Don't Overplay the Fiddle of Legal Process When Civilization is Threatened with Burning

I'm republishing the following piece for the readers of this new blog.


By Con George-Kotzabasis

A brief reply to: This Time We Were Lucky. This Time…by William Rees-Mogg in The TimesOnline July 2, 2007


Luck is a scarce visitor in the affairs of mankind and in the Age of Terror one scarcely would expect it to come the second time around. Sir William argues in his article, in the aftermath of the failed attempts of the terrorists in London and Glasgow, that “the danger will become greater” and therefore we need new laws to protect ourselves. He also contends, that there are serious flaws in our culture that hinder us from fighting effectively against this external and internal foe.


As always Sir William pens his thoughts with wisdom and one would be a fool not to take them seriously. If the danger is going to be greater in the future, as he correctly points out, then the present “gaps” in our legal system must be closed. That means that the old regime of laws which are completely inadequate against religiously inspired terror must be overthrown and replaced with a new regime of laws that will apprehend and convict terrorists not on “solid evidence”, as he argues, which in the murky and shadowy world of terror is a will-o’-the-wisp search, but on reasonable suspicion.


Furthermore, our culture is flawed because of our mutual respect for other cultures, for our tolerance, generosity, care, and kindness that we continue to exercise ceaselessly in these most unkind of times generated by the atrocious actions of the terrorists. It’s therefore necessary that we harden some of the soft features of our culture that prevent us up till now to take on this great and long challenge posed by global terror. By a set of stronger measures and imaginative concepts that will have a chance quickly and decisively to subdue this portentous danger that arises from an irreconcilable and undeterred enemy, who having been bred in the madrassas and Mosques has been anointed with his suicidal fanaticism. Western governments therefore will have to counter-generate the moral fortitude that in the legislation of these new laws the latter will make the most “unkind of cuts”, that is, deny suspects of home-grown terror of a spate of legal processes that normally apply in peaceful times but should never apply in times of war.


This is more urgent than ever because of the logic of this war. If unarguably the latter is going to be a long war with a remorseless, immoral, evil enemy who is not open to negotiation or to political or economic rewards and whose goal is the accomplishment of his godly mission, one does not have to be a prophet to foresee that with the inevitable further development in technology and its easier accessibility by people, the holy warriors of Islam will soon be armed with weapons of mass destruction, and indeed, with nuclear ones. And boosted by their religious fervor will unhesitatingly use them against the infidels of the West. Hence, these jihadists in civilian clothes with their deadly belts around their bi-gender, and indeed, teenage midriffs, will open the door to Armageddon.


Politically and strategically it’s always prudent to defeat such an enemy, by using against him both overt and covert overwhelming force, while he is still weak and before he becomes stronger. The question however is, whether the political leaders of Western civilization will have the wisdom and mettle to use “uncivilized” means and methods to defeat such a mortal foe.

The War Cannot Be Won if its Commanders are Hostages to Politics

I'm republishing this proposal sent to President Bush as Washington politicians were attempting to micro-manage the war.

By Con George-Kotzabasis


The following was written on April 11, 2004 and was sent to President Bush on the same date. It's republished now, as the Bush administration is forging a new strategy for Iraq that hopefully will be victorious against the murderous insurgents.


Dear Mr. President,


The present armed insurgency, threatening to become a general insurgency against your forces in Iraq, unless its momentum is promptly nipped in the bud, of Shiites and Sunnis against the Coalition, threatens to put off balance your whole strategic project for Iraq and the Middle East in general, which would have tremendously negative effects on the war against global terror. Needless to say therefore, the stakes are infinitely high.


At the present moment these fanatic thugs are fighting your forces under the misperception that they have the "upper hand" in this confrontation. It is for this reason therefore, that any conciliatory move your Authority in Iraq will be making toward the insurgents will be perceived by them to be a sign of weakness by your side. A current example of this is the ceasefire in Fallujah, that Paul Bremer was probably compelled to declare as a result of pressures put upon him by some members of the Interim Governing Council (IGC). This was done to presumably give the opportunity to diplomatic palaver to resolve some of the issues that are contested between, in my judgement, irreconcilable opponents. These talks are bound to fail, as you will confront the hardened positions of these fanatics, which arise from their false belief that they will be bargaining from a strong position, that will be totally incompatible with your military plans against the insurgents, and therefore will be rejected by your side.


It is neither surprising nor unreasonable, that some members of the IGC have condemned your military actions in Fallujah and have opted for negotiations with the insurgents. What is unreasonable however, about the stand of the IGC - which apparently does not have political and military strategists among its members - is the futility, except as a public relations stunt of doubtful value, of these negotiations on the core issues between the belligerents, and the loss of valuable time that could be expended instead by your military commanders in putting, urgently and immediately, a stop to the momentum of the insurgency that threatens to engulf the whole country.


Paul Bremer therefore, has the responsibility to awaken these members of the IGC from their somnambulistic illusions, and spell out to them the high stakes involved, which can only be resolved by the use of major military force by the Coalition. However, despite these negative aspects of the ceasefire in Fallujah, it can be used positively by enabling women and children to evacuate the town, hence saving them from becoming collateral casualties from a future attack by your forces.


The paradigm of Vietnam has shown conclusively that your brave commanders and troops could not win a war that was politically restrained, as to the appropriate kind of weapons used against their enemies, by the hands of "micro-politicians". In any major critical military engagement, military considerations should have the upper hand over political considerations. Certainly, the overwhelming military response of your forces against the insurgents will have local and international repercussions and will spark a "wildfire" of protests against your Administration. But despite this, the priority of the military over the political must not be modified and must prevail. It is the price that statesmanship must pay.


Moreover, what is of the utmost importance in this conflict is to inflict such a deadly blow on the insurgents in selected towns of Iraq, from which they will never be able to recover. It is not enough to capture or kill them in small numbers, but to do so in the largest number possible. Their capture or killing en masse, will have a powerful psychological effect upon other insurgents in other towns, and will irreparably breakdown their morale and their fighting spirit. To achieve this goal, you Mr. President, as Commander-in- Chief, must direct your commanders on the ground to use the weapons that would inflict this devastating blow on the insurgents. That means that incendiary bombs, and the "daisies cutter" be used as a last resort against the insurgents, whose total defeat is so pivotal to your historic project in Iraq and to the war against global terror.


Sure enough, as I said above, there will be multiple political repercussions on a world scale. But one has to be reminded that wars are won or lost by military actions not by political repercussions. It is a terrible situation to be in for a Commander-in-Chief, but the question for free, open, and civilized societies, is to be or not to be. It is by such tragic and historic burdens that your leadership and Tony Blair's are weighed with presently. But the mantle of statesmanship falls on Churchillian shoulders.

Political Vaudeville Staged by Liberal Impresario

By Con George-Kotzabasis

This is political vaudeville at its best. While the Opposition forces are grievously pounded by Gaddafi’s arms and are calling for an active “Western support” to prevent their defeat before the bloodhounds of the regime, Steve Clemons of The Washington Note calls, with extraordinary coolness to those who are willing and prepared with direct action to save the Opposition from destruction, to “shelve emotion-and to think through very carefully what would make on-the-ground difference and not delegitimate (M.E.) the Opposition and what would not.” This is like calling for the legitimacy of the dead once Gaddafi is let free to deal his death blow to the Opposition.

Israel Distorted by Loewenstein's Slezak's Lens

I'm republishing the following for the readers of this new blog.


A reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to:


Gaza distorted by media lens by Antony Lowenstein and Peter Slezak

On Line Opinion January 2, 2009


One could re-write this article under the title “Israel Distorted by Lowenstein’s and Slezak’s Lens”. The lives of 400,000 Israelis that live and work within the range of the Quassam rockets are threatened on a daily basis and their freedom of movement is infringed, which is a cardinal principle of human rights, as they are enforced to live on a daily basis in-and-out of shelters, and Loewenstein and Slezak with a sleight of hand transform this threat and abrogation of freedom of movement into a failure of the media and of politicians to acknowledge the transgressor in this conflict which to them clearly is the 'terrorist government' of Israel.


Guilty to the brim of his cup of consciousness that he does not support Israel in this deadly conflict, Loewenstein—as I don’t know whether Slezak too is a Jew—attempts to cover up his “turncoatedness” to Israel under the slogan of “tough love” and furtively place himself as a true friend of Israel. True friendship however is shown when friends rush along to help someone who is in a critical situation, like Israel is and has been for a long time. Loewenstein has no love for Israel.

Egypt:Which Side Will the Dominoes Fall?

To swallow victory in one gulp may choke one

By Con George-Kotzabasis February 08, 2011

Egypt, not unexpectedly for those who have read history and can to a certain extent adumbrate its future course, as one of the offsprings (Tunisia was the first one) of the rudimentary Democratic paradigm that was established in Iraq by the U.S. ‘invasion’, has a great potential of strengthening this paradigm and spreading it to the whole Arab region. The dominoes that started falling in Iraq under a democratic banner backed by the military power of the Coalition forces are now falling all over the Arab territories dominated by authoritarian and autocratic governments. The arc that expands from Tunisia to Iran and contains all other Arab countries has the prospect and promise of becoming the arc of Democracy. But Heisenberg’s principle of uncertainty in physics also and equally applies to politics. For one cannot predict, especially in a revolutionary situation, and more so, when it is combined with fledgling and immature political parties that is the present political configuration in Egypt as well as of the rest of the Arab world due to the suppression of political parties by their authoritarian regimes, whether the dominoes will fall on the side of Democracy or on the side of Sharia radical Islam. This is why the outcome of the current turmoil in Egypt is of so paramount geopolitical importance. And that is why the absolute necessity of having a strong arm at the helm that will navigate the presently battered State of Egypt toward the safe port of Democracy is of the utmost importance. Contrariwise, to leave the course of these momentous events in the hands of the spontaneous and totally inexperienced leaders of the uprising against Mubarak is a recipe of irretrievable disaster. For that can bring the great possibility, if not ensure, that the dominoes in the whole Arab region will be loaded to fall on the side of the extremists of Islam. And this is why in turn for the U.S. and its allies in the war against global terror, it is of the uttermost strategic importance to use all their influence and prowess to veer Egypt toward a Democratic outcome.


One is constrained to build with the materials at hand. If the only available materials one has to build a structure in an emergency situation are bricks and mortar he will not seek and search for materials of a stronger fibre, such as steel, by which he could build a more solid structure. Presently in Egypt, the army is the material substance of ‘bricks and mortar’ by which one could build a future Democratic state. It would be extremely foolish therefore to search for a stronger substance that might just be found in civil society or among the protesters of Tahrir Square. That would be politically a wild goose chase at a time when the tectonic plates of the country are moving rapidly toward a structural change in the body politic. The army therefore is the only qualified, disciplined organization that can bring an orderly transitional change on the political landscape of the country. Moreover, the fact that it has the respect of the majority of the Egyptian people and that it has been bred and nourished on secular and nationalist principles, ensures by its politically ‘synthetic nature’ that it will not go against the wishes of the people for freedom and democracy, that it will be a bulwark against the extremists of the Muslim Brotherhood, and that it will be prepared to back the change from autocracy to democracy, if need be, with military force and thus steer the country away from entering the waters of anarchy and ‘permanent’ political instability that could push Egypt to fall into the lap of the supporters of Allahu Akbar.


The task of the army or rather its political representatives will be to find the right people endowed with political adeptness, experience, imagination, and foresight from a wide pool of political representation that would also include members of the old regime who will serve not only for their knowledge in the affairs of state but also as the strong link to the chain of the anchor that will prevent any possibility that the new political navigation of the country will go adrift. The former head of Egyptian Intelligence Omar Suleiman will play a pivotal role in this assembly of political representation which will not exclude members of the Muslim Brotherhood. What is of vital importance however is that this new political process will not be violently discontinued from the old regime. While room will be made to ensconce the new representatives of the people to government positions, this will not happen at the expense of crowding out old government hands. The only person that will definitely be left out will be Hosni Mubarak and some of his conspicuous cronies. And Mubarak himself has already announced that neither he nor his son will be candidates in the presidential elections in September. The call of the Tahrir Square protesters to resign now has by now become an oxymoron by Mubarak’s announcement not to stand as president in the next election. Further, it is fraught with danger as according to the Constitution if he resigns now elections for the presidency must be held after sixty days. That means a pot- pourri of candidates for president will come forward without the people having enough time either to evaluate their competence nor their political bona fide and might elect precipitatingly without critical experience and guidance a ‘dunce’ for president, an Alexander Kerensky in the form of Mohamed Al Baradei, that will open the passage to the Islamic Bolsheviks. To avoid this likely danger I’m proposing the following solution that in my opinion would be acceptable to all parties in this political melee.


The Vice President Omar Suleiman as representative of the armed forces, to immediately set up a committee under his chairmanship that will comprise members of the variable new and old political organizations of the country, whose task will be to appoint the members of a ‘shadow government’ whose function in turn will be to put an end to the protests that could instigate a military coup d’état, to make the relevant amendments to the constitution that will guide the country toward democracy, and to prepare it for the presidential elections in September. The members of this shadow government will be a medley of current holders of government that would include the most competent of all, Ahmed Nazif, the former prime minister, who was sacked by Mubarak as a scapegoat, and of the old and new political parties that emerged since the bouleversement against Mubarak. The executive officer of this ‘government in the wings’ will be Vice President Suleiman, who, with the delegated powers given to him by the present no more functional president Mubarak will be the real president during this interim period. Finally, the members of this shadow government will have a tacit agreement that their political parties will support candidates for president in the September elections who were selected by consensus among its members.


The ‘establishment’ of such a shadow government might be the political Archimedean point that would move Egypt out of the crisis and push it toward democracy.


Hic Rhodus hic salta

Iraq War:The Unenviable Actions of Responsible Governments

By Con George-Kotzabasis

I cannot understand how you have deduced from my argument that I considered Saddam to be a “Muslim fanatic” or even alluded to him as being connected with 9/11. What I alluded to was “on the probable conception of the nexus of terrorism with rogue states” that no strategically astute and responsible government could disregard in the face of the atrocious action of 9/11 and more than probable the continuation of such actions in the near future, as exemplified in Madrid, Bali, and London. It was this “developing nexus of terrorism and rogue states,” as is presently illustrated by Iran and its terrorists proxies of Hamas and Hezbollah, that a politically responsible administration was duty-bound to prevent.


Certainly it is true that Saddam as a secularist leader might have been an enemy of “Islamic terrorists.” But you seem to be blind to the possibility that he could also consider them to be his allies against his comparative greater enemy, the United States. Saddam had the political insight to perceive fanatic terrorists developing into a weighty force, and by controlling them he could use them against his foes. That is why he gave generous payments to the families of Palestinian ‘martyrs’, trained terrorists in his own country, and provided medical treatment to the future leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, al Zarqawi.


Lastly, one can never possess “indisputable evidence” about the future actions of one’s enemy as such actions can never issue from scientific experiments. One can only surmise such evidence from the malicious past actions of one’s foe and his intention to use ruthlessly all means to defeat his enemies, as Saddam did in the war against Iran and against the Kurds by using mustard gas. When one’s life is at stake, one does not search for imponderable evidence before one acts in self-defence. It is by such clear threats that the unenviable pre-emptive military actions of responsible governments are made.

How to Overcome Difficulties of a No-Fly Zone and How to Defeat Gaddafi

By Con George-Kotzabasis March 05, 2011

The ineffectiveness of a no-fly zone in Bosnia cannot be used as an argument in the totally different circumstances in Libya. Milocevic was fighting a nationalist war for a greater Serbia and his relatively powerful military forces were involved ardently in this 'great' goal of Serbia. By contrast, Gaddafi is fighting for his own survival with a weakened army, due to defections from its ranks, and compelled to import mercenaries to kill his own people, which in turn increases and exacerbates the divide between the regime and the Libyan people. This is the fundamental difference between Milocevic and Gaddafi. Therefore, I would propose the following strategy.

The design of a strategy of the unexpected by U.S. military strategists might overcome the difficulties of a no-fly zone, as expounded by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, and might defeat Muammar Gadhafi.

Given the destabilization of his regime, not only because of the revolt of the Libyan people but also because of the widespread defection of politicians, diplomats, and military personnel to the side of the rebels, this chain of events has increased the magnitude of the vulnerability of his own supporters to the call of major nations and of the UN for the ousting of Gadhafi, and hence could ease, and lead to, the abandonment of the autocrat.

To ratchet up the momentum of this vulnerability, military strategists should draw up a plan of vaguely defined unexpected threats that would be inflicted on Gadhafi’s supporters if they continued to defend him. The linchpin of this plan would have two strategic components. The immediate declaration by the U.S. and NATO of both the imposition of a no-fly zone and of no-use of air defences by Libyan forces. In the event that the latter do not abide to these two demands they would draw like fly-stick upon themselves the awesome devastation that will emerge from the military power of the U.S. and NATO. The latter will not have to send one aircraft over, or ground one soldier in, Libya, they will only have to ‘send’ this uncertainty as to the unexpected destruction that would befall on the supporters of Gadhafi.

Airpower therefore can also be used as a psychological weapon, especially in circumstances when the enemy’s military forces are losing trust toward their political leadership and are concerned about their own safety, as presently happens to be the situation in Libya.

Veni vidi vici.

Engineers of New Versions o Socialism Never Die

By Con George-Kotzabasis

Some have noticed, that whenever Clemons posts a ‘provocative’ post such as the present one “Grotesque Nationalism” presumably for the purpose of bringing into port the spiritually and cognitively leaking armada of anti-America Americans and anti-free marketeers, who are too scared and cowardly, and spiritually and intellectually too enfeebled, to be motivated to sail into the Schumpeterian heavy seas of “creative destruction,” and makes a bungle of an apparently serious post he stands to be corrected. And as ever with such posts it’s the resourceful, doughty, and politically and historically savvy American Jewess, Nadine, who corrects him, and so many others, like Dan Kervick, who in another post being intellectually disabled to give a serious answer to Nadine’s unassailable facts that Israel is engaged in defensive wars and not in expansive wars as Kervick claims, and whom Nadine accuses of being a “disgrace” to Western civilization. And to this accusation Kervick deploys a queasy defence by saying that for eighteen years he taught the philosophy of Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Ockham, Leibniz, Hume, and Russel, as if such philosophic pedigree absolves him from his incompetence to answer cogently Nadine’s argument.


Why Clemons is in need to fall back from the total failure of “high octane socialism” to even the weakest low octane version of socialism in the face of a brilliant constellation of economists, such as Amartya Sen of Britain, who cogently argue that it was capitalism, with all its shortcomings that Adam Smith himself noted, in the last hundred years that has substantially decreased relative poverty and has incrementally increased the standard of living of the masses? In any version socialism has proven to be an irreversibly bankrupt policy.

Julia Gillard: The Sunset Prime Minister of Australia

By Con George-Kotzabasis March 08, 2011-03-08

Julia Gillard with dissatisfied ratings of 51% and satisfied with 39% for her performance, as a result of her economically calamitous and electorally imprudent carbon tax, is rapidly becoming the ‘sunset’ Prime Minister of Australia. Also, her continued bungling of her refugee policy, and her fatal embrace of the Green Party and willingness to become the ‘bridesmaid’ of Bob Brown’s same sex marriages, has raised the ire of a major part of Australians against her, and is presently compared in the polls unfavourably even with the ousted Kevin Rudd whom she replaced.


The above leads to the speculation that she herself will be replaced, only one year in her occupancy as Prime Minister, and will be rudely asked by the apparatchiks of the Labour Party to remove her belongings from The Loge, so the new occupant, either in the person of Greg Combet or Bill Shorten, will move in. Hence, Julia might not after all take the bride of same gender marriages to the anxiously waiting bridegroom, Bob Brown.

False Realists Onlookers to Atrocities of Brutal Iranian Regime

By Con George-Kotzabasis

It’s very sad to see Steve Clemons making a mockery of his own facts. He states in one of his previous posts “those who are being brutalized and risking everything to challenge Ahmadinejad and his thugs deserve our respect and our nuanced (M.E.) support.” While Iranians in substantial numbers are opposing a “military dictatorship,” that Clemons himself acknowledges as being so, for whom is an existential issue, for Clemons apparently is an issue of intellectually splitting hairs by his use of the words “respect” and “nuanced.” Ostensibly he is doing this as a ‘political realist’ who needs to see reality through always ‘nuanced’ binoculars. His fatal error is that by using these binoculars in all circumstances he blows up his political realism to smithereens by not realizing that in a situation where people are engaged in an existential struggle, they do not need “respect” and “nuanced support” but clear open sans nuance unequivocal support.
False realists of this sort, President Obama being one of them on this issue, by refusing to take an unambiguous and strong stand in support of the modernist forces of Iran, become willy-nilly onlookers to the atrocities committed by the mullohcracy that in the process of fighting for its survival suppresses the peaceful democratic dissent against it by the most nefarious and brutal means.

American Liberal Considers Obama will be a Strong Leader

The following was written prior to Obama’s election as president.



By Con George-Kotzabasis


Sweetness, you bring up many points and allow me to deal with some of them. First, let us assume you are right that on the issue of Obama saying ‘present’ at Congress sessions was strategy not indecision. But what about his savvy political decision to have Hillary as Vice President that was vetoed by Michelle who hated her and Obama caving before his wife’s decision? You will say this is rumour. But let us see if this rumour can be verified by some facts. The worse mummy’s boy is the one without a mother. Obama was abandoned by both his parents when he was a little boy and was brought up by his grandparents. All his life he was searching for his lost father whom he finally found in his pastor Jeremiah, and more importantly, for his runaway mother whom he found when he married strong Michelle. (And that is probably the reason why he never abandoned her, like so many other African-Americans do with their wives.) It is Michelle that is wearing both pair of pants: Her own and her husband’s.


Secondly, on the war, his decision to oppose the war was not based on wisdom but on ignorance and anti-war populism. Ignorant of the content of the briefings as a junior Senator that other Democrat Senators more senior became aware of and for that reason supported the impending war. On the issue of the Surge and Woodward’s assessment, the Surge was part of a new strategy under General Petraeus linked to the ‘groundbreaking new covert techniques...’ that were primary in defeating the insurgency, according to Woodward. And the Surge may have facilitated these new techniques to achieve their goal. Further Obama only six months ago had pledged to the American people that he would withdraw the troops from Iraq. And he would do this while the bravery and professionalism of the US army were winning the war in Iraq. Thus depriving the soldiers their glorious victory and, most dangerous of all, conceding to their enemies that the U.S. was defeated in the war in Iraq, as that would be the logical conclusion of Obama’s withdrawal. Surely, as a reasonable person, you would not consider these decisions of Obama arising from his strength of character.


Thirdly, what I meant to say was that Obama by ‘cutting his sails to the winds of populism’ went along with the uninformed masses who had made their decision on the issue of the war not by the power of their brain but by the beats of their heart, and it was on those “beats” that Obama also positioned himself on the same issue. Unlike McCain who supported the Surge at the peak of the unpopularity of the war. This shows clearly which of the two leaders is endowed with a strong character.

Strength of Character is Shown in Critical Circumstances and Obama Fails the Test

Will the American electorate be susceptible to the false idealistic promptings of a confused weak leader?


A reply by Con George-Kotzabasis to a Bush contrarian

Only the poverty of thought can make a statement such as the “poor republicans...through no fault of their own.” There is no virtue to be found in human beings not making mistakes. No one is infallible, especially in the multi-variable dimensions of war. The virtue lies in swiftly correcting these mistakes. And this is exactly what Bush did when he adopted and implemented the Surge turning a losing war into a potentially victorious one. This was the “major” and crucial policy that “was successfully implemented and carried out” with all the potential geopolitical developments that could flow into the region with the establishment of democracy in Iraq, and hence justifying fully the Bush Doctrine of democratizing the Middle East as a preventive cure for terrorism.

The liberal intelligentsia with their tongue stuck in the bitterness of being totally wrong with their gloomy prognostications about the outcome of the war, cannot and will not concede this ‘reversal of fortune’ for the Bush administration. But history, which has no taste either of bitterness or sweetness, will give the final verdict on Bush. And dare I say it will be a favourable one.

What Obama proposes to do is to deprive America of this tremendous strategic victory over the extremists of Islam by his pledge to pull out US forces from Iraq before the conditions for such a withdrawal are strategically ripe.

If you were an editor even in the most provincial newspaper and spelled out the obvious as news, you would not have held your position as editor for very long. Bigotry, irrational religious beliefs, and ignorance—like poverty—up to the present inflict even the best and most affluent societies. If educated prosperous America has this bane in its midst you can imagine other less educated and prosperous countries in what state they are in this area. To say however, that either McCain or Palin would select to govern for the irrational beliefs and ignorance of such minorities, is to show that one is completely politically naive and no one can take such person seriously.

And do you really believe that Obama has his “feet on the ground,” when he says that once America starts implementing its own values it will turn the present hate of the world for America into love, into a global loving circle of holding hands, including perhaps the fanatical jihadists?

Always bear in mind the great adage of Friedrich Nietzsche that the character of a person is revealed in critical circumstances, followed by my minuscule one that in hard times only the hard men/women prevail. Obama lacks the strength of character to lead a great nation in these most dangerous times. In the vocation of Statecraft according to his populist policies and faith in changing America he remains an infant and is the ultimate ‘mummy’s boy’. As the worst mummy’s boy is the one who had no mother. (His mother abandoned him when he was an infant to be brought up by his grandparents.) That is why he chose Biden for his vice president instead of the most savvy politically Hillary Clinton, because his wife Michelle didn’t want the latter. It’s Michelle that wears the pants, and if he wins, which I doubt, it will be the first ‘matriarchic’ presidency of the United States.

Your opinion

Liberals' Deficit of a Sense of Reality

By Con George-Kotzabasis

Jane Mayer and the reviewer of her book Andrew Bacevich both of them have an unfathomable deficit of a sense of reality and are oblivious of the lessons of history. Like beatific angels they descend from “a fine cloud of solicitous idealism” to critique and accuse the Bush administration of American-made Gulags. Disregarding and forgetting that the normal and complacent days of America ended on 9/11. On this fateful day America was attacked by an invisible deadly enemy whose only transparency was that he was wearing civilian clothes. In such circumstances the Administration was in the morally unenviable position to apprehend people not on hard legal evidence but on suspicion and to hold them for a long period because of the possible great danger. In the darkness of this war against global terror the enlightened civilized processes of the Geneva Conventions and due process became totally obsolete, not by the nefarious practices of the government but by the dicta of reality and history. On the latter criteria, Mayer and Bacevich are irredeemable failures. To quote the great Austrian writer Robert Musil, “to the mind good and evil… are not sceptical, relative concepts, but terms of function, values that depend on the context (M.E.) they find themselves in.”


Further, desperate to make their case against the Administration they throw the latter into the pool of the politics of fear. They are deliberately not making the nuanced distinction between the words threat and fear. While one can threaten even the fearless it does not follow that the threatened reacts out of fear. He merely reacts to a plausible threat like any reasonable person would in the same circumstances. And this is exactly what Americans are doing in the aftermath of 9/11. To claim as Mayer and Bacevich do that the Bush administration deliberately let loose the winds of fear to batter Americans for their own nefarious ends, whatever the latter happen to be, is on their part intellectual legerdemain par excellence.

I rest on my oars: your turn now

Judge Goldstone Eyeless in Gaza: No Evidence of Human Rights Violations by Israel's Defence Force

By Con George-Kotzabasis


Professor Alan Dershowitz is to be commended for exposing a ‘solipsistic’ toady of the United Nations Human Rights Council who puts his personal vain glory above the truth, that no human rights violations were perpetrated by the Israeli Defence Force during the Gaza incursion whose goal was to stop the rain of rockets on Israel shot by Hamas. Judge Goldstone sacrificed veracity to his own vanity.

American Liberal Annoyed by Australian 'Snow Flakes' Falling on his Head

American says,

I have no idea about the substance and accuracy of the report itself. But I'm not sure I understand how the release of this news would be supposed to put a better face on the war. Doesn't the story instead create the impression that the war is a classic imperialist war, with US over in Afghanistan prospecting for mineral riches, when they are supposed to be hunting down terrorist "safe havens"?

Australian says


Kervick like an eager bambino susceptible to all thrilling excitements seen his hobbyhorse “classic imperialism” on the rugged mountains of Afghanistan rushes to ride it for a playful trot.


American says,


Kotzabasis, you didn't read my comment very carefully.


I will elaborate on the point I was making. Since the James Risen story was published, there has been a flurry of comment in response to the story. Much of that comment is skeptical about the timing and purpose of the release of information on which the story is based. The common theme of these sceptical comments is that this release is somehow designed to make the war in Afghanistan look better or more justified.


The problem with this line of sceptical argument is that the Risen report about minerals in Afghanistan, whether accurate or inaccurate, whether overblown or proportional, whether suspiciously timed or not, does nothing at all to make the war look any better. That's because the war is supposed by its defenders to be justified as an essential fight against dangerous jihadist terrorists, Taliban extremists and their enclaves in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Any story line that clouds that message actually *undermines* the justifications for the war offered by the administration and its supporters. Surely the people who are telling us that we need to be in Afghanistan to defeat Al Qaeda and to combat the evil oppression of Taliban-style Islamic government do not want us thinking that the war is really driven by greed.


So my implicit point was not that the war actually *is* an imperialist war for booty, but rather that if there is any deliberate timing to the release of this information about the discovery of mineral riches in Afghanistan, then a better explanation for that release is that it is designed to *undermine* support for the war by making it look like the US's interest in fighting it is driven by a desire to exploit and profit from Afghanistan's mineral wealth.


On a separate point, your comments on this blog are about 95% concerned with the other commenters on the blog, and only about 5% concerned with the actual events and issues you claim. I think you should try harder to keep your personal characterizations to yourself and focus on issues.


Australian says,


Only for phantasmagorical ideologues of the Left could the war be anything other, post 9/11, than a war against “dangerous jihadist terrorists.” To imagine now with this ‘serendipitous’ discovery of minerals, if it’s true, that this could “undermine” the “support” and justification of the war could only be imagined by someone with a ‘cloudy’ mind., since only such a mind would come to the conclusion that this was just another “classic imperialist” venture.


The reason why I sometimes refuse to deal with the content of the commentators, including some of your own, is that they are a banal regurgitation of the intellectually and politically bankrupt dogmas of the pathological Left. And this engenders in me a frolicsome mood to deride directly the amateurish violinist who pretends to give a classical performance (Read political analysis) with discordant sounds and intellectually cacophonous notes. Now you know the secret about my playful mood sans ‘French letter’.


American says,


Kotz, you really are an ass. You do more than I ever could, by virtue of your own demeanor, to discredit everything you say. So I will have nothing more to do with you, and will let your disordered personality speak for itself. Feel free to fire at will with the insults.


Australian says,

My Dear Kervick, TO EACH HIS OWN. And your raising the white flag against my arguments, in your refusal to engage me, speaks volumes about your character and intellectual weight.

Legendary Stork Brought Unloved Child to White House

As a result of the mid-term elections in the United States that are a devastating blow to the presidency of Obama and which more likely than not will deprive him of a second term in office, I'm republishing the short article below that was written and published on May 2009, that predicted what would be the fate of Obama.



By Con George-Kotzabasis


A photo of Obama that tells it all about the latter’s ‘substance.’ Has anyone seen Obama’s photo in The Australian, April 29, 2009, when he was given the cap of the FBI at his visit in its headquarters? His expression is that of a toddler who has been given an ugly toy for a present. This photo will haunt Obama for the rest of his term.

The legendary stork has brought an unloved child in a basket to the American people. Abandoned as a toddler by his father, dumped as a child by his mother on his grandparents, he has been searching for love ever since. And finally he founded it in the initially warm embrace of the foster parenthood of the prattling classes, the politically disgruntled from the previous administration, and all the poor. And being laid in this ‘public’ bed of love and indulging its pleasures to the full Obama will eventually have to pay its high price. As to continue to be the recipient of this love, so existentially necessary for him, his agenda perforce has to be focused in satisfying these three groups simultaneously. That is why his grand social policies of universal health care, education, foreign policy, and climate change, are so important to him. But this is a task for one endowed with superior qualities and Obama has the ordinary qualities of a ‘community organiser’ dressed in ‘ivy clothes leaves.’ And in this inability to accomplish the great change that he promised to the American people the presently smitten with love public for Obama will turn against him and the latter will find himself bitten by the public adder on his path to political failure.

And the first signs of this failure are the dramatic events unfolding in the aftermath of the Iranian election which have turned his foreign policy and new diplomatic outreach to the foes of America and his hopes to placate them into shambles.

PS. In the mid-term elections the adder has bitten Obama.The question now is how long the victim will survive its poisonous bite.

Preemptive Attack both on the External and Internal Enemy

By Con George-Kotzabasis


The 'unanimous rejection and repudiation of terrorism... and commitment to work within the laws of Australia', by the Muslim leaders who attended the Meeting on 23 of August in Canberra, must now be used by the Howard government as a "jump-start", to a "summit" of hard, but not foolhardy, action, that would effectively protect Australia from those fundamentalist Muslims and their followers in our midst, who pose an ominous and a grave threat to the security of our country.

Notwithstanding the support of the six principles, drafted at the Meeting, by the Muslim leaders, the government must not "manure" and water any illusions that these leaders will be able to do anything 'effective' against those fundamentalist imams and deflect them from continuing to push their radical-fanatic agenda among their followers, albeit this time, cautiously and stealthily, so they can avoid from being seized by the arm of the law. Fanaticism has the spots of the leopard on its back. And as one cannot change the spots of the latter, it would be the "summit" of folly to believe that the Muslim "summiteers", by exercising reason and persuasion, could change the nature of fanaticism embodied in these imams. This much was conceded by the Prime Minister himself, who in his riposte to the journalists as to why he had not invited radical Muslims to the Meeting, said that it would be impossible to change the views of fanatics by persuasion. And the evidence is overwhelming that no amount of reasonable arguments can persuade these fanatics to change their views, as despite the flood of concrete evidence to the contrary, they still believe that Osama bin Laden was not behind the attack on 9/11. Even some moderate Muslims believe that bin Laden was not the culprit. And, like the fanatics, they believe in all kinds of Americano-Jewish "twin" conspiracies, such as for example, that the Jews had foreknowledge of the attack, and that was the reason why they had not turned up for work on the day of the attack on the twin towers.

It is on this principle alone, 'once a fanatic always a fanatic', that the government must now enact the no "legal niceties" foolproof no loopholes legislation that would prevent, effectively, fundamentalist imams and teachers in Islamic schools, from teaching their doctrine of hate against America and Western nations, and from propagating - by craftier and more devious means, instead of doing this openly and with tongue in cheek as they have done in the past - a holy war against those nations and their peoples, who are fighting global terror in Afghanistan and in Iraq. (And it is precisely for this reason-the fighting of global terror- that countries engaged in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan have become targets of terrorists. And not as second rate and rationally shallow commentators, a la Kerry O'Brien and Tony Jones of the ABC, to mention only the most prominent ones in this country, who assert that these countries, and Australia in our case, have become terrorist targets because of their alliance with the U.S. and because of being co-occupiers with the latter in Iraq. These countries and America would not have been in Iraq, if the latter had not been an integral part of global terror, and especially now, when it has become the front-line of global terror. It is the ultimate contradiction on the one hand to agree, as most of these pundits do, that the countries of the free world have no other alternative but to fight global terror, which is a war sans borders and unlocalised, and then to refuse to fight it in the crucible of terror that Iraq has now morphed into.)

The government must realize, that only by legislating a "Sword of Damocles" over the heads of these dangerous fanatics that would deport them to the countries of their origin --if not jail them in this country for treason, if they happen to be Australian citizens--even by stripping them of their Australian citizenship, in the case that they are officially Australians. This can be done by retrospective legislation, in order to carry out their deportation, if they blatantly violated or violate the pledge they have made to their Australian citizenship. Thus, will it be able to protect Australia, to the highest degree possible, from home-grown terrorism.

In the enactment of this legislation protecting Australia, the Howard government must be consistent with the logical position of its foreign policy, as expounded by the Prime Minister himself. He made it crystal-clear, that if a country's terrorists in our region threatened the security of Australia by weapons of mass destruction, and the government of such a country was unwilling or impotent to prevent such an attack, then Australia would be forced to launch a pre-emptive raid to stop such an attack upon Australia. The Prime Minister cannot do less in regards to the internal enemy that also poses an imminent and lethal threat to the security of our country. The anti-terrorist legislation therefore, that the government is preparing to take, must also comprise the pre-emptive wherewithal, that would abort an attack on our country by home-grown terrorists. If the Prime Minister is willing and prepared to take the greater risk of invading and violating the borders of a sovereign nation to protect Australia, why then cannot he take the lesser risk, of uprooting and "destroying" the enemy within, which is the inalienable sovereign right of Australia, as it would be equally the right of any other nation in the same situation, to protect its people from an enemy attack?

Australia is at war! It has committed its brave soldiers, its sons and daughters, to fight a treacherous fanatical enemy in Afghanistan and in Iraq who is engaged in global terror, and whose goal is no less than the establishment of a block of Islamo-fascist states in the region, that would ultimately threaten the existence of Western civilization. It would be the acme of folly, of historic dimensions, that while Australia is engaged with its allies in such an existential war, that its government would allow a more than possibly operational fifth column of treacherous fanatics in the meantime, to stab Australia in the back. Such a folly, if it were to happen, would be registered in the annals of history as unforgivable and as inexcusable. It would irremediably demean all the sacrifices that our soldiers had made in fighting this war, and it would put an inerasable stain of moral feebleness and political incompetence, upon the up- to- now admirable leadership of the government on the war on global terror.

The Prime Minister, being fully aware of the real stakes of this war against global terror, who, with historical insight, moral fortitude, and political acumen, decided to commit Australian troops to fight it, must not now be squeamish about the necessary force of the legislative measures that must be commensurate to the great threat that is posed by home-grown terrorism. The political leadership of the free world is now at the crossroads of leading from the front or leading from behind. If, as some leaders of the West, such as Chirac, Schroeder, and Beazley - not to leave out our own crop - have decided to lead from behind, pushed by the stream of populism, these leaders will be everlastingly condemned by history, for their intellectual dishonesty, and political opportunism. Those leaders, such as Bush, Blair and Howard, who have decided to lead from the front, against the stream of populism, will be for ever and ever renowned by future ages for their indomitable spirit, that saved Western civilization from these terrorist barbarians.


ECRASEZ L'INFAME DE TERORRISME

American Liberals Dyed-in-the-Wool Isolationists

By Con George-Kotzabasis

The American liberal Steve Clemons by supporting Pape’s and Feldman’s arguments seems to be, despite his grandiose geopolitical concepts and propositions, either a dyed-in-the-wool isolationist or has strategically a geopolitical ‘split personality’. Is he suggesting that in a dangerously turbulent world America should desist from having Napoleonic points d’appui or withdraw them just because they are subjects of ‘irritation’ and objection to their deadly enemies, such as Osama bin Laden?


Critics of US bases overseas do not realize or are oblivious of the fact that these bases are placed by professional strategists, and not by papier mache strategists like themselves, in specific countries for the purpose of being most militarily effective against their enemies.


Posted by nadine, Oct 06 2010, 7:08PM - Link


Kotz, lots of people have the naive mindset that people only hate the US because we did bad stuff to them (they conveniently overlook the actions of other countries).


The idea that other nations have enmity to the US due to their ideology or perceived self-interest does not occur to them. Therefore when they see that some action of ours has irritated someone, even a self-declared enemy like Osama bin Laden, they conclude we must be doing something wrong!


Hey guys: here is a lesson from street smarts kindergarten: if your enemy hates a move you just made, maybe that move is good for you and bad for him!