Conservatively Speaking

Military affairs specialists say General Motors’ plans to sell its Hummer vehicle division to China making it a CHummer and raising new concerns about the transfer of valuable military vehicle technology.

The Hummer is the civilian version of the front-line U.S. military vehicle widely used since the 1990s and the replacement to the World War II era Jeep.

Richard Fisher, of the International Assessment and Strategy Center, says “Multiple versions of the Hummer are produced by two Chinese companies already, and AM General already sells parts to one of them,” Fisher said.

“The PLA already buys their Hummers for PLA Airborne units and for police units across China. All that’s left is for Congress to appropriate monies to give uparmored Humvees to the PLA and order the U.S. Army to buy Chinese-made Hummers.”

Calls flooded the Pentagon, Capital Hill and AM General following reports of the sale to China.

Steve Clawson, a spokesman for South Bend, Indiana-based AM General, said the military and civilian programs are separate.

“GM’s proposed sale of the civilian Hummer brand would have no impact on the military Humvee program,” he said.

The Wall Street Journal identified the Chinese buyer, Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery, as a major company in China that is seeking to break into the U.S. market with the Hummer purchase.

The deal may be blocked by U.S. regulators, the Journal noted, noting that Sichuan is the location where China’s military vehicles are built, raising concerns that the Hummer will boost the PLA.

China’s state-run industries do not distinguish between civilian and military manufacturing. Often factories that make refrigerators also make missiles and other weaponry.

God, grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones that I do like, and the eyesight to tell the difference.

Benign Neglect as Immigration Policy Obama has found a new way to handle the problem of America’s 12 to 20 million illegal immigrants- ignore them, says American Spectator’s George Wittman.  Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano has decided that the best way to deal with the negative aspects of this sensitive issue is to shove it off on local officials, city, state and federal. Out of sight, out of the media, out of mind, she thinks.There is a continuing campaign by various Latino groups, among others, that local police harass illegal immigrants. In the mind of these activists, the fact that these individuals are suspected of being here in the United States illegally is not adequate reason to abridge their “civil rights” by seeking to determine if they are legal or not..Harassment, by the way, means that often immigrants are stopped by police for apparently minor infractions, and are held on that charge while being checked through ICE (acronym for the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement arm). This is not a uniform circumstance. Border states such as California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas have towns and cities that differ widely on local laws in regard to informing ICE of their police contact with possible “illegals.” Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security stays as far away as possible from becoming involved in these discontinuities.

Within local law enforcement, depending on the judgment of the officer, there is also often a wide range of application of the same local laws. The Latino community in California, the Southwest, Florida, and elsewhere with large Hispanic immigrant populations has the ability to apply considerable local political pressure to protect “immigrant rights” of those who are documented or undocumented. Local law enforcement responds accordingly.

Secretary Napolitano’s logic appears to be that the more local officials are tasked with the major portion of the burden of dealing with the presence of illegals in their communities, the less negative political fallout will occur on the Obama and Napolitano.. Her entire approach to illegal immigration is to do everything possible to nullify the broader political effects of the legal and security aspects of ultimately millions of people pouring into the United States.

What is particularly curious is that Napolitano went to great trouble when she first took on her new assignment to de-emphasize countering the foreign-sponsored terrorist aspects of her job while making a priority of the economic and social impact of the growing problem of the “undocumented.” Apparently that approach now has been relegated to local domestic concern.Placing the weight of enforcement of the first phase of illegal immigration laws on local police is theoretically not inappropriate - although it does conspicuously add to their workload. Local cops are the ones best acquainted with their communities. A relatively quick assessment of non-English speakers by local law enforcement can differentiate between those with community ties and those without.

The legally ticklish problem of “profiling” is a matter in which Sec. Napolitano does not want to become involved. Better leave that hot button issue to the people on the front lines to take the heat. She knows full well that cops “profile” suspects in many ways during their everyday assignments. Of course they are going to be attracted first by people of Mexican or Central American background. It’s perhaps unfortunate, but these nationals make up the core of illegal entrants.

With Obama pounding his universal health care plan down Congress’ throats and the acknowledged fact that perhaps a third of the reportedly 47 million uninsured are illegal alients and now the Congressional Budget Office pegging its cost at $1.6 trillion that mean taxpayers are going to have to cough up a half trillion dollars to cover them.

The pro-immigrant groups believe that asking non-English speakers to prove they are in the U.S. legally is discrimination.

A Sunday school teacher was discussing the Ten Commandments with her five and six year olds. After explaining the commandment to ‘honor thy father and thy mother’ she asked, “Is there a commandment that teaches us how to treat our brothers and sisters?”

Without missing a beat one little boy answered, “Thou shalt not kill.”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad warned  the United States and Britain on Sunday not to interfer in the Islamic Republic’s internal affairs, the ISNA ( Iranians news agency) was cited by Reuters as saying. Sunday morning ISNA said 17 have been killed and 100 injured.

A picture in Sunday’s Jerusalem Post  shows Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, listening to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s speech with  judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi and parliament speaker Ali Larijani sit, during Friday prayers.

Also on Sunday the BBC speculates that the protests in Iran are slowly being suffocated as more and more troops and militia are massed to suppress public anti government displays. There are rumors of strikes being encouraged for as early as Monday.

Ahmadinejad has been quoted as warning, “Definitely by hasty remarks you will not be placed in the circle of friendship with the Iranian nation. Therefore I advise you to correct your interfering stances,” Ahmadinejad was quoted as saying in a meeting with clerics and scholars.

Many Western countries have criticized the election, which was won by Ahmadinejad according to official figures, and its aftermath. His main opponent, moderate Mir Hossein Mousavi, says the vote was rigged. The government denied the charges.

Also Sunday, Iran’s Parliament reiterated warnings sounded by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in which he said that leaders of the US, UK, France and Germany must not to interfere in the country’s internal affairs, threatening that Iran would respond to such meddling “in other fields.”

Obama has remained measured in his comments about the Iranian protests sparking criticism that he is too partial to Islam and not nearly supportive enough of the anti-government forces. For his part Obama said he did not want the U. S. to become a “foil” for Iran’s theocracy - but, that appears to already have happened.

For its part the The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the Islamist shock troops in charge of Iran’s nuclear arms program, has said Obama’s speech in Cairo legitimized Iran’s nuclear program.

IRGC paramilitary unit Qods Force, says that Obama’s comments about the Iranians having a right to the peaceful use of nuclear power indicate the president “acknowledged Iran’s nuclear right within the framework of the NPT; he must show this in practice.” 

“The dignified foreign policies of the ninth government forced him to officially acknowledge Iran’s nuclear right and asked for negotiations with Iran without preconditions,” Kowsari said. “Obama’s presence in the Middle East and in the Islamic countries was because America wanted to support Saudi Arabia and Egypt and also wanted to send a limited verbal signal to Iran.”

Sunday Senator John McCain regretted Obama has not taken a stronger stance on opposing suppression of Iranian “human rights.” He lamented Obama’s tepid leadership. On Friday the U. S. Congress reaffirmed its conviction that people have the right to peaceful protest. He said America has a moral obligation and faces the same responsibility now as during the Cold War he cited Daniel Webster and JFK who pledged to “go anywhere and bear any burden” in the pursuit of freedom.

Hanging over the entire Iranian issue are oil prices that have recently been driven up by speculators and the fear of a spike deep into three figures resulting in $4-$5 per gallon gasoline prices in the U. S. is the wheels coime off in Iran. That would bring economic recovery to a screeching halt. So far the Iranian dustup has not impacted oil prices primarily because there is a glut which of course raises the issue of the 51-day run up on per gallon prices - that’s another story.

Left-wing activists who want political show trials of Bush administration officials over War on Terror policies get their funding from George Soros. A search Capital Research Center conducted to find the domain name registration record for a new pressure group called the Commission on Accountability revealed that the group’s website address, commissiononaccountability.org, was reserved for Soros by Blue State Digital, LLC, a research and media firm that BusinessWeek last summer called Obama’s “secret weapon.” At least eight of the 19 left-leaning institutional members of the Commission -including the Constitution Project and Human Rights Watch- are funded by the secretive Soros.

California’s unemployment rate has risen from 6.5% a year ago to 11.5% in May fully 2% higher than the national unemployment rate of 9.5%. California’s unemployemtn was 4.8% in 2007. Most expect unemployment to exceed 10% nationally and California could top 14%.

California’s budget disaster is so serious the state is talking about ending welfare payments to more than 2 million people, mostly women with children.

Only Rhode Island and South Carolina at 12.1%; Oregon at 12.4% and Michigan at 14.1% exceed the percentage of those out of work in California. Nebraska and North Dakota have the nation’s lowest unemployment rate at 4.4%.

The criticism about Obama’s timid approach to Iran is spreading faster than the Iranian protest and includes unflattering comments from the protesters themselves.