Archive for the 'Obama Administration' Category

Obama has rolled out his plan for defense cuts.  He appeared at the Pentagon with such notables as Generals Odierno and Amos.  This is extremely bad form, and this tactic was used to make it appear that the military agrees with or is setting national defense policy, specifically, the Obama administration policy.  It isn’t the business of the military to agree or disagree with its civilian leadership on national defense policy.

To the point, the revised policy includes things such as a so-called rebalancing towards the Asia-Pacific region.  It also will place higher emphasis on drones and cyberwarfare, and will markedly decrease the size of the Army and Marine Corps.  This shift in policy is supposed to align with an increased concern over saber-rattling by China and increased growth of its military.

There has also been a large amount of posturing over the wasteful spending at the Pentagon.  At Foreign Affairs Lawrence Korb has penned an article entitled Why Panetta’s Pentagon Cuts Are Easier Than You Think.  Any review of my advocacy will show that I have opposed ridiculous programs as well.  I’ve called for the end of the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle and counseled the Marine Corps to focus its energies on forcible entry based on more rapid and aggressive airborne assault (such as with helicopters and V-22 Ospreys).  I have advocated the end of the highly wasteful F-35 program, as well as more F-16s and F-22s (both of which outperform the F-35).  I have advocated against the Army Future Combat Systems, and other wasteful programs.

Furthermore, my own advocacy for the far east has been to cut Japan loose from our umbrella of nuclear protection, as well as for South Korea.  Nothing would slow China’s military advances more than having to worry over a nuclear Japan.  But my advocacy has also been for staying the course in both Iraq and Afghanistan, for strengthening our infantry, both Army and Marines, and for replacing and upgrading infantry equipment.  An entirely new armory of rifles and automatic arms will be needed to replace the aging actions of older firearms in order to keep our infantry well-supplied.  Future policy has also pointed towards a reduction in the number of aircraft carrier groups, while I have argued for steady or increasing carrier availability as one of the most effective elements of force projection.

But this – the current Obama administration actions – is more than re-apportionment and redistribution of resources to ensure wiser spending.  Make no mistake about it.  Approximately one and a half years ago, the CATO institute produced a study entitled Sustainable Defense Task Force, and it wasn’t the only such study.  The unspoken presupposition of these efforts was the need to find money for entitlement spending.  They saw it coming, and they prepared the think tank papers and studies to show that it was necessary.

But Glen Tschirgi has pointed out that entitlements will consume all tax revenues by the year 2049.  Defense cuts won’t do the job.  Mark Steyn has argued that Ron Paul suffers from the same illusion that grips the left.

Like many chaps round these parts, my general line on Ron Paul was that, as much as I think he’s out of his gourd on Iran et al, he performs a useful role in the GOP line-up talking up the virtues of constitutional conservatism. But this Weekly Standard piece by John McCormack suggests Paul is a humbug even on his core domestic turf: The entitlement state is the single biggest deformation to the Founders’ republic, and it downgrades not only America’s finances but its citizenry. Yet Paul has no serious proposal for dealing with it, and indeed promises voters that we won’t have to as long as we cut “overseas spending”.

This is hooey. As I point out in my book, well before the end of this decade interest payments on the debt will consume more of the federal budget than military spending. So you could abolish the Pentagon, sell off the fleet to Beijing and the nukes to Tehran and Khartoum and anybody else who wants ‘em, and we’d still be heading off the cliff. If a candidate isn’t talking about entitlement transformation, he’s unserious.

And, before the Ronulans start jeering “Neocon!”, I part company with many friends on the right who argue that defense spending can’t be cut. I wrote a cover story for NR a couple of months back arguing that the military’s bloated size (and budget) is increasingly an impediment to its effectiveness: When you’re responsible for 43 per cent of global military expenditure, it’s hardly surprising that you start acting like the world’s most lavishly funded transnational-outreach non-profit rather than the sharp end of America’s national interest. In Afghanistan, the problem is not that we haven’t spent enough money but that so much of it has been utterly wasted – and mostly in predictable ways. I am in favor of a leaner, meaner military, with the emphasis on both adjectives.

But Ron Paul, with his breezy indifference to the entitlement question, is peddling the same illusion Obama sold a gullible electorate in 2008 – that, if only America retreats from “Bush’s wars”, life can go on, and we’ll be fat and happy with literally not a care in the world. Big Government parochialism is an appealing fantasy because it suggests America’s fortunes can be restored without pain. But they can’t – and when Ron Paul tells you otherwise he’s talking hogwash.

The illusion is that cuts to defense spending can save our economic system from collapse.  The administration talks of two wars ending, and the wars of the last decades “coming to an end.”  Coming to an end indeed.  While I have argued endlessly for better and smarter logistics, the difficulty facing the logisticians now is getting troops and materiel out of Afghanistan rather than into it.  And with waning political support for the campaign, it would be easy to argue for complete withdrawal, even immediately.  If the campaign won’t be taken seriously and run to its completion with an outcome that we can live with, I argue (herein) for such withdrawal.  America apparently isn’t prepared to encounter militant Islam on our own terms.  Very well.  Then we’ll do it on their terms, and it will be more painful.

The wars of the “last decade” won’t go away.  The enemy gets a vote on our fate fate as well.  And Robert Scales outlines the downside of defense cuts.

Harry Truman seeking to never repeat the costs of World War II reduced the Army from 8 million soldiers to fewer than half a million. Without the intervention of Congress, he would have eliminated the Marine Corps entirely. The result was the evisceration of both land services in Korea, a war Truman never intended to fight.

With Dwight Eisenhower came the “New Look” strategy that sought to reduce the Army and Marine Corps again to allow the creation of a nuclear delivery force built around the Strategic Air Command. Along came Vietnam, a war that Eisenhower, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson never wanted to fight. But by 1970 our professional Army broke apart and was replaced by a body of amateurs. The result was defeat and 58,000 dead.

After Vietnam, the Nixon administration broke the Army again. I know. I was there to see the drug addiction, murders in the barracks and chronic indiscipline, caused mainly by a dispirited noncommissioned corps that voted with its feet and left. Then came Jimmy Carter’s unique form of neglect that led to the “hollow Army” of the late ’70s, an Army that failed so miserably in its attempt to rescue the American hostages in Iran.

The only exception to this very sad story was the Reagan years, when the land services received enough funding to equip and train themselves to fight so well in Operation Desert Storm. Then tragedy again as the Clinton administration reduced the ground services, intending to rely on “transformation,” a program that paid for more ships and planes by reducing the Army from 16 divisions to 10. In the George W. Bush administration, Donald Rumsfeld continued a policy that sought to exploit information technology to replace the human component in war. Had it not been for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the Army would have gone down to fewer than eight divisions.

So, here we go again. The Obama administration will reduce its long-service, professional land force to pay for something called “Air Sea Battle,” a strategy that seeks to buy more ships and planes in order to confront China with technology rather than people. This strategy shows a degree of a-historicism that exceeds that of any post-World War II administration. So much for remembering “the lessons of the past.”

I’m in good company in my advocacy for good men and materiel.  Drones are slow and lumbering, and our national fascination with them will come to a timely end when they see service against states that can easily shoot them out of the air (such as recently with Iran).  They are no replacement for the Air Force flying manned fighters, GPS is no real replacement for the ability to read maps and use a compass, red dot optics is no replacement for knowing how to use iron sights, and heavy reliance on logistics is no replacement for training in the ability to use the land for survival.  The human element in warfare cannot be replaced by technology.

From Cato Institute

We will suffer some future hardships from lack of intelligent and wise funding of our military.  Defense cuts can exacerbate those hardships.  But what defense cuts cannot possibly do is be anything other than a very short-lived and dangerous bank account for survival until we deal with what will be the true root cause of our economic demise: the entitlement state.

From Josh Rogin at Foreign Policy, “Obama Administration Secretly Preparing Options For Aiding the Syrian Opposition.”

As the violence in Syria spirals out of control, top officials in President Barack Obama‘s administration are quietly preparing options for how to assist the Syrian opposition, including gaming out the unlikely option of setting up a no-fly zone in Syria and preparing for another major diplomatic initiative.

This is one of those articles that illustrates the quandary of politics and democracy in America, circa 2012.  A Leftist can read the article and feel concerned but encouraged that the Obama Administration is carefully reviewing options and nicely weighing consequences and unforeseen possibilities.   A Conservative can read this very same article and find a mother lode of examples of everything that is wrong with Obama and his foreign policy team.   So without offense to Mr. Rogin, we will begin to mine.

In the lede paragraph we find that the Administration is, “quietly preparing options for how to assist the Syrian opposition, including gaming out the unlikely option of setting up a no-fly zone in Syria and preparing for another major diplomatic initiative.”   The fact that this is even news is disturbing.   Isn’t this one of the principal tasks of any administration– to look at the likely hot spots on the globe and have a plan, even (gasp) a strategy for each?   The reaction of the Obama Administration to Syria is the same as it was for Libya as it was for Iran as it was for Egypt as it was for Iraq:  caught with its pants down.

There is no stratagey, no over-arching view of the world that weaves U.S. foreign policy into a coherent set of goals and takes pro-active action, in advance, of events.   In short, the Obama Administration has been playing defense from day one.  And it shows.  When the people of Iran rose up and marched in the streets to denounce the fraud and, later, to demand an end to the Regime, Obama’s reaction was to stay out of it.   There was no thought of seizing an unparalleled opportunity to change the trajectory of the Middle East overnight.  In Libya, the Administration went along for the ride with Britain and France, or, more precisely, Britain and France took the U.S. for the ride, relying on U.S. logistics and air power for the bulk of the mission.   And, despite the War Powers Act, Obama never once articulated a rationale to support the use of force (and the risk of American lives) in Libya.   Obama waffled back and forth on Egypt, with different Administration officials making conflicting statements for months before Mubarak was thrown to the wolves.   Even now, with the Muslim Brotherhood on the verge of gaining power in Egypt, the Administration is busy reacting—or perhaps better known as covering its rear end by painting the Brotherhood as a “moderate” Islamist group.

Notice, too, in just this, first paragraph, how the Administration is busy “preparing for another major diplomatic initiative.”   That pretty well sums up Obama’s first term in world affairs:  floating one  “major diplomatic initiative” after another, even in the face of abject failure and embarrassing rejections.   Iran is busy developing nukes?  No problem.  Let’s get our terrific allies, the Russians and Chinese, to get behind Security Council resolutions that have no, real teeth and do nothing to stop the nuke program.   Here we go again with Syria.  An opportunity to take out one of the worst enablers of terrorism, a puppet of the Iranian Regime and an implacable foe of our only ally in the Middle East, Israel, and Obama is busy “preparing for another major diplomatic initiative.”    Oh and “the unlikely option” of a no-fly zone.

Every line of Rogin’s piece is like a manual on what is wrong with this Administration:

…U.S. officials said that they are moving cautiously in order to avoid destabilizing Syria further, and to make sure they know as much as possible about the country’s complex dynamics before getting more involved. [Emphasis added]

Yes, this thing in Syria is just so, darn complex that we have to move slowly because, you know, we wouldn’t want Syria to become even less stable than it is now, what with the tanks in the streets and snipers randomly shooting civilians trying to buy bread.   And, of course, that Bashar Assad is such a “reformer” that we want to make sure he stays in power as long as possible.

And here’s a great line about the Administration’s idea of taking action:

…the administration is now ramping up its policymaking machinery on the issue. After several weeks of having no top-level administration meetings to discuss the Syria crisis, the National Security Council (NSC) has begun an informal, quiet interagency process to create and collect options for aiding the Syrian opposition, two administration officials confirmed to The Cable. [Emphasis added]

I have to hand it to Rogin on that sentence: it is a marvelous description of an Administration steeped in timidity laced with inaction bounded by circumspection and ringed with preliminary precaution.    “[S]everal weeks” of no, real discussions about Syria!?  What were the “top-level” people doing in the months before that when Syrians were demonstrating against Assad and being killed?  I know, I know, it’s a busy world and there’s a lot of golf that needs playing.

But not worry.  We are told that the NSC is on top of it now.   Uh… with “informal” and, um, “quiet” talks to “create and collect options” to do something.   This has to be the biggest exercise in foot dragging ever.   Essentially the Administration does not want to do anything with respect to Syria except, perhaps, give the impression that it is really, really about to get serious about thinking about creating an “interagency” panel of some sort who will exchange memos about  how to study the issue of, perhaps, aiding the Syrian opposition.

The unmistakable impression is that the Administration is not just playing defense here, they are doing everything they can to run out the clock in the hopes that someone else will do something (and if that “something” happens to turn out well, then take full credit for that result and trumpet it as another foreign policy triumph).

Well, at least there seem to be some options on the table:

The options that are under consideration include establishing a humanitarian corridor or safe zone for civilians in Syria along the Turkish border, extending humanitarian aid to the Syrian rebels, providing medical aid to Syrian clinics, engaging more with the external and internal opposition, forming an international contact group, or appointing a special coordinator for working with the Syrian opposition (as was done in Libya), according to the two officials, both of whom are familiar with the discussions but not in attendance at the meetings.

“The interagency is now looking at options for Syria, but it’s still at the preliminary stage,” one official said. “There are many people in the administration that realize the status quo is unsustainable and there is an internal recognition that existing financial sanctions are not going to bring down the Syrian regime in the near future.”

Gosh, it’s great that the U.S. is so focused on providing “humanitarian” help to these people that are being shelled by Assad’s artillery.   They probably do need alot of bandages and stuff.   But somehow it seems strange that Obama was hell-bent to bomb the pants off of Qaddafi for, what was it?  Oh yes, the possibility of a “humanitarian disaster,” but when it comes to Syria, where people are actually dying at the hands of a ruthless dictator in a country that actually has vital importance to the U.S., Obama is playing the coy, young girl.    Yes, when important world events demand immediate action you can count on sweet Miss Barack to spend months writing in his diary and having endless slumber parties before coming to anything like a decision.   This does not earn the U.S. any points in the world, though perhaps it will do something for Barack Obama at this year’s Miss World competition.

But, as it turns out, Mr. Rogin found at least “one official” who was willing to (anonymously) provide an explanation of the Administration’s odd behavior:

“Due to the incredible and far-reaching ramifications of the Syrian problem set, people are being very cautious,” the official said. “The criticism could be we’re not doing enough to change the status quo because we’re leading from behind. But the reason we are being so cautious is because when you look at the possible ramifications, it’s mindboggling.”

A power vacuum in the country, loose weapons of mass destruction, a refugee crisis, and unrest across the region are just a few of the problems that could attend the collapse of the Assad regime, the official said.

“This isn’t Libya. What happens in Libya stays in Libya, but that is not going to happen in Syria. The stakes are higher,” the official said. “Right now, we see the risks of moving too fast as higher than the risks of moving too slow.”

I don’t know, maybe I just have impossibly high standards for civil servants, but, unless this “official” with knowledge of these discussions is the office janitor who happens to be in the room changing EPA-approved CFC lightbulbs, it sounds a bit funny: the Administration is being hyper-cautious because of the “incredible” and “far-reaching ramifications” of taking any action in Syria.   Ooooh.  There are “ramifications.”   And they could be “incredible.”   And “far-reaching.”   [Director’s Note:  Insert here shot of President in fetal position in dark corner, sucking thumb, blankie in other hand].   As the “official” said (with no trace of irony as far as I could tell), “It’s mindboggling.”

And the examples?  A “power vacuum” in Syria?  Got news for you, buddy, Syria under the Butchers of Damascus (Assad I and Assad II) has been plenty frightening.   When the Assads have not been killing and torturing their own people, they have been busy assassinating every pro-Western leader in Lebanon, assisting Iran’s plans to obliterate Israel, hosting and training terrorists for worldwide terror missions and trying to develop their own nukes (until Israel blasted the nuclear reactor to oblivion in 2007).  How much worse are we talking here?

“Loose weapons of mass destruction” ?  Come on, now.  We’re not falling for that one again.   The Left screamed their little heads off that Saddam did not have WMD’s and all the evidence that they were moved to Syria in the year prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq have been ridiculed by the Left.   Surely Obama is not going to try to tell us that Syria has WMD’s, is he?  That just opens up too many cans of worms, even for a guy who owns the Leftist Media in this country.

And a “refugee crisis, and unrest across the region” ?  The entire Middle East is a refugee crisis and non-stop unrest.   Nothing the U.S. could do in Syria is going to change these eternal features.   This is truly one of those situations where things have to get better because they cannot get any worse.

I could go on and on.  Literally.   This valuable piece by Josh Rogin is comedy gold and you should read the entire thing.   Yes, those chortles will be mixed with tears of frustration at such an inept Administration, but these days we have to find the silver lining anywhere we can.

Here are just a few more highlights:

“This isn’t Libya. What happens in Libya stays in Libya, but that is not going to happen in Syria. The stakes are higher,” the official said. “Right now, we see the risks of moving too fast as higher than the risks of moving too slow.”   [Really?  Syria is more important than Libya?  Now there’s a good reason to go even slower! And you have to love the tie-in with Las Vegas.]

***

The option of establishing a humanitarian corridor is seen as extremely unlikely because it would require establishing a no-fly zone over parts of Syria, which would likely involve large-scale attacks on the Syrian air defense and military command-and-control systems.  [Yes, attacks against the air defenses and command-and-control should only be attempted against third-rate loons like Qaddafi where our vital interests are at stake.]

***

Rhetorically, the administration has been active in calling for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step aside and protecting the rights of Syrian protesters, despite the lack of clear policy to achieve that result. “The United States continues to believe that the only way to bring about the change that the Syrian people deserve is for Bashar al-Assad to leave power,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Dec. 21.  [I am told that Jay Carney scored rather well on the Journalism 101 test for stating the obvious.  Still, it’s good that Obama sees the problem even if he has no clue what to do about it.]

As the comedy writers are fond of saying about real life, “You just can’t make this stuff up.”   But it took Obama to bring us the perfect marriage of U.S. Foreign Policy and Comedy Central.   And with CNN World, you can get this farce 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  Expect things to get much funnier in 2012.

Normally I would not bother to read an article with “Hungary” in the headline, but any country that has a “widening rift” with the uber-Left European Union is worth a look.   My curiosity was rewarded.

Although I do not pretend to know anything about the internal politics of Hungary or the particular policies being implemented there, I am not offering this post as a substantive critique of policies but, rather, as an example of how the Left condemns the very practices that the Left uses to agglomerate power and demonizes a conservative government.

First, the headline itself is misleading:  “Hungary poised to widen rift with the west.”  This title gives the impression that Hungary must be embarking on some kind of anti-Western program of fascism or authoritarianism that threatens its relationship with the West.  When you read the article, however, it is clear that the conflict is entirely with the E.U. and the International Monetary Fund (with the typical self-righteous finger-pointing from the Obama Administration).   Furthermore, the policies pursued by Budapest involve such horrible policies as— prepare yourself— a… flat… tax!  Controls on the Hungarian central bank!  Reduction in the overall number of members in parliament together with the redrawing of electoral districts that favor the party in power!  Clearly, in the view of the Left, the dark night of oppression and economic insanity is descending.

Here is the lede:

Hungary is poised to drive another wedge into a rift with the European Union and international lenders when its parliament on Friday passes a controversial law limiting the independence of the country’s central bank.

The law is one of a package being rushed through before the end of the year that is prompting international concern about Hungary’s economic policies and a perceived erosion of democracy in this EU member state.

If you follow the link to the “economic policies” that are causing such concern in the EU and the IMF, you will find that it is a flat tax that the article claims is ruining government revenues.

The article continues to list the sins of the Hungarian government:

Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, wrote last week to Viktor Orban, prime minister, expressing concerns.

As well as the central bank law and a new flat tax rate that have been sharply criticised by the EU and the International Monetary Fund, other measures include reforms that critics warn will subject the judiciary to political interference and electoral changes that opponents say would entrench Mr Orban’s power for years to come.

“A number of constituencies have been reduced and redrawn in a way that, based on past voting patterns, clearly favours [Mr Orban’s centre-right party] Fidesz in future elections,” said Robert Laszlo, election specialist at Political Capital, a Budapest think-tank. Fidesz already enjoys a two-thirds majority in parliament.

“Mr Orban is trying to build up a new system completely in line with his power interests. It will be extremely difficult to change these laws,” said Andras Biro Nagy of Policy Solutions, a Budapest consultancy.

The slew of legislation has provoked modest protests in Budapest, including one last week where Ferenc Gyurcsány, former prime minister, was briefly arrested.

Imagine, a law that makes the judiciary accountable to elected officials.   In the U.S., we have a judiciary that increasingly sees itself as completely unaccountable to the people and the final arbiter of every law, regulation and even personal behaviors of the people.  This was never intended by the U.S. Constitution and it is creating havoc in our society and political system.   Maybe Hungary is on to something.

Notice, too, that the EU, IMF and Hillary Clinton criticize the redrawing of election districts that favor the party in power.   Lord knows that the Democrats in the U.S. would never try anything as sleazy as that.   Here in Maryland, the overwhelmingly Democrat legislature and Democrat governor are putting the finishing touches on new congressional districts that intentionally dilute conservative voters with reliable Democrat voters.  I am not shocked at the practice– it is part of the spoils that go along with elections and demographics, but the posturing of the Left in calling such practices a threat to democracy in Hungary when they practice those very things themselves is disgusting.

It is worth noting that this “slew of legislation” that has the Left up in arms has not resulted in mass riots or social upheaval.  No, the legislation has “provoked modest protests.”   When the Left calls a left-leaning protest “modest” you can be sure that less than 50 people showed up.   Any more than that and the Left trumpets it as “broad-based” or “masses.”

This next example is hilarious:

Mrs Clinton also criticised use of a new media law to prevent broadcasts by Klubradio, a popular talk-radio station that is frequently critical of the government.

Hungary’s media council, which took the decision, said the Klubradio affair had become “a consciously planned, premeditated, sheer political provocation” supported by prominent leftwing and liberal public figures, along with “members of foreign diplomatic corps”.

Take this in.  Hillary Clinton is criticizing a new law in Hungary that would prevent broadcasts by what the Hungarian government called a left-wing, political provocation– essentially subversive broadcasting.    This is the same Hillary Clinton that supported, while in the U.S. Senate, efforts by the left wing of the Democrat Party to try to force the likes of Rush Limbaugh off the air by reinstating the “Fairness Doctrine” in American media laws.

This is always the way it is with the Left whenever they are confronted with a government anywhere that attempts to take a conservative direction.   The flat tax is a dangerous fiscal policy.   Electoral districts that favor conservative candidates is a threat to democracy while gerrymandering for Leftist candidates is perfectly alright.

The article further complains that this “slew of legislation” was rushed through at the last minute before Hungary’s new Constitution takes effect on January 1, 2012.    Hmmmm… does this seem like a familiar tactic?   Obamacare?  Frank-Dodd financial reform?  TARP?  The 2009 Stimulus?   When the Left has a majority they have no qualms about using unprecedented or even extra-constitutional methods to ram through their unpopular laws, but they condemn a center-right government that passes laws prior to the effective date of a new constitution, even though there is no evidence that the people of Hungary did not support these measures (unlike the Stimulus and Obamacare).

Here is the typical way the Left likes to portray those who implement policies that the Left dislikes:

But western countries and international bodies have become concerned over moves by his government seen as removing democratic checks and balances.

“It now seems all too clear that Viktor Orban’s government is determined to take the country in a direction that is far from the core values on which the European Union is built,” said Daniel Cohn-Bendit and other leaders of a Green-liberal bloc in the European parliament in a letter to José Barroso, European Commission president, last week.

That’s it, then: “the core values.”   Expect to hear this from the Left in the 2012 U.S. elections, regardless of the GOP candidate.   The GOP will be trying to implement policies that threaten America’s “core values,” which, translated, means dependency upon Big Government, Big Spending, voter fraud among Democrat constituencies and Government Health Care.   The first step in demonizing an opponent is to question their commitment to “core values,” as you, of course, define them.   Expect to hear from the Left such catcalls as “authoritarian policies” or hints of Nazi sympathies with regard to Viktor Orban.   Classic Saul Alinsky.

As I said before, I do not know whether the actual policies pursued by Hungary are truly good policies or not.  On the surface, control of the central bank, a flat tax and redrawing electoral districts seem to be good policies.   But the fact that the Left (in the form of the EU, IMF and the Obama Administration) has bothered to condemn these policies is strong evidence that Hungary is on the Right track.

If Lanny Breuer isn’t arguing against gun possession outside the home, Obama’s Bureau of Land Management (Department of the Interior) is trying to promulgate new regulations on shooters.

Gun owners who have historically been able to use public lands for target practice would be barred from potentially millions of acres under new rules drafted by the Interior Department, the first major move by the Obama administration to impose limits on firearms.

Officials say the administration is concerned about the potential clash between gun owners and encroaching urban populations who like to use same land for hiking and dog walking.

“It’s not so much a safety issue. It’s a social conflict issue,” said Frank Jenks, a natural resource specialist with Interior’s Bureau of Land Management, which oversees 245 million acres. He adds that urbanites “freak out” when they hear shooting on public lands.

If the draft policy is finally approved, some public access to Bureau lands to hunters would also be limited, potentially reducing areas deer, elk, and bear hunters can use in the West.

So exactly how would such regulations be implemented?

This is the key paragraph foes say could lead to shooters being kicked off public lands:

“When the authorized officer determines that a site or area on BLM-managed lands used on a regular basis for recreational shooting is creating public disturbance, or is creating risk to other persons on public lands; is contributing to the defacement, removal or destruction of natural features, native plants, cultural resources, historic structures or government and/or private property; is facilitating or creating a condition of littering, refuse accumulation and abandoned personal property is violating existing use restrictions, closure and restriction orders, or supplementary rules notices, and reasonable attempts to reduce or eliminate the violations by the BLM have been unsuccessful, the authorized officer will close the affected area to recreational shooting.”

The new regulation may as well say that for any reason under the sun when an employee of the BLM wants to close down lands to shooting, he may do so at his discretion.  This has a potentially huge affect on shooters, and the most remarkable thing is its broad sweep (note that implementation of the regulation doesn’t require demonstrated safety issues), combined with the bypassing of the process for making law – you know, the Congress.  Congress has been left out because, you know, the Obama administration knows better than to have to wait on something silly like the law-making process.

There has been quite a bit of talk lately about whether Israel is contemplating an attack against Iran’s nuclear facilities.   One article on the subject is found at Commentary Magazine’s online blog, “Contentions.”

Jonathan Tobin does a very good job of looking at the big picture and discussing the geopolitical aspects of an attack by Israel against Iran’s nuclear facilities, but the long odds facing such an operation by Israel seem simply prohibitive.

But what if all of the public debate about an Israeli strike against Iran was not just conjecture or the case of Israeli politicians leaking information to the press, but, rather, an intentional gambit by Israel to push President Obama to take stiffer action against Iran than the ineffective sanctions route?  What if the Israelis know something about Obama that tells them that not only is Obama receptive to attacking Iran but he is looking for an excuse to do so?   Could this President be just crazy enough to try to pull off a missile and air strike against Iran’s nuclear program?   Ordinarily the idea is absurd.   But these are not ordinary times.   Obama’s presidency is failing fast and he is thrashing around like a drowning man.

Fasten your seatbelts for a little rampant speculation and see if there isn’t a grain of sense in all of this.

First, let’s get inside the Obama White House.   Imagine the increasing frenzy.   Obama has tried everything to resurrect his sinking popularity but nothing has worked so far.   Killing Bin Laden?  A temporary bounce that has long since fizzled.  Killing Qaddafi?  Nothing doing.   Yanking the troops out of Iraq post haste?  No one seems to care.   Another $500 billion, Son of Stimulus spending spree packaged as a “Jobs Bill” is going nowhere fast.  The public has figured out that Obama does not spend our tax dollars but, rather, throws most of it out the window of Air Force One while the rest goes to his political cronies like unions and Democrat campaigns.

He needs something big.  Really big.  Domestic policy is not an option because the Republicans have a choke hold on the House of Representatives for the remainder of his term.

Could Iran be the ticket?

As crazy as it sounds, there are a number of factors that might line up in Obama’s mind and convince him to green light an attack.

For one, an attack against Iranian nuclear facilities is exactly the kind of wargaming that Obama enjoys the most:  remote, relatively low-risk, no ground troops involved, short duration, odds stacked highly in our favor.   Missiles, drones, stealth bombers, stealth fighters.  Maybe some Special Ops going in to blow up a thing or two.   No long-term commitment and largely out of his hands once the decision is made to proceed.

Another factor Obama may find attractive in a strike against Iran is the revenge factor.  More than one commentator has observed that Obama does not like to be snubbed or insulted.   He has extraordinarily thin skin.   And the Iranians have insulted and maligned him like no other on the international stage.   This must be especially galling to Obama given the way he has scraped and bowed to the Iranian Regime, offered the so-called “open hand,” and the only response has been the back of their hand across Obama’s face.  Pure speculation here, but it must eat at his sizable ego to think of Ahmadinnerjacket and the mullahs laughing at him.   He must want to get even very badly.   So there is ample motivation for him.

Still another argument in favor of striking Iran would be its effect upon Israel.   Whether it is all the anti-Semitic rants he absorbed for 20 years in Jeremiah Wright’s Chicago church or the Leftist obsession for the “plight of Palestinians,” President Obama seems to harbor a deep dislike for the Jewish State and, perhaps especially, for Prime Minister Netanyahu.  There is no doubt that Israeli officials have been making it clear to the Administration that they will act if Obama does not.   The thought that Netanyahu might show himself to be a decisive leader while Obama dithers is unbearable to The One.   This may be the very game that Netanyahu is playing on Obama right now.   And Obama may that he will be in a strong position to demand huge concessions from Netanyahu if Obama takes out Iran’s nukes, enough to seal the deal on a peace plan that could net Obama a second Nobel prize and the international acclaim he constantly craves.

But perhaps the most appealing aspect must be the political angle and its effect on his chances of re-election.  Americans have a hard time resisting a war-time President.  As long as hostilities do not go one for too long and they are seen as relatively successful (and the Leftist Media will make sure that no one knows whether it has been successful until long after the 2012 Elections), it is highly likely that his approval ratings will take a large jump.    It will also make Republican arguments that Obama is incompetent much harder to sell.

Will it be enough to drown out the terrible economy and lousy job market and skyrocketing deficits and rising prices?   Maybe not.  But that only makes it all the more imperative for him to try something as mad and desperate as this.   Add to this the calculus of the slowly widening scandals that threaten to engulf this Administration.   So far the Leftist Media has been able to hold back the floods on Solyndra (where it appears that more than half a billion dollars were railroaded to a failing company headed by a close ally and financial contributor of Obama) and the “Fast and Furious”  (where we are nowhere close to getting the truth and extent of the malfeasance).   If it appears that either or both of these scandals will take off in the public’s consciousness, Obama will be extremely tempted to pull a Bill Clinton-Lewinsky-Missile Strike distraction operation.    Attacking Iran with stand-off weapons would be the ultimate distraction that would assure zero coverage of either of these political scandals.

Do I really think that President Obama would launch a surprise strike on Iran?   No, not really.

But sometimes, when a politician lacking in scruples and dedicated to the idea that nothing is off limits in the quest for continued power is cornered, even the unthinkable may just be possible.   In this light, the withdrawal of all U.S. forces in Iraq next month actually eliminates one of the easiest targets for the Iranians to go after as a counter-strike.   Coincidence?  Almost certainly.  But convenient nonetheless.

And consider this article in The Guardian that discusses the preparations that Great Britain is making to support a U.S. attack on Iran:

Britain’s armed forces are stepping up their contingency planning for potential military action against Iran amid mounting concern about Tehran’s nuclear enrichment programme, the Guardian has learned.

The Ministry of Defence believes the US may decide to fast-forward plans for targeted missile strikes at some key Iranian facilities. British officials say that if Washington presses ahead it will seek, and receive, UK military help for any mission, despite some deep reservations within the coalition government.

In anticipation of a potential attack, British military planners are examining where best to deploy Royal Navy ships and submarines equipped with Tomahawk cruise missiles over the coming months as part of what would be an air and sea campaign.

They also believe the US would ask permission to launch attacks from Diego Garcia, the British Indian ocean territory, which the Americans have used previously for conflicts in the Middle East.

The Guardian has spoken to a number of Whitehall and defence officials over recent weeks who said Iran was once again becoming the focus of diplomatic concern after the revolution in Libya.

They made clear that Barack Obama, has no wish to embark on a new and provocative military venture before next November’s presidential election.

But they warned the calculations could change because of mounting anxiety over intelligence gathered by western agencies, and the more belligerent posture that Iran appears to have been taking.

Hawks in the US are likely to seize on next week’s report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is expected to provide fresh evidence of a possible nuclear weapons programme in Iran.

The Guardian has been told that the IAEA’s bulletin could be “a game changer” which will provide unprecedented details of the research and experiments being undertaken by the regime.

***

Another Whitehall official, with knowledge of Britain’s military planning, said that within the next 12 months Iran may have hidden all the material it needs to continue a covert weapons programme inside fortified bunkers. He said this had necessitated the UK’s planning being taken to a new level.

“Beyond [12 months], we couldn’t be sure our missiles could reach them,” the source said. “So the window is closing, and the UK needs to do some sensible forward planning. The US could do this on their own but they won’t.

“So we need to anticipate being asked to contribute. We had thought this would wait until after the US election next year, but now we are not so sure.

“President Obama has a big decision to make in the coming months because he won’t want to do anything just before an election.”

Another source added there was “no acceleration towards military action by the US, but that could change”. Next spring could be a key decision-making period, the source said. The MoD has a specific team considering the military options against Iran.

Since when do the British start making contingency plans to support a U.S. attack on Iran?   Very suspicious.  No doubt that President Obama will try to avoid anything so drastic as an attack on Iran for as long as possible, but this article indicates that the decision may well come to a head in the next several months.   As I say, it is probably crazy talk, but if the economy continues to stagnate, unemployment remains high, a scandal starts to gain traction and Obama’s approval numbers stay in the tank, do not be shocked if we start to hear increasingly tough language out of the Administration’s mouthpieces as a prelude.

As the saying goes, stay tuned.

AFP:

A top US Justice Department official told lawmakers Tuesday that better controls are needed to help stem the flow of weapons from the United States into Mexico, where they may end up in the hands of drug cartels.

“It is clear that we need more tools to get those people who are buying the guns and illegally transporting them to Mexico,” Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer told a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing. “We need to stop the flow.”

According to Justice Department figures, in the past five years 94,000 weapons have been recovered from Mexican drug cartels, of which 64,000 — 70 percent — come from the United States.

Yet currently the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), a division of the Justice Department, is not permitted to “receive reports about multiple sales of long guns, of any kind of semiautomatic weapon or the like,” Breuer said.

“Very few hunters in the United States or sports people and law-abiding people really need to have semiautomatic weapons or long guns,” he said.

Breuer said that if US officials were notified then they could keep track of the powerful weapons.

This is a remarkable report on the testimony before Congress for several reasons.  First, even now after all of the information is out on the scandal that Fast and Furious has become, Breuer is still pretending that the handover of thousands of weapons to the drug cartels with absolutely no ability whatsoever to track them any further than the border was all about trying to stop the flow of weapons to the drug cartels.  It’s absurd on its face.

Next, Breuer still insists on perpetuating the 90% myth (although it has now morphed into the 70% myth in an apparent attempt to make it more believable).  Finally, Breuer steps on his own testimony by reintroducing the anti-firearms argument to the calculus.  If he was smart he would have avoided this as a potential for contaminating his (and the Justice Department’s) motives.  But like a dog returns to its own vomit he must continue his assault on the Second Amendment.  It’s a canard, this idea that so-called assault weapons are somehow responsible for mass shootings in the U.S.  Based on information I compiled when examining Heller II and assault weapons, long guns and assault rifles were no more likely to be used in shootings than handguns or shotguns.  Moreover, the number of mass shootings is so low as to be statistically insignificant.  They just don’t happen that often in America regardless of what the main stream media portrays.

But Lanny Breuer wants everyone to shoot a bolt action rifle, apparently, or better yet, nothing at all (Would Breuer allow us to use single action revolvers?).  Law abiding citizens just don’t need such a thing, according to him.  Not for hunting feral hogs in Texas or Georgia, not for home defense, not for sporting (such as 3-gun or other shooting competitions like IDPA), not for any reason at all.  And thus has Breuer told us what he and the Justice Department (and by extension, the White House) really thinks is important in this whole affair.  Citizens don’t need firearms.

Got it.  Hopefully the American public will file that one away for the next election cycle.

UPDATE: Cross posted at reddit/r/guns.

UPDATE #2: Thanks to Dave Hardy for the attention.

UPDATE #3: Thanks to Say Uncle for the attention.

On October 16th, The New York Times reported an astonishing account of repeated shelling of U.S. and Afghan forces from across the Pakistani border that has been near-continuous since  May, 2011.

FORWARD OPERATING BASE SHARANA, Afghanistan — American and Afghan soldiers near the border with Pakistan have faced a sharply increased volume of rocket fire from Pakistani territory in the past six months, putting them at greater risk even as worries over the disintegrating relationship between the United States and Pakistan constrain how they can strike back.

Ground-to-ground rockets fired within Pakistan have landed on or near American military outposts in one Afghan border province at least 55 times since May, according to interviews with multiple American officers and data released in the past week. Last year, during the same period, there were two such attacks.

May is also when members of a Navy Seals team killed Osama bin Laden in the house where he lived near a Pakistani military academy, plunging American-Pakistani relations to a new low. Since then, the escalation in cross-border barrages has fueled frustration among officers and anger among soldiers at front-line positions who suspect, but cannot prove, a Pakistani government role.

The government’s relations with the United States frayed further after senior American officials publicly accused Pakistan of harboring and helping guerrillas and terrorists. Last month, Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, called the insurgents who attacked the American Embassy in the Afghan capital “a veritable arm” of the ISI, Pakistan’s military intelligence service.

Pakistani officials have repeatedly denied aiding fighters for the Taliban and the Haqqani militant network, who operate on both sides of the border. They insist they try to prevent cross-border incursions or violence.

Funny coincidence.   U.S. bases get shelled from Pakistan beginning the same month that U.S. special forces entered Pakistan and killed Osama Bin Laden.   OK, well, I suppose that one could argue that this is a not-altogether-unexpected consequence of sticking a steel-toed boot right up the backside of Pakistan and laughing as we dump Bin Laden into the ocean for fish food.   (All properly according to Islamic hoyle, of course).  So we should not be surprised.

The truly troubling part about this is that there is no apparent Administration response or any, apparent guidance from the chain of command for these units who must sit there and take it.

When taking fire from Afghanistan, they said, they return fire with barrages of high-explosive and white phosphorus artillery rounds. (The burning effects of white phosphorus, they said, can detonate rockets waiting on launchers; for this reason, white phosphorus falls within rules guiding the soldiers’ use of force.)

When receiving fire from Pakistan, they said, they do not return fire with white phosphorus and fire far fewer high-explosive rounds. Attack helicopters and aircraft are also less likely to fire ordnance the closer the firing position is to the border, they said, even if it is on the Afghan side.

Several soldiers complained of what they called the “politics” limiting their choices. “We’re just sitting out here taking fire,” one soldier said. “If they want us to do our jobs, let us do our jobs.”

Senior officers described a tactical and strategic puzzle.

On one hand, soldiers said a principle of any modern military defense is that they patrol to and beyond the range of weapons systems that can menace them, and, in this case, at least to the border of the nation that the United States, in essence, has underwritten. On the other, heavy return fire against the firing positions inside Afghanistan has not prevented the attacks from continuing, so it is not clear that more fire into Pakistan would stop the cross-border firing, either.

And Colonel Bohnemann noted a complicated history. Afghan units have patrolled to the border, he said, and then been fired on by Pakistani military units who claimed they mistook the Afghans for insurgents. That fighting included Pakistani artillery fire.

The risk of having an American patrol face similar fire has been reasonable grounds for caution when planning sweeps near the border, and when returning fire over it, he said.

“Am I frustrated?” he asked. “Yes. Would I like to fire more? Yes. But do I want to be sure not to escalate out of frustration? Absolutely.”

(Emphasis added)

This is simply indefensible.  As I have said on many occasions, our Afghan strategy is really no strategy at all but a charade for political purposes:  the appearance of force and toughness but lacking in the kind of metrics necessary for victory (higher force levels, robust rules of engagement, proper focus on appropriate lines of effort, etc…).   This Administration has played politics with Afghanistan since Day One and one of the obvious results is that we have Americans sitting on the Pak border forced to absorb indirect fire from Pakistan without any, meaningful way of defending themselves.

Disgraceful.

The Solicitor General, along with Lanny Breuer, has responded to the Petition for Writ of Certiorari before the Supreme Court by Sean Masciandaro’s attorney, Antigone Peyton, a case which I have discussed here and here.

I see a number of serious weaknesses and logical blunders in the brief that I intend to exploit in a followup analysis article.

In the mean time, if you wish, you may weigh in yourself in the comments with what you perceive to be the problems with the brief.  The Solicitor General’s brief may be found here.

From CBS News:

There’s a new twist in the government’s “gunwalking” scandal involving an even more dangerous weapon: grenades.

CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, who has reported on this story from the beginning, said on “The Early Show” that the investigation into the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF)’s so-called “Fast and Furious” operation branches out to a case involving grenades. Sources tell her a suspect was left to traffic and manufacture them for Mexican drug cartels.

Police say Jean Baptiste Kingery, a U.S. citizen, was a veritable grenade machine. He’s accused of smuggling parts for as many as 2,000 grenades into Mexico for killer drug cartels — sometimes under the direct watch of U.S. law enforcement.

Law enforcement sources say Kingery could have been prosecuted in the U.S. twice for violating export control laws, but that, each time, prosecutors in Arizona refused to make a case.

Grenades are weapons-of-choice for the cartels. An attack on Aug. 25 in a Monterrey, Mexico casino killed 53 people.

Sources tell CBS News that, in January 2010, ATF had Kingery under surveillance after he bought about 50 grenade bodies and headed to Mexico. But they say prosecutors wouldn’t agree to make a case. So, as ATF agents looked on, Kingery and the grenade parts crossed the border — and simply disappeared.

Six months later, Kingery allegedly got caught leaving the U.S. for Mexico with 114 disassembled grenades in a tire. One ATF agent told investigators he literally begged prosecutors to keep Kingery in custody this time, fearing he was supplying narco-terrorists, but was again ordered to let Kingery go.

The prosecutors — already the target of controversy for overseeing “Fast and Furious,” wouldn’t comment on the grenades case. U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke recently resigned and his assistant, Emory Hurley, has been transferred. Sources say Hurley is the one who let Kingery go, saying grenade parts are “novelty items” and the case “lacked jury appeal.”

Attkisson added on “The Early Show” that, in August, Mexican authorities raided Kingery’s stash house and factory, finding materials for 1,000 grenades. He was charged with trafficking and allegedly admitted not only to making grenades, but also to teaching cartels how to make them, as well as helping cartel members convert semi-automatic rifles to fully-automatic. As one source put it: There’s no telling how much damage Kingery did in the year-and-a-half since he was first let go. The Justice Department inspector general is now investigating this, along with “Fast and Furious.”

 Sharyl Attkisson has indeed been on this story from the beginning, as have the folks at Sipsey Street Irregulars and David Codrea with Examiner.  This isn’t the first mention of explosive ordnance in the context of Fast and Furious, but the magnitude of the scandal in this report is important.

It’s also important to note that, unlike the characterizations in the MSM (other than CBS) and even sometimes at one of my favorite hangouts (reddit guns), this scandal has nothing whatsoever to do with incompetence or negligence.  Even the term malfeasance isn’t quite appropriate.  All of these terms imply that the ATF was simply too stupid to pull off a sting that was ill-conceived from the beginning and should never have been tried.  Folks at the ATF aren’t stupid.  The real story, as so aptly pointout out by Bob Owens, is that the ATF knew that they could never track these weapons across the border, as they have no jurisdiction in Mexico, no intelligence, no ability to follow the firearms themselves, and no confidence in the ability of the Mexican authorities to do any of this either.

This operation wasn’t an instance of stolid neglect or incompetence.  What we’re witnessing isn’t a bug in the operation.  It is a feature.  And now we see that one aspect includes knowingly allowing the trafficking of explosive ordnance.  It isn’t just the coverup that is the problem here.  This is clearly a violation of Arms Export Control Act, and many other statutes.

The Atlantic:

Outside the U.S. government, President Obama’s order to kill American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki without due process has proved controversial, with experts in law and war reaching different conclusions. Inside the Obama Administration, however, disagreement was apparently absent, or so say anonymous sources quoted by the Washington Post. “The Justice Department wrote a secret memorandum authorizing the lethal targeting of Anwar al-Aulaqi, the American-born radical cleric who was killed by a U.S. drone strike Friday, according to administration officials,” the newspaper reported. “The document was produced following a review of the legal issues raised by striking a U.S. citizen and involved senior lawyers from across the administration. There was no dissent about the legality of killing Aulaqi, the officials said.”

Isn’t that interesting? Months ago, the Obama Administration revealed that it would target al-Awlaki. It even managed to wriggle out of a lawsuit filed by his father to prevent the assassination. But the actual legal reasoning the Department of Justice used to authorize the strike? It’s secret. Classified. Information that the public isn’t permitted to read, mull over, or challenge.

Why? What justification can there be for President Obama and his lawyers to keep secret what they’re asserting is a matter of sound law? This isn’t a military secret. It isn’t an instance of protecting CIA field assets, or shielding a domestic vulnerability to terrorism from public view. This is an analysis of the power that the Constitution and Congress’ post September 11 authorization of military force gives the executive branch. This is a president exploiting official secrecy so that he can claim legal justification for his actions without having to expose his specific reasoning to scrutiny. As the Post put it, “The administration officials refused to disclose the exact legal analysis used to authorize targeting Aulaqi, or how they considered any Fifth Amendment right to due process.”

Reuters:

American militants like Anwar al-Awlaki are placed on a kill or capture list by a secretive panel of senior government officials, which then informs the president of its decisions, according to officials.

There is no public record of the operations or decisions of the panel, which is a subset of the White House’s National Security Council, several current and former officials said. Neither is there any law establishing its existence or setting out the rules by which it is supposed to operate.

Not too long ago: