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Trump Was Right, Obama Did Make Illegal Cash Ransom Payment To The Iranian Government

Outrage broke out this week over the revelation that Obama arranged to ship the mullahs in Iran piles of cash

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9 years ago

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The president hoped to camouflage what he knew to be against the law. Did it ever occur to President Obama to ask why he couldn’t just cut a check to the Iranian regime?

Outrage broke out this week over the revelation that Obama arranged to ship the mullahs piles of cash, worth $400 million and converted into foreign denominations, reportedly in an unmarked cargo plane. The hotly debated question was whether the payment, which the administration attributes to a 37-year-old arms deal, was actually a ransom paid for the release of American hostages Tehran had abducted.

It is a waste of time to debate that point further. The Iranians have bragged that the astonishing cash payment was a ransom — and Obama has been telling us for months that we can trust the Iranians. The hostages were released the same day the cash arrived. One of the hostages has reported that the captives were detained an extra several hours at the airport and told they would not be allowed to leave until the arrival of another plane — inferentially, the unmarked cargo plane ferrying the cash. The reason American policy has always prohibited paying ransoms to terrorists and other abductors is that it only encourages them to take more hostages. And, as night follows day, Iran has abducted more Americans since Obama paid the cash. No matter how energetically the president tries to lawyer the ransom issue, if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck . . . More worth examining is why the transaction took the bizarre form that it did. To cut to the chase, I believe it was to camouflage — unsuccessfully — the commission of felony law violations.

The Wall Street Journal has reported that the Justice Department strongly objected to the cash payment to Iran. As we shall see, that should come as no surprise.

$400 Million Ransom Deal Was Money Laundering And Material Support To Terrorism:

What is surprising is the Journal’s explanation of Justice’s concerns: Department officials, it is said, fretted that the transaction looked like a ransom payment. I don’t buy that. It is not a federal crime to pay a ransom; just to receive one. Our government’s stated disapproval of paying ransoms is a prudent policy, not a legal requirement. The Justice Department’s principal job is to enforce the laws, not to ensure good policy in foreign relations. It seems far more likely that Justice was worried that the transaction was illegal. If they were, they had good reasons.

At a press conference Thursday, Obama remarkably explained, “The reason that we had to give them cash is precisely because we are so strict in maintaining sanctions and we do not have a banking relationship with Iran.” Really Mr. President? The whole point of sanctions is to prohibit and punish certain behavior. If you — especially you, Mr. President — do the precise thing that the sanctions prohibit, that is a strange way of being “so strict in maintaining” them.

Now, the sanctions at issue exclude Iran from the U.S. financial system by, among other things, prohibiting Americans and financial institutions from engaging in currency transactions that involve Iran’s government. Contrary to the nuclear sanctions that Obama’s Iran deal (the “Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” or JCPOA) attempts to undo, the sanctions pertinent here were imposed primarily as a result of Iran’s support for terrorism. That is significant. In pleading with Congress not to disapprove the JCPOA, Obama promised lawmakers that the terrorism sanctions would remain in force.

Terrorism-related sanctions against Iran trace back to the early 1980s, shortly after the jihadist regime overthrew the shah, stormed the American embassy, took hostages, and triggered Hezbollah’s killing sprees. But the sanctions most relevant for present purposes stem from President Clinton’s 1995 invocation of federal laws that deal with national emergencies caused by foreign aggression. Clinton concluded that Iran had caused such an emergency by, among other things, “its support for international terrorism.” Note that this was even before Iran killed 19 members of the U.S. Air Force in the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia.

To this day, Iran remains on our government’s list of state sponsors of terrorism. Clinton’s state-of-emergency declaration has been annually renewed ever since.

Let that sink in: Notwithstanding Obama’s often shocking appeasement of Tehran, he has been renewing the state of emergency since 2009 — most recently, just five months ago. Indeed, it is worth noting what the Obama State Department’s latest report on “State Sponsors of Terrorism” has to say about Iran. This is from the first paragraph: Designated as a State Sponsor of Terrorism in 1984, Iran continued its terrorist-related activity in 2015, including support for [Hezbollah], Palestinian terrorist groups in Gaza, and various groups in Iraq and throughout the Middle East. In 2015, Iran increased its assistance to Iraqi Shia terrorist groups[.] . . . Iran used the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) to implement foreign policy goals, provide cover for intelligence operations, and create instability in the Middle East. The IRGC-QF is Iran’s primary mechanism for cultivating and supporting terrorists abroad. It is due to this atrocious record that Congress pressed Obama to maintain and enforce anti-terrorism sanctions, which the administration repeatedly committed to do. This commitment was reaffirmed by Obama’s Treasury Department on January 16, 2016, the “Implementation Day” of the JCPOA.

Josh Earnest stuttering his way through lying at White House briefing:

Best part of this video starts at the 12:12 mark, Josh gets caught in huge lie about the ransom payment.

Treasury’s published guidance regarding Iran states that, in general, “the clearing of U.S. dollar- or other currency-denominated transactions through the U.S. financial system or involving a U.S. person remain prohibited[.]” (See here, p.17, sec. C.14.) I’ve added italics to highlight that it is not just U.S. dollar transactions that are prohibited; foreign currency is also barred. Obama’s cash payment, of course, involved both — a fact we’ll be revisiting shortly. Treasury’s guidance cites to what’s known as the ITSR (Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations), the part of the Code of Federal Regulations that implements anti-terrorism sanctions initiated by President Clinton under federal law.

The specific provision cited is Section 560.204, which states:

The exportation, reexportation, sale, or supply, directly or indirectly, from the United States, or by a United States person, wherever located, of any goods, technology, or services to Iran or the Government of Iran is prohibited. [Emphasis added.] The regulation goes on to stress that this prohibition may not be circumvented by exporting things of value “to a person in a third country” when one has “knowledge or reason to know that” such things are “intended specifically for supply, transshipment, or reexportation, directly or indirectly, to Iran or the Government of Iran.”

To summarize, the anti-terrorism sanctions are still in effect, a fact the administration has touted many times. Obama conceded at his press conference both that these sanctions are still in effect and that they applied directly to his $400 million pay-out to our terrorist enemies. But here’s the president’s problem: While he is correct that the sanctions barred him from sending Iran a check or wire transfer, that is not all they forbid — not by a long shot. They also make it illegal to do what he did. As noted above, the sanctions prohibit transactions with Iran that touch the U.S. financial system, whether they are carried out in dollars or foreign currencies. The claim by administration officials, widely repeated in the press, that Iran had to be paid in euros and francs because dollar-transactions are forbidden is nonsense; Americans are also forbidden to engage in foreign currency transactions with Iran.

Obama had our financial system issue U.S. assets that were then converted to foreign currencies for delivery to Iran. Both steps flouted the regulations, which prohibit the clearing of currency of any kind if Iran is even minimally involved in the deal; here, Iran is the beneficiary of the deal. The regs further prohibit supplying things of value to Iran, regardless of whether it is done “directly or indirectly.” Expressly included in the “indirect” category are transfers of assets to another country with knowledge that the other country will then forward the assets, in some form, to Iran. That’s exactly what happened here, with Obama pressing the Swiss and Dutch into service as intermediaries.

Although these regulations leave no room for doubt that their point is to prevent and criminalize things like sending $400 million in cash to the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism, the ITSR adds another reg for good measure.

Section 560.203 states:

Evasions; attempts; causing violations; conspiracies: . . . Any transaction . . . that evades or avoids, has the purpose of evading or avoiding, causes a violation of, or attempts to violate any of the prohibitions set forth in this part is prohibited. . . . Any conspiracy formed to violate any of the prohibitions set forth in this part is prohibited.

By his own account, President Obama engaged in the complex cash transfer in order to end-run sanctions that prohibit the U.S. from having “a banking relationship with Iran.”

The point of the sanctions is not to prevent banking with Iran; it is to prevent Iran from getting value from or through our financial system — the banking prohibition is a corollary. And the point of sanctions, if you happen to be the president of the United States sworn to execute the laws faithfully, is to follow them — not pat yourself on the back for keeping them in place while you willfully evade them. The president’s press conference is better understood as a confession than an explanation. Oh, and there is also Section 560.701, which makes clear that willful violations of the regulations constitute serious felony offenses under federal criminal law — punishable by up to 20 years’ imprisonment. source

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Barack Hussein Obama

THE PRESIDENT THAT WASN’T THERE: Joe Biden Comes To An Ignominious End As The Third Term Proxy Presidency Of Barack Obama Comes To A Close

Published

4 months ago

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December 19, 2024

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For 4 years, the White House has run a con game that Joe Biden was a functioning leader, in reality it was the presidency by proxy of Barack Obama in his third term pulling the strings

Earlier today, the usually conservative Wall Street Journal ran a blistering story on how the entire Biden administration spent 4 years conning America that Joe Biden was actually in charge and calling the shots. It’s a stunning article, a segment captured below, and we encourage you to read the whole thing on wsj.com. What they left out, however, was that it was way more than just a con game, it was the literal third term of Barack Obama, made possible by the president who wasn’t there, Joe Biden.

“When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.” Proverbs 29:2 (KJB)

We have told you before Joe Biden was ever sworn in that the whole reason he was chosen was because of his highly diminished mental faculties, that way he could be propped up before the cameras while Barack Obama called all the shots like the Wizard of Oz from behind the curtain. Biden went bad, to worse, to “replace him with Kamala” in sickeningly realistic fashion. The main stream media did their part by refusing to report on Biden’s obvious ‘absent while present’ speech patterns, weird gesture and motions, and everyone’s favorite thing to pretend is not happening, his walking away from the podium as if he had no idea where he was. He had no idea. What does all this have to do with drones over New Jersey? The same government that told you Joe Biden was fine is the same government telling you there is nothing to worry about with the drones. That’s the memo.

How the White House Functioned With a Diminished Biden in Charge

FROM THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: The president’s slide has been hard to overlook. While preparing last year for his interview with Robert K. Hur, the special counsel who investigated Biden’s handling of classified documents, the president couldn’t recall lines that his team discussed with him. At events, aides often repeated instructions to him, such as where to enter or exit a stage, that would be obvious to the average person. Biden’s team tapped campaign co-chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg, a Hollywood mogul, to find a voice coach to improve the president’s fading warble.

Biden, now 82, has long operated with a tightknit inner circle of advisers. The protective culture inside the White House was intensified because Biden started his presidency at the height of the Covid pandemic. His staff took great care to prevent him from catching the virus by limiting in-person interactions with him. But the shell constructed for the pandemic was never fully taken down, and his advanced age hardened it.

The structure was also designed to prevent Biden, an undisciplined public speaker throughout his half-century political career, from making gaffes or missteps that could damage his image, create political headaches or upset the world order.

The system put Biden at an unusual remove from cabinet secretaries, the chairs of congressional committees and other high-ranking officials. It also insulated him from the scrutiny of the American public.

The strategies to protect Biden largely worked—until June 27, when Biden stood on an Atlanta debate stage with Trump, searching for words and unable to complete his thoughts on live television. Much of the Democratic establishment had accepted the White House line that Biden was able to take the fight to Trump, even in the face of direct evidence to the contrary.

On July 13, Biden held an uncomfortable call with a group of Democratic lawmakers called the New Democrat Coalition, aimed at reassuring them about his ability to stay in the race.

The president told participants that polling showed he was doing fine. He became angry when challenged, according to lawmakers on the call. At one point, Biden looked up and abruptly told the group he had to go to church. Some lawmakers on the call believed someone behind the camera was shutting it down. Biden dropped out of the race eight days later. READ MORE

The sad and strange decline of Joe Biden

Joe Biden dropped out of the race to become the next president, after a series of gaffes in 2024 raised concerns about his age, and a disastrous presidential debate performance caused alarm within the Democratic party.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

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But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

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Barack Hussein Obama

New Netflix Movie ‘Leave The World Behind’ Produced By Barack Obama Released As Chinese Cyber Army Hacks Into US Power Grid And Utilities, Coincidence?

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1 year ago

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December 12, 2023

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‘Leave the World Behind’ is a 2023 American apocalyptic psychological thriller film executive produced by Barack and Michelle Obama for Netflix

For starters, we have covered for many years, the money-path that the Barack and Michelle Obama have taken after their first two terms in the White House. One leg of that path led straight to Netflix where, for a cool $50,000,000.00, they were invited to produce movies supporting their Leftist Agenda. Predictably, their first effort ‘American Factory’ was awarded the Oscar with seemingly no effort at all. It was a ‘Christmas Miracle!’. So let’s talk about their latest release, an end times apocalyptic thriller, (yes you heard right), called ‘Leave The World Behind’.

“And they brought forth the images out of the house of Baal, and burned them.” 2 Kings 10:26 (KJB)

The first thing I’d like to direct your attention to is the movie poster itself, proudly featuring the names of the 4 stars who act in it, is the fascinating little acrostic it contains. We have gone ahead and highlighted what we found in red, and you will see it forms the word ‘Baal’. That’s not a review, that’s the marketing, so you can see the position we start this from. But honestly, did you expect anything different from Barack and Michelle Obama? I certainly did not.

As far the movie itself goes, I gave up my Netflix subscription when they started showing movies promoting kiddie porn, pro-abortion and such like so I had to rely on various sources like social media and a plot synopsis. The least troubling part of the ‘Leave The World Behind‘ is the overt racism it promotes where the main characters are reinforcing the troupe that blacks cannot trust whites. Democrats have nothing if they stop peddling racism, and it is peddled quite well here.

THE MAIN THEME: “After a prolonged stand-off, Danny decides to help Archie in exchange for money and directs them to a nearby underground bunker prepared for doomsday. G.H. confesses to Clay that he knows what’s happening – he says that a political coup d’état is afoot, which is why the people in positions of power are letting a civil war take root by disrupting technology and feeding chaos. Amanda and Ruth see New York City being bombed, and Rose has walked into the neighboring home and found the bunker, where an Emergency Alert System interceptor reveals that the U.S. is at war with rogue armed forces with the suggestion of radiological weapons being involved.” Basically, it’s a story about the end of the world written by lost people without the Bible. But you get the idea.

Translated it reads like this. Barack and Michelle have produced an end times movie showing the United States government turning against the people, and using the military to bomb them into submission. Hmm, sounds like someone has been roaming in the corridors of Now The End Begins. We’ve been warning of things like that for 15 years now. I’m sure it’s just a ‘coincidence’, but ‘Leave The World Behind’ comes out just as reports of the Chinese Cyber Army hacking the US power grid are revealed. I’m sure that’s just a crazy coincidence. Now back to your bunker.

Chinese Cyber Army Hacks US Power Grid As Obama Netflix Movie ‘Leave The World Behind’ Is Released

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

Please continue to pray for us, and for wisdom for me especially, as we continue taking steps to print the NTEB branded King James Bible for our free Bible and Bibles Behind Bars program. It is exciting and intimidating at the same time. If the Lord has prospered your financially, we ask you to donate to help us continue to send out free Bibles at this level, and even higher than we are at the moment. It takes a lot of prayer, and a lot of resources to do all this. Praise the Lord we are doing it, all of us together, labouring in the Lord’s harvest field. TO THE FIGHT!!!

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

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Barack Hussein Obama

Barack Obama Parses His Words Very Carefully As He Calls For An ‘End To The Occupation’ And An Implementation Of The Two State Solution

Published

1 year ago

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November 4, 2023

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Former President Barack Obama called the Israel-Hamas conflict a ‘moral reckoning for all of us’ at an event hosted by his foundation Friday, says ‘occupation must end’.

Last time I checked, Israel was not occupying anyone. They are in their land, given to them by God, as the Bible clearly points out in Genesis. But there is indeed an ‘occupation’ of Gaza and the Palestinians, only it’s Hamas who is doing the occupying. But as Obama was throwing around phrases like ‘end the occupation’, he never mentions who is referring to, and that’s quite intentional. He needs to keep things ‘open ended’ so as not to cause his donors to flee, without alienating his Jewish staff members.

“In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: The Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, And the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, And the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.” Genesis 15:18-21 (KJV)

For those of you who are not geographical scholars, here is the original land grant God gave to Abraham in bullet points:

  • The upper-right portion of Egypt
  • All of modern-day Israel
  • All of Lebanon
  • All of of Syria
  • A piece of Turkey
  • Half of Iraq
  • The northern half of Jordan
  • A little slice of Saudi Arabia

Now I understand that in this dispensation of the Church Age, that is something that will never be realized. Israel is actually preparing to go into the time of Jacob’s trouble which includes the 3.5 year time of the great Tribulation. But there is a Day coming where, in that day, all the land that I just told you belongs to Israel will be given back to them by the LORD Himself. In the meantime, Israel is a ‘deadly piece of dirt’ that grows deadlier with each passing day. One day, people like Barack Obama will bow down before the Jewish King of Kings, and confess that Jesus Christ is LORD to the glory of God the Father. And there will be no more the Canaanite in the house of the LORD. That’s a fact, and that’s Bible. Go look it up.

Obama calls for end of ‘occupation,’ security for Israel, state for Palestinians

FROM FOX NEWS: Obama spoke at the Obama Foundation’s Democracy Forum on Thursday, where he called for a two-state solution and an end to the “occupation,” while not clarifying what occupation he meant.

“All of this is taking place against the backdrop of decades of failure to achieve a durable peace for both Israelis and Palestinians,” the former president told the forum audience.

Obama continued, “One that is based on genuine security for Israel, a recognition of its right to exist, and a peace that is based on an end of the occupation and the creation of a viable state and self-determination for the Palestinian people.”

Palestinian governing authority Hamas launched a terrorist attack against Israel on October 7 that killed over 1,400 Israeli citizens. Since then, more than 9,000 people have been killed in Gaza as Israeli Defense Forces continue their ground incursion of the region, the Gaza Health Ministry claims. The death toll is expected to rise once buildings are cleared and rubble is taken away.

“Now, I will admit, it is impossible to be dispassionate in the face of this carnage,” Obama said Thursday. “It is hard to feel hopeful. The images of families mourning, of bodies being pulled from rubble, force a moral reckoning on all of us.”

“We’ve had to sort through our anguish, our outrage, our fears and our differences on the issues,” he said. “I had a conversation with a group of you around this issue, and you were passionate and pushed me around some of the public statements I’d made.”

“And the issue is not a wish for different outcomes – an end to the killing, peaceful coexistence between two sovereign and free peoples – but rather different assessments of the path that we need to take in order to get there,” former president Obama continued.

The United States does not officially support a cease-fire, as President Biden has repeatedly affirmed Israel’s right to self-defense against Hamas. Biden has recently shifted his tone, amid pressure from progressive groups and world leaders, to express support for a humanitarian “pause.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that a pause in Israel’s ground invasion would give time for Hamas to reorganize or plan other attacks. READ MORE

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

Please continue to pray for us, and for wisdom for me especially, as we continue taking steps to print the NTEB branded King James Bible for our free Bible and Bibles Behind Bars program. It is exciting and intimidating at the same time. If the Lord has prospered your financially, we ask you to donate to help us continue to send out free Bibles at this level, and even higher than we are at the moment. It takes a lot of prayer, and a lot of resources to do all this. Praise the Lord we are doing it, all of us together, labouring in the Lord’s harvest field. TO THE FIGHT!!!

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORT…TO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Continue Reading

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