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March 2022

FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Russian Roulette and High Treason: Sarah Stern

By on March 11th, 2022

https://emetonline.org/russian-roulette-and-high-treason/

While all eyes are, understandably, on the horrific war Russia inflicted upon Ukraine, scant little attention has been paid to the Iran nuclear negotiations in Vienna and the imminent deal. What seems to have also escaped public purview is that America, which was not even allowed into the room to negotiate directly with the Iran, has allowed Russia interlocutor Mikhail Ulyanov to be our water carrier in these critical negotiations. 

It is nothing short of diplomatic malpractice for the American team, headed by Robert Malley, to let a Russian emissary to the Iran negotiations be our water carrier. For months during these talks, Russia has made its imperial designs on Ukraine quite clear, threatening NATO and all of the West as well.  

It has been made transparent that Russia under Putin has no love lost for the United States and wants to resurrect the Cold War, with Russia emerging as a major player on the world’s stage.  Yet, for some inexplicable reason, Malley depended on Russia to negotiate for us, in what State Antony Blinken promised to be “a longer, stronger deal” with Iran.  

One hoped for an agreement that would address the issues omitted from the 2015 agreement, such as Iran’s malign behavior throughout the region and the globe, its missile development, and the sunset clauses which are all due to expire in nine short years. (UN Security Council Resolution 2231, regarding the arms embargo, expired in October 2021.) 

A recent viral video shows Ulyanov gloating about his wins for the Islamic republic. Here are his exact words: “Iranian clerics are fighting for Iranian nuclear national interests like lions.” (His emphasis.)  “I am absolutely sincere in this regard. Iran got much more than it could expect, much more….Our Chinese friends were also very efficient and useful as co-negotiators. We could rely on each other on many, many points.” 

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Tech Totalitarians Are on the March Roger Kimball

By on March 11th, 2022

https://www.theepochtimes.com/tech-totalitarians-are-on-the-march_4319982.html

The Chinese were pathbreakers.

With their system of “social credit,” which seeks to enforce conformity by “grading” an individual’s or business’s adherence to the party line and imposing penalties for deviations, they have showed the West the way.

If you don’t espouse the right attitudes, you might find yourself barred from public transportation, from work permits or travel visas, from preferred jobs and other social—which includes economic—perquisites.

It’s a totalitarian’s dream—one that was dreamt by George Orwell in the pages of “Nineteen Eighty-Four”—and it’s made all the more total by advances in technology.

Winston Smith, Orwell’s unhappy protagonist, had to contend with a tiny two-way television set in his flat that he could not turn off and that constantly eavesdropped on him.

Chinese citizens have to contend with having their texts, emails, and internet activity constantly scrutinized, which also means having every phone conversation docketed and financial transaction tracked.

Cameras, backed up with facial-recognition technology, are everywhere, watching, listening, building up a record that can always be marshaled as an indictment.

It’s a good thing, isn’t it, that we in the freedom-loving West eschew such totalitarian intrusiveness?

Just kidding.

The American Department of Justice showed how it is done in the land of the formerly free when it employed all those techniques to track down, arrest, and incarcerate hundreds of people involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, protest at the Capitol.

Phone and social media accounts were hoovered up and dissected; facial recognition technology was deployed and weaponized; financial transactions and travel records were subpoenaed and combed through.

Hundreds of people are still languishing in a Washington, D.C. gulag, waiting while the authorities expend vast amounts of legal ingenuity to transform various misdemeanors into felonies.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Russian Economy in ‘Shock’ Due to Sanctions (But So Is Ours, Without Them)By Stephen Green

By on March 11th, 2022

https://pjmedia.com/vodkapundit/2022/03/11/russian-economy-in-shock-due-to-sanctions-but-so-is-ours-without-them-n1565674

The Russian economy is in “shock” over what the Kremlin calls “economic warfare” waged by the U.S. and the West… so what’s our excuse?

According to a new Reuters report, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, “Our economy is experiencing a shock impact now and there are negative consequences, they will be minimized.”

Exactly how Moscow would minimize those negative consequences — with much of Russia’s trade and finance halted, sanctioned, or frozen — wasn’t specified.

“This is absolutely unprecedented,” Peskov said. “The economic war that has started against our country has never taken place before. So it is very hard to forecast anything.”

Bloomberg calls the pinch “a domestic toll that’s already comparable to the worst downturns of President Vladimir Putin’s more than two decades in power.”

“Russia is already headed for one of its biggest inflation spikes this century and the risk of shortages is prompting the government to impose restrictions on exports,” according to the report.

A Bank of Russia survey showed that analysts believe the Russian economy will shrink 8% or more in 2022, compared to a pre-Ukraine War consensus of 2.4% growth.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

Florida ‘Parental Rights in Education’ bill gets the old Democrat histrionics treatment By Monica Showalter

By on March 11th, 2022

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2022/03/florida_parental_rights_in_education_bill_given_the_old_democrat_histrionics_treatment.html

It’s getting to be a pattern with Democrats. A statehouse passes an extremely popular common-sense bill with voters, and Democrats immediately brand it with extremist distortions and say it’s something it’s not. We saw this with voter rights bills, dubbed “Jim Crow 2.0” by the left. We saw it with measures opposing mask and vaccine mandates, dubbed ‘people will die’ laws on the left. We see it with anti-illegal immigration bills, dubbed racist, and with the branding of parents protesting objectionable policies and failure to protect vulnerable students from sexual predators by school boards, as “terrorists.” The histrionics of the left are getting pretty baroque now, but they’re also entirely predictable.

Case in point: Florida’s Parental Rights in Education bill, expected to be signed by Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis, states this:

The two bills in the state legislature, HB 1557 and SB 1834, state that a school district “may not encourage classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in primary grade levels or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students.” 

Democrats have branded it with the catchy slogan “don’t say gay,” which is found nowhere in the bill. The bill clearly permits age-appropriate discussion for students if there’s a need to use the word ‘gay’ or explain it, but that’s unimportant to the hysterical opponents on the left.

The left is on a tear:

“This would erase LGBTQ+ history and culture from lesson plans and it sends a chilling message to LGBTQ+ young people and communities,” said Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, the executive director of the national LGBTQ youth advocacy group GLSEN.

Apparently, this activist believes that if five-year-olds or seven-year-olds still learning their ABCs aren’t studying and thinking about the Stonewall Riots or the life of Harvey Milk at that tender age, they’ll be scarred for life. 

There’s also the health angle to the hysteria:

“We have to create a learning environment where they feel safe and healthy, or it’s not an effective learning environment,” said Heather Wilkie of the Zebra Coalition, a Central Florida LGBTQ advocacy group.

“When you have laws like this, that directly attack our kids for who they are, it prevents them from learning,” she said. “It prevents them from being able to be healthy.”

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FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Biden’s Foreign Policy Inconsistencies Come to a Head in Iran Negotiations By Carine Hajjar

By on March 11th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/bidens-foreign-policy-inconsistencies-come-to-a-head-in-iran-negotiations/

Despite speculations that the Iran deal would drop earlier this week, negotiators in Vienna are still stalling, primarily over Russian demands. EU foreign minister Josep Borrell tweeted that the final text of the agreement is “essentially ready and on the table.” 

Russia continues to demand that U.S. sanctions in response to the brutal invasion of Ukraine do not effect Moscow’s trade with Tehran. 

Given Putin’s needless brutality over the last months, it’s by no means unreasonable to block the Russians from seeking a perk from the proceedings in Vienna. On Tuesday, Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland accused Russia of “trying to up the ante and broaden its demands” in Vienna, but said the U.S. is not “playing ‘Let’s Make a Deal.’”

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ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Poll: Republicans Beat Democrats among Hispanics, at 27 Percent among Black Voters By Philip Klein

By on March 11th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/poll-republicans-beat-democrats-among-hispanics-at-27-among-black-voters/

There is a lot of grim news for President Biden and Democrats in the latest Wall Street Journal poll (Cliff Notes version is that while more Americans approve of his handling of Ukraine, they give him low marks for his handling of other issues more important to them, particularly inflation). But I just wanted to take a moment to flag this part of the poll, which is remarkable and not something I can recall ever seeing before:

The survey also found Republicans making gains among minority groups. By 9 percentage points, Hispanic voters in the new poll said they would back a Republican candidate for Congress over a Democrat. The two parties had been tied among Hispanic voters in the Journal’s survey in November.

Democratic margins also eroded among Black voters, who favored a Democrat for Congress by 35 percentage points in the new survey, down from 56 points in November. Support for a Republican candidate rose to 27% among Black voters, up from 12% in November.

It’s fair to say that if these numbers are anywhere close to the actual results, Democrats will be massacred in November.

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

Amnesty International: Hell Yes, We Want to Destroy the Jewish State By David Harsanyi

By on March 11th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/amnesty-international-hell-yes-we-want-to-destroy-the-jewish-state/?utm_

Amnesty International’s fixation on Israel veered into antisemitism with the publication of a “report” accusing the liberal democracy of employing “apartheid.” This ludicrous accusation — Arab Israelis, not without their own troubles, are perhaps the freest Arabs in the Middle East — is meant to associate the Jewish state with the defunct racist South African regime in mind of Westerners to help spark an effort to isolate and economically destroy it.

If you think this is an exaggeration, let Amnesty International’s United States director Paul O’Brien set you straight. Speaking to the Women’s National Democratic Club last week, O’Brien argued that Israel “shouldn’t exist as a Jewish state,” and that the purpose of Amnesty’s report was to “collectively change the conversation,” which “needs to start first and foremost with the Jewish community.”

O’Brien contends that “we are opposed to the idea — and this, I think, is an existential part of the debate — that Israel should be preserved as a state for the Jewish people.” Though polls still show support for Israel among Jews, O’Brien told the group, his “gut” tells him that most do not actually support the Jewish state, per se, but a “safe Jewish space” that is predicated on “core Jewish values.”

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Ukraine Worked With Democrats Against Trump in 2016 to Stop Putin. The Bet Backfired Badly.Then came collusion against Trump. By Paul Sperry

By on March 11th, 2022

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2022/03/10/how_ukraine_conspired_with_dems_against_trump_to_

Six years ago, before Russia’s full-scale invasion of their country, the Ukrainians bet that a Hillary Clinton presidency would offer better protection from Russian President Vladimir Putin, even though he had invaded Crimea during the Obama-Biden administration, whose Russian policies Clinton vowed to continue.

Ukraine worked with Hillary Clinton and the Democrats against Donald Trump as protection against President Vladimir Putin of Russia … 

… but Ukraine’s bet backfired both when Trump won in 2016 — and when Russia invaded after the Democrats regained power under Joe Biden.

Working with both the Obama administration and the Clinton campaign, Ukrainian government officials intervened in the 2016 race to help Clinton and hurt  Donald Trump in a sweeping and systematic foreign influence operation that’s been largely ignored by the press. The improper, if not illegal, operation was run chiefly out of the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington, where officials worked hand-in-glove with a Ukrainian-American activist and Clinton campaign operative to attack the Trump campaign. The Obama White House was also deeply involved in an effort to groom their own favored leader in Ukraine and then work with his government to dig up dirt on – and even investigate — their political rival.

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FOREIGN POLICY, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The End of the Unipolar Moment The global chess pieces are moving. Josh Hammer

By on March 11th, 2022

https://spectator.org/the-end-of-the-unipolar-moment/

“Effective statesmanship calls for recognizing the world as it is, not in wish casting what it could, or should, be. That means recognizing the end of the uni-polar era. Never before has clear-eyed, American national interest–centric realist diplomacy mattered more. But first let’s avoid getting sucked into World War III in Ukraine.”

The defeat of Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan in World War II ushered in the Cold War era. For the four and a half decades between the defeat of fascism and the collapse of communism, global affairs unfolded within a bipolar backdrop of “mutually assured” destruction between the two nuclear superpowers: the United States and the Soviet Union. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the formal dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 ushered in a unipolar moment of unquestioned American economic, diplomatic, military, and geopolitical supremacy on the world stage.

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

By on March 11th, 2022

I missed last week’s good news from Israel. In an avalanche of grim world news, it is heartening to know how Israel’s outsize contributions to every aspect of human endeavor bring succor to those struggling with the ravages of illness, famines, epidemics, and wars…..rsk

https://verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com/

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Stopping cancer spreading during chemotherapy. A Technion doctorate student has discovered that the LOX enzyme plays a major role in helping cancer spread (metastasis) when the patient is having chemotherapy. Inhibiting LOX protects the patient from this deadly effect.

https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2022/02/world-cancer-day-chemotherapy-metastasis/ 

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34666995/

Hope for when cancer has spread. Israel’s New Phase has developed hyperthermic treatment that kills up to 50% of metastatic cancer. In animal and human trials, iron-oxide nanoparticles, produced in a lab managed by three Druze Arab women, are injected into stage 4 cancer patients, and then heated to 45º C using RF radiation.

https://www.israel21c.org/novel-hyperthermic-treatment-offers-hope-for-stage-4-metastatic-cancer/

https://newphase.co.il/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ6h6szr4eM

Prostate cancer treatment is saving lives. (TY Don) Although not an Israeli treatment, Israel’s Sheba Medical Center is one of the few global hospitals treating prostate cancer patients with Lutetium-177 therapy. It attaches to prostate-specific membrane antigens (PSMAs) on tumors and emits beta radiation to neutralize them.

https://www.shebaonline.org/how-does-lutetium-177-therapy-work/ 

We have the cure inside us. Scientists at Israel’s Technion Institute have found that misfolding proteins in the brain cells of ALS and Huntingdon’s sufferers can be corrected by other proteins already in the cell, called “chaperones”. But the cell doesn’t activate them or activates the wrong ones! New treatments are anticipated.

https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2022/02/huntingtons-als-chaperone/

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-27982-w

Longer-lasting heart valves. An Israeli-led team of researchers has prevented the deterioration of bioprosthetic heart valves (of animal origin). These last only 10 years due to calcification of the tissues. They used hearts from pigs that were engineered to stop expressing foreign sugars and this prevented calcification.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01682-w

Repairing heart valves without replacing. The calcification of heart valves is currently resolved by transplanting a new prosthetic valve (see above). Israel’s Pi-Cardia (see here previously) has been developing the Leaflex system to treat the calcification, and is currently conducting human clinical trials across Europe.

https://www.israel21c.org/novel-non-surgical-solutions-for-aortic-valve-stenosis/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NXQQ-Zqnes

Gut bacteria could prevent heart attacks. Scientists from Israel’s Rabin Medical Center and the Weizmann Institute studied the microbiome of 200 patients just hours after a heart attack. They found most were missing a Clostridiaceae family bacterium that was present in a control group. They are now isolating it into pill form.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-study-mines-donor-poop-for-bacteria-that-could-avert-heart-attacks/

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01686-6

Helping preemies absorb food. The ELGN-GI insulin formulation developed by Israel’s Elgan can save the lives of preterm babies with immature stomachs that cause feeding intolerance. It will avoid the adverse effects of intravenous nutrition, which often leads to infection and liver problems. A Phase 3 trial is being planned.

https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/pregnancy-and-birth/article-699123 https://www.elganpharma.com/

http://www.ngt3vc.com/elgan-pharma/

A physical therapist on your smartphone. Israel’s OneStep uses the power of the smartphone to analyze gait (how you walk) and provide feedback directly to patients and their physical therapists. OneStep is partnering with Kinomatic in the US to bring OneStep’s app to all patients using Kinomatic’s Virtual Reality solution.

https://www.prnewswire.com/il/news-releases/digital-physical-therapy-company-onestep-partners-with-smart-surgery-provider-kinomatic-to-enhance-physical-therapy-for-surgery-patients-301477411.html

https://www.onestep.co/   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=335FEpK2y7Y

Successful trials for portable eye test. Israel’s AEYE Health (see here previously) has just completed Phase 3 clinical trials of its hand-held retinal analysis system. The hand-held fundus camera and single-image AI software detected diabetic retinopathy with high accuracy, far better than current expensive specialist cameras.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/seeing-straight-with-the-help-of-artificial-intelligence/

The best partners for innovation. Israel’s Sheba Medical Center has again been ranked as the 10th best hospital in the world by Newsweek Magazine. Sheba also announced a partnership with GE Healthcare to develop digital healthcare solutions in cardiology, remote pregnancy monitoring and molecular imaging.

https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/323198 

https://www.jns.org/israels-sheba-ge-team-up-to-advance-digital-healthcare/

Global DNA sequencing center. Illumina – the world’s leading DNA sequencing company, worth over $50 billion, is opening a Center of Excellence in Tel Aviv. It will develop Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions that dramatically shorten genome analysis time for diagnosing rare diseases and transform lives.

https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/ryfdj7ce5

Advanced Materials. Several issues of the international journal Advanced Materials, including cover pages, feature the breakthrough skin patches developed in the lab of Israel’s Technion Arab Professor Hossam Haick (see here previously). They include Strain sensors, Wound dressing (and cover), Micro-needles sensor, Electronic skin and more.  https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2022/02/hossam-haick-diagnosis-micro-needles/

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