Former Pentagon chief Gates dings Obama’s leadership, Biden’s foreign policy chops

nbcpolitics

By Carrie Dann, NBC News

The former defense secretary who served under both President Barack Obama and President George W. Bush has less than glowing praise for America’s top two elected officials.
In a new memoir, “Duty: Memoirs of a Secretary at War,” former Pentagon chief Robert Gates writes that Obama lacked commitment to the decisions he made about his strategy in Afghanistan, the New York Times reported Tuesday.
“As I sat there, I thought: The president doesn’t trust his commander, can’t stand Karzai, doesn’t believe in his own strategy and doesn’t consider the war to be his,” Gates writes in the new book. “For him, it’s all about getting out.”
He also writes that the White House's national security staff lacked experience and tended towards  "micromanagement of military matters."
His words for Vice President Joe Biden are even more harsh, the paper reports.
“I think he has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades,” Gates wrote of Biden, whom he also described as a “man of integrity.”
Before becoming vice president, Biden served as the longtime head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
While critical of Biden, Gates appears to favor former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The NYT writes that Gates has “especially high praise” for Clinton.
The Washington Post adds, however, that Gates says both Clinton and Obama admitted to basing their opposition to the 2007  "surge" in Iraq in part on political considerations.
"Hillary told the president that her opposition to the [2007] surge in Iraq had been political because she was facing him in the Iowa primary. . . . The president conceded vaguely that opposition to the Iraq surge had been political. To hear the two of them making these admissions, and in front of me, was as surprising as it was dismaying," Gates writes, according to the Post.
Both Clinton and Biden are considered possible contenders for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination.

Obama’s Half-Brother Reveals What the President Did the First Time They Met in Kenya and Talked About ‘Heroes of Western Culture’

President Barack Obama with half-brother Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo and his wife. (Image: Mark Obama Ndesanjo Foundation Ltd.)

Sharona Schwartz

President Obama’s half-brother told an Israeli newspaper that when he first met Barack, he was struck by his sibling’s rejection of Western culture.

“I remember that my impression at the first meeting was that Barack thought that I was too white, and I thought that he was too black,” Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo told Maariv. “He was an American citizen on a journey in search of his African roots, while I was a resident of Kenya seeking to find his white roots.”

“I remember that when I spoke with him about the heroes of Western culture he rolled his eyes impatiently. My feeling was that, here is an American who in many ways is trying to be a local Kenyan youth. This is something I tried to flee my entire life,” Ndesandjo said of the brothers’ first meeting in Kenya, which Obama described in his 1995 best-selling memoir, “Dreams From My Father.”

In his memoir, Obama also described the first meeting with his brother: “I don’t feel much of an attachment [to Kenya]. Just another poor African country,” Obama quoted Ndesandjo saying. He went on to say, “You think that somehow I’m cut off from my roots … Well, you’re right.”

As reported on TheBlaze last month, Ndesandjo has said he wants to “set the record straight” about some of the details presented in Obama’s memoir.

The siblings have met since that first meeting in Kenya, including in 2007 before then-candidate Obama’s debate with rival Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

“I came to visit him in Texas, and it was one of the happiest moments of my life. He entered the room where I was waiting for him, looked at me and said, ‘Mark, what happened to your afro?’ And I asked: ‘What happened to your afro?’ He said: ‘I cut my hair.’ It was a real moment, very natural, as if for a moment we returned to being two brothers,” Ndesandjo recounted.

Keep reading on TheBlaze.com >>

Obama Channeling Pope Francis to Sell Wealth Redistribution

breitbart

By Robert Wilde 

President Obama is using Pope Francis to foster wealth redistribution ideas in his speeches on the importance of reducing the gap between rich and poor.

Now that the President’s message of “Hope and Change” has drastically soured over his last few years in office, Obama is hoping the popular pontiff’s vitality will rub off on him. Michael Peppard, a professor of politics and the papacy at Fordham University, posits, "I think Obama probably wants to tap into some of the energy, and tap into some of it for his own message."

Obama quoted Francis in a recent speech on fiscal policy this month: "How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses 2 points?" Although the President has tangled with the Catholic Church on a variety of issues, most notably the contraceptive provisions in the Affordable Care Act, Obama now sees the Pope as an ally. 

Larry Snyder, President of Catholic Charities, is distrustful of Obama embedding Francis’s words into his political speeches. "The danger I see in it is that the pope is not a politician," he cautioned. "When the pope speaks, there's a consistent teaching. And the danger would be other people pick and choose, 'I like this, but I don't like that.'”

Obama has employed a “pick and choose approach” when it comes to the teachings of the Catholic Church. Expressing values antithetical to the teachings of the Catholic Church, the President has announced his approval for gay marriage and is an advocate of abortion. However, Obama views Pope Francis as like-minded when it comes to social issues of immigration or increasing funding for welfare programs. In December, Obama told MSNBC that Francis was an "extraordinarily thoughtful and soulful messenger of peace and justice."

Arguing that their religious freedom is being violated, U.S. Bishops have criticized the President and Obamacare for mandating that Catholic institutions include a contraceptive provision in the healthcare plans that they offer to their employees. This point of contention is a serious problem in improving the White House’s relationship with the Church.

President Obama's Top 10 Constitutional Violations of 2013

By Ilya Shapiro
One of Barack Obama’s chief accomplishments has been to return the Constitution to a central place in our public discourse. Unfortunately, the president fomented this upswing in civic interest not by talking up the constitutional aspects of his policy agenda, but by blatantly violating the strictures of our founding document. Read at cato >>

Santa Obama Gives Pay Raise to Federal Workers

By Ben Shapiro

Just in time for Christmas, President Obama signed an executive order on Monday giving a 1 percent pay raise for federal employees. The raise follows a four year hiatus from salary increases for federal workers, although most federal employees have apparently seen their pay increase via promotion or performance. The first increased paycheck will kick in on January 1.

Read more on Breitbart >>

Lo peor esta por venir

atrancalimpia

Por Andrés Pascual

El filibusterismo oficial y comprobable que ha resultado en la ejecución socio-político-económica del país por la tenaza diseñada por los “interesados” para Obama, es el precedente que está sentando lo peor: Estados Unidos frente el bombardeo futuro de gente como este tipo, a partir de su falsa y engañosa política mesiánica, camouflage del “anticristo del siglo XXI", no más incapaces, no más mentirosos, no más antiamericanos, que sería imposible, sino iguales y se dice todo.

Resulta que no llega por ningún lado el refuerzo de la decencia, la moral y los principios conservadores y la impresion de que este tipo de ciudadano desapareció o lo tienen en túneles bajo tierra a ver qué hacen con él ES UNA REALIDAD DEMOLEDORA.

Los datos sobre la “comunidá” que arribó este año reflejan que la continuación de la la vista gorda define la importancia del castrismo para Obama: por cada elemento que agarran "mojado", permiten que lleguen 200 "con los pies secos". Sin embargo, la noticia será 8 que capturaron en el mar y deportarán para “partir corazones”.

Este detalle no fuera preocupante si la mayoría no se constituyera en parte de la 5ta columna castro-obamista, a partir del apoyo al resquebrajamiento moral del partido demócrata, siempre consecuente con cualquier actitud que golpee a la Unión.

Para la “la comunidá” solo hay una posición política: la que apoye su condición de “emigrantes económicos” sin exigencias de compromiso patriótico, que no les interesa, válido a través del decreto que los autorice a viajar (único objetivo visible), a disfrutar el intercambio, a enviar lo que tengan sin importarles que el salidero económico sin regulaciones empobrece a la ciudad y al país...

Como cualquier ilegal, no tienen en cuenta la realidad económica americana para correr el riesgo de "lanzarse"; ni les interesa si hay o no trabajo, tampoco traen en la agenda aprender ingles, a fin de cuentas “esto es Carraguao” o el Fanguito o Tepito y a “joder la pava y a los pavitos, que vivir del welfare, del fraude y otros "demases" no exige mucho esfuerzo.

Definitivamete, las frases más antiamericanas de la historia son “este es un país de emigrantes” y “el sueño americano”; la primera, sin ninguna razón lógica ni realista para convertirla en significación ética hoy, fue un estandarte de americanos patriotas que, en su momento, no se percataron de que le servirían el arma soberbia al enemigo público 1 de este país: la emigración ilegal, que ha logrado espacios tan significativos por el asalto al poder de comunistas encubiertos como mantener en jaque la política americana con la oficialización de exigencias de reforma migratoria.

La situación no se le escapó de las manos a “los americanos”, sino la dejaron escapar antipatriotas, la “azoraron” los peores engendros de nadie sabe quiénes jamás nacidos aquí...

Sencillamente, la estimulan con objetivo político electoral como primer paso “compañeros” en la lucha contra el capitalismo representado por Estados Unidos.

La conspiración nace en el partido demócrata americano con apoyo de los seculares del Diablo en ultramar.

La situación se ha tornado hiperpeligrosa una vez que lograron imponerle el sello contribuyente para “lo que se avecina” al Vaticano, que eligió, para contentar y reforzar un poder no tan secreto, a un PAPA de la categoría comunista envuelto en papel liberal o reformador.

En ese orden de cosas, hasta la palabra “ilegales” han prohibido en los medios por gestiones de otra “luchadora por esos delincuentes”, jueza en la Corte Suprema, sustituyéndola “indocumentados”; a fin de imponer, como si fuera un derecho, a quienes entraron sin autorización, les falta una firma y a imponer el relajo “como Pedro por su casa”, que es en lo que buscan convertir el “paso de la frontera”.

Con el 90 % del andamiaje mediático en control de los comunistas encubiertos que favorecen todas las medidas contribuyentes a destruir el poder de Estados Unidos, con el Partido Republicano contra la pared, rehén de la circunstancia “ilegales, homosexuales, negros...”, nadie sabe cuánto de malo le espera por las concesiones oportunistas de pusilánimes y traidores.

Razones suficientes para fruncir el ceño cada vez que alguien le desee “felices fiestas...”, porque hasta “christmas” es un delito decir, y un ¿próspero? AÑO NUEVO.

The Top 5 Imploded Leftist Myths of 2013

breitbart

By Ben Shapiro*

www.sodahead.com

2013 was a year of myths falling apart. The myth of President Obama – a myth in which Obama was a messianic figure descending to bequeath health care, equality, and brotherhood on mankind – imploded. The myth of an America embracing the leftist social agenda collapsed. And the greatest myth of all – the myth that America is ready to become Europe – crumbled to ash.

Here, then, are the top five imploded myths of the last year:

The 2012 election gave President Obama a mandate to cram through his signature program. In the aftermath of President Obama’s re-election, members of both the administration and the media trumpeted that Obama had received his long-sought mandate. Obamacare, Americans were told, was the law of the land. It could not be changed; it could not be stopped. Obamacare would be implemented, the country would rejoice, and Republicans would mourn the day they ever opposed the anointed one.

Then the Obamacare rollout proceeded to run off the rails in catastrophic fashion. With Obama’s re-election won, the media no longer felt the obligation to cover up Obamacare’s disastrous crippling of the health care system. Suddenly, Obama’s statements about keeping your health insurance plan became the “lie of the year” rather than a mere “half-truth.” Suddenly, Obama’s brilliant team of implementers, headed by the Chief Implementer himself, became a group of half-wits stumbling around attempting to put back together millions of lines of broken code.

That didn’t mean that the media started covering Obamacare in fair fashion. The media turned Senator Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) plan to fund the entire government except for Obamacare into obstructionism, while Obama’s bullheaded insistence on pushing forward a failing rollout was hailed as strength. World War II veterans barred from their memorials by President Obama out of pure vindictiveness were portrayed by Jon Stewart as buffoons.

Nonetheless, the overall impression of the Obama mandate is that it no longer exists, if it ever did.

Americans hate social conservatism. The 2012 election, we were told, was a referendum on the Republican “war on women.” If Republicans had avoided the stumbling blocks of same-sex marriage and abortion, they would have put Mitt Romney in the White House.

2013 proved how wrong that notion was.

The left attempted to turn late-term abortion advocate Wendy Davis into a national hero; instead, her quixotic quest to become governor of Texas is stumbling badly. When the left attempted to turn Duck Dynasty’s Phil Robertson into a homophobic bully, Americans finally fought back and let the left know that citing the Bible isn’t homophobia or bullying. Conservatives can learn from 2012, and they have: abortion should be discussed in terms of the extremism of the left, and same-sex marriage must be discussed in the context of religious freedom.

Racial divisions have been palliated thanks to President Obama. President Obama’s media supporters suggested that his lack of support in 2012 was due in large part to a rising tide of racism. In the aftermath of his re-election, Americans were once again treated to the idea that America’s changing demographics and its black president meant that the emerging American minorities-majority would usher in an era of racial tolerance.

With the controversy over the “knockout game,” the media’s disgusting perversion of the Trayvon Martin case, and the consistent drumbeat from the left that all opposition to the leftist agenda was race-based, it’s now clear that racial friction in the political sphere is increasing, not decreasing. That’s how the left wants it.

New models will save the leftist media. When the Huffington Post was sold to AOL for $315 million, the media announced a new age of ventures that would bring the old media into a gleamingly profitable world. When Jeff Bezos of Amazon bought the Washington Post, we were told the same thing. When John Henry of the Boston Red Sox bought the Boston Globe, we were told the same thing.

These ventures have all changed hands, but none have stumbled on a true formula for success in the non-print world.

Meanwhile, in television, MSNBC grew to surpass CNN, but is now struggling to find a new audience; CNN is withering; Fox News continues to dominate.

The reality for the left media is that they have two problems to solve: first, a problem of content; second, a problem of profit model. They can’t solve the second without the first. Unfortunately, they continue to look at business strategies rather than coverage strategies. And that’s a formula for continued failure.

Americans are ready to become Europe. President Obama’s biggest advocates believe that Americans are ready to embrace his vision for the United States: a less muscular America on the world stage, an America with a more controlling executive branch and less conflict in the legislative branch, an America in which the government takes care of us, be we Pajama Boys or Julias.

In 2013, that vision for America was put to bed. President Obama’s Iran deal, the greatest sign of his vision for a scaled-down America, is wildly unpopular. His incessant attempts to rewrite his own healthcare law have contributed to his plummeting popularity. And as for the notion that Americans want government to take care of us, it’s becoming increasingly clear that we would prefer the government to leave us the hell alone.

That doesn’t mean that Republicans are in the ascendance or that conservatism’s glory days are just around the corner. It does mean, however, that the cherished leftist visions of January 2009 are fading fast. And that’s good news for Americans who still believe in American freedoms and values.

---------------------


*Ben Shapiro is Editor-At-Large of Breitbart News and author of the New York Times bestseller “Bullies: How the Left’s Culture of Fear and Intimidation Silences America” (Threshold Editions, January 8, 2013). He is also Editor-in-Chief of TruthRevolt.org. Follow Ben Shapiro on Twitter @benshapiro.

Obama shook Raúl Castro's hand after SIX MONTHS of secret U.S.-Cuba talks, report claims

Confirmed: 'We're in talks' with Cuba on a wide range of issues, said Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes (L), shown with the president on Air Force One

dailymail

By David Martosko, U.s. Political Editor 

The handshake seen 'round the water cooler was no fluke, it turns out.

When President Barack Obama approached the podium at Nelson Mandela's memorial service and made a beeline for a row of foreign leaders – stopping first to shake Cuban dictator Raúl Castro's hand – it came after representatives from the two historically antagonistic nations had already been in talks for six months.

'[B]ehind the scenes,' two Daily Beast national security reporters wrote on Tuesday, 'U.S. and Cuban officials have held midlevel discussions in Havana and Washington on a range of issues, including direct postal service, migration issues, disaster response, and search and rescue at sea.'

During the president's trip back from South Africa, Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters on Air Force One that 'it's been quite some time since the Presidents of the United States and Cuba were even in the same place.'

But he acknowledged that 'we’re in talks on issues associated with migration that, again, I think allow for there to be greater connectivity particularly among Cuban Americans and Cuba.'

News that the two leaders' deputies have been meeting in secret comes after nearly five years of a foreign policy thaw between the U.S. and the communist island nation, and nearly two decades after Mandela himself suggested that the two countries re-evaluate their icy Caribbean staring match.

The Obama administration has already turned heads by lifting an earlier prohibition on family travel and money transfers to Cuba. But a hostage situation and the iron fist that Castro wields against pro-Democracy activists have largely kept the U.S. at arms' length.

National Security Adviser Susan Rice laid out a case for the softer approach on Dec. 4 during a speech during a Washington, D.C. human right summit.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2522263/Obama-shook-Ra-l-Castros-hand-SIX-MONTHS-secret-U-S-Cuba-talks-report-claims.html#ixzz2nW99fhkl

5 out of 6 “foreign dignitaries” listed on the official Mandela memorial service are known Marxists

Trevor Loudon's New Zeal Blog 

By: Cliff Kincaid*
Accuracy in Media

If President Obama’s handshake with Cuban dictator Raul Castro is news, Castro’s featured presence at the Nelson Mandela memorial service and what the South African government said about him are equally newsworthy. South Africa was described as “joined at the hip” to Cuba and in its debt for “liberation.”

Yet, this part of the memorial service has been carefully edited out of most of the “mainstream media” coverage of the event.

The service was organized and orchestrated by officers of the African National Congress (ANC), the ruling party of South Africa which operates as a front for the South African Communist Party. Baleka Mbete, ANC chairperson, introduced Raul Castro’s speech by saying, “Comrades, we will now get an address from a tiny island—an island of people who liberated us, who fought for our liberation in Cuito Cuanavale—the people of Cuba.”

Cuito Cuanavale refers to the foreign intervention of thousands of Cuban military troops on behalf of communist Angolan government forces in Africa under the guidance of Soviet military officers during 1987 and 1988. This was a critical time when communist forces backed by the Soviet Union, Cuba and China were determined to crush the non-communist pro-freedom movement UNITA (The National Union for the Total Independence of Angola).

As part of his effort to turn the tide against communism in Africa and elsewhere, the “Reagan Doctrine,” President Ronald Reagan strongly supported UNITA and its leader, Jonas Savimbi.

In the end, the communists solidified control of Angola, assassinated Savimbi (shot 15 times, twice to the head and once to the throat), and then took over Namibia and South Africa as the white population—fearing extinction in the face of the onslaught—made deals with the communists.

Mandela, in commemorating the 20th anniversary of the battle in 2008, referred to it as “a turning point for the liberation of our continent and my people.” This helps explain why the Cuban regime is held in such high regard by the South African government. The ANC and SWAPO (the South West Africa People’s Organization) communists in Namibia greatly benefitted from the Cuban imperialistic intervention. Of course, Mandela’s communist movement also enjoyed the support of Libya and the PLO.

After Raul Castro’s speech, during which he highlighted Mandela’s visit to Cuba to meet with and thank Fidel Castro, ANC deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa said, “Thank you President Castro. We thank you for all the support and help that we continue to get from the people of Cuba during our years of struggle, and our countries continue to be joined at the hip in the areas of development…”

AIM noted in our column about current South African President Jacob Zuma that he traveled to Cuba in 2010 to receive the top Communist award from Raul Castro himself. Zuma also told a meeting of young communists in South Africa, “Work begins today in earnest to improve the quality of life of all our people and to build Cuban-style patriotism and internationalism within our ranks.”

Of the 6 “foreign dignitaries” listed on the official Mandela memorial service program as giving a tribute to Mandela, five are known Marxists: Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff (a former terrorist herself); Chinese Vice President Li Yuanchao; Namibian President Hifikepunye Pohamba; Cuba’s Raul Castro; and of course President Obama. The other speaker was President Pranab Mukherjee of India, described as a “close friend” of Marxists in India who has “remained a friend” of the Communist Party of India during his political career and leadership in the United Progressive Alliance. Indeed, he has been labeled a “communist agent.” The Indian delegation to the memorial service included Sitaram Yechury of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M).

Earlier in the memorial service, Andrew Mlangeni, identified as a Mandela “family friend,” spoke on Mandela’s behalf. Now considered an “elder statesman” in the ANC, he had studied “military science” and “guerrilla theory” in China. The Stephen Ellis book, External Mission, confirms that Umkhonto we Sizwe, which became the military arm of the ANC, was launched by the South African Communist Party after negotiations with Chinese Communist mass murderer and dictator Mao Tse-tung. The cover of the book, which also reveals that the East German secret police trained the ANC’s security personnel, shows a photograph of Mao Tse-tung meeting with SACP leader Yusuf Dadoo, a Muslim Indian South African communist.

Mandela ran Umkhonto we Sizwe, which carried out violence and terrorism, and he went to prison as a result. He was never a “political prisoner.” He refused to renounce violence in order to be released early. He could have been hanged for his conviction for terrorism.

Although Mandela is being widely praised for his spirit of “forgiveness” and “reconciliation,” the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), led by Mangosuthu Buthelezi, was never fully accepted as a legitimate partner and actor in South African politics by Mandela’s ANC. The IFP advocated the abolition of apartheid, or racial segregation, but refused to engage in violence and terrorism against innocent people. It also had an anti-communist orientation.

“The armed struggle, and Inkatha’s refusal to engage it, had driven a wedge between our organizations,” Buthelezi says. “Propaganda against me and Inkatha was rife and there were many attempts on my life.”

But the U.S. government under Obama is in complete support of the South African government and provides an estimated $500 million a year in foreign aid to the regime.

The United States ambassador to South Africa, former Democratic Party operative and radical organizer Patrick Gaspard, recently announced that American taxpayers would provide an additional $100,000 in U.S. government funding for the purpose of the “preservation of documents” relating to Mandela. The money was given to the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, the official home of the Nelson Mandela Foundation. This is the same group offering a poster featuring a quotation of Mandela under an image of communist murderer and Castro henchman Che Guevara.

In supporting South Africa, the U.S. is supporting Cuba. Obama’s handshake with Castro only confirms this fact.

-------------------

*Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen: Obama-Castro Handshake WAS PLANNED

Video aqui >>

Should President Obama Have Stopped to Shake Hands With Cuba's Raul Castro?

Fox News Insider

President Obama stopped to shake hands with Cuban President Raul Castro today at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service. Some are calling into question the handshake given the long history of distrust between the U.S. and Cuban governments.

Radio talk show host Michael Graham acknowledged that it’s the president’s job to deal with unpleasant people. However, he said, “I would say unless he’s going to talk about Alan Gross, the American who has been held there for four years, […] that would be something to chat about.

Fox News contributor Jehmu Greene countered, “It wasn’t a conversation; it wasn’t a diplomatic meeting. It was a handshake.”

On a day spent remembering a man who brought people together, Greene said we should ask ourselves, “What would Nelson Mandela do? […] We can’t also forget that there are so many families who have been separated by 90 miles of water.”

Bill Hemmer interjected, “There are a lot of those families who would tell you it’s the Castros who separated them.”

“It’s not that Cubans and Americans can’t get along,” Greene responded. “Our leadership has failed on this on both sides of the aisle. So if we can start with a handshake as a step in the right direction to maybe bring these families back together, I think that that’s a good thing.”

What do you think of the handshake?

 

Did Obama know date of Mandela’s death was June 26, 2013?

canadafreepress/ Judi McLeod

President Barack Obama may have already known the real date of Nelson Mandela’s death and studiously planned funeral when he made his June 2013 African trip—and was even able to take the photo he would later Tweet on the day of Mandela’s officially announced death while he was still in South Africa.

Claiming to defer to Mandela family members on visiting the ailing Mandela during his June 28-30 whistle-stop trip through Johannesburg, Obama instead met with South African President Jacob Zuma. 

Zuma was one of the key figures who kept the news that doctors had been keeping Mandela alive in a vegetative state, a top world secret.

Among thousands of news outlets,  only one newspaper made a valiant attempt to get the true story out and keep it there.

According to the read-by-millions Las Vegas Guardian Express, Mandela died on June 26th, 2013, but was kept on life support until December 2013.

On December 5,  2013, the White House tweeted a picture showing Obama behind the bars of the Robben Island prison, where Mandela had been incarcerated for 27 years.  The picture tweeted on Dec. 5, 2013 had been taken on June 29, 2013, when Barack and Michelle Obama visited the world famous site.

As president and first lady of the USA,  the Obamas make pretty good vultures.

This is the story of Mandela’s June 26 death following his persistent vegetative state as reported by the Guardian Express:

“On the morning of June 26, we received a message from one of our South African correspondents, Laura Oneale that Nelson Mandela had passed away the previous evening. The news had come to her in the form of a text message from an acquaintance who was well-placed in the South African media. It should be understood that this organization was not authorized to break the news. Clearly, the South African government and the Mandela family had already decided that the news would not be made public. Undoubtedly, this decision had been made even before his death; at least, that’s what we were thinking.
“Our assumption, at the time, was two-fold: firstly, we doubted that such news would not long escape the attention of the international media, even if the South African media was being muzzled. As is the nature of the news media industry, we saw that we had been handed a major scoop and that our window of opportunity to be the first to break this news was limited. Cynical? Perhaps, but we did not doubt the integrity of the source, given that individual’s position. We are in the news business. What other publication – given the gravity of the story and the knowledge of Mandela’s health condition – would not have immediately prepared to publish? We began both to work on a couple of articles and to seek out verification. We found no other corroborating evidence. We wrote our stories.
“In the interests of being completely honest, we cannot say that we did not second – guess ourselves. Did we have direct, first-hand proof that Nelson Mandela was dead? No, we didn’t. One must look at how news stories are broken, though: A media publication receives information from a trusted source; every good faith attempt is made to verify the information. In the absence of verification, the editor or editorial team must make a decision to publish or not to publish. What we did have was the best source we could have, other than first-hand, eye-witness testimony. Moreover, Mandela was seriously ill; according to reports, the icon and former African leader was on his deathbed; hooked up to medical devices that enabled him to breathe.
“We published.
“Now, we were walking on eggshells; our reputation was at stake. What were we thinking? Other news outlets actually published stories announcing Mandela’s death; they quickly retracted, without actually justifying why they had done so. To us, that in itself indicated that they had been told to retract, rather than doing so because they had discovered that Mandela was still alive. The Las Vegas Guardian Express, however, was a relatively new and completely independent publication with no government ties and no corporate owners or shareholders. We could not be pressured into retracting, other than through legal action. In addition, we were a tiny speck on the world news radar.
“Naturally, it was in our own interests to quickly verify Mandela’s condition. Is that an admission that we published news of his death without being sure? No, it is not; we were sure and we could clearly see that an official announcement could be kept under wraps for any number of reasons; a visit by US President Barack Obama was already scheduled and there were obvious security implications. Additionally, the South African government is absolutely capable of using such news for political purposes. Our only misgiving was that we had failed to uncover any corroborating source. The strength of our conviction is proven by the fact that, even as the days went by and no word of his death came from official or family sources, we maintained our position. It seemed logical enough that there was no reason to retract without absolute proof that Nelson Mandela still lived.
“As the few articles we published drew attention – along with numerous comments – it became self-evident that both the South African government and the Mandela family were aware of our reports. Had we been wrong – and had the family been able to prove that Mandela was still alive – it is beyond doubt that the Las Vegas Guardian Express would have received some form of legal threat. Not only did such action never transpire, but our publication was subjected to cyber-attack: Denial of Service attacks, originating in South Africa, disabled our site on more than one occasion. We took this as proof that we were reporting something that the South African government did not want us to report.
“It should be remembered that our publication was relatively small and generated only modest revenue through advertising. Nevertheless – and at considerable expense – we dispatched a senior editor to South Africa. During his time there, Michael Smith uncovered intriguing details of the situation regarding Nelson Mandela, the family, the African National Congress and South African President Jacob Zuma. Our investigations opened a door into the corruption and dishonesty of the aforementioned parties. During a Mandela family legal battle, documents emerged which stated that doctors had advised the family to turn off Mandela’s life support as he was brain-dead. At a later point, Zuma made a statement denying this, but we noted carefully that, while other news organizations were reporting that the doctors themselves had retracted their claims that Mandela was brain-dead, no such retraction had been made; Zuma himself claimed that the doctors had retracted this assertion.
“Now that it has been officially announced that Nelson Mandela has passed away, our position on the matter has not changed in any way. Inevitably, his passing had to be revealed. Many of our South African readers have believed us from the start; those that have criticized us have presented not one shred of evidence that we were wrong. The idea that we are proven wrong because the official announcement comes only now is absurd.
“This article has not detailed every piece of evidence that fell into place during our investigation into why Nelson Mandela’s death was covered up. One of the most compelling discoveries was brought back from South Africa by Michael Smith: He returned with an audio tape of a recorded telephone conversation Between a South African Defense Force officer and a private security contractor. The audio can be found in the first of the links listed at the foot of this article. For the reader who wishes to get the full story of our reporting on this story, each of those articles listed provide, collectively, the complete picture. During the call, the officer details the circumstances of Mandela’s death – which, according to him, occurred even earlier than we reported – and the possible implications of it, as well as the Mandela family’s motives for not releasing the news.
“Even now, the South African government, it seems, is attempting to prevent the Las Vegas Guardian Express from revealing the truth to the people of South Africa. Our Facebook page received a telling comment today. The comment reads:
Hallo
I am from South Africa and for some reason I cannot view your website or any articles regarding Nelson Mandela. Is it possible that your site being blocked by our country?
could you kindly send the the articles you recently wrote.
Kind regards
“Nelson Mandela is now officially dead – but he was already dead. Nothing has transpired between our initial June 26 reports and the present time to prove otherwise.
“Nevertheless, we would be remiss if we did not convey to the South African people, that we have the utmost respect for Madiba and the great legacy he has left the world. However, as a publication, read by millions across the globe, we have an obligation and responsibility to report the truth and what we were thinking.”

On the White House.gov website, the itinerary for Michelle Obama’s June African trip is still online.  The links from her page to Barack Obama’s page with information of the South African trip produce an error advising viewers that the page they’re looking for can’t be found.

Palabras de Obama a los opresores durante funeral de Mandela

Joel García

Obama shakes hands with Cuba’s Castro at Mandela service

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

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Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

President Barack Obama shakes hands with Cuban President Raul Castro.

By Erin McClam, Staff Writer, NBC News

Briefly laying aside differences hardened over decades, President Barack Obama on Tuesday shook the hand of the president of Cuba at the memorial service for Nelson Mandela.

The handshake appeared to be the first between American and Cuban presidents since 2000, when Bill Clinton and Fidel Castro greeted each other at a United Nations luncheon in New York, and only the second in history.

Tuesday, it was Fidel Castro’s brother, Raul, named president of Cuba in 2008, who shook Obama’s hand. The moment came just before Obama delivered a eulogy for Mandela in a Johannesburg soccer stadium.

Kai Pfaffenbach / Reuters

Minutes later, Obama offered implicit criticism of governments like Cuba's when in his speech he said too many people embrace Mandela's legacy of racial reconciliation but passionately resist economic and other reforms. 

"There are too many who claim solidarity with Madiba's struggle for freedom but do not tolerate dissent from their own people," Obama said, referring to Mandela by his clan name. 

On his way to the rostrum, Obama also shook the hand of Robert Mugabe, the strongman ruler of Zimbabwe, and hugged Dilma Rousseff, the president of Brazil, who has stridently opposed spying by the National Security Agency and criticized the U.S. government.

Leaders of almost 100 countries turned out for the service for Mandela, who died last week at age 95.

Former President Jimmy Carter, who was also in Johannesburg for the Mandela service, shook hands with Fidel Castro on a visit to Cuba in 2002, long after Carter’s presidency. That trip was the first by a sitting or former American president to Cuba since Fidel Castro took power in 1959.

Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

Obama stirred controversy with a handshake in the past. In 2009, the president shook hands with the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez  — who called the United States "the biggest menace to our planet," among other criticism — at the Summit of the Americas.

El funeral de Mandela fuerza un apretón de manos entre Obama y Raúl Castro

Karel Becerra Hernandez

Diario de Cuba

El presidente estadounidense, Barack Obama, estrechó este martes la mano de Raúl Castro como parte de saludos protocolares en el funeral Nelson Mandela, que se realiza en el estadio FNB, de Soweto.

Obama saludó a los mandatarios y personalidades que se encontraban en el camino a la tribuna de oradores. Entre ellos estaba el dictador cubano, ubicado junto a la presidente brasileña, Dilma Rousseff.

El general sonrió al presidente estadounidense y le dirigió una frase. Aunque forzado por un protocolo, el saludo no tiene precedentes.

Miles de personas asisten bajo una constante lluvia al funeral del Premio Nobel de la Paz, fallecido el jueves pasado. Como los otros oradores, Obama dedicó sus palabras a resaltar la figura de Mandela y su legado.

"A día de hoy, hombres y mujeres siguen encarcelados por pensamientos políticos. Hay muchos líderes que muestran solidaridad por la lucha de Mandela pero que no liberan a su propio pueblo", dijo Obama.

El saludo entre Obama y Raúl Castro coincide con la celebración del Día Internacional de los Derechos Humanos, que el régimen cubano suele acompañar con la represión de los disidentes que intentan realizar actividades por la fecha.

O'Reilly: President Obama escaping reality

Obama: Iran Deal Better than 'All-or-Nothing' Approach

breitbart

By William Bigelow 

Barack Obama, speaking at the Saban Forum of the Brookings Institute on Saturday, insisted that the deal he struck with Iran allowing Iran to keep its uranium enrichment while the West relaxed sanctions will “eliminate the incentive” for Iran to build nuclear weapons. Obama lambasted those, including Israeli prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who favor what he called an “all-or-nothing” approach in which Iran would dismantle its entire nuclear program before the West relaxed sanctions, saying:

You’ll hear arguments, including potentially from the prime minister, that said we can’t accept any enrichment on Iranian soil, period, full stop, end of conversation. One can envision an ideal world in which Iran said, ‘We’ll destroy every element and facility and you name it, it’s all gone.’ I can envision a world in which Congress passed every one of my bills that I put forward. There are a lot of things that I can envision that would be wonderful.”

Obama said there is no way to stop Iran from enriching uranium: “Theoretically, they will always have some capability because technology here is available to any good physics student at pretty much any university around the world. And they have already gone through the cycle to the point where the knowledge we are not going to be able to eliminate. But what we can do is eliminate the incentive for them to want to do this.”

He continued, “When I hear people criticize the Geneva deal say it’s got to be all or nothing, I would just remind them that if it’s nothing, if we did not even try for this next six months to do this, all the breakout capacity we are concerned about would accelerate in the next six months. They’d be that much closer to breakout capacity six months from now. And that’s why I think it’s important for us to test this proposition.”

Obama said that despite the fact that Netanyahu publicly denounced the deal, they share the same goals: “Bibi and I have very candid conversations and there are occasionally significant tactical disagreements. But there is a constancy in trying to reach the same goal, and in this case that goal is to make sure that Iran does not have a nuclear weapon.”

Then Obama loaded his argument, insisting that sanctions were ineffective in turning the Iranians from their nuclear ambitions and cunningly making the opposition to the deal look as if it only came from Israel and its American supporters, ignoring the Arab states who are nervous about Iran’s nuclear ambitions: “The idea that Iran, given everything that we know about their history, would just continue to get more and more nervous about more sanctions and military threats and ultimately just say, ‘We give in,’ I think does not reflect an honest understanding of the Iranian people and the Iranian regime. I think even the so-called moderates or reformers inside of Iran would not be able to simply say, ‘We will cave and do exactly what the U.S. and the Israelis say.’”

The reality is: Sanctions brought Iran to the table. The Saudis and others in the Arab world don’t want a nuclear Iran. The deal does nothing to inspect the dangerous nuclear work done in Parchin.

But for Barack Obama, vilifying the Israelis and tacitly encouraging Iran to go forward with its deadly ambitions are the reality he has chosen.

Report: IAEA Stats Show Iranian Centrifuges Jumped 400% Under Obama

breitbar

www.thisismoney.co.uk

According to a new report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iran’s nuclear enrichment capabilities skyrocketed under President Obama’s administration. According to Fox News’ analysis of IAEA documents, “the vast majority of Iran’s enrichment capability came online during the Obama administration.” In 2007, Iran had 3,000 centrifuges. By 2009, Iran likely had 5,000. Today, Iran has 19,000 centrifuges according to Secretary of State John Kerry.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters that the administration wasn’t attempting to blame anyone for the development of Iranian centrifuges; instead, she said, they were focused on “the fact that we're now at a point where we are halting and rolling back the progress of their program and we're working towards a comprehensive agreement to bring an end to it."

The Obama administration has been trumpeting its sanctions as both effective, and conversely unable to stop Iranian nuclear development. President Obama suggested during the 2012 campaign that he had been dramatically harsh on Iran via sanctions, but Kerry recently stated, “sanctions came in, and today there are 19,000 centrifuges and growing.”

The Obama Family Members You Might Not Know

TheBlaze

White House Makes Big Admission About Obama’s Uncle

Fred Lucas

Onyango “Omar” Obama

White House press secretary Jay Carney on Thursday said President Barack Obama did briefly stay with his illegal immigrant uncle while attending Harvard Law School in the 1980s.

This is a contradiction of what the White House told reporters in 2011, asserting Obama did not know his uncle.

“Back when this arose, folks looked at the record, including the president’s book, and there was no evidence that they had met and that was what was conveyed,” Carney told reporters. “Nobody spoke to the president.”

The president’s uncle Onyango “Omar” Obama, 69, said at a deportation hearing this week that Obama stayed with him when the president was a student at Harvard. The uncle, whom Carney stressed was the president’s father’s half-brother, was arrested for drunk driving in 2011 and faced deportation after living in the United States for five decades. The judge decided to let the Kenyan national remain in the United States.

Carney stressed that the uncle is the half-brother of the president’s father.

“When Omar Obama said the other day, and there were reports that he said the other day, that President Obama, back when he was a law school student had stayed with him in Cambridge, I thought it was the right thing to do to go ask him,” Carney said. “Nobody had asked him in the past and he said that he in fact had met Omar Obama when he moved to Cambridge for law school, that he stayed with him for a brief period of time, until his — the president’s — apartment was ready. After that, they saw each other once every few months while the president was in Cambridge and after law school they gradually fell out of touch. The president has not seen Omar Obama in 20 years and has not spoke with him in roughly 10 years.”

Keep reading on TheBlaze >>

Family tree: Barack Obama is one of eight children his father, Barack Obama Snr, had. His 'uncle' Omar, is the son of Sarah Obama, his grandfather's third wife

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2031360/Barack-Obamas-Uncle-Omar-U-S-jail-country-illegally-drink-drive-arrest.html#ixzz2mdUCqR4B