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2016

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The grassroots and interfaith effort behind the GOP’s pro-Israel, anti-2 state platform by Shalle’ McDonald

By on July 16th, 2016

Amid the intrigue and speculation over the upcoming Republican National Convention (RNC) in Cleveland, one item that the party has settled is its firm support for Israel and opposition to a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

On Tuesday, the Republican Platform Committee unanimously approved a number of significant changes to its platform in an attempt to further set the party’s pro-Israel credentials apart from the Democrats, who are facing concerns over their party’s future support for the Jewish state. The GOP’s platform changes included removing language encouraging a two-state solution as well as reinstating a reference to an “undivided” Israel that was previously included in the party’s 2008 platform, but was removed in 2012.

“The U.S. seeks to assist in the establishment of comprehensive and lasting peace in the Middle East, to be negotiated among those living in the region,” the approved amendment said. “We oppose any measures intended to impose an agreement or to dictate borders or other terms, and call for the immediate termination of all U.S. funding of any entity that attempts to do so.”

Alan Clemmons, a member of the South Carolina House of Representatives and a Republican convention delegate, conveyed his disappointment over the 2012 GOP convention, when the platform committee chose not to recognize Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel.

“I was a delegate at the last RNC, but was not on the platform committee. I observed the platform committee process and proposed language similar to the language that was passed today (July 12). Unfortunately, that language gained no traction and it went nowhere on the platform, and as a matter of fact the platform regressed in terms of support for Israel,” Clemmons told JNS.org.

The push to bolster the Republican Party’s language on Israel follows a four-year effort by Clemmons and Joseph Sabag, the former executive director of the Israel Allies Foundation. Both leaders sought to reach out to the party’s base—evangelical Christians—as well as to Jewish and other ethnic groups to reach a consensus on the GOP’s pro-Israel stance.

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Will Pence help Trump with Jewish voters? Richard Baehr

By on July 16th, 2016

Indiana Governor Mike Pence will reportedly run with Donald Trump as his vice presidential nominee, with the selection to be officially announced shortly. Prior to his election as governor, Pence served in Congress as a member of the House of Representatives and had an excellent reputation as a very strong and knowledgeable supporter of Israel. Many Jewish Republicans hoped that he would run for the White House. Now, a key question going forward will be whether having Pence on the Trump ticket will enable more Jewish Republicans and some “never Trumpers” to back the ticket and financially support the campaign.

A sizable number of prominent Jewish Republicans and other mainstays of the pro-Israel cause have been unenthusiastic about Donald Trump as the GOP nominee. They have been put off both by some of his policy positions, and the way he ran his campaign for the nomination — including the personal attacks on other candidates. Others consider him insufficiently conservative — a former Democrat who successfully engineered a hostile takeover of the Republican Party. Trump has also had to deal with accusations that he has not been quick enough to criticize and separate himself from members of the “alt-right,” which includes nasty anti-Semites who have harassed some Jewish writers that were critical of Trump. His most recent controversy was over his sending out a tweet about Hillary Clinton accompanied by a graphic created by someone who did not belong to his campaign. The graphic called her the most corrupt candidate ever and showed a six-pointed star over a large amount of cash. Trump was accused of sending out an anti-Semitic tweet because of the association of the six-pointed star (the Jewish star of David) with mounds of money. Trump argued that the star was not a Jewish star, and could as easily have been a sheriff’s badge. In essence, he maintained that this was an example of politically correct hypersensitivity at work and that many Americans were sick of it. Trump is very uncomfortable with appearing to cave to this kind of pressure. His campaign has been built on an image of strong leadership, and bowing to critics could damage this appeal.

There is no evidence whatsoever in his long background in business and media that would lead one to believe that Trump is an anti-Semite. He has worked with, hired and been friends with many prominent Jewish people, and contributed to Jewish and pro-Israel causes. This is perfectly natural for a successful businessman in the New York area. His daughter Ivanka married a Modern Orthodox Jewish man, underwent a conversion, and is now leading a traditional Jewish lifestyle, keeping kosher at home, and observing the Sabbath. Whatever one thinks of Trump, he appears to have very close relationships with his adult children and relies on them for support and guidance in both business and in his political efforts this year. His Jewish son-in-law Jared Kushner took to the pages of the weekly newspaper he owns, the Observer, to defend Trump against charges of anti-Semitism and bias in general.

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French Lesson: Guns not Critical To Jihadi Violence by A.J. Caschetta

By on July 16th, 2016

Originally published under the title “French Lessons.”

The Bastille Day attack in Nice, France last night should cause the Democrats to reconsider their gun control approach to counterterrorism. After San Bernardino and then Orlando, Obama, Chuck Schumer and others have been citing jihadi terror attacks to support their domestic legislation agenda.

France is about as close to a national gun-free zone as you can get. Lesson number one from France is that gun laws will not stop jihad terror.

There are no gun show loopholes in France, because there are no gun shows. There are no mandatory waiting periods, and there is no debate about gun control. Everybody agrees that guns are bad, so only the police have them. Or at least that was the plan. But of course the people who don’t obey laws have guns. They are called criminals. Lately a lot of them happen to be Jihadis.

Lesson #1 from France: gun laws will not stop jihad terror.

Remember the touching father and son scene last November, after a jihad attack in France, where Parisians were consoling themselves in the modern fashion with flowers, stuffed animals and candles? A conversation between a reporter, a young father and his little boy was captured on French television and “went viral.” The boy was worried about all of the bad guys with guns. His father told him not to worry “They’ve got guns but we have flowers.” Lesson number two from France is when your enemy has guns, flowers will not suffice.

So another jihadi has used guns to kill French citizens. This one was also prepared to use grenades (also illegal in France). But he also used a truck, reminiscent of Mohammed Reza Taheri-azar who in 2006 drove his SUV into a crowd of people on the campus of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill injuring nine.

Lesson #2 from France: when your enemy has guns, flowers will not suffice.

Banning firearms did not prevent the Nice, France attacker from finding and using firearms. It did not prevent the Bataclan killers, or the killers at the Charlie Hebdo offices, or the killer at the Hyper Kasher Deli, or the killer at the Jewish school in Toulouse. Nor did it prevent the Moroccan jihadi on the train in Paris, who would have done much more damage had it not been for the valiant efforts of three type-A, gung ho Americans with nerves of steel. While the crew of the French train ran away from the shooter, Spencer Stone, Alek Skarlatos and Anthony Sadler ran towards the gunfire and subdued him. Lesson number three from France is that only by fighting back can you survive.

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The Obama/Soros Legacy By Rachel Ehrenfeld

By on July 16th, 2016

Donald Trump’s choice of his VP running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, worries the marijuana lobby. They question Pence’s belief that marijuana is a gateway drug and its abuse is a crime, deserving penalty. While the marijuana lobby claims “Marijuana is a happy, healthy, wonderful plant and everybody should have the right to grow it, just as they grow dandelions,” the National Insitute of Drugs (NIDA) findings support Pence’s objection to the legalization of marijuana. According to NIDA’s latest available data, “illicit drug use in the U.S. is on the rise, and “More than half of new illicit drug users begin with marijuana.” Yet, marijuana legalization has become an issue in the U.S. presidential elections.

How did we get here?

The impresario who staged and pushed to legally dope of the American people is the billionaire financier George Soros. He found a kindred spirit in President Obama who got this dog and pony show on the road. The chosen vehicle was Obama-Care. And the first indication for this came on August 5, 2009, with the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)’s little noticed tender for the production and distribution of large quantities of marijuana cigarettes, for purposes other than for research, clocked under the DEA control and supposedly in compliance with FDA regulations

According to pro-legalization activist Sean Williams, “President Obama has suggested that the best way to get the attention of Congress is to legalize marijuana in as many states as possible at the state level. If a majority of states approve marijuana measures, and public opinion continues to swell in favor of cannabis, Congress may have no choice but to consider decriminalization — or legalize the substance.” Not surprisingly, recently there have been widely-reported leaks from the DEA that the agency anticipates making “medical” marijuana” legal in all 50 states, even though this requires FDA approval.

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LEO STRAUSS IN 1956: “WHY CONSERVATIVES SHOULD SUPPORT ISRAEL”

By on July 15th, 2016

While today Israel enjoys wide support on both sides of the American political aisle, this was not always the case. Late in 1956 the eminent political theorist Leo Strauss took the unusual step of commenting on contemporary political affairs to come to Israel’s defense. Strauss was moved to write by attacks against the nascent Jewish state in the conservative National Review. In this letter to Willmoore Kendall, a professor of political philosophy, founding editor of National Review, and an admirer of Strauss, Strauss reflects on the Jewish state based on his observations as a visiting professor at Hebrew University. Israel is a modern Western country with a spirit nurtured by the Hebrew Bible, he explains. Claims that the state is racist are unfounded. Strauss reminds his readers that political Zionism aims to reconnect the Jewish people with their heritage and restore the inner freedom and dignity that was lost in the ambiguous results of European emancipation.

The original letter is reproduced in full below. It was later edited and republished as an official Letter to the Editor in the January 5, 1957 issue of National Review.

November 19, 1956
Professor Wilmoore Kendall
Department of Political Science
Yale University
New Haven, Connecticut

Dear Professor Kendall:

For some time I have been receiving The National Review. You will not be surprised to hear that I agree with many articles appearing in the journal, especially your own. There is, however, one feature of the journal which I completely fail to comprehend. It is incomprehensible to me that the authors who touch on that subject are so unqualifiedly opposed to the State of Israel. No reasons why that stand is taken are given; mere antipathies are voiced. For I cannot call reasons such arguments as are based on gross factual error, or on complete non-comprehension of the things which matter. I am, therefore, tempted to believe that the authors in question are driven by an anti-Jewish animus; but I have learned to resist temptations. I have been teaching at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem for the whole academic year of 1954-1955, and what I am going to say is based exclusively on what I have seen with my own eyes.

The first thing which strikes one in Israel is that the country is a western country, which educates its many immigrants from the East in the ways of the West: Israel is the only country which as a country is an outpost of the West in the East. Furthermore, Israel is a country which is surrounded by mortal enemies of overwhelming numerical superiority, and in which a single book absolutely predominates in the instruction given in elementary schools and in high schools: the Hebrew bible. Whatever the failings of individuals may be, the spirit of the country as a whole can justly be described in these terms: heroic austerity supported by the nearness of biblical antiquity. A conservative, I take it, is a man who believes that “everything good is heritage.” I know of no country today in which this belief is stronger and less lethargic than in Israel.

But the country is poor, lacks oil and many other things which fetch much money; the venture on which the country rests may well appear to be quixotic; the University and the Government buildings are within easy range of Jordanian guns; the possibility of disastrous defeat or failure is obvious and always close. A conservative, I take it, is a man who despises vulgarity; but the argument which is concerned exclusively with calculations of success, and is based on blindness to the nobility of the effort, is vulgar.

I hear the argument that the country is run by labor unions. I believe that it is a gross exaggeration to say that the country is run by labor unions. But even if it were true, I would say that a conservative, I take it, is a man who knows that the same arrangement may have very different meanings in different circumstances. The men who are governing Israel at present came from Russia at the beginning of the century. They are much more properly described as pioneers than as labor unionists. They were the men who laid the foundations under hopelessly difficult conditions. They are justly looked up to by all non-doctrinaires as the natural aristocracy of the country, for the same reasons for which Americans look up to the Pilgrim fathers. They came from Russia, the country of Nicolai the Second and Rasputin; hence they could not have had any experience of constitutional life and of the true liberalism which is only the reverse side of conservatism; it is all the more admirable that they founded a constitutional democracy adorned by an exemplary judiciary.

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JONATHAN TOBIN: IN NICE- A FAMILIAR FORM OF TERROR- BUT IGNORED WHEN ISRAELIS ARE VICTIMS

By on July 15th, 2016

TREATING TERRORISM DIFFERENTLY

A Familiar Form of Terror By Jonathan S. Tobin
Commentary magazine
July14, 2016

At the moment we don’t know the identity or the motive of the person responsible for the Bastille Day terror attack in Nice, France. Speculation about whether this killer, who took the lives of scores of persons gathered to watch holiday fireworks, was a lone wolf terrorist inspired by ISIS is natural but premature. So, too, are any other theories. But while we mourn with the people of France and wait for more details to be released, it’s worthwhile pondering the terrorist’s choice of tactic: using a vehicle as a lethal weapon.
Viewing the horrifying videos being posted online or broadcast on television of the attack, there’s no doubt in anyone’s mind that the Nice killer was using a truck to murder people and that his actions are obviously an act of terror. But what that brings to mind is the fact that when Palestinians do the same thing, many in the international community and the media treat Israeli efforts to take out the potential killer as unjustified and often dispute whether the attack was a form of terrorism.

After the erection of Israel’s security fence in the West Bank, the wave of suicide bombings in which Palestinians affiliated with both the mainstream Fatah movement and Hamas killed hundreds of Jews inside Israel during the second intifada came to a halt. Faced with a more formidable challenge to their ability to inflict mass casualties on Israelis, terrorists resorted to new tactics. One of their more popular choices was vehicular homicide. In incidents in Jerusalem and at security checkpoints in the West Bank, Israelis have been subjected to numerous attempted hit and run attacks. At least three were killed in such incidents last year at the start of what is now known as the “stabbing intifada.”

But such attacks are rarely referred to as terrorism in the international media. Outside of Israel, the press has often either ignored them or treated the nature of the incident as questionable even referring to them as accidents rather than terror. They also denounce Israeli defensive measures that aim, as authorities in France did in Nice, to shoot or otherwise disable the terrorist as an unjustified attempt to execute a possibly innocent person.

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Will infrastructure derail the GOP and Trump? By Clarence Schwab

By on July 15th, 2016

With the Republican Party’s convention next week, Republicans are about to publish their 2016 platform. Unfortunately, a major new infrastructure plank calling for maintaining and upgrading our infrastructure will be missing.

This despite the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) giving American infrastructure a grade of D+, http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/a/#p/home, and despite U.S. families losing in aggregate about $428 billion in disposable income this year (based on ASCE estimate), or about $3,400 per American family, because of lost productivity and higher costs due to our crumbling and outdated infrastructure.
This $3,400 in estimated lower annual disposable income per American family is expected for each of the next ten years, http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/asce-news/the-high-cost-of-underinvesting-in-infrastructure-9-a-day/.

Without aggressive and prompt infrastructure investments—to prevent bridges from becoming unstable or collapsing, highways from buckling, and outdated highways and airports from causing further congestion, delays, lost productivity and extra costs for everyday goods—Congress and, by extension, the GOP with majorities in both chambers risk voters’ physical safety, their incomes, and their anger.

Voter anger will only increase if delays to repairs continue, because replacing infrastructure is much more costly than simply repairing it. In addition, costs may grow even larger if interest rates rise from current levels. Interest rates on 10- and 30-year U.S. Treasury bonds reached all-time lows last week, 1.32% and 2.10%, respectively. These levels are much lower than even those under Eisenhower. By comparison, April 1954 yields on 10-year notes reached as low as 2.29%.

What mystifies this registered independent, and proud American, about GOP intransigence is that such infrastructure investment yields large returns and that such investment is part of the GOP’s historical DNA.

The ASCE estimates a $1.4 trillion investment gap will need filling over the next decade, http://www.asce.org/failuretoact/. Were the federal government to borrow the required $1.4 trillion by issuing 10-year bonds at today’s extraordinarily low interest rates, the U.S. government might pay only about $21 billion each year in interest.

For purposes of illustration, aggregate family disposable income would increase by about $428 billion. If families were to spend this additional income each year, federal tax receipts could increase by up to about $107 billion each year (assuming a 25% tax rate). These tax revenues over ten years could cover all related interest and repay just over 60% ($860 billion) of the debt incurred. But that’s not all.

These increased tax revenues can be expected to continue for longer than ten years because infrastructure improvements generally last decades.

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One Year of Obama Failures on Iran Iran’s aggression and provocation have been met with concessions. By Marco Rubio

By on July 15th, 2016

One year ago today, President Obama announced the start of the flawed nuclear deal that he claimed would prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Unfortunately, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) has made America less safe. It at best only delays Iran’s nuclear-weapons program and does nothing to protect Israel and our allies in the region from Tehran’s continued nefarious activities.

The Obama administration has gone to great lengths to save this deal. Administration officials have boasted of creating an “echo chamber” with reporters ensuring that journalists parroted the administration’s line and ignored worrisome details about the deal.

Over the last year, Iran has continued to endanger our troops and allies in the region and further its quest for regional domination.

Iran has kidnapped U.S. citizens and dual citizens as part of its statecraft. Iran still has not provided information on the whereabouts of Floridian Robert Levinson, who is the longest-held hostage in American history. Iran also continues its unjust detention of Siamak Namazi and his father, Baquer Namazi.

Iran has expanded its support to proxy forces in Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq, which has been made easier by the $100 billion Tehran received because of the JCPOA. The head of designated terrorist group Hezbollah recently admitted that his group, which has the blood of Americans and Israelis on its hands, receives funding directly from Iran.

Over the last year, Iran has continued to expand its ballistic-missile program. Iranian missiles launched in March were marked with a statement in Hebrew reading, “Israel must be wiped off the arena of time.” The Obama administration has backtracked from its original assertions that these launches were prohibited by U.N. Security Council Resolutions.

In January, Iran detained U.S. sailors in international waters and an investigation by the chief of naval operations noted that Iran “violated international law by impeding the boats’ innocent passage transit and they violated sovereign immunity by boarding, searching and seizing the boats and by photographing and videotaping the crew.”

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Bill Whittle’s Firewall: Is Hillary Guilty? Of course the fix is in. Of course we see through it. They don’t care. They’ve got us pegged.

By on July 15th, 2016

Bill Whittle is back with another Firewall video commentary. It takes Bill only 93 seconds to show Hillary Clinton guilty of violating three separate Federal Statutes. It takes him another three minutes to explain why she and Obama simply DO NOT CARE.

Let’s start by getting one thing out of the way right at the top: there is no questionthat Hillary Clinton committed multiple violations of federal law.

U.S. Code, Title 18, Part I, Chapter 101, Section 2071, Paragraph a:

[ TITLE: COMPLETE TEXT OF A ]

says that anyone who removes — and doesn’t return — ANY Federal records regardless of classification has committed a felony.

GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said that all work-related emails were returned to the State Department. Was that true?

COMEY: No, we found work-related emails – thousands – that were not returned.

[TITLE: COMPLETE TEXT OF B ]

Paragraph B says that anyone who attempts to conceal or destroy these records has committed a second felony, which specifically bars the offender from holding any office in the United States government.

GOWDY: Secretary Clinton said that neither she nor anyone else deleted work-related emails from her personal account. Was that true?

COMEY: There’s no doubt that there were work-related emails that were removed electronically from the email system.

And finally let’s talk about 18 U.S. Code § 793: Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information

In order to clear the legal bar for prosecution on that statute – that part of the United States code — the prosecution would have to prove “gross negligence” on the part of Mrs. Clinton.

GIULIANI: He said during his long statement that she was “extremely careless.” The first definition of “gross negligence” that comes up when you take out the legal dictionary is being “extremely careless.”

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The War on Cops An interview with Heather Mac Donald. Mark Tapson

By on July 15th, 2016

There is no more important book to read right now than Heather Mac Donald’s clear-eyed, riveting new work The War on Cops: How the New Attack on Law and Order Makes Everyone Less Safe. You cannot fully get to the core of the truth about the current anti-cop sentiment in the country, or be armed with the facts to shoot down Black Lives Matter lies without reading it. If you can get a copy, that is – demand is so great that there is currently a one-to-two month wait for it on Amazon.com. Don’t wait – get the ebook.

In case you haven’t already been following everything Mac Donald writes, she is the Thomas W. Smith Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. Her writings have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New York Times, The New Republic, Partisan Review, The New Criterion, and elsewhere.

She is the recipient of the New Jersey State Law Enforcement Officers Association’s 2004 Civilian Valor Award, the 2008 Integrity in Journalism award from the New York State Shields, the 2008 Eugene Katz Award for Excellence in the Coverage of Immigration from the Center for Immigration Studies, and the 2012 Quill & Badge Award for Excellence in Communication from the International Union of Police Associations. In other words, unlike the legion of talking heads in the news media pontificating about the racism in American law enforcement, Heather Mac Donald has actually done the journalistic legwork, is qualified to discuss the subject, and is bold enough to speak the truth about it.

The War on Cops begins by noting that crime is skyrocketing in cities across the United States as “the most anti-law-enforcement administration in memory draws to a close.” This isn’t, however, “the greatest danger in today’s war on cops. The greatest danger lies, rather, in the delegitimization of law and order itself.” If we don’t begin to counter the present lies about law enforcement propagated by the Black Lives Matter movement and facilitated by a complicit media and by the “academic victimology industry,” Mac Donald concludes, civilized urban life will break down – which we are already beginning to witness.

Ms. Mac Donald took time out to answer a few questions about crime, terrorism, and the recent Dallas cop shooting for FrontPage Mag.

Mark Tapson: More than a dozen years ago you wrote Are Cops Racist? in which you pushed back against the anti-profiling crusade and warned that it was undermining the law enforcement progress of the previous decade. What, if anything, has changed between that book and your newest one?

Heather Mac Donald: We are now living in the most anti-law enforcement administration in recent memory and most likely in American history. The specious “driving while black” crusade of the 1990s and early 2000s was mostly promulgated by left-wing activists, albeit with help from the mainstream media.

Today, we have a president who regularly spreads the poisonous lie that the criminal justice system is racist. The academic victimology industry, presciently identified by David Horowitz’s pioneering work, has only become more entrenched and powerful over the last decade. It, too, is the essential helpmate of the Black Lives Matter movement, propelling the anti-cop narrative to powerful mainstream status.

MT: What were your thoughts upon hearing of last week’s Dallas shooting in progress, when police were dying and being wounded even as they tried to protect the demonstrators who had gathered there to protest their supposed racial bias?

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