Monday, 12 January 2015

CNN's Jake Tapper offers some thoughts

CNN's Jake Tapper offers some thoughts

The Common Ills
Sameer Yacoub (AP) reports an Abasiyat suicide car bomber has taken his own
PC. from here
life and the lives of 12 Iraqi security forces.  And yesterday, Alsumaria reports, the continued bombing of Falluja's residential neighborhoods left 11 civilians dead with seven more injured.  These bombings of Falluja are illegal and legally defined War Crimes.  Nouri al-Maliki kicked them off in January of last year.  September 13th, Iraq's new prime minister announced they were wrong (they are illegal, not just wrong) and that they were stopping.  Despite that announcement, these bombings continue daily.  And the people carrying out the bombings?  The Iraqi military.

Meanwhile, we'll leave Iraq to note a column by Jake Tapper (CNN).  Jake was in Paris on Sunday when the unity march was held.  This is from his "I'm ashamed by U.S. leaders' absence in Paris:"

And world leaders were standing together amidst a procession that included Francois Hollande of France, Angela Merkel of Germany, David Cameron of Great Britain, Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority and Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, along with the leaders of Mali, Jordan and Turkey.
It is no small thing for the king of Jordan, a direct descendent of the Prophet Mohammed, to march in a rally prompted by the murders of people who mocked Islam as well as of innocent Jews -- all of whom were killed by Islamic extremists.
The United States, which considers itself to be the most important nation in the world, was not represented in this march -- arguably one of the most important public demonstrations in Europe in the last generation -- except by U.S. Ambassador Jane Hartley, who may have been a few rows back. I didn't see her. Even Russia sent Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
    I say this as an American -- not as a journalist, not as a representative of CNN -- but as an American: I was ashamed.
    I certainly understand the security concerns when it comes to sending President Barack Obama, though I can't imagine they're necessarily any greater than sending the lineup of other world leaders, especially in aggregate.
    But I find it hard to believe that collectively President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew and Attorney General Eric Holder -- who was actually in France that day for a conference on counterterrorism -- just had no time in their schedules on Sunday. Holder had time to do the Sunday shows via satellite but not to show the world that he stood with the people of France?

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