Today is Bowe Tuesday...again.

Keep him in your prayers this Thanksgiving.

Pray that he comes home soon...

Netanyahu Rebukes Obama in Phone Call About Iran Deal

Leah Barkoukis / Townhall Columnist

 

Since the Iran nuclear deal was announced on Sunday, top Republicans and Democrats have blasted it, former Ambassador to the UN John Bolton called the deal an “abject surrender by the United States,” and one of our closest allies is “extremely angry,” to say the least. That ally, as you well know by now, is Israel. And the Sunday phone call between the two world leaders went just as you would imagine.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

A lawmaker from Netanyahu's Likud faction told an Israeli television station earlier on Monday that the premier rebuked US President Barack Obama over the interim agreement agreed upon by the Western powers and Iran on Sunday. 

"The prime minister made it clear to the most powerful man on earth that if he intends to stay the most powerful man on earth, it's important to make a change in American policy because the practical result of his current policy is liable to lead him to the same failure that the Americans absorbed in North Korea and Pakistan, and Iran could be next in line," Likud Beytenu MK Tzachi Hanegbi told the Knesset Channel.

Obama called Netanyahu on Sunday from Air Force One to discuss theinterim agreementstruck between world powers and Iran.

The White House’s statement on the phone call said “the two leaders reaffirmed their shared goal of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon,” but failed to mention any disagreement between them. No surprise there.

What did come out of the phone call, however, was an agreement that an Israeli diplomatic team would come to the US in the coming days to discuss a final agreement with Iran.

Random Thoughts

Thomas Sowell/ Townhall Columnist

Random thoughts on the passing scene:

Many people take pride in defying the conventions of society. Those conventions of society are also known as civilization. Defying them wholesale means going back to barbarism. Barbarians with electronic devices are still barbarians.

After the government shutdown crisis, the one thing that Congressional Democrats and Republicans finally agreed on was to kick the can down the road a few more months, so that we can go through all this again -- and perhaps again after that.

One of the best peace speeches I ever read was one delivered back in the 1930s -- by Adolf Hitler! He knew that peace speeches would keep the Western democracies from matching his military buildup with their own, or attacking him to prevent his buildup from continuing. Peace speeches by Iran today serve the same purpose of buying time -- until they can create a nuclear bomb.

President Obama really has a way with words, such as calling the problems that millions of people have had trying to sign up for ObamaCare "glitches." When the Titanic sank, was that a "glitch"?

Among the painful signs of our time are TV programs built around paternity tests. Apparently the way these women live, it is anybody's guess who their child's father might be.

Don't you love it when a politicians says, "I take full responsibility"? Translated into plain English, that says, "Now that I have admitted it, there is nothing more for me to do (such as resign) and nothing for anyone else to do (such as fire me)." Saying "I take full responsibility" is like a get-out-of-jail-free card in the Monopoly game.

No one seems as certain that they know what the Republicans need to do to win presidential elections as those Republicans who have lost presidential elections, such as Mitt Romney, John McCain and Bob Dole. Moreover, people take them seriously, and seem not to notice that what the losers advocate is the opposite of what won Ronald Reagan two landslide election victories.

If you believe in equal rights, then what do "women's rights," "gay rights," etc., mean? Either they are redundant or they are violations of the principle of equal rights for all.

One of the painfully sobering realizations that come from reading history is the utter incompetence that is possible among leaders of whole nations and empires -- and the blind faith that such leaders can nevertheless inspire among the people who are enthralled by their words or their posturing.

The one thing that the national debt ceiling does not do is put a ceiling on the national debt. It just provides political melodrama when the existing ceiling is repeatedly raised to accommodate ever higher spending.

Those who want to "spread the wealth" almost invariably seek to concentrate the power. It happens too often, and in too many different countries around the world, to be a coincidence. Which is more dangerous, inequalities of wealth or concentrations of power?

President Obama said to the world that Bashar Assad's days as ruler of Syria are numbered. All our days are numbered but Assad will probably still be ruling Syria on Obama's last day in the White House.

Parole is just another way of lying to the public -- in this case, lying about the time that convicted criminals will spend behind bars. Suspended sentences are another form of make-believe punishment to mollify the public.

Writing about the Habsburg Empire, distinguished British historian Paul Johnson said, "Every reform created more problems than it solved." That was not peculiar to the Habsburg Empire. The same could be said of modern welfare states, and especially our own ObamaCare.

Because many of us make mistakes that can have bad consequences, some intellectuals believe that it is the role of government to intervene and make some of our decisions for us. From what galaxy government is going to hire creatures who do not make mistakes is a question they leave unanswered.

One of the reasons it has taken so long for some people to finally see through Barack Obama is that people do not like to admit, even to themselves, that they have been played for fools by a slick-talking politician.

FBI Hate Crime Statistics for 2012
From: Bare Naked Islam

Ibrahim ‘Uncle Dougie’ Hooper of CAIR is furiously wringing his hands trying to figure out how to spin this report into his ‘Any Criticism of Islam is a Muslim Hate Crime’ crusade.

Religious Bias

Of the 1,340 victims of an anti-religious hate crime:

• 62.4 percent were victims of an offender’s anti-Jewish bias.

• 11.6 percent were victims of an anti-Islamic bias.

• 7.5 percent were victims of a bias against groups of individuals of varying religions (anti-multiple religions, group).

• 6.4 percent were victims of an anti-Catholic bias.

• 2.6 percent were victims of an anti-Protestant bias.

• 0.9 percent were victims of an anti-Atheist/Agnostic bias.

• 8.6 percent were victims of a bias against other religions (anti-other religion). (Based on Table 1.)

FBI

Six-month freeze on hold: Iran can continue nuke activities until details of deal are finalized

From Jihad Watch / Posted by Robert Spencer

Fox and prey

Is there any possible way this deal gives anything to the West, or is it just a nuclear bomb tied with a ribbon and FedExed to Tehran with directions to Tel Aviv enclosed?

"Deal or No Deal," by Adam Kredo for the Washington Free Beacon, November 25:

The final details of a nuclear agreement signed over the weekend between Iran and Western nations will not actually go into effect until further negotiations take place at a later date, according to a senior administration official and sources on Capitol Hill. 

Even as Iran and the P5+1 announced late Saturday night that they had reached a six-month interim deal that curbs Iran’s nuclear program while giving Tehran the ability to continue some uranium enrichment activities, it is now clear that the six-month freeze will not go into effect until the P5+1 negotiators and Iran agree to a final plan to implement the interim agreement.

“Technical details to implement the Joint Plan of Action must be finalized before the terms of the Plan begin,” a senior administration official told the Washington Free Beacon on Monday. “The P5+1 and Iran are working on what the timeframe is.”

Congressional sources confirmed that the freeze would not actually begin until the parties agree to sign a supplemental agreement that puts the framework into effect.

That means the six-month clock referenced by the administration and media has not yet started. Iran can continue its most controversial nuclear activities as negotiators work to finalize the interim deal reached over the weekend.

“There is no deal in place,” a senior congressional aide briefed on the deal told the Free Beacon. “The agreement signed this weekend was not an actual agreement—it was a list of ideas with no way to implement them.”...

‘I Won’t Enforce It’: Pro-2nd Amendment Stance Helps New York Sheriff Dominate In Re-Election Bid 

by Ben Bullard  / Personal Liberty Digest

SPECIAL

Sheriff Tim Howard

Back in May, one county sheriff pledged not to enforce the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement (SAFE) Act, a bill that came early in the post-Newtown backlash of knee-jerk gun control legislation that swept through the Nation’s social progressivism outposts.

That sheriff, Tim Howard of Erie County, signed on to a lawsuit against the SAFE Act along with other New York sheriffs, and famously told The Buffalo News: “I won’t enforce it.”

Howard was up for re-election this year, and he faced two opponents in the general election in early November. But Howard’s stance on gun control resonated with Erie County voters. Here’s how The Buffalo News revisited Howard’s political arc after he won his third term in office:

Four words that he uttered at a news conference last May helped Timothy B. Howard win a third term as Erie County sheriff.

The words were “I won’t enforce it,” and Howard was talking about the SAFE Act, a controversial new state firearms law that has outraged gun owners.

The support of angry firearms owners helped the Republican sheriff to a big win Tuesday over his Democratic Party opponent, retired Sheriff’s Deputy Richard E. Dobson, and Sheriff’s Lt. Bert D. Dunn, a Law and Order Party candidate who lost the Democratic nomination in the September primary.

…Late Tuesday night, a jubilant Howard thanked his supporters and leaders of the Republican and Conservative parties for helping him win. He said people all over Erie County have thanked him for his stand on the gun issue.

“I did what I thought was the right thing to do,” Howard told The Buffalo News. “People in Western New York feel strongly about the Constitution and Albany’s misreading of it.”

The Erie County sheriff’s office is reportedly the largest local police force in western New York, with 1,000 employees and a budget that tops $100 million. Howard’s position at the center of the sheriffs’ collective rebuttal to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat who pushed hard for the SAFE Act’s swift passage into law, has been a high-profile one.

Howard went a step further than many of his law enforcement peers in New York, filing an amicus curiae brief on behalf of New York sheriffs attached to the SAFE Act lawsuit. The suit, originally brought in Federal court by the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, claims the law infringed on citizens’ 2^nd Amendment rights. The suit is ongoing.

Howard never took a defiant position against the SAFE Act in his own county; he simply said he would not initiate any enforcement proceedings that would bring the State into an adversarial relationship with citizens who choose to violate it, because the Nation’s founding documents take precedence over subsequent laws that abrogate their instructions.

“The Constitution is the law of the land,” Howard said in May. “If you know it’s a violation of the Constitution, how can you enforce it? … I don’t think we’re going to suppress evidence; I just don’t think we’ll be actively pursuing it.”

Op-ed: 
Betrayed and left behind 
By: Diane Sori

Shameful…utterly and completely shameful for America is NOT supposed to leave anyone behind.

Four were left behind in Benghazi to die…Bowe Bergdahl is still a prisoner of the Taliban who Obama now wants to negotiate with…an 85-year old Korean War veteran is being detained in North Korea and no one has any idea why…and Pastor Saeed Abedini…an Iranian born American citizen who converted from islam to become an ordained Evangelical pastor…has languished for over a year in the hell-holes that are the signature of Iranian jails.

His crime…Abedini is a Christian pastor who chose to practice his Christian faith…to preach Christianity in Iranian homes while in Iran to continue work on an orphanage he was building and building it with government approval. Arrested while with relatives, Abedini was convicted on charges of ‘crimes against national security’ and was given an eight-year prison sentence.

And so while leaving a POW, American diplomats, and an elderly veteran behind are crimes in and of themselves which this administration is most definitely guilty of…add in now that Barack HUSSEIN Obama is also guilty of leaving a ‘man of the cloth’ behind…an American pastor whose only crime was simply spreading the word of Jesus Christ. And so red flags should be raised for every American of faith as Barack HUSSEIN Obama…the man who professes to be a Christian…had a perfect opportunity to secure Abedini’s release…an opportunity as in if Iran wanted some sanctions lifted the pastor MUST be set free…and that should NOT have been open to any negotiations…period.

But this president…a president who has turned GITMO into a country club for terrorists…cares NOT about the torture…both physical and mental…that is the harsh reality of Abedini’s current life. And last week’s talks in Geneva were seen by Abedani's family as holding the key to his release, but the Obama White House confirmed that Abedini’s imprisonment was NOT even mentioned during those talks.

NOT even mentioned…NOT brought up at all…for Iran had NO incentive to release him as Obama capitulated on everything they wanted...as Obama’s shill John ‘Swiftboat’ Kerry remained silent…calculatingly silent even after the American Center for Law and Justice, which represents the Abedini’s family, sent Kerry a letter urging him to demand Abedini’s release as a condition of any agreement on Iran’s nuclear program.

But we all know that letter was ignored and so Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel of the The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) issued this statement, “President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry turned their backs on a U.S. citizen by refusing to secure his freedom before reaching an agreement with Iran.”

And amazingly…and I NEVER thought I would ever say this…NOT all the blame for Abedani being left behind can be placed on Obama and Kerry alone for where is the mass outrage from America’s Christian community…why for the most part have they remained silent…is it that all the scandals currently on America’s plate have so distracted them from focusing on one of their own in grave danger…could the hit to their collective pocketbooks have redirected their moral compass inward allowing the severity of the scandals to have turned America’s Christian heart cold…it sadly seems that way.

Or could it simply be that the plight of one lowly man…a man who knowingly knew the consequences of his actions before he ever set foot on Iranian soil…is just NOT worth the risk involved in helping him.

Now in NO way am I saying that America’s Christian community does NOT care…I’m saying the extent of their caring…the volume of their voices…seems quite limited in its scope in this particular case. There are petitions circulating to try and secure Abedani’s release…there are a few scattered here and there rallies to bring his plight to the public consciousness…there are letters being written to Congressmen by many of all faiths…but all this is moot as the number of voices is just too small to be taken seriously by this administration…an administration headed by a man who believes the muslim call to prayer is the most beautiful sound in the world.

And that says it all for America’s muslim president…and make NO mistake Barack HUSSEIN Obama is a muslim…could care less about the plight of a Christian pastor never mind that he’s an American citizen.

But above all else…and another black eye delivered by Obama to the American people of all faiths…is that by Abdeini’s plight NOT being part of the negotiations…actually NOT being a precursor to any negotiations even being discussed…shows Iran and the world that Barack HUSSEIN Obama believes that American lives…Christian lives…are indeed expendable. And by the very deal reached, Barack HUSSEIN Obama has also proved that Jewish lives…whether American Jews or Israeli Jews…are just as expendable.

And so Pastor Abedani is left to languish in Rajee Shahr Prison in the city of Karaj, one of the worst of all Iranian prisons…a prison where political inmates like Abedani are put in 10′ by 10′ cells with five other inmates in the ward reserved for murderers and rapists. And while Iran has said he can go free if he renounces his Christian faith and becomes a follower of Islam once again, Abedani…a man of principal and faith…has decided to stand strong with his God…the one true living God of the Christians and Jews.

And that is something Barack HUSSEIN Obama cares NOTHING about for his god is NOT Abedani’s God…nor is his god the God our great nation was founded upon…and to that I say…period.