Rex Tillerson and the Friendship of Order

"Lies can be dangerous. Willfully ignoring the truth is far more so. Lies can be fought with truth. Self-delusion has no natural enemy."--Garry Kasparov

John McCain: “I don’t know what Mr. Tillerson’s relationship with Vladimir Putin was, but I’ll tell you it is a matter of concern to me. You want to give the president of the United States the benefit of the doubt because the people have spoken. But Vladimir Putin is a thug, bully and a murderer, and anybody else who describes him as anything else is lying.”

Senator Robert Menendez: "Reports that Rex Tillerson could be nominated to be our nation's top diplomat (are) alarming and absurd. With Rex Tillerson as our secretary of state the Trump administration would be guaranteeing Russia has a willing accomplice in the president's cabinet guiding our nation's foreign policy."

NBC: "In 2013, the Kremlin bestowed the country's Order of Friendship honor on Tillerson.
He will also be paired with former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton as his deputy secretary of state, one of the sources added, with Bolton handling day-to-day management of the department."

American Thinker: "According to a recently published Heritage Foundation report, the 2017 Index of U.S. Military Strength, Russia poses a “formidable” and “aggressive” threat to the vital interests of the United States. The report states, “Russia seeks to maximize its strategic position in the world at the expense of the United States. It also seeks to undermine U.S. influence and moral standing, harasses U.S. and NATO forces, and is working to sabotage U.S. and Western policy in Syria.” ...

Near the close of 1999, as Russians became increasingly angry about massive government corruption and lawlessness and the popularity of Yeltsin and his heir apparent, Putin, dropped into single digits, four apartment buildings were bombed. The violence was orchestrated by the FSB to turn the attention of the populace away from domestic concerns and redirect it toward Chechen terrorism. Satter, who has the distinction of expulsion from Russia in 2014 as an “undesirable,” explains how the Russian government rigged explosions of civilian housing. More than 300 Russian citizens died and the bombings were conveniently blamed on Chechen separatists.

With the perceived Chechen threat and the fear kindled within the Russian population, Putin had an excuse to start the second Chechen war. This action instantly transformed him into a popular hero, easily able to assume control of the country. With the terrorist threat upfront, the miserable conditions in Russia and Yeltsin’s criminal government took a back seat, Satter says. Russians unified behind Putin and shifted their concerns to homeland security. Once elected, Putin, perceived now as a tough leader avenging Chechen aggression, exonerated Yeltsin, who had resigned as president, amid outrage over his government corruption.".......

Glenn Reynolds:  "SO, I WAS WRITING ABOUT THIS PUTIN STUFF BACK IN JULY, but nobody seemed to care then. 

Meanwhile, if you want to do something about Russian interference going forward, we need to (1) get serious with cybersecurity and not give divas like Hillary a pass because they’re divas; (2) go to paper ballots and other forms of enhanced election-integrity protections. I’d go full-bore with the kinds of standards used in many other countries: Photo ID, dyed finger, paper ballots counted in a big open room in front of many witnesses, etc. U.S. elections aren’t run according to accepted international standards, and that should be fixed.

And remember, anyone who doesn’t want to fix things is obviously a big ole Putin stooge.".......

John Bolton said to FOX's Eric Shawn that Russians cannot be allowed to tamper with our elections. The ambassador called for a real fact-finding look, not the usual ObamaFarce. He also thinks there's a possibility of some false flag operations, noting that incriminating cyber fingerprints were oddly left in some instances, yet not in others. There was certainly talk this year of American intelligence officers who hate Hillary's guts.

Russians aside, it would be great if we could get Democrats to stop tampering with American elections, such as registering foreigners to vote or Obama accepting foreign campaign contributions.

As for Tillerson's Order of Friendship from Putin, being true friends implies a relationship of equals. Da?

UPDATE: Rubio skeptical, too. Allahpundit counts the votes and it's looking thin. Carly?!

Geert Wilders' Badge of Honor

Ban New Rioters--Not Old Rights

"Dear friends,

I still cannot believe it, but I have just been convicted. Because I asked a question about Moroccans. While the day before yesterday, scores of Moroccan asylum-seekers terrorized buses in Emmen and did not even had to pay a fine, a politician who asks a question about fewer Moroccans is sentenced.

The Netherlands have become a sick country. And I have a message for the judges who convicted me: You have restricted the freedom of speech of millions of Dutch and hence convicted everyone. No one trusts you anymore. But fortunately, truth and liberty are stronger than you. And so am I.

I will never be silent. You will not be able to stop me. And you are wrong, too. Moroccans are not a race, and people who criticize Moroccans are not racists. I am not a racist and neither are my voters. This sentence proves that you judges are completely out of touch.

And I have also a message for Prime Minister Rutte and the rest of the multicultural elite: You will not succeed in silencing me and defeating the PVV. Support for the Party for Freedom is stronger than ever, and keeps growing every day. The Dutch want their country back and cherish their freedom. It will not be possible to put the genie of positive change back in the bottle.

And to people at home I say: Freedom of speech is our pride. And this will remain so. For centuries, we Dutch have been speaking the unvarnished truth. Free speech is our most important possession. We will never let them take away our freedom of speech. Because the flame of freedom burns within us and cannot be extinguished.".......

Read it all at John Bolton's house.

Mark Steyn, earlier this year:

"And oddly enough no matter how explicit the threats of violence and death are from Islamic supremacists they never attract the attention of supposed "anti-hate" laws like Section 13 and 18C, or "tolerance" police like the Australian "Human Rights" Commission.

Instead, when the state ideology is boundless "tolerance", it somehow winds up becoming mercilessly but highly selectively intolerant. Douglas Murray again, this time on the Netherlands:

On Monday of this week the latest trial of Geert Wilders got underway in Holland. This time Wilders is being tried because of a statement at a rally in front of his supporters in March 2014. Ahead of municipal elections, and following reports of a disproportionate amount of crimes being committed in Holland by Muslims of Moroccan origin, Wilders asked a crowd, "Do you want more or fewer Moroccans in this city and in the Netherlands?" The audience responded, "Fewer, fewer." To which Wilders responded, "Well, we'll arrange that, then..."
The long-term implications for Dutch democracy of criminalizing a majority opinion are catastrophic. But the trial of Wilders is also a nakedly political move.
Whether or not one feels any support for Wilders's sentiments is not in fact the point in this case. The point is that by prosecuting someone for saying what he said, the courts in Holland are effectively ruling that there is only one correct answer to the question Wilders asked. They are saying that if someone asks you whether you would like more Moroccans or fewer, people must always answer "more," or they will be committing a crime.

There are more and more areas of debate in which the authorities take the view that "there is only one correct answer". A free people should be free to argue, whether they take the right side or the wrong side of the question. But, as I always say (he says wearily), when you're arguing that only one side is allowed to have a side, you're on the wrong side.".......

Andrew Stuttaford, on Wilders' rising poll numbers, recalling: "When I interviewed Wilders for NRODT more than a decade ago, he was living in a prison. That was thought to be the safest place for him after the murders of politician Pim Fortuyn and the filmmaker Theo van Gogh. It struck me then that Wilders’ position on Islam (and Islamic immigration) was, like van Gogh’s and Fortuyn’s, rooted in concern over the threat that Islamism represented to traditional Dutch freedoms."....... 

Fakey Faking Fakers and the Fakey Fake News They Fake

The Evening Noose

"Even though Iran is building nukes with our money and half the country is out of work, I think we can all agree; the most important threat we face today is people saying things without getting my permission first.
 It must be stopped. Lives are at risk."

"Bipartisan legislation is making its way through Congress and Silicon Valley needs to censor stuff I don't like. It's imperative that leaders in both the private sector and the public sector step up to censor
anything I deem to be "fake news". How 'bout a show of hands if you're with me, Congress?"

"That's better. How 'bout you, private sector? Do you reject fake news, too?"

"Very good, private sector--who did not cheat and give me the answers
or collude with my campaign in any way.
Now, let's see a show of hand by those opposed to my federalized Fake News Suppression Squads..."

"Um....okay. Nevermind. I have to go now. I have an sudden appointment downtown." 

"No, no, no...please don't make me go up the elevator and see him!"

"As if they were wiser than God": Heather Has Two Mommies, One Daddy, A Sister City and a Mad Scientist

“This triangle of truisms, of father, mother and child, cannot be destroyed; it can only destroy those civilisations which disregard it.”--G.K. Chesterton, "Superstition of Divorce"

The Federalist: "This is the first child ever born as the biological offspring of three different adults: two women and a man.  [T]he couple insisted the procedure not destroy any embryonic human life, which it didn’t, and a new married mother/father family was created. Pro-family, pro-life. Isn’t that certainly something to celebrate? Not really. ...

The first concern here is something that is not new at all. It’s three-party fertility. A mother and father contract with a third party to produce a new child, by purchase of egg, sperm, or leasing a woman’s womb for nine months of gestation and a painful and exhausting final day of labor. Three-party involvement is not just immoral in the sexual act, but in the procreative one as well. In the ideal, both acts are integral cooperations of marital intimacy where others are not invited. Only in the modern age could we even consider the two as separate activities. They are indeed a continuity. ...

When Canada passed same-sex marriage, they made it legal for three or more adults to be assigned parentage of a child. California law allows the same thing. Not long ago Canada took it even further. They now allow a child to have three parents listed on her birth certificate. You see, the same-sex-parenting experiment demands this. It’s not rare for same-sex couples to do three- or four-way parenting: the couple, the egg/sperm donor, and possibly her/his partner. If you add in a surrogate carrier and partner, this could potentially include six adults who desire to be legal parents.

So parentage is based on what the adults desire rather than who the child’s actual family is. Thus, this selfishness requires the “Love makes a family” gloss. But no child should need an org-chart to explain her artificially constructed, experimental family." .......

Wesley J. Smith on the UK's pending experiments; Here Come Three Parent Children:

 

"As often happens with Brave New World technologies, the pretext for these experiments is health, in this case, allowing a woman to give birth and not pass on mitochondrial disease. But this technology will also open the door to creating novel family structures and a means of genetic engineering–currently on the fast track of scientific study. And yet, we aren’t even taking the time to pause and have a societal conversation about any of this and how or whether to regulate the parameters of such human gnomic manipulations.

 

We are supine before the hurricane of naked science’s power.".......

In his journals, Of Plymouth Plantation, 1620-1647, William Bradford spoke of the failed communal harvest there--until the communistic compact was revoked and blessings flowed. Children are a blessing, too. Instead of prosperity counsel, try reading Bradford as family counsel:

“My purpose is that their children may see with what difficulties their fathers had to wrestle in accomplishing the first beginnings; and how God ultimately brought them through…

“Let none argue that this is due to human failing, rather than to this communistic plan of life in itself. I answer, seeing that all men have this failing in them, that God in His wisdom saw that another plan of life was fitter for them.

 

The failure of this experiment of communal service, which was tried for several years, and by good and honest men proves the emptiness of the theory of Plato and other ancients, applauded by some of later times. That the taking away of private property, and the possession of it in community, by commonwealth, would make a state happy and flourishing, as if they were wiser than God.

 

In this instance it was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment which would have been to the general benefit and comfort. For the young men who were most able and fit for service objected to being forced to spend their time and strength in working for other men’s wives and children, without any recompense. The strong man or the resourceful man had no more share of food and clothes than the weak man who was not able to do a quarter the other could.  As for men’s wives who were obliged to do service for other men, such as cooking, and washing their clothes, they considered it a kind of slavery, and many husbands would not brook it.”

 

This had very good success, for it made all hands very industrious. Much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could have devised, and saved him a great deal of trouble and gave far better satisfaction. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to plant corn, while before they would allege weakness and inability; and to have compelled them would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.

By this time harvest was come, and instead of famine, now God gave them plenty, and the face of things was changed, to the rejoicing of the hearts of many, for which they blessed God. And the effect of their planting was well seen, for all had, one way or other, pretty well to bring the year about, and some of the abler sort and more industrious had to spare, and sell to others, so as any general want or famine hath not been amongst them since to this day."

 

It was to the astonishment of many and almost to the wonder of the world, that from so small a beginning such great things should ensue, as in due time was manifested; and that there should be a resting place for so many of the Lord’s people here, when so sharp a scourge had come upon their own nation [England]. But it was the Lord’s doing, and it ought to be marvelous in our eyes.”........

 

Psalm 139:13-15 The Message Bible 

 

"Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out; you formed me in my mother’s womb. I thank you, High God—you’re breathtaking! Body and soul, I am marvelously made! I worship in adoration—what a creation! You know me inside and out, you know every bone in my body; You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit, how I was sculpted from nothing into something. Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth; all the stages of my life were spread out before you, The days of my life all prepared before I’d even lived one day."

That You Might Live Free

Who We Are

From 'A Family Affair':

"“I then did the most difficult thing I’ve done in my life. I walked upstairs, woke Karen to the news, and broke her heart.”

 

Kelly had earned the terrible distinction of being the most senior American officer to lose a child in Iraq or Afghanistan, and not a soul would have begrudged him taking some time. But November is when the Marine Corps celebrates its birthday, and Kelly had been invited to speak at a celebration in St. Louis four days after. He attended, and there delivered one of the most powerful American speeches of the last decade and a half of war.

 

Even though most in attendance knew about his loss, as a courtesy it was not mentioned by the officer introducing him, who opened instead with the jaunty anecdote, “Let me share my favorite line from General Kelly when we were in Iraq. .  .  . ‘We’re the United States Marine Corps. We took Iwo Jima. Baghdad ain’t s—.’ ” Taking the podium to raucous applause, Kelly drew a clear moral line from 9/11 through to the fights in both Afghanistan and Iraq: “Our enemy fights for an ideology based on an irrational hatred of who you are. Make no mistake about that no matter what certain elements of our ‘chattering class’ relentlessly churn out.” Kelly expressed dismay about weak support for the war, and about how small the proportion of Americans who served was, before turning to the character of the current generation of Marines.

And what are they like in combat? They’re like Marines have been throughout our history. In my three tours in combat as an infantry officer, I never saw one of them hesitate, or do anything other than lean into the fire and, with no apparent fear of death or injury, take the fight to our enemies. As anyone—and many of you have—who has ever experienced combat knows, when it starts, when the explosions and tracers are everywhere and the calls for the Corpsman are screamed from the throats of men who know they are dying—when seconds seem like hours and it all becomes slow motion and fast forward at the same time, and the only rational act is to stop, get down, save himself. But they don’t. When no one would call them a coward for cowering behind a wall or in a hole, none of them do.

Kelly paused a number of times, clearly fighting back emotion, but never succumbed. He then made the only reference in the speech to Robert: “Like my own two sons who have fought in Iraq and, until last, this week in Afghanistan, they are also the same kids that drove their cars too fast for your liking, and played that Godawful music of their generation too loud, but have no doubt they are the finest of their generation.”".......

Pearl 75

Asked and Answered

"Most writers have looked to the ashes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki; to find answers for the use of those atomic weapons. The real answers lay in thousands of graves from Pearl Harbor around the world to Normandy and back again. The actual use of the weapons as ordered by the President of the United States was believed to be the quickest and least costly (in terms of lives lost) way to stop the killing. I carried out those orders with the loyal support of the men of the 509th Composite Bomb Group and the United States military at large. Our job was to serve. Our sworn duty was to God, country and victory."--Brig. Gen. Paul W. Tibbets, pilot and commander of the Enola Gay mission

Honor

With Six you Get Eggroll and With Open Borders You Get Housewife Abductions

Sanctuary Slavers & their Unindicted Co-Conspirators 

LifeZette: "Recently freed California mom Sherri Papini who was tortured and branded by her captors was likely the victim of a kidnapping gone awry by a Mexican sex-trafficking ring, according to a private investigator who worked on the case.

The case seems to underline how America’s porous borders enable criminals and other bad elements to enter the United States seeking victims. Mexican crime syndicates have become more active north of the border in recent years. The Redding area in Northern California has become an important corridor for sex traffickers in recent years.".......

Inquisitr: "The 34-year-old mother of two young children was discovered beaten, branded, emaciated, and with a bag over her head in Yolo County.".......

Thank God for her delivery.

It turns out, when you abandon your borders, criminals abandon theirs, too. Easy pickings and all. Just a suburban mom out for a jog.

If there is one good thing about this, at least the two gang molls who snatched her into a van were eligible for California drivers licenses. Obeying traffic laws is so very important!

Probably stopped to vote, too.

Thanks, Governor. You, too, Mr. President. "Couldn't have done it without you."

You have both failed your most basic duty; to protect the safety of your citizens. Instead, you protect the convenience of criminals. Kate Steinle nods.

"Use Public Lands North of Interstate 8": They keep moving this sign.

"We're teaching university students lies."

And Charging Them Exorbitant Rates For the Fraud!

Imagine if 250 of your co-workers--all of whom consider themselves to be the most open-minded people on earth--signed a letter demanding that you be silenced, forbidden from discussing a proposed law. And the letter wasn't even in an East German dialect!

That's what happened to U Toronto Psychology professor Jordan Peterson.

Yet he just von't be silenced. Via Small Dead Animals:

"One of the things that I’m trying to convince my students of is that if they had been in Germany in the 1930s, they would have been Nazis. Everyone thinks “Not me,” and that’s not right. It was mostly ordinary people who committed the atrocities that characterized Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.
Part of the reason I got embroiled in this [gender identity] controversy was because of what I know about how things went wrong in the Soviet Union. Many of the doctrines that underlie the legislation that I’ve been objecting to share structural similarities with the Marxist ideas that drove Soviet Communism. The thing I object to the most was the insistence that people use these made up words like ‘xe’ and ‘xer’ that are the construction of authoritarians. There isn’t a hope in hell that I’m going to use their language, because I know where that leads.".......

Canada?

Chronic Plastic Surgery Patient Calls Brain Surgery Genius "Unqualified"

"Disturbingly!"

Limousine Liberal and Failed San Francisco Democrat Nancy Pelosi: "Wif, bjob brfugh cafdoxidij!"

Sure, you're angry at surgeons, lady, but don't take it out on Ben...

Neurosurgeon Ben Carson couldn't be reached for comment, as he was busy saving lives.

If not Dr. Carson, then who does Pelosi consider qualified to head HUD?

"President Barrack Obama nominated San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro to be Secretary of Housing and Urban Development on May 23 in spite of his city’s alleged misuse of funds from that same federal department."

"Wajeeble!"

Justice for Walter Scott is Justice For Us All

When Do We Want It?

FoxNews: "Circuit Judge Clifton Newman on Monday declared a mistrial in the case of Michael Slager after the jury of 11 whites and one black deadlocked. The panel, considering verdicts of murder or voluntary manslaughter, deliberated more than 22 hours over four days and heard testimony from 55 witnesses during the five-week trial.

"God is my strength, and I know without doubt he is a just God and injustice will not prevail," Scott's mother, Judy, told reporters later. "We have a federal trial and another trial to go. I'm going to rest in the Lord."".......

Amen, sister, amen.

Judge Napolitano says the trial judge blew it by not interrogating the jurors and replacing any malcontents, especially if there was a racial motive. It is also an insult that the defendant is free on bond.

Slager shot Walter Scott like he was a dog in the street, and then planted evidence to cover it up, ripping holes in that family and even his own.  Only God can provide the Grace, but a jury must provide justice.

The sooner, the better.

American Retreat vs. American Re-Tweet

The Palace Eunuchs are all a-Twitter!

The Washington ComPost:

"President-elect Donald Trump spoke Friday with Taiwan’s president, a major departure from decades of U.S. policy in Asia and a breach of diplomatic protocol with ramifications for the incoming president’s relations with China. ...News of the official outreach by Trump is likely to infuriate the regional military and economic power.

The exchange is one of a string of unorthodox conversations with foreign leaders that Trump has held since his election...Trump sent another tweet, apparently in response to criticism of the Taiwan call as potentially reckless...Conway bristled when asked whether Trump was properly briefed before the call on the government’s long-standing policy blahblahblah".......

In tradecraft, that is known as agitprop: noun

1. agitation and propaganda, especially for the cause of communism.

2. (often initial capital letter) an agency or department, as of a government, that directs and coordinates agitation and propaganda.

3. Also, agitpropist. a person who is trained or takes part in such activities."

 

Or just the dying gasps of a failed philosophy and dinosaur technology.

 

Reagan hand Jeffrey Lord: "[T]he real irritant in that story was that Trump was using Twitter to target journalists who quite clearly had targeted him.

 

"What became of our forces which held the bridge till twenty minutes ago...?" The President of the United States telegraphed a colonel in the field during the Civil War Battle of Second Manassas (Bull Run) in 1862. Abraham Lincoln was using the new medium of electronic communications in an unprecedented manner to revolutionize the nature of national leadership. ...

 

FDR made canny use of the radio in election campaigns and political contests. He often saved his most fiery rhetoric for nationally broadcasts speeches to big public rallies.

Catch that? “He often saved his most fiery rhetoric for nationally broadcasts speeches to big public rallies.” Hmmm…. “fiery rhetoric” at “big public rallies.” And just who has been doing exactly the same thing in this last campaign? We all know who.".......

 

Darth Cheney to CNN: "One of the most important things [President-elect Trump] can do is exactly the opposite of what his predecessor did. With respect to Iran and nuclear weapons, and don't make the mistakes that the situation he is inheriting from the Obama administration... I think one of the reasons people get so concerned about the tweets is it is sort of a way around the press. He doesn't have to rely upon, uh, rely upon -- this is the modern era, modern technology. He's at the point where we don't need you guys anymore."

 

The Leg-Humping Media invented the need for FoxNews, and they learned nothing from that.

 

Instead of adding value, which is key in a competitive environment, they are subtracting value by making news consumers decipher

 

1.) is this the usual workaday dishonesty?

2.) or the Special Game-Day Dishonesty?

3.) or did they slip up and actually tell me something true?

Frankly, it's become more work than its worth.

Sad!

Eight Years A Traitor: Gitmo, Then and Now; From Chanting to Fainting

"Do you solemnly swear that you will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic?"

No-New Yorker:

"At the Guantánamo military prison—a desolate place near the eastern tip of Cuba—detainees began a chant that grew louder as it spread: “Obama! Obama! Obama!” It was Election Night in November of 2008, and the returns had made it clear that Barack Obama had soundly defeated John McCain. The chant echoed from blocky concrete buildings arranged into camps, where “compliant” detainees watched television and took classes, and “non-compliant” ones passed their time in twelve-by-eight-foot cells. The sound of the chant stopped short of the top-secret Camp 7, where the C.I.A. held “high value” detainees, including five men charged with participating in the attacks of September 11, 2001. But at Camp Justice, which housed visiting defense lawyers and military prosecutors in facing rows of tin sheds, the lawyers formed a chain and mamboed through the prosecutors’ side, chanting their own refrain: “Hey, hey . . . goodbye!” The prosecutors evidently took offense: a shoving match broke out. ... On January 22, 2009, his second day in office, he issued an executive order, directing that the prison be shut down within a year. When detainees got the news, they shouted to the guards, “Have you heard? We’re getting out of here!”.......

Yes-Fire Andrea Mitchell:

"Prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay military prison in Cuba “thought it was the end of the world” the night of the presidential election and asked their guards for tranquilizers and sleeping pills, CBS correspondent Margaret Brennan reported Thursday.
David Remes, the lawyer of one of the prisoners at Guantanamo, recounted to Brennan what his client told him about election night.
“He said that many detainees thought that it was the end of the world and felt terrible and that many detainees asked for tranquilizers, sleeping pills because they were so distraught,” Remes said.
Remes said he is afraid that once Donald Trump officially becomes president, the doors will “slam shut” and remaining detainees will not be able to be released.".......

There are 59 terrorists left at Gitmo. Obama plans to release at least 20 more. What could possibly go wrong?

What could definitely go right?

There's a new sheriff in town--literally!