The Iran-US Window is OPEN -- for a Few Hours

Every so often in history, there is a moment where nations can tremendously alter long-established relationships with other nations.

The assassination of Iranian hit man Qassem Soleimani has -- despite initial expectations -- become that very moment.

Iran, which has absolutely nothing to gain from open war with the US, wisely lobbed a volley of missiles in the vicinity US troops.  Not *at* the troops, but in their vicinity.

This was a public-relations master stroke on the part of the Iranians.  It gave them cover with their own war hawks ("see, we did *something*") and sent the message that they had the capability to hit us if they so desired BUT DIDN'T, and it made the next aggressive move by the US far more difficult for the world to accept.

Then, they made a serious mistake in accidentally shooting down an airliner full of innocents.

The next few hours are an opening for another master stroke, this time by President Trump, if he only grabs it.  All he has to do is get up to the podium and propose a reconciliation:

Look, we have our differences with Iran.  But the tragic loss of so many innocents on board Ukrainian Airlines Flight 752 offers Iranians and Americans alike the possibility of taking this in a different direction.

First, I wish to apologize to the Iraqi people for the killing of Iraqi officials who were in the vicinity of our attack on Qassem Soleimani.  We will study ways to more tightly target those who have committed atrocities, so that there is less chance of injury or death to those who should not pay the price for the sins of others.

Second, we are taking other measures also, that hopefully will allow our people to finally stop fighting each other.

I have ordered the full withdrawal of American forces from all of southern Iraq, and the dismantling and removal of all of our bases.  There will remain a few soldiers as requested by the Kurdish government, but otherwise, the request of the Iraqi government will be honored.

Third, I am offering a complete end to all US-government sanctions on Iran, if the Iranian government will likewise de-escalate their activities against Americans and citizens of other nations:

-- Full normalization of relations between the US and Iran, and the reintroduction of embassies and consulates on each others' soil -- with full protection of our respective personnel.

-- Immediately release and end prosecution of any and all prisoners -- American or otherwise -- who have not committed any crimes of violence against any other individuals, and aggressively protect the rights of foreign visitors in Iran.

-- Repeal all barriers to trade with American citizens.

-- End all state harassment of religious and ethnic minorities and missionaries.

-- Cooperate with efforts to clear Arabian Sea and other regional waters of mines and sunken ships.

-- Cooperate with international police agencies to bring violent criminals to justice, wherever they may be found.

No Iranian should regard any American as an enemy.  And no American should regard an Iranian as an enemy.  The natural condition of people is to be friends and to do business with one another.  It is time to let the quarrels of the past go.  I am willing to try.  If I fail, my successor will probably not extend this olive branch.  There are many in both the United States and Iran, as well as in other countries, who profit handsomely from continued hostility between America and Iran.  You and I have an opportunity to tell them "no!".

What say you, President Khamenei?  The tragic loss of those on Flight 752 -- because of the fog of war -- has us staring into the abyss.  Will Iran and American step back from the edge and once again become the friends we always should have been?

It's worth a try.  And it could only succeed while the Iranian government is reeling from the blowback from their own mistake.  That blowback will not last.

Unfortunately, it is likely neither Trump nor anyone else in the US government, including all of the Mickey Mouse Democrats who are only anti-war when it's not their gorilla in the hot seat, have the spine to do any such thing.

So as soon as the Iranians have the blowback under control, the window will close, the opportunity will be gone, and escalation will likely continue.

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Vote Libertarian * 800-ELECT-US * http://www.LP.org
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Written by Marc Montoni <AMCAmbassador@gmail.com>, November, 2019.  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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For more information about the Radical Caucus, see www.LPRadicalCaucus.org or see the Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/2497146127/  .
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The Left's National Forest Reichstag Fires

Regarding the big wildfires in the American West this year:

A number of them are attributed to "pyroterrorism".  It's actually a real thing: USFS and other federal agencies have been holding training sessions and meetings about pyroterrorism at a more & more feverish pace the past few years...

Why?

Because jihadi groups have discovered that American forests have become supremely vulnerable -- and as a consequence, they can cost the US lives and billions -- for the price of a cellphone, a few ounces of gasoline, and a few matches.
 
The idea is not new: Hamas has been torching Israeli farm fields and nature reserves for many years in similar ways; and there is mounting evidence that the disastrous fires in Greece this year were largely a result of Turk and Muslim pyroterrorists who snuck into Greece alongside refugees & immigrants.

What's new, though, is that these extremists in America have begun training in remote-activated incendiary devices designed to ignite fires in fire-prone areas (think IED's for Smokey Bear).

Plus, stupid people are always around.

So why are American forest and grasslands are increasingly vulnerable?

One reason is that federal land policy has gotten trapped by lawsuits (many of which are funded by the forced "investment" by American taxpayers via the EAJA -- in other words a wholesale wealth transfer from taxpayers to the lawyer-industrial complex) which have done much to shut down logging on forests “managed” by the federal government, together with environmental activist political pressure to stop forest "management".   Land managers are increasingly restricted from setting up prescribed / controlled burns to eliminate fuel.  Nor can they contract out to resource (eg logging) companies to clear overgrown areas.

Besides the external pressure towards ignoring management, there is internal inertia trending in the same direction: older forest managers who understood that American forests and open land were supposed to be for a balance of uses, including recreation, wild areas, logging, mining, and drilling, and so on, are gradually being replaced by a newer generation of land managers who are increasingly opposed to any uses other than recreation -- or, better yet: human-prohibited wild space.

So a perfect storm is building bigger and bigger every year -- with increasingly devastating wildland fires as the predictable result.

Common sense says global warming isn't global if it's local.  However, environmentalists and their leftist brethren are now peddling the idea that global warming can occur in one small region, which is absurd.  Nevertheless it is the "logic" behind claims that local heat records are evidence of global warming.  This is how environmentalists play their game.

Suppose those of us who are not alarmists do the same?  Let's try it:

"Arsonist forest fires are definitely a sign that Man’s activities has increased local temperatures – as much as 800-1000 degrees C. If environmentalists' opposition to sensible forest management contributes to this 800 degree rise in the local temperature, they should pay for the damages they've caused."

That’s the way, right?

If, by your actions, you create conditions that result in the destruction of property, which includes causing "local" ... er... "global" warming by 800 degrees, then you can expect to bear the consequences in law and liberty:

Pay up, y'all.

But the real solution is to get politics out of the environment (and insurance), and thenceforth to protect property rights.

The fed should sell off the millions of acres it owns to the highest bidder, and from that point on, allow property owners to provide for the protection and management of their property.  How they do so will be managed by their insurers.  Such a regime will encourage proper management of forest resources and the mitigation of harmful practices.

Libertarians have called for the abolition of the BLM, USFS, NPS, and other alphabet-soup bureaucracies, and the wholesale privatization of government property.  We also call for the abolition of welfare for lawyers and political activists who profit endlessly by suing government.  If governments didn't own property, taxpayers wouldn't be left holding the bag on both sides of every argument over the environment.

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Written by Marc Montoni <AMCAmbassador@gmail.com>, August, 2018.  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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For more information about the Radical Caucus, see www.LPRadicalCaucus.org or see the Facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/2497146127/  .
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Gaza

Something that annoys me about Libertarians is that there are so many who think they know what is going on in the Middle East, but they've never been there.

Plus, they seem to have blinders on about half of the discussion about the region.

Yes, AIPAC and other such propaganda organs hold a disproportionate share of eyeballs in the policy-making community.

But the policy-making community is notoriously prostitutional in nature, and so the flood of petrodollars from the Arab governments into the American political marketplace ensures the Arab point of view likewise gets an outsized share of attention.

I find it very distasteful to find Libertarians jumping on the anti-Israel bandwagon. There is nothing about Israel that isn't true about a hundred other US allies.

My main concern with Libertarians singling out Israel for our ire and derision is that doing so makes us sound like Nazis who only find fault with Jews.  Yes, there are so-called libertarians who *are* prejudiced against Jews, just as there are libertarians who are bigoted towards women, men, blacks, caucasians, and so on.

A pox on all their houses.

Bigots -- Nazi or otherwise -- should not be allowed to hijack the movement or the Party.

The only real "Libertarian position about Israel" is that we regard them no differently than any other government: We call for disengagement from all foreign conflicts and abolishing all foreign aid, regardless of the recipient.

A recent discussion reminded me of the lack of investigation libertarians are sometimes guilty of.  Specifically, a friend related a claim from WikiLeaks

"... The State of Israel is conspiring to keep their economy at the lowest level of subsistence possible..."

I found this statement to be ridiculous -- regardless of the alleged source being a US Embassy cable.  The Embassy is part of the US government -- and the US government is invompetent at everything it does.
 

The Israelis are no more capable of "keeping" the Gazan economy "on the brink of collapse" than the US government is capable of controlling the flow of guns, drugs, people, counterfeit products, or anything else across the Rio Grande.

Israel was for decades the largest buyer of goods made (or grown) in Gaza. The decline in exports from Gaza and the resultant economic repercussions were primarily a result of the Israeli regulatory boycott on goods which was instituted in response to repeated murders and rocket attacks. I suspect Americans wouldn't want to buy anything from Canada either if it was throwing bombs across the border every day.

There is NO prohibition on Gazan goods going to other countries from Gaza. Slowdowns of trucks (and ships) to accommodate searches for weapons and bomb precursors (as well as to calculate taxes), yes, but prohibitions, no.   As if the USA doesn't have exactly that same policy.  Ever heard of "US Customs"?  Same freaking thing.  Well, except there are a lot more things the US government prohibits from crossing the border (such as foreign medications, etc).

Despite the so-called economic "blockade" nee bureaucracy at the border, Gazans manage to smuggle $3 billion in goods into Gaza every year, and almost that much in exports -- all outside of the normal regulatory trade markets.

Formal trade -- in other words, good NOT smuggled, mainly between Israel and Gaza -- amounts to about $6 billion per year, or about twice the informal sector.  Indeed, formal business between Israel and Gaza & the West Bank together amounted to about $20 billion in 2013.

I suspect the KFC imports from Egypt are no more difficult than it would be doing the same thing across the border from Tijuana into California.  Or even across the border from Windsor ON to Detroit MI.

Americans -- and Libertarians -- need to worry about our own house.