Author Archives: Barry Kelly

About Barry Kelly

Author of "Justice Beyond Law," "Justice Without Mercy," "Shades of Justice," "Justice Without Mercy," and "Run to Freedom," as well as two ,"nonfiction books ,"INSIGHTS-The Transforming of America," and "INSIGHTS-Stepping Stones to Tyranny. He also is the author of the blog "8 Decades of Insights." Barry Kelly is no stranger to the world of espionage, counter-terrorism, weapons, deep cover, and the inner workings of the governmental security apparatus. His immersion in the Cold War began with enlistment in the U.S. Navy during the Korean War. Following his discharge, he earned a BA from the University of Pittsburgh and a master’s degree from Duke. His career in the CIA included deep cover operations and overseas experience, primarily in South and Southeast Asia. He has been awarded the Certificate of Merit with Distinction, the Intelligence Medal of Merit, the Cross of Gallantry with Silver Star, the Distinguished Intelligence Medal and the Intelligence Officer of the Year Award. After retiring from the CIA, Kelly served as a special assistant to President Reagan. He holds a first dan black belt in hap-ki-do. Visit www.factsandfictions.com or find the author on Facebook.

by Barry Kelly | May 13, 2014 · 6:50 pm

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 114

A DANGEROUS TOLERANCE

Tolerance is part of the American heritage and it has served us well. There are times when tolerance is a questionable response to a dangerous situation. There is nothing in our Constitution that tells us that we must be tolerant in the face of danger. Constantly showing tolerance for the excesses of radical Muslims is counter-productive. Jihadism or radical Islam is a threat to Americans and our way of life. They will not be satisfied until America and what it stands for is destroyed. The threat from radical Islam will not go away. It is not a fad or something that will go away if we just understand it and tolerate their hatred. Progressives led by President Obama, who also want to weaken American economic and military power, will someday understand that they, too, are marked by jihadists for elimination.

Show Muslims love, understanding, and compassion and you show them weakness and a lack of commitment to freedom and liberty, two concepts that do not flourish now and never have in any Muslim state. Muslims are not required to turn the other cheek in the presence of violence or love their neighbors or respect the weak. It appears their love and compassion does not extend outside of their faith. When the Twin Towers were brought down by Muslim terrorists, all the Arabs and other Muslims dancing in the streets of their various homelands were not al-Qaida members or jihadists. They were what progressives like think to represent moderate Muslims. These moderate Muslims tolerate and support radical jihadists by not speaking and acting to stop the senseless killing. These same moderates often support the imposition of sharia law, the mutilation of young Muslim girls, the abuse of Christian minorities and the lack of education for Muslim females.

There is nothing reciprocal about Christians showing kindness and understanding to Muslims. In America ,we allow Muslims to build mosques nearly anywhere they want. We believe in and practice freedom of religion. Name any Muslim nation that allows Christians to build churches with the freedom to convert Muslims to Christianity. There is an inherent conflict between the tenets of Christianity and those of Islam. Our leaders who have shown a decided lean toward Islam in the practice of foreign policy, need to recognize this conflict and demand reciprocity. When that doesn’t happen, which it won’t, then we have to examine the wisdom of a policy that provides freedom to a religion bent on destroying America and the West.

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Filed under Conservative views, Eight Decades of Insights, foreign policy, Intelligence & Politics, Politics

Tagged as Christianity, Islam, Jihadism, Middle East, moderate Muslims, Progressives, radical Islam, sharia law, terrorism

by Barry Kelly | May 10, 2014 · 10:54 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 113

PROFILING: A SURVIVAL INSTINCT

Profiling is not a politically correct law enforcement policy in today’s world. Most liberals and even George W. Bush, a Republican president, spoke against profiling as part of a counter-terrorism program. Profiling doesn’t need to be defined. Everyone knows exactly what it is because everyone does it.

The act of profiling is as old as the beginning of life. Isn’t profiling simply looking for indicators of a danger to survival? Like any other activity, profiling can be misused. But when used properly it can save lives and diminish day-to-day threats.

People who live and work in active war zones quickly sharpen up their profiling skills. In Danang, Vietnam, in 1968 one of the best Viet Cong assassins was a young boy, probably not yet in his teens. His modus operandi was to carry a pistol in a paper bag and on a crowded street walk casually up to his selected target and shoot through the paper bag from inside three feet. How long do you think it took for those of us walking in the markets of Danang to profile any young boy carrying a paper bag? Not long. It wasn’t because we were discriminating against young boy or paper bags. It was the awakening of an old survival instinct. All living creatures have the ability to recognize dangers to their survival. Ask anyone who has ever hunted crows. They will tell you that the crows can recognize if you are carrying anything looking like a rifle or shotgun. The crows profile hunters.

In the world of counter-terrorism, all Arab Muslims are not terrorists but most terrorists are Arabs and Muslims. It is insane for law enforcement officers to not give special scrutiny to Arab-looking men and women traveling by air. How many elderly non-Arabs have been pulled out of line for extra scrutiny just to show no one is being profiled? If you resemble a rational threat description, you should be profiled. Not many blue-haired grandmothers have been terrorists.

Profiling has been attacked by people perpetuating racism. Black male teenagers have reported they hear car door locks clicking when they cross streets. Our president has said he has heard the doors locking when he was a young man crossing streets. Of course, and it is not because they are black or young. It’s because nearly all urban street crime is by young black males. Most of it black on black violence. You have to be nearly mindless if you do not profile a group of young black men approaching. Remember the wave of people injured in the “knockout game” on urban streets. Weren’t all the victims white and the attackers black?

Profiling can be abused and profiling policies need to be routinely reviewed. Profiling is a natural instinct. Don’t confuse it with racism.

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Tagged as arabs, blacks, muslims, Obama, profiling, racism, survival, whites

by Barry Kelly | May 6, 2014 · 6:06 pm

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 112

WHAT IS THE SCORE?

The president’s polls are dropping. He long ago slipped under the fifty percent favorability rating. The majority of the population believes he lies and doesn’t pay any heed to the transparency issue. For example:

His delaying tactics on the ‘Fast and Furious’ gun-running episode
IRS scandal of discriminating against conservative political groups
the facts of the deaths of four Americans in the Benghazi terrorist attack
the anti-Muslim video talking points by Susan Rice
the monitoring of journalists phones, and the infamous,”If you like your health care, you can keep your health care, period” lie

This is a terrible record of over-the-line actions that is matched by Obama’s failure to solve a single problem in either domestic or foreign policy. Syria, Ukraine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Russia, Iran, and Israel highlight his foreign policy. Obamacare, energy, job creation, thousands of government regulations that slow or kill economic progress, class warfare, and his fixation on income redistribution showcase a failed domestic policy.

Judged by those traditional issues that presidents have always been rated by, his is a failed presidency. But what if a successful presidency by our terms is not his agenda? What if he is the first American president not to care one bit about solving problems? In that case, he would be judged by progressive insiders to be very successful.

He may not be a leader or an experienced manager, but he is not dumb or stupid. How then can he be doing so poorly in the eyes of the opposition who think all they have to do is wait for the 2016 election? The answer cannot be found in the traditional leadership of the Republican Party, which has failed to understand Obama is not playing the traditional game of a president struggling with a non-supporting Congress.

A progressive jury would give Obama high marks. He has set in motion a universal health care system that will nearly destroy the America traditional medical care system. The health care in America will soon be in such chaos that the progressives will be able to bring in their long-wanted ‘single payer’ system, which is really just socialized medicine. One seventh of the economy will then be under government control.

Obama’s energy policy is preventing America from becoming self-sufficient in the production, refinement, and marketing of natural gas, coal, and oil. This policy of the EPA fossil fuel haters prevents economic growth and maintains a high unemployment and under employment rate. Welfare systems have expanded beyond any rational hope of sustainability. The national debt will cripple a stagnant economy.

Obama has successfully sown all the seeds of destroying what he inherited so he can proceed with transforming America. He has made no secret of his plan to destroy America’s military and economic power and move toward socialism and one world government. If only the real Democrats, independents, and Republicans would get their heads out of the sand and recognize Obama is winning by his rules. His opponents don’t even have a rule book.

Spread the word. Save the nation.

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Tagged as Obama, politics, Progressives, rating, socialism

by Barry Kelly | April 26, 2014 · 9:33 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 111

THE CHANGING FACE OF RACISM

Eight decades is a long time. Fortunately as we age, and I am very close to 83, our long-term memory remains vivid. The short-term is another story. I have seen the face of racism in the south and the north. It was very real in 1938 when I was a transplanted Yankee in the third grade in Jackson, Mississippi, an early learning experience. In case there was any doubt about how whites and blacks lived in the deep south, there were signs to help and firm comments from white residents making sure Yankees knew the rules.

My first venture into the deep south only lasted a little over a year. My family moved back to Jeannette, PA. Jeannette was then a small tough town of mills and manufacturing, primarily glass factories set in the soft coal region. Racism was far less visible. While neighborhoods were mostly segregated, all the schools were integrated. The president of my senior class was a black student and captain of the football team. A few years later I was in a Navy boot camp. The camp was integrated but the black sailors in my company did not have the same choice of navy schools or occupations. Black recruits mostly ended up in the navy’s version of service industries. The navy was behind the army and air force in integrating. Racism was still alive but was definitely giving ground.

I took full advantage of the G.I. Bill and went to the University of Pittsburgh. While there I became a member of the NAACP. By that time a very high percentage of my peer group and fellow students knew that skin color was not linked to abilities in anything from sports to scholastic achievement. I think that single awareness, that skin color meant only skin color, contained the destruction of the elaborate trappings of racism, mostly then, held by an aging population, both white and black.

My awareness and exposure to racism had another chapter. While studying for my master’s degree in political science at Duke University, I had the good fortune to meet Dr. Martin Luther King when he came to Durham in 1960 to guide the “sit in movement.” I didn’t realize at the time how lucky I was to participate briefly in picketing, attending church to hear him preach, and to meet the black college students who were the mainline troops on the street.

Twenty odd years later after retiring from the CIA and while working in the Reagan White House, my wife got me to join with her in a church sponsored part of the “I Have A Dream” program in the inner city of Washington, DC. A wonderful experience. The sixth-grade kids we were closely involved with over the next seven years taught us all more than we able to teach them. Years later we are still in touch with some of them.

All the above is just to establish some background for what I want to say.

We have arrived at the point in America where few whites admit to being racists. It is a bad thing and none of us want to be known as racists. If you’re white there is no upside to being a racist. I think American blacks are expected to have some anti-white feelings. It’s part of the inner city culture. No black wants to be labeled an “Uncle Tom” or an “Oreo.” While there are hundreds of thousands of blacks that do not carry racist baggage, it does not help that the President and his Attorney General never miss a chance to suggest racism is alive and well in America and use it as an excuse for their failures.

The President and his AG are unpopular with a growing segment of our population not because they are black but because of their actions, non-actions, speeches delivered, and those that should have been delivered but weren’t. Entrenched black political leadership never misses a chance to hoist the flag of racism. It is the tool they use to justify their roles and to motivate their followers. Sadly, they are the primary guarantors of the continued presence of racism. Our black citizens have done their share in the building and defending of America. Let’s bury racism and rejoice in our diversity. Racism can only exist if it has victims who search for it and find it where it doesn’t exist. Progressivism needs class warfare and racism to carry its message of transformation and destruction.

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Tagged as blacks, martin luther king jr, Obama, progressivism, racism, whites

by Barry Kelly | April 14, 2014 · 10:09 am

EIGHT DECADES OF INSIGHTS 110

IS THIS A GAME?

Yes it is, and the Republicans have not learned the rules yet. Time is running out and our team is behind. We have no offense and the defense is out coached. Coach Obama knows what he is doing but only his inner team has the playbook. To win the title for the next several generations he has to change capitalism into socialism, reduce America’s military power, give up our technology position in space exploration, give over control of much of our communications to a world body, abandon NATO, under fund the defense contractors, control energy production, expand the number of people dependent on government assistance, turn the civil service into a force to control opposition, abandon free market concepts and abolish political opposition. How is he doing?

We are dependent on the Russians to deliver people and supplies to the International Space Station. We no longer have the booster technology or the space vehicle to conduct space missions. We were once by far the world leader in space exploration. Now we are voluntarily taking a backseat to Russia and China. Space dominance and military power are closely coupled. Our space capability depended on skilled teams of civilians and military personnel. That capability would take several years to reconstitute. Obama can take a victory lap.

He is reducing our military manpower to below World War II levels. He knows his word on the world power stage is weak and he is okay with that. NATO nations no longer trust the United States nor do the NATO leaning nations of Eastern Europe. Power comes from capability and will, not speeches. How about armored divisions to prevent Russia from over running Europe. How? The U.S. Army does not have a single battle tank in Europe. Remember Benghazi? Our once vaunted military could not rescue or even try to rescue the embattled Americans in the Benghazi Consulate. Another victory lap for the president.

Control of energy. Without the hindering regulations from the Obama administration, we would now be a dominant energy exporter. Putin would have to develop another source of funds for his reconstruction of the Soviet Empire. Obama’s work to wreck the energy industry in America can be seen in the incredible failure to approve the Canadian pipeline, the heavy funding of alternative energy technologies that are decades away, and regulations preventing additional offshore drilling or more exploration and drilling on federal lands. Fortunately, he could not prevent the energy boom in the Dakotas. But he will try. A half victory lap here.

The economy. The recovery is very poor in job or gross national product terms. Real unemployment is above 12 percent. Money printing by the Keynesian Federal Reserve has kept the stock market sound but has increased the gap of wealth between those who can invest and those who need income from labor. Printing 75 billion or so each month does not help our workers. His first triumph, Obamacare, is not a failure. It is right on or ahead of schedule. It was never intended to improve health care in America, only to bring in socialized medicine. Obamacare is creating so much disruption in the health services that in a year or so, the single-payer system will come to the rescue. This has always been the plan. Another victory lap is awarded.

The civil service. I always thought that the civil service was an unheralded check on either the executive or the legislature grabbing too much power. Wrong. President Obama has taken less than six years to turn the IRS, HHS, DOJ, EPA, DHS, DOE, and parts of the intelligence and military staffs into active supporters. Nothing Obama does can be investigated by the government or the media. Congress doesn’t even understand what’s happening. Yes, Speaker Boehner, it is a game and you are losing badly. Learn the rules and do what your job calls for. The president earns another victory lap here.

If you can clear your head and look at what is happening and has happened, it should be clear that President Obama’s train did not wreck. He just needs to pass on his mantle to another progressive Alinksy-ite to build on what he has done. Could that be Hillary?