Free Republic

...Romney campaign may have misfired with its suggestion that statements by President Obama and U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice about the Benghazi attack last month weren’t supported by intelligence,... “Talking points” prepared by the CIA on Sept. 15, the same day that Rice taped three television appearances, support her description of the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate as a reaction to Arab anger about an anti-Muslim video prepared in the United States. According to the CIA account, “The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo...

When MSNBC discarded Keith Olbermann, al-Qaida mourned. So reports David Ignatius, the Washington Post columnist who has gained exclusive access to some of the documents recovered from Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. In his Wednesday column in the Washington Post, Ignatius reported on the details of a 21-page letter to bin Laden written by al-Qaida media adviser Adam Gadahn. Though the letter was undated, Ignatius says that it was likely written sometime after November 2010. Laying out the current media landscape for the now waterlogged terrorist kingpin, Gadahn, an American-born Jewish convert to Islam, lamented the “firing” of...

Issues: * Santorum Vs Romney. * Birth control. * Nuclear Iran. -- [Lib.] D. Brazil: Over 60% of Republicans like Rick Santorum On ABC 'This Week' with George Stephanopoulos. The same Dianne Brazil who says she's "catholic" defended the Pres. Whereas George Will said: This is what liberalism [and progressives] looks like, to break the [religious] institutions. WashingtonPost's 'Anti War' journalist David Ignatius had to inject his opinions too trying to scare and insist on "negotiations..." Even though he knows that Syria is Islamic-fascist Iran's door to the Arab world, and he knows that Iran is a GENOCIDE threat. George...

The expanding confrontation between Israel and its neighbors has been described variously as a "train wreck," a "lose-lose situation" and a "political tsunami." It's all those things, and likely to get worse: For there's no quick fix by Israel's ally, the United States. The Obama administration has been seeking diplomatic solutions to the two most incendiary issues — the demand by Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, for an Israeli apology for the Gaza flotilla incident of May 2010, and the Palestinian plan to ask the United Nations to declare statehood. Despite feverish American efforts to defuse these bombs, they're...

The administration of U.S. President Barack Obama is considering reaching out to the political elements in Hezbollah, the Washington Post reported on Friday, stressing that the at this stage it was an intelligence effort, not a policymaking one. In an opinion piece appearing on the newspaper's online edition, columnist David Ignatius indicated that Washington was considering an effort similar to the one the U.K, implemented "during the 1990s with Sinn Fein, the legal political wing of the terrorist Irish Republican Army." "That outreach led to breakthrough peace talks and settlement of a conflict that had been raging for more than...

Whatever else you might think about the war in Iraq, the fact is that the Iraqis have stopped supporting Islamic terrorism outside their borders and no longer pose a threat of using or supplying WMD to these monsters. Al Qaeda violence in Iraq has been quelled, and the problem there has shifted to the traditional enmity between Shi’as and Sunnis that has led to extreme violence in the presence of a weak government and our reluctance to use overwhelming force. The scene has now shifted to Iran, where major Islamic terrorism against America started in 1979, and where, fortunately, we...

It should be obvious to any thinking person that we in the west are engaged in a life-or-death struggle with the dark side of Islam. From the turmoil we are seeing in Iraq and Afghanistan, from the obvious support that so-called, peaceful Muslims in the Middle East give to the terrorists, and from the clear indications that in large portions of Europe, they have already won, it’s also clear that we are in for a long and difficult struggle for the survival of our way of life and of our civilization.

Washington Post reporter David Ignatius on NPR 9/6/06 NPR: "You described in one column last week the sense you get in Iran and elsewhere in the region that Iran's star is on the rise in the region." IGNATIUS: "Well, Iranians certainly tell you that. They think this is their moment. They see the United States in retreat. They look at our predicament in Iraq and have almost a kind of contempt. That's one of the dangerous things about this moment is the Iranian devaluation of American power. But they think this is their moment to emerge as the dominant country...

I'm once again breaking out the shows into their own separate posts and including the background/info links with the guests' listing in those posts.  I will not be posting an entry for ABC This Week because:ABC This Week (George Stephanopoulos) 'This Week' will not air on Sunday, July 23, due to ABC's coverage of the British Open; we will return with all the latest in politics on Sunday, July 30.ABC This Week comment web page John Bolton does a twofer this week, covering both FNS and CNN.  Coming just after news that Voinovich will now vote for confirmation followed by...

Weekend Talk Show *Preview* for 5/27 - 5/28/06 (not the live thread)The main message is the Sunday Shows.  Message 1 will be the Saturday Shows and message 2 will be the show guest links post.  Then I'll post the ping list.ABC This Week (George Stephanopoulos) Meme: The power of the MSM is unassailable!watch as they destroy the evil right wingers and crown the good progressives while blaming everything on the United States (It's what they do best) Topics: Reports of a massacre in Haditha, IraqThe immigration debate Guests Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif. Duncan Hunter doesn't realize it yet, but he's...

At the Group of Eight summit this week in Gleneagles, Scotland, the leaders of rich countries will be talking about how they can aid poor countries. That's a noble mission, but a remarkable new book argues that it misses the point. Treating the poor as wards of the global economy ignores the fact that they are a vast market -- and that companies can profit right now by serving their needs. "If we stop thinking of the poor as victims or as a burden and start recognizing them as resilient and creative entrepreneurs and value-conscious consumers, a whole new world...

A funny thing is happening on the way to a globalized economy: Even as national boundaries are getting fuzzier because of free trade and instant flows of capital, the world is becoming more nationalistic. In this new nationalism, as in most things, America has led the way. Recall the behavior of our Olympic athletes over the years and you'll realize that American chauvinism and flag-waving are nothing new. President Bush elevated "America First" to a new ideology after Sept. 11, 2001 and has been denounced by globalists ever since for "unilateralism." But Bush-bashers may be missing the real point: Everybody...

PARIS -- The argument always comes up eventually when you're traveling in the Middle East: The United States cannot play the role of peacemaker, your Arab host will insist, because the pro-Israel lobby in Washington is too strong. This is a conversation I have grown to hate -- partly for its not-so-veiled anti-Semitism, partly because it ignores the reality that most Israelis want peace, whatever right-wing lobbyists may say, and partly because of its cynical, one-dimensional view of U.S. politics. America is a country of surprises, I like to remind my Arab hosts. In U.S. foreign policy, values and strategic...