RUTHFULLY YOURS

A weekly column in the Sunday Times Magazine concerns questions of ethics which are addressed by three experts at least partially selected for the diversity they’re meant to represent. With first names like Kwame, Kenji and Amy, we can see immediately that this troika come from different races and ethnicities. In a rare example of e pluribus unum, all three moral mavens responded in unanimity to this week’s question which concerned the following dilemma.

A homosexual college student wonders whether it’s ethical for him to lie to his father who has expressed his unwillingness to pay his tuition and support if the son is engaged in a homosexual lifestyle. The father had previously found love letters between his son and another student which the son vigorously denied. With slight variations in emphasis, all the ethicists found that it is permissible to lie to a homophobic parent and to forgive oneself for doing so. They further asserted that a father with means has an obligation to provide such funds for college; lying is therefor a way of ensuring that the father will be saved from the sin of failing to do his duty.

http://jamieglazov.com/2015/09/07/the-ugly-truth-about-historical-voluntary-islamic-conversion-on-the-glazov-gang/

This special edition of The Glazov Gang was hosted by Ari David, the host of the Ari David Show Podcast, and joined by Raymond Ibrahim, Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center.

Raymond came on the show to discuss The Ugly Truth about Historical “Voluntary” Islamic Conversion, unveiling how most of the non-Muslim ancestors of today’s Muslims were converted to Islam.

Don’t miss it!

By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT

WASHINGTON — A special intelligence review of two emails that Hillary Rodham Clinton received as secretary of state on her personal account — including one about North Korea’s nuclear weapons program — has endorsed a finding by the inspector general for the intelligence agencies that the emails contained highly classified information when Mrs. Clinton received them, senior intelligence officials said.

Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign and the State Department disputed the inspector general’s finding last month and questioned whether the emails had been overclassified by an arbitrary process. But the special review — by the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency — concluded that the emails were “Top Secret,” the highest classification of government intelligence, when they were sent to Mrs. Clinton in 2009 and 2011.

On Monday, the Clinton campaign disagreed with the conclusion of the intelligence review and noted that agencies within the government often have different views of what should be considered classified.

As a zamler, or book collector, I have been invited into the homes of people who, though they may not understand Yiddish, do not want to discard the Yiddish books that their grandparents used to read and cherish. I collect the books and send them to the National Yiddish Book Center, whose rescue efforts are nothing short of miraculous.

In one of my journeys into an elderly woman’s attic, I discovered Saul Raskin’s artistic rendition of Tehillim, or the Book of Psalms. As if directed by providential intervention, the book opened to an arresting picture of Hitler the beast, sword in hand, while a feminine figure rises above him. Soldiers with swords lord it over their prostrate victims.

Published in 1942, this collection of drawings is Raskin’s artistic interpretations of the Psalms. This particular etching not only describes the evil of the 20th century but actually presages the ongoing malevolence of the 21st century. The black and white etching is accompanied by Psalm 14 and reads, “The fool hath said in his heart. There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.” And on the lapel of Hitler is the Hebrew for “there is no God.”

With all due respect to Gilbert and Sullivan, the current charade on display among Democratic U.S. Senators with regard to their announcements of support for the Iran deal presents the very model of a modern pro-Israel Democrat.
In short, the senator announces his or her support for the agreement, but admits it was a very close call and a difficult decision. The senator concedes that the deal is imperfect and less than was hoped for in many areas. The senator indicates unhappiness with the relaxation of sanctions on weapons and ballistic missiles and admits to being unhappy about Iran’s calls for death to Israel and the United States, its support for terrorist groups, and what Iran might do with all the frozen funds (perhaps as much as $150 billion) once the money is released. The senator then restates firm support for Israel, and indicates that he or she is prepared to introduce or at least vote for new measures providing weapons and aid to Israel. Of course, the senator never explains why, if the deal is good for the U.S., Israel and our Arab allies, Israel and the Arab states would need new security guarantees and offensive or defensive weapons from the U.S. as a result of the agreement.
But, in the end, the senator lets everyone know why, despite these many concerns, he or she is prepared to support the deal. Here is the argument: The senator believes the deal will shut off Iran’s path to a nuclear weapon for a few years and that alternatives short of war are not promising (renegotiating the agreement, or keeping American sanctions in place, while other countries eliminate their own). Virtually no Senate Democrat, however, will be heard mouthing some of the administration’s logic behind the deal — that Iran should have its place as a regional power, and that this kind of agreement may lead to a change in Iran’s aggressive behavior.

http://counterjihadcoalition.org/2015/09/new-glazov-gang-isis-terrorists-coming-to-a-neighborhood-near-you/

This special edition of The Glazov Gang was hosted by Ari David, the host of the Ari David Show Podcast, and joined by Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center who writes the blog The Point at Frontpagemag.com.

Daniel discussed ISIS Terrorists Coming To a Neighborhood Near You, unveiling how Obama is flooding America with fake Syrian refugees.

Don’t miss it!

In the year 628, Muhammad, now ruling in Medina, signed the ten-year Treaty of Hudaybiyyah with his long-time enemies, the tribal confederacy of Quraysh, who ruled Mecca. Twenty-two months later, under the pretext that a clan from a tribe allied with the Quraysh had squabbled with a tribe allied to the Muslims, Muhammad broke the treaty and attacked Mecca, conquering it. It is as certain as day follows night, that the Iranian regime will find a pretext to break the deal. Already, on September 3, the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamene’i made it clear that he would back out of the deal if sanctions were not completely removed at once.

The Iranian regime not only despises democracy; it considers all Western law, including international law, invalid.

The Shi’a consider themselves underdogs, who are willing to sacrifice all to establish the rights of their imams and their successors. That was what the 1979 revolution was all about, and it is what present the Iranian regime still insists on as the justification for its opposition to Western intrusion, democracy, women’s rights and all the rest, which are deemed by Iran’s leadership as part of a plot to undermine and control the expansion of the Shi’i faith on the global stage. These are not Anglican vicars.

The Iranian Army and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps “have responsibility… for a religious mission, which is Holy War (Jihad) in the path of God and the struggle to extend the supremacy of God’s law in the world.” — Iran’s Constitution, Article “The Religious Army”.

The AAUP—the American Association of University Professors—held its annual Conference on the State of Higher Education at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C. June 10-14. A few subway stops away, the Heartland Institute held its tenth International Conference on Climate Change at the Washington Court Hotel, June 11-12. I suspect that I am the only person to attend both.

Both events dealt with the issues of academic and intellectual freedom. Both focused on current threats to such freedoms. Both pictured a world in which politically-motivated foes of free expression are using their wealth and power to silence legitimate dissent.

But, of course, these events were polar opposites. The AAUP was gearing up to pass a resolution to censure the University of Illinois at Urban-Champaign for rescinding its offer of an academic appointment to Steven Salaita. The Heartland Institute was championing the work of Dr. Willie Soon, the solar physicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who came under attack by Greenpeace and the New York Times after he published an important article in Science Bulletin.

Both controversies have received ample coverage, though I think it is quite possible, even likely, that people who know a lot about one may not know a lot about the other. A primer:

Steven Salaita. He was a tenured associate professor of English at Virginia Tech who in October 2013 received an offer for a tenured position in the American Indian Studies Program at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, contingent on the board of trustees’ approval. On August 1, 2014, the university’s vice president of academic affairs and its chancellor wrote to Salaita informing him that they were not proceeding with the appointment. Salaita appealed to the trustees who on September 10, 2014, voted 8 to 1 not to reconsider his appointment. Salaita soon after filed a lawsuit which is on-going.

Trompe l’oeil is defined as a style of painting in which things are painted in a way that makes them look like real objects. Another more apposite definition is : something that misleads or deceives the senses. That defines Donald Trump. Read this column by Rich Lowry about a real conservative alternative for those who seek a “political outsider.”

http://www.nationalreview.com/node/423539/print
Ben Carson, A Superior Outsider By Rich Lowry

While Jeb Bush feuds with Donald Trump and others kowtow to him, only one candidate is seriously gaining on him.
Ben Carson is now tied with Trump in one Iowa poll and is close in others. His rise suggests that it’s possible to catch the populist wave roiling Republican politics and yet not be an obnoxious braggart. Ben Carson is a superior outsider to Donald Trump.
He is more gentlemanly and more conservative, with a more compelling life story. He is a man of faith who, despite his manifest accomplishments, has a quiet dignity and winsome modesty about him. Ben Carson is a throwback, whereas Donald Trump is a boldfaced name straight out of our swinish celebrity culture.
What they have in common is that they are political neophytes who are memorable communicators precisely because they speak and carry themselves so differently from other candidates. Although the similarities stop there — Carson is what Trump calls “low energy.” And yet Carson makes it work.
Few politicians have ever wielded soft-spokenness to such rhetorical effect. Carson aced the Fox debate when in his closing statement he didn’t puff himself up and attempt to soar like candidates always do but gently said a few nice things about his background as a surgeon, with a touch of humor. It was a hit.
If you like your outsider not to favor higher taxes, not to have once opposed the ban of partial-birth abortion, not to speak favorably of socialized medicine, and not to have been an erstwhile booster of Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton, Ben Carson (or Carly Fiorina) is a much better bet than Donald Trump.
And Carson is altogether a more sympathetic figure. He rose from nothing; Trump took over the family real-estate business. Carson’s mom was one of 24 kids, had a third-grade education, and worked as a domestic; Trump’s father amassed a fortune of about $300 million.

Among “elite” circles Zionism is a dirty word these days. When American Jewish reggae star Matisyahu was barred from performing [1] at a Spanish music festival, it was on grounds that he was a “Zionist.” It was only after the Spanish government condemned this blatant case of discrimination that the festival reinvited [2] the singer.

Blackballing Zionism, though, is not only a European phenomenon. Republican pollster Frank Luntz has been warning Israel that it is rapidly losing support among Democratic “opinion elites.” Almost half of them, he says, consider Israel a racist country. And as The Times of Israel reports [3]:

Still more drastically, Luntz said the word “Zionism” could play no part in messaging designed to repair relations with US Democrats. There has to be an “end to the [use of the] word Zionism,” he said. “You can’t make the case if you use that word. If you are at Berkeley or Brown and start outlining a Zionist vision, you don’t get to make a case for Israel because they’ve already switched off.”

So, Zionism is that bad?