Terence P. Jeffrey on the role of secular, messianic foreign policies in pushing Christians out of Middle East

Via Terry Jeffrey of CNSNews.com:

.....In our time, Christianity could be driven from some of the lands where it first took root.

If that dark and epochal moment comes, some of the blame for it must be pinned on the messianic foreign policies pursued by our most recent two presidents, George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
.....[Bush] expressed his evangelical zeal for this secular cause in his second inaugural address.

Saying Lincoln Freed the Slaves is Like Saying Obama Ended the War in Iraq

Saying Lincoln freed the slaves is like saying Obama ended the war in Iraq.

Truth be told...

...Lincoln never thought blacks to be equal and once said that if he could "save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it."

Myth #1: Lincoln invaded the South to free the slaves. Ending slavery and racial injustice is not why the North invaded. As Lincoln wrote to Horace Greeley on Aug. 22, 1862: "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it"
Congress announced to the world on July 22, 1861, that the purpose of the war was not "interfering with the rights or established institutions of those states" (i.e., slavery), but to preserve the Union "with the rights of the several states unimpaired."

Myth #3: Lincoln championed equality and natural rights. His words and, more important, his actions, repudiate this myth. "I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races," he announced in his Aug. 21, 1858, debate with Stephen Douglas. "I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position." And, "Free them [slaves] and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this. We cannot, then, make them equals."
In Springfield, Ill., on July 17, 1858, Lincoln said, "What I would most desire would be the separation of the white and black races." On Sept. 18, 1858, in Charleston, Ill., he said: "I will to the very last stand by the law of this state, which forbids the marrying of white people with Negroes."

 Lincoln supported the Illinois Constitution, which prohibited the emigration of black people into the state, and he also supported the Illinois Black Codes, which deprived the small number of free blacks in the state any semblance of citizenship. He strongly supported the Fugitive Slave Act, which compelled Northern states to capture runaway slaves and return them to their owners. In his First Inaugural he pledged his support of a proposed constitutional amendment that had just passed the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives that would have prohibited the federal government from ever having the power "to abolish or interfere, within any State, with the domestic institutions thereof, including that of persons held to labor or service by the laws of said State." In his First Inaugural Lincoln advocated making this amendment "express and irrevocable."

Lincoln was also a lifelong advocate of "colonization" or shipping all black people to Africa, Central America, Haiti--anywhere but here. "I cannot make it better known than it already is," he stated in a Dec. 1, 1862, Message to Congress, "that I strongly favor colonization." To Lincoln, blacks could be "equal," but not in the United States.

...And President Obama lobbied the Iraq government to stay in longer but got booted out.

The last U.S. troops left Iraq in December 2011, while Barack Obama was president, but the “status of forces agreement” that governed the departure of U.S. troops was actually negotiated between Iraqi and U.S. officials in late 2008, under the auspices of President George W. Bush.  In fact, none other than the Huffington Post actually pointed out that as president, Obama was actually interested in keeping troops in Iraq past the agreed-upon 2011 deadline, explaining that “the president ultimately had no choice but to stick to candidate Obama's plan -- thanks, of all things, to an agreement signed by George W. Bush.” Just six months before the Bush deadline, Obama tried to foist 10,000 U.S. troops on the Iraqis past 2011.

So Republicans and Democrats are being disingenuous when they say these men did these things.

Reagan's Homeboy: His Legacy Stinks

I really enjoyed writing this article. Here's an excerpt:

The former budget director under President Ronald Reagan said something you don’t hear often from people who have worked under Reagan or from conservative politicians.  That is, that the conservative idol and oft-referred to leader of a bygone era left a “horrible legacy.”

“The thing that came out of the Reagan era, which really was a horrible legacy, was the notion that deficits didn’t matter and the rationalization that we were only trying to starve the beast and if the deficit got big enough or persistent enough or extended far enough in time, surely they would wake up and shrink the government,” said David Stockman, former Director of the Office of Management and Budget from 1981-1985, at the Cato Institute Wednesday.

 Read More: Former Reagan Official: "Reagan Era Was A Horrible Legacy" || Politic365

The chief and most original insight is his analysis of Reagan's defense build up and its connection to the Iraq war of the 1990s. I never heard anything like it before this lecture. It's pure gold. Read it for yourself.

Bill Maher Real Time 'The Israelis Are Controlling Our Government'

Bill Maher points out that Chuck Hagel received so much opposition from right-wing Republican senators, even though he is a right-wing Republican that voted for the Iraq War, Afghanistan War, the PATRIOT act, and Department of Homeland Security -- and yet Republicans still didn't want the guy as Department of Defense Secretary.

"He's a right-wing republican and that's not good enough?" Maher asked.

Two explanations immediately come to mind: (1) The Maher explanation: Republicans filibustered Obama's nominee for Defense Secretary simply because he's Obama's nominee, and (2)You just aren't allowed to question Israel. (Other explanations do come to mind)

I always wanted to know from Hagel although he voiced criticism against certain policies and yet he always voted with the Republican party on the above-listed issues will he always go along with Obama's policy despite having personal objections to the policy.

This raises serious issues if you don't like Obama's policies. Why would you confirm a Secretary of Defense who spent all his political career going with the flow?

Hagel's criticism's, of course, do deeply trouble Republicans because they are out of line with Republican foreign relations orthodoxy. Why should the guy who is critical of establishment policy--which ironically is generally shared by the President--be put in the position to make policy and influence policy?

Buchanan: Why y'all all 'wee-weed up over Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?"

Pat Buchanan asks:

How is America, with thousands of strategic and tactical nuclear weapons, scores of warships in the Med, Persian Gulf, Arabian Sea and Indian Ocean, bombers and nuclear subs and land-based missiles able to strike and incinerate Iran within half an hour, threatened by Iran?

I don't know. You tell me Pat.

Iran has no missile that can reach us, no air force or navy that would survive the first days of war, no nuclear weapons, no bomb-grade uranium from which to build one. All of her nuclear facilities are under constant United Nations surveillance and inspection.

Say what?

Yet, according to the Christian Science Monitor, Bibi first warned in 1992 that Iran was on course to get the bomb — in three to five years! And still no bomb.

Yup, I blogged about that article in 2011.

And Bibi has since been prime minister twice. Why has our Lord Protector not manned up and dealt with Iran himself?

Answer: He wants us to do it — and us to take the consequences.

 Bibi's vision: U.S. as aggressor and the fall guy.

Shia Iran has influence in Iraq because we invaded Iraq, dethroned Sunni Saddam, disbanded his Sunni-led army that had defeated Iran in an eight-year war and presided over the rise to power of the Iraqi Shia majority that now tilts to Iran. Today’s Iraq is a direct consequence of our war, our invasion, our occupation.

Buchanan: Infantile Conservatism || Human Events

[Editor's Note: I took liberty with the quote in the headline. Pat's statement which I quoted from isn't in a form of a question.]

Patrick Buchanan on Ron Paul in 2007: He is "no TV debater" but "was speaking intolerable truths"

Ron Paul is no TV debater. But up on that stage in Columbia, he was speaking intolerable truths. Understandably, Republicans do not want him back, telling the country how the party blundered into this misbegotten war.

Patrick Buchanan, But Who Was Right -- Rudy or Ron?

Our Fear of Iran-Iraq Shiite Government Partnership Makes Perfect Sense

So let me get this straight:

(1) We invaded Iraq to depose Saddam Hussein, a Sunni Muslim, who suppressed the Shiite minority over the years.
(2) We are now scared that the Shiite-led government will collaborate with the Shiite Government of Iran.

That makes perfect sense.

According to the Daily Telegraph:

Lt Gen Firouzabadi added that Iran was now "ready to expand its military and security ties with Iraq."

It continues:

US analysts have expressed concern that Iran could exploit the vacuum left by the US withdrawal to bolster links with Iraq's Shiite-led government.

New readers, please note the irony.