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Ruth King

These are the real scandals plaguing our country Michael Goodwin

https://nypost.com/2018/08/28/these-are-the-real-scandals-plaguing-our-country/

Not so long ago, editors and reporters dreaded the dog days of August because news took a vacation. Now the news never stops.

The challenge today is to make sense of the gusher of apocalyptic-sounding eruptions, claims and predictions. Here’s my view of what’s happening to our country.

America is being scandalized by four enormous events that are happening simultaneously. By scandalized, I mean that people are shocked and outraged at what they regard as breaches of acceptable behavior or morality.

That wouldn’t be a problem if the vast majority were scandalized by the same things. That’s not the America we have. The vicious polarization stems from the fact that the country is split almost exactly in half over what people are outraged about.

The first scandalizing event is Donald Trump — his candidacy, his election and his presidency. And, on some days to some people, his existence.

They have a point — up to a point. Trump is unlike any president in history, taking the Oval Office after a notorious business career and personal life. And it’s not as if he folded into the mold once he got elected, though his policies are more conventional that his personality.

Lanny Davis is more proof 2018 is year of lawyers living dangerously By Jonathan Turley

http://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/404073-lanny-davis-is-more-proof-2018-is-year-of-lawyers-living-dangerously

For lawyers, it has been a year of living dangerously. The scandals swirling around Washington have left a pile of attorneys accused of false statements, leaks or other improper conduct. The latest casualty appears to be Lanny Davis, who just admitted to not only spreading a false story but then lying about being its source.

Only recently, Davis — a Democratic stalwart who has been a close adviser to the Clintons — announced that he would represent President Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, free of charge. Davis has steered Cohen into a 180-degree turn from Trump loyalist to chief accuser. He suggested that Cohen could implicate Trump in crimes touching on obstruction, collusion and campaign-finance violations. He caused a firestorm nationally when he suggested Trump knew in advance about Russian hacking of Clinton campaign and Democratic Party emails and also approved the infamous meeting with Russian representatives in Trump Tower.

At the same time, Davis attacked Trump and his counsel as liars, proclaiming that his defense of Cohen is powerfully simple — “it’s about truth, and the power of the truth is what Michael Cohen now has no matter what … Mayor (Rudy) Giuliani invents for a president who’s been known to lie.”

How Social Media Collusion Censors Speech By Christopher Roach

https://amgreatness.com/2018/08/29/how-social-media-

Whether it is Twitter’s “shadowban,” Facebook’s news-sifting algorithm, or YouTube’s concern for user “safety,” social media gatekeeping is now deployed shamelessly in the service of leftist politics. The latest victim is Alex Jones. While he is bombastic, prone to conspiracy theories, and, um, loud, that’s not why they banned him. He supports President Trump and is a critic of elite conventional wisdom. That’s his crime.

The Establishment Is Trying to Prevent a Repeat of 2016
In the early days of the World Wide Web—almost 20 years ago now—the watchword was freedom, whether freedom from censorship, freedom from local governments’ sales taxes, or freedom from government surveillance. The emerging tech companies then expressed reasonable concern that restrictions from these quarters would cripple the industry, defeating the emerging benefits of the instantaneous, nearly anonymous, and highly connected network that is the internet.

Then the election of 2016 happened. It was a wake up call to the tech world’s emerging establishment. It particularly traumatized those who thought Obama’s election was a permanent elevation of his politics, his style, as well as the “emerging majority” that brought him to power.

As they previously have done in talk radio, on social media the far right has shown acumen and effectiveness. While this may seem merely like preaching to the converted, it also encourages supporters and the uncommitted by undermining the dominant Left’s pretentions of inevitability and unanimity. Twitter in particular was a great equalizer. Whether president or peon, the accounts looked the same. It soon was overrun by a highly motivated army of right-leaning critics and trolls, hilarious anonymous memes, Pepe the Frog, Trump’s Taco Bowl, and, ultimately, their collective efforts contributed to his electoral victory.

Under Fire for the Faith in Nigeria Jihad’s genocide against Christians ensues unabated.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/271141/under-fire-faith-nigeria-jack-kerwick

Recently, via social media, I’ve become friends with a Catholic priest in Nigeria. Because of the brutal persecution to which Christians in his country are routinely subjected by Muslims, I will not disclose his name. Just a couple of days ago, he posted on his Facebook page a link to a story regarding a fellow Nigerian priest, a man of God who was doing some shopping at the local market for the poor when Muslim gunmen shot him dead.

Knowing that I’ve made it a mission of sorts to draw what attention I can to the plight of persecuted Christians throughout the world, particularly throughout the Middle East and Africa, my new friend private messaged me, thanking me for my “love.” He also underscored the unadulterated evil of Islamic-on-Christian oppression in his country, adding: “The Muslims want our lives!”

On August 18, Father Michael Akawu, “the first indigenous priest of the Catholic Archdiocese of Abuja, Nigeria’s capital, was gunned down in cold blood while shopping at a “supermarket” in Gwagwalada, a suburb of Akawu.

Father Michael was ordained as recently as February of last year.

Is the Deep State Winning? The stakes if it is. Bruce Thornton

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/271142/deep-state-winning-bruce-thornton

By any reasonable standard, the presidency of Donald Trump has so far been a success. After eight years of Barack Obama’s sluggish recovery from the 2008 Great Recession, the economy is “blistering,” as MarketWatch put it, its vigorous growth creating jobs, raising incomes, and lifting the market’s “animal spirits.” Abroad, the “kick me” sign Obama and the progressives hung on America’s back is gone, with allies, rivals, and enemies alike now taking us seriously as the indispensable world power to treat with respect, rather than a daft rich uncle to bully and fleece.

Yet despite all these reasons for feeling good about the country’s getting its mojo back, the current mood is one of crisis and hysteria. We’re consumed by a special counsel’s show trials of marginal Trump associates whose actions had no material impact on the election or the public weal. Appointed to investigate “collusion” with Russia and foreign interference in our election, all that the two-bit Javert Robert Mueller can come up with are paltry financial crimes and duplicitous perjury traps. Consequential developments abroad, such as Turkey’s implosion and a war brewing on Israel’s northern border, are ignored so we can pick over the carcasses of a couple of bottom-feeding swamp-fixers like Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen.

This lack of seriousness and failure to recognize this government’s successes have many reasons. Partly it’s a consequence of just how good we have it. Like most of our political dysfunctions, we are so rich and comfortable that we think we can afford to obsess over payoffs to porn stars and Playboy bunnies, and ignore more important issues. Our attention is hostage to a 24/7 virtual carnival and freak-show on social media, cable news, and the internet. We’re in the third generation of a failed educational system that exists not to teach basic skills, cultural knowledge, and critical reasoning, but to create the new Progressive Man who mouths social justice pieties as he keeps up with the latest fads and fashion. We live in a world of noisy, kinetic distractions, like mice in a maze scurrying to snatch the latest bit of cheese from Apple, Facebook, YouTube, and Hollywood.

Instagram Makes Free Speech Disappear Company owned by Navy SEALs banned for criticizing NFL kneelers. Lloyd Billingsley

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/271172/instagram-makes-free-speech-disappear-lloyd-billingsley

Project War Path, a clothing company owned by Navy SEALs and Army Special Forces combat veterans, Charlie Nash of Breitbart News reported Monday, “has been permanently suspended from Facebook’s Instagram platform for ‘hate speech’ after criticizing NFL players who kneel during the national anthem.”

The post in question read, “This sums it up, Veteran’s defend our freedom and keep us safe. Meanwhile overpaid turds throw a leather ball around in an overpriced stadium and shit on all the men and women who have been killed defending our country.”

Project War Path co-owner Tej Gill, a Navy SEAL veteran, told Breibart “players kneeling really hits home with me and my teammates, I think it’s disgusting, an insult to all veterans, Americans, and especially families of veterans that have been killed and wounded during war.”

The same post on Twitter was not removed but Instagram took it down. As Gill explained to Breitbart, “I tried to reinstate my account, the form I filled out said my account was permanently suspended for hate speech. I have not heard anything back from Instagram since.”

Gill cited “a very aggressive censorship operation that is being conducted by Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and the mainstream media.” Instagram, as it happens is owned by Facebook, which purchased the upstart in 2012 and turned it into a profit center.

The Unbearable Darkness of Young Adult Literature Books on sexual abuse, dysphoria, racism, gang life, domestic violence and school shootings. By Steve Salerno

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-unbearable-darkness-of-young-adult-literature-1535495594

Although “Heather Has Two Mommies” caused quite a stir upon its 1989 publication, a case could be made that the book was a reasonable reflection of the gay-rights zeitgeist as well as the latter-day realities of American domesticity. If nothing else, “Heather” was uplifting in theme and execution, likely to make young readers more comfortable with an evolving culture.

The same can’t be said for a list of “socially aware” books featured prominently at the inaugural Summit on the Research and Teaching of Young Adult Literature, held at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas in June. The four-day summit convened nearly 50 presenters—top educators and authors from across the land—and focused nominally on “Rising Up: Socially Relevant Texts, Critical Literacy, and Identity.”

But “rising up” might not be the first phrase that comes to mind when one surveys a representative sampling of the marquee fare:

• “How It Went Down,” a novel by Kekla Magoon, presents 18 different perspectives on the shooting of an unarmed black youth. (This is the second prominent young-adult book on the topic published recently. While not featured at the summit, Angie Thomas’s “The Hate U Give”—also about the shooting of an unarmed black youth—contended for a National Book Award in 2017.)

• “Shout” is author Laurie Halse Anderson’s memoir of her sexual assault and struggle with eating disorders while growing up with an alcoholic parent suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Ms. Anderson’s debut novel, “Speak,” examined sexual assault from the viewpoint of a ninth-grade girl.

• In “Losers Bracket,” family therapist Chris Crutcher introduces young readers to the heartbreaking lives of children who continue to love and depend on their parents “no matter how badly treated” they may be. CONTINUE AT SITE

Yahoo Admits It Scans Emails to Collect Data to Sell to Advertisers By Phil Baker

https://pjmedia.com/trending/yahoo-admits-it-scans-emails-to-collect-data-to-sell-to-advertisers/

While the tech companies harvest our data to sell ads, in recent years email services have been off limits. That limit has just been crossed with the disclosure that Verizon is now promoting a new service to advertisers where they continually scan the 200 million inboxes of Yahoo Mail users. Yahoo Mail is a part of Yahoo that Verizon recently acquired under their Oath brand. Oath/Verizon told advertisers that they search the mail for clues about what people might buy or be interested in buying. They are doing the same with AOL Mail, which Verizon also owns.

Among all of the U.S. email providers, these are the only mail services being exposed to this intrusion. In the past, Gmail also scanned users’ emails but terminated that practice last year. Of course, Google has many other ways to gather our personal data. CONTINUE AT SITE

Toxic Antibiotics By Eileen F. Toplansky

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/08/toxic_antibiotics.html

Urinary tract infections affect millions of women, and often they are prescribed Ciprofloxacin (Cipro), Gemifoxacin (Factive), Levofloxacin (Levaquin), Moxifloxacin (Avelox), Norfloxacin (Noroxin), or Ofloxacin (Floxin). These are fluoroquinolones, antibiotics, and have been on the market for more than 30 years. They are also routinely prescribed for a range of infections – sinusitis, cystitis, prostatitis, bronchitis, and skin infections.

For some people, what is supposed to be a helpful medicine has turned into a medical nightmare, and many are still unaware of the dangers posed by these antibiotics.

Fluroquinolones, when used as tablets, capsules, or injectables, are associated with disabling and potentially permanent serious side-effects that can occur together.

The concerns about the antibiotic fluoroquinolone drugs are not new. In fact:

The FDA first added a Boxed Warning to fluoroquinolones in July 2008 for the increased risk of tendinitis and tendon rupture. In February 2011, the risk of worsening symptoms for those with myasthenia gravis was added to the Boxed Warning. In August 2013, the agency required updates to the labeling to describe the potential for irreversible peripheral neuropathy or serious nerve damage.

Then, on May 12, 2016, the FDA warned that fluoroquinolone antibiotics (emphasis added):

… are associated with disabling and potentially permanent side effects of the tendons, muscles, joints, nerves, and central nervous system that can occur together in the same patient. …

Taking an Axe to ‘Peace Processing’ By Shoshana Bryen

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/08/taking_an_axe_to_peace_processing.html

The Trump administration has restored the United States to the position of honest broker – emphasis on “honest” – and taken a hatchet to a series of fantasies underlying the notion of an Israeli-Palestinian “peace process.” Twenty-five years after the Oslo Accords ushered in radical, despotic, kleptocratic Palestinian self-government, the Accords are dead. And that’s good.

The new construct is as follows:

The U.S. is not neutral between Israel, America’s democratic friend and ally, and the Palestinians, who are neither.
Everybody has a “narrative,” a national story. Not everyone’s narrative is factual. The U.S. will insist that there are facts, and that history – both ancient and modern – is real and knowable. The American government’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of the State of Israel is simply the acceptance of the truth of history. The city was the capital of the Jewish people and never, ever the seat of government for any other. In this assertion, the president was joined by many members of the U.S. House and Senate, irrespective of party – although some had more trouble saying so than others.
The U.S. will not pay for fraud, mismanagement, or support of terrorism by the Palestinians or the United Nations. Repeat the comment about congressional support.
Neither will we fund two Palestinian governments simply because it is easier than figuring out what to do with Hamas and Fatah, who are fighting a civil war and agree on little besides the need for Israel’s ultimate demise. Repeat the comment about congressional support.

In the new game, the Palestinians have something to lose – the sine qua non of successful negotiations.