Saturday, August 31, 2013

Where else can you go AROUND THE WORLD in 3 decades on $5?









Friday, August 30, 2013

I CONFESS. I DID sneak in a photo of both John Kerry AND George Bush IN DRAG

OK, OK. I CONFESS. I DID sneak in a photo of both John Kerry AND George Bush IN DRAG in my book "Better Better Times Ahead: April Fool? But that was NOT in the Syria part! LOL.

It's in the Amsterdam part where even I had to consider the consequences of drag versus being dead when i discovered a fraud on U.S. Investors in Europe from another continent! lol "Some like It Hot" is part of this unique, unusual global series of true events. 


If you can top this, bring it on! LOL.
http://bettertimesaheadaprilfool.com/

The Streets I Walked, Filled With Killer Gas - "Better Times Ahead"...



 There are photos of Damascus streets that were filled with deadly gas in my book "Better Times Ahead April Fool" – the same streets I once walked on a mission; streets where artillery shells and chemical gave has been used.

If you REALLY want to make an INFORMED opinion on Syria instead of posting your opinion based on...exactly what? Speculation? How you "feel"?  Gimme a break. I have been there and it wasn't as a giddy tourist. You should base your opinion on FACTS - not some bloviating talk radio host whose international experience was in Disney Land and would fill their pants if they even got off an aircraft in the Middle East. They have zero expertise in this area. 

Syria was one of nearly 50 countries I have negotiated in. If that doesn't count then America is doomed to make yet another foreign policy blunder (I argued AGAINST the Iraq war - no one listened then either - my proof is online on YouTube. You find find them by searching "Michael Fjetland.") Acting without knowledge, and against what I said on TV then in 2003,cost America $5 Trillion and hundreds of thousands of lives.

If you have an interest in America's role in the world and the Syria issue then you should read that chapter in my book (Seven, I think) if nothing else --although the rest is a true adventure story with solutions on winning the 21st century in the last chapter.Syria is different, and weird, and getting weirder. It's laid out in the book.

In Better Times Ahead you SEE FOR YOURSELF from photos, mostly taken by me, what those streets looked like then and now. Plus I talk about the history of the Assad's and what is REALLY going on there. Its complicated.

Until you have been there yourself, I suggest you form an opinion based on facts and evidence by someone who has ACTUALLY BEEN THERE...

Few in Congress have even been there --they watched the gassing while off on vacation for a month in Somewhere USA – not Damascus.

Otherwise you are just GUESSING.

And how does guessing lead to a right decision?

http://bettertimesaheadaprilfool.com/

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

What I Saw In Syria You Should Know – Former TV Terrorism Analyst...



On the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s “I have a Dream” speech, we stand on the verge of a U.S. military strike on Syria, a country that I have been to. We stand on the edge of a potential abyss and it could be MLK’s dream President who pulls the trigger for peace.

 I am one of the few Americans who have been to Syria and describe it, with photos I took, in a chapter of my book “Better Times Ahead April Fool” www.BetterTimesAheadAprilFool.com released in 2013.

Is a U.S. military strike against Syria wrong after thousands of citizens, women and babies were killed in their sleep by nerve gas?  Or should we continue to focus our worries on who the next Batman actor should be and how outraged we are Miley Cyrus danced dirty while babies in Damascus died in their sleep from a gas cloud? What are our American values and what are our interests, if any?

As I said today on The Michael Smerconish Program SiriusXM Radio #POTUS 124, I was a terrorism analyst on 9/11 and for years after. My time in Syria was spent as an international attorney negotiating a child kidnapping case involving a Texas woman’s daughter who was taken against her consent. We had to do the negotiations in Damascus, Syria. Therefore, I have walked the Damascus streets where chemical gas has now been released. Photos of those streets are in the book www.BetterTimesAheadAprilFool.com

My take? I was against Iraq and “boots on the ground” because I knew Saddam was not part of 9/11 and had no ambitions beyond being a local dictator. He was no global jihadist like Osama bin Laden. In Syria we have a leader who has repressed democracy and has killed over 100,000 of his own people, forcing 2 million into refugee camps in surrounding countries like Turkey and Jordan to escape his army’s artillery shells. And now chemical gas.

President Clinton fired cruise missiles into Afghanistan in 1998, after Osama bin Laden. He was forced to act in Bosnia to protect Muslims being killed by militant Serb “Christians.” He still regrets failing to act when 500,000 died in Rwanda from tribal butchery. But Syria is different. Syria has the largest stockpile of chemical weapons in the world; weapons banned by 195 countries – all but five countries including North Korea.

Did we not watch Hitler gas Jews in 1940 and not care?

We should not make that mistake again, regardless of the race or religion of those being murdered by the ruthless rogue controlling their country. People like the Assad family. When I there, Assad’s father, Hafez, was the strongman killer who shelled a village, killing tens of thousands – for the audacity of their not liking him. Like father, like son.

Do we say to the world: “Gas your people and we care not?”  This is not a call for boots on the ground, but for showing rogues that they cannot kill without some consequence other than Miley Cyrus waving her butt at Assad on air.

If you want to see what I saw in Syria, check out “Better Times Ahead April Fool” – Syria is but one of many global issues, like China that impact our future significantly. I unveil their dark secrets.

Michael Fjetland
Global American Series
Global American Values
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http://globalamericanvalues.blogspot.com/






Friday, August 16, 2013

a decision that probably saved our lives today



When I was traveling globally on business negotiations, often something unexpected would come up. The professional knows how to create chicken salad out of a chicken crap situation – like the time I was taking a small business owner to Paris to sell his Texas videos to Euro-Disney, but a strike by French transport workers made getting to the meeting “iffy” – I did it.

It was good training for today’s strange events. 

After driving yesterday south on Texas highway 87 and not having Internet or even much in the way of humans visible for hundreds of miles, today we left for Houston on I 10 after a night in San Antonio. It wouldn't be a normal trip.

Then we made a decision that probably saved our lives. We stopped at the nice Texas travel center in I 10 just outside of Columbus, TX. After taking a break we started driving out but the car was wobbling like a duck in the front. I thought a tire had gone out but all four looked normal. So I tried again and realized something major was broken on the front – either bearings or some other critical part.

Had we not stopped, the car would have failed at 75 miles per hour and we would have had control issues and a car in the ditch or piled into other cars. 

But that presented another problem – how to make a 2:30 closing on my refi at a great rate (3.8%) with a dead car? I called AAA and got them “coming” (so I thought). Then I used the smartphone to find repair shops in Columbus – about 4 miles away. AAA said a tow would be there in an hour. I found a car rental at a Ford repair place. It turns out that ALL repair places close for the entire weekend in Columbus. My car would have to become a resident for a few days.

I had juggled all the balls and had the rental lined up and the tow, which had not arrived 2  hours later—an hour after the committed time. Then they were “15 minutes away” but were not there 30 minutes later. Then another company told me AAA doesn’t pay and it takes 3 hours to get them to show up.  So I got a tow from Vaughan Ford, left the keys and left the car in the rest area. We took off in the rental Suburban – which had only ¼ tank of gas!

We were nearly out of time to make the closing and we didn’t have enough gas.

We ran nonstop and I made a quick pit-stop for gas – and got here for the closing just 3 minutes before the closing lady arrived!  That international “make it up as you go” experience came in handy again today.

Today was Euro-Disney all over again. That’s what we had to do when the schedule fell apart – Make it up as you go.”  We had to run a blockade to get to the site, and then I had to jump over a turnstile in a suit because the doors wouldn’t open…part of my helping a small business guy get his foot in the door for a potentially huge payoff. What happened?

Its part of “Better Times Ahead April Fool.” Better yet, the final chapter deals with SOLUTIONS for America to win the 21st century, in “Agenda for American Greatness.”

www.BetterTimesAheadAprilFool.com