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Ruth King

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Dem Economist Predicts Most Explosive Recovery Ever. Democrats Predictably Horrified By Megan Fox

By on May 27th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/election/megan-fox/2020/05/26/dem-economist-predicts-most-explosive-recovery-ever-democrats-predictably-horrified-n428514

Democrats have finally admitted that economic recovery for the American people means defeat for them. They would rather watch us suffer so they can beat Donald Trump. Politico published an article called “The General Election Scenario That Democrats Are Dreading,” which confirms what we’ve all been suspecting: the longer the lockdown continues and Americans are out of work, the happier Democrats are.

What kind of people root for economic ruin over recovery? Democrats.

Jason Furman, a Harvard professor and economist who worked for Barack Obama, gave a presentation in April to a group of bipartisan officials about the coming economic recovery. Democrats on the call were reportedly terrified.

“We are about to see the best economic data we’ve seen in the history of this country,” he said.

The former cabinet secretaries and Federal Reserve chairs in the Zoom boxes were confused, though some of the Republicans may have been newly relieved and some of the Democrats suddenly concerned.

“Everyone looked puzzled and thought I had misspoken,” Furman said in an interview. Instead of forecasting a prolonged depression-level economic catastrophe, Furman laid out a detailed case for why the months preceding the November election could offer Trump the chance to brag — truthfully — about the most explosive monthly employment numbers and GDP growth ever.

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MEDIA Comments turned off

The New York Times Continues to Pollute What Used to Be Journalism By Stephen Kruiser

By on May 27th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/columns/stephen-kruiser/2020/05/26/the-new-york-times-continues-to-pollute-what-used-to-be-journalism-n430112

The Once Mighty Times Is a National Embarrassment

The New York Times is, for better or worse, still the newspaper of record in the United States. That title obviously doesn’t carry the prestige that it once did. The Times has basically won a war of attrition as the newspaper industry across the land continues to fade into irrelevance. If it hadn’t already had such a prominent position in American news consumption, it would be on the verge of disappearing soon too.

The Times just had a particularly offensive Memorial Day Weekend, and I say that as someone who is so used to their biased nonsense that I try not to let it bother me any more.

First — and this may have only offended me — the editorial brain trust at the paper decided to do a gimmicky front page on Sunday that listed the names of Americans  who died from COVID-19. Of course I believe these people should be mourned. What bothered me is that there is a very, very specific group of fallen Americans who we are supposed to remember on Memorial Day Weekend and I found the timing of this to be exceedingly off-putting.

The Times Never Commits Accidental Bias

The timing of the above example was undoubtedly deliberate and intended to deflect from duly honoring our war dead. That was a slight. What the editorial board did to kick off the weekend intended to honor our military dead was egregiously offensive and un-American.

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Media’s Unpunished Lies Hurt The Nation Far Worse Than Trump’s Indefensible Tweets By Mark Hemingway

By on May 27th, 2020

https://thefederalist.com/2020/05/26/medias-unpunished-lies-hurt-the-nation-far-worse-than-trumps-indefensible-tweets/

The grim joke of the 20th century was that one death is a tragedy, 1 million is a statistic. Well, in the 21st century age of information warfare, one man’s libel is an outrage. When thousands do it, we call that ‘the news.’

Donald Trump’s tweets suggesting Joe Scarborough somehow murdered a young woman who died of natural causes nearly 20 years ago are reprehensible. This is in no way because these tweets defame Scarborough. It’s pretty hard to feel bad for a guy whose media presence enabled Trump’s political rise to the point he openly flirted with running as his vice president before making a comic heel turn against Trump. (In fact, back when Scarborough was playing footsie with Trump, left-wing blogs were trafficking in this repugnant conspiracy.) Trump’s tweets are awful because of how they have thrust the deceased girl’s memory and her family into the limelight.

This letter written by the dead woman’s husband asking Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to take down the offending Trump tweets is heart-wrenching. It’s exactly the kind of behavior I feared Trump was capable of in 2016 and loomed large in my mind when I made the decision not to vote for him.

So there’s your ritual malediction against Trump, necessary though it may be. Please don’t pretend to be outraged when now it must be explained, once more with feeling, why a torrent of new condemnations of Trump’s indefensible behavior will have no effect on his supporters or the political dynamic heading into November and beyond. And don’t confuse that with approval of Trump’s rhetoric or tweets.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Order Forcing Nursing Homes to Take Covid Patients Scrubbed from N.Y. State Website By Tobias Hoonhout

By on May 27th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/cuomo-coronavirus-order-forcing-nursing-homes-to-take-covid-19-patients-scrubbed-from-new-york-state-website/

The New York Department of Health has apparently deleted a March order issued by Governor Andrew Cuomo that forced nursing homes to admit Covid-positive residents.

The order, which was implemented on March 25, stated that “no resident shall be denied re-admission or admission to a nursing home solely based on a confirmed or suspected diagnosis of COVID-19,” and also prohibited nursing homes from requiring testing prior to admission or readmission. But the order is no longer visible on the state’s website.

Other outdated guidelines, including a February order stating “there is no need to cancel school or social events, and there is no need for students or school staff to wear surgical masks at school,” remain active on the site.

The New York Department of Health and Cuomo’s office did not respond to requests for comment as to why the order was deleted.

New York leads the country with over 5,000 nursing home deaths due to coronavirus, and earlier this month admitted to quietly changing its criteria to count only those cases in which the individual died at the nursing home, rather than at the hospital. News of the policy has resulted in calls for an investigation from conservative lawmakers.

Cuomo, who said in April that he was not aware of his state’s own policy, reversed it earlier this month. “We’re just not going to send a person who is positive to a nursing home after hospital visit. Period. If there’s any issue, the resident must be referred to the department of health which will find alternative care,” he announced on May 10.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The 82-Day Dictatorship By Michael Brendan Dougherty

By on May 27th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/coronavirus-pandemic-hungary-prime-minister-viktor-orban-not-a-dictator/

Worries about Hungarian authoritarianism prove overblown, but are they hiding the real danger?

One wonders if it will be recorded in the history books that from March 30th to June 20th Hungary lived as the shortest dictatorship in European history, before voluntarily extinguishing itself. An odd act for a dictatorship. Prime Minister Viktor Orbán of Hungary had used the coronavirus to make himself dictator for life, it was said. But I guess he only had it in him to be dictator for life for less than three months.

Our most important experts on democracy and Eastern Europe knew that Viktor Orbán had really done it this time. Yasmeen Serhan, writing in The Atlantic this April, declared: “There is a line between using emergency powers and outright authoritarianism—one that Hungary has undoubtedly crossed.”

“The brazenness of Orbán’s power grab is without any parallel in recent European history,” wrote Dalibor Rohac in the Washington Post, predicting confidently that absent a “strong pushback from Brussels and Washington — which are both understandably preoccupied by more urgent matters — Hungary is bound to emerge from the current crisis as a full-fledged dictatorship.”

It was on March 30th that the Hungarian Parliament approved a state-of-emergency law to deal with coronavirus that gave power to Viktor Orbán’s government to pass laws by decree, and instituted severe-looking restrictions on the dissemination of fake news. Several European countries had already passed enabling acts of this sort — France has seemed to go in and out of such states of emergency regularly in the last decade. That the emergency powers were a feature of Hungary’s existing constitution, limited by that constitution not to touch fundamental rights and subject to a parliamentary check, troubled none of these analysts.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Why New York Is In Trouble – 290,304 Public Employees With $100,000+ Paychecks Cost Taxpayers $38 Billion Adam Andrzejewski

By on May 27th, 2020

https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2020/05/26/why-new-york-is-in-trouble–290304-public-employees-with-100000-paychecks-cost-taxpayers-38-billion/#66d7b319fee2

New York’s budget deficit ballooned from $6 billion to $13 billion while the Empire State was the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic. But the financial woes aren’t stopping 290,304 government employees from bringing home six-figure salaries and higher.

Across New York, nearly 20,000 highly compensated local, city and state employees out-earned Governor Andrew Cuomo’s $178,500 salary.

Our auditors at OpentheBooks.com found plumbers in New York City making $285,000 per year; police officers at the Port Authority of New York-New Jersey earning $423,467; Long Island school superintendents making up to $547,049; and a 93-year old college professor retired on a $561,754 pension.

So, maybe it’s no surprise that the New York General Assembly hiked their own pay and will be the most highly compensated state legislature in the country by 2021 with salaries of $130,000.

Using our new interactive mapping tool, quickly review (by ZIP code) the 290,304 New York public employees and retirees who earned more than $100,000 and cost taxpayers $38 billion (FY2018-9). Just click a pin and scroll down to see the results rendered in the chart beneath the map.

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

Ruthie Blum : Demonstrating against the forces of condescension

By on May 26th, 2020

https://www.jns.org/opinion/demonstrating-against-the-forces-of-condescension/

Protestations to the contrary, the chattering classes in the press, academia and the courts have been on an endless campaign to delegitimize the right.

(May 26, 2020 / JNS) Hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside the Jerusalem District Court on Sunday afternoon to express their support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his arraignment. It was the first hearing of a trial that his champions had hoped would never materialize, and that his enemies had spent the past four years pressing for and salivating over.

The latter also turned out at the courthouse, mainly to gloat. But a greater number preferred to hold their anti-Netanyahu festival—replete with champagne and blessings of l’chaim—in front of his official residence on Balfour Street, a mere mile-and-a-half away.

Finally, after four years of investigations into the activities of their nemesis, they were getting their wish: that the longest-serving prime minister in Israeli history, whom they’ve been unable to beat at the ballot box, will end his career in disgrace, if not in jail.

But their schadenfreude may be short-lived—whatever fate befalls Netanyahu at the hands of the panel of three judges, hand-picked for the purpose of kicking him when he’s up.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Support for China Falls Dramatically in European, Indian Polls by Lawrence Kadish

By on May 26th, 2020

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16063/poll-support-for-china

A soon to be released international survey finds that when the COVID-19 virus finally burns itself out its biggest victim may be the very country that launched the pandemic —China.

Bluster, bullying, and propaganda launched by China’s leadership to subdue international criticism of their handling of COVID-19 is only stoking the anger among nations as diverse as the U.K., Germany and India, according to data revealed during a comprehensive poll conducted by the firm McLaughlin & Associates.

They may not embrace the White House on any given issue but when it comes to China, a large and significant number of those polled in this global COVID-19 survey would now support economic sanctions, confronting China’s strategy to achieve global dominance by controlling worldwide access to technology, pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, and more.

What can only be described as a diplomatic earthquake is the emerging political fault line along China’s southern border with India.

The McLaughlin poll found that a majority of voters in the world’s largest democracy, some 54%, believe China hid key COVID-19 details, resulting in more damage by the pandemic, and 78% believe China knowingly kept data from the international community.

And it gets worse for Beijing. As many as 85% of Indian voters believe China should be held accountable with 88% approving of an investigation of not just China but the World Health Organization (WHO) regarding what did they know and when did they know it.

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Ending the Dangerous U.S. Dependence on China By Andrew Foxall

By on May 26th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/coronavirus-pandemic-china-united-states-west-must-end-dangerous-dependence-on-beijing/

As the pandemic has made clear, the U.S., and the West as a whole, cannot continue to depend on an authoritarian rival state for strategically important goods.

 I t is not necessary to agree with all of President Donald Trump’s foreign policies in order to agree with one of his foreign policies. His approach to China is a case in point.

Since it emerged late last year, the coronavirus has brought into sharp focus the outlines of the international system and amplified long-standing tensions between Washington and Beijing. Many of Trump’s critics have identified him as part of the problem, arguing that an “America first” foreign policy — which was written into the official National Security Strategy that his administration published in 2017 — at best undermines international cooperation in the fight against the coronavirus and at worse obstructs it. A divided West, the argument goes, is ceding global leadership to China.

Yet the pandemic has highlighted something that Trump’s National Security Strategy identified three years ago. Instead of becoming a “responsible stakeholder” in the international system — a term coined by Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick in 2005 to describe the role that the Bush administration hoped China would play following its 2001 entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) — China has instead “expanded its power at the expense of others.”

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The Remains of an Administration By Victor Davis Hanson

By on May 26th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/obama-administration-scandals-coming-to-light-legacy-in-tatters/

Obama’s policies are in tatters, and the worst scandals of his White House are coming to light.

“One is not struck by the truth until prompted quite accidentally by some external event.”
— Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day

Each day that the Obama administration fades into the past, its wrongdoings manage to wander back into the present.

After years of suppression, all sorts of strange events keep popping up to remind us of what little is left of the Obama years — the Susan Rice memo, Christopher Steele deleting his computer records, FBI-doctored and lost 302s, text messages wiped clean, the bizarre Obama January 5, 2017, Oval Office meeting, the ambush interview of Michael Flynn, the unmasking and leaking of redacted names swept up in reverse-targeting surveillance operations, the administration fraud perpetrated on the FISA courts. The list is so overwhelming and bizarre that it ensures that anything at any time can now appear. And the result keeps reminding Americans of how corrupt were the years between 2009 and 2017 and how untruthful was the coverage of such institutionalized wrongdoing.

Emeritus Barack Obama now and then ventures out to go through the motions of an enfeebled defense for what is becoming an increasingly discredited administration. But his heart is not in it. His mind is elsewhere. His cause is no longer social activism and community organizing, if it ever was, but lucre and the perceived well-earned good life. The arc of his moralizing universe is long, but for the anointed like him, it apparently bends toward the just deserts of riches and material bounty.

First lady forever and bestselling memoirist Michelle Obama sometimes takes a hiatus from making millions to offer a half-hearted progressive warning about the sudden heartlessness of the country — reminiscent of her transitory 2008 warnings about a downright mean country and one of which she had previously not been especially proud.

The remains of the Obama team (Susan Rice, Ben Rhodes, Hillary Clinton, John Brennan, James Comey, Samantha Power) are not offering much of a defense for the Obama years — they are now too busy scrambling to hide their own legal culpability and exposure. The bending arc of the 2009 dream team finally ends in the platitudes of “I can’t remember” and “Not to my knowledge” that will eventually find their way from CNN and MSNBC into the court room.

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