The world has gone back to sleep, says Mark Steyn. “The ‘global war on terror’ was a Bush concept and will expire with his presidency, long past its sell-by date, as far as the ‘international community’ is concerned,” he writes. Everyone is tired of being fearful of a terror attack. “Code Orange is fine if it’s just taking your shoes off at the airport, but as a 24/7 mindset it’s kind of exhausting,” Steyn continued.

Meanwhile, the terrorist threat remains. Steyn points to a Wall Street Journal article by Brian Kennedy of the Claremont Institute to show how real, and catastrophic, the terrorist threat could be. “The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, have proven how vulnerable we are,” Kennedy warns. “It is not unreasonable to believe that if they obtain nuclear weapons, they might use them to destroy us.”

The world thinks that Israel would be threatened by an Iranian nuke. But, says Kennedy, the U.S. would be at risk too (emphasis mine):

Consider Iran. For the past decade, Iran—with the assistance of Russia, China and North Korea—has been developing missile technology. Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani announced in 2004 their ability to mass produce the Shahab-3 missile capable of carrying a lethal payload to Israel or—if launched from a ship—to an American city. …

Kennedy goes on to describe a couple of chilling scenarios that he says are not far-fetched. Read his whole article. For more, read what we wrote here.

Cherry on Top of the National Breakdown

Columnist Thomas Friedman called the Bernard Madoff affair a “cherry on top of a national breakdown in financial propriety, regulations and common sense.” Yesterday’s International Herald Tribunedescribed Madoff’s worldwide “Ponzi scheme” as

a fraud that lasted longer, reached wider and cut deeper than any similar scheme in history, entirely eclipsing the puny regional ambitions of Charles Ponzi, the Boston swindler who gave his name to the scheme nearly a century ago.”Absolutely—there has been nothing like this, nothing that we could call truly global,” said Mitchell Zuckoff, author of Ponzi’s Scheme: The True Story of a Financial Legend, who is a professor at Boston University. …Just as the scheme transcended national borders, it left local regulators far behind. Its lies were translated into a half-dozen languages. Its larceny was denominated in a half-dozen currencies. Its warning signals were missed by enforcement agencies around the globe. And its victims are scattered from Abu Dhabi to Zurich.

The $50 billion fraud—almost three times the size of the gm and Chrysler bailout—will have repercussions that go far beyond simple monetary losses. Already facing a massive credibility issue resulting from U.S. banks marketing toxic subprime mortgages as aaa-rated investments to the world, foreign investors are beginning to shun the U.S. This latest con is one more straw on the back of a massively overloaded camel.

EU Can Sink the Pirates

Last week, Joel Hilliker wrote in his column about the EU’s first-ever naval intervention—Operation Atalanta—which has enabled Germany to take “robust” measures to combat pirates in Somalia (exactly the opposite approach the U.S. is taking to the situation).

Spiegelelaborates on the specifics of that “robust” action, stating, “EU ships operating off the coast of Somalia have not only been given the green light to ward off or capture pirates—they can also sink their ships.” According to Spiegel, the mission that involves “half a dozen ships, up to three reconnaissance aircraft as well as unmanned drones, began a week ago and has not yet reached full strength. The German government has already agreed to contribute a frigate and 1,400 troops.”

American Political Corruption

The scandal surrounding Illinois Gov. Rob Blagojevich’s alleged attempt to sell Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat brings up an intriguing question, according to National Public Radio:

What separates the pay-to-play scheme laid out in federal charges against Blagojevich from the back-scratching and favor-providing that has always fueled American politics? …Big donors frequently end up with ambassadorships—and lucrative government contracts—with no legal ramifications. And the durable system of rewarding supporters through political patronage has, over decades, managed to resist reform.”Politicians exist and thrive on legitimate political contributions,” says Connecticut defense lawyer Hugh Keefe. “But there has always been a vague line between those contributions and the point at which bribery and personal gain come into play.”

In London, the Times notes,

Some suspect that the only difference between the traditional deal-making that lubricates Washington and the effort to sell Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat was that the governor got caught.Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, predicted that Blagojevich’s lawyers will use this premise to establish their defense and “argue that this is the way we do business—at the presidential level, they do it with ambassadorships. Here, the thing he had was a Senate seat.”

Interestingly, Blagojevich was elected in 2002 to help clean up corruption in the state of Illinois after his predecessor was convicted of corruption charges himself.

“Slumbering Enemy” in Germany

Right-wing extremism has long been viewed by many as a problem confined to eastern Germany, but last week’s knife attack on the police chief of Passau confirmed its integration into Bavaria as well, according to Spiegel.

Investigators believe neo-Nazis wanted revenge on the police chief who was known for his aggressive anti-Nazi stance. This is certainly not the first time this city has been touched by Nazi violence—far-right crimes in Passau alone have doubled this year. There are an estimated 1,100 violent neo-Nazis in Bavaria and about 10,000 in Germany. Bavaria’s interior minister Joachim Herrmann said, “We must take this escalation of violence very seriously.”

Another article in Spiegel warned that “right-wing extremism in Germany has reached a new and threatening dimension.” There have also been public calls to ban the National Democratic Party. Spiegel quotes a center-left German newspaper as saying,

There’s something ritual about the debate over right-wing extremism. If something unusual happens, an attack on foreigners or a big demonstration by neo-Nazis, there’s a brief outcry but the excitement dies down again. The constant xenophobic incidents such as daubing graffiti or desecrating cemeteries are barely registered by the public. Right-wing extremism in Germany is a problem one likes to push aside. After all, somehow it always affects ‘the others,’ and society’s middle ground doesn’t feel challenged or threatened. That has changed since the murderous attack in Passau. This time it wasn’t some minority that was attacked. The state itself in the form of Passau police chief Alois Mannichl was the target.Never before has a single representative of the state fallen victim to such a targeted act of violence. Far-right violence has reached a new, much more threatening dimension. Right-wing extremism in Germany is a slumbering enemy whose danger was long underestimated.

EU to Obama: Fix the Middle East

Europe continues to try to dictate U.S. policy with the upcoming inauguration of a president Europeans see as more pliable to their wishes. The European Union’s external relations minister said Friday that the new U.S. administration should take up the Middle East peace process as a “very first point.”

Ever since Barack Obama became America’s president-elect, Europe has taken this approach of trying to shape his future policy. Specifically, as in a letter to Obama immediately after his election, EU foreign ministers asked the president-elect to afford the EU a greater role in world affairs.

This latest statement also reflects the EU’s own interest in the Middle East, and its desire to become more involved.

“Biggest Meeting in the History of the World”

A new book by John W. O’Malley calls the Second Vatican Council “quite possibly the biggest meeting in the history of the world.” Vatican ii, as it is often called, was a massive thee-year meeting between 2,400 bishops that opened under Pope John xxiii in 1962 and closed under Pope Paul vi in 1965. It brought the church back into the world spotlight and commenced the initiatives that continue to this day to garner the wayward Protestant and Orthodox daughters of the church back into its fold.

Behind the scenes, Germany—the nation that claimed to be the most Christian of nations in the first half of the 20th century, having lost face massively after starting two global wars—was gradually preparing to regain its historic role as protector of Rome.

Though probably not mentioned in O’Malley’s book, it was at this watershed council of the Roman church, Vatican ii, that two cardinals met: Karol Wojtyla the Pole and Joseph Ratzinger the German. The friendship they formed there would cement itself into one of the most powerful partnerships in Vatican history. For more on this important history, read what we wrote here.

“Cease-Fire” Over

On Thursday Hamas declared its truce with Israel over. In her column on Friday, Caroline Glick detailed the advancements made by Hamas during the six-month “cease-fire”:

Hamas has doubled both the size and the range of its rocket and missile arsenals. Today it fields more than 10,000 rockets, missiles and mortars and has extended their range from 20 to 40 kilometers, placing major cities like Beersheba and Ashdod under threat.If the government ever permits the idf to defend the South by launching an offensive in Gaza, Hamas will be able to put up a very strong fight. Thanks to Iranian assistance and Israeli passivity, today Hamas’s forces are organized much like Hezbollah forces were in 2006.Hamas has raised a 16,000-man army divided into eight brigades. Its forces possess advanced anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles. Like Hezbollah, Hamas has developed sophisticated intelligence capabilities. And like Hezbollah it has constructed 50 kilometers of tunnels and bunkers along Gaza’s borders with Israel and Egypt.

Elsewhere on the Web

The Phoenix Business Journal cites a U.S. Army War College report that “talks about the possibility of Pentagon resources and troops being used should the economic crisis lead to civil unrest, such as protests against businesses and government or runs on beleaguered banks.” For information on why rioting will eventually sweep across America, read Ezekiel: The End-Time Prophet—especially Chapter 4.

On the growing divide between Israelis and American Jews, the Jerusalem Post has an excellent piece here. It’s one more reason why Israel will make the mistake of turning to Europe for help, as we have long been saying.

And Finally …

A George Will bon mot from today: After Congress decided not to give $14 billion to General Motors and Chrysler, the White House decided that it would ignore Congress and give them the money anyway—actually, Will writes, “More money—up to $17.4 billion—than had been debated, thereby calling to mind Winston Churchill on naval appropriations: ‘The Admiralty had demanded six ships: the economists offered four: and we finally compromised on eight.’”