Ireland’s Anti-Israel Drift: How Did It Come to This? by Lawrence A. Franklin

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13908/ireland-anti-israel

Ireland, as a European Union member state, is subject to the EU’s commercial rules. EU trade rules may prohibit Ireland’s unilateral action as an EU treaty requires common commercial policy for all EU member states. The proposed law “could force US companies with Irish subsidiaries to choose between violating the Irish law or violating US Export Administration Regulations.” — Orde Kittrie, Professor of Law, Arizona State University.

Worst, there is no evidence that Ireland’s “pro-Palestinian” activities are in any way helping Palestinians, who continue to be arrested, tortured and deprived of any viable future by their own corrupt leaders. Most European activities seem actually focused on trying to destroy Israel.

What is most notable, of course, is that there is no commensurate hostility toward any other country. Ireland’s rancid vote also needs to be contrasted to its virtual silence regarding countries that are daily committing hair-raising crimes against humanity, such as Iran, China, Turkey, Syria, North Korea, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Mauritania, Cuba, Venezuela or Sudan, for instance. Why only Israel? What is now on display is simply a hypocritical condemnation by Ireland of the only democracy in in the Middle East with equal rights for all its citizens.

What is essential is that this double standard — one set of rules for Israel and a whole other set of rules for countries actually committing atrocities — must stop.

Ireland’s legislative lower house (Dáil) on January 29 approved a bill that would make it a crime for Irish citizens to import or sell any product produced by Israelis in areas located beyond the 1949 armistice lines, most of which, such as Jerusalem, were actually liberated by Israel during the 1967 Six Day War from their illegal occupation by Jordan in 1948-49, after Israel was attacked by five Arab armies who were literally hoping to crush it the day of its birth. In 1967, Egypt, presumably hoping to finish the job it had started in 1948, created a casus belli (cause for war under international law) by announcing a blockade of Israel’s access to the Red Sea via the Straits of Tiran.

Ireland’s legislative lower house (Dáil) on January 29 approved a bill that would make it a crime for Irish citizens to import or sell any product produced by Israelis in areas located beyond the 1949 armistice lines, most of which, such as Jerusalem, were actually liberated by Israel during the 1967 Six Day War from their illegal occupation by Jordan in 1948-49, after Israel was attacked by five Arab armies who were literally hoping to crush it the day of its birth. In 1967, Egypt, presumably hoping to finish the job it had started in 1948, created a casus belli (cause for war under international law) by announcing a blockade of Israel’s access to the Red Sea via the Straits of Tiran.

Chelsea Clinton’s Sister Souljah Moment

https://www.nysun.com/editorials/chelsea-clintons-sister-souljah-moment/90612/

The attempt by students at New York University to blame Chelsea Clinton for the massacre of Muslims in New Zealand is a shocking marker of the temper of our times. At a vigil for the 49 persons killed by a self-described “racist” and “ethno-nationalist eco-fascist,” students accused Ms. Clinton of having stoked the killer’s hatred because — wait for it — she recently criticized anti-Semitism.

If that sounds crazy, feature the video that has gone viral on Youtube. It shows Ms. Clinton, visibly pregnant and backed against a wall, being told — by a woman jabbing a finger at her — “Forty-nine people died because of the rhetoric you put out there.” It was apparently a reference to Ms. Clinton’s condemnation of the anti-Jewish remarks of, among others, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

No escape from new leukemia biosensor. Tel Aviv University scientists have devised a novel biosensor that can isolate and target all leukemic stem cells – the most malignant of leukemic cells. Previous therapies missed many types of these stem cells, allowing them to evade destruction and subsequently multiply.
https://www.jewishpress.com/news/on-campus/israeli-scientists-create-biosensor-to-isolate-leukemic-stem-cells/2019/03/12/ https://www.nature.com/articles/s41375-019-0386-z

European approval for lung collapse warning. I’ve reported previously (see here) on Zebra Medical Vision and its technology that helps radiologists spot acute conditions in scans and X-rays. Zebra has just received European CE certification for detecting pneumothorax – a sign of imminent lung collapse.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israels-zebra-gets-europe-nod-for-ai-tech-that-finds-brain-bleeds-gas-in-chest/

Square-fiber endoscope is outside the box. The miniature endoscope from Israel’s Zsquare is made from layers of square fiber. The unique technology provides 3D high resolution, hyper-spectral imaging. Then after use, just throw it away so no chance of cross-infections. Zsquare has just raised $10 million of funds.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3757236,00.html https://www.z-squaremedical.com/

Israeli doctors bring expertise to Africa. Several Israeli doctors have spent decades changing the nature of healthcare in Africa. Ori and Britta Shwarzman established a mobile clinic in Ghana; Professor Zvi Bentwich has been eradicating diseases in Ethiopia and Dr Morris Hartstein treats hundreds at his eye clinics in Ethiopia.
https://www.sajr.co.za/news-and-articles/2019/02/28/israeli-doctors-bring-expertise-to-africa

Why you need to sleep. Researchers from Israel’s Bar-Ilan University have shown that individual neurons in the brain need sleep to give the chromosomal repair system a chance to clear out daily debris accumulated during wake time. At night, neuronal traffic is light and damage caused by activity or environment can be fixed.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/to-sleep-perchance-to-let-dna-be-repaired-study-finds-new-reason-for-slumber/
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-08806-w

Boosting the gut’s immune response. I reported previously (Feb 2013) on the research of scientists at Israel’s Weizmann Institute into the gut’s immune cell training system. They now have discovered that gut bacteria slow the immune response. Increasing the level of antigens boosts the response, also enabling oral vaccines.
https://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/life-sciences/revealing-gut%E2%80%99s-b-cell-training-program-may-point-new-means-developing-oral-vaccines https://www.nature.com/articles/s41590-019-0325-1

Breaking: Double shooting in Samaria, one dead, two wounded reported

https://worldisraelnews.com/breaking-shooting-at-ariel-junction-wounded-reported/

Two shootings took place in the Samaria region. Three victims are reported. One is confirmed dead. Two are in serious condition.

By World Israel News Staff

Two shootings took place in the Samaria region. One dead is reported. Two more are in serious condition. IDF forces are in pursuit of the killer.

Early reports say that the terrorist stabbed his first victim and stole his weapon, shot him and fled.

The same attacker then stole a car, traveled to nearby Giti junction, and opened fire.

Magen David Adom paramedics evacuated two of the victims to Beilinson Hospital, including a 35-year-old man and a 20-year-old man.

Ram Shagai, deputy director of Beilinson Hospital, said one of the wounded is in very serious condition and the other in critical condition. “We are fighting for their lives,” he said.

Emergency medical technician MDA Hananel Hess recounted that when he was passing through the Ariel intersection he noticed a commotion.

Jimmy Fallon’s Beto O’Rourke Is An Overzealous Lightweight By Emily Jashinsky

http://thefederalist.com/2019/03/16/jimmy-fallons-beto-orourke-is-an-overzealous-lightweight/

“Tonight Show” host Jimmy Fallon did his job well on Thursday, rolling out an impression of Beto O’Rourke that accurately captured his manic flailings and limited credentials.The sketch was a direct parody of O’Rourke’s announcement video, although Fallon’s surprisingly keen mockery of his subject’s wild and incessant gesticulations barely amounts to an exaggeration. They really were that ridiculous.

At times, the impression felt soft (“I’m like if your friend’s hot dad had the energy of a golden retriever”), but Fallon brought it home with jabs about whippets in 7-11 parking lots, virtue-signaling Instagram polls, and a biting final line: “Are there more experienced candidates out there with clearer policy ideas? Sure,” his Beto concedes with a clueless smile.The effect is an early depiction of O’Rourke as a lightweight, and a completely overzealous one at that.

Youth planned mass killing in Christchurch February 2018

https://twitter.com/andrewbostom/status/1106913024517070849
https://courtnews.co.nz/2018/02/15/youth

A Christchurch teenager who converted to Islam planned to ram a car into a group of people and then stab them until the police killed him, the Christchurch District Court was told at his sentencing.The teen has now told a psychologist that when the violent incident began he “decided not to hurt anybody because he did not have the means to kill enough people”, Crown prosecutor Chris Lange told the court.“The reason no-one was hurt was that he did not have access to knives,” Mr Lange said. But there was significant premeditation, and hostility towards non-Muslims.The teen harboured thoughts for five months of killing multiple people, and expected to be killed by the police. He had written a goodbye note to his mother.

After his arrest, the youth told police he was angry and had “done it for Allah”.The court has adopted a rehabilitative approach to the teen’s sentencing, with Judge Stephen O’Driscoll releasing him on intensive supervision with a list of conditions and a warning that if he breaches the conditions or reoffends, he will likely be sent to prison.Among the conditions – which will apply for two years while the judge monitors his progress – is counselling by a member of the local Muslim community.

The Admissions Scandal and Racial Preferences-Peter Kirsanow*****

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/the-admissions-scandal-and-racial-preferences/

Peter N. Kirsanow is an attorney and a member of the United States Commission on Civil Rights.

The recent revelation concerning college admissions is disconcerting, but not any more than racial preferences in admissions.As Roger Clegg notes below, the Left, never letting a scandal go to waste, immediately leapt on the admissions scandal as a justification for racial preferences. The disingenuousness of their argument is matched only by its incoherence.

Ever since Grutter v. Michigan, the lie about racial preferences is that a college applicant’s race is only considered as a flexible “plus” factor, a mere “feather on the scale,” in the admissions process. The truth, however, is that in nearly every case race is not a feather on the scale, but an anvil. At some universities race renders a black or Hispanic applicant not 10 percent more likely to be admitted over a similarly situated white or Asian comparative; not even 15 percent more likely to be admitted. Rather, at some selective schools the racial preference makes black and Hispanic applicants up to 500 times more likely to be admitted than similarly situated white and Asian applicants.

As Stuart Taylor notes, during the discovery process in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard  (the pending complaint brought by Asian students alleging racial discrimination in Harvard’s admissions program) documents produced by Harvard showed that the average combined SAT scores of Asian students admitted between 2010 — 2015 were 218 points higher than those of black admittees.

Our Bankrupt Elite By Matthew Continetti

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/03/college-admissions-scandal-bankrupt-elite/

These people aren’t interested in the common good. They are interested in themselves.

Every element of the college admissions scandal, a.k.a “Operation Varsity Blues,” is fascinating.

There are the players: the Yale dad who, implicated in a securities-fraud case, tipped the feds off to the caper; a shady high-school counselor turned admissions consultant; the 36-year-old Harvard grad who sold his talents for standardized testing to the highest bidder; the comely actresses from Full House and Desperate Housewives; the fashion designer; the casino magnate. Who would have thought that one of the major headlines of 2019 would be “Lori Loughlin released on bond”?

There are the children: the social media influencer (yes this is a thing) who was told of her parents’ arrest while vacationing on the yacht of a USC trustee; the mom who submitted doctored photographs to USC to portray her son as a championship pole-vaulter; the place kicker for a high school with no football team; and the rap artist from the Upper East Side who defended his mom and dad to the press while smoking a blunt.

There are the means: paying tens of thousands of dollars to Rick Singer, Trinity ‘86, who bribed athletic directors and coaches, doctored student résumés, and arranged for clients to take college-admittance exams alongside a “proctor” who answered the questions for them. The icing on the cake: Some payments were made to a charitable foundation so the parents could get the tax write-off. What a country.

Jefferson, Adams, and the Hope of Liberal Education By Alexander Khan

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/03/thomas-jefferson-john-adams-friendship-liberal-education/

The Founders’ friendship can save our paltry civics education.

Citizenship in America is in a troubling state. In 2015, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni conducted a survey of college graduates which found that only 28.4 percent could name James Madison as the father of the Constitution. Thirty-nine percent did not know that Congress had the war power, and roughly 45 percent did not know the length of congressional terms. In 2017, the Annenberg Public Policy Center found that 37 percent of Americans could not name any of the rights in the First Amendment, and that only 26 percent could name all three branches of government. Gallup poll results from 2018 reveal that young Americans’ views of capitalism and socialism have switched since 2010, with only 45 percent of respondents now professing a positive view of the capitalist system. A November 2018 YouGov poll revealed that Americans’ patriotism and knowledge of civics was troublingly low. More recently, in January 2019, Gallup released survey results which showed that 30 percent of younger Americans, a record high, would like to permanently leave the U.S. Unfortunately, these results are not shocking. Each new poll extends the long line of depressing findings.

The answer to this crisis of civics and citizenship is a renewal of America’s commitment to liberal education. A consensus is growing among many on the left and right that a reinvigorated system of liberal education is necessary if we want a society of active, engaged, and informed citizens. As an article published in the Association of American Colleges & Universities’ journal Liberal Education noted, liberal education “is the best means to the desired end of having a citizenry with the knowledge, skills, and wisdom necessary to participate in democratic governance.”

The Branding of Alexandria Ocasio Cortez Eileen F. Toplansky

If Alexandria Ocasio Cortez is the new brand of the Democrat Party, let’s unwrap the claims she uses in order to attract a new audience.  Many years ago Jeffrey Schrank wrote “The Language of Advertising Claims” and it is fascinating to apply these claims to this new face of the Democrats. Schrank asserts that many people are “notorious believers in their immunity to advertising” because they believe that “advertising is childish, dumb, a bunch of lies, and influences only the vast hordes of the less sophisticated.” 

He then goes on to elucidate different persuasive ways that advertisers use to lure in the consumer.

If these claims can be applied to Ocasio and her ilk, perhaps the American voter, particularly the millennial, will be able to see through the bilge that Ocasio regurgitates.

One of the most widely used advertising methods is the use of “invisible” or “weasel” words.  A weasel word “is aptly named after the egg eating habits of weasels.”  A weasel will suck out the inside of an egg and then turn the egg over so when the mother bird returns to the nest and continues to sit on her egg, she does not realize that there is nothing growing anymore.  Thus, “weasel” words or claims appear at first to be substantial but “disintegrate into hollow meaninglessness” upon analysis.