acting up, you know, being able to get your drugs delivered in new york is part of the cost of doing business. they don't charge extra for it. been able, if you don't like the food have in your refrigerator or that or assisted living community is serving, being able to order some chinese to read this is a great thing. new york is an assisted living community in ways that a lot of cities aren't. i think real carefully about retiring to one of those retirement communities where even though they of services, if you don't have a car, you just can't get around. ..

and have a normal conversation with an. that is a terrible thing. i remember the last time i saw her he took her to a riverbend nearby and she was so happy she said it good to be among the living. the last thing she said come the lasting country town i saw it issued a doubt is that it's good to know the beauty of the world will go on without me. >> host: that's a good spot to add. susan jacoby, thank you very much. the book is trained to. trained to. >> house afterwards, but to the signature program which authors

are interviewed right journalists, legislators and others familiar with the material. >> coming up next on booktv, michael scheuer, head of the bin laden that cia talks about bin laden and his war at the united states. mr. scheuer spoke about his book at the philadelphia free library. >> good evening, everyone. i think it's perhaps a troubling time to be talking about the subject, that the events of the day, the past month perhaps six weeks requires a solid thing to rethink how we stand in the

middle east. so tonight i'd like to talk about the three threats to the united states that emanate from the persian gulf, iran, saudi arabia and what i call al qaeda some. and speaking tonight about the persian gulf and the road against the islamists emanating from there, i want to start with words george washington used to describe the new government's responsibility, to ensure americans clearly understand the threat they face at home and abroad. i am sure that the massive citizens of these united states meanwhile, washington told john jay 1976 and i believe he will always act while whenever they can obtain a right understanding of matters. let me say that i share washington state in the essentially sound common sense of americans, except perhaps the coming generations is no members

in unable to figure out how to put a baseball cap on to the brim point forward. but i do not say that our national government under either party is capable or even desirous of accurately educating the citizenry about the islamists that confronting america. americans which not have what washington called her right understanding of the threats from the persian gulf region. in my writings i sat to acquaint americans at the nature of these threats called in from iran and its coreligionists in iraq and lebanon, the vicious martial, anti-christian, anti-jewish and anti-western branch of islamic theology exported under saudi arabia official imprimatur for the forces of osama bin laden, al qaeda and other sunni islamists lead essay. i also argue that the united states government under both parties is fighting an islamist enemy that does not exist and

therefore policies ran counter towards american tradition and so too is best interests. official washington's islamic enemy is that the hollywood fires. if a shia or sunni, the islamists are in limited panda fanatic nihilists, ready to kill widely and indiscriminately for the pure joy of murdering and sacrificed their lives because my doctors go to university, iowans hold early presidential primaries every four years and because i come and make us forgive me have one or more stand on after work. without such an enemy exists? where you'd be at most a nuisance and not a national security threat posed today to lesser or greater degree by iran, the south east of islamic imperialism and the sunni islamists inspired by osama bin laden. the farcical view is unfortunately pandemic in both

parties. much of the u.s. and western media and perhaps most damaging than much of the academy, especially in our most prestigious universities. it is in my judgment as he was almost entirely with us instantiation. if he continues to washington's working assumption, and america will slowly but surely be defeated to the loss of prestige, financial saw the need and domestic clinical cohesion. we will lose not because any of these threats are stronger than we are. that certainly is not the case. america's myopic governing elite and its media acolytes have taken enemies who are military capability at most the puny five-foot tall, even in check but it sandals and made them into 10-foot tall and still current human. the three threats i'm going to speak about are those posed by iran, saudi arabia and it's

outlays. taking these threats come each base in the persian gulf, let us first look at the smallest least threatening that, that which comes from iran. since the korean embassy was used in 1979 and humiliated for more than 400 days, the islamic republic of iran is the bat in honor of the u.s. governing elite, created a hatred among ordinary americans that is easily exploited by u.s. politician, journalists, academics and pro-israel organizations. so successfully had the scare mongers and -- so successful at the scare mongers and in hate being what they often call and not they like every man that fact that in all of american history there probably has not been a non-threat like a rant that is more feared by the average american. look at iran and what you see.

first, we see relatively small island of shia muslims surrounded by his sunni world at despises them and would rather kill them than all the americans , britons are israelis they can get their hands on. second, we see in iran in the last decade has been virtually surrounded by u.s. military bases and knows that its access to the high seas can be shot almost instantly by the u.s. navy. third, we see in iran's image production has peaked and with the economy the boards is steadily declining. in cold war terms then, iran is fully contained by opposing powers, but then again so is iraq and that did not stop an unnecessary disastrous war. i come you might say, what if iran gets a nuclear weapon? my answer is to notice about it. iran will get a nuclear

capability. if we've been serious about stopping it, we would've stopped our european allies from selling their land as necessary elementary technology and a 90s. iranian leadership are very has heard nothing from washington, israel and much of nato for the past 20 years except for the regime change, preemptive strikes, has experienced little reality for the u.n. sanctions and most recently has seen more than 400 u.s. congressman senators turning on their president is standing and cheering at 2010 speech in washington by benjamin netanyahu calling for war in iran. it is also seen as today in egypt western governments encouraged a nice, safe and politically naïve college students to tutor young iranians, churches political revolution without a care about how many of those iranians would

die in the streets of servers else. given this context in terms of political reality, iran's leaders agree to be negligent if they were not seeking an effect of defense against the constant threats from the world's most militarily pull nations. so tehran will certainly get a nuclear weapon. then what? my responsibility would be to ask, so what? iran does not have the ability to hit the united states is such a weapon. when we certainly can incinerate persia and the shiites will not supply the sunni extremists would be more likely to use it again as iran and against the west. but will they not use it against israel, u.s.? i would say on this iranian leaders have been host's big men and women all ever created. israel possesses a large multifaceted and wholly accounted for wmd arsenal that was surely as it is tehran -- it looks like it was remotely thinking about a first strike.

indeed come iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons so they fit a shia islands rendered by half while sunnis and the u.s. military bases in u.s. and israeli nuclear tributaries oka squarely on it. in other words, with or without a nuclear weapon, iran is contained. they can continue to dabble with its violent circuit in israel moved him water, but it cannot pose a military threat to the united states. before moving toward so-called saudi friends, let me say that there is one serious iranian threat to the united states, but only if we or the israeli strike iran first. thanks to martin 35 years of criminal negligence by the u.s. executive and legislative branches in the areas of water control and domestic security, both iran and its lebanese surrogates have treated a large claim the same infrastructure in the continental united dates. one which works similar networks

in canada, mexico and the caribbean. iranians are too smart and too afraid of u.s. military power to use this network to strike first in america. but it clearly is designed to allow tehran to respond with financier if iran is attacked by the united states or by israeli allies. now for saudi arabia and the other coast dates to what we too often forget is referred to by the sunni world as the arabian gulf. let me first say that i you saudi arabia to investigate great the peninsula tyrannies as a nationstate that is perhaps the most dangerous to the united states into the west generally. yes russia and china are threats to the united state, the day are threats washington openly knowledges, closely watches and assesses and is fully capable of defending america against. saudi arabia however is a

serious threat, indeed one more teenagers in iraq toward which our governing elites in both parties turns a blind eye. early deceitfully pretends to react as close and allied that keeps its security dependent on its enemies by relying on the saudi's to play a pro-u.s. girl in the world oil market and it endangers our economy by allowing the saudi's to buy an ever larger share of our ever more out-of-control federal debt. in addition, studies in the past 30 years have built the highly fact is lobbying the united states, which is as pernicious, affect them correctly nice ipaq, but more quiet and subtle. the former u.s. ambassador's generals and senior intelligence officers argue its case in the white house, the congress and the media and especially in "the wall street journal." needless to say, this lobby's

work is enthusiastically assisted by our oil and arms making corporations whose concerns have less to do with u.s. he then making sure they keep their seats on the saudi gravy train that is even now hauling away another $60 billion worth of us-made arms. due to the fact there's coming u.s. leaders never tell americans the truth about the kingdom, which is that since the 1970s oil boom started an enormous transfer of westernmost independent, and the saudis quietly exported rate of sunni islam that is radicalize much of the historically defined sunni middle east region and which is now and are basing in places like indonesia, malaysia, pakistan, afghanistan, india, balkans, north caucasus and sub-saharan africa. last year in nigeria, for example, saudi and gulf missionaries have long labored and spent large sums of money

and islamist group known as local heroin amended it local agenda to name the united states as its number one target for a quote unquote america's oppression and aggression against muslim nations, particularly in iraq and asking us and because of this point work for israel close quote. more immediately dangerous for the west however at the saudi regime funded activities of the circuit islamic clerics in the united states and europe, especially in the united kingdom. for more than 30 years, the saudi's domestic establishment, which controls education, social policy and missionary work as pro-western muslims to the kingdom for theological training. they returned to the west to preach what can only be described as a martial oriented imperialism prohibition of the world is holy islamic and which

for the west would mean that christian and jewish populations could convert it said subordination to islam or face elimination. the saudi trained creatures are prominent in mosques and in the united states and europe and have secured positions as chaplains and western universe these come up prison systems the military spirit this is not to say, let me stress, solid american or european muslim communities share the martial expansion orientation, but it's very much to say the saudi trained clerics have teamed enough positions in the west and have enough access to muslim youth through multiple media vehicles to have a growing impact. they are now influencing some young muslim males in the west in a pro-jihad direction in much the same way they have for years since the band in the middle east, asia and africa. those who doubt this would be well served in reviewing the

escalating number of militant related a cavities would've been uncovered and stopped in the united states since 2007. to note the growing number of young u.s. canadian australian muslims were going abroad to fight and bronchitis banter, yemen and afghanistan, to note al qaeda is very successful talented u.s. citizen muslim ran media operations in the english-speaking world. and the saudi's to private bridge from our second source of concern in the persian gulf. the saudi kingdom and tyrannies to the third, namely osama bin laden, al qaeda, their allies in increasing numbers of muslims inspired by each. when all is said and done, osama bin laden has not been an anomaly in saudi arabia. rather he is the poster boy for its educational systems,

successors. for chilly for the united states and the west, bin laden has matured as intemperate, not the saudi monarchy and the muslim brotherhood, offensive and intolerant ones. even with these differences, however, the saudi's overseas missionary activities are an innocent will be to al qaeda's work notational military and media activities. your ex-patriot saudi preachers, islamic ngos and direct funding by local islamic organizations, studies have treated muslim communities in most areas of the world that are alienated from and even hateful toward west. and so these communities are congenial environments for hosting al qaeda presence in the balkans, india and bangladesh, and the north caucasus and south asia, north america and europe and sub-saharan africa, these

preachers, ngos and doses of saudi cash have for decades prepared the ground for al qaeda and its allies. the saudis realized this? of course they do. you must always keep in mind that the only islamist terrorist insurgent attack at they can approve of are those that occur outside the kingdom. inside the kingdom rather. a final point to make on the symbiotic saudi arabia qaeda relationship outside the arabian peninsula is that saudi dignities rod woodlief al qaeda of the need to fund, staff and manage a humanitarian health services waiting like those run by hamas, hezbollah and the muslim brotherhood. and therefore, bin laden is allowed to focus on spreading this organization including military dvds. bin laden, al qaeda and their allies and those they inspire at

the third of persian gulf that. they are a think the most dangerous to the united states. they are the most dangerous not because they are more powerful than the united states or because they are supported by all muslims, they are most dangerous goals set to america because the u.s. bipartisan governing elite has uniformly refused to accept reality. from the first bush to clinton to george w. bush, barack obama, americans have been told they are poor because america and its allies are motivated by hatred for liberty, way of life and democratic institutions. this is a palpable, lethal lie. we are being attacked because of our elite half-century we let us intervention the muslim world. it is accumulative impact from the 50 years of interventionism that we find the main motivation of america's islamist enemies as well as the print both organizational glue that provide

the monica of unity to the movement always fragile cohesion. the islamist motivation is to be found in their perception of u.s. foreign policy is an attack on the islamic religion and its followers. this is a view held not only by those carrying ak-47s, but extend the polling by a delightful that nearly 80% of all muslims worldwide, young and old, moderate and militant men and women. no american must accept the islamist indictment of the anti-muslim intent of u.s. foreign policies. but to avoid military defeat, economic ruin and widespread domestic violence, u.s. leaders must have knowledge and explain to americans that this is the muslim world perception that u.s. security requires all of us to accept the hard truth that perception is always reality.

and what are the policies motivating the bin laden islamist clerics i can do no better to u.s. policies bin laden and invited it in 96 and to which we would flee for the next 15 years. i would also go for the six policies motivate our foes in iran. according to bin laden, his declaration of war in islam is clear in the following facts. the u.s. military and civilian presence -- peninsula, u.s. and western energy resources, the u.s. military prison in the muslim paint the, four for nations that oppress muslims, russia, china and india. unless an unqualified real u.s.

support and protection. but that is the lifestyle that causes the whir of the united state. and yet, 15 years on, there is an no mention be any serious political figure of ron paul and dennis kucinich. they are motivated to anything more than a bloodlust and a political culture featured in the west. why such the case? it is because america's governing elite keeps interventionism. the default response, witness for example clinton and mccain in the egyptian crisis. from obama to speaker boehner to senator mccain, from "the new york times" to the "washington

times," from fox news to national public radio and for most of the u.s. professoriat and punditry to the top pastors of the christian evangelical community, u.s. leaders, left right and center believe there is no political problem of war, general a quality efficient tea, revolution, ethnic conflict, curt election, poets or religious clash. it does not require direct american involvement. and that's whether or not they can identify even a single genuine nationalist avarice. i do not suggest he can read the minds or hearts of those who have for three decades to find her disastrous foreign policy in the muslim world because no one has such divine in sight to take as my guide, general washington's assertion that the views of men can only really known or guessed i put their

words or actions. using this metric, or leaders pervasive bipartisan indoctrinating interventionism emerges in sharp relief. u.s. intervention then is the islamist main motivation for fighting america. while u.s. citizens can debate the policy status code should be kept for one or more of the policies to be amended or abandoned, making the assumption that muslims hate americans for they are and how they live and not for what the u.s. government does in the islamic world will lead to nothing less than a fast case of self exception, yielding eventually calamity for the nation. indeed, the united states today may stand in an historically unique position. no other great power in my memory has faced a situation in which it is likely to be attacked at home in a manner probably more severe than 9/11 and have no means with which to respond to the enemy in the

military manner. having already destroyed the known infrastructure of al qaeda and the taliban, we are bereft of the military targets that are left with only the most likely to overspend to attack iran the mother who attacks us were attacked symbolic target such a population centers in afghanistan and pakistan were holy places such as mecca or medina. us, after a second attack in the united states, the choice for washington would be one or two. understanding motionless and the quivering but important rage or launching attacks of the late professor huntington all too pressing. in america today before going analysis not mainstream. indeed, i've often heard dismissed as pathological. and yet more than 14 years after al qaeda declared war on the united states comes a cynical act of political expediency in

iraq known as the surge is unraveling as he was casualties for sharing with the kerry and violence grows and more elections and go. the war in afghanistan is lost younger call on president obama has murdered military forces, make him an resupply route, traverse hostile russian and pakistani territory. pakistan is in danger of going the way of afghanistan with unfortunate tax plans of proliferation in which 18 bleedthrough from iraq is already those will in jordan, syria, turkey, lebanon and gaza. in addition, the islamist insurgencies in somalia and algeria have been rekindled at the small initiating this victory spreading into west africa. similar insurgencies of varying a building fatality are underway in yemen, southern thailand, mindanao and the north caucasus.

the major cities of hindu india have been attacked by islamic fighters in the islamist movement is growing in britain has driven the traditionally stoic security services of public despair for the united state, belmont at monaco delineated out warnings for defeating america in three concise praises. first come is take advantage of economic situations internationally to help lead america to bankruptcy. second, to spread that u.s. military intelligence forces with their flexibility and exhaust their reserves. third, to strip away america's allies and to disrupt domestic political unity in america as much as possible. i will leave it to the audience using these as a magic, whether there is any reason for bin laden and al qaeda to be discouraged about the progress they have made in the whir they began in 1996.

now let me move to discussing how we can begin to want the persian gulf. this foreign policy has advice for the obama administration, and act for u.s. administration has been heard by anyone who's flown on the airline. during the preflight safety briefing count each passengers told a case of an emergency, place your oxygen mask on first and then help others with theirs. i've refer to this commonsense instruction in my books and i believe it's continuing direct pertinent to u.s. policy. before america, the feel of our allies of who can fight, who will fight rather can defeat the expanding islamist movement in egypt we must, unfortunately with more military power that we have use today. washington must put its own political and foreign-policy houses in order. ..

if there be one principle more deeply rooted in the mind of every american, jefferson wrote in 1791, it is that we should have nothing to do with conquest. in america's dealings with iran and obviously with saudi arabia, as well as eds war with islam, we are losing because our bipartisan government and its academic immediate apologists have turned mr. jefferson's guidance on its head much to the nation's detriment. because of this interventionism, which the founders would have damage to hell, we as a nation are mired in an environment in the persian gulf region that is

conducive to an endless war with muslims. foreign policy is at a base about creating multiple options to use to protect genuine u.s. interests in the independence and in always unpredictable world. but what americans celebrate independence day this coming july, i would predict neither president obama nor senator mccain would have the moral courage to tell americans the truth, which is that over the past 35 years both parties have consciously eviscerated u.s. independence on the single most important foreign policy issue, the decision about whether or not to go to war. both parties, for example, have failed to move the united states closer to energy security since the first saudi level wheelan wargo in 1973. instead of freeing the u.s. economy from the dagger pointed it's hard, american presidents, republican and democratic, have on manfully graveled, bigot and

even publicly vowed to the tyrants of the arabian peninsula in the desperate quest for more oil. the same president, moreover, have enormously over spent the public treasury that america is now further in the thrall of the same air at higher rents, who with china by the largest part of our debt. i can only remark that there are few better definitions of abject foreign policy than one that puts u.s. energy and financial security in the hands of its enemies. because of such leadership, americans find the have lost control over the peace or war decision. if antisaudi unrest in the kingdom's eastern province seriously curtails oil production, and u.s. forces will deploy there to defend and secure the saudi police state and to restore the flow of oil. and the reality of an automatic goes beyond the arab world. currently, mexico is one of our top oil supply years and is creeping toward the status of a

failed state. and by 2015, the united states will import 20% of its crude from the niger delta region. if production in either place, and both already have massive insurgencies, is ever significantly reduced, u.s. soldiers and marines almost certainly will deploy to restore production. and if you think the insurgencies in iraq and afghanistan are nightmares, wait until u.s. forces are fighting in the niger delta as 27,000 square kilometers of swamp and forest. as for mexico, i can only think that our governing elites criminal failure to enforce that indispensable component of national defence known as effective border control has said america up for a tragedy of shakespearean proportions. a tragedy that when it comes, will be of our own making and one that once started will unfold rapidly and bring with it a strong possibility of significant violence in parts of the united states. americans also have lost control

of the peace or war decision because their leaders have involved them almost inextricably in the unending and the honorable religious war between arabs and israelis, ignoring and even ridiculing the founders explicit guidance to avoid getting americans involved in other people's war. both parties not only have involved us in this middle east conflict, but they have involved as in other people's religious wars. can there be any better definition of an insane foreign policy than the one that today find is the united states not only involved to the hilt in this year relevant religious war, but politically backing in phonetically arming both of the major antagonists in the war, israel and saudi arabia. by being israel's cash cow and unquestioning protector, and the only protector of the fundamentally anti-american saudi state, washington has created a situation in which america will be drawn into any arab-israeli war that includes any arab state beyond palestine.

no matter the wishes or the interests of the american people. having all but negated the ability of the united states to abstain from wars for oil and major wars between arabs and israelis, the u.s. political elite has completed and axis of doom for americans through its apparently limitless zeal for overseas democracy crusading to read a perversion of what america stands for that can only lead to war and more war. the american elites democracy crusading in iraq is destabilize the entire region creating new threats to oil supply and making prices largely unpredictable. it also has cost american taxpayers nearly a trillion dollars. has killed more than 4500 of our soldiers' children, while wounding 30,000 more and has set the stage for a potential regionwide secretary ansel war. a few more missions accomplished like this one in the democracy building from will bankrupt the

nation. and the still pending threat of another war to impose dhaka see this time in iran, which is of course a more representative state than washington's islamofacist. allies would be in - achievement of bigot proportions. for mike dayron would be billed as a warm-up to elaborate oppressed iranians or stop the spread of nuclear weapons, but in reality, it would be like iraq no more than a war to protect israel. and in terms of american independence, just conjure for a moment the and nerving reality that 300 million americans could awaken one morning soon to find themselves at war with iran because a man named netanyahu or mahmoud ahmadinejad, both foreigners no american never voted for, decided to expand a religious war in which no genuine u.s. interest is at stake. as i noted, our participation in such a war would produce iran sponsored terrorism in america and just might temporarily unite

the entire muslim community. 1.4 billion people if you're counting in the jihad against the united states. america's bipartisan governing elite than with the support of the media and the academy have brought the united states face-to-face with war at every turn. war over leal, war over religious conflict in which no genuine u.s. interest is at risk, and war to impose a secular democracy on people who will fight it to the death. the situation is surely the antithesis of what the founders intended when they designed a system meant to limit the chances are butchering government leads inevitably to tyranny. the founders new and contemporary americans are painfully learning that there are few better definitions of tierney than one that finds a nation repeatedly led into wars or no national interests are at risk by the personal beliefs, ambitions, or even whims of a single individual in his or her

closest advisers. to have a shot at negating the persian gulf threats to america, u.s. leaders must be made to abandon the half century binge of interventionism and begin to rebuild the politically cohesive financially solvent american republic to replace washington's already collapsing attempted in higher. the question is of course how to begin to retrieve the blank check commitments u.s. leaders have given to the foreigners. let me suggest several ways of proceeding. first, america must accelerate conversion to alternative energies, expand nuclear power, and further, explode fossil fuel reserves. and america, nothing should be allowed to detour the ingenuity and initiative of americans from securing greater energy self-sufficiency. furies induced by the bp oil leak shouldn't keep drilling halted. and demand for protection for arctic rabbits, the gulf of mexico trembled reefs or the

sunni oelrich pacific waters off california at the cost of debt soldiers and marines should be ignored. beyond oil, america has no national interests in the persian gulf, arab peninsula region. save the freedom of navigation, which the u.s. navy can assure. and as our dependence on foreign energy declines, this will become much more clear. self-sufficiency will also allow america in the west to stop protecting the gulf and other muslim tyrannies. regimes that cloud our economic destiny, steadily export religious hatred for us and make our advocacy of freedom appear to be pure and even spectacular hypocrisy. for america and its allies, it will also and the current cruel reality that sees a portion of the price parents pay the pump, flow from oil rich arabs to insurgents who are killing their soldier children in iraq and afghanistan.

second, the in possible must be done. the congress must be made to find a backbone or be purged in the coming elections to be the backbone with which in its supine and surely he legal at occasion to the executive branch of its sole power to declare war. and thereby restore the constitutionality and therefore sanity to the u.s. were making process. infamously, no congress has declared war since december 8, 1941. and yet, we have repeatedly seen america dragged into the wars because one man and his of pfizer's have decided it is the right thing to do. the joint resolutions permitting the president to start wars our covered reactors that surrender constitutional prerogatives and allow senators and congressmen to have it both ways. they cannot what the troops and beat their chest if the war goes well, or they can slide and undermine the president of the war goes belly up. our post war history is littered

with failed wars, initiated by the president, and which divided americans among themselves. perhaps the restoration of the founders' intent on the issue of were making will allow americans both to win war abroad and not page them against each other at home. third, the united states must stay out of other people's wars, particularly their religious wars. america, for example, now stands as the abject loser in the israel hezbollah conflict, the palestine war, the economic strangling of hamas and the periodic israeli invasions of gaza. indeed, america is in part losing to bin laden and the islamist movement because of its absolute backing of israel, which requires among other things the coddling of air and tyrannies and it's self-defeating blind eye for the saudis blatant and aggressive jihad spreading. america, and i would suggest your love, must withdraw from

the savagery. no vital aspect of the western life or security would be negatively impacted if israel or palestine or both disappeared tomorrow. in this really ought to receive great attention today. as a hezbollah that politician becomes lebanon's primm minister, the saudis seek to spread their malign influence by replacing our aid to mubarak, and the egyptian tierney teeters toward the muslim brotherhood. all of which, like the occupation of iraq, will further compromise israel's security. in addition, we are tied to the saudi tierney only because of the moral cowardice of politicians, eager for the cheap oil and massive arms sales. we also must reject the of serve contention that u.s. western and israeli national security interests muslim world are identical. america is now shedding blood in iraq because of the country's neoconservative and pro-israel citizens in their journals.

these men provoke a hubris war based on the idiot idea the democratic state could be treated in muslim iraq the would be less than wholeheartedly anti-israeli. in doing so, saddam hussein, a shield for the israelis and the israeli security, or permanently compromised from the moment the u.s.-led invasion of iraq began. moreover, this is not a fixable situation. because a potentially -- the cause a potential iraq regime ambivalent towards israel exists only in the minds of pro-israel u.s. citizens, these are the men and women who at the day's end our israel's most lethal enemies. the cost of the unqualified u.s. support for israel long has been measured only in dollars and political capital. and as such has been largely ignored by americans and ignored to washington's wasteful. but we are now in a situation

where the cost of support for israel is or soon will be measured in the lives of american parents children. that cost i think will quickly become obvious, abhorrent, and utterly unacceptable to those parents. fourth, finally, and i think most importantly, the u.s. government and its european allies must stop trying to spread democracy abroad by military, financial, humanitarian or political intervention. no young american man or woman should die for the insane goal of giving the people of iraq and afghanistan a possibility of increasing democracy, a phrase used that in some item by u.s. presidents and other western leaders. no small republican government like our own has the right to spend the lives of its young in military crusades for unattainable obstructions such as giving liberty, justice, gender equality and democracy to

foreigners who do not want them and will fight them to the death. this is especially true when our youngsters lives are spent as they have been in iraq and afghanistan. by a governing elite that does not intend to win the wars and starts and refuses to allow the full use of the conventional military force taxpayers have bought to protect their country and their children. u.s. foreign policy than must revert to what it was before the cold war gave license to u.s. politicians to become a democracy mongering interventionists. foreign policies meant to defend our country, not to define who we are by doing what our eletes defined as good deeds overseas. in america, foreign policy need to do but one thing. it must protect america's soul to us the expansion of liberty, freedom, and the equality of conditions. if no additional foreigner ever votes in an election, americans,

and i would say europeans would be no worse off and practically speaking, our efforts to build democracies abroad have a track record of making us less safe, not more safe. indeed, washington's intervention as some and its more recent crusading in the muslim world has a and paul first loss in treasure, blood, domestic political unity, and what mr. lincoln called the right for example of our -- to write full influence of our republican example. to protect the precious legacy our ancestors have built here in north america over the past four centuries. weak and america must return to the founder school for our country. that of being the well-wishers of freedom and independence for all. but the champion of the indicator only of our own. thank you very much. [applause]

>> thank you, michael. i have a feeling we are going to have some questions after that speech. i would encourage you to freeze your question as a question and we will take one per person only. second row. no, sir, the one behind you. we will get to you. >> thank you. i am confused about the relationship between the saudi royal family and al qaeda. can you explain that a little bit more, and particularly how -- what is in the interest of the saudi royal family to establish a al qaeda sales in the united states? how does that work? what is being done and how far has progressed? >> the saudis are inoffensive almost imperialists purveyor of islam. they are indeed the people who

want to build a caliphate worldwide. bin laden is more of a defensive jihadists wanting to take back the land that he believes were taken from his mom to the co -- islam. it elsewhere are both sponsoring and paying for subversives activities and indeed, are trying to make the world entirely islamic over time. the relationship with bin laden and the saudis is always a cloudy one. they have disowned him. but i think you will accept things are never quite black and white in the arab world and especially in saudi arabia. parts of the royal family are said to still contribute money to bin laden and other islamists , certainly wealthy families and wealthy muslims around the world continue to do that. so, the saudis are shielded by

smiling speaking english and holding hands with president rose garden, but the taliban is not far from being what saudi arabia would be without the royal family. the taliban was educated by the saudi educationists if you will. another question right in front here. >> [inaudible] brad about how the millions america spend and bin ladens several times, which you haven't mentioned, would bankrupt the west to read every target except the pentagon and the west was an economic target. in other parts of the world that don't like a good muslims watching sports and pakistan. when the west was economic.

of course it's part of the culture of people who seem too eccentric, but if they are convinced they are responsible for the united states going bankrupt, is the -- of the u.s. government seems it is not going to go bankrupt what is going to stop them from attacking the withdraw u.s. troops from afghanistan, etc.? >> welcome i don't think i missed seeing it, sir. i think it is curved bin ladens's first priority as to take it that the economic conditions internationally to try to help that process along to bankrupt us. that is clearly his intention. he knows, he said publicly we can't invade milwaukee or the words to that effect. the goal was clearly to make us spend money to the we don't have any left to spend and we seem to be doing quite well with that at the moment.

>> [inaudible] >> there is no way to do with until we tell the american people the truth, and we begin to fight the enemy that exists instead of the enemy that our politicians want us to believe in. once we tell the american people it's what their government does and not how they live, perhaps we can have a rational discussion, but until then, we're going to keep spending money without much effect. for example, we've spent, what, 50 billion, $100 billion on gadgets at airports and crossing points around the country. so now we are fully capable of stopping a guy carrying a bomb wearing an eye i love osama bin laden teacher as long as he comes through miami or niagara. if he happens to drive a 13-year-old or 18 year old pickup truck across the border from mexico to houston, we don't have a prayer.

so, we are well on our way, you know, what do they say that those cargo aircraft bombs cost $4,500? i would bet we've spent over a billion in beefing of our defenses. but it all starts at recognizing the enemy coming and we haven't. >> can you talk more about what you just mentioned, the crossing in from mexico and canada? you had said that hezbollah and iran have already established some sort of infrastructure? >> yes. >> what kind of evidence is there for that? >> i think there's a great deal of evidence. if you read what the fbi has said about it publicly there are strong al qaeda -- or hezbollah organizations in north carolina and new york, montreal, toronto, vancouver, los angeles. initially established with the iranian intelligence service to keep an eye on the young shah and his followers, but it's clearly designed also to have a

dual use which is to strike back against us. it's not talked about very much. you know, the bush administration talked about saddam having a terrorist capability here, and of course he didn't, but the iranians absolutely have a presence here. >> okay. thank you. on the left in the third row. >> i have a question or asked to comment on the failure of the intelligence community, which is part, you know, which has rapidly grown in funding and also power in the united states. and as a large part responsible, i feel, for these wars we engage in. is there a suggestion? >> the intelligence community can't declare war no one declares war so what we stand back for a moment. the intelligence community is a particularly the cia is a peculiar instruments of the president of the united states. with the intelligence community does is order and often voiced

by the president. so the idea that somehow the cia and the community as an organization is kind of nonsense. and you are seeing the absolute avery come if you will come of the president of the united states, mr. obama, and blaming the intelligence community for not telling him this stuff was going to happen in the middle east. for the past 30 years the intelligence community has reported that the tierney in the middle east live on and i said, that they will be just fine as long as they are brutal and repressive and nothing out of the ordinary happens. if he didn't know that, it was a failure of his senior advisers or of his ability to see the world as it is rather than he wants it to be. i suspect the only intelligence failure was an inability to predict the day the guy let himself up to nisha. just as the intelligence failure

of 9/11 of course was mr. clint's failure to kill bin laden when he had multiple chances in 1998 and 99. and the reason the war is going on in afghanistan today is because mr. bush didn't kill bin laden when the community had identified his presence at torturo in december, a 2001. over the course of my career come intelligence failures are generally the result of a republican and democratic presidents failing to act in time on intelligence that they talf. >> i think we need to move on to read it is a gentleman right behind you and then we will go to this site. >> i thought your presentation was very courageous and intelligent is that it'll be the few available? >> i could surely send a copy to andy and if you want to put on the website or send it to people who request it.

>> this is being podcast as well >> thank you. >> okay the gentleman -- yes. >> u.s presented some very interesting points about alternative approaches to foreign policy and domestic policy. can you tell me what kind of falling and what kind of support we might see in terms of congress or in terms of the executive branch with anything that you flee now? >> i don't think we will provide think mr. paul is the only one who speaks on this, but the one thing i would tell you is we toured the country quite a bit speaking in people between 2436, 37 are very interested in doing more at home and less overseas, and so i tend to think that the quality of the leadership in

both parties is so bad that this particular time that the only thing that is going to get us off the mark either on foreign policy or debt or a number of other issues is calamity. they won't do anything until this disaster occurs. i hate to be that cynical or that , but i've watched this for an awful long time, a very small portion of it, but i watched bin laden attack us for example in somalia in '94, toys and saudi arabia in '95 and '96, destroyed two of our embassies in east africa in 98, almost sank the colin 2,000, and then 9/11. after each one of those things i thought the american government is not going to let this go and fester forever, and it never did. and so, i am -- i guess i would say i'm resigned to waiting for

the calamity the would trigger a change. >> why did we pushback at torch borut. you were with jerry bernstein and we were talking about at that time, and they said that gary said they had everything trained, the new in exactly where he was and it had to do with the generals pulling back. >> the generals if there's a blessing from all of the war it perhaps is the fact the next crop of generals want be bureaucratic paper pushers, that they will have seen their troops died in the ground to the generals, when we had a bin laden taught in the tora bora mountains decided it was bad public relations to lose our own troops to do our own dirty work if you will. and then they found the two afghan commanders to hire to go into the mountains. garrey was on the ground, said the names back to us my people

did the naim traces on the gentleman. both of them fought with in london against the soviets and both of them were commanders for the local mujahideen tribal chieftain who lived in the tora bora area. both of them were his commanders so they were clearly going to be a daily and a dollar short. they took the money and they were a daily and a dollar short and osama bin laden got away. and the only reason he did is we didn't use the 6,000 marines and the tenth mountain division that were nearby and were eager to go >> more questions. let's see. bill, if you could get this fellow in the blue crew neck who doesn't have his hand up that date. yes. >> i want to ask you about bin laden. you said one of his issues was we were exploiting the oil from the middle east. it seems to me that it's a two-way street. the fact that we were depending

on the oil as a plus for him, not a mius. could you explain that? >> the argument is that untold recently at least we have exploited the oil at prices less than the market would have required, and that so there was an amount of theft. he's an economist in part by training and there is a long discussion of how much other commodities have gone up. and until recently oil hadn't approached the growth in other commodities. so the idea is both that we took -- we were taking oil at below market prices, but as important, that muslim governments are kowtowing to us by selling oil at less than market prices. oil remains one of the hardest targets for al qaeda because they recognize it is our achilles' heel, but if they destroy a production facility in the middle east, it hurts

muslims which is one of the reasons they are so focused on a place like houston, for example. >> very good presentation to read to the point of -- it seems to me that you're advocating until we get to more or become an isolationist country again, that kind to me it flies in the face of how we have become so, you know, interconnected globally. so, you know, what are the -- what is the chance of that happening in your estimation? >> i think the chance of it happening probably is pretty strong as we continue to be punished and beat him at various wars and the americans -- the american people decide the game isn't worth the candle. but i also think that isolationism is a slur. i think america has never been isolationist. if you look at the scholarship in the last 50 years that looked at the inter war period from 1919 to 1941, america was never

more fully engaged in the world economically, educationally, scientifically. nonintervention doesn't mean fortress america. it means trade, it means international cooperation and climate activities, it means all of those things. what nonintervention means it is not becoming involved in problems and which we have no interest, which we have basically very little knowledge, and at the end of the day don't in hinge on our interests. i think of any we sort of in my lifetime seen a bloating of what we call a national interests. you know, freedom of the sea and now freedom of the air for transportation. certainly, unfortunately, energy is a national security interest, but to be a parent of a 20 year old who's considering the marines to the that someday i might have to face a dead son

because my government father was worth spending his life so mrs. mohammed can go to -- vote would be very painful i think. and so, i think -- i don't think i'm arguing for isolationism. i think i arguing for perhaps a better definition of what is really in our interest. >> the lady in the front row. >> the current strife and he just seems to be democratically inspired. also it is a at this time and the past weeks people have been out in the streets and i'm wondering what kind of response using we should make to egypt just to stay out of it and let mubarak and other sandlin? how should we relate to the current egyptian situation? >> i think we've proven the way we shouldn't, which is to have come down on both sides.

first, we were for a pro -- a quick transition to democracy, and then we said well, we emineth, we beat the committee we need to the to -- we need mubarak to look for things until the election comes to the best thing is to keep your mouth shut and let the cards kind of fall where they may. but to be realistic, we really can't do that. we have put for 50 or more years, we have built rather for 40 or more years our position on the middle east on supporting tierney whether it is in saudi arabia and the persian gulf war to protect israel we have maintained the jordanian tierney and the tyranny in egypt, and by not taking out the al asad, we have let that tire really exist also, so the real problem for all of us a thing to face is

that if there is a change in government in any of those three particular dictatorships, israel's security is compromised the compromise of its security that began with the destruction of saddam is multiplied because any government that follows those three governments is going to be less effective, more influenced by domestic islamists i would doubt comfortable, that egypt would renounce the treaty, but they would be less willing to expand it or further that cooperation, and they certainly would not be willing to kill egyptians who were trying to help the palestinians. so i think we've really -- the other thing if i can say quite sincerely, what i take away from

egypt situation is the utter failure of the american educational system to prepare americans for how the world is and not how we want it to be. the idea that any responsible politician in either party or in the media would expect a democracy to emerge in egypt is either a signal that they don't know american history or they have no respect for what we have accomplished in 800 years since running at. and the media of course is a cheerleader for these people. today interview? the interview egyptians who are middle class, educated english speakers. so what impression do we get that they want a secular democracy? does it make sense really in a time of turmoil, violence and perhaps instability for a

prolonged period that 32 million muslims in egypt would reach for an alien ideologies like secular democracy over a thousand-year-old faith in islam it just strikes me that our education system has really left us in a blind. i was on fox earlier this afternoon, and i had people -- i just finally kept my mouth shut because the host was insisting that cairo was on the verge of becoming philadelphia in terms of governing itself. >> icy hands but we have time for only two more. the leedy in the second row right here. >> the media reported that there was a cyber attacks on iran nuclear facilities that

originated with a joint american is really faction. could you give some insight on to who or what is behind that and is it still going on? is it still a threat? >> i've been out of the government for six years, but just listening to the media, it is apparent that u.s. officials are extraordinarily concerned about what they are calling cybersecurity. and i also know from leona time in government that they were -- the military was ordered to develop a very vigorous capability to attack cyber target's. and i have read that it was either a u.s. or an israeli or joint effort to go after the irani in computer system but i don't know that for the fact. all i can give you this speculation. except after the last few years i was still working at the

agency, cyber warfare was becoming not a password kind of very important concept and was attracting the contracting large amounts of funding. >> we're going to take one more question in the back but i would point you to an article that was in the times magazine about three weeks ago about the creation of the between as rile israel and siemens switches corporation remics the generators that were sabotaged. yes, sir. >> my question is could america really get to listen to what you say? i have a feeling that the country, meaning america, is too tall now to be doubled to find

which foot to dance on. it seems they've been standing around for a long time until we get this matter under control. could america, for instance, survive without the oil that they are going after, and could america survive by doing a proper policy? wouldn't we think that by targeting different groups that america judges pernicious to the country that the anticipating what it could be doing in the future? spec we have a limit and you've asked three questions already so we will answer one of those. thank you. >> if i understand correctly, you wanted to know if we could possibly change policies. is that --

>> [inaudible] >> one question, please. >> it seems there is no choice for america at this point. >> let me answer that. that is certainly a common concern. i'm now 58, and perhaps one of the biggest changes since i was a boy is that when i was a kid, america could do most anything whether it was go to the moon or when the cold war. and now everything is too hard. it's too hard to reduce the deficit. it's too hard to change foreign policy. it's too hard to control the border. everything is too hard. well, life is hard. and when they talk about oil can imagine if we had done anything except of daylight savings time up three weeks the last 40 years, perhaps we wouldn't be in the position we are today. there is nothing on the eda peninsula that's worth a dead marine except for oil.

and, you know, i was saying to somebody earlier today that i have been surprised that americans who fell you israel and its security haven't been among the most aggressive pressing for american energy self-sufficiency because if we do that, we can stop supporting these tyrannies of the muslim world and we can deny some of the glue of unity that holds our enemies together, but it's like everything else in life, it requires leadership and leadership is more than cheerleading, and unfortunately i haven't seen a president since mr. ronald reagan, who is kind of worth a bucket of warm spit when it comes to being a leader. >> i guess we will leave it their folks. thank you for coming. [laughter] [applause] >> thank you very much for coming out tonight.

>> for more about michael scheuer and his work, visit non-intervention.com.