May 21, 2010 — Contents

FRIDAY MAY 21 CONTENTS

(1)  EDITORIAL:  Russia, Pipeline to Terror

(2)  COLUMNIST:  Russia and the WTO

(3)  EDITORIAL:  Barack Obama, Traitor

(4)  The Treachery of Barack Obama

(5)  The Nightmare that is Barack Obama

NOTE:  A special issue today, devoted to the horrifying “foreign policy” of the Obama administration towards Russia, made more special by an original contribution from our old friend Professor Ethan Burger.

EDITORIAL: Russia, Pipeline to Terror

EDITORIAL

Russia, purveyor to Terror

Russia proudly announced last week that it plans to deliver vast quantities of offensive weapons, including fighter jets and armored attack vehicles, to Syria, as well as defensive systems for nuclear technology it also plans to to hand over the the rogue regime in Damascus.

So Russia is a pipeline to Syria.  That crazed dictatorship, of course, is itself a pipeline — to the Hezbollah terrorist organization which is committed to the destruction of one of America’s closest allies, Israel, as well as to the United States itself, no differently than Osama bin Laden.  In fact, as Pajamas Media reports, Russia is even manufacturing covert weaponry which appears to have terrorists as its primary market.

We can’t help but wonder:  How would Russia react if the United States decided to begin pumping dangerous offensive weapons into a country that was well known to be supplying the same weapons to the terrorist “bandits” of Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia?  Would Russians be inclined to say “that’s America’s right, it’s none of our concern?” Or would they be outraged and demand that the U.S. cease such actions immediately?

COLUMNIST: Russia and the WTO

Russia and the WTO

by Ethan S. Burger

Original to La Russophobe

Ethan Burger

In 2002, at a conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, as part of a panel a U.S. government official gave a presentation praising all the new legislation Russia was enacting. He suggested that “western technical” assistance in the legal area was having a real impact in the country. The next speaker was a Russian law professor who specializes in anti-corruption and human rights matters. He began his remarks with the comment that while he enjoyed the prior’s speaker’s remarks, it was unfortunate that he was describing a country that did not exist.

Russia is now seeking entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO). It should not be allowed to join this body until it enforces its own domestic laws, amends its restrictive foreign investment laws, and observes its existing international obligations. Russia has a poor record in applying the 1959 U.N. Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Arbitral Awards. Its does uphold its obligations under, or follow the standards and guidelines of, arising from its membership in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Cyber attacks on Estonia and Britain has arisen from its territory (arguably NATO should have responded). It foreign policy to a great extent seems aimed “reset” Europe to the Cold War era (although it has apparently privatized or contracted out formally state activities. Russia is not so powerful that it should not be challenged for its aggressive actions.

EDITORIAL: Barack Obama, Traitor

EDITORIAL

Barack Obama, Traitor

In today’s issue we republish an op-ed piece by David J. Kramer, a former Bush administration State Department official in Eastern Europe.  Kramer’s scathing condemnation of Barack Obama’s cowardly betrayal of American allies in the region is required reading for anyone who is concerned about Russian imperialist aggression.

In a second piece, from the Huffington Post of all places, Ken Blackwell documents how, at every geopolitical turn, Obama’s “foreign policy” has been naive, misguided and ended in failure.

In an original column, scholar Ethan Burger points out the folly of allowing Russia to join the WTO without embracing the WTO’s core values, making Russia a fox in the proverbial hen house.

Finally, in our lead editorial, we show how Russia is rapidly becoming a world-leading pipeline of dangerous offensive weapons to rogue terrorist states like Syria and venal terrorist groups like Hezbollah.

It all adds up to just one thing:  Obama is, willfully or not, undeniably a traitor to American values and the nation that elected him to lead it.

The Treachery of Barack Obama

David Kramer, a senior transatlantic fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and a former deputy assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs in the George W. Bush administration, writing in the Washington Post:

The most glaring example of this trend came this week. In a message accompanying the White House’s resubmission to Congress of a nuclear cooperation pact with Russia, President Obama declared that the situation in Georgia “need no longer be considered an obstacle to proceeding” with congressional review of the agreement. The Bush administration signed this “123” agreement in May 2008 but withdrew it from congressional consideration four months later, knowing it would be rejected in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Georgia that August. Russian forces continue to occupy separatist parts of Georgia in Abkhazia and South Ossetia in blatant violation of the cease-fire agreement between the two countries and are constructing bases in both regions, which Moscow has recognized as independent states. The situation remains tense and could easily explode again.

The Nightmare that is Barack Obama

Ken Blackwell, writing on the Huffington Post:

As a candidate, Barack Obama wowed the world. He went to Berlin and gave a speech at their victory monument. It was a curious venue for such a speech. But a million Germans came out to hear him. It was a phenomenal scene. No one remembers what he said there, but it was quite a show. A year later, when he returned to the continent, as president, he spoke at Normandy. No one can quite recall what Obama said, but everyone remembers what Newsweek’s Evan Thomas said: “I mean in a way Obama’s standing above the country, above — above the world, he’s sort of God.”

If you are hailed as a “sort of God,” it’s no wonder that your head gets turned. You don’t want to seem puffed up, or succumb to the sin of pride. So you start apologizing. Not for yourself, but for your country. America has been arrogant, you tell the world. America has tried to go it alone. America has not sufficiently respected the rest of the world. And you bow. You bow a lot.