ConservativeINC

In certain circles outside and within the United States there has been a major push for a multi-polar geo-political scene. By “multi-polar” they mean that there is more than one superpower, or, in our case, hyperpower. According to their thought process things were better during the Cold War because there was a balance of power between the Soviets and us. Now they live in fear because our power supposedly goes unchecked in the world.

Their wish is beginning to shape up. But instead of the old formula where it was one powerful nation balanced against another it is going to be us versus a confederacy of the world’s most corrupt and dangerous nations.

In the West we have Hugo Chavez’s tentacles spreading out all over the Americas. He spends tens of millions of dollars spreading his influence in the region and around the world. His main goal is to undermine the United States at every turn while aggrandizing himself as some kind of perverted Simon Bolivar.

The really dangerous nexus is in the East, though. Russia is falling down the rabbit hole of totalitarianism again. Vladimir Putin has found a job for himself during his term off as president. He’s going to be the prime minister if, sorry, when Medvedev is elected “president” of the Mother Land. This will ensure Putin’s continued dominance of Russian politics and will significantly increase his power throughout the region.

As the de facto ruler of Russia, one of Putin’s most ambitious gambits is to confound America with Iran. After reading the AP story that gives the details to this story I’ve come to realize that Russia knows it’s playing an extremely dangerous game. Their goal of undermining the United States remains but they know that if Iran uses the nuclear fuel to build a nuke or a dirty bomb and then fires it at Israel, Russia is going to be thrown into a World War.

If that happens their country would assuredly be devastated and they would probably lose any major engagement with America and its allies. Russia is trying to have it both ways now. By pushing the limit they are increasing their stature in the world but they are risking everything along the way. And, like it was during the Soviet Union, Russia’s future depends solely on the decisions of one man.

Venezuela, Iran, Russia, North Korea, et al all have one man in charge. One man making the decision without any opposition. Just take a look at Iran for a perfect example of this.

Ahmadinejad, who has been let off his leash by the king makers in the background for some time now, continues to escalate his rhetoric against the United States. In response to the latest intelligence report, which found Iran hasn’t been trying to build nukes since 2003, Ahmadinejad called it a “surrender” on our part.

Now that strikes me as odd. He doesn’t declare it a victory for his country or even for peace. Ahmadinejad paints it as a loss for America. Really? How could it be a loss for us? Well, it would be a loss for us if we have declared Iran clean when they haven’t stopped building nukes.

That’s the only way it would be a loss for us. Heck, if it were true that Iran isn’t trying to build nukes then that would be a huge victory for us because then we could let them run themselves into the ground all on their own. Their economy is crumbling and their people aren’t nearly as radical as the ruling class is. If it weren’t for the threat of a nuclear Iran we could just ignore them.

But that isn’t the case. A nation with a huge amount of oil underground and a penchant for declaring the end of the world should not be trusted when they say they want nuclear technology for “peaceful” reasons. A nuclear Iran would give them a significantly increased role in the Middle East and would limit our influence in the region (Iraq and Afghanistan for example).

Everything that is going on in the nations that oppose American power is aimed at weakening our stature. Russia gives nuclear fuel and technology to the Iranians as a slap in the face to us and a way to increase Russia’s influence as well. When Ahmadinejad spews nonsense he is puffing himself up while his house crumbles.

The same goes for every other nation that is arrayed against America. I don’t think that most of the nations (Russia) really want a showdown with us. They just want more power.

But when you’re dealing with nations that are basically ruled by one man, you can never be sure what is going to happen. BigT

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Breaking news: the media thinks that Bush is an idiot. This is - wait, this has been the party line since he took office. Here’s just some reiteration from Yahoo! News’ Odd News section. Bush cannot use the proper grammar with schoolchildrens and an article on preventing Bushisms. In other hard hitting news Yahoo! covers the global links to terrorism between Russian crime lords, Chinese officials, North Korean scientists, renegade nuclear scientists, Iranian Revolutionary Guard members, and Venezuelan kleptocrats - wait, they don’t cover stuff like that or Iran’s lack of homosexuals either.

Maybe some of you remember the brouhaha over Ahmadinejad’s visit to Columbia and how it was crucial for the survival of free speech that he got a forum to air his views. Well, I guess that the View doesn’t really agree with freedom of speech either. There is talk that their new hostette, Sherri Shepherd, is going to be canned because she questions evolution. To sum it up: questioning evolution = fired; questioning the holocaust = free speech.

And what about freedom of speech for our generals? They know a heck of a lot better what is going on in Iraq then, say, any civilian in America. And guess what they say:

“If the American people are informed properly,” Lynch told reporters after he arrived home on leave, “I believe they will be supportive of the mission. But they’re not getting the right story. As a result, they’re anti the war.”

The media use a “filter” that downplays information about American successes: “All I’m seeing when I watch TV … is the bad news and not the good news.”

But guess what News Busters found out about this article in Editor & Publisher; it omitted all the good news from the original interview! The rest of his interview goes on to say this:

Enemy attacks and U.S. casualties in the 3rd ID’s West Virginia-sized battle zone south of Baghdad are “way down.”

More than 2,000 enemy have been killed or captured there in the past six months.

The enemy has lost “sanctuaries” where it makes bombs, stores munitions, trains suicide bombers and plans attacks.

“But you never see that by watching Fox, CNN and NBC,” he said.

Interesting stuff. But instead of hearing this we hear about a soldier who is going to return his medals to Rumsfeld in an anti-war stunt.

John Bolton, in the top two of UN ambassadors we’ve ever had, reacts to Ahmadinejad’s visit.

In Myanmar there are some really brave people. Their country is being ruled by a junta that prevents the most basic of human rights. Three of the protestors, who are mostly monks, have been killed. This picture tells more then anything I can write though.

From Hot Air we get news that what we heard Ahmadinejad say is actually not what he said. “What?” you say. Yep, that’s right. The real transcript from the Washington Post is different then the official Iranian transcript. Basically, in Iran there’s not even any questions about gays (totally expunged from Iran’s official transcript) and there are other changes to play to the crowd. I know free speech is great but does this really count? Probably if you hate Bush.

Isn’t it great that the United States provides health care for children that don’t have it? No, it’s not. These kids are not from poor families and, anyways, I think it’s unconstitutional and immoral for the government to take money away from productive citizens and give it to people no matter how good the cause seems. But don’t blame Bush for not adding to spending. Take a look at this graph from a post in Sweetness & Light showing the dramatic increase in spending for SCHIP.

In other news, there’s a major schism growing in the ranks of the Sunni terrorists. According to Counterterrorism Blog this is what was said in al Qaeda publications:

The audio recording released on September 14 from Abu Omar al-Baghdadi was particularly significant–especially to those who follow the very serious internal schisms opening up between Al-Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood in Iraq. In his address, al-Baghdadi directly attacked other Sunni insurgent groups–such as the 1920 Revolution Brigades, Hamas in Iraq, and the Iraqi Islamic Resistance Front (JAAMI)–as “backstabbing” traitors who have abandoned their commitment to jihad. Needless to say, al-Baghdadi also reserved a strong dose of vitriol for the “degenerate crusader nation of Sweden”, where cartoons were recently published that were viewed as disrespectful to the Prophet Mohammed. In response, al-Baghdadi promised to launch punitive terrorist attacks by mid-October on Swedish “industrial giants” such as Volvo, Scandia, Ikea, and Ericsson–in addition to killing both the cartoon artist himself and his Swedish editor.

This is good stuff and, as the terrorists do, try and leverage this news. We need to put out our own counter-propaganda out there to knock down al Qaeda. Publishing the fact that there is a break among the ideological brethren of hate could significantly weaken recruitment drives by terrorist organizations. Why would anyone well-meaning young Muslim want to join a group that is at odds with other Islamic groups? Maybe even the main stream media - yeah, like that’ll ever happen.

Or maybe the fact that al Qaeda is targeting Muslims would dissuade young Jihadis? Yes, I know this is an old story but it comes from the Huffington Post so we should all be glad that at least they found out about it sometime.

And in other Iraq news, what is being touted as the Biden plan, which might come as a shock to Sen. Brownback who also supported the bill, passed the senate calling for a switch to a more federalized Iraq. I have said in previous posts that I think that wanting a strong and powerful national government in Iraq is probably the wrong way to go and that power should be distributed like it was even before our Revolutionary War.

This move does show that at least some in the senate still care about winning this war. This is the list from DailyKos (the list includes the names of everyone who voted against the denounce the moveon.org ad) of those that we cannot trust in the senate or the house. The list is too long to put here but if you need to know click on the above link and you will find Hillary’s name.

Unfortunately in America race matters. It matters because without it many leftist “leaders” would be left without jobs. Unfortunately this continuance of racial sensitivities is hurting Obama. Some may not vote for him because he is black but many will vote for him just because he is black. This hurts his credibility because the issue is not even about what he has to say or what he stands for. I would never vote for him but wouldn’t it be nice if his race wasn’t a factor?

Boing Boing is an extremely popular blog that sometimes shows its true liberal colors. Most of the stuff on there is great though and this article titled Scroogled in the Wall Street Journal is one of those good things. The interview, in this case, was about how Google, trying to just do good (their motto by the way) is actually doing really bad things because it is saving everyone’s information in the name of doing good. This is a problem because in the post Patriot Act world we live in (this is their liberalness coming out) the government could subpoena our search histories.

Besides the fact that the government can already subpoena our computer’s hard drive with, unless you have a program that is hardy enough to completely destroy all evidence of where you’ve been, the government can already retrieve all this information. But this is missing the point in the extreme.

The real point is that the biggest group of people that is taking control of our lives in the name of doing us good is the democrats. They want to have control over all our health information, financial information, and every single other piece of information available to aid in their control, uh, benefiting of our lives. Forget Google, I don’t want Hillary getting her hands on my private stuff.

BigT’s Linkapalooza:
Left is for Draft.
Katie flag pins are more dangerous than WMDs Couric’s news brethren have dinner with Ahmadinejad.
Lists of Conspiracy Theories from the right and the left.
Women are unhappy thanks to feminist revolution.
George Soros hates democracy, well our version anyway.
And here’s a graph from DailyKos readers saying who really frightens them.

BigT

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From Jihad Watch we find this great response to the terrorists from an ex-Muslim. The graphic novel, called The Infidel, is about two brothers: one a fighter against terrorists and another a terrorist. I hope he doesn’t get intimated out of doing this and everyone should give it a look.

Remember Haditha? Remember how Murtha called them all sorts of horrible things basically convicting them before they had a fair trial. Well the trial ended today for a Marine Captain and guess what happened. Yep, he was found innocent! Here is how Hot Air treated Mrutha:

Good for them.

Now lets juxtapose two pieces of news today. First we have this You Tube video starring a local Imam.

And then we have this reaction from those pillars of strength at Daily Kos:

We are fortunate that mosques in the U.S. are not the fertile recruiting stations for Jihadis that they are in Europe. But more braying from jackasses like Peter King and Virgil Goode could create an environment where American Muslims feel more alienated and less invested in the safety and security of all Americans. If America is not committed to protecting the liberties of all Americans, not all Americans will remain committed to America.

Isn’t it obvious why they have so many readers at Daily Kos? The real danger to them is those vile Christians who protest outside of abortion clinics. How many abortion clinics have been bombed? Have more people been killed by abortion clinic bombing or by one day’s worth of Islamic terrorism on this soil? How many babies have died at abortion clinics?

Sometimes it feels like your fighting against the ocean when you try to talk sense to some people. Then I woke up and realized that I have a damn good life and it’s thanks to veterans like those who marched in support of the war. There were about 250 of them, less then at the commi ones, but those vets at least count for 100 men a piece. Thanks guys.

Do you know where the world’s slowest coup de tat is happening? No not America, but good point dear reader, it is happening in Lebanon. Here from the Counterterrorism Blog is the explanation:

This morning, Lebanese parliamentarian Antoine Ghanem was assassinated in Beirut. Ghanem, a Phalange MP allied with the pro-West Government led by Prime Minister Fouad Siniora was the third parliamentarian in the anti-Syrian majority to be killed this year. A fourth, Gibran Tueni, was killed in December 2005. With Ghanem’s death, the Government’s majority has decreased to 68 of 127 MPs–down from 72 a few years ago. The shrinking majority of this democratically elected government raises the very real prospect that terrorism will overturn the results of the 2005 Lebanese General Elections.

Really, if we want to be serious about all of this, it is the Iranians who are behind this. They have control over Syria, probably even more so now that Israel has proven it has carte blanche to do whatever operations it wants to do in Syrian territory. If Iran gets a foothold on territory that borders Israel it would be a gigantic blow to our steadfast ally. For some reason we seem find just letting it happen. Maybe we are doing covert work in Lebanon but I can’t be sure. I guess just hope for the best.

Thomas Sowell is a brilliant man in many areas. Even though he is a trained economists (I know, I’ve read some of his books, he’s an economist) he knows more about other subjects, like history, then do some specialists of those subjects. His latest column, Banish the Concept of Nation-Building, is, unfortunately, right on. Nation building is not something easily done, it is something that must grow organically. That is why I have argued for changing the political structure in Iraq to more of a confederacy or federation-style government.

Like Mr. Sowell points out in his column, the Kurdish area of Iraq is basically peaceful (less so recently). But that is because they have been left alone without much pressure from a newly minted Iraqi government. Shifting power from a national government to regional governments determines by tribal affiliation or whatever metric will work is the best option for success in Iraq.

You know, I’ve got to say something about the Huffington Post. While it is true that their bloggers are mostly left-wing nuts they do put out some good stuff daily. But I think they missed the point with this story about subway stations being wired for cellular phones. Obviously wiring subways for cell phones is a bad idea because terrorists can now use them to set off bombs in the trains. It also makes for a perfect place to make covert calls, just jump on the train and bye-bye. I’m not paranoid, am I? Nope, just creative and so are some of our adversaries.

Consumer prices dropped in August. This makes the fifty basis point drop in the interest rate more palatable. Maybe the threat of moral hazard is ameliorated in this situation due to the mitigating factor of falling consumer prices, maybe not. But the bigger question is why do we need the Fed in the first place? Another day Grasshopper.

T. Boone Pickens predicts $100 oil in the future. I predict $1,000 gold in the future. He says nothing, I win.

Hugo Chavez wants an extra half hours sleep and now he gets it because he is king.

We can’t make nukes but we can put huge solar panels in space. That’s the answer for all our energy problems!

Maybe the biggest economic story in the coming decade is being totally ignored. Communist China will screw up it’s economy one way or the other. Here’s one way their doing it from Investor’s Business Daily:

Beijing froze prices of land, utilities, fuel and other goods that it controls through year-end, the gov’t said, amid mounting inflation concerns. The gov’t also urged private businesses to hold down prices during an upcoming holiday to promote China’s “development, reform and stability.” Inflation jumped to a multiyear high of 6.5% in Aug., raising concerns of social unrest.

Price controls never work. All it does is artificially increases the demand (because products are now cheaper people demand more) and artificially decreases the supply (because products are now cheaper people produce less). Oh, have fun you billions of poor Chinese because the rooster is coming home to roost, unfortunately for you. BigT

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