their policy of my-way-or-else.
In April, 2011, the United States government almost shut down over Republican demands about subsidized pap smears.
During a late-night White House meeting with President Barack Obama and key Congressional leaders, Republican House Speaker John Boehner made this threat: His conference would not approve funding for the government if any money were allowed to flow to Planned Parenthood through Title X legislation.
Facing an April 8 deadline, negotiators worked day and night to strike a compromise—and finally reached one.
Three months later—on July 9—Republican extortionists again threatened the Nation with financial ruin and international disgrace unless their demands were met.
Symbol of the Mafia “Black Hand”
This time, Republicans refused to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agreed to massively cut social programs for the elderly, poor and disabled.
And while Republicans demanded that the disadvantaged tighten their belts, they rejected any raising of taxes on their foremost constituency—the wealthiest 1%.
To raise taxes on the wealthy, they insisted, would be a “jobs-killer.” It would “discourage” corporate CEOs from creating tens of thousands of jobs they supposedly wanted to create.
President Obama had offered to make historic cuts in the federal government and the social safety net—on which millions of Americans depend for their most basic needs.
But House Speaker John Boehner rejected that offer. He could not agree to the tax increases that Democrats wanted to impose on the wealthiest 1% as part of the bargain.
As the calendar moved ever closer to the fateful date of August 2, Republican leaders continued to insist: Any deal that includes taxes “can’t pass the House.”
One senior Republican said talks would go right up to—and maybe beyond—the brink of default.
“I think we’ll be here in August,” said Republican Representative Pete Sessions, of Texas. “We are not going to leave town until a proper deal gets done.”
President Obama had previously insisted on extending the debt ceiling through 2012. But in mid-July, he simply asked congressional leaders to review three options with their members:
- The “Grand Bargain” choice—favored by Obama—would cut deficits by about $4 trillion, including spending cuts and new tax revenues.
- A medium-range plan would aim to reduce the deficit by about $2 trillion.
- The smallest option would cut between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion, without increased tax revenue or any Medicare and Medicaid cuts.
And the Republican response?
Said Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee: “Quite frankly, [Republican] members of Congress are getting tired of what the president won’t do and what the president wants.”
Noted political analyst Chris Matthews summed up the sheer criminality of what happened within the House of Representatives.
Chris Matthews
Speaking on MSNBC’s “Hardball,” on July 28—five days before Congress reached its August 2 deadline to raise the debt-ceiling—Matthews noted:
“The first people to bow to the demands of those threatening to blow up the economy were the Republicans in the House, the leaders. The leaders did what the followers told them to do: meet the demands, hold up the country to get their way.
“Those followers didn’t win the Senate, or the Presidency, just the House. But by using the House they were able to hold up the entire United States government. They threatened to blow things up economically and it worked.
“They said they were willing to do that—just to get their way—not by persuasion, not by politics, not by democratic government, but by threatening the destruction of the country’s finances.
“Right. So what’s next? The power grid? Will they next time threaten to close down the country’s electricity and communications systems?”
With the United States teetering on the brink of national bankruptcy, President Obama caved in to Republican demands.
.jpg)
Bureaucracybuster's Blog 
2012 PRESIDENTIAL RACE, ALTERNET, AP, BARACK OBAMA, BAY OF PIGS, BBC, BERLIN WALL, BILL CLINTON, BRUCE GREENWOOD, BUZZFEED, CARLOS MARCELLO, CBS NEWS, CIA, CIVIL RIGHTS, CLIFF ROBERTSON, CNN, CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, DAILY KOS, DAVID HALBERSTAM, DONALD J. TRUMP, FBI, FIDEL CASTRO, FRANK SINATRA, ICH BEN EIN BERLINNER SPEECH, INTERNET MOVIE DATABASE, J. EDGAR HOOVER, JAMES MARSDEN, JOHN F. KENNEDY, JOSEPH MCCARTHY, JOSEPH P. KENNEDY, LYNDON B. JOHNSON, MAFIA, MALCOM X, MARTIN LUTHER KING, MARTIN SHEEN, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MOVIES, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NEWT GINGRICH, NIKITA KHRUSHCHEV, NPR, NUCLEAR TEST BAN TREATY, POLITICO, PT-109, RAW STORY, REUTERS, RICK PERRY, ROBERT F. KENNEDY, ROBERT S. MCNAMARA, SALON, SAM GIANCANA, SANTOS TRAFFICANTE, Sarah Palin, SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE, SEATTLE TIMES, SLATE, SOVIET UNION, THE ATLANTIC, THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST, THE BUTLER, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE MISSILES OF OCTOBER, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE RAT PACK, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, THE WASHINGTON POST, THIRTEEN DAYS, TIME, TWILIGHT ZONE, TWITTER, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UPI, USA TODAY, VIETNAM WAR, WILLIAM DEVANE, WILLIAM PETERSON
JFK: “CAMELOT” ENDED SIXTY YEARS AGO: PART ONE (OF TEN)
In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on November 9, 2023 at 12:10 amNovember 22, 2023, will mark the 60th anniversary of the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy in Dallas, Texas.
Today—62 years after he took office—millions of Americans bitterly contrast his memory with the character of the most hated President in American history: Donald John Trump:
JFK – A decorated war hero
DJT – A five-times draft-dodger
JFK – Youthful (43 upon taking office) and handsome
DJT – Old (77) and overweight
JFK – A fervent anti-Communist
DJT – Elected with support from Russian Communist Intelligence
JFK – Witty, self-mocking
DJT – Humorless, self-bragging
JFK – Optimistic, well-informed, appealing to the best in Americans
DJT – Doom-saying, uninformed, appealing to the “darker side” of his Right-wing base
Some have called the Kennedy administration a golden era in American history. A time when touch football, lively White House parties, stimulus to the arts and the antics of the President’s children became national obsessions.
John F. Kennedy
Others have called the Kennedy Presidency a monument to the unchecked power of wealth and ambition. An administration staffed by young novices playing at statesmen, riddled with nepotism, whose legacy includes the Bay of Pigs, the Vietnam war and the world’s first nuclear confrontation.
The opening days of the Kennedy Presidency raised hopes for a dramatic change in relations between the United States and the Soviet Union.
But detente was not possible then. The Russians had not yet experienced their coming agricultural problems and the setback in Cuba during the Missile Crisis. And the United States had not suffered defeat in Vietnam.
Kennedy’s first brush with international Communism came on April 17, 1961, with the invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. This operation had been planned and directed by the Central Intelligence Agency during the final months of Dwight D. Eisenhower’s term as President.
The U.S. Navy was to land about 1,400 Cuban exiles on the island to overthrow the Communist government of Fidel Castro. They were supposed to head into the mountains—as Castro himself had done against the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1956—and raise the cry of revolution.
The invasion would occur after an American air strike had knocked out the Cuban air force. But the airstrike failed and Kennedy, under the pressure of world opinion, called off a second try.
Even so, the invasion went ahead. When the invaders surged onto the beaches, they found Castro’s army waiting for them. Many of the invaders were killed on the spot. Others were captured—to be ransomed by the United States in December, 1962, in return for medical supplies.
It was a major public relations setback for the newly-installed Kennedy administration, which had raised hopes for a change in American-Soviet relations.
Kennedy, trying to abort widespread criticism, publicly took the blame for the setback: “There’s an old saying that victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan….I’m the responsible officer of the Government.”
The Bay of Pigs convinced Kennedy that he had been misled by the CIA and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Out of this came his decision to rely heavily on the counsel of his brother, Robert, whom he had installed as Attorney General.
The failed Cuban invasion—unfortunately for Kennedy—convinced Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev that the President was weak.
Khrushchev told an associate that he could understand if Kennedy had not decided to invade Cuba. But once he did, Kennedy should have pressed on and wiped out Castro.
Khrushchev attributed this to Kennedy’s youth, inexperience and timidity—and believed he could bully the President.
On June 4, 1961, Kennedy met with Khrushchev in Vienna to discuss world tensions. Khrushchev threatened to go to nuclear war over the American presence in West Berlin—the dividing line between Western Europe, protected by the United States, and Eastern Europe, controlled by the Soviet Union.
Kennedy, who prized rationality, was shaken by Khrushchev’s unexpected rage. After the conference, he told an associate: “It’s going to be a cold winter.”
Meanwhile, East Berliners felt they were about to be denied access to West Berlin. A flood of 3,000 refugees daily poured into West Germany.
Khrushchev was embarrassed at this clear showing of the unpopularity of the Communist regime. In August, he ordered that a concrete wall—backed up by barbed wire, searchlights and armed guards—be erected to seal off East Berlin.
As tensions mounted and a Soviet invasion of West Berlin seemed likely, Kennedy sent additional troops to the city in a massive demonstration of American will.
Two years later, on June 26, 1963, during a 10-day tour of Europe, Kennedy visited Berlin to deliver his “I am a Berliner” speech to a frenzied crowd of thousands.
JFK addresses crowds at the Berlin Wall
“There are many people in the world who really don’t understand, or say they don’t, what is the great issue between the free world and the Communist world,” orated Kennedy. “Let them come to Berlin.”
Standing within gunshot of the Berlin wall, he lashed out at the Soviet Union and praised the citizens of West Berlin for being “on the front lines of freedom” for more than 20 years.
“All free men, wherever they may live,” said Kennedy, “are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words, ‘Ich ben ein Berliner.’”
Share this: