Photo, above: The Battle of Chaldiran (Persian: چالدران‎ ; Turkish: Çaldıran) occurred on 23 August 1514 and ended with a victory for the Ottoman Empire over the Safavid Empire. As a result, the Ottomans gained immediate control over eastern Anatolia and northern Iraq. The battle, however, was just the beginning of 41 years of destructive war between the two empires that ended only in 1555 with the Treaty of Amasya. While the Ottomans often had the upper hand, the Persians for the most part held their ground. The Ottomans deployed heavy artillery and thousands of Janissaries equipped with gunpowder weapons behind a barrier of carts. The Safavids used cavalry to engage the Ottoman forces. The Safavids attacked the Ottoman wings in an effort to avoid the Ottoman artillery positioned at the center. However, the Ottoman artillery was highly maneuverable and the Safavids suffered disastrous losses. Ismail's greatest legacy was establishing an enduring empire which lasted over 200 years. Even after the fall of Safavids in 1736, their cultural and political influence endured through the era of  Afsharid,  Zand, Qajar, and Pahlavi dynasties into the modern Islamic Republic of Iran, where Shi’a Islam is still the official religion as it was during the Safavids.

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Hour One

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 1, Block A: Jim McTague, Barron's Washington, in re: U.S. Economy Begins to Hit Growth Stride   The U.S. economy grew at a healthy 4.1% annual rate in the third quarter, revised figures showed Friday, boosting hopes that the recovery is shifting into higher gear after years of sluggishness.   GDP by the Numbers   Economists React

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 1, Block B:  Catherine St-Louis, NYT, in re: A Gap in the Affordable Care Act The flawed implementation of pediatric dental care under the new health law could leave millions of young patients without access, experts warn.

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 1, Block C:  Tim Higgins, Bloomberg, in re:  GM: SHIFT CHANGE  On December 10th it was announced that Mary Barra would become the first woman to run General Motors, succeeding Dan Akerson as CEO. She inherits the reins of the world's largest automaker which, under Akerson, has been profitable for 12-straight quarters and looks stronger than it has in decades. To understand how GM has come back from bankruptcy, reduced costs and bolstered brands – and why it made the bold decision to put Barra at the helm Akerson called Barra “a change agent” and “a very astute student” who “learned a lot from the prior generation, good and bad.”   New details about the sales bar GM is setting for Cadillac: sales of 1 million vehicles a year, or five times as many Caddies as it sold last year; how delaying the planned rollout of the Chevy Cruze was a “multi-hundred million-dollar” decision; and as a “Moon Shot” GM is aiming to bring out a next-generation of electric vehicles in 2016 that will be able to go 200 miles on a charge and cost around $30,000.  

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 1, Block D: Reva Bhalla, Stratfor, in re: At the edge of empires lies Kurdistan, the land of the Kurds. The jagged landscape has long been the scene of imperial aggression. For centuries, Turks, Persians, Arabs, Russians and Europeans looked to the mountains to buffer their territorial prizes farther afield, depriving the local mountain dwellers a say in whose throne they would ultimately bow to. The hot temperament of this borderland was evident in an exchange of letters between Ottoman Sultan Selim I and Safavid Shah Ismail I shortly before the rival Turkic and Persian empires came to blows at the 1514 Battle of Chaldiran in northern Kurdistan. The Ottoman sultan, brimming with confidence that  . . .  [more]

The Ottoman sultan: 

Ask of the sun about the dazzle of my reign;

Inquire of Mars about the brilliance of my arms.

Although you wear a Sufi crown, I bear a trenchant sword,

And he who holds the sword will soon possess the crown.

 

Safavid Shah I, also writing in Turkish, poetically retorted:

Should one embrace the bride of worldly rule too close,


His lips will kiss those of the radiant sword . . .

Bitter experience has taught that in this world of trial,

He who falls upon the house of 'Ali always falls.

Hour Two

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 2, Block A:  Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re: The Fantasy of Extreme Weather  . . .  three stories describing new research proving that global warming is going to cause an increase in the number and violence of extreme weather events. Each was published in one of the world’s three most important scientific journals.

The IPCC fixes the facts.  Key quotation: None of this portion of the IPCC assessment is drawn from peer-reviewed material. Nor is it consistent with the documents sent to external reviewers.

Apparently to hide the failure of models to predict the pause in temperature rise during the past fifteen years they tweaked their graphics aggressively, without explanation.  More negative reactions to the IPCC report here. [more]

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 2, Block B:  Daniel Henninger, WSJ, in re:  The Prozac Presidency. For Obama, 21st-century Americans live with a wolf at every door  The talkative Mr. Obama has made this a presidency of speeches, and at times even the most committed political mind can lose focus amid the now-familiar tone. So attention must be paid when the president reveals something out of the ordinary. That would be his recent speech in Washington on income inequality. Income inequality—what it is exactly, its causes and cures—is a worthy subject. But burdened by ObamaCare, Democrats running  . . .   [more]

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 2, Block C:   Gretchen Reynolds, NYT,  What Happens in the Brain After a Concussion  Scientists have found that after a concussion, reactive oxygen molecules flood the brains of mice. The findings for the first time hint at the possibility of treating concussions through the rapid use of antioxidant drugs.   . . . A remarkable recent experiment allowed scientists to see inside the skull and brain of animals that had just experienced a concussion, providing sobering new evidence of how damaging even minor brain impacts can be. While the results, which were published in Nature, are worrisome, they also hint at the possibility of treating concussions and lessening their harm.

Concussions occur when the brain bounces against the skull after someone’s head is bumped or jolted. Such injuries are fairly common in contact sports, like football and hockey, and there is growing concern that repeated concussions might contribute to lingering problems with thinking or memory. This concern was heightened this week by reports that the brain of the late major league baseball player Ryan Freel showed symptoms of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative condition. He reportedly had been hit in the head multiple times during his career. But scientists did not know exactly what . . . [more]

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 2, Block D: Michelle Conlin, Reuters, in re: Analysis: U.S. drilling boom leaves some homeowners in a big hole  When Gary Gless bought his sleek, modernist house in Los Angeles in 2002, he thought he had hit a "gold mine." The world's largest inner-city park - featuring a lush, 18-hole golf course - was about to get built across the street. Gless's balcony was set to overlook the clubhouse and first tee.  [more]

Hour Three

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 3, Block A:  Michael Vlahos, Naval War College, in re: Hagel calls Chinese actions toward USS Cowpens 'irresponsible'
Stars and Stripes ‎- 1 day ago 
During a news conference on Thursday, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel reprimanded China for its aggressive actions toward the USS . . .     How the US Lost the South China Sea Standoff  ;  China Defense Ministry Confirms Naval Confrontation (1 of 2)

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 3, Block B: Michael Vlahos, Naval War College, in re: Christmas Message 1941 - Winston Churchill   Shortly after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941, Churchill went to Washington with his chiefs of staff to meet President Roosevelt and the . . .  (2 of 2)

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 3, Block C:  Richard A Epstein, Hoover Institution, Chicago Law, in re:   The United States Constitution is at its core a classical liberal document. But over the last hundred years, much of it has turned into a progressive text thanks in large part to Supreme Court justices who interpret it creatively. Here, I address one major cause of the problem—the fine art of making its critical words and letters just disappear through the Court’s imaginative application of judicial review. This constitutional disappearing act does not take sides in the longstanding debate over judicial restraint and activism. In some cases, it unduly expands judicial power; in other cases, it wrongly contracts it. The two best illustrations of how this process works are found in the Eighth Amendment and in Article 1, which sets out the federal government’s taxing power . . .  (1  of 2)

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 3, Block D: Richard A Epstein, Hoover Institution, Chicago Law, in re:   The United States Constitution is at its core a classical liberal document. But over the last hundred years, much of it has turned into a progressive text thanks in large part to Supreme Court justices who interpret it creatively. Here, I address one major cause of the problem—the fine art of making its critical words and letters just disappear through the Court’s imaginative application of judicial review. This constitutional disappearing act does not take sides in the longstanding debate over judicial restraint and activism. In some cases, it unduly expands judicial power; in other cases, it wrongly contracts it. The two best illustrations of how this process works are found in the Eighth Amendment and in Article 1, which sets out the federal government’s taxing power . . .  (2 of 2)

Hour Four

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 4, Block A: Art Held Hostage: The Battle over the Barnes Collection by John Anderson (1 of 4)

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 4, Block B: Art Held Hostage: The Battle over the Barnes Collection by John Anderson (2 of 4)

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 4, Block C: Art Held Hostage: The Battle over the Barnes Collection by John Anderson (3 of 4)

Friday  20 December  2013 / Hour 4, Block D: Art Held Hostage: The Battle over the Barnes Collection by John Anderson (4 of 4)

..  ..  ..  ..  ..  ..

Music

Hour 1:  Infamous.

Hour 2:  After Earth. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. 

Hour 3:  Tomorrow Never Dies. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Frost/Nixon. 

Hour 4:  Downton Abbey. Michael Clayton.