NO SURPRISE THAT OBAMA BELONGS TO THE MULTI-CULTI CULT
There was nothing particularly new about President Obama's remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast the other day. Not that it's unimportant. It's extremely important. But the unfortunate notion that all religions, and indeed all cultures, are morally equivalent has been with us a long time, and it's very fashionable. It's now the conventional liberal wisdom, as a matter of fact. Even Pope Francis is a member of the liberals' Multi-Culti Cult. I'm not going to dwell on the silly anachronisms and false parallels in the speech - Governor Jindal did it best, I think, when he told the president to relax about medieval Catholicism and focus his concerns on contemporary Islamism - but rather on what we're supposed to do when we encounter religious views that offend us, or seem threatening to us. Obama basically said we should just shut up. His remarks weren't made in a theoretical debate. They come shortly after the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris, and other barbaric acts in the name of radical Islam. They are part of the doctrine of multiculturalism or "multi-culti," which started as "culturalism," early in the last century.
THE PLATINUM VEGAS RENDEZVOUS XIV
EXPOSING WHO CAUSED THE GREAT RECESSION HAS THE PERPS HOPPING MAD
What do you think was the primary cause of the Great Recession -- too little government regulation ,or dictates by the government to banks and other mortgage lenders, requiring them to lend to the unqualified? Peter J. Wallison, former general counsel of the U.S. Treasury Department and White House counsel to President Reagan, who was also a member of the congressionally authorized Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, has just published a book, "Hidden in Plain Sight," in which he clearly documents what caused the financial crisis and why it is likely to happen again. For this act of detailed scholarship and truth-telling, he has come under fierce attack by many of those who were, in part, responsible for the crisis. Mr. Wallison is a problem for the political class, much like the boy who said the emperor had no clothes. He cannot be dismissed as a know-nothing lightweight. So his character must be impugned since the facts are on his side. The Great Recession was a crime, and its perps do not like being exposed.
THE “HYUNDAIZATION” OF THE GLOBAL DEFENSE MARKET
Ten or fifteen years ago, when you looked at the cars on the road, how many Hyundais did you see? How many Hyundais do you see now, driven by buyers who wanted a "good enough" car for a reasonable price? Back in my April 4/14 Half-Full Report, I referred to a nascent "Hyundaization" (hun-dye-zay-shun) trend in the global defense market. Even now, few people have noticed this. Hyundaization has been masked by spending from high-end customers who only want top-end gear, and by global fire sales of used Western equipment. As an example of those fire sales, many of the Jordanian F-16s bombing ISIS right now recently belonged to the Dutch and Belgian air forces. After a decade of those sales, however, there isn't much second-hand equipment left to sell. That's opening the door to new buys from new sources. A combination of technology trends, industrial policies, and a multi-polar global shift will give this trend staying power. This is a sea change on multiple levels. "Hyundaization" is going to have profound diplomatic, military, and industrial consequences. Let's talk about them.
THE REAL CRUSADERS
[This was written in 2005. We are republishing it in light of Zero's idiotic Prayer Breakfast speech last week, comparing Medieval Christians to Moslem terrorists of today who want the whole world to live in their world of Dark Ages barbarism. This is the real history of the Crusades in summary form. It is not taught in schools or universities today, and certainly never learned by Zero. He claims to have been educated at Harvard and Columbia, but extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and his words and deeds have never provided any evidence he is educated in any way.] It’s amazing how much the Arabs complain about the Crusades when they had so little to do with them. The Crusades were their great trauma, they constantly moan, the bottomless source of their resentment of the West and Christianity. Mysteriously, they never condemn the Real Crusaders who wiped out their entire civilization. There were eight separate Crusades over two hundred years, from 1095 through 1294. The Arabs played no significant role in any. The first was caused by the Seljuk Turks, who had swarmed out of Central Asia to conquer the Middle East, and seized Jerusalem in 1070. The Holy City had been part of the Fatimid Empire of Ismaili Shia Berbers from North Africa, who provided Christian pilgrims unhindered access to their holy places and freedom to worship in their churches. The Seljuks conducted pogroms on the Christians and desecrated their churches. They also terrified Byzantine Emperor Alexius I, who had lost much of his empire to them, so much that he pleaded with his rival in Rome, Pope Urban II, to call for all Christendom to rescue the Holy Sepulcher from the Islamic infidels.
HALF-FULL REPORT 02/06/15
We begin with an act of political genius, the greatest campaign ad of modern times:
YOU LIE ABOUT THE ECONOMY, MR. PRESIDENT
From 1820 through 2000, America's real (inflation adjusted) gross domestic product grew at an average annual rate of 3.6 percent. Last year was the 9th consecutive year in which the economy grew less than 3 percent. Real GDP has grown 13.6 percent since the recovery officially began in June, 2009. The average rate of growth at this point in the recoveries from the four recessions since 1975 was 21.9 percent. If it weren't for gains made by the well off, there wouldn't be a "recovery." Five years after it began (by June 2014), the top 1 percent of earners (more than $366,623 a year) had garnered 81 percent of its fruits. The incomes of the top 1 tenth of 1 percent (about $8 million a year) grew 39 percent. The incomes of the bottom 90 percent of earners declined, according to a study by University of California-Berkeley economist Emmanuel Saez. Real median household income was $54,417 in December, 5.1 percent lower than in January, 2008 ($57,317). The plain fact is that it is Mr. Obama's rules, regulations, and policies that are stifling our economy and job growth. That's why, of course, he's lying about it.
THE LOST KINGDOM OF LO
If you're like me, we have to take a break from the current torrent of treason pouring out of this pestilential presidency or we're going to lose our minds. So let's take that break and visit a magical unknown corner of the world behind the Himalayas so hidden away its people neither know nor care who infests the White House. Our journey will be with photos. If you want to go there with me for real - well, that can be arranged.
WINNING IN A WALKER
The battle for the Republican nomination for president effectively began at the Iowa Freedom Summit in Des Moines Jan. 26-27. Twelve prospective candidates spoke at the Freedom Summit, a testament to the power Iowa wields by being the first to select delegates. I'm appalled by the wildly disproportionate influence the Iowa caucuses have, since only about 20 percent of those eligible attend them. But I don't mind so much this cycle, because Iowa figures to boost the guy I think is best able to unite the GOP; appeal to swing voters, do the best job as president. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker was the most impressive at the Freedom Summit, said pundits left and right. Iowans evidently agree. At 15 percent, he was the top first choice of respondents in a Des Moines Register poll last week, tied with neurosurgeon Ben Carson for top 2nd choice (10 percent). He was a runaway winner in an online poll conducted for the Drudge Report this week. Most prospective GOP candidates really are running 1) for vice president; 2) to send a message; 3) to boost their lecture fees and/or massage their egos. Among those running for vice president (whether they know it or not) are...
THE IDIOCY OF ABASEMENT TO THE UMBRAGE POLICE
The celebrity actor Benedict Cumberbatch has said he is "a complete fool," an "idiot," "thoughtless" and that he is "devastated" for having inadvertently used the term "colored" to describe black people on a US talk show. It's depressing enough that he felt the obligation to apologize. But what's worse is that he felt the need to do with such groveling self-abasement. Yes, we all know why he did it. It's Oscar nomination season coming up, Cumberbatch is a possible contender for his portrayal of fashionably autistic, gay code-breaker Alan Turing in The Imitation Game, and Hollywood is notoriously PC and squeamish about issues to do with race. But if anyone who owes anyone an apology, here, it's not poor put-upon Cumberbatch but the noisome professional offense-takers who by seeking to make political mileage out of such achingly trivial issues are creating a climate of linguistic fear in which good people suffer. This, though, unfortunately, is how the liberal-left rolls. For as my friend Alex Wickham tells me, "Liberals are the new Puritans who want to control your life." We need an End to the New Puritanism movement.