Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Friday, August 15, 2008
Jeff Beatty Uphill Fight/Name Recognition
Republican Candidate for Senate Jeff Beatty is going to face an uphill battle in his attempt to beat John Kerry in the November Election. His position on the issues may not be the problem so much as it is that no one knows who he is.
A recent Rasmussen Poll showed Kerry with a 27 percent lead in the polls. But while in favorable ratings Beatty had a whopping 41 percent of people who where polled saying they were "not sure". This points to the fact that he lacks name recognition at this point.
So if I were Jeff Beatty I would not put so much focus on the 30 second campaign adds. I would throw most of my energy pounding the pavement meeting people, and getting myself on the news shows.
Beatty's message is simple, "Relevant Experience". He states that he had an opportunity to challenge the Bush Administration on the Iraq War prior to the invasion. He has stated several times that given the evidence that was presented to him he would not have supported the Iraq war. He points to the primary factors relating to the intelligence not coming from American Boots on the ground, but from foreign contacts who received payment based on the amount of information they gave. So in essence, the United Stated had no first hand evidence of WMD's or anything else related to our reasons for invasion.
John Kerry voted for the War.
http://www.jeffbeatty.com/
A recent Rasmussen Poll showed Kerry with a 27 percent lead in the polls. But while in favorable ratings Beatty had a whopping 41 percent of people who where polled saying they were "not sure". This points to the fact that he lacks name recognition at this point.
So if I were Jeff Beatty I would not put so much focus on the 30 second campaign adds. I would throw most of my energy pounding the pavement meeting people, and getting myself on the news shows.
Beatty's message is simple, "Relevant Experience". He states that he had an opportunity to challenge the Bush Administration on the Iraq War prior to the invasion. He has stated several times that given the evidence that was presented to him he would not have supported the Iraq war. He points to the primary factors relating to the intelligence not coming from American Boots on the ground, but from foreign contacts who received payment based on the amount of information they gave. So in essence, the United Stated had no first hand evidence of WMD's or anything else related to our reasons for invasion.
John Kerry voted for the War.
http://www.jeffbeatty.com/
Board of Selectman Election Set for Monday 8/18
Don't forget to vote. I for one am not overly excited about either of the prospects, but it is what is for now. I won't personally be endorsing anyone, but I will point out the bitter irony if David Viera wins since that pretty much gives us the exact same BOS we had prior to the override attempt. Of course we are smarter now, and at least know we can't trust half of them. Especially Mike Brady who is nothing more than a two faced liar. See my previous post on his re-election campaign.
Mcain Fundrasing/Obama Miscalculation?
John McCain raised 27 million dollars in July, so he has about 21 million dollars spend going into August. The beauty of this is; McCain is excepting public financing. This means that after he formally accepts the Republican nomination in September he can only spend the 84 Million allocated to him out of the public funds. So essentially he is going to have to drain his bank account between now and his nomination. Have you noticed the McCain adds during the Olympics?
Obama on the other hand got cocky, and opted out of public funding "because the system is broken". Whatever that means. Basically he thinks he is going to be able to raise another 200 million or so. I tend to doubt that. Most of his big money donors have maxed out their 2300 dollar limit buy now. The economy sucks, and let's not forget it's the republicans who are the rich ones, not the democrats. Right? Right??
Obama on the other hand got cocky, and opted out of public funding "because the system is broken". Whatever that means. Basically he thinks he is going to be able to raise another 200 million or so. I tend to doubt that. Most of his big money donors have maxed out their 2300 dollar limit buy now. The economy sucks, and let's not forget it's the republicans who are the rich ones, not the democrats. Right? Right??
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Clinton To Be On Nomination Ballot in Denver!
So it appears that Hillary Clinton as somehow managed to get Barak Obama to agree to her name being submitted for nomination at the DNC. This is great stuff!
Now, she should have been on it anyway, but Obama wanted to use some archaic method of just having the delegate vote being a formality. Looks like that won't be happening, and Obama may have, at the very least, allowed for chaos to ensue. This will certainly be a big news story leading up to the official delegate vote, and therefore will take away focus on Obama the candidate. At worst, he may have just cost himself the nomination.
Don't forget that neither Clinton or Obama have enough pledged delegates to capture the nomination. Obama is basically relying on a bunch of IOU's from the Super Delegates. They can vote for whoever they choose. If Obama does not do a better job of proving that he is in fact a viable candidate and not a celebrity whose time in the spolight will fade, there is a good chance that Hillary can convince enough super delegates to vote for her.
It doesn't get better than this! To be a fly on the wall!
Stay tuned for more info as it comes.
Now, she should have been on it anyway, but Obama wanted to use some archaic method of just having the delegate vote being a formality. Looks like that won't be happening, and Obama may have, at the very least, allowed for chaos to ensue. This will certainly be a big news story leading up to the official delegate vote, and therefore will take away focus on Obama the candidate. At worst, he may have just cost himself the nomination.
Don't forget that neither Clinton or Obama have enough pledged delegates to capture the nomination. Obama is basically relying on a bunch of IOU's from the Super Delegates. They can vote for whoever they choose. If Obama does not do a better job of proving that he is in fact a viable candidate and not a celebrity whose time in the spolight will fade, there is a good chance that Hillary can convince enough super delegates to vote for her.
It doesn't get better than this! To be a fly on the wall!
Stay tuned for more info as it comes.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Comprehensive Analysis of the Russia/Georgian Conflict
I would like to take a step back from local and national politics for a moment focus on the world stage. I found a very well written analysis of the conflict in Georgia. To read it make the hari raise on the back of you neck a little bit. But the reality is...this is the new reality. It's not very nice.
The Russo-Georgian War and the Balance of Power
By George Friedman
The Russian invasion of Georgia has not changed the balance of power in Eurasia. It simply announced that the balance of power had already shifted. The United States has been absorbed in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as potential conflict with Iran and a destabilizing situation in Pakistan. It has no strategic ground forces in reserve and is in no position to intervene on the Russian periphery. This, as we have argued, has opened a window of opportunity for the Russians to reassert their influence in the former Soviet sphere. Moscow did not have to concern itself with the potential response of the United States or Europe; hence, the invasion did not shift the balance of power. The balance of power had already shifted, and it was up to the Russians when to make this public. They did that Aug. 8.
Let’s begin simply by reviewing the last few days.
On the night of Thursday, Aug. 7, forces of the Republic of Georgia drove across the border of South Ossetia, a secessionist region of Georgia that has functioned as an independent entity since the fall of the Soviet Union. The forces drove on to the capital, Tskhinvali, which is close to the border. Georgian forces got bogged down while trying to take the city. In spite of heavy fighting, they never fully secured the city, nor the rest of South Ossetia.
On the morning of Aug. 8, Russian forces entered South Ossetia, using armored and motorized infantry forces along with air power. South Ossetia was informally aligned with Russia, and Russia acted to prevent the region’s absorption by Georgia. Given the speed with which the Russians responded — within hours of the Georgian attack — the Russians were expecting the Georgian attack and were themselves at their jumping-off points. The counterattack was carefully planned and competently executed, and over the next 48 hours, the Russians succeeded in defeating the main Georgian force and forcing a retreat. By Sunday, Aug. 10, the Russians had consolidated their position in South Ossetia.
On Monday, the Russians extended their offensive into Georgia proper, attacking on two axes. One was south from South Ossetia to the Georgian city of Gori. The other drive was from Abkhazia, another secessionist region of Georgia aligned with the Russians. This drive was designed to cut the road between the Georgian capital of Tbilisi and its ports. By this point, the Russians had bombed the military airfields at Marneuli and Vaziani and appeared to have disabled radars at the international airport in Tbilisi. These moves brought Russian forces to within 40 miles of the Georgian capital, while making outside reinforcement and resupply of Georgian forces extremely difficult should anyone wish to undertake it.
The Mystery Behind the Georgian Invasion
In this simple chronicle, there is something quite mysterious: Why did the Georgians choose to invade South Ossetia on Thursday night? There had been a great deal of shelling by the South Ossetians of Georgian villages for the previous three nights, but while possibly more intense than usual, artillery exchanges were routine. The Georgians might not have fought well, but they committed fairly substantial forces that must have taken at the very least several days to deploy and supply. Georgia’s move was deliberate.
The United States is Georgia’s closest ally. It maintained about 130 military advisers in Georgia, along with civilian advisers, contractors involved in all aspects of the Georgian government and people doing business in Georgia. It is inconceivable that the Americans were unaware of Georgia’s mobilization and intentions. It is also inconceivable that the Americans were unaware that the Russians had deployed substantial forces on the South Ossetian frontier. U.S. technical intelligence, from satellite imagery and signals intelligence to unmanned aerial vehicles, could not miss the fact that thousands of Russian troops were moving to forward positions. The Russians clearly knew the Georgians were ready to move. How could the United States not be aware of the Russians? Indeed, given the posture of Russian troops, how could intelligence analysts have missed the possibility that the Russians had laid a trap, hoping for a Georgian invasion to justify its own counterattack?
It is very difficult to imagine that the Georgians launched their attack against U.S. wishes. The Georgians rely on the United States, and they were in no position to defy it. This leaves two possibilities. The first is a massive breakdown in intelligence, in which the United States either was unaware of the existence of Russian forces, or knew of the Russian forces but — along with the Georgians — miscalculated Russia’s intentions. The second is that the United States, along with other countries, has viewed Russia through the prism of the 1990s, when the Russian military was in shambles and the Russian government was paralyzed. The United States has not seen Russia make a decisive military move beyond its borders since the Afghan war of the 1970s-1980s. The Russians had systematically avoided such moves for years. The United States had assumed that the Russians would not risk the consequences of an invasion.
If this was the case, then it points to the central reality of this situation: The Russians had changed dramatically, along with the balance of power in the region. They welcomed the opportunity to drive home the new reality, which was that they could invade Georgia and the United States and Europe could not respond. As for risk, they did not view the invasion as risky. Militarily, there was no counter. Economically, Russia is an energy exporter doing quite well — indeed, the Europeans need Russian energy even more than the Russians need to sell it to them. Politically, as we shall see, the Americans needed the Russians more than the Russians needed the Americans. Moscow’s calculus was that this was the moment to strike. The Russians had been building up to it for months, as we have discussed, and they struck.
The Western Encirclement of Russia
To understand Russian thinking, we need to look at two events. The first is the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. From the U.S. and European point of view, the Orange Revolution represented a triumph of democracy and Western influence. From the Russian point of view, as Moscow made clear, the Orange Revolution was a CIA-funded intrusion into the internal affairs of Ukraine, designed to draw Ukraine into NATO and add to the encirclement of Russia. U.S. Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton had promised the Russians that NATO would not expand into the former Soviet Union empire.
That promise had already been broken in 1998 by NATO’s expansion to Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic — and again in the 2004 expansion, which absorbed not only the rest of the former Soviet satellites in what is now Central Europe, but also the three Baltic states, which had been components of the Soviet Union.
The Russians had tolerated all that, but the discussion of including Ukraine in NATO represented a fundamental threat to Russia’s national security. It would have rendered Russia indefensible and threatened to destabilize the Russian Federation itself. When the United States went so far as to suggest that Georgia be included as well, bringing NATO deeper into the Caucasus, the Russian conclusion — publicly stated — was that the United States in particular intended to encircle and break Russia.
The second and lesser event was the decision by Europe and the United States to back Kosovo’s separation from Serbia. The Russians were friendly with Serbia, but the deeper issue for Russia was this: The principle of Europe since World War II was that, to prevent conflict, national borders would not be changed. If that principle were violated in Kosovo, other border shifts — including demands by various regions for independence from Russia — might follow. The Russians publicly and privately asked that Kosovo not be given formal independence, but instead continue its informal autonomy, which was the same thing in practical terms. Russia’s requests were ignored.
From the Ukrainian experience, the Russians became convinced that the United States was engaged in a plan of strategic encirclement and strangulation of Russia. From the Kosovo experience, they concluded that the United States and Europe were not prepared to consider Russian wishes even in fairly minor affairs. That was the breaking point. If Russian desires could not be accommodated even in a minor matter like this, then clearly Russia and the West were in conflict. For the Russians, as we said, the question was how to respond. Having declined to respond in Kosovo, the Russians decided to respond where they had all the cards: in South Ossetia.
Moscow had two motives, the lesser of which was as a tit-for-tat over Kosovo. If Kosovo could be declared independent under Western sponsorship, then South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the two breakaway regions of Georgia, could be declared independent under Russian sponsorship. Any objections from the United States and Europe would simply confirm their hypocrisy. This was important for internal Russian political reasons, but the second motive was far more important.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin once said that the fall of the Soviet Union was a geopolitical disaster. This didn’t mean that he wanted to retain the Soviet state; rather, it meant that the disintegration of the Soviet Union had created a situation in which Russian national security was threatened by Western interests. As an example, consider that during the Cold War, St. Petersburg was about 1,200 miles away from a NATO country. Today it is about 60 miles away from Estonia, a NATO member. The disintegration of the Soviet Union had left Russia surrounded by a group of countries hostile to Russian interests in various degrees and heavily influenced by the United States, Europe and, in some cases, China.
Resurrecting the Russian Sphere
Putin did not want to re-establish the Soviet Union, but he did want to re-establish the Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet Union region. To accomplish that, he had to do two things. First, he had to re-establish the credibility of the Russian army as a fighting force, at least in the context of its region. Second, he had to establish that Western guarantees, including NATO membership, meant nothing in the face of Russian power. He did not want to confront NATO directly, but he did want to confront and defeat a power that was closely aligned with the United States, had U.S. support, aid and advisers and was widely seen as being under American protection. Georgia was the perfect choice.
By invading Georgia as Russia did (competently if not brilliantly), Putin re-established the credibility of the Russian army. But far more importantly, by doing this Putin revealed an open secret: While the United States is tied down in the Middle East, American guarantees have no value. This lesson is not for American consumption. It is something that, from the Russian point of view, the Ukrainians, the Balts and the Central Asians need to digest. Indeed, it is a lesson Putin wants to transmit to Poland and the Czech Republic as well. The United States wants to place ballistic missile defense installations in those countries, and the Russians want them to understand that allowing this to happen increases their risk, not their security.
The Russians knew the United States would denounce their attack. This actually plays into Russian hands. The more vocal senior leaders are, the greater the contrast with their inaction, and the Russians wanted to drive home the idea that American guarantees are empty talk.
The Russians also know something else that is of vital importance: For the United States, the Middle East is far more important than the Caucasus, and Iran is particularly important. The United States wants the Russians to participate in sanctions against Iran. Even more importantly, they do not want the Russians to sell weapons to Iran, particularly the highly effective S-300 air defense system. Georgia is a marginal issue to the United States; Iran is a central issue. The Russians are in a position to pose serious problems for the United States not only in Iran, but also with weapons sales to other countries, like Syria.
Therefore, the United States has a problem — it either must reorient its strategy away from the Middle East and toward the Caucasus, or it has to seriously limit its response to Georgia to avoid a Russian counter in Iran. Even if the United States had an appetite for another war in Georgia at this time, it would have to calculate the Russian response in Iran — and possibly in Afghanistan (even though Moscow’s interests there are currently aligned with those of Washington).
In other words, the Russians have backed the Americans into a corner. The Europeans, who for the most part lack expeditionary militaries and are dependent upon Russian energy exports, have even fewer options. If nothing else happens, the Russians will have demonstrated that they have resumed their role as a regional power. Russia is not a global power by any means, but a significant regional power with lots of nuclear weapons and an economy that isn’t all too shabby at the moment. It has also compelled every state on the Russian periphery to re-evaluate its position relative to Moscow. As for Georgia, the Russians appear ready to demand the resignation of President Mikhail Saakashvili. Militarily, that is their option. That is all they wanted to demonstrate, and they have demonstrated it.
The war in Georgia, therefore, is Russia’s public return to great power status. This is not something that just happened — it has been unfolding ever since Putin took power, and with growing intensity in the past five years. Part of it has to do with the increase of Russian power, but a great deal of it has to do with the fact that the Middle Eastern wars have left the United States off-balance and short on resources. As we have written, this conflict created a window of opportunity. The Russian goal is to use that window to assert a new reality throughout the region while the Americans are tied down elsewhere and dependent on the Russians. The war was far from a surprise; it has been building for months. But the geopolitical foundations of the war have been building since 1992. Russia has been an empire for centuries. The last 15 years or so were not the new reality, but simply an aberration that would be rectified. And now it is being rectified.
*****
read the story with the active links at
http://www.stratfor.com/
The Russo-Georgian War and the Balance of Power
By George Friedman
The Russian invasion of Georgia has not changed the balance of power in Eurasia. It simply announced that the balance of power had already shifted. The United States has been absorbed in its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as potential conflict with Iran and a destabilizing situation in Pakistan. It has no strategic ground forces in reserve and is in no position to intervene on the Russian periphery. This, as we have argued, has opened a window of opportunity for the Russians to reassert their influence in the former Soviet sphere. Moscow did not have to concern itself with the potential response of the United States or Europe; hence, the invasion did not shift the balance of power. The balance of power had already shifted, and it was up to the Russians when to make this public. They did that Aug. 8.
Let’s begin simply by reviewing the last few days.
On the night of Thursday, Aug. 7, forces of the Republic of Georgia drove across the border of South Ossetia, a secessionist region of Georgia that has functioned as an independent entity since the fall of the Soviet Union. The forces drove on to the capital, Tskhinvali, which is close to the border. Georgian forces got bogged down while trying to take the city. In spite of heavy fighting, they never fully secured the city, nor the rest of South Ossetia.
On the morning of Aug. 8, Russian forces entered South Ossetia, using armored and motorized infantry forces along with air power. South Ossetia was informally aligned with Russia, and Russia acted to prevent the region’s absorption by Georgia. Given the speed with which the Russians responded — within hours of the Georgian attack — the Russians were expecting the Georgian attack and were themselves at their jumping-off points. The counterattack was carefully planned and competently executed, and over the next 48 hours, the Russians succeeded in defeating the main Georgian force and forcing a retreat. By Sunday, Aug. 10, the Russians had consolidated their position in South Ossetia.
On Monday, the Russians extended their offensive into Georgia proper, attacking on two axes. One was south from South Ossetia to the Georgian city of Gori. The other drive was from Abkhazia, another secessionist region of Georgia aligned with the Russians. This drive was designed to cut the road between the Georgian capital of Tbilisi and its ports. By this point, the Russians had bombed the military airfields at Marneuli and Vaziani and appeared to have disabled radars at the international airport in Tbilisi. These moves brought Russian forces to within 40 miles of the Georgian capital, while making outside reinforcement and resupply of Georgian forces extremely difficult should anyone wish to undertake it.
The Mystery Behind the Georgian Invasion
In this simple chronicle, there is something quite mysterious: Why did the Georgians choose to invade South Ossetia on Thursday night? There had been a great deal of shelling by the South Ossetians of Georgian villages for the previous three nights, but while possibly more intense than usual, artillery exchanges were routine. The Georgians might not have fought well, but they committed fairly substantial forces that must have taken at the very least several days to deploy and supply. Georgia’s move was deliberate.
The United States is Georgia’s closest ally. It maintained about 130 military advisers in Georgia, along with civilian advisers, contractors involved in all aspects of the Georgian government and people doing business in Georgia. It is inconceivable that the Americans were unaware of Georgia’s mobilization and intentions. It is also inconceivable that the Americans were unaware that the Russians had deployed substantial forces on the South Ossetian frontier. U.S. technical intelligence, from satellite imagery and signals intelligence to unmanned aerial vehicles, could not miss the fact that thousands of Russian troops were moving to forward positions. The Russians clearly knew the Georgians were ready to move. How could the United States not be aware of the Russians? Indeed, given the posture of Russian troops, how could intelligence analysts have missed the possibility that the Russians had laid a trap, hoping for a Georgian invasion to justify its own counterattack?
It is very difficult to imagine that the Georgians launched their attack against U.S. wishes. The Georgians rely on the United States, and they were in no position to defy it. This leaves two possibilities. The first is a massive breakdown in intelligence, in which the United States either was unaware of the existence of Russian forces, or knew of the Russian forces but — along with the Georgians — miscalculated Russia’s intentions. The second is that the United States, along with other countries, has viewed Russia through the prism of the 1990s, when the Russian military was in shambles and the Russian government was paralyzed. The United States has not seen Russia make a decisive military move beyond its borders since the Afghan war of the 1970s-1980s. The Russians had systematically avoided such moves for years. The United States had assumed that the Russians would not risk the consequences of an invasion.
If this was the case, then it points to the central reality of this situation: The Russians had changed dramatically, along with the balance of power in the region. They welcomed the opportunity to drive home the new reality, which was that they could invade Georgia and the United States and Europe could not respond. As for risk, they did not view the invasion as risky. Militarily, there was no counter. Economically, Russia is an energy exporter doing quite well — indeed, the Europeans need Russian energy even more than the Russians need to sell it to them. Politically, as we shall see, the Americans needed the Russians more than the Russians needed the Americans. Moscow’s calculus was that this was the moment to strike. The Russians had been building up to it for months, as we have discussed, and they struck.
The Western Encirclement of Russia
To understand Russian thinking, we need to look at two events. The first is the Orange Revolution in Ukraine. From the U.S. and European point of view, the Orange Revolution represented a triumph of democracy and Western influence. From the Russian point of view, as Moscow made clear, the Orange Revolution was a CIA-funded intrusion into the internal affairs of Ukraine, designed to draw Ukraine into NATO and add to the encirclement of Russia. U.S. Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton had promised the Russians that NATO would not expand into the former Soviet Union empire.
That promise had already been broken in 1998 by NATO’s expansion to Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic — and again in the 2004 expansion, which absorbed not only the rest of the former Soviet satellites in what is now Central Europe, but also the three Baltic states, which had been components of the Soviet Union.
The Russians had tolerated all that, but the discussion of including Ukraine in NATO represented a fundamental threat to Russia’s national security. It would have rendered Russia indefensible and threatened to destabilize the Russian Federation itself. When the United States went so far as to suggest that Georgia be included as well, bringing NATO deeper into the Caucasus, the Russian conclusion — publicly stated — was that the United States in particular intended to encircle and break Russia.
The second and lesser event was the decision by Europe and the United States to back Kosovo’s separation from Serbia. The Russians were friendly with Serbia, but the deeper issue for Russia was this: The principle of Europe since World War II was that, to prevent conflict, national borders would not be changed. If that principle were violated in Kosovo, other border shifts — including demands by various regions for independence from Russia — might follow. The Russians publicly and privately asked that Kosovo not be given formal independence, but instead continue its informal autonomy, which was the same thing in practical terms. Russia’s requests were ignored.
From the Ukrainian experience, the Russians became convinced that the United States was engaged in a plan of strategic encirclement and strangulation of Russia. From the Kosovo experience, they concluded that the United States and Europe were not prepared to consider Russian wishes even in fairly minor affairs. That was the breaking point. If Russian desires could not be accommodated even in a minor matter like this, then clearly Russia and the West were in conflict. For the Russians, as we said, the question was how to respond. Having declined to respond in Kosovo, the Russians decided to respond where they had all the cards: in South Ossetia.
Moscow had two motives, the lesser of which was as a tit-for-tat over Kosovo. If Kosovo could be declared independent under Western sponsorship, then South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the two breakaway regions of Georgia, could be declared independent under Russian sponsorship. Any objections from the United States and Europe would simply confirm their hypocrisy. This was important for internal Russian political reasons, but the second motive was far more important.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin once said that the fall of the Soviet Union was a geopolitical disaster. This didn’t mean that he wanted to retain the Soviet state; rather, it meant that the disintegration of the Soviet Union had created a situation in which Russian national security was threatened by Western interests. As an example, consider that during the Cold War, St. Petersburg was about 1,200 miles away from a NATO country. Today it is about 60 miles away from Estonia, a NATO member. The disintegration of the Soviet Union had left Russia surrounded by a group of countries hostile to Russian interests in various degrees and heavily influenced by the United States, Europe and, in some cases, China.
Resurrecting the Russian Sphere
Putin did not want to re-establish the Soviet Union, but he did want to re-establish the Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet Union region. To accomplish that, he had to do two things. First, he had to re-establish the credibility of the Russian army as a fighting force, at least in the context of its region. Second, he had to establish that Western guarantees, including NATO membership, meant nothing in the face of Russian power. He did not want to confront NATO directly, but he did want to confront and defeat a power that was closely aligned with the United States, had U.S. support, aid and advisers and was widely seen as being under American protection. Georgia was the perfect choice.
By invading Georgia as Russia did (competently if not brilliantly), Putin re-established the credibility of the Russian army. But far more importantly, by doing this Putin revealed an open secret: While the United States is tied down in the Middle East, American guarantees have no value. This lesson is not for American consumption. It is something that, from the Russian point of view, the Ukrainians, the Balts and the Central Asians need to digest. Indeed, it is a lesson Putin wants to transmit to Poland and the Czech Republic as well. The United States wants to place ballistic missile defense installations in those countries, and the Russians want them to understand that allowing this to happen increases their risk, not their security.
The Russians knew the United States would denounce their attack. This actually plays into Russian hands. The more vocal senior leaders are, the greater the contrast with their inaction, and the Russians wanted to drive home the idea that American guarantees are empty talk.
The Russians also know something else that is of vital importance: For the United States, the Middle East is far more important than the Caucasus, and Iran is particularly important. The United States wants the Russians to participate in sanctions against Iran. Even more importantly, they do not want the Russians to sell weapons to Iran, particularly the highly effective S-300 air defense system. Georgia is a marginal issue to the United States; Iran is a central issue. The Russians are in a position to pose serious problems for the United States not only in Iran, but also with weapons sales to other countries, like Syria.
Therefore, the United States has a problem — it either must reorient its strategy away from the Middle East and toward the Caucasus, or it has to seriously limit its response to Georgia to avoid a Russian counter in Iran. Even if the United States had an appetite for another war in Georgia at this time, it would have to calculate the Russian response in Iran — and possibly in Afghanistan (even though Moscow’s interests there are currently aligned with those of Washington).
In other words, the Russians have backed the Americans into a corner. The Europeans, who for the most part lack expeditionary militaries and are dependent upon Russian energy exports, have even fewer options. If nothing else happens, the Russians will have demonstrated that they have resumed their role as a regional power. Russia is not a global power by any means, but a significant regional power with lots of nuclear weapons and an economy that isn’t all too shabby at the moment. It has also compelled every state on the Russian periphery to re-evaluate its position relative to Moscow. As for Georgia, the Russians appear ready to demand the resignation of President Mikhail Saakashvili. Militarily, that is their option. That is all they wanted to demonstrate, and they have demonstrated it.
The war in Georgia, therefore, is Russia’s public return to great power status. This is not something that just happened — it has been unfolding ever since Putin took power, and with growing intensity in the past five years. Part of it has to do with the increase of Russian power, but a great deal of it has to do with the fact that the Middle Eastern wars have left the United States off-balance and short on resources. As we have written, this conflict created a window of opportunity. The Russian goal is to use that window to assert a new reality throughout the region while the Americans are tied down elsewhere and dependent on the Russians. The war was far from a surprise; it has been building for months. But the geopolitical foundations of the war have been building since 1992. Russia has been an empire for centuries. The last 15 years or so were not the new reality, but simply an aberration that would be rectified. And now it is being rectified.
*****
read the story with the active links at
http://www.stratfor.com/
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Beatty criticizes Kerry’s judgment
For those of you who do not know, Jeff Beatty is running for US Senate against John Kerry. Below is and article that blasts John Kerry for his critisizm of John McCains position on Iraq. Good stuff.
By Jeremy P. Jacobs:
Responding to U.S. Sen. John Kerry's television appearance on Sunday, Jeff Beatty, Kerry's Republican challenger, blasted the senator for criticizing another politician's judgment.
Kerry (D-Boston) repeatedly criticized presumptive Republican nominee U.S. Sen. John McCain's (R-Ariz.) judgment in the war in Iraq on CBS's "Face the Nation.
Beatty said Kerry is in no position to criticize McCain's judgment after voting to authorize the use of force in Iraq in 2002.
"Really what it goes to is his judgment," Beatty told PolitickerMA.com. "He's got no room to talk. He has voted for the war for all the wrong reasons. And, given the same facts, I would not have voted for the war."
When asked about Kerry appearance on "Face the Nation," Beatty said that Obama's willingness to listen to the military before withdrawing troops is at odds with Kerry's position. In 2006, Kerry, along with Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) introduced legislation calling for a specific timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops.
"Even right now he is still talking about his timetable to get out at any cost," Beatty said. "We can't do anything at any cost...Barack Obama himself realizes we can't get out at any cost."
Beatty said Obama's position on withdrawal is now closer to his than it is to Kerry's. "Even Barack Obama, the standard bearer of the party," he said, "has had to distance himself from Kerry's position."
The Kerry campaign dismissed the charges as trying to twist the senator's position on Iraq.
"Republican candidates," said Roger Lau, Kerry's campaign manager, "will say or do anything to avoid facing the reality that their standard bearer John McCain has a plan for staying in Iraq while Barack Obama and John Kerry have a plan for getting out of Iraq and winning the war in Afghanistan. Period. End of story."
In 2003, Beatty attended a Pentagon briefing with then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld during the run up to the war. Beatty said he was working as a security consultant on a national anti-terrorism security program. His client was invited to the briefing and insisted Beatty attend. (Beatty could not name his client due to confidentiality agreements.)
"I was presented with the same facts that Sen. Kerry was," Beatty said. "And the question comes to, are we basing this on U.S. eyes on the target [meaning we've found weapons of mass destruction] or are we basing this on a foreign agent where the more we pay him the more fantastical things he tells us."
Beatty said that following that briefing, he would not have voted to authorize the use of force.
"John Kerry had access to the same set of facts and yet he voted for the war," Beatty said. "He is just a political figure and he's not voting for the interests of the people of Massachusetts."
politickerma.com
By Jeremy P. Jacobs:
Responding to U.S. Sen. John Kerry's television appearance on Sunday, Jeff Beatty, Kerry's Republican challenger, blasted the senator for criticizing another politician's judgment.
Kerry (D-Boston) repeatedly criticized presumptive Republican nominee U.S. Sen. John McCain's (R-Ariz.) judgment in the war in Iraq on CBS's "Face the Nation.
Beatty said Kerry is in no position to criticize McCain's judgment after voting to authorize the use of force in Iraq in 2002.
"Really what it goes to is his judgment," Beatty told PolitickerMA.com. "He's got no room to talk. He has voted for the war for all the wrong reasons. And, given the same facts, I would not have voted for the war."
When asked about Kerry appearance on "Face the Nation," Beatty said that Obama's willingness to listen to the military before withdrawing troops is at odds with Kerry's position. In 2006, Kerry, along with Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) introduced legislation calling for a specific timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops.
"Even right now he is still talking about his timetable to get out at any cost," Beatty said. "We can't do anything at any cost...Barack Obama himself realizes we can't get out at any cost."
Beatty said Obama's position on withdrawal is now closer to his than it is to Kerry's. "Even Barack Obama, the standard bearer of the party," he said, "has had to distance himself from Kerry's position."
The Kerry campaign dismissed the charges as trying to twist the senator's position on Iraq.
"Republican candidates," said Roger Lau, Kerry's campaign manager, "will say or do anything to avoid facing the reality that their standard bearer John McCain has a plan for staying in Iraq while Barack Obama and John Kerry have a plan for getting out of Iraq and winning the war in Afghanistan. Period. End of story."
In 2003, Beatty attended a Pentagon briefing with then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld during the run up to the war. Beatty said he was working as a security consultant on a national anti-terrorism security program. His client was invited to the briefing and insisted Beatty attend. (Beatty could not name his client due to confidentiality agreements.)
"I was presented with the same facts that Sen. Kerry was," Beatty said. "And the question comes to, are we basing this on U.S. eyes on the target [meaning we've found weapons of mass destruction] or are we basing this on a foreign agent where the more we pay him the more fantastical things he tells us."
Beatty said that following that briefing, he would not have voted to authorize the use of force.
"John Kerry had access to the same set of facts and yet he voted for the war," Beatty said. "He is just a political figure and he's not voting for the interests of the people of Massachusetts."
politickerma.com
Bloggers Accuse Google of helping to block Anti-Obama Blogs
It has been a reported fact that the Barack Obama campaign has a very large and active "cyber-warfare" team actively surfing the web and attempting to silence the "untrue rumors" reported by the alternate media.
Well it appears that some of that team, possibly with the help of google, managed to shutdown a number of Anti-Obama blogs on the google owned site blogger. Google claims the blogs were victims of "the result of an incorrect automated response from a spam filter." But the bloggers think a loophole was exploited that allowed someone to incorrectly report their blogs and spam blogs, in effect rendering a "guilty before proven innocent" verdict.
Typical...did I mention that Barack Obama is a communist?
Read the Fox News Story
Well it appears that some of that team, possibly with the help of google, managed to shutdown a number of Anti-Obama blogs on the google owned site blogger. Google claims the blogs were victims of "the result of an incorrect automated response from a spam filter." But the bloggers think a loophole was exploited that allowed someone to incorrectly report their blogs and spam blogs, in effect rendering a "guilty before proven innocent" verdict.
Typical...did I mention that Barack Obama is a communist?
Read the Fox News Story
Friday, August 1, 2008
Another example of Communism and the Democratic Party...
...Or pherhaps we should call it Totalitarianism. Today was the last day the house was in session before the 5 weeks August break. Knowing that this was the last chance for any type of energy fix to be voted on the Democrats blocked the Republicans from debating about drilling of our shores, shut the lights out, and left! Apparently they forget about the democratic process and feel that their ideas are the only ones that matter.
Well, the Republicans felt otherwise and proceded to continue debate in the empty Capital building bringing in tourists and local citizens to listen to their speaches.
That democracy; those are republicans.
Click on this posts title to read the full report at the Politico.
Well, the Republicans felt otherwise and proceded to continue debate in the empty Capital building bringing in tourists and local citizens to listen to their speaches.
That democracy; those are republicans.
Click on this posts title to read the full report at the Politico.
If this isn't Communism
Obamas latest announcement and proposal to have big oil fund another rebate with Big Oil money should raise a red flag for Americans everywhere. Especially if you happen to own a business. The government has no right...no right at all to force a private company to give money to it citizens.
That philosophy is the foundation of communism. And that is what Barack Obama is. A Communist.
That philosophy is the foundation of communism. And that is what Barack Obama is. A Communist.
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