Displaying the most recent of 90425 posts written by

Ruth King

Pakistan: Kidnapping, Forced Marriages, Forced Conversion by Uzay Bulut

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19800/pakistan-forced-marriage-conversion

Imagine if you are a child from a persecuted religious minority living in one of the world’s most oppressive countries. The country’s majority culture and institutions are largely shaped by a religious ideology that has no regard for anything outside that system, as well as a record of mistreating women and girls.

Sadly, the government of Pakistan appears complicit in these and other crimes: it fails to provide women and children with required legal protection. A bill to criminalize forced religious conversions has been presented in the Sindh Assembly at least three times (2016, 2019 and 2021). Each time, it was rejected.

Any military or economic cooperation with Pakistan should be conditioned on Pakistan’s improvement of human rights and liberties for minorities, and a respect for international law. A government that is complicit in the abduction, forced religious conversion, sexual abuse and coerced “marriages” of minority children should not be considered qualified to benefit from any aid or cooperation from the West.

America’s Strength for Freedom by Lawrence Kadish

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19801/america-strength-for-freedom

Earlier this month, a Gatestone Institute reader, Goh Heung Yong, submitted a comment in which he noted:

“No one should forget that it was America’s strength for freedom, that freed just about all of Asia from Japanese occupation. Her power for peace liberated half of Europe and kept Stalin’s predatory advance at bay. America still is that shining beacon for freedom and civilized existence.”

His astute observation reveals a number of important insights regarding the historic role of the United States during World War II. While much of our attention is often drawn to the European theater of operations, America fought a two-front war. The Pacific theater was a literal fight-to-the-finish as our Marines, Army, Navy and Army Air Corps created a ring of steel around the Japanese Empire intent on fighting for every square inch of land. America won in the Pacific at enormous cost, and only the use of two atomic weapons finally brought the conflict to an end.

What few Americans appreciate was the path of destruction and litany of war crimes committed by the Japanese Empire throughout their zone of occupation, which included huge swaths of China.

Historians have documented their crimes; these included repeated massacres of civilians and prisoners of war, sexual slavery, human experimentation, forced labor and starvation. While those crimes occurred wherever the Emperor’s soldiers occupied Asia, China bore the brunt of Japan’s assault on humanity. Historians estimate that from 1937 to 1945, nearly 4 million Chinese, mostly civilians, were killed as a direct result of Japanese violence.

What Does Biden Have Against Israel? The President treats the governing coalition in Jerusalem worse than he does Iran.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-israel-benjamin-netanyahu-tom-nides-iran-abraham-accords-judicial-reform-639bd846?mod=opinion_lead_pos3

Why does President Biden go out of his way to snub, criticize and give marching orders to the government of Israel? At least rhetorically, the President and his Administration treat Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his governing coalition worse than they do the ruling mullahs in Iran.

Mr. Biden declined again this week in gratuitous public fashion to invite Mr. Netanyahu to the White House, pointing to the Prime Minister’s elected coalition partners. Tom Nides, Mr. Biden’s departing Ambassador to Israel, chimes in that the U.S. must speak up to stop Israel from “going off the rails.” Each gibe makes headlines in Israel.

When Mr. Netanyahu was most vulnerable, in late March, Mr. Biden needlessly decreed that Israel “cannot continue down this road” on judicial reform. The Prime Minister had already changed course and agreed to moderate the reforms—a domestic Israeli affair in which the U.S. President has no business. Mr. Nides publicly instructed Mr. Netanyahu, as if with his chauffeur, to “pump the brakes.”

The effect of this piling on is for Israelis to see that the U.S. sides with their opposition parties. This is no way to treat a democratic ally and no way to pursue U.S. interests while Mr. Netanyahu’s Likud Party is in power, as it has been for most of the past 25 years.

Whether Israel’s proposed reforms would rein in its high court’s unusual powers, in the absence of a constitution, or tip the balance too far toward British-style parliamentary supremacy, is for Israelis to debate. Which they do, noisily, without Mr. Biden’s commentary.

Do Not Let China Attack America from America by Gordon G. Chang

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19799/china-attack-america-within

It is way past time to end the ability of the Chinese regime to conduct political warfare against the United States from American soil. America’s defense begins with closing down the America ChangLe Association.

American presidents for decades have known that China’s diplomats and agents were violating American sovereignty and did either nothing or virtually nothing to stop these activities. Therefore, China’s Communists naturally thought they could get away with even more blatant conduct.

Americans may think they are at peace, but the Communist Party believes it is locked in an existential struggle with America. People’s Daily, speaking for the Party, declared a “people’s war” on the United States in May 2019. The Chinese regime has been conducting “unrestricted warfare” against America for decades.

“While it is fair to say that the CCP prefers to win this war without fighting, it is more accurate to say that the CCP intends to win without us fighting back. Through political warfare, the CCP disarms us intellectually and psychologically as it co-opts, corrupts, and ultimately controls key American elites, particularly political and foreign policy decision makers.” — Kerry Gershaneck, NATO fellow for Hybrid Threats, to Gatestone Institute, July 11, 2023.

Beijing has almost certainly purchased most of the Biden family. In March, a spokesperson for Hunter Biden’s legal team admitted that Hunter had received “good faith seed funds” from an energy company in China. That was essentially an admission of bribery… no Chinese business in these circumstances would pay seed money.

In addition to the Bidens, China has purchased hundreds — if not thousands — of politicians, academics, businesspeople and law enforcement officials at the federal, state, and municipal levels.

How do we know this?

“The Chinese Communist Party uses three color-coded ‘political-interference tactics’ to gain influence over American citizens at home as well as those who naively travel to China. Blue refers to sophisticated cyberattacks on target computers, smartphones, and hotel rooms for possible blackmail. Gold refers to bribes, while yellow means ‘honey pots,’ sexual seduction.” — Charles Burton, of the Ottawa-based Macdonald-Laurier Institute, to Gatestone Institute, July 10, 2023.

China’s agents work out of, among other places, Beijing’s four consulates and large Washington, D.C. embassy as well as nine or so police stations, many state banks and enterprises, Confucius Institutes and Confucius Classrooms, and organizations such as the Chinese Students and Scholars Association. China’s regime, over the course of decades, has penetrated just about every organization of influence in the United States.

The United States faces a challenge it is now seriously underestimating.

What should the United States do in the face of such challenge? The regime uses every point of contact to destroy America, so America needs to sever every point of contact with the regime.

Americans cannot afford to leave any Communist Party member or any Chinese saboteur, agent, official, banker, or corporate officer in America. There should be no Chinese consulates in the U.S., and the embassy staff of hundreds should be cut down to the ambassador, his personal staff, and family.

Extreme? By no means. Why should we ever allow China to attack America from America?

Pride vs. Shame How much more are we willing to tolerate before there is no escape? by Cal Thomas

https://www.frontpagemag.com/pride-vs-shame/

Perhaps America needs its own walk of shame. If we had one, the traffic would likely be pretty heavy, but the results might be the redemption of our corrupt and tainted souls.

DUBROVNIK, Croatia – Twenty-one episodes of the popular HBO series “Game of Thrones” were filmed in this city of 16th-century high walls and complicated history. One of them was shot along a section of St. Dominic Street, known as the walk of shame.

The very concept of shame seems foreign to us today, like the stockades of the American Puritan era which were designed to humiliate those who violated what were then cultural norms and serve as a warning to others not to tread similar paths.

After Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) was recently censured by the Republican House for promoting the Russia collusion fiction in the 2020 election, Democrats chanted “shame, shame, shame.” It’s nice to know they have some standards besides the double standards they usually display.

At the end of the LGBTQIA+ community’s celebration of “Pride Month,” it might be worthwhile to consider some of the downsides of pride and its opposite — shame, or humiliation.

Nobel Laureate: “Climate science has metastasized into massive shock-journalistic pseudoscience”

https://gript.ie/nobel-laureate-climate-science-has-metastasized-into-massive-shock-journalistic-pseudoscience/

Dr. John F. Clauser, joint recipient of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics, has criticized the climate emergency narrative calling it “a dangerous corruption of science that threatens the world’s economy and the well-being of billions of people.”

Along with two others, Dr Clauser, an experimental and theoretical physicist, was the 2022 recipient of the Nobel Prize for work done in the 1970s that showed “quantum entanglement” allowed particles such as photons, effectively, to interact at great distances, seemingly to require communication exceeding the speed of light. 

He has criticized the awarding of the 2021 Nobel Prize for work in the development of computer models predicting global warming, according to a coalition of scientists and commentators who argue that an informed discussion about CO2 would recognise its importance in sustaining plant life. 

In a statement issued by the CO2 coalition, Nobel Laureate John Clauser Elected to CO2 Coalition Board of Directors – CO2 Coalition Dr. Clauser said that “there is no climate crisis and that increasing CO2 concentrations will benefit the world”

He criticized the prevalent climate models as being unreliable and not accounting for the dramatic temperature-stabilizing feedback of clouds, which he says is more than fifty times as powerful as the radiative forcing effect of CO2.

Dr. Clauser notes that bright white clouds are clearly the most conspicuous feature in satellite photos of the earth.

These clouds are mostly produced by the evaporation of seawater by sunlight. They cover variably one third to two thirds of the earth’s surface.

Loving Dad Joe Engages Son in Life of Crime By John Green

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/07/loving_dad_joe_engages_son_in_life_of_crime.html

The propaganda ministry is in full spin mode, trying to explain why Joe Biden is parading around the world with Hunter in tow.  The two are together for state dinners, overseas junkets, and weekends at Camp David.  As the narrative goes, Hunter is a troubled man, victimized by the demon of addiction.  Any appearance of presidential impropriety is simply a loving father concerned about his son, holding him close to keep him out of trouble.

I say hogwash.

Organized crime bosses protect themselves from legal jeopardy by insulating themselves from the dirty work.  They use underlings to sell their product, collect the money, launder the money, and if necessary take the fall.  If a legal price is to be paid, it’s paid by the expendables.  The boss keeps them quiet with hush money, legal assistance, and witness intimidation.

Does anyone believe that a cartel boss helps an arrested underling out of love?  Nope.  He does it in service to his own selfish interests — which brings me to Hunter Biden’s loving father, Joe.

We’ve learned a great deal about the Biden family business in the last three years from abandoned laptops, congressional investigations, and federal whistleblowers.

We know that Hunter was working on a deal with a Chinese energy company in which 10 percent would go to the “big guy.”  We learned from Hunter’s business partner, Tony Bobulinski, that the “big guy” was Hunter’s code name for his dad, Joe Biden.  Oddly, Bobulinski was never interviewed by Biden’s consigliere or his crew, the Department of Justice.

What was Hunter selling to the Chinese?  We’ve learned that from WhatsApp text messages to Henry Zhao, the group chairman of China’s Harvest Fund Management.  He texted:

The Bidens are the best I know at doing exactly what the chairman wants from this [partnership].

56% Of Voters Agree Biden ‘Likely’ Took Bribes In Office: I&I/TIPP Poll Terry Jones

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/07/12/56-of-voters-agree-biden-likely-took-bribes-in-office-ii-tipp-poll/

Whistleblowers allege President Joe Biden and his family have taken up to $30 million in illicit bribes and payments from foreign sources tied to China, Russia and Ukraine. Biden denies it. Do Americans believe him? No. By more than 2-to-1, they say they believe the whistleblowers, the latest I&I/TIPP Poll shows.

The online poll of 1,341 adults, taken July 5-7, asked respondents how likely is it that the claims are true? The poll has a margin of error of +/-2.7 percentage points.

The results weren’t close. Americans, by 56% to 27%, called Biden bribery charges “likely,” rather than “unlikely.” Further broken down, the “likely” responses included 34% who called it “very likely” compared to 21% who called it “somewhat likely.” Among the “unlikely” responses, only 12% said it was “not at all likely,” while 15% termed it “not very likely.”

Among the remainder, 18% overall said they weren’t sure.

Biden Widely Criticized After Admitting to Military Shortages in Televised Interview By Eric Lendrum

https://amgreatness.com/2023/07/10/biden-widely-criticized-after-admitting-to-military-shortages-in-televised-interview/

On Sunday, Joe Biden admitted during a televised interview that the United States is low on 155 mm artillery ammunition rounds, leading to widespread backlash for an act that essentially revealed classified military information to the entire world.

As Fox News reports, Biden made the remarks in an interview on CNN with Fareed Zakaria, while the subject of the Ukraine war was being discussed. Biden was defending his administration’s controversial decision to send cluster munitions to Ukraine, which he called a “transition period” until more munitions can be produced and sent to the war-torn country.

“This is a war relating to munitions. And they’re running out of that ammunition, and we’re low on it,” Biden told Zakaria in the interview. “And so, what I finally did, I took the recommendation of the Defense Department to – not permanently – but to allow for this transition period while we get more 155 weapons, these shells, for the Ukrainians.”

The crucial line from the exchange – “and we’re low on it” – has led to criticism, mockery, and warnings that a major national security secret was just leaked live to the entire world, including America’s adversaries.

“Love when the president of America goes on CNN to tell everyone we’re low on ammo,” said political operative Logan Dobson on social media.

“Joe Biden broadcasting to the world that the US is low on 155mm shells. Moron.” tweeted Steve Guest, a conservative commentator. “Does Biden not care that our adversaries in China are listening?”

Meanwhile, Biden’s main challenger in the 2024 Democratic primaries, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., criticized the decision to send cluster munitions to Ukraine at all, highlighting the White House’s past statements condemning the use of such weapons.

“Last year, WH Press Secretary Jen Psaki called the use of cluster bombs a ‘war crime.’ Now President Biden plans to send them to Ukraine. Stop the ceaseless escalation! It is time for peace,” Kennedy tweeted.

“Biden was opposed to cluster bombs in 1982 as well, when he opposed their sale to Israel,” Kennedy pointed out in another tweet, before rhetorically asking: “What happened to his conscience?”

In response to the backlash, an Administration official was forced to do damage control by walking back Biden’s remarks, claiming that “everything we send to Ukraine is in excess of that. So, the U.S. is not running out of ammunition ourselves.”

“We are authorizing cluster munitions to ensure that Ukraine is not left defenseless while we wait for our own domestic production of ammunition to ramp up substantially, which we are in the process of doing as are our allies and partners,” the official added. “These cluster munitions are a bridge as we significantly increase production of ammunition over the coming months – and will have much higher production levels soon.”

Illegal Immigration and Western Spiritual Sickness Enforcing the Law Has Become Abnormal By Victor Davis Hanson

https://amgreatness.com/2023/07/10/illegal-immigration-and-western-spiritual-sickness/

The usual suspects have weighed in on recent belated efforts to enforce U.S. immigration laws.

Our now bankrupt media, the corrupt government of Mexico, and the Diversity/Equity/Inclusion apparat have damned a series of laws recently passed by the Florida legislature and signed by Governor Ron DeSantis that enforce existing federal immigration laws.

Such critics seem oblivious to the current violence that is paralyzing Europe in general, and in particular France—as if such European chaos offers no lessons for the U.S. or any other salad-bowl, open-borders Western nation.

Florida decided no longer to provide de facto and illegal exemptions to foreign nationals who entered and now reside in the state illegally.

Gov. De Santis is conveying a message to the country that not enforcing the laws, exempting those who break them, or treating foreign nationals as if they had a birthright to enter the U.S. illegally, does not even win gratitude from those who violate U.S. law.

Such American magnanimity is seen, and rightly so, by illegal immigrants and the government who sends them here, as Western spiritual decadence. Thus illegal immigration is to be unapologetically leveraged and forever manipulated—and rarely to be reciprocated with any appreciation.

The Mexican government was not only more fearful of destroying the U.S. border during the Trump years; it oddly also gave the hated Trump more respect than it had shown either the supposedly messianic Barack Obama or compliant Joe Biden.

Indeed, the more Mexico praised and manipulated Obama and Biden, the more contempt it showed the U.S. Paradoxically, the more Mexico denounced Trump, the more it conceded to Trump that it must begin to cease its export of multimillions of its own citizens.

No one is now arguing that Florida is breaking any laws by enforcing them.

Again, the outrage is instead over the state’s legal adherence to the law.

No one privately believes the illegal aliens affected by the new enforcement are euphemistically merely “undocumented migrants.”