The UK exits the EU.

It seems here in America the re-interpretation of Britannia's choice to leave the EU was an independence defining moment . The "Brexit" vote stunned the country's political elite, the financial markets and British bookmakers, all of whom had expected a very close vote in favor of remaining in the European Union. Instead, (1)>>Britain now finds itself in uncharted waters, and looking for a new captain. Britain will spend at least two years negotiating the terms of its departure from the 28-member alliance that has dictated the economic and political order in Europe for more than four decades. Britain must elect new leadership, strike new trade deals and craft a dizzying array of new regulations about issues such as immigration and investment.  Prime Minister David Cameron, just days after vowing that "Britain never quits," says he'll be stepping down by October. Though the damage is likely to be concentrated on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, experts said the repercussions would ripple across the world and into the United States. The domino effect was on full display Friday as the (2)>>Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted more than 600 points in one of the most harrowing days of trading this year. The drop was even more dramatic in Europe and Asia, where major stock indexes sank 7 percent or more. So Great Britain's decision to leave the EU is enough to leave the world economy teetering on the edge of collapse. If that's the case something is definitely wrong. For Americans, there are other questions. The U.S. government has long favored Britain-in-Europe, both because the U.K.-EU single market speeds U.S. business on the continent, and because U.S. policymakers have long worried about the statism and anti-Americanism likely to prevail in an EU from which Britain is absent.

Why Britian left the EU?

The force that turned Britain away from the European Union was (3)>>the greatest mass migration since perhaps the Anglo-Saxon invasion. 630,000 foreign nationals settled in Britain in the single year 2015. Britain’s population has grown from 57 million in 1990 to 65 million in 2015, despite a native birth rate that’s now below replacement. On Britain’s present course, the population would top 70 million within another decade, half of that growth immigration-driven. Almost every Western European country joined the EU group to merge their economic rules in 1993. They did this by allowing people, goods, services, and capital to move freely between member countries. It's kind of like how states in the US work.The EU has helped foster long periods of economic prosperity, and it's helped keep the region at peace. The consequences ,UK not only will lose duty-free access to the EU’s single market of 500 million people; it will have to renegotiate every single trade deal with the rest of the world since all of them have been EU-negotiated. French economy minister and presidential hopeful Emmanuel Macron has already warned that, “if the UK wants a commercial access treaty to the European market, the British must contribute to the European budget like the Norwegians and the Swiss do. If London doesn’t want that, then it must be a total exit.” Britain will be locked out of the single market – to which over 50% of its exports go — unless it pays almost all that it currently pays. Moreover, London must still accept freedom of movement, as in European immigration. Take, for example, the 2008 financial crisis. Many economists agree that the European Central Bank failed to respond effectively, leading to a recession that was much more severe than it needed to be. Unemployment rose, and tax revenue fell. Banks needed bailouts, and debt in a number of EU countries soared. The Obvious question Who will lead Britain into this uncharted territory? Bookmakers back Brexit leader and former London mayor Boris Johnson, the elitist populist who commands a mixture of public affection and deep mistrust: clever but careless, a spinner of words but not of detail. That outcome is likely but uncertain too. Watch out for home secretary Theresa May, quietly positioning herself as a second Thatcher. In his subdued victory speech Johnson made no mention of his leadership ambitions and sought to reassure young, educated voters – overwhelmingly for Remain – that Britain will not be pulling up the drawbridge.

The Murder of Jo Cox . Suspicious anyone ?

British MP Jo Cox , out spoken member
of Parliament defender of
human rights.
Assassinated before UK referendum .

Just Prior to the UK referendum , A rising star in Britain’s Parliament was shot and stabbed to death.Just two days ahead of Britain’s referendum on whether to leave the European Union, Russia’s state-owned Channel One ran what ostensibly appeared to be a news item on the vote. But cutting from the studio presenter before a backdrop of the UK and EU flags, the item opened with an aerial shot of police working at the site where Labour MP (4)>>Jo Cox was murdered on June 16. It's a bit strange in this day in age of "conspiracies". in an attack that stunned the nation and brought the country’s European Union referendum campaign to an abrupt halt just a week before the vote.The killing was of the sort that has become all too common in the United States, but is virtually unheard of in Britain: without warning, hyper-violent and ultimately, perhaps, inexplicable.It claimed as its victim Jo Cox, a widely respected 41-year-old member of the center-left Labour Party who won election last year after a career in humanitarian work and who was widely respected for her outspoken advocacy on behalf of refugees and civilians in Syria. Officials did not provide a motive for the killing. But British media organizations including the Guardian and Sky News quoted witnesses as saying that the assailant shouted “Britain first!” during and after the attack.Britain First is the name of a far-right group that stages provocative anti-Muslim demonstrations. After Thursday's attack, the organization posted a statement on its website denying involvement and saying it “would never encourage behavior of this sort.”Witnesses told British media that the assailant appeared to have been waiting for Cox outside a library in the town of Birstall where she had been meeting constituents as part of her usual weekly schedule.MP Jo Cox wanted to remain in the EU. In a video message posted on Britain First’s social media channels on Friday, Jayda Fransen, the party’s deputy leader, disputed evidence that its name was shouted and falsely claimed that Cox, a former aid worker who was elected to Parliament last year, was not assassinated, but killed while trying to break up a fight between two men on a street in the Yorkshire town of Birstall. It seems crass to say this of an event that left two small children motherless, but Mrs Cox's death meant that for three days at least, most people in the country heard almost nothing of the arguments for and against the EU, since campaigning was (rightly) suspended and headlines (rightly) focussed elsewhere. Monday's recall of Parliament will mean the story once again dominates the agenda. That’s a particular worry for Remainers because their hopes of overturning the Leave lead had rested on a week-long media blitz in which their core message about the economic risks of Brexit would be hammered home to wavering voters again and again.

Will the UNION REMAIN?

The Scottish National Party, which runs the Scottish Government, has said that Scotland being dragged out of the European Union without its consent might be cause for a second independence referendum. U.S. bank JP Morgan said on Wednesday it now expects Scotland to vote for independence and introduce its own currency before Britain leaves the European Union in 2019."Our base case is that Scotland will vote for independence and institute a new currency at that point (2019)," JP Morgan economist Malcolm Barr said in a note to clients on Wednesday.Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon will meet European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker on Wednesday afternoon, seeking a way for Scotland to remain in the EU.Scotland voted to stay in the EU in last week's referendum, putting it at odds with the United Kingdom as a whole, which voted 52-48 percent in favor of Brexit.For all the expectation of an imminent central bank intervention over the past two days, something which according to Bloomberg was the main catalyst for the stock surge since Monday.The (4)>>Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy, has said he will oppose any attempts to hold talks with Scotland over its EU membership in the wake of Brexit. Any separate deal for continued Scottish membership before the UK completes its two-year withdrawal process would depend on unanimous support from EU member states.But acting Spanish prime minister Mr Rajoy said after a summit of EU leaders in Brussels that he wanted to be "very clear Scotland does not have the competence to negotiate with the European Union". What he did instead is open a new Pandora's box, one which invites all secessionist movements in Europe to demand a comparable treatment.The UK and the EU have two years to figure out the terms of the exit — what rules would still apply to Britain and what privileges Britain would still get.

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

(1)>>Britain now finds itself in uncharted waters. Nicola Sturgeon is to lobby EU member states directly for support in ensuring that Scotland can remain part of the bloc, after Scots voted emphatically against Brexit on Thursday.The first minister has disclosed that she is to invite all EU diplomats based in Scotland to a summit at her official residence in Edinburgh within the next two weeks in a bid to sidestep the UK government. Ms Sturgeon revealed the plan after 62 per cent of Scots voted Remain in the EU referendum.The SNP leader confirmed her government will begin to draw up the legislation that could see a fresh vote on Scottish independence take place within the next two years.  (2)>>Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted. All the pre-Brexit polls were too close to call or showed a clear edge for Remain. Now the Wall Street Journal is reporting that George Soros and several of his clones made billions. Could it be that they played the classic market game of pumping up the difference between expectation and results? The bigger the difference between rumor and news, the greater the killing. Something smells here. Could some of the polls and betting markets have been manipulated by the smart money to suck in the dumb money on the wrong side of the bet? A few millions to manipulate expectations would be a small price to pay for some of those who "madoff" with billions on this play, so to speak. It's ERM 1992 all over again in the exchange rate casinos, and will be for quite some time. Soros is laughing all the way to the bank today with his bulging gold holdings. (3)>>the greatest mass migration since . By uncanny coincidence, EU referendum day in the U.K. coincided with the U.S. Supreme Court decision that halts President Obama’s program of executive amnesty for young illegal immigrants and their parents, an estimated 5 million people. American policymakers—like their U.K. and EU counterparts—have taken for granted that an open global economy implies (and even requires) the mass migration of people. Yet this same mass migration is generating populist, nativist reactions that threaten that same open economy: The anti-EU vote in the U.K., the Donald Trump campaign for president in the United States. If any one person drove the United Kingdom out of the European Union, it was Angela Merkel, and her impulsive solo decision in the summer of 2015 to throw open Germany—and then all Europe—to 1.1 million Middle Eastern and North African migrants, with uncountable millions more to come. Merkel’s catastrophically negative example is one that perhaps should be avoided by U.S. politicians who seek to avert Trump-style populism in the United States. Instead, the politician who most directly opposes Donald Trump—presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton—is doubling down on Merkelism.(4)>>Jo Cox was murdered .  Russian Media was ablaze with speculation. In the segment, correspondent Grigoriy Yemelyanov notes the media discussion of her killer Thomas Mair’s reported mental health issues and his links to the far-right, but then says that “discussing how this killing took place at a good time for the British government is quietly considered unseemly.”Yemelyanov turns to right-wing British journalist John Laughland, who is director of studies at the Paris-based Institute of Democracy and Cooperation, headed by Russian nationalist Natalia Narochnitskaya, a former State Duma deputy.Laughland, a longtime Eurosceptic and defender of any dictatorship to have fallen foul of the West, tells Channel One:

“The press have really been venting emotion, writing about how this is a terrible murder, how Jo Cox was a wonderful woman and so on. They are not making assumptions. Generally none at all. I remember that when a politician was shot dead on the street in Russia, in Britain everyone was shouting over each other that this was done on the orders of the authorities. But now no one is asking any questions. No one in the press has suggested that Cox’s murder could have been orchestrated.”

 The man suspected of murdering British Member of Parliament (MP) Jo Cox on Thursday was identified as Thomas Mair. The 52-year-old, locally known as ‘Tom’ or ‘Tommy,’ was arrested shortly after the attack in Birstall— a market-town in West Yorkshire, where he has lived for most of his life.Cox was fatally attacked and shot outside her constituency surgery and was pronounced dead at 1.48pm. Police have not formally identified Mair as the suspect but they have searched Mair’s semi-detached home and said they are not looking for any other suspects. (4)>>Spanish prime minister. Scotland will get no joy from the EU. To many countries there especially Spain with the Basques and Catalans who want what Scotland wants separation. No chance if they are expecting Spain to vote on their behalf. Spanish PM Mariano Rajoy said only the UK, and not Scotland, had competence to negotiate with the EU. "I am extremely against it, the treaties are extremely against it and I believe everyone is extremely against it. If the United Kingdom leaves ... Scotland leaves," Rajoy said. Spain fears Scotland's bid to stay in the EU, which could entail declaring independence, could inspire Spanish regions to follow suit.

Gun Control's Historic "Sit in".

Brave Democrats stage a
sit in demanding
action on gun control.
Historic otherwise .

The issue of gun control has divided this country . (1)>>This is the Republican's verses the Democrats, the two parties have reached their level of unworkability .  A Democratic protest demanding votes on gun-control legislation led to pandemonium in the House chamber that did not end until early Thursday, when Speaker Paul D. Ryan and his fellow Republicans reclaimed control long enough to force through a major spending bill. Instead,  for a long time with so may mass shootings .Democrats have voluntarily taken it upon themselves to grandstand in such a rule-breaking fashion that Republicans declared the House in recess. Remember the Republican's did the same thing for years shutting down the government , this act by the Democrats is payback at last.  And that’s a good thing! The less time Congress is voting on bills, the less opportunity they have to take away our constitutionally protected freedoms.(2)>>Congress has remained completely silent on this issue. And that’s mainly because one relentless organization, the National Rifle Association, has done everything in its power to keep the status quo.Largely due to the NRA’s efforts, the (2.2)>>Untied States is home to nearly 300 million privately owned guns, which notches the highest rate of civilian gun ownership in the world next is Yemen, with only half that of the Untied States); 25 states have adopted some form of Stand Your Ground laws, which have widened the scope for justifiable murders and handcuffed law enforcement; and every state, except Illinois, allows gun owners to carry concealed weapons outside their home.To make matters worse, the NRA viciously pushed for the infamous “gun show loophole,” which currently makes it possible for criminals and fugitives to purchase guns without a background check. Despite widespread support, even among gun owners, to close the loophole, the NRA has refused to stand down. There are few better ways of grasping how far the Republicans have abandoned the middle ground, where they used to win elections, than the way their leaders have become agents of the gun industry. Conservatives used to consider themselves law-abiding citizens who put great store by the permanence of institutions, by the rule of law, and by the traditional caution and common sense of the sensible majority. Today the Republican Party remains in hock to the NRA leadership and through them to their paymasters in the gun-making industry. The NRA runs an official list, like the old Communist Party, of preferred candidates and grades them according to their adherence to the strict constructionist interpretation of the (3)>>Second Amendment. Endless debate rages over exactly what the Framers meant by the term “well regulated Militia” in the 2nd Amendment. The strongest argument for gun control is found in the 2nd amendment itself, which reads:A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.Read it again:A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.What does "well regulated" mean?  In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the U.S. Supreme Court stated that the adjective 'well-regulated' implies nothing more than the imposition of proper discipline and training. Who is responsible for the regulation of this militia?  Not the militia itself, in that they would never participate in any meaningful self-regulation.  Not Congress, because the government cannot regulate a militia which limits its power.  Not state governments, for the same reason.  Certainly not the NRA, because they oppose any regulation whatsoever.  The Republican majorities in both the U.S House and Senate consistently parrot the National Rifle Association’s talking points. Paramount among the criticisms from the NRA is that innocent people might well be put on the terrorist watch list. “Protections should be put in place that allow law-abiding Americans who are wrongly put on a watch list to be removed,” stated Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA Institute for Legislative Action. It is certainly admirable to raise the issue of these flawed “terror watch lists” and how people can get off them. But many Republicans are only raising the issue now for the first time, suggesting that all they care about is that the lists limit the number of people who can buy weapons. If a candidate fails to offer total support for absolutist gun rights, the NRA funds a campaign in the next party primary to unseat them.The NRA exists to protect weapons manufacturers, they don't care a whit about an individual gun owner beyond making sure that said gun owner exists. In order to make profit for the weapons manufacturers. Polls suggest, however, that the NRA leadership no longer represents the wishes of its members towards moderate gun controls, and since the Sandy Hook massacre of schoolchildren, the extremism of NRA leaders like Wayne LaPierre, whose tin-eared response to the shootings so jarred voters in all parties, suggests the existence at the top of the organization of a self-serving, superannuated elite that no longer commands the confidence of its rank and file. The standoff, which began with a Democratic sit-in on the House floor just before noon on Wednesday, did not end until about 3 a.m. Thursday when Mr. Ryan — barreling over Democrats’ objections — took the rare and provocative step of calling a vote on a major appropriations bill in the wee hours and without any debate. He then adjourned the House, with no legislative votes scheduled until July 5.

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

(1)>>This is the Republican's verses the Democrats. Republicans at the time said Democrats were looking to capitalize on the grief of the moment and worried it could lead to people who were wrongfully placed on the terror list being denied their constitutional right to buy guns. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, instead pushed an alternative that would have delayed suspected terrorists from being able to buy firearms for up to 72 hours, giving the FBI time to block the sale. House Republicans oppose an extrajudicial use of so-called terror watch lists because the lists are a civil rights nightmare. People have no right to know if they’re put on the list or why they’re put on the list. Sen. Ted Kennedy was put on the list not because he once killed a woman but for some other unknown reason. Heck, Rep. John Lewis, the civil rights leader currently fighting against civil rights on the House floor, was once on the list.  (2)>>Congress has remained completely silent on this issue. Members of the U.S. House of Representatives staged the first sit-in in Congress’ history, taking the floor of the House and demanding a vote on what is called the “no fly, no buy” restriction on gun purchases. This narrow provision would deny people on the federal “no-fly list” the ability to legally buy a gun. The protest was launched by Atlanta’s congressional representative John Lewis, the legendary civil-rights activist. “Sometimes you have to do something out of the ordinary. Sometimes you have to make a way out of no way,” Lewis said from the well of the House. “There comes a time when you have to say something, when you have to make a little noise. This is the time. Now is the time to get in the way.” He left the podium and, joined by many other members of Congress, gave new meaning to “speaking from the House floor” by sitting down in front of the podium and refusing to get up.(2.2)>>Untied States is home to nearly 300 million privately owned guns. In recent years 67 federal agencies such as the IRS and Health and Human Services have spent $1.48 billion purchasing guns, ammunition and military-style equipment. These Departments have more than 200,000 federal officers with arrest and firearm authority. Note: the entire United State Marine Corps consists of 182,000 personnel.The Internal Revenue Service itself has stockpiled guns and ammunition for 2,316 “special agents” and their own SWAT teams. Including semi-automatic shotguns with buckshot and slugs; AR-15rifles (S&W M&P 15) and military-style H&K 416 rifles.Source OpenTheBooks.com. (3)>>Second Amendment. The Second Amendment is not an absolute guarantee to own any firearm, and until recently was not considered an individual right.For most of America’s history, the Second Amendment was interpreted as only applying to militia service, unlike in many state constitutions where the individual right to bear arms is clearly spelled out. Even though there is some scattered evidence supporting the view that the Second Amendment is an individual right, for most of the 20th century (when gun-control entered the national discussion), the consensus view was that it protected a collective right, nothing more. As the Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Miller, a case challenging the first major federal gun control law, the right of the people to keep and bear arms is an individual right only in that it requires individuals to man a militia. It was not until very recently that the right was detached from such service and declared a purely individual right.

Oakland's Police Troubles.......

Oakland Mayor”Schaaf vowed to “root out what is
clearly a toxic, macho, culture” . She has
big a job trying fix the problem.

Nation wide police departments have come under scrutiny . Not as much about the issues of brutality, corruption and  shooting unarmed African -American men . Recently a scandal is just as much brewing that it has attracted national media . For the fourth time in less than two weeks, the police department in Oakland, Calif., is answering to a different leader.The changes have come as the city deals with two investigations involving its officers: a widening sex scandal and a series of racist text messages sent within the department. How this all started . The scandal is a crippling blow to a department that has struggled for decades to win the trust of residents and has been under federal oversight for 13 years in partbecause of failures to adequately hold officers accountable for misdeeds. Dysfunctional police force!??? NO really? How could such a thing happen in this country? After all police departments are such bastions of "good guys" ... so they all adhere to the highest standards of professionalism. Seems the myth is crumbling before our eyes all across this country.The internal affairs investigation revolves around Celeste Guap, who allegedly had sex with more than a dozen police officers starting when she was 16, sources told KPIX5. (1)>>Guap, who is now 18 or 19 and lives in Richmond, California, started revealing details on Facebook suggesting she had illicit encounters with officers – calling the relationships harmless  but insisted that she did not ‘snitch’ on anyone. Not only is that gross. But, then you should call into question every arrest or official document these officers hand their hand in, because during that period they were breaking the law in a serious way. The Oakland Police Department is not the only agency affected by the scandal. An inspector in the Alameda County District Attorney's Office was put on administrative leave in a possible connection, according to ABC station KGO-TV in San Francisco.  That prompted (2)>>Mayor Libby Schaaf to mince no words Friday.“As the mayor of Oakland, I am here to run a police department, not a frat house,” she said. “Today continues to be a day where we are sharing disturbing information with you.”Schaaf vowed to “root out what is clearly a toxic, macho, culture” within the city’s (3)>>police department.Racism ? Schaaf also said Friday that the department was close to finishing an investigation into an exchange of racist text messages between officers.The text message inquiry does not involve Figueroa, according to Schaaf , who said that situation was “not as widespread” as the sexual misconduct scandal.According to Schaaf, several African American officers sent and received messages that were “wholly inappropriate and not acceptable from anyone who wears the badge of the Oakland Police Department.” The latest controversy is over racist text messages, such as a text obtained by NBC News that showed a picture of a Ku Klux Klan member on a cereal box. The box message read, “Brad, I heard you got boxes of these in your cupboards” as well as a text using the n-word. Schaaf said that the texting scandal is not widespread throughout the department. Yet racism within the department has been a longstanding issue. Stanford researchers found that during a 13-month period, looking at 28,000 field reports of stops, 17,000 of those stops involved officers halting black people on the street.The department is still under federal oversight after incidents in 2000 where veteran police officers, known as the “Rough Riders,” planted evidence and beat citizens. In 2012, the (4)>>department came under scrutiny from a federal judge for its handling of the Occupy Oakland protests. The department was supposed to engage in a number of reforms since then and had begun to rebuild trust with the public as violent crimes and use-of-force complaints were down, the Mercury News reported. Nobody has quite nailed down exactly what caused Oakland’s Police Department to fray. Some, like Ross, blame layoffs in past years, which cut out officers who could have formed the department’s core leadership today. Others blame a recruitment and hiring spree that started under former Mayor Jean Quan — many of the officers currently under investigation were hired between 2012 and 2014, before Schaaf took office. Still others blame the command staff, saying it was too permissive and unwilling to crack down on bad behavior by the rank and file.Some say that macho culture may be an endemic feature of police forces, and that it’s up to city leaders to snuff it out.

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

(1)>>Guap, who is now 18 or 19. The sex scandal unfurled after the suicide of one of the department’s officers last fall. An 18-year-old woman has since alleged in several media reports that she had sex with that officer and several others from Oakland and other police departments in the area, including some while she was a minor.This is a difficult story to sort out. Certainly the juvenile should not have been involved in prostitution. An even more startling development was that the juvenile's mother was an Oakland police department dispatcher, and that the juvenile apparently started prostitution at age 12. This story has some serious questions. Was the juvenile separated or emancipated from her mother. Why did she have a pimp? Did the police arrest the pimp. Probably the pimp should be a prime target for arrest since they would be involved in sex trafficking. If the police were frequenting a prostitute, they should be held responsible. How closely can police officers be supervised. A police captain may not know all the activities a patrolman is involved in. It may be necessary for some kind of internal affairs investigators to conduct surveillance on the police officers. (2)>>Mayor Libby Schaaf. The Mayor said more :   "As the mayor of Oakland, I'm here to run a police department, not a frat house," Schaaf told a news conference Friday evening.Schaaf said she will not immediately appoint an acting or interim chief. Instead, the command staff will report to City Administrator Sabrina Landreth, who will be responsible for personnel and disciplinary decisions."This is the appropriate time to install civilian oversight in this police department," Schaaf told a news conference Friday evening. "I want to assure the citizens of Oakland that we are hell bent on rooting out this disgusting culture."For the past year we have been hearing conservatives cry about how people don't respect the police because they provide such a public service to us. These guys are thugs no better than the criminals they arrest. They give all cops a bad name. Over and over again we see examples of cops shooting people in the back when they are running away. Someone gets it on tape, a grand jury is convened and unbelievably they get off only to have the city pay out millions in damages without admitting any wrong doing. (3)>>police department.Racism?. "Separately, a number of officers have been accused of sending racist texts. The officers in question are black, Reuters reports, and are currently under investigation." Gotta' love it. Were the comments racist about whites? Or Asian-Americans? Or Hispanic-Americans? Or, perhaps, about African-Americans? (4)>>department came under scrutiny from a federal judge.  Oakland has had a checkered past when it comes to human rights violations. Oakland SWAT has been accused of excessive force during the Occupy Oakland protests. They have also been found top employ racially discriminatory tactics. Going back to 2003, Oakland PD has been under the eye of federal authorities stemming from a case of vigilante cops robbing suspects and planting evidence to make cases. Numerous federal reviews have shown that Oakland PD, who was on a kind of “probation”, has not progressed and in recent history has regressed from any developments that may have been on their horizon.

Syria quagmire .

It appears that  (1)>>Russian intervention has succeeded .More than 50 State Department officials signed an internal memo protesting U.S. policy in Syria, calling for targeted U.S. military strikes against the regime of Bashar al-Assad and urging regime change as the only way to defeat IS. Although NBC and CBS on Friday covered the “unprecedented,” “deep frustration” that diplomats at the State Department have for Barack Obama’s Syria policy, ABC’s Good Morning America allowed a scant 18 seconds to the move against Obama. New war? We are already at war. I personally think they should leave Assad alone. Every time we have removed a strong man from control in the Middle- East  it has created chaos.  (1.2)>>Yes, Syria is a made in America chaos . Those 50 people who are calling for this policy change, need to quit and volunteer for the military, then request to be the first ones in. Or, they need to send their children in. As a military member and part of a military family, I'm so tired of people pushing for war when they aren't the ones who have to pay the piper. President Barack Obama has resisted wading deeper into the Syria conflict, but

officials familiar with the memo said the State Department officials could be trying to force a policy debate in the upcoming elections. Hillary Clinton has promised a tougher policy toward Assad, while Donald Trump has promised to get tough on IS but would work with Russia.  We should have supported Assad against IS and other Islamists from the start, but Clinton and Obama were pushing the disastrous "Arab Spring", and the invasion of Libya.Whoever these State Department officials are, they should be fired. The strategy proposed by the diplomats is directly in contradiction Washington's strategy that has been approved by the UN Security Council: to defeat Daesh with the assistance of both the Syrian government and the secular/moderate "rebels."Furthermore, it is unlikely that the US "Syrian adventure" would receive high praise from Netanyahu's government in Tel Aviv: Israel could be subjected to attacks from both Syrian armed groups and Hezbollah militias as a result of chaos in the region. But with the struggle against the Islamic State largely stalemated, it is the naked display of Russian military power in neighboring Syria, as well as the leadership of Putin, Islamic State insurgents faced major assaults on two fronts in both Iraq and Syria on Wednesday in what could prove to be some of the biggest operations to roll back their caliphate since they proclaimed it in 2014. Pressuring the United States in to further action.  U.S.-backed militia with thousands of Arab and Kurdish fighters were reported to have captured villages near the strategically-important Turkish border after launching a major operation to cut off Islamic State's last access route to the outside world. The Syrian operation, which began on Tuesday after weeks of preparations, aims to drive Islamic State from the last stretch of the frontier with Turkey it controls.(2)>>U.S. policy has quietly fueled the escalation of the conflict in Syria and undermined every effort to bring the Syrian people the ceasefire and peaceful political transition they need and want.  Whoever is directly responsible for hundreds of deaths in the latest alleged chemical weapons incident, the critical covert and diplomatic role the United States has played in a war that has killed at least 100,000 people means that their blood is also on our hands.Surely the small scale and sporadic protests that began before March 2011 were met with violent repression from the Syrian state, and none of these findings absolve the Assad government from blame for this, however it is also true that these opposition movements were financed, trained, and advised by the US through ‘democracy promotion’ endeavors. Evidence shows that when members of these groups complain about their connections to Washington they are subsequently ousted from membership.The goal of financing these groups is regime-change, intended in Syria for 2 decades, and from the very beginning the US was arming and training the opposition to attack the state. Money, weaponry, and foreign fighters flowed in and were facilitated by the US special forces from the onset with a view towards targeted assassinations and eliciting a collapse from within. The government needed justification for this which was accomplished by the media’s refusal to report on information that ran counter to the official narrative.Over the past several decades, the U.S. State Department has deteriorated from a reasonably professional home for diplomacy and realism into a den of armchair warriors possessed of imperial delusions, a dangerous phenomenon underscored by the recent mass“dissent” in favor of blowing up more people in Syria. So, it’s not entirely surprising that several dozen U.S. “diplomats” would attack President Barack Obama’s more temperate position on Syria while positioning themselves favorably in anticipation of a Hillary Clinton administration, which is expected to authorize an illegal invasion of Syria — under the guise of establishing “no-fly zones” and “safe zones” — which will mean the slaughter of young Syrian soldiers. The “diplomats” urge the use of “stand-off and air weapons.”These hawks are so eager for more war that they don’t mind risking a direct conflict with Russia, breezily dismissing the possibility of a clash with the nuclear power by saying they are not “advocating for a slippery slope that ends in a military confrontation with Russia.” That’s reassuring to hear.

NOTES AND COMMENTS:

(1)>>Russian intervention. So, far from being reluctantly dragged into a terrible conflict not of its own making, the United States and its allies have in fact followed a quite coherent policy of regime change, modeled roughly on their successful overthrow of the Libyan government in 2011.  The main difference has been the absence of foreign air support for the Syrian rebels.  In Libya, NATO conducted 7,700 air strikes, demolishing Libya's air defenses in the early stages of the campaign and thereafter bombing at will throughout the country.  The fact that Syria possesses a far more extensive, modern, Russian-built air defense system has successfully deterred the West and its Arab royalist allies from following the same strategy in Syria.Four months after launching airstrikes in Syria, the Kremlin is confident that Moscow’s largest overseas campaign since the end of the Soviet Union is paying off.Under the banner of fighting international terrorism, President Vladimir Putin has reversed the fortunes of forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, which were rapidly losing ground last year to moderate and Islamist rebel forces in the country’s five-year-old crisis. Government forces are now on the offensive, and last week they scored their most significant victory yet, seizing the strategic town of Sheikh Miskeen from rebels who are backed by a U.S.-led coalition.The Russians investigated one attack that the Assad regime was blamed for  and conclude it was a weak Sarin gas made and used by the US supported Rebels. They sent an 80 page report to the US and the UN. A later gas attack was determined to also be done by the rebels according to Carla Del Ponte, a UN

investigator. The UN chemical experts were in town to investigate the earlier attack when this most recent attack occurred. The fact that no country or organization, except France, is willing to join the US in an attack should tell you something. (1.2)>>Yes, Syria is a made in America chaos .  A small group of neocons at the State Department (probably Victoria Nuland's fan club) are urging Obama to go for total war in Syria -- not against ISIS, but against the secular Assad government! http://sputniknews.com/politic...

The document appears to echo the CIA's longstanding stance that Daesh cannot be defeated while Syria has a "weak" government. Incredibly as it may seem, the intelligence agency believes that "destroying what's left of Syria's government might conceivably help".(2)>>.U.S. policy. As protests spread through the Arab world in 2011, the mostly leftist groups who organized the Arab Spring protests in Syria formed the NCB to coordinate peaceful protests and resistance to government repression.  They agreed, and they still agree, on three basic principles: non-violence; non-sectarianism; and no foreign military intervention.  But the U.S. and its allies marginalized the NCB, formed an unrepresentative "Syrian National Council" in Turkey as a government-in-exile and recruited, armed and trained violent armed groups to pursue regime change in Syria. The United States, the United Kingdom, France, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar began flying in fighters, weapons and equipment to turn the Syrian Spring into a bloody civil war.  Once they had overthrown the government of Libya, at the cost of 25,000 to 50,000 lives, they began adapting the same strategy to Syria, despite knowing full well that this would be a much more drawn-out, destructive and bloody war.

FBI failed Orlando .

Once again , again the President addresses
the nation ..........

It's incredibly shocking what happened in Orlando Florida . What is more asinine is that the government agency that  is in charge of protecting the nation utterly failed . There is vary little reaction from President Obama  other than condolences . Rather than criticizing the FBI. Up to this writing , the FBI & Media are "playing down" any outside connections . Yes, it's damage control for a failing agency .  Offering "any" { that we already know } new details Monday (1)>>on the worst mass shooting in U.S. history, FBI director James Comey defended the bureau's handling of Omar Mateen in the lead up to this weekend's massacre at a gay Florida nightclub. The shooter identified in the Orlando shooting was apparently under FBI investigation for terrorist ties for "years" according to sources .  The senior law enforcement source reports that Mateen became a person of interest in 2013 and again in 2014. The Federal Bureau of Investigation at one point opened an investigation on Mateen but subsequently closed the case when it produced nothing that appeared to warrant further investigation. (2)>>Omar Mateen's connections prior to the shootings, In 2015, after Moner Abusalha became the first American suicide bomber in Syria, the FBI investigated Omar Mateen’s connection to Abu-Salha. Abu-Salha went to the Middle East, trained, and returned to the Treasure Coast, specifically Vero and fort Pierce, to recruit. The FBI says he didn’t recruit anyone, but it’s possible he did have contact with Mateen.Then, one year later, in 2014 the FBI conducted an investigation into possible ties between Mateen and an American suicide bomber. The FBI conducted another investigation, which included an interview with Mateen, but determined that the contact did not constitute a threat at that time. Which may be an overstatement: the FBI's 2014 probe allegedly found that the  Orlando shooter had "minimal" contact with Florida al-Nusra fighter Moner Abusalha who blew himself up in Syria. Meanwhile, the Hill reported that Mateen's employment, and gun licenses, were untouched even though the FBI confirmed it had interviewed the 29-year-old three times before the shooting took place early Sunday morning.  An official said that the FBI first became aware of the suspect, Omar Mateen, 29, in 2013 when he made "inflammatory comments to coworkers alleging possible terrorist ties." In the course of that investigation, Mateen was interviewed twice, but the FBI was unable to verify the substance of his comments.This is similar to the attack in San Bernardino, California, where government had failed to notice terrorist advocacy by the woman immigrant who later killed American citizens. 

FBI BIG TIME FAILURE.

Father  of Omar Mateen may have radicalized his son .
Here  he is with a banner aimed at President
Obama.

It gets even more bizarre: despite his chequered history and his numerous FBI encounters, the Orlando Police just reported that he had managed to purchase firearms in just this past week. Mateen worked at G4S for many years despite being the subject of multiple FBI investigations.  This demonstrates not only that IS has infiltrated the Department of Homeland Security, but that the other agencies tasked with keeping us safe are asleep at the switch.  Make no mistake, this is a major FBI failure. Mateen’s employer – where he worked as a security contractor!!! – provides security to more than 90% of U.S. nuclear facilities.  They also transport illegal immigrants in fortified buses.  What could possibly go wrong having an IS operative providing security at a nuclear facility?  And who is watching the watchers?  G4S failed to check the background of their security employee and the FBI failed to take action when they knew he was a threat and held a job related to national security.  It reads like a bad thriller.The father of the Orlando nightclub gunman insists that his son was not motivated by Islamist radical ideology, (2.1)>>describing the 29-year-old as  “a good son” .  Remember Amed Mohamed and the exploited islamic opportunism with 14-year-old “clock boy” bomb hoax from Irving Texas and how his father was running for political office in Sudan?Well, apparently 29-year-old terrorist Omar Mateen  comes from a similarly engaged political family and his father, (3)>>Seddique Mateen , was/is running for national office in Afghanistan and not happy with the government of Pakistan., hosted a bizarre YouTube talk show. The Associated Press reported that a former Afghan officer said that the show was filled with “anti-US tirades.” In one episode, he even professes to hold allegiance to the Taliban. Seddique Mateen posted dozens of episodes of the show, which was called “The Durand Jirga Show.” Most of the videos have less than 200 views. The shows are obviously very low budget. Mateen speaks mostly in the Dari language. Bizarrely, in one of the episodes, he announces his candidacy for the presidency of Afghanistan (a year after the elections had already occurred).The Fox News reports that both Papa and son Omar were “registered Democrats” (for which you have to be US citizens). Fox and others also report that Papa immigrated, meaning that he had to be naturalized in order to be a citizen.Part of naturalization ceremony is the taking of the Oath of Allegiance to the US ???  “Our brothers in Waziristan, our warrior brothers in [the] Taliban movement and national Afghan Taliban are rising up.Inshallah the Durand Line issue will be solved soon,” the father said in one of the videos, according to a Washington Post translation. Even stranger, hours before his son opened fire,  Seddique Mateen posted a video on his Facebook page which is called the Provisional Government of Afghanistan.  A day after 49 people were massacred at a gay dance club in Orlando, the gunman's father, Seddique Mir Mateen, posted a video on Facebook in which he said that it should have been up to God — not his son — to administer "punishment" for homosexuality.In the video, which was posted early Monday morning and later removed, Mateen said that his son's actions are not supported by Islam, but he also suggested that the victims of the attack  — the deadliest mass shooting in US history — deserved to be punished by a higher power."The punishment for homosexuality is upon God and he will decide on them not humans," Mateen said. "What he [my son] has done has shocked me... I ask God for help and guidance for all the youth to follow the true path of Islam."

The " Question of Guns".

“We have to decide if that’s the kind of country we want to be. And to actively do nothing is a decision as well,” President Obama noted in a White House press conference. The Administration’s typical pivot toward promoting background checks, health evaluations and related registration procedures will likely not see as much air time in the days ahead – for good reason. Here is why. Of course this is about  Islamic terrorism, no one would suggest it isn’t. Of course this is an attack on America. We’ve now learned that Mateen made a 911 call and pledged his allegiance to IS. We also learn that the FBI investigated Mateen in 2013 and 2014. But how can this only be about religion and ideology and not about the gun? How can we ignore the fact that nothing in Mateen’s past prevented him from being able to buy guns legally in Florida ? AR-15 assault rifle has been linked to massacre in Orlando—  The most popular rifle in the country, it’s become a symbol for both sides of the gun control debate. If the shooter has any links to a jihadist group, however tenuous, we have the

"terrorism" conversation. Conservatives propose aggressive military action against terrorist groups abroad and warn of a deep rot within the religion of Islam. Liberals warn against jumping to conclusions and preach about the consequences of overreaction.If the suspect has no such links, we have the "guns" conservation. Liberals talk about the need for new gun control laws like background checks and argue that "something is wrong" with American gun culture. Conservatives warn against jumping to conclusions and preach about the consequences of overreaction.  And who knows what they could have found about Omar had the FBI did it's job. Do we want the FBI to arrest everyone who buys a gun that then has a report of suspicious behavior? We complain when they do it to right wing gun owners.Criminals are difficult to spot until the commit a crime. Even with all the so called government spying . This man appear to be vetted for owning a gun. he used our ways to kill so many. That does not mean the bill of rights be overturned.   So we can't say they should arrest every Muslim with a gun, unless we want to have them doing the same to us. Yes, some guns don't belong in citizens hands like the AR-15 , Sorry, but if we have rights, sometimes it means they cannot get a bad guy in time. It is very, very sad when it happens, but the alternative, mass "preventative arrest" or gun confiscation, is worse.

NOTES AND COMMENTS: 

(1)>>on the worst mass shooting in U.S. history. So far since Columbine , these "shootings" have been labeled the "Worst Mass Shootings..." The shooting would be by far the deadliest in the past 34 years. Mother Jones has tracked and mapped shooting sprees over the three decades since 1982. The magazine counted 62 mass shootings from 1982 through 2012, using the definition of 4 or more people killed in a public space in a seemingly indiscriminate killing. The magazine updated its numbers to include three or more people killed for calculations starting 2013, and since then there have been 18 more mass shootings through February of this year, not including the Orlando killings.In most cases, the Mother Jones staff found, the killers had obtained their weapons legally. (2)>>Omar Mateen's connections. The FBI interviewed Mateen again in 2014 about a potential connection with suicide bomber Moner Abu Salha.Vero Beach Bomber who attended the same Mosque. The FBI director described his agency’s first contact with Mateen, who died in a gun battle with police Sunday, as a 10-month preliminary investigation that was triggered when Mateen claimed to coworkers at the private security firm that employed him that he had family connections to al Qaeda as well as mutual acquaintances with the Tsarnaev brothers, who carried out the deadly Boston marathon bombing. (2.1)>>describing the 29-year-old as  “a good son” . yet left-wing media outlets twist themselves into pretzels trying to absolve Muslims and their ideology from any responsibility. MSNBC anchor Chris Jansing yesterday to a national security expert: "The father of this individual said his son witnessed two men kissing in Miami and that that enraged him. What do you make of that?" National security expert: "if that's true, then we have to shift to looking at this as a hate crime instead of a terrorist act."   (3)>>Seddique Mateen. Mr. Seddique Mateen the political candidate is also a prolific user of social media and has reams of U-Tube footage broadcasting his political ideology.FACEBOOK HERE – U-TUBE HERE –  In addition, the jihadist’s father was a frequent visitor to Washington DC and the U.S. State Department.  – SEE FULL STORY HERE –