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February 13, 2012
Binyamin Rose: Back to the Bunker: How a life-risking act by a Christian family during the Holocaust saved a family and built a thriving community a world away
Menachem Wecker: Business Schools Teach Real Estate Despite Troubled Housing Market
February 10, 2012
Lisa M. Krieger: Man with defibrillator demands access to his own heart's information
David G. Savage: Why activists may not be in a hurry to have High Court rule on alternative marriage
February 9, 2012
Laura McMullen: 10 Least Expensive Public Schools for Out-of-State Students
Kimberly Palmer: How to actually enjoy -- relaxing, financially -- your vacation
February 8, 2012
Warren Richey: Why momentous Prop. 8 ruling might not satisfy gay-rights groups
Menachem Wecker: Though Controversial, LL.M.'s Can Lead to Specialized Legal Jobs
The Kosher Gourmet byDana Velden: Going to the bother of making soup? You know it better be good. This CREAM OF TOMATO SOUP certainly is! And it's a cinch to make, too (Includes techinques and serving secrets)
February 7, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Caught off-guard? President's Super Bowl interview with Matt Lauer gives those who need a reason not to vote for him, a darn good one
Suzanne Bohan: Leaping lizards! Tiny reptiles advancing robot design
February 6, 2012
Jonathan Tobin: Iran Threatens Israel With Destruction, But the New York Times Doesn't Hear It
Jeffrey Fleishman: In newly democratic Egypt, tens of democracy activists jailed, to stand trial; their groups are 'threatening the stability of the homeland'
Julie Deardorff : Researchers say antioxidants may not be that effective and could do more harm than good
Mark Clayton: How did Anonymous hackers eavesdrop on FBI and Scotland Yard?
February 3, 2012
Edmund Sanders : Israeli official says Iran is creating missile that could reach East Coast of US
Victoria Kim: Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling
February 2, 2012
Jim Carney: Wrong number call may have saved her life
Reza Kahlili : Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: What Obama doesn't grasp about striking deals with Tehran
Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
February 1, 2012
Brian Bennett: US officials see increasing threat of domestic attack from Iran
Emily Brandon: How to Take Advantage of New 401(k) Fee Disclosures
January 31, 2012
January 30, 2012
Paul Richter and Ramin Mostaghim: Misreading Teheran's limits -- deadly and economically devastating as they may be -- is a risk administration, Europe seem willing to take
Suzanne Bohan: Warning: Nap-deprived tots missing more than sleep, study finds
Meg Handley: Banks Revamping Rewards Programs to Woo Customers
January 27, 2012
Caroline B. Glick: Obama: Of course I intend to prevent a nuclear holocaust . . . in a few months
Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
Jeannine Stein: An inflated ego and thinking you're 'all that' doesn't just make others sick of you, it can make you ill
Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
Susan Johnston: 5 Sneaky Coupon Strategies Consumers Should Watch Out For
January 24, 2012
Carol Clark: The price of your soul: How your brain decides whether to 'sell out'
Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
January 18, 2012
January 17, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz: Thriving through touch: Gentle massage helps older people with low mobility improve in mind and body
January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
Warren Richey: Supreme Court says no to new rule on eyewitness testimony
John Fauber : Statins found to raise diabetes risk in postmenopausal women
Katy Hopkins : Consider This Before You Pay for an Online Degree
The Kosher Gourmet by Joseph Erdos: This mushroom and barley soup has an intense -- almost nutty -- flavor that mixes robust with Middle East. It has creaminess without cream
January 11, 2012
Shari Roan: Millions of atrial fibrillation sufferers at risk for devastating, but preventable, stroke
Tom Hussain: Pakistan -- recipient of more than $21 billion in civilian and military aid -- speeds pursuit of Iranian pipeline, defying US
David G. Savage: High court signals it won't be loosening TV's 'indecency' rules
Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
January 10, 2012
Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Karen Kaplan: Study: Nicotine replacement products ineffective when used in real-life situations
January 9, 2012
Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
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Jewish World Review
Nov. 6, 2009
/ 19 Mar-Cheshvan 5770
Election victories useless if we lose our way of life
By
Diana West
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Finally, some transparency from the Obama White House. I refer to see-through efforts to affect nonchalance about Tuesday's elections in which Republicans made gains unthinkable just a year ago.
No, of course President Obama wouldn't be watching election returns, both White House spokesman Robert Gibbs and senior aide David Axelrod told the media in advance. Wasn't there a Chicago Bulls game on that night?
Of course, it wasn't elections in general that put the president off. It was these elections in particular. As Gibbs later reported, the president spent Election Night 2009 watching an HBO special about his own election in 2008. By Gibbs' reckoning, as Newsbusters's Kyle Drennen notes, this was the second time the president had watched his own election story.
Maybe it gets better with age. Or maybe it offers an affirming rush of newfound nostalgia, that someplace pleasant to linger and bask.
Either way, the president's self-involved example offers a lesson. Such retrospection, narcissistic or not, is precisely what Republicans must not lapse into with their own victories, however stunning they now appear. Yes, the people voted in two key states to beat down Big Obama Government, but conservatives must offer more than pushback in 2010 and beyond. There's a war going on, a gargantuan national effort that these mainly state and local elections, of course, said nothing about.
I was reminded of this gaping hole when a prominent British Labor politician, Kim Howells, made news in Great Britain this week with a proposal summed up under the Guardian headline: "It's time to pull out of Afghanistan and take the fight to Bin Laden in Britain." This proposal, coming from a former Foreign Office minister who has supported the war in Afghanistan, is guaranteed to crack the UK war debate wide open, something that has yet to happen here.
And what does he mean? In a lengthy essay that appeared on the same day that five British troops were murdered by a Taliban-linked Afghan policeman, Howell explains that seven years of military and civilian aid have neither destroyed Al Qaeda in Afghanistan nor the Taliban.
"There can be no guarantee," Howells writes, "that the next seven years will bring significantly greater success and, even if they do, it is salutary to remember that Afghanistan has never been the sole location of terrorist training camps."
The light begins to dawneth.
"If we accept," he continues, "that Al Qaeda continues to pose a deadly threat to the UK, and if we know that it is capable of changing the locations of its bases and modifying its attack plans, we must accept that we have a duty to question the wisdom of … the deployment of our forces to Afghanistan. It is time to ask whether the fight against those who are intent on murdering British citizens might better be served by … (bringing) home the great majority of our fighting men and women and concentrate on using the money saved to secure our own borders, gather intelligence on terrorist activities inside Britain, expand our intelligence operations abroad, co-operate with foreign intelligence services, and counter the propaganda of those who encourage terrorism."
Hallelujah, it's a start. Someone in a high political place seems to realize that what I think of as a multilevel war on Sharia-spreading jihad isn't confined to the sketchy borders of Afghanistan, isn't solved by politically correct fantasies of "nation-building," and, further, is already raging unopposed within the UK itself. This is at least a variation on my call to stop nation-building in the Islamic world and start nation-saving in the Western one.
The resulting reconfiguration of British priorities, Howells believes, would also reconfigure British life: "Life inside the UK would have to change," he writes. "There would be more intrusive surveillance in certain communities, more police officers on the streets, more border officials at harbours and airports, more inspectors of vehicles and vessels entering the country, and a re-examination of arrangements that facilitate the 'free movement' of people and products across our frontiers with the rest of the EU."
Which doesn't sound pretty. Then again, war isn't pretty. And it is the apparent recognition that there is a war on Great Britain being waged from within Great Britain a war that "nation-building" in Afghanistan does nothing to stop that is the most refreshing element of Howells' proposal.
Will any U.S. politician, preferably from the pro-military, pro-Israel, anti-jihad heart of the GOP, ever think to hurl such a consensus-shattering brick into our own national debate?
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