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April 2020

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Iranian and US Ships Come Dangerously Close as Disputes Continue in Persian Gulf By Isabel van Brugen

By on April 16th, 2020

https://www.theepochtimes.com/iranian-and-us-ships-come-dangerously-close-as-disputes-continue-in-persian-gulf_3314174.html

Nearly a dozen Iranian naval vessels made “dangerous and harassing” maneuvers near U.S. Navy and Coast Guard ships in the Persian Gulf, also known as the Arabian Gulf, U.S. Naval Forces Central Command said on Wednesday.

In a statement, the Navy said that 11 vessels from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN) came dangerously close to six U.S. vessels, repeatedly crossing their bows and sterns while they were conducting integration operations with U.S. Army Apache attack helicopters to support maritime security outside of Iran’s territorial waters.

Iranian naval vessels came as close as 10 yards of the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Maui, and within 50 yards of the USS Lewis B. Puller, a ship that serves as an afloat landing base, according to the statement. Other vessels among the U.S. ships included the USS Paul Hamilton, a Navy destroyer, and the USS Firebolt.

The U.S. ships attempted to issue multiple warnings, through bridge-to-bridge radio, long-range acoustic noise maker devices, and five blasts from the ships’ horns, but U.S. crews received no response from the IRGCN.

The IRGCN vessels responded after roughly one hour by radio and moved away from the U.S. ships.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

World Health Organisation ‘Not Immune to Criticism’: Australian PM By Victoria Kelly-Clark

By on April 16th, 2020

https://www.theepochtimes.com/world-health-organisation-not-immune-to-criticism-australian-pm_3314192.html#

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Australia will continue to support the World Health Organisation (WHO) but he said they’re not immune from criticism and should do things better.

This is because had Australia relied on WHO advice back in January, “Then I suspect we would have been suffering the same fate that many other countries currently are,” said Morrison.

“I mean, [Australia] called [the pandemic] weeks before the WHO did,” he said.

At the time, on Jan. 14, the WHO advised countries that there was no human-to-human transmission of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as novel coronavirus.

However, we now know that this was wrong and that by at least mid-December, the CCP was aware that human-to-human transmission was occurring in mainland China, making the virus ripe for spreading. Yet the CCP did not admit this until Jan. 20, after over 5 million people had left Wuhan.

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Presidential Power Is Limited but Vast Trump can’t fully reopen the economy on his own authority. But he can go a long way in that direction. By David B. Rivkin Jr. and Lee A. Casey

By on April 16th, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/presidential-power-is-limited-but-vast-11586988414?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

President Trump has come under attack this week for saying he has “absolute authority” to reopen the economy. He doesn’t—his authority is limited. But while the president can’t simply order the entire economy to reopen on his own signature, neither is the matter entirely up to states and their governors. The two sides of this debate are mostly talking past each other.

The federal government’s powers are limited and enumerated and don’t include a “general police power” to regulate community health and welfare. That authority rests principally with the states and includes the power to impose coercive measures such as mandatory vaccination, as the Supreme Court held in Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905). Nor may the federal government commandeer state personnel and resources to achieve its ends or otherwise coerce the states into a particular course of conduct. There is no dispute about these respective state and federal powers.

In most federal-state disputes, the question is what happens when authorities at both levels exercise their legitimate constitutional powers at cross-purposes. Here, the president has the edge. The Constitution’s Supremacy Clause requires that when the federal government acts within its proper sphere of constitutional authority, state law and state officials must give way to the extent that federal requirements conflict with their own. Federal power encompasses a broad power to regulate the national economy. Thus although the president lacks plenary power to “restart” the economy, he has formidable authority to eliminate restraints states have imposed on certain types of critical commercial activity.

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ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Racial Disparities and the Pandemic: Looking Past the Rhetoric of ‘Racism’ By Robert Cherry

By on April 16th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/04/coronavirus-racial-disparities-rhetoric-of-racism/

The virus has affected different groups at different rates, but the reasons are more complicated than the media are letting on.

I t’s hard not to notice the effort to place racism against black Americans at the center of the coronavirus story. In pursuit of its 1619 Project thesis, the New York Times has featured much coverage on the subject. In a front-page April 8 article titled, “Black Americans Bear the Brunt as Deaths Climb,” it highlighted black deaths in a number of cities. On an MSNBC telecast, Nikole Hannah-Jones, the project’s coordinator, claimed, “It’s not surprising that black Americans are bearing the brunt of coronavirus.”

While it is unquestionable that black Americans have been disproportionately adversely affected, it is uncalled for to claim that they bear the brunt. Outside of urban central cities, white Americans account for an overwhelming share of deaths. For example, 30 percent of New York State deaths are outside of New York City. Among these, 60 percent have been white, while 17 percent have been black. In New York City, blacks make up 28 percent of coronavirus deaths, but all those over 65 years old compose over 70 percent. Indeed, nationally, senior citizens continue to bear the brunt of deaths.

Nor are black Americans the most affected by the economic effects of coronavirus. Immigrant communities bear much more of the economic impact of the lockdown. Latinos own 2.5 times as many businesses with paid employees as black Americans. Though only one-third of the black population, Asians own nearly five times as many businesses. And yet the national media has followed the Times’ lead. 60 Minutes and then Forbes highlighted the plight of the black owner of the Harlem restaurant Melba’s. Obviously this business and its pain are real, but using its singular struggles to try to make a broader point is misleading.

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