PROPHETIC WORDS: Bush predicted terror, death and chaos of Iraq pullout

A PROPHETIC WARNING from then-President George W. Bush on July 12, 2007, about what would happen if the U.S. withdrew troops from Iraq too soon is getting new attention in light of the Islamic State's gains, as each of his predictions appears to be coming true.

September 11 anniversary to be marked in much-changed lower Manhattan

NEW YORK –  A solemn reading of the names. Moments of silence to mark the precise times of tragedy. Stifled sobs of those still mourning.
As the nation pauses Thursday to mark the thirteenth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack, little about the annual ceremony at ground zero has changed. But so much around it has.
For the first time, the National September 11 Museum — which includes gut-wrenching artifacts and graphic photos of the attacks — will be open on the anniversary. Fences around the memorial plaza have come down, integrating the sacred site more fully with the streets of Manhattan while completely opening it up to the public and camera-wielding tourists.
A new mayor is in office, Bill de Blasio, one far less linked to the attacks and their aftermath than his immediate predecessors. And finally, a nearly completed One World Trade Center has risen 1,776 feet above ground zero and will be filled with office workers by this date in 2015, another sign that a page in the city's history may be turning.
For some who lost loved ones in the attacks, the increasing feel of a return to normalcy in the area threatens to obscure the tragedy that took place there and interfere with their grief.
"Instead of a quiet place of reflection, it's where kids are running around," said Nancy Nee, whose firefighter brother, George Cain, was killed in the attacks. "Some people forget this is a cemetery. I would never go to the Holocaust museum and take a selfie."
But for others, the charges are an important part of the healing process.
"When I first saw (One World Trade Center), it really made my heart sing," said Debra Burlingame, whose brother Charles Burlingame was the pilot of the plane that crashed into the Pentagon. "It does every time I see it because it's so symbolic of what the country went through."
"I want to see it bustling," she said. "I want to see more housing down there, I want to see it alive and bursting with businesses."
As happens annually, family members of those killed in the attacks will gather Thursday morning to read the names of the deceased, pausing the sad roll call only four times: when the first plane struck the World Trade Center, when the second plane struck, when the first tower fell and when the second tower fell.
The memorial plaza will be closed to the public for most of the day and only available to family members. It will reopen at 6 p.m., at which point thousands of New Yorkers are expected to mark the anniversary at the twin reflecting pools where the towers once stood.
On the same day in May when the museum opened in a ceremony attended by President Barack Obama, the fences that had surrounded the plaza for years disappeared, as did the need for visitors to obtain a timed ticket. Now, thousands of people freely visit every day, from cellphone-toting travelers to workers on a lunch break, and those crowds will only swell further this year when One World Trade Center finally opens.
"The memorial and museum is extremely important to those impacted on 9/11," said Mary Fetchet, whose son, died in the attacks. "And surrounding that memorial, lower Manhattan has been revitalized."
The first ceremony at the site was held six months after the Twin Towers fell and was organized by then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his aides. Bloomberg, who took office just three months after the attacks, remained in charge, acting as the master of ceremonies for the next decade.
After other elected officials attempted to gain a larger role at the solemn event, in 2012, all politicians — including Bloomberg — were prohibited from speaking at the event. That remains the case now, as de Blasio, who took office in January, agreed to let the National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the World Trade Center Foundation organize the commemoration ceremony. Bloomberg is the foundation's chairman.

Syria strategy 2.0: Obama to hit reset to counter growing ISIS threat

One year to the day since addressing the American people about possible strikes against the Assad regime in Syria over its chemical weapons attack, President Obama is coming back to the American people with a drastically different -- and strategically complex -- plan to combat a drastically different enemy. 
The president, when he speaks from the White House Wednesday night, is expected to on one hand seek Congress' support in arming and aiding the moderate Syrian opposition. But he is also keeping the door open for possible airstrikes in Syria, something that might require tacit cooperation from the Assad regime. 
The target this time is not the Assad government, but the Islamic State, which has in the year since Obama's last address evolved into Assad's most formidable enemy -- as well as a threat to the Iraq government and the West. 
The result could be Obama's trickiest task yet in the Middle East. 
Going after the Islamic State, or ISIS, in Syria would be a boost for Assad's efforts to retain power. Yet the administration is trying to counteract that by aligning with moderate opposition groups. 
According to one White House aide, the president is seeking more aid for the rebels so they could be the ground troops in place to support potential U.S. airstrikes against ISIS. The Obama administration already is pursuing a similar strategy in Iraq, where U.S. airstrikes are backed by Iraqi security forces on the ground -- as opposed to U.S. ground troops. 
A White House aide told Fox News the president has already asked congressional leaders, with whom he met late Tuesday, to quickly pass a bill giving him the power to ramp up support to Syrian rebels. 
The president, based on what he has told congressional leaders behind closed doors, appears unlikely to actually announce airstrikes in Syria during his address. But officials are expecting the president to give his strongest signals yet that he is moving closer to authorizing them. 
A senior official also told The New York Times Obama is willing to order airstrikes inside Syrian territory, despite warnings from Syrian president Bashar al-Assad's government not to do so without their permission. 
Administration officials said Obama will press forward with other elements of his plan without formal authorization from U.S. lawmakers. That could include wide-ranging airstrikes. Other elements of Obama's plan included increased support for Iraqi security forces, as well as military and diplomatic commitments from partner nations. 
As for aid to rebels, the White House aide told Fox News the administration has existing funds that could be used to escalate support to the Syrian rebels -- including heavy arms -- and then they would come back to Congress for more money down the road. 
The U.S. already has been running a small CIA program to train the rebels, but Obama is seeking approval for a more overt military effort that could involve staging training locations in countries near Syria. Administration officials told the Associated Press Obama also sees a congressional authorization for a Syrian train-and-equip mission as sending a strong signal to allies who are considering similar efforts. 
Secretary of State John Kerry, meanwhile, traveled to the Middle East on Wednesday for discussions in Saudi Arabia and Jordan. 
The Times reported that Obama will send a delegation to brief senators prior to his speech Wednesday. 
The president huddled for nearly two hours Tuesday with the top four Congressional leaders at the White House -- House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio; Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.; Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.; and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. -- to build support for his planned campaign. A White House statement released after the session made it clear the president would not be asking for a congressional vote to authorize military force. 
"The president told the leaders that he has the authority he needs to take action against ISIL in accordance with the mission he will lay out in his address tomorrow night," the statement said in part. It added that Obama would "welcome" congressional support. 
Some lawmakers say the president, under the War Powers Resolution, must seek congressional authorization within 60 days for such military action. But U.S. presidents have traditionally challenged that measure, and Obama advisers indicate they already have the authority they need. 
A Boehner aide said that the speaker told Obama that he would he would support the president if he chose to deploy the military to help train and play an advisory role for the Iraqi Security Forces and assist with lethal targeting of ISIS leadership. 
With Obama ruling out sending U.S. ground troops into combat in Iraq or Syria, bolstering the capacity of the Iraqi security forces and Syrian opposition will be crucial to efforts to root out the Islamic State militant group, which has moved freely across the blurred border between the two countries. U.S. airstrikes could help give the forces in both countries the space to make gains against the extremists. 
The U.S. has already launched approximately 150 airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq, a mission undertaken at the invitation of the Iraqi government and without formal authorization from Congress. But the scope of the mission has been relatively limited to strikes that help protect American interests in the region and prevent humanitarian crises. U.S. officials said Obama was expected to loosen those limitations in his speech Wednesday. 
At a private dinner Monday with foreign policy experts, Obama emphasized the importance of viewing the Islamic State as one organization, not two groups separated by a border.
Obama would still have to contend with the notion that American airstrikes against the Islamic State militants were actually helping Assad, who has overseen Syria's bloody civil war. 
The U.S. has long called for Assad to leave power, and the Islamic State group is one of the groups inside Syria that is seeking to oust him. 
However, Jane Harman of the Woodrow Wilson Center, who attended Monday night's dinner, told The New York Times that the president that he could order action in Syria without necessarily helping Assad, since ISIS currently holds ungoverned territory in the northeast of Syria that Assad's forces are unlikely to recover.   

California city mandates free medical marijuana for low-income residents

Weed welfare? 
That’s what the Berkeley City Council in California has unanimously approved, ordering medical marijuana dispensaries to donate 2 percent of their stash to patients making less than $32,000 a year. 
The new welfare program in the liberal-leaning city is set to launch in August 2015. 
The ordinance, which passed in August and is the first of its kind in the country, comes at a time when several states are debating how to handle a growing movement to legalize marijuana for both medical and recreational use. 
But Berkeley's decision to effectively order weed redistribution is prompting a vocal backlash. 
Bishop Ron Allen, a former addict and head of the International Faith Based Coalition, told Fox News he doesn’t understand why the California city would want to dump pot on the impoverished.  
“It’s ludicrous, over-the-top madness,” Allen said. “Why would Berkeley City Council want to keep their poverty-stricken under-served high, in poverty and lethargic?”
John Lovell, a lobbyist for the California Narcotic Officers’ Association, agrees. 
“Instead of taking steps to help the most economically vulnerable residents get out of that state, the city has said, ‘Let’s just get everybody high,’” Lovell told The New York Times.
But others, like Mason Tvert, director of communications at the Marijuana Policy Project, say it’s a community program. 
Tvert told Fox News that the decision to provide the drug to some of its low-income residents is up to the community.
“So it’s a matter of the democratic process, people following the state’s laws, and this law appears to accommodate both of those,” he said.
California was the first state to legalize medical marijuana nearly 20 years ago.
California dispensaries are prohibited by law from turning a profit. But some places have been giving pot away to patients who couldn't pay for years.
One of Berkeley’s largest dispensaries, Berkeley Patients Group, has been doing it for a decade, The New York Times reports. One recipient, Arnie Passman, a poet and activist, said he’s couldn't remember exactly how long he had been given medical marijuana or why.
“It could be for my allergies, or my arthritis -- you know what happens to us folks: We forget,” Passman, 78, told the newspaper.