Category Posts by Others

Apr 21 2015

Not Arms But Character


Prof. Paul Eidelberg

Israel, which has the most formidable military power in the Middle East, has been the victim of non-stop Arab-Islamic terrorism since the Government signed the Oslo or Israel-PLO Agreement of September 1993. Why?

How are we to explain that regardless of which party is at the helm, whether it be Labor or the Likud, Israel displays no deterrent power against her sworn enemies?

A common explanation is that Israel’s enemies are animated by religious fervor, that is, by Islam’s 1,400-year tradition of jihad. This explanation is certainly relevant, but let me offer another reason for the indecisiveness of Israel’s military power.

The most important reason is this. First and foremost, Israel is a secular democratic state whose leaders are not animated by any distinctive Jewish goal, one that would endow Israeli prime ministers with national pride and purpose.  Absent in these politicians is serious and steadfast conviction in the truth and grandeur of the Torah and in the unique nobility of the Jewish heritage, which even learned Gentiles admire as unsurpassed in wisdom and creativity.

Israel simply lacks statesmen whose intellectual and moral character is unworthy of this heritage. These half-educated leaders can only boast of Israel’s being “the only democracy in the Middle East.”  They are mindless of the fact that Aristotle, the world’s greatest political scientist – indeed, the founder of political science – held that democracy, though not as bad as oligarchy, is basically an unjust form of government!

That the formidable State of Israel should be locked in an interminable war with the PLO, a mere consortium of terrorist groups, and that Israel’s rulers should yield sacred Jewish land to these thugs, confirms Aristotle’s assessment that democracy is a perverse and contemptible form of government.

I say this regardless of the government’s achievements when weighed against 15,000 Jewish casualties as well as by the trauma suffered by even more Jewish women and children. This suffering of Jewish women and children prompted former Israeli politician Ephraim “Effi” Eitam, a military commander and member of the National Religious Party, to question the manliness of Israel’s ruling elites!

Is it any wonder that Muslims persist in their genocidal war against Israel and her anything but heroic leaders? It comes down not to a question of arms, but to a question of character or morale, ultimately, the most important factor of a nation’s military power

Apr 8 2015

Democracy in an Age of Thermonuclear Weapons


Prof. Paul Eidelberg

In an age of ballistic-tipped thermonuclear weapons, the basic principles of democracy, including freedom of speech and of the press, due process of law, and limited government break down.

Imagine prosecuting an individual or a group of individuals for a hate crime when your country is threatened by Muslims who not only have access to weapons of mass destruction, but whose leaders gleefully chant “Death to America.”

How would a member of the American Civil Liberties Union react in a lawsuit against an Imam who uttered that malediction in a mosque? Would he invoke the “clear and present danger” doctrine associated with the First Amendment of the American Constitution, which liberals call a ”living constitution?

Would Muslims in America invoke that doctrine against limitations on their freedom to advocate the teachings of Islam, including that which regards Jihad as a major religious obligation?

It is well known to legal scholars that America has two constitutions, one for times of peace, and one for times of war. But they also know that there is no clear line between the two.

Although Senator Rand Paul is correct in saying that the Constitution invests Congress with the authority to declare war, would he engage in a debate on the Senate floor on that issue if, ten minutes after the commencement of the debate, the president pro tempore is informed that an Iranian ballistic missile is heading toward Washington, D.C.?☼

 

Apr 8 2015

The 21st Century Munich Agreement


Post by Jeff Longo

The more we learn about the “framework” for an Iranian nuclear deal, the more apparent it becomes that we have sold out our Israeli allies. Iran’s nuclear infrastructure will be left intact, economic sanctions will be lifted and unannounced snap inspections will not be permitted.

In a desperate attempt to sell this framework to a deal, President Obama assures us the world will become a much safer place. He insists the only alternative to his deal is a war with Iran. The truth is the alternative to this bad deal is a good deal and anything short of that must be rejected.

America has come to expect lies and deceit from Iran’s leadership. Unfortunately we’ve come to expect the same from Barack Obama. Our negotiations have come from a position of weakness and the results are a framework for disaster. This president no longer deserves the benefit of any doubt and it’s past time for Congress to stand up to him and kill this horrible deal once and for all.

 

 

Apr 3 2015

Calling Obama to Account


BY Prof. Paul Eidelberg

When President Barack Obama returned a bust of Winston Churchill to London, he thereby pronounced not only his hatred of British colonialism, but also his deep animosity toward Western Civilization of which Churchill was a champion, both as a historian and as a statesman. Indeed, since Mr. Churchill was made an honorary citizen of the United States, Obama’s return of said bust was an insult to America’s ally in the Second World War. Nor is this all.

This insult degrades what Winston Churchill so vividly represents, his admiration of the two cities that most represent Western Civilization, Athens and Jerusalem. These two cities are the hallmark of Western Civilization, but it’s Jerusalem that has been most influential, especially by way of its offspring Christianity.

Also of profound significance, ponder what Churchill wrote in 1899 in The River War:

Moslems may show splendid qualities, but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science, the science against which it had vainly struggled, the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.[1]

Obama’s war against Israel should be regarded as a facade for an Islamic war against Christianity.

As Christians well know, the New Testament stands or falls on the Old Testament. Without the Bible of Israel, Christianity would be disemboweled. Hence Islam’s first target is Israel, the “little Satan.”

Christian clergymen also know that a nuclear armed Iran would be the spearhead of a global Islamic caliphate, a totalitarian regime more extensive than the Third Reich, which Hitler dreamed would be the successor to the Holy Roman Empire.

Before Obama’s first inauguration as President of the United States in February 2005, America’s ambassador to the United Nations, John R. Bolton, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute who participated in arms control negotiations, urged Israel to attack Iran. A few more words about Bolton are in order.

During the Reagan administrations, he worked in several positions within the State Department, the Justice Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development. Bolton’s government service included such positions as Assistant secretary for International Organization Affairs at the Department of State (1989–1993), where he led in the successful effort to rescind the United Nations resolution from the 1970s that had equated Zionism with racism.

Bolton’s urging Israel to attack Iran was the recommendation of a scholar-statesman experienced in arms control negotiations who well-understood the awesomeness of nuclear weapons. He not only urged Israel to attack Iran but also called on the United States to support Israel in this operation.

Obviously, Obama’s sympathies are with Iran, the world’s greatest exporter of terrorism. Hamas and Hezbollah, notorious terrorist organizations, are clients of Iran. Iran is not only expanding its influence in the Middle East. The Mullocracy in Tehran has agents in South and Central America and sleeper cells in the United States – all animated by Islam’s malediction “DEATH TO AMERICA!

Obama may not be a very learned man. He may not regard Islamic terrorism as rooted in the teachings of the Qur’an. But he KNOWS that the malediction DEATH TO AMERICA is not only a curse but a rallying call to Muslims the world over to destroy the country he has is sworn to defend,

Therefore, as an American citizen who served in the United States Air Force during the Korean War, and whose brother was awarded a Silver Star for bravery in the Second World, I call upon members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives to inquire into the propriety of censuring Barack Obama for documented public statements of his and/or acts of his that cast contempt on the United States, or call into question his loyalty to this country and to the lawful agreements with its allies.

At the same time, I call upon American veterans of foreign wars to denounce any statements of Mr. Obama that reflects negatively on the military service they performed on behalf of their country. They should also write their congressmen.☼

Mar 31 2015

Obama Release Of Secret Report On Israel Nukes Betrays Ally


Obama is also betraying America.

By Paul Eldelberg

Therefore, as a former officer in the United States Air Force, I call on all Americans to devise ways and means short of violence–but not excluding massive civil disobedience on a state and national level — to compel Barack  Obama — who is (1) disarming America, (2) destroying her economy, (3) betraying our NATO Allies in Europe, (4) scorning out Declaration and Federal Constitution, thus serving, in effect, either as an instrument or an agent, of Global Islam.

Accordingly, I urge all patriotic Americans to speak up and organize local and national protest movements with the objective of pressing all members of Congress to demand Obama to resign from office.

And if this fails, to support the proposals of former members of Congress Lt. Col. Allen White and Michelle Bachmann to initiate impeachment proceedings against Obama, and for this purpose to rally support from eminent Black American such as Alan Keyes, who tried to get BO disqualified for the Presidency on legal grounds in 2008.

Mar 31 2015

A Matter of Urgent Importance


Prof. Paul Eidelberg

President Barack Obama is deliberately disarming America. He is deliberately alienating America’s European allies. He is doing this while Russia is expanding its influence in the Balkans, where the Russian Black Sea Fleet threatens NATO’s southern front along the Mediterranean.

I therefore urge my readers to ponder and devise ways and means of lawfully removing Barack Obama from office. Impeachment has been proposed by former members of Congress such as Allen West and Michelle Bachmann. However, this is not only an exceedingly slow and uncertain process, but it will be exploited to foment racial conflict.

More effective are Congressional investigations of Obama’s abuses of executive powers.  Also required are serious exposés of Obama’s “pro-Muslim” appointments to the executive branch, exposés articulated by eminent Americans.

Also important are exposés of Obama’s disparaging statements regarding America’s foundational documents, the Declaration of Independence, and the Federal Constitution.

Such exposés can facilitate protest movements across the nation and in Washington, D.C., calling for Obama’s resignation.

Public attention should be focused on Obama’s Muslim sympathies. The public should clearly recognize that Obama’s fundamental and all-consuming objective is to terminate America’s role as the leader of the Free World.

Without America’s benign leadership, the world will descend into anarchy – which is occurring while I write this article.

But this anarchy is only the prelude of a New World Order, a Worldwide Islamic Caliphate, the Mullocracy envisioned by the Ayatollahs of Iran, a Totalitarian regime extending beyond that of the Persian Empire of antiquity.◙

 

Mar 22 2015

The Irrationality of Democracy: Machiavelli’s Copernican Revolution


By Paul Eidelberg

An organic principle of democracy is equality. This principle entails the political principle of “one-adult-one-vote.”  The political principle of one-adult-one vote is irrational and immoral, since it mandates equal votes to intelligent and idiotic citizens, as well as to patriotic and unpatriotic citizens.

The irrationality of democracy was well understood by Plato, as may be seen in Book VIII of his greatest dialogue, The Republic.

The Greek and Roman, as well as the medieval, philosophers scorned democracy as a bad or unjust form of government.

Democracy did not obtain a good reputation from philosophers until Machiavelli, the father of modern political science. Machiavelli initiated a Copernican revolution in his masterpiece, The Prince, the most influential text in the political science departments of the democratic world, including Israel.

Machiavelli’s Copernican revolution is profoundly elucidated by Professor Leo Strauss, and is outlined in my book A Jewish Philosophy of History.

Comment by Centinel2012. When one studies the  US Constitution one finds that the founders realized this and did not create a Democracy but a Republic with limited vote not universal vote. Democracies to not last long for the reasons Paul talks about in the first paragraph. By limiting the vote to land owners initially the founders tried to prevent the destruction of what they created. Since land ownership was not an impediment to the average person the ability to vote was larger in America then elsewhere but still not to the point the politicians could manipulate the vote. That came much later mostly after 1913 the 17th amendment however the 19th amendment is an exception although an amendment was not technically needed to achieve the result.

Mar 15 2015

Why Jews in Israel Can’t Win Against their Arab Foes


By Prof. Paul Eidelberg

When I first visited Israel in 1972, I asked my host, a Harvard graduate, to tell me about the political science curriculum at Tel Aviv University. He told me it doesn’t include political theory, which is taught in the philosophy department. I was shocked, because this meant that Aristotle, the father of political science, who wrote treatises on 100 Greek polities, was not taught in Israel’s largest university.Imagine this: Aristotle wrote the first and most comprehensive work on Statesmanship. He also wrote two treatises on Ethics and the first systematic treatise on Rhetoric.  He is the very man who taught Alexander the Great, who was a statesman as well as a conqueror.   Nevertheless, this man, an unsurpassed architectonic genius, in comparison with whom Machiavelli’s knowledge of politics could be put on a postage stamp – this Aristotle, to date the world’s greatest political scientist, had no significant place in the curriculum of Israel’s political science departments, hence in the studies of those who became, or were to become, Israel’s policy makers and decision makers! Heaven help us! Let me offer only a few simple words about Aristotle on whom I have written an entire treatise contrasting him with the leading thinkers of modernity.As is well known, Aristotle set forth a six-fold classification of regimes: three just and three unjust, depending on whether or not the rulers ruled in the interest of the common good. Kingship, aristocracy, and “polity” were included in the good. Their degenerate forms, tyranny, oligarchy, and democracy, were included in the bad.Although kingship, for Aristotle, is the best regime in theory, one almost never finds a people with enough wisdom and virtue to construct such a regime. Aristotle therefore devotes a good deal of space in his treatise to what he deems the best regime in practice, a “mixed regime,” which he calls a “polity.”  A polity, which I liken to a “Republic,” combines democracy, the rule of the poor (meaning, for Aristotle, those who have to work for a living), and oligarchy, the rule of the rich. However, our wise Aristotle weights his mixed regime somewhat toward democracy to ensure greater political stability and security. He thus prescribes a middle class regime that respects the rule of law to resolve disputes among its citizens and thus maximize justice.That Aristotle distinguishes between good and bad regimes is the basic reason why he is a virtual stranger to contemporary political science in the democratic world, including Israel and the United States, where the doctrine of moral relativism reigns supreme. This doctrine induces Israel, a democracy, to engage in the morally neutral policy of “conflict resolution” when dealing with the Palestinian Authority, a tyranny. Aristotle would say that this policy is morally perverse as well as politically futile, if not self-destructive.

But I know of no political scientist in Israel that would utter such a statement, and none should be expected given the moral relativism that underlies the teaching of political science in this country, as I have noted in books and many articles since 1976, both in English and in Hebrew translations, but which Israel newspapers have ignored, with one ephemeral and forgotten exception.

The exception was once reported, but never used to causally as well as logically explain the disastrous territorial policies of Israeli prime ministers, by the gifted editor and political analyst of The Jerusalem Post, Caroline B. Glick.  Come with me back to the year 2003 and see how the subversive doctrine of moral relativism was manifested by Israel students at Israeli universities.

Ms. Glick addressed some 150 political science students at Tel Aviv University, where she spoke of her experience as an embedded reporter with the U.S. Army’s Third Infantry Division during the Iraq war. Any person not corrupted by moral relativism would favor, as she did, the U.S. over the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.  Yet the general attitude of her academic audience was expressed by a student who asked, “Who are you to make moral judgments?” Now ponder this exchange between Glick and a student who spoke with a heavy Russian accent:

Student: “How can you say that democracy is better than dictatorial rule?”

Glick: “Because it is better to be free than to be a slave.”

Student: “How can you support America when the U.S. is a totalitarian state?”

Glick:  “Did you learn that in Russia?”

Student: “No, here.”

Glick:  “Here at Tel Aviv University?”

Student:  “Yes, that is what my professors say.”

Ms. Glick spoke at five liberal Israeli universities. She learned that all are dominated by moral relativists who indoctrinate their students and ban “politically incorrect” publications.

Ms. Glick did not have to elaborate by saying that moral relativism is undermining Israel’s struggle or conflict with morally confident – nay arrogant – Muslims that rule the Palestinian Authority.  She could hardly be expected to anticipate the “two state solution” to this conflict, which Benjamin Netanyahu advocated on June 14, 2009, is a logical consequence of moral relativism.

Mr. Netanyahu is not a moral relativist, judging from a brief encounter I had with him some years ago. Nevertheless, he succumbed to the “two-state solution” advocated by the American State Department, whose officials, according to former US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton, are steeped in “moral equivalency,” the corollary of moral relativism. But this university-bred doctrine is one if not the basic reason why Jews can’t win against their Arab foes!

Mar 13 2015

When Jews Negotiate with Arabs


Prof. Paul Eidelberg

If you make a make candid survey of the punctuated negotiations that have taken place between Jews and Arabs during the past twenty-three years, that is, since the enfolding and conclusion of the OSLO or Israel-PLO Agreement of September 13, 1993, a disturbing conclusion strikes you.

Those negotiations, which engaged the minds of six Israeli Prime Ministers, specifically, Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ehud Barak, Ehud Olmert, Ariel Sharon, and again Benjamin Netanyahu – those negotiations, yield an obvious conclusion:  opposite these Jews, the Arabs win hands down. Indeed, they make the ostensibly better educated Jews of Israel look like fools, to put it mildly!

Since OSLO, it’s clearly demonstrable that the Arabs have advanced, while the Jews, despite their vaunted military power, have retreated.  Why? This brief essay provides an indispensable part of the explanation.

We are discussing the Arabs who constitute the Palestine Liberation Organization (the PLO), renamed the Palestinian Authority (PA) since Oslo. These Arabs – really Muslim Arabs – have progressed from a welter of terrorist groups dispersed in the Middle East and North Africa into a formidable multi-faceted organization with offices in Israel, the United States, and in the various capitals of Europe.

Since Oslo, these Muslims have obtained the Gaza strip and swaths of Jewish land in Judea and Samaria – even in the ancient Jewish capital of Hebron. These Jew-killing Arabs of the PA have acquired the prestige and influence of representation in the United Nations, even though their terrorist activities violate the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights!

Although the PA is not state actor, and even though Hamas, one of its two major factions, is the Palestinian wing of the notorious Muslim Brotherhood, the PA’s influence in the United Nations exceeds that of Israel – proof enough that the Arabs excel the Jews in international diplomacy. To clinch the argument, the PA, despite its despotic character, receives annual grants of hundreds of millions of dollars from democratic America as well as innumerable financial subsidies from the European Union.

Of course, our Middle East experts will attribute this bizarre state of affairs to the influence of Arab oil and petrodollars, as if nothing more need be said of this theater of the grotesque. After all, as every school boy knows, Muslims are enormously more numerous than Jews. And since the disciples of Muhammad occupy one-fifth of the world’s land surface, their geo-political standing vis-à-vis minuscule Israel is pathetically obvious.

Nevertheless, history records that minuscule Rome, a city on seven hills, overawed nations and armies on three continents, and did so not only by virtue of Rome’s superior military power, but also because of Rome’s bold and brilliant statesmanship and efficient system of government.

Does this mean that Israel’s political and military leaders are inferior to those of Rome? Does it mean that the Israelis lack the practical wisdom or expertise as well as the stamina and daring of their Roman counterparts? Does it mean that the structure of Israel’s government hinders the art of statecraft, or that the mentality of Israeli leaders undermines the application of military science, whether derived from Carl von Clausewitz or Sun Tzu?

But don’t Israel’s political leaders benefit from academic think tanks and the professional advice of university-trained political scientists?  Don’t these auxiliaries of modern government and warfare augment the practical wisdom of Israeli decision makers? And by so doing, don’t these auxiliaries bolster Israel’s self-confidence and fighting spirit? Don’t they heighten Israel’s ability and determination to defeat her enemy – indeed, to disarm and emasculate the enemy and thus make its leaders shudder at the thought of waging another war with the killing machine of the Jewish State – notwithstanding the promised delights of Islam’s paradise?

On the other hand, perhaps the education I have in mind, the education that should shape the hearts and minds of Israel’s political and military echelons, exists in another universe of discourse. Aside from their studying military hardware and topography, one gets the impression that Israel’s war college  –  if one may use such politically incorrect language – is more concerned with sociology and “conflict resolution” than with the inherent relentless bellicosity and relentless global ambition of authentic Islam and Islamic theology.

Judging from my experience at Bar-Ilan University, where I taught some Israeli officers, and judging also from my meetings with high-ranking Israeli officials, and supplementing this knowledge with the critical comments of some astute Israeli journalists, I have the impression that Israel’s democratically distracted political and military leaders have not seriously studied the biographies and memoirs of the great warriors and wartime leaders of history.

I know of one prominent general, in fact an Israeli prime minister, who publicly declared that self-restraint vis-à-vis Arab terrorists is a form of strength –  which of course may be true if we stop with the Ethics of the Fathers and ignore the exploits and Psalms of King David.

By the way, the general I just alluded to not only orchestrated Israel’s retreat from Gaza. He is also on record of having said that his son taught him “not to think in terms of black-and-white” – even though Jews were being reduced to body parts!

That anemic doctrine has been purveyed at Israel’s Command-and-Staff College, who’s one-time Director, the Middle East specialist that helped craft the Oslo or Israel-PLO Agreement, was a self-professed moral relativist! Small wonder that when Jews negotiate with Arabs, the sons of Ishmael win hands down!

Mar 13 2015

The Greening of a High Tech Third World Nation


By Prof. Paul Eidelberg

Wise Americans have called Barack Obama not only a “Post-American” President, but also a “Third World” President. This disparagement should be taken seriously, and that’s the basic intention of the present article, which transcends politics even though it focuses on the pathetic but strutting character of Barack Obama.

If you have a President as ignorant and as arrogant as Mr. Obama, and if he enjoys some support among Democrats in Congress, he is bound to say anddo things that contradict Americas two foundational documents, the Declaration of Independence and the Federal Constitution.

Since these documents embody the Principle of Limited Government and the related System of Institutional Checks and Balances, it’s time for some Senator, or some member of the House of Representatives, to address the public and enumerate the many times President Barack Obama has displayed ignorance as well as arrogance regarding these sacred documents. And it would be wise and most timely if this Senator or Representative is serving, respectively, in the Senate or in the House Judiciary Committee.

Of course, by exposing statements and/or acts of Mr. Obama that disparage him politically, and that may possibly incriminate him legally, the public may call for his impeachment, and this may result in violent urban repercussions that would make the recent riots in Ferguson appear mild by comparison.  Hence, some other lawful way should be formulated to render Mr. Obama innocuous.

Whatever method is chosen, it should serve to educate the American people about the principle of Limited Government and how this principle is fleshed out by our system of institutional checks and balances.  The public will then learn how this system was designed to minimize the danger that an ignorant or an arrogant President might abuse the powers of the Executive Branch, and thus violate the Rule of Law, a foundation stone of civilized society. The Obama Administration has been lax on this law by its turning a blind eye toward Muslim organizations whose creed is not very civilized.

It should also be emphasized, however, that the ignorance and arrogance manifested by the Obama Administration is not only a consequence of Mr. Obama’s post-American, Third World leanings. His leanings reflect a century-long evolution of nihilism in American higher education. This nihilism,  better known as moral relativism, has filtered down and stultified countless citizens of this now sexually indiscriminate country to the extent of transforming high tech America into a morally lax or semi-third world nation!