We’re counting down for a conflict in the Middle East. It’s not clear how it will start, or what will happen once it does. But it’s likely to begin in that narrow window of time between three countdown clocks sitting on Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s desk.

The first clock counts the “zone of diplomacy” — how much more time Israel feels it must give President Obama to halt Iran’s nuclear programs with sanctions and diplomacy. Netanyahu has concluded that three years of sanctions and diplomatic outreach to Iran have failed; that the only thing Iran has done since Obama extended the hand of friendship is accelerate its nuclear weapons program.

Obama wants to give a new round of sanctions and diplomacy more time. The sooner Netanyahu launches his jets, the better things look for his country militarily, but the worse they look diplomatically.

And here’s the truth: whatever happens once the dust settles, Israel needs America.

The second clock counts Iran’s “zone of immunity” — that is how much time is left before Iran moves its nuclear program deep underground where it is no longer vulnerable to an Israeli attack.

The more capable US weapons systems could attack Iran’s nuclear sites even after Iran moves underground, but Israel can’t bet its very existence on Obama’s willingness to use them.

The third clock counts down to the American election — let’s call it the “campaign zone.” No presidential candidate can abandon Israel and expect to win in November. On the other hand, no president wants to seek re-election with another war in the Middle East and high gasoline prices at the pump as his calling card.

Israel knows that in the second term of an Obama presidency these factors are reversed. His pledge to have Israel’s back may not hold past November.

Those three clocks should all near the final count down by this summer, leaving Netanyahu to ponder whether he should put the fate of Israel’s future in Obama’s hands.

He has already made it clear that when it comes to decision time, he won’t wait for Obama to save him. His statement this week that, “My supreme responsibility as prime minister of Israel is to ensure that Israel remains the master of its fate,” made clear that if it comes down to the crunch, Netanyahu won’t hesitate to go it alone.

But Netanyahu also made it clear that while Israel might feel compelled to go it alone, Iran would retaliate against the United States as well as Israel. He told Obama at the White House Monday, “You are the big Satan and we are the little Satan….We are you and you are us.”

Israel is not the only country setting the agenda in the Middle East, however. The United States and Iran may not initiate events, but they will respond to them.

And all three countries have different objectives. Israel’s position is straightforward. A nuclear Iran is an existential threat to the State of Israel. In other words, if Iran gets nukes, Israel’s days are numbered. It wants to stop a nuclear Iran at all costs.

The Iranian regime’s objectives are two-fold and mutually reinforcing: to become a nuclear weapons state AND even more importantly, to control the world’s energy flow.

Iran envisions an empire stretching from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea, giving them control of the vital choke point of nearly a third of the world’s oil. Nuclear weapons might allow Iran to hold Israel and the Middle East hostage, but control over a vital piece of the world’s oil supply gives them leverage over the entire planet. Iran doesn’t want a war, especially one that draws in the overwhelming military power of the United States.

America’s objectives are more complicated. A nuclear Iran isn’t an existential threat for the United States the way it is for Israel, at least not for several years until Iran has Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles capable of reaching us.

We’re more concerned about proliferation of nuclear weapons in the region as other Middle East nations race to get their own. That means the next war in the Middle East – and for three thousand years there has always been another war in the Middle East – could well go nuclear.

As a country the immediate concern for the United States is to keep the oil flowing and domestic gasoline prices low. A conflict or even a prolonged crisis in the region could send prices through the roof.

For President Obama personally, the countdown is a test of his worldview and outreach to the Muslim world; hence his continued insistence on sanctions and diplomacy even in the face of three years of failure. But he’s a practical politician facing a tough reelection campaign. He is unlikely to initiate military action against Iran, despite what he says, but wouldn’t risk abandoning Israel once war breaks out and alienating key voters in the swing states, especially Florida.

He also knows that Americans are war weary, and that any conflict in the Middle East will rattle the world’s oil markets. High gasoline prices and long lines at the pump are the last thing he wants come November, especially since he has opposed ramped up development of the US oil and natural gas industries.

A second term Obama is an unconstrained Obama. His commitment to Israel could waver, especially if the price is economic reversals and a prolonged military commitment.

Israel, the United States and Iran are locked in a dance of destiny, and time is the dancing master. When the clocks finish counting down and the music finally stops is anyone’s guess.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/03/08/israel-united-states-and-iran-in-dance-destiny/#ixzz1sH2I6SEv

We were baby boomers who went to college during the height of the civil rights and anti-war movements, and entered the workforce during the movement for women’s rights. We knew we were blazing a new trail. Our mothers’ generation may have had to choose between career and family; our generation would be different. We were going to have it all. The problem was this: we weren’t sure about how we would juggle everything – education, career, marriage and children. And in that struggle to juggle, we sometimes turned on ourselves, because we had so few role models to show us the way.

I was so desperate for advice when debating whether to quit my big job in Washington in the 1980s to marry and move to New York, that I stopped my neighbor, the first woman Justice of the Supreme Court, Sandra Day O’Connor, in the checkout line of our local grocery store. After a brief chat, I asked Justice O’Connor whether I was making a mistake to take time off to marry and raise a family. She graciously answered that she had taken some time off to be a stay-at-home mom when her boys were young, and her career turned out all right. I took her life story as gospel that a woman could have it all.

That’s why I found Rosen’s remarks so disappointing. But when I listened to those remarks a second time, and the dismissive and disdainful tone of her voice, I got mad….really mad. Because Hilary Rosen wasn’t just scoring political points against Ann Romney, she was betraying the freedoms and opportunities the women of my generation fought long and hard to give her.

Who is Rosen to sit in judgment of other women and the life choices they’ve made? Doesn’t she realize that the rights she enjoys — to equal education, equal job opportunities, and even the chance to have an equal voice on the national stage — are things that just a generation ago very few women could even dream of? Doesn’t she realize that what she takes for granted as her due, women of my generation fought long and hard to achieve? Doesn’t she realize that the struggle was not just for equal opportunities in education and career, but for the right to make those choices ourselves? That being forced to do without a career was just as bad as being forced to have one?

My generation of women blazed a trail without the legal protections against discrimination that Rosen takes for granted. Yet isn’t her criticism of Ann Romney and stay-at-home moms just another form of discrimination? Would she really take us back to that place when women sit in judgment of other women for the choices they make?

How would Hilary Rosen like others to sit in judgment of her? Is she married? Is she divorced? Should they snicker it’s because Ms. Rosen couldn’t keep a man? Does she have children? Should the Ann Romney’s of the world berate her for being a bad mother because she’s handed off child-rearing responsibilities to others? Of course, no one would dream of doing that to her, and shame on anyone who would. But how would those criticisms be any different from Hilary Rosen debasing Ann Romney for ‘never working a day in her life’?

My generation fought long and hard not just for professional opportunities for ourselves and our daughters, but for the opportunity to choose. We wanted to move past the catfights; to leave behind forever the days when women ganged up against other women, or self segregated into camps of working women versus stay-at-home moms. We wanted to bequeath to our daughters the opportunities our mothers never had — the chance for an education, and a career, and a husband and children. But we also wanted to give them the chance to choose, to have any of them, or all of them; to have them all at the same time, or to live them in chapters.

One of the greatest freedoms American women enjoy today is the freedom to choose. Inherent in that freedom is the opportunity to choose without bringing down the wrath of other women for those choices. We should focus on supporting each other as we try to juggle the extraordinary opportunities we have, not scratch each others’ eyes out for making different choices. Women of my generation thought we had successfully left those dark days behind us. What a tragedy if the women of this generation, like Hilary Rosen, bring them back.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/04/12/hilary-rosens-remarks-against-ann-romney-betray-freedoms-fought-long-and-hard/#ixzz1sEDs3erc

Our military men and women have succeeded in everything we’ve asked of them. It’s our political leaders – from both parties – who have failed us.

Our original mission in Afghanistan in 2001 was to defeat and destroy Al Qaeda after the September 11 attacks. We accomplished that in a mere three months, and by December 2001 Usama bin Laden and the ragtag remnants of Al Qaeda escaped over the Tora Bora Mountains into Pakistan.

Al Qaeda was gone, yet we stayed on in Afghanistan to engage in the fruitless task of nation building. Our new mission was to create a strong and modern Afghan democracy, which would bar the doors should Al Qaeda attempt to return.

For a decade our Afghan mission has grown ever larger, our generosity in the country has spread to everything from healthcare to education to infrastructure to business development.

We created the Karzai government, which turned out to be corrupt and incompetent but excelled at one thing – playing us along.

While we focused on Afghanistan, Al Qaeda regenerated across the border in Pakistan. We didn’t pursue the terrorist network there, relying instead on the Pakistanis to defeat them in the ungoverned tribal areas.
Pakistan played us along, too, most tellingly in efforts to “get Bin Laden.”

Pakistan went into the “finding Bin Laden business.” And we paid them handsomely for it.
But they knew if they ever “found” Bin Laden, they were out of business. They knew if we found Bin Laden, they were out of business.

They knew if Bin Laden died, they were out of business. So they kept Bin Laden alive in a safe house in a Pakistani military district so they could continue to get over $2 billion a year in US aid.
The veil was pulled back on Pakistan’s duplicity when SEAL Team Six raided the compound and killed Bin Laden.

Throughout the last 11 years the United States military succeeded at every task our political leaders threw at them.
- They defeated Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.
- When our political leaders turned their attention away to Iraq, our military diverted resources to fight that war.
- When our new political leaders decided Iraq was the bad war and Afghanistan the good war, our military redirected resources back to Afghanistan.
Our military men and women have performed nobly, selflessly, and effectively. But in the end, that would not be enough to win.

Afghanistan is like a three-legged stool, and all three legs need to be strong for it to stand.
First, it needs a military leg to reverse the Taliban gains and win on the battlefield in Afghanistan.
Second, it needs a diplomatic leg to get Pakistan to destroy the safe havens where Al Qaeda and the Taliban could regroup and regenerate.
Finally, it needs a political leg — a competent Afghan government capable of uniting the country and keeping the security our forces had won for them.

In the end, our military did win on the battlefield, but those victories could not be sustained as long as the Pakistanis refuse to destroy the safe havens, and as long as the Karzai government is corrupt and incompetent. The victories we won on the battlefields of Afghanistan have been lost in the capitols of Kabul and Islamabad.

And despite what they say publicly, our political leaders have concluded Afghanistan is a lost cause.
That’s why President Obama is keen to leave, but not until 2013. He knows the country is likely to descend into a multi- party civil war the minute we leave, and he doesn’t want to carry that loss on his balance sheet as he heads into the general election campaign.

The great tragedy of Afghanistan is the leaders who have failed us — the politicians in Washington, and Kabul and Islamabad.
They stand in stark contrast to our men and women in uniform. Our military have performed nobly, selflessly, and effectively and these brave men and women deserved far better leaders than they have had.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/02/29/its-time-to-declare-victory-in-afghanistan-and-come-home-before-have-to-shoot/#ixzz1oTX4zpgI

But Kissinger was right – you always want an Option C, especially when Options A and B are lousy.

That’s the nub of our problem with Iran, we’ve failed to develop an Option C.

For years we’ve had two extremely bad choices: Option A: bomb Iran, or Option B: let Iran get the bomb. Our efforts to find a third option have either failed or carried too high a price.

But now, for the first time, a credible Option C is possible– using Western resolve, Arab cooperation and Western technological advances to stress the Iranian economy to the point that it collapses and the Iranian people bring about regime change on their own.

To exercise Option A is to court disaster. An attack against Iran’s nuclear sites would be fraught with logistical difficulties. Iran would retaliate against Israel and U.S. interests worldwide, and likely make good on threats to disrupt the flow of oil through the Strait of Hormuz. The price of oil, and gasoline at the pumps, would skyrocket.

At best we would have set Iran’s nuclear program back just a few years.

At worst we would have given the Iranian regime the opportunity to rally their people ‘round their tattered flag.

Yet Option B – letting Iran get the bomb — would be even worse. A nuclear Iran will spark a nuclear arms race throughout the region as Saudi Arabia, Turkey and others rush to acquire their own arsenals. That means the next war in the Middle East – and there is always another war in the Middle East – could well go nuclear.

An Option C has always been out of reach, but it’s not for want of trying. The Bush administration launched the second Iraq war in part to create a bulwark against Iran. They thought post-Saddam Iraq would be a strong, pro-American democracy in the heart of the Arab Muslim world and partner with us in containing Iran. They were wrong.

At best, post-American Iraq will be fragile and weak; at worst it will be in Iran’s orbit.

President Obama came into office thinking the problem rested with Bush’s failure to engage Iran diplomatically, so he immediately extended the ‘hand of friendship.’ It was promptly rebuffed, time and again.

Obama’s efforts to create an anti-Iran coalition at the United Nations, and among Iran’s neighbors in the Middle East, also failed.

And, while the new U.S. and UN sanctions have made life difficult for Iranians, they haven’t been enough to halt their nuclear weapons program or force regime change.

So far, we’ve stopped short of imposing the ultimate sanction: shutting down Iran’s oil exports. Why?

Because it would also hurt us, too. If Iran’s oil were taken off the world market oil prices would rise. If Iran blocked the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation, oil prices would rise even more. Even if the 5th Fleet were to clear the Strait almost immediately, oil prices would remain high because of increased insurance rates.

We’ve never had the ability to deny Iran its oil revenues without inflicting major damage to ourselves.

But now, for the first time, there might be a way to stop Iran’s oil exports without causing undue hardship to the U.S. and world economy.

First, the West is now united in imposing sanctions that could cripple Iran’s economy by putting a blockade around Iranian oil, but using banks instead of gunboats.

In November the U.K. agreed to sanction Iran’s central bank. In December the US Congress overwhelmingly voted for similar sanctions and President Obama signed them into law. The Europeans followed suit this week, and Japan is considering doing the same.

Even if the Chinese continue buying Iranian oil, they will press for steep price discounts, as much as 40% according to Foundation for the Defense of Democracies’ Mark Dubowitz.

Second, Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Arab oil states appear willing to use their spare capacity and ramp up oil production to compensate for any loss of Iranian oil. Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said recently his country is ready and able to meet any increase in demand.

Finally, western oil companies have developed new technologies that allow Canada, Brazil and the United States to become major energy exporters. Advances in engineering technology now make it possible to extract oil from tar sands in Canada at competitive prices, and Canada is on track to become a larger oil producer than Iran.

The U.S. will produce oil from significant resources in the Bakken in North Dakota. Breakthroughs in mapping technologies have made it possible for western companies to “see” past through thick layers of rock and salt and discover huge oil reserves off the coast of Brazil.

We’ve developed hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling techniques to get natural gas from shale and “tight oil” from dense rocks in the U.S.

These technologies aren’t years away, they’re here now. In 2011 the U.S. became a net exporter of petroleum products for the first time in 62 years. We’ve now surpassed Russia as the world’s leading gas producer.

Ronald Reagan won the Cold War because he realized the Soviet Union’s Achilles’ heel was its failed economic model and dependency on oil exports. Working closely with selected oil producers, Reagan tightened the noose slowly, but when oil prices fell by two-thirds in the mid-1980’s, the oil-dependent Soviet regime came close to collapse. They had no money to pay for their defense buildup, social programs and most especially for imported wheat. Without that revenue, they had no choice but to come to terms.

Iran has the same problem. Oil exports account for nearly 80% of foreign exchange earnings, and more than 60% of government revenues.

If Iran can’t sell its oil, or is forced to sell at steeply discounted prices, it’s broke.

No money for the massive subsidies that keep the Iranian people fed and housed.

No money for their nuclear weapons program.

No money for their terrorist clients Hezbollah and Hamas or Syria’s thugocracy. Iran’s leaders would be lucky to keep their heads, much less their hold over government.

Even with the more limited sanctions we have imposed to date, the Iranian regime has had to cut subsidies and prices for gasoline, electricity and bread have skyrocketed. Hyperinflation has hit Iran and their currency has fallen by half since December 2010.

The new banking blockade will drain their treasury to the point of collapse and could reignite the democratic counterrevolution that the regime squashed in 2009.

As we have seen with The Arab Awakening in North Africa over the last year, regime change in the Muslim world isn’t just a pipedream. And an Iran under very different leadership is a very different story.

As former CIA Director Michael Hayden says, it’s not so much that we object to Iran getting nuclear weapons – it’s that we object to this Iran getting nuclear weapons.

Iran’s Green Movement in 2009 was the precursor to the Arab Awakening of 2011. It may also be the culmination of it and finally give us an Option C with Iran. If so, it will come just in the nick of time, because one way or another 2012 is the year of reckoning with Iran.

Perhaps they think it makes President Obama look like a tough commander in chief to announce he’s slashing the defense budget with the victims standing right behind him.

Perhaps they think it’s a smart political move that will appeal to his anti-war base, cutting defense while keeping entitlements whole.

Perhaps they hope to discredit any off-the-record complaints to Congress or the press from military officials who fear the cuts endanger national security.

Perhaps they think it gives credibility to President Obama’s lead from behind strategy; that without a robust military the U.S. will have no choice but to be part of a coalition.

Perhaps these points make sense for a president whose sights are set on winning reelection, and who never intends to make good on threats to use military force if necessary.

But the problem with any presidential statement, whether given from the Oval Office or the Pentagon briefing room is that there are more audiences tuning in than just those who vote in U.S. presidential elections.

So how will President Obama’s decision to cut the defense budget be seen around the world? What are they to make of his going from a military capable of fighting two wars to a military which can only fight one war, and which is already bogged down in Afghanistan?

If you’re the Taliban you realize the president can’t keep the Afghan war going for long, and it’s only a matter of time before you can walk back into Afghanistan.

If you’re China you figure the president might say he’s pivoting U.S. defense strategy to Asia, but is cutting the bandwidth to accomplish it. So there is no reason to hold back building a Chinese blue water navy and expanding into the South China Sea, or getting tough with Taiwan, or continuing a secret cyberwar against America’s industrial base, military and civilian infrastructure.

If you’re North Korea you realize President Obama isn’t likely to rush to South Korea’s aid if you provoke a military crisis.

If you’re Israel you’re coming to the uncomfortable conclusion that you’re on your own in dealing with Iran.

If you’re Iran you realize President Obama will do anything to keep oil prices oil low, including let you get nuclear weapons, push your weight around in the Middle East, and rush in to fill the vacuum left by departing U.S. forces. The president may say ‘all options are on the table’ and that it is ‘unacceptable’ for Iran to become a nuclear weapons state, but it’s looking increasingly like an empty threat. You realize this is your moment.

And, if you’re of the mind that America is a declining power, that its best days are behind it, that it will no longer keep open the seas lanes of communication and commerce, or honor all its treaty commitments, then you have just seen demonstrable evidence of it from the American commander in the chief.

The U.S. made some tragic strategic mistakes in Afghanistan and Iraq. While our military performed bravely and brilliantly in both wars, our political leaders — of both parties — failed us. They tried a unrealistic nation building strategy in Afghanistan and failed to shut down the Taliban safe havens in Pakistan. They toppled Saddam Hussein, but failed to create a strong, pro-American Iraq in his place.

We do need to cut defense spending, and redraw the U.S. military to focus less on land wars and more on sea power, missile defense and civilian and military cyber-defense.

Even so, we can repair our economy, maintain peace through strength and resume our position as leader of the free world. But we can’t do it while swinging a meat ax at the U.S. military, or cutting back on the care of our wounded warriors or returning veterans.

When I came into the Pentagon at the beginning of the Reagan administration we found ships that couldn’t sail for lack of fuel, planes that couldn’t fly because pilots didn’t have the minimum training hours, and tanks that were patched together with spare parts cannibalized from other equipment. And most shameful of all, we had Vietnam Veterans whose medical needs were not met, and enlisted military personnel whose pay was so low they qualified for food stamps.

That was the legacy of the Carter administration’s defense cutbacks.

The legacy of the Obama cuts will be even worse, and invite aggression against U.S. interests around the world. Because, guess what, President Obama has only begun to cut back on America’s defenses. There is another half trillion dollars of cuts on the horizon.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/01/05/obama-unveils-defense-cuts-while-iran-threatens-war/#ixzz1ncVT1t4U

She knows what she needs is a practical pair of black leather pumps. But once she’s in the shoe store she can’t help but look around.

Wow! Those sure are adorable white strappy sandals, and they’re on sale! So she tries them on.

What about those sexy red 4 inch spike heels! So she tries them on.

And look at those drop dead patent leather boots – so she tries them on, too.

They all look terrific. But the sandals won’t keep her warm in the winter and white is tough to keep clean. And those shiny books look great with a leather miniskirt, but will look a little silly on a hot August day, plus they are WAY over budget. Those spike heels are gorgeous, and every head will turn while she’s standing around at a cocktail party, but no way she can walk all the way to the parking lot in them afterwards.

They’re all great shoes and every pair looks great on her. (Sigh) But she can only buy one pair of shoes, and she’s got to them wear everywhere, summer, spring, winter and fall.

So what does she end up buying? Those practical, black pumps. They make not make her heart pound, but they’re the only shoes that make sense.

Mitt Romney? He’s the black pumps.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/01/02/in-2012-gop-is-like-lady-who-goes-shoe-shopping/#ixzz1ncVzZK00

Kim Jong-Il’s death may be unexpected but it hasn’t been unanticipated.

It’s not secret that Kim has been sick for several years. A year ago he designated his youngest and favorite son, Kim Jong-un as his heir apparent.

Kim’s father and son were expected to formalize the succession in 2012, on the 100th birthday celebration of grandfather Kim Il-sung, founder of the North Korean state.

The two had hoped for a several year transition period for Kim Junior to learn the ropes.

The question now will be can the twenty-something Kim consolidate power quickly and win over the North Korean generals of the ruling elite. It won’t be easy.

Kim Jong-un is young, inexperienced and has no military background, despite being designated a four-star general last year.
He’s got two older brothers who were passed over for the job, too. He’s got an aunt and uncle who were thought to be close to Kim Jong-Il but who seem recently to have fallen out of favor.

He’s got to provide for the some 40% of North Koreans who will need food, fuel and gasoline subsidies to make it through the winter.

He’s got to juggle relations with China, which provides some 75% of North Korea’s aid donations.

And he’s got to keep all those generals happy.

So what now and what about the United States?

Here are three big issues to watch on the Korean peninsula in the days and weeks ahead:

1. Will Kim Jong-un manage to consolidate his position? How will he do it? Will he try to prove he’s tough enough to fill his father and grandfather’s shoes by provoking a military incident with South Korea?

A year ago, when he was designated heir apparent, the North Koreans sunk a South Korean ship, killing over 40 people, and shelled an island; analysts suggested Kim Junior was signaling that he would, like his father, put ‘military first.’
And, while it may be unrelated, the North Koreans tested a short-range missile a day after they announced Kim Senior’s death.

2. What will South Korea do if tensions rise? A year ago South Korea’s President Lee didn’t retaliate against the North Korean provocations. He was roundly criticized for failing to protect the South Korean people and his popularity plummeted.
President Lee can’t risk looking weak again, especially if another incident results in South Korean casualties. He has put his forces on high alert.

3. What is the greatest risk to stability on the Korean Peninsula? Miscalculation on both sides of the border.

Last year I met with the outgoing U.S. commander of our forces in South Korea who said one of the biggest problems was that North Korea’s self imposed isolation makes them hard to read, and they have trouble reading us. What might be a minor incident could quickly escalate into something much more dangerous.

Even North Korea’s most senior leaders have little contact with the outside world. They have no Internet, no Facebook, no blogosphere and they’re not on Twitter.

North Korea is one of the poorest countries in the world, and governed by an insular group of military leaders.

North Koreans don’t travel abroad and foreigners don’t go to North Korea. Yet on their southern border, just across a heavily fortified Demilitarized Zone, lies South Korea — an open, democratic society, and one of the world’s economic miracles.

So why does America care what happens to a small dictatorship half way around the world? Because North Korea has nuclear weapons and we have a mutual defense treaty with South Korea.

The United States has some 28,500 military personnel in South Korea, many serving as a tripwire at the demilitarized zone between North and South.

Our navy recently completed a joint military exercise with the South Korean Navy. There is no doubt that a military conflict between North and South Korea would involve U.S. troops.

As 2011 comes to a close, and just as America is exiting one war zone, things may start heating up in another one, half way around the world.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/12/20/three-things-to-watch-on-korean-peninsula-in-days-ahead/#ixzz1iKCumN14

Navy Midshipmen and Army Cadets spend their entire four years of college saying, “Beat Army” or “Beat Navy” dozens of times a day.

In the weeks leading up to the contest both Academies wage mock war against each other – with pranks, commando raids and high jinx. On game day the Armed Forces network broadcasts it around the world. Soldiers will listen in from their posts in the war zones. Sailors will tune in from the high seas.

Not only is the Army-Navy game one of the oldest college football competitions in the nation, in many ways it is one of the best.

It’s not that the football is great, because it’s usually not. The young men who play for Army or Navy weren’t recruited by the top university teams – they’re too small, or too light. They aren’t semi-professional football stars, living, eating and studying apart from their college classmates.

The men who play at West Point or Annapolis major in physics or electrical engineering and spend more time doing homework and marching in drills than at football practice. When they graduate they won’t be drafted by the NFL.

It is the last organized football game most of them will ever play. In a few months time, they will be ensigns standing watch on ships in the Pacific, marine lieutenants flying helicopter reconnaissance missions, and army lieutenants in remote, forward operating bases in Afghanistan.

So why is the Army-Navy game one of the best in college football? Because it is a metaphor for what is best about America. It shows us that we are at our best when we fight ferociously in the game, but afterwards, no matter who wins or who loses, we come together as brothers.

The finest moment of the game comes after the whistle blows. At the end, no fans rush onto the field. Nor do they head for their cars to get ahead of the traffic. They stand at their seats, take off their hats, and put their hands on their hearts. The entire stadium is silent, respectful, alert.

The players didn’t do war dances or whoops of victory, either. Both teams meet at the 50-yard line, shake hands and pat the backs of their opponents. They take off their helmets, tuck them under their arms and walk together to losing team’s side.

Last year it was a Navy victory, so both teams sang the West Point to Alma Mater to the entire 4,000 Corps of Cadets. Then they all turned and walked over to the Navy side of the field and sang to the 4,000 Brigade of Midshipmen.

If you looked up at the stadium screens you could see that many of the players had tears in their eyes. If you looked at your neighbors in the stands, they did too. Because what everyone in that stadium witnesses at every Army-Navy Game is the miracle that is America – that after the fiercest of contests we can rise above the victory or the defeat and come together as one nation. Regardless of our religion, family heritage or political affiliation, we are first and foremost, Americans. As much as our differences matter to us, our shared patrimony matters more.

Today the Army Navy game is being played in Washington, D.C. rather than its traditional home in Philadelphia.

All the senior leaders of government will be there. The president and vice president will attend, as will the leaders of Congress from both parties and all ends of the political spectrum.

Let’s pray they get more out of today than a good football game. Let’s pray that they will take to heart the miracle of the game, and follow the example of the cadets and midshipmen and realize that it is possible to lay down our rivalries and animosities and suspicions, and realize that we’re in this together — and that what is more important that being a Republican or a Democrat is being an American.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/12/10/miracle-army-navy-game/#ixzz1iK9PeoYb

We, like the battered wife, need to face the reality that things are only going to get worse, and it’s time to walk away and make some new friends. But it won’t be easy and it won’t be without major risks.

For ten years we have had a tortured relationship with Pakistan. We’ve needed their help in the Afghan War, and they’ve wanted our money. We’ve needed Pakistani supply routes to get our equipment and material into landlocked, mountainous and roadless Afghanistan. We’ve needed Pakistan to help take out the Taliban safe havens in the tribal areas inside Pakistan. We’ve needed Pakistan to help us find Bin Laden and destroy Al Qaeda. And we’ve given them some $20 billion in military and economic assistance as an incentive. And they have helped us….just enough…. to string us along and keep the relationship going.

But they’ve never been committed enough to the relationship to go all in. Why? Because they see things differently than we do and have different goals. Above all, they want a pro-Pakistan, government in Afghanistan after our inevitable departure, to give them strategic depth against their arch-enemy India. If we leave and the Karzai government stays in power, fine, Pakistan has helped achieve that outcome. But if we leave and the Karzai government falls, as looks ever more likely, the Pakistanis are hedged because they have given safe haven to the Taliban group most likely to succeed Karzai.
Sound complicated? Not really. They’re just doing what they think is best for them.

They did the same thing with Usama bin Laden. For years the government denied that the terror mastermind was in Pakistan. Yet Bin Laden was found in a safe house near in a military complex in… Pakistan. Shocking? Hardly.

The Pakistanis were in the “finding” Bin Laden business. Once Bin Laden was found — dead or alive — they’d be out of business. So they did the sensible thing — from their perspective — and kept him alive and hidden. They pretended to help us look for him and they continued asking us for more aid to do so.

From our viewpoint, they’ve been double dealing. But from Pakistan’s viewpoint, they’re only doing what is in their best interest: hedging their bets against our departure, hedging their bets to get our assistance.

But we’ve got to do what is in our best interests, too. Those in favor of sticking it out with Pakistan cite three reasons:
First, if we don’t Afghanistan will descend into chaos and Al Qaeda will come back. Phooey. Al Qaeda has already moved on….to Yemen….to Somalia…. we don’t have 100,000 troops there. Who needs Afghanistan if they have all of cyberspace?

Second, they point to Pakistan’s nuclear weapons arsenal and say if we sever ties with Pakistan those nukes could fall into the hands of terrorists. Yet, by that logic we have just as much to fear from North Korea’s nuclear weapons and from Iran’s nuclear weapons program. Even our most militant neo-cons don’t think we should invade Iran.

To a certain extent, we’ve been Pakistan’s enablers. Hasn’t our military assistance allowed them to devote more of their own resources to their rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal? Wouldn’t it be better for us to take those billions of dollars in aid to Pakistan and put it towards intelligence gathering and covert operations so we can know where those nuclear weapons are and if need be stop them from falling into the hands of terrorists?

Finally, some of the aid we give Pakistan ultimately ends up supporting the Pakistani intelligence services which give safe haven to and work with the Taliban. As former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mullen said, the Haqqani Taliban network is a virtual arm of the Pakistani intelligence services. — This is the same group responsible for a number of the recent attacks on NATO military and civilian targets.

Isn’t it unconscionable that we are paying Pakistan to kill our people in Afghanistan? Don’t we owe it to the men and women who have sacrificed so much for our country and who are still in Afghanistan to walk away from this abusive relationship?

None of them “won” or “lost” and they’re all getting better it debating. Come the election season, anyone of them will fare well against Obama because the dirty little secret is that while Obama may deliver a great TelePrompTer speech, he’s a lousy debater.

The big picture story is the nature of primary campaigning has changed, probably forever. In years past candidates ran state-by-state campaigns. They raised money, built ground teams, and camped out in the early primary states. If they won, donors sent in checks and the candidate could on going to the next primary state. If not, he had to quit. No money, no campaign. No ground game, no votes.

This time around retail campaigning, has given way to America’s newest reality TV series, the weekly Republican debates. Because candidates have to be sharp and well-rested or risk ridicule on “Saturday Night Live,” they’ve not had much time for chicken dinners in Iowa or diners in New Hampshire. Instead they’re running national campaigns by going on Fox News Channel and showing up at the debates. They’re reaching far more voters on national TV than they could at the pancake house in Cedar Falls. Which also means they don’t have to raise tons of cash. And that levels the playing field — all a candidate needs is a plane ticket and a hotel room and snappy debate performance. Will this translate to votes in the states? We won’t know if this strategy works until the primary states head to the polls starting in a few weeks time

There are not a lot of foreign policy differences between the candidates – except for Ron Paul. Sure Romney and Huntsman disagree on Afghanistan. Perry and Bachmann disagree on immigration. Gingrich disagrees with everyone about amnesty.

The biggest contrast will be later, between Obama and the GOP standard bearer. They will disagree on issues like how to stop Iran’s nuclear weapons program, how to end the Afghan war, and defense cuts. But at the core, Americans want to know which candidate can restore America’s faith in itself.

When Obama took the oath of office in January 2009 America was the undisputed leader of the world. That’s no longer the case today. Friends no longer seek our advice, foes are willing to challenge us, and worst of all the American people no longer think we’re just going through a temporary bad patch, but that we’re in an inevitable and permanent decline.

President Obama is fond of saying we’ve never been through such perilous times. He’s wrong. We’ve been in far worse places before and survived and thrived. Think of Lincoln trying to hold the Union together by having to sacrifice 600,000 lives. Or FDR dealing with the Great Depression, Pearl Harbor and World War II. In spite of the crises they faced, they never doubted our ability to get through it and climb to even greater heights. And we knew they believed it, not just with pretty speeches but at the core of their beings, and so we believed it too. Lincoln talked about preserving the ‘last best hope of earth.’ FDR said the only thing we had to fear was fear itself. Reagan talked about that shining city on a hill.

Obama believes in global solutions, and that American exceptionalism is no different from British exceptionalism or Greek exceptionalism. He prefers to lead from behind and thinks America should just be one among many. He says the problem is we’ve become lazy. And because he doesn’t believe in us, we’ve started to doubt ourselves, too.

In the end this is the only issue that matters. Most Americans believe deep in their hearts that we have something special here and we’re in danger of losing it. We think Washington is broken, and the country is on the wrong track. We can’t understand why there are no jobs, we’re looking for the candidate that can get us to believe in ourselves again, the one who believes deep in his heart that we are different from every other country in the history of the world; that we have been blessed by God and our founding principles like freedom and self reliance and equal rights have made us unique and exceptional.