Photo, above: A Historical Outline of the Deen Instituted by the Jahmites, and Subsequently Adopted by the Mu'tazilah, Ash'ariyyah and Maturidiyyah.  See: Hour 2, Block C,  Robert R Reilly, Academia [dot] edu, book review, The Closing of the Muslim Mind.

JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW

Hour One

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 1, Block A:  Bill Roggio, Long War Journal and FDD, in re: Pakistan – an army with a state. Egypt – another army with a state. Asmatullah Muawiya said the PML-N "will have to pay a price" if it carries out the executions of jihadists. Pakistan's interior minister said the government will carry out death penalties starting next week.  [more] Begin with the tribes of the Pashtun belt: Taliban/al Q commander threatens Nawaz Sharif and Islamabad: demanded a stop to executions; Islamabad refused, then several days later said they'd be postponed. 

     The Islamic State of Iraq in the Levant: attacks stepped up a lot.  Some pressure fro Iran; gearing up for more battles.    Recall Mookie Sadr: now afeared of being overwhelmed by al Nusrah Front.  Without US assistance, will continue its slow collapse. Last week, the Foreign Minister came to US begging for counterterrorism support, drones, a lot of help to keep the country from wholly disintegrating.  Egypt: jihadists are lining up Egypt in the target zone; expect civil disruption or civil war.  Insurgency has begun in Egypt; 25 police butchered in northern Sinai.   Jihadists will travel there from a long radius.  The Egyptian military proved that all the critics of democratic elections – were correct. 

Last week, there was to be a call between Pres Obama and Gen al Sisi. The president called, and al Sisi refused the call. The US is out of the Middle East.

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 1, Block B: Joshua Zumbrun, Bloomberg, in re: "Shampoo recovery," says Jared Bernstein, referring to an economy having a little too much froth. Even with wealk growth, can have asset prices go much too high. 

ECONOMIC RECOVERY. Obama Focuses on Risk of New Bubble Undermining Broad Recovery –President Barack Obama, who took office amid the collapse of the last financial bubble, wants to make sure his economic recovery doesn’t generate the next one. Obama this month spoke four times in five days of the need to avoid what he called “artificial bubbles,” even in an economy that’s growing at just a 1.7 percent rate and where employment and factory usage remain below pre-recession highs.  [more] Obama to Meet Financial Regulators on Dodd-Frank.    Implementation Today

The closed-door meeting at the White House, listed at 2:15 p.m. on the president’s schedule, also will include Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew, the Comptroller of the Currency, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and the chairmen of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., National Credit Union Administration, and Securities and Exchange Commission.

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 1, Block C: Salena Zito, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review & Pirates fan, in re:  Reports of the death of the Republican Party are greatly exaggerated: the down-ticket (local) is doing so well that the AFofL/CIO is committing its money to the fight. Everyone pretends that PA is a blue state, but if you look at local representatives, judges, et al., it's Republican and that's true of 22 states.   Thirty of fifty governors are Republican. Democrats have failed to build on the local level – note, "All politics is local."  IOWA. New Hampshire.

Things Looking Up for GOP Down-Ballot; Here for link.    Spin spin spin - three more years of editors's search for a new way to say that HRC is new.  Bad Hair Days Make for Good Polling for HRC!

First Read: "What's interesting is that in talks with strategists on both sides of the aisle, there's universal head-scratching over her decision to engage this early. The long campaign didn't help Clinton in 2007-2008. Short campaigns are always more helpful to well-known front-runners. But if you're Clinton, you may be thinking that you need to make sure there's no room on your left for another Obama, and it could be why she's willing to risk her bipartisan political standing so early. Then again, that's fighting the last war."

        Nestled in the valley between Chestnut and Laurel ridges, this tiny village once included a state-funded relief camp for jobless men during the Great Depression; it housed, fed and employed them for 40 cents an hour (before the government deducted a daily 85-cent maintenance fee).  It began a generational dependence and an allegiance to Democrats that lasted for 80 years and kept Republicans out of office in Saltlick Township and Fayette County. Democrats’ registration is overwhelming here, dwarfing Republicans’ by more than 41,000 voters. So it’s no surprise that they win every seat from the top down in this area along stunning Indian Head Creek – that is, until recently. 

New York Times: "As Gov. Chris Christie heads for what is expected to be an easy re-election, he is also quietly building a sophisticated political operation that could become the basis for a national campaign. His advisors, while saying the governor is focused on New Jersey, are aiming to run up a huge margin against his Democratic opponent and position. Mr. Christie is a formidable figure among Republicans ahead of the next presidential primary."

"At the Republican National Committee summer meeting in Boston last week, Mr. Christie and his aides repeatedly made the case that his re-election effort in heavily Democratic New Jersey this fall would offer a model for Republicans in the years ahead. And despite their claims to be focussed only on 2013, his aides have also signaled to Republicans that the governor, if re-elected as expected, plans to begin visiting other states immediately after November."

        Former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) "is traveling to Iowa on Sunday to check out the big boar and the super bull at the Iowa State Fair - and to size up if Iowans might take a liking to him," the Des Moines Register reports.

Said Brown: "I'm going to be coming out more often to try to if whether there's an interest in my brand of leadership and Republicanism."

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 1, Block D:  Patrick Chovanec, chief strategist at Silvercrest Asset Management, in re: The Party's new leadership seems to consider democracy a bad word, although some members disagree. "Constitutionalism is a weapon of capitalism."

27% of new properties in London were bought by Chinese nationals in the past year. 

Buyers from China bought London properties worth up to US$266 million in the first half of the year.

"China steps up inspections as local governments swim in debt"  [more] 

Hour Two

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 2, Block A:  John Fund, National Review Online,  and David M Drucker, Washington Examiner Sr Congressional correspondent, in re:

New 2016 rankings: Christie jumps into 'top tier,' Elizabeth Warren challenges Hillary New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has vaulted into the "top tier" of 2016 Republican presidential candidates, knocking Florida Sen. Marco Rubio down a notch, as he sails to reelection and casts his...

Taking Back the Debates   Enough already with the Candy Crowleys.

Zogby Report Card: Obama 'very small' on the world's 'eve of destruction'  Pollster John Zogby reports in our weekly White House report card that President Obama just looks "very small" watching--and golfing--as world hotspots are exploding. "To rework the lyrics of... read more…

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 2, Block B: John Fund, National Review Online,  and David M Drucker, Washington Examiner Sr Congressional correspondent, in re: Candidates going to Iowa.

 

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 2, Block C:  Robert R Reilly, Academia [dot] edu, in re: book review, The Closing of the Muslim Mind. "One could even make the point that Jihadism is much more a successor of Mu'tazilite moralism than it is of any element in Ash'arite thinking." Deny cause and effect in the natural world (as in, fire doesn’t burn cotton; God burns cotton).  This devolution is what we can attribute the diminution of Arab science to.  [highly recommended] 

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 2, Block D:  Gordon Chang, Forbes.com, in re: All the Red March ties, the insider's game: does the Party run this, or are their syndicates within the party? Property Mogul Emerges as China’s Richest Person

A Chinese court on Friday upheld an 11-year prison sentence for Liu Hui, the brother-in-law of jailed Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo  [more]

Hour Three

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 3, Block A:  Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re: Meanwhile, the violence continues, and over 1,000 people have now been killed since Wednesday. The attack in the Sinai was described as an attack on a group of off-duty policemen, who, according to security officials speaking to the Associated Press, were killed execution-style. As for the Islamists killed in custody, Egyptian authorities claim that they were killed when they tried to escape, but the Muslim Brotherhood claimed that they had been shot and tear-gassed while in a locked police van. The Brotherhood put the total dead at 52.

 

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 3, Block B: Malcolm Hoenlein, Conference of Presidents, in re: Militants Kill 25 Egyptian Policemen in Sinai

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 3, Block C:  Michael Smith, Bloomberg Markets Magazine, in re: ILLEGAL MINING. Terrorist Tungsten in Colombia Taints Global Phone-to-Car Sales – Illegally mined minerals that fund a decades-old war in Colombia are making their way into supply lines for cars, smart phones and computers. Amazon Indians explore the rain forest for valuable rocks that contain tantalum and tungsten, both of which are used to manufacture smartphones and other mobile devices. While the Indians do the digging, they rely on another more powerful group to get the ore to market, Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). [more]

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 3, Block D: John Tamny, RealClearMarkets, in re: It's a mystery to many why Huma Abedin would stay with and defend Anthony Weiner, but the answer why is that she married him to begin with.  Politicians are a different, often odious breed, and for her to have married him in the first place speaks to vaulting ambition that easily trumps the desire for someone faithful.  

Eager to Understand Huma Abedin? Look No Further Than Anthony Weiner  The recent 'sexting' revelations involving Anthony Weiner have predictably generated a lot of commentary about his allegedly victimized wife, Huma Abedin. The conversation mostly centers on how could she stay with him after he so publicly and dishonestly proclaimed himself a changed man, how she could have remained married to him after the initial errant Twitter message, and most of all, how she could defend him so publicly despite what it means for her own reputation.

Hour Four

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 4, Block A:  Eric Trager, Washington Institute, in re: Egypt, Muslim Brotherhood.

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 4, Block B: Ariel Kaminer, NYT, in re:  Facing Criticism, N.Y.U. Will Cease Loans to Top Employees for Second Homes The university will offer assistance only on primary residences and its president, John Sexton, will step down at the end of his term, according to a resolution released Wednesday.

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 4, Block C:  Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re:  The engineering tests to try to save Kepler have found that the mission is essentially over.

A headline at this New York Times article, “NASA’s Kepler Mended, but May Never Fully Recover” is wrong, as the telescope has not been “mended.” They have found they might be able to do some limited science, at the most. NASA is going to review this possibility, weighing the cost versus the benefit, and decide in the fall. 

Ad astra: Scientists today published a new model that suggests that Voyager 1 actually left the solar system and entered interstellar space in July of last year.  In describing on a fine scale how magnetic field lines from the sun and magnetic field lines from interstellar space can connect to each other, they conclude Voyager 1 has been detecting the interstellar magnetic field since July 27, 2012. Their model would mean that the interstellar magnetic field direction is the same as that which originates from our sun.  Other models envision the interstellar magnetic field draped around our solar bubble and predict that the direction of the interstellar magnetic field is different from the solar magnetic field inside. By that interpretation, Voyager 1 would still be inside our solar bubble.

Monday  19 August  2013 / Hour 4, Block D: Sarah Maslin Nir, NYT, in re: Struggling Immigrant Artist Tied to $80 Million New York Fraud  Pei-Shen Qian, a 73-year-old immigrant, is believed to have produced more than 60 works that were attributed to Modernist masters.

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