Iran’s underground nuclear sites not immune to U.S. bunker-busters, experts say

Western spy agencies for years have kept watch on a craggy peak in northwest Iran that houses of one the world’s most unusual nuclear sites. Known as Fordow, the facility is built into mountain bunkers designed to withstand aerial attack. Iran’s civil-defense chief has declared the site “impregnable.”

But impregnable it is not, say U.S. military planners who are increasingly confident of their ability to deliver a serious blow against Fordow, should the president ever order an attack.

U.S. officials say they have no imminent plan to bombard the site, and they have cautioned that an American attack — or one by its closest Middle Eastern ally, Israel — risks devastating consequences such as soaring oil prices, Iranian retaliation and dramatically heightened tension in a fragile region.

Yet as a matter of physics, Fordow remains far more vulnerable than generally portrayed, said current and former military and intelligence analysts. Massive new “bunker buster” munitions recently added to the U.S. arsenal would not necessarily have to penetrate the deepest bunkers to cause irreparable damage to infrastructure as well as highly sensitive nuclear equipment, likely setting back Iran’s program by years, officials said.

The weapons’ capabilities are likely to factor in discussions with a stream of Israelis leaders arriving in Washington over the next week. The Obama administration will seek to assure the visitors, including Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, of U.S. resolve to stop Iran if it decides to build a nuclear bomb. White House officials are worried that Israel may launch a preemptive strike against Iran with little or no warning, a move U.S. officials argue would be do little to stop Iran’s nuclear ambitions and may in fact deepen Iran’s determination to become a nuclear state.

In arguing their case, U.S. officials acknowledged some uncertainty over whether even the Pentagon’s newest “bunker-buster” weapon — called the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or MOP — could pierce in a single blow the subterranean chambers where Iran is making enriched uranium. But they said a sustained U.S. attack over multiple days would probably render the plant unusable by collapsing tunnels and irreparably damaging both its highly sensitive centrifuge equipment and the miles of pipes, tubes and wires required to operate it.

“Hardened facilities require multiple sorties,” said a former senior intelligence official who has studied the formerly secret Fordow site and agreed to discuss sensitive details of U.S. strike capabilities on the condition of anonymity. “The question is, how many turns do you get at the apple?”

U.S. confidence has been reinforced by training exercises in which bombers assaulted similar targets in deeply buried bunkers and mountain tunnels, the officials and experts said.

U.S. officials have raised the necessity of multiple strikes as they warn Israel against a unilateral strike against Iran’s nuclear installations, the officials said. While Israel is capable of launching its own bunker-buster bombs against Fordow, it lacks both the United States’ more advanced munitions and the capability of waging a sustained bombing campaign over days and weeks, U.S. officials and analysts said.

The U.S.-Israeli rift over the urgency of stopping Iran’s nuclear progress stems in part from the belief among some Israeli officials that their window for successfully attacking Iran’s nuclear installations is rapidly closing as it moves key assets into bunkers. Barak, in a speech this month, spoke of Iran’s progress in creating a “zone of immunity” for its nuclear program.

To U.S. military planners, the “zone of immunity,” if it exists at all, is still years away. The Obama administration, while not ruling out a future strike, regards military action as a last resort, preferring to allow more time for changing Iran’s behavior through economic and political pressure.

U.S. officials also remain unconvinced that Iran has decided to build a nuclear bomb, though they believe it is pursuing the capacity to do so. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful energy production.

Fordow is in the barren hills of northwestern Iran just outside Qom, the ancient city that is the spiritual home of the 1979 revolutionary movement. U.S. intelligence officials believe that tunneling began nearly a decade ago for what was intended to be a secret uranium enrichment site that would operate parallel to the country’s much larger, declared enrichment plant at Natanz.

The CIA began monitoring the site at least four years ago, and in 2009, President Obama, flanked by other world leaders, publicly exposed the partially built facility and demanded that Iran come clean about its intentions.

Iran acknowledged that it was building a second uranium-enrichment plant and soon allowed the International Atomic Energy Agency in for a visit. The U.N. inspectors saw a series of chambers built into the side of a mountain and connected by tunnels with thick walls and blast-proof doors. Some of the bunkers were protected by as much 200 to 300 feet of mountain.

The underground plant — not yet fully operational — is relatively small, with space for only about 3,000 centrifuges, compared with the tens of thousands planned for Natanz. But analysts say it’s big enough to process the enriched uranium necessary for at least one nuclear weapon a year, should Iran decide to build them.

Iran started enriching uranium in the Fordow plant in January. A report by U.N. inspectors last week confirmed that the plant is making a purer form of enriched uranium that can be relatively easily converted to weapons-grade fuel.

Iran has publicly defended Fordow’s unusually robust fortification, citing repeated threats by Israel to destroy the country’s nuclear program.

Western analysts believe Fordow has not only the protection afforded by natural rock but also additional hardening that draws on North Korean bunker-building expertise. A report last week by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, said the facility was believed to include multiple “blast-proof doors, extensive divider walls, hardened ceilings, 20-centimeter-thick concrete walls, and double concrete ceilings with earth filled between layers.”

“Such passive defenses could have a major impact” in blunting the impact of an aerial bombardment, said the report, written by Anthony Cordesman, a former director of intelligence assessment at the Defense Department and now the holder of CSIS’s Arleigh A. Burke Chair in strategy.

Cordesman acknowledged that reports about such fortification “are often premature, exaggerated, or report far higher construction standards than are actually executed.”

Still, current and former U.S. officials acknowledge that Fordow’s fortifications far exceed those of other facilities encountered in other conflicts, including the al-Taji bunkers that shielded Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s command posts on the eve of the 2003 Iraq invasion.

Against such a target, the United States has an array of conventional bunker-busting weapons. They include the 5,000-pound BLU-122, capable of penetrating more than 20 feet of concrete or 100 feet of earth before detonating, as well as the far more powerful Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or MOP, a 30,000-pound titan that can be delivered by the country’s largest strategic bombers. Although the weapon’s precise capabilities are classified, the MOP is estimated to be capable of boring through up to 200 feet of dirt and rock before exploding.

The Pentagon is investing tens of millions of dollars to further enhance the MOP’s explosive punch and concrete-piercing capabilities. Some also note that the weapon’s performance is partly dependent on geology, particularly the type and density of the rock through which the bomb passes.

It’s impossible to know precisely what the impact of a bomb would be against such a difficult target. Certainly, U.S. warplanes would set back Iran’s nuclear efforts, said Michael Eisenstadt, a former military adviser to the State Department and Pentagon.

But for how long?

“You never really know until you do it,” said Eisenstadt, director of Military and Security Studies for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “We may be so close to the outer performance limits of the current technology that it becomes a roll of the dice.”

Yet, ultimately, the ability to destroy the Fordow does not depend on whether a bomb physically penetrates the cavern where Iran’s centrifuges are operating, several analysts said.

“There are good outcomes short of destroying” the centrifuge hall, Cordesman said in an interview. Strikes against more accessible targets — from tunnel entrances and air shafts to power and water systems — can effectively knock the plant out of action. Repeated strikes will also make Iran fearful of attempting to repair the damage, he added.

Other analysts stressed the particular vulnerability of centrifuges, machines that spin at supersonic speeds to purify uranium gas into the enriched form usable in nuclear applications. Almost anything that upsets delicately balanced machines — from shock waves and debris to power disruptions — can render them useless, said one former Pentagon official who also requested anonymity in discussing potential Iranian targets.

“If you can target the one piece of critical equipment instead of the whole thing, isn’t that just as good?” the official said. “Even by reducing the entrances to rubble, you’ve effectively entombed the site.”

MEDIA FINALLY PAYING ATTENTION TO ELIGIBILITY?

PHOENIX, Ariz. – Poll after poll in recent months has revealed that Americans have a high level of concern over Barack Obama’s eligibility to be president, with one poll revealing fully half of the nation wants Congress to investigate the question.

But mostly reporters for the traditional media – networks, major newspapers, major news corporations and conglomerates – have giggled when talk turns to the serious question of just what – exactly – does the U.S. Constitution require of presidents.

But that’s changing, as media organizations from all political persuasions seek admittance to a news conference to be held by Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz.

The event is tomorrow at 1 p.m. Mountain Standard Time in Phoenix, 3 p.m. Eastern, and will be live-streamed by WND.

The topic of discussion will be an investigation by Arpaio’s Cold Case Posse into concerns about Obama’s eligibility, the first time an official law enforcement report has addressed many of the allegations about the presumptive 2012 Democratic nominee for president.

Those issues include his eligibility under the U.S. Constitution’s requirements, questions about his use of a Connecticut Social Security number, the image of his purported birth certificate from Hawaii and others.

In addition to the live-streaming, WND will make available to the public, the same day by email, the official report distributed to media by Arpaio’s investigators. Those interested in receiving the report can sign up for the free service.

Top national media organizations have indicated their plans to attend and bookings for radio and television reports are in the works. Expected are reporters from AP, Reuters, Univision, the Washington Times and NBC, CBS and ABC affiliates, as well statewide radio networks, among many others.

Because of the circumstances, the decision was made to hold the press conference at the sheriff’s training center, which is on the outskirts of Phoenix, rather than at a downtown office, according to reports.

It even has drawn the promise of protesters who object to the sheriff’s office review of allegations that Obama may be using – or attempt to use – a fraudulent document to have his name placed on the 2012 presidential election ballot in Arizona.

Without releasing any details, Arpaio has said the results “could be a shock.”

He constituted a special five-member law enforcement posse last year to investigate allegations brought by members of the Surprise, Ariz., Tea Party that the Obama birth certificate released to the public by the White House on April 27 might be a forgery.

The posse is made up of three former law enforcement officers and two retired attorneys with law enforcement experience. Members have been examining evidence since September concerning Obama’s eligibility to be president under Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution, which requires a president to be a natural-born citizen.

Among other issues, there also have been allegations of Obama’s use of a Social Security number that corresponds to a Connecticut address, even though the president apparently had no links there.

WND earlier reported a private investigation found that the Social Security number being used by Obama does not pass a check with E-Verify, the electronic system the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has created to verify whether or not someone is authorized to work legally in the country.

Arpaio’s investigation is the first official law enforcement look at the allegations surrounding Obama’s eligibility. Many of the private investigators who have examined it contend there are too many questionable circumstances to believe that everything regarding Obama is above-board.

Arpaio previously told WND that when he launched his Cold Case Posse it was with the possibility that he would clear Obama.

But he said it wasn’t an issue he could ignore, after 250 members of the tea party organization “came to me and asked their sheriff to investigate Obama and the birth certificate.”

SIGN UP NOW TO GET FREE COPY OF ARPAIO REPORT AS SOON AS IT IS DISTRIBUTED TO PRESS MARCH 1.

The WND TV live-streaming coverage of the news conference Thursday is possible through the support of the Western Center for Journalism.

The decisions in dozens of court cases over the last few years questioning Obama’s eligibility were typified by a recent decision in Georgia in which several individuals filed challenges to Obama’s name on the 2012 ballot and provided evidence to a hearing officer.

Even though Obama and his lawyer deliberately snubbed the case – the lawyer wrote the judge a letter in advance telling him Obama would not attend – the judge threw out the evidence presented by several attorneys and ruled in favor of Obama.

Similar ballot challenges are being filed in a long list of other states already.

The Arpaio investigators were given the case following a meeting held in the sheriff’s office Aug. 17, 2011, with tea party representatives from Surprise, Ariz., who presented a petition signed by more than 250 Maricopa County residents. The petitioners expressed concern that their voting rights could be irreparably compromised if Obama uses a forged birth certificate to be placed on the 2012 presidential ballot in Arizona or otherwise is found to be ineligible.

The tea party letter formally stated the following charge: “The Surprise Tea Party is concerned that no law enforcement agency or other duly constituted government agency has conducted an investigation into the Obama birth certificate to determine if it is in fact an authentic copy of 1961 birth records on file for Barack Obama at the Hawaii Department of Health in Honolulu, or whether it, or they are forgeries.”

The posse was constituted as a 501(c)3 organization, designed to cost the people of Maricopa County nothing, while enabling people from around the country to contribute to its mission.

Those wishing to send a tax-deductible contribution directly to the Cold Case Posse may do so by mailing a check or money order to: MCSO Cold Case Posse, P.O. Box 74374, Phoenix, AZ 85087.

WND has reported that dozens of experts with varying ranges of competency who have looked at the situation believe the birth documentation image released by Obama last year is not genuine.

A flying-banner and billboard campaign to let people know about the questions regarding eligibility that was started by WND CEO and Editor Joseph Farah also has raised the public’s awareness of the situation.

Farah wrote recently that the underlying question to be determined is whether the U.S. Constitution remains the law of the land, or whether it has become “an archaic old document that needs to be amended.”

“At its core, it’s really quite simple: Does Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution dealing with who can serve as president of the United States simply mean that any citizen age 35 or older is eligible? If so, why did the founders use a different term altogether – ‘natural born citizen’? What is a ‘natural born citizen’? Is it anyone born in the United States? If so, why have candidates born outside the United States been deemed eligible? Do we owe it to America’s future to go back in history to determine what that term actually means?

“Until now, as hard as it may be to believe, no official vetting of Obama’s credentials has been done – not by the 50 secretaries of state who oversee elections, not by the Federal Elections Commission that administers the nation’s elections laws, not by the Electoral College, not by any judge in America, not by Congress, not by anyone,” he continued.

Even before the results become public, Farah said he’s confident there will be a significant impact.

“I strongly believe it could be a game-changer,” he said.

FDA Adds Warning Labels to Cholesterol-Lowering Drugs

U.S. health regulators are adding warnings to the labels of widely used cholesterol lowering drugs, such as Lipitor, to say they may raise levels of blood sugar and could cause memory loss.

The Food and Drug Administration announced on Tuesday the changes to the safety information on the labels of statins such as Pfizer's [PFE 21.22 ] Lipitor, AstraZeneca's [AZN-GB 2801.00 -23.50 (-0.83%) ] Crestor andMerck's [MRK 38.38 ] Zocor that are taken by tens of millions of people.

Statins have been shown to significantly reduce the risk of heart attack and heart disease, and the FDA said the new information should not scare people into stopping taking the drugs.

"The value of statins in preventing heart disease has been clearly established," Amy Egan, deputy director for safety in FDA's Division of Metabolism and Endocrinology Products, said in a statement. "Their benefit is indisputable, but they need to be taken with care and knowledge of their side effects."

Lipitor, which became available late last year in generic form as atorvastatin, is the world's all-time biggest selling prescription medicine with cumulative sales in excess of $130 billion. As a class, statins have helped enrich the world's largest drugmakers, but most of the major brands are now prescribed as far cheaper generic medicines.

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Last year, more than 20 million Americans were taking some form of statin, according to IMS Health.

"These are nuances, tiny little tweaks to the label, and the bigger picture doesn't change," said Steven Nissen, chief of cardiology at Cleveland Clinic. "There are few drugs that have saved as many lives as statins and we don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater here.

"If you have heart disease, you probably should be on a statin. If you're at high risk, a statin may be warranted. But we don't think these drugs should be put in the water supply," Nissen said.

Asked what prompted the label changes, FDA spokeswoman Erica Jefferson said they were based on the agency's review of medical literature, clinical trial data and reports of adverse events.

"I wouldn't point to any one thing," she said. "We've been looking at all the information for some time. It's part of our ongoing surveillance."

Doctors Won't Balk from Prescribing Statins

The FDA said it was aware of studies in which some patients taking statins may have a small increased risk of higher blood sugar levels and of being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes.

The statin labels will also now reflect reports of certain cognitive effects such as memory loss and confusion experienced by some patients taking the drugs, the agency said. It said those reports generally have not been serious and the symptoms were reversed by stopping use of the statin.

"We have known for three or four years that statins slightly increase blood sugar," Nissen said. "The fact that the blood sugar went up a little bit did not diminish the effectiveness of the statins in reducing (heart) risk for patients."

The elevated diabetes risk cropped up in a 2008 Crestor study of nearly 18,000 patients. A separate study published in the Lancet medical journal in 2010 found that statins can raise the risk of diabetes by 9 percent.

The memory loss issue was more anecdotal from adverse event reporting and not from formal studies, the FDA said, adding that there was no proof that the problem was caused by statins but that it wanted people to be aware of the possibility.

One safety warning long associated with the class of medicines will be reversed, the FDA said. Patients taking statins will no longer need periodic monitoring of liver enzymes, since cases of serious liver injury are rare and unpredictable in individual patients.

Other statins, most of which are available as generics, include Livalo, Mevacor, Pravachol, Altoprev and Lescol. There are also combination medicines that include statins, such as Merck's Vytorin and Abbott Laboratories' Simcor.

Jon LeCroy, an analyst who follows the pharmaceutical industry for MKM Partners, said he did not believe the label changes would have a lasting impact on statin use.

"The overwhelming evidence on statins is they save lives, so I can't imagine this would reduce anyone prescribing them," LeCroy said.

"There are some buzzwords that tend to scare the lay public. This is not a cancer warning," he said.

The FDA also specifically said that Merck's Mevacor, the world's first approved statin, known generically as lovastatin, should never be taken with certain drugs used to treat HIV and certain bacterial and fungal infections due to increased risk of a serious muscle disease.

"I don't think we should change our practice based on this report," said Dr. Kenneth Ong, acting chief of cardiology at the Brooklyn Hospital Center in New York.

"But the report is a sobering reminder there's no such thing as a free lunch," Ong said. "Every drug has its problems and its side effects, despite the benefits."

Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Obama Loses His First Debate

In a speech that the Gingrich campaign has begun broadcasting around the country, and which is posted at Newt.org, Gingrich presents a unique new vision for a booming American economy. I think you will find it pathbreaking. It is so compelling that it drew Obama into a transcontinental debate with the former Speaker, the first exchange that Obama has decisively lost since he appeared on the national stage.

Gingrich began the explanation of his vision like this:

What if we had a program that enabled the American people to develop so much new energy that we were, in fact, no longer reliant on Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran. We didn't care what the Iranians did in the Strait of Hormuz because we were safe in national security terms.

What if that new energy program created well over a million new jobs, high-paying jobs, jobs that put Americans back to work and kept the money here at home that we had been sending overseas, giving us a dramatic improvement in our balance of payments, strengthening the dollar and giving us a chance to live much freer and more independently?

What if that very idea also meant that we'd also have dramatic increases in federal revenue… without a tax increase but that, in fact, the federal government would have literally an entire new stream of money?

And finally, what if that big new idea meant that you personally were better off because you are buying gasoline for $2.50 a gallon, not for $3.89 or $4 or what some people project by the summer could be could be $5 or more?

How is that possible, you ask? Well, that is what is exciting, and that is one of the reasons I am running for President.

Gingrich begins demonstrating the new vision by pointing to the Bakken geologic formation in North Dakota, which turns out to hold far, far more oil than the U.S. Geological Survey used to think, 25 times as much in fact, or 2,400 percent more. That Bakken breakthrough exists today "because it is on private land, and liberals weren't able to block us from developing it," Gingrich explains.

The result is that the official unemployment rate in North Dakota is 3.5 percent, with nearly 20,000 jobs paying $60,000 to $80,000 a year remaining unfilled for lack of sufficiently skilled applicants. Revenue from the booming growth is gushing into the North Dakota state government so fast that after seven consecutive tax cuts, the state enjoys a rainy day fund of several billion dollars, even though the entire state budget is only $2 billion.

Gingrich then projects, "If North Dakota has that much energy, how much do we think we have everywhere else? Turns out, we may have more oil in the United States today, given new science and technology, than we have actually pumped worldwide since 1870. We may, in fact, by one estimate have three times as much oil in the United States as there is in Saudi Arabia." Or as there ever was in Saudi Arabia.

Then there is a parallel revolution in natural gas. We have long known there was a lot of natural gas in shale, but we did not know how to get it out. As recently as 2000, people thought we had seven years of natural gas supply left in the United States. Investors began committing big funds to building facilities for importation of liquefied natural gas from the Middle East.

But then entrepreneurs began applying to shale rock formations the horizontal drilling techniques that had been developed for deep water ocean drilling, where the most had to be gotten out of one hole by drilling in every direction. Combine that with the long-time technique of fracking, breaking up the shale rock with steam, water and sand (supposedly so scary to "environmentalists"), and the net result, Gingrich elaborates, is that

[W]e now have in shale tremendous amounts of natural gas that is recoverable. In one short decade, we went from 7 years of supply to over a hundred years of supply because science and technology had improved so much. Furthermore, instead of us importing liquefied natural gas from the Middle East, there is now serious talk that we're going to build facilities in Houston… to ship liquefied natural gas to China.

But this is all just the beginning, because, as Gingrich adds, "in places like the Marcellus Shale in Western Pennsylvania, in eastern Ohio, cutting down along the Appalachians, all the way out to Dallas, Texas, there is formation after formation after formation."

What that means is what I reported last year in my book, America's Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb. America has the resources to be the world's number one oil producer, number one natural gas producer, number one coal producer, number one nuclear energy producer, even the number one alternative energy producer. The reason you never heard about this before, as Gingrich explains, is that "the politicians in Washington, the old-time establishment, the elite news media, the bureaucrats, don't have a clue what's possible, or in some cases, they have a clue and they are opposed to it."

"And the result is not just money for big oil," Gingrich continues, "but people who own the property, farmers." Gingrich recounts a conversation with Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, "who just had run into a farmer who suddenly discovered that he had natural gas on his farm and he had been given an amazingly big check by the natural gas company." That same story is being replicated, or will be, from Texas to Tennessee across the Appalachians throughout Pennsylvania, to long impoverished upstate New York (if the liberals get out of the way there).

It means as well big money for our bankrupt federal government. As Gingrich reports, "One of the leading experts on North Dakota has suggested that we might well have over the next generation $18 trillion, not billion, $18 trillion in royalties… for the federal government with no tax increases." Note, that is more than the national debt.

But that is not all. Gingrich adds, "If you had $500 billion a year that was not going overseas, that was paying royalties in the U.S., paying landowners, paying people to go out and develop the oil, paying the pipeline builders, you would suddenly have a booming economy right here at home." What that means is that suddenly "We get a lot more jobs, people come off unemployment, food stamps, welfare, public housing, Medicaid. All that saves money. And they go to work taking care of their family and paying taxes. So government revenue goes up, government expenses go down…. Second, as we develop this, the companies are going to make more profit, so they are going to pay more taxes back."

And the economy gets a further boost because "Every time prices go up, they are the equivalent of a tax on working Americans and retired Americans." Similarly, every time gas prices go down, it is like a big tax cut boosting the economy, and lower energy prices are a big tax cut for energy intensive manufacturing in particular. Newt concludes, "Now $2.50 may sound like it is an impossible number, but that's baloney. When I was Speaker of the House, we paid $1.13 on average during the four years. When Barack Obama became President, we paid $1.89 that week."

Obama's Pondscum Vision
President Obama felt compelled to respond to Newt and his campaign for $2.50 a gallon gas, in a speech in Miami February 23. Obama said regarding surging gas prices:

Now some politicians see this as a political opportunity…. You can bet that since it's an election year, they're already dusting off their 3-point plan for $2 gas. And I'll save you the suspense. Step one is to drill and step two is to drill. And then step 3 is to keep drilling. We heard the same line in 2007 when I was running for President. We hear the same thing every year. We've heard the same thing for 30 years.

Well, the American people aren't stupid. They know that's not a plan, especially since we are already drilling. You know there are no quick fixes to this problem. You know we can't just drill our way to lower gas prices. If we're going to take control of our energy future and start avoiding these annual gas price spikes that happen every year -- when the economy starts getting better, world demand starts increasing, turmoil in the Middle East or some other part of the world -- if we're going to avoid being at the mercy of these world events, we've got to have a sustained, all-of-the-above strategy that develops every available source of American energy.

And that's why under my administration, America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years…. Over the last 3 years, my administration has approved dozens of new pipelines, including from Canada. And we've opened millions of acres for oil and gas exploration. All told we plan to make available more than 75 percent of our potential offshore oil and gas resources from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico.

But, exactly contrary to Gingrich's vision explained above, Obama contends, "But here's the thing -- it's not enough….The United States consumes more than a fifth of the world's oil -- more than 20% -- just us. But we only have 2% of the world's oil reserves. We consume 20; we've got 2….[A]nybody who tells you that we can drill our way out of this problem doesn't know what they're talking about, or just isn't telling you the truth."

So here is Obama's big answer, contrary to Newt's vision explained above:

We're making new investments in the development of gasoline and diesel and jet fuel that's actually made from a plant like substance -- algae. You've got a bunch of algae out here, right? (Laughter). If we can figure out how to make energy out of that, we'll be doing all right. Believe it or not, we could replace up to 17% of the oil we import for transportation with this fuel we can grow right here in the United States. Now, none of the steps that I've talked about today is going to be a silver bullet. It's not going to bring down gas prices tomorrow. Remember, if anybody says they got a plan for that -- what?

AUDIENCE: They're lying.

Newt Slam Dunks Obama
Two days later, in San Francisco, Gingrich gave his reply to Obama's Miami speech, slam dunking Obama, and his Obamabot audience. Gingrich said, "After I came out for a program to get to $2.50 a gallon gasoline, Obama decided he had to make a speech on energy. It is a very revealing speech. It is factually false, intellectually incoherent, deeply conflicted on policy and in some places just strange."

Gingrich began by providing context.

In 2007, as a Senator, Obama was the only sponsor of a bill which would have eliminated an inventory of offshore oil reserves. This is part of the Left's great problem today. They really believe in "Peak Energy." They really believe that we're going to run out. The government has to be in charge. Jimmy Carter was right. We ought to have gasoline rationing. We ought to make sure we don't use all this up.

And the problem is they are wrong. Now, their fear is if they actually show us how much energy we have, we will actually want the energy. So they want us to not see the energy because then we can't ask for it because we don't have it. And so he literally introduced a bill that was in favor of ignorance. And it is fascinating because what North Dakota has done is that it has blown apart their worldview."

Gingrich was discussing here proposed legislation Senator Obama introduced to terminate the federal government's inventory of offshore oil reserves.

Gingrich also recounted what Obama had said about his energy policy campaigning in 2008 to the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board:

Under my plan of cap and trade, electricity prices will necessarily skyrocket and power plants, natural gas, you name it, wherever the plants were, whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, they would have to retrofit their operations and that will cost money and they will pass that money on to the consumers. So if someone wants to build a coal powered power plant, that will bankrupt them because they are going to be charged the huge amount for all that greenhouse gas that is being emitted.

Gingrich explains, "So it is really open. Higher prices are good. They are necessary. Companies will be bankrupt. This is the true Left."

Gingrich also noted what Obama told a constituent worried about the impact of high gas prices on his family: "If you are complaining about the price of gas and only getting 8 miles to the gallon (laughter) you may have a big family, but it is probably not that big." When he found out how many kids the guy had, Obama told him, "Well, you definitely need a hybrid."

Gingrich added that in February 2009, Obama appointed as "anti-energy" Secretary Berkeley Professor Steven Chu, who had said that America needs the same gas prices as in Europe, which are $9 a gallon or more. "So when they tell you this [the high price of gas] is all an accident, baloney. This is a deliberate strategy of the Left to punish the American people into driving the vehicles" the left and Obama want them to drive.

Gingrich responded to Obama's claim that we can't just drill our way to lower gas prices saying, "Well, let me give the President a brief history lesson. In 1976 gasoline had reached $2.46 a gallon. By 1980, with Jimmy Carter's failing economic policies, it had gotten to $3.30," despite Carter's heavy handed gas rationing. "The first Executive Order Ronald Reagan signed deregulated gasoline. The Left was panic stricken. The New York Times thought the prices would skyrocket. Within 6 months it collapsed. In fact, the collapsed oil price was a major factor in beating the Soviet Empire because it stripped them of hard currency. By 1988 it had dropped to $1.72" -- half the price of when Reagan was sworn in, the result of 8 years of drilling. The price of natural gas has also collapsed over the past couple of years in response to soaring drilling.

To Obama's boast that America is producing more oil today than any time in the last 8 years, Gingrich noted that the North Dakota boom was on private land. He reported in his earlier speech that "Under President Obama because he is so anti-American energy, we have actually had a 40% reduction in development of oil offshore, and we have had a 40% reduction in the development of oil on federal lands." In his San Francisco speech, Gingrich added: "So in the area he controls, production is down and the area that is hard at the free enterprise stuff where people get rich, production is up. So he is now claiming credit for the area he can't control in order to have us think he is actually for what he opposes."

Gingrich continued, "And let me give you an example of the depth of audacity" of Obama's dishonesty.

"He says quote, 'Over the last 3 years, my administration has approved dozens of new pipelines, including through Canada.' Now, Mr. President, you know how limited your respect for the intelligence of the American people must be. How could you possibly veto the only major pipeline that matters from Canada, the Keystone Pipeline, and turn around and suggest to us that the fact that we have approved dozens of tiny ones -- this is like saying, 'My Navy has 11 ships, they're all rowboats.' I mean how do you deal with a President who is this fundamentally out of touch with being honest? It would be one thing if he said, 'Yes, I vetoed the Keystone Pipeline and here is why.' But to come and say, "I have approved lots of pipelines, why are you mad at me? Well, because you did not approve the one that mattered. The Keystone Pipeline is worth 700,000 barrels a day when you use it…. This President is driving Canada into a partnership with China in order to build a pipeline due west to Vancouver to deliver the oil to China. It is a strategic disaster of the first order."

While Obama tells us, "We plan to make available more than 75% of our potential offshore oil and gas resources," Gingrich explained in response, "This is [Obama] letting you know he is a lawyer. He has carefully selected out a phrase, which is totally misleading and technically inaccurate…. He is now telling you that in the areas we currently know about that they want to make 75% available. What he didn't tell you is under this definition, 85% of the offshore acreage" will still not be available because we don't know anything about reserves in those areas. (Remember this is the guy who wanted to abolish the inventory of reserves.)

Gingrich added, "One more example that shows how fundamentally dishonest this President is. He says, quote, 'We only have two percent of the world's oil reserves.' And what he is referring to is proven current reserves. But…in 1980, our proven reserves were 30 million barrels. Since then, because of advancing technology, because of changing prices, because of entrepreneurship, we have produced 75 billion barrels out of the 30 billion-barrel reserve, and we have more reserves today than we had in 1980."

Indeed, proven reserves can only exist in areas where drilling has been allowed and permitted. They don't include anywhere near the 1.4 trillion barrels of potentially recoverable reserves in the United States, more than has been pumped worldwide since 1870, three times as much as in Saudi Arabia.

Gingrich adds:

So now the President goes on to say, quote, "We are taking every possible action to develop safely a near hundred years supply of natural gas in this country." That is fundamentally misleading. They have a task force of 8 different agencies trying to figure out how to block fracking, which is the method by which we get natural gas. They are methodically trying to undermine and cripple the natural gas industry, and it is stunningly dishonest for this President to pretend that he favors something that his administration is actively working to undermine.

Gingrich exposed Obama's confusion regarding fracking, saying that Obama

lives in this fantasy world of government subsidies. He says, quote, "It was public research dollars that over the years helped develop the technologies that companies are right now using to extract oil and natural gas." Just to set the record [straight], fracking began in Kansas in 1947 and it expands to Oklahoma in 1949. It's done in Canada in the 1950s. And George Mitchell and the private sector are regarded as the pioneers in the development of "fracking." This would be like suggesting that the Air Force invented the airplane and they don't know who these two Wright Brothers are because, after all, they were private sector guys who were just bicycle mechanics, and how could they have invented the airplane when actually it must have been the Air Force because everything that was good is done by the government. That is the Obama mindset.

Finally, Gingrich addressed Obama's pondscum strategy, saying:

Now, I am a scientific optimist. I have a friend at Texas A&M who is developing algae that eats municipal waste and then uses alcohol as a byproduct, and some point down the road, it will probably be useful. But this is like Solyndra. The President is for any fantasy that doesn't work today as opposed to any practical thing that works today so as to take your money to prop up something which well might work -- Solyndra might work in 30 years. Solyndra might even work in 10 years but it won't work now, and it is being given venture capital by the Department of Energy…. But what are the odds that you're going to ramp up to a commercial price gasoline from algae in the foreseeable future? Not very good. Now most of us live in the foreseeable future. What are the odds that if you actually allow people to drill and if you allow people to build refineries, you could get dramatically less expensive gas in the foreseeable future? Really, really high.

Gingrich added:

The last point I want to make about what he said, he says three or four times, "There are no silver bullets." There is a pen. Big difference. The Presidential pen could today sign approval of the Keystone Pipeline. That is 700,000 barrels a day. The Presidential pen could today sign approval to go back to the Gulf of Mexico, and that is about 400,000 barrels a day. The Presidential pen could today approve areas of Alaska that we know have oil. That's about a million, two hundred thousand barrels of oil a day. Three signatures we would have 2.3 million barrels of oil a day in the United States. So I should say we are not looking for silver bullets. We are looking for Presidential leadership.

Gingrich concludes:

At the end of his speech he says, quote, "We need to sustain all of the above strategy that develops every available source of American energy, yes, oil and gas, but also wind and solar and nuclear and biofuels and so on." Well, this is exactly what John Boehner has been campaigning on for four years. I hope the House Republicans in the near future will move an all-of-the-above energy bill. And we will see whether or not [Obama] really means this, which by the way he didn't, but it is a great line and it is exactly the Republican policy.

It is actually a poll-driven line by the President which, as Gingrich says, Obama transparently has no intention of following through on. It is just more Calculated Deception, to mislead the Bubbas.

Gingrich summarizes:

This is a very revealing speech. You have an intellectual left winger who lives in a fantasy world in which he very cleverly uses language to say things that aren't true that sound good because he knows that if he tells you what he really wants to do, you will defeat him in a landslide. One of our jobs, of course, is to make sure that the American people understand what he really wants to do.

Our choice is between energy independence and never again bowing to a Saudi King and $2.50 gasoline and about $18 trillion in royalties over the next generation; enough you could literally pay off the national debt just with the royalties for the federal government from development with no tax increase, and at least a million new jobs. That is our side. His side is a series of fantasies in which your tax money is thrown away on products that are not commercially feasible, while you pay higher and higher prices, and are coerced into smaller and smaller and smaller vehicles. These are the two futures we are going to campaign on this year.

Isn't this the campaign that conservatives should want? Is there any doubt how that campaign would turn out? Conservatives need to recall after all the out of context misquotes or misunderstandings about what Gingrich has said in recent years, when he had political power, he governed as a Reaganite conservative, as someone who, in the words of Nancy Reagan, had the baton passed from Goldwater, to Reagan, to Gingrich.

West: 'Second Holocaust' Looms if US Doesn't Champion Israel Read more on Newsmax.com: West: 'Second Holocaust' Looms if US Doesn't Back Israel Impo

The United States needs to back Israel fully to avoid a tragedy befalling its ally, says freshman Rep. Allen West. “You’re looking at a second Holocaust” if Israel doesn’t “know they can trust and depend upon the stars and stripes . . . to provide them support,” the Florida Republican said during a town hall meeting in West Palm Beach.

He made the comments several days ago, but they didn’t get much attention until spreading on the Internet Monday, The Palm Beach Post reports.

Iran isn’t the only nation that Israel has to worry about, West said. “What happens if, all of a sudden, Syrians don’t focus on fighting each other, but focus on fighting Israel?”

The rise of radical Islam in Egypt also represents a threat to Israel, he said.

If a second Holocaust occurs, “there will be no spiritual homeland for Christians to return back to,” West said. “There will be no homeland for the Jewish people in the United States of America for their birthright. This is a dangerous situation, and we have to take the Iranians for their word.”

Also at the meeting, West warned against raising taxes on the wealthy. “You can tax people to 110 percent, and it will still not make a dent” in the budget deficit, he said.


Read more on Newsmax.com: West: 'Second Holocaust' Looms if US Doesn't Back Israel
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

To draw Iran into nuclear talks, Obama avoids ousting Assad

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal did not hide his anger before marching out of the Friends of Syria conference attended by 70 nations in Tunis Friday, Feb. 24 after it fell in behind US plans for avoiding direct action against Syria’s Bashar Assad. Filmed sitting with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Saudi minister told a reporter that arming the Free Syrian Army was an “excellent idea” because they needed to defend themselves. Clinton remained frostily aloof on this obvious bone of contention.
As one of the world’s richest oil and financial powers, Saudi Arabia could buy and sell Iran several times over, and after seeing the ayatollahs get away with insulting America time and time again, the Saudi foreign minister did not pull his punches when he faced his US colleague. He was frank about Riyadh and the Obama administration being miles apart in their perceptions of current Middle East events; resentment over the US role in the overthrow of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak remains a constant irritant.
This dissonance came to the fore when Saudi al Faisal accused Washington of reducing Assad’s butchery of his opponents to the level of a humanitarian issue and so saving his regime
Riyadh is no happier with Moscow than it is with Washington.
Saudi King Abdullah is reported by Middle East sources to have banged down the telephone on Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Wednesday, Feb. 22, when he called to invite the oil kingdom to align with Russia’s Syrian strategy against the West.
Tariq Alhomayed, the talented editor of the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat, who is regarded as having a direct line to the king, wrote later: “This was undoubtedly a historic and unusual telephone call.” He reported that Abdullah rejected out of hand Moscow’s proposal of a two-hour ceasefire in Homs, the Syrian city bombarded now for three weeks. He retorted that this would give Bashar Assad’s killing machine a 22-hour day carte blanche.
Alhomayed did not refer directly to the clash of wills between the Saudi foreign minister and the US secretary of state, except for a snide dig: “He [the Saudi king] is also the one who, during the Arab summit in Riyadh, first described the US army in Iraq as an army of occupation.”

Israel’s Binyamin Netanyahu’s is of one mind with Saudi rulers in his aversion to the policies for handling the Assad regime: Washington though horrified by the Syrian people’s butchery is yet shy of taking the final steps for his removal, while Moscow showers arms and intelligence on the Syrian despot to preserve him against his enemies.

In this regard, the Saudis and Israelis share a distrust of President Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin, suspecting them both of keeping Bashar Assad in power to promote their divergent interests in Iran.

The Saudi king faults the “safe havens” plan under air force protection – the sum total of foreign intervention taking shape between Washington, Turkey, some European powers and Gulf emirates -because it excludes what he regards as the key component: Bombardment of the presidential palace in Damascus and the crushing of the Syrian army, the same treatment meted out to Muammar Qaddafi in Libya.

Saudis therefore sees this plan as actually protecting Assad’s regime and not only his victims.

Underlying Obama’s restraint is his indefatigable quest for nuclear negotiations with Iran, which is impelling him to show Tehran he is even prepared to keep its ally Assad in power – albeit with clipped wings - for the sake of a negotiated nuclear accord.
The Saudis think the US president is dreaming if he reckons Iran’s rulers will be so grateful for Assad’s escape that they will be willing to give up their aspirations for a nuclear weapon.

They also think Obama misguided in aiming for Russian collaboration in making its political, military, technological and nuclear clout in Tehran available at some point for them to arrive together at agreed accommodations in both Syria and Iran.
Riyadh regards its case as proven beyond doubt by events of the past week.
Up until Monday, Feb. 20, Washington was bucked up by apparent Iranian signposts pointing to resumed talks with world powers on an eventual nuclear standstill and a freeze on uranium enrichment past five percent. Iranian emissaries in backdoor exchanges were forthcoming on US requests for gestures to confirm that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was serious about entering into diplomatic dialogue.
A rude awakening was not long coming.
Ten days ago, the Obama administration asked and received from Tehran final proof of goodwill, a promise that International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors would be allowed to view the Parchin military facility.

US National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, when he first met Israeli leaders in Jerusalem Thursday and Friday (Feb. 16-17), accordingly informed them that since Tehran had agreed to open this suspect site to UN inspection and nuclear negotiations were soon to begin, Israel had no cause for attacking its nuclear facilities.
Tuesday, Feb. 21, the UN inspectors arrived in Tehran, certain they would be admitted to Parchin – only to run into their second Iranian refusal this month. Their visit was cut short by IAEA Vienna headquarters.

Every attempt by Washington to find out what had gone wrong drew a blank. Iranian officials withdrew into total hush and let the entire diplomatic edifice so painstakingly constructed by Washington start falling apart.
But Obama the eternal optimist has not given up. He is treating Tehran’s latest spell of intransigence as no more than a hiccup symptomatic of the run-up to parliamentary elections on March 2, after which Khamenei will revert to the track leading to negotiations.
This approach is what put Saudi backs up. They accuse the US and Russia through their different polices of granting the Syrian ruler a license to keep on massacring his people, regardless of any safe havens or “no kill” zones the West may be planning.
Netanyahu is likewise opposed to the Obama administration’s interconnected policies on Syria and Iran. His White House meeting with Obama on March 5 is not expected to put this dispute to rest.