KEVIN WILLIAMSON ON RAND PAUL: THE CAN-DO, MUSTN’T DO PRESIDENCY

The more hawkish wing of the Republican party and the conservative movement prefers a can-do presidency, vigorous and dynamic not only on matters of foreign policy and military affairs but domestically as well. The can-do models are Lincoln, Wilson, and FDR, which is not to say that these conservatives necessarily admire Wilsonian progressivism or the New Deal (though Conrad Black makes a persuasive case for Roosevelt), but rather that they desire to have a president who acts energetically across a broad range of issues. Of course they claim Reagan for their own. When it comes to Founding Fathers, the can-dos like Madison and Washington. They see the Constitution’s description of the president as commander-in-chief and its investing the executive with a broad role in foreign affairs as a warrant for action. If they were British, they’d be Tories.

The characteristic can-do vice is a sneaking envy of strongmen, but while their critics accuse them of suffering from Putin envy, what they really long for is a Churchill, though they’d take a de Gaulle in a pinch. Their characteristic virtue is having been fundamentally correct about the nature of our enemies in Nazi Germany, the Communist bloc, and the Islamic world, though in the case of Iraq their remedy exemplified another vice: an excess of optimism.

In the opposite corner are the more libertarian-leaning partisans of the mustn’t-do presidency, cautious and finicky about foreign entanglements and deeply suspicious of executive power at home. The mustn’t-do models are Cleveland, Coolidge, and Senator Robert Taft, which is not to say that they universally are admirers of the gold standard or are tempted toward mugwumpery, but that they desire to have a president who has a narrower conception of his role rather than a broader one. Of course they claim Reagan for their own. When it comes to the Founding Fathers, the mustn’t-dos like Jefferson and Paine. They see the Constitution’s separation of powers, the Tenth Amendment, and the congressional role in treaties and war declarations as limitations on government generally and on the president particularly. If they were British, they’d be Whigs.

The characteristic mustn’t-do vice is passivity, but while their critics accuse them of being Pollyanna pacifists, what they really long for is Senator Taft, though in a pinch they’d take George W. Bush before he discovered the allure of nation-building. Their characteristic virtue is having been correct about the metastatic nature of what Eisenhower called the military-industrial complex and about the limited, uncertain prospects of the so-called democracy project in the Middle East, though in the case of Iraq their position exemplified another vice: a weakness for counterfactual just-so stories.

The main internal housekeeping project of the can-do wing is, at the moment, working to ensure that Senator Rand Paul, the most prominent mustn’t-doer on the scene, does not become the Republican nominee in 2016. They point to his not entirely consistent or coherent approach to Vladimir Putin and, especially, to the Islamic State as evidence that his mustn’t-doism would undermine the American position by failing to offer a credible political framework for American leadership in the world — the current absence of which they blame for the anarchic Middle East and resurgent Russian imperialism.

STOP AND SEIZE ?Aggressive Police Take Hundreds of Millions of Dollars From Motorists Not Charged With Crimes….Must read

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2014/09/06/stop-and-seize/

After the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the government called on police to become the eyes and ears of homeland security on America’s highways.

Local officers, county deputies and state troopers were encouraged to act more aggressively in searching for suspicious people, drugs and other contraband. The departments of Homeland Security and Justice spent millions on police training.

ABOVE: : Video images from YouTube, Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office and Seward County Sheriff’s Office.
The effort succeeded, but it had an impact that has been largely hidden from public view: the spread of an aggressive brand of policing that has spurred the seizure of hundreds of millions of dollars in cash from motorists and others not charged with crimes, a Washington Post investigation found. Thousands of people have been forced to fight legal battles that can last more than a year to get their money back.

Stop and Seize: In recent years, thousands of people have had cash confiscated by police without being charged with crimes. The Post looks at the police culture behind the seizures and the people who were forced to fight the government to get their money back.
Part 2: One training firm started a private intelligence-sharing network and helped shape law enforcement nationwide. (Coming Monday)
Part 3: Motorists caught up in the seizures talk about the experience and the legal battles that sometimes took more than a year. (Coming Tuesday)
Behind the rise in seizures is a little-known cottage industry of private police-training firms that teach the techniques of “highway interdiction” to departments across the country.

One of those firms created a private intelligence network known as Black Asphalt Electronic Networking & Notification System that enabled police nationwide to share detailed reports about American motorists — criminals and the innocent alike — including their Social Security numbers, addresses and identifying tattoos, as well as hunches about which drivers to stop.

Many of the reports have been funneled to federal agencies and fusion centers as part of the government’s burgeoning law enforcement intelligence systems — despite warnings from state and federal authorities that the information could violate privacy and constitutional protections.

A thriving subculture of road officers on the network now competes to see who can seize the most cash and contraband, describing their exploits in the network’s chat rooms and sharing “trophy shots” of money and drugs. Some police advocate highway interdiction as a way of raising revenue for cash-strapped municipalities.

DANIEL GREENFIELD: THE WEEK THAT WAS

Code Pink Takes Time Out from ISIS and Hamas to Support Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine

LEAVING TO LOVE BIG JIHAD

Israel was told not to take down Arafat or Hamas would take over. Now Israel is being warned that if it destroys Hamas, ISIS will take over…

And who is to say that ISIS is as extreme as it gets? Shouldn’t we be careful not to bomb ISIS too much or it will be replaced by an even more extreme group such as SuperJihad or “Behead Anyone Who Isn’t a Salafi”?

And if SuperJihad ever shows up, we’ll have to turn Gaza over to ISIS before you can say the Shahada six times fast so that it can bomb Tel Aviv before SuperJihad bombs Tel Aviv.
Learning to Love Our Terrorist Friends

PASTAPHOBIA

A protest held by refugees against “monotonous” Italian food was “excessive”, especially at a time when thousands of Italians go hungry, the president of a police organization told The Local.

“There are thousands of Italians living in poverty and who aren’t even eating one meal a day, let alone two or three,” he said.

For two days, a group of about 40 asylum-seekers staying at a refugee centre in the Veneto province of Belluno refused to eat the “pasta with tomato sauce, bread and eggs” meals they were given and called to be fed food from their own countries,

Muslim “Refugees” in Italy Reject Pasta, Demand Food from Own Countries

JOHN KERRY FOR CALIPH

Kerry to NATO: Obama Strategy Becoming Clearer Day by Day

Muslim Beheader of 82-Year-Old UK Woman Grew Beard, Began Praying

Kerry: Real Face of Islam is Health Care Not Beheadings

Who Lost Britain? 14 Culprits By Robert Spencer ****

With 600 [2] Muslims from the United Kingdom now making up over twenty-five percent [3] of the foreign jihadists fighting for the Islamic State, and many vowing to return and wage jihad at home, it is not reckless to predict that Britain’s future is dark. For those 600 are just the tip of the iceberg of an untold number of jihad supporters and sympathizers in the country now. Indeed, there are twice as many [4] British Muslims fighting for the Islamic State as there are in the British armed forces. And with unrestricted immigration policies, more are arriving all the time.

So it must be asked: who lost Britain?
1-3. Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, and David Cameron.

In December 2010 [5] there were an estimated 2,869,000 Muslims in Britain – up from 1,647,000 in 2001. That’s an increase of 74 percent. This is the direct result of the immigration policies implemented and pursued by three successive British prime ministers, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown and David Cameron.

Those immigration policies were fueled in part by the naïve and roseate view of Islam that Blair energetically proffered, saying in 2007 [6] that “to me, the most remarkable thing about the Koran is how progressive it is,” and in 2008 [7]: “I regularly read the Koran, practically every day,” and the Islamic prophet Muhammad had been “an enormously civilizing force.” The immigrants were considered to be bringing that “enormously civilizing force” to Britain, and consequently no attempt was made to determine whether any of them held jihadist sentiments or believed that Islamic law should supplant British law.

Only now that a significant number of those immigrants and their children are waging jihad for the Islamic State is Cameron is swinging into action. (It is, of course, far too late: in December 2010, when a poll revealed [8] that 40% of Muslims in Britain wanted Sharia and 33% supported killing for Islam, the government did nothing.) Last week he proposed, according to the BBC [9], that legislation be “drawn up to give the police statutory powers to confiscate the passports of suspect terrorists at UK borders.” But apparently aware that there was hardly any chance that British jihadis would not be allowed back into the country, at the same time he proposed that returning jihad terrorists be “required to undergo de-radicalisation programmes.” Such programs have failed spectacularly [10] to turn jihadis away from jihad in Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, but maybe the British have a magic key that will make them succeed.

“MODERATE” SAUDI ARABIA: CHURCH RAIDED AND 27 CHRISTIANS ARRESTED: PATRICK POOLE

EXCLUSIVE: Saudis Raid House Church, Arrest 27 Christians

Arabic media reports indicate that Saudi authorities raided a house church in Khafji province, arresting 27 men, women and children. The raid was conducted by the Saudi Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, according to reports.

Khafji was the site of the first major ground engagement of the 1991 Gulf War.

The raid is another part of an ongoing harassment campaign directed at Christians at the exact same time that the Saudi Kingdom is making a major “interfaith outreach” push internationally.

Here is an Arabic report that appeared late yesterday on Twitter:

Another report appears to show pictures of the Saudi raid:

A 2010 Reuters report observes the plight of Christians in the Gulf states and the Arabian Peninsula:

At least 3.5 million Christians of all denominations live in the Gulf Arab region, the birthplace of Islam and home to some of the most conservative Arab Muslim societies in the world. The freedom to practice Christianity — or any religion other than Islam — is not always a given in the Gulf and varies from country to country. Saudi Arabia, which applies an austere form of Sunni Islam, has by far the tightest restrictions.

As the Islamic State engages in widespread religious cleansing in Iraq and Syria of ancient Christian communities, it might be fair to ask whether the difference between Wahhabis and the Islamic State is merely of degree and not kind.

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL: MICHAEL ORDMAN

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com
http://blogs.jpost.com/users/just-look-us-now

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Proton beam destroys tumors. Israel’s Hil Applied Medical has patented lasers that perform safer, focused radiation cancer therapy using positively charged ions (protons). Hil’s revolutionary reduced-size, economical lasers can bring proton therapy to many of the 300,000 US cancer patients and others who can benefit from it.
http://hilappliedmedical.com/?p=298

Laser treatment for nail fungus. (Thanks to Atid-EDI) Gentle Pro YAG lasers from Israel’s Syneron Medical can now treat onychomycosis (nail fungus) – affecting 10-12% of the population and especially dangerous for diabetics. Laser heat is safer than oral alternatives and more effective than topical treatments (i.e. creams). Syneron has also developed a laser that can remove tattoos.
http://investors.syneron.com/2014-08-14-Syneron-Medical-Introduces-New-FDA-Cleared-5mm-Spot-Size-for-Treatment-of-Onychomycosis

Acne treatment knocks spots off alternatives. As Israel’s Foamix prepares to go public, enter Phase III trials and get FDA approval, the latest results of its acne treatment are impressive; 72% reduction in pimples for 150 patients with moderate to severe acne during the 12-week treatment period; and zero side effects.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-firms-novel-acne-treatment-foams-up-to-ipo/

Good trial results for new asthma treatment. Israel’s Teva reported that Phase III trial results for its asthma treatment reslizumab reduced the frequency of attacks by 50 – 60% compared to placebo.
http://www.globes.co.il/en/article-teva-reports-positive-phase-iii-asthma-drug-results-1000968700

Asthmatics need to check Vitamin D levels. A study of 21,000 Israeli asthmatics showed that those with a Vitamin D deficiency were 25 percent more likely to have an asthmatic attack than those with normal levels. Vitamin D is known to play a role in regulating the immune system.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/plenty-of-sunshine-could-help-against-asthma-israeli-study-shows/

Israeli agro-tech is a game-changer for Virginia. Ralph Robbins, executive director of the Virginia Israel Advisory Board (VIAB) has developed the model “Ecosystem for Success” in order to promote Israeli companies that can bring benefits to the agriculture of the US State of Virginia.
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/israeli-agrotech-game-changer-for-virginia/

Israel celebrates “International Bat Night”. Israel hosts and protects 33 species of bat – they are important pollinators and prey on insects, especially mosquitoes. Bat Night has taken place every year since 1997 in more than 30 countries. Lectures and tours take place across Israel.
http://www.jpost.com/Not-Just-News/Israelis-to-celebrate-International-Bat-Night-on-Thursday-evening-372534

Israel’s sea turtles are hatching. Some 50 days after mother turtles laid their eggs in Israeli beaches, newborn sea turtles are starting to make their way “home,” to the sea. The Israel Nature and Parks Authority tries to ensure that there are clear paths to the sea for the newly hatched sea turtles.
http://www.sviva.gov.il/English/ResourcesandServices/NewsAndEvents/NewsAndMessageDover/Pages/2014/8%20Aug/In-Race-to-Survive-Newborn-Sea-Turtles-Begin-Long-Trek-to-Sea.aspx

IsraAid helps clear up after Washington wildfire. (Thanks to Nevet – www.broaderview.org) Despite the war back home, workers from the Israel Forum for International Humanitarian Aid (IsraAid), spent two weeks helping clean up after the destruction from the single biggest wildfire in Washington State’s history.
http://jewishsound.org/despite-a-war-back-home-israelis-feel-called-to-help-in-pateros/

The first globally-sustainable Israeli company. Israeli company Salt of the Earth is one of only 36 companies worldwide – and the first Israeli company – to pass GRI materiality matters check. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) encourages organizations to contribute to sustainable development.​
http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/news-releases/salt-of-the-earth-reveals-new-gri-sustainability-report-273722021.html https://www.globalreporting.org/Information/about-gri/Pages/default.aspx

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Israel completes 11.6km tunnel. Israel’s longest tunnel has been completed after 22 months of work. The tunnel forms part of the 57km (28 minutes) Jerusalem Tel Aviv rail link via Ben Gurion airport. A new station is under construction at the western entrance to Jerusalem. The entire project costs NIS 7 billion.
http://www.globes.co.il/en/article-work-completed-on-israels-longest-tunnel-1000966830

Speech analysis can profile personality. Ben Gurion University researchers have developed a new computer-based personality profiling methodology that can decipher the actual feelings of an individual. When used to analyze speeches of Presidents Obama and Putin it produced some interesting assessments.
http://nocamels.com/2014/08/putin-is-a-romantic-loner-and-obama-mistrustful-according-to-israeli-personality-algorithm/ http://in.bgu.ac.il/en/Pages/news/profile_personalities.aspx

Samsung enhances HD TVs using Israeli technology. Samsung has selected the Adaptive Video Accelerator (AVA) from Israel’s Giraffic to provide Internet video streaming for its smart High Definition TVs. Giraffic’s AVA software virtually eliminates the need for re-buffering, to provide reliable, high quality, video download.
http://www.giraffic.com/press-releases/giraffic-enables-adaptive-video-accelerator-technology-samsung-smart-tvs/

Backup your smartphone while it’s re-charging. (Thanks to Atid-EDI) Don’t worry if you lose or break your smartphone. With bleep-Smart from Israeli start-up Musers, your data is backed up every time you charge the phone’s battery. Contacts, history, pictures, videos, WhatsApp – it’s all saved to a secure memory stick.
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/bleep-smart-charging-cable-that-backs-up-your-data

THE EPA COULD DECIDE THAT YOUR SWIMMING POOL IS “WETLAND”….

http://www.cfact.org/about/

Does EPA hope to regulate your property?

When CFACT reported on the wetlands maps Congressman Lamar Smith obtained from the EPA, many asked us to post all of the maps. People want to know how EPA’s proposed redefinition of the “waters of the United States” (WOTUS) might impact them.

Here they are.

Check out all ten of EPA’s regional U.S. wetlands maps at CFACT.org.

EPA’s new WOTUS rule may purport to be about water, but people are wising up the the fact that it’s really about controlling land.

Is the United States uderregulated?

The Obama administration thinks so.

The deadline to speak up about EPA’s WOTUS land grab is October 20th. http://cfact.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=87b74a936c723115dfa298cf3&id=1f1ba78898&e=552053f981

Do you know anyone who still needs to sign CFACT’s statement to EPA?

Please forward this email to them.

JOHN COHN,M.D.: A MEDICAL MISSION TO ISRAEL….SEE NOTE

DR. COHN IS AN E-PAL -A PHYSICIAN AND ARTICULATE WRITER WHOSE LETTERS TO THE EDITOR NEVER FAIL TO PACK A SERIOUS PUNCH…..PLEASE READ THIS AND CIRCULATE IT….RSK

Friends,

Like you, I am disturbed by the senseless violence in Israel and the surrounding Middle East, which did not start in June but which has been going on for years.

Especially troubling is the abuse of civilian populations for political goals. No doubt the people of Gaza have suffered, as have Israelis. But the people of Gaza have for the most part been harmed by leaders who have used them as human shields, squandering humanitarian aid on weapons, attack tunnels and fortifications.

As a physician I am particularly bothered by the use of hospitals as military command posts as occurred in Gaza. I have also been distressed by the politicization of medical science for political means, which reached a new low with “An open letter for the people in Gaza” that The Lancet published online on July 22. That letter can be found here.

This resulted in an outpouring of articulate and well-supported responses by physicians, who were appalled by The Lancet’s substitution of distortion and bias for science. This included a response by the Israel Medical Association, published by The Lancet and written by Leonid Eidelman and Arnon Afek. In a single page they pointed out so much of what was right with Israel but was being missed by not just the original letter’s authors, but by the mainstream media and their readers. A copy of that letter is attached.

But one or even a handful of letters is not enough of a response. What is needed is to bring physicians and other healthcare providers to Israel so they can see see the facts on the ground for themselves. This will enable them to better participate in the debate and engage with their colleagues, having been there and seen for themselves what is really taking place.

Attached is a brochure outlining in more detail a unique educational medical mission planned for five days in late October early November. If you are a physician or other healthcare provider, I hope you will come to Jerusalem on October 31 and join us. Please share this with your friends and colleagues as well.

John R. Cohn, M.D.
Professor of Medicine & Pediatrics
Thomas Jefferson University & Hospitals

Asthma Allergy & Pulmonary Associates
1015 Chestnut Street
Suite 1300
Philadelphia, PA 19107

Louis Rene Beres and Leon Edney : A Sea Based Nuclear Deterrence for Israel

A stealthy submarine force would ensure an enemy strike would be suicidal

For Israel, an overriding long-term security requirement must be to deter future attacks with weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by enemy states, especially Iran. Israel will need to fashion a comprehensive and calibrated strategic doctrine that identifies and correlates all available options (deterrence, pre-emption, active defense, strategic targeting and military use of nuclear weapons) with enumerated national-survival goals.

The challenges of an Israeli nuclear-deterrence posture needs discussion, with special reference to twin requirements of perceived ability and perceived willingness. Before any rational adversary could be deterred by an Israeli nuclear threat, that enemy would first need to believe that Israel had both the capacity to launch a nuclear-weapons response for any WMD aggression, and also the will to take such an action. Where it is facing a prospectively irrational strategic enemy, Israel’s deterrence posture would then need to be based upon credible pre-emptive capabilities.

Since its statehood was formally established following World War II, Israel has experienced many periods of intensive rocket and mortar attacks launched intentionally against its cities. In response, with significant American financial support, Israel developed and deployed the Iron Dome system. David’s Sling would defend against the midrange rocket and missile threat; Arrow, against the longer-range, higher-lethality WMD ballistic-missile threat.

During Operation Protective Edge, Iron Dome performed with distinction. In this Gaza War conflict, a less than 100 percent reliability of intercept was judged acceptable. Still, nothing less than a 100 percent reliability of intercept could be tolerable when facing enemy nuclear missiles. The prospective task for Arrow, in any possible future encounters with long-range Iranian ballistic missiles, would be far more complex and demanding.

Israel has always understood the critical need to develop a “great equalizer,” which became its undisclosed nuclear-weapons posture. Doctrinally, Israel has plausibly rejected any notions of nuclear war-fighting; nonetheless, there are still some circumstances where an Israeli nuclear response could be the sole rational option. In any event, nuclear exchanges between Israel and particular enemies could fall under the following comprehensive possibilities: First, enemy-state first strikes launched against Israel would not destroy Israel’s second-strike nuclear capability; second, enemy-state retaliations for an Israeli conventional pre-emption would not destroy Israel’s nuclear counterretaliatory capability; three, conventional Israeli pre-emptive strikes would not destroy enemy-state second-strike nuclear capability; and fourth, Israeli retaliations for enemy-state conventional first strikes would not destroy enemy-state nuclear counterretaliatory capability.

JACK ENGELHARD: HURRY! THERE’S STILL TIME TO BE ANTI-SEMITIC

To be an anti-Semite must be wonderful, a truly wonderful life. Hating the Jewish people answers everything.

What a terrific shortcut to whatever troubles you. You’re stopped for drunk driving? Do what Mel Gibson did. Blame the Jews.

Your talentless career is on freefall and you need something to keep your name in the news? Do the Russell Brand shtick and blast away against Israel.

You’re a fading rock star with nothing left to sing, join the Boycott movement, as did Rogers Waters to win new fans.

You’re a failed president who needs to make amends, do the Jimmy Carter shuffle and dance with the people who brought on 9/11.

Nobody pays attention to anything you say because you’re a proven fool, do like Geraldo Rivera and give terrorists every benefit of the doubt.

You’re a Jewish comedian who needs to show the campus crowd that he is not TOO Jewish, take it from Jon Stewart that Israel is always open to defamatory wisecracks.

Satchel Paige warned, “Don’t look back. Something might be gaining on you.”
You’re part of the crowd that marches on campus and around the world shouting, “Jews to the gas” – okay.