Month: November 2015

by William Skink

The debate about whether to accept Syrian refugees into America is a bullshit partisan distraction that ignores the root cause, which is American foreign policy. Pete Talbot takes the bait and writes that Montana should take refugees. Great, let’s take refugees. Who cares that we can’t even take care of the homeless already in our community. If it makes liberals happy to think they’re saving the people who are fleeing the region their “elected” Commander-in-Chief has decimated, they’re going to advocate for it, regardless of what the reality on the ground dictates.

The Cowgirl has an even more ridiculously partisan post about scapegoating the victims, ascribing the refugee crisis to the Iraq invasion, completely ignoring what has happened in Libya and Syria:

And finally, don’t lose sight of the fact that Zinke, Daines, and Gianforte no doubt thought that the Iraq war–which largely caused the current state of affairs in the Middle East–was a great idea. They viewed the manchild president, George W. Bush, as a visionary foreign policy maker who surely must be followed, since he was clearly such a wise man. And they followed his vision, criticized all who opposed it, and now that we have the mess, naturally none of them want to participate in the cleanup.

What a bunch of crap. It’s like the last 7 years of Obama’s foreign policy, executed in part by the sociopath presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, didn’t exist. This is dangerously ignorant partisanship meant to keep the Democrat herd properly focused on Bush and not Obama or Clinton.

In the background this morning I’m listening to NPR and they’re talking about French airstrikes on Syria. What targets exist today that didn’t warrant airstrikes before the Paris attacks? Along that vein, Moon of Alabama has a very interesting post about Russia shaming Obama into actually targeting ISIS, which previously the administration hasn’t been serious about actually doing. From the link:

The U.S. claims it wants to hit the Islamic State but in one year of bombing it never really touched one of its biggest sources of income. Hundreds of oil tanker trucks are waiting every day at IS distribution points to smuggle oil to Turkey and elsewhere. Only one such distribution point was ever bombed and that attack was by the Iraqi air force.

Now the Russian President Putin played some “name and shame” at the G-20 meeting in Turkey and, lo and behold, the problem gets solved.

The Obama administration recently claimed it would increase attacks on the most expensive Syrian oil infrastructure which is owned by the Syrian government but under IS control. But it said it would still not hit the large truck gatherings.

And why was the Obama administration reluctant to bomb the trucks that smugglers use to sell oil, providing ISIS with millions in oil revenue? Because of the fear of civilian casualties:

While the American-led air campaign has conducted periodic airstrikes against oil refineries and other production facilities in eastern Syria that the group controls, the organization’s engineers have been able to quickly repair damage, and keep the oil flowing, American officials said. The Obama administration has also balked at attacking the Islamic State’s fleet of tanker trucks — its main distribution network — fearing civilian casualties.

Civilian casualties is absolutely NOT the reason the Obama administration has balked at degrading the oil revenue ISIS depends on. If our president was concerned about civilian casualties, he’d stop the drone terrorism he’s perpetrated across the globe.

So if that’s not the reason, what is? The answer to that question is not something the American public can wrap their heads around because it implies that ISIS is a geopolitical tool of the west. That may go against the propaganda Americans have been spoon-fed for years, but it’s the truth.

So just keep focusing on those bad Republican Governors pandering to their xenophobic base, Democrats, and pretend like these refugees are a product of Bush’s foreign policy. Putting Hillary in the White House is more important than acknowledging the utter failure of Obama’s foreign policy, right?

By JC

You get the founder of America’s and the world’s most valuable company.

By JC

I attempted to add the following comment at Intelligent Discontent on Don Pogreba’s post “Does Islam Promote Violence? Stupid Question Gets a Smart Answer.” As usual, my comments get moderated and never post.

Pogreba’s post consists of nothing more than a much regurgitated Reza Aslan interview at CNN as an answer to his question. Unfortunately, Don refrains from adding any original thought to the video, so one must assume that he is down with it.

Fortunately, there are people far more informed than I (and obviously Pogreba) who have much invested in the matter, and avoid trite knee-jerk responses to the tragedy unfolding in the Middle East, and spilling over into Africa and Europe. I much prefer the well thought out discussion by the two ex-Muslims quoted below to Aslan’s theatrics. So here is my comment (reformatted into a post here) to Don:

———–
So I don’t why Don would post Reza Aslan’s interview without doing a bit of due diligence. Aslan’s interview sparked a huge outcry in the Muslim sphere after it was aired on CNN….

For those who would like to hear a cogent rebuttal, “Reza Aslan is Wrong About Islam and This is Why”, Muhammad Syed and Sarah Haider (co-founders of Ex-Muslims of North America, a community-building organization for ex-Muslims) weigh in at Patheos.com:

…We believe that Islam badly needs to be reformed, and it is only Muslims who can truly make it into a modern religion. But it is the likes of Reza Aslan who act as a deterrent to change by refusing to acknowledge real complications within the scripture and by actively promoting half-truths. Bigotry against Muslims is a real and pressing problem, but one can criticize the Islamic ideology without treating Muslims as themselves problematic or incapable of reform.

There are true Muslim reformists who are willing to call a spade a spade while working for the true betterment of their peoples — but their voices are drowned out by the noise of apologists who are all-too-often aided by the Western left. Those who accept distortions in order to hold on to a comforting dream-world where Islamic fundamentalism is merely an aberration are harming reform by encouraging apologists.

————

Please go read the whole post by Sayed and Haider. It is a refreshing alternative to the liberal apologies offered by “the left” in the West.

byWilliam Skink

James Conner isn’t making himself any new friends with his coverage of the David Lenio spectacle, and that’s because he’s made the prescient assertion that this case is being groomed for the national spotlight. To counter this assertion, Jonathan Hutson took on Conner directly with a guest post at Cowgirl.

This story is now getting much wider traction, thanks to Hutson’s efforts (because Conner was right). Here is Hutson with piece at Huffington post, titled: White Banker’s Son Threatens to Shoot School Kids and Jews, Gets ‘Get Outta Jail Free’ Card. And here’s the title of another article, this one at Raw Story: Banker’s son from Montana who threatened to shoot kids and Jews is back online despite ban.

What does Lenio being the son of a banker have to do with this case? Both articles go on to say virtually nothing about Lenio’s father, but I guess it’s good framing for a liberal audience.

Everything about this case is starting to stink. Who benefits from politicizing this and hyping it for national consumption?

What angers me about out of state interests jumping on the prosecution of this unstable young man is that prosecuting him to fullest extent of the law won’t alleviate the threat this person represents to local communities. If he’s mentally ill, prison will worsen his mental status. If he gets on probation, he will have to remain in Montana unless he gets cleared to leave. His job prospects will be that much worse, which is significant because throughout his tweets his perception that he’s a “wage slave” seems to be a primary factor in his rage toward the malignant forces he perceives are oppressing him.

David Lenio is a microcosm of the macro crisis facing young men around the world. Lack of economic opportunity combined with an absence of fulfilling personal relationships makes young men much more susceptible to extremists ideologies.

Last month I came across an article making this very point. I can’t remember if I linked to it, but here it is:

There’s a Way to Stop Mass Shootings, and You Won’t Like It.

That’s right. You’re not going to like it because it’s going to require you to do something personally, as opposed to shouting for the government, or anyone to “do something!”

You ready? Here it is:

“Notice those around you who seem isolated, and engage them.”

If every one of us did this we’d have a culture that was deeply committed to ensuring no one was left lonely. And make no mistake, as I’ve written before loneliness is what causes these shooters to lash out. People with solid connections to other people don’t indiscriminately fire guns at strangers.

I know what you’re thinking. That’s never going to work because no one is going to make the effort to connect with the strange kid sitting by himself at lunch each day. No one is going to reach out to the gawky, awkward guy at work and ask him about his weekend.

You’re probably right and that’s an absolute shame.

Guest post by Matthew Koehler

If anyone opens up the Missoulian opinion page today you’ll be greeted by an epic, off-the-rails rant from the Montana Wilderness Association’s ‘communications manager’ Ted Brewer (complete with outright lies and entirely propped up by strawman arguments) against longtime environmental and public lands champion George Ochenski.

Recently the Missoulian published two columns on its Opinion page that were, topically speaking, quite different. Psychologically speaking, however, they were quite similar.

One column claimed the U.S. government is controlling the weather through commercial airliner exhaust, known as “chemtrails.” The other was George Ochenski’s column claiming the Forest Service is using tax dollars to “buy” the support of conservation groups for logging, grazing and other resource extraction projects.

A friend of mine who used to work at a daily newspaper calls the Opinion page a “fact-free zone,” but these two conspiracy theories, printed on the same day, turned the Missoulian’s Opinion page into a paranoia playground, where President Obama makes it rain and an extravagantly funded Forest Service slips bags of cash to conservation groups while dining on filet of bull trout and leg of Canada lynx.

I’m the communications manager at Montana Wilderness Association, certainly one of the top entries on Ochenski’s list of enemies and a longtime, routine target of his column. (If Ochenski goes a few months without blasting MWA, I start to wonder if his mind might be slipping.) I’ve also been a writer for the past 20-odd years. I’ve written a fair number of magazine stories that have required me to dig for the sources that back my claims. It’s part of the job and the fun of doing credible journalism.

But once you start making outrageous claims without providing proof, then you’ve joined the ranks of birthers, chemtrail conspiracy mongers, and other ideological zealots and crackpots with personal and political axes to grind. That’s where we find Ochenski these days, so desperate to smear his enemies that he compares them to Nazis (yes, he did that) or tries to embroil them in controversies of his own paranoid concoction.

In the opinion piece, the Montana Wilderness Association compares Ochenski to “birthers, chemtrail conspiracy mongers, and other ideological zealots and crackpots.” The Montana Wilderness Association also calls on the Missoulian to replace George Ochenski (their very popular, weekly progressive columnist).

Apparently, what caused the Montana Wilderness Association to go completely off the deep end was the following information Ochenski included in a recent opinion column, in which he highlighted the comments by Wilderness Legend Stewart Brandborg (the only living person who was responsible for passage of the Wilderness Act in 1964). Brandborg recently warned groups like MWA at a Wilderness Conference to “resist the fuzzy, fuzzy Neverland of collaboration,” because Brandborg believes that groups like MWA are giving up huge chunks of America’s public lands legacy in exchange for basically what amounts to some Wilderness crumbs. Continue reading “MWA Demands Missoulian Replace Ochenski with a Lackey”