Wednesday Morning - The Front Page Cover

 The Front Page Cover 
"I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened"
 
Featuring:
Iran and the Lessons of History
With the pending nuclear deal, Obama courts dishonor—and possibly war
Myron Magnet
 
"Rise up together as one voice"
"Be careful where you stand"
~~~lll~~~
 
 
 MILLIONS FLOWED TO CLINTON CHARITY FROM FOREIGN   FRIENDS 
The Clinton Foundation may have sworn off donations from foreign governments while Hilly Clinton was secretary of state, but millions of dollars from individuals with ties to foreign governments and state-owned companies flowed into foundation coffers during her tenure.
WSJ: “Some donors have direct ties to foreign governments. One is a member of the Saudi royal family. Another is a Ukrainian oligarch and former parliamentarian. Others are individuals with close connections to foreign governments that stem from their business activities… All told, more than a dozen foreign individuals and their foundations and companies were large donors to the Clinton Foundation in the years after Mrs. Clinton became secretary of state in 2009, collectively giving between $34 million and $68 million, foundation records show…After Mrs. Clinton left the State Department in 2013, the foundation resumed accepting donations from foreign governments. Just after she stepped down as secretary of state, it received a large donation from a conglomerate run by a member of China’s National People’s Congress. In response to questions about foreign donations, a foundation official said the individuals have given to a host of other major philanthropies.”  -Fox News  
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 Broke foundation donor disclosure pledge -   Reuters: “In 2008, Hilly Clinton promised Barack nObama, the president-elect, there would be no mystery about who was giving money to her family’s globe-circling charities. She made a pledge to publish all the donors on an annual basis to ease concerns that as secretary of state she could be vulnerable to accusations of foreign influence. At the outset, the Clinton Foundation did indeed publish what they said was a complete list of the names of more than 200,000 donors and has continued to update it. But in a breach of the pledge, the charity’s flagship health program, which spends more than all of the other foundation initiatives put together, stopped making the annual disclosure in 2010, Reuters has found. In response to questions from Reuters, officials at the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) and the foundation confirmed no complete list of donors to the Clintons’ charities has been published since 2010.”   -Fox News  
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 Hilly gives likely last paid speech before a 2016 presidential run       WaPo: “Hilly Rodham Clinton, edging closer to an expected presidential run, came to [Atlantic City, N.J.]… Thursday to deliver a nostalgic and cheerful address on family, the outdoors and schoolyard fights. The audience: thousands of professional camp counselors, whose trade group spent an estimated $200,000 to hear from the frontrunner for the 2016 Democratic nomination. The speech to a regional gathering of the American Camp Association was the last paid appearance on Clinton’s public calendar, and probably the last she will give before her campaign begins.”  -Fox News  
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 nOBAMA TO NETANYAHU: U.S. REASSESSING PEACE APPROACH 
With tensions between the two allies already strained, President nObama told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday that the U.S. is reassessing its approach to Israeli-Palestinian peace in light of Netanyahu’s pre-election comments rejecting the establishment of a Palestinian state. AP: “In [a] telephone call, nObama extended congratulations to Netanyahu for his election victory two days ago,. But a White House official said nObama also raised Netanyahu’s critical comments about Israeli Arabs ahead of the election, which the White House has denounced as a ‘cynical’ effort to mobilize voters.”  -Fox News  
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 No flip-flop, Netanyahu insists -   Fox News: “’I didn’t retract any of the things I said in my speech six years ago, calling for a solution in which a demilitarized Palestinian state recognizes a Jewish state,” Netanyahu told Fox News host Megyn Kelly. ‘I said that the conditions for that, today, are not achievable for a simple reason: Abu Mazen, the leader of the Palestinians, rejects consistently the acceptance of a Jewish state. He’s made a pact with the Palestinian terrorist organization, Hamas, that calls for our destruction. And the conditions in the Middle East have changed to the point where any territory we withdraw from is immediately taken up by Iranian-backed terrorists or by ISIS.”
          [Top Onbama aide to address Netanyahu opposition group - The Hill: “White House chief of staff Denis McDonough will be the keynote speaker at the national conference of J Street, a group that opposes many of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies.]
          “President nObama has said time and time again, as I’ve said, that the only path to a peace agreement is an agreement, a negotiated agreement…I think that you can’t force the people of Israel, who’ve just elected me by a wide margin, to bring them peace and security, to secure the state of Israel, to accept terms that would endanger the very survival of the State of Israel. I don’t think that’s the direction of American policy.” -- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on “The Kelly File” Watch here -Fox News  
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1.
 Iran & Hezbollah Off Terror List - On The Record  
(nicedeb.wordpress.com) - For some nefarious reason, this year’s Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Communities does not include Iran or Hezbollah...The official excuse the nObama Regime is using to explain why Iran and Hezbollah were left off the U.S. terror threat list doesn’t pass the smell test or even the laugh test. National Intelligence Director James Clapper has cited “a change in formatting” as the reason for this removal – evidently too ashamed to admit the awful truth – that nObama had agreed to do it as a concession in his nuke talks with Iran. “It’s a flat lie,” John Bolton, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. told Greta Van Susteren on Fox News, last week. “The format of this years report is exactly the same as last year’s report,” Bolton explained.
2.
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 The Pres Pretends We Are on the Same Side as the Iranian  
(Sara Noble) - General Petraeus interviewed with The Washington Post last week and alerted Americans to the danger of Iran’s appearance of expansion. They are not our allies, he warned... “I would argue the foremost threat to Iraq’s long-term stability and the broader regional equilibrium is not the Islamic State,” Petraeus said, “rather it is the Shiite militias, many backed by, and some guided by Iran. Neither the Iranians nor Daesh are 10 feet tall, but the perception in the region for the past few years has been that of the U.S. on the wane, and our adversaries are on the rise. I hope we can begin to reverse that now.” Finally, Petraeus said, “The current Iranian regime is not our ally in the Middle East. It is ultimately part of the problem, not the solution. The more the Iranians are seen to be dominating the region, the more it is going to inflame Sunni radicalism and fuel the rise of groups like the Islamic State.”       http://www.independentsentinel.com/stephen-hayes-president-pretends-we-are-on-the-same-side-as-the-iranian-regime/
3.
 Iranian Nuke Talks, Toughest Stance is being Taken by…France?  
(Jake) - Even though history supposedly began in 2009, I’m old enough to remember when the French were derided as cheese eating surrender monkeys. Now, under a socialist government no less, they are standing up for the free world where America won’t...The news from Lausanne, Switzerland, is that they are the ones expressing the most skepticism about the deal pushed by the nObama administration that will, make no mistake, give Iranians the bomb. Here’s the Wall Street Journal observes: France has strong ties to Israel and the Arab world, so this might be a major reason for their tough stance. As the article notes, French defense companies have signed lucrative arms deals with both the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia in the fairly recent past. Neither of those two countries like the idea of a deal that strengthens Iran and gives it the bomb. Of course, it should also be noted that the threat to France by a nuclear armed Iran is also a lot more immediate that it is for the United States. After all, Paris is much closer to Tehran than New York City; Washington, DC; or Los Angeles are.*       http://www.redstate.com/2015/03/21/iranian-nuke-talks-toughest-stance-taken-france/
4.
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 nObama: bin Laden’s Bodyguard Cleared for Release from GITMO  
(Sara Noble) - Saeed Sarem Jarabh, once classified as a forever prisoner, is close to being released. The 44-year old Yemeni has miraculously become a low-level detainee. He is a member of Al Qaeda and was Osama bin Laden’s bodyguard...This release stems from nObama’s insistence on closing GITMO at all costs. He will free him even if the cost is the death of some in our military and Americans overseas and on the homeland at the hands of these terrorists. nObama is very generous with our lives. All he cares about is his radical ideology. Ashton Carter promised during his confirmation hearing to not endanger Americans by freeing terrorist detainees . So much for that promise. Blood will be on the hands of this administration.
5.
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 This Is What Brought Megyn Kelly and Marc Thiessen to Laughter  
(Sara Noble) - There was a funny shootout over the Hilly Clinton email scandal on The Kelly File last night which brought Megyn Kelly and Marc Thiessen to laughter. Thiessen and Kelly obviously thought they were going to have a debate...A Democratic strategist came on the show to tell a tall tale about the Hilly Clinton scandal that was the exact opposite of the truth. That is the new strategy – lie unabashedly through one’s teeth. It is the strategy coming out from the Hilly supporters with the help of faux Republican Colin Powell who appeared on ABC This Week in early March to prop up the new narrative.
6.
 Proposed Deal with Iran Not Legal; Iranian Nukes in South America  
(Peter Huessy) - The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) forbids any of it signatories to have nuclear weapons. Full stop...Under the terms of the NPT, the P5+1 have no legal authority to amend the treaty unilaterally, to abrogate the treaty, or to allow nations that are signatories to the NPT to abrogate the treaty. Since when can the UN Security Council amend U.S. treaty law? The UN can certainly propose amendments, but it cannot approve such changes on behalf of the U.S. Congress and the American people. If Iran is allowed nuclear weapons capability, other nations -- especially throughout South America, already infiltrated by Iran -- will doubtless follow suit.       http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/5430/iran-nuclear-deal-npt
7.
 War Authorization: nObama Vs. Democrats
(shawn) - It’s not often that President nObama finds himself battling his own party, but the conflict against ISIS has forced the president into a corner where he has no good options...Republicans want to see him take off the gloves and stop limiting himself and future presidents when it comes to dismantling the deadly organization. Democrats, on the other hand, want to avoid Iraq War III at all costs. Some ranking Democrats in both houses of Congress have been adamant against granting the president any more authority than he already has. The most serious concern, of course, is the use of U.S. ground troops. nObama has gone on record dozens of times to say that he would not put boots on the ground in Iraq. But as it becomes obvious that airstrikes are not enough to combat this threat, Democrats are concerned that the president will try to go back on his earlier promise. For congressmen who believe they were elected on a wave of Iraq War resentment, the thought of authorizing another one may be too much to overcome.       http://totalconservative.com/war-authorization-obama-vs-democrats/
8.
immigrant assistance
 Number of immigrants visiting Valley shelter trending up  
(SKY CHADDE) - Seemingly out of nowhere, tens of thousands of children and families from Central America crossed the border in 2014, and many pit-stopped in McAllen...Absent a relief effort after U.S. Border Patrol agents cut the immigrants loose in downtown McAllen, Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley stepped in, setting up a makeshift shelter at the church, welcoming new arrivals with clean clothes, showers and meals. The effort continues today. And this year is projected to have the second-most number of Central Americans migrate to the United States, and many are expected to cross through the Valley again, according to a study from the Washington Office on Latin America.       http://www.valleymorningstar.com/news/local_news/article_d63adbbc-d036-11e4-8eb6-db8984fffa7e.html
9.
 Australia Just Declared WELFARE JIHAD On Muslim Leeches  
(madworldnews.com) - Australia is doing what America should do, but we won’t for at least the next two years as we endure the time remaining in President nObama’s second term...Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott is putting his foot down and no longer taking any more chances, now that terrorists are coming into his country in droves and recruiting Australians, who are fleeing to join the Islamic State in Syria. Quite frankly, Abbott understands that Australia’s welfare systems is far too abused and is funding radical Islamists, as they leech off taxpayers in his country, all while they plan to obliterate the hand that feeds them. It’s the worst form of system abuse there has ever been. But the first step is acknowledging it’s happening and not making excuses for it like nObama does.       http://madworldnews.com/welfare-jihad-muslim-leeches/
10.
 Radicalization of Europe's Muslims Hits a Crisis Point  
(Abigail R. Esman) - With every new atrocity, Western leaders and political commentators collectively assure themselves and the public that the Islamic State's power will suffer, that its PR machine is failing, and that the flow of Western Muslims to the Caliphate will stop. It doesn't...European Muslim radicals have shown no hint that they are reconsidering their hero worship of IS (or ISIS), not even in the aftermath of the widely-condemned killing of Jordanian pilot Moath al-Kasasbeh, who was caged and burned alive in February. While Muslim moderates around the world decried the killing, teens from England, Germany, Holland, Belgium, France and even the United States continue to cross into Syrian territory, eager to join the jihad.     http://www.investigativeproject.org/4803/guest-column-radicalization-of-europe-muslims
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Iran and the Lessons of History
With the pending nuclear deal, Obama courts dishonor—and possibly war
Myron Magnet

     (city-journal.org) - For all their differences, President Barack nObama uncannily resembles his Democratic predecessor, President Jimmy Carter, in his stiff-necked, self-righteous inability to listen to others or to learn from experience or history. Against ferocious opposition at home and abroad, he is about to repeat the grievous mistake of appeasing Iran that Carter made over three decades ago and do even more geopolitical damage than the hapless peanut farmer wreaked in 1979.

     Recall the history. On February 1, 1979, two weeks after the cancer-ridden Shah of Iran left his country in the hands of a caretaker as he wandered the world in search of treatment, his fanatical opponent, Islamist cleric Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, returned from his 14-year Parisian exile and within a week had engineered the overthrow of the shah’s feeble substitute and installed his own puppet regime. Not only did Iran’s Islamists hail the ayatollah’s return; Carter’s United Nations ambassador, the painfully naïve Andrew Young, lauding Islam as “a vibrant cultural force in today’s world,” prophesied that the ayatollah himself—with ferocious indignation flashing from his eyes and bristling from his beard under his sharia-chic turban—would prove “somewhat of a saint.” On February 15, the saintly imam began murdering Iran’s officer corps, and on April Fool’s Day, which he called “the first day of a government of God,” he declared his nation an Islamic republic. In mid-May, the U.S. Senate condemned Iran’s systematic slaughter of its officers, a rebuke Iran met by recalling its ambassador from Washington. By July, mullahs began publicly taking control of the government.

     On October 22, just when the Carter administration and the mullahs seemed to be finding a way to get along, the shah—his eagle-proud face pain-worn and his wasted body too small for his once-resplendent, Gilbert-and-Sullivan-ornate uniform—arrived in New York for cancer treatment. Less than two weeks later, on November 4, a mob of “students” invaded and seized the American embassy in Tehran and took its 68 employees hostage, though they soon released the 15 women and African-Americans, and later set free another hostage suffering from multiple sclerosis. The other 52 Americans endured 444 days of captivity. How far the mullahs engineered this feat as retribution for America’s welcome of the shah is unknown; their initial assurances that all would be well would prove consistent with Iran’s habitual double-dealing.

     Carter’s initial response was entirely correct. On November 14, a fleet of U.S. warships sped into the Indian Ocean. But then Carter entangled himself in a bewildering web of fruitless international negotiations at the UN and the World Court, organizations whose keynote is cynicism and bad faith, and whose chief product is hot air not action.

     What the president should have done, as was clear even then, was simple and traditional. He should have told the mullahs that they had 48 hours to release our citizens unharmed, or else we would leave not one stone standing on another in the “holy” city of Qom. We then should have leafleted the city with warnings to the population to flee. And, were the hostages not released, we should have done what we threatened to do. And were they not released at that point, we should have made the same threat against Tehran.

     My own belief is that the initial threat would have succeeded. The mullahs would have said, “Oh, you know how unruly these students are, how immature, how hot-headed; but don’t worry. We will get them into line and get your citizens back to you. The embassy seizure shocked us as much as it did you.”

     But suppose I am wrong. Suppose the mullahs had defied Carter. Then we might have lost 53 of our countrymen and an untold number of Persians whom their tyrannical rulers might have held in the city as human shields. Being a world leader, however, sometimes requires making such harrowing choices. To prevent the powerful French fleet in Algeria from falling into Nazi hands after the 1940 Vichy surrender to Germany, British prime minister Winston Churchill ordered the Royal Navy to seize or sink it, if its commanders did not get it out of Nazi reach, thus protecting Britain’s vital mastery of the seas. A single pigheaded French admiral failed to choose any of the three honorable options Churchill offered. As a result, 1,297 innocent French sailors went to their watery graves after the British fleet opened fire on July 3, with 977 dying in the first 15 minutes. Also as a result, skeptical Americans finally came to believe that Churchill wasn’t kidding when he said that the British would never surrender, and the U. S. government took a giant step closer to joining the war. As sociologist Max Weber warned, anyone who wants to keep his hands clean should stay out of politics, because politics ultimately rests on the force and violence necessary to repel force and violence against one’s countrymen. And force and violence, however legitimate and productive of ultimate good, also produce evil in the process.

     So what good might have come from bombing Iran in 1979? The Persian people might have changed their government and spared themselves three decades of tyranny: a secular autocrat is generally better than a theocratic dictator for a Muslim people culturally unready for democracy—as the shah was better than the ayatollah, and as Egyptian president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi seems by a long chalk an improvement on the deposed Mohammed Morsi. From Iran’s warm welcome of the Shiite hijackers of an Alitalia jetliner a month before the American embassy seizure, right up to today, the mullahs have been avid supporters of Islamic terrorism, and with their enthusiastic backing of Hezbollah, they have become state sponsors of terrorism, as well. For more than a decade, the regime has been trying to make a nuclear weapon; and the idea of nuclear-armed millenarian fanatics emerging as hegemons out of the Middle East’s current anarchy, sparking a nuclear arms race in that hair-trigger region, is unsettling, at best.

     For the United States, bombing Iran in 1979 would have given the world proof of America’s resolve as a global superpower not to be attacked with impunity—as it was in the 1983 bombing of U.S. marine barracks in Lebanon, the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, or the al Qaida-directed bombing of the USS Cole in 2000. That is the point of a superpower’s disregard of the shibboleth of “proportionality” in its response to adversaries: to show indomitable might and unshakable will. Who knows whether it might have discouraged the 2001 World Trade Center destruction? But it’s my guess that Osama bin Laden learned his technique of recruiting followers by distributing audio tapes from Khomeini, who first organized the Iranian revolution using audio tapes sent from Paris. I’m pretty sure I heard one of bin Laden’s tapes in a taxi driven by a man in full hajji garb on 9/8/2001, and you didn’t have to speak Arabic to understand its message of murderous hate.

     So now President nObama wants to make an agreement that will ensure that Iran can produce an atom bomb essentially overnight. He has not seen fit to explain his reasoning to the American people, and it is hard to imagine what it might be. But all I can think of is Churchill’s rebuke to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain when he returned from his infamous appeasement of Hitler in Munch in 1938. “You were given the choice between war and dishonor,” Churchill thundered in Parliament. “You chose dishonor, and you will have war.” Certainly President nObama is choosing dishonor. What kind of war he might unleash, the world watches with dread.

http://www.city-journal.org/2015/eon0322mm.html

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