Conservatively Speaking

On July 14, President Obama will throw out the first pitch at the All-Star Game in St. Louis. Joe Biden will be on hand to commit the first error.

It has been a couple decades since the then USSR used Cuba as its African proxy to spread violent discord across the continent most notably then in Angola. That pretty much failed and certainly ended when the USSR collapsed. .

Now the race for Africa’s resources is heating up again as RFussia’s President Dmitry Medvedev goes on a four-day trip this week to key countries aimed at reestablishing Russia’s influence on the continent.

After signing a strategic cooperation pact with Egypt, Dmitry Medvedev travelled to Namibia, before penning nuclear and gas deals with energy-rich Nigeria on Wednesday.

According to a featute story in MOSCOW NEWS datelined June 25, 2009 exact details of the Nambian deal were not released, Gazprom, Russia state owned energy giant, was reportedly interested in signing a $2.5 billion deal to create a joint oil and gas exploration venture with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp, signaling its intent to strengthen its grip on Europe’s energy supply.

Although exact details were not released, Gazprom, Russia state owned energy giant, was reportedly interested in signing a $2.5 billion deal to create a joint oil and gas exploration venture with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp, signaling its intent to strengthen its grip on Europe’s energy supply.

Although exact details were not released, Gazprom, Russia state owned energy giant, was reportedly interested in signing a $2.5 billion deal to create a joint oil and gas exploration venture with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp, signaling its intent to strengthen its grip on Europe’s energy supply.

“I think Gazprom still wants to buy all gas produced around Europe and resell it on its own terms,” said Mikhail Korchemkin, head of the East European Gas Analysis, a US-based consultancy.

Gazprom has lagged behind competitors like Royal Dutch/Shell and ExxonMobil in the battle for Afircan oil and gas.

To start competing Gazprom wants to gain involvement in the Trans-Saharan pipeline, which would transport Nigerian gas to Europe, though some have seen geo-political motivations in this move as re-exporting gas eats into the monopolist’s profit.

“As a business model, it [re-exporting African gas] does not make sense,” said Korchemkin.

Although Russia is not dependent on Sub-Saharan raw materials, there are substantial gains to be made as their extensive resources remain undeveloped.

“The sizeable infrastructural gap in Nigeria and Angola could also create substantial attractive opportunities for Russian companies in the power, energy and construction sectors,” Renaissance Capital wrote in a note.

It is speculated that LUKoil is looking to increase its presence in West Africa, as it has investments in Ghana and Cote D’Ivoire, while RusAl already holds a majority stake in Nigerian aluminium smelter Alscon.

Medvedev was scheduled to meet with Angola’s president, Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who studied in the Soviet Union and was married to a Russian.

Angola is a major oil producer and currently holds the OPEC presidency.

“While the trip to Angola might be driven by the desire to secure contracts in the oil industry, one should not discount the ‘political relation’ aspect of this visit,” Renaissance Capital said in a note.

Despite not having the economic clout of Nigeria and Angola, Africa’s second- and third-largest economies, respectively, Namibia was on Medvedev’s agenda as a major producer of uranium oxide and has extensive undeveloped natural resources, including diamonds, in which Russia’s Alrosa has investments.

Nuclear power was on the agenda in Egypt, which is building its first nuclear plant in 20 years and Rosatom is hoping the presidential visit will boost their claim for the $1.8 billion tender.

Since the USSR’s collapse “Russia’s” influence in Africa has withered while China’s has investments have boomed - to $11 billion in Nigeria alone.

Playing the Africa card appears a logical next step in the Putin planned renaissance of Russia. Its resurrection in the Middle East and now Africa has largely resulted from the [received weakness in Obama foreign policy that is seen as fragmented, and a peculiar mix of Ramsey Clark and Rodney King. Plus Obama is obcessed with pushing an increainsgly radical domestic agenda and even more desperate to renew the START nuclear arms reduction treaty which Medvedev will do while exacting a painful long term price for the US.

Excoriate (ik-SKOR-ee-ayt) verb tr.:1. To severely criticize someone or something.2. To strip off the skin. From Latin excoriare (to strip or to skin), ex- (out) + corium (skin, hide). Ultimately from the Indo-European root sker- (to cut) that is also the source of words such as skirt, sharp, scrape, screw, shard, shears, carnage, curt, carnivorous, hardscrabble, and incarnadine.

As a first generation American  of Scots-Irish heritage.  I can testify that there is no love lost between them and the "English" notwithstanding fighting for centuries for the British empire. Indeed it is a heady time in Irish pubs and Guiness is flowing by the barrel.

After a centuries of conflct it appears the people of Ireland now have the fate of Britain in their hands and without a drop of bloodshed. The deal reached by Irish Premier Brian Cowen at the EU summit at the weekend appers to have snooked the English allowing him to call a new referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in early October.

If the Irish vote "yes," and "Gordon Brown's wretched lame duck of a government clings to power in London until next year," then Britain will probably remain a member of the EU. If the Irish vote "no," then Britain's disengagement is likely to begin.

David Cameron, the Conservative leader who looks almost certain to win Britain's next election, has promised a separate British referendum on the Lisbon Treaty if the ratification process is not completed in all 27 EU member states. The Irish referendum is one such hurdle. The German Constitutional Court is another, but on what seems to be a technical matter. The Czech and Polish presidents have yet to sign the ratified document, but all other legal procedures are complete.

So an Irish "yes" vote means that Cameron will probably not have to carry out his promise to hold a referendum in Britain. This would probably come as something of a relief to Cameron, who is happy to run against the EU when campaigning in Britain, but does not want to leave the EU altogether. The question will be how Britain can stay a member of an organization when all its other members have agreed to create an entirely new one, and Britain alone rejects it.

Most opinion polls say the British would vote against the Lisbon Treaty by a margin of two to one. In the European Parliament elections earlier this month, Gordon Brown's Labor candidates were beaten into third place behind the United Kingdom Independence Party, a single-issue party that says "no" to Europe.

Most Conservatives now oppose the treaty, even though it was their party that took Britain into Europe more than 30 years ago, and many of their senior figures remain fundamentally pro-European. These party splits over Europe have been deeply damaging. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was toppled for being too skeptical of Europe. Her successor John Major was emasculated in Parliament by his own anti-Europe rebels. The arguments over the treaty could bring back those bitter divisions of the past.

"The treaty transfers power from national parliaments to the Brussels bureaucracy and would make Britain a province of a European state with a European president," comments William Rees-Mogg, a former editor in chief of London's The Times who speaks for many traditional conservatives.

So David Cameron's priority is to ensure that Europe does not become so prominent an issue that it splits his party yet again. That was why he promised the referendum, in what at the time seemed like an empty gesture. Now it could be the issue that defines his political future.

This issue has been building for years. The Lisbon Treaty, which gives the EU a powerful new president and foreign minister and gives greater powers to the elected European Parliament, originally began 10 years ago as a new EU Constitution.

When the French and Dutch voters rejected that idea in a referendum in 2005, the Eurocrats of Brussels cunningly reinvented the constitution as a treaty. This meant it could be ratified by parliaments without need for a referendum -- except in Ireland, where the government was not allowed to get away with such fancy footwork.

It is largely the same document, although some symbols that suggest a European federal state have been removed, like the EU anthem and flag.

The next Irish referendum is now the key. At the last time of asking, they voted "no." But since the rest of the EU has now agreed to add a solemn protocol to the treaty to guarantee that the Irish will not have to give up their traditional neutrality and their control over the own taxes and abortion laws, Cowen can now tell his voters that he has secured a better deal than the one they rejected.

The big difference is that when they voted "no," the Irish thought their economy was doing fine. This year their economy is in deep recession, and without the euro and the prospect of EU support, the country would be at great risk of defaulting on its debts. So the opinion polls suggest that the Irish will vote "yes" in October and put the British political system into an agonizing dilemma.

Cameron would love to replace Gordon Brown sooner rather than later, but not if the timing would force him to hold a British referendum on Europe. Brown would rather hang on until May 2010, the final date by which he must call an election. But if Brown can be toppled soon by his own party, and a new leader calls an election in October, the opinion polls say they would lose many fewer seats in Parliament. And they would thrust Cameron into an immediate and ruinous crisis over Europe.

Only the -Irish and Scots can organize an election dust-up such as this.

"President Obama suggested at a town hall event Wednesday night that one way to shave medical costs is to stop expensive and ultimately futile procedures performed on people who are about to die and don't stand to gain from the extra care." -- Peter Nicholas, Los Angeles Times

Before Iran's presidential election, Obama sent a secret "love note" to its supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei calling for "cooperation in regional and bilateral relations" and a resolution of the dispute over Iran's nuclear program.

 Irans media gave great prominence to the strange disclosure - for which they cited the Washington Times of Wednesday, June 24 - in order to underline Obama's backing for Khamenei and president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in contrast to his latest words of condemnation for the regime and support for the "reformists." At best the letter was ill-timed and with Obama's later repudiation creates and image of confusion and indecision or worse.

 According to the WT, a senior Obama administration official speaking on condition of anonymity refused to confirm or deny that this letter had been sent to the supreme leader or whether there had been a response.

 Iran is using this expose to embarrass Obama for telling a news conference in Washington Tuesday that Iran's rulers are on the wrong side of history while sending secret expressions of support. .

The secrecy of the communication can only add to the awkwardness because it points to Obama being convinced that once the protest movement dies down, he can go back to his plan for engaging Iran's leaders in dialogue almost as soon as the bodies are buried.

Khamenei himself referred indirectly to the missive when he commented in his sermon last Friday:

"On the one hand, they write a letter to us to express their respect for the Islamic Republic and for re-establishment of ties, and on the other hand, they make these remarks. Which one of these remarks are we supposed to believe."

 Following the disclosure of the Obama letter, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs announced: "Given the events of the past many days, those invitations [for Iranian diplomats to attend July 4 events in different world capitals] will no longer be extended.”

 The events going back and forth in a single day, Wednesday, signaled a conspicuous retreat in the process of US-Iranian rapprochement and a continuation of waffling that encourages U. S. enemies to act more aggressively.

A Sunday school teacher was teaching her young students about Noah and the ark. She asked them what they thought Noah may have done to pass the time in the ark for forty years. After waiting a few moments, the teacher suggested, “Maybe he did a lot of fishing. How about that?”

One little boy gave her a funny look and said, “I don’t think so. It’s kinda hard to fish with just two worms!”

China is rapidly building up its submarine forces with more capable and quiet submarines and advanced weapons designed to sink U.S. ships and submarines in a future conflict, according to recent testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission.

Commission Co-chairman Larry Wortzel, a former military intelligence analyst and operator, told the June 11 hearing that China in recent years has made “great strides” in building up its naval forces, specifically submarines.

“Since 2004, the Chinese navy has procured dozens of modern naval platforms, including 20 submarines spread among five different classes, eight destroyers, and 24 advanced fighters, the Su-30 Mkk2 [jets],” Wortzel said.

“China is on the cusp of an operational submarine-based nuclear deterrent and the Central Military Commission seems to be considering building aircraft carriers,” he said.

Additionally, China is working on a credible military capability to deny regional access to U.S. and other ships through anti-ship ballistic missiles and anti-ship cruise missiles.

Wortzel noted that Chinese military writings have stated the need for Beijing to “control the seas” through missiles, electronics and information technologies that span the surface, subsurface, air and space domains.

Recent far-away naval deployments by Chinese ships, including the Gulf of Aden, the transiting of Chinese warships through Japan’s Tsugaru Strait into the Pacific, and the noticeable increase in overseas port calls “demonstrate that the Chinese navy is turning into a blue water navy,” he said.

Congressional Research Service specialist Ronald O’Rourke told the commission that China’s navy is rapidly building up an array of advanced warfighting weapons.

“China’s naval modernization effort encompasses a broad array of weapon acquisition programs, including programs for anti-ship ballistic missiles (ASBMs), anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCMs), land-attack cruise missiles (LACMs), surface-to-air missiles, mines, manned aircraft, unmanned aircraft, submarines, destroyers and frigates, patrol craft, amphibious ships and craft, mine countermeasures (MCM) ships, and supporting C4ISR  systems,” O’Rourke said.

Chinese submarine forces include construction of “a significantly more modern and capable submarine force.”

Since 2006 the Chinese have taken delivery of eight Russian-made Kilo-class non-nuclear-powered attack submarines. These are in addition to four Kilos China purchased from Russia in the 1990s.

China has recently built or is building four other classes of submarines, including the following:

• a new nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) design called the Jin class or Type 094;
• a new nuclear powered attack submarine (SSN) design called the Shang class or Type 093;
• a new SS design called the Yuan class or Type 041 (or Type 039A); and
• another, also fairly new SS design called the Song class or Type 039/039G.

O’Rourke said the new submarines benefited from Russian technology and are faster and quieter and thus more difficult to detect. Its current force includes 28 relatively modern attack submarines - meaning Shang, Kilo, Yuan, and Song class boats. Between 1995 and 2007 China deployed 38 submarines, an average of 2.9 submarines a year.

“This average commissioning rate, if sustained indefinitely, would eventually result in a steady-state submarine force of 58 to 88 boats of all kinds, assuming an average submarine life of 20 to 30 years,” O’Rourke said.

The submarines are armed with one or more of the following: anti-ship cruise missiles, wire-guided and wake-homing torpedoes, and mines. China’s eight recently delivered Kilos are armed with highly capable SS-N-27 Sizzler ASCMs.  In addition to other weapons, Shang-class SSNs may carry land attack cruise missiles.

A Harley rider is passing the zoo when he sees a little girl leaning into the lion’s cage.

Suddenly, the lion grabs her by the cuff of her jacket and tries to pull her inside to slaughter her under the eyes of her screaming parents.

The biker jumps off his bike, runs to the cage and hits the lion square on the nose with a powerful punch. Whimpering from the pain  the lion jumps back, letting go of the girl, and the biker brings her to her terrified parents, who thank him endlessly.

A New York Times reporter has watched the whole event.. The reporter says, “Sir, this was the most gallant and brave thing I saw a man do in my whole life.” The biker replies, “Why, it was nothing, really, the lion was behind bars. I just saw this little kid in danger, and acted as I felt right.”

The reporter says, “Well, I’m a journalist from the New York Times, and tomorrow’s paper will have this story on the front page… so, what do you do for a living and what political affiliation do you have?”

The biker replies, “I’m a U.S. Marine and a Republican.”

The following morning the biker buys The New York Times to see if it indeed brings news of his actions, and reads, on front page:

“U.S. MARINE ASSAULTS AFRICAN IMMIGRANT AND STEALS HIS LUNCH.”

 Russia’s official defense newspaper reported last week that a new Cold War between the United States and China is impending. Ten days ago Pravda, Russia’s official news service, advised Obama to stop his foolish domestic spending and now is adbvising him on foreign policy.

“The United States requires new weapons, particularly in missile defense systems and in other super modern military potential in order to deter China’s steady build-up of its nuclear and conventional arsenal and to create a counterweight to it,” the newspaper reported June 16.

The comment was based on a draft report on China produced by a State Department advisory board and first reported in The Washington Times.

The Russian report said that the semi-secret State Department report identified China’s strategy as going beyond building forces capable of taking back Taiwan and that China was striving to “break out,” projecting its might beyond the limits of the region, including shipping lanes over which energy products needed for Chinese modernization are transported.

The Russian report said the U.S. is building up missile defenses in Asia to counter China and is actively recruiting allies for development of other defenses, including Japan and Australia.

For China, a “major objective is to counter U.S. presence and U.S. military capabilities in East Asia through the acquisition of offensive capacities in critical functional areas that systematically exploit U.S. vulnerabilities.” According to the document, the arms build-up is occurring in accordance with existing tenets of “asymmetric warfare.” In particular, “space and cyber weapons are being developed, which can help the Chinese forces vanquish the stronger American Army.”

The report appeared in Krasnaya Zvezda, or Red Star, the official newspaper of the Russian defense ministry.