Look for these nine aftershocks.
Listening to Obama right now is nauseating. I love how he continues to babble and repeat the same nonsense in response to incredulous questions from the press as though they’re the idiots.
“ISIS isn’t a state, they’re killers.”
I know it’s hard for such a dyed–in-the-wool statist as Obama to imagine, but it’s entirely possible for an entity to be both a state and “killer.” Just ask Hitler. Or Stalin. Or Mao. Or Pol Pot. In fact, historically, the most efficient human abattoirs have been states.
Seriously, what is it that makes ISIS not a state? It controls territory, it has a government, it has resources, it has an army. All it lacks is UN recognition and only fools think that’s of any consequence. It wants to be treated like a state, fine. If Westphalia still means anything, declare war on it in response to these ongoing acts of war, and don’t stop until it unconditionally surrenders.
The President expressed outrage at the Paris attacks.
This is well and good for the President to say this, but outrage, it seems, plays into terrorism-as-lawless-criminal activity. Shooting into crowds of unarmed civilians is pretty outrageous, lawless, and criminal on the face of it, but I see what happened as an act of war and as a consequence of an ongoing war.
Did Winston Churchill express outrage regarding acts of war committed by Germany against England? He certainly expressed defiance. He certainly pledged resistance (We shall fight them in France, we shall fight them on the seas and oceans, we shall fight them on the beaches . . .). Yeah, I guess we shall fight them in France and other places.
The manner in which this attack was conducted and by unlawful (not-in-uniform) enemy combatants may be a war crime, but what happened is much larger than a crime, it is indeed war.
I would be heartened if the President explained to the American people the nature of this ongoing war. Like Churchill, Mr. Obama can rally us by being candid about the setbacks in that war, including declaring a kind of victory a day before this black day took place. “We thought we had this enemy ‘contained’ but our enemy had different plans and proved us wrong.” People would respect that kind of candor.
The other thing I observed is that in pledging solidarity with France, the President spoke of France being an ancient ally, but he did not use the N-word . . . NATO.
France has long had a kind of complicated membership relationship with NATO, and I can understand the President being extremely careful in the choice of words that would trigger direct American military involvement on behalf of another country. But use of the N-word in this circumstance needs to be given thoughtful, deliberative consideration.
This is a hairy situation. If France calls on NATO, as its right, we are obligated to send our military to help. Would Obama refuse to honor that treaty? NATO is perhaps the only place where Americans have credibility on pledges of military assistance. Refusing to honor our obligations would mean that pivots to Asia, promises to Israel, or any number of similar arrangements are worthless.
But consider the situation if NATO does go to war in Syria. NATO began as a way to check Russian aggression and Russia has planes in the air and boots on the ground in Syria. How would a paranoid Putin view this?
This is a pretty tricky situation and we have our C team in the White House.
If France calls on NATO, as its right, we are obligated to send our military to help.
Our military is already attacking ISIS.
Yes, and our military is so successful, Obama called ISIS “contained”.
No, we are not attacking ISIS. Not seriously in any way.
We’ve reportedly dropped 28,000 bombs and missiles on ISIS targets in the last year. If someone did that to us I think we’d consider it a serious attack.
NATO did more bombing missions in ten weeks in Kosovo than the US has in a year on ISIS targets. It’s just for show.
We’ve reportedly dropped 28,000 bombs and missiles on ISIS targets in the last year. If someone did that to us I think we’d consider it a serious attack.
You do realize that isn’t many bombs? I’m reading that it’s about 60 bombs a day. Low intensity long duration bombing is much less effective than the same payloads over a much shorter period of time. And none of that is effective without land forces to take advantage of the result.
You have to forgive Jim. When it comes to military history, he’s an utter ignoramus.
NATO did more bombing missions in ten weeks in Kosovo than the US has in a year on ISIS targets. It’s just for show.
The second sentence does not follow from the first.
When it comes to military history, he’s an utter ignoramus.
The question of whether the U.S. is currently attacking ISIS is not a question of military history.
The question of whether or not it is attacking it effectively is very much military history. But you are far too ignorant of military history to understand that.
Not seriously.
Jim’s advice clinches it, and Jim is telling us that President Obama was wrong for stopping short of acknowledging our NATO treaty obligations. I thought the President was being very measured, very deliberate, and very careful in not mentioning our NATO treaty relationship, a statement that may commit us to actions that may not lie in our direct national interest, much as we stand by France morally.
But no, the NATO “trigger” is of no consequence here because Mr. Obama already as as “all in” as Jim correctly points out.
It is a change of pace that Jim is implicitly critical of the President, but here, I stand with President Obama in being careful about invoking the NATO obligation right away.
“because Mr. Obama already as as “all in” as Jim correctly points out.”
Obama isn’t all in, he doesn’t even have the bra off yet.
There is a big difference between what we are doing now and engaging in a conflict like when we invoked NATO for Afghanistan. Obama could be dragged kicking and screaming into an escalation.
Are you suggesting we tell France we are already doing enough?
I thought that same thing. I wonder IF they are holding off on saying NATO because the Scandinavians are NOT interested in helping out in southern Europe OR the M.E.?
Add Germany in there too. Oddly, the want to appease the radicals it seems. I’m guessing they do NOT teach much about European History from the Anschluss in 1938, until the invasion of Poland in 1939.
Clearly Chancellor Merkel has NOT seen what appeasing a willing and murderous group turns into. Let’s hope she doesn’t fly into Syria and fly back to Germany, waving a single sheet of paper declaring, “…es wird Frieden für unsere Zeit!”
As it is, most of the political and elected worms of the world have sadly never heard of George Santayana.
This kind of thing is WHY so many ‘mericans have been stock piling beans and bullets since 9/11. Suppose they took out a large chunk of our grid, using the same tactics. Just some guns and explosives could murder the grid IMO. That and some hate filled willing terrorists.
This kind of thing is WHY so many ‘mericans have been stock piling beans and bullets since 9/11.
At what point do those people start looking like ridiculous nervous nellies? After 10 years? 20 years? When they die of old age, and their kids inherit the beans?
Suppose they took out a large chunk of our grid, using the same tactics.
We’d fix it, just as we have every time the grid has failed before. You’re giving these people way too much credit.
Not nearly as ridiculous as those supporting Paris gun control while terrorist manage to arm themselves for a third time with AK-47s.
Well, Jim I hate to shatter your illusions of the world but disaster strikes from time to time. Never know when an earthquake, wildfire, hurricane, or volcano is going to ruin your week.
Last summer we had a bad wind storm that knocked power out for a week. Back in the early 80’s Mt St Helens erupted. How many earthquakes and hurricanes during those years?
Being prepared to weather events like this is part of being a rational human being who understands that the future is uncertain and you can’t control it no matter what sacrifices you make to Mother Gaia.
A lot of Democrats are into this sort of living, off the grid in microhomes and what not too.
Preparing for weather emergencies is sensible. Stockpiling bullets because of 9/11 or the Paris attacks is irrational.
As a disciple of Obama, you of all people should appreciate preparing for man caused disasters.
Know who first responders are? All of us. Terrorism is a diffuse threat and refugees are sent all over the country into small and large communities alike. You can’t assume that only NYC is a target. Obama has made it so walla walla is now a target and they don’t have the resources NYC does.
Everyone should be prepared, including concealed carry. The first people on the scene will be the targets. Didn’t 9/11 teach you anything? Google Spencer Stone for a more recent example of an American fighting back rather than bowing down as Democrats always suggest.
Listening to Obama at any time is nauseating.
He uses words like “outrage” and phrases like “…a terrible and sickening setback..” with as much sincerity as he worships last week’s sewage.
Of course ISIS is a state. ISIS is the point of why we have states… so we can treat it as an entity.
Hand-wringing about ISIS is ridiculous. First we support their neighbors with inexpensive arms… Kurdish women are only asking for bullets. Then we go after infrastructure… or as Trump says, “bomb the shit out of ISIS oil.”
We used to know how to win wars.
this is a step in the right direction, but the dropping of leaflets first reminds me of the “Phony War” phase of WWII. It shows whomever gave that order isn’t serious.
Ken,
I’m a post ‘Nam vet. And I have to tell you that the attitude of the military hierarchy when I joined in 1979 to when my older son retired two years ago, looks like a different ‘entity’.
First and foremost, they are not ALLOWED to win!
So much so that playing these conflicts out always goes like Japanese Baseball, playing for the tie, just seems perfectly natural to them. You’d think after spending the time from June of 1950 until today, fighting for a draw or to push X insurgent group beyond some border, some mile marker in Urdu, Pashtu, Persian or beyond some made up grid marker n a map, would begin to seem a fools errand.
And screw the money, what about the LIVES involved. Our dead and wounded and their families alone deserve to know that this crap wasn’t fought in vain.
Sorry if my flag is sticking out here, but being 4th generation military, with both my sons as veterans and now my grandsons are getting old enough to consider it, we need to fight to win and get some peace for my GGrandchildren, or we need to pull the hell out of everywhere and build an impressive system of defenses here.
I am NOT holding my breath.
“I know it’s hard for such a dyed–in-the-wool statist as Obama to imagine, but it’s entirely possible for an entity to be both a state and ‘killer.'”
Actually, the two pretty much always go hand in hand.
..what a crock of unmitigated BS.
I am sure Democrats still love Obama’s endless mocking of his critics as a way to deflect blame and ignore the need to change his strategy but its wearing pretty thin on the rest of us.
Obama is essentially saying, “All these other guys are idiots and don’t know what is really going on. My strategy is working just as it is supposed to and the problem lies not in the strategy but in others being able to understand it.”
The problem is people see some pretty disastrous consequences of the strategy so if this is going according to plan, Obama needs to lay out to the country what his strategy actually is but much like with Obamacare, he can’t be honest about what he is actually doing because the country would turn on him, possibly even useful idiot Democrats.
In the question of malice or incompetence, Obama claims competence. Non-Democrats take that as malice.
Obama is essentially saying, “All these other guys are idiots
Can you blame him? Jeb Bush wants to put a religious test on refugee admissions. Ted Cruz wants that too, and for us to kill more civilians with airstrikes. Huckabee wants the GOP to depose Paul Ryan as Speaker of the House unless he bars Syrian refugees. Trump wants to talk about closing mosques in the U.S. It’s a race to the hysterical, xenophobic bottom.
Has any GOP presidential candidate offered a reasoned response to the Paris attacks?
What the hell would you suggest is “reasoned”? Reduce the target for Syrian immigration from 65k to 50k? Pardon the rest of us if we don’t exactly define hysterical and xenophobic as “these perps were Syrian refugees, maybe we should re-think how many we invite here”.
Has any GOP candidate actually said “maybe we should re-think how many we invite here”, as opposed to just slamming the door shut? Chris Christie says we shouldn’t let in 3 year old orphans from Syria. That isn’t a rational threat analysis, it’s simple hysteria.
So you feel like sitting around and coming up with some sort of reasoned response when the bad guys have carried out several attacks this month and says you are next?
How about saving the lives FIRST and then working out a reasoned response later…loosening up after thoughtful careful consideration. Because it’s damn well clear that everyone thinks they have been careful thoughtful and thorough…..
but go ask the 130 people in Paris.
Jon is right..if you had to face a 10th of the trouble this could bring you’d sing a different tune.
It sure was funny watching Geraldo sing a different tune the other night. Though I’m glad his daughter was safe.
as opposed to just slamming the door shut?
Is it the “slamming” part that has you in panty-twist mode? If we closed it quietly would that help?
Jim,
it’s a more reasoned response than what the Democrats did to the Germans and Japanese during WWII.
They’re talking about closing out people who we can’t check on, because there is not enough running bureaucracy in Syria to TELL mus who’s a god guy or bad guy.
Of course the flip side of that is that we couldn’t trust them BEFORE the Civil War and ISIS problems.
Of course the flip side of that is that we couldn’t trust them BEFORE the Civil War and ISIS problems.
And the death toll from Syrians we’ve let in despite being unable to properly vet them is what?
As of last week, the death toll in Paris from Syrians they’d let in despite being unable to vet them was… zero.
Now it’s not.
Everything can change overnight.
Can you give one good reason for letting any of them in? And by ‘good reason’, I don’t mean ‘huggy fluffy wuffy feelgood’.
Why look at all these insane people. 22 sitting governors are rebelling against Obama’s plan on Syrian refugees. Xenophobes, all of them!
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/11/16/revolt-22-sitting-gop-governors-rebel-president-obama-syrian-refugees/
22 sitting governors are rebelling against Obama’s plan on Syrian refugees. Xenophobes, all of them!
It’s hard to tell whether they’re irrationally afraid of refugees, or rationally afraid of voters who are irrationally afraid of refugees. But it’s shameful either way.
What’s shameful is how you automatically call all of us racist because we have different ideas than you.
Can you really justify calling us racist? That’s as knee-jerk as calling someone who disagrees on climate a “denier”. You’re quite a gem, Jim. I wish my arguments could be as simple-minded as that.
It’s hard to tell whether they’re irrationally afraid of refugees, or rationally afraid of voters who are irrationally afraid of refugees. But it’s shameful either way.
If the governors are responding to the will of the people, are you against that? I thought you were all about democracy. Evidently you’re only for democracy when it goes your way.
Because racism.
“Can you blame him? ”
Easily. He’s the biggest numbskull of them all. This is his fault. He has Paris blood and 10’s of thousands of other’s blood on his hands. His purported plan to destroy ISIS has failed and will continue to fail. People have died in droves because of that moron. They will continue to do so.
Worst of all he wants to bring in 10’s of thousands of Syrian refugees. Given that that is how many of the Paris attackers got in, that is slightly insane.
But we’ve been saying that all along.
“Jeb Bush wants to put a religious test on refugee admissions. Ted Cruz wants that too, …”
Well let’s see, if Mideast plumbers wanted to slit your throat, then you’d focus finite resources on minimizing devotees of the Elbow Joint. They stay out.
And you conveniently left out more of Cruzs statement:
“”If there were a group of radical Christians pledging to murder anyone who had a different religious view than they, we would have a different national security situation,” Cruz said. ”
Exactly. But you knew this. You know that everyone who wants to keep us safe don’t hate muslims per se. They hate dying horribly, and/or watching their children die horribly. It’s the dying they would like to avoid.
There is no rule on the face of the planet that requires us to let people in of any one particular religion. The Constitution is not a suicide pact. US Constitutional Freedom of religion are for U.S. CITIZENS. Don’t like that? FU.
#1 job is to keep American citizens safe. If that means keeping Kwanza’s out then that’s what it means. Don’t like it? FU.
Christians are being raped crucified tortured and burned. I feel like helping them first. I don’t feel like helping the torturers, rapists and crucifiers.
Don’t like it? FU.
If that means that non-islamofascist Syrians cannot get in…too bad.
” Huckabee wants the GOP to depose Paul Ryan as Speaker of the House unless he bars Syrian refugees.”
And what is wrong with that? What are 130 tortured and dead people to you? Eggs for the omelette?
Sheesh.
The Federal Government’s #1 job is to protect us. Obama has failed the entire 7 years (just go back over the list of successful terrorist attacks in the last 7 years). If our leaders (Speaker of the House is #3 in line) cannot or will not perform their duty they should resign.
Obama should have resigned years ago.
” It’s a race to the hysterical, xenophobic bottom.”
Says the supporter of the biggest most grievously failed President in American History.
Well let’s see, if Mideast plumbers wanted to slit your throat, then you’d focus finite resources on minimizing devotees of the Elbow Joint. They stay out.
You and Ted Cruz are saying we should punish ISIS’s victims for ISIS’s crimes, because both call themselves Muslims.
Not only is that prejudicial and inhumane, it is giving ISIS exactly what they want.
Obama has failed the entire 7 years (just go back over the list of successful terrorist attacks in the last 7 years).
A great example of the sort of hysteria on display since the attacks. How many Americans have been killed on U.S. soil by foreign terrorists since 2009? How many by refugees resettled in the U.S.? Now compare that to, say, the number of people killed in mass shootings.
Why is it xenophobic not to take these refugees? I thought Islam took care of their own. Send them to Jordan, Saudi Arabia, etc. first.
As usual Jim, you act as if you take the moral high ground, but you don’t. You have never had to live with the consequences of mass immigration from Somalia and these other crap holes.
Why is it xenophobic not to take these refugees?
Not accepting refugees because we fear them as dangerous is practically the definition of xenophobia.
You have never had to live with the consequences of mass immigration from Somalia and these other crap holes.
You are saying we shouldn’t accept refugees from Somalia or other “crap holes” either?
Not accepting refugees because we fear them as dangerous is practically the definition of xenophobia.
No, the definition of xenophobia is the irrational fear of the foreign and the strange.
If one takes these assumptions: 1) Those from the middle east have a history of violence and jihadism and a hatred of Christianity and the West and 2) ISIS is hiding amongst “refugees”, we would get to
3) Let’s not let them near us.
This is very logical. In fact, to allow them in knowing the history of the area is irrational and foolish.
You are saying we shouldn’t accept refugees from Somalia or other “crap holes” either?
Yes, that is what I am saying. I am from ground zero with the Somali problem. I know that African Christians are generally hard workers and want to become a part of our society. I saw the Hmong and Vietnamese assimilate quite readily as well while growing up.
I also know that the Muslims prefer to stay separated and find themselves to be elite, because they are Muslim. So much so that they demand welfare benefits and despise working.
And yet, more and more arrive and get shoved down the throat of rural communities. They are kept at bay because of massive federal and state subsidies. Let me tell you that there is a groundswell of resentment out there. But you don’t know it because you prefer to sip champagne and browbeat those who disagree with you.
In many cases, that in fact did turn out to be a huge mistake.
Not accepting refugees because we fear them as dangerous is practically the definition of xenophobia.
Wow. Please provide a definition of “practically” that can bring that up to breathing height. Otherwise you’re underwater.
“Not accepting refugees because we fear them as dangerous is practically the definition of xenophobia.”
No Jim not accepting refugees from nations who have a substantial number of their population causing multiple hundreds of deaths a week and who make videos saying they are going to kill YOU is intelligent.
You are trying to conflate accepting a group who has no history or interest in killing you with one who has substantial elements interested in precisely that.
Cannot you see the difference?
This is very logical.
No, it’s prejudice dressed up as logic.
I am from ground zero with the Somali problem.
Because Somali refugees have committed terrorist acts against Americans? In fact, of the hundreds of thousands of refugees accepted in the U.S. since 9/11, not a single one has been charged with domestic terrorism (according to The Economist).
You don’t like Somali refugees, fine. But there’s no empirical reason to consider them, or refugees from Syria or Iraq, to be any more dangerous that the average American.
Ahhh, here it is. Prejudice. The ultimate sin. I don’t do what you want so you call me racist.
This is really what it boils down to, isn’t it Jim? No room for opposing views, not when the holy canon of Racism is involved. No reasoning will every trump Racism.
“Can you blame him? ”
Yes. It is Obama’s policies that are currently setting the world on fire. We can speculate about how other people would perform but that is just what it is speculation about the future. You don’t know how the future will turn out but you fatalistically claim that anything other than Obama’s policies will be bad. And you do that while ignoring the reality that we are living at this very moment.
I don’t know if a future Republican or Democrat President will solve this problem but I know for sure Obama made it drastically worse.
“Has any GOP presidential candidate offered a reasoned response to the Paris attacks?”
Did you watch the stumbling clusterf*** that was the Democrat debate? One guy said AGW pockylips was to blame and we had to stop it to beat terrorism. The other two muttered total nonsense about improving intelligence and working with other countries from waaaaay back behind the lines. Do they not know we already have intelligence programs? We already have alliances?
All three of the Democrats looked like they were about to suggest the country convert to Islam.
For what POSSIBLE reason would we want to let Syrians into the country?
That argument won the day in the 1930s, when it was German Jews fleeing persecution. Since then we’ve tried to do, and be, better.
Seen on Twitter: “Land of the free and home of the not quite brave enough to welcome those seeking freedom. “
Moronic answer: the Jews did not have, insinuated within them, people who wanted to kill us.
That makes not letting them in a mistake. They were the persecuted not the persecutor.
We didn’t welcome the Nazi’s in with open arms – you have a problem with that?
Sheesh.
Do you give ANY thought to a reply before you pound it in?
Moronic answer: the Jews did not have, insinuated within them, people who wanted to kill us.
Of course they did. Any sufficiently large population has, insinuated within it, people who will kill. One reason that we did not let Jews in is that people in positions of power thought they posed a danger. And they had basis for that belief: we’d let in millions of Eastern Europeans in previous decades, and insinuated within them had been anarchists and communists (including Jews) who had assassinated a U.S. president and committed a variety of other acts of terrorism. They made the same argument you are making now: we know that some of these Jews are dangerous? Why take the risk of letting in an Emma Goldman?
They were the persecuted not the persecutor.
We go to such lengths to verify that refugees coming here are “the persecuted” that the process is very slow. We’ve only accepted 1,800 Syrian refugees in the last year, out of the 4 million Syrians who’ve fled the conflict. By way of contrast, in 1980 we accepted 200,000 refugees from Vietnam. No doubt there were people warning that there might be American-hating Vietnamese Communist agents secreted among them, but no great wave of terror followed. Today those refugees and their children and grandchildren are part of what makes the U.S. a great nation.
Um, Jim, in case you hadn’t noticed, the threat posed by islamic immigration is not theoretical; there have been terror attacks committed by these people. Plenty of them, in fact, both in the USA and Europe.
As for the screening, it’s simply not possible to do it effectively when most of them don’t have documentation plus accessible records.
How many Americans have been killed, in the U.S., in terror attacks by Muslim immigrants? And how does that rate compare to the rate of Americans killed by other Americans?
WTF difference does it make? Are you trying to win the Special Illogical Oympics contest?
“Of course they did. Any sufficiently large population has, insinuated within it, people who will kill.”
Jim are you being purposefully obtuse or are you just thick?
You did not have European Jewry – as a group – verbally threatening the mass murder of US citizens. We aren’t talking about the usual number of murderers in any sufficiently large population.
The Jews didn’t kill by the hundreds in Europe in the 30’s…they didn’t push 200 kids face down in the desert and gun them down…..they didn’t make a video saying they were coming to Washington next.
Is your support for that imbecile in the White House so thoughtless that you cannot carry on a cohesive argument?
You did not have European Jewry – as a group – verbally threatening the mass murder of US citizens.
We do not have Syrian Muslims, as a group, threatening the mass murder of US citizens today.
There are Syrian Muslims who are members of ISIS, just as there were European Jews who advocated a Communist revolution. Keeping entire groups out because of the beliefs and actions of a few is rank prejudice.
And it isn’t new. In 1938, 68% of Americans polled opposed letting refugees from Germany and Austria into the U.S. Today my governor, a Democrat running for Senate, said that she didn’t want Syrian refugees settled in New Hampshire (which isn’t even in a governor’s power to control). Politically motivated xenophobia is a bipartisan tragedy.
How many Americans have been killed, in the U.S., in terror attacks by Muslim immigrants? And how does that rate compare to the rate of Americans killed by other Americans?
So when we go through airport security it is because there might be one or two Jews who want to kill us?
If one person dies, we must ban all guns but if ISIS announces its plot to send agents with refugees, we must accept terror attacks?
I find the comments against this Yglesias refreshing and very accurate.
“Seen on Twitter: “Land of the free and home of the not quite brave enough to welcome those seeking freedom. “”
TWIT-ter is the right term for that one.
How EFFING brave are you when one out of a group of, say 100, let into your neighborhood could shoot you or yours and slit their belly open as they lay dying?
Huh?
No problem for you? Happy to let them in?
Because do not think that those people are vetted….they are not and President Fail will not see to it that they are vetted.
There’s bravery and then there’s mindless stupidity. It’s clear which side you come down on.
Why don’t you pick up and go move into the projects of Chicago? Huh?
What? Too dangerous for you?
That argument won the day in the 1930s, when it was German Jews fleeing persecution. Since then we’ve tried to do, and be, better.
It just can’t be said enough. That’s just a moronic response.
“That argument won the day in the 1930s, when it was German Jews fleeing persecution. ”
And we fought a war to put an end to NAZI Germany. A real war not this half assed lead from waaaaay behind thing Obama has going on.
We used to say never again. Don’t bring up the Holocaust if you aren’t unwilling to support ending the modern day version. We should stop this genocide and allow Syrians and refugees from other countries to remain in their own homes and retain their way of life.
It isn’t clearly within our power to end the suffering that Assad and ISIS and their ilk are inflicting on the people of Syria. It is easily in our power to drastically improve the lives of tens of thousands of people who make it out, and thereby weaken the propaganda message that ISIS uses to sustain itself. I’m baffled by people urging an expensive wider war that will kill and maim Americans, while at the same time claiming that we can’t afford the burden or risk of accepting refugees who are fleeing the violence.
Because maybe, just maybe they aren’t refugees. And if you really, really want to help, put your money and time where your mouth is. Quit preaching and calling us racist and go down to the local churches and say, “I want to volunteer my time by helping the few Syrians or Haitians or whomever assimilate into American culture.”
That’s the difference between the left and right. The right gets involved, gives money to charity while the left poses as concerned citizens who can then brow-beat the peasants from their ivory towers while sipping champagne.
Why are pushing this point so hard? Are you getting paid by George Soros? That is the only conclusion I can come up with. Why would you attempt this Sisyphean struggle knowing damn well nobody (well, maybe a few) agrees with you? Is this your mission? Is this how you spend your time? Why waste it here? Like I said, get off your butt and go volunteer. That’s what a real non-racist would do.
and thereby weaken the propaganda message that ISIS uses to sustain itself.
Please clarify what this “message” is. And clarify what flavor of jelly beans you prefer while viewing unicorns.
Isn’t clearly in our power or you don’t want to use the military to clean up Obama’s mess and stop genocide?
You guys always say the defense budget needs cut cause we spend more than anyone else and can fight every country at the same time and win. Why isn’t our military strong enough to fight in a single war against ISIS?
I, and many others, have been saying since ISIS rolled into Iraq that its Achilles heel is its organizational and logistical style.
Fact; the United States has assets in the region (including at least one CBG) that could have, but did not, attack the ISIS convoys that were invading Iraq. Instead, we dithered for days, and that window of opportunity closed.
Another fact; ISIS gets most of its money from oil. This oil is shipped out in tanker trucks, mainly to Turkey. With that in mind, read the following quote;
*
“The official said previously the fuel trucks were off limits to U.S. military strike aircraft. When asked if the Paris attacks would bring about a change in the U.S. military’s rules of engagement, the official said that the truck drivers were warned first before the bombs fell.
“We dropped leaflets, warning the drivers to scatter,” said an official who had been briefed on the strike. “Next we strafed the area [with 30mm cannons] before the dropping bombs” from the warthogs.”
***
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/11/16/us-military-sharing-intelligence-with-france-on-isis-targets-in-syria/?intcmp=hpbt1
Got it? The tankers were off limits until now! And, we reduced the effectiveness of the raid, AND put the lives of our airmen in grave danger, to warn the drivers!
It’s getting ever harder to excuse this sort of thing as immense incompetence and stupidity. That leaves intentional malice as the only viable explanation.
Maybe they didn’t think that driving ISIS trucks, or being near ISIS trucks, was enough justification for a fiery death.
“Maybe they didn’t think that driving ISIS trucks, or being near ISIS trucks, was enough justification for a fiery death.”
Being near the trucks when they explode is one thing, and collateral damage should be kept to a minimum in hostile engagements.
Actually DRIVING the trucks, on the other hand, is the very definition of aiding and abetting an ongoing terrorist organization. I’m sorry, but if you know that you’re doing the work of ISIS, even under the threat of your family’s safety, you’ve aligned yourself with the enemy.
If I didn’t know better, I would think I was watching the scene in Clerks where they were discussing whether or not the contractors working on the Death Star II deserved to die in the Rebel attack in Return of the Jedi. I mean, seriously.
Actually DRIVING the trucks, on the other hand, is the very definition of aiding and abetting an ongoing terrorist organization.
You are assuming that the drivers have some choice in the matter. I wouldn’t put it past ISIS to use hostages as human shields.
And maybe as one Democrat said, “ISIS isn’t necessarily evil. They are just doing what they think is right for their community.”
We need to fight ISIS not fall over groveling in front of them or offering defenses of them. I don’t know why Democrats so frequently side with people who declare themselves our enemy.
Yes, we need to fight ISIS. Accepting Syrian refugees with open arms and helping them thrive in the West is a powerful way to undermine ISIS’s appeal.
Um, no it isn’t.
God you are a fucking idiot.
Jim, these refugees hate the USA, likely think a lot of messed up stuff about Jews and Christians, and have been known to act on these prejudices in refugee camps. I feel sorry for them but the best way to help is by helping them keep their homes.
I do support open arms for Christians, Jews, and other minority groups persecuted by ISIS and Muslim refugees alike.
How EFFING brave are you when one out of a group of, say 100, let into your neighborhood could shoot you or yours and slit their belly open as they lay dying?
Of course they could. Someone could move to your neighborhood from Chicago or Miami or Walla Walla and do that. Someone born in your neighborhood could do that. Blindly associating danger with foreigners is simple xenophobia.
There is no reason to believe that Syrian refugees pose a greater threat than anyone else who might move to a community; if anything I’d expect the crime rate of refugees to be lower than that of U.S. natives. I’d be happy to have Syrian refugees move in next door. I’m glad that our country has accepted refugees and regular immigrants from all over the world in the past — it was the right thing to do, and they’ve made our country a better place. Abdulfattah Jandali was a Muslim political activist from Homs, Syria, when we let him in on a student visa; he fathered a son who founded Apple Computer. We have no idea how much we’re losing when we give in to irrational fear.
Good, announce your intentions with the Christian Churches that are eagerly lapping up the refugees and placing them around the country.
Volunteer! C’mon Jim, walk the talk. Use your weekends to help these poor, helpless victims become law-abiding Americans. Post your pictures up on Facebook. Do your part!
Well, guess what. I have friends from Europe and Japan who can’t come here because the best they can hope for is to win the lottery. They have skills that could benefit the US immediately, but you’d rather wring your hands over the injustices happening in the middle east.
I’m all for lifting the quotas and letting your friends come. Why should it be one or the other?
“Someone born in your neighborhood could do that. Blindly associating danger with foreigners is simple xenophobia.”
No Jim..stop and think for a second:
200+ dead in an airline bombing
160 dead in Parisian attacks.
More in the Beirut bombing.
all in a month.
You don’t get that in typical society murders very often.
Sorry but you cannot conflate mass murder – even by one person – with a murder of one or two.
Dead is dead, whether one by one or in a large group. The U.S. has thousands of homicides every year. Immigrants and refugees commit a smaller fraction of those crimes than their percentage of the population.
Is it possible that a refugee will commit mass murder? Of course, any person has that potential. But by the same token any child born in the U.S. is a potential mass murderer. Blocking refugees because they might kill us makes as much sense as blocking childbirth. Less sense, actually, because we know more about the refugees that we accept, and statistically they’ve been less prone to crime than the native born.
Conservatives and libertarians sensibly decry the use of the precautionary principle when it comes to government regulation. But it’s being embraced (and not only on the right) where refugees are concerned.
Dead is dead By that logic, we should do away with criminal homicide statutes and/or prosecute doctors unable to save patients as harshly as serial killers. The vast majority of the world’s population is not as moronic as Jim making the statement “dead is dead”.
Conservatives and libertarians sensibly decry the use of the precautionary principle when it comes to government regulation.
Not when it comes to defense of the United States. Perhaps you should study history before making stupid comments like these.
“I’d be happy to have Syrian refugees move in next door.”
You could sit around and complain about American Imperialism and how everyone is really racist against Muslims. Enlist them in Democrat efforts to fight the systemic racism in the USA. Before you know it you could inculcate them with your stereotypes of other Americans.
The anti-American progressive democrat socialist ideology is as great a threat of radicalizing these refugees as jihadi preachers. And part of the work is already done because so many in the region believe in the socialist narrative about the USA. The same narrative that Democrats believe.
I understand that Democrats don’t think of them as a threat because they share so many views about the USA but importing millions of people who dislike the USA is a mistake.
A better move is to help them stay in their homes and retain their way of life. They don’t want to come here out of love for our country.
The sad thing is, that Christians and other minorities are likely to get the short end of the stick when it comes to being settled as refugees. They already have problems with the other refugees acting like ISIS toward them.
As a change of pace after reading so many posts from Baghdad Jim, you might enjoy reading someone who seems (unlike Jim) to value Western liberty:
http://www.wsj.com/article_email/europes-terrorist-war-at-home-1447626449-lMyQjAxMTA1MzE5NjYxNzY4Wj?alg=y
So the Muslim countries won’t take these refugees because they’re afraid of upsetting the balance.
But we’re supposed to do it?
Really, Jim?
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-09-04/why-don-t-gulf-states-accept-more-refugees-
Christians can’t even go to the UN camps because the Muslims refugees rape and persecute them.
I don’t deny that many of these refugees are fleeing ISIS but that doesn’t mean they are super awesome people.
If Saudi Arabia doesn’t have a society that can accept and benefit from refugees, that’s their failing and their loss. Is it really hard to believe that the U.S. is more robust, tolerant and forward-looking than Saudi Arabia?
Maybe they know something we don’t. Did you think of that?
Do you think they know something we don’t about the dangers of women driving?
Honestly, do you really want the U.S. to take guidance on refugee policy and the treatment of religious minorities from Saudi Arabia?
Dude, you are the one advocating we import millions of people who think women shouldn’t drive.
We are tolerant but are the refugees?
“In fact, of the hundreds of thousands of refugees accepted in the U.S. since 9/11, not a single one has been charged with domestic terrorism”
What about the Boston Bombers? We have foiled many domestic terror plots despite how Obama tells you we haven’t been attacked during his presidency.
The Tsarnaevs came to the US on tourist visas. We accepted over 150,000 Bosnian Muslim refugees in the 1990s; none has been charged with terrorism.
Bosnian Muslims are barely Muslims. They drink, and let their women wear whatever they want.
“The Tsarnaevs came to the US on tourist visas. ”
Lie:
They may have initially got in on a tourist visa but then after a year they have to apply for asylum. They did as persecuted refugees.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev were refugees from brutal Chechen conflict
“With their baseball hats and sauntering gaits, they appeared to friends and neighbors like ordinary American boys. But the Boston bombing suspects were refugees from another world — the blood, rubble and dirty wars of the Russian Caucasus.
Anzor Tsarnaev and his wife arrived in the United States in early 2002 after gaining refugee status. Their two sons and two daughters followed a short time later with an aunt.”
National Review:
The bombers’ parents claimed refugee status at a time when their place of residence was Kazakhstan, where there are many ethnic Chechens and little in the way of persecution that would justify refugee status. In fact, Tsarnaev père apparently had little reason to fear persecution in Russia, either: He returned there to live, and his son Tamerlan spent an extended period of time with him there, with side trips to the Islamist hot spot of Chechnya. Tamerlan never became a U.S. citizen (his flagging by the Russian intelligence service as a likely Islamic radical prevented that), his parents had returned to Russia, and he himself was in and out of the country a great deal: not exactly a candidate for what our forebears used to quaintly describe as our national melting pot.
Nice try.
It’s funny watching Jim say every is irrational about ISIS terrorists hidden with Syrian refugees, when this is exactly what happened and what was predicted weeks ago. Not so funny is that Jim says all this stuff while still supporting Hillary Clinton, who calls Republicans both the enemy and likens them to terrorists. Obama has done the same, and even the press noted today that his anger level rose when addressing Republicans more so than ISIS (it’s on twitter Jim, you find that a source of intelligence, so look it up).
when this is exactly what happened and what was predicted weeks ago.
What happened? Most of the Paris attackers identified to date were EU citizens, who could have carried out the attack whether or not the EU was accepting Syrian refugees.
ISIS has reason to want the EU to stop accepting refugees: it’s embarrassing to them that so many Syrians and Iraqis are fleeing their supposed caliphate. Every example of Western xenophobia and Islamophobia is a propaganda win for ISIS, supporting their narrative of a clash between Islam and the West.
“Most of the Paris attackers identified to date were EU citizens, who could have carried out the attack whether or not the EU was accepting Syrian refugees. ”
But not all.
Please explain to us why you think it’s a grand idea to let in even one Syrian jihadist posing as a refugee.
Please explain to us why you think it’s a grand idea to let in even one Syrian jihadist posing as a refugee.
We shouldn’t. But we shouldn’t keep out 10,000 or 100,000 Syrians who aren’t jihadists, just because we can’t prove to a certainty that none of them are faking. That’s a ridiculous approach to risk. It’s like banning all spaceflight, or all automobiles, because someone might get killed. In fact, it’s worse than that. We know that the people already in the U.S. are statistically more prone to violence than the refugees who make it through our screening. Letting them in makes the country a tiny bit less violent overall. Even if criminal violence was your only concern, you’re better off accepting refugees.
And crime isn’t our only concern. Accepting Syrian refugees is a humanitarian good. It is a propaganda blow against ISIS. It makes our country richer, stronger and more vibrant. The U.S. became the country it is today by welcoming people seeking a better life. What could be more American than accepting refugees?
“We shouldn’t. But we shouldn’t keep out 10,000 or 100,000 Syrians who aren’t jihadists, just because we can’t prove to a certainty that none of them are faking.”
Except that’s not the argument and you consistently fail to see.
The argument is that we KNOW they will infiltrate that way.
So not only can’t we find them….we know they will use that method.
So please explain why you think it’s ok to let one in.
I see ThinkProgress is making that claim, but then they don’t actually provide a link (here is their source) that backs it up. However, here is one link that shows at least one attacker entered through Greece. He did have a fake Syrian passport, but that’s the point we are all making, and you are too dumb to understand. You want to take in 10,000 Syrian refugees that you cannot vet. It only takes a fake passport to get pass someone as moronic as you, Jim.
Most of the attackers that have been identified so far, including the ringleader, were EU nationals. ISIS doesn’t need to have its members pose as refugees to strike targets in the West, they have plenty of members who already live in the West.
Yes, so let’s import another couple million targets ripe for radicalization. You don’t even see the gaping hole in your logic.
ISIS has reason to want the EU to stop accepting refugees
Actually, according to the Russians, the Pope, and even ISIS itself, the refugees provide a good way to sneak in terrorists. Your claim, Jim, is not supported. It is what we call, “wishful thinking”. The reality is the spread of military age men, as most of the refugees are, is actually a great technique to spread the caliphate. There is also evidence that the technique is working. ISIS said they would do it, and they have shown that they can and will continue to do so.
Your further miss use of the word “xenophobia” is simply dig the hole deeper. 300 people injured and over a hundred dead is not an irrational fear. What is irrational is taking the word of a person holding a fake Syrian passport that they should enter Greece and then travel to France, because they simply claim to be Syrian and escaping a war zone. It is absurdly irrational to criticize the use of a religious test to allow refugee status, and then cite as a supporting example for unvetted refugee status the 1930s intake of Jews.
I’m struggling Jim to find any value in the arguments you provide. You seem to be nothing but an extension of the ThinkProgress propaganda machine, and your ability to make rational statements backed up with solid sources is as equally bad as that website.
Actually, according to the Russians, the Pope, and even ISIS itself, the refugees provide a good way to sneak in terrorists.
And yet, in the 14 years since 9/11, the U.S. has not been attacked by a single terrorist who got into the U.S. that way.
300 people injured and over a hundred dead is not an irrational fear.
It’s an innumerate fear. The U.S. has a hundred homicides every weekend. The odds of an American being killed by an ISIS terrorist who got into the U.S. by posing as a refugee is much, much lower than her odds of being shot by a toddler. The former has never happened, the latter happens roughly once a week.
And yet, in the 14 years since 9/11, the U.S. has not been attacked by a single terrorist who got into the U.S. that way.
What an absurd thing to say. Nothing has happened because of our tactics by the NSA, FBI, etc. There have been many attempts. And, as I’ve said before, we go through airport security because of Muslims, not Jews, not Eastern Europeans, not Chinese.
I love how you compare domestic homicides with terrorism. It’s an absurd comparison.
Let’s do another. Why not say there are fewer deaths due to prescription drug overdoses than gang killings? My gosh, we should just let gangs shoot each other because, compared to drug deaths, it’s miniscule!
Are you racist against minorities? Is that why you let them shoot each other?
“Most of the Paris attackers identified to date were EU citizens, who could have carried out the attack whether or not the EU was accepting Syrian refugees. ”
But since at least two of the attackers WERE Syrian “refugees” please explain to use why it’s a good idea to let one in.
Are you willing to walk up to the parents of some kid shot and disembowled by a Syrian jihadist you let in and tell them
“Well, at lease we showed how nice we are.”
??
But since at least two of the attackers WERE Syrian “refugees” please explain to use why it’s a good idea to let one in.
Because your alternative — barring all Syrian refugees, because you can’t stand the possibility that one of them might be a secret terrorist able to get by our screening — would give ISIS exactly what they want.
With all due respect Jim. Not taking a serious military approach to eradicating ISIS is giving them what they want, a caliphate.
What shows greater care, making refugees walk thousands of miles leaving behind their homes and possessions while risking the very violence they are fleeing from their fellow refugees to live in a country they despise or establishing safe spaces in the region, killing ISIS, and allowing these people to reclaim their way of life?
Just because people disagree with you about how best to help refugees, doesn’t make them racist or xenophones or whatever slur you want to use.
Lol, Jim thinks Paris was attacked by Belgians. EU citizen is a euphamisim. Why wouldn’t multigenerational Islamic radicalization not be a threat? All it would take is four years of socialist democrat inculcation on a college campus. We could have a Muslim Lives Matter movement engaging in domestic terrorism to bring down the colonialist white power structure, the constitution.
Notwithstanding Jim’s scattergun collection of totally disjoint “points”, let’s make this very simple:
1) Syrian jihadists are infiltrating the West, organizing and carrying out terrorist attacks that kill (or attempt to kill) hundreds.
– We know this because it has happened. For example: Paris and the French Train attempt.
– There is absolutely no debating this point because it’s a demonstrated fact.
2) All previous attempts to vet these “refugees” in Western Europe and the US have failed.
– We know this because the French have admitted it and because we know this with our own common sense as we hear what President McFail has to say, and has done.
– There is no debating this because it’s a demonstrated fact.
3) Syrian (and others – ISIS in general) have declared that the US is next.
– We know this because we can read and watch tv.
– There is absolutely no reason to doubt the ISIS declaration.
If you think they are just showboating and huffing and puffing and don’t really mean it, I dare you to walk up to the parents of the 130 dead and tell them that to their face.
Go on…I dare you.
4) The US does not have to take anybody in. No obligation.
– This is not a reflection of how generous and kind we are – we are the kindest, most generous most giving people on the planet.
5) We are not obliged to demonstrate our kindness by taking in 10’s of thousands of refugees which will ABSOLUTELY contain jihadists ready and willing to carry out attacks like Paris or worse.
Not only are we not obliged to do it..it would be sheer lunacy to do it.
6) That innocent refugees will not reap the benefits of settling in the US if we stop the flow is a fact.
– BFD. US citizens – even Jim – are of far more deserving of protection by the US government than anyone outside the US.
– Our power is not infinite – we cannot help everybody all the time.
– Any attempt to suggest that not helping these refugees is an indicator of American heartlessness means that you have somehow found an excuse to dispense with logic.
7) Profiling works and is therefore smart when you have finite resources and capabilities. Refusing the entrance of muslims into the US is not a reflection of the US opinion of the religion: it’s a reflection of the demonstrated behavior of a large group of them (see all the points above).
– As Cruz said (and Jim judiciously left out) If it were christians making the threats then we’d keep the christians out. it it were plumbers then we’d keep the plumbers out.
But it isn’t any of those.
Is it?
Slam the door shut now. Fortunately 27 governors understand simple facts and have retained the use of logic. I hope the other 23 will as well. We’ll see.
In the meantime, we have to find and deport all those jihadists who have infiltrated the Southern Border because President McWorthless refuses to seal off that entry way.
Syrian jihadists are infiltrating the West
There are no examples of Muslim jihadists coming the U.S. as refugees in order to carry out attacks. There is no reason to believe that not accepting Muslim refugees will reduce the number of Americans killed in terror attacks; it could just as well increase the number (e.g. by helping ISIS paint the U.S. as anti-Muslim, and thereby helping their recruitment of Americans, the same way that ill treatment of Muslims helps ISIS recruit Europeans like the ones who committed the Paris attacks).
We are not obliged to demonstrate our kindness by taking in 10’s of thousands of refugees which will ABSOLUTELY contain jihadists ready and willing to carry out attacks like Paris or worse.
On what do you base that “ABSOLUTELY”? We’ve accepted hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees since 9/11. None has carried out attacks. How can you be sure that the next 10,000 we accept will be different?
Refusing the entrance of muslims into the US is not a reflection of the US opinion of the religion
You can tell yourself that, but do you really think that Muslims will see it that way? ISIS tells Muslims that the West hates them. Banning refugees simply because they are Muslim helps make their point.
Our power is not infinite – we cannot help everybody all the time.
So we have the resources to escalate our attacks against ISIS, but we don’t have the resources to accept refugees?
In the meantime, we have to find and deport all those jihadists who have infiltrated the Southern Border
Have any jihadists come over the Southern border and attacked Americans, or is this an urban legend?
“There is no reason to believe that not accepting Muslim refugees will reduce the number of Americans killed in terror attacks; it could just as well increase the number (e.g. by helping ISIS paint the U.S. as anti-Muslim, and thereby helping their recruitment of Americans, the same way that ill treatment of Muslims helps ISIS recruit Europeans like the ones who committed the Paris attacks).”
Aside from being a nonsensical reach, and yet again another “America is Hateful” argument (one which befits a kindergardner at best), it really doesn’t matter – they have told us that they are coming to kill us. They told France and carried it out. They have demonstrated the will and the ability to do this.
What part of that do you not get?
“On what do you base that “ABSOLUTELY”? ”
Paris
“We’ve accepted hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees since 9/11. None has carried out attacks. How can you be sure that the next 10,000 we accept will be different?”
Because it’s been demonstrated to us on a stack of 160 bodies. Plus your question is imbecilic:
it wasn’t a good idea to let the previous sets of people in either. We are not saying that “before” was ok and “now” is not ok.
We are saying it was never ok while they are your sworn enemies.
it really doesn’t matter – they have told us that they are coming to kill us.
It does matter. Their ability to kill us depends on their ability to recruit and motivate soldiers for suicide missions. That in turn depends on their propaganda message, which is that Muslims are despised in the West, and can only find fulfillment in service to the caliphate. Barring Muslim refugees, because they are Muslim, supports their message and validates their world view.
Because it’s been demonstrated to us on a stack of 160 bodies.
No, it hasn’t. None of the Paris attackers went through U.S. refugee screening.
We are saying it was never ok while they are your sworn enemies.
The hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees accepted since 9/11 — none of whom have committed terror attacks — are our “sworn enemies”? And you wonder why ISIS gets traction with its claim that the U.S. is at war against Islam?
“The hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees accepted since 9/11 — none of whom have committed terror attacks — are our “sworn enemies”? ”
No Jim do try to keep up:
The refugees come from areas controlled by people slaughtering them – jihadists. Jihadists want to slaughter you. To do that, jihadists have and will continue to infiltrate themselves into the US.
Are you seriously denying that jihadists have infiltrated the US and Western Europe via refugee influx?
Do you deny that?
“That in turn depends on their propaganda message, ”
Democrats have been getting this wrong for the last 15 years. You fail to learn that they will say anything for propaganda. You guys used to claim the only reason why there was fighting in Iraq was because we were there. This was at a time when Syrian and Iranian proxies were waging war against Iraqi civilians and not US troops. And then we left and ISIS came back.
I don’t know entirely why this is but Democrats always call for appeasing the jihadis while parroting the same talking points they do.
So we have the resources to escalate our attacks against ISIS, but we don’t have the resources to accept refugees?
Defense is the most important enumerated power of the federal government. Letting in and supporting refugees, not so much.
“Defense is the most important enumerated power of the federal government.”
For Baghdad Jim, like other government sniffers and State humpers, it’s the ability to force other people to do the things he wants them to do and pay for things he wants them to pay for.
“Banning refugees simply because they are Muslim helps make their point.”
Lets help them over there.
For 15 years we hear endless tirades from our friends to the left about how everyone in the region hates us. About how we shouldn’t do this or not do that because it will make them hate us more. Now, the Democrats are advocating open borders for the very same people they said hated us last month, the very same people they claimed couldn’t live with a western styled government or a civil society.
You guys are just not consistent on this except that you always come down on supporting whatever is bad for the USA and spout defenses of people who hate the USA.
Here’s the real racism, Jim.
http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2015/11/17/discrimination-2098-syrian-muslim-refugees-allowed-into-america-only-53-christians/
Anyone who studies the refugee situation knows that we are allowing muslims into the country but refusing the christians. Any sane person would want christians in first because, you know, they’re being crucified, tortured and put into slavery. But that isn’t happening.
Why are you such a bigot?
The Obama administration has yet to label ISIS actions against Christians as genocide and there is some speculation that they wont be.
When it comes down to protecting victims of Muslim persecution, Obama and the Democrats deny they even exist. You think Obama and the Democrats would be more sympathetic to people being sold into sex slavery and crucified. Well, sympathetic to the slaves anyway.
And just to how how ridiculously stupid (or evil – take your pick) President McImbecile’s touted “plan” is:
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/11/one_picture_to_sum_up_obamas_foolish_isis_policy.html
Yes a very good ending to the blog post:
“Does the question not immediately arise in your mind why we would target a specific human enemy and yet leave perhaps hundreds of them alive and well to continue to conduct their war against us?
Will you please explain this strategy, Mr. Commander-in Chief?”
Hollande’s tough talk is just that, so far:
talk.
Time will tell if he means it or if he’s posturing to fend of the rising right wing of French politics.
If I had to bet, I would bet the latter. Here’s why:
“Ezra Levant reports from Paris:
France has developed a tolerance for terrorism. They accept terrorist violence as the new normal. They’re numb to it now.
Here’s proof. In January of this year, Muslim terrorists launched a series of five attacks that killed 17 people across Paris, including 12 at the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. That led to a massive solidarity march through Paris, with millions of people — including many foreign leaders — swearing it would never happen again.
But it did happen again, ten times worse…
But there’s no massive march this time, no stream of foreign leaders coming to pay their respects. And even at the actual site of the massacre, the mood was subdued. As you can see in my video reports, there were a few hundred people milling around, but there was no resolve, no conviction, no purpose. Outside Bataclan, a street performer set up to entertain the crowd — and no-one seemed to find it inappropriate.”
And Mark Steyn (who posted the above on his web page) said:
“I hope Ezra’s wrong, but as I wrote four months ago:
So the cowardly and evasive “support” the world showed after January’s bloodbath was a very clear lesson to the survivors in the limits of global solidarity – and how it will go next time: We’ll be sad when you die, too! (Although probably not quite as sad and not in as many numbers, because, like, been there, done that.)”
Yeah….no marches of solidarity. Why this time the slaughter was so banal that Obama showed up late for the moment of silence at the G20.
Eggs…omelettes…right Jim?
Jim let’s try to cut through all your obfuscating BS. Please answer the following two questions with a yes or a no:
1) Do you believe jihadists, who wish to carry out terrorist attacks on US soil, have infiltrated the via various means including insinuation with refugee groups, in the past?
2) Do you believe it’s possible that jihadists, who wish to carry out terrorist attacks on US soil will infiltrate into the US via the 65,000 Syrians Obama wants to bring in?
Simple yes or no answers will suffice.
An extremely accurate piece on the current Syrian problem. It’s an excellent critique by that democrat, Walter Russell Mead.
Jim, I’ve put the one quote that you’ll walk away with so you don’t have to read it:
And many of these people are spewing ugly hate about Syrian refugees in ways that appall—or should appall—anybody with an open mind and a humane spirit
For everyone else, it’s an excellent piece:
http://www.the-american-interest.com/2015/11/17/president-obamas-cynical-refugee-ploy/
Unexpected!!!!
Nearly SEVENTY are arrested in America over ISIS plots – and they include refugees who had been given safe haven but ‘turned to terror’
“US authorities have charged at least 66 men and women with ISIS-related terror plots on American soil – including a handful of refugees, Daily Mail Online can reveal.
The terror group has set its sights on Washington, D.C. as it vows to further infiltrate the West and ramp up its blood-soaked offensive.
Presidents Obama insists says that ‘slamming the door’ on Syrian refugees fleeing ISIS would be a betrayal of American values.”
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3322649/The-enemy-Nearly-SEVENTY-arrested-America-ISIS-plots-include-refugees-given-safe-haven-turned-terror.html#ixzz3rrhsN4lw
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
I like it!
This should gain Cruz a few more points in the polls:
“Mr. President, if you want to insult me, you can do it overseas, you can do it in Turkey, you can do it in foreign countries, but I would encourage you, Mr. President, come back and insult me to my face,” Cruz told reporters Wednesday morning, looking directly into the cameras. “Let’s have a debate on Syrian refugees right now. We can do it anywhere you want. I’d prefer it in the United States and not overseas where you’re making the insults. It’s easy to toss a cheap insult when no one can respond, but let’s have a debate.”
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2015/11/ted-cruz-obama-syrian-refugees-216018#ixzz3rrluyoXj
Unexpected!!!!
SIXTH SYRIAN with Fake Passport Captured in Honduras on Way to US
Jim Hoft Nov 19th, 2015 6:00 am 45 Comments
Five Syrians with stolen Greek passports tried to enter the United States from Honduras.
EXCLUSIVE — CONFIRMED: 8 Syrians Caught at Texas Border in Laredo
UPDATE: The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has confirmed that eight Syrians were taken into custody at the Laredo port of entry.