The Mexican Credencial Federal Electoral

We have tried and tried to convince the washed masses of elitists and those, who knowing little and understanding nothing, are decidedly self-appointed experts on everything.   They have taken that position, also taken by the bleeding hearts and demagogues, that Texas is evil for requiring a photo ID in order to vote.  Those same elitists assure us that it is one of the worst forms of racism  and something that will take us quickly back to slavery.

     It is the position of the liberals, progressives, and other assorted marxists that people of Mexican and African descent are too stupid to do anything without the direct intervention of the superior white liberals who come from approved graduate programmes from approved universities.

     Admittedly, there are many people even of my own political persuasion who find it hard to believe what El Gringo Viejo tries to point out every now and then.  We have the luxury, at this age and position in life, to be able to say, if a person chooses to not believe the following, the problem is his and not mine.

 

     If one travels to the mother-lode of people with any kind of Mexican ancestry (Mexico), he will find that not only are photo-identifications used in Mexican elections, they are required.   In spades.

     Not only that, but at each Mexican polling station in these times, and since the last three presidential elections and all intervening gubernatorial, Congressional, and local elections, one arrives and finds polls workers in possession of a thick catalogue with the roster of qualified electors for that precinct complete with that elector's photograph.   Each named elector has a picture of the elector that must match the image of said elector on the voter's credential.  The card itself is sturdy, and has the thumbprint of the elector on the rear.  There are two endorsements, and the voter must sign in with his/her signature or rubric.   There are thirteen security markers, three encryptions, and the Instituto Electoral Federal (IFE) makes the stern admonition, NO CREDENCIAL - NO VOTACION.

 

     These changes came after essentially pulling teeth without benefit of numbing agents during the 1980s and 1990s.  During the past three presidential elections, there were no reasonable challenges made to the elections' results.  Each election precinct is governed by a committee representing each of the parties fielding candidates relative to that "casilla electoral".  All must sign that the election process at that voting site was without stain or disorder.  A quick process for passing up protests to a judiciary is provided for, has been used, and decisions have been accepted, 99.9% of the time quite readily.  Among the hard leftists, there have been a few, very few abrasive moments, but that is due, as usual, to the left's desire to provoke riots, disorder, and mayhem out of any perceived (fabricated) injustice.   Ferguson and Treyvon are not situations that occur only in the United States.

Typical voting scene somewhere in the
Interior of Mexico.   49,000,000 people
voted, that being about 62%  of all that
registered. 

    And abuse?  In a country where women first voted in the early 1950s, and where elections were generally seen as shams, except in rare cases, the CEF has become an icon of liberty and mile marker of orderly democratic republican practice of governance.   For instance, the CEF is used as a formal identifier more than even the sacred Pasaporte Mexicano.   Give your attention to this USA - Today article from the year 2012:

But voting was not the main reason she was getting it. The free photo ID issued by the Federal Electoral Institute had become the accepted way to prove one's identity — and is a one-card way to open a bank account, board an airplane and buy beer.

Voting was almost an afterthought to Martínez.

"They ask for it everywhere," she said. "It's very difficult to live without it."

National IDs for voting, or proving citizenship, is an idea that is being floated in the United States to crack down on voter fraud, illegal immigration and foreign terrorists.

Proponents, such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform, say it is an efficient way to verify identities and prevent crime. Opponents, such as the American Civil Liberties Union, describe it as an invasion of privacy. Minority advocacy groups have even alleged that the cards would frighten minorities going to the polls.

But Mexico has not seen many problems with its card, and national identity cards have been issued for years in France, Poland, Singapore, Brazil, to prove citizenship.

 

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    And, for those who say that the right-wing bigots who hate minorities cannot point to even on example of voter fraud anywhere....please....just shut up.  In these four counties alone where we have more people registered to vote by far than we have native born or naturalised adults, each election is beset by claims and charges that voter engineers, usually large women who use lots of make-up and carry big, heavy purses.   In the local vernacular, these women are  known as "politiqueras" and other people, usually males, known as "polleros" (chicken herders) who strive to register illegal (or even legal) voters and/or sell the votes of bloques of family members and friends.  These people  have been practicing these and many other time-tested "vote enhancement" shenanigans, all illegal since voting first started in South Texas in the 1850s.

Makin' a list, checkin' it twice, gonna find out
whose naughty and nice....!!

    The ''politiqueras" are particularly loathsome because they will rough up and intimidate granny in the rest home to sign an absentee ballot without it having been "voted".  The "politiquera" tells granny that she will take care of that later.   And yes, Virginia, during the last elections, after a great clean-up of all such offenses a couple of years ago, it was worse than ever.  Thousands of questionable votes actually went into the judicial process, all Democrats...in Democrat Primaries....all thoroughly corrupt....and incensed if somebody points it out.   But please remember that the County Tax Assessor and Collector's Office in Starr County is under lock-down and intense forensic accounting recovery concerning millions of dollars of money just lifted out by the staff and administration of said office...which also controls the voting mechanics of Starr County, Texas.   Hidalgo County has the ex-Sheriff and his immediate subordinate doing long terms in prison now, due to collusion with drug traffickers, involving huge sums of money....The Sheriff's son, and various of the relatives of other heavy duty quadruple - AAAA minor league Democrat office holders are all learning license-plate engineering in the prison shop, now.   Let us remember the now defunct, and resurrected under a legion of different names, ACORN.....illegally registered literally hundreds of thousands of voters registration applications over the years.   Proven in court....Virginia.  And yes, for you and me and mine, Virginia, there is still that same Santa Claus watching after us!!

 

El Gringo Viejo

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They are not stupid. They are marionettes at the end of strings pulled by Valerie Jarrett.

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Staff Meeting - White House

The point, once again, is to not assume that the lackeys of this administration are stupid or idiotic.   They are not.  They are lackeys under the complete control of Valerie Jarrett who is under the complete control of a particular group of socialist elitists.   We call them robotrons.   Dr. Frieden is a classic example of a robotron.    General Wesley Clark, the spokesman for the Pentagon, the press secretary Whatzizneim, 0the entire staff and crew of ABCCBSNBCCNNMSNBCRuetersAssociatedPressNYTWP.... and still, people like Hannity say (during his frequent and pointless re-repetitions of saying things over-and-over again on a time sensitive medium....) "Why can't they see the stupidity of what they are doing?"

     The fact is, Hannity, once again I am shouting into the ear that leads into the hollow cave that you call a brain cavity....."It is all intentional."  This particular manoeuvre of shaming the hospital in Dallas was purposefully constructed and designed to cause hospitals to be ridiculed by "higher authority" such as the  central government that has a grand national plan to avoid all this silliness.  This entire thing is set up so as to justify calls for the nationalisation of the hospitals.   Can we not see (Sir Edmund)Hillary and Rosie O'Pottamus nodding in agreement with each other when Hillary proposes that nationalisation next week on The View?
   Do we not remember that  Government Motors was nationalised by the stroke of a pen, and turned over to the labour unions?  That Chrysler was sold to FIAT, once again, by the stroke of a pen....and billions of dollars worth of bonds and preferred stock were flushed down a National Socialist toilet that in all probability was made in Red China.

     Because the National Socialist Democrat Labour Party tells us it cares more about the most exposed in the society, we feel moved to  remind the OROG community of  something they already know; that being, American Corporate Preferred Stock and Bonds are referred to as "The Widows' and Orphans' Fund".  Obama cancelled a good portion of that fund.  Nobody said or did anything in the face of that act of tyranny.

 

The waiting room for a small town Cuban Hospital
And please understand, we did not scour the archives
for something really ratty.  This is the norm or
perhaps a little above the norm.

   As an adjunct to taking over the hospitals so as to induct them into a British NHS-style medical jungle, the purpose of all of this medical gyration is to drive the American system into the ground so that we have the equivalent system found in every dull, grey socialist country with public-health-for-the- Proles.   Perhaps, more like Cuba, where all medical care is "free".   One thing for sure, in Cuba, since it's "free" you know how much it is worth. 

    The epithet on the wall by Comrade Che's image reads, "There is greater value in the life of one human being than all the gold of the richest man in the world."   This is a touching statement attributed to a man who, by reasonable estimates, shot down, in cold blood, over 250 people in his miserable, short lifetime.

Think before you speak, Hannity!  Please.

El Gringo Viejo

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A Quick Word for the Nurses - and a Longer Word for Why the Avoidance of the Truth About WMD in Iraq

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THE NURSES and all those at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital - Dallas

 

 

     You are our daughters, granddaughters, sisters, cousins, aunts, and wives. You, whether you wish to be or not, have become real, live Texans involved in being blamed for errors of people who are "more important" than the two of you.   You both committed yourselves to a daunting, perhaps impossible task, in trying to save a man that should never have been where he was in the first place.

     Although he must have felt a certain desperation, he did not have the right, morally or legally, to come into a place and expect a free cure for something he knew was not curable.   But, more, El Gringo Viejo faults the arrogant, snippy, and condescending people such as Dr. Frieden who poo-poo's any questioning about the accuracy of his conclusions and protocols.

     As it has turned out, everything  said by Barack Hussein Obama and Dr. Frieden has been false, probably even purposely false (a lie ).   The hood-ornament for the preposterousness of their positions and statements is the advisory given by Dr. Frieden when he made it known that people could ride trains and planes and busses with Ebola without any danger at all, and  furthermore, people should not ride in a train or plane or bus in order to avoid being contaminated with Ebola.  Perhaps a tie for first place is Barack Obama reassuring everyone that the chances for Ebola making into the United States are "very low".

 

     El Gringo Viejo calls upon all Texans to express personal offense at the discard of these two Registered Nurses who threw themselves upon the barbed-wire fence, in order to protect US....their fellow Texians.   And  who then suffered the condescending ridicule of the "important people'.   Here, among us, you Nurses are the important people and we are pulling for you, lighting candles for you, and invoking the Saints to your defence and comfort.

    We feel as though you have been taken to places where you cannot communicate, and where you will be convinced by skilful interrogators that you somehow have culpability in the matter of this dispersal of this plague.   You do not.  It lies with Dr. Frieden and the President and those who are willing to sacrifice the "little people" for the greater purpose of establishing a nationalised health system, operated by the same government that caused this problem.

 

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CONCERNING THE DISCOVERY OF THE WEAPONS OF MASS

DESTRUCTION IN SADDAM HUSSEIN al TIKRITI's IRAQ

     As most OROGs know, this writer has always believed, nay, known that these stores of weaponry existed.

 

     Saddam Hussein had this weaponry available during the Iraq - Iran War which lasted eight years and cost a minimum of 1,000,000 dead, combatants and civilians (estimate is very conservative).

 

     Saddam Hussein had very advanced chemists and other scientists working on improvements to his nerve gas reserves.  They were working on biological and nuclear, with abandon.   Even after the war with Iran, suddenly Hussein managed to come up with the best AAA-minor league stash of cannon-missile-bomber delivered nerve-gas around.   Somewhere there were biologics and stuff for nuclear....already underway in terms of processing to at least a Hiroshima level set of bomb....more than enough for all the capitals of places Saddam hated.

     The Hebrews were so informed and so sure of their information that they bombed the slop out of a "peaceful nuclear programme facility" to the west of Baghdad in 1981.  This took out a French Osiris small nuclear reactor usually adapted to electricity production.  The problem is that, Iraqis, who are not stupid in advanced math and science, were working on building an Osiriq variation of the really neat little French machine. The "shell" and much understructure and superstructure had already been  built.
 

 

 

    This was known as IDF-AF Operation Osirik and  was totally successful!  The Israelis reduced the place to rubble.

 

     The removal of 7,000 nerve-gas warheads adaptable to multiple delivery systems, and the discovery of enough yellow-cake to have to require three (perhaps two) different deliveries to Canada as radioactive waste weighing over 2,000 tonnes of uranium....delivered through Basra and two oceans during the later stages of the Bush 2nd term....is enough to underscore that, yes Virginia, there really were weapons of mass destruction.

    This nerve gas alone would have been enough to kill everyone in Riyadh, Alexandria, Cairo, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Beirut, and Amman....along with Damascus.

     Nothing serious.

     And if the OROG or anyone wants to wonder if there are good Ishmaelites or if they are all bad.....these agents of death were not employed by middle and fairly high ranking Iraqi army officers and weapons-systems bureaucrats once it became apparent that the Gringos had won the 2nd War.  They did not have the inhumanity to do so.

   One scientist, I remember, from a CNN  clip took an American heavy infantry platoon, with all civility and hospitality, to his back yard and told him that Hussein had sent people to tell him to bury his centrifuges.  Upon digging them up, it was apparent that the centrifuges were not the kind one might encounter in a medical laboratory or a college chemistry class.   They were about half the size of a king-sized bed, and about three feet tall.  The man said that there were "many, buried in many yards and places". 

 

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     This brings us to the point.  It is about Karl Rove.  It is about the Country Club Republicans against  lower range blue-bloods, the blue collars, the small business people, the skilled blue collar people, and all those who make America, America.   The Country Club people pretty much see a crystal wiggle when they are looking through the "others".  Just because all of them call themselves Republicans does not mean that the lower range blue-bloods, the blue collar, the small business people, the skilled blue collar people and all those who make America, America...the "lower group" should be allowed any peek into the "Holy Tent of the Covenant".

    They genuinely despise us.  They despise us much more-so than they dislike....in a kinder and gentler way, of course....Democrats, socialists, criminal politicians like the Clintons, marxists, and all others who live on Cape Cod, in Kennebunkport, or the Correct Place,  and Beyondyourreachia.  We can bring to mind that Barbara Bush recently informed the lessers that she felt towards William Jefferson Blythe as though he were her own son.  And George and Billy Jeff get along so well saving the Haitians (all of whom are still rotting save for a few hundred who have been primped and dressed to look like human beings), and the people of the Tsunami of wheneveritwas.  Those people mainly pulled themselves up by their own efforts although the Clintons are taking credit for it.

 

     When those of us who knew that the truth about the WMDs asked of the "important people" why George the Lesser would not defend himself, the answers were not coherent.  When Scooter Libby was thrown under the bus, no pardon, no nothing when he was totally innocent of any crime....nothing....not a finger lifted.   Libby, although a good liberal Republican like Cheney....was not to the manor born.

 

     Karl Rove was always the stalking horse in Texas Republican politics for the Country Club people.  One of the rare agreements my remaining brother and I had was an abiding distaste for the high-handedness of Karl when he was doing the bidding of the Earls and Dukes and especially Duchesses.  This particular brother was the Executive Director of the Republican Party of Texas in the late 1960s and early 1970s.  He served a long term of it as John Tower's AA in Washington, D.C.  during the 1970s, and Tower was proud to serve as Godfather for that brother's first son's baptism.  Then that brother established a group called the Associated Republicans of Texas, a group that had considerable success in the election of local and State-wide Republican candidates through the 1980s and 1990s and continues to this day, I am given to understand.  Work by that political action committee....totalling huge sums and scores of 0thousands of hours of technical assistance...converted Texas to what is now the most Red state in the union.   But Karl was always there to subvert to the greatest extent possible.  The Country Club people were never comfortable with having too many of "them" in anything identifiably Republican.   Each Country Clubber had his/her image what "them" is.  To Barbara Bush...a multiple sexual assaulter and crook and perjurer is A-OK.

     We began to feel a long time back that Karl and Jim Baker were determined to keep the discovery of weapons of mass destruction out of the popular consciousness even if it justified our effort and restored our honour.   The Voice Behind the Curtain....and those on the social registry in New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut and other such approved places were really tired of talking about guns and bombs, and against the right to choose, and all those "southern type things"... and that it was time to let Iraq ride into the sunset.   It was time to embrace the homosexuals  and let girls take care of their "inconveniences" and "reach out" to the people who had been downtrodden so long.   (???????????????????????)  After all, we have to be reasonable.

 

     This is a song of lament.  It is readily recognised that the Bush family et al is far, far beyond the Clintons, the Obamas, and almost the entire coterie of the Democrat national socialists, in terms of class and character.  A toenail clipping of either George Bush has more class than all generations of the Billy Jeff Clinton lineage twenty generations to the past and forty generations to the future.

 

     To George W.'s discredit, it seemed that he could not have cared less about the covering up of the proof that WMDs had existed and how revealing such information would have positively  affected the Republican Party and the national psyche.   It is all very troubling.   But, who cares?  El Gringo Viejo is only one of those lower level aristocrat slobs, or skilled blue collar or small businessman or proprietor-types....not qualified for having the regal sword drawn across his shoulder by a well-crowned person.

 

More Later.

El Gringo Viejo

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The Tree ran out in front of me....!!!! Really!!!

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In all sincerity,  we had no idea that (Sir Edmund)
Hillary even had a driver's license.
They'll probably blame this on me as well.
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Father Obamaham promises: Nobody gots no Obolo, and it's those nurses' fault.

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    Typical liberal - progressive tactic:   The system breaks down, as scheduled and on purpose, thereby exposing a large population of generally blameless people to a dangerous plague.

    First:   Disseminate all nature of pleasant sounding reassurances.  Indicate that there is no danger.

    Second:   Maintain in force those conditions and procedures that further the possibility of disaster, contamination, and lack of preparedness to respond.

    Third:   Keep all channels open so that a carrier of the plague can be inserted as far into the centre of the Republic as possible.  Passive measures are sufficient, because the TSA employees are generally stupid, untrained, unconcerned, lazy, and filled with a sense of both pre-potency and victimhood.

Governor Blanco and Mayor Nagin had well
over three days to fuel up the school and city
fleet of busses to carry scores of thousands
to safety.  They ran and dithered.  And then
blamed Bush, who was the only one who did
anything.   Lib-think...

     Fourth:  Cause there to be a clamour for another useless layer of bureaucracy....such as a "czar"....to do to things.  (A), further confuse the matter, as in the case of "Homeland Security", and (B), have someone to blame for being even more incompetent than the nincompoops who allowed the plague to be inserted into the populace to begin with.

     Fifth:   Choose a "czar" such as the general Bush put into the New Orleans situation after Nagel and Blanco had essentially destroyed the entire city by stupidity and inaction.   Then after about a month, leak information to the Obsolete Media that the "czar" is a child molester who murdered his mother and beat his wife while marching in pro-life rallies against abortion.

     Generally:   During this entire episode, ridicule any realistic measures that would literally break the back of the spread of the plague,  such as declaring no air or sea connections to the plague-involved  area for at least one year.   Such measures have already been taken to great success by every adjacent African nation....and nations as far away as Jamaica...along with 20 European nations.

    We could begin serving solutions to the problem with various C-5s that are sleeping on runways right now.  Each one can deliver enough expendables and medical supplies to supply Corpus Christi, Texas  for three days.   Remember what the Gringos did for Berlin during the post World War II Airlift....(with no C-5 Galaxies).

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The C - 5 Galaxy
The Cavalry to the Rescue
There is nothing prettier to an afflicted
people than the sight of an American
relief flight.

     Remember these basic facts.   Saying, "Why doesn't Father Obamaham understand that what he is doing is not working....?"  is a fool's creed.  It is Valerie Jarrett's total mission to destroy America as the pre-eminent nation in the world.  It is the work of Steyer - Soros - and the board of directors of five or six very prestigious-sounding  foundations...Annenberg, Ford, Rockefeller, the Obsolete Media, and the entire progressive - marxist movement.

     Sending in United States Army National Guard medical and supply units attached to the 101st Airborne Division is lunacy.  It is a purposeful denigration of the most advanced Guard units and treating them like cub-scouts.  In fact, there are many, many civilian groups who would be willing to take United States Air Force planes to the Ebola Zone and work in the mess; people with substantial training in no-con and "putting on the duds" and all such protective measure.   The French...Mon Dieu!!! Le Francaise!!! Les Docteurs sans Frontieres have performed heroically in horridly horrid conditions to more than excellent effect, as have we.   Co-ordinating with them, others like them, and backing them up with Americans who know what they are doing, and C-5 Galaxy type delivery conveyances,  that is the answer.

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     If we think that this assembly of errors were accidental, then we are hopelessly lost in a desert of disbelief.  Every measure taken by this administration....even the pinning of a few medals on a few military personnel and saying a few throwaway words....can easily be recast in the light of the true treatment this Administration has rendered to the military in general.  The trading of 5 Taliban high-ranking personalities for one deserter/collaborator is an example of Barry's contempt for the military and the concept of America.   We send this note of strength, resolve, showmanship, sincerity of a common Southerner dedicated to the Good Will that still unites us in spite of the contempt shown the Nurses who served loyally, willingly, and yes, even heroically  on the front lines in Dallas in spite of the incompetence of the central government officers:

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     Back to the medicine chest for my Airwick and Nodoz.  I might even take some Gold Bond Powder for gargling.

El Gringo Viejo

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Suddenly El Zorro, then the outpost in Extreme Central Texas, the communications pour in....The War Drums, They're a-beatin'

That coloured in red is from the contributing OROG from "Extreme Central Texas".
That coloured in blue is from "The American Conservative" people, a contrarian, but not rabid radical group, by any means.
That coloured in blood or maroon is El Gringo Viejo
(collaboration by two more OROGs, including Mr. Spaceman)



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Xxxx,

     I read both of your posts with interest. The chemical munitions article was certainly long enough and was able to destroy any residual confidence I had in our military leadership, especially after reading about the General Amos’ alleged ethical lapses on his resume. 

     Regarding the second post, I think the author is spot on with his conclusion, but his headline was an exaggeration to generate attention.  Currently the Arabs do not have us over the “oil” barrel, but someone is funding ISIS.  It appears increasingly difficult to determine where our erstwhile allies stand regarding ISIS.  Turkey, Oman and Saudi Arabia all seem to be double dealing with objectives inconsistent with defeat the announced enemy.   

    After a decade of investing blood and treasure in Iraq, their army threw down their rifles faster than Italians leaving Ethiopia.  The only player really committed to the defeat of ISIS is Asad and with enough Novocain in the right place, he might administer the rare anal root canal procedure.   

     I would suggest that the hastily summoned coalition be allowed to take the lead with Euros from Europe.  This would allow the U.S. to hone its intelligence and diplomatic skills, hopefully with some advice from Putin.  Possibly, just possibly, the leadership and acumen required to win in the byzantine Middle East is beyond the expertise of a distracted community organizer.

     Think about it another way, if ISIS hasn’t been able to topple Asad, who has had modest assistance; there is a chance that ISIS would not be a major military threat to the U.S.  After all, we have tried every form of involvement except letting the locals do what they are best at, desert population control.  All problems aren’t our problems!
(signed)

The Secret Agent found at times in Extreme Central Texas or on the High Seas.
(rubric-rubric) 

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 The Middle East Doesn’t Matter

Neither ISIS nor any of America's fair-weather allies are worth the price of the U.S.'s deepening regional commitments.

By SCOTT MCCONNELL • October 15, 2014

State Department photo / Public Domain 

The ISIS rampage through Iraq and much of Syria, roiling Washington and other world capitals, gives rise to an interesting question: Who would win a contest to be named America’s most worthless Mideast ally? Competition is fierce, but three countries are clear frontrunners.

There is Saudi Arabia, whose princely emissaries to Washington have been confidants of presidents and fixtures on the Georgetown party circuit, a country whose rulers and princes possess seemingly unlimited amounts of discretionary income. They have used this wealth to subsidize worldwide the teaching of the most extremist and intolerant variants of Islam, but also to prop up the US defense industry by buying at every opportunity the most elaborate weapons systems we would sell them. It isn’t yet known whether Saudi pilots can actually effectively fly these advanced fighter aircraft under combat conditions. (There is sufficient evidence however that even relatively untrained Saudis can learn to steer a fully loaded 747 into a fixed ground target.)

What do the Saudis do with their shiny F-16′s and spanking new tanks? One might have hoped to see Saudi forces in action against ISIS—which really hasn’t had any success against a military formation that has been systematically trained and adequately armed. But this isn’t happening, probably because Saudi leaders realize that a great many Saudis (a majority?) actually agree with the ISIS ideology, and there is no guarantee they wouldn’t defect to ISIS if called upon to battle it. Among the best few sentences written since the onset of the crisis comes from veteran observer William Pfaff, who pointed to the stakes:

Moreover, is it fully appreciated in Washington that the “New Caliphate” has every intention of taking over the existing role in Islamic society of Saudi Arabia? It wants to conquer and occupy Mecca. If it succeeds, the Saudis themselves will be submitted to the ferocious discipline the ISIS practices. The Saudi ladies who now complain that they are not allowed to drive cars will find themselves in a new world indeed!

Then there is Turkey, an actual NATO member, a Muslim majority country which bridges Asia and Europe, a country with a considerable middle class and millions of educated and highly trained citizens. There are smart people in Washington and beyond who have held great hopes for Turkey: that it might solve the seemingly intractable riddle of how to combine Islam with modern democracy; that it might provide meaningful diplomatic support to the Palestinians; that it could both restrain America from disastrous blunders (as it tried to do in Iraq) and exert its growing influence on behalf of social and scientific progress in the region as a whole.

I shared those hopes, but have to admit they now seem pretty naive. Faced with an aggressive extremist Sunni movement beheading people on its borders, Turkey’s leaders choose to focus on the alleged dangers posed by its own long-restive Kurdish minority, while remaining obsessed with the Alawite (i.e. not Sunni Muslim) regime in neighboring Syria. Turkey has allowed ISIS to be replenished by allowing its own territory to be used as a transit zone for jihadist volunteers. If, as seems plausible at this writing, the Syrian-Kurdish town of Kobani falls while Turkey’s powerful NATO-armed military observes placidly from just over the border, it will be a long time before anyone in Washington will be able to say “our ally Turkey” with a straight face again.

Then there is Israel, usually touted as the best of American friends in the Mideast, if not the best ally any nation has been blessed to have, ever. Recipient of nearly as much American foreign and military aid as the rest of the world combined, Israel, with its crack air force and large stockpile of nuclear weapons, stands unchallenged as the region’s dominant military power. Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu shows up on American news talk shows more than leaders of the rest of the world combined; were it not for John McCain, he would surely log more “Face the Nation” time than any American politician.

Once again, events illustrate what utility Israel has as a regional ally when the crunch comes. Faced with a unforeseen, rapidly moving, and dramatic crisis, Americans watch as Israel does absolutely nothing except antagonize the Muslim world further by announcing new land seizures so more illegal settlements can be built in Jerusalem. Of course this isn’t without precedent; Israel was of no help in the first Iraq crisis, and of course no help in the second—beyond providing a parade of prime-time cheerleaders to encourage George W. Bush in his lurch into war. Indeed, almost by definition Israel is no help in any regional crisis. The Israeli military may well remain formidable, though it is hard to be sure, as its most recent campaigns have been conducted against essentially undefended civilian populations.

What distinguishes Israel from Turkey and Saudi Arabia, is that no one is particularly surprised that it gives no help; it is not expected to do so. Congress will respond anyway with new resolutions demonstrating to major campaign donors its absolute submissiveness to Tel Aviv; perhaps Israelis will be permitted to travel to the U.S. without visas while Israel doesn’t reciprocate the favor, or the Pentagon’s replenishment of Israeli military stocks, exhausted by Gaza bombardment, will be prioritized.

Might there be a silver lining in all this? As we witness the emergence of a violent new force, simple realism forces upon us the fact that the friends we’ve been wooing for decades just don’t see it that way. They may not like ISIS, but for various reasons they have other fish to fry. That should tell us something about the strategic vision underlying our policies for the past two or three decades. (I would give a passing grade to the American Mideast policies pursued during the heat of the Cold War, when strategists considered keeping oil flowing and the region out of the communist orbit to be a pressing national priority, superseding all other considerations. In this they succeeded.)

What silver lining? It’s rooted in the fact that the Mideast may now actually matter much less than we think it does. We do have the option of pretty much ignoring it, if we choose. Its contribution to the world economy is negligible. Its oil will reach the market one way or another. The security and well-being of the American people is not linked to the survival of a Shi’ite regime in Baghdad, a medieval monarch in Riyadh, or, for that matter, a Jewish state in Jerusalem. Recognition of this fact is only beginning to seep into the discourse: Justin Logan argues persuasively here that virtually nothing that goes on in the Middle East can threaten us very much, that no country in the region is worth starting a war over, and that the amount of money we’ve spent combatting terrorism in the region is wildly disproportionate to the actual threat. (It goes without saying that American bombing, with its inevitable “collateral damage,” will create a growing class of Muslims who have concrete reason to want to harm Americans.) In an recent interview, Francis Fukuyama elaborates on this view. 9/11 didn’t “change everything” as many claimed, or shouldn’t have; it was essentially a lucky shot.

“These are really marginal people who survive in countries where you don’t have strong states … Their ability to take over and run a serious country that can master technology and stay at the forefront of great-power politics is almost zero,” he says. Elsewhere he notes that the crisis over ISIS is really a subset of the Sunni-Shia civil war, and America’s ability to have any lasting impact on that is also almost zero.

This perspective—that the Mideast isn’t actually all that important to American security and we should pay much less attention to it—should now become a critical part of the American conversation. The thinkers cited here—Logan and Fukuyama, and one should add the popular blogger Andrew Sullivan, also writing along these lines—are far from knee-jerk “isolationists.” Fukuyama posits particularly that we should use military offshore balancing to ensure that no single power controls the oil fields; and obviously Iran would not want or allow ISIS to shut off its ability to export oil. But beyond that, we can afford to take the region much less seriously.

Unfortunately, there are no major American politicians now ready to make this argument. Rand Paul, regrettably, seems to have folded into a “me too” ISIS hawk after the first atrocity appeared on television, and the entire debate in Washington is now between neocons who want to send American ground troops now, and Obama establishment figures who hope, against much persuasive evidence, that some combination of bombing and special forces and our “coalition partners” will halt the ISIS advance. This narrowing of our true choices is madness.

There is a third, quite realistic, option: ISIS doesn’t matter all that much, and in any case if our “allies” don’t want to fight it, there’s very little we can do about it. If it one day rules Mecca, more the pity for the Saudi women and their driving aspirations. But the impact on American life will be minimal.

Scott McConnell is a founding editor of The American Conservative.  http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-middle-east-doesnt-matter/

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EL Gringo Viejo responds:

    There is broad concurrence with this article on the part of this observer.  You might be surprised that, were I to be advising a real President,  I would further point out that Assad has blustered a bit, but he has managed to stay in front of the bullet.  And he has not been obtusely hostile to the Hebrews.  And he seems to be a fit, if not a close fit, for being a neighbour to Lebanon and Jordan.   If we could simply arm the Kurds heavily, and withdraw completely to something no one else can do....float huge arsenals of destruction in the Mediterranean Sea.   If we were to take Assad, Jordan, the Lesbians, the Hebrews, and the Egyptians....and begin a quiet degradation of the Muslim Brotherhood and Hezbollah,  a very quiet degradation....then there would be a general advance of the good over the bad....and we could float around in the Med being refuelled and making port o' call and "keeping the sea lanes open".  I would let the Persians, the Iraqis (Nebuchadnezzar would never recognise the place), and the Turks stew in their own juices.

     The present Turkish governance wants to get rid of Assad, and the Kurds hate the Turks.   The Turks like ISIS (ISIL) and the Kurds like the Gringos....we can leave it at that.   Things would be substantially improved if we could have a president and secretary level people who can keep their stupid mouths shut, and let the bad guys guess about when and where the Americans might have a "wardrobe malfunction" and blow up an Iranian nuclear fuel factory accidentally.   "I didn't know about it until I read about it in the newspapers this morning."

     The problem we have right now is that there is absolutely no one, all the way down to the level of 3-star, general officer, presently serving, who has the guts, testosterone poisoning sufficient, or the vision to even begin to think in strategic terms or in any terms that might be injurious, in any meaningful way, to Obama's half-brother's group.   That group, of course, is the Muslim Brotherhood specifically and Islam in general.

   Valerie Jarrett has declared this group, the Brotherhood, to be immune from any recrimination, reprisal, judgment, or negative vibing or ohming.   Remember that the best man at the pairing of the robotrons Michelle Robinson (also a construct of the Annenberg "Communications" people) and Barry Soetoro is Barry's half-brother. who also happens to be a ranking Imam, and a chaplain for the Muslim Brotherhood in the Egypt-trans-Gaza-trans-Israel-trans-American prisons-trans-The Levant.

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(The following  is readily drawn from an internet source that has never been challenged.  The only problem is  the American publishing industry and  news media is unwilling to address the answers and questions raised by the facts presented below.   It explains why Obama is so willing to use Liberians as human biological bombs as his term comes to an end.   Why else the utter horror expressed by the robotrons under the control of Valerie Jarrett at the idea of sealing off western Africa from having access to the New World by air or sea?

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Barack Hussein Obama’s half-brother, Malik, joins terror group Hamas in advocating the destruction of Israel:

Posted on Malik Obama’s WEBSITE, ‘The Barack H. Obama Foundation,’ is a photo of Malik wearing a Hamas scarf (keffiyeh) that bears a well-known Palestinian slogan – ‘Jerusalem is ours – WE ARE COMING!’ It also includes a map of Palestine that says, ‘From the River to the Sea!’ In other words, Malik is saying, ‘there is no Israel.’

SHOEBAT  The keffiyeh (or scarf) doesn’t just say, ‘Al Aqsa is ours and is not their temple’. It also says ‘Innana Qadimun’, which translates to mean ‘We are marching forward’. This famous battle command which is a reference to the prophecy that some day the Muslim world will march on Jerusalem and then the trees and stones will cry out, ‘here is a Jew hiding behind me… come O Muslim, come and kill him’.

Hamas leader Khalid Mash’al (Right) wearing the same kind of keffiyeh

It went unreported in the mainstream media that Malik received 501(c)(3) status for his Barack H. Obama Foundation in less than 30 days and had it illegally backdated 38 months by Lois Lerner. Malik’s foundation is tied to a State Sponsor of Terrorism in Sudan. Lois Lerner should be granted immunity and compelled to testify about why she granted tax exempt status to a man who is tied to terrorism and just so happens to be the brother of the President of the United States.

Malik reads and speaks fluent Arabic as do many in his family, like cousin Musa Ismail Obama and uncle Sayyid, who’ve been to at least one prominent Wahhabist university in Saudi Arabia. Barack recited the opening lines of the Arabic call to prayer with a ‘first-rate accent’ according to the New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof.

Musa Obama and Sayyid Obama at Umm al-Qura University

“Everyone’s referring to us as half, quarter,…step, things like that,” he says, displeased even by the taste of those words. “I think that’s like weights and measures. This didn’t even occur to us until he became president, until he gained prominence. And now we’re sort of like celebrities. “But this is a streak of ignorance,” he adds. “Here in Africa we don’t think of each other as ‘half’ this or that. In an extended family, someone is your brother even if he is just in your clan. So I…am Obama.”

Here is Malik in 2010, with al-Dahab in Khartoum, Sudan during the Islamic Da’wa Organization (IDO) conference, (advocating for a new Islamic Caliphate around the world) presided over by Sudan’s terrorist leader Omar al-Bashir, who belongs to the Muslim Brotherhood and is wanted for crimes against humanity:

Malik Obama and Suar al-Dahab

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Hiding in plain sight.  The Truth.

El Gringo Viejo

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