Stock Market and Political Commentary

Torture Techniques Revealed

See the article below to learn just how weak and pathetic we've really become in the US in dealing with those who have cost us several thousand lives, over a trillion dollars and counting, and who have basically changed our way of life forever.  If you don't believe it just go to the airport and see what all you now have to go through just to get on board a flight within the US.  It's additional time, money, and frustration on every flight you take.
 
When you understand that our "torture" techniques are actually so lame that they wouldn't even be tough enough for college hazing rituals then you can understand just how warped the liberal mind is that constantly moans about us "torturing" these prisoners and wants those who were working to keep it from happening again in the previous administration prosecuted for "crimes".
 
Let me get this straight.  Every liberal I talk to says they were for going to Afghanistan to kill and mame anyone who might have had something to do with 9/11 and of course they knew some innocent people will be killed and mamed in the process as this is simply the reality of war even in today's world where we have precise weapons and take great care to keep this from happening.  King Obama himself is actually increasing troops in Afghanistan to escalate that war at this time.
 
But if we capture one of these guys we are not allowed to pour some water on him or put a bug in his room to make him reveal information that could save us from another terrorist attack.  Does this make sense?  Of course not.... but you must understand the liberal mind always comes up with something totally devoid of logic and reality.
 
That's why they are dangerous and wreckless.... and also in total power at this time.  Stay tuned for the consequences.
 
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=31669
 
J. Cogburn

--
Making Money Fast is Fun
http://www.QuickProfitStockTips.com/

Airhead Case Study - April 2009

Why are some people airheads?

Because they never learn even when a clear example is provided for them that should teach them something.  The simple lesson can be presented over and over for 8 years on all the national news and all the national newspapers.

But does it sink in to their empty skull?  No.  Thus the label is an accurate description of a human condition, which I'm going to call airhead-itus to lend a clinical flavor to my analysis of this affliction. 

Now let's do a quick case study of the US Airhead in Chief (AIC), Barack Hussein Obama, to see how this plays out in real life and on the world stage for a simple yet profound example.

After back-slapping and fist-pumping with Hugo Chavez, another dictator who openly hates capitalism and the United States, Obama defended his actions by saying the following:

"we have nothing to fear from Venezuela, whose defense budget is probably 1/600 that of the U.S."

Now why you ask is this an airhead statement?  Because anyone but an airhead knows the threat in the 21st Century is from asymmetric warfare, not conventional warfare.

Of course no other country in the world could possibly even come close to defeating our Air Force in a conventional war.  And the military that holds the high ground will win in a conventional war. However, even that could change in time if the military budget continues to get cut as Obama is proposing, but at the moment that is the way it is.

Low budget operations can do grave harm to our nation through asymmetric warfare.  On 9/11 we had an asymmetric warfare example when 19 men armed with box cutters and airline tickets did the following:

    - killed 3,000 of our citizens,

    - grounded our domestic airlines,

    - shut down our financial markets for days,

    - cost us untold billions of dollars in direct and indirect damage to our infrastructure and our   economy,

    - caused us to add layers of security from now on that costs us billions every year in security costs, time, and frustration at the inconvienience.

    - started the war on terror which has resulted in a 2 front war that cost hundreds of billions more dollars,  thousands more deaths, and is still not over years later.

So there you have it.  I'm sure the airhead heard about 9/11, read about it in the paper, saw it on the radio and TV news, and has probably even had security briefings on possible attacks like this in the future since he is now the President of the United States.

But what is his conclusion from all this?  If a country has a small military budget they are no threat to the United States.

This clearly demonstrates that the airhead called Obama had 8 years to get it right and still did not learn the simple lesson.... through asymmetric warfare large defense budgets and capabilities are not necessary to do grave harm to our nation.  All that is needed is a hatred of capitalism and America plus the willingness to act on that hatred to harm us economically and / or militarily.

Chavez has made it clear that is his intentions.  But the Airhead Obama thinks his small military budget prevents this man from being a threat to America.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

J. Cogburn

Decisive Action?

The hostage situation regarding an American Captain and Somali pirates took days to resolve.  This seemed strange to me if decisive action had been taken and the pirates were taken out at the first opportunity.

According to reports the Navy ship had been towing the little pirate boat, which to my understanding was actually furnished by the hijacked ship when the pirate craft sunk during the hijacking, for quite a while and the pirates were nearing their objective of making it back to land with their hostage.  Now more details are emerging as to why this took so long.

According to a recent article,

 "Multiple opportunities to free the captain of the Maersk Alabama from three young pirates were missed, these sources say – all because a Navy SEAL team was not immediately ordered to the scene and then forced to operate under strict, non-lethal rules of engagement."

See the full story. 

J. Cogburn

The Moral High Ground

Who has the moral high ground in your opinion; those who use tough interrogation techniques to get critical information from our enemies to keep the country safe or those who won't and are willing to take a chance on having a major terrorist attack take place in the US once again because they don't want to make anybody uncomfortable?

If you believe we shouldn't pour water on these people to make them talk, would you still feel that is was the right decision if it allowed them to explode a nuclear device in one of our major cities that killed, oh say 500,000 innocent citizens? 

In other words, would you still feel you had the moral high ground if your refusal to make these guys uncomfortable to make them talk resulted in the unecessary deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and what that would portend for our economy and way of life in the future?  I have to ask because some people would still smugly hold their head high and be confident they did the right thing.

We're not even talking about real torture where peoples eyes are routinely gouged out, tongues cut out, hands and feet cut off, being pushed off 3 story buildings blindfolded, etc. before they are sent to one of the mass graves.... you know, like Saddam did it (I've seen the actual films on some of this real torture).  We're just discussing making these guys very uncomfortable for a short period of time to see if they have some valuable information they might want to share with us.

Who would you say has the moral high ground in your opinion on a related subject; those who would keep our sources and methods for extracting information from the enemy secret per the CIA charter or those who would let the whole world know what our secrets are so they can then neutralize them and make our intelligence agencies even more ineffective than they already have been since they were watered down many years ago?

Obama has now decided to release highly classified information from the CIA... see full story.

"A former top official in the administration of President George W. Bush called the publication of the memos “unbelievable.” "

“It's damaging because these are techniques that work, and by Obama's action today, we are telling the terrorists what they are,” the official said. “We have laid it all out for our enemies. This is totally unnecessary. … Publicizing the techniques does grave damage to our national security by ensuring they can never be used again — even in a ticking-time- bomb scenario where thousands or even millions of American lives are at stake."

Our new King believes telling the world about the CIA's sources and methods is a good idea.  Keep this in mind when the next terrorist attack takes place on America's soil if you are not one of the casualties.  You see if the terrorists get their hands on the right weapons and we are unable to find out about their plans and stop them before they strike then the next attack will make 9/11 look like minor incident.

But Obama is willing to increase the chances of this happening.  There is literally  no limit to the damage this airhead will do to this country's national security before he is through and somewhere down the line we will pay the price for it.

Nobody knows for sure if it will be this month, this year, or a few years from now.  But this kind of naive and wreckless action will have consequences I can assure you of that. 

J. Cogburn

Who's Helping the Poor - Me or You?

All you liberals out there who are always droning on an on about helping the poor and then we find out you personally donate almost nothing to charity and support dictators who enslave and impoverish whole nations of people, listen up!
 
I've advocated taking strong action against the Somali Pirates who are hijacking ships and taking hostages.  In a strange irony some of the ships being hijacked are carrying a cargo of supplies and food for the Somalia people.
 
But some of you bleeding hearts that never believe force is necessary to stop evil men and who run around with asinine bumper stickers such as "war is not the answer" are in reality the enemies of poor people all over the world.
 
That's right.  I have outlined a specific program to help poor people both directly and indirectly by dealing with this pirate problem swiftly.  If you disagree with this then read the following article and see who is really a friend of the poor... me or you?
 
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_piracy_forgotten_hostages
 
If you are still too obtuse to grasp this truth I have just clearly laid out for you then by all means please tell me how your spineless approach of allowing the pirates to continue hijacking ships, impeding the delivery of needed goods, and taking hostages is a better plan for helping the poor than what I have proposed.
 
My Help the Poor Plan
http://stocks-politics.typepad.com/stock_market_and_politica/2009/04/how-to-deal-with-pirates.html
 
J. Cogburn
 
--
Making Money Fast is Fun
http://www.QuickProfitStockTips.com/

Liberals and Animals

My friend writes....

You are wasting your time trying to get Phil and other liberals to see reality. They really are incapable of sorting through facts and coming to a logical conclusion and they are too stubborn to ever change their minds. You might as well try to teach a pig to talk. After all his arguing about the impossibility of snipers taking out the pirates, have you heard from him when it, in fact, happened.

My response....

You are right on this.... it is a part of my observation long ago that the truly liberal mind is "impervious to facts".  Facts bounce off the liberal mind like raindrops bounce off a plate glass window.
 
I want to catalog your "You might as well try to teach a pig to talk" analogy for future study and possible use.  But first I must make sure there is a zero chance of teaching a pig to talk.  It is similar to what my cousin said regarding liberals and animals.
 
He says that you could use flawless logic backed up by undisputed scientific and historical fact to get a liberal to see an obvious truth.  But they won't see it because it is like presenting this argument to a cow who is out in the field picking grass and expecting the cow to be convinced by your argument.  It won't happen.
 
No I didn't see anything from Phil that said I was right and he was wrong about the snipers.  Instead he tried to defend his attack on President Bush by trying to equate a pirate "attack" on a ship with a successful hijacking of an American ship and / or the taking of American hostages.
 
The former is an incident that shouldn't be taken lightly while the latter is a much more serious situation that demands immediate action.  The liberal mind has trouble with nuances in a given situation and how that it affects how the situation should be viewed and dealt with and whether the two situations are equivalent.
 
For example, the truly liberal mind always thinks guns are bad and  should be outlawed.  They fail to see the nuance of the situation.  The nuance is that is guns are inanimate objects and can be used for bad purposes (murder of innocent people in the commission of a crime) or for good purposes (to stop criminals from robbing, raping, or murdering innocent people).
 
There are many other nuances I could give, but let me just give one other example.  My friend Phil is very interested in helping the poor which is fine an comendable if it is directed at helping those who through no fault of their own need some help and is not done in such a way that it stifles initiative from those receiving the aid to where it becomes an expectation and way of life.
 
Giving to the poor, especially through government programs, can be like feeding animals in the wild; soon they lose the ability to feed themselves and are totally reliant on others to survive.   Again it is all in how it is done as to whether it is ultimately a good thing or a bad thing for all concerned.
 
But while I believe my friend has a good heart and wants to help those in need he supports guys like Castro who literally enslave and impoverish whole populations for 50 years.  He doesn't get the nuance in the situation here again, otherwise he would be with me in opposing dictators at all times in all places.
 
Generally I don't spend time seeking out liberals to argue with because as you have rightly pointed out it is an exercise in futility.  But as a hobby I do spar a bit with my friend Phil and occasionally others who seem to be misguided who cross my path.  However, I have little expectation that they will grasp my arguments and change their way of thinking so I don't really do it for that purpose.
 
As to the pirates, I'm pretty sure at least 3 of them, and maybe 4, will not be hijacking any American ships in the future.
 
But unless my 3 part program outlined in a previous commentary is carried out many others will continue this activity as long as it is profitable to do so.
 
One caution...if we decide to take out the pirate strongholds it must be a major strike that kills thousands and makes those who live tremble at the idea we will be coming for them should they decide to continue in their old occupation.  A timid or half hearted strike will probably not help at all and may in fact make things worse.
 
Most of the pirates at this time seem to be interested primarily in the money.  An easier way to stop this is for everyone to advertise they will no longer pay a ransom for any reason and mean what they say.  But what are the chances of this?  It is possibility but a low probability I think that this would be carried out indefinitely and uniformly by the entire globe.
 
Of course you may have some pirates that would like to involve themselves in this activity for terrorist type reasons instead of financial gain.  In those cases you have to deal with them the same way you deal with other terrorists.... find out who they are, where they are, and take them out before they strike.
 
So we shall see what happens.  The pirates have vowed revenge while our Secretary of Defense is carrying out the young King's wishes by cutting the defense budget and has stated they don't see any need for further action against the pirates at this time.
 
Will additional attacks on American ships change their mind or are they in fact planning a massive raid on the pirates per my recommendation even now?  We shall see.
 
J. Cogburn

This Just In on the Pirate Story

Earlier today I revealed to a few close friends and family what really happened yesterday regarding the pirates who were holding the US citizen hostage (see below).
 
Now it has been learned that on the hopes his cover has not been blown Obama intends to continue acting like an absolute airhead by increasing the federal budget so much it may literally bankrupt the country while at the same time cutting the defense budget. 
 
In a super airhead move to continue concealing his true identity if possible, Obama is not only cutting the defense budget, but more specifically he is reducing the funding for our missile defense programs which are the only hope of keeping millions from dying should a rogue nation launch an ICBM with a nuclear warhead into the United States or into the country of one of our allies.
 
This is being done at the time when this type of technology is nearing operational status in countries like Iran and North Korea and when the President of Iran has threatned to wipe one of our allies off the map time and time again plus makes no bones about openly calling us "the great Satan" and says the end is near for us too.
 
Will his effort to conceal his true identity succeed by convincing everyone he is a liberal lightweight who is trying to disarm America thereby encouraging rogue nations to launch an attack that will get thousands or even millions of innocent people killed?
 
Or will this pirate incident blow his cover and expose him as a hawk even though the force used was already authorized by the Law of the Sea Treaty on Piracy and anyone with an ounce of common sense knows deadly force is authorized even by policemen, but especially by military personnel, when someones life is in imminent danger?  Time will tell.
 
And now for the UNTOLD STORY of what really happened to the poor pirates..
 
What you don't know is that our 44th President is a real hero, even more so than President Bush.  I have it on good authority that what actually happened was this....
 
Obama had a chef flown in from 1/2 way across the country to make pizza for a party of 140 people, because he liked the crust this guy makes, as a diversionary tactic.
 
While everyone was focused on this King like summons (fly in a chef from the midwest to make pizza for a party...at taxpayers expense?), he snuck out of the White House and flew himself directly to the Navy ship in his own private jet that he bought from the royalties of his inventions while in the private sector.  Of course he got his flight training as a military officer and honed his skills while flying secret combat missions over enemy terroritory for many years.
 
Since he is also a weapons expert from his special ops training, and a world class swimmer from his days in a Navy Seals unit, he carefully selected his weapon of choice after landing his small jet on a destroyer (never been done before, but he did it in this emergency situation).  This is why even today he is a strong supporter of the 2nd Amendment.
 
He carefully lowered himself into the water, despite swells up to 10 feet at the time, with his hi-powered sniper rifle firmly gripped between his teeth as he had to keep his hands free to complete the 5 mile swim required to get him within range of the pirate's vessel.
 
One man, while swimming in rough waters, being able to take out all 3 pirates before they could harm the Captain would be the tough part. But he was sure his confidence and warfare skills, plus an adrenaline rush at the prospect of taking down the bad guys, would be sufficient to accomplish the task.
 
Well you know the rest of what happened.... our superhero President, the smartest and most accomplished man in the world, completed his mission.  His cunning and bravery will be talked about and taught in military tactics classes for years to come.
 
What the most important and amzaing thing to know is that this was in the planning stages for years just in case something like this might come up.
 
To make sure he could keep his cover and strike the enemy by total surprise he had to create an image of being a complete airhead who had no real accomplishments before becoming President and make it look like he had spent his whole life listening to and learning from radicals who hate the US and all it stands for, especially those freedom and capitalism parts.
 
Well done Mr. President, mission accomplished!
 
J. Cogburn
 

--
Making Money Fast is Fun
http://www.QuickProfitStockTips.com/

Does Attack Equal Hijack?

My friend writes...

I give up you cannot deal with a radical.If you would have read the article titled : (CNN) -- U.S. Navy personnel cleared unexploded ordnance from a luxury cruise ship Monday, two days after pirates attacked the vessel off Africa, the U.S. military said.  
  The ship was attacked and nobody was killed thanks to Captain keeping the passengers off the deck and using evasive action to get away from the Pirates. The word attack is mention in all three articles. Again you read what you want and bullshit the rest.
  As For Bush when he was first sworn in he visited Mexico or was it Israel or Bangladesh but did not come to Canada until much later. After 911 he accused Canada for allowing the terrorist into the US. Next he diverted all planes coming from aboard to Canada. It was not until his second term he thanked Canada for allowing US planes with potential terrorist to land in our airports. Apologize to Bush you got to be kidding.

My response.....

The untold story...find out what actually happened in taking down the pirates. I outline the interesting details below, but first a reply to my friend Phil's latest correspondence....
 
My original statement on this was the following:
 
"Do some research will you?  Tell me when ships with American flags were taken by pirates off the coast of Somalia and American citizens held hostage by the same during the Bush administration.  Then after you can't find it you can send an apology for unfairly attacking President Bush once again."
 
See the commentary where this appears at: http://stocks-politics.typepad.com/stock_market_and_politica/2009/04/did-bush-allow-pirate-attacks.html
 
Notice the words "were taken"... this means successfully hijacked.
 
Also notice "American citizens held hostage by the same"... this is pretty self explanatory, but would normally occur only after the pirates achieved the first objective.

So based on this check your dictionary to see if "attacked" is a synonym for "successfully hijacked" and / or "hostages".  That's important because only a successful hijacking of an American vessel and / or American hostage being held by the Somali pirates would qualify as something similar to this during the Bush administration regarding pirates.
 
Your own quote from the article makes it clear that "the ship took evasive action to get away from the pirates".  To me that means they did not succeed at hijacking the ship.  What does it mean to you?
 
Also, since they were not able to hijack the ship it would be assumed they were not able to take any hostages.  This is especially true since the article didn't say anything about hostages being taken. 
 
Notice by actually reading what the article says and using a bit of logic we can determine that:
 
a.  Pirates fired at the ship in order to attempt to get control of the ship, i.e., hijack it.
 
b.  The crew took evasive action so the pirates were unable to achieve their objective.
 
c.  Since they were not able to board the ship no hostages were taken.
 
d.  Some of the ordnance did not explode when it hit the ship; it was later cleared by U.S. Navy personnel.
 
As to what Bush did when he first became President, I didn't say anything about that.  What I said was that he made his first speech as a private citizen after two terms of President in Canada.
 
Since you previously equated him with Saddam Hussein in moral equivalency, and you seem to have an affection for dictators, I thought perhaps you liked our 43rd President and would want to correspond with him if given the chance.  Maybe I was wrong about this.
 
But it looks like I was right about snipers taking out the pirates, eh Phil?
 
And now for the UNTOLD STORY of what really happened to the poor pirates..
 
What you don't know is that our 44th President is a real hero, even more so than President Bush.  I have it on good authority that what actually happened was this....
 
Obama had a chef flown in from 1/2 way across the country to make pizza for a party of 140 people, because he liked the crust this guy makes, as a diversionary tactic.
 
While everyone was focused on this King like summons (fly in a chef from the midwest to make pizza for a party...at taxpayers expense?), he snuck out of the White House and flew himself directly to the Navy ship in his own private jet that he bought from the royalties of his inventions while in the private sector.  Of course he got his flight training as a military officer and honed his skills while flying secret combat missions over enemy terroritory for many years.
 
Since he is also a weapons expert from his special ops training, and a world class swimmer from his days in a Navy Seals unit, he carefully selected his weapon of choice after landing his small jet on a destroyer (never been done before, but he did it in this emergency situation).  This background is why even today he is a strong supporter of the 2nd Amendment.
 
He carefully lowered himself into the water, despite swells up to 10 feet at the time, with his hi-powered sniper rifle firmly gripped between his teeth as he had to keep his hands free to complete the 5 mile swim required to get him within range of the pirate's vessel.
 
One man, while swimming in rough waters, being able to take out all 3 pirates before they could harm the Captain would be the tough part. But he was sure his confidence and warfare skills, plus an adrenaline rush at the prospect of taking down the bad guys, would be sufficient to accomplish the task.
 
Well you know the rest of what happened.... our superhero President, the smartest and most accomplished man in the world, completed his mission.  His cunning and bravery will be talked about and taught in military tactics classes for years to come.
 
What the most important and amzaing thing to know is that this was in the planning stages for years just in case something like this might come up.
 
To make sure he could keep his cover and strike the enemy by total surprise he had to create an image of being a complete airhead who had no real accomplishments before becoming President and make it look like he had spent his whole life listening to and learning from radicals who hate the US and all it stands for, especially those freedom and capitalism parts.
 
Well done Mr. President, mission accomplished!
 
J. Cogburn

When is an Attack, an Attack?

My friend writes...

I believe Bush was President during these two incidents. But maybe these incidents to not count because they don't involve oil.
I have two pictures of the lifeboat. Only when the portholes are open the people inside are visible.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
U.S. Navy boards ship after pirate attack
Tourists resume sightseeing in Seychelles
Monday, November 7, 2005; Posted: 8:38 p.m. EST (01:38 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/africa/11/07/somalia.pirates/index.html
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Somali pirates attack US Navy
Independent, The (London) ,  Sep 25, 2008
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20080925/ai_n28110677/

U.S. navy tanker under apparent pirate attack off Somalia
Wed Sep 24, 2008 2:23pm EDT
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE48N67320080924?feedType=RSS&feedName=topNews
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am waiting for an apology.

My response....

Did you mean three incidents?
 
All incidents count where the American ships are successfully hijacked and / or Americans are removed from their vessel on the high seas and taken hostage... it doesn't matter whether oil was involved or not.
 
Although this is a nice try Phil and I'm glad to see you did some good research here I'm afraid it appears that none of these incidents meet the criteria that I previously outlined and repeated above.
 
So I can only apologize for not being able to give you an apology..... but you can still give me one since these incidents don't qualify. It is still apparent that you wrongly attacked President Bush.  Rest assured I will pass your apology along to W. as promised so make it good.
 
Just say the word and I will also pass along your personal thanks for him honoring Canada with his first private citizen speech after he completed his second term as President of the United States.  I know you would like to do something to express your remorse at not being able to attend this historic event.  This seems like a golden opportunity for you to do that before it's too late.
 
In my April 10, 2009 commentary I outlined 3 steps to dealing with the pirate situation.  It looks like the first one was partially completed (3 of 4 dead pirates) today via sniper fire as I also recommended.  Unfortunately it is unlikely my other 2 recommendations will be taken at all, and if so I would say it is unlikely to be taken to the degree that I would advise unless this type of activity continues.
 
How To Deal With Pirates
http://stocks-politics.typepad.com/stock_market_and_politica/2009/04/how-to-deal-with-pirates.html
 
J. Cogburn

--
Making Money Fast is Fun
http://www.QuickProfitStockTips.com/

Australian PR on Torture

A friend sends me the following solution which was apparently proposed by an Australian to the torture issue... it looks like a good plan to me so I'm posting it here on the blog.

One thing about blokes from Oz is that their hearts and humour are always in the right
place! 

 T. B.  Bechtel, a  City Councillor from Newcastle, Australia, was asked on a local live
radio talk show, just what he thought about the allegations of torture of suspected terrorists.
His reply prompted his ejection from the studio, but to thunderous applause
from the audience.

HIS STATEMENT:
'If hooking up one raghead terrorist prisoner's testicles to a car battery to get the truth
out of the lying little camelshagger will save just one Australian life, then I have only three things to say,'

'Red is positive,
Black is negative, and
Make sure his nuts are wet.' 

See... solutions to real world problems can sometimes be fairly simple with modern technology.

J. Cogburn