ELECTIONS HAVE CONSEQUENCES

©2015 jbjd

I am Jewish. After much searching, I found the perfect Star of David necklace on-line. It was sold by a military supplier, and is made of stainless steel. I purchased two, one for me, one for my son. He tucks his in; I wear mine outside of my clothing. This bothers him, especially when I am riding the train to school, and even more so once I’m there. He worries that one of my Muslim students will hurt me. I told him, sometimes, I am concerned about advertising my Jewishness, too. But I explained, if I am not brave enough to wear my Jewish Star in public, here, now; would I have lifted a finger in Nazi Germany, to try to forestall the Holocaust?

My landlady, also Jewish, drove me to the store today. She brought up the subject of her grandson Joey, who is spending a college semester abroad studying in Israel. Given the current turmoil there, she lamented she  constantly fears for his safety. I did not bite my tongue.

‘You voted for Barack Obama, twice. Elections have consequences.’

I recounted that during the 2008 primaries, I investigated the candidates. Inasmuch as my most important consideration for the Commander in Chief is foreign policy; I began by focusing on their foreign policy advisers. That’s when I found this pronouncement by Samantha Power, now U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., who advised the Obama campaign (emphasis provided by jbjd):

I actually think in the Palestine-Israeli situation there’s an abundance of information and what we don’t need is some kind of early warning mechanism. What we need is a willingness to actually put something on the line in helping the situation. And putting something on the line might mean alienating a domestic constituency of tremendous political and financial import. It may more crucially mean sacrificing, or investing I think more than sacrificing, really billions of dollars not in servicing Israel’s military, but actually investing in the new state of Palestine; investing billions of dollars it would probably take also to support I think what will have to be a mammoth protection force, not of the old, you know, Srebrenica kind or the Rwanda kind, but a meaningful military presence.

Because it seems to me at this stage–and this is true of actual genocides as well, and not just major human rights abuses which we’re seeing there–but you have to go in as if you’re serious. You have to put something on the line. And unfortunately imposition of a solution on unwilling parties is dreadful, it’s a terrible thing to do, it’s fundamentally undemocratic. But sadly, we don’t just have a democracy here either, we have a liberal democracy. There are certain sets of principles that guide our policy–or they’re meant to anyway. And there, it’s essential that the same set of principles becomes the benchmark, rather than a deference to people who are fundamentally, politically destined to destroy the lives of their own people. And by that I mean what Tom Friedman has called “Sharafat.”

I mean, I do think in that sense that both political leaders have been dreadfully irresponsible, and unfortunately it does require external intervention which–very much like the Rwanda scenario, that thought experiment, if we had intervened early–any intervention is going to come under fierce criticism, but we have to think about lesser evils, especially when the human stakes are becoming ever more pronounced.

And that was a couple of months before the Rev. Wright fiasco. I pointed out, if I put my arm around Adolph Hitler and call him my spiritual adviser for 20 years, it’s safe for you to conclude, I  am not too crazy about the Jews.

P.S. In general, I am not a fan of Henry Kissinger. For me, the Nobel Peace Prize lost most of its  luster when it was awarded to him. But he wrote a brilliant article about the current Middle East mess: A Path out of the Middle East Collapse. One of the ‘talking points’ in the piece is his rejection of the favorable comparison between the nuclear deal with Iran, and President Nixon’s opening diplomatic relations with China. (Kissinger was then Nixon’s National Security Adviser, later his Secretary of State.) In short, for reasons stated, he declares these two are ‘applies and oranges.’ And, at least on this account, he would know.

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My mind is a terrible thing to waste.

 

 

 

HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES

©2011 jbjd

I was only marginally familiar with Historian Niall Ferguson because of his involvement with the brilliant PBS Series, The Ascent of Money.  So, when I viewed these remarks he made in response to a question about the President’s “policy” in the Middle East focusing on Egypt – a “flip followed by a flop” – I immediately determined to post the video here.  (Several hours later, after figuring out, MSNBC does not post directly to WordPress; setting up a VodPod account; and maneuvering through their interface with the WordPress platform, here it is.  Now, you  just have to click on the link below this image, to view video.)

Vodpod videos no longer available.

Morning Joe: Ferguson: Obama’s foreign policy f…, posted with vodpod

But hearing Mr. Ferguson praise the foreign policy creds of Henry Kissinger – National Security Advisor under President Nixon and Secretary of State under both Nixon and President Ford – I was reminded that understanding history requires (at least) an awareness of the contextual history of the historian.  See, my disillusionment with the Nobel Peace Prize did not occur in 2010 with Obama but with Kissinger, in 1973.  http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1973/ Here is a pretty good amalgamation of the lowlights of Mr. Kissinger’s forays into foreign policy territory from a site I just discovered called zpub, based in SF, CA.

In the minutes of a secret 1975 meeting of the National Security Council attended by President Ford reveal Henry Kissinger grumbling, “It is an act of insanity and national humiliation to have a law prohibiting the President from ordering assassination.” – LOST CRUSADER: The Secret Wars of CIA Director William Colby, by John Prados, Oxford University Press, 2003

The February and March 2001 issues of Harper’s Magazine feature a series by Christopher Hitchens on the case for charging Kissinger with War Crimes. Part I: The making of a war criminal Part 2 will feature an extensive section on East Timor.

Christopher Hitchens’ Trial of Henry Kissinger: A Review By Mike McGlothlin …

Hitchens presents a rather straightforward argument that establishes two seemingly undeniable propositions: on at least one occasion, Henry K. conspired to commit murder, and that on numerous other occasions, Henry K. was the primary force behind certain acts that could quite plausibly be considered war crimes. The case for Henry K. as murder conspirator is what Hitchens calls a “lay-down” case, i.e., one that stands out for its clear facts and clear law. The murder victim is General Rene Schneider, who was the Commander in Chief of the Chilean Army, whom Hitchens misidentifies as the Chilean “Chief of Staff.”; According to Hitchens (and the 09 September, 1970 minutes of the “40” Committee, the Kissinger chaired secret panel that oversaw U.S. covert operations), the Chilean military had a strong tradition of neutrality in political affairs, a rarity on the South American continent. General Schneider was known as an officer committed to upholding the Chilean constitution and therefore opposed to the rumored incipient coup against newly elected Socialist President Salvador Allende by a right wing would-be junta of current and former Chilean military officers. Using U.S. Government communications cables from the CIA and documents from the State Department, and White House, Hitchens relates the facts of Kissinger’s direct involvement in the direction, planning, financing, and general support by the organs of the U.S. Government in the plot to remove General Schneider.

LA Weekly: WLS Review: Henry: Portrait of a Serial Kissinger

How You Can Do What the Government Won’t: Arrest Henry Kissinger – Manhattan’s Milosevic, The Village Voice, Week of August 15 – 21, 2001

… bring Henry Kissinger to justice for crimes against humanity. Consider, though, what happened to the last people to talk even jokingly about plans for a citizen’s arrest of the real-life model for Dr. Strangelove. … An indictment of Henry Kissinger for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes would include (but not be confined to) the following. …

Henry Kissinger: War Criminal or Old-Fashioned Murderer? – Welcome to the “Henry Kissinger: Unindicted Terrorist” file! …

Incredibly, Henry Kissinger—the man who rivals Pol Pot for the dubious honor of being the person responsible for the death of the largest number of innocent people in South East Asia (and far surpasses Pol Pot in criminality when one factors in Kissinger’s various levels of responsibility for wholesale slaughter and repression in other parts of the world)—still wields significant power in the United States; but his role as eager facilitator of mass murder, totalitarian repression and other atrocities is never discussed in polite society.

Masterminded the murder of as estimated 600,000 peasants in Cambodia (the “Secret bombing”)

Pol Pot And Kissinger On war criminality and impunity by Edward S. Herman

President Ford and Secretary of State Kissinger gave the go ahead to Suharto’s invasion of East Timor and subsequent massive war crimes there, and the same Kissinger, who helped President Nixon engineer and then protect the Pinochet coup and regime of torture and murder, and directed the first phase of the holocaust in Cambodia (1969-75) …

The time was September 11, 1973. The country was Chile. The event was the bloody overthrow of a democratic government. And the criminals were Henry Kissinger, Richard Nixon, The CIA, and Chilean Dictator Augusto Pinochet. Pepsico, ITT, and other large U.S. corporations were also guilty parties in these crimes against the State and against The People of Chile. The Pornography of Power

TOBY HARNDEN, TELEGRAPH, LONDON: Washington reacted furiously to a request by Chilean judges for Henry Kissinger, the former secretary of state, to answer questions about an American journalist killed during the 1973 coup in Chile. A Bush administration official condemned the Chilean supreme court decision to send questions to Dr Kissinger, saying the move increased unease about the proposed International Criminal Court in The Hague. The administration source said: “It is unjust and ridiculous that a distinguished servant of this country should be harassed by foreign courts in this way. The danger of the ICC is that, one day, US citizens might face arrest abroad and prosecution as a result of such politically motivated antics.” . . . In its ruling, Chile’s supreme court said a list of questions should be sent to the US supreme court with regard to Dr Kissinger’s knowledge of the circumstances surrounding the death of Charles Horman, a journalist arrested by troops loyal to General Augusto Pinochet. His body was identified in a mortuary weeks later . . . The Chilean order came less than two months after French detectives delivered a court summons to Dr Kissinger, who was visiting Paris, asking him to testify about the disappearance of French nationals in Chile . . . In another case, a judge in Argentina has ordered Dr Kissinger to testify in a human-rights trial about a 1970s plan by South American governments to kidnap and kill Left-wing critics. [news/2001/08/01]

The US involvement in coup planning began even before Allende’s election victory, under the code-name FUBELT, with action plans prepared for Kissinger’s consideration. One group of officers working under CIA direction carried out the assassination of General Rene Schneider, a pro-Allende officer, in an unsuccessful attempt to spark a full-scale coup before Allende could take office. Can Henry Kissinger be Extradited?

He serves his consulting firm, Kissinger Associates, serves as a sort of private National Security Adviser and Secretary of State to about 30 major corporations around the world, such as American Express, Freeport-McMoRan Minerals, Chase Manhattan Bank, Volvo … Walter Isaacson on Booknotes

According to the new book Kissinger, by Walter Isaacson, published in 1992 by Simon & Schuster, ASEA Brown Boveri (page 733) had a contract or project arrangement with Henry Kissinger’s money-making consulting firm, Kissinger Associates, in 1990. According to this fascinating book, Kissinger started his consultancy in July 1982 with “$350,000 lent to him by Goldman Sachs and a consortium of three other banks.” Some of the people Kissinger hired to work for him were Brent Scowcroft, former national security adviser, and Lawrence Eagleburger “who was lured aboard as president in June 1984 after serving as undersecretary of state”. Both Snowcroft and Eagleburger left Kissinger Associates in 1989 to join President Bush’s administration. Kent Associates is a subsidiary of Kissinger Associates. On pages 733-734 a list of some of Kissinger’s corporate clients include, aside from ABB: Shearson Lehman Hutton, Atlantic Richfield, Banca Nazionale del Lavora (BNL) “a Rome bank that made illegal loans to Iraq”; Fluor; Hunt Oil; Merck & Co.; Union Carbide. http://www.workonwaste.org/wastenots/wn218.htm

The Iranian: Opinion, Kissinger, Good will – From “The Oil Deal With Iran” by Henry Kissinger, distributed by the Los Angeles Times Syndicate and published in The Washington Post (October 28, 1997).
Chapter 9 – An Abridged History of the United States – . This material rested on illegal wiretaps ordered by Henry Kissinger, and it turned up in John Ehrlichman’s office.
Kissinger, Iraq, BNL

Kissinger was born in Fuerth, Germany, on May 27, 1923, came to the United States in 1938, and was naturalized a United States citizen on June 19, 1943. He speaks French and German.

Kissinger is married to the former Nancy Maginnes and is the father of two children [Elizabeth and David] by a previous marriage. First wife, Ann Fleischer.

Henry and Nancy Kissinger have a house in Kent Connecticut.

On American Express Board of Directors.

The Chairman of Kissinger McLarty Associates is Dr. Henry Kissinger. Washington, D.C.-based Kissinger McLarty Associates is an affiliate of Kissinger Associates, Inc., which is headquartered in New York City. GlobalNet Retains Kissinger McLarty Strategic Consulting Firm … “The firm of Kissinger, McLarty & Richardson epitomizes Washington, D.C. at its worst – sleazy ex-administration officials, feeding off special influence and power and then … – Larry Klayman from Judicial Watch KISSINGER, McLARTY & RICHARDSON

Kissinger Associates, Inc.
350 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10022
(212) 759-7919

IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION CONCERNING THIS PERSON, PLEASE ADD IT HERE

DIRECTOR WORLD BUREAU OF TRUTH DEPARTMENT OF INJUSTICE

http://www.zpub.com/un/wanted-hkiss.html

I looked up Mr. Ferguson.  Selfishly, I wish I had not. Turns out, Mssrs. Ferguson and Kissinger go way back.

In 2009, the International Republican Institute (“IRI”), Chaired for the past 2 (two) decades by Sen. John McCain, awarded Henry Kissinger their Freedom Award.  In his opening remarks, Sen. McCain noted that instead of the usual presentation of formal remarks, the honoree has agreed to participate in a discussion with interviewer Dr. Niall Ferguson, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard College.  McCain, referring to the interviewer by his first name, relates in his bid for the Presidency, “…the two advisers I wish I could have spent more time consulting… are the two distinguished historians we are about to hear from.”  (Note:  the UK Times also reports, Mr. Ferguson quit the McCain campaign to advise candidate Barack Obama. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1249095/)

I only anticipated Obama would be disastrous for foreign policy, especially in the middle east, and tried to warn others;  based on his limited record related to foreign policy; the people who historically had influenced his life in relation to foreign affairs; as well as the people he had chosen to advise him on foreign policy when he was still only the D Corporation Presidential nominee wannabe.  (I didn’t get past Samantha Power.)

05/09/2008 – 8:10am EDT | jbjd

One of the several reasons I support Senator Clinton for the Office of President of the United States is her practical multi-step approach to solving our country’s problems. For example, addressing complaints and concerns about the high price of gas, I understood Senator Clinton to say that, short-term, we can ease consumers’ burden by imposing a gas tax holiday and shifting the burden to the oil companies, through a tax on windfall profits. Long term, she proposed conservation and sanctioning OPEC through the WTO.

One of the several reasons I do not support Senator Obama for the Office of President of the United States is that he omits from his list of ‘qualifications’ to the office, the only experience I find that could credibly contribute to a claim of his ability to lead the country, that is, his stint as the head of the Annenberg Challenge. This is the educational program set up by his friend, the self-promoting terrorist, William Ayers, who hired his inexperienced pal to run the show. (And because his chief foreign policy adviser, Samantha Power, advocated in 2003 that the President should unilaterally invade Israel to establish a Palestinian state because, to paraphrase, ‘powerful lobbies in this country would otherwise prevent such a move’. And because he gave Senator Clinton the finger.)

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/let-them-eat-arugula

jbjd, on July 27, 2008 at 2:35 am said:Austin Goolsbee is still BO’s chief economic adviser. But he did shove Mr. G onto the hood of the bus by claiming the only reason he lied that his staff hadn’t met with the Canadians to discuss NAFTA is that Mr. Goolsbee, who met with the Canadians, hadn’t told him.

http://riverdaughter.wordpress.com/2008/07/26/what-is-wrong-with-barack-obama/

By jbjd – May 8, 2008 11:51:22 AM ET

Is anti-Semitism not a deal breaker for Democrats endorsing Barack Obama for the Office of President of the United States because he is bi-racial?

If I am a member of and a major financial contributor to a church whose minister revels in the company of Louis Farrakhan; traveled with him to confer with the leader of an anti-Semitic terrorist regime; and, in 2007, proclaimed he is the “Man of the year; all the while touting him as my spiritual mentor, it is safe for you to assume, I am not too crazy about the Jews. And if I am running for the Office of President of the United States in 2008; and I select as one of my advisers Samantha Power, who in 2003 published a paper at Harvard in which she advocated unilaterally breaching Israel’s sovereignty to create a Palestinian state (because otherwise, to paraphrase, ‘powerful lobbies in this country will never permit such an establishment’), then it is safe for you to assume, I haven’t changed my mind.

For your information, here’s how I learned about Samantha Power. I figured checking out the staff who advise Candidate Obama would inform me what to expect of a President Obama (assuming he would staff the White House with these same people). I got their names from his web site and then searched the internet. In this way, over countless hours, I educated myself about the candidate, learning enough about him to be certain, he would never earn my vote.

http://my.democrats.org/page/community/post/jbjd/ChN7

jbjd May 07, 2008 at 7:04PM

Will Oregonians support an anti-Semite for the Office of President of the United States, because he is black?If I am a member of and a major financial contributor to a church whose minister revels in the company of Louis Farrakhan; traveled with him to confer with the leader of an anti-Semitic terrorist regime; and, in 2007, proclaimed he is the “Man of the year, all the while touting him as my spiritual mentor, it is safe for you to assume, I am not too crazy about the Jews. And if I am running for the Office of President of the United States in 2008; and I select as one of my advisers Samantha Powers, who in 2003 published a paper in which she advocated unilaterally breaching Israel’s sovereignty to create a Palestinian state (because otherwise, to paraphrase, ‘powerful lobbies in this country will never permit such an establishment’), then it is safe for you to assume, I haven’t changed my mind.

Did your newspaper know about Samantha Power? If so, why didn’t you print the story? If not, why didn’t you know? For your information, here’s how I learned about Samantha Power. I figured checking out Candidate Obama’s advisers would inform me what to expect of a President Obama (assuming he would staff the White House with these same people). I got their names from his web site and then searched the internet. In this way, over countless hours, I educated myself about the candidate, learning enough about him to be certain, he would never earn my vote.

http://blog.oregonlive.com/breakingnews/2008/05/portland_democratic_presidenti/886/comments-newest.html

But then again, I am not a noted  historian.