Friday, October 30, 2009

The Recession is Over! ...or not

  Yesterday the propagandist in chief (Obama) and gaffe-aholic (Biden) were quick to claim that the recession was officially over due to a slight increase in GDP last quarter.  The markets responded quite well to this news and the news that Friday they would announce over a million jobs have been saved or created by the $700+ billion dollar spendulus bill with the documents to prove it!

  Well here we are on Friday realizing that yet again the White House played a trick and our treat wasn't so nice.  The Associated Press reported that the administration basically lied about the numbers they claimed on jobs.  Biden, this afternoon said; that over a million jobs have been created or saved yet earlier today the Recovery.gov website had listed only 30,000 jobs created or saved as of 10/15/2009.  Shortly after Biden opened his pie hole that number quickly changed to 640,329 as of 10/30/2009 on the website!  I'm really starting to believe Obama does have God like powers, in a matter of minutes he made 610,329 jobs appear on that very same site.  Then again, if you are going to pull numbers out of thin air at least keep up with your own lies and post the 1 million plus number that Biden claimed.  So what was the outcome of all this?  A massive sell off on Wall St. causing the DOW to tumble 249 points with traders saying Monday will be even worse.  How could this happen?  Well lets just say that I think people are starting to finally realize that nothing the White House announces regarding the economy has any truth to it.

  I said months ago that the market would pick up and tank even worse than March.  Hopefully I'm wrong but I am far from convinced the worst is over...

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Somali Pirates: A Simple Solution

  Remember Richard Phillips, the American Captain captured by Somali pirates back in April?  How could we forget, the entire nation was glued to their televisions awaiting news of his fate.  In dramatic and heroic fashion a team of Navy SEAL snipers were dispatched then simultaneously shot and killed the pirates holding him captive aboard a life boat.  Seeing this as his first international crisis, Obama quickly took credit for giving the go ahead to take out the pirates.  Little do people know that he had absolutely nothing to do with that order, it was given to the SEAL team by SECNAV (Secretary of The Navy) when they were dispatched.  Yet again Obama holds true to the administration's mantra of "never waste a good crisis".

  Since April we have increased our presence in the waters off of the African coast along with other NATO nations and even the Russians.  Thats all well and good but quite frankly a useless strategy for patrolling hundreds of thousands of square miles looking for boats that are sometimes no more than 20ft in length.  I don't disagree with having the ships there but I do think the only ships there should be those with special operations forces and aircraft on the ready.  Steaming around looking for suspicious vessels or waiting for a call for help just seems like a waste of time and resources given the scope and size of the area.  We have the most advanced military in the world and by far the most superior Navy.  So how are we using this to our advantage?  We aren't.  As of now its patrol, board suspicious vessels and wait for a distress call.  The strategy needs to be more proactive and utilize the technology we have to our advantage.  Fly unmanned drones over the base camps of the pirates or set up an air combat patrol zone over the coast of Somalia and bomb the homes and bases they operate from.  Sadly this will never happen solely because this administration is as gutless as Clinton was.

  We left Somalia in 1993 after the Blackhawk Down incident, with our tails tucked between our legs.  Instead of finishing the mission, we packed up and left because Clinton didn't want anymore bad public relations from the conflict.  The images of that soldier being dragged through the streets on CNN were enough to put a scare and rage into anyone, but even more reason to stay and get the job done.  By leaving Somalia it has allowed the country transition even deeper into a terrorist and pirate breeding ground.  I can say with a fair amount of certainty that if we had completed the mission there, the problems we are currently facing wouldn't be as severe.

  As of yesterday a British couple are being reported as kidnapped by Somali pirates.  The news is still thin as there haven't been any communications or ransom demands of yet.  But here we are again, scrambling to find this poor couple when this may have just been prevented by playing offense instead of defense.  My thoughts and prayers go out to the couple and their family.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Afghanistan: Obama's Vietnam

  Now the title may be misleading and some of you are saying to yourselves "Afghanistan is nothing like Vietnam, we lost so many more troops in that war" and to a degree you are right.  We haven't lost 50k plus soldiers in Afghanistan and I certainly hope the total of both there and Iraq never come close to that number.  Mr. Nobel Prize has done one thing to turn this war around in Afghanistan and ONE thing only; dictate a war from Washington ignoring commanders on the ground in the combat zone.  He was in Florida last week pleading with troops to be patient while he makes the decision weather or not to listen to his General's suggestions for a strategy and troop increase.  Frankly I felt bad for those men and women in uniform that had to listen to him make more excuses for his incompetence.  Find me one Marine or just about any service member that doesn't want to just get the job done and defeat our enemies by any means necessary.

  I'd say the vast majority of my generation knows little or nothing about the Vietnam war other than a lot of people died or they're parents got really stoned.  What they don't know is that we were there cleaning up after the French.  They certainly don't know the main reason so many troops died was because Washington told the Military where they could and couldn't strike, contrary to the recommendations of the Commanders in theater.  Now Mr. Obama finds himself at the helm of another toy, our military.  He is second guessing Commanders, some of which HE appointed.  In the meantime, unbeknown to him; there is no Pause button in war.  People die, insurgents gain ground and the forward progress we were making is gradually erased on a daily basis.

  Long Binh and Bien Hoa were battles fought during 1968 in Vietnam are forgotten in today's modern school of warfare but should serve as a lesson.  Outnumbered and outgunned the U.S. troops were able to win those battles because their Commanders allowed them to fight a war properly without politicians being involved.  They raided churches, holy sites and used massive tear gas attacks to flush out the enemy.  Troops were allowed to destroy the enemy at any cost and win what is today referred to as the first Tet Offensive.

  Our current military doctrine and rules of engagement now reflect a more politically correct stance.  Places of worship are strictly off limits and the famous order "do not fire until fired upon" no longer hold true.  This administration has taken the ROE's to a whole new level by basically only allowing troops to engage an enemy once permission has been obtained through almost the entire chain of command unless otherwise specified.  The call for reinforcements has up until this point been ignored by the White House.  Of all the negative effects Obama's change has brought to our beloved America, this is the most troubling.  Shame on you Mr. President for yet again disrespecting the men and women in uniform that fight for the very freedom which you abuse.