"Time is running out fast and we will be lucky if it doesn't happen in the first term of this president. If he gets elected to a second term -- which is quite possible, despite whatever economic disasters he leads us into-- our fate as a nation may be sealed".
Thomas Sowell

It appears that our current president has a lot on his plate with the determination to pass Cap and Trade and socialize our health Care System, despite his repeated denial that he wants to substitute free enterprise medicine with a government plan.
So it is not surprising that his press conference yesterday had no reference to the threats that KimJong sent his way in the last few days.

The following is an excerpt from the Tokyo Times editorial page,
and it illustrates that the little mad man who runs North Korea wants the World to know that he is now a member of the Nuclear Weapons club.

"North Korea has confirmed the worst suspicions of those who fear the destabilizing consequences of nuclear proliferation by announcing that it will become a full-fledged nuclear state, able to build both uranium and plutonium bombs and fit them to the nose cones of its missiles.

In its latest act of defiance, Pyongyang is reportedly preparing a new series of ballistic missile launches and another nuclear test, after a long-range missile test in April and the second test of a nuclear explosive device in May.

These and other actions have reversed steps the North had taken to abandon its nuclear program, coaxed by security, aid and other incentives offered in six-party negotiations with the United States, South Korea, Japan, Russia and China.

North Korea's breakout announcement June 13 followed the unanimous approval by the U.N. Security Council the day before of a resolution demanding that North Korea halt nuclear weapon tests, suspend its ballistic missile program and rejoin the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

The resolution marked a significant hardening of Chinese and Russian positions toward Pyongyang. They had previously counseled patience and opposed sanctions. China was particularly concerned about upsetting North Korea in the midst of a sensitive leadership transition, as its ailing leader Kim Jong Il reportedly prepares the country for rule by one of his sons.

The Security Council resolution extends penalties on North Korea by targeting its financial transactions and arms industry. It authorized U.N. member states to inspect suspect sea, air and land cargo going to or from North Korea. They are required to seize and destroy goods shipped that violate the sanctions, including nuclear or missile supplies. Pyongyang has financed its weapons' program with the sale of missile technology.

But as recent history has shown there is little affect on those who are placed on sanctions by the United Nations. Case in point, Saddam Hussein and the Mullahs of Iran.
And to provoke the USA even more this item was found in the North Korean offical paper.
"On Monday, North Korea's main Rodong Sinmun newspaper called it "nonsense" to say the country is a threat to the US, and instead claimed Washington was the one threatening the North. The paper also warned in a commentary that the country is prepared to strike back if attacked.

"As long as our country has become a proud nuclear power, the US should take a correct look at whom it is dealing with," the editorial said. "It would be a grave mistake for the US to think it can remain unhurt if it ignites the fuse of war on the Korean peninsula."

The North Korean newspaper also denounced Obama's recent pledge to defend and protect South Korea - even vowing to keep Seoul "under the US nuclear umbrella" - as an attempt to attack North with atomic bombs. Obama made the pledge in a joint statement after a summit last week with the president of South Korea Lee Myung-bak.

I believe a total embargo on all commerce is in order as the first move toward stopping North Korea from becoming a nother 1941 Japan. If that does not work. It is time to re-evaluate what we are doing in Afghanistan, and possibly turn our miltary attention to North Korea.
Of course the "talker" president will never do this until we are attacked and many people have paid the ultimate price!

Beginning during the Viet Nam war the Press and the anti-military ilk began to decry the death of indigenous peoples more than they did our own soldiers.
What was once considered the cost of winning a war, a tactic that was used in Germany and most notably in Japan. The killing of civilians to break the will of the people to continue fighting, was called "collateral damage". An unfortunate part of winning a war, but a necessary evil that was accepted in the battle plans of military leaders and the public at large.

Now it appears the lives of the people who are dressed in civilian clothes, and appear to be non-combatants are more important than the lives of the men and women our government puts in harms way!
This directive is reported in the Wall Street Journal as coming from the new general in charge of the troops in Afghanistan, but as anyone who has had any association with the military knows. The directives come from Washington, where, these days, being in a war seems to be more important, then winning a war!

The new U.S. commander in Afghanistan is finalizing a far-reaching change in tactics that will generally require U.S. troops taking fire in populated areas to break contact rather than risk civilian casualties, military officials said.

The rules being crafted by Gen. Stanley McChrystal are the clearest indication yet of how the new U.S. command team in Afghanistan plans to reduce civilian fatalities, a cause of public anger against U.S. efforts there.

When did our military get off track, and start worrying about what the civilians feel about the our presence in their country. If we are trying to win the hearts and minds of those who don't like us, we should withdraw all forces from Afghanistan now. Every man, woman and child could have a rifle or bomb inside their burka , as they all hate Americans. Send the peace corps. not the military if the object is to win the hearts and minds!

U.S. officials said the rules were designed to reduce the use of bombs, missiles and other heavy weaponry in populated areas. They will require U.S. forces that come under fire from militants operating out of houses and other buildings that may contain civilians to end the engagement and leave the area, officials said.

The restrictions could force commanders to be more cautious in the mission-planning stage and eschew operations likely to require operations in populated areas, according to an officer serving in Afghanistan.

The rules make clear exceptions for situations where the lives of U.S., North Atlantic Treaty Organization and Afghan personnel are in danger, U.S. officials said. The guidelines allow U.S. personnel to call in airstrikes or use powerful weaponry if they fear being overrun, can't leave the area safely, or need to evacuate wounded colleagues.But this is a decision that men and women in harms way should not have to make!

Gen. McChrystal, who arrived in Afghanistan last week, is "trying to make it as clear as possible that risking civilian lives for the sole goal of killing the enemy is not acceptable," said his spokesman, Rear Adm. Gregory Smith.

I am sorry, but if we don't kill the enemy, they will kill us! There is no way this war cannot turn into another Viet Nam if we try to fight a "clean surgical" war. Besides the direct order to wait until the field commander in the battle determines that they are about to be "over run" will result in more casualties of our troops you can be sure. As any captain who wants to advance in rank will not want to be brought up on charges that he applied excessive force! This is no way to fight a war, but it is consistent with our current presidents attitude toward our enemies. Talk, talk, talk and they will do our bidding. Bovine excrement!!!

During former president Bush's administration the Iranian regime was called the "Axis of Evil", and there was a lot of talk about sanctions. The sanctions were supposed to deter Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
But the sanctions were not really effective in motivating either the people or the regime to stop their nuclear quest.

Perhaps the reason the sanctions did not motivate the people of Iran to put pressure on their leaders to stop short of making fissionable material for a nuclear warhead. Was the fact that the sanctions did not include food stuffs, medical supplies and many other items of commerce. These ARE considered "humanitarian" aid.

My question is what good is it going to do if you allow the supposed enemy, who has sworn to eliminate Israel and the USA, to buy food supplies from US when we are faced with rising costs for products made of grains like wheat and soy beans?
Talk about sanctions is cheap! Real sanctions to be effective must include an embargo on all products. Especially when Americans are paying over $3.00 for a loaf of bread, and cereal products have doubled in price in the past year.

I remember when I was a child and milk prices got so low in the years following the great depression. The farmers started dumping milk, and the federal government started buying up butter and storing it in caves to bring the price up.
This analogy has very little to do with what is going on with Iran, as Iran is our sworn enemy by their own admission. But it appears that the government appears to be more concerned with finding markets for farmers than in bringing pressure on the Mullahs!

This article was found in FoxNews.com: "Iran spent nearly twice as much on U.S. imports during President Barack Obama's first months in office as it did during the same period in 2008, showing that despite trade penalties and tense relations, the two countries are still doing business.

The U.S. exported $96 million in goods to Iran from January through April, according to an Associated Press analysis of U.S. government trade data compiled by the World Institute for Strategic Economic Research in Holyoke, Mass. U.S. exports to Iran totaled $51 million during the same period in 2008 and $27 million over those months in 2007.

Soybeans, wheat and medical supplies -- all considered humanitarian items exempt from U.S. trade sanctions -- are among the top exports this year.

The latest trade figures reflect an increase in Iran's agricultural imports over the past year due to poor harvests there, said Bill Reinsch, president of the National Foreign Trade Council, a business group in Washington.

"I wouldn't read too much into it as far as trends are concerned," Reinsch said. Of course he would say this, or he would go the way of Special prosecutor Walpin!

Reinsch said he is hearing from more businesses interested in Iran. But beyond an effort by the Obama administration to encourage talks with Iran, he hasn't seen any policy changes that would lead to more opportunities for U.S. businesses.
Several countries have been more than willing to do business with Iran. Those exporting more than $1 billion in goods to Iran last year included China, $8 billion; Germany, $5.7 billion; Italy, $3.2 billion; France, $2.6 billion; and Japan, $1.9 billion.

That compares with about $747 million in exports to Iran by Britain, $689 million by Belgium, about $685 million by Spain and $683 million by the U.S.

It can be difficult to stop even sensitive goods and technology from making their way to another country. It is common for Iran and other sanctioned countries to use transshipment points such as the United Arab Emirates to try to obtain U.S. goods undetected.

The value of U.S. exports to Iran rose exponentially under Bush, even as he called the country part of an "axis of evil." In 2001, Bush's first year in office, they totaled just $8.3 million, a tiny fraction of last year's number.

Exports during the Bush years included a range of agricultural products and medical supplies, but some more surprising items also made it to Iran: brassieres, fur clothing, sculptures, perfume, musical instruments and military apparel.

Humanitarian shipments are an example of the tricky line the United States has walked in dealing with Iran -- even more so during Iran's election protests. Esprcially since Obama has taken a hands off stance on the violence in the Iranian streets!

It is apparent that president Obama and his merry band of leftist followers plan to destroy the private health Insurance industry that covers over 65% of the populace of the USA, and replace it with a government single payer program. Socialized medicine!
This despite the fact that polls show that in early 1993 the sense of a health care crisis was far more widespread than it is today – a 55% majority in 1993 said they felt the health care system needed to be “completely rebuilt” compared with 41% today. Health care costs were also a broader problem in 1993 – 63% of Americans said paying for the cost of a major illness was a “major problem” for them, compared with 48% currently.


In my life I have experienced government medicine first hand by being a Navy veteran with a service connected disability that makes me eligible for Veterans medical care and medicines.
Persoanally, I think the Congress of the USA doesn't allow enough money for the VA to care for the varied wounds and mental traumas that have occured to our brave warriors from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Of the 23.4 million veterans currently alive, nearly three-quarters served during a war or an official period of conflict, and the 2009 budget for this 12.7% of the U.S.population is 40 billion dollars!

But,my experience with the VA medicine is good, even though I have to travel 42 miles each way to See my VA doctor twice a year, and the yearly blood and x-ray exams. I am lucky to get the medicines I need from the VA pharmacy via the US mail at a deep savings.

So I am offering a plan to cover the estimated 46 million people who do not have medical insurance by utilizing special clinics for those who either cannot afford medical insurance, or choose to not spend the money to buy it.
If it is good enough for those who put their lives on the line for the Country, why not utilize special clinics for those who don't have insurance?

There will be those that cry second class treatment for these people, but if it is good enough for those who risked life and limb for their Country. Why not for those who cannot or will not buy health insurance?

There is the question of how do you staff these clinics with doctors and nurses?
It is a fact that most medical and nursing students utilize government guaranteed loans that accumulate in some cases to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

I suggest that instead of relying on the doctor and nurse graduate to pay back the loan. Many never do! The requirement should be for every year the medical student or nurse attends school on a government loan, they must pay back one year of service to the government by serving a year in these clinics.

All clinics should be placed on regular bus lines so that no one could say they were inaccessible, and emergency rooms would be open 24 hours a day, unlike the VA clinics!

Of course there are horror stories about VA clinics as this post on VETERANS TODAY illustrates, but then there are many such cases in the private practice of medicine. Else there would not be any malpractice lawyers!

"The Veterans Affairs Department appears poised to hit a milestone it would rather avoid. That's a backlog of 1 million claims to process.

The milestone approaches as the agency scrambles to hire and train new claims processors. VA officials are working with the Pentagon to create by 2012 a system that will allow the two agencies to electronically exchange records. The process is now done manually on paper.

Former Marine Corporal Patrick Murray of Arlington, Virginia, says the first claim he filed was lost. The second ended up at a VA office in Colorado.

The 25-year-old Murray was severely burned and his right leg was amputated after a roadside bomb explosion in 2006. He says it's mind-boggling to have spent 11 months in Walter Reed Army Medical
Center and in outpatient care, only to find out he had to mail his records to the VA to prove he was injured".

Before we dismantle the present private medical system that is the envy of the World. I believe we should consider the establishment of clinics for people without insurance.
And do not tell me that this concept is degrading to those who have no insurance! If it is good enough for us veterans, then it is good enough for those who have done nothing to warrant medical care except get sick!

If any of you have ever bought a used car, not a previously leased car, but a car with a lot of miles on it. A car that may or not be in good mechanical order.'
You have experienced as I id when I purchased my four year old ford coupe. The salesman wanted to make a deal and he highlighted the fact that the car had low mileage, even though I later found out that the speedometer had been turned back a few thousand miles. He lighted the good points of the car never letting on that the car would be a mechanical nightmare for me later.
So I bought the car, fat dumb and happy I drove home in my first car. Then the fuel pump failed, the carburetor vapor locked almost every day and the transmission developed a strange noise. Turned out they had put sawdust in the transmission!
I bought a lemon!

Well, I believe Obama is trying to sell a lemon to the American taxpayers in his health care bill. A bill that is not even finsihed being dratted, but has over 700 pages detailing rules, regulations and all manner of bureaucratic BS.

The American people have a right to know what’s in the Bill and I would hope that our elected representatives get to read the bill before they vote on it. But with Obama setting a July 31st deadline that possibility is doubtful. Maybe they will have a speed reader read it to the Congress!

Just like a used car salesman, Obama has to make the sale quick on this massive expenditure that presently does not even cover about 30,000 of the uninsured poor!Senator Kyl offered several reasons why proposed health care reform may fail if the Senate does not pass it quickly.

“There’s a reason why the president has said ‘if we don’t get this done soon, it’s not going to happen,’” Kyl said. “Why? Why does he say that?

“Because he knows that momentum will inevitably slow for something that’s extraordinarily costly, will deny people the coverage that they already have, will ration their health care, and could provide some kind of government insurance company that’s going to drive out the private insurance companies that provide all these options,” he said.

“It will impose new taxes, it will tell employers that they either have to pay a certain amount of money to cover people or they’re going to be fined,” Kyl added.

Obama’s clock may be ticking, but some lawmakers say more time is needed to ensure effective reform of America’s health care system.And I agree with those who say it is time to slow down and thoroughly examine a bill that will affect our lives and those of our children for generations to come!

If you look at the rhetoric coming from the White House and from members of Congress, they’re using the same rhetoric that they had with the stimulus bill – that this ‘needs to be done,’ it ‘needs to be done quickly,’ and when it comes to the cost it’s like 'Yeah, but you've got to think about the cost of what will happen if we don’t pass this,'” McClusky said.

The text of that bill, which was 1,071 pages, was not made available in final form for public inspection until the night before it faced a final vote in Congress.

“They (congressional Democrats) don’t deal with facts and figures when they’re talking about it. They’re just dealing in psychic projections, basically, in what they think this legislation will do,” he added.
Source: CNSNews.com
The president is playing the "shell and pea" game with the American public, when he says that he does not want Socialized medicine. He wants it but through the back door of regulation and squeezing the life out of PRIVATE insurance that today covers over 65% of the American public with the best medical coverage in the World!
Yes, it is expensive, but so is bailing out car companies that should have been allowed to go bankrupt!

Will the unions and the leftists prevail, or will the silent majority rise up and roar no to this dastardly attempt to sneak in another socialism scheme?

British economist John Maynard Keynes argued in "General Theory of Employment Interest and Money" that lower aggregate expenditures in the economy contributed to a massive decline in income and to employment that was well below the average. In this situation, the economy might have reached a perfect balance, at a cost of high unemployment.
Although Keynes never mentions fiscal policy in The General Theory, and instead advocates the need to socialize investments, Keynes ushered in more of a theoretical revolution than a policy one. His basic idea was simple: to keep people fully employed, governments have to run deficits when the economy is slowing because the private sector will not invest enough to increase production and reverse the recession. Keynesian economists called on governments during times of economic crisis to pick up the slack by increasing government spending and/or cutting taxes.

In 1928 and 1929 prior to the great depression, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates to try to curb Wall Street speculation (otherwise known as a "bubble"). Many historians like Brad DeLong believe the Fed. "overdid it" and brought on a recession. Moreover, the Fed then sat on its hands: "The Federal Reserve did not use open market operations to keep the money supply from falling.... [a move] approved by the most eminent economists."
There was not yet a "too big to fail" mentality at the federal government policy level. And today to pay for Obama's spending the Fed has had to artificially raise the principal on our T-Bonds to get foreign governments to buy them! Source: Wikapedia.com

It appears that president Obama is, if not a student of the Keynesian theory,a person who is using Keynes ideas to spend our country out of what he refers to as an impending economic disaster

During the Depression, Roosevelt tried public works, farm subsidies, and other devices to restart the economy, but never completely gave up trying to balance the budget. According to the Keynesians, he needed to spend much more money, but they were unable to say how much more.
Keynesian economists assumed poor people would spend new incomes; however, they saved much of the new money; that is, they paid back debts owed to landlords, grocers and family. Keynesian ideas of the consumption function were upset in the 1950s by Milton Friedman and Franco Modigliani,but apparently Obama has either forgot or put aside that portion of our history.
He has spent or committed trillions of dollars to government take over programs, and he always prefaces his program with the idea that if we do not do it we will have financial disaster in the future. Never once admitting that the debt he is growing will saddle not only this generation, but generations to come after us with the burden of high taxes and a weak dollar!

A perfect example of how this president uses fear to persuade any doubting people that what he is proposing is necessary to avoid a disaster is his speech today about Wall Street.

Obama said; “Wall Street seems to maybe have a shorter memory about how close we were to the abyss than I would have expected,” President Obama told Bloomberg News in an interview published on Wednesday. Most prudent thinkers will agree the word "abyss" is a large and shameful description of our times.

“When I hear some of the commentary that’s been creeping up about, “You know, it’s time for government to get out of the economy. And what’s the Obama administration doing?’ I have to try to remind them -- all we’re doing is cleaning up after the mess that was made,” Yes he inherited a large debt, but it is about time that Obama takes some of the blame for spending us into a 11.4 trillion dollar debt!

Obama's comments came hours before the unveiling of what are the most sweeping changes to the US financial regulatory system since the 1930s, as an attempt to prevent last year's financial crisis from happening again they say.


Although acknowledging that "you’re starting to see the engines of the economy turn,” the President added that "it’s going to take a long time” for a robust recovery to emerge.

The proposals to be announced today will require approval by Congress and the administration is hoping to have the legislation passed by the end of the year.

The President also told Bloomberg that "as soon as this economy has stabilised, we want the market to do what it does best, and that is produce jobs, invest.” He cannot be serious!

Mr. Keynes said this about people who claim to know the way to solve economic problems.
"The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed, the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back... soon or late, it is ideas, not vested interests, which are dangerous for good or evil".

The short Bio. on Norman Eisen shows that he worked for the prestigious law firm of Zuckerman Spaeder. He was a classmate of the sitting president. Just one more of the Harvard boys running the day to day operations of the Obama administration.
His professional history reveals that he spent much of his time defending people who were accused of ethical crimes and misdemeanors.
Therefore, it is understandable that Obama picked him for his "ethics" transitional team and now he heads the ethics "department" of the Obama White House.

The only problem with this picture is that apparently he did not do a very good job of vetting some of the choices Obama made for his Cabinet positions, and now it would appear that he has taken over the job of covering up dirty tricks perpetrated by "friends of Obama"!
At the end of only his second full week in office, President Barack Obama's administration slammed into Washington's unwritten law( pay your taxes) as two key government nominees withdrew under a cloud of tax problems.
Former Sen. Tom Daschle pulled out Tuesday as Obama's pick as Health and Human Services secretary, citing a growing chorus of criticism over his failure to fully pay taxes from 2005 through 2007He has since paid more than $140,000 including interest, then there was News of Nancy Killefer pulling her candidacy to be the first chief performance officer for the federal government, saying she didn't want her failure to submit payroll taxes for household help to be a distraction for the president. She had faced but subsequently settled a Washington city government tax lien of $946.69 on her home.
The one that slipped by, because he was described as being to valuable to turn down is Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. He had failed to pay taxes on a portion of his income when he worked for the International Monetary Fund. Geithner's tax history was the first to raise red flags in the Senate, but the Ethics man did not raise an objection so we have a tax "cheat" running the IRS!

The Obama administration pledged to focus on ethics and government openness and transparency.Apparently this has become a forgotten promise, as the firing of Inspector General Gerald Walpin shows.

"The White House's decision to fire AmeriCorps inspector general Gerald Walpin came amid politically-charged tensions inside the Corporation for National and Community Service, the organization that runs AmeriCorps. Top executives at the Corporation, Walpin explained in an hour-long interview Saturday, were unhappy with his investigation into the misuse of AmeriCorps funds by Kevin Johnson, the former NBA star who is now mayor of Sacramento, California and a prominent supporter of President Obama. Walpin's investigation also sparked conflict with the acting U.S. attorney in Sacramento amid fears that the probe -- which could have resulted in Johnson being barred from ever winning another federal grant -- might stand in the way of the city receiving its part of billions of dollars in federal stimulus money. After weeks of standoff, Walpin, whose position as inspector general is supposed to be protected from influence by political appointees and the White House, was fired.

Walpin learned his fate Wednesday night. He was driving to an event in upstate New York when he received a call from Norman Eisen, the Special Counsel to the President for Ethics and Government Reform. "He said, 'Mr. Walpin, the president wants me to tell you that he really appreciates your service, but it's time to move on,'" Walpin recalls. "Eisen said, 'You can either resign, or I'll tell you that we'll have to terminate you." Source: Amereican Thinker

Mr. Walpin, a 78 year old attorney known for his honesty and decisions that have never been influenced by politics over his more than 50 years in the law, had also just sent a report to the White House that he just finished. A report on the misuse of "stim" funds by the City University of New York. The two reports taken together would have placed Obama cronies in the sights of a criminal investigation. Hence, we have to be a least a little suspicion that the timing of his firing was "very interesting" as Walpin put it.

In case anyone thought this was still America, have a look at the official White House blog of Norm Eisen, special counsel to the president for ethics and government reform, who addresses the problem of people exercising their First Amendment rights and speaking up against the way the government has been wasting our money under the guise of "stimulus":

"First, we will expand the restriction on oral communications to cover all persons, not just federally registered lobbyists. For the first time, we will reach contacts not only by registered lobbyists but also by unregistered ones, as well as anyone else exerting influence on the process. We concluded this was necessary under the unique circumstances of the stimulus program." Source: Washington Examiner

A White House spokesman says the administration would not immediately offer any more details of Eisen's role in the White House Counsel's office. Now we know he is one of BHO's "hatchet" men!

Eisen, was co-founder of the good government group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW),and has previously represented federal officials and agencies on ethics issues.

According to his bio on Zuckerman Spaeder's Web site, Eisen was co-chairman of the firm's public client practice. He has assisted public officials investigating the subprime lending crisis; examining student loan marketing activities; and managing complex securities litigation.

Eisen also has represented government clients to "conduct internal investigations of their offices, represented them in disputes with the federal government and translated their policy ideas into statutes, regulations, executive orders, and programs."

Additionally, he has defended cases involving violations of government ethics rules and related misconduct, and now he is a point man for cover ups for Friends of Obama and their TRANSGRESSIONS!

IT IS NOT BAD ENOUGH THAT OUR COUNTRY HAS A MORE THAN 13 TRILLION DOLLAR DEBT, AND IT IS GROWING BY MORE THAN 3.8 BILLION DOLLARS A DAY.

Now comes the news that the Obama administration, that is restricting our exploration of crude oil resources, is helping Russia develop a pipe line to aid the Russians in selling gas to Western Europe to the tune of billions of dollars.

A report in the Tokyo Times, June 9, 2009, demonstrates the way Obama is furthering his "one world" vision at the expense of the U.S. taxpayers. It appears that he is He## bent on bankrupting this country while destroying the free enterprise system!


"Germany's ex-Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder is a legend in Russia. He serves Gazprom's interests for a measly couple of million euros a year, sits in on sessions of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and writes books about his staunch friendship with "Genosse Wladimir," who, in the not-so-distant past, earned himself the well-deserved nickname of "Stasi" among business circles in gangster-ridden St. Petersburg.

But it is not immediately obvious whether it is Schroeder licking Vladimir Putin's boots nowadays or vice versa. The two are building, or trying to build, the Nord Stream gas pipeline, an exceptionally costly project that satisfies twin strategic objectives. Demonstratively hostile to the interests of both Belarus and Ukraine, the pipeline is intended to ensure that these countries are under Russia's energy thumb, regardless of who is in power.

As a bonus, the pipeline will also consolidate the Russian economy's status as an appendage of Germany's — its supplier of natural resources. Some of Schroeder's predecessors as German chancellor sought to attain the same objective by rather different means.

The Kremlin's achievements in securing the help of Americans willing to offer their influence are equally impressive. Indeed, the Obama administration's Russia policy is being nurtured with advice from people who have no official position in the administration but who do have close business ties to Russia and the Kremlin: Henry Kissinger, James A. Baker, Thomas Graham and Dimitri Simes.
The first two are major geo-politicians; Graham and Simes are respected as outstanding Russia specialists. They write key reports for the administration, and shuttle between Moscow and Washington, coordinating the parameters of the Obama administration's effort to "reset" the bilateral relationship.

Like Schroeder, all these people are not economically disinterested. Baker is a consultant for the two companies at the commanding heights of the Russian economy, Gazprom and Rosneft. The Kissinger Associates lobbying group, whose Russian section is headed by Graham, feeds into the Kissinger- Primakov working group, a quasi- private sector effort, blessed by Putin, to deepen ties between Russia and the United States.Is this deal even known by the U.S. Congress, that is the big question?

It is highly instructive to read the recommendations of these people and groups, as they unobtrusively render the objectives of their Kremlin clients into a language familiar to American leaders.

Graham's latest contribution, "Resurgent Russia and U.S. Purposes," is most revealing in this respect. The author finds the government of a "Russia getting up off its knees" to consist of progressive modernizers fully aware of the challenges facing their country as it attempts to "return to the great powers club."

To become a genuinely developed and "modern country," Graham continues, "in the coming decade Russia will need to invest at least one trillion dollars in modernizing its infrastructure. America and the West in general have a vital interest in seeing the modernization of Russia succeed. The lion's share of the technologies, knowhow, and a substantial proportion of the investment, needs to come from Europe and the U.S."
In addition to the technology and investments, Graham quietly slips in a foreign policy suggestion for the Obama administration that is sure to please the Kremlin: "Finlandizing" Ukraine. Unless that sort of appeasement is pursued, he warns, Russia will continue to oppose the U.S. "wherever and whenever it can."

According to Graham, "At the extreme, a weak Russia, with its vast resources and sparse population east of the Urals, could become the object of competition among the great powers, notably China and the U.S."

That unspoken help-us-develop-or- we'll-let-the-Chinese-do-it threat is a logical development of Putin's homily at this year's World Economic Forum in Davos, where he advocated decisive action to end the world economic crisis. His recipe? Western countries should write off half a trillion dollars' worth of debt owed to them by the Russian state corporations run by his pals from the Dresden KGB and the Ozero dacha cooperative. But no amount of money will succeed in modernizing Putin's kleptocratic regime, which has already squandered trillions in oil wealth.

Simply put, the Putin system is institutionally and intellectually antithetical to the task of modernization.

Graham's only error in his presentation is his attempt to frighten the administration with a hypothetical confrontation between the U.S. and China over Russian resources. This is not his area of specialization. Kissinger works personally with the Chinese account, jointly propounding with his longtime rival Zbigniew Brzezinski the notion, so seductive for an America growing weary of its imperial burden, of a global Big Two.

Here is a recent sample of Kissinger's geopolitical arts: "The role of China in a new world order is crucial. A relationship that started on both sides as essentially a strategic design to constrain a common adversary has evolved over the decades into a pillar of the international system.
The Sino-American relationship needs to be taken to a new level. This generation of leaders has the opportunity to shape relations into a design for a common destiny, much as was done with trans-Atlantic relations" after the war.

No doubt Kissinger believes every word he wrote, but his ideas also honestly articulate the aspirations of his customers. It's just that not all customers have the same motives.

One wants to get his hooks into a further trillion dollars that it can pick away at, while the other wants to become "a central construct of the system of international relations." In both cases, the customers are getting the influence for which they are paying".

This is certainly not a story you will find in our newspapers or on TV, as the propaganda arm for Obama does not want to let the people in the USA know that he is more concerned with One World success through Progressive-ism, than he is OUR own Constitutional government as it stands today!

All the media are highlighting the fact that Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, is pleased with the UN resolution "condemning" North Korea for the nuclear tests and the provocative missile launches.

But it appears to me that Clinton is either putting on a good face for the Obama administration, or is naive enough to believe that the UN resolution is more than just useless words on paper!

The Wall Street Journal has an article on the Web today that illustrates how weal the watered down version of the UN reprimand had to be to get China, Russia and other Communists nations who sit on the UN Security Council, to sign on to the worthless document.

"Friday's UN resolution was weaker than the one the U.S. and its allies initially sought.

The new text prohibits the export of all North Korean weapons and the import into North Korea of all arms, excluding small arms, if they are reported to the U.N. That exception was a key demand of China, which exports small arms to North Korea, a Western diplomat said.

Moscow and Beijing agreed to the U.S. draft after language on inspecting North Korean cargo ships in international waters was diluted. Russia and China feared that inspections on the high seas could spark a military conflict with Pyongyang, a Western diplomat said.

"We believe sanctions such as cargo inspections are very complicated and sensitive and countries involved must act prudently and with sufficient grounds," said Zhang Yesui, China's U.N. envoy.

Under the compromise, the resolution says the Security Council "calls upon" -- instead of the earlier "authorizes" -- all U.N. nations to inspect the ships for nuclear-related material and other contraband, with the consent of the vessel's flag state. Flag states that refuse to have a ship boarded must direct the vessel to "an appropriate and convenient port" for inspection -- a loophole that could allow nations both to avoid inspections or to deny ships entry.

At a White House news conference, Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., acknowledged that the sanctions don't guarantee a North Korean ship will divert to a nearby port, and the resolution doesn't allow the use of military force"
So essentially the sanctions are worthless!



Complicating the North Korean nuclear situation,until now, South Korean presidents have unreservedly backed the six-party talks -- a forum that includes the U.S., the two Koreas, Japan, China and Russia. The multilateral group was launched by the Bush administration in 2003 after Pyongyang withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and it has been enthusiastically supported by the Obama White House. All six parties say they agree about the need to "denuclearize" the Korean peninsula. Yet the North is believed to have two nuclear programs: a plutonium program and a highly enriched uranium program that Pyongyang alternately denies or boasts about.

The talks -- only the latest iteration of an over twenty year effort to stunt North Korea's nuclear program,haven't worked. And Mr. Lee, speaking at the president's private offices, is the first national leader to publicly acknowledge their failure.

"The North Koreans have gained, or bought, a lot of time through the six-party-talks framework to pursue their own agenda. I think it's important now, at this critical point in time, for us not to repeat any past mistakes," he says. Now, it's "very important for the remaining five countries -- which excludes North Korea -- to come to an agreement on the way forward."

Mr. Lee is obliquely referring to the conflicting goals of the six-party talk participants. South Korea's stated goal is the denuclearization and ultimate reunification of the Korean peninsula. This was the U.S. position under Bush, but now that Obama has indicated that we can accept Iran having a nuclear program.It is not clear that the Obama administration will strive for this result.

China and Russia don't want to see the Kim regime fall, fearing floods of refugees, weapons proliferation, and, most importantly, the potential collapse of a buffer state between them and the democratic nations of North Asia. China has proved an especially difficult negotiating partner since it has served as the North's main economic support since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
And I believe that Putin's Russia was complicit in aiding North Korea with their nuclear program.

South Korea's President, Mr. Lee says, "the United Nations resolution calling for increased sanctions looks weak".

What about stricter financial sanctions, like the kind the U.S. Treasury successfully leveled against Banco Delta Asia (a North Korea enabler) in Macau in 2005? That is "one type of sanction that we can level." Should the U.S. add the North to the list of terror-sponsoring nations? "That in itself may have some symbolic meaning. But in actuality, having North Korea on the list or not will not make really much of a difference," he says.

Mr. Lee added that the bottom line: "Our ultimate objective is to try to convince North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons program, but we must also ask ourselves: What do the North Koreans want in return for giving up their nuclear weapons program? I think this is the type of discussion that the five countries should be engaging in now."

It is not even on the table for consideration, but I believe the USA cannot talk, talk, talk until the North Koreans have the nuclear weapons that can be fitted to the long range missiles that they are developing, before we consider a pre-emptive strike on their missile bases. Or do we wait until the missiles start falling on Alaska and Hawaii?

And to highlite the type of reaction that North Korea had to the UN sanctions there is this from the Japoanese News Agency,Kyodo News Agency.
"North Korea reacted with anger Saturday to a U.N. resolution meant to punish the country for its latest nuclear test, saying it will ''weaponize'' more plutonium, begin uranium enrichment and react militarily to blockades.
In a Foreign Ministry statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency, North Korea also called the resolution, "yet another vile product of the U.S.-led offensive aimed at undermining North Korea's ideology and system".

From the "Long War Journal" I learned that not only is Obama planning on closing Gitmo prison, there are other releases little noticed by the Main stream media.
The following is an excerpt from an article detailing the release of a leader of a known Iranian terrorist group affiliated with and a direct connection to Hezbollah.
It illustrates that the Bush and Clinton doctrine of not negotiating with terrorists who hold hostages is now being abrogated by the Obama administration.
It appears the technique of extending the hand of friendship and open dialog, now is extended to known terrorist leaders and groups

"The US military has released a senior member of a deadly terror group backed by Iran that has been directly implicated in the kidnapping and murder of five US soldiers in Karbala during a complex operation in early 2007.

Laith al Qazali was freed last weekend "as part of a reconciliation effort" as well as an attempt to secure the release of captive British hostages, according to a report in The New York Times.

Laith is the brother of Qais Qazali, the commander of the Qazali network, which is better known as the Asaib al Haq, or the League of the Righteous. Qais Qazali was a spokesperson and senior aide to Mahdi Army leader Muqtada al Sadr. The terror group, which was part of the Mahdi Army until the spring of 2008, has received extensive financial and military support from Iran's Qods Force, the external division that backs Hezbollah and is tasked with supporting the Khomeinist Islamist revolution.

The League of the Righteous was directly implicated by General David Petraeus as being behind the January 2007 attack on the Provincial Joint Coordination Center in Karbala as well as other high-profile terror attacks in Iraq. Five US soldiers were killed during the Karbala attack and subsequent kidnapping attempt. The US soldiers were executed after US and Iraqi security forces closed in on the assault team.

The attack on the Karbala Provincial Joint Coordination Center was a complex, sophisticated operation. The assault team, led by tactical commander Azhar al Dulaimi, was trained in a mock-up of the center that was built in Iran. The unit had excellent intelligence and received equipment that made them appear to be US soldiers. Some of the members of the assault team are said to have spoken English.

Also detained during the raid was Ali Mussa Daqduq, a senior Hezbollah operative who was tasked by Iran to organize the Special Groups and "rogue" Mahdi Army cells along the lines of Lebanese Hezbollah. Daqduq is a 24-year veteran of Hezbollah, and he commanded both a Hezbollah special operations unit and the security detail of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. Azhar al Dulaimi was killed in a raid in Baghdad in May 2007.

The US military claimed that Laith's release is part of a reconciliation effort with the League of the Righteous, but the real aim appears to be the release of five British hostages who were captured by the group.

"As part of a reconciliation effort between the government of Iraq and Asaib al Haq, the decision has been made to release Laith Qazali," Lieutenant Colonel Brian Maka told The New York Times. "Asaib al Haq has pledged to representatives of the Iraqi prime minister to give up violence and move the group towards peaceful integration into Iraqi society. An unconditional cease-fire will be undertaken by the group."

But the League of the Righteous has long demanded that the US military release Qais, Laith, and other members of the terror group in exchange for the five Britons captured in March 2007 during another complex operation at Iraq's Finance Ministry.

The real purpose of the release of Laith was explained by Sami al Askari, a spokesman for Prime minister Nouri al Maliki. The issue of reconciliation is merely a pretext for a prisoner / hostage exchange.

"This is a very sensitive topic because you know the position that the Iraqi government, the U.S. and British governments, and all the governments do not accept the idea of exchanging hostages for prisoners," Askari told The New York Times. "So we put it in another format, and we told them that if they want to participate in the political process they cannot do so while they are holding hostages. And we mentioned to the American side that they cannot join in the political process and release their hostages while their leaders are behind bars or imprisoned."

A one-to-one exchange of Shia terrorists for the British hostages will take place over the next week. It is unclear if Qais or Daqduq will be released in the exchange, but in the past, the League of the Righteous has been adamant that they be released.

The release of the League of the Qazalis and other senior leaders of the terror group does not bode well for the improved security situation in Baghdad and wider Iraq as the US prepares to withdraw from Iraq's cities. The Iraqi military dealt the terror group and its Iranian backers a deadly blow during the offensive against the Shia terror groups in central and southern Iraq that began in Basrah in March 2008 and resulted in thousands of Mahdi Army fighters killed and thousands more wounded, and the death of several of its senior military leadership. The movement itself was fractured and was forced to pull out from provincial elections.

The League of the Righteous still conducts operations against Iraqi and US forces in Baghdad and central and southern Iraq. The group has not honored previous ceasefire agreements, and the release of its senior leadership may give the group new life.

Both the Iraqi government and the US military have said Iran has backed various Shia terror groups, including elements of the Mahdi Army. While the Iranian government has denied the charges, Iraqi and US forces have detained dozens of Iranian Qods Force officers and operatives, captured numerous Shia terrorist leaders under Iranian command, and have found ample documentation as well as Iranian-made and Iranian-supplied weapons.

US and Iraqi forces have captured several high-level Qods Force officers inside Iraq since late 2006. Among those captured are Mahmud Farhadi, one of the three Iranian regional commanders in the Ramazan Corps; Ali Mussa Daqduq, a senior Lebanese Hezbollah operative; Qais Qazali, the leader of the Qazali Network which is better known as the Asaib al Haq or the League of the Righteous.

Since mid-October 2008, Iraqi and US forces have killed one Qods Force operative and captured 14 during raids throughout southern and central Iraq.

Qods Force, the special operations branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, has supported various Shia militias and terror groups inside Iraq, including the Mahdi Army. Qods Force helped to build the Mahdi Army along the same lines as Lebanese Hezbollah. Iran denies the charges, but captive Shia terrorists admit to being recruited by Iranian agents and then transported into Iran for training.

Iran established the Ramazan Corps immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime to direct operations inside Iraq. The US military says Iran and Lebanese Hezbollah have helped establish, fund, train, arm, and provide operational support for Shia terror groups such as the Hezbollah Brigades and the League of the Righteous. The US military refers to these groups as well as the Iranian-backed elements of the Mahdi Army as the "Special Groups." These groups train in camps inside Iran.

US military officers believe that Iran is ramping up its operations inside Iraq after its surrogates suffered a major defeat at the hands of the Iraqi military during the spring and summer of 2008. Iraqi troops went on the offensive against the Mahdi Army and other Iranian-backed terror groups in Baghdad, Basrah, and central and southern Iraq. More than 2,000 Mahdi Army members were killed and thousands more were wounded.

The League of the Righteous receives funding, training, weapons, and direction from the Qods Force. The League of the Righteous conducts attacks with the deadly armor-piercing explosively formed projectiles known as EFPs, as well as with the more conventional roadside bombs.

The size of the League of the Righteous is unknown, but hundreds of members of the group were killed, captured, or fled to Iran during the Iraqi government offensive against the Mahdi Army from March to July of 2008, according to the US military.

Sadr is looking to pull the rank and file of the League back into the fold of the Sadr political movement. Earlier this year Sadr issued a message rejecting the US-Iraqi security agreement and said he "extends his hand to the mujahideen in the so-called Asaib but not their leaderships who have been distracted by politics and mortal life from the [two late] Sadrs and the interests of Iraq and Iraqis."

The Hezbollah Brigades, or Kata'ib Hezbollah, has been active in and around Baghdad for more than a year. The terror group has increased its profile by conducting attacks against US and Iraqi forces, using the deadly explosively-formed penetrator land mines and improvised rocket-assisted mortars, which have been described as flying improvised explosive devices. The Hezbollah Brigades has posted videos of these attacks on the Internet.


The terror group is an offshoot of the Iranian-trained Special Groups, the US military said last summer. Hezbollah Brigades receives funding, training, logistics, guidance, and material support from the Qods Force.

The US and Iraqi military believe the Special Groups are preparing to re-initiate fighting as their leaders and operatives are beginning to filter back into Iraq from Iran. On Feb. 4, Lieutenant General Lloyd Austin, the deputy commander of Multinational Forces Iraq, said that Iran continues to arm, fund, and train the Special Groups, and that munitions traced back to Iran continue to be uncovered in Iraq. Recent intelligence and the finds of new Iranian caches "lead us to believe that Iranian support activity is still ongoing," Austin warned.

In my not so humble opinion, this is just another example of the way the Obama administration is making our country and our troops in harms way less safe. This is all wrong, and it must stop!!

Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.” —Ronald Reagan

Today's Americans, enticed, perhaps enchanted, by charismatic speeches, are ceding so much power to Washington, and like yesteryear's Germans are building the Trojan Horse for a future tyrant. SOURCE:WALTER WILLIAMS

A sage once said; "Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t do either, “raise consciousness”. Those who can’t do anything go into politics. Meaningful term limits are long overdue.

The burning question in my mind is how can we have 60 lawyers in the U.S. Senate and 204 Lawyers in the U.S. Congress, who do not object to the obvious violation of the Constitution being perpetrated by the president.
Obama has created 17 czars and the 18th is waiting in the wings. He will be the czar for compensation.
All of these czars are responsible only to the president, and that makes them a government within the Constituted government.
The House of Representatives is supposed, by our Constitution, to appropriate all funds for government programs.

The framers of the Constitution detailed the duties and reasons for the delegation of those duties to the Congressional House of Representative.The House has an equal status with the Senate on most matters, but a superior status in tax and spending.

House of Representatives, Duties as detailed by our Constitutional framers includes the following.

15 May 1789 Annals 1:65
"The Constitution, having authorized the House of Representatives alone to originate money bills, places an important trust in our hands, which, as their protectors, we ought not to part with. I do not mean to imply that the Senate are less to be trusted than this house; but the Constitution, no doubt for wise purposes, has given the immediate representatives of the people a control over the whole government in this particular, which, for their interest, they ought not to let out of their hands.

The Constitution places the power in the House of originating money bills. The principal reason why the Constitution had made this distinction was, because they were chosen by the people, and supposed to be the best acquainted with their interest and ability. In order to make them more particularly acquainted with these objects, the democratic branch of the legislature consisted of a greater number, and were chosen for a shorter period; that so they might revert more frequently to the mass of the people".

As lawyers, each and every one of the 264 current members of the U.S. House and Senate must certainly understand that what Obama has done by appointing czars, who are responsible to no one but him, is a direct violation of the Constitution the president swore to uphold when he took the office of President.
He has appointed special "advisors" who will work from inside the White House on healthcare, the economy, energy and urban issues, with more to come.
Source: Answers.com

Why then, has no one objected to Obama taking away from the House of Representatives their Constitutional rights? He appears to be subverting the authority of Congress, and concentrating too much power in the presidency! These "petty dictators" apparently plan to expand government's tentacles into nearly every nook and cranny of American government, business, and personal life,and control the purse strings of trillions of tax payers money.

In my un-legal opinion, Obama has committed an impeachable offense and nobody in Congress is even voicing an objection! Apparently, the virtue of decency and respect for the rule of law has been subverted by the quest for power, and in so doing we may loose our Country as our parents and grandparents experienced it!

Our government, while having neither moral nor constitutional authority, has the legal and physical might to take the property of one American and give it to another. And Obama has been doing this since taking over the Oval Office at a rate that exceedes all the money spent by Bush for the Iraq war and his Tarp program!

The unanticipated problem with this agenda is that as Congress uses its might to take what belongs to one American to give to another, what President Obama calls "spreading the wealth around," more and more Americans will want to participate in the looting. It will ultimately produce something none of us wants: absolute control over our lives. They call it fascism!

In Israel, free men and women are every day demonstrating the power of courage and faith. Back in 1948 when Israel was founded, pundits claimed the new country could never survive. Today, no one questions that. Israel is a land of stability and democracy in a region of tyranny and unrest...Ronald Reagan

That is until now! Sunday, PA officials said the Palestinian Authority will not return to the negotiating table with Israel unless Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu endorses the two-state solution and freezes construction in the West Bank settlements.

The officials said Abbas had relayed this position to the US during his recent visit to Washington, where he held talks with Obama.

One of the officials expressed hope that the looming crisis between the Obama administration and Netanyahu over the future of the peace process would lead to the collapse of the Israeli government.

"Netanyahu's government is bad for the peace process," the official told The Jerusalem Post. Peace for the sake of accomplishing a political promise is no peace at all! But it appears to me that Obama sides with the Arabs more than any previous president.

Now that the campaign for the Oval Office has been won by Obama, he has begun to use his middle name, Hussein. During the campaign it was conspicuously absent, and anyone who referred to his middle name was accused of trying to identify him as a Muslim.
But in his trip to Saudi Arabia and Egypt Obama repeatedly mentioned his childhood learning from the Koran which he quoted frequently.
He used his relatives Muslim experience to ingratiate himself with King Abdulla and the Egyptian attenders at his speech in the auditorium of Cairo University. Which was broadcast over AlJazeera to the Arab World.


And now by direct orders from BHO, George Mitchell is on his way to Israel, the Palestinian territories and Jordan to talk about stopping the Israeli settlements.
On his way he stopped off at the Donors to the Palestinians Group meeting.
He spoke at the PA donors' conference in Oslo, Norway. A group dedicated at providing support for the Palestinian Authority.
Mitchell said it was important to build up Palestinian institutions so that an independent and viable Palestinian state could soon be in place.
Mr Mitchell also said that President Obama has made clear to him and his administration, that a two-state solution is the only viable one.
The president reinforced this position by repeating his call for a two-state solution and a halt to Jewish settlement activity during a visit to Germany and Egypt last week.

But on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would make a major speech on peace and security issues later this month. He has also said he is ready to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and pursue a three-track peace process focusing on economic, security and political issues. This indicates he does not intend to be pushed into a hasty agreement!
Mr Abbas replied that renewed negotiations would be pointless unless Mr Netanyahu first endorsed the notion of Palestinian statehood,and halted the expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.

How about Mr. Abbas and the rest of the Palestinian leaders renouncing their threat to annihilate Israel, and stop their terrorist incursions into Israel as they did today when they attempted to perpetrate a bomb attack that involved horses strapped with explosives.Israeli soldiers reportedly came under attack by the militants before returning fire, according to the Israel Defense Forces. Source: CNN.Com


And just who is the present day major force in the Palestinian group? It is Hamas, a terrorist organization. Branded as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the US and the EU(BO), before Obama was elected.
It is seen, however, by its supporters as a legitimate fighting force, defending Palestinians from a brutal military occupation by Israel
It is the largest Palestinian militant Islamist organisation, formed in 1987 at the beginning of the first intifada, or Palestinian uprising against Israel's occupation in the West Bank and Gaza.
The group's short-term aim has been to drive Israeli forces from the occupied territories. To achieve this it has launched attacks on Israeli troops and settlers in the Palestinian territories and against civilians in Israel.

It also has a long-term aim of establishing an Islamic state on all of historic Palestine - most of which has been contained within Israel's borders since its creation in 1948.This of course, would destroy Israel!

Hamas became increasingly involved in Palestinian factional politics, both in the occupied territories and with a political branch in exile.
Hamas remained outside the main Palestinian political structure of the PLO, but it took part in, and won Palestinian Authority (PA) legislative elections in the occupied territories in 2006.
Hamas came to prominence after the first intifada as the main Palestinian opponent of the Oslo accords. The US-sponsored peace process that oversaw the gradual and partial removal of Israel's occupation in return for Palestinian guarantees to protect Israeli security.
Despite numerous Israeli operations against it and clampdowns by Yasser Arafat's Palestinian National Authority, Hamas found it had an effective power of veto over the process by launching suicide attacks.This fact has not been publicly discussed by either president Obama, nor Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Both of whom now are ignoring letters of intent from presidents Bush an Clinton, acknowledging the right of Israel to build as necessary, for growth, within the so called occupied territories of Gaza.

The prime minister, briefing the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on his recent trip to Washington, said, "it is likely that we are not going to reach an agreement with the Americans" regarding settlement construction, but did his best to portray his meeting with US Obama in a positive light.

A source in Jerusalem said it must be clear that the "proposed settlement policy of the Netanyahu government is more or less identical to that of previous governments, and that if someone is changing the ground rules, it is not Israel." It appears to me that it is Obama.

The source, alluding to understandings on settlement construction that existed at the time of Bush administration, said if on the one hand Washington was calling on Israel to abide by all previous understandings, then "shouldn't the person asking be abiding by previous commitments and understandings as well?"

When reporters asked whether the letter former president George W. Bush wrote to then-prime minister Ariel Sharon in 2004 speaking of expectations that Israel would retain these blocs still applied.
The answer was typical of spokes person for Obama, vague and semantic!
"The United States lives up to its obligations," he said. "Right now, we are focused on, as I said, trying to get both sides to adhere to the road map so that we can move forward toward that two-state solution. And it's not going to be easy, as you know. We've spoken to that many times. And we're going to continue to try to do that."

Asked again if the Bush letter was binding, Wood said, "This administration has, as I said, laid out its proposals, its strategy for moving forward. And that's about the best I can help you with on that." Source: Reuters and Jerusalem Post