Vital Perspective

Greenspan is wrong. The war is not about oil.

Allegations that the Bush Administration was driven to invade Iraq by a lust for the country’s oil have been part of the anti-war movement’s narrative even before the war’s first shots were fired. The image of a White House hijacked by a cabal of former oil executives who steer foreign policy to advance Big Oil's interests gained credence as disillusionment from the war grew. This idea is now being reinforced by former chairman of the Fed Alan Greenspan whose memoir hits bookstore shelves this month. "I'm saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows -- the Iraq war is largely about oil," wrote the man dubbed "The Oracle." As long as such allegations came from Michael Moore they could be brushed aside but echoed by Greenspan, one of Washington’s most influential yet least controversial figures, it's time to expose the charge to serious scrutiny.

We'd be last to deny the toxic influence oil dependence has on America’s foreign policy, its international conduct and its selection of "friends and allies" in the Middle East. There is no doubt that since the 1945 meeting between President Roosevelt and Saudi King Ibn Saud the U.S. has been militarily committed to the stability of the Persian Gulf and time and again has used its muscle to guarantee the supply of oil from the region. But while there is no gainsaying America’s oil dependence, attributing oil motivation to every U.S. activity in the Persian Gulf is a gross extrapolation.

While proponents of "it’s the oil, stupid" view offer little evidence to support their claim, the evidence to the contrary is ample. Take for example the bedrock of the Administration's energy security strategy, the 2000 National Energy Policy Development Group, also knows as the Cheney Report. This policy paper, composed by no fewer than eight cabinet members, reflects the pre-9-11 mindset within the Bush White House on how to achieve energy security. Yet, it has almost no mention of Iraq and its vast oil reserves. The opposite is true: the report warns against concentration of world oil production in one region and calls for the U.S. to diversify its energy supply away from the Middle East.

Despite the involvement of Saudi nationals in 9-11 the Bush team not for one moment contemplated invading the oil rich Saudi Arabia. Instead it chose to invade Afghanistan, the only country in central Asia that doesn’t have oil. Furthermore, the administration decided to end the decades long American military presence in Saudi Arabia, a country that produces five times as much oil as Iraq, and move U.S. bases to Qatar, which produces one tenth as much as Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain which has essentially ran out of oil. A questionable move for someone whose supposed main driver was oil.

The Administration's actions prior to the 2003 invasion beg another question. At the time Iraq was hardly exporting any oil and was under a strict sanctions regime which prevented international companies from investing in its ailing oil industry. For profit driven companies like Exxon and Halliburton the sanctions were an impediment to business and they lobbied the Administration to review them. The last thing they wanted was the uncertainty associated with war. Yet, since his inauguration in early 2001 and up until the war start in March 2003 President Bush was persistent in maintaining the sanctions regime, providing competitive advantage to non-American companies bidding for Iraqi oil. Bush's decision to go to war against the interests of Big Oil rather than lifting the sanctions pokes a huge hole in the Iraq-is-about-oil narrative.

Prior to the war the U.S. hardly imported any oil from Iraq and oil stood on $30 a barrel.  Today, only four percent of U.S. oil imports come from Iraq and oil is at $80. With 160,000 American troops on the ground in Iraq America’s oil companies are nowhere to be seen. It is Russian and Chinese companies that are enjoying the spoils of war. If Greenspan is right and Iraq was truly about oil, then our failure there is even bigger than thought.

But he isn’t. Oil played at best a supporting role in the decision making process that led to the war. Greenspan’s statement has only one significance: it serves as a painful reminder of the Administration’s failure to provide a compelling explanation why we are in Iraq. And in the absence of such explanation even the Oracle can misconstrue.

Luciano Pavarotti, R.I.P.

"I think I just stopped for one year when from a kid I become a man and the voice is changing," he said in 1991. "I was an alto and became a tenor and that is the only time I think I remember to have stopped singing. Otherwise I have sung all my life." 

Truth slips out; New York Times editor slaps it down

Moslem Arab grabs a security guard's gun in Jerusalem, shoots him with it, and is killed in the gunfight.  Let's take a look at the headlines:

New York Times initial headline: "Terrorist Killed and 10 People Hurt in Jerusalem Gunfight"

Apparently another editor sees it, changes headline to "Gunman Dies After Fight With Guards in Jerusalem". The articles are identical, only the headline has changed, omitting the word terrorist, we suppose because according to the New York Times stylebook a Moslem on a rampage, especially one intent on murdering non-Moslems, can't be called a terrorist. 

Still, Steven Erlanger did a good job with the article (journalists don't choose the headline, editors do).

It's also interesting to examine the headline compared to those produced by other news sites. 

Voice of America: "Shooting in Jerusalem's Old City Kills One, Injures 10"  Headline offers no indication that the one shot was the terrorist.

or how about this beauty from the BBC: "Palestinian killed in Jerusalem".  Someone just glancing at the headline would reach precisely the opposite conclusion from the real story.

A Saudi Rosa Parks

Just as "moderate Germans" did nothing to stop the Nazis, we should not expect "moderate Muslims" to risk disruption of their lives and exclusion from their communities to stand up and oppose Islamists with vehemence. History has taught us well and repeatedly that "moderates" simply want to go on with their lives, not make a fuss, just ride with the tide. The heros of history are not the moderates.  They are the reformers. Those who are willing to risk everything to stand up in the face of evil and injustice and call it by its name, at cost of their comfort, place in society, and sometimes their freedom and even life.  The movie banned by PBS, "Islam vs Islamists" gives voice to a few brave reformers. Wajeha Al-Huwaider is another one:

"On the first anniversary of the crowning of King Abdallah on August 4, 2006, Wajeha Al-Huwaider chose to mark the occasion in a way that typifies her style in recent years. In an attempt to remind the king of the promise he made on the eve of his coronation, she marched alone on the bridge connecting Saudi Arabia with Bahrain, holding a sign that made one demand of King Abdallah: “Grant Women Their Rights.” After marching for about 20 minutes she was arrested and taken in for questioning at the nearest police station, but the investigation itself could not get underway because any investigation involving a woman requires the presence of a clergyman who belongs to the “Morality Police” (Al-Mutawin).

"This special police force has 20,000 members who oversee proper public conduct in accordance with the harsh principles of the Wahhabi movement, the official stream of the Saudi monarchy and one of the most orthodox and conservative currents in Islam. [...]

"A few hours after her arrest she was set free, but her passport was confiscated and she was forbidden to leave the country. In accordance with existing laws in Saudi Arabia, a woman is not permitted to walk around alone without being chaperoned by a male from her immediate family. Therefore she had to stay at the station until her brother, many years her junior, arrived to take her home.[...]

"This is what Al-Huwaider wrote in heartrending fashion, with regards to the current system of laws in Muslim states intended to limit a woman to her home, under the supervision of the males in her life: “These are laws that are definitely unsuitable at a time where cats and dogs, in the developed world, enjoy much greater rights than those enjoyed by Arab women, and even greater than those which Arab males receive.” These words have a significance that goes beyond their immediate context. Al-Huwaider chose to make her arguments while still living in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, which endows her words with an unusual power intellectuals living elsewhere cannot match."

The cult of the Twelfth Imam

MEMRI has an excellent synopsis of Mahdism, a must read for those seeking to understand events in Iran.

"According to Shi’ite tradition, the Twelve Imams, descendants of the Prophet Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law Ali Ibn Abi Talib, were endowed with divine qualities that enabled them to lead the Shi’ite believers and to function as Allah’s emissaries on earth. However, when the Twelfth Imam Muhammad Al-Mahdi disappeared in 941 CE, his connection with the Shi’ite believers was severed, and since then, the Shi’ites are commanded to await his return at any time..."  Read the whole thing.

"Immediately upon assuming the presidency, Ahmadinejad began to assert his belief in the imminent return of the Mahdi as the basis for his political activities. Despite the traditional belief that no one can foresee the hour of the Mahdi’s return, Ahmadinejad frequently stated that his coming was nigh, and even gave a more specific prediction.

Also: A big roundup on Iran's energy sector and its efforts to make sanctions irrelevant here.

Doctors without borders

The London version of Muhammed Atta, is Dr. Mohammed Asha, a Jordanian-educated physician who moved to England with his family two years ago after studying in Jubilee School in Amman, one of the most prestigious schools in Jordan. Another doctor drove the burning Jeep Cherokee into the Glasgow Airport passenger terminal. The involvement of physicians in terror attacks is not a new phenomenon. It is a stern reminder that even those who took the Oath of Hippocrates pledging "to abstain from whatever is deleterious or mischievous" could be some of the most vile murderers.

Companies doing business with sponsors of terror

Thanks to Judith for pointing this out.  The SEC publishes a list of companies that do business with state sponsors of terror .Of course, our so-called friends the Saudis, oil tick sponsors of Wahhabi Islam and Islamist terror, aren't considered a state sponsor of terror by our government, so companies that do business with them aren't listed.  But this list is useful anyway. You can make a difference with your investment decisions and purchase choices - for maximum impact let the companies know why you are taking your business elsewhere.

Companies that do business with Iran

Companies that do business with Sudan

Companies that do business with Syria

Companies that do business with North Korea

UPDATE: Well, look at our spineless political class: Congressional pressure forced SEC to remove the above lists. SEC withdraws list linking companies to terrorism

Within the last week, both the chairman and the ranking Republican member of the House Financial Services Committee had written to the SEC criticizing the list. The chairman, Barney Frank, Democrat of Massachusetts, called the list "unfair and perhaps counterproductive." He said some companies "apparently have investments that are so negligible they could not be considered material either to investors or the economy of the terrorist financing state." The ranking Republican of the committee, Spencer Bachus of Alabama, said "this initiative appears to have been ill-conceived and poorly implemented."

A brilliant offensive against the British academic boycott of Israel

Alan Dershowitz writes in the Wall Street Journal:

"As soon as [the British academics boycott of Israel] was reported, I helped to draft a simple petition in which signatories agreed to regard themselves as honorary Israeli academics for purposes of any boycott and "decline to participate in any activity from which Israeli academics are excluded."

Working with Prof. Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in physics, and Ed Beck, the president of Scholars For Peace in the Middle East, we circulated the petition. I expected to gather several hundred signatures.

To my surprise, we have secured nearly 6,000 signatures, including those of 20 Nobel Prize winners, 14 university presidents as well as several heads of academic and professional societies. Three university presidents -- Lee Bollinger of Columbia, Robert Birgeneau of Berkeley and John Sexton of New York University -- have issued public statements declaring that if Israeli universities are boycotted, their American universities should be boycotted as well. Every day, I receive emails from other academics asking to be included as honorary Israeli academics for purposes of any boycott. We expect to reach at least 10,000 names on our petition.

It is fair to say, therefore, that the British boycott appears to be backfiring. British academics are on notice that if they try to isolate Israeli academics, it is they -- the British academics -- who will end up being isolated from some of the world's most prominent academics and scientists."

You can view signatories or add yourself to the list here:

An International Call To Academics and Professionals To Stand In Solidarity With Our Israeli Academic and Professional Colleagues

Fellow bloggers -- please help spread the word!

In the name of Islam

Thailand is known for its beautiful beaches and friendly people. How many people though are aware that radical Islam has set its sites on this lovely country?

"Twenty-five beheadings -- including 10 already this year -- have been reported in southern Thailand since an Islamic-inspired insurgency erupted in 2004, claiming more than 2,200 lives."

Here is the story of one brutal murder in the name of Islam: "Mohama Waekaji ...walked one cool morning to a rice mill, carrying a knife and following orders from a guerrilla commander to behead the 72-year-old Buddhist owner. He asked the elderly man, Juan Kaewtongprakam, for some rice husks. As he turned to collect them, Waekaji says, he slashed the blade through the man's neck."

What kind of vicious people would do such a thing? What kind of people would market and propogate this behavior? What kind of people would promise one 72 virgins in heaven for brutalizing another human being? "Thai authorities say jihad videos from the Middle East, captured from rebel training camps, may be inspiring young men like Waekaji. One clip said to have come from Iraq shows a woman lying on her side on a patch of grass as a man slowly cuts her throat with a long knife. Blood spurts from the wound, the screaming finally stops and her head is completely severed."

Simply evil.

Madness is doing the same thing twice and expecting a different result

Has the Israeli government lost leave of its senses? Otherwise, we find it hard to understand this:

"Israel agreed to extensive training of members of the Presidential Guard of Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in areas near Jericho, in the Jordan Valley....
The request for Israel to permit such extensive training was made through the Americans. Prior to this, Israel agreed to the transfer of thousands of rifles and ammunition to Abbas' Presidential Guard. The serial number of each weapon was registered in order to maintain at least minimal control over the weapons."

Not that the American government is doing any better for U.S. domestic security with this 24-hr amnesty madness.

Pathetic on all fronts.

No mercy for infidel

MEMRI reports:

"The liberal Arabic-language website Aafaq reports that a Muslim student set off a debate when she sent an email to the mailing list of a Muslim students' association (rabitat al-tullab al-muslimin) at Virginia Tech asking the students to pray that Allah have mercy on those killed and wounded in the shooting attack at the university.

"According to Aafaq, the dean of student affairs at American International University, Abu Hamza Hijji, responded, writing that Allah the Most Merciful forbids praying for mercy for the non-Muslim dead, or even for the non-Muslim living, and that it is only permitted to pray that they be rightly guided. He added that what happened was a sad occurrence, but that does not give Muslims the right to transgress the laws of Allah the Most Merciful."

In the name of Islam

Pakistan:

"The boy with the knife looks barely 12. In a high-pitched voice, he denounces the bound, blindfolded man before him as an American spy. Then he hacks off the captive’s head to cries of “God is great!” and hoists it in triumph by the hair."

Turkey:

"Three Protestants murdered at a Christian publishing house in Malatya, Turkey, were tortured for three hours before their assailants slit their throats [...]  Ugur Yuksel, one of the three victims of the massacre at the Zirve (summit) publishing house, which distributed Christian literature [...] “had scores of knife cuts on his thighs, his testicles, his rectum, and his back [...] His fingers were sliced to the bone."

Philippines:

"Muslim extremists decapitated seven men they were holding hostage on the southern Philippine island of Jolo and sent the heads in sacks to two army detachments, the military said on Thursday." More here.

Thailand:

"Suspected Muslim insurgents shot and killed two Buddhist laborers and then beheaded one of them as deadly violence and scattered bombings continued [...] In separate violence, three suspected insurgents stormed a construction site late Tuesday in the Sisakorn district of Narathiwat province and fatally shot two Buddhist workers [...] After shooting their victims, the attackers beheaded one of the corpses before fleeing."

Saudi Arabia:

"A court in 'Ar'ar in northern Saudi Arabia has sentenced a foreign Arab national to death for having desecrated the Koran. "

Arabian Nights: keep that booty covered!

A truly fascinating report this time: "According to the religious edict issued by Rashad Hassan Khalil, a former dean of Al-Azhar University’s faculty of Sharia (or Islamic law), “being completely naked during the act of coitus annuls the marriage”."

Yep.

Al-Azhar’s fatwa committee chairman Abdullah Megawar is a bit more lenient, arguing "that married couples could see each other naked but should not look at each other’s genitalia and suggested they cover up with a blanket during sex."

It occurs to us that if these guys lightened up just a wee bit, cut loose so to speak, Islamists would be less inclined to blow themselves up in search of 72 virgins. (Hat tip, LGF)

Pimping for Allah

MEMRI translates an article from Al-Rafidayn:

The investigator for the case of the murder of a German national in Sharja, U.A.E. has revealed the existence of a prostitution network whose profits were used to support al-Qaeda.

The network was headed by an American Muslim, Shahid King Bullis, who confessed to killing the German national and to running the prostitution network.

Investigators have found material including instructions for manufacturing poisons.

Bullis's cellphone was found to contain photos of him in bed with very young girls.

Assad chooses soccer over Pelosi

From the Washington Post ("As any diplomat with knowledge of the region could have told Ms. Pelosi, Mr. Assad is a corrupt thug whose overriding priority at the moment is not peace with Israel but heading off U.N. charges that he orchestrated the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri...Ms. Pelosi's attempt to establish a shadow presidency is not only counterproductive, it is foolish."), to the Syrian Reform Party ("Assad could not have been happier because Syrian women, seeing a US official confirming what their husbands, the Imams in the Mosques tell them, and the society at large imposes on them through peer pressure will see in her wearing a Hijab as a confirmation of the societal pressures they are constantly under. No one will ever know how many women took the Hijab on after seeing Pelosi wearing it. The damage Speaker Pelosi is causing with her visit to Syria will be felt for many years to come."), much has already been written about Pelosi's shameful "photo-ops with dictators" tour of the Middle East. We have one tidbit to add, via the excellent MEMRIBlog: Assad letting Pelosi know exactly where she ranks in his order of priorities: "It is not possible. I cannot meet you today. I have a very important guest from Turkey; and tonight we will watch together a soccer game. I cannot come to Damascus before he leaves. We may meet tomorrow."

Arabian Nights: fear of female sexuality

Egyptian Dr. Muhammad Wahdan is scared of women. Otherwise this statement would be pretty hard to explain: "In Egypt we have four and a half million spinsters. The definition of a spinster is a woman who has reached 30, without ever receiving a marriage proposal. We have a spinster problem in the Arab world, and the last thing we want is for them to be sexually aroused. Circumcision of the girls who need it makes them chaste, dignified, and pure."

Click to watch the discussion.

What we can't quite figure out is what Dr. Mo is so scared of? That a "sexually aroused" female will attack him in a dark alley? Or, perhaps, that a "sexually aroused" female might find him unsatisfactory? We're not quite sure. Neither is a good reason to mutilate young girls, traumatize them for life and risk their death from blood poisoning with a procedure which Ayaan Hirsi Ali describes as follows in her autobiography: "the scissors went down between my legs and the man cut off my inner labia and clitoris. I heard it, like a butcher snipping the fat off a piece of meat. A piercing pain shot up between my legs, indescribable, and I howled. Then came the sewing: the long, blunt needle clumsily pushed into my bleeding outer labia, my loud and anguished protests"

Hirsi Ali notes: "In Somalia, like many countries across Africa and the Middle East, little girls are made "pure" by having their genitals cut out. There is no other way to describe this procedure, which typically occurs around the age of five. After the child's clitoris and labia are carved out, scraped off, or, in more compassionate areas, merely cut or pricked, the whole area is often sewn up, so that a thick band of tissue forms a chastity belt made of the girl's own scarred flesh. A small hole is carefully situated to permit a thin flow of pee. Only great force can tear the scar tissue wider, for sex.  Female genital mutilation predates Islam. Not all Muslims do this, and a few of the peoples who do are not Islamic. But in Somalia, where virtually every girl is excised, the practice is always justified in the name of Islam. [...] Imams never discourage the practice: it keeps girls pure."

Arabian Nights: Rules for beating your wife

Bahraini Cleric Abdullah Latif Aal Mahmoud informs his audience of the correct way to beat their wives: "If the husband wants to use beatings to treat his wife, he must never ever do it in front of the children. It must remain between him and her. It must be done according to the following conditions: He must not cause bleeding or bruise her body. He should avoid her face and other sensitive parts of her body. As we've said, the limitations on beating are: They must not cause bleeding, they should not break any bones, they should not be on the face, and they should not bruise her." Watch him on Bahrain TV.

Our advice to a Muslim wife whose husband chooses to follow this mullah's advice: wait till he gets real close, then knee him right where it hurts. Hard.

Arabian Nights: Sex in Arabia

In our new Arabian Nights series, we'll explore the inner life of the Islamist male and try to find out if there is any connection between the peculiarities of sex in radical Islam, and the tendency of its adherents to blow themselves up.  Exhibit A: Saudi Sheik Muhammad Al-Munajid dispenses marital advice:  "According to Islam, a wife needs to comply with her husband's desires in bed. The Prophet Muhammad said: "If a man calls his wife to fulfill his needs, she must come, even if she is by the stove"".  The Sheik also notes with some dismay that the system is a bit different in the West, and not only because of electric stoves: "The wife in the West is not obligated to [obey her husband's desire for sex...] They claim that if [her husband] has sex with her against her will - this is rape! They consider this rape. They claim she must be willing. They claim that she must want it.""  Truly, Western women must seem rather uppity to your average Saudi male.  Click to watch the video.

Something different for a Friday evening

Enjoy.

Tiger roundup

Sri Lanka's Ministry of Defense notes:

Another Indonesian arms dealer, Hadji Subandi (69) pleaded guilty in the second Tamil Tiger sting operation case before a Baltimore USA federal judge for attempting to smuggle sophisticated weapons to the foreign terrorist group the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). [...]

Subandi had been arrested in September 2006 with five other suspected arms dealers after an elaborate sting operation. As part of the sting, alleged representatives of the Tamil Tigers deposited $700,000 with undercover agents as a down payment for millions of dollars in sniper rifles, submachine guns and grenade launchers, officials say.

In this second successful sting operation conducted by the US federal government against Tamil terrorist arms buying in the US Federal Agents arrested five Asian buyers and one Sri Lankan Tamil for trying to buy US Dollars 900,000 dollars worth of surface to air missiles and other sophisticated military weapons for Sri Lanka's separatist terrorists, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Apart from the missiles, the LTTE brokers were trying to buy grenade launchers, submachine guns, sniper rifles and night vision goggles.

Three of the other Indonesian men arrested with Subandi (Reinhard Rusli, 34; Helmi Soedirdja, 33; retired Indonesian Marine Corps General Erick Wotulo) have pleaded guilty before, and the other two a Singaporan (Haniffa bin Osman) and a Sri Lankan Tamil are scheduled for trial in May.

Meanwhile, in Sri Lanka:

The Sri Lanka troops overran four Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam held military camps in the Trincomalee district inflicting heavy casualties among the separatists during a raid conducted before the dawn on Friday.

The Sri Lanka army troops backed by artillery and multi barrel rocket launchers killed more than 20 Tiger guerillas that came a day after the LTTE threatened to cover Sri Lanka in a blood bath if the troops did not stop the offensive.

In a separate incident the LTTE fighters killed three and wounded 13 elite police commandos by ambushing an armored vehicle by a roadside bombin the Batticaloa District.

Five Sri Lankan soldiers are being held hostage by the LTTE, which is threatening to attack civilian vessels plying the waters between Trincomalee and Jaffna.

In India:

In its crackdown against LTTE supporters in the state, the Tamil Nadu Police have so far arrested 41 persons, including 16 Sri Lankans, Director General of Police D Mukherjee said here today.

[...]a Sri Lankan Tamil was arrested in Tiruchirapalli on March 6 and Rs 10 lakh seized from him. Based on information given by him, another Sri Lankan Tamil was arrested. His questioning led to the seizure of 150 bags of iron balls, weighing 4,500 Kg from Permanalur.

Two other Sri Lankan Tamils were subsequently arrested at Chennai, as also another Indian who provided Rs 17.66 lakh of 'hawala' money. Another person was arrested at Pudukottai yesterday, Mukherjee said.

Listing steps taken from November 29 last, he said 750 Kg of explosives, about to be smuggled to Sri Lanka from Kerala, were seized that day. Four persons, including one who was absconding for the past 18 months, were arrested.

Mukherjee said police conducted surprise raids in Chennai and Tuticorin on january 23 and seized 7.5 tonnes of iron balls meant for being smuggled to Sri Lanka. Twelve persons, including five Sri Lankans, were arrested.

Again on Feb 12, the Navy seized 92 bags of aluminium bars near Dhanushkodi. During the course of the investigation, 11 persons were arrested and 1.5 kg of aluminium bars seized.

The next day, the Coast Guard seized a boat carrying explosives off the Palk Straits. Five persons including four Sri Lankans were arrested. The boat was later destroyed in mid sea.

On February 14, the Navy seized a country boat carrying explosives and aluminium bars and arrested three Sri Lankans.