Obama Warns Israel It Will Face Isolation If It Refuses U.S. Peace Plan

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When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the White House tomorrow, President Barack Obama will tell him that his country could face a bleak future — one of international isolation and demographic disaster — if he refuses to endorse a U.S.-drafted framework agreement for peace with the Palestinians. Obama will warn Netanyahu that time is running out for Israel as a Jewish-majority democracy. And the president will make the case that Netanyahu, alone among Israelis, has the strength and political credibility to lead his people away from the precipice.

In an hourlong interview Thursday in the Oval Office, Obama, borrowing from the Jewish sage Rabbi Hillel, told me that his message to Netanyahu will be this: “If not now, when? And if not you, Mr. Prime Minister, then who?” He then took a sharper tone, saying that if Netanyahu “does not believe that a peace deal with the Palestinians is the right thing to do for Israel, then he needs to articulate an alternative approach.” He added, “It’s hard to come up with one that’s plausible.”

Unlike Netanyahu, Obama will not address the annual convention of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a pro-Israel lobbying group, this week — the administration is upset with Aipac for, in its view, trying to subvert American-led nuclear negotiations with Iran. In our interview, the president, while broadly supportive of Israel and a close U.S.-Israel relationship, made statements that would be met at an Aipac convention with cold silence
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Obama was blunter about Israel’s future than I’ve ever heard him. His language was striking, but of a piece with observations made in recent months by his secretary of state, John Kerry, who until this interview, had taken the lead in pressuring both Netanyahu and the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, to agree to a framework deal. Obama made it clear that he views Abbas as the most politically moderate leader the Palestinians may ever have. It seemed obvious to me that the president believes that the next move is Netanyahu’s.

“There comes a point where you can’t manage this anymore, and then you start having to make very difficult choices,” Obama said. “Do you resign yourself to what amounts to a permanent occupation of the West Bank? Is that the character of Israel as a state for a long period of time? Do you perpetuate, over the course of a decade or two decades, more and more restrictive policies in terms of Palestinian movement? Do you place restrictions on Arab-Israelis in ways that run counter to Israel’s traditions?”

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Ukrainian PM Warns: ‘We Are On The Brink Of Disaster’

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Photo Credit: Getty, APIgniting a tense standoff, Russian forces surrounded a Ukrainian army base Sunday just as the country began mobilizing its military in response to the surprise Russian takeover of the Crimean Peninsula.

Outrage over Russia’s tactics mounted in world capitals, with Secretary of State John Kerry calling on President Vladimir Putin to pull back from “an incredible act of aggression.” Fearing that Europe’s borders were being rewritten by force, world leaders rushed to find a diplomatic solution to reverse what had already happened on the ground: Russia had captured the Black Sea peninsula on Saturday without firing a shot.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said there was no reason for Russia to invade Ukraine and warned: “We are on the brink of disaster.”

“We believe that our western partners and the entire global community will support the territorial integrity and unity of Ukraine,” he said Sunday in Kiev.

NATO held an emergency meeting in Brussels, Britain’s foreign minister flew to Kiev to support its new government and the U.S., France and Britain debated the possibility of boycotting the next Group of Eight economic summit, being held in June at Sochi, the host of Russia’s successful Winter Olympics.

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What Gutting the U.S. Military Means

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Photo Credit: JTF GuantanamoWhen I was growing up in a Midwestern farming village, several World War I, World War II, and Korean War vets lived there. As a teenager, I worked for some of those men. I was struck by their opinions about military strength. They unanimously supported a strong military and rued America’s military weakness before December 7th, 1941.

Years later I visited the National World War II Museum in New Orleans. The museum’s first exhibit shows the relative size of America’s military and those of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan prior to Pearl Harbor. That exhibit consists of plastic figurines intended to depict the size of the three nations’ armed forces.

The exhibit’s message is simple: relative to the armed forces of either Nazi Germany or Imperial Japan — let alone both — the U.S. military’s size was incredibly tiny. Viewing that exhibit, one wonders how America won against such odds, even allowing for the fact that we had allies.

The disparity between America’s military preparedness prior to Pearl Harbor and that of Hitler’s Germany or Hirohito’s Japan was not limited to numbers. Thanks largely to Congress’ niggardly funding of our military during the 1920s and 1930s, there were qualitative weaknesses of our tanks, naval torpedoes, and warplanes. Sadly, public opinion during those decades buttressed Congress’ stinginess vis-à-vis the military.

No one should underestimate U.S. military personnel’s valor. American soldiers, marines, sailors, and airmen were as good as or better than those they met on the ground, on the sea, or in the air.

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Lois Lerner to Finally Testify Before Congress According to Rep. Darrel Issa

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Photo Credit: PoliticoLois Lerner, the former IRS official involved with the Washington scandal regarding the alleged targeting of conservative groups, will finally testify before the United States Congress in the coming week. The announcement about Lois Lerner’s participation in the investigation was revealed by Rep. Darrell Issa who is a Republican from California, according to a UPI report on Sunday.

Lerner is the former government official who refused to testify under subpoena back in May of last year regarding her participation in the alleged misconduct of targeting conservative groups that had been seeking tax-exempt status from the IRS. The scandal arose when it was learned by the United States Treasury Department’s inspector general that many groups with the terms “Tea Party” or “patriot” in their names were given special review before the tax exemption was given.

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NJ Gun Law Critic Targeted By State Police 72 Hours Prior To Hearing (+video)

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Photo Credit: Ammolandis breaking that an outspoken critic of New Jersey’s draconian gun laws is being actively targeted with an arrest warrant issued by the New Jersey State Police.

With less then 72 hours before a scheduled Law and Public Safety Committee Hearing on Assembly Bill A2006, a New Jersey proposed law to limit magazine capacity to a maximum of ten rounds of ammunition. Additionally the Assembly Bill A2006 would ban more than 30 models of common .22 plinking rifles. Is it coincidental that the New Jersey State Police should suddenly find need to issue a warrant for Mr. Kaleda’s arrest only days before he would be expected to appear and testify at this type of hearing?

James Kaleda, is a well known outspoken critic of New Jersey gun laws and New Jersey Assembly abuses of parliamentary procedure. Mr. Kaleda was famously thrown out of a similar hearing last year by Democrat George Norcross for being “Out of Order“. Today via social media Mr. Kaleda revealed that he received a phone call from the New Jersey State Police that a warrant has been issued for his arrest over allegations of falsifying portions of an application for a New Jersey Non-Resident Firearms Owner ID Card.

Mr. Kaleda was understandably and wisely reluctant to say exactly what the allegations were when I spoke to him, but he did acknowledge that the State Police contacted him approximately two weeks ago and suggested there was a problem with his paperwork and offered an opportunity to “come in and make corrections”. Mr. Kaleda declined, correctly deducing that presenting himself to make such changes would be viewed as an implicit acknowledgement of actually committing the offense of falsifying the document, essentially admitting to guilt of a technical violation.

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Marco Rubio: Russia is a Government of ‘Liars’

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Photo Credit: AP Photo/Ivan SekretarevSen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said Russia cannot be trusted to fulfill its international commitments because their government lies on a regular basis and is “increasingly behaving like an enemy of international peace and international norms.”

Appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Rubio reacted to Russia’s Friday invasion of the Crimea region of Ukraine by calling the Russian government “liars” that the U.S. cannot trust.

“Let’s call it what it is,” Rubio said. “They are lying – this government is a government of liars, the Russian government. You see what’s happening now in Crimea. I mean, they’re claiming they’re not there. You’ve got these individuals showing up in unmarked uniforms, wearing masks, but clearly they’re Russian troops, even if they refuse to acknowledge it.”

He also said Secretary of State John Kerry has given the Russian government too much credit for cooperating in recent years on international agreements.

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Anti-Obama Street Art Hits Oscars: ‘Oczars’

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Photo Credit: Breitbart A rogue street artist has ambushed the 86th Academy Awards with a slew of street art posters poking fun at President Barack Obama and the Oscars. The posters, of unknown origin, feature the Oscar statue with Vladimir Lenin’s head and the title “OCZARS,” referring to the proliferation of “czars”–powerful officials with no congressional oversight–in the Obama administration. The “O” is the Obama campaign’s familiar symbol.

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North Carolina School Board Votes to Keep Controversial Book in High School Curriculum

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Photo Credit: James SarmientoA North Carolina school board will keep in its high school curriculum a book that tackles abortion, torture, rape and prostitution.

The Watauga County school board voted 3-2 on Thursday to keep Isabel Allende’s “The House of the Spirits” in the curriculum after the mother of a sophomore at Watauga High read the book assigned to her son and asked teachers to ban it, Fox 8 reported, citing the Winston-Salem Journal.

The vote follows a five-month controversy over the novel, a New York Times bestseller, which is recommended by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction as part of the Common Core curriculum.

“Parents need and deserve an opt-out if they don’t want their children to read this particular book,” said board member Brenda Reese, who added she has read the book twice since the challenge first came up in October. “But I don’t feel like we should pull this book from the class.”

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Movement to End Solitary Confinement Gains Force

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Photo Credit: NBCIn the small, dark world of solitary confinement, an inmate’s basic needs can go neglected for months — and many are starting to wonder for what purpose.

For Jan Green, 52, who spent eight months sleeping on a thin mat on the floor of a New Mexico jail cell about 7 feet wide and 7 feet long, being in isolation meant no access to basic necessities like sanitary napkins. It meant no exercise, no human contact, no medicine, and barely any running water.

“I had a metal toilet and sink, and couldn’t get the water to work properly, so I rarely could wash my hands or get a drink of water or brush my teeth,” said Green, who landed behind bars on domestic violence charges — charges that were ultimately dismissed.

Green was in solitary confinement at the Valencia County Detention Center in Los Lunas, N.M., where she says a nurse failed to report her psychiatric problems and corrections officers refused to give her any time out of her single-window cement block, day after day. (Standard treatment for solitary inmates includes one to two hours each day outside of their cells.)

Last month, Green, who has been out of jail since February 2012, settled a lawsuit with Valencia County for $1.6 million. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder before her arrest, she said her time in solitary pushed her into a state of psychosis that still haunts her from time to time, despite receiving treatment after getting out.

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Kunming Knife Attack: Xinjiang Separatists Blamed for ‘Chinese 9/11’

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Photo Credit: APChina’s president, Xi Jinping, has called for “all-out efforts” to bring to justice the black-clad assailants who killed 29 people with knives and machetes in a bloody terrorist attack in the south-western city of Kunming on Saturday night.

Officials blamed Xinjiang separatists for the frenzied violence at a crowded train station. Witnesses described fleeing in fear as the assailants hacked at people apparently at random. Graphic photographs of the aftermath showed bodies lying in pools of blood.

One of the 130 survivors injured in the incident described fleeing in terror as a man lashed out with a long knife, nicking his scalp. “I was terrified … they attacked us like crazy swordsmen, and mostly they went for the head and the shoulders, those parts of the body to kill,” 20-year-old student Wu Yuheng told Reuters as he lay on a bed in a corridor of the Kunming Number One People’s hospital.

Xi urged security officials to “severely punish in accordance with the law the violent terrorists and resolutely crack down on those who have been swollen with arrogance,” state news agency Xinhua said. He added: “Understand the serious and complex nature of combating terrorism … Go all out to maintain social stability.”

It is the first time people from the north-western region have been accused of such a major and organised attack outside its borders, despite rising unrest there in recent years. Many of its Uighur ethnic group, who are Muslim and Turkic-speaking, chafe at Chinese policies and a smaller number want an independent state.

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