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50 STATES AND DC, CONGRESS AND THE PRESIDENT

A Sorely Needed Change in Climate avatar by Ruthie Blum

Last weekend, during a visit to Washington, DC, I was nearly knocked down by a mob of demonstrators. Had they known I was attempting to cross through the marching throng in order to make it to an appointment in the lobby of the Trump International Hotel, I likely would have been lynched.https://www.algemeiner.com/2017/05/05/a-sorely-needed-change-in-climate/

As bad luck would have it, guards at the barricade separating the crowds on Pennsylvania Avenue from the hotel would not let me through for understandable security reasons. So, after phoning the person I was supposed to meet for drinks in the majestically refurbished Old Post Office building to suggest a different venue, I was forced to slither my way back again without getting trampled on by poster-wielding protesters sweating profusely in the afternoon sun.

This was no easy feat, particularly since each segment of the tens of thousands of people expressing their ire over “climate change” — the social cause whose name was changed from “global warming” when freezing temperatures made the term as laughable as the phenomenon itself — booed loudly as they passed by the hotel.

“No Trump, no KKK, no fascist USA,” many chanted, pushing babies in strollers, carrying toddlers on shoulders or simply walking alongside friends, proud of themselves for being seen and heard by like-minded left-wingers bent on rescuing the planet from destruction at the hands of human beings with differing views. This did not prevent dozens of them from entering nearby air-conditioned restaurants to escape the heat and enjoy some pricey food generated by the very corporations “guilty” of inflicting tsunamis and other unforgiving acts of nature on the world. Oops. I forgot for a moment that the word “nature” is forbidden in the United States these days, as it connotes a belief in the innateness of things like gender.

Yet, while talking about “nature” is a no-no among enlightened Americans, “science” is all the rage. This was also evident at the rally, many of whose participants waved placards denouncing those who do not support spending billions on climate-change research and rectification as “anti-science.” This is despite the tens of thousands of physicists and physical chemists who have debunked claims by the climate-change fanatics.

In any case, what the storm on Pennsylvania had to do with President Donald Trump, the Klu Klux Klan or fascism was not made clear. Such is the method to the madness of intersectionality, according to which all extreme liberal positions are interconnected and live under one large umbrella of malcontent. The fact that these stances often run counter to one another does not seem to bother their adherents.

OIG Report: More Than 100 Veterans Died While Waiting for Care at Los Angeles VA VA employees failed to follow proper procedure Natalie Johnson

More than 100 veterans died while waiting for care at a Veterans Affairs hospital in Los Angeles, Calif., over a nine-month span ending in August 2015, according to a new government report.

The VA Office of Inspector General found in a recent healthcare inspection that 225 veterans at the VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System facility died with open or pending consults between Oct. 1, 2015 and Aug. 9, 2015. Nearly half—117—of those patients died while experiencing delays in receiving care.

The inspector general reported that 43 percent of the 371 consults scheduled for patients who ended up dying were not timely because of a failure by VA employees to follow proper procedure. The report was unable to substantiate claims that patients died as a result of the delayed consults.

Concerned Veterans for America, a D.C.-based nonprofit, cited the OIG findings as evidence that problems persist at the Department of Veterans Affairs despite a series of legislative reforms implemented after the 2014 wait time scandal in Phoenix, Ariz.

“VA negligence can be a matter of life or death,” CVA policy director Dan Caldwell said in a statement Thursday. “While the VA wait scandal received the most attention a few years ago, the reality is that Congress hasn’t done anything to change the toxic culture at the VA and we can’t be sure that veterans still aren’t dying waiting for care.”

Caldwell told the Washington Free Beacon that it’s important to recognize the OIG investigation covers a period that occurred two years ago, suggesting that changes have since been implemented. He said the report reinforces findings that wait list manipulation took place at VA facilities nationwide and was not isolated to a handful of hospitals, as initially suspected.

The VA did not return a request for comment.

Congressmen Call On CUNY to Revoke Invite to Anti-Israel Linda Sarsour Lawmaker: Taxpayer-funded university’s commencement speaker ’embarrassing’ by Brent Scher

United States congressmen are turning up the heat on the City University of New York (CUNY) over its decision to have anti-Israel activist Linda Sarsour deliver its commencement address next month.

Reps. Daniel Donovan (R., N.Y.) and Lee Zeldin (R., N.Y.) are both urging CUNY to revoke its invitation to Sarsour, citing numerous inflammatory comments directed towards Israel and arguing that students and their families should not be subjected to this type of speaker on graduation day.

Donovan, who was born in New York City, sent a letter to CUNY chancellor James Milliken earlier this week calling the taxpayer-funded university’s decision to honor Sarsour an “embarrassment,” citing her history of anti-Semitism and sexist remarks.

“I could not disagree more with the CUNY administration’s decision,” Donovan wrote in his letter. “It is, in my opinion, an embarrassment to the university to host a speaker with a history of derogatory, sexist, and anti-Semitic remarks to deliver the 2017 commencement address.”

Donovan argues in his letter that it would be different if Sarsour was invited to speak at CUNY for an academic event, but inviting her to headline what is supposed to be a celebratory event is crossing a line.

“A distinction exists between a university allowing those with alternative—even incendiary—viewpoints to express their positions free from obstruction, and actively embracing deeply controversial positions by forcing hateful rhetoric upon students who wish to attend their graduation ceremony,” Donovan wrote.

“Academic institutions have an obligation to permit intellectual exploration, and that includes allowing speakers to peacefully express their ideas,” he wrote. “But commencement speeches are flagship events representing the culmination of years of studies for students and their families.”

“In my opinion, it is disrespectful to taint an otherwise celebratory event by subjecting students who wish to take part in their own graduation ceremony to such a vitriolic and disparaging speaker.”

“The invitation for Linda Sarsour to be the CUNY commencement speaker should be revoked,” Zeldin told the Free Beacon. “This is an individual who has called Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu ‘a waste of a human being,’ and has encouraged terrorism, among many more controversial and disgusting statements.”

“This is a special and very hard earned day for the graduates and their families and to force all of them to listen to someone so controversial and objectionable shows an extreme lack of concern on the part of the university,” Zeldin said.

End the Gorka Calumny by Heshie Billet

This past week has been both solemn and happy in Israel. Israel mourned and remembered more than 23,500 of her best men and women who died defending their country, as well as the many innocent victims murdered in evil acts of terror. On the very day Israel celebrated 69 years as the only true independent democracy in the Middle East, UNESCO slammed it as the aggressive “occupying power” of Jerusalem and referred to that city’s holy sites by Muslim names only.

At the same time, the invitation given to Muslim-American activist Linda Sarsour to speak at a CUNY commencement has continued to evoke condemnation. Sarsour — who was praised by New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand as a “suffragist” because of her role in the Women’s March on Washington earlier this year — recently shared a podium in Chicago with fellow activist and marcher Rasmea Odeh. They each attacked Zionists for their supposed “land grab.” Ironically, they spoke before a group called “Jewish Voice for Peace,” whose mission statement includes seeking “an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Gaza Strip, and East Jerusalem” and “security and self-determination for Israelis and Palestinians.”

Odeh is being deported from the US because she never reported in her immigration application that, as a terrorist in Israel, she murdered two men and was convicted by a military court. She served ten years in jail before being released in a prisoner exchange.

The Jewish people lost a great patriot, an amazing man and a special soul on Friday with the passing of…

Sarsour declared in The Nation in March that one cannot be both a feminist and a Zionist. This week, former Anti-Defamation League national director Abe Foxman called Sarsour “a bigot.” And yet, she continues to receive support from Jews and non-Jews who are blind to who she really is.

Some of the same people advocating for Sarsour have attacked Dr. Sebastian Gorka, a deputy assistant to President Donald Trump. The most glaring allegations against him are that he is an antisemite with connections to fascist groups in his late father’s native Hungary. Because these are very serious charges, I chose to investigate the matter. What I learned was that the allegations are baseless and entirely unfounded. Gorka’s interactions with Jews, Jewish communities and Israel have been uniformly positive and thoroughly supportive.

Potemkin Universities Behind the facades, universities have broken faith with a once-noble legacy of free inquiry. By Victor Davis Hanson

College campuses still appear superficially to be quiet, well-landscaped refuges from the bustle of real life.

But increasingly, their spires, quads, and ivy-covered walls are facades. They are now no more about free inquiry and unfettered learning than were the proverbial Potemkin fake buildings put up to convince the traveling Russian czarina Catherine II that her impoverished provinces were prosperous.

The university faces crises almost everywhere of student debt, university finances, free expression, and the very quality and value of a university education.

Take free speech. Without freedom of expression, there can be no university.

But if the recent examples at Berkeley, Claremont, Middlebury, and Yale are any indication, there is nothing much left to the idea of a free and civilized exchange of different ideas.

At most universities, if a scheduled campus lecturer expressed scholarly doubt about the severity of man-caused global warming and the efficacy of its government remedies, or questioned the strategies of the Black Lives Matter movement, or suggested that sex is biologically determined rather than socially constructed, she likely would either be disinvited or have her speech physically disrupted. Campuses often now mimic the political street violence of the late Roman Republic.

Campus radicals have achieved what nuclear strategists call deterrence: Faculty and students now know precisely which speech will endanger their careers and which will earn them rewards.

The terrified campus community makes the necessary adjustments. As with the German universities of the 1930s, faculty keep quiet or offer politically correct speech through euphemisms. Toadies thrive; mavericks are hounded.

Shortchanged students collectively owe more than $1 trillion in student-loan debt — a sum that cannot be paid back by ill-prepared and often unemployed graduates.

Test scores have plummeted. Too many college students were never taught the basic referents of liberal education. Most supposedly aware, hip, and politically engaged students can’t identify the Battle of Gettysburg or the Parthenon, or explain the idea of compounded interest.

Many students simply cannot do the work that was routinely assigned in the past. In response, as proverbially delicate “snowflakes,” they insist that they are traumatized and can only find remedy in laxer standards, gut courses, and faculty deference.

“Studies” activist courses too often are therapeutic. They are neither inductive nor Socratic, and they rarely teach facts, methods and means of learning without insisting on predesignated conclusions. Instead, the student should leave the class with proper group-think and ideological race/class/gender fervor of the professor — a supposed new recruit for the larger progressive project.

Universities talk loudly of exploitation in America — in the abstract. But to address societal inequality, university communities need only look at how their own campuses operate. Part-time faculty with Ph.D.s are paid far less than tenured full professors for often teaching the same classes — and thus subsidize top-heavy administrations.

Graduate teaching assistantships, internships, and mentorships are designed to use inexpensive or free labor under the protocols of the medieval guild.

One reason that tuition is sky-high is because behind the facade of “trigger warnings,” “safe spaces,” and “culture appropriation” are costly legions of deputy associate provosts, special assistants to the dean, and race/class/gender “senior strategists” and facilitators (usually former faculty who no longer teach).

The way to ensure student confidence and self-reliance is not through identity-politics courses that emphasize racial, sexual, and religious fault lines.

The Nightmare Reality of the Communist Dream Another communist fantasizes that ‘this time’ they’ll get it right. Mark Tapson See note please

This is the new meme in academia and the media….Communism is a noble ideology hijacked by some meanies like Stalin, Mao…..just as radical Islam is peaceable and hijacked by some meanies like Bin Laden, Isis, Al Shabaab, Abu Sayef, Hamas, Hezbollah….etc……rsk

With a Republican in the White House threatening to – horrors! – make America great again, nostalgia for the Communist-utopia-that-could-have-been is running high among dejected leftists. Last Monday on May Day, otherwise known among Reds as International Workers’ Day, the New York Times actually published an encomium to those thrilling days of yesteryear “when Communism inspired Americans.” But it’s not just American communists keeping the dream alive; in the run up to May Day the week before, writing for the digital news publication Quartz, Australia’s Helen Razer explained “Why I’m a Communist—and Why You Should Be, Too.”

According to the website description, the chief focus of Razer’s work “has been what she sees as the crisis of liberalism.” The real crisis is that true liberalism has been shoved aside by a radical left that embraces violent totalitarianism, but that’s not Razer’s take. In her mind, the crisis is that pure communism hasn’t been given enough of a chance to succeed. “Communism is a system of social organization that has never been truly tried and, these days, never truly explained. Yet it inspires fear in some, derision in others, and an almost universal unconcern for what it is actually intended to convey.”

This is the excuse communists repeatedly trot out in the face of a tsunami of evidence that their ideology has indeed been tried all over the world and has proven to be arguably the most devastating, inhumane belief system ever imposed on mankind. Every country where communism has been “tried” has gone to hell because of it. That’s not a coincidence nor is it just a failed effort to get it right; that is the inevitable consequence of communism.

No no no, Razer and other communist hopefuls argue. Marx’s ideas aren’t evil, just misunderstood. All this “fearful European talk about the ‘specter’ of communism,” for example, is nothing but “jittery gossip,” she states. So, “given that a) Marx is tough, and b) you’re pretty busy making profit for capitalists all day,” she has taken it upon herself to enlighten you about this “historical stage vital to the flourishing of all.”

Dartmouth Appoints Anti-Semitic Terrorist Enabler As Its New Dean A letter to the faculty at Dartmouth College. Alan Gustman

Editor’s note: The following letter was written by the author to all of the faculty at Dartmouth College asking them to fight the promotion of a new pro-BDS dean.

Dear Colleagues:

As you know, Dartmouth has appointed N. Bruce Duthu as its new Dean of the Faculty. What you may not know is that Professor Duthu is an active advocate of the BDS movement, a movement that proposes boycotting, divesting and sanctioning Israeli academic institutions. As the Treasurer of the Council of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA), Professor Duthu coauthored a statement in support of the boycott of Israeli academic institutions as follows: “The NAISA Council encourages NAISA members to boycott Israeli academic institutions because they are imbricated with the Israeli state and we wish to place pressure on that state to change its policies.” The document our presumptive Dean coauthored can be found at http://www.naisa.org/ (scroll down to “NAISA Council Declaration of Support for the Boycott of Israeli Academic Institutions”).

In advocating the boycott of Israeli academic institutions, BDS is anti-Semitic. The chant of the BDS movement, from the river to the sea, is anti-Israel, anti-Zionist, and profoundly anti- Jewish. It refers to sweeping the Jews out of Israel. Where else do we find movements advocating action against the academic institutions in any country but Israel, including many truly bad actors in the world? BDS is singling out Israel – the one country in the world that has a majority Jewish population. Indeed, this movement has become a cover for many anti-Semites who like nothing better than to once again be free to exercise their prejudices. It also is important to understand, especially when evaluating the significance of appointing a BDS advocate as the Dean of the Faculty, that BDS is not just a statement of beliefs or a philosophical movement: it is a statement of action.

Given my concerns about this matter I wrote letters to President Hanlon, to Professor Duthu, and individually to members of Dartmouth’s Board of Trustees. President Hanlon responded that he would never accept anti-Semitism at Dartmouth and reminded me of a letter he circulated to the Dartmouth campus against any boycott advocated by the BDS movement. Professor Duthu also states that he is not anti-Semitic and would not permit anti-Semitic acts at Dartmouth. Some of his friends, including those from the Jewish Studies Program, also argue that he is not anti-Semitic. In personal correspondence he cites a portion of the resolution as a defense of his position: “The NAISA statement, which you can find on the organization’s website, explicitly champions and defends intellectual and academic freedom with a recognition that “collaboration with individuals and organizations in Israel/Palestine can make an important contribution to the cause of justice.” Note that this statement does not support academic freedom in general. It supports Professor Duthu’s notion of justice. No member of the Board of Trustees responded to my email.

I have no reason to believe that Professor Duthu is anti-Semitic. His friends and colleagues do not consider him to be anti-Semitic, and are sincere in their opinions. What is relevant here is that he is supporting a movement that is substantially anti-Semitic, and that he has taken a position with regard to the BDS movement that is in opposition to the position and responsibilities he will have as Dean of the Faculty. Most importantly, he has not publicly renounced his public NAISI statement on the BDS movement.

Partial Obamacare Repeal Passes House Congressional Republicans finally get their act together. Matthew Vadum

Republicans claimed victory as their Obamacare-replacement bill that pundits pronounced dead a few weeks ago passed the House of Representatives.

Many conservatives say the bill is a step in the right direction, but they dispute the idea that is a true repeal of Obamacare, the GOP’s signature campaign promise for the last seven years. Although Obamacare is collapsing as premiums rise and insurers flee certain areas, it leaves much of the structure of Obamacare intact.

The legislation is a modified version of the measure that House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) dramatically pulled from the House floor on March 24. The House narrowly approved the legislation yesterday afternoon on a vote of 217 to 213. All of the 193 Democrats who showed up to vote, voted “no.” There were 20 Republicans voting “no.”

Americans “suffered with Obamacare,” a triumphant President Trump said in the Rose Garden. “I went through two years of campaigning, and I’m telling you, no matter where I went, people were suffering so badly with the ravages of Obamacare.”

With the passage of the revamped proposed “American Health Care Act,” “your premiums, they’re going to start to come down,” he said. “Your deductibles … were so ridiculous that nobody got to use their current plan – this nonexistent plan that I heard so many wonderful things about over the last three or four days.”

He continued:

After that, I mean, it’s – I don’t think you’re going to hear so much. Right now, the insurance companies are fleeing. It’s been a catastrophe. And this is a great plan. I actually think it will get even better. And this is, make no mistake, this is a repeal and replace of Obamacare. Make no mistake about it. Make no mistake.

Trump added, “very importantly, it’s a great plan. And ultimately, that’s what it’s all about.”

Now the legislation goes to the Senate where it faces an uncertain future.

Senate leaders don’t like that the measure has not been scored by the Congressional Budget Office, which means it isn’t clear how much it will cost. Nor are they happy that the bill was rushed – in their view – through the House.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) praised the conservative House Freedom Caucus for improving the bill but said it’s still a bad piece of legislation.

But what I’m still concerned with is, this’ll be the first time that Republicans have affirmatively put their stamp of approval on a program where federal money, taxpayer money, is paid to insurance companies. … And it boggles my mind how that became a Republican idea.

San Diego: Ground Zero for Islamic Indoctrination in American Public Schools By Janet Levy

With a decade-long history of yielding to Islamic demands and recent, more alarming submissions, San Diego city schools appear to be ground zero for Islamic indoctrination within American public schools. The current capitulation includes an Islam-centric curriculum with input and resources from a Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated organization, which raises First Amendment issues as well as serious concerns of favoritism toward Muslims students over students of other faiths.

The San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD) history of accommodation to the demands of Muslim students began in 2007. That year, Carver Elementary School in East San Diego ignited controversy when 100 Somali Muslim students transferred from a closed charter school. To accommodate these new students, the school rescheduled its recess periods to allow a 15-minute break each afternoon for Muslim prayer. The school also added Arabic to its curriculum and removed pork and other non-halal food from the cafeteria. The outcry forced the school to rescind the break, but it simply shifted the lunch hour to accommodate Muslim prayer. SDUSD wasn’t as accommodating to a Christian student in 1993 and was successfully sued when it denied a high school student’s request for a lunchtime Bible study.

This past week, SDUSD, in collaboration with the Council on American Islam Relations (CAIR), instituted an anti-bullying campaign aimed specifically at protecting Muslims students. In launching the initiative, SDUSD cited an unsubstantiated study by CAIR claiming that 55% of American Muslim students surveyed in California said they were bullied because of their religion. The new program will include adding lessons on Islam to the social studies curriculum that emphasize prominent Muslims in history, creating Muslim-only “safe spaces,” adding Muslim holidays to the school calendar, and providing support and resources for Muslim students during Ramadan.

According to Stan Anjan, SDUSD’s executive director of family and community engagement, the new program will focus on promoting a positive image of Islam. Special disciplinary measures will also be created for the so-called bullying of Muslims cited by CAIR. Instead of detention, the school plans a “restorative justice” program in which students dialogue with each other about perceived bullying words or actions. Educational materials on Islam and resource listings will be provided to parents and school personnel as well.

CAIR, “a radical fundamentalist front group for Hamas,” according to terrorism expert Steve Emerson, was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror-funding case brought by the Justice Department in 2007. CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce terrorist groups Hamas and Hezb’allah, and several CAIR executives have been successfully prosecuted and incarcerated for terrorist activities. CAIR was designated as a terrorist group by the UAE in 2014.

Rep. Gowdy Says Congress May Subpoena Susan Rice By Debra Heine

Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) suggested on Fox News Thursday morning that Congress may soon subpoena former Obama national security adviser Susan Rice to appear in a closed-door setting. His comments came after Rice declined a request to testify next week before a Senate subcommittee, with Rice citing “separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches and the fact that the invitation was not bipartisan.”

Many Republican members of Congress are interested in questioning Rice about her unmasking of names from surveillance records, particularly her requests to unmask the names of Trump transition officials caught up in incidental surveillance.

President Trump brought attention to the issue on Twitter this morning, criticizing Rice for refusing Sen. Lindsey Graham’s invitation to appear before the Senate Judiciary subcommittee — which is holding a hearing looking into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election — on Monday:

Gowdy quipped:

There are other ways to invite people other than via letter. There are things called subpoenas. … You shouldn’t have to use it with a former national security adviser but if you do, you do.

He called Rice a “very important witness” who may feel like she can’t testify in an open setting, and suggested she be invited to testify before the committee in a closed door hearing instead.

Members of the House intelligence committee, which Gowdy sits on, is questioning FBI Director James Comey and NSA Director Mike Rogers today behind closed doors. Asked to respond to Comey’s testimony before the Senate yesterday, Gowdy said:

He is a foundational witness who touches on all tranches of Russia and masking and unmasking and dissemination of classified information.