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Reagan, Trump and America Paul Johnson And Tycho Johnson

Tycho Johnson: Let’s start by talking about Reagan. What were your first impressions when you met in 1980?

Paul Johnson: He was a very smooth operator. Everything about him was smooth. He had a soft, sympathetic voice, he loved talking, and he talked well. You could tell that he had been a professional actor. He had a lot of the graces and characteristics of one, he spoke well, spoke evenly, never at a loss for a word, and in fact gave a very good performance, you might say.

TJ: Modern Times, your history of the 20th century, profoundly influenced American conservatism, and Reagan himself is believed to have read it.

PJ: He did read it, and I remember he read a number of things of mine, and said he liked the way I wrote.

TJ: Did Modern Times have an impact on his presidency?

PJ: I think that would be going a bit too far, but I think it had some impact on him, yes, and he certainly enjoyed it.

TJ: Could you say that it provided the historical framework to give conservatism purpose at the time?

PJ: Yes. I think he liked to see things through the lenses of history. And therefore he needed a historical context in which he could place himself and his work as president of the United States. I think my writings helped him to do that, they helped him to see how his times fitted in to the general perspective of history, and how he emerged from it, and how he could possibly change things as a result of his perception of himself.

TJ: How would you describe the economic and political mood of America before Reagan?

PJ: The Cold War was coming to an end, and America had won it, but he didn’t want to proclaim this too openly, for fear the Russians would react too strongly against it.

TJ: Would you say that the feeling of the nation, before Reagan, was one of uncertainty? That they felt in a precarious situation?

PJ: Yes, they did feel that way, but Reagan was a very reassuring figure. He looked reassuring, he had a reassuring voice, reassuring things to say, and his general aura was one of calmness: “We’re doing well, and we’re going to do even better!” He was also the kind of person who got his inner strength from reassuring other people, to give them the sense that life was improving in general and he wanted people to aim higher than just “good”.

TJ: America today finds itself in a similarly precarious situation, as it was before Reagan. Massive debt, low wage growth, foreign policy concerns such as China, Russia, Islamic terrorism, not to mention the divided public. How would you compare the moods of then and now?

PJ: I think America has had a weak presidency for these last few years, and nobody pays much attention to Obama. So they have to recover from that, and I think they will. People are very critical of Trump, but I think that Trump may well turn out to be an above-average, maybe rather impressive president, once he gets going.

TJ: Reagan was a Hollywood actor who transitioned to politics. Trump is somewhat similar, being a businessman and TV celebrity. How would you compare them background-wise?

PJ: A lot of people didn’t think Reagan would do well, but he was probably one of the best presidents of the 20th century, and I think that is something very much to his personal credit — he created it all himself. So I think in that way they are alike. Both are self-made.

TJ: We had Reagan Democrats, and Trump seems to have attracted similar blue-collar votes. Is there a connection between their particular personalities, backgrounds, and ability to attract that demographic?

Last Night in Sweden Problems? What problems? Bruce Bawer

Well, I knew I shouldn’t have said anything. A few days ago I bragged in this space about having overcome my years-long addiction to the New York Times. Then, in the wake of President Trump’s remark on Saturday in Melbourne, Florida, about “last night in Sweden,” I noticed on Facebook that the Times had run a “news story” by one Sewell Chan headlined “‘Last Night in Sweden’? Trump’s Remark Baffles a Nation.” I couldn’t resist.

As it turned out, of course, Trump hadn’t baffled the entire Swedish nation. What had really happened was that a great many members of the Swedish establishment – politicians, journalists, business and academic elites, and so on – had professed that they were baffled. “Sweden? Terror attack? What has he been smoking?” asked former Swedish prime minister Carl Bildt. Chan himself maintained that some news media (those, you understand, that lean right and have less rigorous journalistic standards than than the august Times) had presented “numerous exaggerations and distortions” about Sweden, “including false reports that Shariah law was predominant in parts of the country and that some immigrant-heavy neighborhoods were considered ‘no-go zones’ by the police.” (False reports, min röv.) Chan went on to quote various Swedish officials who roundly denied that Muslim immigrants had had a significant impact on crime and rape statistics.

To be sure, I was puzzled at first by Trump’s reference to Sweden, and rechecked a few news sources to see if I’d missed something. Then I realized he might have been referring to a segment I’d watched the night before on Tucker Carlson Live. One or Carlson’s guests was filmmaker Ari Horowitz, who had made a documentary about all those non-existent Swedish no-go zones and all that imaginary crime. Sure enough, Trump later tweeted that this was exactly what he was talking about: he’d been watching Tucker Carlson, too. (Which, incidentally, was nice to know.)

But one article calling Trump out on his Sweden remark wasn’t enough for the Times. The next day it ran another. “The Swedes were flabbergasted,” claimed Chan and co-reporter Sewell Baker. Again we heard from Bildt, who this time said: “We are used to seeing the president of the U.S. as one of the most well-informed persons in the world, also well aware of the importance of what he says….And then, suddenly, we see him engaging in misinformation and slander against a truly friendly country, obviously relying on sources of a quality that at best could be described as dubious.” The piece went on to cite this incident as yet another example of Trump alienating “American friend[s]” (something that the Times hadn’t been particularly worried about when Obama was sticking his fingers in the eyes of our allies and sucking up to our foes).

At the Times, of course, as I wrote the other day, “fake news” is old news. And “fake news” about Trump has been a staple at that newspaper ever since he rode down that escalator in Trump Tower. But this new bout of “fake news” about Sweden was even more transparently fake than usual. If everything’s fine in Sweden, then why the hell are the Sweden Democrats rising in the polls? Hell, if everything’s fine in Sweden, why do the Sweden Democrats exist at all? Chan and Baker interviewed a couple of leading Swedish politicians and other top members of Sweden’s cultural elite, but they didn’t quote any Sweden Democrats.

Sweden: Hate Speech Just for Imams by Judith Bergman

“I do not think anyone has the right to violate other people in the name of religion”. — Jonnié Jonsson, Chairman of RFSL Halland.

In Sweden, comments that object to sexual violence against women in the Quran are prosecuted, but calling homosexuality a “virus” is fine.

Antisemitism has become so socially acceptable in Sweden that anti-Semites can get away with anything, and no one even notices, as Nima Gholam Ali Pour reports.

One of Sweden’s main news outlets, in fact, described anti-Semitism as simply a different opinion. Clearly, in the eyes of Swedish authorities, neither homosexuals nor Jews count for much.

Swedish authorities also give large sums of money to organizations that advocate violence and invite hate preachers who support terrorist organizations such as ISIS and Al Qaeda.

One of the speakers SFM hired was Michael Skråmo, who has publicly called on his fellow Muslims to join ISIS and has appeared in propaganda videos, posing with assault rifles alongside his small children.

Are some individuals receiving preferential treatment under Sweden’s “hate speech” laws? It seems that way.

Under the Swedish Penal Code, a person can be held responsible for incitement if a statement or representation made “threatens or disrespects an ethnic group or other such group of persons with regards to race, color, national or ethnic origin, religious belief or sexual orientation”.

In 2015, the imam at Halmstad mosque, Abu Muadh, said that homosexuality was a “virus” from which parents were obliged to protect their children.

The Swedish Federation for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Rights (RFSL) filed a legal complaint in October 2015. “[M]any people are listening [to the imam] and there is a risk that the opinions and other expressions of homophobia will spread among believers, as they attach great importance to their representatives’ words”, said Ulrika Westerlund, chairman of RFSL.

The Swedish legal establishment however, seemed entirely unconcerned; the imam was not prosecuted.

“[F]or something to be incitement, it needs to reach a certain level and in this context, the assessment is that this statement does not reach that level”, said Martin Inglund, acting investigation officer at Halmstad police. He added that an assessment had been made based on freedom of religion, as well as the European Convention on Human Rights. It took the police only one week to make the decision not to prosecute the imam.

“It is a strange decision, said Jonnié Jonsson, chairman of RFSL Halland, “I do not think anyone has the right to violate other people in the name of religion”.

Jews Under Assault in Europe by Robbie Travers

A German court actually ruled that firebombing a place where Jews worship is somehow different from attacking Jews.

Why was the Israeli embassy not attacked, rather than a synagogue whose worshippers were presumably not Israeli? Presumably the worshippers were German. What happened in the German court was pure Nazi-think and the most undisguised antisemitism: that Jews are supposedly not Germans.

Meanwhile, another German Court again rejected an action against your friendly neighborhood “sharia police.”

In Germany, it seems, firebombing synagogues is merely “anti-Israeli” even if there are no Israelis there, and “police” who use Islamic sharia law — without legal authority and within a system of law that persecutes women, Christians, Jews and others — are acceptable and legal.

The anti-Semitism facing Jews at UK universities led the Baroness Deech to declare British University campuses “no-go zones” for Jews.

Simply defining and identifying anti-Semitism is only the start. It is also necessary to start tackling the anti-Semitic attitudes of Islamic communities across Europe and the attitudes of immigrants coming to our nations.

What needs to be made clear is that you are welcome here as long as you respect Jews, Christians and all others, as well.

Antonio Tajani, the new President of the European Parliament, has made a bold opening statement of intent: “No Jew should be forced to leave Europe.” While this is an admirable position to hold, it sadly could not be farther from the truth. The poison of anti-Semitism festers in Europe once again.

Europe is seeing yet again another rise in the number of Jews leaving the continent. Jonathan Boyd, Executive Director of the Institute of Jewish Policy Research (IJPR), notes that the number of Jews leaving France is “unprecedented”

The results of the study show that 4% of the French and Belgian Jewish populations had emigrated those countries to reside in Israel.

The IJPR attributes this demographic transformation to the inflow of migrants from the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia. Is this really surprising? Sadly, when individuals come from nations that have culturally a high dislike of Jews, many of these immigrants might hold anti-Semitic views that eventually get spread.

In France, anti-Semitic incidents more than doubled between 2014 and 2015, from 423 reported incidents to 851. From January to July, anti-Semitic incidents in the UK increased by 11% according to the UK’s Common Security Trust. And this prejudice is increasing.

Netanyahu in Singapore:”This is a battle for the future of humanity. That future is represented in Israel”

At the Maghain Aboth Synagogue in Singapore, to about 200 members of Singapore’s
Jewish community of about 2500 people, Bibi Netanyahu has declared: “I feel that Singapore and Israel are kindred nations. I find it a special privilege and an honour to be the first Israeli Prime Minister to make an official visit to Singapore. This follows the visit of Premier Lee to Israel, the first official visit of the Prime Minister of Singapore to Israel and it’s an obvious bond, a growing bond.

Seventy years ago, if you looked at Israel and you looked at Singapore, there wasn’t much to see. But there’s a lot to see and it’s not, I think, accidental that our two nations formed this bond between us because we are both inspired to do things, to punch above our weight.

Israel is the innovation nation, we’re both entrepreneurial centres. We have innate talent and we have great drive to succeed.

I believe that great powers around the world look at Israel and Singapore today and see tremendous economic opportunities. Tremendous. And one reason that that is the case is that we have an unbridled spirit and we put it to use. That spirit is something that we’ve enshrined in our peoples for a long time, for a long time. The Jewish People have passed learning from one generation to another, an inquisitive mindset and the ability to produce new things.

I don’t have to say that to the Jewish community in Singapore because you’ve been here for almost two centuries and you have that entrepreneurial quest for many, many decades, and I think that you serve as a human bridge between Singapore and Israel. I know that you care for the State of Israel. I know you care for Jewish traditions. This gathering is an indication of that concern and that passion.

I also want to point out to you that I recently visited two Muslim countries, one is Azerbaijan and the other is Kazakhstan. And in those Muslim countries, in Kazakhstan I visited a synagogue.

And Jewish children in Kazakhstan were singing Hebrew songs, as they sang here, in a Muslim state and that reflects the kind of world we’d like to see: a world of tolerance; a world of diversity; a world that is opposed to the world that is being challenged today by the forces of barbarism and intolerance.

We Can’t Ignore Hamas By Lawrence J. Haas

When Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman offered the other day for Israel to turn Gaza into “the Singapore of the Middle East,” with a seaport, airport and industrial zones, if Hamas would stop firing rockets, building tunnels and seizing Israeli citizens, the terrorist group had a curt response.

“If we wanted to turn Gaza into Singapore, we would have done it ourselves,” Mahmoud al-Zahar, a senior Hamas leader, told an Arabic-language newspaper. “We do not need favors from anyone.”

Al-Zahar’s exchange with Lieberman, which came just days after Hamas chose the ruthless murderer Yehiya Sinwar as its new leader, puts in perspective the silly kerfuffle over President Donald Trump’s suggestion that the United States is no longer firmly fixed on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

To refresh memories, Palestinian territory is split in two, with the Palestinian Authority, or PA, running the West Bank while Hamas runs Gaza. The PA dances a devious two-step, promoting Israeli-Palestinian peace with the West while praising Jew-killing, martyrdom and “resistance” with its own people.

Hamas, by contrast, is forthright, calling for Israel’s destruction before every audience. And while everyone who supports the two-state solution – which is almost every respected voice in foreign policy circles – focuses on Israel and the PA, Hamas is the huge obstacle to Israeli-Palestinian peace that nobody wants to acknowledge.

Hamas has ruled Gaza – a 141-square-mile strip of nearly two million Palestinians that borders Israel, Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea – since it ousted the PA in a violent coup in 2007. It has fought three wars with Israel since 2008, with its soldiers firing rockets and building tunnels to attack the Jewish state and hiding in schools and hospitals to ensure maximum civilian carnage when Israel responds.

So, here’s an inconvenient truth: Whether pursuing the two-state solution or a more controversial one-state formula of Palestinian rights under Israeli rule, would-be peacemakers begin not with two warring entities but, in fact, three – Israel, the PA and Hamas. And no one can wish away that reality.

Watch! Swedish migrant rioters set cars ablaze By David Frankenhuis

Swedish police officers were last night forced to fire live ammunition at mobs of masked rioters that hurled stones at them in the Stockholm district of Rinkeby. The vicious attacks in the migrant-dominated neighbourhood followed the attempted arrest of a wanted criminal. Only eight days ago, similar worrying skirmishes took place in Rinkeby.

The authorities had initially reported on “warning shots being fired”, but a few hours ago, police stated that the officers actually tried to hit the stone-throwers, daily Aftonbladet reports. According to police, none of the attackers was hit by the officers’ bullets.

During this night’s riots, that lasted several hours, Rinkeby not only witnessed assaults on police but cases of larceny were registered as well. Furthermore, about a dozen cars have been set alight by the local youths, that subsequently blocked roads in order to prevent fire department units getting through. Shops were plundered and civilians were beaten, some of whom were also robbed, but no arrests have been made so far. Rinkeby is considered by many to be Sweden’s most notorious no-go zone.

Yesterday’s violence started after police tried to arrest a wanted person in Stockholm’s subway system. The situation escalated quickly when “a large number” of onlookers started hurling stones at the officers. According to the detective in charge, Sylvia Odin, police “felt vulnerable” and the situation was described as “highly threatening.” Eventually, police had to withdraw from the scene.

Lars Bystrom, who is the spokesperson for Stockholm’s police, told Expressen TV that eventually police even had to withdraw their patrols from the scene and subsequently retreated to a gas station after one of the officers was hit by a stone. Bystrom calls the attacks “planned and orchestrated.”

“A number of young men appeared at the location and they started throwing stones at the police. We don’t know how many there were.”

According to a witness, at least 30 persons were involved in the Rinkeby rioting.

Previous ‘incident’ in the no-go zone

About one week ago, 3 police officers ended up in hospital after being assaulted by some 30 Rinkeby youths. This attack as well started in response to an attempted arrest of a gangster. Youngsters beat and kicked police constables, while stones and bottles were hurled at the officers of the law. The authorities then stated:

“Of course it’s serious when police officers on duty are attacked in this way. Unfortunately, this is the reality… for officers.”

Update: photographer beaten and kicked

NIKKI HALEY’S FIRST HURRAH; RUTHIE BLUM

Four months ago, when South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley was nominated by the president-elect as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, I wrote that there was reason to hope she would live up to the legacies of Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Jeanne Kirkpatrick and John Bolton as “shining beacons in the Midtown Manhattan snake pit.”

Though at the time I could not judge whether she was the right person for the job, it appeared that she possessed the kind of moral clarity and tough skin required in an arena filled with people whose key purpose is to cloud the distinction between good and evil. Indeed, it takes a special kind of envoy to maneuver the Orwellian universe in which the international body operates, where Western values are on a lower hierarchical rung than third-world culture, and where a mockery is made of the concept of human rights, the championing and upholding of which the organization was originally established to safeguard.

One indicator that Haley seemed to fit the bill was that she, the daughter of Indian immigrants who went through legal channels to become Americans, signed a law to crack down on illegal immigration. Another was her introduction of legislation to outlaw boycotts, divestment and sanctions “based on race, color, religion, gender, or national origin of the targeted person or entity.” Since Israel has been the focus of BDS campaigns everywhere, it was clear what she had in mind. No wonder her appointment caused Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations Riyad Mansour to flinch.

Mansour was right to be worried, just as I now believe my high hopes were well-founded when Haley was confirmed.

On Thursday, after her first encounter with the U.N. Security Council, Haley told reporters that she had asked its members to help her understand “when we have so much going on in the world, why is it that every single month we’re going to sit down and have a hearing where all they do is obsess over Israel.”

Haley went on to describe the meeting, which she called “a bit strange,” as exactly what it was: a forum for bashing the Jewish state.

“The discussion was not about Hezbollah’s illegal build-up of rockets in Lebanon,” she said. “It was not about the money and weapons Iran provides to terrorists. It was not about how we defeat ISIS [Islamic State]. It was not about how we hold [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad accountable for the slaughter of hundreds and thousands of civilians. No, instead, the meeting focused on criticizing Israel, the one true democracy in the Middle East.”

Asserting that the U.S. “will not turn a blind eye to this anymore,” Haley underscored America’s “ironclad support for Israel” and intolerance for the “U.N.’s anti-Israel bias.”

She pointed out that, “incredibly, the U.N. Department of Political Affairs has an entire division devoted to Palestinian affairs,” while it has “no division devoted to illegal missile launches from North Korea … no division devoted to the world’s number one state-sponsor of terror, Iran.”

A Swedish Gaffe That Wasn’t The world guffawed when it thought Donald Trump was hallucinating about Sweden. But he wasn’t really wrong. By Jonathan S. Tobin

Late-night television hosts got another gift from President Trump over the weekend, but it turns out the incident wasn’t so much comedy gold as it was an illustration of everything that is wrong about the colloquy between Trump and his critics on immigration and refugees.

On Monday evening, Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers made a meal out of the latest Donald Trump gaffe. Trump was lambasted for saying that there had been a terror attack in Sweden on Friday night. Since there had been no such attack, it prompted the usual avalanche of mockery in the president’s direction. But while Trump’s vague language and willingness to fabricate facts to suit his talking points often justifies the brickbats thrown in his way, in this case there were two problems with the hilarity: Trump didn’t actually claim there had been a terror attack, and the facts about Sweden actually do back up his claim about a surge in violence by Muslim immigrants in Europe.

During the course of his campaign-style rally in South Carolina on Saturday, Trump said:

We’ve got to keep our country safe. You look at what’s happening in Germany, you look at what’s happening last night in Sweden. Sweden, who would believe this? Sweden. They took in large numbers. They’re having problems like they never thought possible. You look at what’s happening in Brussels. You look at what’s happening all over the world. Take a look at Nice. Take a look at Paris.

Given the context, in which he appeared to be referencing violence in Belgium, France, and Germany, it sounded as if Trump was saying there had been an attack the previous evening in Sweden. Except he wasn’t. In typical imprecise Trumpian fashion, he was actually referring to a segment broadcast on Fox News in which Tucker Carlson interviewed filmmaker Ami Horowitz about a video he had made about Sweden, which had been originally posted on YouTube in December.

Trump’s fan base may not care, but we still live in a world in which the words uttered by the leader of the planet’s sole superpower are a matter of great import. There’s a reason why presidents shouldn’t make offhand remarks about what’s going on in other countries. A more diligent commander-in-chief would first listen to information and advice from his staff and the intelligence community. Although we are getting used to government by tweet, there is a serious problem with Trump’s reliance on cable news channels as his sole source of information before he starts shooting off his mouth.

But as much as we should be appalled by the slapdash manner in which the leader of the free world spouts off about what he saw on television in his typical ordinary-guy manner, in this case Trump wasn’t playing the fabulist.

Horowitz is something of a film provocateur, and he may not have the prestige of a mainstream liberal documentarian, but he isn’t a liar. His short deals with the fact that a massive infusion of Muslim immigrants from the Middle East has created problems for Swedish society. Despite claims made by Trump’s detractors, sexual violence has spiked in the Scandinavian country, and the immigrant population bears a good deal of the responsibility. The culture clash between liberal Swedish society and the misogyny of some of the immigrants, combined with the creation of no-go zones there, bears all the signs of the same serious problems that have arisen in France and Germany, where it is no longer possible to pretend that nothing is wrong.

French Presidential Candidate Marine Le Pen Refuses to Wear Headscarf on Lebanon Trip Country’s highest Sunni Muslim authority says politician had been informed she would need to cover her head By William Horobin and Stacy Meichtry

ARIS—Marine Le Pen, the presidential candidate for France’s far-right National Front, seized on a trip to Lebanon to showcase her hard line on Islamic custom, refusing Tuesday to wear a head scarf and upending her plans to meet with the country’s senior Sunni Muslim cleric.

On the final day of a three-day visit, Ms. Le Pen refused to take a head scarf before meeting with Grand Mufti Sheik Abdel-Latif Derian at his office, saying Sunni officials hadn’t demanded she cover herself in meetings with Sunni leaders in the past.

Ms. Le Pen was making the visit to Lebanon in a bid to raise her international profile in a country at the doorstep of Syria’s war and its resulting refugee crisis.

“It doesn’t matter. Pass on my considerations to the Grand Mufti but I will not veil myself,” Ms. Le Pen told reporters before turning back to a waiting car.

The press office of Dar al-Fatwa, Lebanon’s highest Sunni authority, said it had informed an aide to Ms. Le Pen on Monday that she would need to cover her head for the meeting.

“When she arrived, the [staff] were surprised by her refusal to abide” by the protocol, Dar al-Fatwa said in a statement carried by the National News Agency.

In France, full-face veils are outlawed and headscarves are banned from schools and public-sector workplaces.