RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://politicalmavens.com/

In its loftiest Orwellian doublespeak, the Wall Street Journal of July 18th informs us that the number of New York Students who scored proficiency level on state-wide standardized English tests has jumped from 52.8% to 55%. In New York City, the number of students who achieved proficiency in English has leaped from 43.9% to 46.9%. In other words, the news that only slightly more than half the 436,000 students taking the test throughout the state passed it, and that the majority of students taking the test in NYC flunked it – is headlined in the WSJ as “Student Test Scores Jump in New York.” These students would have to be olympic pole vaulters to make this “jump” anything but shocking, shameful and totally discouraging. If the staggering sum of 18.82 billion dollars that gets funneled into the Department of Education’s annual budget can’t bring most students to a passing grade, why do we continue to fund it? Though a better headline might be “New York City Jumps Ship As It Closes Rotting Dept of Education,” Mayor Bloomberg congratulated Chancellor Denis Walcott with the salvo of “a wonderful accomplishment,” a line that would surely have elicited a smile from that great, dead satirist, Jonathan Swift.

In behavior consistent with the parody of educational achievement, the parents and educators are disturbed less by the failure of the students to perform than with the growing length of the exam and the fact that these scores will be used as a significant part of teacher evaluations. Judging by these scores, what needs to be radically lengthened is the number of hours and days that students attend school and the number of hours and days that educators and administrators should spend revising whatever pedagogical approach has led us to this disaster – without being paid overtime. There are no real surprises here. Students are failing upwards as they continue to be promoted regardless of their capacity to work at grade level. English as a Second Language has been nothing more than a holding cell for students, preventing them from being immersed in a language which they might learn within six months, as foreign students have proven in Israel utilizing the ulpan method of learning Hebrew and as our immigrant forbears managed to do when they came to NYC at the beginning of the last century. In those days, progress was measured not by the increasing numbers of translators available for every immigrant child to understand the test material in his/her native language but by the ability of foreign and native students to comprehend, speak and write just one language – English.

http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/

Creativity is an individual act. The act of building something, whether with hammers, blueprints, words, boards or plans is individualistic. Collectives can build, but not creatively. A mass has no vision because it has no personality. It can follow rules but not dreams.
The soul of American exceptionalism lay in a society which empowered the creative talents of the individual, not through grants, regulations, instructional pamphlets, inspectors and guidelines, but through the simple virtue of leaving men alone to do their work.

Freedom is the greatest creative force because it liberates the individual to build and as freedom diminishes within a society so does its creativity. Progress in restricted areas dwindles to a trickle as collectives expend a thousand times the money and effort, and still fail to equal the achievements of individuals operating on shoestring budgets.

The Soviet Union fell because its Communist collectives were not able to equal the West in the military or the economic arena. The only technique that Communist states ever had was to create a heavily regulated top-down infrastructure and when a crisis occurred, a mass of people would be thrown at the problem.

http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/309931

STOP TWIDDLING YOUR THUMBS…..LET THE SO -CALLED PROCESS DIE OUT…ENCOURAGE WIDESPREAD SETTLEMENT OF JUDEA AND SAMARIA AND CURB THE ILLEGAL ARAB BUILDING AND IMMIGRATION THERE….WHEN IT IS STABLE AND IRREVERSIBLE….ANNEX IT …THE ARABS WHO FIND IT TOO ONEROUS TO LIVE UNDER ISRAELI RULES WHICH ARE COMPATIBLE WITH SECURITY AS WELL AS RIGHTS OF ASSEMBLY, SPEECH AND PRESS SHOULD BE FREE TO MOVE NEXT DOOR TO EASTERN PALESTINE AKA JORDAN…..RSK

Let us start with a rare activity in that twilight zone that is called the Middle East peace process: talking about things we agree upon.

Regional leaders and experts on all sides of the discussion have declared the peace process to be dormant, if not dead. No meaningful negotiations have taken place in almost three years. The Obama administration is hiding its head in the sand. Rumors have replaced ideas and action.

Alas, that reality remains a taboo topic in Washington. So, for that reason, we and others have arrived on Capitol Hill to lay out the realpolitik of the peace process, to strip away the fig leaf, and to force us to see and act.

The time has come, 20 years after Oslo, to reevaluate our thinking and try a new approach. It is the only hope of moving toward a lasting peace. This Thursday in Washington, we are converging with leaders, experts, and journalists from all sides to go back to the drawing board and rethink our basic assumptions about peace in the Middle East. We must. If no path forward can be found, the region is doomed; the sentiment that “it can’t get any worse” will be disproved and mocked.

The two of us come together as Zionists. We do not yield in our determination that Israel shall thrive and grow and be a beacon of democracy, perhaps even a role model for our neighbors in the Arab world, who are now probing new possibilities and lurching toward possible democracy — or theocracy — in their homelands. That said, we do not always agree with each other about the appropriate way to achieve this all-important goal.

In 1992, one of us, Yossi Beilin, initiated top-secret negotiations with the Palestinians, including now–Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas, resulting in the Oslo agreement in 1993, and then, in 1995, a list of guidelines for a permanent solution to the conflict. He further participated in the 2001 joint talks in Taba and the later signing of the Geneva Accords, which were designed to be a model permanent-status agreement.

http://frontpagemag.com/2012/sarah-n-stern/appeasing-the-muslim-brotherhood-crocodile/ This weekend, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made her first visit to Egypt since Mohammad Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood was elected president of Egypt. Despite the fact that her motorcade was pelted with tomatoes and stones and protesters chanted “Monica, Monica,” the Secretary seemed to be willfully blinding herself as to what “Islamism” […]

http://frontpagemag.com/2012/jamie-glazov/the-dark-muslim-brotherhood-world-of-huma-abedin-2/ Editors’ note: Senator John McCain (R-AZ) has denounced Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN) for including Hillary Clinton’s top aide, Huma Abedin, among those she has noted for having Muslim Brotherhood ties in her recent call for government agencies to investigate the Brotherhood ‘s penetration of Washington. Robert Spencer’s article in this issue crystallizes why McCain […]

http://frontpagemag.com/2012/davidhornik/israeli-mega-coalition-collapses/print/ Not long ago I lauded the advent of Israel’s new mega-coalition government. That development surprised everyone, being announced on May 8 just as the country seemed headed for new elections. Instead the largest opposition party, left-of-center Kadima—which according to all surveys would have declined steeply in the elections—joined the coalition led by Prime Minister […]

http://blogs.jpost.com/print/3609

While Israel’s enemies have again been demonstrating that they love death, Israel has been proving that it loves life. My latest newsletter summary on the Jerusalem Post on-line (written before yesterday’s terrorist attack in Bulgaria) highlights this clearly. If you sometimes feel that you don’t have control over events, then don’t despair. Read through the dozens of articles in the JPost “Just look at us now” archives and you will come across thousands of innovative solutions that Israel is developing to put you firmly back in the driving seat.
A serious medical condition can turn your life upside down, but thankfully Israeli devices, drugs and therapies frequently are the first choice of physicians treating these ailments. Some that I describe may not be available on prescription yet, but clinical trials are already showing positive results. For example, OrSense’s new non-invasive blood monitor for anaemia screening and haemorrhage detection in pregnant women. Another medical device from Israeli-Arab owned Alpha Omega has just won a US award for its ability to control neurological disorders like Parkinson’s disease.

Medical news comes in constantly. Recently, a diabetic friend refuted my assertion that Israeli biotechs were developing relevant solutions for her condition. Two minutes later I received an email stating that Israeli biotech Orgenesis had announced a therapy called autologous cell replacement which transplants a patient’s own cells into their liver where they secrete insulin. To stay really in control, however, you must get hold of one of the first of its kind medical smartphones. Israel’s LifeWatch Technologies has unveiled the LifeWatch V, which measures ECG, heart rate, body temperature, blood sugar levels, body fat percentages, blood oxygen saturation and an index for measuring stress. It’s mainly for people who are at risk – and for those who may think that they are.

These next two news items are almost in the realm of science fiction. Firstly, Israeli scientists have learnt how to control insects. A robotics professor and an aerospace engineering scientist at Israel’s Technion have decoded the movement of insects. Replaying the electronic signals makes the insects move. Whereas I would like them now to program all mosquitoes to drown in the Mediterranean, the scientists aim to use this “biomimicry” to help produce small controlled vehicles. And the other fantasy that has become reality is straight out of the movie “Avatar”. Israeli student Tirosh Shapira has become the first person to meld his mind and movements with a robot surrogate. Situated inside an fMRI scanner in Israel, Tirosh controlled a humanoid robot 2000 kilometers away, in France, just by using his mind.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/disillusioned-german-islamists-returning-home-to-germany-a-844799-druck.html By Oezlem Gezer and Holger Stark in Istanbul More than 200 Islamists are believed to have left Germany to join the jihad in Pakistan. But, after learning what life there is really like, many of them are abandoning the cause and heading home — right into the unwelcoming arms of the law. Istanbul’s Kumkapi […]

http://www.jewishledger.com/2012/07/gentlemans-agreement/

It is obviously easier to criticize how something was covered in the newspaper or who was included in an international or academic forum than to write about what or who was not there. Often, the most powerful bias of a publication or conference organizer comes out in what they choose not to report or for a meeting, who was excluded.

Last year, the United States established a Global Counterterrorism Forum (GCTF), inviting a total of 29 states. As the State Department website reads, “Launched by Secretary Clinton on September 22, 2011, the GCTF is a major initiative within the Obama Administration’s broader effort to build the international architecture for dealing with 21st century terrorism”.
Israel, which has certainly had vast experience with terrorism, was not even mentioned in Secretary Clinton’s initial remarks in September, let alone invited. As for a video on terrorism victims prepared for the GCTF, the State Department advised, “Watch Global Survivors Network’s documentary, featuring survivors from Jordan, Northern Ireland, Pakistan, India, Uganda, Turkey, Columbia, Spain, Northern Ireland, Indonesia and the United States”. Still no Israel.

And from the New York Times and other media?
Nothing.

As a physician I am often reminded, “If you don’t document it, it did not happen”. The New York Times famously promises to provide “All the news that’s fit to print”.
The United States established the GCTF. While this is commendable, Israel was excluded not only from the initial membership but also from the June meeting in Turkey and the July meeting in Spain.
In her remarks at the GCTF’s most recent meeting, Israel was also MIA (missing in action) from the list of terrorist victims recounted by Maria Otero, the State Department’s Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights.

It has been observed that not inviting Israel to a counterterrorism conference is like excluding Colombia from a coffee conference. Colombia, of course, is an exporter of coffee, while Israel may be the world’s leading recipient of terrorism. Israel’s experience combatting terrorism is unmatched.

There has been an ongoing effort at boycott, divestment and sanctions directed at Israel, the so-called BDS movement. Israelis have been excluded from academic conferences, as well as from appearing on campuses and international forums, her enemies seeking to isolate and thereby destroy her.

http://frontpagemag.com/2012/robert-spencer/huma-abedin-and-the-muslim-brotherhood-bachmann-vs-mccain/ Huma Abedin and the Muslim Brotherhood: Bachmann vs. McCain Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN) is at the center of a firestorm over her request that the State, Homeland Security, Defense and Justice Departments, investigate potential “policies and activities that appear to be the result of influence operations conducted by individuals and organizations associated with the […]