The Fantasy Infects the Media -- No Surprise There

Obama compliant Yahoo News is headlining that president Obama is "offering Putin a way out" of the Ukraine mess.  This is the same line that the White House itself is following in not for attribution remarks that are being widely disseminated.  Obama and his people apparently view the entire scene in Ukraine as if Putin and the Russians got involved by mistake and are just looking for an easy way out.  The delusion of our high officials is unbelievable.  Russia has been trying to take control of Ukraine for years.  Putin thought he had bought the leadership of Ukraine last November when the then president threw over the proposed treaty with the European Union in favor of a closer alliance with Russia.  When protest erupted, Putin sided with the government against the people in the streets.  Even when the former president of Ukraine ordered the military and the police to open fire on peaceful demonstrators killing almost 100 of them, Putin and the Russians still supported him.  Eventually Russia gave the former president asylum when he was forced to flee Ukraine after his attack on the protesters cost him his job.  The Russian troops sent into Ukraine was an effort by Putin to achieve with the army what he had failed to achieve through bribes and diplomacy.  None of this was an accident or a mistake by the Russians.  They are not looking for a way out; they are seeking control of their neighbor.

Right now, we have a president who is making moves based upon the world that exists only in his fantasy life.  Russia will not leave Ukraine because Putin wants to go.  Russia would only leave if Putin felt he was forced to go.  It does not help to have the idiots in the media repeating the fantasies.  Reality needs to appear soon or worse things are coming.

 

Let's Not Forget Iran

While the latest focus of news has been the Ukraine, we ought not forget about Iran.  Today comes news that the Israeli navy boarded a ship in the Red Sea that was trying to deliver Iranian missiles to Hamas in Gaza.  The missiles are medium range and are capable of hitting targets up to 150 miles from the point of launch.  Their delivery to Hamas would have put a much bigger swath of Israeli territory under the gun of the terrorists.  According to Israeli sources, the rockets were smuggled out of Iran and into Iraq for shipment in order to try to avoid their detection by the Israelis.  They were hidden inside containers marked as building materials.  Israel has released photos of the weapons.  Of course, Hamas has denounced the action.

It is good to see that at least one government can actually take action against the bad guys.  Israel understands that words alone will not protect it.  Maybe they could explain that to president Obama.  Of course, he would not listen anyway, but one can always hope.

 

New York's Answer to Failing Schools

New Mayor diBlasio of New York City has announced a new plan for dealing with the problem of failing public schools.  His answer is to close charter schools that actually educate their students well.  This is supposed to help the bad schools.

I am not kidding.  DiBlasio announced that a batch of charter schools which have been performing well will no longer get the support of the city.  Supposedly, the opposition of the teachers' union to these schools which require teachers to actually perform well has nothing to do with the mayor's bizarre position.  He is closing good schools because this is supposed to help the bad ones.  How?  Will the self-esteem of the bad schools be raised because there will be no good ones to use for comparison.

What about the students who were actually being educated?  Are they to be consigned to a future without an education?  Must all NYC graduates be functionally illiterate?

I suppose the city is getting what it voted for when it selected someone as leftist as the new mayor.  The kids in the charter schools did not get to vote, however, and it is their lives that are being ruined.

 

Purple?

The latest poll from Quinnipiac about the governor's race in Connecticut has the race a tie.  Governor Dan Malloy and his likely Republican challenger Tom Foley both have 42% of the vote.  This is about the same as the last poll taken months ago when Foley was ahead slightly. 

The poll results are striking in a state like Connecticut where statewide Republicans have been on a long losing streak.  The truth is that the numbers show that even in a true blue place like my home state, the combination of a weak economy and Obamacare can drag down the Democrats.  Of course, the Connecticut economy has been stagnant for all of Malloy's term in office, and he has no accomplishments of note that would encourage voters to select him for another term in office.  Nevertheless, the normal momentum for any Democrat in Connecticut ought to have an incumbent ten points ahead of a challenger at this point.

Maybe Connecticut is becoming a purple state.  Then again, that is about as likely as the high reaching 85 degrees tomorrow.

 

The Almighty Dollar

Secretary of State Kerry landed in Kiev today and brought what some in the media are calling a major weapon to be used by the new government of the Ukraine; Kerry is pledging one billion dollars in American loan guarantees for the new leaders of the threatened country.  Is he kidding?  Is this just some sort of parody?  Is Kerry trying to remind people of the moment in the Austin Powers movies where Dr. Evil demands one million dollars or else he will destroy the world?

Let's put this move into proper context.  One billion dollars is not even a rounding error to the USA.  And guess what?  It is not much of a sum even in the Ukraine.  More important, a loan guarantee is not help in stopping and invasion.  It will not provide weapons for the military of Ukraine.  It will not stop a Russian tank.  It will not deter Putin.  Surely, even Kerry does not expect the Russians to stop because America is helping Ukraine borrow money.  The only way that would happen is if Putin and the Russian leaders laugh so long and so loudly at the American move that they pass out from lack of air.

Today, the latest news is that the Russians are moving their troops that were on field exercises in Russia back into their bases; as a result world markets are soaring as I write this.  The problem, of course, is that the Russian forces in the Crimean Peninsula in the Ukraine are NOT being withdrawn.  That region is effectively now controlled by the Russians and there is no sign that they plan to leave.  Nothing that Putin says makes any difference on that score; we can look only at what the Russians do.

Yesterday, the Washington Post called Obama's foreign policy one "based on a fantasy".  It was correct.  The problem for America and the world, however, is that reality has a harsh way of breaking through the fog of words.  Armies with guns really do not care all that much what Obama has to say, no matter how well he says the words.  To them, it is all hot air.

 

The "Mistake" and the "Wrong Side of History"

The talking points for the Obamacrats regarding Ukraine are becoming clear, but the course of action is not.  The word from the White House is that president Obama's allies are supposed to say that Putin and the Russians have made a mistake in the Ukraine and are on the "wrong side of history".  As the church lady on SNL used to say, "Well isn't that special!"  We are all to believe that the Russian takeover of the Crimean region of the Ukraine and perhaps more of the eastern section of that nation is a mistake which will isolate Russia and reveal its weakness.  Get it?  Russia uses force to detach a section of a neighboring country in a manner most frequently seen in the 18th and 19th centuries and that shows weakness.  The problem, of course, is that it shows nothing of the sort.  Taking over additional territory shows strength, not weakness.  When Russian forces smash a neighbor into giving up control of territory, it makes all of Russia's neighbors more fearful of the Kremlin and less likely to accept the platitudes offered by Obama and others on his behalf.  Countries like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania understand that a speech by Obama condemning the Russians is not going to stop bullets or artillery shells fired by the modern equivalent of the Red Army.  A ruthless ruler like Putin does not care what Obama says; his only concern is what Obama does.  Putin already learned well the lesson that Obama's principal trait in foreign policy is dithering--he just cannot make up his mind.  Indeed, even when Obama says his mind is made up (like when he announced a red line regarding chemical weapons in Syria), it is not something that anyone else can rely upon. 

The real truth is that Putin did not make a mistake in the Ukraine unless there really is a concrete and active response from the West.  There have to be real costs to what Putin has done.  Russia has to suffer serious consequences for this attack on a neighbor.  So far, the biggest move made by Obama has been to pull the USA out of the Paralympics in Sochi.  Putin gets part of the Ukraine, and in response we refuse to send some paralyzed athletes to compete in games in Sochi.  Maybe if Putin takes the whole country, Obama will close the Russian Tea Room restaurant in New York.  That should make Putin nervous!

This is not a case of trying to make the USA look macho.  Instead, America needs to convince the Russians that continuation of their current course will bring dire consequences to that country.

Returning Home

I arrived home today from two weeks in South America.  It was good to be away from the non stop news cycle, but that did not stop the outpouring of news in any event.

Obviously, the big story has been the Russian incursion into the Ukraine.  In many respects, that incursion only took place because of a flubbed foreign policy by the USA and NATO.  Even now as things get worse in Eastern Europe, the talking heads on TV tell us that there really is nothing that America can do about it.  They are wrong, of course, but it does not stop the outpouring of professions of impotence.  We may all come to regret the weakness displayed by president Obama.

Another big story has been the hostility shown by Obama to Israel.  Obama may be unable to move Putin or Iran, but he seems to have no trouble threatening the Israelis on a seemingly non-stop basis.

Then there is the endless disaster which is Obamacare and its continuing infliction of major harm on America.  Things have gotten so bad that partisan idiots like Harry Reid have taken to name calling rather than reason.  They have nothing they can say regarding the law itself, so instead they attack the messengers who let people know just how bad things really are.

I'm looking forward already to my next vacation.