U.S. Foreign Policy

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

The bank most likely keeping this currency afloat.....'>.....

[Nonc Hilaire]

21 carat gold is not investment grade. MFF's Franklin Mint standard isn't too far off.

I wonder what the point of this is. Seems a bit much to be a simple provocation.

[Heracleum Persicum]

.


Napoleon : .. " I want to make an alliance with the Shah "


I always liked Bonaparte .. and .. " Der Perfide Engländer " at it again


If Napoleon had prevailed, world would be now a much better place .. No Hitler, No Zionism and many other NO


.

[Doc]

21 carat gold is not investment grade. MFF's Franklin Mint standard isn't too far off.

I wonder what the point of this is. Seems a bit much to be a simple provocation.

I am waiting for AZ to claim the world will adopt the ISIS Dinar of the world's reserve currency. By the looks of it the Franklin Mint has higher quality minted coins.

[Heracleum Persicum]

21 carat gold is not investment grade. MFF's Franklin Mint standard isn't too far off.

I wonder what the point of this is. Seems a bit much to be a simple provocation.

I am waiting for AZ to claim the world will adopt the ISIS Dinar of the world's reserve currency. By the looks of it the Franklin Mint has higher quality minted coins.

Am researching where those Dinars are minted .. prevailing sayin in Iran is those Dinars minted in London and Washington .. wouldn't surprise me

Look, Doc, you no foolin Ahmadinejat, NSA and CIA listening and readin everything and they did not know these criminals selling 1 million barrels of Oil to Turkish and Kurdish refineries ? ? ? 1 m barrel of oil is $ 80 m/DAY .. how is this paid ?

Come on

.

[Doc]

21 carat gold is not investment grade. MFF's Franklin Mint standard isn't too far off.

I wonder what the point of this is. Seems a bit much to be a simple provocation.

I am waiting for AZ to claim the world will adopt the ISIS Dinar of the world's reserve currency. By the looks of it the Franklin Mint has higher quality minted coins.

Am researching where those Dinars are minted .. prevailing sayin in Iran is those Dinars minted in London and Washington .. wouldn't surprise me

Look, Doc, you no foolin Ahmadinejat, NSA and CIA listening and readin everything and they did not know these criminals selling 1 million barrels of Oil to Turkish and Kurdish refineries ? ? ? 1 m barrel of oil is $ 80 m/DAY .. how is this paid ?

Ask Ibrahim.


Did you actually look at the pictures you posted? The ISIS mint needs some quality control.

[Endovelico]

The US, Canada and the Ukraine voted against this UN proposal:

Combating glorification of Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance

The EU countries abstained. Israel voted in favour.

Read it here:

http://www.mediafire.com/view/94n40m3x0 ... 460426.pdf

That's US foreign policy for you...

[Doc]

The US, Canada and the Ukraine voted against this UN proposal:

Combating glorification of Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance

The EU countries abstained. Israel voted in favour.

Read it here:

http://www.mediafire.com/view/94n40m3x0 ... 460426.pdf

That's US foreign policy for you...

I take it these are the sponsoring countries:

Belarus, Benin, Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Burkina Faso, Cuba, Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea, Kyrgyzstan, Namibia,
Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Russian Federation, Syrian Arab Republic,
Turkmenistan, United Republic of Tanzania and Venezuela (Bolivarian
Republic of): draft resolution

[Heracleum Persicum]

.


Shabtai Shavit, former director general of the Mossad : For the first time, I fear for the future of Zionism


The nation of Israel is galloping blindly toward Bar Kochba's war on the Roman Empire.
The result of that conflict was 2,000 years of exile.

From the beginning of Zionism in the late 19th century, the Jewish nation in the Land of Israel has been growing stronger in terms of demography and territory, despite the ongoing conflict with the Palestinians. We have succeeded in doing so because we have acted with wisdom and stratagem rather than engaging in a foolish attempt to convince our foes that we were in the right.

Today, for the first time since I began forming my own opinions, I am truly concerned about the future of the Zionist project. I am concerned about the critical mass of the threats against us on the one hand, and the government’s blindness and political and strategic paralysis on the other. Although the State of Israel is dependent upon the United States, the relationship between the two countries has reached an unprecedented low point. Europe, our biggest market, has grown tired of us and is heading toward imposing sanctions on us. For China, Israel is an attractive high-tech project, and we are selling them our national assets for the sake of profit. Russia is gradually turning against us and supporting and assisting our enemies.

Anti-Semitism and hatred of Israel have reached dimensions unknown since before World War II. Our public diplomacy and public relations have failed dismally, while those of the Palestinians have garnered many important accomplishments in the world. University campuses in the West, particularly in the U.S., are hothouses for the future leadership of their countries. We are losing the fight for support for Israel in the academic world. An increasing number of Jewish students are turning away from Israel. The global BDS movement (boycott, divestment, sanctions) against Israel, which works for Israel’s delegitimization, has grown, and quite a few Jews are members.

In this age of asymmetrical warfare we are not using all our force, and this has a detrimental effect on our deterrent power. The debate over the price of Milky pudding snacks and its centrality in public discourse demonstrate an erosion of the solidarity that is a necessary condition for our continued existence here. Israelis’ rush to acquire a foreign passport, based as it is on the yearning for foreign citizenship, indicates that people’s feeling of security has begun to crack.

I am concerned that for the first time, I am seeing haughtiness and arrogance, together with more than a bit of the messianic thinking that rushes to turn the conflict into a holy war. If this has been, so far, a local political conflict that two small nations have been waging over a small and defined piece of territory, major forces in the religious Zionist movement are foolishly doing everything they can to turn it into the most horrific of wars, in which the entire Muslim world will stand against us.

I also see, to the same extent, detachment and lack of understanding of international processes and their significance for us. This right wing, in its blindness and stupidity, is pushing the nation of Israel into the dishonorable position of “the nation shall dwell alone and not be reckoned among the nations” (Numbers 23:9).

I am concerned because I see history repeating itself. The nation of Israel is galloping blindly in a time tunnel to the age of Bar Kochba and his war on the Roman Empire. The result of that conflict was several centuries of national existence in the Land of Israel followed by 2,000 years of exile.

I am concerned because as I understand matters, exile is truly frightening only to the state’s secular sector, whose world view is located on the political center and left. That is the sane and liberal sector that knows that for it, exile symbolizes the destruction of the Jewish people. The Haredi sector lives in Israel only for reasons of convenience. In terms of territory, Israel and Brooklyn are the same to them; they will continue living as Jews in exile, and wait patiently for the arrival of the Messiah.

The religious Zionist movement, by comparison, believes the Jews are “God’s chosen.” This movement, which sanctifies territory beyond any other value, is prepared to sacrifice everything, even at the price of failure and danger to the Third Commonwealth. If destruction should take place, they will explain it in terms of faith, saying that we failed because “We sinned against God.” Therefore, they will say, it is not the end of the world. We will go into exile, preserve our Judaism and wait patiently for the next opportunity.

I recall Menachem Begin, one of the fathers of the vision of Greater Israel. He fought all his life for the fulfillment of that dream. And then, when the gate opened for peace with Egypt, the greatest of our enemies, he gave up Sinai – Egyptian territory three times larger than Israel’s territory inside the Green Line – for the sake of peace. In other words, some values are more sacred than land. Peace, which is the life and soul of true democracy, is more important than land.

I am concerned that large segments of the nation of Israel have forgotten, or put aside, the original vision of Zionism: to establish a Jewish and democratic state for the Jewish people in the Land of Israel. No borders were defined in that vision, and the current defiant policy is working against it.

What can and ought to be done? We need to create an Archimedean lever that will stop the current deterioration and reverse today’s reality at once. I propose creating that lever by using the Arab League’s proposal from 2002, which was partly created by Saudi Arabia. The government must make a decision that the proposal will be the basis of talks with the moderate Arab states, led by Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

The government should do three things as preparation for this announcement: 1) It should define a future negotiating strategy for itself, together with its position on each of the topics included in the Arab League’s proposal. 2) It should open a secret channel of dialogue with the United States to examine the idea, and agree in advance concerning our red lines and about the input that the U.S. will be willing to invest in such a process. 3) It should open a secret American-Israeli channel of dialogue with Saudi Arabia in order to reach agreements with it in advance on the boundaries of the topics that will be raised in the talks and coordinate expectations. Once the secret processes are completed, Israel will announce publicly that it is willing to begin talks on the basis of the Arab League’s document.

I have no doubt that the United States and Saudi Arabia, each for its own reasons, will respond positively to the Israeli initiative, and the initiative will be the lever that leads to a dramatic change in the situation. With all the criticism I have for the Oslo process, it cannot be denied that for the first time in the conflict’s history, immediately after the Oslo Accords were signed, almost every Arab country started talking with us, opened its gates to us and began engaging in unprecedented cooperative ventures in economic and other fields.

Although I am not so naïve as to think that such a process will bring the longed-for peace, I am certain that this kind of process, long and fatiguing as it will be, could yield confidence-building measures at first and, later on, security agreements that both sides in the conflict will be willing to live with. The progress of the talks will, of course, be conditional upon calm in the security sphere, which both sides will be committed to maintaining. It may happen that as things progress, both sides will agree to look into mutual compromises that will promote the idea of coexisting alongside one another. If mutual trust should develop – and the chances of that happening under American and Saudi Arabian auspices are fairly high – it will be possible to begin talks for the conflict’s full resolution as well.

An initiative of this kind requires true and courageous leadership, which is hard to identify at the moment. But if the prime minister should internalize the severity of the mass of threats against us at this time, the folly of the current policy, the fact that this policy’s creators are significant elements in the religious Zionist movement and on the far right, and its devastating results – up to the destruction of the Zionist vision – then perhaps he will find the courage and determination to carry out the proposed action.

I wrote the above statements because I feel that I owe them to my parents, who devoted their lives to the fulfillment of Zionism; to my children, my grandchildren and to the nation of Israel, which I served for decades.

Well, HAL 10000, Monster, Parodite .. told you so, this on a dead end street


.

[noddy]

The US, Canada and the Ukraine voted against this UN proposal:

Combating glorification of Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance

The EU countries abstained. Israel voted in favour.

Read it here:

http://www.mediafire.com/view/94n40m3x0 ... 460426.pdf

That's US foreign policy for you...

ahahha.

so how does all the crap i keep getting fed by you and azari about the zionists taking over america work then ?

[Endovelico]

so how does all the crap i keep getting fed by you and azari about the zionists taking over america work then ?

I can't imagine Israel daring to vote against such a motion, no matter how much they dislike the proponents. That's something else with the US. Sometimes I feel that's not the holocaust the US government objects to, but its target... Had it been Iranians or North Koreans, and the holocaust would have been simply branded "enhanced collateral damage"...

[Heracleum Persicum]

.


Hagel Forced to Step Down


.

[kmich]

.


Hagel Forced to Step Down


.

Hagel struggled with the incoherence of Obama’s national security policies and could only halfheartedly speak for them. His primary concern was the soldiers, sailors, and airmen his department led, and not the ambitions of politicians. He just did not fit in with the neocon restoration that Obama has led in response to the Syria/Iraq/ISIS debacles. So, Hagel had to be pushed out and declared privately as "not being up to the job." If Hillary Clinton gets elected, this restoration of war as a reflexive national response to the world will likely continue on steroids, although I doubt the nominated Republican candidate will be any different. No one is going to obtain or stay in power in this government without championing violence and preening exceptionalism as the primary MO that more blood and treasure will be spent on.

[Heracleum Persicum]

.


Hagel Forced to Step Down


.

Hagel struggled with the incoherence of Obama’s national security policies and could only halfheartedly speak for them. His primary concern was the soldiers, sailors, and airmen his department led, and not the ambitions of politicians. He just did not fit in with the neocon restoration that Obama has led in response to the Syria/Iraq/ISIS debacles. So, Hagel had to be pushed out and declared privately as "not being up to the job." If Hillary Clinton gets elected, this restoration of war as a reflexive national response to the world will likely continue on steroids, although I doubt the nominated Republican candidate will be any different. No one is going to obtain or stay in power in this government without championing violence and preening exceptionalism as the primary MO that more blood and treasure will be spent on.

The Neocons (and American electoral) need a "catastrophic" DEFEAT .. something like "escaping in choppers from that Saigon embassy rooftop" .. to understand world has changed .. unfortunately, until that date, lots of killing and blood spilling


.

[kmich]

.


Hagel Forced to Step Down


.

Hagel struggled with the incoherence of Obama’s national security policies and could only halfheartedly speak for them. His primary concern was the soldiers, sailors, and airmen his department led, and not the ambitions of politicians. He just did not fit in with the neocon restoration that Obama has led in response to the Syria/Iraq/ISIS debacles. So, Hagel had to be pushed out and declared privately as "not being up to the job." If Hillary Clinton gets elected, this restoration of war as a reflexive national response to the world will likely continue on steroids, although I doubt the nominated Republican candidate will be any different. No one is going to obtain or stay in power in this government without championing violence and preening exceptionalism as the primary MO that more blood and treasure will be spent on.

The Neocons (and American electoral) need a "catastrophic" DEFEAT .. something like "escaping in choppers from that Saigon embassy rooftop" .. to understand world has changed .. unfortunately, until that date, lots of killing and blood spilling.

We never learned a thing from the Vietnam debacle, other than how to hide and scapegoat policy failures, so it is unlikely we will learn from further defeats. War/sanctions/isolation efforts supported by self righteous lectures have become the habitual response of our state of Versailles on the Potomac and its preening courtiers.

Our state has no other way of responding no matter who is in power. Militarism has infected the culture too deeply and our republic is in serious decay. The only thing that would change matters would be a failure that we could not ignore, scapegoat, or rationalize, and that would have to be catastrophic.

[Heracleum Persicum]

.

Militarism has infected the culture too deeply.

The only thing that would change matters would be a failure that we could not ignore, scapegoat, or rationalize, and that would have to be catastrophic.

.

Unfortunately you right, kmich, you right

American JOE needs a catastrophic military, political, human DEFEAT which can not be "scapegoat" .. leading to a self-analysis of "American Culture" .. Joe must change, a lengthly process but must be

.

[Parodite]

The failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, impotently mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as the negative role in the Ukrainian crisis pretty much put the bag over the head of US foreign policy for the time being. It remains to be seen what lessons are learned if any.

[Doc]

The failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, impotently mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as the negative role in the Ukrainian crisis pretty much put the bag over the head of US foreign policy for the time being. It remains to be seen what lessons are learned if any.

Hagel just got fired. He was hired to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. SO I suppose the latest refrain is going to be "Its all Hagel's fault"

[Heracleum Persicum]

The failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, impotently mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as the negative role in the Ukrainian crisis pretty much put the bag over the head of US foreign policy for the time being. It remains to be seen what lessons are learned if any.

Lesson America learned from Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya etc , is, Joe thinking politicians (latest case Obama in Afghanistan) chickened out, did not drop enough bombs and did not kill enough .. Joe believin, otherwise things were winnable ..

Hagel just got fired. He was hired to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. SO I suppose the latest refrain is going to be "Its all Hagel's fault"

Rise of ISIS is directly fault of Hagel .. happened on his watch

America realized all those "free Syrian fighters" in reality ISIS fighters, West was arming and training ISIS terrorists .. Hagel missed this, asleep behind the wheel

Now, Assad is an ally again .. do you hear, lately, any complain from Assad ? ? NO .. he keeping "radio silence" .. meaning west now repent .. all those Arab allies of US and Turkey f*cked up

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/11/24 ... rive-back/

James George Jatras, former US Senate foreign policy analyst, made the remarks on Monday while commenting on Hagel’s resignation, which was reportedly taken under pressure.

“I think with his departure that those who are in favor of trying to remove [Syrian President Bashar] Assad will gather strength and that we will see some shift in that direction in the near future,” Jatras said.

He said that “one of the primary shifts may be on the question of Syria,” adding, “that’s not entirely clear at this point but that seems likely especially given what the confirmation process for a new secretary is going to look like in front of the Republican Senate.”

..

“There’s a great deal of speculation that Mr. Hagel was in fact forced out of the administration. I think this comes at a time when the Obama administration is facing failures on every front, in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine, and that some shakeup was perceived to be necessary,” Jatras said. “It’s unclear what direction that will take, but it seems one of the primary shifts may be on the question of Syria.”

“Several weeks ago Mr. Hagel sent a memo to Obama suggesting that they needed to clarify how they are going to look at the Assad regime [sic],” he noted.

Hagel was reportedly critical of the US war in Afghanistan and Washington’s strategy against the ISIL terrorist group in Iraq and Syria.

.

[Heracleum Persicum]

.


g1SUQ1qtdb0


CNN’s Amanpour show edits out criticism by visiting RT host


CNN Amanpour clashing with RT Anissa


Doc, can't stop laughing


.

[Doc]

.


g1SUQ1qtdb0


CNN’s Amanpour show edits out criticism by visiting RT host


CNN Amanpour clashing with RT Anissa


Doc, can't stop laughing


.

Yes Russia Today is quite laughable.

"We are Russia Today we are funded by the Kremlin"

[kmich]

The failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, impotently mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as the negative role in the Ukrainian crisis pretty much put the bag over the head of US foreign policy for the time being. It remains to be seen what lessons are learned if any.

Yes, but a couple of thoughts. The American attempting to shepherd a peace process with Israel has been the blind trying to lead the blind. Both nations share the same stupefying self righteousness and exceptionalism that are the toxic ingredients in the glue of the so-called "special relationship" that blinds both. Also, Europeans should not be self satisfied and complacent. If we go down we will be taking all our collaborators and enablers with us which will include them.

Yes Russia Today is quite laughable.

"We are Russia Today we are funded by the Kremlin"

True, RT has no credibility when it comes to issues that impact on the Kremlin and the Putin regime, although they have produced other material of interest and value in the past. Our own media outlets remain stenographers for our own government in spite of the partisan Sturm und Drang they try to entertain us with. They are not particularly credible either.

[Parodite]

The failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, impotently mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as the negative role in the Ukrainian crisis pretty much put the bag over the head of US foreign policy for the time being. It remains to be seen what lessons are learned if any.

Yes, but a couple of thoughts. The American attempting to shepherd a peace process with Israel has been the blind trying to lead the blind. Both nations share the same stupefying self righteousness and exceptionalism that are the toxic ingredients in the glue of the so-called "special relationship" that blinds both.

True, but that self rightiousness and exceptionalism alias supremacism extends to the other players in this conflict as well such as Hamas, Hizbollah, Islamic Jihad, their sponsors and cheerleading crowd of supporters. Many blind leading many blind. A paralympics for the mentally impared.

Also, Europeans should not be self satisfied and complacent. If we go down we will be taking all our collaborators and enablers with us which will include them.

History shows that there is little we can do to stop the various bastards.

[Typhoon]

The failures in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, impotently mediating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as well as the negative role in the Ukrainian crisis pretty much put the bag over the head of US foreign policy for the time being. It remains to be seen what lessons are learned if any.

Yes, but a couple of thoughts. The American attempting to shepherd a peace process with Israel has been the blind trying to lead the blind. Both nations share the same stupefying self righteousness and exceptionalism that are the toxic ingredients in the glue of the so-called "special relationship" that blinds both. Also, Europeans should not be self satisfied and complacent. If we go down we will be taking all our collaborators and enablers with us which will include them.

Yes Russia Today is quite laughable.

"We are Russia Today we are funded by the Kremlin"

True, RT has no credibility when it comes to issues that impact on the Kremlin and the Putin regime, although they have produced other material of interest and value in the past. Our own media outlets remain stenographers for our own government in spite of the partisan Sturm und Drang they try to entertain us with. They are not particularly credible either.

I recall that there used to be a running joke among my E European and (former) Soviet colleagues that

to learn everything that is wrong with the USSR, read the NY Times; and

to learn everything that is wrong with the USA, read Pravda.

The US shrill parochial partisan point scoring is certainly both tiresome and boring to a bemused outside observer.

On the other hand,

American Political Partisanship in Historical Perspective.

So, after both parties exhaust themselves, perhaps the pendulum will swing back to compromise.

[Heracleum Persicum]

.


Meet George W. Bush

.

With Chuck Hagel’s departure, Obama is turning into George W. Bush

In a cruel echo of history, Obama is morphing into the president whose foreign policy he campaigned to overturn. Obama on Monday morning sacked his Pentagon secretary, Chuck Hagel, after huge midterm election losses in the sixth year of his presidency — just as Bush did in sacking Donald Rumsfeld after midterm losses in the sixth year of his presidency.

..

The Republican former senator, a decorated veteran and the first enlisted man to hold the top job at the Pentagon, was brought in to help Obama wind down wars and to shrink the Pentagon. His strong ties to the military and his reluctance to use force (he had opposed the Iraq surge) made him an ideal man for the job, and his battle wounds from Vietnam gave him the moral authority to answer the chicken hawks who opposed the contraction of the military.

But now Islamic militants have taken over much of Iraq and Syria, and even Jimmy Carter has said the Obama administration was too slow in responding. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has begun to float the idea of ground troops. Even recovering isolationist Rand Paul has called for a declaration of war. Obama, whether he likes it or not, is going to need a Pentagon chief to oversee this war he doesn’t want to fight.

.

.