The Arrogance of Fools

I watched the Kerry speech about Israel and the settlements with interest. As the speech dragged on and while watching this hypocritical attempt at sincerity and balance... the nausea took over. Most Jewish folk have a centuries old and ingrained sense of foreboding when confronted by hostility in sheep's clothing. Listening to John Kerry whine how he really loved Israel, had climbed Masada, how some of his best friends were Israeli's and what he was doing was for our own good, Einstein's definition of insanity (doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results) flashed through my mind.

The modern day Middle East was created by an Englishman and a Frenchman after the First World War. They manufactured countries by drawing lines on a map and dividing the area between England and France...The Sykes - Picot Agreement. They were secure in the knowledge that European culture and superiority would last for centuries while the barbarians in the area would do as they were told. The wheeling and dealing reached a peak when the members of the Hussein bin Ali family (hashemites) ruled Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Iraq. In short, Arab nation states were created by a stroke of a pen and ruled by brothers, uncles and cousins. 

The importance of oil soon became evident and these nation states understood the power that came with the black gold. The UN quickly became inundated with men in flowing robes while Europe and the US kowtowed to the monster they had created. The monster instantly realized that with all this power, they could create nation states and so the myth of a Palestinian nation state was born. I could go into all the details of how the Arab nation states with all its billions kept the so-called potential Palestinian nation state poor and armed to the teeth, but that is a story for another day.

Bottom line, the Two State Solution, rejected by the arabs in 1948 was reborn. Decades went by without agreement and the oil weapon went into decline. A new messiah then arrived in the US by name Obama. Cheered on by Hollywood and CNN, encouraged by demonstrations in the Arab countries, he decided the time was right for the birth of democracy in the Middle East. On national TV he declared "Mubarak must go, Assad must go. Free and fair elections for all. An Arab Spring is on the horizon". Who could stop the great Obama revolution? Well, the rest is history. The Arab nation states disintegrated into civil wars. The Sykes - Picot map collapsed. Israel stood firm and flourished. But no...wait... another late twist in the tale.

This selfsame president, the same man whose foreign policy resulted in the death and destruction for millions and created a refugee problem of epic proportions, refused to believe the evidence before his eyes. After seeing the barbarism of ISIS, Assad and Hamas. After witnessing the terrorist attacks and the rape epidemic in Europe and finally after the collapse of the Arab nation states, this petty man sends his poodle John Kerry to advocate for the birth of a new mythical Arab nation state and blames Israel and the settlements for the lack thereof. So in conclusion, Obama the messiah is just a mere man blinded by his own intellectual ignorance. A man whom in his final year as president I regarded as a class act. Man, was I was wrong....big time!

The smaller the mind the greater the conceit - Aesop

Each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it - George Orwell

The world is not fair, and often fools, cowards, liars and the selfish hide in high places -  Bryant H. McGill

George Friedman is regarded as the foremost geopolitical analyst in the world. He established "Stratfor" and recently has established "GPF Geopolitical Futures". He advises most major intelligence services  around the world and when he analyzes, most world leaders read and take note. This is a long analysis and I have taken the liberty of shortening some paragraphs. The bottom line is clear.

By George Friedman

A Meaningless UN Security Council Resolution

The international community’s gestures and edicts will have no real bearing on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has condemned Israeli settlements on the West Bank. The interesting part is that the United States abstained from the vote, which is why it passed. It is likely that President-elect Donald Trump, taking office in less than a month, will pursue a very different policy on Israel than recent administrations have. Neither the United Nations resolution nor Trump’s shift is of great significance. Over the years, throughout the world, UNSC resolutions have been met with indifference. It does not matter what the UNSC says. It matters what the permanent members of the UNSC do. In the case of Israel and Palestine, no one on either side can do very much of significance. As for public opinion, that is fairly well locked into place. There are four camps: those who are pro-Israeli, those who are pro-Palestinian, those who wring their hand and express pieties and those who couldn’t care less. Nothing that happened at the U.N. will change anyone’s mind. There are now two realities. The first is that the Palestinians are weak. No great power or Arab state has an overriding interest in the creation of a Palestinian state. The Russians are indifferent and the Arabs are concerned about the radicalism of such a state. The Palestinians are also divided, split into the relatively secular West Bank and religious Gaza – the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas. Without unity among the Palestinians, no one can sign an agreement authoritatively or coordinate resistance to the Israelis. The second reality is that it is impossible to create two states. The Israelis cannot give up the Jordan River line since it is their main defensive position. Nor can they accept a westward shift of the border toward the 1948 lines, as it would make the Israeli heartland (the Tel Aviv-Haifa-Jerusalem triangle) vulnerable to the kinds of rockets fired from Gaza. The Palestinians can’t accept a state divided between Gaza and the West Bank, without any transport under their control. Nor can they accept Israeli control of the Jordan River line, as that would mean that they remain isolated except for Israel permitting movement – and would mean the Israeli army moving through Palestinian territory. Finally, such a geography would be economic insanity. Palestine would remain dependent on Israel, with its population employed in menial jobs in Israel, passing through Israeli checkpoints. Therefore, the resolution on settlements and the entire settlement question completely miss the point. The Palestinian problem is that it has no meaningful Arab support, and its support in Europe or the United States consists of meaningless gestures. In fact, many see Israel as an ally against more immediate threats. The Palestinians’ only means of asserting their claims is the Intifada, which is far more painful to the Palestinians than the Israelis. The divisions among the Palestinians make the discussion pointless. The Israelis can’t abandon the Jordan River line without endangering Israeli survival should Arab states shift their strategy. Nor can they accept a movement of the border westward because Palestinian politics could readily move the Gaza problem to Tel Aviv. Therefore, a two-state solution is impossible and it is inevitable that Israel will strengthen its position in the West Bank with settlements and other means. This is not because Israeli is strong. It is because the Arab world is in a dynamic moment. It does not know what will emerge, and in the end, the Arabs are potentially much stronger than Israel so it must act now, while it can. The U.N. resolution, President Barack Obama’s decision to abstain from the vote and Trump’s appointment of David Friedman as ambassador to Israel all have no impact because the reality is geopolitically locked in.

A Knife in the Back!

Most folks think of Barack Obama as a a decent man and someone who thinks carefully before coming to a decision. When compared to Trump he appeared to have the makings of a president who will be revered by future generations. Not so after the UN decision to recognize the Western Wall in Jerusalem as "Occupied PalestinianTerritory" and building in Jewish Quarter of the old city of Jerusalem as "Illegal". Obama has returned to his roots and exposed to the Jewish people an insight into his dark and ugly soul. Reverend Wright must be dancing the cha-cha right now.

When Michelle Obama barks "When they go low...we go high!", she is not referring to her husband. The intellectual Obama clearly believes "when they go low...I go even lower!" With the UN vote, Obama has definitely exposed what a narrow minded, small, vengeful  and irrelevant individual he is. Lets take a look at his record. 

Weeks after shaking hands with Husni Mubarak and declaring him to be a friend of the US, Obama declared on national TV that "Mubarak must go!" A definite knife in the back, especially since Mubarak was jailed and Egypt was then taken over by the Muslim Brotherhood, an ally of today's ISIS. He then declared that Assad must go and and drew a red line in the sand. Guess what? He then delivered another knife in the back of Assad's opponents, culminating in the murder of hundreds of thousands of women and children in Aleppo and other places. Remember Aleppo Obama...its your legacy!

Add to this legacy of betrayal his "rebalancing" of US strategies by signing a weakling's  agreement with Iran.They are still laughing all the way to the bank and signing their check books with the appropriate signature "B. Obama...The useful idiot." Recently he withdrew US support to Saudi Arabia for human rights abuses against Yemen. Human rights? "Look around you fool at what 's happening in Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Sudan, Afghanistan, Europe and Africa. Your Arab Spring was the springboard of a human refugee crisis epic in its proportions."

Perhaps we could put it down to the inexperience of a new and naive president filled with intellectual purpose. But no....after eight years as president, in the dark of the night, when the political price was at minimum and all were asleep, he revealed the affliction in his soul. Obama thrust the cowardly knife he carried in the shadows, hidden for all these years and stabbed the Jewish people in the back. This mere man thinks he can change 3000 years of Jewish attachment to Jerusalem with the flick of a pen and a hidden knife. There is no cure for stupidity.

So when Purim comes around and Obama is relegated to the refuse heap of history, we will sing and dance and celebrate the demise of Obama, Haman and Arafat amongst others. Israel will continue to grow and be a shining light of democracy in a dark world. We will continue to build in the land of Israel and continue to toast "Next Year in Jerusalem"...wherever we may be.

It's hard to tell who has your back, from who has it long enough just to stab you in it.... ― Nicole Richie

The evil that is in the world almost always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding - Albert Camus

Politicians and diapers should be changed frequently and all for the same reason -José Maria de Eça de Queiroz. 

The Peanut Gallery

Statements, comments and forecasts that have no substance, but just might turn out to be relevant.

1. The right wing revolution against the elites and the immigrants continues. First Brexit and now Trump. Soon Italy and then France and Holland. A fascinating chapter in humankind history. We will now witness how the politics of fear and the theory of "divide and conquer" play out. It's no longer important what Trump says....a divided US is already the name of the game. Its important what Trump does. COMMENT: Some folk believe Trump has a plan. I believe that what you see is what you get.

2.Stratfor: Beijing is set to invest an additional $8.5 billion in Pakistan's railways and energy infrastructure, Pakistan's Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal said Nov. 23, Reuters reported. The funds come in addition to the two countries' $46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project, a deal aimed at building roads and energy infrastructure in Pakistan and connecting northwest China with Pakistan's deep-water Gwadar port. COMMENT: If Trump thinks that threatening China will bring the desired result...clearly the law of unintended consequences is showing a different result.

3.South Korean prosecutors raided Samsung’s headquarters and the country’s state-run pension on Nov. 23 fund over allegations that the office of embattled President Park Geun-hye pressured the fund’s decision to back the company’s merger plan in 2015, Yonhap reported. The president’s office is suspected of pressuring the state fund to support the company in return for favors given to Park’s close associate, Choi Soon-sil, who was indicted over the weekend on corruption charges. COMMENT: When it rains...it pours.

4.Financial Times columnist Wolfgang Münchau: "One day Italy will be led by a party in favour of withdrawal from the euro. When that happens, euro exit would turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy. There would a run on Italy’s banks and its government’s bonds. The next Italian prime minister will need to explain to the next German chancellor, presumably Angela Merkel, that her choice will not be between a political union or no political union, but between a political union or Italy’s withdrawal from the euro.The latter would imply the biggest default in history.

5.Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) said it foiled a terrorist attack plotted by the Islamic State, International Business times reported Dec. 15. An FSB statement said four suspects from Tajikistan and Moldova have been arrested in connection with the plot, which it said involved using improvised explosive devices in Moscow. It said a high-level Islamic State commander from Turkey helped plan the failed attack. Security forces reportedly seized automatic weapons, ammunition, chemicals and explosive devices during the arrest raids. COMMENT: This is a disease and nobody is immune.

6.A private 5 billion euro ($5.22 billion) recapitalization plan to save Italy's third largest lender, Monte dei Paschi di Siena, collapsed Dec. 21, Financial Times reported. The rescue plan failed to find an anchor investor, according to several informed sources. Italy's government will now move forward with a state-run rescue plan to save the bank, sources said. Both houses of the country's parliament approved Dec. 21 a possible 20 billion euro ($20.85 billion) rescue of some of the country's struggling banks. COMMENT:The Ukraine just nationalized its largest bank. It starts as a few drops....

7.Gatestone: The police released a report noting that Sweden is at the top of the EU's statistics on physical and sexual violence against women, sexual harassment and stalking. The report stated unequivocally that it is "asylum-seeker boys" and "foreign men" who commit the vast majority of the reported crimes. COMMENT: From the rape trucks of Syria to the blond emancipated women of Sweden.

8.Two Israeli women of Ethiopian descent were sworn in as judges by President Reuven Rivlin on Tuesday, marking a first in the country’s history. The ground-breaking appointments of the two attorneys were announced by the Judicial Nominating Committee in late September. At the time, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said the appointments helped realize the wishes of late Israeli President Shimon Peres, who authorized the covert evacuation of thousands of Ethiopian Jews to Israel in 1984 while serving as prime minister.
COMMENT: Go Israel!!

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity - Martin Luther King, Jr.

The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits - Albert Einstein

I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it - Edith Sitwell

Trying to Understand the Refugee Conundrum

Omran has no tears...he lives a different reality. Anyone who looks at this picture and does not feel overwhelming sorrow and pain is definitely a candidate for the sicko of the year award. This poor kid....what does he have to look forward to? How will his life unfold? How do we fix this...or can we even fix this? Aldous Huxley once said "Maybe this world is another planet’s hell.” We all relate to this kind of tragedy in different ways. I can only relate through my own reality.

I was born in Apartheid South Africa. My first view of the world was through a lens where whites employed blacks as servants. We had servants who cleaned the house, cooked the meals, made our beds, weeded and watered the gardens. At our "whites only" schools we were taught that even though us whites were first class citizens and everyone else were second class citizens, the different ethnic groups were different from us and we needed to respect that difference (of course, as long as we remained the superior colour group).

So imagine my shock, landing in Israel in 1973 and heading for a restaurant only to find that some of the customers were black. Needless to say, I immediately retreated and went in search for a restaurant where there were no people of colour. The shock was multiplied when arriving at my kibbutz and discovering that not all Jews were white! There were Jews of every colour and extraction...all living together under the same roof....wow! To cut a long story short it took me many years to adjust to a new reality and for me, a real truth.

As a result, when I look at the above child and multiply this picture by the thousands, possibly millions, I shudder to imagine what life will look like for this lost generation of kids. All Omran has ever known is violence. In Aleppo today as Syrian forces advance, women are committing suicide simply because they understand what is awaiting them. What else has this child witnessed besides the ear-shattering explosion that brought his home down upon him. What were the discussions he heard in the family kitchen as massive explosions shook the building? His knowledge of the world is limited to rape trucks, murder, guns, food and survival. In Canada our kids knowledge is limited to love, warmth, security, education and fun. 

In conclusion, I doubt whether the child in the photo will be able to adjust to a peaceful world. At best he will land in Europe and North America and understand how unfair his world is while trying to apply himself to the new reality. On the other hand, the more likely scenario is that he will revert to what he knows and understands. He will interpret the the kindness for weakness and unite with his peers to take by force what does not belong to him. Judging by the migrant rape crisis spiralling out of control in Europe and the emerging terrorism and anti-immigrant wave on that continent, it looks like the planet is in for a rocky future. 

When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace - Jimi Hendrix

Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality. - Edgar Allan Poe

It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it - Aung San Suu Kyi

It all Started in the Spring.....

What is the connection between a Canadian real estate bubble, an Australian real estate bubble and an Israeli real estate bubble? Why are North American and Japanese equity markets rising into a bubble type formation? It all began In 2008 and continued in December of 2010. It began with the economic mismanagement of George Bush and continued with the intellectual arrogance of Barack Obama. But most of all, it began in the Spring of 2010 when a Tunisian set himself alight and started what today is termed "The Arab Spring". Wow! So let's follow the money.

In 2008 an economic bubble burst endangering the world banking systems. The American public fired the GOP and replaced them with a socialist leaning president. What could be easier than dealing with a burst credit bubble? Thats easy...create an even larger credit bubble. Its called "cheap (easy) money". Armed by a wave of popularity, swagger, rolled up sleeves and superior intellectualism, Barack Obama decided the time was right to spread democracy to the Middle East. Declaring that Mubarak and Assad "have to go" and cheered on by the liberal media Mr Obama set off a chain of events that have led to instability across the planet. The civil wars in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Sudan and Libya have led to a trickle of refugees which now has turned into a flood. Russia, trying to amplify the impression of power (lets face it sanctions + oil price = weakness) has intervened in Syria and hopes to face down US and Turkish interests in the area.

Europe in all its social glory opened the gates to millions of refugees from the different battle arenas, naively believing (like American liberals) that these folk are Westerners wearing different clothing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Europe knowingly imported millions of potential insurgents who know no better than violence of all types to achieve their goals. These refugees threaten Europe not only physically, but financially. They are enhanced by the Islamic threat to Russia and the Balkans. When one adds the above credit bubble to the mixture, it is easy to see why the money is running from Eurasia and seeking safe geopolitical havens.

Australia is a great example of a geopolitical haven. A continent far from the maddening crowd, to coin a phrase and physically safe from an impending explosion. Despite a 0.5% contraction in GDP, real estate prices in Oz are booming. The same goes for Canada. Nice and safe, plenty of water, land and raw materials. And of course, real estate markets are booming as anxious and fearful funds seek safety and security. Even Central banks are getting in on the act. Fear leads to diversification of assets. The Central banks of Japan, Switzerland and the ECB, amongst about 23% of all nations worldwide are purchasing stocks. Its amazing how physical and financial fears effect human nature. Add Brexit, Trump and the wave of an anti-establishment revolution and we have the makings of a new and fearful community running in all directions.

As for Israel, the boom continues. Israel is secured by a line of steel and arguably the best air force on the planet. Shouts of Heil trump in the US and the rise of anti-semitism worldwide have only led to more demand for Israeli real estate.

Choose your poison folks. One thing for sure is that the the stable world we once knew is no longer....and it all began in Spring.


“There are decades where nothing happens, and there are weeks where decades happen.” - Lenin

You should be careful what you wish for, as the reasons for war get confused. One person can be very clear in their motives, but others can have different agendas - 

Dougray Scott