"We don't like to see our money going to countries that burn our flag."

U.S. puts Pakistan on notice: do more to stop terrorism https://t.co/kUzPTTNIoh

— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) January 2, 2018

"We don't like to see our money going to countries that burn our flag." — @RandPaul on @POTUS withholding military aid to Pakistan https://t.co/fpuzzt5Yn9 pic.twitter.com/q4JKZVjCvA

— Fox News (@FoxNews) January 2, 2018

#BREAKING: Trump admin suspends security assistance to Pakistan. Rand Paul introduces bill to end aid to Pakistan

#BREAKING: Trump admin suspends security assistance to Pakistan https://t.co/LpWJGffCxL pic.twitter.com/HY7j5C7gK3

— The Hill (@thehill) January 4, 2018

I’m introducing a bill to end aid to Pakistan in the coming days. My bill will take the money that would have gone to Pakistan and put it in an infrastructure fund to build roads and bridges here at home. pic.twitter.com/SHlA00rWEd

— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) January 4, 2018

Even if the pledges were met the deal would be useless

Do the math: the ‘contribution’ of China and India to the Paris agreement is worthless https://t.co/cuAcZHaFwk pic.twitter.com/74sI4FDIL3

— Watts Up With That (@wattsupwiththat) December 19, 2017

A common argument against the Paris agreement has been that the “pledges” to cut emissions are only that: promises, targets, hopes. There is no way to enforce them, or even to verify them in many cases.

Another common argument, highlighted in Trump’s speech but made since long before, is that even if the pledges were met the deal would be useless. According to this view, China, India et al are not even putting up with the charade of trying to reduce emissions. Their emission targets are what you’d expect if their economies and energy systems continued their historical experience; in other words, their “target” is equivalent to doing nothing. Most hilariously, Pakistan’s INDC simply stated its emissions would peak at some point.

(Proponents of the agreement have usually countered this argument by putting their hands on their ears and ceaselessly screaming “I HEAR NOTHING”)...

Pakistani model murdered after offending devout Muslims with selfies

“I am proud of what I did. I drugged her first, then I killed her.” https://t.co/owWjY1s3I2

— HotAir.com (@hotairblog) July 18, 2016

“I am proud of what I did. I drugged her first, then I killed her,” Waseem Baloch says. “She was bringing dishonor to our family.”…

Waseem goes on to remark that he thinks he will be remembered with pride and honor, and by bringing honor to his family he has earned his place “in heaven.”

“Girls are born to stay home and follow traditions. My sister never did that,” he says.

Social Media Star Murdered in ‘HONOR KILLING’ by Her Brother: And the accursed feminists stay silent ….. Acco... https://t.co/AxPb953Zqe

— Pamela Geller (@PamelaGeller) July 16, 2016

Pakistani model murdered after offending devout Muslims with selfies: https://t.co/mQOB9xOSjP pic.twitter.com/fsvgctSDpJ

— TheBlaze (@theblaze) July 16, 2016

More than 20 women are murdered in honour killings every week in Pakistan #QandeelBaloch https://t.co/Hj16kLR2zG

— Rita Panahi (@RitaPanahi) July 16, 2016

More than 1,000 girls and women die in honor killings in Pakistan each year

More than 1,000 girls and women die in honor killings in Pakistan each year. https://t.co/xg6ELKvC64

— Heritage Foundation (@Heritage) June 5, 2016

Geopolitical structure in shambles...

A very dense, but important read by Dr. Kissinger. A Path Out of the Middle East Collapse http://t.co/mzUYypB8uX

— James E. Wilson (@jwilsonsc) October 17, 2015

KISSINGER: A Path Out of Middle East Collapse... http://t.co/QPBJAWdE6R

— DRUDGE REPORT (@DRUDGE_REPORT) October 16, 2015

With Russia in Syria, a geopolitical structure that lasted four decades is in shambles. The U.S. needs a new strategy and priorities.

London Sunday Times: Saudi Arabia to purchase "off-the-shelf" A-bombs from Pakistan say "senior American officials"

London Sunday Times: Saudi Arabia to purchase "off-the-shelf" A-bombs from Pakistan say "senior American officials" - http://t.co/e1Bge5RZOq

— Stephen Schwartz (@SchwartzCNS) May 17, 2015

Report: Saudis may purchase Pakistani atomic bomb http://t.co/EvMo3uz5K8

— The Times of Israel (@TimesofIsrael) May 17, 2015

A Glimpse Into Evil of the Taliban: ’We Have Killed All the Children… What Do We Do Now?’

Depraved: The Taliban gunmen who slaughtered 148 innocent people, including 132 children, are pictured just hours before the massacre. The white banner they pose in front of is the flag of the Pakistani Taliban and reads: 'There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is Allah's Messenger'

◼ After terrorists invaded a Pakistan high school and slaughtered more than 130 students, one of the Taliban militants reportedly had one of his last conversations with his handler. The chilling transcripts of the conversation were apparently provided to local newspapers by law enforcement officials. - The Blaze

“We have killed all the children in the auditorium. What do we do now?” one of the terrorists reportedly told his handler.

“Wait for the army people, kill them before blowing yourself,” the handler responded.

◼ 'We have killed all the children, now what do we do?': Taliban death squad's frantic request for instructions after slaughtering 132 innocents... as military airstrikes kill 57 in hunt for 'Radio Mullah' who ordered massacre - JOHN HALL FOR MAILONLINE

◼ No distinction between good Taliban and bad Taliban: Sharif - Times Of India

PESHAWAR: Rattled by the Peshawar attack, Pakistan's squabbling political parties showed rare unity on Wednesday, pledging to fight the killers of the Army Public School's children by making no distinction between good Taliban and bad Taliban. The Pakistan government also announced the end of moratorium on the death sentence, in effect since 2010 to facilitate talks with Pakistan Taliban.

"We announce that there will be no differentiation between 'good' and 'bad' Taliban, and resolve to continue the war against terrorism till the last terrorist is eliminated," said Sharif, marking the end of any hope of talks with the terrorist organization.

Hearbreaking Quote of the Day ​"The smaller the coffin, the heavier it is to carry,"

◼ Said Pakistan's defense minister Khawaja Asif, as funerals began for the 132 child victims of Tuesday's Taliban attack.

TALIBAN SLAUGHTERS 132 SCHOOL CHILDREN IN PAKISTAN UPDATED

◼ Pakistani Taliban kill over 140 schoolchildren and teachers - Le-gal In-sur-rec-tion

There has been another outrageously evil attack in which Islamist terrorists target children, this time in Pakistan:

Militants from the Pakistani Taliban have attacked an army-run school in Peshawar, killing 141 people, 132 of them children, the military say.

Officials say the attack in the north-western city is over, with all the attackers killed. Seven militants took part in all, according to the army.

Gunman methodically went from room to room and shot most of the victims in the head. The terrorists are reported to have been wearing suicide vests, and this article indicates that some of those vests were set off after Pakistani security forces came to the scene.

◼ Pakistan School Attack: Taliban Militants Kill 126 in Peshawar - NBC News

Taliban militants laid siege to a Pakistan high school in a brazen hours-long attack on Tuesday, killing more than 100 children in an atrocity condemned by the White House as "heinous" and "horrific."

More than eight hours after uniformed militants struck the school, the Pakistani military confirmed the assault was over. Officials said that at least 126 lives were lost — and most of the victims were children.

"The gunmen entered class by class and shot some kids one by one," a student who was in the Army Public School in Peshawar at the time told local media.

The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, which Pakistani officials said appeared to be aimed at the children of senior military personnel. Heartbreaking scenes played out in the streets around the school, as parents rushed to a nearby hospital for news of their children.

◼ Vicar of Baghdad: ISIS Beheaded 4 Christian Children; They Said, 'We Love [Jesus]'

Reverend Canon Andrew White, head of the only Anglican church in Iraq, described in a recent interview some of the atrocities committed against Iraqi Christians by the Islamic State, including the beheading of four children who refused to convert to Islam and told their killers, “We love Yeshua [Jesus], we have always loved Yeshua.”

A Pakistani girl, who was injured in the attack, is rushed to a hospital in Peshawar

◼ 'I folded my tie into my mouth so I wouldn't scream': Teenage survivor shot in both legs by Taliban gunmen reveals how he played dead under a bench as insurgents hunted for children to kill - Ted Thornhill for MailOnline and Imtiaz Hussain In Peshawar For Mailonline and Aamir Iqbal and Aoun Sahi and Steph Cockroft for MailOnline and David Williams for the Daily Mail

• Shahrukh Khan was in school auditorium when four gunmen stormed in
• 16-year-old heard one say: 'There are so many children... go and get them'
• Schoolboy played dead as gunman 'pumped bullets' into students' bodies
• Said: 'I lay as still as I could and closed my eyes, waiting to get shot again'
• 10-year-old also described how he saw two classmates shot in front of him
• Muhammad Muneeb: 'I saw my own brother die, he was shot in the throat'
• One said: 'There are dead bodies everywhere. This city is filled with dead bodies'
• Gunmen in Peshawar entered school and started shooting at random
• One terrorist blew himself up in a classroom containing 60 children
• Taliban accepted responsibility for the attack, claiming it 'was just a trailer'

At first, the children thought it was just a drill. Then the screaming began. As the pupils poring over their books realised the bangs they could hear were the sounds of guns fired in anger, panic spread....

Speaking from his bed in the trauma ward of the Lady Reading Hospital, Shahrukh described how the gunmen shouted 'Allah-o-Akbar' before opening fire.

Obama Refuses To Say "Taliban" In Condemnation Of Pakistan Attack http://t.co/MzRssAG8tl

— Patrick Dollard (@PatDollard) December 16, 2014

The Washington Post reported last week that the State Department’s aid coordinator for Pakistan, Robin Raphel, is the subject of a counterintelligence investigation and has had her security clearance revoked.

◼ Hillary Donor Under Investigation in Counterintelligence Probe - Washington Free Beacon

Robin Raphel worked as registered foreign agent for Pakistani government

"Sickening"

◼ Rotherham: The perils of tolerating intolerance - Michael Barone/Washington Examiner @michaelbarone

Sickening. That’s the word that comes to mind when I contemplate the story from Britain of how local authorities in Rotherham failed to protect 1,400 young girls were raped, abused and consigned to prostitution by Pakistani and Kashmiri — Muslim — men. The reason: their goal was to promote “community cohesion” — multiculturalism — and so they systematically ignored abundant evidence of multiple vicious crimes. I won’t describe all the horrifying details: For the full horror, check out on the Telegraph website ◼ Allison Pearson’s account, and commentary by Conservative member of the European Parliament ◼ Daniel Hannan and Labour supporter (and son of Labour MP Glenda Jackson) ◼ Dan Hodges. At ◼ Breitbart, Milo Yiannopoulos has another excellent article.

The central problem faced by tolerant societies is how far to tolerate intolerance. Intolerance particularly in the form of criminal jihadism and criminal misogyny by Muslim immigrants and their offspring. Not all Muslims, of course, but an uncomfortably large percentage of them. Fans of multiculturalism and “community cohesion” desperately want to avoid facing the problem. They tend to see their own societies as bigoted and intolerant, when in fact the level of bigotry and intolerance in nations like the United States and the United Kingdom is very low indeed, enormously low when seen fairly in historic perspective. And they tend to believe that our societies have oppressed others — people of color, those from the Third World — and that they have the moral high ground. So you have the absurd spectacle of the supporters of feminism and gay rights looking with sympathy on those Muslims who believe it is right or at least acceptable to rape women and kill gays.

Rotherham exposes this foolishness. How far should a tolerant society tolerate intolerance?

◼ Rotherham: In the face of such evil, who is the racist now? - Allison Pearson/Telegraph [UK]

Men of Pakistani heritage treated white girls like toilet paper. They picked children up from schools and care homes and trafficked them across northern cities for other men to join in the fun. They doused a 15-year-old in petrol and threatened to set her alight should she dare to report them. They menaced entire families and made young girls watch as they raped other children....All but one of the perpetrators were Muslims of Pakistani heritage...

One 11-year-old known as Child H told police that she and another girl had been sexually assaulted by grown men. Nothing was done. When she was 12, Child H was found in the back of a taxi with a man who had indecent pictures of her on his phone. Despite the full co-operation of her father, who insisted his daughter was being abused, police failed to act. Four months later, Child H was found in a house alone with a group of Pakistani men. What did the police do? They arrested the child for being drunk and disorderly and ignored her abusers....

◼ Rotherham child sex scandal: these children were victims of 'anti-racism' - Daniel Hannan/Telegraph [UK]

Patriotic & Responsible: Desert Tactical Arms Gun Company Turns Down $15M Obama Admin Contract For Arms To Pakistan

◼ Desert Tactical Arms turned down a $15 million contract to provide arms to Pakistan for the moral issue that they employ many who are military veterans and fear that the equipment sold to Pakistan could be used against US troops. - Gateway Pundit

Not sure which is the bigger story to debate: The fact that this company is making a courageous choice to turn down a lucrative contract in favor of doing the right thing—OR the fact that the Obama Administration is seeking a taxpayer funded contract to arm our enemies?

56 women killed in 2013 for giving birth to girls

◼ Fifty-six women have been killed in Pakistan this year for giving birth to a girl rather than a boy, human rights activist IA Rehman said at a symposium here on Monday. - Hassan Naqvi/Express Tribune [Pakistan]

“A country where mothers are killed for giving birth to baby girls can’t be called an ethical society,” Rehman said at the symposium, titled ‘Youth emerging as a force for positive change’, meant to mark the International Day to Eliminate Violence Against Women. The event was arranged by the All Pakistan Women’s Association (APWA).

From January 2012 to September 2013, there were also 90 acid attacks on women, 72 cases of burning caused by other means, 491 cases of domestic violence, 344 cases of gang rape and 835 cases of violence, he said. “Young girls are being raped in Pakistan and all we do is shout rather that do anything practical,” he said.

In Pakistan: 13 yr old girl crawls out of grave after being raped, buried alive

◼ The men took the young girl to an isolated place and raped her and then buried her alive as they believed she died during the brutal attack. - New York Post

Child rape remains a problem in Pakistan where local activist group Sahil said cultural myths persist such as HIV positive men believing they can be cured through sex with a virgin.

Malala Yousafzai, Wounded Pakistan teen is now face of girls education movement

◼ Malala Yousafzai, who publicly demanded an education and was shot by Taliban militants, becomes a potent symbol for the global push to improve developing countries by educating their girls. - Scott Gold/Los Angeles Times

Malala Yousafzai did not trade in her modest head scarf for a pair of skinny jeans. She wanted to go to school.

For that, the Taliban tried to kill her. When her attackers learned that the freckled 14-year-old Pakistani might survive, they promised to finish the job. Malala, they explained, had been "promoting Western culture."

The Taliban has committed all manner of atrocities over the years, many of them aimed at women. This time, the militants created an icon for a global movement — for the notion that the most efficient way to propel developing countries is to educate their girls. The idea has been flourishing in some of the world's most destitute and volatile places. Today, courtesy of the Pakistani Taliban, it has a face.

"People think 'Western values' is wearing jeans and sipping pop. Malala was doing none of that," said Murtaza Haider, a Pakistan native and the associate dean of research and graduate programs at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Toronto's Ryerson University. "All she said was: 'Would you be kind enough to reopen my school?' This is what the Taliban thinks is a 'Western value.' This is not a Western value. This is a universal value."

◼ Outrage in Pakistan over girl, but change unlikely - AFP/Sunday Nation (image source)
__________________
UPDATE
__________________
◼ Malala Yousufzai Comes Out of Her Coma - Dashiell Bennett/The Atlantic

There are more reports out England today that 14-year-old Taliban shooting victim Malala Yousufzai is responding well to treatment and has a good chance of fully recovering without any brain damage. Adam Elick of The New York Times reports on Facebook that she has come out of her coma (though she is not fully concious) and appears to have feelings in all her limbs, suggesting that she hasn't suffered any permanent physical damage as result of her attack. Malala was flown to the United Kingdom this weekend after having a bullet removed from her skull by doctors in Pakistan.

Why I Refuse to Vote for Barack Obama

◼ I don't see how anyone who confronts Obama's record with clear eyes can enthusiastically support him. I do understand how they might concluded that he is the lesser of two evils, and back him reluctantly, but I'd have thought more people on the left would regard a sustained assault on civil liberties and the ongoing, needless killing of innocent kids as deal-breakers. - Conor Friedersdorf/The Atlantic

Nope.

...The whole liberal conceit that Obama is a good, enlightened man, while his opponent is a malign, hard-hearted cretin, depends on constructing a reality where the lives of non-Americans -- along with the lives of some American Muslims and whistleblowers -- just aren't valued. Alternatively, the less savory parts of Obama's tenure can ◼ just be repeatedly disappeared from the narrative of his first term, as so many left-leaning journalists, uncomfortable confronting the depths of the man's transgressions, have done over and over again.

Keen on Obama's civil-libertarian message and reassertion of basic American values, I supported him in 2008. Today I would feel ashamed to associate myself with his first term or the likely course of his second. I refuse to vote for Barack Obama. Have you any deal-breakers?

How is ◼ this not among them?

◼ The Ongoing Effort to Sanitize Obama's Image - Conor Friedersdorf/The Atlantic

President Barack Obama has promised not to attack Pakistan-based al-Qaida leaders or fighters from bases inside Afghanistan. The surprising commitment effectively bars Obama and his successors from launching another nighttime helicopter raid like the one that that killed Osama bin Laden.

◼ Say, you know who else wouldn’t get Osama bin Laden now? - Ed Morrissey/HotAir

The new agreement signed on the anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s demise would forbid exactly the kind of raid that Obama ordered, one originating from Afghanistan into Pakistan...

That’s not the only option Obama has taken off the table in the new agreement, either:

Obama’s commitment will also end the use of secretive drone-attacks from Afghanistan. Those attacks have killed hundreds of al-Qaida leaders since the mid-2000s. They’ve also been very popular with U.S voters, and usually have had tacit Pakistan approval.

...how cynical can one be to accuse a political opponent of lacking the testicular fortitude to launch the kind of mission Obama green-lighted a year ago while negotiating a pact that forbids them in the future anyway? The only answer to this is that an American President might not feel bound to honor that part of the agreement, but that’s a poor answer. That would call our commitment to the entire pact into question, as well as our credibility on other treaties and pacts around the world. Besides, it doesn’t answer the question. Obama accused Romney of not having the guts to make the call, while agreeing with Karzai to never make a similar call himself. It’s hypocritical in the extreme, and the inclusion of such an agreement should have us questioning Obama’s intestinal fortitude in fighting terrorists in the region.

PAKISTAN ENRAGED

◼ Hundreds of enraged Pakistanis took to the streets across the country Sunday, burning an effigy of President Barack Obama and setting fire to US flags after 24 soldiers died in NATO air strikes. - Yahoo News
◼ Burn effigy of Obama... - Sky News
◼ ULTIMATUM: GET OUT...
◼ NATO braces for reprisals... - Guardian
◼ AFGHANS: They fired at us... - MSNBC