Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Friday, September 6, 2013
Senators backing war in Syria are flush with defense industry cash
HELLO, FRIEND: Secretary of State John Kerry, center, is greeted by members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday in Washington, D.C.
By Eric Boehm | Watchdog.org
This just in: The military-industrial complex is a powerful force in Washington, D.C. politics.
It’s not exactly new information, but the debate over Syria seems to have exposed — once again — the degree to which defense contractors and others who stand to profit from the United States launching missiles at a foreign country.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday voted 10-7 in favor of authorizing military action in Syria. The vote was the first step to a full Senate vote to authorize President Barack Obama’s plan to bomb the war-torn nation.
According to an analysis by MapLight, which tracks lobbying and campaign contributions in Congress, senators who voted in favor of the resolution received, on average, 83 percent more money from defense contractors and other defense interests than senators who voted against the resolution.
The MapLight analysis looked at campaign contributions between 2007 and 2012.
In raw dollars, the 10 senators voting in favor of the military authorization received a total of $ 728,000, for an average of $ 72,800.
It’s hardly surprising that uber-hawk Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., led the way with more than $ 176,000 in contributions from defense interests. (McCain, during the same hearing, was caught playing video poker on his smart phone).
On the other side, the seven senators who opposed military action in Syria received a total of $ 278,000 from defense interests, for an average of $ 39,000 per senator.
It’s worth noting that every senator on the committee received at least $ 14,000 from the defense industry between 2007 and 2012, according to MapLight. Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, was the low man on that totem pole.
Of course, it’s easy to spend lots of money on politicians when your business is making missiles that sell for $ 1.45 million apiece.
Here’s the whole rundown:
Eric Boehm can be reached at Eric@PAIndependent.com and follow @EricBoehm87 on Twitter.
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Senators backing war in Syria are flush with defense industry cash
Sunday, July 21, 2013
So Cal Is Not Backing Down
A handful of rallies are slated throughout Southern California this weekend, calling for federal prosecution of George Zimmerman in the wake of his acquittal in the killing of Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Fla. But unlike earlier protests in the wake of the July 13 verdict that ended in violence and arrests, these events are expected to be largely peaceful and structured.
Backed by local chapters of well-formed national groups, the rallies are put on by people who know how to best get their message across through respectful civil disobedience. And that, say some, makes a difference between a peaceful event and one that spins out of control.
“In our marches, we’re a very experienced militant — but disciplined — organization,” said Mike Prysner, a member of the Los Angeles chapter of Washington, D.C.-based activist group Answer (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) Coalition. “The demonstrations that have escalated — and we’re not judging anyone with how they protest — have been grass-roots efforts by people who have never protested before.”
Answer Coalition readied one of the calmer protests this week, a rally and march on July 16 that started at Los Angeles City Hall, wound through downtown streets for more than an hour and ended on the steps of police headquarters. No one was arrested, and after just a few hours, organizers vocally brought the event to an end.
“We didn’t let it degenerate into something else after the protest was over,” Prysner said.
The group has planned another rally for Sunday at Anaheim City Hall that is expected to draw upward of 1,000 people, with buses bringing in protesters from Northern California.
Most of the half-dozen gatherings planned for Saturday are backed by Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, which was predicated on the motto “No justice, no peace.” Sharpton on Monday called for a “Day of Unity” and encouraged chapters to stage rallies and prayer vigils at federal court buildings demanding that the Department of Justice indict Zimmerman on civil-rights violations. More than 100 are planned nationally for this morning.
An LAPD spokesman said these types of events are different than the spontaneous protests that have sprung up in the week since the verdict in the Zimmerman case. The department is planning for what is expected to be a large rally at the federal courthouse on Spring Street starting at 9 a.m.
“We have been in constant communication with the organizers of the event and we have an understanding of their want and need to have this rally,” said LAPD’s Sgt. Albert Gonzalez. “We have been working with them to facilitate a peaceful rally. We’re not anticipating any violence.”
Gonzalez added that while it doesn’t change the department’s plans, when events are scheduled often plays a key role. “Obviously, under the cover of darkness, people with ulterior motives can hide,” he said. “But since [this is] an early-morning, early-afternoon event, there’s less of that likely to happen.” He declined to give details on the number of officers the department is assigning to the area.
Similar rallies and vigils are planned for Riverside, San Bernardino, Victorville and Palmdale on Saturday.
Rocky Ford, organizer of the Palmdale vigil, said he expects it to be calm and doesn’t have an estimate on the number of people expected.
“It’ll be interesting to see if a lot of people show up, because Palmdale is such a small community,” he said. “But people have called to check in about it, so we’ll see.”
kelly.goff@dailynews.com
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So Cal Is Not Backing Down
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
These Are the Rebels We"re Backing in Syria?
Two recent newspaper editorials illustrate the double-mindedness some feel about President Obama’s decision to provide small arms and ammunition to Syrian rebels.
The Washington Post headlined an editorial: “No time for half-measures: Syria’s rebels need a robust intervention from the Obama administration.” The New York Times took a more realistic approach: “After Arming the Rebels, Then What? President Obama should be careful about being dragged into the brutal Syrian war.”
I’m on the side of the Times.
Some promote U.S. involvement in Syria for humanitarian reasons. That might be sufficient if the outcome advanced humanitarian concerns, but exchanging one tyrant for another is not a long-term solution. One Syrian rebel group has reportedly pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden’s replacement, al-Qaida leader Sheik Ayman al-Zawahri. Deposing a mass murderer in favor of jihadists committed to “holy war” against America and the West is like choosing a firing squad over the guillotine.
The Washington Post reported the murder of a 14-year-old boy by Syrian rebels. The boy’s crime? When he “was asked to bring one of his customers some coffee,” the Post writes, “he reportedly refused, saying, ‘Even if [Prophet] Mohammed comes back to life, I won’t.’” A group of Islamist rebels took this as an insult to Islam. Are these the rebels Obama’s backing?
The United States has a bad track record in the Middle East. President Jimmy Carter helped topple the shah of Iran. Now the shah’s replacements, in concert with Hezbollah, writes ABC News, “have been helping the Syrian regime of President Bashar Assad…”
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei recently called Israel a “cancerous tumor” and vowed Iran’s support to any nation or group that attacks it. Iran is intent on acquiring nuclear weapons. The Independent newspaper in Britain reports that Iran has pledged to send 4,000 Iranian Revolutionary Guards to Syria to support Assad.
In Egypt, Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate, won the last election after the U.S. supported the ouster of Hosni Mubarak. The outcome in Libya, following U.S. support of rebels opposed to Moammar Gadhafi, is unlikely to be pleasant should that nation’s draft constitution based on Sharia law be adopted.
The Obama administration reportedly is ready to consider a U.N. request to resettle some Syrian refugees in the United States. “…part of an international effort that could bring thousands of Syrians to American cities and towns,” writes the Los Angeles Times. Can we be sure a number of them won’t be jihadists?
For too long, American involvement in the Middle East has employed the wrong formula in the mistaken belief that we can change the thinking of radical Islamists. Many administrations have pressured Israel in the misguided and unjustified hope that this would produce a change in outlook and a reset in religious fanaticism. It hasn’t. In fact, our “reach-out” efforts are seen as weakness in much of the Islamic world.
Arab and Muslim peoples have been at war with other nations and each other for centuries. The two major factions of Islam — Sunni and Shia — are in constant conflict over which one is Prophet Mohammed’s legitimate heir. The “infidel” West can’t help settle any of this and is more likely to unite the warring factions against us, as it has in the past.
Add to this a scenario that resembles the Cold War. Russia is “all-in,” supplying anti-ship cruise missiles to President Assad’s regime. Moscow, according to the Wall Street Journal, has deployed at least a dozen warships to patrol waters near the Russian naval base in the Syrian city of Tartus. Obama’s token gesture of small arms and ammunition is the equivalent of dipping one’s toe in the Mediterranean Sea and calling it swimming.
As in so many other instances, Obama is, according to the Daily Telegraph, “leading from behind in Syria — and can’t see where he is going.”
The president wants credit for withdrawing American forces from Iraq and Afghanistan, but with Syria he is involving the U.S. in another war that can’t be “won,” at least not in a way that will advance American interests.
These Are the Rebels We"re Backing in Syria?