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December 2021

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Democrats whistle past a crime wave They’d rather deny it exists or blame it on Covid than take action By Grace Curley

By on December 17th, 2021

https://spectatorworld.com/topic/democrats-whistle-past-crime-wave/

This past weekend, twenty CEOs from big box retailers sent a letter to Congress, asking for help in combatting the rampant theft that is plaguing their stores.

While it’s refreshing to finally see these companies speaking up, it’s hard to ignore the irony of their circumstances. After all, a little over a year ago many of these retailers were sending out emails to their customers that echoed the far-left rallying cries of progressives. No one asked for Best Buy or Ulta to weigh in on social issues, but they were more than happy to virtue-signal anyway.

Plenty of the stores that signed on to this letter have openly supported the Black Lives Matter movement. To understand what that means, you have to understand the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation. One of the founders of BLM described the group’s creators as “trained Marxists.” In June 2020, Alicia Garza, one of the three founders, excused the violence and destruction caused by the riots. 

“We don’t have time to finger-wag at protesters about property,” Garza said. “That can be rebuilt. Target will reopen. The stores will reopen.” 

The socially aware CEOs didn’t let the red flags stop them. Instead, they appeased the alligator with empty woke statements. Now that the “undocumented shopping” is affecting these companies’ bottom lines, they are fed up. So they are asking the same people who fanned the flames to help them put out the fire.

Unfortunately for these companies, many Democratic politicians aren’t concerned about crime. Instead, prominent voices on the left are still promoting asinine ideas like defunding the police and bail reform.

In San Francisco, thanks to Proposition 47, thefts under $950 are labeled misdemeanors rather than felonies. In November, after a Louis Vuitton in Union Square was ransacked, Mayor London Breed offered her solution: “We’re going to be making some changes to Union Square and how cars are able to access. There will be limited access in terms of when you come to this area.” Why focus on prosecuting criminals when you can focus on parking? 

While some leaders offer pathetic band-aid solutions, others prefer to deny, deny, deny.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

SPEAKING WITH RON DESANTIS The Florida governor unveils an ambitious anti-CRT agenda. Chris Rufo

By on December 17th, 2021

http://christopherrufo.com

Yesterday, I accompanied Florida governor Ron DeSantis on an early-morning flight from Tallahassee to The Villages retirement community, where he was scheduled to deliver a policy address on critical race theory. During the flight, DeSantis reviewed talking points for his speech, edited communications materials, and, after the plane touched down, selected a red-and-blue sign that would hang on the podium: “STOP WOKE ACT.”

DeSantis warmed up the crowd of approximately 100 people at Ezell Regional Recreation Center and outlined the “Stop the Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees Act,” which would ban critical-race-theory indoctrination in public schools, prohibit racially abusive training programs in the workplace, and provide parents and workers the right to sue institutions that violate these prohibitions.

The governor framed the rise of critical race theory as a mortal threat to the United States. “I think what you see now with the rise of this woke ideology is an attempt to really delegitimize our history and to delegitimize our institutions,” he said. “And they basically want to replace it with a very militant form of leftism that would absolutely destroy this country.”

As illustrations of critical race theory in American institutions, DeSantis cited seven of my reports for City Journal: Arizona claiming that babies are racist; Santa Clara County denouncing the United States as a “parasitic system”; Philadelphia teaching students  to celebrate “Black communism”; San Diego telling teachers “you are racist”; Bank of America teaching that the United States is a “system of white supremacy”; Verizon teaching that America is fundamentally racist; and Google teaching that all Americans are “raised to be racist.”

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

What’s in it for the US in its “foreign aid” to Israel? Yoram Ettinger

By on December 17th, 2021

https://bit.ly/3GNyAWQ

1.  The return on the annual US investment in Israel

*On October 2021 and January 2020, Israel’s intelligence alerted the US of Iranian drone and missile attacks on US military installations in Southern Syria and Iraq. 200 US soldiers (in Syria) and 1,500 US soldiers (in Iraq) took effective shelter.

*The scope of Israeli intelligence shared with the US exceeds the intelligence provided by all NATO countries combined. It includes data on Iran’s global terrorism and nuclear and ballistic programs; Islamic terrorism targeting the US and pro-US Arab regimes; battle tactics and military systems of US rivals and enemies; Israeli-developed technologies and battle tactics neutralizing hostile capabilities; Soviet nuclear-equipped intercontinental ballistic missiles; etc.

*According to General George Keegan, former Head of Air Force Intelligence: “I could not have procured the intelligence [received from Israel] with five CIAs.” The annual budget of one CIA is around $15BN.

*Israel is the most cost-effective, battle-tested laboratory of the US defense industries, employing (with much gratitude!) hundreds of US military systems, sharing with the US manufacturers lessons (operation, maintenance, repairs), which are integrated as upgrades. These upgrades enhance US global competitiveness, spare the US billions of dollars and many years of research and development, increase US exports and expand US employment. According to Lockheed-Martin (formerly GD), Israel’s use of the F-16 has yielded over 700 upgrades, netting a mega-billion-dollar bonanza to the manufacturer. A similar bonanza is enjoyed by McDonnell-Douglas, the manufacturer of the F-15. The benefits to the US derived by the more sophisticated and expensive F-35 are substantially higher.

*According to the late Admiral Elmo Zumwalt and General Alexander Haig, “Israel is the largest US aircraft carrier, which does not require American soldiers on board, cannot be sunk, and is deployed in a most critical region, economically and militarily, sparing the US the need to manufacture, deploy and maintain more real aircraft carriers and additional ground divisions, which would cost the US some $15bn annually.”

*The formulation of US battle tactics is largely based on Israel’s battle experience. For instance, Special Operations units (on their way to Iraq and previously to Afghanistan) and urban warfare specialists are trained in Israel. The US Air Force benefits greatly from joint maneuvers with Israel’s Air Force, which possesses much more battle experience, shedding light on the far-reaching capabilities of US-made combat aircraft.

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

YES, PRIME MINISTER: RUTHIE BLUM

By on December 17th, 2021

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/yes-prime-minister-opinion-688986

Yes, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, you were right to tweet about the “settlers in Judea and Samaria [who] have been suffering from violence and terrorism, daily, for decades.”

It was appropriate for you to have called them the “protective wall of us, all [whom] we must strengthen and support in word and deed.”

It was wise of you to stress that though certain kinds of fringe phenomena exist everywhere, “we cannot make a broad generalization about an entire sector.”

Yes, prime minister, it was apt of you to criticize Public Security Minister Omer Bar Lev for his outrageous discussion with US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland, during their meeting this week at the David Citadel Hotel in Jerusalem. Too bad you didn’t actually mention his name or tag him in your post. But then, he’s a key member of your cabinet, and you have to be strategically prudent.

Even without your spelling it out, everyone understood that you were referring to Bar Lev, who had boasted on social media about his get-together with Nuland, claiming that she “was interested, among other things, in settler violence and how to reduce tensions in the region and strengthen the Palestinian Authority.”

Your longtime sidekick — or possibly former one, now that you turn to Shimrit Meir for foreign policy and other advice — was more direct. Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked attached her comments to Bar Lev’s tweet, accusing him of being “confused.”

The settlers, she wrote, “are the salt of the earth, descendants of the pioneers from the valley and the mountain.”

She pointed out what is obvious: “The violence that should be causing shock is that of the dozens of cases of throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at Jews every day — only because they’re Jews — all with the encouragement and support of the PA. I recommend that you talk about that violence with Ms. Nuland.”

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