My RedState colleague and good friend Victoria Coates recently wrote a post calling for a humanitarian intervention in Syria on behalf of the opposition and civilians who are being killed daily by Bashar al-Assad’s regime.  She writes:

“In dealing with Libya and Syria, consistency need not be the hobgoblin of little minds but can rather be the hallmark of a consistent and coordinated foreign policy.  There are equivalencies to be drawn between the two crises, and once these are recognized we should take equivalent action.  It is not a decision to be taken lightly, but we would not be alone and the cause is just.  We have the unified support of our European and Arab allies.  We have moral and strategic interests at stake.  Rather than whining about the shocking moral turpitude of the United Nations, the President of the United States needs to remember his responsibilities as the leader of the free world–and lead.”

While I have the utmost respect for Dr. Coates, I am hesitant to agree with her in this case.  There is no question that the bloodshed in Syria, which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton referred to a mere nine months ago as a simple “police action” and contrasted favorably to the violent crackdown in Libya, has been both constant and staggering (in that same interview, Clinton favorably contrasted Assad to Qaddafi, saying “many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe he’s a reformer”).   The death toll in Homs alone has reportedly grown to 3,500 over the last eleven months, and while the Arab League has repeatedly called for an end to Assad’s crackdown, opposition from Russia and China has left the UN Security Council unable to pass even a simple resolution condemning the government’s murderous actions.

As the bodycount continues to rise in Syria, there has been an increase in calls for intervention conducted outside the auspices of the UN.  However, while these calls are understandable on humanitarian grounds, their authors almost invariably neglect to include any details on just what it is they wish to see take place with regard to that intervention.

Read More →

My RedState colleague and good friend Victoria Coates recently wrote a post calling for a humanitarian intervention in Syria on behalf of the opposition and civilians who are being killed daily by Bashar al-Assad’s regime.  She writes:

“In dealing with Libya and Syria, consistency need not be the hobgoblin of little minds but can rather be the hallmark of a consistent and coordinated foreign policy.  There are equivalencies to be drawn between the two crises, and once these are recognized we should take equivalent action.  It is not a decision to be taken lightly, but we would not be alone and the cause is just.  We have the unified support of our European and Arab allies.  We have moral and strategic interests at stake.  Rather than whining about the shocking moral turpitude of the United Nations, the President of the United States needs to remember his responsibilities as the leader of the free world–and lead.”

While I have the utmost respect for Dr. Coates, I am hesitant to agree with her in this case.  There is no question that the bloodshed in Syria, which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton referred to a mere nine months ago as a simple “police action” and contrasted favorably to the violent crackdown in Libya, has been both constant and staggering (in that same interview, Clinton favorably contrasted Assad to Qaddafi, saying “many of the members of Congress of both parties who have gone to Syria in recent months have said they believe he’s a reformer”).   The death toll in Homs alone has reportedly grown to 3,500 over the last eleven months, and while the Arab League has repeatedly called for an end to Assad’s crackdown, opposition from Russia and China has left the UN Security Council unable to pass even a simple resolution condemning the government’s murderous actions.

As the bodycount continues to rise in Syria, there has been an increase in calls for intervention conducted outside the auspices of the UN.  However, while these calls are understandable on humanitarian grounds, their authors almost invariably neglect to include any details on just what it is they wish to see take place with regard to that intervention.

Read More →

(H/T The Other McCain) It turns out the Wukan Revolution is now well underway:

For the first time on record, the Chinese Communist party has lost all control, with the population of 20,000 in this southern fishing village now in open revolt.

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The world didn’t become a better place. Our absolutely dyspepsic middle eastern policy has just about everybody shaking their heads. Now, the morons want to arm the Libyan rebels so that our guys and gals over there can get our own stuff fired back at us.

‘Her Thighness’, Hillary Clinton, has been rocketing from capital to capital, braying the administration’s next change of course, change of mind, or the next whimsical pronouncement of the ‘Anointed One’, arguably the least influential person on the international scene. Notice I didn’t use the word ‘leader’.

Speaking of leadership, I’ve been watching the antics of the Republican leadership with increasing unease, bordering on anger. They still don’t get it. They had thousands of Tea Party Patriots demonstrating outside Congress and they still don’t get it.

Allow me to lay this out for you establishment Republicans once again… one point seven trillion dollars in deficit this year alone. And now these brave, brave men have the unmitigated temerity to come to the taxpaying patriots of this country with a heroic sixty billion dollars in deficit spending cuts. Words fail me…

The Marxists, in the form of Harry Reid and Upchucky Schumer, are trumpeting that our Republican intransigence will result in a government shutdown. Oh, No! Lions and tigers and bears… Oh, my! This is what has Boehner quaking? Bleating that we’re only 1/2 of 1/3 of the government? This is why he and the rest of the so-called ‘leaders’ that we, you and I, worked hard and skillfully to get elected, have the nerve to say to us that they cannot do the job that we sent them to Washington to do because it may cause a government shutdown!
Shut that sucker down!

What if we shut down the government and nothing happened? Because that’s exactly what would occur. All essential services would still function. The only ones who would be discomfited would be politicians, bureaucrats and parasitic government types in their hundreds of thousands… and that’s a good thing.

I see that Repubic Scott Brown opened his mouth and labeled himself as the new primo RINO in the Senate. I’m sure McCain must be jealous. Mr Brown labeled the insignificant sixty billion dollars in proposed cuts as ‘irresponsible’. One has to wonder… has this man, who we judged to be fairly intelligent, any grasp on reality?

What slays me is that you can hear these various Republicans on the conservative radio talk circuits and they all sound like bold deficit hawks, and reiterate that they know who put them in office and with what mandate. Yet all we get out of the House leadership are these lame squeeks and bleats about why we can’t do something.
Fellow Patriots, I sense another change wind blowing…

Post Script: To those of you who followed my son’s recent illness… we brought him home (he had a drug -resistant pneumonia that almost killed him) and with a few weeks’ rest he should be fine.
Why in the world would any sane person want to trade the most magnificent medical system in the world for Osama… whoops, slip of the keyboard, Obamacare? Think about it.

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2011

According to Robert Gates, our goal is not to get rid of Ghaddafi. According to the others in the administration, our goal is not to help the rebels. According to Barack Obama, our goal is protect the citizens of Libya. But that then begs the question why he is (A) not going into Darfur, (B) not going into North Korea, and (C) something about keeping GTMO open.

There is not in any way, shape, or form any rational explanation for the United States engaged in Libya to do nothing except for one I can think of — Barack Obama’s re-election.

Obama is sitting out negotiations on Capitol Hill for the budget lest he take any ownership of anything that should happen. He wants a government shutdown because that’s what Bill Clinton got. But he wants to keep everything away from himself so he can’t have any ownership of the shutdown and can instead work to re-open the government.

The other area of Bill Clinton’s playbook Obama feels the need to steal from is Kosovo.

In 1995, Scott O’Grady got shot down. The nation became transfixed on Bill Clinton’s efforts at securing the Dayton Accord. He looked very Presidential.

Obama has not really had a personal international crisis. Libya gives him exactly that. He can use the U.S. Military to prove he is not afraid of using the U.S. Military. He can look Presidential. He can get Politico drafted “Lewinskies” about how he dared to stop having dinner in Chile for updates on downed American pilots in Libya.

Suddenly Obama can look Presidential again — all through manufacturing the need for American involvement where there was no need. Barack Obama wants to be re-elected. The best playbook for his re-election is that of Bill Clinton. But Clinton had a government shutdown and Kosovo. In the absence of either, Barack Obama must manufacture them.

And he has.

According to Robert Gates, our goal is not to get rid of Ghaddafi. According to the others in the administration, our goal is not to help the rebels. According to Barack Obama, our goal is protect the citizens of Libya. But that then begs the question why he is (A) not going into Darfur, (B) not going into North Korea, and (C) something about keeping GTMO open.

There is not in any way, shape, or form any rational explanation for the United States engaged in Libya to do nothing except for one I can think of — Barack Obama’s re-election.

Obama is sitting out negotiations on Capitol Hill for the budget lest he take any ownership of anything that should happen. He wants a government shutdown because that’s what Bill Clinton got. But he wants to keep everything away from himself so he can’t have any ownership of the shutdown and can instead work to re-open the government.

The other area of Bill Clinton’s playbook Obama feels the need to steal from is Kosovo.

In 1995, Scott O’Grady got shot down. The nation became transfixed on Bill Clinton’s efforts at securing the Dayton Accord. He looked very Presidential.

Obama has not really had a personal international crisis. Libya gives him exactly that. He can use the U.S. Military to prove he is not afraid of using the U.S. Military. He can look Presidential. He can get Politico drafted “Lewinskies” about how he dared to stop having dinner in Chile for updates on downed American pilots in Libya.

Suddenly Obama can look Presidential again — all through manufacturing the need for American involvement where there was no need. Barack Obama wants to be re-elected. The best playbook for his re-election is that of Bill Clinton. But Clinton had a government shutdown and Kosovo. In the absence of either, Barack Obama must manufacture them.

And he has.