The shameful silence on the Taliban’s war on women Why Western progressives are so unwilling to criticise Islamic tyranny. Brendan O’Neill

https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/01/08/the-shameful-silence-on-the-talibans-war-on-women/

Two images of men are seared into my mind from the month of December. In the first, brave lads in Afghanistan, about to sit a university exam, get out of their seats, pick up their exam papers, and leave. They were protesting against the Taliban’s obscene ban on women attending university. It was a moving act of solidarity, a courageous display of moral conscience in a nation in which you can be severely punished for doing such a thing. The men jeopardised their education to take a stand against the vile misogyny of their government.

In the second image, a row of men in Holyrood, the Scottish parliament, applaud as Nicola Sturgeon’s gender-ID bill is passed. The men look nothing like our modestly dressed heroes in Afghanistan. Their attire is eccentric. They have long, strangely coloured hair. They don’t even think of themselves as men – they claim to be women. And their gesture was about as far from an act of solidarity with women as it is possible to get. They were cheering the passing of a bill that will make it ridiculously easy for a man to be legally recognised as a woman. Where those valiant Afghans were fighting for the right of women to enter into the sphere of education, the grinning trans activists in Holyrood were fighting for the right of men to enter into women-only spaces. The former want women’s rights expanded; the latter want them shrunk.

Nothing better captures the moral degeneracy of the modern West than the contrast between these two events last month. It was nothing short of despicable that as women were violently cast out of universities in Afghanistan, reduced to second-class citizens in the most brutal fashion, the issue that was occupying the minds of the supposedly virtuous here in the UK was the right of men to say: ‘I’m a woman!’ Valorous men in Afghanistan put their necks on the line for a woman’s right to learn alongside men. Right-on, pronoun-declaring, vegan men in the West put nothing whatsoever on the line for a man’s right to get undressed alongside women.

There’s a last days of Rome feel to all this now. Only a society that had become utterly untethered from sense and reason could devote so much energy to the navel-gazing gender ideology.

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com 

  

You know the expression “one day at a time”? In Israel it applies to the unceasing and amazing daily advances in Medicine: treatments for cancer, essential tremors, burns, and dental implants, and fertility; Technology: quantum computers and new facilities to convert waste into hydrogen and bio-plastics, soil management, crop production and water purification.

All the aforementioned are shared with the rest of the world to ease the burdens of illness and want, and are brought to our attention one week at a time by Michael Ordman in this essential newsletter.

Happy New Year Israel! rsk

 

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Israelis live longer. Israelis have the world’s 10th highest life expectancy, according to the Worldometer’s Life Expectancy of the World Population – a project by NiceR that helps Americans access affordable prescription medications. The average Israeli life expectancy is 83.5 (82 for men and 85 for women). In 2020 it was 82.6
https://www.israel21c.org/israel-has-10th-highest-life-expectancy-in-world/
https://www.nicerx.com/best-healthcare-countries/ https://www.worldlifeexpectancy.com/israel-life-expectancy
 
Reprogramming the immune system of cancer patients. Scientists at Jerusalem’s Hadassah hospital and Bar-Ilan University have developed HBI0101- a CAR-T therapy for multiple myeloma and amyloidosis, benefiting over 90% of patients in trials. Los Angeles-based Immix BioPharma will commercialize HBI0101.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/after-demonstrating-57-remission-rate-israeli-immunotherapy-licensed-by-us-firm/  https://haematologica.org/article/view/haematol.2022.281628
 
Implants heal 3 times faster. Israel’s Magdent (see here previously) has received CE approval for its Miniaturized Electromagnetic Device (MED) that has been clinically proven to shorten the healing process after dental implants by up to 3 times. The device is being sold in Israel and the EU. FDA approval is being sought.
https://www.ourcrowd.com/companies/magdent  
 
Relieving migraines in the US. (TY OurCrowd) 2,500+ US physicians have prescribed the Nerivio migraine relief device from Israel’s Theranica, benefiting some 35,000 Americans with its neuromodulation technology.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/us-doctors-offer-drug-free-migraine-relief-from-israeli-startup/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tbRRWVi1q4
 
From both sides now. Essential tremor usually affects hands and arms on both sides of the body – one side more than the other. Israel’s Insightec (see here previously) has now received FDA approval to treat the second side of the brains of patients in the US a minimum of nine months after treatment of the first side.
https://insightec.com/insightec-receives-fda-approval-to-treat-essential-tremor-patients-second-side-expanding-total-available-market-in-united-states/
 
New way to cure pulmonary embolisms. Doctors at Jerusalem’s Hadassah hospital removed a blood clot in an Israeli’s lung (pulmonary embolism) using, for the first time in Israel, a US-developed FlowTriever. It sucked out some of the patient’s blood, cleaned it of the clot and replaced it. No blood thinners, no invasive surgery.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/no-knife-procedure-to-avoid-some-open-heart-surgeries-is-now-in-israel/
 
4th child for ex-cancer patient. (TY UWI) Thanks to the Fertility Preservation Center at Sheba Medical Center, Ayelet, 35, gave birth to her fourth child, following years of aggressive cancer treatment for Hodgkin lymphoma. She is the first woman in the world to give birth to 4 children through cryopreservation of her eggs.
https://www.jns.org/four-little-miracles/
 
US approval for burns treatment. Israel’s Mediwound has received FDA approval for its NexoBrid pineapple plant-based burn treatment (see here previously) to be sold in the US to treat thermal burns. The US already has emergency stockpiles. NexoBrid is now approved for use in 44 countries, including the EU, Japan, and India.
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-fda-approves-mediwound-burn-treatment-1001434234
 
More approvals on the way. This article identifies three more Israeli companies that are expected to receive FDA approval for treatments in 2023. They are Gamida Cell (Omidubicel / NiCord – bone marrow transplants); Protalix (PRX-102 – Fabry disease); and BioLineRX (BL-8040 / Motixafortide – multiple myeloma).
https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-four-israeli-cos-expect-fda-approvals-in-2023-1001434199
 
Lower cost of prescription medicines. The maximum prices for dispensed medicines in Israel are to fall by an average of nearly 7.5%. Israel’s prescription prices are based on the lowest that the medicines cost in Europe on Jan 1st. Israelis then only pay 15% of that price – the remainder being paid by Israel’s health companies.
https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-725994
 
Training medics in Ethiopia. A team from Magen David (MDA) and three Israeli hospitals are currently in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia training doctors and nurses in the treatment of trauma. In a separate mission, Professor Hanoch Kashtan and his Assuta Ashdod team have been training surgeons and nurses, in northern Ethiopia.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/365142  https://www.jpost.com/health-and-wellness/article-726005
 
1.3 million calls to MDA. During 2022 Magen David Adom EMTs and paramedics attended over 1.3 million emergencies from nearly 200 stations. The call centers received on average one call every 10.8 seconds. MDA’s 31,600 staff include nearly 14,600 youth volunteers. https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/365150
 

January 6: A Day That Will Live in Alchemy In a feat of political sorcery—fueled by lies, cover-ups, and careerism—the Biden regime has transformed an unruly, four-hour protest into an act of domestic terror. By Julie Kelly

https://amgreatness.com/2023/01/05/january-6-a-day-that-will-live-in-alchemy/

A few weeks before Christmas, federal authorities arrested a Washington state couple for their participation in the Capitol protest on January 6, 2021.

The FBI investigated Scott and Holly Christensen for more than 14 months; agents interrogated coworkers, scoured social media accounts, reviewed hours of security video from inside the Capitol building and body cam footage from law enforcement, and issued a search warrant to confirm the couple’s whereabouts that day. 

“According to records obtained through legal process served on AT&T, cellphones associated with [the Christensens] were identified as having utilized a cell site consistent with providing service to a geographic area that included the interior of the United States Capitol building, on January 6, 2021, from 2:43 EST to 3:51 EST. AT&T records confirm that both devices belong to Scott CHRISTENSEN of Puyallup, Washington,” an unidentified agent on the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force wrote in a November 2022 criminal complaint.

So, what exactly did these alleged “domestic terrorists” do? They entered the Capitol through open doors as police officers stood by. Carrying no weapons, the couple took photos inside the Rotunda and wandered through some hallways; surveillance video shows Holly Christensen talking to a Capitol police officer. At another point, Scott Christensen chatted with a D.C. Metro police officer, a conversation captured on a body-worn camera. Police led the pair toward an exit door about 45 minutes later without arresting them.

For that uneventful jaunt through a public building that posed a threat to no one, the Christensens will now be destroyed by the Department of Justice, the federal court system, and the news media. Although both were charged with nonviolent misdemeanors—the same four offenses that represent the overwhelming majority of charges—journalists dishonestly portrayed the couple as traitors to their country. “Washington state couple to face Jan. 6 insurrection charges,” an Associated Press headline blared on December 12.

The media glosses over the recession calamity America faces By John Dale Dunn

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2023/01/the_media_glosses_over_the_recession_calamity_america_faces.html

Joe Biden’s media supporters keep assuring us that things are getting better with the economy. However, Joe Hoft, founder of Gateway Pundit, wrote on New Year’s Day of the reality—we are in a recession.  Stop drinking the “we’re OK” Kool-Aid. 

Biden, with help from the Federal Reserve and Congress, wiped out $10 trillion in American wealth in 2022.  This is record-breaking destruction.

Steve Bannon at War Room rolled out a Financial Times chart from earlier in the week showing what an outlier 2022 was when compared to prior years.

The US should be in the right upper quadrant of the chart, but 2022 put the US in the left lower quadrant.  The 2022 situation doesn’t even factor in the effect of the 1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill. The data point on the chart reflects the value of assets in stocks and bonds, with no effort to measure other assets like real estate.  It might be worse if other economic measures are considered. 

Just the other day, the St. Louis Federal Reserve Branch, relying on multiple indicators, declared that we have a recession. This information is no surprise, but it raises questions about what’s happening at the rest of the Fed’s branches.

Our Current House Fight Doesn’t Hold a Candle to the 1855-56 Speaker Vote By Chris Queen

https://pjmedia.com/columns/chris-queen/2023/01/05/our-current-speaker-fight-doesnt-hold-a-candle-to-the-1855-56-speaker-vote-n1658942

As I’m writing this, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) just lost his eighth vote to fulfill his lifelong dream of becoming speaker of the House. For all of the weeping and gnashing of teeth, the whole situation is kind of funny — as long as your name isn’t Kevin McCarthy.

It’s been a heck of a week for Congress, and it’s the first time in a century that the vote for speaker went beyond one ballot. But if these folks want to set a record, they have a long way to go.

A lot of the one-and-done nature of selecting a speaker over the past few decades has much to do with the dominant two-party system, but before the 1860s, multiple ballots were common. History shows us that eight votes for speaker went more rounds than this one has gone so far. Six contests went into the double digits, but the longest fight for speaker went a whopping 133 rounds and took about two months.

It all started with the disintegration of the Whig party in 1855, which left no single dominant party in the House. The country was starting to splinter over the issue of slavery, and factions in favor and against slavery in Congress tussled for control. When the House convened on Dec. 3, 1855, to choose a speaker, 21 candidates from several parties put their names into the mix.

Pro-slavery Rep. William Richardson (D-Ill.) was the early leader, but he couldn’t muster a majority of votes. Anti-slavery members began to coalesce around Rep. Nathaniel “Bobbin Boy” Banks (American Party-Mass.), a young teetotaler who started his career in the textile industry, where he earned his nickname.

(Side note: we don’t give our representatives nicknames like “Bobbin Boy” anymore. Maybe that’s the problem, and doing so would make them more humble.)

As the votes continued, Banks began to garner more votes than Richardson, but neither one of them could summon a majority of votes. By the 33rd vote, Banks had 100 of the 113 he needed to secure the speakership.

Time to stop fearing the Jew-Hating bullies and fight back! Diane Bederman

https://dianebederman.com/time-to-stop-fearing-the-jew-hating-bullies-and-fight-back-pikuach-nefesh/

I apologize for the length of this article. It is much longer than most of my blogs. I tried to reduce the words by editing the number of Jew hating incidents reported in 2021-the most recent year of hate statistics…

Time for the Jewish people to worry less about others, Tikkun Olam, and more about Pikuach nefesh: the preservation of human life that overrides virtually any other religious rule of Judaism. We have the moral and ethical right to protect ourselves including carrying weapons to prevent attacks on our people; especially in synagogue. Protecting life is above all other religious considerations.

Rabbi Hillel asked: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And being for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?” The time has come, dear Jews to be for ourselves.

We are living in a time where demonizing the Jews has become culturally acceptable. Jewish students are being bullied for being Jewish and for Israel being a white colonial oppressor against the oppressed Palestinians. Critical Race Theory is targeting Jews.  The time has come for the Jews to stand up to this endless industrialized bullying, this “coercive” aggression that is purpose-driven, not fear- or anger – driven. It’s the type of bullying that demonstrates an absence of ethics and compassion. It is bullying that has a tangible goal, carried out under intellectual control and will involve sufficient violence to achieve its goal, influencing social outcomes. This is the bullying of Jews taking place taking place in the 21st century and it’s time to fight back. Literally.

Although Jewish people constitute less than one-half of one percent of the world’s population, no other people have been as harassed, attacked, impugned more than the Jews from time immemorial. When it comes to the Jews and Israel, facts don’t matter. We live in a world where facts and critical thinking have been overtaken by feelings and wishful thinking.

West Point Begins Its Erasure of Robert E. Lee Alex Parker

https://redstate.com/alexparker/2023/01/05/west-point-begins-its-erasure-of-robert-e-lee-n683676

How much has America changed? Well, consider moves being made at West Point.

Over the summer, Washington’s Naming Commission — comprised of four civilians and as many retired military vets — came to final conclusions regarding seven different Department of Defense “assets.” In its report, the group recommended a renaming of sites honoring Confederate General Robert E. Lee, along with Generals P.G.T. Beauregard and William Hardee.

And over the holidays, the United States Military Academy at West Point began the process of purging Lee from its hallowed halls.

As relayed by the Daily News, Superintendent Lieutenant General Steve Gilland released a December 26th statement:

“During the holiday break, we will begin a multi-phased process, in accordance with Department of Defense directives, to remove, rename or modify assets and real property at the United States Military Academy and West Point installation that commemorate or memorialize the Confederacy or those who voluntarily served with the Confederacy.”

“We will conduct these actions with dignity and respect,” he added.

Included in the extraction: a 20-foot portrait of the man who served as superintendent of the United States Military Academy from 1852 to 1855. The 1931 painting of Lee has long towered over cadets in West Point’s Jefferson Hall library.

Monikers being stricken from the school:

Lee Road
Lee Gate
Lee Area Child Development Center
Lee Housing Area
Lee Barracks

A Few New Year’s Resolutions for the FBI Will Republican congressional leaders hold the leadership of the DOJ and FBI accountable?by John Nantz

https://www.frontpagemag.com/a-few-new-years-resolutions-for-the-fbi/

Last year was a complete disaster for the men and women of the FBI. They’ve been betrayed by apparatchiks at DOJ, led by the mole-like Attorney General Merrick Garland who has behaved like the Grand Inquisitor to Joe Biden’s very real persecution of everything constitutional. Aside from Jim Crow — another Democrat party initiative —our civil rights have never been more threatened, abused, or abrogated.

FBI Director Christopher Wray has presided over some of the most pernicious abuses of power in the history of the FBI. The Watergate scandal, an egregious invasion of executive privilege for which no one has been held accountable, and resulted in the impeachment of President Nixon, pales in comparison to the 2022 list of malfeasance.

The invasion of Mar-a-Lago by a gestapo-like phalanx of FBI agents, directed by DOJ and FBI HQ politicians was breathtaking in its unabashed hubris. And, the deeply collusive behavior of former and current FBI agents at Twitter is profoundly disturbing. It must be noted, however, that though conspiracy theories are tempting to entertain, because they’re simplistic, it is far more likely that these bad actors aren’t conspirators so much as they share a common liberal world view.

Furthermore, it’s not necessarily a bad thing to have former FBI agents working at a social media company. In fact, the FBI does some very necessary work by liaising with big tech to share threat information and collaborate on solutions.

As the new Congress is sworn in, there may be some cause for a cautious optimism. The new Republican chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Jim Jordan of Ohio, and Republican James Comer of Kentucky, who leads Oversight and Reform have both promised hearings. Well, we’ve heard that before. The Wall Street Journal’s Kim Strasser reports that Republicans are considering the creation of a new Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Again, we’ve heard that before.

At this point, it’s a lot of talk. Some real action would be a welcome change from the mostly inert Republican Party.

Final Battle: David Horowitz Defines the Fight for America We’re one election away from losing our future. by Daniel Greenfield

https://www.frontpagemag.com/final-battle-david-horowitz-defines-the-fight-for-america/

“These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country,” Thomas Paine wrote in 1776.

No American who loves our country can look at these past years without feeling that our souls have been tried. At conservative conferences and events there is an inescapable desire for a big picture sense of what we are up against and whether the fight can be won. And that is what David Horowitz offers in his latest book, “Final Battle: The Next Election Could Be the Last”.

Since “Destructive Generation”, Horowitz has spent over three decades chronicling our national crisis in his books and few deny that we are living in the world that he had spent so long warning conservatives would come to pass if the totalitarian ambitions of the Left went unchecked.

“Final Battle” is a fitting title for a culture warrior whose message to conservatives, over and over again, was that they needed to learn to fight. This is a book that describes the fight and its missed opportunities, of those who fought and those who didn’t, and what the next phase, and perhaps the final phase, of the struggle for the country that he loves so much looks like.

How About A Kill Switch To Shut Down Washington?

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/01/06/how-about-a-kill-switch-to-shut-down-washington/

Kris Kristofferson said that “freedom” is “just another word for nothin’ left to lose.” To the political left, freedom is an abomination that must be defined and controlled by the ruling class elites. And what better way to do that than to crack down on automobile travel?

Cars are a favorite target of all progressives and most Democrats. No human invention has increased freedom as much as the automobile. That’s why they have chosen to go to war on cars. It’s a long-term campaign that will take decades to finish. But there are victories along the way, and one of them was won in Washington with the help of Republicans.

According to Bob Barr, a former federal prosecutor and congressman from Georgia, the infrastructure bill the president signed a little more than a year ago includes “​​​​a little-noticed ‘safety’ measure that will take effect in five years.” It “amounts to a ‘vehicle kill switch,’” Barr wrote in the Daily Caller, and every car built after 2026 has to have one.

Of course, the mandate was characterized “as a benign tool to help prevent drunk driving.” But safety is always a pretense for further government intervention and the erosion of liberty. Prime example: The COVID-19 lockdowns we just went through. 

Writing in Motorius, automotive journalist Steven Symes notes that, ​to many, a mandatory kill switch “might sound like a wonderful idea.”

“After all, we’ve seen wanted criminals who have fled from police only to crash into a car with a family inside, killing innocents as they try to avoid capture. Being able to stop the pursuit early and almost instantaneously seems like a wonderful thing, a potential lifesaver any law-abiding citizen would enthusiastically embrace.”