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Ruth King

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

It’s Not Just the Wall — Democrats Hate Interior Enforcement, Too By Rich Lowry

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/its-not-just-the-wall-democrats-hate-interior-enforcement-too/

My post below on border funding assumes that there is a deal, which isn’t a guarantee. The sticking point at the moment is the interior:

But throughout the talks, Democrats had also been focused on limiting ICE’s ability to detain unauthorized immigrants, which has become a major issue for the party because of their opposition to the Trump administration’s aggressive detention tactics. The Democrats’ proposal included a new limit on detention beds for immigrants picked up not at the border but in the interior of the country.

Democrats wanted to cap that number at 16,500, which they said is around the level of interior detentions in the final years of the Obama administration. Republicans proposed excluding immigrants with criminal records from the cap. But Democrats said that would make the cap toothless, because it would amount to giving ICE free rein to round up thousands of immigrants without criminal records, on top of unlimited numbers of immigrants with criminal convictions.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

The Slippery Slope of Speech Suppression at CUNY The dire consequences of violating students’ First Amendment rights. David Seidemann

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/272797/slippery-slope-speech-suppression-cuny-david-seidemann

Reprinted from jamesgmartin.center.

Public universities morally should and legally must uphold free speech. Unfortunately, the university where I’ve taught for 43 years has a very bad record, and matters are getting worse.

The City University of New York (CUNY) has a long history of speech suppression, as a sampling of legal cases at its various campus units reveals. For example, in 2007, a federal appeals court ruled that the College of Staten Island’s president violated students’ First Amendment rights when she nullified a student election; in a 2017 court settlement, Queens College administrators agreed to reverse their arbitrary decision to deny official recognition of a pro-life group litigation.

The administration of Brooklyn College has been particularly aggressive in suppressing speech. This is illustrated in a series of court cases involving students who were attempting to stop the college from collecting a mandatory fee in support of the New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG), an off-campus, liberal lobbying group.

In 1996, the college arbitrarily canceled a referendum on the issue. A New York court ordered it reinstated. In 1997, the college blocked a similar referendum based on the (risible) claim that the students running it had libeled NYPIRG in a campaign poster by portraying the group as a rat. The college agreed to rescind that decision in a federal court stipulation. In 1998, the college refused to allow students to even start petitioning for a referendum, but a federal court ordered the college to permit petitioning. In 2001, the college refused to allow students all the allowed time for petitioning. That too was reversed in a federal court stipulation.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Who Is Behind the “Green New Deal”? A look at the Sunrise Movement and its socialist dreams.

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/272814/who-behind-green-new-deal-discover-networks

The Sunrise Movement (SM) is a 501(c)(4) environmental advocacy organization that, while denying that it is loyal to either “the right or left” side of the political spectrum, in fact throws its full support behind left-wing Democratic Party candidates and agendas. Most notably, SM endorses the enactment of a “Green New Deal,” environmental legislation whose multifaceted mission is to eliminate all fossil-fuel use from the U.S. economy (in favor of renewables like wind and solar energy) by the year 2030; create a “basic income program” and a federal jobs guarantee that would provide a “living wage” to every person who wants one; implement a government-run, single-payer health care system; and “transform our economy and society” in a manner that will restore its ecological and moral integrity.

Rooted in the premise that the greenhouse gas emissions associated with human industrial activity are a major cause of potentially catastrophic “climate change,” SM is composed chiefly of what it terms “an army of young people” who aim to take “immediate and decisive action to transform our energy system” and thereby address the “climate crisis” that threatens to consign humanity to “a future ravaged by wildfires, heatwaves, and hurricanes.” In pursuit of this objective, SM vows to “end the corrupting influence of fossil fuel executives on our politics.” That “handful of wealthy oil and gas executives,” says the organization, “will stop at nothing to squeeze the last bit of money out of the earth” – no matter how many “children must breathe toxic air,” or how many “parents must choose between a dangerous and polluting job, and no job at all.”

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

The Brutal Murder of a Jewish Teen A glimpse into the horrific Palestinian practice of “Pay for Slay”. Ari Lieberman

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/272833/brutal-murder-jewish-teen-ari-lieberman

When police and security forces discovered 19-year-old Ori Ansbacher in Jerusalem’s Ein Yael forest on Friday, she was already dead. Police noted that she was murdered in a brutal fashion having been stabbed at least 12 times in the chest and neck. There were other signs of brutality but in deference to police requests and the dignity of the Ansbacher family, I will refrain from noting them here. Needless to say, this was a barbaric crime even by Palestinian standards of barbarity.

Forensic teams scoured the site for evidence and within 24 hours, there was a significant evidentiary breakthrough that led to the doorstep of 29-year-old Hebron resident, Arafat Irfayia. So strong was the physical evidence that police noted that they could secure a conviction even without a confession. Following the crime, Irfayia hid in a mosque in the Arab village of El-Bireh, and subsequently made his way to a home adjacent to the mosque where Israeli security forces nabbed him. His Hebron home has already been mapped for demolition.

On Sunday, Irfayia reenacted the crime for investigators. On day of the murder, Irfayia, who was known to law enforcement, left his Hebron home armed with a knife and made his way to Jerusalem, where he stumbled upon his innocent female victim. It was a crime of opportunity and unfortunately, Ori became a victim of Irfayia’s monstrous hate of Jews and deviant sexual proclivities.

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ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The Green Robe of Climate Justice Alan Moran

By on February 11th, 2019

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed

Being open-minded and impartial, as his tenure as a judge requires, we can take for granted that Mr Justice Preston read more broadly than the warmist epistles of alarmists and climate careerists cited in his judgment against the Rocky Hill coal mine. Alas, the views of less excitable climate scientists failed to get a mention.

Last week, the senior judge in the NSW Land and Environment Court, Mr Justice Brian Preston (left), rejected the Rocky Hill coal mine’s application to operate for a number of reasons, one of them being “to meet generally agreed climate targets” for a “rapid and deep ­decrease” in emissions. The case against the mine was run by the activist Environmental Defenders Office NSW, which is funded in part by the state government and at which Preston once served as the founding principal solicitor.

Mr Preston was appointed to the leading legal role in the Land and Environment Court by Labor attorney-general Bob Debus in 2005. Debus said he was impressed by his record as an environmental activist when appointing him to the job.

Upon being elevated to the bench, Mr Preston talked about how the “pressing challenge facing the court now is to engage with and to explicate emerging international concepts and principles.” He further said,

The best illustration of an international concept that has taken root locally is that of ‘ecologically sustainable development’ (ESD). The ESD principles are hortatory but lack precision. The challenge is to articulate mechanisms for translating these laudable principles into specific actions. The court has a role to play in this task. The court has begun the task in a few cases but more work still needs to be done.

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BOOKS Comments turned off

Panthers on the Prowl in London Elizabeth Beare Reviews “The Husband Hunters: Social Climbing in London and New York” by Anne de Courcy

By on February 11th, 2019

https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle? Nothing new there really. Just catnip.

The daughters of the American rich who invaded London in quest of titled mates tended to be spirited and good company, not milksops like the general run of British debutantes. Whatever their other attractions, the ‘buccaneer belles’ have inspired a social history par excellence.

There I was, in an airport bookshop, seeking some entertainment for another long-haul flight, clutching a paperback that had looked promising on the shelf, and so it proved to be. The cover picture was enticing, a coloured-up photograph of an 1890s belle, displaying in pastels the porcelain skin, long straight nose, fine clear eyes and the pile of preferably auburn hair that was all the go at the time, the whole a cultural ensemble for feminine pulchritude, topped off with a bunch of pink peony roses dramatising her blue straw hat. Her neck swathed in a high fichu of fine white lace, the hint of an elegantly generous leg-of-mutton sleeve on her gown and her discreet stud-pearl earrings all said “lady”, but her vaguely eager expression suggested she might be fun nevertheless.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

British woman arrested for calling a transgender woman a man By Rick Moran

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/02/british_woman_arrested_for_calling_a_transgender_woman_a_man.html

A British woman was arrested in front of her children and held in police custody for 7 hours after calling a transgender woman a man online.

Kate Scottow was detained following an argument on Twitter with a transgendered woman. She was charged with “harassment and malicious communications.”

“Malicious…” what?

Daily Mail:

Writing on online forum Mumsnet, Mrs Scottow – who has also been served with a court order that bans her from referring to her accuser as a man – claimed: ‘I was arrested in my home by three officers, with my autistic ten-year-old daughter and breastfed 20-month-old son present.

‘I was then detained for seven hours in a cell with no sanitary products (which I said I needed) before being interviewed then later released under investigation … I was arrested for harassment and malicious communications because I called someone out and misgendered them on Twitter.’

Confirming the arrest, Hertfordshire Police said: ‘We take all reports of malicious communication seriously.’

You will be forced to care…or else.

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ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE Comments turned off

The Question of Sea Level Rise By S. Fred Singer

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/02/the_question_of_sea_level_rise_.html

Sea level has risen about 400 feet since the last glacial maximum of ~18,000 years ago. [see fig. below]

Currently, sea level is rising at the rate of 1-2mm per year — and has been rising at that rate for the past several centuries.

At that rate, SL will be about six inches higher by 2100 — a long way from Al Gore’s 2006 estimate of a 20-foot rise.

By choosing a short interval, 1910-1942, of certified warming, I can show the lack of any acceleration [see below]. SLR does not depend on ocean temperature — or CO2.

Every one of the individual records of SLR shows this constancy of SLR.

But water expands when heated; so why doesn’t SLR accelerate as temperature rises? I assume that evaporation of sea water offsets the expansion, with increased humidity and precipitation. I fully expect to see more ice deposited on the Antarctic continent — probably too hard to measure accurately.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

On the 29th anniversary of Mandela’s release By Silvio Canto, Jr.

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/02/on_the_29th_anniversary_of_mandelas_release.html

On this day in 1990, Nelson Mandela was released from prison. I remember the news story quite well. As I remember, there were lots of good vibration that came out of this day.

Today, Mandela is dead and South Africa is a country going downhill. Today, the news out of that country is all bad, as we see in this report from a few weeks ago:

Thousands of predominantly white farmers are emigrating Down Under every month, as South Africa’s government prepares to roll out land seizures to make right the “original sin” of how the black population was treated in days gone by.

A law firm based in Perth, Western Australia, said the number of South Africans who have arrived on Australia’s shores since last February is estimated to be at least 162,000.

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Malpass May Emerge As Trump’s Anti-Socialist Point Man

By on February 11th, 2019

https://www.nysun.com/editorials/malpass-could-emerge-as-trumps-anti-socialist/90569/

Could David Malpass emerge as the point man of President Trump’s campaign against socialism? The thought occurs to us as the economist prepares to accede to the presidency of the World Bank. Mr. Trump’s formal announcement of his plan to name Mr. Malpass to the post took place the day after Mr. Trump, in his State of the Union speech, laid down his marker in respect of socialism.

The context in which Mr. Trump brought up socialism was Venezuela. The president didn’t give a monograph on the impoverished oil-rich country. The president did, though, ascribe to the regime’s “socialist policies” blame for having “turned that nation from being the wealthiest in South America into a state of abject poverty and despair.”

Then Mr. Trump warned of creeping socialism here at home. “Deftly” is the word a dispatch in the Hill newspaper used to describe the way the president juxtaposed the two. It “created an immediate public split among Democrats that was caught on live television.” Senators Schumer, Stabenow, Manchin, Tester, and Brown joined a standing ovation with Republicans. Other Democrats, not so much.

What an opening for Mr. Trump, what an issue for a sage like Mr. Malpass. He understands the economic problem down to the ground — that the biggest problem the developing world faces, the biggest problem poor countries face is socialism and the lack of a system protecting property rights, sound money, market prices, and a system of independent courts to enforce laws.

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