From YouTube, and reported @AJELive #Bahrain, police shooting in Sitra this morning: what looks to be a handful of militia in a rough part of town, with graffiti on the walls, few cars, certainly not uniformed police authority, moving backward from unseen shouting. Two or more shots ring out, unclear from where, and then one of the militia fires a round. Spoke Pat Lang and Larry Johnson, Tuesday 15, who tell me that Riyadh has broken off communication with Washington re Bahrain. David Sanger, NYT, tells me that the first time the White House knew of the Saudi troops rolling over the causeway to Bahrain was when it saw it on the news. Pat Lang says this is a major turn in the road, an unprecedented breakdown. Pat Lang and Larry Johnson and I speculated whom the Saudis will task for military cover in the Gulf if they are shedding the US. China is the guess. The Saudis have quit the Obama administration as an ally. The deterioration started with the Mubarak fiasco of late January and now continues through the Q fiasco of March. The Bahrain event, the imminent brutality, the distrust and disdain by Riyadh for Washington, all signs point to bloodymindedness in the Gulf. There is a proxy war between Riyadh and Tehran, and the US is out of the fight.
Wednesday Morning 16
Am reporting now that the Bahrain riot police backed up by tanks and the Saudi troops are moving now on the protesters camped out in the open in Manama, using tear gas and brute force. Widely reported that it is in fact a more-damaging nerve gas.
Seriously. If you had this administration for an "ally," would you tell them jack about what you were going to do, especially if you had locked and loaded on your neighbor's Shia population?
Next thing the Obama people would do would be to throw you under the bus and appeal for a political solution including a constitutional government, protected rights for all, even the IRGC spies, and more "sharing the wealth."
Conservative media is awash this morning - all asking the same question, “Where in the world is Barack Hussein Obama?” It’s as if they all received the same memo overnight; sent out by the Koch brothers, no doubt. And indeed, the question is quite valid. It seems that the Saudis have already decided that their partner in the West is and has been MIA for far too long; that it’s high time they begin taking things into their own hands. Israel is rapidly coming to the same conclusion. Turkey, Brazil and others have already fled; while still others are scrambling to find new, more reliable partners. Russia and China see untold new opportunities.
The only ones stuck in the pretense of American leadership is us. Our hands appear to be tied by convention. It’s not that we’re not aware. In fact, it becomes clearer by the day; that we’ve have jettisoned our rudder, our engines and our sails; that we are now drifting and (perhaps) worse: being blown about aimlessly by outside currents and upheaval. And that’s the best case scenario (not yet time to throw the horses overboard). The worst being, that it’s deliberate and done from the inside with a brick on the gas.
This now should become critical to our calculations. If our leadership is indeed just taking a hands-off approach, then we might just eke out another year and a half. Even a clock left unwound is right at least twice a day. If, on the other hand, it’s being done deliberately, then all bets are off. We’re practically guaranteed never to catch a break. By 2012, we’ll have fallen so far; it’ll be moot to even have elections.
While there are now a few new faces in Congress who are raising concerns; at the same time, they’re already throwing up their hands. They find the institution has been eviscerated and reduced to the level of straw man. Our Republican leadership seems quite content to assume this role and appears eager to stand by and watch. The strategy, as far as I can make out, appears to center on handing the administration enough rope.
It won’t work. By the time 2012 rolls around, there just might not be much of anything left to tie up in pretty pink ribbons.
http://peterkoelliker.blogspot.com/
http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/
We must not forget that Bahrain is the home of our 5th Fleet. If fighting should break out in earnest, can we expect the Fleet to be more than just ornamental?
The 3 AM phone has been ringing off the hook.
Luckily, the answering machine says "Present, please leave a message".
vsk
On a slightly different track, I would urge you all to read Caroline Glick's column in today’s Jerusalem Post entitled, "Our World: Three Jewish Children". As a reading of this column were not horrific enough, I suggest a little exercise: Substitute the word "America", "Republicans", "conservatives", or "tea parties" every time you see the word "Jews" and you'll have a fair indication of what's happening in our own country today.
We are not yet at the point where hatred has been stoked up to combustible levels; we still harbor hope that our political process can contain outright violence. But realize we find ourselves only a few steps away from the abyss in which all niceties fall apart. I would argue that if John McCain were president, we would already have crossed that threshold; that the election of Barack Hussein Obama merely gave us some time to reconsider and turn away from a path that was mapped out under Bush.
http://peterkoelliker.blogspot.com/ (see above mentioned article here)
http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/
One of Saul Alinsky's rules for radicals that Barack Obama has totally and repeatedly ignored is that the Community Organizer should never get himself elected to public office. The CO should be the ultimate background manipulator, setting up community groups, handpicking the leadership, then leaving it to them to do the heavy lifting to follow. Any more official involvement with the group would be too much like work, for Saul Alinsky was a classic leftist egghead who regarded permanent, regular employment of any kind with horror. Moreover, the CO needed to be free to skip town when things didn't work out as planned and/or to "organize" a new bunch of dupes and tools somewhere else while living leech-like off grants and other donations from rich liberals, non-profits, unions, the local Catholic diocese and other churches, etc.
Whatever else Obama may or may not be, he is no background figure; his self-image, overweening pride, and glibness will not permit that. Unlike John the Baptist, Obama must always increase, never decrease (John 3:30); it is he himself who is The Messiah after all. So The Bamster transformed himself from CO to standard-bearer and got himself elected to the Illinois state legislature and then the US Senate with brass-knuckle campaign efficiency.
However, poor Barry quickly found out that his mentor Alinsky had been quite right -- being an elected legislator, rather than either a CO or a campaigner or a left-wing academic, really was too much like real work! Issues had to be studied, bills read, all a bunch of tedious minutiae for which the great visionary Obama had neither time nor respect. Even worse, The Bamster found himself under constant pressure to publicly take positions for-or-against on all those bothersome actual issues, thus to provide moments of clarity that were at best irrelevant or at worst harmful to his personal transformative "social justice" agenda. In other words, Barry found himself caught in the politician's dilemma, expressed by Cardinal Newman as being trapped "between the Scylla of 'yes' and the Charybdis of 'no.'" Yet, being a towering world genius, young Barry quickly found the solution -- he simply voted "present" 126 times in the Illinois legislature, and then stayed away from the US Senate as much as possible, the better to remain in permanent campaign mode, this time for President.
Having won the WH, Obama soon received another rude awakening. The US Presidency is the most terriblly demanding "real job" on the planet! Moreover, being an executive position -- the Chief Executive, in fact -- voting "present" is not an option; Scylla and Charybdis are ever present companions. So on the domestic side The Bamster tries to outsource stuff to Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid as he did with ObamaCare while building his network of czars who, like the community-group dupes and tools he left back in Chicago, are taking on the actual policy and implementation heavy lifting. On the foreign policy side, it was even easier, or so it seemed. POTUS would simply DO NOTHING, dithering and, like the typical leftist academic, studying and discussing every conceivable option except making an actual decision. Such paralysis-by-analysis is intended to ensure poor overworked Obama that he will not have to exert himself much more than the leaders of the unexceptional Third World states that are his true inspiration while jettisoning America's superpower leadership position in the world, which was one of his main "transformative" goals in the first place.
Of course, bumps have arisen even along that royal road to purposeful irresponsibility and historical irrelevance. First, there are those pain-in-the-ass traditional allies, especially such Obama non-faves as Britain and Israel, who still want in the one case a "special relationship" with America and in the other their own national survival with American support. How rude! How boring! Then there's all that troublesome nonsense about oil supplies and energy and stuff when our real destination is a "de-developed" USA where such concerns will be irrelevant or surpressed. Even worse, there's that loud and pesky alternative media always demanding decisions and explanations and even that "transparency" Obama actually promised during the 2008 campaign. What a freakin' nerve! It's all too exhausting for poor Barry; being the US President really is the hardest "real job" imaginable! And now the Middle East blows up and Japan gets quaked, tsunamied, and possibly Chernobyled, and the CO-in-Chief's workload actually increases by the day . . . No wonder poor POTUS whines that he wishes that he were president of China instead, although President of Andorra might better suit his foreign policy style. Anyway, boo-freakin-hoo!
However, all is not lost -- the ever-resourceful POTUS has developed a brilliant solution. No longer able to simply vote "present" and let it go at that as in the good old days, Obama instead seeks solace and escape in the perks of the Presidency which he is convinced he so richly deserves ("God has given us the papacy, now let us enjoy it!" -- Pope Innocent X, 1510). Although not all of those presidential perks quite meet Barry and Michelle's high standards -- notably Camp David; the country, ugh! -- there's enough of them to cushion the impact of, or better yet substitute for, real work. So, while Japan lurches through a natural and perhaps nuclear uber-catastrophe, the Middle East explodes, the reeling US economy gasps for investment rather than more "stimulus," food and energy prices skyrocket, etc., Obama devotes himself to a private concert from Stevie Wonder, the tomfoolery of the Gridiron Dinner, his personal NCAA March Madness bracketology, and golf, golf, golf . . .
In short, having voted "present" so often as Legislator Obama, President Obama now chooses to vote "absent," but for the very same reason -- to do otherwise would be, frankly, too damn much work. Which is to say that to the lengthy list of Barack Obama attributes -- brilliant, cool, handsome, articulate, unprecedented, etc. -- we must add yet another: plain LAZY! This addition should not surprise us. Anyone as hostile to free enterprise and the capitalist work ethic as The Bamster will inevitably apply his swaying-palms, Third World sensibilities to his own position (see "Dreams from My Father."). Nor will Obama see any reason why he should bust his hump to preserve either the American free enterprise system or her free world leadership, especially since he wants to "transform" those once-happy realities into something quite different -- Third World socialism and UN-dependent foreign policy, in which case no one in America, from the President on down, will ever have to work hard again for any reason whatsoever.
President Obama will never answer the 3 AM phone call -- he doesn't even answer it at 3 PM, as he is still on the golf course.
Looking to Obama for a clear sensible response to world disasters and uprisings is folly.
He is not as smart or engaged as a lazy no-goodnick eggheaded Alinsky
He's a silver spoon fed Social Democrat Robot in re-election mode. The landslide is moving against him now despite what the noodle kneed snivelers on Morning Joe say.
The college hoops brackets scandal is upsetting to me. I feel like we have been swindled and that our guard is down. God forbid something terrible happens here, on top of the economic havoc we are facing because of this nincompoops policies towards energy and finance, and his non policies when it comes to true leadership.
Lou mentioned the 19th century Wisconsin public chasing down and catching errant legislators and dragging them into sessions for a vote, well we ought to do the same with Obama. This man-child needs to be forced by the public into voting for something besides "Present" as president. It is truly shameful and I've never seen anything like it.
Bill Clinton is looking better than ever right now, he's a dream come true compared to the 2011 Democrat. Hurts me to say it.
I'm a conservative who believe we ought to rally around the likes of Evan Bayh, Joe Manchin, as well as our Conservative tea party inspired politicians for the good of the country and the health of a deteriorating two party system.
So much for globalism: At today’s White House press conference Jay Carney was asked if it was appropriate for the president and his family to leave for a Rio de Janeiro vacation this weekend. He replied - without questioning the premise of a ‘vacation’ - that the president understood that what was happening in Japan amounted to a major disaster; adding, however, that it is not our problem, but Japan’s.
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On the Lou Dobbs radio program today, Lou raised the question (ever so delicately) whether or not president Obama had not somehow made a deal with Tehran through back channels to have events in the Middle East turn out the way they are (favoring Iran). His guest, Walid Phares, responded carefully but did let it slip that the remaining old-guard rulers in the region have already reached a consensus as to exactly this point.
http://peterkoelliker.blogspot.com/
http://pkoelliker.blogspot.com/
18th century and it wasn't Wisconsin, but close enough for government work.
What was up with Larry Kudlow's audio last night? It sounded like Grandpa Munster calling up from the basement.
The WABC website notes that Boxer and Feinstein have written a letter to the NRC asking them to inspect the faults around Diablo Canyon and San Onofre. I can tell you that with respect to San Onofre, it's a complete waste of time. There is a fault under San Onofre, and it has been "extinct" for several hundred thousand years, if memory serves. What a waste of taxpayer money, calling for an inspection without bothering to Google first and make sure there hasn't already been one done. OTOH, they probably know there's no danger but want to be perceived as doing something for their constituents.
Also, unlike Fukushima, San Onofre is RIGHT on the ocean. I mean, a scientist standing on the top of one of the San Onofre domes could probably take a leak right in the ocean if the wind was out of the west. All they have to do in the case of San Onofre is open a couple of the sea doors and the reaction is over.
This is a perfect example of fear-mongering on the part of politicians, and opportunistic, stupid fear-mongering at that.
BTW I just saw a piece from Reuters that Fukushima #4 is cooling down.
Make that "if the wind was out of the east". Growing up along Lake Michigan, the water is always to the east no matter how long you're in California....
Yeah man my apologies for fast reading....
Point is somebody still needs to grab Carnival-Obama by the lapel or the ears, sit him down and ask him to vote up or down on the important work we need done
"On the Lou Dobbs radio program today, Lou raised the question (ever so delicately) whether or not president Obama had not somehow made a deal with Tehran through back channels to have events in the Middle East turn out the way they are (favoring Iran). His guest, Walid Phares, responded carefully but did let it slip that the remaining old-guard rulers in the region have already reached a consensus as to exactly this point."
All Obama is doing really is continuing the Bush policy with respect to Iran. Unfortunately, JB made it clear 3 years ago that a backroom deal was precisely how Bush, and now Obama, chose to handle the late stages of the Iraq war and the withdrawal of US troops from theater: "Leave us alone, let things settle down long enough for us to get out credibly, and you can have it." I'd really be surprised if Obama would either object or push back on this denoument at this late date. Hell, he doesn't even like fighting the good war in Afghanistan. Balancing Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and Iraq are just too much for a cerebral con law prof for whom thinking is the highest form of action humans can do.
I want to reemphasize that the fault that San Onofre sits on has been motionless for well over 100,000 years. It is considered geologically extinct.
John's earthquake expert (Chris Godomsky) conveniently failed to mention that last night.
Now, the expert may disagree that the fault is completely extinct, but in the interest of full disclosure, he has a responsibility at least to bring up the point.
It's not ON the San Andreas fault - it's well to the west of the San Andreas (which is active).
His comments sound like little more than (somewhat) educated guesswork to me.
He can't even pronounce "nuclear".
John, usually your experts are great, this one wasn't. (IMO)
I'm leaving the 21st century and going back to ancient Rome.
I'm overwhelmed by the fecklessness of the last two administrations, and perverse anti-Americanism of the present administration in particular. The onslaught of bad news, largely created by bad policy choices amounting to abandonment of stewardship, is staggering. I've become a subscriber to Ancient Warfare http://www.ancient-warfare.com/cms/ and will return to the present when things settle down and I can be a little more hopeful.