RUTHFULLY YOURS

Someone with fourth-hand knowledge that the bank was robbed claims that Smith conspired — er, I mean, colluded — with the local organized-crime family to rob the bank. Jones figures it must be true because he heard it from a trusted friend, a former cop — and you know those guys have great sources. Yet, Jones has no concrete evidence that it’s true. In fact, he can’t even prove that the mobsters had anything to do with the robbery, much less that Smith did.

But Jones is an industrious investigative journalist. Long before the bank was robbed, he conducted months of in-depth research and came to a single, unalterable, unassailable conclusion: Smith is a really crappy guy. He is a grade-A louche with mafia business partners and a decades-long record of financial shenanigans that walk the razor’s edge of actionable fraud. Born into wealth, he puts on the airs of the self-made man. When he’s in town, hide the women away. If he says he’ll pay you for a job, get it in writing . . . and make sure he still needs you when it’s time to pay up. Better have a good lawyer on retainer, too, just in case. Smith’s books are undoubtedly cooked, but they’re better hidden than Jimmy Hoffa — and yeah, you can bet he knows something about that, too.

Here’s what totally infuriates Jones, though: Smith seems to skate from debacle to debacle not only unscathed but ever more audacious. If you knew what Jones knows, rather than what the public thinks it knows, you wouldn’t trust Smith to run a 7-Eleven — yet, Smith sees himself as White House material!

Do you feel the frustration, the indignation that Jones feels in our hypothetical? If you do, then you know what it’s like to be Glenn Simpson.

The former Wall Street Journal reporter is a superb investigative journalist. More notoriously these days, he is the founder of Fusion GPS. It was he, in cahoots with his friend and collaborator, former British spy Christopher Steele, who orchestrated the compilation and dissemination of the so-called Steele dossier — the fons et origo of the Trump–Russia collusion narrative. We now know the dossier was covertly commissioned by the Clinton campaign, which dealt with Fusion through a layer of lawyers.

The recent protests by black players in the National Football League were rather sad for their fruitlessness. They may point to the end of an era for black America, and for the country generally—an era in which protest has been the primary means of black advancement in American life.

There was a forced and unconvincing solemnity on the faces of these players as they refused to stand for the national anthem. They seemed more dutiful than passionate, as if they were mimicking the courage of earlier black athletes who had protested: Tommie Smith and John Carlos, fists in the air at the 1968 Olympics; Muhammad Ali, fearlessly raging against the Vietnam War; Jackie Robinson, defiantly running the bases in the face of racist taunts. The NFL protesters seemed to hope for a little ennoblement by association.

And protest has long been an ennobling tradition in black American life. From the Montgomery bus boycott to the march on Selma, from lunch-counter sit-ins and Freedom Rides to the 1963 March on Washington, only protest could open the way to freedom and the acknowledgment of full humanity. So it was a high calling in black life. It required great sacrifice and entailed great risk. Martin Luther King Jr. , the archetypal black protester, made his sacrifices, ennobled all of America, and was then shot dead.

For the NFL players there was no real sacrifice, no risk and no achievement. Still, in black America there remains a great reverence for protest. Through protest—especially in the 1950s and ’60s—we, as a people, touched greatness. Protest, not immigration, was our way into the American Dream. Freedom in this country had always been relative to race, and it was black protest that made freedom an absolute.

It is not surprising, then, that these black football players would don the mantle of protest. The surprise was that it didn’t work. They had misread the historic moment. They were not speaking truth to power. Rather, they were figures of pathos, mindlessly loyal to a black identity that had run its course.

What they missed is a simple truth that is both obvious and unutterable: The oppression of black people is over with. This is politically incorrect news, but it is true nonetheless. We blacks are, today, a free people. It is as if freedom sneaked up and caught us by surprise.

Dr. Charles Jacobs, whose fight against Islamists has made a tremendous impact in Boston and beyond, returns with another ‘Moment’ on the Glazov Gang. This one indicts leftist clergy for selling out the Jewish community to suit leftist agendas.

That means allying with anti-Semitic Islamist clergy to fight President Trump. It means crawling into bed with CAIR, with the Imam down the block who preaches a phony tolerance in interfaith settings, while shouting, “Death to the Jews” in his own mosque (as recent video revelations by MEMRI have shown.) It means pretending to fight anti-Semitism while allying with anti-Semites.

And not just bigots who say or shout things, but terrorists who actually go out and kill Jews. It even means money going to pro-Hamas groups.

Dr Jacobs offers a powerful message and a timely warning. When any clergy, Jewish or Christian, makes leftist politics into their religion, they will end up destroying their own religion and community.

According to the Department of Labor, the number of workers receiving unemployment benefits fell to the lowest level in 44 years at the end of 2017. The Thursday report showed that 1.87 million people received unemployment insurance benefits in the last week of December, marking the lowest seasonally-adjusted mark since December of 1973. In most states, benefits are available for up to 26 weeks.

The lower rate of unemployment benefits recipients indicates an improving economy and that fewer people are being subjected to layoffs. In recent months, the total number of unemployment claims came close to the lowest levels in many years. In the first week of 2018, claims rose 11,000 to 261,000, according to the same report.

While economic forecasters had expected employment claims to descend only slightly from the previous week’s level of 250,000, which was the highest since November, they rose to their highest level since September, when the numbers were inflated by hurricane damage to states in the Deep South. The Department of Labor said that damage related to hurricanes in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are affecting claims in those places.

However, new unemployment claims are still below the level that would suggest a spike in unemployment. Economists suggest that it should be about 300,000.
With the unemployment at the lowest rate since 2000 (4.1 percent), job creation by the economy has been strong, recently. Joblessness could thus decline even further this year. Over the last three months, job gains have averaged 204,000 for each month. While unemployment claims fell during the end of Barack Obama’s tenure in office, they spiked during the financial crisis and reached levels not seen in the mid-2000s. During Trump’s first year in office, unemployment has steadily declined.

More and more feminists are now ditching those pink, anti-Trump “pussyhats” on the grounds that they’re actually racist and transphobic.

According to an article in the Detroit Free Press, many activists have concerns that the hat “excludes and is offensive to transgender women and gender nonbinary people who don’t have typical female genitalia and to women of color because their genitals are more likely to be brown than pink.”

Honestly? This is so stupid that I don’t even know where to start.

As for the color issue, the Pussyhat Project (yes — that’s a thing) states on its official website that the hats’ pink color has nothing to do with “genitals” — it’s simply that the color pink “is considered a very female color representing caring, compassion, and love.”

In other words: This complaint is ridiculous, and based on an objectively inaccurate assumption. (Of course, to be fair, many social-justice activists would actually consider the claim that pink is “a very female color” to be an equally offensive explanation. For example: A campaign at Syracuse University last year encouraged students to file a report on campus if they were to see any signs that were “color-coded pink for girls and blue for boys,” calling such material “abhorrent and intolerable.” I’m actually kind of shocked that an organization as progressive as the Pussyhat Project didn’t know this.)

As for transphobia? Well, first of all, the website addresses that:

Some people have questioned whether the very name “pussyhats” means our movement is saying only people with vaginas can be feminists. No way! Trans people and intersex people and people with any genital anatomy can be feminists and wear Pussyhats™. Feminists who wear Pussyhats™ fight transmisogyny and support ALL women.

To demonstrate their opposition to male sexual misconduct, women in Hollywood wore black to the Golden Globes awards this week. To demonstrate their opposition to male sexual misconduct, women in Congress plan to wear black to President Donald J. Trump (R)’s first State of the Union address in a few weeks. To demonstrate their opposition to the surprising (to them) election of Trump, last year, women across the country – indeed, across the world – joined in large gatherings called Women’s Marches, many of them donning awkwardly shaped pink (a female color) so-called pussy hats, based on a statement the new president had made in private a decade ago.

(And yes, Trump’s election – did I mention the shock? – instead of President Bill Clinton [D]’s sexual misconduct-enabler wife was the raison d’être for the latter female temper tantrum.)

Those caps are now collectors’ items. In the year since the Women’s March, many women, especially in the entertainment and political arenas, have gone public about their experiences with male inappropriate sexual behavior, ranging from unpleasant remarks and actions to actual rape and violence, mostly at the hands of liberal, feminism-professing males. So at this year’s Women’s March – and yes, there will be another one, because…well, Trump is still president – most women will not be re-wearing the symbolic headgear. Why not?

(Computer and phone safety trigger warning alert: Clear your mouth of all food and liquids so as not to ruin your computer’s or phone’s keyboard when you burst out laughing.)

OK, ready? According to Kristen Shamus of the Detroit Free Press:

The reason: The sentiment that the pink pussy[] hat excludes and is offensive to transgender women [sic; that is, men who consider themselves women –ed.] and gender non[-]binary people [sic; who knows? –ed.] who don’t have typical female genitalia [sic!] and to women of color because their genitals are more likely to be brown than pink.

If we are to believe the transcript of Fusion GPS founder Glenn Simpson’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee in August, released unexpectedly by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the search for a smoking gun in the dossier scandal may lead us to a dead body, at least according to Simpson’s lawyer:

During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in August 2017, Glenn Simpson was questioned about whether he tried to “assess the credibility” of sources behind information uncovered by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence agent who compiled the dossier.

“Yes, but I’m not going to get into sourcing information,” Simpson said.

Asked again what “steps he took to verify their credibility,” Simpson declined to answer.

His lawyer, Joshua Levy, then intervened and said Simpson was just trying to protect his sources.

“Somebody’s already been killed as a result of the publication of this dossier and no harm should come to anybody related to this honest work,” Levy said.

The interview didn’t pursue the line of questioning further.

Well, maybe somebody should pursue this hand grenade tossed in the middle of the room. Whoa! Somebody’s already been killed as the result of the dossier put together by former British spy Christopher Steele from questionable Russian sources and paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC, and possibly used by the FBI to obtain FISA warrants to spy on the campaign of Hillary’s opponent, Donald J. Trump?

As shocking as this revelation may be, it dovetails nicely with fear expressed for her safety by former DNC chair Donna Brazile. In a stunning interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos about her new book, Hacks, Brazile made cryptic references to murdered DNC I.T. staffer Seth Rich and revealed that afterward, she took the precautions one takes when one fears for his life.

It has been nearly three months since Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, and the island’s recovery has been slow. The U.S. territory is struggling with shortages of food and medical supplies, and a full 45% of residents still don’t have power.

San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz blames Washington for failing to devote adequate resources to Puerto Rico’s recovery — she recently dubbed President Trump the “disaster-in-chief”. But a journalist for El Nuevo Día, the newspaper with the largest circulation in Puerto Rico, has found a different culprit: “the Jew.”

Columnist Wilda Rodríguez wrote a piece on Monday, titled “What Does ‘The Jew’ Want From The Colony?” According to Rodríguez, it is “Wall Street types,” not politicians, that dictate U.S. policy. And, who are the power brokers on Wall Street?

“In the end, Congress will do what ‘the Jew’ wants, as the vulgar prototype of true power is called,” she wrote.

Rodríguez added a disclaimer: “No offense to people of that religion.” She even argued that the term is a source of pride for Israeli Jews.

“More than 20 years ago, the Israeli paper Ma’ariv had an article in Hebrew that explained how the Jews control Washington,” she wrote. “For Israelis, recognizing Jewish power over Washington is not an offensive statement. It is the victory of the Diaspora.”

Back in 2006, when George W. Bush was still president, Duke University Medical Center professor of psychiatry Dr. Jonathan Davidson published a study that reviewed biographical sources for the first 37 presidents (from 1776 to 1974), and expert psychiatrists concluded that half suffered from mental illness, 27 percent while still in office. Twenty-four percent met the diagnostic criteria for depression at some point in their lives, including most famously Abraham Lincoln and Calvin Coolidge. Richard Nixon was treated for many years for stress by psychiatrist Dr. Arnold Hutschnecker, and was severely depressed after leaving office. The psychiatrist who treated Nixon after Watergate has confirmed this to me. “Who wouldn’t be?” he said.

The key to all these cases was either a physician making an in-person assessment and coming up with a diagnostic impression and treatment plan or at least the president or those close to him recognizing the problem. What makes the current pundit-media attack on President Trump’s mental health most disturbing is that those leading the charge are either non-psychiatrists, or else have never examined the president, such as psychiatrist Dr. Bandy Lee of Yale, who traveled to Washington last month to brief twelve Democratic and one Republican lawmakers on President Trump’s supposed mental instability.

Dr. Lee’s claims come across as partisan meanness, and they undermine the integrity of the medical profession at a time when we are already spending too little actual face time with our patients. Philadelphia psychiatrist Dr. Claire Pouncey, writing in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine, supported the actions of Dr. Lee, along with the book of essays she published, The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump. But Dr. Jeffrey Lieberman, chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University, writing a response in the New England Journal of Medicine, called Pouncey and Lee’s actions “a misguided and dangerous morality.”

On Tuesday, the American Psychiatric Association reaffirmed its adherence to the so-called Goldwater Rule, which stipulates that member psychiatrists should not publicly discuss the mental health of a public figure, leader, or candidate. This rule is wise, protects our integrity as physicians, and continues to apply here.