HALF-FULL REPORT 08/29/14
Well... (as "Bones" always begins his Forum posts) ...hours after he pledges peace in Ukraine, Putin Huilo orders his troops and tanks to invade; Iran claims to be arming terrorists within Israel itself; ISIS and Al Qaeda promise to take their terror war to America; the Chicoms dangerously intercept a US recon plane over international waters they illegally claim - and Rand Paul thinks he can be elected president by going to the left of Hillary Clinton? Before we get into the details of all the above, and a lot more, I need to tell you that our TTP Portugal Fall Retreat is filling up very fast. We only have a few spaces remaining, so please, if you're considering having this marvelous experience with us, register as soon as you can. And yes, that picture of the castle in the clouds is real, by the way. We'll begin discussing geopolitical reality vs. Blame America First isolationism with this map focused on a place you never heard of, James Shoal. Then we'll detail how under Zero, the US government has become the most corrupt on earth. Compared to it, Mexico's is a piker. Actually, there's terrific news from Mexico -- and unbelievably good news from Saudi Arabia.
LIFE’S GREATEST JOY
It's easy these days to get drawn into a variety of small boxes: computers, televisions, iPads, Kindles, smartphones... or occasionally even an actual book. There are a lot of wonderful possibilities within each of these (particularly books, but I'm old-fashioned), but they can deprive us, if we're not careful, of life's greatest joy: the treasure of human connection. Fortunately, it's fairly easy to counter this tendency, and enjoy the benefits of a richer emotional life and a healthier physical life as a result. One of my favorite researchers is Barbara Fredrickson of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her new book is Love 2.0, in which she looks at "love from the body's perspective." She has been studying how the experience of the emotion of love affects your physiology, including your physical health. Now, when we hear the word "love," the first form that usually comes to mind is romantic love. But this is only one framework within which we feel the emotion of love. We even feel a kind of love in what Fredrickson calls "micro-moments of connection." The nice conversation we have with the checkout person at the grocery store; the warm greeting of welcome by a new acquaintance at a meeting; even the moment of eye contact with a stranger who holds open a door - that wonderful warm feeling is something that is much more ubiquitous than we might expect. It turns out that these micromoments of connection are actually filled with stuff that is good for us, emotionally, psychologically and in terms of our overall health... just as a good meal is filled with nutrients. Here's how and why.
THE ODDS FOR IMPEACHMENT ARE RISING
What do you get when you combine these three news stories? Breitbart, Monday 8/25: Obama to Enact Amnesty for Five Million Illegals Next Week Fox, Yesterday 8/27: Al Qaeda Urges Bombing of Las Vegas AP, Today 8/28: Americans' Pessimism on Economy Has Grown You get a perfect storm engulfing Democrats and the Zero Presidency on November 4. The Boston Globe on Wednesday (8/27) ran this dog-bites-man headline: Obama Amnesty Plan Could Hurt Democrats. Ya think? Maybe. Could be. Just might be. There are 68 days until November 4. That's several lifetimes long in politics. Lots of time to prepare one or more "October Surprises," lots of ways a Black Swan event can come out of nowhere to change everything. What's got everyone in DC weirded out is that Zero seems hell-bent to engineer an October Surprise foisted on his own party - literally creating political hell for his fellow Dems - and in early September no less. Zero's Amnesty will give us the Senate (and, ironically, no further amnesties). But what about impeachment? That requires a Black Swan, for which the odds are rising.
THE POLITICAL CLASS IS DETERMINED TO MAKE OUR ECONOMY WORSE
Do you think government has grown or contracted during the past seven years? If you listen to the political class and many of their lackeys in the news media, you would think there have been massive cuts in government spending. The truth is the opposite both in the United States and Europe. According to Keynesian orthodoxy, the massive government spending binge of 2009 was supposed to result in a rapid recovery, high growth (the Federal Reserve and the Obama administration had predicted several years of approximately 4 percent growth in the U.S.), and big increases in employment. It didn't happen. The Democrat Party and one of its gurus, New York Times economist Paul Krugman, blames the poor result on the "stimulus" being too small. One little problem for the Krugman crowd is...
WILL NOVEMBER 4 BE THE LONGEST NIGHT EVER FOR DEMS?
Since he began hammering her on illegal immigration, Republican Scott Brown has moved into a statistical tie with Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-NH, according to the WMUR Granite State poll Aug. 22. Sen. Shaheen now leads, 46-44. In July she'd led, 50 to 38. But if President Obama issues an executive order to grant legal status to millions more illegal immigrants, it isn't just the WMUR poll that signals doom for Sen. Shaheen and many other Dems running this year. Mr. Obama plans to issue another executive order to grant legal status to 5 million more illegals, Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill, said he was told by White House aides. That'll make most Americans seriously unhappy. Unhappiest of all will be any and all Dems trying to get elected on November 4. Is Mr. Obama about to throw the entire Democrat Party under his bus?
IS THE ISLAMIC STATE PRAISING ALLAH THAT OBAMA IS PRESIDENT?
The grotesque terrorists of the Islamic State or ISIS beheaded American journalist James Foley last Wednesday (8/20). (The Islamic State) has no place in the 21st Century," Mr. Obama said in response, before he went back to playing golf. "People like (the Islamic State) ultimately fail. They fail because the future is won by those who build and not destroy." That may be so, said the editors of the Washington Post, who endorsed Mr. Obama in 2008 and 2012. But "history provides too many examples of destroyers who hold power for long stretches of time and do not lose it until they are dislodged by ‘builders' who are finally roused to action." "No American president can survive if he lets Americans be beheaded on international television with impunity," said MSNBC talk show host Chris Matthews, who once got "tingles" when Mr. Obama spoke. "He has to strike back." If the journalists belatedly beginning to realize there's no there there regarding Mr. Obama had been paying attention back when it mattered, we'd have been spared a lot of pain. Most of our pain may be yet to come. ISIS vows to attack the United States. They're already here.
WHY THE ISLAMIC STATE MUST BE KILLED AND WHAT IT WILL TAKE
The Islamic State's video-dissemination of one of its goons beheading an American is an existential challenge from which we cannot afford to shrink. Until the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL/IS) did that, it made sense for the U.S. government to help contain it because the Islamic world, which the IS threatens most directly, must destroy it sooner or later. But internetting that beheading was a gory declaration of America's impotence - a dare-by-deed that is sure to move countless young persons around the globe to get in on killing us, anywhere they can. The longer the Islamic State survives, the more will take up its dare. Either we kill the IS, or we will deserve the wave of terrorism that will engulf us. Killing the IS requires neither more nor less than waging war - not as the former Bush administration waged its "war on terror," nor by the current Obama administration's pinpricks, nor according to the too-clever-by-half stratagems taught in today's politically correct military war colleges, but rather by war in the dictionary meaning of the word. To make war is to kill the spirit as well as the body of the enemy, so terribly as to make sure that it will not rise again, and that nobody will want to imitate it. That requires first isolating the Islamic State politically and physically to deprive all within it of the capacity to make war, and even to eat. Then it requires killing all who bear arms and all who are near them.
THE TTP PORTUGAL FALL RETREAT
It was so successful that we ran another in April. Everyone had such a terrific time that there's clamor for a three-peat this Fall.
As before, this is an intimate get-together of no more than a dozen TTPers to discuss the world in depth with me. And I might as well give you a warning up front.
In addition to learning more about the world than you thought possible in under a week, you run the risk of falling head over heels in love with Portugal. I describe it as utterly captivating, and once you are there you'll easily understand why. Every TTPer who was with us last Spring agrees.
Portugal is the authentic Europe, unknown and unspoiled. It's legendary for its weather, wine, and food. And for the friendliness of its people. I hope you'll join us. You'll never forget it.
Here's our schedule, a little different from the last two. In mid-October, the summer crowds are gone, the fall colors are peaking, and the weather beautifully crisp and clear. Enjoy the pictures!
HALF-FULL REPORT 08/22/14
It's an understatement to say this has been an eventful week, reeking with horror, mayhem, and jaw-dropping Democrat thuggery. Yet, at week's end - at least Friday morning as this is written - the glass is turning out to be more than half-full. The bad guys are taking it in the shorts from Austin to Ferguson to Donetsk to Gaza to Iraq. And it's been a bad week for Zero too... We'll start with the good news about Raed Atar, Muhammad Abu Shamaleh, and Muhammad Barhoum: they're dead. The three top Hamas military commanders were nailed in an IAF air strike yesterday (8/21). It's a Moral and Military Blow for Hamas, declared the Jerusalem Post... You may have noticed there's a new YouTube graphic in the left side bar. That's a link to the TTP YouTube video channel. I kicked it off with four vids of me that I hope you enjoy (and yes, one is the Arm Wrestling Putin saga). Feel free to send them to everyone you know on earth. We'll be adding to our video library (and not just me pontificating!). Let us know on the Forum what you think... OK, here's the question of the moment. On January 20, 2017 when President-elect Perry takes the oath of office on the Capitol's West Portico, will he have sent a thank you note and personal invitation to attend to Rosemary Lehmberg?... Then there's the Epic Fail of Ferguson.
THE AMAZING PERRY LAWFARE BACKFIRE
"We love him for the enemies he has made," said Edward S. Bragg in his speech seconding the nomination of New York Gov. Grover Cleveland to be the Democrat candidate for president in 1884. Republicans are saying that about Texas Gov. Rick Perry. He's not the first Republican to be victimized by Democrat efforts to criminalize policy differences. But he could be the last. Democrats make bogus criminal charges against Republicans to hurt them with voters who read only the headline "so and so was indicted." But there must be some ambiguity for "lawfare" to work, and the news media must be complicit. Yet so flimsy are the charges against Gov. Perry that even liberals described them as "B.S.," "fishy," "sketchy," "far-fetched," "unbelievably ridiculous," the "stupidest thing I've seen in my entire career." Stupid enough to be denounced by the New York Times and the Washington Post. Backfire City.