Battle of the Bilge

“It has always been my private conviction that any man who pits his intelligence against a fish and loses has it coming.” – John Steinbeck

Slow News Day?

A quick attempt to hopefully keep the viral emails from going around on this issue is in order. Although not directly related to the military, there are enough sport fishermen out there that this will catch their attention. Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh stated plainly that the president was targeting people’s right to fish. A direct quote from Beck was “Forget about the frickin’ fish. People are losing their rights. Who’s more important: the fish or you?” Other samplings across the blogosphere have been equally knee-jerk:

From the SayAnythingBlog: “Because He’s Not Unpopular Enough: Obama Pushes Ahead With Fishing Ban.”

From RedState: Obama: The Will Of The People Be Damned – I’LL Decide Who Can Go Fishing

From GatewayPundit: Obama’s Latest Assault on Freedom– New Regulations Will Ban Sport Fishing

The story that sparked the commotion originally ran as a blog article on ESPN that cited Phil Morlock of the New York Times in saying that:

“Morlock fears that “what we’re seeing coming at us is an attempted dismantling of the science-based fish and wildlife model that has served us so well. There’s no basis in science for the agendas of these groups who are trying to push the public out of being able to fish and recreate.

“Conflicts (user) are overstated and problems are manufactured. It’s all just an excuse to put us off the water.”

The issue is that the Obama administration has ceased accepting public input on a strategy to change the way our nation uses our water supply and natural resources. NOAA is leading the review and will give recommendations to the president. While there may be some changes to fishing sites and regulations, there has been no indication that any decision has been made. Task forces often close off public input at certain points in their mission to develop plans based on what has already been received. NOAA is extremely unlikely to recommend anything approaching a ban on sport fishing, and the president would have to be crazy to think a move like that would be politically viable. There are as many as 60 million voters in this country that enjoy fishing, and this would not be something easily forgotten.

That Smell is Not the Fish

As the rhetoric on the web and cable news got heated, ESPN took action to try to calm everyone down. Executive Editor ESPNOutdoors.com, Steve Bowman, issued this statement, which I’ll reproduce in full:

Firestorms get started in a variety of ways, especially on politicized issues.

ESPNOutdoors.com inadvertently contributed to a flare-up Tuesday when we posted the latest article in a series of stories on President Barack Obama’s newly created Ocean Policy Task Force, a column written by Robert Montgomery, a conservation writer for BASS since 1985. Regrettably, we made several errors in the editing and presentation of this installment. Though our series has included numerous news stories on the topic, this was not one of them — it was an opinion piece, and should have been clearly labeled as commentary.

And while our series overall has examined several sides of the topic, this particular column was not properly balanced and failed to represent contrary points of view. We have reached out to people on every side of the issue and reported their points of view — if they chose to respond — throughout the series, but failed to do so in this specific column.

This series started in October and has included several updates on how the creation of the task force and its actions could impact recreational anglers. ESPNOutdoors.com should have made it clear to all readers that this was part of a larger series, and — even though this was Montgomery’s opinion, and those of the sources quoted in the column — we should have taken more care to fairly represent opposing arguments.

We do feel it is our duty to cover issues surrounding outdoor sports to the best of our abilities, and given the nature of this task force and the potential impact on all fisherman, this was an appropriate topic to address for our audience. We take seriously the tenets of journalism that require we take an unbiased approach, and when we make mistakes in the presentation of a story or a column, it is our responsibility to admit them.

Any confusion on that part rests entirely on my shoulders as the executive editor of this site.

We have appended the original column to note that it was in fact a commentary, and we will institute more rigorous editing safeguards in order to prevent such issues in the future.

Discussion

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“Like recurring nightmares, conspiracy theories aren’t necessarily gone for good just because they disappear for a while” – David A Graham, Newsweek

Background – Newsweek’s Blunder

If you intend to take on a list of conspiracy theories as a member of one of the largest news outlets in the world, you have to assume that it will draw major attention. Knowing this it would be a good idea to do your research and come up with thorough lines of evidence to support your conclusions. If there is one cardinal rule about discussing conspiracy theories, is that you bring as much information to the table as possible. The true believers on the subject are going to deny your research and conclusions anyway, but at least you’ll have specific points of information to start the discussion.

In a web exclusive article posted on February 12th, Newsweek breaks this rule with gusto, providing one or two sentence rebuttals to conspiracy theories with very little in the way of supporting evidence for their conclusions. Called the ‘Guide to Conspiracy Theories’, the article is a shotgun listing of various active theories that have permeated the web, most of which we have reported on in the past. The result of the article’s lack of evidence, although the conclusions are for the most part dead on, has been a thrashing of the article via its comments section, and believers and non-believers alike have expressed their feelings about the article in a massive way. Instead of putting these issues to rest, Newsweek seems to have successfully contributed to their durability and in some cases will no doubt breathe new life into (thankfully) dying theories.

First let’s take a look at the thirteen theories highlighted by the article and their short conclusions.

Newsweek’s List and Conclusions

1. Barack Obama was not born in the United States.
Kernel of Truth? It’s fully debunked. Forged Kenyan birth certificates have been exposed, and—despite protestations to the contrary—Obama’s birth certificate has been certified by the state of Hawaii, and images have been shown on national television. And that’s leaving aside plenty of circumstantial proof, like birth announcements in both major Hawaiian papers from August 1961.

2. Anthropogenic global warming is a hoax.
Kernel of Truth? Deniers have long taken advantage of scientists’ cautious statements, and “Climategate” breathed new life into the movement, but the science stands: warming is real, and it’s caused by human actions.

3. Goldman Sachs intentionally created the economic crisis.
Kernel of Truth? Goldman undoubtedly did better than any competitor from the financial crisis, and CEO Lloyd Blankfein even admitted—albeit cryptically—that the company had “participated in things that were clearly wrong.” This theory is tougher than others to debunk fully, because there’s no empirical data available either way. Nonetheless, while Goldman may have profited, that alone doesn’t prove malice or conspiracy.

4. Democrats’ health plan will create death panels.
Kernel of Truth?[Sarah] Palin was apparently referring to a provision of draft legislation that would have funded consultation about end-of-life care. There was and is, however, no plan for rationing care as a cost-cutting measure, and fact-checking outlet PolitiFact named the theory the “Lie of the Year” in 2009.

5. Barack Obama is a secret Muslim.
Kernel of Truth? Nope. Obama belonged to a Christian church in Chicago (for which he ironically also caught flack) and has a record of unambiguous support for Israel and hawkish policies on eradicating Al Qaeda’s strongholds in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

6. Sarah Palin is not the mother of her 1-year-old son, Trig.
Kernel of Truth? No. Sullivan has couched the whole thing as just pointing out minor discrepancies and asking for reasons—not directly making accusations. Palin has understandably refused to dignify these questions with responses. No one else has picked up the theory publicly, although privately some liberals regard it as plausible.

7. ACORN is part of a liberal conspiracy to steal elections.
Kernel of Truth? The James O’Keefe videos showed questionable conduct at the very least, but neither they nor anything else proves a vast left-wing conspiracy between Democrats and ACORN to steal elections.

8. FEMA is establishing detention camps.
Kernel of Truth? Too silly to discuss.

9. The Council on American-Islamic Relations is trying to infiltrate Capitol Hill and spread jihad.
Kernel of Truth? CAIR has tried to place interns on Capitol Hill, but as it points out, that’s standard practice for advocacy groups of all types and allegiances. There’s no proof of sinister motives or an effort to encourage international jihad.

10. Obama wants to conscript Americans into a civilian defense corps.
Kernel of Truth? Liberal press watchdog Media Matters says the theory stems from a speech Obama made in which he argued for the importance of the Foreign Service, AmeriCorps, and the Peace Corps. That’s a far cry from an American Gestapo—a claim for which there’s no support.

11. Time magazine wants to restrict the Internet to licensed users.
Kernel of Truth? Time published a story reporting on a Microsoft executive who’d like to see licensing to combat anonymity. Broadcasting such a controversial proposal—regardless of its merits—is quite the opposite of censorship, as Time’s Michael Scherer rightly explained.

12. 9/11 was an inside job.
Kernel of Truth? Not even the staunchest mainstream George W. Bush bashers believe this one. Enough said.

13. The Omnibus One-World Government, Unified Currency, Dollar-Abolishing, Free Trade–Advocating Theory of Everything:
Kernel of Truth? Eh, sounds plausible to us.

For the full background on each conspiracy theory in the article, go to: http://www.newsweek.com/id/233518/

Comments on, Attacks and Denials Incoming

The article itself, by its very nature, is going to get a lot of heated comments and the usual rhetoric of believers on both sides. But the way it was written, in an apparent vacuum where supporting documentation and evidence, assumes there are no dissenting beliefs or outstanding questions for most of the issues. Instead of spelling out the evidence and creating a clear rebuttal of each, Newsweek basically painted a big target on their site for the attack of the legions of believers of these theories. Thus not only emboldening the spread of false information but also given their readers a chance to attack Newsweek as the often cited ‘part of the machine’ and demonizing their report as misinformation fed to them by the nation’s elite.

Let’s take a quick look at a few of the more out there comments:

Hahaha, wow newsweek has now hit a new low in my book. This is clearly a liberal article. Was there even one conservative “conspiracy theory” that this so called author even talked about?
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Newsweek is such an intelligent publication. This one ranks up there with when they said the Internet would never catch on.
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This article isnt worth even wiping my A$$ with!
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Wow! This article truly is a joke…whoever wrote this should punch themselfs in the face because its been proven that “global warming” is natural…its the earth’s way of reaching equalibrium.
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Propaganda from the New World Order… this “article” is laughable. 9/11 was indeed an inside job.
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Fodder for the masses, Newsweek strikes again! WOW! 11 for 13. And that’s only because Goldman-Sachs was just the catalyst for the “crisis”to occur. And who gives a rodents back-side about Palin’s reproductive and family problems? The only people who would believe this drivel are children and fools! The facts prove every one of these to valid.
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I admit to only skimming the comments on this ridiculous Newsweek fluff but I didn’t see ONE that supported the article.
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Newsweek. Your lies perpetuate myths which cause us to focus on the wrong problems while actual problems threaten our very existence. You really stink.
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This article is a complete joke. Complete subjective journalism without any revelation or examination of facts and evidence. I will never read Newsweek again. Hear that advertisers?
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Newsweek is pure propaganda. This pathetic excuse for an article is proof, and I am complimenting you by calling it an article!

Almost all of the comments are like this, with some groups attacking Newsweek about specific issues like 9/11, birthers, global warming and ACORN. It seems that everyone still has very strong feelings about these issues, and Newsweek poured oil on a large stack of wood just waiting to find a spark. Birthers are sick of being called racists and anyone that believes 9/11 was an inside job is an idiot, if you read the comments.

My absolute favorite comment came from an exchange between “grossmutter” and “MNPatriot79″:

Posted By: grossmutter @ 02/19/2010 7:33:42 PM
No one gives a rat’s ass anymore. People are sick of hearing the whole Muslim thing. Find something else to spout off about.

Posted By: MNpatriot79 @ 02/19/2010 8:29:01 PM
Obviously, a LOT of people care, soooo… you’re dumb…

Commenting on the Internet

As a very smart man once told me, to paraphrase ‘the great part about the internet is that it gives people a release that they would normally internalize and let it burn until they took real world action. Better to have them angry sitting behind a computer than angry on a rooftop with a weapon’. Very true, and this article and the hundreds of comments it has produced illustrates that. I’m not going to go over each theory and debunk or support them, I’ve touched on many here before. I just want to point out how much distrust there is in the government and the media to illicit this sort of response. I’ve held back most of the more virulent attacks in the comments of the article, but take a look and think about what this tells us about our country.

As for Newsweek, hopefully a lesson learned. While you can’t reason people out of anything that they didn’t reason themselves into, you can’t just dismiss what people believe in without a good amount of information to back it up. Something I’ve learned the hard way. Anyway, thank you Newsweek for giving me material for the 100th article of Battle of the Bilge.

Discussion

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_

“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” -Sun Tzu

Another TFL & Medicare Email

An article that appeared on January 9th on GOPUSA has been picked up by Tea Party sites and forwarded as a viral email raises once again the issue of TFL and retiree health care. Unfortunately, the piece contains scare tactics and assumptions, and paints military organizations in a bad light. The MOAA response is listed below in full from our Director of Government Relations.

The Email

Subject: TriCare For Life & Medicare
Military Retirees, Victims of a Congressional Shell Game

Military piece by Thomas D. Segel Harlingen, Texas, January 9, 2010

Military retirees are very close to losing their hard won Tricare for Life health insurance…and it is their own fault. The sad truth about military retirees is they usually fail to respond when their rights are violated or their futures placed in jeopardy. When viewing voting constituencies, the most dossal and inactive people are found among the retired military members and their dependents.

Any politician engaged in the deceitful practices of Washington D. C. knows one of the easiest targets to attack is the retired military community. Politicians view this group as the least harmful of any who make up the ranks of the voting public. They place those who served in uniform at the top of their least harmful list, thus making them political targets whenever there is a search being conducted to show the public what the political elite call meaningful dollar savings.

There are some strong military retiree advocates who are speaking out on the dangerous situation facing their former comrades-in-arms. One of these is Colonel Wayne Morris, USMC (Ret), who says, “We know that nothing is safe right now when considering the ongoing efforts of the current administration especially in any and all areas aligned with health care! Military retirees will quickly become a ‘soft target’ for those who would take away from one group and give to another.

I personally see a marked effort on the part of the current administration to divide us on this issue – to cause those who are NOT military retirees, (even those now on active duty) to eventually play against us and the benefits we have thus far been able to retain.”In support of this idea, the colonel points out there are some ‘so-called’ veteran support organizations already advising retirees to calm down and not worry about our health benefits.

These groups are telling the veterans that Tricare for Life benefits are safe and that retirees have nothing to worry about. The falseness of such statements can be understood when it is realized that under current legislative plans Medicare will be cut by $500 billion and Tricare for Life is linked solidly to Medicare.

Doing the math anyone can see that such a devastating cut in services and benefits to Medicare would mean similar cuts in Tricare for Life.Additional searching into this healthcare legislation will reveal that, as now drafted, new healthcare rules would require our advanced aged military retirees on Medicare and Tricare for Life to pay the fist $525 of medical costs for the beneficiary and identical costs for any dependent.

The retiree would then pay 50% of the next $4,725 of medical charges up to a total of $6,301 per year. This is the additional financial load our Congress will place on those who have already given twenty and more years of service to their country. Many of who left their blood and body parts on the fields of battle.The Washington version of the old Shell Game has already started. This is a confidence trick where three shells and a pea are used in what is claimed to be a gambling game.

Actually, as the shells are shifted from position to position, the pea is removed from the table…and the player ends up picking NOTHING. In the 2,000 plus page Obamacare health insurance bill, congressional lackeys tell us time and again that Tricare for Life is protected. But hey keep shifting those shells. The service organizations have already swallowed the snake oil and are echoing administration claims that TFL is safe. They have already bought into the Shell Game.

We also know everyone in the Democrat Congress is keeping those shells moving and not letting us see that pea. The end result will be another case of “nothing is too good for those who served in uniform”…and that is what they will get. NOTHING!

Response from MOAA’s Legislative team

Much of the specific information in his message is patently untrue. The TFL changes he mentions are not, repeat NOT, in the current health care reform bill.

What he describes was one option in a list of options prepared by the Congressional Budget Office more than a year ago…well before the current administration took office.

That idea didn’t go anywhere – as we predicted it wouldn’t. It never appeared in any legislation anywhere on the Hill, and was never supported by anyone in the Administration or Congress.

Further, we would never say there’s nothing to worry about on military health care. Of course there is. The ongoing budget pressures (which will only get bigger with mounting deficits) will create tremendous pressures in 2010 and beyond to cut all kinds of federal spending. There’s a lot of talk about setting up an entitlements commission to review changes needed to preserve the financial viability of Medicare and Social Security when millions of baby boomers become eligible for those programs in the coming decade.

I believe there will be such a commission, and once it starts reviewing possible Social Security and Medicare changes, it will inevitably lead to review of possible changes for military and federal retirement, military and federal health care, military and federal survivor benefits, VA benefits, etc., etc., just as we saw during the last budget/deficit crunch in the early and mid-90s. We had a huge fight to dodge most of those proposals back then, and it will be a much bigger challenge in light of the much bigger deficits we face now.

But there’s a vast difference between being (a) alert to potential coming threats and (b) claiming that those threats are embodied in current legislation – which they’re not. There are some smoke and mirrors issues in the current legislation – as there is in almost any big bill Congress passes, and there are some things to keep an eye on in the future (such as assumptions that Medicare and its providers will achieve some pretty optimistic “efficiency” goals in the coming years). But most of the changes to Medicare in the current health reform legislation are actually relatively modest and pretty doable ones. The real problem is that those savings will be used to fund health care for the current uninsured rather than to build the Medicare bank to meet the coming expenses of the baby boomers. So when the boomer tide hits, Congress will have to come up with far more significant cuts or tax increases to meet that need, because the relatively easier savings options will have been used up.

So there’s a reason to be worried, but it’s difficult to put much stock in most opinions being passed around the internet about the health care bills, because most start from a highly partisan standpoint, and many just pass on pieces of misinformation that have long since been proven untrue – as in this case.

Unfortunately, once such things get out on the internet, they acquire a life of their own, and well-intentioned people pass them on and help perpetuate the misinformation.

Steve Strobridge
Colonel, USAF (Ret)
Director, Government Relations

Discussion

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“From a pound of talk, an ounce of understanding” - Yemeni Proverb

Security Failure and Luck

Following the Christmas day attempt by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to take down Delta Air flight 253 on approach to Detroit, the Obama administration has been meeting with top security and intelligence members to figure out what went wrong in the process. Abdulmutallab, a Nigerian citizen who received bomb making material and training in Yemen, was unsuccessful in what would have been a disastrous act of terror when the powder/liquid mixture he was carrying in his underpants failed to ignite. A Christmas miracle, to be sure, but a complete breakdown in screening procedures and common sense. The flight originated in Amsterdam and Abdulmutallab carried no luggage and bought a one way ticket in cash. President Obama said that the U.S. “Failed to connect the dots” and that “We dodged a bullet but just barely. It was averted by brave individuals, not because the system worked and that is not acceptable.” The incident, in addition to increasing airline precautions and re-sparking the debate over full body scans and profiling, has also caused the world to take a close look at Yemen, where Al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula reportedly provided the training for the mission and are planning more attacks. Nearly a decade after the attack on the USS Cole which took the lives of 17 U.S. sailors, a look at the current situation in Yemen shows a deeply troubled nation and one that has the potential to become the next major focus in the war on terror.

Modern Yemen’s Violent History

Although it is one of the poorest countries in the world, Yemen is in an extremely important geographical location when it comes to shipping lanes and oil exports.



The nation we know of as Yemen has only existed in its current state since 1990, when North Yemen, which had been ruled by the Ottoman Empire until 1918 and became a republic in 1962, formally merged with South Yemen, which had until 1967 been occupied by Great Britain. North Yemen President Ali Abdullah Saleh became president of the nation and remains in power today, following two democratic elections. The unification process has not been a peaceful one, however. The nation fought its first civil war in 1994 between the northern and southern factions, with the south receiving significant support from Saudi Arabia. The south seceded from the country and formed the Democratic Republic of Yemen, but failed to gain international recognition and the fighting dissipated.

Yemen’s Battle with Militants

Internal relations were shaky until 2004 when the second civil war broke out. This time, Yemeni government forces were fighting a minority Shiite rebel movement called the Houthis, named after their leader Hussein Al Houthi, in northern Yemen. The war started when the government attempted to arrest Al Houthi, a leader of the Shiite sect (actually he is a member of an offshoot of the Shiite sect called Zaidi). This battle continues to rage today, with the Houthis dug in to mountain positions and occasionally striking out against the government. On top of the rebel fighting, a southern secessionist movement has been a constant problem for the government, although the issue has died down some recently due to the northern war. During this time, Al-Qaeda has supported the Houthis and sent hundreds, if not thousands, of their militants into the region. With the nation on the verge of collapse (unemployment is over 40% and popular support for the central government is eroding), the government of Ali Abdullah Saleh is finding it increasingly difficult to fight an insurgency and maintain order. This has led to several nations getting involved through various channels, including military action. This threatens to turn an internal war into a regional one.

Proxy War?

Saudi Arabia has been the nation most directly affected by the second Yemeni civil war. In August of 2009, Muhammad bin Nayef, a member of the Saudi royal family and ironically the country’s top counter-terrorism official, was injured in a suicide bombing attributed to a member of the Houthi movement. On November 3rd, Houthi rebels briefly captured two villages in Saudi territory. The Saudi response has been strong, with numerous air strikes and ground operations taking aim at the Houthis in support of the central government and out of fear of further incursions or attacks. The Saudi attacks have been starkly criticized by Iran, whose leaders have spoken out feverishly against the Saudi involvement. Iran has been accused of providing tactical and military assistance to the Houthis, raising the tensions across the region. With a growing U.S. involvement in the war, these tensions will only continue to rise. Iran’s objection to Saudi actions are based on their disgust of Muslims spilling the blood of other Muslims, in an obvious attempt to make Saudi Arabia’s influence in the Arab world reduced as Iran continues in its efforts to become the regional superpower.

The majority Sunni Saudi Arabia is in a difficult position. They face internal strife from elements of Al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups that are opposed to the royal family’s grip on power, and have seen in the past decade a rise in Iranian influence in the region, from Shiite majority Iraq and Iran’s sponsorship of Hizbollah in Syria and Lebanon. A Shiite state to its south would not bode well for the Kingdom.

American Military Actions

On December 17th and again on the 24th, cruise missiles struck Al-Qaeda bases in rebel provinces and caused considerable loss of life to the militants (as well as civilians, according to Yemeni sources). Admiral Mike Mullen praised the strikes but did not say that the U.S. had any active role in the operation. After the Christmas day attempted terrorist attack, President Obama stated that “our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred”, and that Al Qaeda in Yemen “will be held to account”. This will mean more support for the Yemeni government in the form of more than doubling the amount of aid sent to the nation to use to fight terror (a figure that could run as high as $150 million), continued drone air attacks, deeper intelligence cooperation and special forces operations. The New York Times ran a story on December 27th detailing America’s expansion of the war on terror to Yemen:

A year ago, the Central Intelligence Agency sent several of its top field operatives with counterterrorism experience to the country, according a former top agency official. At the same time, some of the most secretive Special Operations commandos have begun training Yemeni security forces in counterterrorism tactics, senior military officers said.

President Obama laid out his intentions on December 28th:

“We will continue to use every element of our national power to disrupt, to dismantle and defeat the violent extremists who threaten us, whether they are from Afghanistan or Pakistan, Yemen or Somalia, or anywhere where they are plotting attacks against the US homeland,” Mr Obama said.

As the center of operations for Al-Qaeda shifts to Yemen, we can expect more U.S. involvement in overt and covert operations to help the government there rid the scourge of terrorists in the strategic nation.

The Outlook

Yemen has all of the ingredients and hallmarks of a growing terrorist safe haven. An active rebellion against a weak central authority, a poor population base to draw in new recruits and access to some of the most critical shipping lanes in the world. The potential for another terrorist attack originating from Yemen is extremely high, and as the 2000 attack on the USS Cole and the Christmas airline plot have demonstrated, Americans are the prime target. While the Houthi movement and Al-Qaeda may have differing immediate objectives, their cooperation represents a clear and present danger to American interests. With our overstretched military engaged in multiple locations around the world fighting Muslim terrorists, the importance of regional engagement by Yemen’s Arab neighbors has never been more pressing. If the government falls, the safe haven will expand and become much like Afghanistan in the late ’90’s. That can not be allowed to happen.

Additional Resources

Qatar’s Peninsula Online
Qatar’s History (wikipedia)
Reuters Analysis
Washington Post’s Report of President Obama’s Statement
Center for American Progress

Discussion

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“Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.” – – Alfred Lord Tennyson

Truth Sandwich

It is a commonly used managerial technique – if you have a piece of bad news to tell someone, you first fit the bad part in between two notes of praise. Truth on the internet can sometimes be like this technique. Give some misinformation, ground it in an actual event that you can link someone to, then hammer home the intended message. This new email is about a true event – an update to an Executive Order which granted full diplomatic immunity status to members of INTERPOL – turned in to a propaganda platform that plays loose with reality.

The Email

Read and Weep For Your Country . .

The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
December 17, 2009

Executive Order — Amending Executive Order 12425
EXECUTIVE ORDER
- – - – - – -
AMENDING EXECUTIVE ORDER 12425 DESIGNATING INTERPOL AS A PUBLIC INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION ENTITLED TO ENJOY CERTAIN PRIVILEGES, EXEMPTIONS, AND IMMUNITIES

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 1 of the International Organizations Immunities Act (22 U.S.C. 288), and in order to extend the appropriate privileges, exemptions, and immunities to the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL), it is hereby ordered that Executive Order 12425 of June 16, 1983, as amended, is further amended by deleting from the first sentence the words “except those provided by Section 2(c), Section 3, Section 4, Section 5, and Section 6 of that Act” and the semicolon that immediately precedes them.

BARACK OBAMA
THE WHITE HOUSE,
December 16, 2009.

In the dead of night on December 17, 2009, President Barack Hussein Obama placed the United States of America under the authority of the international police organization known as INTERPOL, granting the organization full immunity to operate within the United States.
Last Thursday, December 17, 2009, The White House released an Executive Order “Amending Executive Order 12425.” It grants INTERPOL (International Criminal Police Organization) a new level of full diplomatic immunity afforded to foreign embassies and select other “International Organizations” as set forth in the United States International Organizations Immunities Act of 1945.
By removing language from President Reagan’s 1983 Executive Order 12425, this international law enforcement body now operates – now operates – on American soil beyond the reach of our own top law enforcement arm, the FBI, and is immune from Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
What, exactly does this mean? It means that INTERPOL now has the full authority to conduct investigations and other law enforcement activities on U.S. soil, with full immunity from U.S. laws such as the Freedom of Information Act and with complete independence from oversight from the FBI.
In short, a global law enforcement entity now has full law-enforcement authority in the U.S. without any check on its power afforded by U.S. law and U.S. law enforcement agencies.

A bit of background is in order here, and Hot Air provides it:
During his presidency, Ronald Reagan granted the global police agency Interpol the status of diplomatic personnel in order to engage more constructively on international law enforcement. In Executive Order 12425, Reagan made two exceptions to that status. The first had to do with taxation, but the second was to make sure that Interpol had the same accountability for its actions as American law enforcement — namely, they had to produce records when demanded by courts and could not have immunity for their actions.
Barack Obama unexpectedly revoked those exceptions in a change to EO 12425 last (week)…
Thus, Interpol now can conduct its operations on U.S. soil with ZERO accountability to anyone in this country.
And you beginning to understand now just what the ‘end game’ is on the part of those who are currently running the U.S. Government?
Let’s go a step further in fleshing out exactly what this means in practical terms. It gets ugly…and scary. Again, from ThreatsWatch:
Section 2c of the United States International Organizations Immunities Act is the crucial piece.
Property and assets of international organizations, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, unless such immunity be expressly waived, and from confiscation. The archives of international organizations shall be inviolable.
Inviolable archives means INTERPOL records are beyond US citizens’ Freedom of Information Act requests and from American legal or investigative discovery (”unless such immunity be expressly waived.”)
Property and assets being immune from search and confiscation means precisely that. Wherever they may be in the United States. This could conceivably include human assets – Americans arrested on our soil by INTERPOL officers.
Why would INTERPOL be arresting American citizens on our own soil, without oversight from our own law enforcement agencies? And remember, citizens who are thusly arrested would have no legal authority to demand full documentation from the International Police concerning the charges brought against them.
Andy McCarthy at National Review asks these crucial, sobering questions of the secretive Obama order:
Why would we elevate an international police force above American law? Why would we immunize an international police force from the limitations that constrain the FBI and other American law-enforcement agencies? Why is it suddenly necessary to have, within the Justice Department, a repository for stashing government files which, therefore, will be beyond the ability of Congress, American law-enforcement, the media, and the American people to scrutinize?
At least one answer to these questions is very clear. A coup is underway in the United States of America, the goal of which is to establish complete, unquestioned authority over the citizens–a ‘fundamental change’ to the United States where citizens have no legal recourse against an authoritarian central government.
Don’t believe me ? From the White House website http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/executive-order-amending-executive-order-12425

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