POLITICS Comments turned off

The Democratic Crack-Up Barack Obama’s political legacy may be the dismantling of the party’s center. By Kimberley A. Strassel

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

The nation tuned in to Round Six of the Republican debate mashup Thursday night, and the media is busy micro-covering every last rift between the GOP candidates. In the process reporters are ignoring the far more interesting party crackup going on.

You might not know it, but the Democratic Party is in the middle of an internecine battle that potentially dwarfs that of conservatives. On one side is a real but weakened mainstream Democratic movement that has its roots in Clinton centrism. On the other is a powerful, ascendant wing of impatient and slightly unhinged progressive activists. This split has been building for years, but The Donald has been so entertaining that few have noticed.

Now it’s getting hard to ignore. Polls this week show Bernie Sanders tying or beating Hillary Clinton in Iowa and New Hampshire. Put another way, a self-declared socialist, a man who makes many think of their crazy uncle Bob, is beating a woman who spent eight years planning this run, who is swimming in money, and who oversees the most powerful political machine in operation.

Some of Mrs. Clinton’s struggles are self-imposed. She’s a real-world, political version of Pig-Pen, trailing along her own cloud of scandal dust. Even Democrats who like her don’t trust her. And a lot of voters are weary or unimpressed by the Clinton name. For all the Democratic establishment’s attempts to anoint Mrs. Clinton—to shield her from debates and ignore her liabilities—the rank and file aren’t content to have their nominee dictated.

POLITICS Comments turned off

Amy Harder and Beth Reinhard: Republican Presidential Field Tilts Rightward on Climate Change Marco Rubio faces attacks over past support for cap-and-trade, and several rivals have moved to the right on climate change

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

Shortly after a conservative website on Wednesday posted 2008 footage of Sen. Marco Rubio backing a cap-and-trade program to combat climate change, his campaign roared back with a counterattack that included an entire web page aimed at debunking the video.

Mr. Rubio’s muscular response revealed how toxic the issue of climate change has become in the Republican Party under President Barack Obama, who has sought to make reducing carbon emissions to alleviate global warming one of his signature accomplishments.

As speaker of the Florida House, Mr. Rubio did vote for a 2008 bill authorizing the state to come up with rules for a cap-and-trade plan, though he raised questions about its cost and effectiveness. A press release from the House Majority Office at the time described the bill as a “responsible response to concerns about global climate change.”

But since running for U.S. Senate in 2010 as the conservative alternative to then-Gov. Charlie Crist, Mr. Rubio has questioned whether climate change is man-made, and opposed potential remedies like cap-and-trade that he says would hurt the economy.

Shifts by Mr. Rubio and some of his rivals on the issue recall an inconvenient past that many in the GOP would like to forget: Republicans, not Democrats, first championed market-based systems to control pollution, as a way to avoid more direct regulation.

Until 2008, many Republicans, including then-presidential nominee John McCain, supported cap-and-trade to address climate change. Once Mr. Obama won the White House, Republicans swiftly unified against nearly all of his initiatives, including a cap-and-trade bill that would have set limits on carbon emissions and allowed companies to trade pollution credits to comply.

BOOKS Comments turned off

References to Islam in School Textbooks Stir Up a Fight Parents object to what they see as an overly benign depiction of the religion By Cameron McWhirter

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

Language about Islamic history in school textbooks is spurring battles across the nation, with some parents’ groups and lawmakers objecting to what they see as an overly benign portrayal of the religion’s spread and its teachings.

Following recent attacks in the U.S. and abroad by terrorists who claim to espouse Islamic beliefs, more American parent groups have turned attention to what children are taught about the religion. Muslims and their supporters say the opposition to the textbooks amounts to fear-mongering and presents a distorted view of their faith.

Kristen Amundson, executive director of the National Association of State Boards of Education, which represents U.S. state and territorial education boards, said she expects to see more parents pushing to change textbooks and curriculum this year.

“We will see a raft of it,” she said. “It is going to be coming before local boards, state boards and legislatures.”

A bill in Tennessee, backed by a leading Republican legislator, is expected to be the focus of heated debate in that state’s legislative session, which started this past week. The bill, introduced by Rep. Sheila Butt, seeks to exclude any “religious doctrine,” not just Islam, from middle-school textbooks.

Ms. Butt, an author of Christian books, said in an email that she wrote the bill after complaints from “constituents who realized that some religions were more heavily weighted in the standards and that doctrine was being taught to Junior High students.” Republican Gov. Bill Haslam has said the bill is too broad, but Candice McQueen, the state’s education commissioner, has sped up reviews of social-studies standards following the criticism.

Similar battles have gone before state education boards in Texas and Alabama, and there were calls throughout 2015 to revise textbooks in school districts in states including California, Wisconsin and Massachusetts. A group called Truth in Texas Textbooks Coalition won substantial changes—many of them regarding descriptions of Islam—from that state’s board of education in 2014, according to the group’s chairman, Roy White.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Iran Nuclear Deal Set to Take Effect Secretary of State Kerry to mark expected ‘implementation day’ in Vienna on Saturday: Jay Solomon

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

The landmark Iranian nuclear deal will go into effect this weekend, Western and Iranian officials said, triggering the lifting of sanctions and reshaping the political and economic landscape in unpredictable ways across the Mideast and beyond.

The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog agency in Vienna was expected to certify by Saturday that Tehran has met its commitments under the July accord with global powers to significantly scale back its nuclear program, according to these officials.

In return, most Western sanctions on Iran will start to be repealed, sending tens of billions of dollars in frozen Iranian oil money back to Tehran and opening world markets to hundreds of thousands of barrels of Iranian petroleum.

The White House says the implementation of the agreement would be a major advance in the U.S. campaign to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. But its also poses major security and diplomatic risks for the U.S. and its close Mideast allies, such as Israel, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, according to regional diplomats and analysts.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

The Terrorists Freed by Obama The president has misled the American people about the detainees released from Guantanamo: Dozens are jihadists ready to kill. By Stephen F. Hayes and Thomas Joscelyn

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

The Obama administration in recent days has proclaimed a “milestone” in its efforts to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, after achieving its long-held goal of reducing the remaining population to fewer than 100 detainees. With the expedited release this month of 14 detainees, the total now stands at 93.

This is nothing to celebrate.

In reducing these numbers, the White House has freed dangerous terrorists and set aside military and intelligence assessments warning about the risks of doing so. The Obama administration has deceived recipient countries about the threats posed by the jihadists they’ve accepted. And President Obama has repeatedly misled the American people about Guantanamo, the detainees held there, and the consequences of releasing them.

On Jan. 6, as part of the Obama administration’s accelerated Guantanamo process, Mahmmoud Omar Mohammed Bin Atef was transferred to Ghana, along with another detainee named Khalid Mohammed Salih al Dhuby. Ghana’s government portrayed the deal as an act of “humanitarian assistance,” likening the Yemeni men to nonthreatening refugees from Rwanda and Syria, noting that they “were detained in Guantanamo but have been cleared of any involvement in terrorist activities, and are being released.”

That description isn’t true for either of the men. Mr. Atef, in particular, is a cause for concern. Long before his transfer, the intelligence analysts at Joint Task Force Guantanamo (JTF-GTMO) assessed him as a “high risk” and “likely to pose a threat to the US, its interests and allies.” (The JTF-GTMO threat assessments of 760 Guantanamo detainees, many written in 2008, were posted online in 2011 by WikiLeaks.) It is easy to understand the analysts’ worry about Mr. Atef. He was, they said, “a fighter in Usama bin Laden’s former 55th Arab Brigade and is an admitted member of the Taliban.” He trained at al Farouq, the infamous al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan, “participated in hostilities against US and Coalition forces, and continues to demonstrate his support of UBL and extremism.”

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Muslim head of J Street U urges pro-Israel organizations to fight Israel’s “Occupation” in order to gain allies, in an op-ed at the JTA. By: Lori Lowenthal Marcus

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

Yes, it’s now gotten to the point where the Muslim student president of the self-described “pro-Israel” J Street U is given the forum of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency to tell Jews to be better pro-Israel advocates by fighting Israel’s “Occupation.”

J Street U gave this University of Maryland student a megaphone which she’s using to attack Israel, and now she’s being given a “Jewish” media outlet to amplify her anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian Arab message.

Amna Farooqi, the J Street U president, seized upon another editorial from another leader of a Jewish organization brought to you by the JTA, David Bernstein of the Jewish Council on Public Affairs.

Bernstein, in turn, was warning Jewish Americans that in order to defeat the BDS (Boycott of, Divestment from and Sanctions against Israel) Movement, Jews should start developing partnerships with various social justice groups “on the mainstream left.”

Bernstein wrote that the BDS movement is teaming up with other “social justice” organizations to together fight against Israel, and so he urged pro-Israel folks to ape this coalition building and thereby fight this “intersectionality” of “other oppressed groups” making alliances with anti-Israel groups.

Farooqi added the next step, which is that the best thing pro-Israel groups can do to defeat this intersectionality dilemma would be to join up with other groups opposing…what, other anti-Israel groups? Nope. Maybe pro-Israel groups should join together with organizations fighting against ISIS? Nope. How about suggesting pro-Israel groups create a coalition with organizations fighting for human rights for persecuted Christians in the Middle East? Nope.

Farooqi suggests the coalition pro-Israel groups should join are those progressives who are attacking Israel for engaging in the “Occupation” of Palestinian Arab land. No joke.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

No more martyrs funerals A plan to stop Arab terrorism. Dr. Moshe Dann

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

According to a survey conducted for Walla by Prof. Camil Fuchs of “Panel Project Hamidgam” and the statistician Yosef Miklada of the STATNET research institute, releasedon Friday, 71% of Israelis believe the government has failed in its efforts to stop Arab terrorism; add the 9% who weren’t sure and it rises to 80%. That is a clear vote of no-confidence.

Moreover, Israeli government officials agree; they announced that they cannot stop Arab terrorism. We can expect, therefore, that more Jews will be murdered and maimed.

Excuses from politicians, police and IDF commanders are pathetic. Waiting for the next tragedy to happen is unacceptable. Neutralizing a terrorist after they have launched an attack is not sufficient. Putting barriers at bus stops offers barely minimal protection. Cameras on the street only help to identify terrorists after an attack. More police on the street is reassuring but doesn’t work.

The only way to stop homicidal jihadists is to create disincentives, making the price that they will pay – in their minds – unacceptable. If they are intent in becoming “holy martyrs,” however, dying in their attack serves their goal of killing “infidels.”

BOOKS Comments turned off

The Obama administration’s most covert war by Caroline Glick

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

Over the past several weeks, we have learned that the Obama administration believes it is at war with Israel. The war is not a shooting war, but a political war. Its goal is to bring the government to its knees to the point where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu loses power or begs Obama and his advisers to shepherd Israel through a “peace process” in which Israel will renounce its rights to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria.

One component of this war is espionage. Last month The Wall Street Journal reported that Israel is a top target for American espionage.

The other component of the administration’s war against Israel is political subversion. Over the past week, the administration has campaigned against the NGO bill sponsored by Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked. If the bill, which was approved by the government, becomes law, it will require political NGOs that are principally financed by foreign governments to identify as foreign agents in their official communications and interactions.

Last week, State Department spokesman James Kirby lambasted the bill at an official briefing. Among other things, Kirby rejected Shaked’s claim that her bill is less restrictive than the US’s own Foreign Agents Registration Act. Kirby offered no substantiation of his claim.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

America’s sorry state by Ruthie Blum

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

Ruthie Blum is the web editor of The Algemeiner (algemeiner.com).

A few hours before U.S. President Barack Obama delivered his last State of the Union address on Tuesday evening, American sailors were captured and detained at sea by the Iranian navy.

Literally forced to their knees, nine men and one woman were held until the following day, when Tehran decided to release them, after determining that their boats’ GPS had led them astray. Had the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy reached a different conclusion, the U.S. “Marines,” as Iran referred to them, would have met a far more unpleasant fate.

While still under Islamic interrogation on the floor of an Iranian vessel, the 10 Americans were unable to listen to Obama’s speech to the nation from the podium of Congress.

This is just as well.

The last thing you’d want in such a situation is to hear the commander-in-chief of your armed forces not even mention it when the topic of Iran came up. Indeed, not even refer to it at all.

What rang loud and clear to the rest of the world who actually watched the speech on television — particularly the ayatollahs — was the president’s utter capitulation to the literal and figurative hostage-takers in the Middle East.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

High return on US investment in Israel Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger

Posted By on January 16th, 2016

The annual US investment in Israel – erroneously defined as “foreign aid” – has yielded one of the highest rates of return on US investments overseas. Israel is no longer a supplicant, transforming itself from a national security and economic consumer to a national security and economic producer, generating substantial dividends, which exceed the annual investment by its lead investor, the US.

US national and homeland security and commercial interests have derived significant benefits from the special US-Israel cooperative alliance, which has evolved into a unique, mutually-beneficial, two-way-street, win-win relationship, transcending the tension between President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu, rising above 68-year-old US-Israel disagreements over the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Palestinian issue.

A case in point is the intensified cooperation between the air forces of both countries, as institutionalized by an unprecedented June 2015 strategic agreement, which established twelve teams of officers, codifying a widening range of joint annual agenda: operations, battle tactics, training, maintenance, repairs, airborne medicine, flight safety, etc., in the face of mutual threats, joint interests and constrained budgets.

F or example, in 2016, US combat pilots benefit uniquely during joint drills with their Israeli colleagues. The latter always fly in a “do-or-die” state of mind – a result of Israel’s narrow geographic waistline in a violently unpredictable neighborhood – which generates more daring and innovative maneuvers, shared with their US colleagues. Recently, Israel’s air force developed a ground-breaking method of identifying, repairing and preempting cracks in old combat planes, such as the F-16, promptly shared with the US Air Force and manufacturer. Instead of grounding the planes for six months and preoccupying hundreds of mechanics, the Israeli-developed system – based on a baby-viewing ultrasound device – requires two weeks and only a few mechanics, yielding significant economic and national security benefits.