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GOOD NEWS FROM MIZZOU-

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

Update: Mizzou uses its ultimate muscle against Melissa Click By Ethel C. Fenig

Using its ultimate muscle and getting her out of there, the University of Missouri at Columbia fired assistant professor of communications Melissa Click because, as the official statement bluntly stated:

The board believes that Dr. Click’s conduct was not compatible with university policies and did not meet expectations for a university faculty member. The circumstances surrounding Dr. Click’s behavior, both at a protest in October when she tried to interfere with police officers who were carrying out their duties, and at a rally in November, when she interfered with members of the media and students who were exercising their rights in a public space and called for intimidation against one of our students, we believe demands serious action.

The board respects Dr. Click’s right to express her views and does not base this decision on her support for students engaged in protest or their views. However, Dr. Click was not entitled to interfere with the rights of others, to confront members of law enforcement or to encourage potential physical intimidation against a student.

The photo of an angry Click, arms upraised, macro-aggressively shouting, “Hey who wants to help me get this reporter out of here? I need some muscle over here!” at the November rally mentioned in the statement above, quickly became a symbol of the protest at Mizzou, summarizing the out-of-control, intimidating behavior by some students and faculty on college campuses across the nation against those who do not agree with their world vision.

Oh, by the way, did you notice that Ms. Click, whose specialty is teaching communications, was attempting to halt communications and media people, whose opinions differed from hers, from communicating? And was communicating by force? Is this how she was teaching communications in class?

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Three Simple Questions for Trump Supporters By Daren Jonescu

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

…..As I consider the rise of Donald Trump, and how he has sucked most of the air out of the constitutionalist movement, I can’t stop thinking about it. Trump’s supporters remind me of my eleven-year-old self, so excited about their incredible triumph that they have blinded themselves to the obvious. However, as the circumstances of their delusion are much more serious and less benign than my childhood touchdown, there is nothing kind about refraining from asking them an awkward question or three.

So today, addressing myself to any Trump supporters who are not already lost to the irrational anger he feeds on — please don’t scream about “righteous anger,” as if I don’t know the difference between justice and wrath — I pose three simple questions:

(1) Don’t you get the strange feeling that this has all been suspiciously easy?

Consider the fates of all previous GOP candidates to run against the party elite. Remember Herman Cain the creepy philanderer? Michele Bachmann the hysterical religious fanatic? Rick Santorum the Catholic extremist who was going to outlaw birth control and lock all women in the kitchen? And of course Ronald Reagan, the rare success story who taught the insiders a lesson they have never forgotten about the need for a unified strategy to nip all serious challenges in the bud?

But forget about the past; today we have Ted Cruz, the maniacal government-hating crusader and despicable liar whom everybody hates, who is owned by Goldman Sachs, and who may not even be an American!

In light of this consistent pattern of preemptive assault from the “left” and “right” against all anti-establishment GOP candidates, isn’t it odd that Trump, who has been the obvious frontrunner in the primaries since last summer, and who presents as inviting a target for a media takedown effort as any candidate has ever presented, has been given a pass? In fact, he’s been given much better than a pass. Aside from the nonstop free advertising he is getting as celebrity of the year, the most overtly leftist news network, MSNBC, has actively helped to create an aura of inevitability around him, and to demean his opponents. Meanwhile, has there been even one serious attempt on any twenty-four hour news network to dredge up and pursue any kind of scandal, ugly rumor, old girlfriends, shady business associates, anything at all that might undermine his campaign?

As for the “conservative media,” in the fall of 2011, Matt Drudge and Ann Coulter put all their weight behind the establishment’s preferred candidate, Mitt Romney. And over the past several months, those same two bigwigs have invested all their savings in Trump stock. Four years ago, Rush Limbaugh pussy-footed (that means walking like a kitten, by the way) around Romney throughout the primaries; this time he seems to be walking even more gingerly around his golf buddy Trump, defending him as an anti-establishment champion, and even half-excusing his “Bush allowed 9/11 to happen” bluster in South Carolina as “strategy.”

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‘The Circus: Inside the Greatest Political Show on Earth’ Review: Winning Is What Matters From a trio of campaign-trail veterans comes a docuseries that follows the 2016 election. Dorothy Rabinowitz

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-circus-inside-the-greatest-political-show-on-earth-review-winning-is-what-matters-1456439178

Rarely does a grandiose claim feel as apt as the one in the subtitle of this series. Undeniably, the current primaries and virtually everything else connected with the American presidential election of 2016 have made for the most riveting, not to mention embittering, political spectacle in memory, and we’re still only at the beginning stages. All the more reason to treasure an enterprise that preserves the small details as “The Circus” does—brief moments that capture the flavor of this race, the light as well as the dark, the faces of Americans rapturous with enthusiasm or etched with doubt as they listen to candidates come to ask for their vote in the crucial primaries.
The creators of “Circus”—veteran political strategist Mark McKinnon and Bloomberg Politics managing editors Mark Halperin and John Heilemann—focus their documentary efforts on what goes on backstage during the arduous primaries battles, but there’s no stinting on the extravaganzas taking place on the public stages themselves. At a Pensacola, Fla., rally packed with Donald Trump fans, where the candidate takes a shot at Ted Cruz—“You can’t win if you’re born in Canada’’—and alludes to “Crazy Bernie,” then predicts “I think I’m gonna win in Iowa” (he didn’t), the crowd roars its ecstasy, a tremendous din. The filmmakers, who deliver snippets of commentary, note Mr. Trump’s obvious rock-star appeal—a power, one says, that you can’t buy.

But there’s another rock star of sorts on the campaign trail: Bernie Sanders, whose wife, Jane, is a constant presence at his side and far more talkative than her husband, who isn’t prone to sharing much beyond his political message. He’s shown a noteworthy fastidiousness when questioned, for instance, about his religious heritage: American Jews whose parents emigrated from Poland don’t usually describe their parents, as Mr. Sanders tellingly does, as “Polish immigrants.” READ MORE AT SITE

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America’s New Libyan War Obama orders a tepid fight against Islamic State in North Africa.

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

http://www.wsj.com/articles/americas-new-libyan-war-1456448403

President Obama has been learning the hard lesson that, in war, you can’t declare premature victory and go home. That’s the story of Iraq, where the U.S. has returned thousands of troops to fight Islamic State long after the President declared the Iraq War over and done. It’s also true in Afghanistan, where he has quietly abandoned plans to withdraw all U.S. forces in the face of major gains by the Taliban.

The same story now seems to be unfolding in Libya. On Tuesday the Italian government acknowledged that it had given permission for armed U.S. drones based in Sicily to carry out operations against Islamic State in Libya. The Italians will grant approval on a “case-by-case” basis, and then only for what they deem “defensive operations.” On Tuesday the Journal cited U.S. officials saying that the drones would be used “to protect U.S. special-operations forces in Libya and beyond.”

That’s the closest we’ve heard to official confirmation that the U.S. has special forces operating in Libya, though in December an undercover team conducting “key leader engagements” was accidentally outed on social media, leading to their hasty departure. What isn’t a secret is that the U.S. last week hit an Islamic State training camp near the city of Sabratha in western Libya, killing dozens of terrorists. That follows November’s U.S. air strike that killed Islamic State leader Abu Nabil. READ MORE AT SITE

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Justice and Clinton’s Email Probe A ‘career’ official doesn’t guarantee an honest investigation.

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

http://www.wsj.com/articles/justice-and-clintons-email-probe-1456448102

Attorney General Loretta Lynch this week tried to assure House Republicans about the impartiality of her department’s investigation into Hillary Clinton’s State Department emails by noting that it would be handled by career government officials. This claim could stand a little parsing.

The probe into her possible mishandling of classified information “is being handled by career independent law enforcement agents—FBI agents—as well as the career independent attorneys in the Department of Justice,” Ms. Lynch said Wednesday. “They follow the evidence, they look at the law and they’ll make a recommendation to me when the time is appropriate,” adding that the probe is being “conducted as every other case.”

That’s what they always say, and it is nice to think so. But there’s reason to doubt given the example of Justice’s investigation into the IRS targeting of conservative groups before the 2012 election. To lead that probe, then Attorney General Eric Holder appointed Barbara Bosserman, a trial attorney in the department’s Civil Rights Division.

Ms. Bosserman’s appointment was curious given that her area of expertise is civil rights, not tax law. She had also donated $6,100 to President Obama’s campaigns and the Obama Victory Fund in 2008 and 2012. That’s no small donation on a career employee’s salary and suggests some serious political loyalty. READ MORE AT SITE

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Under Pope Francis and President Xi, hopes rise for a thaw in ties By Jiang Jie Source By Jiang Jie Source

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

After decades of frozen ties, China and the Vatican seem to be witnessing a slow but significant change in relations. While divergences remain, including on the issue of who gets to appoint bishops, experts and religious leaders have seen progress in the overall tone of dialogue.

Over 8,000 kilometers away from each other, the Vatican City seems incompatible in many ways with Beijing, the hearts of the Catholic faith and the biggest Communist nation, the country with the smallest population in the world and the country with the largest.

Since 1951, the two sides have lacked official diplomatic connections. As the two countries welcomed new leaders in recent years, some have hoped for a thawing in ties.

These hopes have gained momentum since October 2015, when the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, said that China and the Holy See were engaged in a “positive” dialogue. Cardinal Parolin also confirmed that a papal delegation would visit Beijing, adding that they would discuss normalization of relations.

Less than four months later, a Chinese delegation visited the Holy See in late January.

Early in February, American Cardinal Theodore McCarrick traveled to China – a trip in which the cardinal said he would visit some “old friends.” While the cardinal insisted in an exclusive interview with the Global Times that he was not visiting in his “official capacity,” his trip has shown that ties are growing more comfortable.

Cardinal McCarrick, former archbishop of Washington, DC, is the first cardinal from a Western country to visit the Chinese mainland since Sino-Vatican ties turned sour, South China Morning Post reported. He has reportedly visited China eight times since the 1990s.

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Michael Copeman: The Obama Doctrine’s Final Act

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

After eight years of alienating allies, abrogating leadership, eschewing hard decisions and spuriously explaining away Islamic outrages, all that remains to be done is a final spectacle to capture the spirit of his administration: a Rose Garden reception and apology for Gitmo’s liberated inmates
A simple way for President Obama to belatedly fulfill his confident 2008 election promise to close Guantanamo Bay (Gitmo) would be to invite all current inmates to join the First Couple at the White House. That would be an act of reconciliation and forgiveness at its most spectacular, the crowning moment of a ground-breaking presidency. His eight years have seen rapprochements with US-hating Venezuela, Cuba and Iran, so why not Gitmo inmates?

Just picture the scene: In a ceremony televised from the Rose Garden, Obama could personally apologise to each detainee and present his honoured guests with large, appropriate sums by way of compensation. That would be small consolation for their abductions at gunpoint, prolonged incarceration, and extended time away from loved ones and their important work, which is the destruction of Western society in the name of radical Islam.

What is clear is that a significant body of inmates released from Gitmo is likely to return rapidly to the cause of terrorism. But not to worry! As Secretary of State John Kerry explains in the video below, there is nothing about the release of homicidal religious fanatics which needs concern reasonable people — the sort who believe Obama to have been a competent president, at any rate.

Gitmo was a vexed solution created by frustrated people in response to a terrible problem created by evil people. But, to the extent that it took likely leaders of global terrorism out of action, it has undoubtedly saved lives. Its existence may even have encouraged ordinary citizens in countries threatened daily by terrorism to go about their lives with just a little less fear.

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David Archibald :A Turn for the Better?

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

The Obama interregnum is drawing to a close and eight years of follies, shrunken influence and impotence with it. So, will it be Hillary Clinton who mires the Oval Office in more of the impotent same, plus legal woes and scandals? Or is it the candidate who has torn up the campaign rule book?
The 2016 presidential election will determine how the United States responds to the most decisive challenges for more than a century to its wealth, strength, and security. But none of the presidential aspirants have yet to outline a coherent strategic policy. With one exception, Hillary Clinton, all the candidates oppose the actions and policies of the incumbent president but all have accepted the overt and covert agendas of that same discredited president. These include supporting the wrong side in Syria, the demonization of Russia and insufficient attention to China’s irredentism.

The Democratic nominating process is about the top-down imposition of its preferred candidate, and thus the superdelegates who are expected to deliver the pre-determined outcome of Hillary Clinton. If Mrs Clinton falls by the wayside, due to her escalating legal problems or, perhaps, a convenient health issue, then a similar establishment figure will be injected into the process. In its nomination procedure, the Republican Party has produced a couple of candidates who have promised that it won’t be business-as-usual but who have yet to articulate a long term vision, beyond generalities.

Why so much foreboding? Food is at the lowest price in human history, energy is now also cheap, poverty around the world is at the lowest level ever, and technological and medical advances continue apace. Those things are well and good, but two conflicts are going to crash the civilizational party. The first is the war of Islam on the rest of the planet, an offensive that is well underway. An early report on it is the “Joint Inquiry Into Intelligence Community Activities Before and After the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001”, 28 pages of which remain classified. No doubt the content of those 28 pages is embarrassing, so much so unsophisticated readers might get angry should they be exposed to their revelations.

At least one official declaration of war came years later. On January 15, 2016, the authoritative and influential cleric Sheikh Abu Taqi al-Din al-Dari delivered the Friday Sermon inJerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque. In short, the sheikh said that the Muslim world must adopt the traditional teachings in the Koran on the perpetual war between the Abode of Islam and the Abode of War. In the way the Muslim world is structured, this is a declaration of war on the West. There have been many similar declarations before and this one won’t be the last, but it is the most influential to date.

The West is aware that there is a problem but has refused to face up to the fact it is engaged in an existential clash of civilisations. To do so would require an adjustment of its belief system – that all cultures are equally good and that there is nothing inherently wrong with any group of people or culture. Just at the moment the pain of the permanent state of emergency in France, for example, is preferable to the effort involved in seeing the world as it really is. Not that France and neighbouring Germany are blameless. Through the EU they made their own attempts at imposing their beliefs on the rest of the World, with Kulturkampf via EU edicts such as penalties on carbon dioxide emissions far beyond their borders. The EU’s attempt at world domination on the cheap requires a stable world to have a chance of working. The world is no longer stable, so while we will not be spared the edicts of Brussels they will be transcribe in the ink of impotence.

The solution to the problem of Islam is simple: don’t have anything to do with it. This solution had its first run after the 9/11 attacks when the Bush Administration restricted the number of visas issued to Saudi nationals. One of the current presidential aspirants has called for barring all Muslims from entering the United States. If put into effect, this policy would significantly reduce the number of terrorist attacks on the US at no cost in to itself. In fact this policy is necessary to shield the US from the fallout that can be anticipated from the ultimate collapse of the Muslim world.

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U.S., Europe Fund Torture by Palestinian Authority by Khaled Abu Toameh

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

A report by the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor documented 1,391 cases of Palestinians arbitrarily arrested by the two Palestinian parties, Fatah and Hamas, in 2015.

Systematic torture in Palestinian prisons in the West Bank and Gaza Strip was documented in the report — at least 179 cases of torture in Palestinian Authority (PA) prisons in 2015.

The PA security forces are trained and funded by several Western countries, including the US. This establishes a direct line between these Western donors and the arbitrary arrests, torture and human rights violations that have become the norm in PA-controlled prisons and detention centers.

The report also revealed that the Palestinian Authority regularly disobeys court orders by refusing to release detainees, showing contempt for its courts and judges.

Before our eyes, two police states are being built: one in the West Bank and a second in the Gaza Strip — in the face of talk by international parties of establishing an independent Palestinian state. But the last thing the Palestinians need is another police state.

Palestinians who incite violence against Israel are called Palestinian leaders. Palestinians who beg to differ with Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas or one of his friends are called criminals and can expect to be interrogated and/or imprisoned.

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The Black Flag of Jihad Stalks La République by Nidra Poller

Posted By on February 26th, 2016

July 13, 2014, the storming of the Bastille was “re-enacted” by enraged mobs shouting Death to the Jews. Trampling the protest march tradition, they stomped down boulevard Beaumarchais, fanned out into the Marais, and massed in front of synagogues, armed with baseball bats, iron bars, rocks, and blood-curdling screams of Slaughter the Jews. They clashed with Jews defending the synagogue on rue de la Roquette and fought with the police that finally arrived to restore order. Six days later, the mobs occupied Place de la République in defiance of a ban against their demonstration. They climbed onto the pedestal of the Marianne statue, symbol of the French Republic and made a mockery of revolutionary iconography. “Pro-Palestinians” proclaimed love for Gaza and unconditional support for la Résistance, burned the Israeli flag, and waved the black flag of jihad.
Israel was fighting back against a constant barrage of rockets launched from Gaza, one more episode in a genocidal war disguised as a national liberation movement. Hamas résistance, Jihad résistance—that’s the program chanted in the heart of the French Republic in the summer of 2014. Demonstrations, banned or authorized, exploded in violence against Jewish shops, synagogues, citizens, and the French police, duty-bound to protect them.
Public opinion was modeled to perceive this unbridled rage as solidarity with civilians in Gaza, victims of “excessive force” and dying in unfair numbers compared to the Jews of Israel protected by an efficient civil defense system. Who thought to warn them of the ominous portent of the jihad flag brandished at the feet of Marianne?
Five months later, in January 2015, the word “jihad” finally took its rightful place in the vocabulary of current events. Jihadis decimated the staff of Charlie Hebdo, executed policemen, assassinated Jews in a kosher grocery store.
In Syria and Iraq, jihadis, more exactly mujahidin, raging under that black flag behead journalists, conquer territory, destroy treasures of humanity, persecute Christians, enslave Yazidi women. “Moderate” rebels armed and trained by Western forces defect to the Islamic State or other jihad factions. European Muslims join the ranks of Daesh, learn the skills of decapitation and plot against the lands of their birth. And the free world snuggles up to the Islamic Republic of Iran. The democracies fight their sworn enemies by pouring oil on the fire. Payback comes in the shape of millions of “refugees” poured into Europe, pounding on its borders, flooding its institutions.