Wednesday, September 12, 2012

She is strong woman. She has faced a great deal of loss during these years.

My sincerest sympathies to all those in the State Department and to a very adept Hillary Clinton. 

She is always the coolest head in the room.

But, her losses have been significant; all the way from the earthquake in Haiti to Holbrooke and not this.

Her victories have been remarkable as well. 


Wednesday, September 12, 2012


NAYPYITAW (Reuters) - A law intended (click title to entry - thank you) to accelerate foreign investment in Myanmar will be signed soon by the president after pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi helped kill a clause that would have protected crony businessmen, a government minister said on Wednesday....


No one could predict the attack in Benghazi. No one can predict the impact of the internet. 

Libya is a dangerous place. These new governments are struggling with their own focus. In Egypt, the military tried to abandon the new President, so to think there is unified forces to protect USA interests is a bit unrealistic. The people venturing into these countries are brave. Extremely brave. There will come a moment in Libya when the people that did this are realized and found to have killed an ally. There will be regrets.

My sympathies to everyone involved.

There is mixed information in the Middle East press.

...The three Libyan officials who confirmed the deaths were deputy interior minister for eastern Libya Wanis Al-Sharaf; Benghazi security chief Abdel-Basit Haroun; and Benghazi city council and security official Ahmed Bousinia....

This was in Arab News, but, the facts are still muddled. In one paragraph it reports the Ambassador and three Americans are dead and then further on it states an official in Benghazi reports one American dead and one shot in the hand. That was all in the same article, so it would seem as though the official report of the incident is not clear. 

Most of the press in the Middle East does recognize the film however and believes that to be the reason for the attacks. There is also a consistency that Americans were the targets and no other ethnic group. That was in the Gulf News, etc.

And this from The Jordan Times where the King is moving forward with a parliamentary government.


Tunisian riot police (click title to entry - thank you) fire tear gas to disperse protesters during a demonstration against a film deemed offensive to Islam, outside the US embassy in Tunis, on Wednesday. A purported portrayal of the life of the Prophet Mohammad in the low-budget ‘Innocence of Muslims’ movie sparked protests in Egypt and violence in Libya that killed US Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three American officials (AFP photo)


Reuters | Sep 12, 2012 | 23:45 



...It was not immediately clear precisely how or where California-born ambassador Christopher Stevens was killed during the assault. Stevens was a key player when the Obama administration supported the anti-Qadhafi insurgency.
US consular staff were rushed to a safe house after the initial attack, Libya’s Deputy Interior Minister Wanis Sharif said. An evacuation plane with US commando units then arrived from Tripoli to evacuate them from the house.
“It was supposed to be a secret place and we were surprised the armed groups knew about it. There was shooting,” Sharif said. Two US personnel were killed there, he said. Two other people were killed at the main consular building and between 12 and 17 wounded....
It would seem the Ambassador and one other was killed within the consulate and the other two at the safe house. There is a surprise to the report by Wanis as to the knowledge of the militants knowing where the safe house existed.
Wanis was the one in the other news media stating there was only one killed at the consulate. Evidently, that might be the case, but the facts are still not completely clear.
No one can deny the widespread protests across the region occurred due to the film. It just is. If Libya is the exception, then why?

Sam Bacile, the maker of the movie is not in hiding (click here). The movie sounds like nothing but lies.

This is from Military.com. I agree with them. This Muslim and Islam stuff is out of line. Way out of line.


'Lawrence Of Arabia' Set for Re-release (click here)

Sep 10, 2012

United Press International/


"Lawrence of Arabia" will be re-released in U.S. theaters to mark the Oscar-winning epic's 50th anniversary, Fathom Events and Sony Pictures Entertainment said.
Directed by David Lean and starring Peter O'Toole, Omar Shariff, Claude Rains, Anthony Quinn and Alec Guinness, the digitally restored movie will be back on the big screen in select theaters Oct. 4.
The special anniversary screening will feature a pre-recorded introduction by Sharif, as well as newsreel footage showing the film's New York premiere and King Hussein visiting the set in Aqaba where he met Lean, O'Toole and producer Sam Spiegel as they were making the movie....
This is standard practice for a group of producers and directors that raise money to rejuvenate very old film. So, this is nothing but STATUS QUO for the movie industry. It is the movie's 50th anniversary. This would have occurred anyway whether or not the USA was engaged in the Middle East.

The film make defaming the Islamic faiths should be ridiculed and removed from circulation. I haven't seen it and I don't want to see it. I am confident it is nothing but lies.

Romney backs dictators.



The Former Governor has extended his lack of knowledge of foreign affairs.


There is a 'mind speak' among the political right wing that ALLOWING the over throw of dictators is adverse to the interests of the USA. These events are suppose to illustrate why it was wrong for the USA to stop the slaughter by Gaddafi of his own citizens in Benghazi. There is a lot to that, but, primarily the idea that Iraq was the best idea going and anytime the USA intervenes it should be with boots on the ground. The USA interest, of course, is oil.

That aside, Mitt Romney has now proven he has no working understanding of the delicate nature of such events. He simply plowed right into it.

Secretary Clinton is correct, in that no violence is justified. Absolutely, but, there are mitigating circumstances in the Middle East among new democracies that cause these reactions. The USA has a responsibility to those abroad. While I agree with the Secretary without reservation, there is also a very dangerous circumstance resulting for those devoted to peace through diplomacy when such hatred is expressed from within the boarder of the USA. It appears as though Muslim faiths are not safe in the world. 

One cannot discount the illegal invasion into Iraq as a hostile act by the USA. Our diplomats within Iraq also were oppressive to newspapers, etc. Our troops were ordered to fire on a beloved Mosque at one time. These things are not forgotten. So, the perception of the USA actually seeking equal freedoms for other countries is always in question to many within the Middle East.

There is an element to the Muslim faith (I will address that later.) that needs tempering in the Middle East and it is the free lancing of violence, however, asking a country newly liberated like Libya to stem that impetus to action is more than difficult. Libya's people are still on the defensive and there is every indication those seeking this violence are still parts of the old regime. Determining the people involved is important.

But, when it comes to promoting democracy Mr. Romney has to ask himself whom's side he is on. Either a country, like the USA, that stipulates democracy is important to all people and not just 'select people' believes in the populous that seek liberation from dictatorships, regardless, of how benevolent the dictator seems through the eyes of the USA. 

Politically, in the USA, reaction from the right wing is through the eyes of acting through military intervention to maintain what 'has existed.' That is not an option. If the USA enforces dictatorships for its own convenience, then it is in 'passive occupation' of the country in question. That is not sovereign to the people of that nation.

What occurred in Benghazi, in my opinion, was well thought out. It was well armed and it did not occur with government troops. This is not an act of war against the USA. This is free lanced violence by elements within Libya attempting to destabilize a fragile peace. Evidently, there are idiots in the USA willing to play to that outcome as well.

I have to wonder if the State Department and USA military sees this as something that would have happened anyway and the inflammatory video was simply an excuse. Tricky question no one has the answer to yet. There are still munitions throughout Libya from the rebellion, a spontaneous act of violence could be organized due to a hate video. Hopefully, the investigation to how this occurred will be through and in respect of those that died; it will be truthful for the outcome our diplomats would expect.


Romney claims Obama sympathizes with attack on U.S. (click title to entry - thank you)

With four American diplomats dead in Libya, including U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, the United States has in effect come under attack overseas. The response of the Mitt Romney campaign has been to accuse the Obama administration of sympathizing with the attackers.
That charge is grotesque. It is also factually incorrect. It can be made correct only by going back in time and rearranging events to suit the Romney narrative, and that is not going to happen. Let’s take a look at how the tragic events in question played out:...

This is not the first time Terry Jones is responsible for other's deaths.

Terry Jones, in Florida, where he supervised the burning of the Qur'an by a fellow pastor, Wayne Sapp, on 20 March 2011







Photograph: Chip Litherland/Polaris/eyevine

This is NOT freedom of religion. It is oppression. To begin Jones is not a recognized pastor of any major faith. His designation as pastor is legal, not ordained. So, in fact, his ? church ? is actually a protest movement. He hides behind the 'church' designation to allow himself and his parishioners escapes from the law and litigation. That is not a church, it is abuse of the rights afforded Americans in the USA Constitution.

Jones is yelling fire where there is no fire. He is creating hate. Hate speech is not free either. If someone states, "I will kill (a person's name)," as in a fit of passion, that is considered serious enough to find itself into a court of law in many states. If a person forces another into suicide that will be prosecuted. So, this disaster of the abuse of American law called Terry Jones should be in prison.

Friday 1 April 2011 11:54  EDT


....Provincial police (click title to entry - thank you) spokesman Sherjan Durrani said the demonstrators poured out of mosques in the city in the early afternoon, shortly after Friday prayers where worshippers had been angered by reports that a Florida pastor had burned a copy of the Qur'an.
Last year Terry Jones, a US fundamentalist Christian leader, did threaten to burn copies of the Muslim holy book. He backed down after warnings that Islamic opinion around the world could be inflamed and the lives of US troops in Afghanistan and Iraq endangered.
But on 21 March Wayne Sapp set light to a Qur'an with Jones standing by.
Durrani said that while most protesters were peaceful, others were seeking targets to attack, including shops and the UN compound.
Whatever the final death toll, the incident is seen as a disaster for the UN, coming just over a week after the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, announced that Mazar-e-Sharif would be one of the first areas of the wartorn country to be transferred from Nato to Afghan government security control....

Today Jones racked up another one; this time it is the USA and the United Nations that is the subject of rage due to an irreverent American.


J. Christopher Stevens, U.S. Ambassador to Libya, who was killed in an attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, eastern Libya, on Sept. 11, 2012. (State Department)



(CBS/AP) Libyan officials said Wednesday that U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens was among four Americans killed in an attack by Muslim protesters on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi the previous evening.
"I do condemn the cowardly act of attacking the US consulate and the killing of Mr Stevens and the other diplomats," Deputy Prime Minister Mustafa Abushagur said on his Twitter account. "Amb. Stevens was a friend of Libya and we are shocked at the attacks on the U.S. consulate."
Abushagur said in a subsequent tweet: "I condemn these barbaric acts in the strongest possible terms. This is an attack on America, Libya and free people everywhere."
Only one death had been verified Tuesday night by U.S. officials, and the State Department had yet to confirm Stevens' death or the two others first reported Wednesday morning by the Reuters news agency. CBS News is seeking confirmation from U.S. officials.
The U.S. Embassy in Libya, in the capital city of Tripoli, would say Wednesday only that officials were still gathering information on the attack in Benghazi, which an official called an "intense battle".
Wanis al-Sharef, an Interior Ministry official in Benghazi, said a total of four Americans were killed when the angry mob, which gathered to protest a U.S.-made film that ridicules Islam's Prophet Muhammad, fired guns and burned down the U.S. consulate in Benghazi....
This is what leadership has come to, Twitter accounts, to influence the mob. I think societies are back to the Greek Colosseum.

In the military, the USA would not tolerate burning of a Quran because a soldier has power over others through munitions. We later saw that when another stalked a family residence in Afghanistan killing innocent people helpless to protect themselves. Terry Jones should not be allowed to continue his hate speech, especially when a video can impose this response. He needs to be prosecuted.

His complete hate of the Muslim faith is clearly illustrated by the burning of the holy book. So, now he is evangelizing his hate on video. 

Hate is oppression. Hate is intended to suppress freedom. 

It is time to call it as it is rather than as some would like to think of such expression of hate. 

I have no doubt the political right wing will defend his practices as necessary and part of the First Amendment. Let them. Let them garner all the support for hate they want. They will be viewed as what they really are, political mainstays of Republican power sought after for votes. They taint the American landscape with hate and are pandered to by the political right wing. 

It is time to end the hate speech of Terry Jones. The translation of his actions into actual deaths abroad is confirmed. He is killing people. In Rwanda that type of hate went to the World Courts. Using media to propagate hate is documented and people are jailed when it leads to deaths. It is time to hold him responsible.