HALF-FULL REPORT 01/23/15

King Salmon – that’s Alaska’s State Fish.  Because of its "high oil content," says one seafood website, it’s "the richest salmon in the world."  But why all the headlines about it this morning?

Oh… sorry… that’s King Salman, the new ruler of Saudi Arabia.  It’s so easy to get vowels mixed up as written Arabic doesn’t have them.  Actually, Salman has been running things for some time now, with his half-brother Abdullah who died last night so old at 90 he hardly knew who he was.

That half-brother distinction, though, is important.  The founder of the Saud family’s personal country, Ibn Saud (1876-1953) had two dozen wives and three dozen sons, with his favorite wife of all – Hassa bint Sudairi – mother of seven:  the famous Sudairi Seven. 

They’ve been the locus of power in the Kingdom for decades, with one – King Fahd – ruling from 1982 to 2005.  Salman is one of them – Abdullah wasn’t, he had a different mom – which means the Sudairi Seven and their sons are back in the Saudi saddle again.

That’s why Salman wasted no time this morning replacing Abdullah’s relatives with his own.  He’s got to be in a hurry as he won’t be around for long either – he’s 79 with persistent reports (such as in The Economist) he has Alzheimer’s.

Thus the Saudi Kingdom could be in beaucoup deep kimchee.  For, like the Former Soviet Union, it’s not a real country but a colonial empire within its own borders. 

A history of that with pics is appended below, but for now here’s a shot I took of the Ibn Saud Conquest Map inside the Masmak Fort in Riyadh.

 

Note the arrows pointing down at the bottom left.  Now here’s a map of Saudi provinces today.  Note the three at the bottom left: Asir, Najran, and Jizan.

 

Ibn Saud stole them with military force from Yemen, forcing Yemen to cede them in 1934 with the Treaty of Taïf. 

The Saudi Royals are Wahhabi Sunni Moslems dedicated to extinguishing any rival Islamic sect.  The people of Asir and Jizan, for example, are traditionally Zaidi Shia Moslem – just like the folks across the now-border in northern Yemen.

Yesterday (1/22), the New York Times reported the fall of the Yemen government to Houthi rebels from the north.  The Houthis are Zaidis and are backed by Riyadh’s arch-enemy, the Shia mullahs of Iran. 

There should be little doubt now that Tehran will soon be prompting Yemen’s new Houthi-run government to initiate a Zaidi rebellion in Asir and Jizan as one move among others to destabilize the Saudi internal empire.

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It gets worse. King Salman faces a far more mortal threat from Iran than fomenting Zaidi rebellions.  Iran Goes Ballistic is an intensely sobering report issued this week by the Middle East Quarterly.  Tehran now has over 1,000 missiles with conventional warheads aimed at Saudi oilfields and other soft targets.  

Should Saudi oil production be destroyed, the damage to the global economy would be almost incalculable.  The threat is real, the entire report is certainly worth reading.

It gets still worse – much worse – of course because we have a JOTUS indifferent to virtually any threat to the US and its vital interests.  He doesn’t care because he really doesn’t want to defend us against them.

The "J" is for his smirking jerk behavior during what the HFR calls his SOTN – State of the Narcissist-speech on Tuesday (1/20).  The best put down of him was by Ted Cruz, who told FoxNews’ Megyn Kelly:

"You know, (Obama’s speech)  reminds me of the classic Saturday Night Live skit with Christopher Walken, where there’s a band playing and his solution to every problem is ‘More cowbell! More cowbell!’ For President Obama ‘More cowbell’ is ‘More taxes! More government! More taxes! More government!’"

The More Cowbell sketch, with Will Ferrell on the cowbell, is legendarily funny.  Here’s an excerpt:

It’s good to laugh at Zero, but the bottom line is scary serious:  he’s a fascist.  That needs to be said everywhere repeatedly:  President Barack Obama is a fascist. 

His only solution to any problem whatever is more government control over people.  That’s fascism. 

He will not brook any disagreement or opposition or laws or Constitution in his way.  That’s fascism. 

He’s contemptuous of democracy.  When he said the November 2014 elections would be a referendum on his policies, and the elections overwhelmingly rejected them, he dismissed the outcome entirely and demanded his policies be accepted regardless.  That’s fascism.

With his speech on Tuesday, he proved beyond any rational doubt that he is a fascist.  He needs to be denounced as such everywhere.

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There should also be no doubt who the HFR Hero of the Week is:  Clint Eastwood.

Clint’s American Sniper is more than a blockbuster, with its first week box office of $135.8 million.  It is more than a movie.  It is a game-changing cultural phenomenon.  Every seat in every theatre (3,700 in the US) is sold out.  The best review I’ve seen so far is David French’s.  Thanks to Clint, who both produced and directed American Sniper:

"Chris Kyle has entered the pantheon of American warriors – along with Alvin C. York and Audie Murphy – giving a new generation of young boys a warrior-hero to look up to, to emulate. After all, our kids’ heroes can’t be – must not be – exclusively quarterbacks, rappers, or point guards…

(The Left’s) backlash may cost the movie an Oscar – but Clint Eastwood has done something far greater than win an Oscar. He reached a great nation with a story it needed to hear."

Clint is also Hero of the Week for sending the entire Libtard Elite of America into a total apoplexy of rage that we haven’t enjoyed in a long time.  It’s so much fun to see them so mad. 

Thanks, Clint. This is your crowning achievement, an ode to heroic patriotism for America and its military, and just when we needed it.  Congratulations from an old friend.

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Speaking of congratulations… a tip of the TTP tam o’shanter goes to Israeli President Bibi Netanyahu for spitting in Zero’s face.  That is what he did according to the bozos in the White House, and it’s precisely what Zero deserves.

Zero is especially ticked at Bibi for killing key commanders of Hezbollah and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards before they could attack Israel.  Bibi hit real pay dirt with that, which is the real spit on Zero’s smirking face.

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There’s a lady who deserves an Honorable Hero Mention for the week.  Her name is Carol Swain, Professor of Political Science and Law at Vanderbilt.

Last week (1/15), she wrote an op-ed published in The Tennessean, Nashville’s main paper, entitled "Charlie Hebdo Attacks Prove Critics Right About Islam."   

Every libtard student on campus went into a tizzy of dhimmitude, kissing the behind of every incensed moose-limb among them.  The news report to read is The Daily Caller’s ereyesterday (1/21):  Vanderbilt Muslims Seek to Bully Black Professor into Silence.

Vandy’s Islamofascists are demanding that Prof. Swain’s words be labeled "hate speech" – that her speech be restricted, that she not be allowed "to say these kinds of things on a campus that’s so liberal and diverse and tolerant."

And what did Prof. Swain say that she not be allowed to in the name of diversity and tolerance?  An example:

"Islam is a dangerous set of beliefs totally incompatible with Western beliefs concerning freedom of speech, freedom of assembly and freedom of association."

Are Vandy libtards that retarded to not see their actions prove her words?  And their parents shell out $55,000 a year for them to go there?  They must be dumber than their kids.

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Witch of the Week award goes to Congresswoman Renee Ellmers of Florida for unconscionably scuttling the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act.

There’s no excuse whatever for blocking a ban on abortions after 20 weeks.  That’s more than enough time for a woman to claim she was raped, the victim of incest, or anything else.  Any decent person who is "pro-choice" should advocate there must be a time-limit to the choice. 20 weeks is enough already. 

For a woman to claim she is "pro-life" and do this… well, no wonder Ellmers is being known as "Abortion Barbie."

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Winner of You-Can’t-Make-This-Headline-Up award of the week:

Breast Implant Leak Delays Congressman Wife’s Bigamy Trial

Especially when it’s about the biggest horse’s ass in Congress, Alan Grayson.

Best headline of the entire week:  1700 Private Jets Fly to Davos to Discuss Global Warming

Suspicions Confirmed Dept.:  A Majority of Senators Are Idiots.  Evidence: Majority of Senators Vote to Affirm Climate Change Is Not a Hoax and Is Caused by Humans.  Just five out of 54 Pubs, though: Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Susan Collins of Maine. 

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Idiocy is one thing, bordering on treason is another:  New GOP Border Security Bill Removes Border Fences – Spends $10 Billion and Deports No Illegals.

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We’ll close with our HFR Health & Fitness Note.

Something I’ve used and never traveled without for 30 years now is DMSO – di-methyl-sulfoxide.  A natural by-product of converting wood into wood pulp for paper, back in the 50s workers in the mills discovered it was amazingly effective at healing sprains, bruises, and burns.

Its use spread as a word-of-mouth cottage industry until it attracted the attention of the FDA back in the 60s, as people were making and selling something medical without the bureaucrats’ approval.  So the FDA attacked it, smeared it, and banned it for anything but very narrow uses requiring a doctor to administer.

The end run was to make it for vets and trainers to heal sprains and other such injuries for their horses.  By now pharmaceutical grade 99% pure DMSO is for sale on Amazon.  Also on a host of other sites, such as dmso.com.  Screw the FDA.

I first started using it in my heavy sky-diving days back in the 80s as it would erase black-and-blue bruises from rough landings – or if I ever sprained my wrist or thumb in a wipe-out on a black diamond ski run. Muscle soreness after a workout – gone.  It was like magic.

It still is.  I always carry a roll-on bottle wherever I go.  I make sure to wash it off with water after a few minutes – it might sting otherwise.  DMSO – amazing stuff.

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 That’s a wrap.  Here’s that note on Saudi history I promised.

Appendix: The Saudi Colonial Empire

The Soviet Union was a Russian Imperial Empire with Marxism-Leninism as its ideological justification. Saudi Arabia is an imperial empire of the Saudi family with Wahhabism as its ideological justification.

The Saud family comes from the central plateau of Arabia, a region called Najd. The dynasty’s founder, Mohammed ibn Saud (d. 1765), ruled the Diriyah oasis near present-day Riyadh.

In 1744 he formed a mithaq or covenant with the leader of a puritanical sect professing strict adherence to the Hanbali interpretation of Islam (after Ahmed Hanbal d. 855), Mohammed ibn Abdul Wahhab (1703-1792).

Saud would provide armed protection for Wahhab who, in turn would provide religious legitimacy for Saud’s conquering other Najd oases and nomadic Bedouin tribes.

Saudi-Wahhabi imperialism spread across Arabia like Russian Communism spread over Eurasia. In April 1802, a Saudi-Wahhabi army sacked Karbala in present-day Iraq, butchering 4,000 Shiites and destroying the tomb of Mohammed’s grandson Hussein.

In 1803, much of the Moslem holy cities of Mecca and Medina were destroyed, and by 1805 Baghdad itself was threatened. The Ottoman Turks and their Egyptian allies finally pushed them back into the Najd deserts.

On January 15, 1902, Mohammed ibn Saud’s great-grandson Abdul Aziz bin Abdul Rahman Al-Saud — known to history as Ibn Saud — leading a group of Wahhabis seized control of the town of Riyadh from the rival Rashidi family, and declared he was Emir of Najd.

By 1913, Ibn Saud had enough Wahhabi soldiers to conquer the Hasa region of eastern Arabia, and by 1921 to conquer the Häil region in northern Arabia.

In December 1925, Ibn Saud invaded the Kingdom of Hejaz along Arabia’s west coast, including Mecca and Medinia, with Ibn Saud now declaring he was King of Hejaz-Najd.

The following year, he invaded the Kingdom of Yemen. British and Italian forces were able to keep him from conquering the entire country, but not to kick him out of Yemen’s northern provinces.

In 1932, Ibn Saud announced his personal country was to be known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

In 1934, the Treaty of Taïf was signed formally ceding the Yemeni states of Asir, Najran, and Jizan to be incorporated into the Saudi state.

All of these conquered provinces are not Wahhabi. The majority of their populations reject the Hanbali version of Islam. There are four madhahib or schools of law in orthodox Sunni Islam.

Most of the folks in Hejaz ascribe to one of the other three, Shafi, Hanafi, and Malaki. The Hanbali Wahhabis denounce the Shafis as Sufi mystics and the Malakis as deviants. All the Hanafis have been driven underground.

Almost the entire population of Najran, members of the Yam tribe, are Ismaili Shias, followers of the Aga Khan.

In Asir and Jizan, folks ascribe to the Zaidi  or "Fiver" Shia Islam practiced in northern Yemen. The Wahhabis have closed Zaidi mosques and forbid the Ismailis from making their distinct call to prayer.

Over 10% of the native population in Saudi Arabia — 2 million out of 19 million — are not Sunnis at all. They are "Twelver" Shias, and they are concentrated in Hasa — right across the Persian Gulf from Shia Iran and right next to all those Shias in southern Iraq.

They are discriminated against in every way by the ruling Saudi-Wahhabi elite, who commonly refer to them as rafida, an Islamic insult equivalent to "nigger." Just as the Sunnis oppressed the Shias in Saddam’s Iraq, so have they done in Saudi.

Here’s the kicker. Saudi Arabia has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, currently at 264 billion barrels. The majority of those reserves are in the east — where all those Wahhabi-hating Shias are.

You can see that modern Saudi history begins with Ibn Saud’s raid on the Rashidi family fortress of Masmak in Riyadh.  It’s now very well preserved as a museum.  Here are some photos I took of it in 2011.

The Masmak Fort:

Commemorating sign and painting of the raid:

Yours truly at the wooden gate that has the original bullet holes and spearhead tips still embedded.  This is how and where the Kingdom began.

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