T😉P SECRET
Reality Winner Is A Loser, And So Is U.S. Secrecy investors.com
Secrets: That 25-year-old Reality Winner — yes, that's her real name — was caught giving out top-secret information is no great surprise. After all, she is a far-left anti-Trump activist who called him an "orange fascist" and a "piece of s**t," and once tweeted to rapper Kanye West to suggest he make a T-shirt saying "Being white is terrorism." (For the record, Winner is herself white.)
She used the hashtags "Resist" and "NeverMyPresident" on her Facebook page and, as the Daily Caller notes, "appears to be a supporter of Bernie Sanders and other progressive icons, such as Bill Maher and Michael Moore."
No, these are not crimes. But taken together, they might indicate at least some possible questions about her trustworthiness for a post with top-secret access — especially working under a president she clearly despises and "resists." Yet, as an employee for National Security Agency contractor Pluribus International Corp. in Georgia, Winner, a former Air Force linguist, had top-secret clearance.
Indeed, Winner worked just three months for her employer before being charged with stealing classified documents on May 9, and then sending them to online publication The Intercept, which published an article on Monday that appeared to contain Winner's information. The documents Winner stole purportedly show that Russian agents tried to hack local U.S. voting systems before the election, not exactly a startling revelation.
What's troubling about this is it isn't the first time this has happened. The government hands out thousands and thousands of security clearances to individuals in the private sector, based on what can only be called a shoddy background check.
In March of this year, the magazine Washington Technology ran a piece with the headline "Security clearance backlog puts contractors, DOD at risk." It contained a stunning statistic: From February 2016 to September 2016, as the security-lax Obama administration was winding down, the security investigations backlog soared 22% from 464,000 to 569,000. That's right: More than a half-million people are now in line for security clearances, many of them to get top-secret clearances.
And the number of top-secret jobs appears to be growing. A quick check Tuesday of the Indeed job website listed some 14,136 openings in its "Top Secret Clearance Jobs" category. And that's just one website!
Is it even possible to give that many people a decent background check?
And given the large and growing number of people required to get security clearances, should we be at all shocked that many of them turn out to be embittered, politically motivated leakers or, worse, traitors to their country?
Nor is this a new problem. It's a problem with a history and a pedigree.
As far back as the 1980s, Christopher Boyce, a wire clerk with a top-secret clearance at Los Angeles-based federal contractor TRW, was caught selling U.S. satellite secrets to the Soviets. He's still serving a life sentence in prison for his crime.
More recently, Edward Snowden — a contractor-employee with Booz, Allen, Hamilton — in 2013 handed over thousands of pages of secret documents about an NSA global surveillance program to a handful of journalists and publications. Threatened with arrest for espionage, Snowden fled to Moscow, where he now lives.
Of course, it may be that some of these more recent youthful violators have been encouraged by others, such as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. By illegally using a homebrew email server, she was likely hacked by either the Russians or the Chinese, and made U.S. diplomatic secrets vulnerable to theft. But her criminal dereliction with the nation's secrets went unpunished.
Did Winner think she, too, would get away with stealing the nation's secrets? Did she think, as Snowden apparently did, that being politically progressive means the nation's laws don't apply to you? Or is this just the latest manifestation of anti-Trump insanity?
Whatever the answer is, it's troubling that so many people with top-secret clearances seem willing to betray their own nation's secrets. It may be time to cut way back on the number of people with access to secrets — and to make sure that those that do have access won't betray their country by stealing them.
RELATED:
This article would make Quirk and Rufus assume the fetal position and claw at their faces:
ReplyDeleteHighly educated, affluent liberals are still trying to come to grips with the results of the 2016 election. Many pundits on the left believe that Donald Trump’s working class voters were the key. As William McGurn notes in his weekly column, at least a few Democrats have resolved to stop looking down on such voters. Meanwhile, two university professors argue in the Washington Post that most of Donald Trump’s voters actually weren’t members of the working class. And now along comes one of the best explanations for our current politics from, of all places, an annual report from a large regional bank.
Let’s start with the Washington Post piece by Nicholas Carnes and Noam Lupu. The authors aim to “bust the myth” of working-class Trump voters:
Among people who said they voted for Trump in the general election, 35 percent had household incomes under $50,000 per year (the figure was also 35 percent among non-Hispanic whites), almost exactly the percentage in NBC’s March 2016 survey. Trump’s voters weren’t overwhelmingly poor. In the general election, like the primary, about two thirds of Trump supporters came from the better-off half of the economy.
But, again, what about education? Many analysts have argued that the partisan divide between more and less educated people is bigger than ever. During the general election, 69 percent of Trump voters in the election study didn’t have college degrees. Isn’t that evidence that the working class made up most of Trump’s base?
The truth is more complicated: many of the voters without college educations who supported Trump were relatively affluent.
This suggests that Mr. Trump did extremely well among voters who lack formal educational credentials but work hard enough to make incomes above the national median. This column will leave it to readers to decide how much myth-busting the authors have achieved with this insight. But for those liberals who are eager to continue looking down on Mr. Trump’s voters, this analysis would seem to be very helpful. The deplorables tend to have fewer academic credentials, so the deplorers can tell themselves that Trump voters lacked the intellectual tools to appreciate the superiority of Hillary Clinton over Mr. Trump.
But wait. A new Journal analysis of standardized test results finds that over the course of their college careers, many students are not markedly improving their ability to evaluate evidence and analyze information. “At some of the most prestigious flagship universities, test results indicate the average graduate shows little or no improvement in critical thinking over four years,” reports the Journal. Given that more-educated voters broke for Mrs. Clinton, perhaps the lesson is that whether or not university professors can teach kids how to think, they have at least managed to teach them how to vote.
DeleteRegardless, one of the better analyses this column has seen of the economic struggles of Middle America showed up in a recent letter to shareholders from M&T Bank CEO Robert Wilmers. Mr. Wilmers doesn’t say anything about Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton but he does note how challenging recent years have been for the workers whose votes are now so coveted by both political parties:
The markets that M&T serves are, in the main, those of historically middle class communities with historically vibrant local economies, often manufacturing-based. Economic and survey data, as it pertains to them, are concerning. On so many measures of economic well-being and security, the so-called middle class has been losing ground for many years. Since 1973, total median household income from all sources, including wages, which comprise more than 80% of income for middle class families, has increased only 13%. In fact, earnings for the typical family actually peaked in 1999. Even as the overall economy, as measured by GDP growth, has approached recovery to a pre-recession level, the typical family has yet to make up the earnings lost in both the 2001 and 2008 recessions. It is no wonder that a declining share of households even consider themselves to be part of the middle class; 63% did so in 2001. By 2015, that number had fallen to just 51%.
Mr. Wilmers also describes how policies enacted since the financial crisis have robbed the middle class of a decent return on their savings:
This extended period of ultra-low interest rates no longer benefits the average U.S. household. The majority of the wealth of the typical M&T customer, like that of most Americans, takes the form of equity in their homes, retirement savings, bank deposits and, to a lesser extent, stock market investments. Low rates initially provided middle class households with relief both by lowering monthly mortgage payments and supporting a recovery in home values. However, the investments of these same families have suffered. Indeed, many middle class families, frightened by the precipitous market decline of 2008, responded by pulling out of the market. Only half of these households today hold any stocks or mutual fund shares; before the crisis, fully 72% did so. Crucially, without stocks and the growth in value and dividends they can provide, most households must rely on interest from their investments to save for college, a down payment on a home, or to prepare for and navigate retirement. It is here that they have felt the sting of near-zero interest rates.
Interest income for households has declined sharply in the aggregate. In 2014, it had, compared to 2005, fallen by some $64 billion. This disproportionately affected households with an income less than $100,000; their interest income declined by $44 billion, or 68% of the total decrease for all households. There are, to be sure, some who can take such a drop in stride—those, for instance, fortunate enough to hold dividend-paying stocks. Dividend income in 2014 was, in fact, $162 billion higher than it had been in 2005. But 95% of that increase in dividend income has accrued to households whose income was greater than $100,000. Indeed, only $9 billion of the $162 billion increase in total dividend income has found its way to households with annual earnings under $100,000—not enough to offset the lost interest income.
DeleteThe bank CEO sums it up: “No wage growth. No investment earnings growth. No wonder families are stretched and stressed.” And no wonder they lost faith in the U.S. political establis
Demand creates its own markets.
ReplyDeleteThe US media creates a commercial demand for government secrets because it makes them lots of money and they get it at almost no cost. Receiving classified information and redistributing it is also a crime.
The press has been getting a pass on this, but the scale and the audacity of the distribution of state secrets is out of control and unprecedented.
The Obama Administration brought five criminal cases against government officials for violating the law by disclosing national security information to the press without authorization under the espionage act. In one case they tried to compel the reporter to reveal the source.
I agree with this. Espionage requires two parties, the thief and the party receiving stolen secrets. Their motivations should be irrelevant.
The high minded, claim the public needs to know, but that is nonsense. The press is using secret information to not inform but for political and monetary gain.
The weakest argument for responsibility is that too many documents are classified. That is clearly in the eye of the beholder.It is like a drug dealer claiming there is so much inventory, he had no choice but to distribute.
We don't need to study this. The press has long past lost its virginity. Prosecute all parties who participate and profit in the unlawful transfer of state secrets. Through disclosure, the legal system can compel testimony.
Any pretense that current US media is anything other than the obvious, a propaganda machine for wealthy partisans, is itself propaganda.
There are no high standards here. There are no ethics. Worse of all, there is no accountability.
Leaking is on the same level as spying and high treason to me. The only way to stop is severe penalties. Severe! Not sending someone off to an extended stay country club.
ReplyDelete"Deuce ☂Wed Jun 07, 05:27:00 AM EDT
ReplyDelete"there would be no deadly terror attacks in the U.K. if Muslims didn't live there."
That is so obviously true and it applies to France, Germany, Belgium and Sweden."
Lordy. I gotta agree with Quirk that the lunacy here only warrants mockery. The Elephant Bar truly is a wingnut world where history is made up and the IRA (to name just one Non-Muslim group who have launched terror attacks in the U.K.) never existed. It would be funny if it weren't so sad.
And now y'all are high and mighty and down on the leakers when not too long ago Snowden was feted here as a hero. Naw, one shouldn't expect consistency in a wingnut world.
You are correct, Ash, about the IRA - Lordy how it hurts to say that - but miss the larger point.
DeletePlease expand your view to Europe and then the whole wide world.
And while you are at it don't forget the 80,000,000 Hindus who died in defensive battles against the muzz in one 250 year period or so. Which is a footnote, a large one to be sure, but a footnote in the history of this 1400 year trail of shit.
The world is nutz these days. We just went through Pullman, Washington, home of Washington State University, and picked up a local paper, and what do we find ? -- concern that the fuzz from the cottonwood trees may constitute an extreme fire hazard.
Give me a fucking break - the Fire Department must be seeking additional funding.
We were checking out the work being done to expand the airport....indeed the dust is truly being raised on the project.
STOP MOSLEM IMMIGRATION TO USA NOW !
The IRA, ruthless bastards as they were, had a political agenda and an objective in their asymmetric war against the British government, constabulary and military. Their tactics were cruel and brutal and their strategy was based on wanting Britain out of Ireland and they took the fight to England.
DeleteThe IRA was not trying to destroy the culture or convert anyone to their religion. They were cruel and calculating, vicious determined bastards.
The war was resolved and the IRA now participates in the governance of Northern Ireland, their ancient homeland.
Muslims and Arabs have no such claims in Europe or the UK. They were never invited and have no cultural or religious roots in any country in Europe. Their enemy is not a government or the military. It is anybody and everybody. there is no end game other than to remake Europe in their own image.
Analogies are lies crafted to make a point and decide nothing.
Ash will destroy this argument.
DeleteTrust me.
I will be glad to recant my note above if you can show me where I hailed Snowden a hero. We know now you are storing all of my posts, ala rat. I'll wait.
ReplyDeletecrapping rat not only stores posts, he makes them up.
DeleteMeanwhile deleting many of his own.
DeleteI wish Deuce would finally kick his stupid arse out of here.
I doubt he would even be missed by Quirk and Ash.
Ciao, and Cheers to all save one.
DeleteIdle hands are the devil's workshop....
I have no memory of you praising Snowden MOME. Deuce on the other hand...
DeleteAll your concerns are why it's good to know that dedicated public servants like Mr. Comey are superdedicated to not involve themselves in politics.
ReplyDelete===
Read Comey's full opening statement on Trump
Former FBI Director James Comey's opening remarks to the Senate Intelligence Comittee has posted online.
Full text, below:
https://www.axios.com/comeys-key-encounters-with-trump-2435996088.html
The most important details from Comey's prepared statement:
Delete1. Close contact: The fired director says he spoke with Trump 9 times, compared to just 2 times while he served under Obama.
===
Comey and the Obama Administration understood that Hillary and Obama using her illegal server was not a problem.
It's only THE LAW and NATIONAL SECURITY.
Obama delivers a new veiled slap at Trump as he warns – in Canada – that America could descend into 'extreme nationalism and xenophobia and the politics of us-versus-them'
ReplyDeleteFormer U.S. president Barack Obama delivered a extended, vicious coded critique of his successor Donald Trump without naming him
He bashed the rise of 'extreme nationalism and xenophobia and the politics of "us-versus-them",' a clear slap at Trump in the language of American liberals
Obama seemed to characterize Trump's 'America First' philosophy as an abandonment of international institutions
In a veiled attack on Trump's 'America First' philosophy, Obama warned against the belief that 'what's good for me and my immediate people is all that matters, everybody else is on their own'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4578906/Obama-warns-Trump-s-extreme-nationalism-xenophobia.html#ixzz4jLopyPrO
" 'extreme nationalism and xenophobia and the politics of "us-versus-them""
Deletejust another day at the bar...
Yup, just another brain dead comment by Ash at the bar....
DeleteSounding as if Comey will be a nothing burger tomorrow, disappointing some here, and T. May will probably continue being Prime Minister, disappointing the same folks.
ReplyDeleteBe prepared, Ash.
Nobody would have believed it, but California has manage to come up with someone even worse to replace Barbara Boxer:
ReplyDeleteKamala Harris, now Senator Kamala Harris.
http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Nevertheless-Kamala-Harris-Persisted-Senator-11202953.php
So very pleased with herself, and her very real chance to become our first female black President.
DeleteTragedy in Tempe
ReplyDeletehttp://launch.newsinc.com/share.html?trackingGroup=90482&siteSection=undefined&videoId=32521646
Comey was afraid to be alone with Trump.
ReplyDelete...that he might grab his pussey.
Copyright, Doug 2017
:)
DeleteBut is pussy pussy or pussey or pussie ?
And, does it really make any difference ?
Turley nails it for a change.
ReplyDeleteRyan Goodman, a professor at New York University School of Law, said Trump's efforts to protect Flynn provide "strong evidence" of obstruction of justice.
However, Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, said that while Trump's dealings with Comey were inappropriate, "We do not indict people for being boorish or clueless."
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_COMEY?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2017-06-07-18-50-51
MAXINE WATERS @MAXINE VVATERS
ReplyDeletePLEASE PRAY FOR THE SAFETY OF OUR MUSLIM BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN #LONDON OUR INACTION ON CLIMATE AND HEALTHCARE HAS PUSHED THEM TO THIS
312 PM 03 JUN 17
https://me.me/i/maxine-waters-maxine-vvaters-please-pray-for-the-safety-of-15084773
You got to be shitting me.
DeleteLast year there was a rise in hate crimes after the UK voted to leave the EU following a campaign in which immigration was a heated issue. The rise now has different features, one police source told the Guardian.
ReplyDelete...
The National Police Chiefs Council lead for hate crime, Assistant Chief Constable Mark Hamilton, said: “We know that terrorist attacks and other national and global events have the potential to trigger short-term spikes in the recording of hate crime. Following the attacks in Manchester and London, both police forces registered spikes in hate crime.
“It is more important than ever that we stand together in the face of hostility. We may see spikes in intolerance and hate but we are also seeing communities around the country come together as we refuse to be divided by fear.”
It is a pity that so many young people make themselves vulnerable or are made vulnerable by the Mr. Rogers view of the world.
ReplyDeleteIt is not a beautiful day in the neighborhood. It never was and it never will be.
They don't know how to recognize a predator and make the fatal mistake of thinking all people are the same.
A washed brain is a terrible waste of evolution.
The world’s oldest Homo sapiens fossils - which could represent the first human family - were excavated in a barite mine at Jebel Irhoud, 60 miles west of Marrakesh, and date to between 300,000 and 350,000 years old.
ReplyDeleteUntil now, experts believed all humans living today descended from a population that lived in East Africa. The earliest examples of our species were found in the 1960s by Richard Leakey, at Omo Kibish in south-western Ethiopia dating from 195,000 years ago.
But new evidence could shift the birthplace of mankind further north and west. A recent study even suggested that our earliest hominid ancestors may have split from apes in Europe.
Prof Hublin said: “It’s not just that we have an older date for the older forms of Homo sapiens but also it allowed us to envision a rather more complex picture for the emergence of our species with different parts of our anatomy evolving at different rates.
“There is an idea that humans like us appeared rather quickly but our results show this is very unlikely to be true.
“The story of our species in the last 300,000 years is mostly the evolution of our brain.”
Prof Jean-Jacques Hublin
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2017/06/07/humans-evolved-100000-years-earlier-thought-east-africa-not/
Assume 5 generations per century, that is 60,000 generations of the brain evolving and the last two generations anesthetized by the progressives.
ReplyDeleteThere is no time before 1950 where societies would fold to a foreign invasion as the past 50 years.
DeleteIf you're talking about Great Britain, what country would you have them retaliate against?
DeleteI'm talking about Europe and the UK. There is no nation state involved other than the disruption caused by the US, UK and France.
DeleteNORTH Korea has launched a number of projectiles off its east coast that are believed to be land-to-sea missiles in the latest provocation by the rogue nation.
ReplyDeleteWith military tension on the Korean peninsula almost at boiling point, the South Korean military said today the North had launched the “surface-to-ship” missiles.
...
Earlier North Korea blasted the ‘selfish’ US for ‘posing a great danger’ in a move that extends well beyond military tensions between the two nations.
US President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement has infuriated the hermit nation, with Pyongyang hitting out at what it says is an “unreasonable and reckless” act.
...
South Korea will suspend any further deployment of a controversial US missile defence system until an environmental impact assessment ordered by new President Moon Jae-In is finished, his office said.
Looks Like CNN's Anonymous Sources Got This One Wrong
ReplyDeleteBack on May 9th, the White House released the letter that President Trump sent to former FBI Director James Comey informing him that he'd been relieved of his duties at the FBI. Within that letter, Trump awkwardly inserted a sentence thanking Comey for informing him "on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation." Here's the full sentence (full post here):
"While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgement of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the Bureau."
Not surprisingly, this statement set off alarm bells at CNN and other MSM outlets because, if true, it would put a real damper on their "Trump colluded with Russian hackers to stage a coup" narrative. Therefore, those outlets set out on a mission to 'prove' that Comey never made those statements and that, by definition, Trump clearly lied about his past interactions with the former FBI Director.
And not long after setting out on that mission, courtesy of those infamous 'anonymous sources', CNN and ABC struck gold when they confirmed that "FBI Director James Comey is reportedly set to testify he never told President Donald Trump that he was not under investigation." Here is a summary of CNN's reporting from their primary echo chamber, HuffPo:
"Former FBI Director James Comey is reportedly set to testify he never told President Donald Trump that he was not under investigation in connection with Russian interference in the 2016 election, according to CNN and ABC News."
And here is the original CNN reporting:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-07/looks-cnns-anonymous-sources-got-one-wrong
The White House initially said Trump fired Comey on the recommendation of the Justice Department, citing as justification a memo from Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein that criticized Comey's handling of the Hillary Clinton email investigation. But Trump later said he was thinking of "this Russia thing" when he fired Comey and would have dismissed him without the Justice Department's input.
ReplyDeleteComey said his practice of keeping written meeting records began after his encounter with Trump before the inauguration. He said he did not keep records of the two private, in-person interactions he had with President Barack Obama between the time he took the helm at the FBI in September 2013 and the end of the 44th president's tenure.
Comey describes nine one-on-one conversations with Trump in four months.
Incompatibility
ReplyDeleteMuslim Child Brides Have A Particularly Difficult Time In America
JAZZ SHAWPosted at 4:01 pm on June 7, 2017
We continue to wrestle with the sticky question of minimum age for marriage around the United States and the implications it has for children, particularly young girls. The minimum age debate is still best left to the individual states in my opinion, but in too many places there are safeguards missing. A story from Time Magazine this week highlights how open to abuse the system can be, particularly in certain communities where religious “traditions” leave girls open to potential exploitation. They feature the story of a young Muslim girl in California identified by only her first and middle names, Sara Tasneem. She was “married” off by her father at the age of 15 to a 28 year old man she had never met before and turned over to him with virtually no notice.
SEE ALSO: Iraqi Kurds: We’re holding a referendum on independence
Sara Tasneem was 15 years old when she was married off to a 28-year old stranger. Her parents were divorced, and her deeply conservative father was a member of a Muslim sect in California. When she went to visit him during high school, “He told me I was going to have to get married and the Sheikh was going to pick who I was going to get married to,” she recalls. “I never questioned my dad, ever.” …
Tasneem’s case illustrates how few protections are available to young brides if their parents are the ones encouraging early marriage. She met her husband the same day as their spiritual marriage ceremony in 1996. “I was introduced to him that morning and I was handed over to him physically that night,” she said. “I remember asking, ‘Where am I going to sleep tonight?’ and they wouldn’t answer me. They just handed me over to this guy that I didn’t know.” She suspects that her husband, who was a new convert to the group, was enticed to the sect by the possibility of marrying a virgin.
In this scenario there clearly should be a case to be made for statutory rape charges. The minimum age of consent in California with parental permission is sixteen, but this child was whisked out of the country with her new “husband” at the age of 15. They returned to the states and were married with the father’s consent after she was 16 and already pregnant. Later on she manged to escape and get a divorce, but only after she had two children and was on her own without even a high school diploma....
http://hotair.com/archives/2017/06/07/muslim-child-brides-particularly-difficult-time-america/
This is all horrid of course but it isn't so different, to be honest about it, than the ways that have been practiced by the upper classes all over the world from time out of mind where, of course, the issue is all about the money.
The aging Duke might say: "Don't I have a daughter wandering around the castle somewhere ? She shall marry so and so...."
And, arranged marriages have somewhere around a 50% success rate, according to some estimates.
Which ain't bad in today's USA.
I am NOT making any argument for this nonsense.
In Hindu life, an uncle has a veto over the marital desires of the niece. Uncle cannot force her to marry so and so, but can issue a veto.
I think this is charming as I now possess such a veto, being the new designated uncle, her others having gone against the young lady's wishes and exceeded their rightful powers by demanding she marry so an so, so, she fired their asses, and hired me.
:)
Don't Mormons marry kids?
DeleteGOOD NEWS ITEM OF THE DAY
ReplyDeleteToo much exercise BAD for gut....DRUDGE
Whew, am I glad to read that I have been properly caring for my gut.
The Cos is truly screwed - America's Dad -
ReplyDeleteCosby Rape Trial Jury Hears Actor Trying To Buy Accuser Off....
There is a 100% chance of a guilty verdict here, and it's sad to watch.
He certainly deserves it though.
The Mayor of London is just another lying moselem arsehole, but the morons there actually elected the guy, so in a way I guess they deserve him -
ReplyDeleteJune 7, 2017
London mayor Sadiq Khan accidentally reveals Trump's criticisms of his statement were correct
By Thomas Lifson
President Trump has come in for a lot of criticism, from both friends and enemies, for tweeting out a challenge to London Mayor Sadiq Khan over his comments after the London Bridge terror attack:
"My message to Londoners and visitors to our great city is to be calm and vigilant today," Mr Khan said. "You will see an increased police presence today, including armed officers and uniformed officers.
"There is no reason to be alarmed by this. We are the safest global city in the world. You saw last night as a consequence of our planning, our preparation, the rehearsals that take place, the swift response from the emergency services tackling the terrorists and also helping the injured."
His tweet in response has been criticized as taking the mayor out of context.
Pathetic excuse by London Mayor Sadiq Khan who had to think fast on his "no reason to be alarmed" statement. MSM is working hard to sell it!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 5, 2017
The U.K. Independent lays out the criticism: "[w]hat Mr Khan actually said was that there is no reason to be alarmed about the increased police presence on the streets after the attack."
However, some alternative facts have appeared that render this criticism meaningless. In an interview on ITV's show Good Morning, Britain, former CNN host Piers Morgan, now an outspoken conservative working at the U.K. Daily Mail, pressed the mayor on jihadis returning to the U.K. from training camps in the Middle East.
ITV reports:
This morning the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan joined us to address the issue of whether Britain has enough police officers on the streets after Saturday's tragic terrorist attack.
"For the past 13 months I've been campaigning for more support for the Met Police service," he told Piers and Susanna. "We've lost over the last seven years six hundred million pounds from the Met Police budget."
As London's first ever Muslim mayor he was also asked by Piers to address the fact there are 400 Jihadis currently in the city and what he is doing to try and stop them from committing more atrocities. "I can't follow 400 people", he said before blaming budget cuts to the police services.
Addressing how everyone has a responsibility to report any signs of radicalisation in young people, Khan said: "All of us have a role to play".
DeleteThe Fox News Insider adds that Khan also said "just over half" of the 400 Britons who trained with terror groups in the Middle East have returned to the U.K. capital.
So the mayor admits that there are 200+ trained insurgents roaming the streets of Britain, but there is no reason to be alarmed!
Hmm, that sounds like a guy who has an armed security detail that follows him everywhere he goes. Don't worry about the cops not following these trained killers who believe that murdering the mayor's constituents is a holy obligation because "all of us have a role to play"? Does this mean the mayor believes that family, friends, and neighbors would turn in anyone suspected of planning terror attacks? That hasn't been the way it has worked.
It seems to me that there is ample reason to be alarmed. The mayor is just blustering.
Watch the exchange here:
Where are the 400 jihadis still in London, @piersmorgan asks @MayorofLondon @SadiqKhan
Full interview: https://t.co/lBg4xY9mJz pic.twitter.com/6lW0hBMh2R
— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) June 6, 2017
Morgan does a good job debunking the mayor's excuse of budget shortfalls. Has there ever been a government official who had enough money to discharge his responsibilities?
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/06/london_mayor_sadiq_khan_accidentally_reveals_trumps_criticisms_of_his_statement_were_correct.html
In the meantime I’ve changed my mind about the proposed state visit. Short of an apology to London’s mayor, I don’t want him strutting through my capital city any time soon.
ReplyDeleteHe has insulted us and it is important that, like the French and the Germans, we exhibit a sense of self-worth, a basic dignity, when dealing with this aberration.
For now at least, Britons don’t want him. Perhaps after today, when James Comey, the FBI director he sacked, gives evidence about the administration’s links to Russia, Americans will begin to feel the same way.
Not Welcome
Are these peers in cahoots too, like the original global warming bunch, or are they onto something ?
ReplyDeleteHas Ash an answer ?
June 7, 2017
Peer-reviewed scientific papers increasingly cast doubt on catastrophic anthropogenic global warming
By Dale Leuck
James Delingpole at Breitbart News provides a short humorously oriented article dismissive of the so-called consensus on catastrophic anthropogenic (i.e., caused by people) global warming (CAGW) with a few graphs from a much longer article posted May 29 at the No Tricks Zone by Kenneth Richard. Mr. Richard provides reference to 80 graphs from 58 peer-reviewed scientific papers published to date in 2017 alone that invalidate the claims of CAGW, and a link to his December 2016 posting documenting an additional 60 papers published in 2016 also debunking the so-called "hockey stick" depiction of "unprecedented" global warming.
Graphs Here
Perhaps at an opportune future time, when Press Secretary Spicer, Counselor Conway, EPA secretary Pruitt, and others are badgered by the press about whether the president believes that global warming is a "hoax," an unequivocal answer may be provided, with references.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/06/peerreviewed_scientific_papers_increasingly_cast_doubt_on_catastrophic_anthropogenic_global_warming_cagw.html
These would include MIT climate scientist Dr. Richard Lindzen, who claims believing that CO2 controls the climate “is pretty close to believing in magic.”
ReplyDeleteNone of those participating in the proposed conference should be academics or scientists who receive federal grants or have other connections to government. This might give them a conflict of interest and reduce their credibility.
Let’s have a high-level debate on this issue and settle it once and for all.
Pullout in Paris
None of those participating in the proposed conference should be academics or scientists who receive federal grants or have other connections to government. This might give them a conflict of interest and reduce their credibility.
Delete:):)
There's a lot of money in global warming, even in climate change, I've always said....
:):)
This scientist here still maintains we will be going into a cooling period....sooner or later.....
DeleteYou will not be able to prove me wrong in my lifetime.
Or right either, now I think about it.
DeleteMovie Review
ReplyDeleteJune 7, 2017
Meagan Leavey: A welcome, warm-hearted movie with a woof
By Marion DS Dreyfus
Meagan Leavey; Directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite; Written by Pamela Gray, Annie Mumolo
Take a plain-spoken heroine who decides for a variety of family reasons to sign up for the Marines. Add a positive take on the U.S. Marine Corps, plus memorable and upstanding characters who ring true.
Then add amazingly lovable (though not at first) German shepherds in the Marine Corps's canine unit, "sniffers" who save lives by detecting landmines and improvised explosive devices (IEDs).
Full disclosure: Having been lucky enough to have been bivouacked in the U.S. Air Force, as well as a sometime volunteer in the Israeli IDF – Army, Navy, and Air force – the author has a huge tender spot for anything military. And as far as canines go, the heart melts with affection and amused marveling, indulgence, and love when there's a dog in the picture. Aside from cats, who doesn't love dogs?
Add to this mix is the fact that Megan Leavey is a true story, portrayed with affecting simplicity and honesty by Kate Mara, and you have a winning combo. What's maybe a little bit more amazing is that both sides of the current political divide, left and right, are charmed by this winning film – a contender in my estimation for one of the best of the year, easily in competition for the kind of praise rightly lavished on the outstanding – and somewhat parallel – The Hurt Locker (2008).
In terms of combat canine training, personal exposure to a colleague's canine training biz over a few years provides insights about what it takes. One thing that may not be evident, but should be, is that soldiers and their canine warrior companions must withstand huge noise assault. Dogs who buck or cower at explosions and sustained gunfire are automatically decommissioned and excluded from further training. I did not see this aspect of the training, which is crucial to the expert wrangling of such prized four-legged soldiers. But it is a point that most won't think of in viewing this standout lenser.
If you wonder why Kate Mara, as Marine corporal Leavey, strokes her amazing sniffer, Rex, and murmurs, "Good boy!" instead of feeding him food and treats, each dog has his own reward mechanism, and here, bonding with the trainer and getting embraced with love and encouragement are reward enough for the four-legged hero.
In life, as shown in the film, Corporal Leavey saved hundreds of lives by IDing mines and explosives in unexpected loci in Iraq.
This is not to say there aren't lethal surprises.
The director cut new terrain, for this viewer, at least, by filling the compassion chambers with affection for Mara as she slowly and painstakingly works with her ultra-aggressive Shepherd. You're full of affection and joy for a while. Shortly thereafter, you are transported into maximal anxiety as the two, with hardcore soldier men in her company, encounter Iraqi irregulars, unknown snipers, seemingly innocent civilians and ground forces shooting at them, exploding ordnance mere feet from them – the suspense and anxiety are much more than the usual film, such as the current acceptable Alien: Covenant, which, for all its remarkable SFX, does not generate fear or anxiety, only attention and interest – especially for the always galvanizing Michael Fassbender in a tour de force double-role.
You don't really bond with the actors in A:C the way audiences do with Leavey.
DeleteA small but not uninteresting note is that the excellent direction and writing are all female. I'm not here claiming that women can't be every bit as dogged and accomplished as male directors and writers in describing military circumstances, but this film is a standout in having all the top-billed creatives being female. Nice to see. Perhaps unexpected.
For all that the plot involves a female Marine, there is little unwanted sentimentality. Leavey seeks, and gets, no favors or extra consideration. That she serves with heroic distinction and physical injuries is all the more laudable. Furthermore, there seems to have been a sea change in that, as portrayed in the film, at least, the sexual harassment quotient seems at a blessed remove from this man's Marines. Leavey faces her tasks and reg-related rejections and obstacles of all sorts with persistence and tenacity. It beats the likes of Ridley Scott-directed Demi Moore's rugged but idealized G.I. Jane (1997). She was expected to fail. Twenty years on, we don't expect Leavey to fail quite so automatically.
A restrained, uncloying, unusually worthwhile and entertaining movie, this is one of the best we are likely to see in a special effects-happy universe.
And, no small miracle, makes you proud to be an American.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/06/emmeagan_leaveyem_a_welcome_warmhearted_movie_with_a_woof.html
The general public is under the impression that the world temperature record for the last century is accurate. That assumption is without merit.
ReplyDeleteA closely guarded secret of the climate gurus is that the temperature record of the Southern Hemisphere is unreliable and basically useless. This assertion was made by none other than James Hansen, global warming doyen, in a 1981 Science article.
...
Since the Southern Hemisphere data is worthless, we cannot have a valid global temperature record. We are left with only the Northern Hemisphere data.
The raw rural data, unaffected by urban heat island anomalies, on similar latitude to latitude basis, suggests that the temperatures of today are the same as those of 75 years ago. The data for all Northern Hemisphere countries ranging from Greenland to southern Europe show no warming from 1940 to mid-1970, a period of noticeable cooling. (Remember the first Earth Day warned of catastrophic global cooling.)
Data is Fake
Deleteunaffected by urban heat island anomalies
DeleteYup, if you place your thermometer in downtown LA near the big Bank of America neon sign you really aren't getting a great reading of what's actually going on.
:)
Added to that the fact that it's now known that the original 'peers' were in cahoots on their 'peer reviewed articles' and it is not so far fetched to think the whole thing is giant fraud.
It's been colder than Islamic hell here this spring, I can say that for sure, for what it's worth.
E Pluribus International
ReplyDeleteI read somewhere it was 125 degrees in Honolulu the last few days.
DeleteI might have seen it in The Al Gore Journal or something similar.
Are you feeling it in your Maui lava tube ?
ReplyDeleteJune 7, 2017
News flash: Where you live is the House of War
By Robert Curry
Do you know this term? It is really important that you know it and really important that you understand it, too. Why? Because according to Islam, it's where you live.
According to the adherents of Islam, the world is divided into two parts: the House of Submission and the House of War, Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb. The House of Submission, Dar al-Islam, exists wherever a Muslim government rules according to sharia (Islamic law). All lands that have not submitted to sharia constitute the House of War, the Dar al-Harb.
You probably do know the word "jihad." Jihad is holy war. Jihad is all about expanding Dar al-Islam. Islam requires of its believers jihad until all of the House of War is subjugated and has thereby become part of Dar al-Islam.
That means if you live in America or Europe, you live in the House of War, and Muslims are in a perpetual state of war with you and your fellow citizens. This is the explanation for the headlines we are presented with every day, dateline: Manchester, England; Paris, France; and many other places.
The American Founders learned what it meant to live in the House of War early on. At the time of the Founding, Muslims were conducting jihad on a grand scale on Mediterranean shipping. Colonial America's ships in the Mediterranean had been under the protection of the British navy. When Britain withdrew its protection, the Founders were forced to confront jihad for themselves, so in 1786, John Adams met with Tripoli's ambassador in London. At that meeting, Tripoli's man explained to Adams that American Christians were fair game for piracy because it was the right and duty of Muslims to plunder and enslave all who had not acknowledged the Prophet of Islam. John Jay and others soon argued for ratifying the new Constitution so America would have a central government and navy strong enough to defend her citizens and interests. And it was America's decision to suppress this threat that sent American Marines to "the shores of Tripoli."
But if Islam is in a state of perpetual war with every part of the world outside the House of Islam, what is all this talk about Islam meaning "peace" and Islam being a religion of peace? In the first place, Islam does not mean peace; it literally means "submission."
In the second place, when everyone either has submitted to Islam or is subject to rule by sharia, everyone will live in Dar al-Islam, the House of Submission, because of course the House of War, Dar al-Harb, would no longer exist.
Muslims claim that worldwide submission to Islam constitutes peace. It is not, I believe, what you and I mean by peace.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/06/news_flash_where_you_live_is_the_house_of_war.html
The Hindus lost 80,000,000 folks in one 250 year period alone declining the invite to the Dar al-Islam.
Bless Them.
We must recall and do the same if need be.
The need might not arise if we would:
END MOSLEM IMMIGRATION TO USA NOW !
Meanwhile, out Quirk's way -
ReplyDeleteDearborn imam who incited London jihadis to mass murder GOES MISSING
By Pamela Geller - on June 7, 2017
UK: RAMADAN TERROR IN LONDON
These imams are as guilty as the devout mass murderers they preach to. Ahmad Musa Jibril, the London Jihadi’s imam, has even made speeches to students in the US. Now he is at large in the USA.
HATE PREACHER ‘WHO INFLUENCED LONDON BRIDGE TERRORIST’ FLEES HOME JUST DAYS AFTER ATTACK
A HATE PREACHER WHOSE VIDEOS WERE WATCHED BY ONE OF THE LONDON BRIDGE TERROR ATTACKERS HAS FLED HIS HOME IN AMERICA.
By Alix Culbertson, The Express, June 7, 2017:
Ahmad Musa Jibril left his home in Dearborn, Michigan, so quickly he left his sandals on the deck.His sister and mother, who live nearby, have also gone into hiding, the MailOnline reported.Videos posted by Jibril online, in which he preached radical Islam, are believed to have helped inspire Khuram Butt, one of the three jihadis who killed eight people and injured 48 in London Bridge and Borough Market.
The Pakistani-born Briton followed Jibril’s clips on YouTube and other video archives in which he preached from his front room where a family album was kept featuring pictures of him dressed as a jihadi fighter.A friend of Butt, 27, informed counter-terror police he started talking about a “Jihadist Britain”, but officers never called the informant back.
The friend said: “He used to listen to a lot of Musa Jibril. I have heard some of this stuff and its very radical. I am surprised this stuff is still on YouTube and is easily accessible.”Jibril’s jihadi sympathies were uncovered when he was jailed for six years in Detroit in 2005 for attempting to steal from taxpayers, with multiple charges including fraud, money-laundering and mail fraud.
At the time, the criminal, who has 43,000 Twitter followers, attempted to take credit for a 1995 al Qaeda bombing which killed four Americans.The court heard how he ran his website from the home he shared with his father and they found a collection of weapons when they battered down his door as he tried to escape from his bedroom window.
jihadiYouTube
Jibril broadcast YouTube videos from his living room
During the trial, he and his father tried to bribe a juror, saying they would pay for her wedding. However, she told the court and Jibril was given a further sentence.
JihadiGetty
Seven people were killed in the terror attack on Saturday
Jibril Getty
Jibril has even made speeches to students in the US
After some time in prison, he petitioned a judge, saying he was being ill-treated, and adding: “I am not a terrorist.”Describing the jihadi photo album, prosecutors, said: “The album includes photos of Ahmad Jebril as a teenager dressed as a mujihid or holy warrior; photos of very young children apparently holding real firearms; ‘playing’ at holding each other hostage and aiming the weapons at each other’s heads.”
http://pamelageller.com/2017/06/dearborn-imam-incited-london-jihadis-mass-murder-goes-missing.html/
Iraqi Kurds: We’re Holding A Referendum On Independence
ReplyDeleteED MORRISSEYPosted at 10:41 pm on June 7, 2017
Forget the Fourth of July — mark your calendars for September 25th for some real fireworks. After years of attempting to work within the US-built federal system in Iraq, the Kurds in the northern region have decided they like autonomy so much that they want to make it official. The president of the regional government announced on Twitter today that they will hold a referendum on independence — and a rather bland statement from Baghdad makes it sound like they won’t put up much of a fight....
....It is not clear whether a ‘yes’ vote, which is expected to be the result, will lead to the declaration of independence. The Iraqi government has so far not reacted to the announcement. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said in April that he respects the Kurdish right to vote on independence, but he did not think the timing was right for the move.
Iraq’s Kurdish region, with a population of about 5 million, already enjoys a high degree of autonomy, including its own parliament and armed forces. But relations with the central government in Baghdad have nosedived in recent years over a range of issues. These include the sharing of oil revenues and the control of some areas that are technically part of federal Iraq but have come under Kurdish control since 2014 during the war against the Islamic State group.
And you thought the Qatar crisis could create a bombshell in the Middle East. Both Turkey and Syria have suppressed separatist Kurdish movements for decades, and Turkey in particular opposes even the autonomy under which the Iraqi Kurds have operated since the 1991 Gulf War, and officially so since the 2003 Iraq War finally deposed Saddam Hussein. This was one of the outcomes Turkey predicted from having the US back the Kurds on both occasions and in the Syrian fight against ISIS....
....It’s not just the money, but security issues as well. The Kurdish peshmerga is also the most effective part of the Iraqi military, and its loss to a new state would immediately make Kurdistan a military threat to an already-weak Baghdad, which isn’t going to sit well in Iran. Furthermore, the Sunni tribes that finally shook off ISIS but still chafe under the Shi’ite-majority government in Baghdad might get happy feet too if al-Abadi lets the Kurds walk away from the federation. That would create Joe Biden’s tri-state outcome without any real planning to smooth the way, and border fights would almost certainly erupt between all three to set the boundaries for the three quasi-states.
Even so, the sudden US withdrawal from Iraq in 2011 leaves no doubt that all of these sectarian and religious factions have no one on which to rely but themselves. The dismemberment of Syria has accelerated that issue, and independence movements are now all but inevitable. The Kurds don’t want to end up under the thumb of Iran, and the Sunnis don’t want to end up under the thumb of the Shi’ites. At this point, it might be better to channel those impulses constructively to ensure that the Sunnis don’t simply adopt an ISIS-style leadership, but have the resources and the latitude to develop into a more responsible state after the Kurds depart Iraq. It’s going to get really interesting over the next few years.
http://hotair.com/archives/2017/06/07/iraqi-kurds-holding-referendum-independence/
ALL WE NEED IS LOVE ... AND DEPORTATIONS
ReplyDeleteUntil any Western leader is willing to reduce the number of Muslims in our midst, could they spare us the big talk?
June 8, 2017 Ann Coulter 2
In Britain, as in the U.S., when an Islamic terrorist is said to be, “known to law enforcement,” the translation is: “He is being actively ignored by law enforcement.”
After the latest terrorist attack in Britain -- at least as of this writing -- Prime Minister Theresa May bravely announced, "Enough is enough!"
What is the point of these macho proclamations after every terrorist attack? Nothing will be done to stop the next attack. Political correctness prohibits us from doing anything that might stop it.
Poland doesn't admit Muslims: It has no terrorism. Japan doesn't admit Muslims: It has no terrorism. The United Kingdom and the United States used to have very few Muslims: They used to have almost no terrorism. (One notable exception was chosen as the National Freedom Hero in this year's Puerto Rican parade in New York!)
Notwithstanding the lovely Muslim shopkeeper who wouldn't hurt a fly, everyone knows that with every tranche of peace-loving Muslims we bring in, we're also getting some number of stone-cold killers.
Former Prime Minister Tony Blair dumped millions of Third World Muslims on Britain to force "multiculturalism" on the country. Now Britons are living with the result. Since the 9/11 attack, every U.S. president has done the same. President Bush admitted Muslim immigrants at a faster pace after 9/11 than we had been doing before 9/11.
Whatever the 9/11 attackers intended to accomplish, I bet they didn’t expect that.
Now we can't get rid of them. Under the rules of political correctness, Western countries are prohibited from even pausing our breakneck importation of Muslims, much less sending the recent arrivals home.
In defense of the poor saps responding to every terrorist attack with flowers, candles and hashtags, these are people who have no ability to do anything else. Western leaders are in full possession of the tools to end Islamic terrorism in their own countries, just as their forebears once ended Nazi Stormtroopers.
Unable to summon the backbone to defeat the current enemy, the West is stuck constantly reliving that glorious time when they whipped the Nazis. In almost every Western country -- except the one with an increasingly beleaguered First Amendment -- it's against the law to deny the Holocaust.
Are we really worried about a resurgence of Nazism? Isn't Islamic terrorism a little higher on our "immediate problems" list? How about making it illegal to make statements in support of ISIS, al-Qaida, female genital mutilation, Sharia law or any act of terrorism?
The country with a First Amendment can't do that -- the most that amendment allows us to do is ban conservative speakers from every college campus in the nation.
But If our elected representatives really cared about stopping the next terrorist attack, instead of merely "watching" those on the "watch" list, they'd deport them.
To this day, we have a whole office at the Department of Justice dedicated to finding and deporting Nazis even without proof they personally committed crimes against Jews. But we can't manage to deport hearty young Muslims who post love notes to ISIS on their Facebook pages.
If the Clinton administration had merely enforced laws on the books against an Afghani immigrant, Mir Seddique Mateen, and excluded him based on his arm-length list of terrorist affiliations, his son Omar wouldn't have been around to slaughter 49 people at an Orlando nightclub last year.....
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/266933/all-we-need-love-and-deportations-ann-coulter
Pamela Geller: Idaho Muslim Migrants who raped 5-year-old plead guilty, get no jail time
ReplyDeleteJUNE 7, 2017 7:43 AM BY PAMELA GELLER
https://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/06/pamela-geller-idaho-muslim-migrants-who-raped-5-year-old-plead-guilty-get-no-jail-time
Big farce.
'My heart rose up with the great grasses'
ReplyDeleteLine from Theodore Roethke, spiritual evolutionary poet
Scientists Find Oldest Known Specimens of the Human Species
Remains found in Morocco date from about 300,000 years ago, about 100,000
older than any other fossils of Homo sapiens
Fossils unearthed in Morocco are providing evidence that humans have been
on earth much longer than previously thought, and are the latest in a
series of recent discoveries about human origins. Photo: Jean-Jacques
Hublin, MPI-EVA Leipzig
By Robert Lee Hotz
June 7, 2017 1:00 p.m. ET
323 COMMENTS
The bones of ancient hunters unearthed in Morocco are the oldest known
specimens of the human species, potentially pushing back the clock on the
origin of modern Homo sapiens, scientists announced Wednesday.
Found among stone tools and the ashes of ancient campfires, the remains
date from about 300,000 years ago, a time when the Sahara was green and
several early human species roamed the world, the scientists said. That
makes them about 100,000 years older than any other fossils of Homo
sapiens—the species to which all people today belong.
“These dates were a big wow,” said anthropologist Jean-Jacques Hublin at
the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Leipzig, Germany. He
led an international team of scientists who reported the discovery
Wednesday in Nature. “This material represents the very roots of our
species—the very oldest Homo sapiens found in Africa or anywhere.”.....
https://www.wsj.com/articles/scientists-find-oldest-known-specimens-of-the-human-species-1496854801
The Max Planck Institutes are wonderful places.
Meanwhile in Venezuela -
ReplyDeleteAll eyes on Venezuelan military as country teeters
By HANNAH DREIER, ASSOCIATED PRESS CARACAS, Venezuela — Jun 8, 2017, 12:12 AM ET
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/eyes-venezuelan-military-country-teeters-47905666