Air-Sand Battle: Force Size, Land-Air-Sea Balance, and the Fight Against #ISIS

I love this piece.

From Kate Brannen, at Foreign Policy, "The fight against the Islamic State is forcing the Pentagon to rethink its plans for the future of warfare":

The  fight against the self-proclaimed Islamic State is still in its early days, but already it is challenging the Pentagon's assumptions about where and how war will be fought and what the military will need to be prepared.

The conflict in Iraq and Syria represents the type of war the Obama administration has tried to relegate to history. The days of fighting protracted ground wars in the Middle East were supposed to be over. Instead, the White House directed the Pentagon to turn its attention to the Asia-Pacific region, where it's believed by some that high-tech weapons systems belonging to the Air Force and Navy could be optimized in a more conventional fight.

But with new conflicts and pockets of violence and instability rapidly cropping up in places such as Ukraine, the Middle East, and parts of Africa, defense policymakers are being forced to revisit, if not rethink, some of the assumptions that underpin today's strategy and resource decisions.

Among the ideas under scrutiny are the relevance of ground forces and whether state actors pose the most dangerous threat to the U.S. homeland and global security.

For the military services, the debate over these assumptions will directly affect their size, budget, and the types of weapons they buy.

For senior military leaders, the issue of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, "is as much about where the services are headed as it is about the problem to solve," said David E. Johnson, a military analyst at Rand who from 2012 to 2014 directed the Army's Strategic Studies Group for Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno.

The Pentagon has laid out a strategy that accepts greater risk in the ground forces so that more resources can be poured into the Air Force and Navy -- the services that play the biggest role in the Asia-Pacific region. A smaller ground force is also believed to be necessary due to escalating personnel costs at a time when the defense budget is shrinking.

As part of this plan, the Army is continuing to shrink from a wartime high of 570,000 active-duty soldiers to today's 505,000, with the goal of dropping to 490,000 by the end of 2015. And even deeper cuts are likely to come; the Army is expected to downsize to 420,000 soldiers if Congress doesn't undo the automatic budget cuts known as sequestration planned for 2016.

The assumption behind these troop reductions is that the United States won't fight large-scale, protracted ground wars like it has in Iraq and Afghanistan anytime soon. And although no one is recommending inserting large-scale U.S. ground forces into Iraq -- the current cap is 3,100 "non-combat" troops -- events there and in Ukraine are providing the Army support for its argument that it is too risky to make the Army much smaller than it already is.

"I think there is a sense by many in the Army of, 'Hey, we told you you've been engaging in some degree of wishful thinking and we think we're getting growing evidence that we're not talking about hypotheticals,'" said Maren Leed, a senior advisor to Odierno from 2011 to 2012 who is now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "It's ISIS, it's Ebola, it's Russia. Name your problem, ground forces matter."

Meanwhile, the other services are arguing, "You can do it with us and with other people's boots," she said...

More.

PHOTO CREDIT: Wikimedia Commons.

#ObamaCare Architect Exposes Progressive Totalitarianism — And Repsac's Too!

But hey, "Gruber Shmuber," right?

All the leftist lies, deceit, and tyrannical corruption are fine and dandy, as long as it provides a few victims of "capitalist oppression" access to ObamaCare!

Newly Insured Through Exchanges Give Coverage Good Marks http://t.co/tMazy4D6zs / Gruber Shmuber. THIS is what matters.

— Walter James Casper (@repsac3) November 14, 2014

Well, maybe not.

See Bruce Thornton, at FrontPage Magazine:

Professor Jonathan Gruber of MIT, who designed the Affordable Care Act, used to be the symbol of the Democrats’ technocratic bona fides, and an example of how big government with its “scientific” experts can solve social and economic problems from health care to a warming planet. Yet a recently publicized video of remarks he made at a panel in 2013, along with 2 other videos in the same vein, has now made him the poster child of the elitist progressives’ contempt for the American people, and their sacrifice of prudence and reason to raw political power.

In the video Gruber explains the spin and lies the Dems used to give cover to their Congressmen so they could vote for Obamacare. Especially important was avoiding the “t-word.” So, Gruber crows on the video, “This bill was written in a tortured way to make sure [the Congressional Budget Office] did not score the mandate as taxes. If CBO scored the mandate as taxes, the bill dies.” He also explained how the bills’ writers covered up the obvious redistributionist core of the legislation, which to work has to take money from the healthy young to pay for health care for the sick and old. “If you had a law which said that healthy people are going to pay in — you made explicit healthy people pay in and sick people get money, it would not have passed.”

Then this handsomely paid consultant to the “most transparent administration in history” revealed the foundational contempt progressives have for the “people” whose champions they claim to be: “Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. And basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really, really critical to getting the thing to pass.” As David Horowitz tweeted, “Progressive totalitarianism: We know what’s good for you and will lie, cheat and then compel you to agree with us.”

This modern version of the Platonic “guardians,” who possess superior knowledge but who must camouflage their tyrannical rule with lies, is now over 100 years old, and has become deeply embedded in our politics. It was the fundamental assumption of American Progressivism, which argued that modern technology and social change had rendered the old constitutional order a dangerous relic....

The politics of today’s progressives all have their roots in the old Progressive assumptions––that enlightened elites know better than the people what is good for them, and that the people, being such unenlightened clods, need to be manipulated and lied to for their own good. Most important, the freedom and autonomy of the people must be limited by intrusive federal agencies and regulations in order for these utopian goals to be achieved.

Or to put it in other terms, this set of progressive beliefs––which we have seen acted on for the last six years by the president and practically every government agency––is totalitarian at its core. Not the brutal despotism of Italian fascism or Soviet communism or German Nazism, but Tocqueville’s “soft despotism,” the kinder, gentler Leviathan which undermines self-reliance and self-government by taking responsibility for the people’s comfort and happiness, and financing its largess by the redistribution of property. But no matter how comfortable in the short-term, such a condition is nothing other than servitude. And as Tocqueville warns, “No one will ever believe that a liberal, wise, and energetic government can spring from the suffrages of a subservient people.”

Repsac's a fascist asshole, so it's easy to see why he's all "Gruber Shmuber" at this outlandish revelation of the massive Obama-Democrat lies, hypocrisy, and jack-boot authoritarianism. It's what he's all about.

Climate Change Made Simple

From Stephen Green, at Pajamas Media:

If we’re just going to jack up energy prices to make ourselves feel good in the name of “doing something,” fuggidaboudit. Cheap energy promotes production, it promotes trade, it promotes mobility — three of the keys to American prosperity. Any permanent “skyrocketing” of energy prices would condemn millions, perhaps billions of people to lives of continued poverty. Or condemn them to death.

Assuming we can safely determine that the coming climate change would be bad for us, we then move on to the question of how and why the change is coming. Is it due to sun cycles? Carbon emissions? Hyperintelligent Wampa terraformers from ice planet Hoth? Some combination of factors? This is a vital question, and the models only provide answers based on the untested assumptions of the programers.

But let us now assume that we know bad change is a-comin’ and that we know what’s causing it. Now we have to do something, right? Not so fast there, pardner. If it turns out carbon emissions are actually helping keep things warmer and better than they otherwise would be, it would be a mistake to play into the Hothians icy hands by reducing those emissions. But until we know, we don’t know. Ignorance is neither bliss nor a basis for swift action...

More.

Dr. Matt Taylor and the Absurdity of Modern Feminism

If by chance you haven't seen the mewling, bawling apology, it's here, "Rosetta comet scientist D.r Matt Taylor apologises for shirt."

Now, at Twitchy, "‘Slutshirt shamed’! ‘Feminist bullies’ just made a comet scientist cry over his ‘sexist’ shirt."

http://t.co/SjaYHf54zY feminist bullies have made the guy who landed a spacecraft on comet cry and apologise for a harmless shirt

— Milo Yiannopoulos (@Nero) November 14, 2014

And here's Glenn Reynolds' response, "1 small shirt for a man, 1 giant leap backward for women."

And that's followed by Ann Althouse's fisking, "Did feminists make the comet landing all about clothes?"

Yes, society's pretty much all f-ked up.

As Global Strategic Threats Intensify, U.S. Nuclear Arsenal at Risk of Becoming Anachronism

A lot of problems with the U.S. strategic nuclear force.

At LAT, "Major overhaul of nuclear force planned to improve security and morale."

And also, "As U.S. nuclear arsenal ages, other nations have modernized":

As Russian forces were drawing back from a swift and violent incursion into Ukraine this fall, Moscow was delivering another powerful military statement many miles to the north.

A new 40-foot Bulava intercontinental ballistic missile, capable of delivering an unparalleled 10 nuclear warheads, was launched by a Russian navy submarine on a test run over the icy White Sea. The weapon was a clear signal to the world that as Russia battles tightening economic sanctions intended to block Moscow's aggressive posturing on NATO's frontiers, President Vladimir Putin has another card to play.

"I want to remind you that Russia is one of the most powerful nuclear nations," Putin declared earlier this year at a state-sponsored youth camp. He reinforced the message last month, inviting the world to "remember what consequences discord between major nuclear powers could bring for strategic stability."

The debate over how to modernize America's aging nuclear forces has taken on increasing urgency with the emergence of a newly assertive Russia and a new generation of nuclear powers with increasing technological sophistication.

North Korea, Pakistan and India all are working quickly to improve their nuclear arsenals and delivery systems. By next year, China is expected to be capable of delivering a nuclear strike anywhere in the continental U.S. for the first time in its history — a threat that Russia has posed for decades.

While the nuclear confrontation between the United States and Russia cooled off after the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, it has never ended. Indeed, the long-held hope for continual reductions in nuclear forces now seems unattainable, nuclear arms analysts say. For the first time in years, the U.S. and Russia each have increased the number of nuclear warheads deployed over the latest six-month monitoring period — the U.S. by 57 additional weapons and Russia by 131.

Russia is spending $560 billion on military modernization over the next six years with 25% allocated to aging nuclear forces, part of a program to replace all of its Soviet Union-era launchers. U.S. officials say it will take at least $355 billion over the coming decade to upgrade America's nuclear arsenal and keep up with the rearmament spree underway in the rest of the world.

"Our rival powers are investing billions of dollars to modernize and improve their nuclear systems," said Maj. Gen. Sandra Finan, Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center commander, warning that if the U.S. is "to remain credible," it must maintain nuclear preparedness as a priority.

But veterans of the Cold War also say tit-for-tat responses in nuclear confrontation carry grave risks, anchored to erroneous assumptions that a nuclear exchange would leave one side in better condition than the other.

"God help us if we ever need them," said Philip Coyle, a former nuclear weapons scientist, director of nuclear testing, senior Pentagon official and national security adviser.

The U.S. and Russia both continue to field land-based missiles that could be launched in a few minutes, submarine-based missiles able to deliver a devastating counterpunch to any surprise attack, and bombers that could loiter in threatening holding patterns above the Arctic.

A new strategic arms reduction treaty signed in 2010 limits deployed strategic warheads to 1,550 on each side, with a cap of 700 missiles and bombers by 2018. And over the last two decades, nuclear capabilities have been far from the U.S. military's top priority. Most of the attention has gone to high-tech conventional weapons that evolved after the first Gulf War. Two decades have gone by without developing a nuclear strategic weapon.

All the while, U.S. nuclear-capable bombers, submarines, intercontinental ballistic missiles and their launch-control bunkers have been allowed to become virtual Cold War museums.

A fascinating piece.

Continue reading.

ZOO's Favorites

At Zoo Today, "ZOO's favourite babes in a boob-packed compilation video!"

Obama's Executive Amnesty Threatens Constitutional Crisis

If Obama goes for the full 5-million legalization plan, there's going to be hell to pay.

Here's Fox News, "Source: Obama to announce 10-point immigration plan via exec action as early as next week."

Also at LAT, "Going solo on immigration: Obama weighs reform options."

And here's Megyn Kelly's full opening segment last night, which includes comments from Professor Jonathan Turley, who has repeatedly warned against Obama's authoritarian executive actions.

After Shellacking, Democrats Shifting to 'McGovern Model' for 2016

I expect regressive Democrats to increasingly rally around Senator Elizabeth Warren over the next couple of years, pulling the party further to the left. And whether or not "Fauxcahontas" runs in 2016, the Dems are positioning themselves the way George McGovern did heading into the 1972 presidential election: as an ideologically extreme party out of touch with Main Street economic concerns. As such, the Republicans could deliver a massive thumping to the Democrats next time around, perhaps not as dramatic as the one Richard Nixon delivered to McGovern, but certainly for the same reasons. The Democrats will be split between ideological purists and political pragmatists, and the wisdom of the latter won't become evident until a couple election cycles of far-left repudiation by the voters.

An any case, here's the NYT, "After Losses, Liberal and Centrist Democrats Square Off on Strategy."

Arrogance Plus Deception = #ObamaCare.

At the Chicago Tribune, "Arrogance plus deception equals Obamacare. Ask Gruber."

The Loneliest President Since Nixon

From Peggy Noonan, at WSJ, "Facing adversity, Obama has no idea how to respond":

Seven years ago I was talking to a longtime Democratic operative on Capitol Hill about a politician who was in trouble. The pol was likely finished, he said. I was surprised. Can’t he change things and dig himself out? No. “People do what they know how to do.” Politicians don’t have a vast repertoire. When they get in a jam they just do what they’ve always done, even if it’s not working anymore.

Seven years ago I was talking to a longtime Democratic operative on Capitol Hill about a politician who was in trouble. The pol was likely finished, he said. I was surprised. Can’t he change things and dig himself out? No. “People do what they know how to do.” Politicians don’t have a vast repertoire. When they get in a jam they just do what they’ve always done, even if it’s not working anymore.

This came to mind when contemplating President Obama. After a devastating election, he is presenting himself as if he won. The people were not saying no to his policies, he explained, they would in fact like it if Republicans do what he tells them.

You don’t begin a new relationship with a threat, but that is what he gave Congress: Get me an immigration bill I like or I’ll change U.S. immigration law on my own.

Mr. Obama is doing what he knows how to do—stare them down and face them off. But his circumstances have changed. He used to be a conquering hero, now he’s not. On the other hand he used to have to worry about public support. Now, with no more elections before him, he has the special power of the man who doesn’t care.

I have never seen a president in exactly the position Mr. Obama is, which is essentially alone. He’s got no one with him now. The Republicans don’t like him, for reasons both usual and particular: They have had no good experiences with him. The Democrats don’t like him, for their own reasons plus the election loss. Before his post-election lunch with congressional leaders, he told the press that he will judiciously consider any legislation, whoever sends it to him, Republicans or Democrats. His words implied that in this he was less partisan and more public-spirited than the hacks arrayed around him. It is for these grace notes that he is loved. No one at the table looked at him with colder, beadier eyes than outgoing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid , who clearly doesn’t like him at all. The press doesn’t especially like the president; in conversation they evince no residual warmth. This week at the Beijing summit there was no sign the leaders of the world had any particular regard for him. They can read election returns. They respect power and see it leaking out of him. If Mr. Obama had won the election they would have faked respect and affection.

Vladimir Putin delivered the unkindest cut, patting Mr. Obama’s shoulder reassuringly. Normally that’s Mr. Obama’s move, putting his hand on your back or shoulder as if to bestow gracious encouragement, needy little shrimp that you are. It’s a dominance move. He’s been doing it six years. This time it was Mr. Putin doing it to him. The president didn’t like it

From Reuters: “‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ Putin was overheard saying in English in Obama’s general direction, referring to the ornate conference room. ‘Yes,’ Obama replied, coldly, according to journalists who witnessed the scene.”

The last time we saw a president so alone it was Richard Nixon, at the end of his presidency, when the Democrats had turned on him, the press hated him, and the Republicans were fleeing. It was Sen. Barry Goldwater, the GOP’s standard-bearer in 1964, and House Minority Leader John Rhodes, also of Arizona, who went to the White House to tell Nixon his support in Congress had collapsed, they would vote to impeach. Years later Goldwater called Nixon “The world’s biggest liar.”

Obama's a petulant bitch --- and a freakin' national disgrace.

More.

New RNC Video Hammers Democrats Over Jonathan Gruber #ObamaCare Comments

The Dems are getting Grubered, heh.

'Jonathan Gruber is One of Most Respected Economist in the World!'

That's the quote from outgoing Senate Majority Dickhead Harry Reid, on the MIT economist suddenly Democrats "have never heard of."

Watch:



And ICYMI, "#ObamaCare Sold on a Pack of Lies."

Keira Knightley's Topless Stunt: Valid Protest or Shameless Self-Promotion?

Everybody's doing topless shoots nowadays. Of course it's promotional. Some folks thought Ms. Knightly was unimpressive in her debut, but beauty's in the eye of the beholder.

In any case, here's Charlotte Allen, at the Los Angeles Times.

And previously, "Keira Knightley for Interview Magazine September 2014."

Donald Sutherland Calls for 'Revolution' Among American Youth

I actually agree with Donald Sutherland on this, although I think we differ on the kind of revolution that needs to happen.

At Truth Revolt.

#ObamaCare Sold on a Pack of Lies

I was trying to avoid the whole idiot-gasbag-liar Jonathan Gruber issue (since the fact that lies were used to pass ObamaCare is like so 2009), but if Charles Krauthammer's weighing in ... well, let's just say he's got my vote.

At WaPo, "The Gruber Confession":

Dude RT @jaketapper: Obamacare architect #Gruber in 6th video: 'Mislabeling' helped us get rid of tax breaks http://t.co/DEfjxzAW47

— Amanda Carpenter (@amandacarpenter) November 14, 2014

It’s not exactly the Ems Dispatch (the diplomatic cable Bismarck doctored to provoke the 1870 Franco-Prussian War). But what the just-resurfaced Gruber Confession lacks in world-historical consequence, it makes up for in world-class cynicism. This October 2013 video shows MIT Professor Jonathan Gruber, a principal architect of Obamacare, admitting that, in order to get it passed, the law was made deliberately obscure and deceptive. It constitutes the ultimate vindication of the charge that Obamacare was sold on a pack of lies.

“Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage,” said Gruber. “Basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really, really critical to getting the thing to pass.” This was no open-mic gaffe. It was a clear, indeed enthusiastic, admission to an academic conference of the mendacity underlying Obamacare.

First, Gruber said, the bill’s authors manipulated the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, which issues gold-standard cost estimates of any legislative proposal: “This bill was written in a tortured way to make sure CBO did not score the mandate as taxes.” Why? Because “if CBO scored the mandate as taxes, the bill dies.” And yet, the president himself openly insisted that the individual mandate — what you must pay the government if you fail to buy health insurance — was not a tax.

Worse was the pretense that Obamacare wouldn’t cost anyone anything. On the contrary, it’s a win-win, insisted President Obama, promising that the “typical family” would save $2,500 on premiums every year.

Skeptics like me pointed out the obvious: You can’t subsidize 30 million uninsured without someone paying something. Indeed, Gruber admits, Obamacare was a huge transfer of wealth — which had to be hidden from the American people, because “if you had a law which . . . made explicit that healthy people pay in and sick people get money, it would not have passed.”

Remember: The whole premise of Obamacare was that it would help the needy, but if you were not in need, if you liked what you had, you would be left alone. Which is why Obama kept repeating — PolitiFact counted 31 times — that “if you like your plan, you can keep your plan.”

But of course you couldn’t, as millions discovered when they were kicked off their plans last year. Millions more were further shocked when they discovered major hikes in their premiums and deductibles. It was their wealth that was being redistributed.

As NBC News and others reported last year, the administration knew this all along. But White House political hands overrode those wary about the president’s phony promise. In fact, Obama knew the falsity of his claim as far back as February 2010, when, at a meeting with congressional leaders, he agreed that millions would lose their plans.

Now, it’s not unconstitutional to lie. Nor are laws enacted by means of deliberate deception thereby rendered invalid. But it is helpful for citizens to know the cynicism with which the massive federalization of their health care was crafted...

Keep reading.

Femen Crucifix Protest at the Vatican

This is actually one of their more grotesque protests --- and I normally give these women the benefit of the doubt.

At Gateway Pundit, "Topless Femen Activists Simulate Anal Sex With Crucifix at Vatican Protest (Video)."

Also at Deutsche Welle‎, "Femen ladies in leather skirts protest at Vatican - boobs and all":

Bare-chested and wearing leather skirts, members of a women's rights activist group gathered at St. Peter's Square in the Vatican on Friday to … ehm protest. Femen style.

Also at Femen's website, "NO POPE IN THE PARLIAMENT! NO RELIGION IN POLITICS!"

Senior Democrats Slam Congressional Leaders After Party's Epic Thrashing in Midterm Elections

At the Hill, "Dems fault leaders for brushing off losses."

The criticisms are going to fall on deaf (and dumb) ears. With the Obama-Dems it's like a runaway train to far-left extremist oblivion.

Obama Looking to Cement His Legacy, Democrat Party Fortunes Be Damned

Those good old boys at the Old Gray Lady are always good for some pro-Obama framing.

In taking his administration farther to the left, ignoring the lessons of the Democrats' historic midterm shellacking, the president hopes to secure his progressive legacy. Meanwhile, this just opens up the political target on Hillary's back. Well, either Hillary or whichever unlucky Democrat bastard gets to carry the party's standard into 2016.

Americans want jobs, economic growth and rising wages. Instead, Obama's ramming down unlawful executive amnesty, bogus climate change agreements, and Internet "net neutrality." I'm sure that just bursts the cockles of economically stressed Americans across the country.

But hey, The One's smarter than everyone else, and NYT's all jiggy with it. Heh, as if we should be expecting something else.

See, "Obama’s Moves Defying Label of Lame Duck."

Obama's Climate Accord Sets Democrats Up for Failure

Hey, if anyone's a true believer it's The One in the Oval Office.

But Democrat strategist John Podesta is the main brain behind making global warming a Democrat hot-button issue for 2016. Podesta's supposedly going to chair a Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, so he's going to be personally responsible for setting her up at the GOP's whipping girl. And boy, top Republicans are chomping at the bit on this one.

At NYT, "In Climate Deal With China, Obama May Set 2016 Theme."

PREVIOUSLY: "Obama's Green Leap Forward."

Obama's Green Leap Forward

So, yeah, Obama learned nothing from the left's midterm debacle. It's almost like he wants his party to fail in 2016 and beyond.

At WSJ, "Obama trades higher U.S. energy costs now for distant Chinese promises":

Meaningless global warming promises are much easier than corralling weapons of mass destruction in North Korea, or convincing Beijing to fight Islamic State, or for that matter stopping Chinese cyber-attacks on U.S. military and corporate targets. Mr. Xi must have been delighted to see a U.S. President agree to make America less economically competitive in return for rhetorical bows to doing something someday about climate change.

More.