From American Thinker:

The commission appointed by President Obama to investigate the Gulf oil spill (the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling) does not include a single member with specialized knowledge of petroleum engineering. This is akin to performing a heart transplant with a surgical team that has never set foot in an operating room.

Of the seven members appointed to the commission, not one is a petroleum engineer, and all have long-standing ties to the environmental movement. This is certainly the case with Frances Beinecke, Donald Boesch, Terry Garcia, and Frances Ulmer, all of whom have close ties to environmentalist research and policy groups. Beinecke, in fact, is president of the Natural Resources Defense Council, while Ulmer is a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists. How’s that for an unbiased commission on drilling?

If the president’s intention was to prevent future leaks, why would he appoint a commission with no knowledge of drilling? The answer, it would seem, is that this commission was never meant to perform the task it was officially charged with. It was never really intended to be a commission on drilling safety, but rather a group of environmental activists intent on regulating and taxing the oil and gas companies out of business. Its report is unlikely to focus on improved safely measures with the intent of increasing oil and gas exploration and production. It will more likely issue a blueprint on how to restrict drilling while extorting profits from oil companies by way of new fees and regulation.

Even as the commission hears impassioned testimony from Gulf Coast residents about the economic devastation of Obama’s ban on deep-water drilling (his second ban, the first having been ruled illegal by a federal court), its members continue to register their opposition to drilling of any sort. Following recent testimony in New Orleans, during which prominent Gulf leaders pleaded for a resumption of offshore drilling, the commission’s directors, William Reilly and Bob Graham, offered lip service to the resumption of drilling. But where were Ms. Beinecke and the commission’s other environmental activists during these hearings? From all accounts, they have been silent about the economic damage caused by Obama’s drilling ban.

There are two crucial lessons to be learned from the Deepwater Horizon accident, but it is doubtful whether the commission will comprehend either of them. The first is that “best practices” exist which, had they been strictly adhered to, may have prevented the Deepwater Horizon accident. It is for the commission to determine whether they were followed in that case, but it is incontrovertible that best practices have prevented significant accidents on all of the other 40,000 wells drilled in the Gulf. These practices, with continual improvement, should prevent spills in the future as well.

The second lesson, and one that no one in government or the mainstream media seems to have considered, is that the Deepwater Horizon, however flawed its management might have been, had the capacity to produce a great deal of oil and gas. Based on the enormous flow of oil from the Deepwater Horizon and others among the 33 deep-water rigs operating in the Gulf, it is clear that vast reserves of oil and gas exist off America’s shores. These reserves are enough to make the United States energy-independent. They are enough to revive our flagging economy, enough to produce jobs for hundreds of thousands of workers and to create secondary and tertiary jobs for millions of others.

Estimates of oil flow from the Deepwater Horizon have come in at between 40,000 and 100,000 barrels. Taking a mean estimate of 70,000 barrels, the annual production from the well, not counting natural gas and condensates, would have amounted to 25,555,000 barrels per year. One hundred such deep-water wells in the Gulf, producing equal quantities of oil, would produce over 2.5 billion barrels per year, enough to supply one-third of the petroleum needs of the United States. This new production alone would add over $175 billion to annual GDP, and it would cut America’s annual trade deficit by the same amount. Combined with increased onshore drilling, conservation measures, and increased production of natural gas made possible by advances in drilling technology, offshore drilling would render the United States energy-independent for the first time in a half-century.

Moreover, deep-water drilling has the potential to transform America from the slow-growth, high-unemployment welfare state that President Obama envisages into a prosperous, full-employment economy. This new economy would not only be energy independent, but it might well become an exporter of oil and gas — as it is now an exporter of coal.

Expansion from the current 33 wells to 100 is a realistic goal, since it would not be necessary to drill 100 deep-water wells annually. Oil flow from wells such as the Deepwater Horizon continues for ten to thirty years, or even more (as it has in the North Sea). Ten additional deepwater wells per year, combined with fracking for natural gas on shore, would soon move the country toward energy independence.

For most Americans, new drilling and the energy independence that comes with it seem like a good thing, but that is the very reason why the president has appointed a commission hostile to increased drilling. The success of the free market in the United States depends to a great extent on the availability of cheap energy. By cutting off the supply of oil, natural gas, and coal, Obama ensures a continuation of high unemployment and an extended period of slow growth, and with these, the expansion of the socialist welfare state.

Nothing could be further from the interests of the modern-day Democratic Party than the transformation of the American economy into a flourishing free-market economy powered by cheap and reliable fossil fuels. The fight over drilling, in this sense, is nothing less than a struggle for the future of capitalism in America.

The White House has some tough questions to answer about the Deepwater Horizon disaster in light of a new report from the Center for Public Integrity. In the critical first days after the explosion, the U.S. Coast Guard disregarded its own firefighting policy and might have caused the oil rig to sink — prompting the leak that resulted in the largest oil spill in U.S. history.

New evidence unearthed by reporters Aaron Mehta and John Solomon reveals the cash-strapped Coast Guard broke its own rules and didn’t have a firefighting expert on the scene to oversee the private boats battling the blaze. There’s an ongoing investigation to determine if the salt water sprayed on the burning oil rig caused it to sink.

“[T]he question of what caused the platform to collapse into the Gulf … remains unanswered and could prove vital to ongoing legal proceedings and congressional investigations,” the article states. “That is because the riser pipe from which the majority of BP’s oil spewed did not start leaking until after the rig sank.”

These new details put the spotlight on the White House, which has repeatedly pinned the blame on BP. If it turns out the Coast Guard is at fault — either because it didn’t follow proper procedures or couldn’t respond adequately because of a lack of resources — the public has a right to know why we’re just now learning this information 100 days after the disaster began.

The crippling budget cuts President Obama proposed for the Coast Guard also deserve a closer examination. Obama’s spending plan reduced the blue water fleet by a full one-third, slashed 1,000 personnel, five cutters, and several aircraft, including helicopters. According to the Center for Public Integrity, the Coast Guard updated its official maritime rescue manual — advising against firefighting aboard a rig — just seven months before the Deepwater Horizon explosion. That change in policy came at a time when Adm. Thad Allen warned the budget cuts threated to turn the Coast Guard into a “hollow force.”

An earlier report from Mehta and Solomon also raised important questions that White House has yet to answer about what Obama knew when. That investigation revealed the White House timeline of events failed to acknowledge an oil leak until four days after the explosion, even though the Coast Guard’s timeline reported a leak one day after explosion.

The United States — along with the UK, China and Russia — have agreed to work together under the globalist umbrella of the United Nations to determine “norms of accepted behavior in cyberspace,” according to Computer Weekly. France, Germany, Estonia, Belarus, Brazil, India, Israel, Italy, Qatar, South Korea, and South Africa are also involved in the effort.

Robert Knake, a cyberwarfare expert with the Council on Foreign Relations, says the signed agreement represents a significant change in U.S. posture. Participation of the U.S. demonstrates the Obama administration’s strategy of diplomatic engagement, according to Knake.

“To achieve that goal nations will share information about their cybersecurity laws, develop international standards of conduct, and help less developed countries tighten their cybersecurity. The principles have been finalized for the United Nations, but there is no indication when they will be reviewed,” reports writes Bert Knabe for Lubbock Online.

As Infowars.com has reported, the threat of cyber attacks is vastly overstated. Dire reports issued by the Defense Science Board and the Center for Strategic and International Studies “are usually richer in vivid metaphor — with fears of ‘digital Pearl Harbors’ and ‘cyber-Katrinas’ — than in factual foundation,” writes Evgeny Morozov, a Belarus-born researcher and blogger who writes on the political effects of the internet.

Morozov notes that much of the data on the supposed cyber threat “are gathered by ultra-secretive government agencies — which need to justify their own existence — and cyber-security companies — which derive commercial benefits from popular anxiety.”

“Our legislature is utterly supine before the national security bureaucracy, which exaggerates cybersecurity threats and consistently uses the secrecy trump card to defy oversight,” writesJim Harper for CATO. “Benign intentions do not control future results, and governmental surveillance of the Internet for ‘cybersecurity’ purposes may warp over time to surveillance for ideological and political purposes.”

Our nation will be even more supine before a global security bureaucracy that does not answer to our elected representatives, does not respect our national sovereignty and our Constitution and Bill of Rights.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced in 2009 that the globalist organization has moved to prevent “hate speech” on the internet. “There are those who use information technology to reinforce stereotypes, to spread misinformation and to propagate hate,” Ki-moon said during a seminar on “hate speech” held in June of 2009. “Look no further than last week’s shocking shooting at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC. For years, the alleged shooter was well known for spewing racist venom through the internet and elsewhere.”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Exn8lvBOj5I

The corporate media and liberal bloggers attempted to place blame for the Holocaust museum shooting on members of the patriot movement. James W. Von Brunn, the accused shooter and avowed white supremacist, “was a right-winger — a far right-winger,” David Neiwert wrote last June. “More to the point, this is precisely the same belief system that today fuels the cottage industry in conspiracy theories — promulgated by the likes of Ron Paul and Alex Jones — that the Fed is part of a massive conspiracy of ‘international [read: Jewish] bankers’ to enslave Americans and destroy the country.”

Following the release of the Department of Homeland Security’s report labeling gun owners, returning veterans, and patriot movement activists as the number one threat to national security, the corporate media launched into a concerted effort to portray “rightwing extremists” who defend the Constitution as domestic terrorists.

Obama partisans — including members of the FCC — characterize conservative talk radio as hate speech and demand it be shut down. Obama’s regulatory czar, Cass Sunstein, has argued that the government ban “conspiracy theorizing” and infiltrate “extremists who supply conspiracy theories” to disrupt the efforts of the “extremists” to propagate their theories over the internet.

The red herring of cybersecurity is now being exploited by the global elite in a cynical effort to tame and fully corporatize the internet and shut down the alternative media that has eclipsed the old dinosaur dead tree and televised corporate media.

The recent agreement at the United Nations signifies that the globalists are determined to take efforts to control and censor the internet to the next level.

Uh oh — Obama and the Democrats are talking about “fairness” again, which means we’re all on the brink of being screwed, but more fairly than ever:

WASHINGTON — President Obama plans to press Congress today to pass pay-equity legislation that would make it easier for women to sue employers who pay them less than their male counterparts, the White House said Monday.

“Women deserve equal pay,” White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett said in an interview, citing government statistics that show women earn 77 cents for every dollar men earn. “It’s a very fundamental right.”

Obama will announce his support for the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill that has languished in Congress for several years. In 2007, President Bush warned he would veto the bill, and it has been stalled by opposition from some Republicans and business groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The ACLU endorses the proposal, as does every visibly aroused trial lawyer from here to Neptune:

“Due to rising unemployment rates, families need to bring home every dollar they rightfully earn, making pay equity even more necessary, not only to families’ economic security but also to the nation’s economic recovery,” the ACLU’s Laura Murphy said in a July 13 letter to senators.

If women earn 77 cents for every dollar men earn, then why not call on government to immediately cut taxes 23% for working females until this gross injustice can be sorted out? (pause for laughter)

Here’s the so-called plan:

A White House task force plans to announce today that the Obama administration will:

• Improve the government’s data collection from businesses to get a better handle on the scope of wage discrimination.

• Close the wage gap among federal employees.

• Promote greater workplace flexibility. Vice President Biden, noting that two-thirds of households with children are run by working parents, said, “The workplace has, for the most part, not changed to reflect these realities — and it must.”

The irony is of course that maybe parents wouldn’t have to work so much if these alleged seekers of “fairness” weren’t strangling the private sector to death. But it’s not like they don’t know that.

Rest assured the Democrats won’t address any wage gap among government employees by bringing the high end down to match the low end, but rather the other way around.

The “Paycheck Fairness Act” will be about little except lawyers, ratcheting up pay for Federal employees (and more importantly, the dues those employees pay the unions who back Democrats), allowing the government to dig their snouts even deeper into the pie of American business (how manymore IRS agents will this Act require in order to enforce it?), and, perhaps most importantly, artificially ratcheting up private sector taxable income via yet another government mandate.

Hopefully the three women and two men in the country who still have an actual job by the time Team Obama is finished will appreciate the gesture.

If we’re serious about settling pay inequities, maybe we should start withObama’s Pay Czar — he’s made more money than any women I’ve ever met, and what’s fair about that?

Type the keywords “Internet censorship” into Google News and you will immediately understand to what degree the world wide web is under assault from attempts by governments globally to regulate and stifle free speech. From Australia to Belarus, from Turkey to Vietnam, from Pakistan to Egypt, from Afghanistan to Iran, huge chunks of the Internet are going dark as the Chinese model of Internet regulation is adopted worldwide.

But why should Americans concern themselves with countries halfway across the globe adopting Chinese-style net censorship? Because under Senator Joe Lieberman’s 197-page Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act, the United States would formally mimic China’s “great firewall” of web censorship.

When Lieberman himself attempted to debunk claims that the bill provides Obama, and any following President for that matter, with a figurative ‘kill switch’ to disable certain parts of the Internet, he explained that the government was merely seeking to emulate powers over the Internet already enjoyed by the Communist Chinese.

Firstly, despite Lieberman’s spin, the text of the bill clearly gives Obama the power to shut down the Internet for at least four months without Congressional oversight.

Secondly, and even more alarmingly, Lieberman’s acknowledgement that the United States is seeking to emulate China’s policies on Internet control confirm that the entire cybersecurity agenda is primarily concerned with silencing political opposition to the state, since this factor completely dominates the Chinese model which Lieberman openly invokes as the ultimate goal of cybersecurity.

China’s vice-like grip over its Internet systems has very little to do with “cybersecurity” and everything to do with silencing all dissent against the state.

Chinese Internet censorship is imposed via a centralized government blacklist of any websites that contain criticism of the state, porn, or any other content deemed unsuitable by the authorities. Every time you attempt to visit a website, you are re-routed through the government firewall, often making for long delays and crippling speeds.

China has exercised its power to shut down the Internet, something that Lieberman wants to introduce in the U.S., at politically sensitive times in order to stem the flow of information about government abuse and atrocities. During the anti-government riots which occurred in July 2009, the Chinese government completely shut down the Internet across the entire northwestern region of Xinjiang for days. In several regions, the authoritiescompletely cut off the Internet for nearly a year, with many areas only now slowly starting to come back online. Major news and discussion portals used by the Muslim Uighurs in the area remain blocked. Similarly, Internet access in parts of Tibet is routinely restricted as part of government efforts to pre-empt and neutralize unrest.

Major websites like Twitter, Google and You Tube have also been shut down either temporarily or permanently by Chinese authorities.

News websites in China now require users to register their true identities in order to leave comments. This abolition of anonymity is used to chill free speech in that it prevents the user from engaging in criticism of the state for fear that they would be tracked down by authorities.

Chinese authorities are now going further than merely maintaining a “blacklist” of banned websites by instituting a “whitelist” of allowed websites, a move that “could potentially place much of the Internet off-limits to Chinese readers”. Websites not pre-registered with the government would be completely blocked to all Internet users, meaning “millions of completely innocuous sites” would be banned. This equates to requiring government approval to set up a website, which would obviously not be granted if the person or organization making the application has a history of or is likely to engage in dissent against the state.

President Obama himself has criticized Chinese Internet censorship as a hindrance to the free flow of information and allowing citizens to hold their governments accountable, and yet Lieberman wants to hand Obama similar powers.

The model Lieberman has identified as the goal of cybersecurity is centered around keeping people oppressed by eliminating any means of widespread dissent and preventing people from organizing politically. It has nothing to do with providing security against foreign hackers and terrorists and everything to do with strangling free speech critical of the state.

However, this is not merely a war on free speech, it’s a war on Internet anonymity. Even if the government shuts down portions of the web, new networks are guaranteed to pop up to take their place. Indeed, as people who have attempted to downplay concerns about the ‘kill switch’ have rightly pointed out, Obama could already attempt to shut down the Internet using the Communications Act, the PCNAA legislation merely codifies this power formally into law.

The real threat posed by the wider cybersecurity agenda is the implementation of an individual identity system for all Internet users. This is what was proposed by Obama’s cybersecurity co-ordinator Howard Schmidt in a paper compiled with the aid of the National Security Council.

The strategy revolves around, “The creation of a system for identity management that would allow citizens to use additional authentication techniques, such as physical tokens or modules on mobile phones, to verify who they are before buying things online or accessing such sensitive information as health or banking records,” reports the FInancial Times.

Only with this government-issued “token” will Internet users be allowed to “able to move from website to website,” a system not too far removed from what China proposed and rejected for being too authoritarian.

So in this sense, the cybersecurity agenda will ensure a world wide web even more draconian than the Chinese model, where the threat of the government identifying individuals, now that anonymity is removed, who engage in “hate speech” critical of the government and revoking their license to use the Internet, will inevitably chill free speech from the very outset.

To trust the federal government with the power to regulate free speech by means of a licensing system for the Internet and not expect the state to abuse such power is the height of stupidity.Cass Sunstein, Obama’s information czar, openly wrote in a 2008 paper of his desire to combat “conspiracy theories” (ie any information communicated primarily through the Internet which represents a threat to the image of the state) by empowering the government to tax or even ban outright opinions of which it disapproves. This is what cybersecurity is all about, eliminating the voices of the oppressed as big government seeks to quicken its takeover of America with the aid of silent obedience.

The cybersecurity assault on the Internet is also dovetailed with an attack from a slightly different angle. Numerous private networks, from transport hubs, to libraries, to universities, to federal government agencies have installed filters that censor political websites which engage in the “hate speech” of dissenting against the state. Since the entire Internet consists of a fusion of privately-owned networks controlled by corporations such as Verizon, AT&T and Qwest, how long before such filters are standardized?

Lieberman’s kill switch bill and the broader cybersecurity agenda has little to do with over hyped threats from foreign hackers and terrorists and everything to do with placing a muzzle on the last outpost of true free speech – the Internet. The state wants to turn the world wide web into a clone of cable television, a sterile medium controlled almost entirely by mega corporations and regulated by FCC bureaucracy and red tape. Your political blog, no matter how many millions of readers it has the potential to attract, has no place in this newly regulated Internet police state.

Tale action – call your Senator and demand that they vote against Lieberman’s Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act, or kiss your right to unrestricted, unregulated, and anonymous free speech on the Internet goodbye. The bill has already been approved by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and is now awaiting a vote by the full Senate.

Find your Senator from the list here or call the Senate switchboard at (202) 224-3121. Tell your Senator’s office that you will vote them out of office if he/she votes in favor of PCNAA.

President Obama will be handed the power to shut down the Internet for at least four months without Congressional oversight if the Senate votes for the infamous Internet ‘kill switch’ bill, which was approved by a key Senate committee yesterday and now moves to the floor.

The Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act, which is being pushed hard by Senator Joe Lieberman, would hand absolute power to the federal government to close down networks, and block incoming Internet traffic from certain countries under a declared national emergency.

Despite the Center for Democracy and Technology and 23 other privacy and technology organizations sending letters to Lieberman and other backers of the bill expressing concerns that the legislation could be used to stifle free speech, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee passed in the bill in advance of a vote on the Senate floor.

In response to widespread criticism of the bill, language was added that would force the government to seek congressional approval to extend emergency measures beyond 120 days. Still, this would hand Obama the authority to shut down the Internet on a whim without Congressional oversight or approval for a period of no less than four months.

The Senators pushing the bill rejected the claim that the bill was a ‘kill switch’ for the Internet, not by denying that Obama would be given the authority to shut down the Internet as part of this legislation, but by arguing that he already had the power to do so.

They argued “That the President already had authority under the Communications Act to “cause the closing of any facility or station for wire communication” when there is a “state or threat of war”, reports the Sydney Morning Herald.

Fears that the legislation is aimed at bringing the Internet under the regulatory power of the U.S. government in an offensive against free speech were heightened further on Sunday, when Lieberman revealed that the plan was to mimic China’s policies of policing the web with censorship and coercion.

“Right now China, the government, can disconnect parts of its Internet in case of war and we need to have that here too,” Lieberman told CNN’s Candy Crowley.

While media and public attention is overwhelmingly focused on the BP oil spill, the establishment is quietly preparing the framework that will allow Obama, or indeed any President who follows him, to bring down a technological iron curtain that will give the government a foot in the door on seizing complete control over the Internet.

As we have illustrated, fears surrounding cybersecurity have been hyped to mask the real agenda behind the bill, which is to strangle the runaway growth of alternative and independent media outlets which are exposing government atrocities, cover-ups and cronyism like never before.

Indeed, China uses similar rhetoric about the need to maintain “security” and combating cyber warfare by regulating the web, when in reality their entire program is focused around silencing anyone who criticizes the state.

The real agenda behind government control of the Internet has always been to strangle and suffocate independent media outlets who are now competing with and even displacing establishment press organs, with websites like the Drudge Report now attracting more traffic than many large newspapers combined. As part of this war against independent media, the FTC recently proposing a “Drudge Tax” that would force independent media organizations to pay fees that would be used to fund mainstream newspapers.

Lost in all the chaos of the Gulf oil spill is Barack Obama’s 52-page manifesto for a New World Order.

I invite you to read for yourself his misnamed “National Security Strategy” – misnamed because it is actually a blueprint for running the whole world like he’s been running the United States since January 2009.

Obama is hardly the first president to plead for America to join a New World Order. It started with the first George Bush and has continued unabated through three more administrations. But Obama’s so-called “National Security Strategy” has little to do with securing the U.S. from threats and much more to do with turning over the U.S. to the illegitimate authority of global organizations.

It starts early in the table of contents: “Promoting a Just and Sustainable International Order.”

Woodrow Wilson tried with the League of Nations. Franklin D. Roosevelt tried with the United Nations. I guess we’re going to keep trying this path until we get it right.

Nowhere in this document will you see the world “sovereignty” used in regard to the United States – only about Iraq and Russia. (Maybe all of us who want to live in a free and independent nation need to move to one of those locales?)

The last seven pages of the document are about this new “international order” Obama wants to build – a pretty ambitious agenda for a guy who has never run any business or served in any executive capacity before assuming the presidency. But don’t worry. His plan is to bring in some people with lots of experience running things – the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, to name a few.

This “international order” term is not a theme in the report, it’s an obsession:

• “Just as America helped to determine the course of the 20th century, we must now build the sources of American strength and influence, and shape an international order capable of overcoming the challenges of the 21st century.”
• “We will do so by building upon the sources of our strength at home, while shaping an international order that can meet the challenges of our time. This strategy recognizes the fundamental connection between our national security, our national competitiveness, resilience, and moral example. And it reaffirms America’s commitment to pursue our interests through an international system in which all nations have certain rights and responsibilities.”
• “This engagement will underpin our commitment to an international order based upon rights and responsibilities. International institutions must more effectively represent the world of the 21st century, with a broader voice – and greater responsibilities – for emerging powers, and they must be modernized to more effectively generate results on issues of global interest.”
• “Finally, our efforts to shape an international order that promotes a just peace must facilitate cooperation capable of addressing the problems of our time. This international order will support our interests, but it is also an end that we seek in its own right. New challenges hold out the prospect of opportunity, but only if the international community breaks down the old habits of suspicion to build upon common interests. A global effort to combat climate change must draw upon national actions to reduce emis sions and a commitment to mitigate their impact. Efforts to prevent conflicts and keep the peace in their aftermath can stop insecurity from spreading. Global cooperation to prevent the spread of pandemic disease can promote public health.”
• “An international order advanced by U.S. leadership that promotes peace, security, and oppor tunity through stronger cooperation to meet global challenges.”
• “Our engagement will underpin a just and sustainable international order – just, because it advances mutual interests, protects the rights of all, and holds accountable those who refuse to meet their responsibilities; sustainable because it is based on broadly shared norms and fosters collective action to address common challenges.”
• “This engagement will pursue an international order that recognizes the rights and responsibilities of all nations. As we did after World War II, we must pursue a rules-based international system that can advance our own interests by serving mutual interests. International institutions must be more effective and representative of the diffusion of influence in the 21st century. Nations must have incentives to behave responsibly, or be isolated when they do not. The test of this international order must be the cooperation it facilitates and the results it generates – the ability of nations to come together to confront common challenges like violent extremism, nuclear proliferation, climate change, and a changing global economy.”
• “That is precisely the reason we should strengthen enforcement of international law and our commit ment to engage and modernize international institutions and frameworks. Those nations that refuse to meet their responsibilities will forsake the opportunities that come with international cooperation. Credible and effective alternatives to military action – from sanctions to isolation – must be strong enough to change behavior, just as we must reinforce our alliances and our military capabilities. And if nations challenge or undermine an international order that is based upon rights and responsibilities, they must find themselves isolated.”
• “Furthermore, our international order must recognize the increasing influence of individuals in today’s world.”
• “Within this context, we know that an international order where every nation upholds its rights and responsibilities will remain elusive. Force will sometimes be necessary to confront threats. Technology will continue to bring with it new dangers. Poverty and disease will not be completely abolished. Oppression will always be with us. But if we recognize these challenges, embrace America’s responsibil ity to confront them with its partners, and forge new cooperative approaches to get others to join us in overcoming them, then the international order of a globalized age can better advance our interests and the common interests of nations and peoples everywhere.”
• “An international order advanced by U.S. leadership that promotes peace, security, and opportunity through stronger cooperation to meet global challenges.”
• “Furthermore, we embrace America’s unique responsibility to promote international security – a responsibility that flows from our commitments to allies, our leading role in supporting a just and sustainable international order, and our unmatched military capabilities.”
• “America’s commitment to the rule of law is fundamental to our efforts to build an international order that is capable of confronting the emerging challenges of the 21st century.”
• “The United States will protect its people and advance our prosperity irrespective of the actions of any other nation, but we have an interest in a just and sustainable international order that can foster collec tive action to confront common challenges. Thisinternational order will support our efforts to advance security, prosperity, and universal values, but it is also an end that we seek in its own right. Because without such an international order, the forces of instability and disorder will undermine global security. And without effective mechanisms to forge international cooperation, challenges that recognize no borders – such as climate change, pandemic disease, and transnational crime – will persist and potentially spread.”
• “International institutions – most prominently NATO and the United Nations – have been at the center of our international ordersince the mid 20th century. Yet, an international architecture that was largely forged in the wake of World War II is buckling under the weight of new threats, making us less able to seize new opportunities. Even though many defining trends of the 21st century affect all nations and peoples, too often, the mutual interests of nations and peoples are ignored in favor of suspicion and self-defeating competition.”
• “What is needed, therefore, is a realignment of national actions and international institutions with shared interests. And when national interests do collide – or countries prioritize their interests in different ways – those nations that defy international norms or fail to meet their sovereign responsibilities will be denied the incentives that come with greater integration and collaboration with the international community. No international order can be supported by international institutions alone. Our mutual interests must be underpinned by bilateral, multilateral, and global strategies that address underlying sources of insecurity and build new spheres of cooperation. To that end, strengthening bilateral and multilateral cooperation cannot be accomplished simply by working inside formal institutions and frameworks. It requires sustained outreach to foreign governments, political leaderships, and other critical constituen cies that must commit the necessary capabilities and resources to enable effective, collective action. And it means building upon our traditional alliances, while also cultivating partnerships with new centers of influence. Taken together, these approaches will allow us to foster more effective global cooperation to confront challenges that know no borders and affect every nation.”
• “Although the United States and our allies and partners may sometimes disagree on specific issues, we will act based upon mutual respect and in a manner that continues to strengthen an international order that benefits all responsible international actors.”
• “The rise of the G-20, for example, as the premier international economic forum, represents a distinct shift in our globalinternational order toward greater cooperation between traditional major economies and emerging centers of influence.”
• “Many of today’s challenges cannot be solved by one nation or even a group of nations. The test of our international order, therefore, will be its ability to facilitate the broad and effective global cooperation necessary to meet 21st century challenges.”

Do you get the picture? Do you want to read more? Do you need to read more?

Keep in mind, this is Obama’s National Security Strategy.

Heaven help us.

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is fond of saying, “You don’t ever want a crisis to go to waste; it’s an opportunity to do important things that you would otherwise avoid.” Well, the Obama Administration certainly has not let the British Petroleum (BP) Deepwater Horizon oil rig crisis go to waste, using it as a smokescreen to silently assault and further diminish American citizens’ personal freedom.

While the nation has its eyes and ears focused on the blame game ping-pong match between President Obama and BP top brass, President Obama on Thursday, June 10, quietly announced a new Executive Order establishing the “National Prevention, Health Promotion, and Public Health Council.”

Claiming the “authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America,” President Obama has truly gone off the deep end this time in his most atrocious attempt to date to control every aspect of Americans’ lives.

According to the Executive Order that details the President’s “National Prevention and Health Promotion Strategy,” the Council will be charged with carrying out ” lifestyle behavior modification” among American citizens that do not exhibit “healthy behavior.”

The President’s desired lifestyle behavior modifications detailed in Sec. 6 (c) focus on:

• smoking cessation;
• proper nutrition;
• appropriate exercise;
• mental health;
• behavioral health;
• sedentary behavior (see Sec. 3 [c]);
• substance-use disorder; and
• domestic violence screenings.

Making matters even worse, if that is even possible at this point, President Obama will create an “Advisory Group” composed of experts hand-picked from the public health field and various other areas of expertise “outside the Federal Government.”

Let’s consider who the President has sought advice and mentoring from in the past:

• Rev. Jeremiah Wright, who the Anti-Defamation League calls a “Messenger of Intolerance,” and
• Bill Ayers, leader of the 1960′s domestic terrorist group ”Weatherman” that was “responsible for 30 bombings aimed at destroying the defense and security infrastructures of the U.S.”

Now, President Obama is going to seek medical advisors who will be charged with modifying lifestyles and behaviors of those citizens he deems unhealthy? “Paging Dr. Kevorkian! You’re wanted in the White House STAT by President Obama!”

Whether you are a child, a parent, a worker, or retired, the President’s approximately 25-member “Advisory Group” will soon be present in every aspect of Americans’ lives, as the Executive Order prescribes in Sec. 4 (b). Specifically, our new so-called lifestyle behavior modification advisors will be actively carrying out the President’s orders in:

• worksite health promotion;
• community services, including community health centers;
• preventive medicine;
• health coaching;
• public health education;
• geriatrics; and
• rehabilitation medicine.

President Obama’s sweeping plan to enforce “lifestyle behavior modification” is chock full of open-ended target areas, especially when it comes to issues of “mental” and “behavioral” health, “proper nutrition,” “sedentary behavior,” and “appropriate exercise.” The President’s Executive Order is a blatant and forceful attempt to adjust the way Americans young and old think, behave, eat, drink and whatever else free will used to entitle our nation’s citizens to enjoy as prescribed by the Founding Fathers.

If you are feeling stressed-out, sad, confused, hungry, thirsty, bored, or tired, do you honestly trust President Obama and his “Advisory Group” to act in your best interests?

Barack Obama has warned Israel he will pave the way for an independent Palestinian state if the peace process remains deadlocked until the autumn.

The US president is proposing to hand control of the Middle East peace process to the international community unless there is a breakthrough in the next few months, Israeli officials have said.

Mr Obama has formulated a secret plan with leading European allies to convene an international peace conference by the end of the year, according to Israel’sHaaretz newspaper.

The move would fulfil one of Israel’s deepest fears by effectively stripping the Jewish state of its power to dictate the course of talks.

The conference would attempt to end decades of Israeli-Palestinian conflict by pressing both sides to accept difficult compromises on issues ranging from the future of millions of Palestinian refugees to the status of Jerusalem.

Mr Obama is also eager to gain international recognition for the creation of a Palestinian state.

Officials in the government of Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, have voiced their dismay in recent weeks over reports that Mr Obama was planning an effective takeover of negotiations by imposing his own peace deal on the two sides.

Such a step, they said, would undermine indirect peace talks, brokered by the US, that could begin as early as next month.

Mr Obama has strenuously denied considering such an idea, but observers have said it is likely the US president would have developed it as a contingency plan.

Since taking office last year, the Mr Obama’s efforts to broker an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal have faltered badly. Trust between the two sides has all but evaporated in a row over Mr Netanyahu’s Jewish settlement policy in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, which also triggered a noxious row between Israel and the United States.

Although both the Israelis and Palestinians have indicated their willingness to resume talks, suspicions linger and negotiations will not be held face to face.

Alon Pinkas, a former Israeli diplomat close to the Obama administration, said it seemeed plausible that officials in Washington would consider taking matters into their own hands.

“An international conference involving the EU, China and Russia is more of a recipe for chaos than a practical political blueprint,” he said. “But anything is better than the status quo.”

Fearing that it will deprive them of ownership of the peace process, the Israeli and Palestinian leaderships are both likely to oppose a conference.

“The idea that you can have instant peace like instant coffee is an illusion,” said an Israeli official.

“If you enforce a time limit and then introduce an imposed solution if they don’t succeed after a period, then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: you’re going to guarantee the talks won’t succeed.”

According to Haaretz, the conference would be convened under the auspices of the Quartet for Middle East peace, whose membership comprises the United States, the EU, the UN and Russia.

It would mark the first time in 17 years of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations that the United States had handed control of the peace process to the international community.

Talk about taking another giant leap in the wrong direction.

Fresh off his successful (for now) effort to ram through an unpopular healthcare “reform” law, President Barack Obama is now fighting for legislation on Capitol Hill that would set up a permanent fund to bail out companies in the financial sector.

Of course, that’s not how his team is spinning things. On the White House Blog, Jen Psaki claims that “under the Senate bill, the taxpayers will never be asked to foot the bill for Wall Street’s irresponsibility.” But that’s simply not true.

“If you liked the bailouts in 2008, you’ll love the Dodd bill,” Sen. David Vitter (R.-La.) tells HUMAN EVENTS. “Congressional Democrats and the Obama Administration want to create a permanent bailout mechanism all while spouting their rhetoric of getting tough on Wall Street, but if you look at who is already lining up to support their ‘reform’ measure it’s a who’s who of the big banks that have already received the taxpayer bailout the first time.”

Vitter is right to note that Wall Street supports this measure. Why? Because big investment houses realize they’ll get bailed out and would have less reason to worry about risky behavior.

Sen. Chris Dodd (D.-Conn.) crafted the Senate version of so-called “Financial Reform” with the support of the President. The procedure used to date resembles the non-transparent and secretive tactics used to pass ObamaCare. The Senate Banking Committee marked up the bill in 22 minutes, with no amendments offered and no debate allowed. Now, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and President Obama are trying to rush the bill to the floor before the American people have a chance to understand that it contains a hidden, permanent bailout fund.

The Dodd legislation may be on the floor of the Senate as early as next week. A version passed the House, in a slightly different form, on December 11 by a 223-to-202 margin.

Much like with ObamaCare, any bill that passes the Senate will then be sent to the House.

There are two specific problems with the Senate approach to “reform.”

First, this legislation would create a new $50-billion bailout slush fund controlled by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). Very big banks and other “eligible financial companies” would be taxed by the FDIC to build up this fund. As with any tax, though, it’s consumers–you and me–who would eventually pay this levy.

The Obama Administration this weekend requested that the $50 billion pre-funded bailout money be removed from the bill. But according to Foxnews.com, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner advocated last year that any bailout funding should be addressed post bailout through a tax on big Wall Street firms. If Senate Democrats only take out the $50 billion slush fund and leave the bailout authority intact, then the taxpayers will still be on the hook for any future bailouts.

Another problem with this bill is that it would bail out the creditors of companies and wouldn’t require any creditor to take a loss after a company starts to fail. If the bailout slush fund is tapped, the FDIC would have the power to reimburse creditors. That could allow the FDIC to pay creditors more than they invested (pursuant to Section 210 of the Dodd bill).

Think about that. If creditors know they aren’t likely take a loss, and risk has been eliminated from an investment, its taxpayers who are assuming all the risk. Of course, taxpayers get none of the rewards if the investments pay off–we would simply be on the hook if they fail. Taxpayers could expect no reward for having insured transactions and protected wealthy investors from any risk. The AIG bailout is a great example of this model.

If the strong-arm tactics used in the passage of ObamaCare are any lesson to Americans, we should get ready for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.) to block all amendments in an attempt to jam a bad bill through the Senate. The Senate bill has many problems, but the multiple bailouts in the bill should raise the eyebrows of Tea Partiers nationwide and taxpayers who are concerned about becoming the insurer of last resort for Wall Street gamblers.