NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Barack Obama Promises to Nominate Successor for Justice Antonin Scalia Sets stage for fierce battle with Republicans over who next will sit on the Supreme Court By Carol E. Lee

Posted By on February 14th, 2016

http://www.wsj.com/articles/barack-obama-promises-to-nominate-successor-for-justice-antonin-scalia-1455417127?mod=trending_now_1

RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif.—The sudden vacancy on the Supreme Court following the death of Justice Antonin Scalia presents President Barack Obama with both a historic opportunity and one of his steepest challenges during his last year in office.

Mr. Obama quickly sought to lay down his marker in what had already become a pitched political debate over Mr. Scalia’s successor in the hours after his death was announced Saturday.

The president stepped before the cameras during a golf vacation in California to make clear he wouldn’t leave Mr. Scalia’s vacancy for his successor to fill, as some Republicans have suggested. By addressing the matter immediately, Mr. Obama underscored how fiercely he intends to mount a public campaign to pressure the Senate to confirm the third Supreme Court nominee of his presidency.

“I plan to fulfill my constitutional responsibilities to nominate a successor in due time,” Mr. Obama said Saturday. “There will be plenty of time for me to do so, and for the Senate to fulfill its responsibility to give that person a fair hearing and a timely vote.”

Mr. Obama will be the first president since Ronald Reagan, who nominated Mr. Scalia, to be tasked with filling three Supreme Court vacancies. He now faces a decision on what type of nominee to choose: a liberal, as desired by his Democratic Party base, or a moderate who may have a better chance of winning the 14 Republican votes needed to meet the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to secure confirmation. READ THE ENTIRE COLUMN AT THE SITE

BOOKS Comments turned off

America, be wary of a Palestinian state! Ambassador (Ret.) Yoram Ettinger,

Posted By on February 14th, 2016

President Obama and Secretary Kerry intend to advance recognition of an independent Palestinian state by January 20, 2017, the end of Obama’s second term, irrespective of its adverse impact upon the national security and homeland security of the US. Therefore, the President turned down a request by the Senate Democratic Leader, Harry Reid, to make a commitment to veto any UN Security Council resolution, which calls for an independent Palestinian state. According to the President, and the US foreign policy establishment, a Palestinian state would enhance stability, moderation, peace, and democracy.

How credible and reality- based is this assessment/expectation?

In 1993, Senator John Kerry and the US foreign policy establishment were convinced that Arafat – a role model for international terrorism – would respond to Israel’s unprecedented Oslo Accords concessions by ”transforming himself from lawlessness to statesmanship.” However, their assessment was discredited by an unprecedented wave of Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas-engineered hate-education, incitement and (the resulting) terrorism, which still persists today.

In 2011, President Obama, Secretary Clinton and Senator Kerry believed that the eruption of turbulence on the Arab Street was an Arab Spring, youth revolution, Facebook revolution, transitioning the Arab World to democracy: “Through the moral force of nonviolence, the people of the [Middle East] have achieved more change in six months than terrorists have accomplished in decades….” However, their assessment has been disproved by the reality of an anti-US, anti-human rights, terror-driven and Islamic supremacy-inspired Arab Tsunami, led by ruthless minority regimes, followed/cheered by obedient and politically insignificant Muslim majority.

BOOKS Comments turned off

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL

Posted By on February 14th, 2016

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Reversing Alzheimer’s symptoms. (TY UWI) Israel’s Dr. Shira Knafo heads Spain’s Molecular Cognition Laboratory at BioCruces Health Research Institute. She has discovered a small protein, which inhibits the processes normally associated with impairment, including depression and Alzheimer’s disease.
http://www.algemeiner.com/2016/02/09/medical-breakthrough-israeli-scientist-heading-intl-research-team-reverses-alzheimers-symptoms-in-mice/ http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nn.4225.html

Sealing wounds without stitches, tape or bandage. Israel’s Vigor Medical Technologies won the Innovex Disrupt contest at Tel Aviv’s Innovex2016 conference. Vigor’s sealant system treats thoracic trauma, a chest injury that can cause the lungs to collapse. If treated within one hour, the patient has an 80% survival chance.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/start-ups-sealant-for-collapsed-lungs-nabs-prize-at-innovex/

Sensors to monitor the elderly. Kytera is another Israeli startup that has developed innovative sensor technology to keep a close eye on at-risk seniors. It also collects anonymous data that can be used to provide vital research on specific illnesses or medications. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOTn_rmJexc

Heart device saves more lives. (TY Atid-EDI) I reported on Israel’s V-Wave in May 2014 when it implanted its first heart shunt to treat congestive heart failure patients. It has since successfully treated over 30 patients. V-Wave has just raised $28 million to expand clinical evaluation, development and production.
http://vwavemedical.com/2016/01/20/v-wave-ltd-announces-28m-series-b-financing/

Portable ultrasound. Professor Yonina Eldar at Israel’s Technion is developing an innovative portable ultrasound system that transmits scans to the treating physician immediately. Scans can be performed in disaster areas, at road accidents, and in developing countries where the medical infrastructure is limited.
http://www.jewishpress.com/news/technion-develops-small-portable-ultrasound/2016/02/09/

Socks to warn of foot ulcers. Another great innovation from Hadassah / Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s BioDesign students. Their SenseGo socks contain dozens of micro-fabricated pressure sensors that send warnings via smartphone of incorrect posture or ill-fitting shoes that may cause foot ulcers to develop.
http://new.huji.ac.il/en/article/28743 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drc7NpiiB74

Another app to cure stuttering. Israel’s Ninispeech enables people who stutter to take control over their speech, using unique mobile feedback technology. NiNiSpeech catalyzes assimilation of speech strategies, encourages communication, sharpens learning curve, and maximizes success rate. 3 top Israeli doctors are cofounders, including Dr Yoav Medan, ex-CTO of Israeli focused ultrasound specialists InSightec.
http://www.ninispeech.com/

Device to shakeup a snorer. (TY Dan) Israeli startup Nexense manufactures a device to treat snoring and sleep apnea. Worn as a chest strap or wristwatch, it detects snoring or sleep apnea and then vibrates to help the patient resume breathing or stop snoring, without waking him / her up. http://nexense.com/?page_id=87
http://www.globes.co.il/en/article-sleep-apnea-treatment-co-nexense-raises-3m-1001099272
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cUgh38h8gI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrCod0AQgyw

Linked to Life. (TY Chani) Cancer charity Ezer Mizion has a unique WhatsApp Group. “Linked to Life” has about 4,000 volunteers who respond fast to (sometimes life-threatening) problems. Like forgotten medication or a premature baby who needs special formula. http://www.ezermizion.org/blog/whats-app-by-kobi-arieli/

POLITICS Comments turned off

Carly Fiorina: The Rare Republican Whose Bid for President Helped Her Party By Ian Tuttle

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

The list of 2016 also-rans makes for a grim chronicle. There were the vanity candidates — Mike Huckabee and Rick Santorum (add, soon: Ben Carson) — for whom self-interest outweighed the public interest. There were the heavyweights — Rick Perry, Scott Walker, and Bobby Jindal — whose prospects were cut short by foolish voters. There were the head-scratching candidates: Jim Gilmore and George Pataki.

And there was Carly Fiorina.

About Carly, who dropped out of the Republican presidential race on Wednesday after single-digit finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire, one can say a rare thing: The Republican party is better for her having run — and, if the party is smart, she’ll be a part of it going forward.

To be sure, that Carly’s presidential bid never caught on is not a surprise. Her path was always narrow. She had no political experience besides a failed Senate race in deep-blue California. Her “CEO-as-president” pitch was undermined by a rocky tenure at Hewlett-Packard. The field was crowded. And it turns out that the Republican electorate is feeling thumotic — fair or not, an advantage to men.

But in a year of also-rans, Carly stood out — as one of the clearest, most incisive, and most forceful conservative speakers to come along in years.

That was on full display on the debate stage, where she turned in one solid performance after another. It was on display on the campaign trail, as my colleague Jay Nordlinger observed last year. And it was on display when you sat down and chatted with her, one-on-one.

POLITICS Comments turned off

Mark Pulliam: The Next Obama Meet Kamala Harris, California attorney general, aspiring senator . . . and future president?

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

The 2016 race to replace four-term U.S. senator Barbara Boxer of California, one of Congress’s most liberal politicians, appears likely to result in the election of an even more liberal successor: state attorney general Kamala Harris. In an increasingly polyglot state that exalts appearance and symbolism over substance, the ever-stylish and multiracial Harris—she is the daughter of an Indian mother and a Jamaican-American father—finds herself in the right place at the right time. She’s enjoyed a meteoric rise in California politics—the first woman, African-American, or Asian-American elected as the state’s top law-enforcement officer. Whether the Senate will be a political stepping-stone for Harris or a final destination depends on how credibly she portrays herself as a politician with national stature. Her fans compare her with President Barack Obama; her detractors do the same.

Now 51, Harris cruised to reelection as attorney general in 2014, after eking out a close victory over Los Angeles County district attorney Steve Cooley in 2010. (Before becoming attorney general, she served two terms as district attorney of San Francisco, where she unseated popular incumbent Terence Hallinan.) The outcome of the 2010 contest, which took nearly a month to resolve, was decided by just 74,000 out of 8.8 million votes, or a margin of 0.8 percent—one of the closest statewide elections in California history. Cooley, a moderate Republican, had been the front-runner in most preelection polls, and he even declared victory on election night. But the results proved too close to call, and Harris eventually prevailed when all provisional and mail-in ballots were counted. And so a position formerly held by Republican law-and-order stalwarts such as George Deukmejian and Dan Lungren, as well as a relatively tough-on-crime liberal like Jerry Brown, fell into the hands of an outspoken opponent of capital punishment whose campaign drew almost no law-enforcement support.

BOOKS Comments turned off

Stop Using Israel’s Example to Justify the Barbaric Practice of Drafting Women into Combat By David French

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

Like clockwork, whenever anyone at National Review — including the editors — writes in opposition to opening all combat jobs to women or (even worse) drafting women into ground combat, there is predictable hue and cry from the Left. “But Israel! You conservatives couldn’t possibly be criticizing Israel, could you?” Perhaps the worst example comes from New York magazine, where writer Eric Levitz accuses NR of “anti-Jewish propaganda” and painting Israelis as “savagely cruel primitives” because our editors had the audacity to rightly label the proposal to draft mothers and daughters into ground combat “barbaric.”

Let’s be clear, National Review was decrying as “barbaric” the notion of drafting women into ground-combat roles. Drafting women into non-combat roles isn’t barbaric, it’s simply unnecessary. Against that backdrop, Levitz’s piece is sheer, unmitigated nonsense. It’s ahistorical idiocy.

When critics attempt to justify the Pentagon’s decision to open all combat jobs to women — or drafting women into those roles — by referring to the Israel Defense Forces, they’re betraying considerable ignorance. Israel’s history with women in combat is vastly overblown, its present policy is more restrictive than the Pentagon’s, and it’s in a fundamentally different strategic situation than the United States. To the extent there’s a valid comparison with the United States, Israel’s history should stand as a cautionary tale for American policy-makers.

It is true that women fought as part of the Haganah, the Jewish militia that defended Jewish settlements during the struggle for survival prior to and following World War II. But, as outlined in a comprehensive paper for the School of Advanced Military Studies at Fort Leavenworth, this policy — born of desperate necessity as Jewish citizens defended their homes and villages from genocidal assaults — also showed the limits of gender-integrated units. Mixed-gender units had higher casualty rates, and Haganah commanders stopped using women in assault forces because “physically girls could not run as well — and if they couldn’t run fast enough, they could endanger the whole unit, so they were put in other units.”

BOOKS Comments turned off

Liberals Rewrite History, Make a Few Mistakes Whom would our undergrads revile if they knew a bit more history? By Josh Gelernter

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

A fetish for de-honoring objectionable historical figures is sweeping American college campuses. Targets range from unrepentant bastards like Jeffery Amherst to imperfect great men like Thomas Jefferson. I wonder if America’s undergrads realize that imperfection, and bastardy, are surprisingly widespread conditions:

“The white race of South Africa should be the predominating race,” said Mahatma Gandhi. He also said, of himself and his followers, “We believe as much in the purity of race as” white South Africans. He called black South Africans “kaffirs,” which is South Africa’s equivalent of “niggers,” and objected to blacks living among South African Indians: “About this mixing of the Kaffirs with the Indians, I must confess I feel strongly. I think it is very unfair to the Indian population.” He wrote that “Kaffirs are as a rule uncivilized. . . . The reader can easily imagine the plight of the poor Indian thrown into such company!”

There are dozens of such Gandhi quotes. Students at Oxford tried to tear down a statue of Cecil Rhodes — who endowed Oxford’s Rhodes Scholarship — after they found out he held comparable, Gandhi-esque views. Should we expect a “Gandhi Must Fall” campaign targeting the innumerable Gandhi statues worldwide? Like the one standing in London, in front of the Houses of Parliament?

“The black is indolent and a dreamer; spending his meager wage on frivolity or drink,” said Che Guevara. He added that members of the “African race” had “maintained their racial purity thanks to their lack of an affinity with bathing.” After the Cuban Communists took over, Che promised that they were “going to do for blacks exactly what blacks did for the revolution. By which I mean: nothing.”

POLITICS Comments turned off

The Democrats’ Likely Nominee Appears to Be a Felon — This Is Not Business as Usual By Andrew C. McCarthy

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

Competing Democrats debate each other one night. Republican rivals take their shots at each other a couple of nights later. An air of frenetic normalcy sets over primary season: The country is $20 trillion in the red and under heightened terrorist threat, yet pols bicker over the legacy of Henry Kissinger and the chameleon nature of Donald Trump – another liability the mogul is marketing as an asset. It is business as usual.

Except nothing about the 2016 campaign is business as usual.

For all the surreal projection of normalcy, the race is enveloped by an extremely serious criminal investigation. If press reporting is to be believed — in particular, the yeoman’s work of Fox News’s Catherine Herridge and Pamela K. Browne — Hillary Clinton, the likely nominee of one of the two major parties, appears to have committed serious felony violations of federal law.

That she has the audacity to run despite the circumstances is no surprise — Clinton scandals, the background music of our politics for a quarter-century, are interrupted only by new Clinton scandals. What is shocking is that the Democrats are allowing her to run.

For some Democrats, alas, any criminality by the home team is immaterial. A couple of weeks back, The Donald bragged, as is his wont, that he “could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose any voters.” Trump was kidding (at least, I think he was). Unfortunately, the statement might have been true had it sprung from Mrs. Clinton’s lips.

In a Democratic party dominated by the hard Left, the power Left, what matters is keeping Republicans out of the White House, period. Democrats whored themselves for Bill through the Nineties, seemingly unembarrassed over the lie it put to their soaring tropes about women’s rights, good government, getting money out of politics, etc. They will close ranks around Hillary, too. After all, if she was abusing power while advancing the cause of amassing power – er, I mean, the cause of social justice — what’s the harm?

More-centrist Democrats realize there could be great harm, but they seem paralyzed. The American people, they know, are not the hard Left: If Mrs. Clinton is permitted to keep plodding on toward the nomination only to be indicted after she has gotten it, the party’s chances of holding on to the White House probably disappear. By then, there may not be time to organize a national campaign with a suitable candidate (as opposed to a goofy 74-year-old avowed socialist).

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

EU Border Office Chief on Refugee Crisis ‘We Should Have No Illusions’

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

Interview Conducted By Peter Müller

As head of the EU border agency Frontex, Fabrice Leggeri has one of the hardest jobs in Europe. Tasked with protecting the external borders of the Schengen area, he is keenly aware of just how fragile the zone has become as a result of the refugee crisis.

Fabrice Leggeri knows his borders. He headed a unit within the French Interior Ministry that dealt with cross-border traffic, and he helped draft the communique to the European Commission that recommended creating Frontex, the European Union’s external border agency. Since Leggeri took up his position as the head of Frontex in January 2015, Europe’s migrant crisis has taken on a whole new dimension. Millions of refugees fleeing war and poverty have flocked to the Continent, and their arrival has tested the very limits of one of the EU’s greatest achievements: its open borders. Leggeri knows the stakes are high: If his agency can’t manage to secure Europe’s outer borders, Schengen could collapse.

SPIEGEL: Mr. Leggeri, Turkey is seen as playing a crucial role in handling the refugee crisis. Is the government there doing enough to limit the influx of migrants to Europe?

Leggeri: No. Taking care of 2 million Syrian refugees is, of course, a burden for Turkey. I appreciate that. But if Ankara is going to demand sweeping concessions, such as a relaxation of visa requirements for its citizens, we Europeans should be able to expect more in return in the form of more stringent border controls.

SPIEGEL: As the head of the EU border agency Frontex, what do you have in mind?

Leggeri: Turkey should make life more difficult for the human-traffickers. These are organized criminals we’re talking about. The Turkish police have the responsibility and the opportunity to put them out of business. At the very least, we expect Turkey to provide us with information: How many refugees can we expect? And where are they going to arrive?

SPIEGEL: Once migrants are at sea, the Greek coast guard has no other choice but to bring them back to Greece.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Turkish-German Pact: EU Split by Merkel’s Refugee Plan

Posted By on February 13th, 2016

By Horand Knaup, Peter Müller, René Pfister and Christoph Schult

Angela Merkel has held six meetings with the Turkish government in the hopes of forging a solution to the refugee crisis. But with most of the leverage in Ankara, progress has been slow. Worse yet, Berlin’s plan has split the EU into two rival camps.

On a recent windy Saturday morning, António Rocha heads out to sea off the north end of the Greek island of Lesbos in accordance with his mission: securing the maritime border between Greece and Turkey. Rocha, a 52-year-old officer with the Portuguese coast guard, steers his ship, the Tejo, into the meter-high waves with the two 350-horsepower engines whining in protest. Rocha stands at the helm, legs spread wide for balance, and scans the sea for inflatable rafts full of refugees. “Only a lunatic would head out today,” Rocha says. Lunatics or, to be more precise, the desperate. And there are plenty of those these days.

Rocha and his three crewmembers have only been active in the area for a few weeks, patrolling on behalf of the European border protection agency Frontex, but the things they have seen in that short amount of time have already proven emotionally challenging. On one occasion, Rocha stopped a drastically overloaded inflatable raft with desperate mothers holding their babies over the gunwale so that they might be saved first.

One thing, though, that Rocha and his shipmates haven’t yet seen is a boat being turned back by the Turkish coast guard. “Sometimes they motor around the refugee rafts and tell them they should turn around,” says the Greek liaison officer onboard the Tejo. “But when nothing happens, the Turkish boats just leave.”

That isn’t good news for the German chancellor, who is heading to Brussels next Thursday to meet with her European partners and with Turkey to discuss possible solutions to the refugee crisis. Ankara is the most important building block in Angela Merkel’s strategy, which is why Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Dovutoglu has been invited to the summit of European leaders.

In the current situation, however, Merkel’s cards are not particularly promising. Since the beginning of the refugee crisis, Brussels has been operating under a new set of rules: Germany, with its power and money, is not able to determine policy on its own. Instead, Merkel is reliant on the understanding and goodwill of the rest of Europe.