Cruising the Web

The successful espionage by the Israeli Mossad to go deep into Iranian territory to their hidden facility to extract literally half a ton of documents and CDs and get them out of Iran is one of the most impressive espionage successes that I can ever remember hearing about. I want to see a documentary or movie about how they accomplished it.

All of Obama’s supporters are out there parroting the same message – that this is old news. But that’s just spin. As Prime Minister Netanyahu said in his speech, these files “conclusively prove” that Iran lied about its program before it signed the deal with Obama. So the deal started out being built on lies. And if they’re telling us now that they knew that those were lies, then they’re admitting that their whole deal was a fraud.

Mr. Netanyahu offered photographs, videos, charts and blueprints from the intelligence haul relating to Tehran’s Project Amad, which the Israeli leader called “a comprehensive program to design, build and test nuclear weapons.” The Iranians have always denied the existence of such a program, and the United Nations downplayed Tehran’s nuclear ambitions in 2015.

Yes, because the goal was always to come out with a deal, any deal that the Obama folks could trumpet as a victory so they were willing to close their eyes to Iran’s lies.

It’s no coincidence that Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif mentioned that 2015 U.N. assessment in a tweet Monday as evidence that Tehran should be trusted. Perhaps the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors would like to revisit those findings in light of this new evidence?

Mr. Netanyahu also claimed that the underground Fordow uranium enrichment facility was designed “from the get-go for nuclear weapons as part of Project Amad,” and misled the U.N. about its activities. The Iranians preserved Project Amad’s documentation and have kept its research team, headed by Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, largely in place in a new organization housed within the Defense Ministry.

So, in exchange for pretending to believe Iran’s lies, we turned over billions of dollars to Iran and were willing to lift sanctions to allow trade with Iran. And Iran has turned around and used that money to fund terrorism and its support of Syria’s regime and their gasing of their own people. And that was what the Obama administration allowed. When people die because of Iranian-backed aggression and terrorism, remember that it was the Obama administration that arranged for Iran to get the funding to continue down that road. John Kerry even admitted that there was no way to guarantee that Iran wouldn’t use that money for supporting terrorists. Guess what, John? They did.

And while all the Obama acolytes who willingly bought Ben Rhodes’ lies about the Iran deal are trying to tell us to move along; there is nothing to see here, the Israelis claim that their findings prove that Iran is still preserving its ability to build a new nuclear weapon.

If the West can verify the new Israeli intelligence that Iran had preserved its design and research work into a nuclear weapon, that’s a big deal — particularly now in light of the May 12 deadline that President Donald Trump has imposed on U.S. negotiations with Europe to come up with fixes to strengthen the nuclear bargain. The trove of data would be a blow not only to Iran’s credibility but also to the reputation of American intelligence gathering.

As negotiations with Iran came to a close in summer 2015, John Kerry, then secretary of state, assured reporters that American intelligence agencies had “absolute knowledge” about Iran’s past efforts to build a nuclear weapon.

It was a strange remark. As the intelligence assessments before the 2003 Iraq War showed, intelligence is never absolute. What’s more, the International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, still had its own outstanding questions for Iran. Indeed, that agency could not give Iran a clean bill of health on the possible military dimensions of its nuclear program nearly six months later.

Now Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is claiming that his country’s spies have purloined a warehouse full of videos, files, blueprints and designs for nuclear weapons compiled between 1999 and 2003. If verified, the new Israeli intelligence would show there were many details the U.S. didn’t know back in 2015.

Much of the case against Iran then was murky. In the George W. Bush administration, for example, U.S. intelligence agencies relied on data from a stolen laptop to prove Iran was building a weapon. Weapons inspectors had found traces of highly enriched uranium on Iranian equipment as well. But the best argument for why Iran was building a weapon was that it endured rounds of international sanctions and censure to build uranium enrichment facilities hidden from the IAEA. If all the mullahs wanted was nuclear power, why build a centrifuge cascade deep inside a mountain?

The Israeli intelligence haul would provide far more specifics about Iran’s weapons program than have previously been known to Western intelligence agencies. For example, Netanyahu on Monday showed slides of warhead designs, a map of potential test sites and other details that had previously been inferred, but not verified by Western intelligence. Some intelligence analysts had assessed that Iran had done warhead design work, but the Israelis now claim to have the proof.

David Albright, the president and founder of the Institute for Science and International Security, told me Monday that the new intelligence, if verified, would fill many of the holes in the West’s knowledge of Iran’s weapons program.

But Albright said it does more than that. If verified, the intelligence also reveals Iran’s intention to eventually build a nuclear weapon. “The most significant thing is that this is a warehoused collection intended to be used later for reconstitution,” Albright said. “They could have destroyed these documents. But these were being carefully protected and hidden with the intention to reuse them when they launch their weapons program.”

Beyond the fate of the nuclear deal, the Israeli intelligence also presents a crisis for the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, to which Iran is a member. If verified, it shows that Iran has systematically lied to weapons inspectors for nearly 20 years. If Iran doesn’t pay a price for its deception, then what is to stop future rogues from following the Iran model?

Well, the only thing that stops those in the West from acknowledging that Iran has lied to them is their willingness to be deceived. That is not diplomacy, that is willful and short-sighted blindness. And when we’re talking about Iran with all its braggadocio about destroying Israel and other enemies, that is a very dangerous approach to take.

Let us remember all the lies that Obama told us about his policies.

Concessions with those deals:

Syria: Let Assad stay in power. Handed country to Iran and Russia.

Bergdahl: 5 high level terrorists.

Iran: Let Hezbollah off the hook, abandoned Ukraine, billions in cash to Iran now being used to fund terrorism, sanctions, & freed prisoners.

— (((AG))) (@AG_Conservative) April 30, 2018

Arab Spring – Led to more extreme brutal regimes like Egypt
Yemen Policy – See civil war.
Russia reset – Invades Ukraine, blows passenger jet out of sky.
Cuba – Goes to baseball game, Cuba attacks ambassadors.

— Stephen Miller (@redsteeze) April 30, 2018

1. If you like your healthcare plan, you can keep it

2. We removed chemical weapons from Syria

3. Iran can’t build a secret weapon under the Iran Deal

4. ISIS is the JV Team

5. The 80′s called, they want their foreign policy back https://t.co/8DyezIwEud

— Garrett Ventry (@GarrettVentry) April 30, 2018

And, while taking time from gabbing about Stormy Daniels’ suit against Trump, the anti-Trump, Obama-loving media are looking for ways to downplay Netanyahu’s announcement. And how to do that? Bring on Obama folks to do it for them.

Ppl love to accuse Fox of being “state media,” but CNN is having Obama fopo appointees “report” that Obama was right and the Israelis are bad, all while pushing objective (and in many cases, knowing) falsehoods. You can call this “journalism” if you want, b/c you are free to lie.

— Seth Mandel (@SethAMandel) April 30, 2018

Yup, that is how they do journalism these days.

The media never seemed to resent Obama adviser Ben Rhodes’ bragging about how the Obama administration snookered them on the IRan deal because too many in the media were too stupid to understand the issues. And he’s still out there snookering away. PJ Media has collected his tweets about Iran which demonstrate all that the Obama folks got wrong on Iran. It all seems highly ironic now when their deceptions about Iran have been exposed.

Charles Glasser at Instapundit exposes how hypocritically smug the Washington media are.

On the same day that comfortably smug people are patting themselves on the back about the use of foul language to describe a President they hate (“War on the press!!!) three Radio Free Europe journalists were killed while on assignment.

Police and the Health Ministry put the number of dead at 25, and police said 45 wounded victims were hospitalized — including six journalists. Kabul police spokesman Hashmat Stanekzai was quoted as saying that four police officers were killed.

How dare the WHCA reporters put themselves in the same league.

And Washington journalists think they’re so brave to get in the same banquet hall eating fine food while laughing at Republicans.

Dan Hannan sheds some common sense on the whole controversy over Apu from The Simpsons. Because one comedian, Hari Kondabolu, made a documentary about “The Problem with Apu, we’re all supposed to be appalled that Apu is a racial stereotype. It’s a comedy TV show; just get over yourselves.

Yes, Apu is a caricature. So is almost every character in the show: That’s how it works. Indeed, Apu is frequently used as a device to parody the complacent bigotry of the others. Consider the episode where Homer tries to throw out immigrants — “Get Eurass back to Eurasia” says one of the placards — and which ends in Apu becoming a U.S. citizen. Here, in just a couple of seconds on screen, are all the stereotypes: Apu the immigrant, Homer the dumb nativist and Lisa the smart-alecky liberal tripping over politically correct terminology:

Apu: “Today, I am no longer an Indian living in America. I am an Indian-American.”

Lisa: “You know, in a way, all Americans are immigrants. Except, of course Native Americans.”

Homer: “Yeah, Native Americans like us”.

Lisa: “No, I mean American Indians.”

Apu: “Like me.”

Lisa: “No! I mean…”

You don’t think that exchange is relevant to modern America? Then consider what happened in Cambridge, Mass, last week. City officials ordered the removal of an election poster following “anonymous complaints.” The poster, promoting Shiva Ayyadurai, an independent challenging Elizabeth Warren for her Senate seat, featured pictures of both candidates with Warren, who once represented herself as Native American despite lacking evidence of such an ancestry, in a feathered head-dress. “Only a real Indian can defeat the fake Indian,” was its slogan.

You see where identity politics leads? It is OK for Ms Warren to claim Cherokee ancestry on the basis of “family lore,” but it is not OK for Mr Ayyadurai to tease her about her choice….

But how is this for an even better idea: Just drop this peculiar obsession with race. Why not accept the Indian shopkeeper as just one more stereotype alongside the mobster, the nerdy professor, the shyster lawyer, the fighting Irishman and all the other characters who populate Springfield? It’s a cartoon, for heaven’s sake.

Christopher Jacobs writes at The Federalist along the same lines.

Apu is indeed a stereotype — one that powerful Americans have perpetuated. Look no further than Joe Biden, who in 2006 patronized an Indian-American supporter: “In Delaware, the largest growth in population is Indian-Americans, moving from India. You cannot go to a 7-11 or a Dunkin Donuts unless you have a slight Indian accent. I’m not joking.” (No word yet on what Biden thinks of the Apu controversy.)

Of course most characters on “The Simpsons” are stereotypes, though, in one way, shape, or form. Dr. Nick Riviera, also voiced by Azaria, is the actor’s attempt to perform a bad Ricky Ricardo impersonation from “I Love Lucy.” But Azaria, unlike Desi Arnaz, who played Ricardo, does not have Cuban roots. While Kondablou criticized “The Simpsons” for not hiring an Indian-American to portray Apu, neither he nor others have criticized the show for not hiring a Cuban-American to portray Dr. Nick.

In the case of Italian-Americans, the show contains myriad stereotypical characters. Restaurant owner Luigi Risotto, who says he speaks in “Pizza English,” appears in one episode with his “happy monkey” Giuseppe. Marge Simpson tells mobster Anthony “Fat Tony” D’Amico that he’s “perpetuating a negative Italian-American stereotype … You could be a pizza man, organ grinder, leaning tower maker … Did I say pizza man?” And “Fat Tony’s” associate Don Vittorio DiMaggio introduces himself as “an old Italian-American stereotype.”

There are loads of other stereotypes on the show. There is also a satire of a devout Christian in the character of Ned Flanders or the rural redneck stereotype in Cletus Spuckler. People just need to get over themselves.

“The Simpsons” contains these many stereotypical characters because, well, it’s a satirical comedy. If the Apu controversy leads to an increase in the diversity of the show’s staff — or of television portrayals of South Asian-Americans in general — so much the better. But removing only one stereotypical character would suggest a politicized process of choosing “acceptable” groups to satirize, which is an offensive proposition in and of itself. And removing them all would eradicate much of the humor from an iconic, and still funny, show.

Sean Davis reports on the evidence in a newly declassified congressional report on Russia and the 2016 election that Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper lied to the public about leaking information to CNN.

In one of the findings within the 253-page report, the House intelligence committee wrote that Clapper leaked details of a dossier briefing given to then-President-elect Donald Trump to CNN’s Jake Tapper, lied to Congress about the leak, and was rewarded with a CNN contract a few months later.

“Clapper flatly denied ‘discussing[ing] the dossier [compiled by Steele] or any other intelligence related to Russia hacking of the 2016 election with journalists,’” the committee found.

When asked directly whether he had ever discussed the dossier with any journalists, Clapper replied that he had not, according to a transcript of the proceedings:

MR. ROONEY: Did you discuss the dossier or any other intelligence related to Russia hacking of the 2016 election with journalists?

MR. CLAPPER: No.

“Clapper subsequently acknowledged discussing the ‘dossier with CNN journalist Jake Tapper,’ and admitted that he might have spoken with other journalists about the same topic,” the report continued.

So, other than lying to Congress and the public, why should we care?

The revelation that Clapper was responsible for leaking details of both the dossier and briefings to two presidents on the matter is significant, because former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director James Comey wrote in one of four memos that he leaked that the briefing of Trump on salacious and unverified allegations from the dossier was necessary because “CNN had them and were looking for a news hook.”

The congressional report on Russian interference noted that it was this very briefing of Trump that multiple media organizations used as an excuse to publish the unverified dossier.

“The Committee assesses that leaks to CNN about the dossier were especially significant, since CNN’s report ‘ that a two-page synopsis of the report was given to President Obama and Trump’ was the proximate cause of BuzzFeed News’ decision to publish the dossier for the first time just a few hours later,” the report stated. “Until that point, the dossier had been ‘circulating among elected official, intelligence agents, and journalists,’ but remained unpublished…”

Comey’s meeting with Trump was a set-up to give CNN a hook for their story on the dossier. And, isn’t it convenient that CNN went on to hire Clapper. Thus are the wages of sin. Sara Carter wonders about the ethics of CNN hiring its leaker. They can market him as an expert on intelligence, but just don’t mention his role in violating the law by leaking to them. And, as Sara Carter says, the job offer from CNN “[s]eems like an ethical problem to pay your sources for unverified information.”

Roger L. Simon has a good laugh about the idea that we’re living in a golden age of journalism as journalists join the #Resistance movement to block and expose Trump.

What a crock! It’s the Golden Age of Leaking, not Journalism. The fantastic success of Woodward and Bernstein during Watergate has brought us to that. Blame “Deep Throat.” A journalist is now someone who answers the phone from a leaker, takes down what he or she says, and spits out the innuendoes and lies to win a Pulitzer. You don’t have to be Hemingway to do that. You just have to have a decent digital rolodex and be a good kiss-ass.

This is the type of discipline in school that I fully support.

A group of veterans taught some Georgia high school students a lesson in patriotism after a senior prank went too far.

On Friday morning, 11Alive News was sent a photo of an American flag that had been sprayed-paint with “Seniors 2K18!” and hung at Heard County High School.

Principal Brent Tisdale said the prank crossed the line, but after speaking to five of the students responsible, he thought it could be a “teachable moment.”

“Our students did not intend to be disrespectful or insult the flag or our country, but that is indeed what happened,” Tisdale said in a statement.

He said the school had a group of local veterans come and speak to the students about what the flag represents and about those who have died fighting for it.

Nikki Culpepper was one of the veterans who met with the students.

“We talked about how we chose to voluntarily defend the flag and their right to do what they did to it, as well as family and friends and loved ones who come home underneath that flag,” she told Fox 5. “Two of the young people had tears in their eyes, shook our hands and apologized. Very remorseful.”

Tisdale said the students understand what they did was wrong and learned a valuable lesson.