BALTIMORE, MARYLAND APRIL 14, 2015 - The Credible and Incisive Column resumes today after the author's back surgery. As of today it will again be at least a daily column.
Agreement in Principal May Have Been No Agreement at All
The essential and always intellectual Charles Krauthammer said recently that he believes the Obama administration lied when it said it had reached an agreement in principal with Iran on the issue of Iran building its own nuclear weapons. Part of the reason for his conclusion, he said, was the immediate rift between American and Iranian spokesmen on whether western sanctions placed on Iran many years ago will disappear the minute the agreement is finally signed, or will be slowly phased out on a set schedule. Iran, predictably, says the sanctions must disappear at once. Corroborating this really sullen stance is the fact that Iran has always said that any agreement it reaches with the west must be accompanied by the immediate cessation of all economic sanctons. Krauthammer reasoned that the only way Obama could keep the talks going without Congressional interference - with interference being Obama's chosen word, and not the GOP's - was to announce a tentative agreement or, in the Obama vernacular, an "agreement in principal; i.e., one that wasn't written down, and then to spin the agreement with false facts that many would approve of. The number one false fact, of course, was that the Iranians had agreed to scale back their nuke program whiule at the same time keeping economic sanctions in place in large part. Iranian spokesmen seemed increduloous, if, indeed, an Iranian spokesman knows how to feign such an emotion. I believe Mr. Krauthammer is on to something.
Hilary's Extremely Boring Entry Into Presidential Sweepstakes
It is a given that people across the country will not be waiting in line to hear Hilary Clinton gripe about what? Obama? Bush? Bill? If this cuastiuc woman cannot gripe, she is emotionless. This week many former and even current confederates are taking a shot at describinh her trash mouth and downright gnarly temper. I know that excites me. There are a few comedians with foul mouths who manage to use that schtick as a stepping stone to a comedic style. And it works if you aren't at the show with your mom. But Hilary has a foul mouth and perpetual bad mood for no known reason. About the only real interest in Hilary is entirely negative. She has no original ideas; not one. Several times in the last week some Hilary functionary was asked to name three accomplishments of hers while in public life. Many cannot even name one. Can you? I cannot. Yet we are told she would be a fine president. She would be a nightmare. It is guaranteed she would reprise Obama's stale far-left Agenda without admitting or even reaiizing that she is ripping America apart at the seams.
It is positively depressing that so feckless a person is deemed her party's consensus candidate. She is not a leader in any area relevant to government or public life. She tried to engineer a public health overhaul at the outset of her husband's first term as President but failed miserably. Many blamed her involvement as the reason the initiative failed. I had read many years ago that she was uncommonly mean to the Whitehouse Staff, many of them older black Americans with no political agenda but an uncommonly large amount of common sense. Yet she constantly berated them. I will admit that it bothered me a lot. People who are mean and ignorant to other people, especially those who would have a difficult time fighting back, to me have little to recommend them. The idea of somebody like her being President isn't just scary, it is deptessing. Of course, the idea that a fringe leftist with an old, stale, far out political agenda is just as deptressing. I've been depressed now, politically, for about six years, going on eight. If Hilary Clinton is the best the Democrats can do, the party is in deep trouble. And here I thought the party's big problem was its takeover by far left fanatics.
Dawn Mission Has Scientists Waiting Anxiously for Next Round of Photos From Ceres; What are the Lights?
The photographs of Ceres sent back to Earth from the Dawn Spacecraft in early March were, to say the least, Sensational. At he bottom of a large but otherwise undistinguished crater on this otherwise unspectacular asteroid were two very brilliant lights. One was far more brilliant than the oehter. Both were quite small considering the amount of light they were emitting. The only theories as to what these lights are were nothing more than educated guesses.
Upon reflection, scientists realized that the lights had been there for quite a long time. The Hubble Space Telescope had photographed Ceres back in 2004, and although detail in the photos was typical of pioctures made from so far across the solar system, scientists knew going in that something was casting a britlliant light on the surface of Ceres, not far north of the asteroid's equator. The Hubble photos did not reveal that there were two lights, or that they were very small for the amount of light being emitted.
Scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory say the next series of photos were taken by Dawn on April 10 and April 14, but that neither will provide good views of the two lights. The spacecraft is in the process of descending into a lwer orbit and photos taken later this month will be from far closer than the ones taken in March, when Dawn was still tens of thousands of miles from Ceres. The April 10 photos were said to not include the area of the planet's surface where the lights are. The ones taken today may or may not, but even if they are included it will not be an optimal view. We are told to stay tuned, more or less.
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