Can We Beat ISIS Without Doing Collateral Damage?

During the Republican presidential debate, a number of the candidates brushed against the key issues in the “War on Terror,” or maybe I should say, pussyfooted around them.
Muslim terrorists recognize no limits as they make war on us; they kill our non-combatants without an iota of compunction. The men, women and children killed in the 9/11 attacks were civilians. The Twin Towers were not  legitimate military targets. The Americans massacred at San Bernardino were non-combatants. The Inland Regional Center was hardly a military target. Under the Geneva Convention it is a war crime to knowingly make war on non-combatants.

Debate moderator Hugh Hewitt asked Ben Carson if he approved of carpet bombing to kill ISIS fighters, if it would cause civilian deaths: “So, you are OK with the deaths of thousands of innocent children and civilians?” The question should have been put to each of the candidates, and put again until they directly responded.

Rand Paul later warned that the Geneva Convention prohibited making war on civilians -- on non-combatants. Sen. Paul correctly pointed out that America was a signatory to the Geneva Conventions and that we would first have to withdraw before we could undertake carpet bombing, if it would involve killing non-combatants. The senator’s remarks were a decent short-hand statement of our obligation. Donald Trump replied, “So they can kill us, but we can’t kill them?”


Mr. Trump’s rhetorical question, as well as  the moderator’s, were not academic questions. How does one kill enemy soldiers who do not wear uniforms, who blend into into the non-combatant civilian population, and who indeed take cover among the civilian population, knowing that America is bound by the 4th Geneva Convention of 1949?


It is one thing to carpet bomb an organized enemy army dug-in in the desert, as we did in the first Gulf War in Operation Desert Storm.  It is an entirely different thing to carpet bomb a city to kill the Islamic State fighters who are in the city operating and/or hiding among women and children.


Mr. Trump’s question more precisely put is really this: If the Islamic State is going to make war on our civilian population, are we barred from making war on their civilian population?


In World War II when the Germans bombed London and Coventry, Britain, and later the U.S. responded by bombing every German city conceivably aiding the German War effort. Additionally, we bombed Japan with conventional bombs, and culminated our efforts by dropping two atom bombs. Those two bombs destroyed Japan’s will to fight and resulted in their unconditional surrender.


In doing so, we didn’t worry about collateral damage or women and children. At Nagasaki we killed some 20,000 soldiers and perhaps 150,000 civilians. At Hiroshima we killed perhaps 280,000. In the process, we avoided the million casualties estimated in an invasion of Japan. In those days there was no 4th Geneva Convention. In the “Gathering Storm,” Winston Churchill asked how a democracy is to respond when attacked by an enemy who ignores the rules of war? He answered that question by writing five more volumes detailing what the allies did.


So how do we get at the Islamic State’s soldiers within the cities they control?


One suggestion is to send in foreign troops. But why would foreign troops fight for us, if we won’t send our own troops in to fight for ourselves?


Another is to send in either our special forces or our ground troops. If we do that, we are guaranteed dead, wounded and maimed American troops.


A third alternative would be to wait forever until the enemy is dumb enough to send its troops out into the desert to fight another “Mother of Battles” with us, and then for us to carpet bomb them into oblivion. But is ISIS stupid enough to repeat Saddam’s blunder?

The ultimate method would be to obliterate, annihilate, and/or wipe out all living beings in cities and town held by the Islamic State -- after “withdrawing” from the Geneva Convention.


I do not believe the American people are yet ready for that last alternative. But that could quickly change with a new president and another attack on the U.S., -- especially if that attack results in massive American casualties.


I cannot see President Obama saying to the Islamic State -- and meaning it -- that “unless you observe the Geneva Convention as to our civilians, we are going to withdraw from the Geneva Convention and kill your civilian population.


Three key questions went unasked:

-- Can we destroy ISIS by fighting a “limited” war, while they observe no such limitations and kill our women and children without compunction?

-- Would you carpet bomb cities held by ISIS if that resulted in massive collateral damage -- the deaths of thousands of women and children?


-- Would you do what is required by the 4th Geneva Convention, before doing so?

Posted: Saturday, December 26, 2015 12:00 am. QCOline.com

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

How Many Jihadist Refugees Are Too Many?

"Intelligence and law enforcement agencies have disrupted countless plots here and overseas, and worked around the clock to keep us safe.

"I've ordered the Departments of State and Homeland Security to review the visa (waiver) program under which the female terrorist in San Bernardino originally came to this country." 

                            -- President Barack Obama, Dec. 6 Oval Office address.

In the wake of one Muslim terrorist attack after another, President Obama has two proposals: (1) Keep guns out of the hands of U.S. citizens, and (2) Bring 50,000 more Muslims "refugees" into this country. He promises they will be "thoroughly vetted."

How does the U.S. go about vetting refugees to insure that NONE are jihadist terrorists? Suicide bombers? Religious zealots intent on slaughtering American infidels?

A day after the president's address, the Trump campaign responded with this news release:

Syria is in utter chaos. Is it possible to get records from Syria? Can we rely on Syrian records to be accurate? Or do we have to take each refugee at his word?  Would a Muslim terrorist intent on killing Americans tell a fib to get into our country?

A day after the president's address, the Trump campaign responded with this news release:

"Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on. According to Pew Research, among others, there is great hatred towards Americans by large segments of the Muslim population. Most recently, a poll from the Center for Security Policy released data showing '25 percent of those polled agreed that violence against Americans here in the United States is justified as a part of the global jihad' and 51 percent of those polled, 'agreed that Muslims in America should have the choice of being governed according to Shariah.' Shariah authorizes such atrocities as murder against non-believers who won’t convert, beheadings and more unthinkable acts that pose great harm to Americans, especially women."

It quoted Mr. Trump as saying, "Without looking at the various polling data, it is obvious to anybody the hatred is beyond comprehension. Where this hatred comes from and why we will have to determine. Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in Jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life.”

Do you recall the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center? The 9/11/01 attacks? The Ft. Hoot Shooting massacre? The Boston Marathon bombings? The Chattanooga Recruiting Office? The San Bernardino  massacre? Were all perpetrated by Muslim terrorists? All done in the name of Allah? All justified by Islamic religious beliefs?

The president calls those religious beliefs a "perverted interpretation of Islam." But is it? Or is it the very form of Islam that made war against the "infidels" throughout the Middle East, North Africa and as far into Europe as Tours and Vienna? That conquered Constantinople, the Balkans and Greece?

It's clear that not all Muslims adhere to this jihadist strain of Islam. But a great many do. AND,  there are 1.57 billion Muslims in the world! 

A Nov. 20 Pew poll concludes that 63 million Muslims support ISIS in 11 countries. In Pakistan, 9 percent support ISIS; in Turkey, 8 percent, in the Palestinian Territories, 6 percent. Additionally, there are another 287 million in those 11 countries who "haven't formed an opinion on whether they support ISIS or not." The survey did not cover Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq or Iran.

 Mr. Trump also cites a June 155 poll by the Center for Security Policy in which 600 Muslims living in the U.S. were interviewed and 51 percent of U.S. Muslims polled believe either that they should have the choice of American or sharia courts, or that they should have their own tribunals to apply sharia. Nearly a quarter believe that, “It is legitimate to use violence to punish those who give offense to Islam by, e.g., portraying the prophet Mohammed.”

Nearly one-fifth said that the use of violence in the U.S. is justified in order to make sharia the law of the land in this country.

Even the liberal Daily Beast says that worldwide "only about 12 percent of Muslims support terrorism."

So is Mr. Trump hysterical? Or is he rational? Consider:

If only 1 percent of 50,000 Syrian refugees come to America to make jihad" we would be admitting 500 terrorists adhering to what the president calls a "perverted interpretation of Islam"

Mr. Obama  ridiculed Republicans for fearing women and children. He assures us we can properly vet Syrians then concedes that the San Bernardino woman terrorist was properly vetted. If the government can't vet one woman from Pakistan, how can we be confident we can vet 50,000?

Two great values are at stake in this debate.

First, our forefathers came to America for religious freedom. Our constitution guarantees to people of all faiths, absolute freedom of belief, but limited free exercise.

That free exercise is rooted in toleration. Free exercise does not go so far as allowing a professed cannibal to eat his neighbor, or a professed Muslim jihadist to fly jets into the Twin Towers.

Second, the idea of admitting immigrants who come to bomb and shoot us, or to eat us is insane. Our constitution is not a suicide pact.

The difficulty is telling in advance which Muslims are entering the country to wage jihad. If one Pakistani woman can kill 14, and if 19 Saudis can kill 3,000, it makes no sense whatsoever to admit 500 potential jihadists. Or even 50.

It comes down to a question of probabilities and risks. Is it probable if we admit 50,000, that 500 are terrorists? 50? Two? If so, is it worth the risk?

I think this is what Mr. Trump means. I hope that is what Mr. Trump means.

So what exactly does the president mean?

Posted: Saturday, December 12, 2015 12:00 am - QCOnline.com

By John Donald O'Shea


Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

To Go to War or Not? For Presidents, the Question Isn’t Academic

I have often wondered what President Obama would have done had he been in President Lincoln’s shoes on the eve of the American Civil War.

Like President Lincoln, President Obama would not have had foreknowledge of the “magnitude or the duration” of the coming Civil War. Neither would he have known that 112,000 union soldiers would be killed in action or die of wounds; that 25,000 more would die in confederate prisons, and that 282,000 would be wounded and maimed.

Nor that when deaths from illness and other causes were added in, the total number of union dead would be 385,000. And he would not have known that confederate losses would be 260,000 dead and 137,000 wounded.

He would not have known the final cost to free the 4 million slaves, and/or to save the union would be a half million dead and 400,000 wounded.

So what would President Obama have done when South Carolina seceded from the union? When Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, etc., followed? When South Carolina demanded the evacuation of Ft. Sumter?

President Lincoln ordered the Star of the West, an unarmed merchant vessel, to carry federal troops and supplies to the fort. Would President Obama have done that much?

What would President Obama’s response have been when secessionist troops fired on the fort? President Lincoln declared a “state of insurrection” and called for “75,000 volunteers to enlist for three months” of service to quell the insurrection. Would President Obama have done likewise?

Mr. Lincoln ordered a naval blockade of all confederate forts. Would Mr. Obama have done that?

President Lincoln ordered federal troops to engage the confederate army in the first battle of Manassas. The union army was beaten and retreated. Would President Obama have ordered union forces into battle? Would he have continued the war, or would he have withdrawn to avoid further loses?

Fourteen months later, Lincoln’s union forces engaged the confederates in the battle of Antietam in which 2,108 union soldiers were killed, 9,540 were wounded, 546 confederates were killed and 7,752 were wounded. Would President Obama still have been pursuing the war? Would he have quit after the carnage of Antietam?

President Lincoln saw the war through.

If we speculate and assume that President Obama would not have fought the Civil War, or that he would not have fought it through to the bitter end, would his decisions have been better or worse than President Lincoln’s? More or less moral?

Was preserving the union worth 500,000 deaths? Over 400,000 wounded and maimed?

Was freeing 4 million slaves worth such casualties? Would the slaves still be slaves today, or would changing economic or other social conditions caused its demise by 1900? 1930? 1945?

Is it moral to kill to preserve a political union that supposedly is based on the “consent of the governed?” Is it moral to use deadly force to end slavery?

On March 4, 1865, 150 years ago, President Lincoln delivered a sober and reflective second Inaugural Address.

“On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it.

“Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. ....

“Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. ....

“The prayers of both could not be answered. ... neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. ....

“If God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsmen’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword ... it must be said ‘the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.’”

I cannot believe, given his unwillingness to make war shown during his years in office, President Obama would have called up troops and gone to war to preserve the Union.

Nor do I have any evidence to believe Mr. Obama would have embarked upon the Civil War to free the slaves. Consider his remarks when Russia intervened/invaded Ukraine: “Russia is on the wrong side of history.” Would he have said, “The Confederate States are on the wrong side of history in seceding, and keeping slaves?” Would he have chosen to employ for “diplomatic and economic steps” to isolate the Confederacy? Would he have been wrong? I don’t know.

Was it wrong or immoral to pursue a war that resulted in nearly a million casualties, not to mention the destruction of families and property, to advance in time the emancipation of 4 million slaves. At Galesburg, President Lincoln labeled slavery as a “moral, social and political evil.” He believed the use of deadly force was justified to end that evil, and to save the union.

Because I, like Mr. Lincoln, would not want to be a slave, and without the advantage of hindsight, I (to free the slaves) would have supported President Lincoln’s course of action. How about you?
To go to war, or not?

The question is not academic. It is the question that President Obama faces every time he is asked to make war, or put “boots on the ground.” But history shows that the euphoria at going to war soon is replaced by a generation-long misery for all those touched by the war.

Posted: Monday, December 7, 2015 6:44 am. QCOnline.com

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

Corporate vs.Iindividual Speech, Part II

(Editor's note: This is the second of two parts examining the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision.)


              “The Democrats have the ultimate super PAC, it is called the mainstream media.”
                             -- Marco Rubio, CNBC Republican Debate, Oct. 28.

In Part I of this piece, I discussed what the U. S. Supreme Court in Citizens United said about the political speech rights of individuals vs. corporations. In Part II I discuss what the Court said about political speech rights of ordinary corporations vs. media corporations.
In the case, the court began by setting out the law:

"Before the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA), federal law prohibited -- and still does prohibit -- corporations and unions from using 'general treasury funds' to make (1) direct contributions to candidates, or (2) independent expenditures that expressly advocate the election or defeat of a candidate, through any form of media, in connection with certain qualified federal elections."

BCRA amended federal law "to prohibit any electioneering communication' as well. ... An electioneering communication is ... 'any broadcast, cable, or satellite communication' that 'refers to a clearly identified candidate for Federal office' and is made within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election."

In Citizens United, the court recognized that while ordinary corporations, large and small, were barred from political speech" while giant (as well as "small")  media corporations were universally recognized as possessing that right. NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN and the New York Times, etc., have it within their power to campaign day after day, right up to the day of the election, against McDonald's serving unhealthy fried foods, and to call for the passage of laws prohibiting the sale of Big Macs right up until election day. At the same time under the campaign reform act, as amended, the McDonald Corp. would face fines or imprisonment if it paid for ads on TV opposing the election of a candidate promising to implement the NY Times' views.

So, should media corporations have a monopoly on political speech, or should ordinary corporations and labor unions -- both of which are "associations of citizens" --- have the same right to protect and/or advance their interests?

Consider the following: On Oct. 28, CNBC "moderated" the third Republican debate.

Given the questions asked, I was expecting the moderators to eventually ask, "Why are you still beating your wife?" The questions themselves were either intended to assassinate the candidates (regardless of the answers given), or to cause Republican candidates to eviscerate each other, while keeping the moderators hands seemingly blood-free. Did you hear a single open-ended question such as, "How exactly are illegal immigrants harming the country?"

Under the BCRA, no ordinary corporation could expend its corporate funds to rebut the perceived harm done to its favorite candidate by the CNBC moderators.

What happened on CNBC conclusively demonstrates that every corporation and union -- that is, every "association of citizens" (including Republicans and Democrats associations ) has to have the same right to engage in political speech possessed by media corporations and conglomerates, and that Citizens United was providently decided.

The court in Citizens United saw that the BCRA "interferes with the 'open marketplace' of ideas protected by the First Amendment.... It permits the Government to ban the political speech of millions of associations of citizens. ... Most of these are small corporations without large amounts of wealth.

"By suppressing the speech of [many] corporations, both for-profit and nonprofit, the Government prevents their voices and viewpoints from reaching the public and advising voters on which persons or entities are hostile to their interests. Factions will necessarily form in our Republic, but the remedy of 'destroying the liberty' of some factions  is 'worse than the disease'” The Federalist No. 10, p. 130 (J. Madison). Factions should be checked by permitting them all to speak, and by entrusting the people to judge what is true and what is false."

In America  all individual and "associations of individuals" need to be able to engage in political speech. As stated in Part I, the Citizens United court did not create PACS. It merely struck down the provisions of the BCRA that gave a monopoly on political speech to the PACs and to the media corporation, so as to put all corporations, unions and PACs on equal footing.

In taking a second look at it, the Citizens United court saw the real and inherent danger in its earlier Austin decision. The court saw the lurking danger of the Austin holding to America's free press -- to its media corporations:

"The chilling endpoint of the [Austin] Court’s reasoning is not difficult to foresee: outright regulation of the press. ... Media corporations have 'immense aggregations of wealth,' and the views expressed by media corporations often have little or no correlation to the public’s support for those views. ... Thus, under the Government’s ['antidistortion'] reasoning, wealthy media corporations could have their voices diminished to put them on par with other media entities. There is no precedent for permitting this under the First Amendment."

Simply put, if the political speech of some corporations can be barred, why not that of the media corporations?

Posted: Saturday, November 14, 2015 12:00 am. QCOnline.com

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

Corporate vs. Individual Speech, Part I

(Editor's note: This is the first of  two-parts examining the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision.)


"An unconditional right to say what one pleases about public affairs is what I consider to be the minimum guarantee of the First Amendment." 
                                       Justice Hugo Black, concurring opinion,  New York Times Co. v. U.S.

Bill Gates is a wealthy individual. His net worth was $79.2 billion as of Nov. 2. Gates can use his entire $79.2 billion, anytime and anywhere, to engage in political speech -- that is, to create political ads for or against causes and candidates. And if you and your friends disagree with what Gates is saying, you can pool your individual resources to engage in counter-speech. But could you set up a not-for-profit corporation and use its corporate funds to engage Gates in political speech?

Before, the U.S. Supreme Court decided the Citizens United case, the answer was an unequivocal "NO!" In the court's words, "Wealthy individuals and unincorporated associations can spend unlimited amounts on independent expenditures. ... Yet certain disfavored associations of citizens -- those that have taken on the corporate form -- are penalized for engaging in the same political speech."

The court saw a problem with that because whatever else a corporation is, it is an "association of citizens." The Citizens United court then criticized its own earlier decision in the Austin Case.
"The Austin majority undertook to distinguish wealthy individuals from corporations on the ground that '[s]tate law grants corporations special advantages -- such as limited liability, perpetual life, and favorable treatment of the accumulation and distribution of assets.' ... This does not suffice, however, to allow laws prohibiting speech. 'It is rudimentary that the State cannot exact as the price of those special advantages the forfeiture of First Amendment rights.'”

So, what associations of citizens do you think should be allowed to engage in political speech to influence elections in America? All associations? Or, only some associations? Should citizens who have associated to form National Rifle Association prohibited from expending NRA corporate funds (general treasury funds)  to create political ads to defeat a candidate who campaigns on a platform of abolishing the 2nd Amendment and confiscating all guns?

Should Planned Parenthood be prohibited from placing TV ads on behalf of pro-choice candidates? Should a movie maker be prohibited from showing his film on a cable channel if the film places the entire blame for the Benghazi fiasco on Hillary Clinton? Should the Catholic or Baptist churches be prohibited from airing on TV political ads supporting candidates who support traditional marriage, or oppose abortion?

All of these are associations of citizens, and all, because they were corporations, prior to the Citizens United decision of the U. S. Supreme Court, were barred, under the threat of criminal prosecution by the provisions of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA), from using their corporate funds to engage in the sorts of political speech enumerated above.
That same BCRA, however, and not the Supreme Court, created what we have come to know in America as PACS -- political action committees. (Those who blame the court for creating them are simply uninformed and wrong.)

In the BCRA, Congress also forbade ordinary corporations (excluding media corporation) and labor unions from using their general treasury funds to engage in political speech for or against political causes and/or candidates, during certain time periods preceding primary and general elections (e.g., buy radio and TV ads, or make movies, etc.).

The BCRA, however, at the same time authorized corporations, unions and others to set up new entities -- PACs,  to use “separate segregated funds," and to raise and expend those funds to engage in political speech for or against the political causes and/or candidates, without any time constraints. That which was forbidden to corporations and unions, was permitted to the PACs.

But in the Citizens United decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, the court explained the problem of being required to set up PACs in order to engage in political speech.

"As a practical matter, however, given the complexity of the regulations and the deference courts show to administrative determinations, a speaker who wants to avoid threats of criminal liability and the heavy costs of defending against FEC [Federal Election Commission] enforcement must ask a governmental agency for prior permission to speak. ... These onerous restrictions thus function as the equivalent of 'prior restraint'  by giving the FEC power analogous to licensing laws implemented in 16th- and 17th-century England -- laws and governmental practices of the sort that the First Amendment was drawn to prohibit."

Recent history shows that if the IRS can be used to silence tea party organizations who apply for tax-exempt status, there is no reason to believe that tea party organizations who ask the FEC to "speak" will receive any better treatment.

For those willing to take time to read  Citizens United, the issue is no more complicated than this:
If the First Amendment has any force, it prohibits Congress from fining or jailing citizens, or associations of citizens, for simply engaging in political speech.

Posted: Friday, November 13, 2015 12:00 am. QCOnline.com

By John Donald O'Shea  

Copyright 2015
John Donald O'Shea 

We Must Heed the Lessons of Nixon's Watergate

Would you ever believe it? The mainstream Republicans are longing for those halcyon days when Richard M. Nixon was president! They list his accomplishments and tell us that but for one “monumental blunder,” Mr. Nixon might be regarded as one of the best presidents of the 20th  century.


“If only Dick Nixon were here today!”

Back in 1974, about the time I was first elected judge (thanks in large part to President Nixon’s Watergate problems), attorney Frank Wallace told me that “without integrity, a candidate for judge might have the finest legal mind, and the best judicial temperament and still be utterly unfit to serve as a judge.

Frank nailed it.

The same is true of presidents and candidates for president.

LBJ said our ships were attacked in the Tonkin Gulf; war followed and Americans were killed.  When Presidents Clinton and Bush told us that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, I believed them. So did a great many other Americans -- in and out of Congress. And more Americans were killed and maimed.

For those who are too young to recall, President Nixon did not make a “monumental blunder.” He flat-out lied to the American public, not to protect the nation from its enemies, but rather to save his own neck.

“People have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I’m not a crook.”
Perhaps not, but he approved the cover up of a burglary at Democratic Headquarters at Washington’s Watergate complex on June 17, 1972, to bug Democrat offices.

Mr. Nixon at first downplayed the scandal, calling it “mere politics.” He labeled news stories linking the White House to the burglary as  “biased and misleading.” He was lying.

But, then, White House aide, Alexander Butterfield, revealed to Congress that Mr. Nixon had a secret taping system in the Oval Office that recorded all his phone calls and conversations. Mr. Nixon provided transcripts of the tapes, but refused to give the actual tapes to Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, claiming executive privilege.

When Cox refused to back down, the president fired him. Eventually, Mr. Nixon’s lawyers turned over the audio tape, but it contained an 18½ minute gap! The president’s personal secretary claimed she accidentally erased that portion of the tape.

Throughout the affair, President Nixon claimed he had no prior knowledge of the burglary, and knew nothing of a cover up. But then, in early 1973, Mr. Nixon’s defense crumbled. A “new tape,” recorded not long after the break-in came, to light showing Nixon had been told of the White House’s connection to the Watergate burglaries soon after they had taken place, and that he had approved plans to thwart the investigation. When congressional leaders told him he would be impeached and convicted, President Nixon resigned.

To call his actions a “monumental blunder” is to convert President Nixon’s course of lies, deceit, and intentional misconduct into a mere mistake of judgment. Nixon was about to be impeached not for some mere lapse of judgment, but rather for intentionally lying to the American people and obstructing justice.

And now it’s happening again. A candidate for president has a secret -- non-official -- email system. When Congress demands to see her Benghazi emails, she labels the investigation “the biggest fairy tale I have ever seen” and rhetorically asks, “What difference does it make?”
When Congress asks for her emails, it is told they were all personal and have been erased, and then she tells the public, “’I think it’s pretty clear ... they ended up becoming a partisan arm of the Republican National Committee.”

Mrs. Clinton is using Nixon’s playbook. Both labeled the congressional investigations partisan politics. Nixon (or an aide) erased minutes from a tape and withheld other tapes. Mrs. Clinton has deleted thousands of emails, and withheld thousands of others from Congress for nearly four years! Mr. Nixon lied to cover up a “third-rate burglary.” Mrs. Clinton lies to keep the public in the dark as to what the American government was doing in Benghazi. All that is presently lacking is her connection to a crime -- such as the Watergate break-in.

But what if it turns out that Ambassador Stevens was, in violation of the law, engaged in smuggling Libyan weapons to the Syrian rebels? Remember the Iran/Contra affair? What if it turns out that the FBI determines that she has lied under oath to Congress, or under oath has intentionally mislead Congress? Isn’t perjuring yourself before Congress a felony?

If Mrs. Clinton intentionally lied to Congress and the people, does that “make a difference?” Shouldn’t our leaders tell us the truth? Or have Democrats forgotten their catchy little jingle, “Bush lied, soldiers died?” Or, is integrity required only of Republicans?

Democrats say the Benghazi hearings have gone on too long. I would suggest that they  would have been over three and a half years ago had Mrs. Clinton simply given Congress her emails when first asked. There would have been no problems for Mrs. Clinton, had the president, Mrs. Clinton or Susan Rice simply told the truth about what our ambassador was doing in Benghazi, rather than inanely blaming an obscure “Internet video.”

Mrs. Clinton’s 11:12 p.m., Sept. 11, 2012 email to her daughter -- the night of the Benghazi attacks — conclusively proves that Mrs. Clinton knew the attack was a terrorist attack, and not video inspired: “Two of our young officers were killed in Benghazi by an al-Qaida-like group.”

If mainstream Republican are really longing for the days of good old Richard Nixon, all they have to do is switch parties and vote for Mrs. Clinton -- the second-coming of President Nixon.

 Posted: Wednesday, November 4, 2015 12:00 am. QCOnline.com

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

The Pope's Message: Will Minds Change?

Pope Francis spent much of his time in the U.S. speaking on the need to welcome immigrants, protect the environment and help the poor.

Regarding his speech to Congress, The Huffington Post writes, "In his wide-ranging 3,404-word address ... the pope called for action to protect refugees, eliminate capital punishment and stop war, yet used a mere 21 words to allude to abortion and only 54 to touch vaguely upon the fact that same-sex marriage is now legal across the United States.

"On abortion, the pope’s comments were tucked into a larger discussion on the the Golden Rule, which 'reminds us of our responsibility to protect and defend human life at every stage of its development.' But he did not say the word 'abortion.'

"On marriage, the pope had a few more words. 'I cannot hide my concern for the family, which is threatened, perhaps as never before, from within and without. Fundamental relationships are being called into question, as is the very basis of marriage and the family. I can only reiterate the importance and, above all, the richness and the beauty of family life.'"

So why is the pope calling upon the U.S. to accept more immigrants?

According to a 2013 U.N. report, "Trends in International Migrant Stock: The 2013 Revision," immigrants form 14.3 percent of the U.S. population.

They compose no more than 4.8 percent of any other country's population; 19.8 percent of all the world's immigrants reside in the U.S. No other country has accepted more than 4.8 percent of the world's immigrants. The pope's home country, Argentina, has accepted 0.8 percent!

There are 45,785,090 immigrants in the U.S. No other country has accepted more than 11,048,064 immigrants.

And why is the pope telling the U.S we must do more for the poor? Is there any other country that presently does more? In the U.S., we have Social Security and Medicare for the aged. We have Social Security Disability and Medicare or Medicaid for the disabled.

We have the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for the "poor." (A family of one with a maximum annual income of $15,301 is eligible, as is a family of four with a maximum annual income of $31,525.) We provide free K-12 public school education for every American child, and special education for disabled children. We provide unemployment insurance for those who lose their job. HUD helps apartment owners to offer reduced rents to low-income tenants to make affordable apartments available for low-income families, the elderly and persons with disabilities. HUD also provides the Section 8 vouchers to allow those with low incomes to pay for all or part of their rent. And nearly half of those (47 percent) who report income pay no federal income tax!

Is the plight of the "poor" in the U.S. more dire than the plight of the “poor" almost everywhere else in the world? If so, why do we have 45,785,090 immigrants? Why are Mexican and Central American immigrants pouring into this country? And why aren't people leaving the U.S. to live in Mexico, Russia or Ethiopia?

And why is he lecturing America on the need to be good stewards for the environment? Haven't we cleaned up the Great Lakes? Can you recall a time when raw sewage was dumped into our rivers? Don't we now have tertiary treatment? Can you remember driving through Gary, Ind., when smog continually hung over the city? Is that the case now? I can remember when some cars got seven miles to the gallon, and spewed exhaust. By 2016, won't American cars and light trucks have to average 34.5 mpg?

Would America be a better place if we immediately ceased heating and cooling our homes with fossil fuels?

In our courts, once the judge determines the witness to be an "expert,” that witness can give his opinion  on the ultimate issue in the case without stating facts that form the basis of that opinion, e.g., "I think Dr. X was guilty of malpractice when he removed Mrs. Y's appendix.” But what good is that opinion without setting out the facts that form the basis of that opinion? "Mrs. Y only wanted him to remove a wart on her big toe!"

So what will be the long-term effect of the pope's words?

When a pope addresses matters that traditionally are within the realm of "faith and morals," it is there that the pope is most authoritative — even for those who reject his infallibility. But when he speaks on quantum physics, absent a showing that he has a background in quantum physics, he lacks credibility. Similarly, his background as a bishop in Argentina in no way qualifies him as an expert on the U.S, our capitalist system or our immigration practices.

Of course, he may be utilizing material prepared for him by experts. But absent a showing of the expertise of his experts, it is entirely reasonable to discount the pope in areas such as biology, physics, chemistry, geology, economics and U.S. history.

Indeed, many of the same people who extol the pope's genius when he speaks on immigration and the environment would label him a "Neanderthal" when he speaks on things on which he should have expertise: abortion, contraception and traditional marriage.


For those reasons, I believe the pope's message will be largely forgotten or ignored within the week. Those who are opposed to "open borders” will remain opposed. Those who believe "God helps able-bodied people who help themselves" will continue in that belief. And those who believe "global warming" to be a scam will conclude the pope is out of his element. Meanwhile, the killing will go on in the Middle East, and in the Planned Parenthood clinics.

Posted: Friday, October 23, 2015 11:00 pm  QuadCitiesOnline

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

Death Penalty: What of Innocent Victim's Right to Life?

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, writing of "Human Life and Dignity," tells us, "As a gift from God, every human life is sacred from conception to natural death. The life and dignity of every person must be respected and protected at every stage and in every condition. The right to life is the first and most fundamental principle of human rights."

I do not quarrel with the proposition that the right to life is the most fundamental principle of human rights. But when I am told that life is sacred or precious, the lawyer within me asks, what does that mean?

During his recent speech to Congress, Pope Francis called for global abolition of the death penalty:

"Every life is sacred, every human person is endowed with an inalienable dignity, and society can only benefit from the rehabilitation of those convicted of crimes."

But if  that is so, what justification did the police at Oregon's Umpqua Community College have in engaging in a shootout with the gunman who had just murdered 10 people there, and who would have murdered far more had the police not intervened?

Wasn't the gunman's life sacred before, after and during his murder spree? Wasn't he "endowed with an inalienable dignity" during commission of each murder? By what right did police interfere? Would it not have sufficed to remind the gunman he was in a Gun-Free Zone? Shouldn't the officers have used non-lethal force to take him into custody?

A 26-year-old man has a life expectancy of 51.4 years. Unless paroled, at $50K per year, his "rehabilitation" will cost society $1.3 million.

Consider the following scenarios:

-- Gunman X walks across the campus at Augustana College, shooting and killing everybody in sight. When Rock Island Police officers arrive, the gunman shoots at them. Can the officers use deadly force to stop the killing spree? Can an officer use deadly force to prevent himself from being shot? Or does the gunman's "inalienable dignity" and the fact that his life is "sacred" mean that his person is inviolate from the officer's use of deadly force?

-- The Iranians finally develop a nuclear weapon. They are intent on wiping Israel off the map. Each Iranian's life is "sacred," and each Iranian is "endowed with an inalienable dignity." Can Israel launch a pre-emptive strike and kill Iranians to prevent its own extermination, or must Israel accept nuclear destruction, and await the eventual "rehabilitation" of the Iranian state and its people?

-- Would the Jewish people have been justified in using deadly force to assassinate Hitler and other Nazi leaders prosecuting the Holocaust? Were Hitler, Himmler and others all endowed with an "inalienable dignity?" Were England, the USSR and the USA wrong to make war on Hitler and his allies?

I can accept the proposition that every person is born with an "inalienable dignity." I also can accept the proposition that no man or government can take away an innocent man's "inalienable dignity." And I accept the proposition that "the right to life is the first and most fundamental principle of human rights." But if human life is truly sacred, and worthy of protection, then there must be some mechanism or mechanisms to protect it.

As the Jews were being exterminated during the Holocaust learned, prayers and papal teachings did not do the job.

I would, therefore, posit a fourth proposition: "A man himself can forfeit his own dignity and his right to life by taking or making war on innocent life."

A man who employs deadly force against the innocent, invites use of deadly force against him. That can be either force used in self defense or in defense of others. Without the right of self-defense and the right to defend others, the right to life of the innocent is illusory, and is alienable at the whim of every prospective murderer, school shooter, or would-be Hitler or Stalin.

I have never been in favor of applying the death penalty in all cases of murder; but in some cases, like St. Thomas Aquinas, I believe it is justified and indeed necessary and proportionate.

Assume that the Umpqua murderer, had been taken alive, convicted and imprisoned for "rehabilitative" purposes. If he thereafter murdered two prison guards in an effort to escape and attack the next community college, the death penalty to me would seem reasonable, necessary and proportionate.

The death penalty should remain disfavored, but available.

If a home owner or a police officer can use deadly force to defend his own life, based on an instantaneous judgment, without a trial and appeals of any sort, it seems bizarre that a state cannot impose the death penalty after a fair jury trial and the innumerable appeals that follow -- if the sentence is reasonable, necessary and proportionate.

If a nation can enter a "just war' and kill millions without anything in the nature of a trial, why can it not execute a murder after an fair trial and appeals which demonstrate the fairness, necessity and proportionality of the sentence?

And for those who don't know, death sentences are reviewed with the strictest scrutiny known to the law.




























Posted: Tuesday, October 13, 2015 11:00 pm QCOnline.com
By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015
John Donald O'Shea

Papal Visit Rekindles Debate: Does God Exist?

"I wouldn't be in such a hurry to see them go, if I were you. With them goes the last semblance of law and order."  -- Rhett Bulter talking about the Confederate Troops to Scarlett O'Hara in "Gone With the Wind"

The Pope’s trip to the U.S. serves to remind us of the most fundamental of questions: Is there a God? If not, the Pope speaks for himself.

But if there is a God, what sort of God? A God content to merely create/set the physical universe in motion? A God each of us can know by searching within ourselves? The God of Moses, the lawgiver, who ordains right and wrong? A God who has incarnated and died to expiate man’s sins? A God who loves and nurtures each of us as his children?

But what if there is no God? Does each of us then become a god unto ourselves? Can there be any objective right or wrong? Any afterlife? Any reward for good; any punishment for evil. Or are good and evil merely subjective? And if subjective, whose view prevails? In a world where all men are equal, does not every man have the right to determine his own right and wrong?


If there is no God, what is the source of morality?  If there is no God, the Pope can’t be God’s agent. Without a God, the Pope is just another man. In the absence of God, does legality (and illegality) replace morality (and immorality)?

Many Holocaust survivors and other skeptics ask, “How can a just and loving God have permitted Auschwitz? What is presently taking place in the Middle East? How can God allow evil to destroy good? A great many people conclude “God is dead.”

 “The horror of Auschwitz is a stark challenge to many of the more conventional ideas of God. The remote god of philosophers, lost in a transcendent apatheia, become intolerable.  Many Jews can no longer subscribe to the biblical idea of God who manifest himself in history, who they say ... died   in Auschwitz. The idea of a personal God ... is fraught with difficulty. If this God is omnipotent, he could have prevented the Holocaust.  If he was unable to stop it, he was impotent and useless. If he could have stopped it and chose not to, he is a monster.”

The logical consequence of “the death of God” manifests itself in Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals. For Alinsky, the notion of personal morality and moral notions of right and wrong are irrelevant to the good of mankind. Only the good of society matters.

His “Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.”

As to the “ends and the means”, Alinsky writes,

“Life and how you live it is the story of means and ends. The ‘end’ is what you want, and the ‘means’ is how you get it. ... The man of action views the issue of means and ends in pragmatic and strategic terms. He has no other problem; he thinks only of his actual resources and the  possibilities of various choices of action. He asks of ends only whether they are achievable and worth the cost;  of means, only whether they will work.”

As long as the “means” chosen will work, Alinsky has no moral constraints.

“One does not always enjoy the luxury of a decision that is consistent both with one’s individual conscience and the good of mankind. The choice must always be for the latter. Action is for mass salvation and not for the individual’s personal salvation.”

In Alinsky’s Utopia, there is no objective truth.

“An organizer  ... does not have a fixed truth -- truth to him is relative and changing; everything to him is relative and changing. ... We live in a world where ‘good’ is a value dependent on whether we want it. ... The Haves want to keep; the Have-Nots want to get.”

Alinsky’s Utopia scares the hell out of me. It’s a world in which I have no wish to live. It is a world of plunder and extermination.

Hitler and Stalin both believed they were working for the betterment of their people. They were men of action, untroubled by notions of personal morality.

Hitler exterminated 6 million Jews, as well as his political opponents, the mentally deficient, Poles, Slavs, gypsies --  all for the betterment of the Aryan Race and to provide  “living space” for the German people.

Stalin used murder, assassination, psychological terror, beatings, threats, torture, forced confessions and secret tribunals to eliminate all opposition to his rule, including from within the Communist Party itself. The Red Army was purged, along with the “rich peasants” who opposed “collectivization,” and the “intelligentsia.” According to the declassified Soviet archives, during 1937 and 1938, the Secret Police detained 1,548,366 persons, of whom 681,692 were shot. During that two-year period, between 950,000 and 1.2 million were either shot, or died in the gulags.

Like Alinsky and Hitler, employed whatever means worked to eliminate all opposition.
So, if God is dead, there can be no objective good, no objective evil.

Morality becomes subjective. We are all gods, and, as Rhett Butler warned, “might becomes right.”
The state, possessed of overwhelming power, eventually enslaves and destroys or the individual.
I can’t prove God exists; but I dread a world without him and without Christian teachings made in his name.

Posted: Tuesday, October 6, 2015 11:00 pm, QCOnline

By John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

Lie Detectors, Body Cams - Modest Proposal

The president would like to see all policemen wear body cameras. I think the president is right. But I don't think he's going far enough.

If he's really serious, he should demand that body cams be worn by all state and federal politicians, and insist that they record all of their conversations and meetings — every last one! For members of the executive department, he could easily do this by executive order.

After all, he delights in telling us he has a "pen." And while he's at it, why doesn't he demand that every politician wears his own personal lie detector? And when he says, "politicians," he could define the term loosely enough to include candidates for the presidency, House and Senate.

Why am I supporting the president, and encouraging him onward and upward?

I think body cams for cops are a good idea, not because I distrust policemen, but rather because I distrust a great many of the people with whom they are forced to interact. And I suggest body cams and lie detectors because I distrust Washington and Springfield politicians even more! They prove daily that they can do far greater damage.

In the years I was on the bench I handled a small number of cases where I felt the officer used excessive force. In one such case, Suspect A stuck out his foot and tripped the officer pursuing Suspect B. The officer retaliated by whacking the big-footed A with his Mag-light. I felt the officer used a tad more than necessary force, but I really would have liked to have seen a video of the whole transaction. It's entirely possible that the officer's whack was proportionate.

But more often, it wasn't the officer who was in the wrong. I recall one case in the days when I was a prosecutor when a deputy arrived at the scene of an armed robbery as the defendants were fleeing the scene. One turned and fired on the officer. I would like to have been able to see exactly what happened. Did the defendant just shoot in the general direction of the officer to scare him? Or did he take aim and try to kill the officer?

Similarly, if I were a lone officer approaching a stopped vehicle on Interstate 80, in addition to a dash camera, I would want a body camera as I approached the stopped car at 2 a.m.

The dash cam only sees from one angle.The body cam may well show a defendant reaching for a weapon or making a threatening move from a different angle to justify the police officer's response.

But just as dash cams and body cams are useful to protect citizens and police officers from over-reach, I think they may be a good deal more valuable in protecting the public from rapacious and unethical Washington and Springfield politicians. Sadly for too many politicians, body cams would not be enough. For far too many, lying has become a way of life. A police officer's misconduct can hurt individuals; corrupt politicians can injure the whole nation. With a politician it's not enough to see and hear what he's saying.

The average citizen does not have time to fact-check what the president, the speaker, the majority and minority leaders and the candidates are telling them. A lie-detector would save the voters a lot of time, and instantly alert them to fibs, white lies and worse. And if the government can hand out cellphones, why not body cams and lie detectors?

Consider the usefulness of those devices in answering the following questions:

— How does a man or woman with no accumulated wealth when he or she goes to Washington or Springfield, retire 30 years later with millions of dollars in his bank account? If the politician was hooked up to a lie detector, we could ask that question, and know whether his "frugality" explanation was truthful or a lie.

— What could an ex-president or his secretary of state spouse possibly say during the course of a speech that would be worth $240,000 to the payer? Is it possible the payer was attempting to buy influence? Imagine if the explanation had to pass lie detector scrutiny!

— Would Lois Lerner — and whoever talked to her about "giving special scrutiny to requests by conservative groups for tax exempt status" — have done what she/they did, had all government officials involved been wearing body cams in recording mode, and attached to lie detectors?

And what if every meeting with every lobbyist/potential lobbyist had to be recorded on the Congressman's body cam? And be subject to lie detector evaluation?

And since the mark of a true leader is to ask your men to do nothing that you yourself wouldn't do, it seems only right that President Obama immediately strap both instruments on himself — first! Even before issuing his executive order!

Posted: Friday, September 25, 2015 11:00 pm | Updated: 11:06 pm, Fri Sep 25, 2015. QCOnline.com

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea

Every Single Life Matters - All of the Time

A group of people, calling themselves "Black Lives Matter" recently marched in Minnesota in support of that proposition. So how do truly concerned people, carrying signs in support of that proposition also chant, "Pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon"?

Do black lives really matter to people who call for cops -- white or black - to be killed and put in body bags? Would life be better in the black community -- or any community -- if there were no cops? No white cops? No black cops?

After watching the "Black Lives Matter" in Minnesota, a friend of mine said, "If Black Lives Matter, they should matter always, every day, and not just when they are lost at the hands of police." I wholly agree with that, but would go further. I believe all lives matter always.

One-hundred-fifty years ago, Abe Lincoln repeatedly said something that many Americans judged to be politically incorrect. But he may have said it best in his debate at Galesburg with Stephen A. Douglas:

"Now, I confess myself as belonging to that class in the country who contemplate slavery as a moral, social and political evil ...  [and] desire a policy that looks to the prevention of it as a wrong -- that it may come to an end."

That belief was shared by roughly 500,000 northern men who gave their lives during our Civil War.

Sadly, 150 years after Abe Lincoln and the Civil War, there still appear to be a significant number of people to whom lives -- black, white or fetal -- don't matter.

If you think that I am wrong, ask yourself these questions, and ask yourself if the Black Lives Matter movement even addresses these issues?

Do black lives really matter to the heroin dealer -- black or white -- who sells the drug in the black community?

Do they matter to the cocaine and "crack" dealers -- black or white -- who sell in the black community?

Do black lives matter to the black or white gang member who fires a pistol at a black member of a rival gang?

Who fires down a city street where black children are playing, or sitting on their porches with their mothers or grandmothers?

Do black lives of children matter to the black or white father who impregnates a black teenage girl and them immediately moves on? Who never sees or supports his child? Who never acts as father to his child?

Do black lives matter to the young black woman who aborts her fetus? Is the black fetus a life?

Do black lives matter to the black or white gunman who holds up and shoots the black owner of the neighborhood grocery store or gas station?

Do black lives matter to black or white rioters who burn down black neighborhoods?

Do black lives matter to young black men who drop out of school, and waste a chance to be educated, the same chance afforded young white men in the same school?

Do black lives matter when black and white people march and chant, "Pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon.”

My bottom line is this: ALL lives matter. For me, "all" includes fetal life, the disabled and the elderly, and regardless of whether those lives are black, white, or any other race or color.

I understand the idea of saying things and doing things to call attention to your movement. But I think it is impossible to have a just society based on hatred and evil. Saul Alinsky rule of "means and ends" is this: "The man of action views the issue of means and ends in pragmatic and strategic terms. He has no other problem; ... He asks of ends only whether the ends are achievable and worth the cost; of means, only whether they will work."

But if pragmatism is the only test of "means," how would killing all the cops make life in the black community an iota better? How would it stop the drug dealing? Gang shootings? The murder of infants on their front porches? Does anybody seriously believe that all black deaths are caused by police shootings?

In recent days, we have seen a spate of ambushes of police officers doing nothing more that sitting in or driving squad cars. Do this really help the black community? The white community? Anybody?

If we are all created in the image and likeness of God, then how can any man of good will kill his neighbor -- or even call for the death of his neighbor -- who is doing him no wrong?

And ask your self if the Black Lives Matter movement even addresses these issues.

Posted: Friday, September 18, 2015 11:00 pm,  QCOnline.com

by John Donald O'Shea

Copyright 2015

John Donald O'Shea