By Patrick Buchanan

“America is Losing the Free World,” was the arresting headline over the Financial Times column by Gideon Rachman. His thesis:

The largest democracies of South America, Africa, the Middle Eastand Asia — Brazil, South Africa, Turkey, India — are all moving out of America’s orbit. “(T)he assumption that the democracies would stick together is proving unfounded.”

President Lula of Brazil has cut a “lucrative oil deal with China, spoken warmly of Hugo Chavez,” hailed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on his election “victory” and honored the Iranian president with a state visit.

In the Security Council, South Africa sided with Russia and China in killing human rights resolutions and protecting Zimbabwe and Iran. Turkey has moved to engage Hezbollah, Hamas and Tehran, and spurnIsrael. Polls show anti-Americanism surging in Turkey. From trade to sanctions on Iran and Burma, India sides with China against America. (more…)

By Patrick Buchanan -  On New Year’s Day, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki issued an ultimatum to the West: Accept a swap of part of our 2 ton stockpile of low-enriched uranium for your higher-enriched uranium for our U.S.-built reactor, or we start enriching to 20 percent ourselves.

Though the White House is on the defensive for its initial nonchalant response to al-Qaida’s attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day and has a need to show toughness, to dismiss Iran’s proposal out of hand may be a mistake.

For, bluster aside, this deal appears consistent with the twin U.S. goals: no nuclear-armed Iran, no war with Iran. Moreover, Iran’s take-it-or-leave-it deal is a variant on an idea first hatched by the White House — to offer Iran uranium that cannot be used for a bomb for the uranium Iran has been producing. (more…)

By Walter Rodgers, Christian Science Monitor  Washington – A year ago, many Americans, mostly white ones, congratulated themselves on having moved beyond the nation’s “original sin” of slavery into a “postracial America.” 

Amid the fervor over the nation’s first black president, few beyond the black media bothered to ask black Americans if they also felt the country had entered a new era. 

Most of us recall that Barack Obama beat John McCain handily. Few recall that he (like most recent Democratic presidential candidates) would have lost big-time if only white votes counted. A black friend who didn’t want to be named cynically told me that “white folks” only voted for Mr. Obama because they “decided things were so bad they would vote for the other guy even if he was black.” (more…)

JERUSALEM – An Israeli military delegation has canceled an official visit to Britain, officials said Tuesday, the latest in a string of politicians and army officials to put off travel to the U.K. because of fears of war crimes prosecution.

Israel complained that the practice, spearheaded by pro-Palestinian activists, is harming relations, and Britain’s visiting attorney general said an urgent solution must be found.

The Israelis called off their trip because their British army hosts could not guarantee they would not be arrested, the Israeli officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. Neither the Israeli military nor the British government would comment.   MORE>>>

By Michelle Malkin –  The left’s police-hating chickens are coming home to roost. While partisan liberals have gone out of their way to blame conservative media and the Tea Party movement for creating a “climate of hate,” they are silent on the cultural and literal war on cops that has raged for decades — and escalated tragically this year.

The total number of law enforcement officers shot and killed this year is up 19 percent over last year, according to the Christian Science Monitor. More officers have died in ambush incidents this year than in any other since 2000.

The Lakewood, Wash., massacre on Thanksgiving weekend claimed the lives of four dedicated officers getting ready for work at a coffee shop Sunday morning. Maurice Clemmons — the violent career thug who received clemency from former Arkansas GOP Gov. Mike Huckabee and benefited from fatal systemic lapses in the criminal justice system — had many other enablers. (more…)

The new U.S. Surgeon General on Thursday called for stepped-up efforts in increasing the number of minority physicians.

In what was one of her first speeches to a large crowd since she was sworn in Nov. 3, Dr. Regina Benjamin noted that the proportion of U.S. physicians who are minorities is only 6 percent — the same proportion as a century ago.

“There’s something wrong with that,” said Benjamin, speaking at a conference on health disparities at a hotel in downtown Atlanta.

The numbers come from a 2004 estimate of the percentage of U.S. physicians that are black or Hispanic. Blacks and Hispanics account for roughly 28 percent of the U.S. population, according to 2008 figures from the U.S. Census Bureau.   MORE>>>

GENEVA – Swiss voters overwhelmingly approved a constitutional ban on minarets on Sunday, barring construction of the iconic mosque towers in a surprise vote that put Switzerland at the forefront of a European backlash against a growing Muslim population.

Muslim groups in Switzerland and abroad condemned the vote as biased and anti-Islamic. Business groups said the decision hurt Switzerland’s international standing and could damage relations with Muslim nations and wealthy investors who bank, travel and shop there.

“The Swiss have failed to give a clear signal for diversity, freedom of religion and human rights,” said Omar Al-Rawi, integration representative of the Islamic Denomination in Austria, which said its reaction was “grief and deep disappointment.” (more…)

A New Jersey blogger about to stand trial on charges he made death threats against federal judges apparently was paid by the FBI in its battle against domestic terrorism, according to a published report.

The Record of Bergen County reported Sunday that Hal Turner received thousands of dollars from the FBI to report on neo-Nazis and white supremacist groups and was sent undercover to Brazil.

Turner also claims the FBI coached him to make racist, anti-Semitic and other threatening statements on his radio show, but the newspaper also found many federal officials were concerned that his audience might follow up on his violence rhetoric. (more…)

A federal judge has ordered Connecticut officials to promote 14 firefighters who won areverse discrimination case in a landmark ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court.

U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton ruled Tuesday that the civil rights of white New Haven firefighters were violated when city officials threw out the results of a 2003 promotion exam when too few minorities did well.

Her ruling followed the Supreme Court’s instructions.

In 2006, Arterton had thrown out the white firefighters’ lawsuit. A federal appeals court upheld her decision before the Supreme Court overturned both rulings in June.   MORE>>>

By Philip Giraldi – AntiWar.com

The American people, barely coping with nearly 20% in actual as opposed to statistical unemployment, a broken health care system, a skyrocketing federal deficit, and a collapse in home values really don’t need another war, but another war is what they are going to get. Blame the usual players in Congress and the mainstream media for a lot of it, but the case being made that Iran is a threat to the remainder of the world is largely being cranked up by Israel and its yapping poodles loosely described as the Israel lobby. That Iran spends only 1% as much on its military as does the United States appears to be irrelevant to the argument because everyone who reads the Washington Post and New York Times knows that those wily mullahs have nukes hidden up the sleeves of those loose gowns that they wear, secret warhead programs, and ballistic missiles that will be able to strike Europe someday for reasons that continue to be somewhat elusive.

Israel, which gets nearly $3 billion in “military assistance” and numerous other perks from Washington annually and spends twice as much as Tehran on its own military gets a free pass even though it has a secret and uninspected nuclear arsenal that undoubtedly contributes to Iranian paranoia. Israel’s Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu has made very clear that he wants the United States to attack Iran. What Israel wants from Washington it usually gets and there is no sign that President Barack Obama has the guts needed to change that sorry history. (more…)

You can get 10-20 years in jail for a fight described as a ‘hate crime’, while terrorists get less than 10 years for plotting to blow up buildings.

Four men described as soldiers in a terrorism plot to destroy Chicago’s Sears Tower and bomb FBI offices have each been sentenced to less than a decade behind bars, far less than federal prosecutors sought.

U.S. District Judge Joan Lenard, in sentencing hearings Wednesday and Thursday, said the four were followers who participated far less than ringleader Narseal Batiste in discussions about possible terrorist attacks. The conversations were recorded by the FBI using an informant posing as an al-Qaida operative. (more…)

By Patrick Buchanan –  As George W. Bush famously asked, “Is our children learning?”

Apparently not in the twin capitals of liberalism, D.C. and New York.

In a ranking of 50 states and D.C. by how much each spent per pupil in public schools in 2005, New York ranked first; D.C. third. The state spent $14,100, and New York City just a tad less.

And the bountiful fruits of this massive transfer of taxpayers’ wealth?

In D.C., nearly half of all black and Latino students drop out. Of those who graduate, nearly half are reading and doing math at seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade levels. D.C. academic achievement ranks 51st, last in the U.S.

Yet last week came a report from New York that makes D.C look like M.I.T. Some 200 students, in their firstmath class at City University of New York, were tested on their basic math skills. (more…)

By Patrick Buchanan — Are we at war — or not?

For if we are at war, why is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed headed for trial in federal court in the Southern District of New York? Why is he entitled to a presumption of innocence and all of the constitutional protections of a U.S. citizen?

Is it possible we have done an injustice to this man by keeping him locked up all these years without trial? For that is what this trial implies — that he may not be guilty.

And if we must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that KSM was complicit in mass murder, by what right do we send Predators andSpecial Forces to kill his al-Qaida comrades wherever we find them? For none of them has been granted a fair trial. (more…)

By Patrick Buchanan-    Nidal Malik Hasan was two men.

One was the proud Army major who wore battle fatigues to mosque; the other, the proud Arab who wore Muslim garb in civilian life.

What brought Hasan’s identities into fatal conflict was his belief that Iraq and Afghanistan were unjust wars, and his shock that he, a Muslim, was to be sent to serve in one of those wars, against fellow Muslims—a sin against Allah meriting damnation.

Hasan was conflicted by a dual loyalty—to the country he had sworn to protect, and to his perceived duty as a Muslim. When Hasan told his neighbor that morning, “I am going to do good work for God,” the call of jihad overrode his oath of loyalty as an American soldier. (more…)

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM – A Jewish rabbi has issued a book giving Jews permission to murder non-Jews, including babies and children, who may pose an actual or potential threat to Jews or Israel. “It is permissible to kill the Righteous among non-Jews even if they are not responsible for the threatening situation,” Rabbi Yitzhak Shapiro, who heads the Od Yosef Chai Yeshiva in the Yitzhar settlement in the occupied West Bank, wrote in his book “The King’s Torah.”

He argues that goyem (a derogatory epithet for non-Jews) may be killed if they threaten Israel.

“If we kill a Gentile who has sinned or has violated one of the seven commandments – because we care about the commandments – there is nothing wrong with the murder.”

Shapiro, who heads a small Talmudic school at the settlement of Yitzhar near Nablus, claims his edict “is fully justified by the Torah and the Talmud.” (more…)

French judges ordered a far-right black comedian to pay 20,000 euros (30,000 dollars) Tuesday over an anti-Semitic stunt during a stage show in which he invited a notorious Holocaust denieronto stage.

The Paris court fined Dieudonne M’bala M’bala, a 43-year-old French stand up, 10,000 euros for his “public anti-Semitic insults” and told him to pay a further 10,000 in damages and legal fees to organisations that sued him.

He was prosecuted after he invited Robert Faurisson, an academic who has been convicted of Holocaust denial, onto stage during a Paris comedy show to receive a satirical award from an actor dressed as a Jewish deportee. MORE>>>

The Dallas Housing Authority board of commissioners plans to create a separate new waiting list for special rental assistance vouchers that can only be used by low-income black residents who move to predominately white neighborhoods.

The DHA, whose board of commissioners gave approval for the new list Wednesday, is not yet accepting applications for the housing assistance. Federal approval is needed.

The agency already has 8,000 families on a waiting list for general rental assistance that can be used anywhere. But it cannot find enough qualified families on that list to use the last 500 of 3,205 special rent vouchers from a court settlement designed to desegregate public housing.   SOURCE>>>

Five European nationalist parties are forming an alliance in opposition to the European Union and globalization, officials said Saturday.

Hungary’s Jobbik, France’s National Front, Italy’s Three-Color Flame, Sweden’s National Democrats and Belgium’s National Front formed the Alliance of European National Movements, saying the British National Party, Austria’s Freedom Party as well as groups from Spain and Portugal would join them soon.

Far-right parties won a surprisingly large number of seats in June’s European parliamentary elections. Jobbik got three seats and nearly 15 percent of the vote in Hungary, while the British National Party won two seats and 6 percent of the vote. (more…)

By Patrick Buchanan-

In the brief age of Obama, we have had “truthers,” “birthers,” Tea Party activists and town-hall dissenters.

Comes now, the “Oath Keepers.” And who might they be?

Writes Alan Maimon in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Oath Keepers, depending on where one stands, are “either strident defenders of liberty or dangerous peddlers of paranoia.”

Formed in March, they are ex-military and police who repledge themselves to defend the Constitution, even if it means disobeying orders. If the U.S. government ordered law enforcement agencies to violate Second Amendment rights by disarming the people, Oath Keepers will not obey.

“The whole point of Oath Keepers is to stop a dictatorship from ever happening here,” says founding father Stewart Rhodes, an ex-Army paratrooper and Yale-trained lawyer. “My focus is on the guys with the guns, because they can’t do it without them.

“We say if the American people decide it’s time for a revolution, we’ll fight with you.” (more…)