Is McCain Losing It ?

So now we hear McCain rant,  Russia must pay, Russia must pay, Russia must pay.  What world is he living in?

America faces a number of foreign policy problems.  There's North Korea.  There's Taiwan and China.  There's China declaring that the South China Seas beings to them.  There's Russia messing around in Ukraine, There's Crimea. There's the Syrian refugees.  There's the war on ISIS and on radical Islam.  And, on and on and on.  And, McCain wants to push it all aside with the idea that what Russia did when they hacked the DNC was our biggest problem.  What world is he living in?

Putin plays chess and McCain's focused on tidily winks.  Goal No. 1 for America is to have the nations of the world take America seriously.  Our reputation has been shredded by Obama's misbegotten policies.  The damage he's done will not heal overnight.  McCain's desperate cry of "Russia must pay" make us look pathetic.

We did nothing when Putin pulled chunks off of Georgia.  We did nothing when he took Crimea away from Ukraine.  As an American, it embarrasses me even to mention Obama's red lines.  And, how could we permit Assad to drop barrel bombs on innocent Syrians and not declare a no-fly zone.  (This was before the Russians had even entered the conflict on the side of Assad, a man we said, "must go.")   McCain now wishes to inconvenience the Russians?  What's he trying to accomplish?

The Russians and the Turks hammered out a truce covering that area of Syria in which they were most interested.  Note:  They did it without a whole lot of Russian boots on the ground.  Obama and Kerry weren't even invited to be a part of the negotiations in spite of America's involvement in the Syrian conflict.  But, McCain is now thinking he's going to punish the Russians?

And, what crime did the Russians commit for which McCain now wishes to punish them?  Hacking into the DNC?  Hacking is a part of life in this cyber age.  But, need I mention, that safeguards do exist.  Our military, as I understand it, is well aware of the threat of cyber attacks.  Banks, computer companies and other important segments of our country are aware of it.  And, they've worked to establish safeguards against it.  It seems the only ones who didn't take the threat seriously was the DNC.  Be that as it may, Hillary didn't lose because of the Russians exposing  her game.  But, really!  For her carelessness, she deserved to lose.

The latest chapter in this theater of the absurd is the hacking that is alleged to have taken place in power plants in Vermont.  Was any damage done?  No.  Did the Russians do it?  Maybe.  But each and everyone of our enemies with the ability to do this kind of hacking is going to try.  And probably already has.  They're not looking to do any damage at this time.  But in the event of war, destroying America's energy grid would become a prime objective.  America must stop waggling a finger, and instead begin to protect its grid system and other key portions of its infrastructure.

Hey, McCain, Give Trump A Chance

Foreign policy under Obama has been a disaster.  Okay, Republicans, we all agree.  So, let's not act stupid now -- especially you, John McCain.  And, yes, you too Lindsey Graham.

So you guys now want to punish Putin for hacking the Democratic National Committee.  And, horror of horrors, for using the information they collected to embarrass Hillary, thereby tilting the election  in Trump's favor?

If Putin actually did what they say -- and as far as I'm concerned, that's still an open question -- Putin was being even more stupid than you guys.  Not because Putin should have foreseen that he might get caught, but because he should have seen that he was acting against Russia's own best interests.  As I see it, trying to look at the matter from Russia's point of view, it would be in Russia's interest to try to weaken the U.S. as much as possible.  That, as I see it, would have meant tilting the election over to Hillary.

Had she won, the division between blacks and whites, Latinos, the young, the police, etc. etc. would have been exacerbated.  Our military would continue to have been weakened.  Her social programs, not to mention her environmental policies, would have gutted our economy, and on, and on, and on. If Putin really did succeed in tilting the election in Trump's favor, we should applaud him not punish him.

I am being facetious -- but only a little bit.  The larger lesson is that it's time to face the realities of cyberspace.  We have to grow up.  Cyberspace can do a whole lot of good.  But, it can also be used in hurtful ways.  Why punish Russia?  Nations, to the extent they were able to get away with it, bugged one another.  That's common knowledge.  Why does anyone think that nations won't hack one another?

That doesn't have to prove fatal.  There are safety measures that can be taken.  And, that too is something that all nations know.  Out military knows it.  Other departments within the government know it.  (Or, they damn well ought to know it.)  To their own regret, it is something that the DNC overlooked and it appears the chief dummy, among many, was Hillary herself.  Indeed, if we don't try to hack our enemies there is something clearly wrong with us.

And so now McCain and Graham want to punish Russia!   To what end?   Is there the remotest possibility that this will alter Russia's behavior, or, for that matter, the behavior of any other nation that thinks it will serve their purpose to hack?   If you can tilt another nation's elections in your favor aren't you going to do it, or at least try?  Didn't Obama try to have Netanyahu defeated in elections over in Israel?

McCain is showing now the same kind of flawed judgement he showed when he accepted Sarah Palin as a running mate.  And, hey, McCain, I'm a Republican who once voted for you.

The Islamic Reformation -- When? Where? And, How?

In America, there have been conferences of Islamic scholars meeting under the rubric of Heretics and Heretical thought.  An insight into the sort of thinking aired in these conferences can be gleaned by reading, "What Is A Muslim Heretic," by Danial Matin Verisco.  I imagine my friends, reading material presented at such a conference, thinking, Muslims aren't really that different from me.  These people are introspective and charming and thoughtful.  But, then you'd stumble over the reality that these conferences would probably be possible nowhere except in the United States.

There are Muslims who, indeed,  want to create a caliphate and who take the Quran, the Sunnah, and the Hadith literally and who yearn for a day when Sharia rules supreme.  How can you institute reform when Wahhabism still rules the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, a country that has funded the construction of mosques throughout the world and has supplied Wahabbi imams to guide these mosques?  Wahhabis think of themselves as Salafists, people who practice Islam the way it was practiced in the days of Muhammed centuries ago.  But, you don't have to be a Saudi to be a Salafist.

Those among us who are less educated as to Islamic thought will posit a good Islam and a bad Islam The "bad" being Jihadists and the like.  This is false.  There is only one Islam.  It's just a matter of whether you take one lump of sugar or two.  It's still coffee.  Muslims have made no clear break from their Islamic fountainhead.

Jews no longer practice polygamy, although it was once a Jewish practice.  The Catholic Church no longer claims Jews murdered Christ, or burns heretics.  But, Muslims do still engage in polygamy and do still murder those who would insult Islam by drawing a figure of Muhammed or engage in other kinds behavior they find blasphemous.  And, that's the problem.

I don't think wiping out Salafist thought and Salafist ideals as found throughout the Islamic world is realistic.  But, I do think it is necessary to create zones of safety for Muslims who would stand for a modern form of Islam, one that could live in harmony with western culture.  And, I believe that only in America could such a school of Islam arise and flourish.

Many Muslims would argue that such Islamic thought has already emerged.  I would disagree.  I have perused "Islam for Idiots"  and nowhere is there mention of Sharia.  There is this pretense that Islamic practices that we would find abhorrent in our western culture can be understood as acceptable in other cultures.  This may have been true in an earlier day when the world was smaller, but not today.  The idea that mosques can, and should, be built throughout the world, but that no church is to be built in Saudi Arabia, the fountainhead of Salafist thought, is simply unacceptable.  The idea that one school of Islamic thought can find another school of Islamic thought impure and that this impurity can be expunged by murdering those found impure is unacceptable.

Until the various forms of Islamic thought and Islamic culture can live together in harmony, we, Muslims and non-Muslims, have a problem.  Until Kurdish Muslims and Shia Muslims, Saudi Muslims and Chechen Muslims, Iranian Muslims and Ahmadiyya can learn to live together and accept people with other religions as well as those who accept no religion we and the Muslim community will continue to have a problem.  I see no solution other than that a form of "reform" Islamic thought emerge, one capable of sweeping throughout the Islamic world.  And, I see no place on earth where this can begin other than in America.  Let heresy flourish and let it be a safe haven.

Dianne Feinstein and Wolf Blitzer on Russian Hacking

They hacked us. . .  they hacked us, cries Feinstain to Wolf.  We must show this to the American public.  We must place additional sanctions on Russia.  My parents came from Russia, I know how they are.  (And, this is a high-ranking Democrat Senator!)

Hacking among nations is a given in the world we now live in.  The British do it.  The Germans do it.  The Chinese do it.  The Israelis do it.  The North Koreans do it.  The Russians do it.  And, we do it too.  Any nation that doesn't do it is being irresponsible in terms of its own national interests.  And so, although I have absolutely no inside knowledge, I assume the Russians did hack the Dem Nat'l Committee.

Did they also hack the Republican Nat'l Committee?  According to Reince Prebus, the answer is no.
The RNC has safeguards on its computer system and they were never breached by hackers.  This leads us to our first important conclusion.  The RNC takes protecting its communications seriously.  The DNC does not.  I find this a powerful argument for denying to the Democratic Party the right to lead this nation in a world where any country can be the target of hacking.  Their carelessness was inexcusable.

If, as alleged, the Russians did hack the DNC, why were individual Democrats sending sensitive matters over an  internet they had failed to secure?  Did the Russians act any differently than we would have acted if the roles were reversed?

For me there is only one question.  Why did the Russians seek to undermine Hillary when she clearly would have been a so much easier president to hoodwink than the Trump people?

America's Deep Shame -- Aleppo

Americans seem to be always presented with false choices.  In the case of Iraq, people ask; should we really have gotten rid of Saddam Hussein.  Maybe we should have never invaded Iraq.  But, in fact, invading Iraq was not the problem.  The problem was the dismantling of the Baath Party.  Sure, the Baath Party was the instrument by which Hussein ruled Iraq.  So what?  Having gotten rid of Hussein, we could have installed one of his generals.

The Baath Party was what held Iraq together.  It was the entity that organized garbage collectors, teachers, policemen, utility workers, healthcare workers the military, tax collectors.  By eliminating the Baath Party, America totally destroyed Iraqi society.

Sure, Hussein's replacement would hardly have been someone infused with a democratic spirit.  However, he would have learned a valuable lesson; namely, that if you mess with the U.S., you'll meet the same fate as Hussein.  Also, we should have divided Iraq into thirds, a Kurdish third in the north, a Sunni third, below that, and a Shiite third at the bottom.  Didn't Joe Biden once make  such a suggestion?  Why didn't we learn anything from Yugoslavia?

But, it's the horror of Aleppo that will haunt America for generations.  Obama, America's Hamlet, drew a red line for Assad.  Cross this line, he said, and we will bomb you.  The line was drawn at using gas warfare.  Assad continued to use gas.  Obama did nothing.  What could he have done?  Bomb Assad?  Maybe, but he could have done something simpler; namely, create a no-fly zone over the area.

Actually, barrel bombs should have been included in the strategies to be denied to Assad.  These bombs did more harm to civilians than they did to combatants.  But, that's a fine point.  A no-fly zone would have taken care of both problems.

We didn't do it.  Our red line meant absolutely nothing.  We relied on a Russian promise that if we didn't bomb Assad, they'd get him to stop using gas.  It was an imperfect promise and on occasion Assad still used gas.

At that time, the Russians hadn't yet entered this theater.  Our creating a no-fly zone would not have been a challenge to the Russians.  However, once we agreed to the stupid deal we had made with them, the game was over.  To now create a no-fly zone -- now as the Russians were flying over Syria with their bombers, a no-fly zone would have indeed been a challenge to the Russians.

Result:  The Russians, Hezbollah, Assad's troops, and a few Iranians all joined forces to flatten Aleppo.  There was absolutely no regard as to the welfare of civilians.  Large number of noncombatants, women children and the wounded were murdered as they tried to escape the burning city.  Were we unaware of Assad's ruthlessness?  Did we not understand that Hezbollah hated Aleppo's Sunnis and were delighted to join in their massacre, something that also brought great pleasure to the Iranians?  Didn't we understand the game that the Russians were playing?

A city and it's inhabitants wiped out -- and all because of America's stupidity.