Exclusive: It’s Not the Economy, Smarty – It’s National Security!


Author: Ruth King

Date Published: 2008-03-03


It’s Not the Economy, Smarty – It’s National Security!

Ruth S. King

 

Let’s paraphrase Ronald Reagan in 1980: Are you safer now than you were six years ago?

 

In the election of 2000 an “accidental” and fairly inexperienced president who won the electoral votes rather than the popular vote rose to incredible heights as steward of a traumatized nation. Do you remember his speech at the United Nations on November 10th, 2001 only weeks after the attacks of 9/11?

 

“… the people of my country will remember those who have plotted against us. We are learning their names. We are coming to know their faces. There is no corner of the earth distant or dark enough to protect them. However long it takes, their hour of justice will come.

“This threat cannot be ignored. This threat cannot be appeased. Civilization, itself, the civilization we share, is threatened. History will record our response, and judge or justify every nation in this hall. For every regime that sponsors terror, there is a price to be paid. And it will be paid. The allies of terror are equally guilty of murder and equally accountable to justice.”


He then challenged the United Nations:

 

“…. there is no such thing as a good terrorist. No national aspiration, no remembered wrong can ever justify the deliberate murder of the innocent. Any government that rejects this principle, trying to pick and choose its terrorist friends, will know the consequence.”

 

 

Well, here we are six and a half years, two wars, thousands of victims of terrorism later.  Saddam Hussein is dead, relative calm has descended in many precincts of Iraq, but Islamic jihad is on a swift march throughout Africa, Europe, Asia, and coming to our shores also, thanks to our non-existing border controls or immigration policies.

 

The United Nations remains steeped in corruption with the nodding assent of the spiteful and sullen Europeans whose own cultures have been degraded and subjugated.

 

It is sad to say, but the president took a major detour in our war against international terror following a “road map” leading nowhere.

 

Well, change is on the way and by next year we will inaugurate our next president. Who, of the candidates on the national casting couch for the keys to the White House will keep America safe?

 

First, let’s discuss Saudi Arabia and the other “moderate” oil kingdoms. President Bush spoke so forcefully against nations that harbor terrorists. However, Saudi Arabia, the locus of money and support for Jihadists remains a threat to our economy, where their wealth can cause great dislocations, and to our institutions and academies, where they hold sway over curriculum and policy, and to our media and journalists who are threatened with libel suits.

 

Well Hillary can’t really say much about this since she and her husband have profited mightily from Saudi grants to the Clinton Library and Foundations. She did ask for “transparency” which is, next to “change” the most overused word in campaign politics.

 

Hello? Obama? McCain? Mitt? Huck? Only Giuliani who refused to take a $10 million check from a Saudi Prince in 2001 because it was tied to a statement blaming Israel for 9/11 is on record about this. However, today on ABC he papered over a soft-ball question about Saudi investments in the United States. 

 

 

Next: How about Russia and Putin, into whose heart our President’s x-ray vision was able to see? He murders political opponents and journalists and mocks the Europeans whose population of seditionist Muslims is growing by the hour. Threats from within and threats from without has always been the Kremlin thugs’ modus operandi. But their bellicosity is escalating. On January 19th, Russia’s military chief of staff Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky announced that Russia could and would use nuclear weapons in preventive strikes. Where is the reaction from the candidates? The same day a report said 11 tons of fuel arrived at the Bushehr nuclear power plant in Iran. Russia has reportedly pledged to give Iran a total of 85 tons of fuel for the plant.

 

The candidates obviously think silence is golden.

 

While they sparred about health care and education and who feels the voters’ pain more, 650 people have been killed in Kenya in tribal conflicts since Kibaki was sworn into office after a disputed December 27th election which observers said was seriously flawed and rigged.

And who is the candidate with the most cogent response? Er….well not a single one

The Clintons did manage to overlook genocide in Rwanda, and Obama has relatives in Kenya, and Edwards has no one to sue there, and Huck may not know where Kenya is and McCain…..

Let’s move on now to Korea: On January 19th, 2008 U.S. special envoy on North Korea’s human rights (human rights??) Jay Lefkowitz disclosed that Pyongang intends to keep its nuclear weapons. So the so-called “engagement” policy of Condoleezza Rice is not working. The U.S. assistant secretary of state Christopher Hill announced that he was reaching the end of his “long leash” in negotiations with Korea’s Kim Gye-gwan. The North Koreans had not completed disabling their Yongbyon nuclear facilities by year's end, nor had they produced a detailed declaration of their nuclear programs, weapons and components.

The candidates? Nada.  Look, it is hard to pronounce some of those names so cut them some slack. They have a longer leash.

Do they hear the rantings of the mullahs in Iran? Obama would like to “dialogue” with them…mano a mano. The others just issue platitudes without any real plan.

Let us move along now to homeland security. After hibernating for a year, on  January 17th, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff noticed that one of the biggest threats to U.S. security may now come from Europe and there are reports that an al Qaeda cell has been established inside Britain.

The candidates?  Well Actually Hillary should check out health care in Great Britain because it is exactly what the outcome of her health care proposals will be like, but not a word about the threat.  From the others?  Not a peep.

 

In fact, none of them even mention anything about “dirty bombs” or germ warfare, anthrax, smallpox or any of the possible threats against millions of Americans.

How about the fact that the Pentagon’s finest expert on Islam, Major Stephen Coughlin was fired? It turns out that Coughlin’s realistic appraisal of Jihad and warnings about American Muslim groups who are fronting for the Moslem Brotherhood (which is a worldwide Jihadist movement) upset Hashem Islam, an aide to the deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England. Now Hashem Islam, a native of Egypt, home turf of the Muslim Brotherhood, is very involved with the Islamic Society of North America…an unindicted c-conspirator in a terror funding case. You can easily understand that his feathers might be ruffled by Coughlin’s assertion that Jihad is a faith driven mandate to wage war on infidels.

The candidates? Not a word in spite of the fact that “infidels ‘r’ us.” …which brings us to the dangers of radical Islam and its many combinations and permutations in immigration policy, homeland security, national ID cards, profiling, eavesdropping, etc.

While Hillary’s goons are busy trying to dig up dirt on Obama’s Muslim connection, she would never use the “jihad” word. Obama won’t either and Edwards….oh well. The Republicans are just a tad better but they offer no real policy and no real challenge.

It would appear security and survival in America is guaranteed only to trees and polar bears because none of the candidates is standing up to the environmentalists who impede any sane energy policy.

On national security the Republicans are marginally better but they are so busy trying to emulate the Democrats on social policy that they give only a modicum of lip service to our safety, and a compliant public does not hold their feet to the fire.

The answer to the original question is: No. We are not safer today than we were six years ago and not a single candidate wants to address this issue to a public more concerned with the economy and government goodies than survival.

#  # 

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Ruth King is a freelance writer. She has written a book and articles on gardening, and also writes a monthly column in OUTPOST, the publication of Americans for a Safe Israel.

 

If you are a reporter or producer who is interested in receiving more information about this writer or this article, please email your request to pr@familysecuritymatters.org.

Note – The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of The Family Security Foundation, Inc.

 

Click here to support Family Security Matters

# # #

FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Ruth King is a freelance writer. She has written a book and articles on gardening, and also writes a monthly column in OUTPOST, the publication of Americans for a Safe Israel.

read full author bio here


If you are a reporter or producer who is interested in receiving more information about this writer or this article, please email your request to pr@familysecuritymatters.org.

Note -- The opinions expressed in this columfn are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of The Family Security Foundation, Inc.




Click here to support Family Security Matters