Monthly Archives: April 2014

Coming Together After A Horrific Event

Posted on by

Today’s Sun Journal (New Bern, North Carolina) posted an article about the way Mayor Outlaw handled the recent deadly shooting of a policeman by a local young man. The young man also wounded another policeman. The shooting was horrible, and there is no way to defend the actions of the young man, who was killed during the incident. However, many policemen and residents of New Bern have criticized the way the Mayor handled the aftermath of the event. I think the criticism is unwarranted. First of all, there is no way the Mayor could have handled this that would have pleased everyone. Second of all, the Mayor is not in office to please everyone–he is there to keep order in the town, uphold the law, and do what he believes is right.

The article explains some of the actions of the Mayor in the aftermath of the shooting:

For his part, Outlaw said he went to Stallings’ funeral Thursday because he had known the family a long time.

“When somebody dies, there is a loss to the family, it doesn’t matter to me if it was cancer, a heart attack or someone getting run over by a train, dying a violent death,” he said. “I don’t focus on the death. I focus on the family. …My thought was I have a dear friend and if that friend needs me I’m there for them. That in no way distracts my admiration and mourning for officer Alexander Thalmann. I don’t control why people die. I just know that I’m going to be there for the family.”

The Mayor did the compassionate thing, I don’t think the criticism is appropriate–he was not honoring the shooter– he was being a friend to a family going through a very difficult time. The family did not shoot the policeman–their son did. Why would anyone want to deny them their friend at their son’s funeral?

The Mayor is the Mayor of all of the City of New Bern–he has responsibilities to all of the residents along with the obligations to friends that all of us have. I understand the anger of the law enforcement community, but I don’t agree with it. This is a time to extend grace and pray for healing in the community.

Enhanced by Zemanta

The Chickens Are Coming Home To Roost

Posted on by

Even though the November election is seven months away, this is the election season. One of the goals of the Democrat party during this season is to convince Americans that ObamaCare is a good thing and that we like it. So far that effort is not going particularly well. Based on some numbers posted by Forbes Magazine, it is about to get worse.

Yesterday Forbes Magazine posted an article with the following headline:

Health Plan Premiums Are Skyrocketing According To New Survey Of 148 Insurance Brokers, With Delaware Up 100%, California 53%, Florida 37%, Pennsylvania 28%

Democrats may be okay with those numbers, but to a lot of Americans, those numbers represent one more broken promise in ObamaCare.

The article reports:

Health insurance premiums are showing the sharpest increases perhaps ever according to a survey of brokers who sell coverage in the individual and small group market. Morgan Stanley’s healthcare analysts conducted the proprietary survey of 148 brokers. The April survey shows the largest acceleration in small and individual group rates in any of the 12 prior quarterly periods when it has been conducted.

The average increases are in excess of 11% in the small group market and 12% in the individual market. Some state show increases 10 to 50 times that amount. The analysts conclude that the “increases are largely due to changes under the ACA.”

Not only has ObamaCare wrecked the American healthcare system, it has spent massive amounts of money to do so and has placed enormous financial burdens on Americans trying to purchase the required healthcare. It is truly time for ObamaCare to go away.

Enhanced by Zemanta

All Export Agreements Are Not Good Agreements

Posted on by

Yesterday Michael Ledeen posted an article at PJ Media about a recent export agreement reached with Iran.

The article reports:

Boeing and General Electric were given export licenses by the Treasury Department and everyone involved has been chanting “we take aircraft security very seriously,” in order to cloak this latest gift to the Khamenei-Rouhani regime in humanitarian hues.

Frankly I’d rather they took national security very seriously.  Iran uses its commercial aircraft for military purposes (one of the reasons that eery flight between Tehran and Caracas is so worrisome), and the mullahs have been limited by the degradation of the national fleet.  The Boeing planes and GE engines date to the 1970s, and very few of them are in service.

The Iranians are quite able to get around what is left of the sanctions on their country and are finding ways to get around the oil embargo–they are bartering with Russia and Turkey. The Russians are probably providing military equipment and the Turks are swapping for gold.
The article comments:

And so it is, indeed the war has been on for some time, and it’s a bit hotter than Cold War 1.0 was for most of the twentieth century.  Kiev burned, and may burn again soon.  Caracas is burning, as are many of Venezuela’s cities and towns.  Crimea has been annexed, and Syria is still aflame, as is Iraq, and also Yemen.  Estonia and Finland are seriously frightened, as well they should be.  If we pull back from the crisis du jour, we can see it’s a global conflict.  Iran and Russia are fighting in Syria, sometimes with and sometimes against the jihadi marauders.  Cuba is fighting in Venezuela, a country the Castros largely command, and Hezbollah is in there, too.  And for those of you who follow Africa, know that the Iranians are up to their necks in Nigeria, buying influence and supporting the mass murderers in Boko Haram.

This is not a time to be helping those that want to destroy us in any way.
The article concludes:

But, as the Ukrainian revolutionaries have found, and as the aftermath of our victory in Iraq has demonstrated, the battle against evil is not going to end on this earth, and if you fail to challenge the heart of the current darkness, you may well find things worse than they were before.  Our enemies are bursting with confidence.  They think they’ve got us.  Bret Stephens: “Mr. Putin knows Mr. Obama. He knows that the U.S. president has the digestive fortitude of a tourist in Tijuana.”

As Mr Obama runs for the Pepto Bismol, he’s arming our enemies for the next round.  So it’s gonna get worse.

Voter Fraud In The Very Early Stages Of The 2008 Election

Posted on by

On Thursday, Fox News posted a story about voter fraud during the primary election season in Indiana. Four Democrats have been charged with forging the presidential primary petitions needed to get candidates on the ballot.

The article reports:

Among those charged is the former long-time chairman of the St. Joseph County Democratic Party, Butch Morgan, who allegedly ordered the forgeries. He was forced to resign when the allegations were first made public last October, even though his lawyer, Shaw Friedman, told Fox News at the time that Morgan did not do anything wrong.

The St. Joseph County Board of Voter Registration‘s Democratic board member, Pam Brunette, Board of Voter Registration worker Beverly Shelton and Democratic volunteer and former board worker Dustin Blythe also face charges.

According to affidavits, St. Joseph County Voter Registration Office worker Lucas Burkett told investigators that he was part of the plan that started in January 2008 “to forge signatures on presidential candidate petitions instead of collecting actual signatures from citizens.”

I have no doubt that campaign workers for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Edwards could have collected enough signatures to put their candidates on the ballot. Why then did they find it necessary to forge the signatures? I have worked on election campaigns. Gathering signatures is time-intensive, but it is a necessary part of the process. I might also add that when campaign workers are gathering signatures, they have a chance to hand out information on their candidates and encourage voters to support their candidates. This fraud actually represents a missed opportunity.

What inspired these Democrats to think they could avoid the process? I am more concerned with the thinking behind the actions than the actual actions. To me, this illustrates that these people have no respect for the electoral process in their state and in America. It is my hope that the people who forged these petitions will not only go to jail, but that they will be denied voting privileges for the rest of their lives. They obviously do not respect the voting process.

Enhanced by Zemanta

This Sort Of Thing Makes My Head Hurt

Posted on by

Dr. Marty Nemko posted an article at the Daily Caller on Friday about the Common Core standards (and curriculum) that is currently being debated in many states.

The article includes a few examples of math problems included in the Common Core:

This is from the Common Core Standards for the 5th grade. All students are required to:

Generate two numerical patterns using two given rules. Identify apparent relationships between corresponding terms. Form ordered pairs consisting of corresponding terms from the two patterns, and graph the ordered pairs on a coordinate plane. For example, given the rule “Add 3″ and the starting number 0, and given the rule “Add 6″ and the starting number 0, generate terms in the resulting sequences, and observe that the terms in one sequence are twice the corresponding terms in the other sequence. Explain informally why this is so.

In the 8th grade, the Common Core requires all students to:

Solve systems of two linear equations in two variables algebraically, and estimate solutions by graphing the equations. Solve simple cases by inspection. For example, 3x + 2y = 5 and 3x + 2y = 6 have no solution because 3x + 2y cannot simultaneously be 5 and 6.

In the 9th grade:

Prove theorems about lines and angles: vertical angles are congruent; when a transversal crosses parallel lines, alternate interior angles are congruent and corresponding angles are congruent; points on a perpendicular bisector of a line segment are exactly those equidistant from the segment’s endpoints.

Lest you think I cherry-picked, here is the link to all the standards, K-12. Throughout, they are remarkably arcane and irrelevant in the real world.

I have no idea what they are trying to do to our children, but it seems to me that learning two plus two and related facts might be much more useful. When I look at the math curriculum of Common Core, it looks like ti was designed by an English major. That is not to knock English majors, but there are some people who will not grasp basic math regardless of what you do to it (I had that problem with physics).

I understand that we live in a complicated, computerized world, but I firmly believe that memorization of addition, subtraction, division, and multiplication facts builds a good foundation for learning mathematics. Common core does not build that foundation–it eschews memorization. When you don’t have a good foundation, the building collapses. I fear that we are about to collapse the American educational system by introducing Common Core. Our educational system is not perfect, but I believe that Common Core will make it worse–not better.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Keeping Politics Out Of Our Military

Posted on by

Unfortunately, we are a stage in our country where everything is political. I don’t know exactly how or when we got here or how to get our of here, but here is where we are. It was refreshing today on Fox News Sunday to hear Senator Kaine say that decisions about guns on military bases should be made by the military in order to avoid politics playing a part in the decision.

The Washington Times reported today:

“I trust the military leadership on this. I don’t live on a military base, and I don’t serve in the military,” the Virginia Democrat said on “Fox News Sunday.” “For those of us in Congress to say ‘here’s what they should do,’ I worry that it would be a little political rather than really about safety or security.”

The article also reported:

Rep. Steve Stockman, Texas Republican, is pushing “The Safe Military Bases Act,” which would allow base personnel to arm themselves.

Fellow Texas Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, argued Sunday that, at the very least, senior military leadership on base ought to be able to carry weapons.

There are a few things to consider here. If senior military leadership had been armed, would the shooter have been brought down sooner? But there is something else to consider. Fort Hood is a gun-free zone. The shooter knew that when he opened fire he would be the only gunman in the room (at least for a short time). Had the shooter known that someone in the room might be armed, would he have taken the chance? The guards at the gate cannot reasonably be expected to search every vehicle or person who comes on base for a gun–the lines getting on to the base would be endless if that were attempted. Obviously, not everyone respects a gun-free zone, so I would suggest creating the possibility that someone in any given area of the base would be armed and prepared to shoot back in case of an attack. It is noteworthy that most of the mass killings we have seen have occurred in gun-free zones, where the killer knew that there would be no opposition. I think we need to create at least some potential opposition.

Enhanced by Zemanta

About That Presidential Victory Lap Last Week

Posted on by

Today’s U.K. Daily Mail posted an article posted a story about President Obama’s statement on Tuesday that “The debate over repealing this law is over. The Affordable Care Act is here to stay.” The basis for this statement was the President’s claim that 7.1 million Americans have signed up for ObamaCare. Well, that may or may not be the case.

The article reports:

But buried in the 7.1 million enrollments he announced in a heavily staged appearance is a more unsettling reality.

Numbers from a RAND Corporation study that has been kept under wraps suggest that barely 858,000 previously uninsured Americans – nowhere near 7.1 million – have paid for new policies and joined the ranks of the insured by Monday night.

Others were already insured, including millions who lost coverage when their existing policies were suddenly cancelled because they didn’t meet Obamacare’s strict minimum requirements.

Still, he claimed that ‘millions of people who have health insurance would not have it’ without his insurance law.’

‘The goal we’ve set for ourselves – that no American should go without the health care they need … is achievable,’ Obama declared.

There is a lot of information in the Rand Study that makes the accuracy of the President’s statements very questionable. The deadline to enroll in ObamaCare has been extended and now depends on someone simply saying that they tried to enroll, with no verification.

We may or may not be stuck with ObamaCare, but frankly I would be very suspicious of any numbers regarding ObamaCare released by the White House.

Enhanced by Zemanta

The Complete Employment Picture

Posted on by

Yesterday CBS News posted an article about jobs and employment in America. On Friday the Labor Department announced that the unemployment rate has remained at 6.7 percent and that 192,000 new jobs were added in March. That sounds reasonable, but it does not tell the whole story.

The article included the following snapshot of the statistics:

march-jobs.jpg

There are currently 7.4 million Americans who are working part-time because full-time jobs are not available. The economy has not recovered from the 2008 recession, and unfortunately until ObamaCare is repealed, it will not. As long as employers can save large amounts of money by hiring part-time employees that they do not have to provide healthcare for, they will do so. Robert Gibbs suggested this week that the employer mandate would probably never actually go into effect. If the employer mandate does not go into effect, America may see the return of the full-time worker. However, if the employer mandate does not go into effect, and the uninsured do not sign up for ObamaCare (which they have not), then what exactly did ObamaCare accomplish other than totally disrupting the American medical infrastructure?

Enhanced by Zemanta

Not Everyone Cheers When The Playing Field Is Leveled

Posted on by

Michael Graham posted an article in the Boston Herald today about the recent Supreme Court decision on campaign donations.

Michael Graham explains why the decision is important to Massachusetts:

The U.S. Supreme Court’s campaign-finance ruling is the first ray of sunshine to reach the Massachusetts Republican party in a long time.

To understand why, you need to know three simple facts about who pays for campaigns, facts that are almost never reported in the mainstream media:

• Six of the top 10 campaign donors are unions. And their money overwhelmingly goes to Democrats. Incumbent Democrats in particular.

• Sixteen of the top 25 campaign funders are liberal, Democratic organizations like ActBlue ($97 million in campaign cash since 1989), which also give disproportionately to incumbents. Only three of the top 25 are Republican.

• None of them are the Koch Brothers. (They rank 57th.)

If you haven’t figured it out, the purpose of campaign finance restrictions is to protect incumbent politicians. This shouldn’t be a surprise given that these laws were passed by … incumbent politicians.

And in Massachusetts, “incumbent” is a synonym for “Democrat.” (When it comes to federal office-holders here, that is literally true.) So any change that makes life more difficult for incumbents is good news for the local GOP.

Union money has bought and sold elections in Massachusetts and some other states for a very long time. This ruling levels the playing field and lets other people with money play. That is why the Democrat party is making such a big deal about it.

The unintended consequence of this ruling may be that being able to be in public office long enough to go from being broke to multi millionaire may no longer be possible. It may be that being in public office may no longer be a career. Keep in mind that our founding fathers envisioned a government made up of ordinary citizens. Unfortunately we have forgotten that concept and created career politicians.

Not everyone loves it when you level the playing field.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Those Speaking Against Intolerance Have Become Intolerant

Posted on by

The Foundry is reporting today that Mozilla Corp. co-founder Brendan Eich has resigned as CEO after a week of public criticism for his support of Proposition 8 in California. Proposition 8 was the ballot initiative that defined marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Brendan Eich had been at Mozilla for 15 years.

I have a few problems with the forced resignation of Mr. Eich. How does anyone know he contributed to a campaign supporting Proposition 8? Is that public information? Since when did supporting traditional marriage cost you your job? Aren’t Americans allowed to contribute to things they believe in?

The intolerance shown by those forcing Mr. Eich to step down is many times worse than the intolerance those people are accusing Mr. Eich of. It is really sad that there is no room for a discussion of the history or tradition of marriage here–Mr. Eich is simply condemned because he supports something that has been a tradition for thousands of years. That is sad.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Free Speech Is Still Part Of The U.S Constitution

Posted on by

The Foundry at Heritage.org posted a story yesterday (with a video) about the efforts of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) to block the showing of the movie “Honor Diaries” from being shown on college campuses.

The article reports:

Kelly last night questioned CAIR Chicago representative Agnieszka Karoluk on “The Kelly File” about the group’s opposition to “Honor Diaries,”  a documentary that addresses abuses  such as female genital mutilation, forced marriages, and the oppression of women in Muslim society – what one commentator in the film calls “systematic, institutionalized misogyny.”

Karoluk, herself a Muslim woman, said that although CAIR  doesn’t oppose raising awareness, the source of funding for the film, the Clarion Project, is “Islamophobic.”  The film’s backers, she said, “use it to promote their own hate-filled agenda.”

…Kelly also spoke Monday night about the film. The documentary, she reported, features “a diverse group of women with different faiths, backgrounds, and nationalities, all of them focused on promoting women’s rights, especially in countries where women and girls are often subjected to something known as honor violence.”

There is nothing hate-filled about showing a film that reveals the abuses of women under Islam. There is everything hate-filled about trying to prevent people from learning about those abuses.

Here is the video:

Enhanced by Zemanta

Oklahoma Moves To Ditch Common Core

Posted on by

Yesterday National Review Online posted an article announcing that Oklahoma is preparing to withdraw the state from the Common Core standards.

The article reports:

The bill to get the Sooner State (out) was hugely popular in both houses. House Bill 3399 was approved by the state house in a 78 to 12 vote before being sent to the state senate for amendments. On Tuesday, the state senate voted 37 to 10 in favor of the bill. The bill will now go to the House for another vote before being sent to the governor’s desk.

Oklahoma was one of the first states to adopt the Common Core standards in June of 2010, after a vote by the state board of education. However, the Sooner State later dropped out of the Common Core’s standardized testing consortium in the summer of 2013. Fallin then issued an executive order in December directing the Secretary of Education to make sure the federal government “does not intrude in Oklahoma’s development of academic curricula and teaching strategies.”

Evidently Governor Fallin took a closer look at the curricula and teaching strategies.

The problem with Common Core is not the idea of setting standards–we all want high educational standards for our children and grandchildren. The problem with Common Core is the curricula and teaching strategies–the method used to teach math to elementary children is so complex that people with advanced degrees struggle with it. Some of the reading material recommended in the curricula is not age-appropriate for any age. One textbook recommended to be used with Common Core for high school history describes America as the aggressor in World War II. Again, the problem is not the standards–it’s the curricula and teaching strategies.

I hope that more states will follow the example of Indiana (which has already opted out of Common Core) and Oklahoma.

Enhanced by Zemanta

What Voter Fraud?

Posted on by

Right now, North Carolina’s voter Identification law is making its way through the courts. A well-placed source told me recently that he expected the law to stand as is without a problem–when it was passed, court challenges were anticipated. The argument of those who do not support voter identification laws has always been that there is no voter fraud. I beg to differ.

PJ Media reported yesterday that there was massive voter fraud in the 2012 election in North Carolina.

The article cites some examples:

  • 765 voters with an exact match of first and last name, DOB and last four digits of SSN were registered in N.C. and another state and voted in N.C. and the other state in the 2012 general election.
  • 35,750 voters with the same first and last name and DOB were registered in N.C. and another state and voted in both states in the 2012 general election.
  • 155,692 voters with the same first and last name, DOB and last four digits of SSN were registered in N.C. and another state – and the latest date of registration or voter activity did not take place within N.C.

There is a 28-state crosscheck of voter roles that can be used to check for voter fraud. The numbers above are a result of that crosscheck. Imagine what the numbers would be if there were a 50-state crosscheck.

The article reports:

The findings, while large, leave open the question of just how widespread double voting might be since 22 states did not participate in the Interstate Crosscheck.

In addition to the above, the crosscheck found that more than 13,000 deceased voters remain on North Carolina’s rolls, and that 81 of them showed voter activity in their records after death.

If nothing else, these number make the case that voter identification laws are necessary if we are to preserve the integrity of the voting process.

Enhanced by Zemanta

When Cuts Aren’t Cuts

Posted on by

The CATO Institute posted an article yesterday about Congressman Paul Ryan’s budget proposal.

The article included this chart which tracks spending in the coming years under Congressman Paul Ryan’s proposed budget:

The chart below compares Paul Ryan’s budget against the CBO projections of the federal budget:

Notice that there are no actual spending cuts in Paul Ryan’s budget–it simply represents a slower rate of growth.

The article reports:

Chairman Ryan’s budget would spend $42.6 trillion over the next ten years. Opponents will say that Ryan’s budget slashes federal spending, while supporters will say that it includes large budgetary savings. The reality is that Ryan’s budget would increase spending at an annual average rate of 3.5 percent, or from $3.54 trillion in 2014 to $5.0 trillion in 2024. Only in Washington would that be considered substantial restraint, let alone slashing.

Until we change the culture of Washington, we can expect to see Congress drive America into bankruptcy. If you want to see change, you need to change the people you vote for. Continually voting for the people who keep spending high will not result in lower spending.  Most of the establishment Republicans (as well as the Democrats) have forgotten their promises to cut spending. Those Republicans need to be replaced by people who will remember their promises.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Why Are We Still Supporting This?

Posted on by

On Saturday The Times of Israel posted an article about the latest meeting of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) meeting. The UNHRC voted for five resolutions condemning Israel. The resolutions were widely supported by the UNHRC. There were no resolutions regarding the persecutions of Christians in Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran, or Egypt.

The article reports:

One such resolution, entitled “Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including East Jerusalem, and in the occupied Syrian Golan,” is part of the UNHRC’s permanent Agenda item 7 on Israel. Israel is the only country on the Council’s permanent agenda.

Although the four resolutions that dealt with Palestinian topics were all adopted by a vote of 46 to 1, the fifth, which was sponsored by the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad and demanded that Israel return the “Syrian Golan,” received more limited support. That resolution passed by a vote of 33 to 1, with 13 abstentions.

During the debate before the votes, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Paula Schriefer denounced the resolutions.

“None of the world’s worst human rights violators, some of whom are the object of resolutions at this session, have their own stand-alone agenda item at this Council. Only Israel, a vibrant and open democracy, receives such treatment,” said Schriefer.

“Not only are the resolutions under this agenda item biased, but they work against our collective efforts to advance a peaceful resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict,” added Schriefer, who led the U.S. delegation to the UNHRC. “This Council continually singles out Israel for criticism without acknowledging the violent attacks directed at its people, nor the obligations and difficult steps of both sides to resolve the conflict.”

Christians in Egypt, Syria, and Iran are being beaten and killed, and the UNHRC is worried about Israel, where Arabs have more freedom than anywhere in the Middle East. Really? It is time for America to ask the United Nations to go somewhere else. The United Nations has been taken over by a political bloc of countries that are run by tyrants who do not support democracy or religious freedom. It is time for them to go.

Enhanced by Zemanta

If You Are Looking For Information On Common Core, This Might Be Helpful

Posted on by

YouTube has posted two videos about Common Core. One is a trailer for the other. If you have the time, watch the 40 minute video–not the trailer. It is worth it.

Here is the trailer:

Here is the entire video:

Both of these videos explain why parents and grandparents should be greatly concerned about the impact Common Core will have on their children’s and grandchildren’s education.

Enhanced by Zemanta

How To Stop The Advance Of Vladimir Putin

Posted on by

Frank Gaffney, Jr. posted an article today at the Center For Security Policy website explaining how to stop Vladimir Putin’s plans to create the former Russian empire.

The article explains how Putin uses the price of natural gas to advance his program:

Russian president Vladimir Putin has just increased by over forty percent the price of natural gas Russia supplies to Ukraine.

This isn’t the first time Putin has used energy as a weapon against Ukraine and others. We should be doing everything possible to make it the last time, though.

Russia’s role as a major exporter of oil and natural gas is a two-edged sword. Yes, the Kremlin can squeeze those dependent on its exports for political or strategic purposes. But the Russian economy is also critically dependent upon such energy sales.

America has the answer to both stopping the Russian blackmail of Ukraine and to collapsing the Russian economy. It’s actually very simple. Begin to develop and export our own natural gas resources. It would probably take less than a year and Russia would lose its leverage over Ukraine and much of Europe. It’s simple and would also help the American economy.

Enhanced by Zemanta

The Next Step After Ukraine?

Posted on by

Yesterday NBC News posted a story about Russian military drills near Finland.

The article reports:

Troops and jet fighters from all four military regions of Russia were deployed Sunday about 150 miles east of the Finnish border, according to the English-language newspaper Finnbay. The Russian defense ministry said in a statement that the exercises were pre-planned and that more than 50 fighter pilots took part.

Vladimir Putin has stated that he wants to restore Russia to its former glory. The article reminds us that Finland was part of the Russian empire for 108 years, from 1809 until Russia’s withdrawal from World War I in 1917.

The article explains Vladimire Putin’s goal:

This anxiety was heightened Sunday after one of Putin’s closest former advisers told the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet that the Kremlin would seek “historical justice” by reclaiming Finland and ex-Soviet countries as part of an enlarged Russian Federation.

 “Putin’s view is that he protects what belongs to him and his predecessors,” wrote Andrei Illarionov, according to a translation by the Moscow Times.

“Parts of Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic states and Finland are states where Putin claims to have ownership,” said Illarionov, who is now a senior fellow at the Washington, D.C.,-based Cato Institute.

Finland is a member of the European Union. Theoretically, Europe would come to its defense if it were attacked. Finland was also the only European nation involved in World War II to avert a foreign occupation. Obviously we would all be better off if Russia were not flexing its muscles at Ukraine and Finland, but until America has a strong leader in the White House we can expect to see more of this.

Enhanced by Zemanta