WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

European Scientists Empowering China’s Military by Judith Bergman

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18660/europe-scientists-china-military

“Western universities need to understand that Chinese military scientists have only one client, and that is the People’s Liberation Army.” — Meia Nouwens, researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), Politiken, May 19, 2022.

“[T]here is an attempt to take as much knowledge as possible from our research communities back to China. In my home country, the Netherlands, there are researchers who have been working on artificial intelligence with Huawei instead of with NATO. It’s the world turned upside down.” — David van Weel, NATO’s Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges, Politiken, May 23, 2022

In one Danish case… a Chinese military engineer, saying that he came from a Chinese research institute that turned out to not exist, collaborated with Aalborg University in Denmark on advanced radar technology. The engineer was, instead, from the People’s Liberation Army Information Engineering University…. [T]he university did not take steps to vet the Chinese engineer’s credentials. — Politiken, November 30, 2021

“If you look at… 40 years ago, [the CCP] had zero satellites… They had no ICBMs… They had no nuclear weapons… They had no navy…. Look at what they have today…. We’re witnessing one of the largest shifts in global geostrategic power that the world has witnessed.” — General Mark Milley, Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, breakingdefense.com, November 4, 2021.

British universities have accepted £240 million from Chinese institutions, many with links to the military, including £60 million from institutions sanctioned by the US government for supplying the Chinese military with fighter jets, communications technology and missiles. In… just six years, the number of research collaborations between scientists in the UK and Chinese institutes with deep connections to the country’s defense forces tripled to more than 1,000. — The Times, February 4, 2022.

[O]ne of the UK’s “foremost” high-tech weapons experts, Professor Clive Woodley at Imperial College London – one of the British universities that has received the most funding from China — had been freely working with China for years…. Most of Woodley’s research has been funded by the Ministry of Defence…. He has advised the MoD about many of its key lethal systems.” — David Rose, investigative journalist, Unherd, May 21, 2022.

“Adapting to a world affected by the rise of China is the single greatest priority for MI6” — Richard Moore, UK’s spy chief, head of MI6, Sky News, November 30, 2021.

New research done by Follow the Money, a Dutch platform for investigative journalism, and ten other European media outlets, found that European scientists have “shared militarily sensitive knowledge with the Chinese army on a large scale.”

The project, known as the China Science Investigation, collected a staggering 353,000 scientific collaborations between Europe and China and found that, of these, 2,994 have taken place with the Chinese military, defined as, “studies where scientists from Western European universities collaborated with Chinese colleagues directly linked to an institute that is part of the Chinese army.”

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Why Do So Many Top Democrats Have No Problem Associating With a Virulent Anti-Semite? Apparently, their views are compatible. Robert Spencer

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/07/why-do-so-many-top-democrats-have-no-problem-robert-spencer/

It seems as if Maher Abdel Qader of the Palestinian American Congress is everywhere. He knows everyone, at least in the Democrat Party, and has a hand in everything. He is close to Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Ramallah) and Cori Bush (D-Race Hate Hysteria), as well as a prominent former congressman, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison. Abdel Qader has also hosted numerous fundraisers for New York City Mayor Eric Adams and was part of a committee putting together a fundraiser for Jesse Jackson’s son Jonathan Jackson, who is running for the House in Illinois. There are lots of well-connected, well-heeled people out there, but Abdel Qader is striking because he is a vociferous anti-Semite. So why is he palling around with so many prominent Democrats? Apparently, their views are compatible.

Abdel Qader appears to be closest to Tlaib, who has, according to Fox News, “participated in several events with Abdel Qader over the years, with the most recent fundraiser posted to his Instagram account on September 25, 2021. One day after the fundraiser, Abdel Qader posted a picture of himself alongside Tlaib on a Manhattan, New York, rooftop. He has been quite generous to Tlaib: “Abdel Qader has not only been a key fundraiser for Tlaib, donating $6,500 to her campaign since 2018, but he was also the chairman of her finance committee during her successful 2018 Congressional campaign. Tlaib introduced Abdel Qader by the title at a campaign event. And in 2018, Tlaib presented Abdel Qader with a medal as a sign of gratitude for his help with her inaugural campaign.”

Tlaib, a vehement critic of Israel, was apparently untroubled by Abdel Qader’s anti-Semitism. The other Democrat candidates Abdel Qader supported didn’t seem to be bothered by it, either. In May, Abdel Qader posted on Instagram: “May 18, 2022, Fundraiser for Keith Ellison the 30th attorney general of the State of Minnesota in Manhattan- New York. Also attended by Michael J. Garner, Chief Diversity Officer, MTA Department of Diversity and Civil Rights.” Of course it was. Of Jonathan Jackson, Abdel Qader wrote: “Jonathan Jackson son of Jesse Jackson/ Chicago is running for congress and needs our support. He is a staunch supporter of Palestine, Palestinians and our Arab American community.”

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

An Unsecured Border Is a Mortal and Moral Hazard Human trafficking, minors crossing illegally in record numbers, and tragic deaths. Terence P. Jeffrey

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/07/unsecured-border-mortal-and-moral-hazard-terence-p-jeffrey/

It happened outside Brackettville, Texas, which sits about halfway between Uvalde and the border crossing at Del Rio.

This was a shooting you probably did not hear about — in part, thankfully, because no one was hurt.

A U.S. Border Patrol agent was on a road that runs out of Brackettville when he saw a Chevrolet Suburban heading north. It was just before 10:00 a.m. on Jan. 3, 2021.

“The USBP agent activated his overhead lights to initiate a vehicle stop on the SUV in order to conduct an immigration inspection,” said a criminal complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas.

“A high-speed pursuit ensued as the SUV attempted to abscond from USBP agents,” the complaint alleged. “During the course of the pursuit multiple shots were fired at the USBP agents who were attempting to stop the vehicle. The vehicle traveled at a high rate of speed, in excess of 100 MPH for approximately twenty-eight minutes before law enforcement officers were able to successfully deploy spike strips, bringing the vehicle to a stop.”

“USBP agents apprehended six (6) Honduran nationals who were illegally present in the United States without proper documentation,” alleged the complaint.

The driver of the vehicle was also illegally in the United States. He was, alleged the complaint, “Sergio Trevino, a Mexican national and illegal alien, who initially absconded from the SUV, but was later apprehended.”

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

NeverTrump Republicans Just Can’t Let Go of Trump Basking in progressive praise – while demonizing Trump supporters as a “cult.” Bruce Thornton

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/07/nevertrump-republicans-just-cant-let-go-trump-bruce-thornton/

The Congressional show-trial disguised as a House committee investigation of the January 6 “insurrection” serves several partisan purposes. Most obviously, it attempts to distract the voters from Joe Biden’s and the Dem’s dismal record of failure both at home and abroad. But it’s also useful for NeverTrump Republicans who may find it difficult to attack President Trump given how starkly Biden’s failures contrast with the policy successes of their bête orange.

The hearings, then, provide Republican NeverTrumpers an opportunity to rehash some of their typical hyperbolic smears from the last six years, as well as potentially ending Trump’s political career. But in the end, all they will achieve is to remind us why ordinary voters distrust the Republican establishment and its fifth-columnist pundits like Bret Stephens.

A New York Times house-conservative and terminal NeverTrumper, Stephens recently posed the question whether the January 6 House investigation “can begin to steer some of the Trump faithful toward the kind of cult deprogramming they so desperately need.” Stephens here is reprising a favorite NeverTrump cliché that the 63 million Americans who voted for Trump in 2016, and the 74 million in 2020, are members of a “cult of personality,” as NeverTrumper Jonah Goldberg put it. Indeed, Stephens speculates that “Americans may someday come to understand Donald Trump as the most successful cult leader of our times.”

The first problem with Stephens’ question is its obvious approval of a House committee that is a transparent exercise in partisan propaganda rather than a good-faith effort to establish facts. We knew this was the case when Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected two of Republican Minority House leader Kevin McCarthy’s recommendations for the Republican members of the committee. Instead Pelosi picked arch-RINOs Liz Chaney and Adam Kinzinger.

HOMELAND SECURITY, MEDIA Comments turned off

Media Uninterested in Discussing 2 Illegal Aliens Who Plotted July 4th Mass Shooting Daniel Greenfield

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/2022/07/media-uninterested-discussing-2-illegal-aliens-who-daniel-greenfield/

Inconvenient narrative.

Mass shooters are supposed to be suburban American kids. In statistical reality, if counting mass shooters by the number of victims, most are gang members in urban areas. And even the conventional concept of the mass shooter, a disgruntled or unstable individual opening fire at a school, workplace, or general area to cause as much harm as possible without a criminal or political motive, the truth is more complicated than the media’s narrative would have it.

That’s why the media is reluctant to discuss it.

Like this latest July 4th mass shooting plot by illegal aliens.

Two illegal immigrants were arrested in a mass shooting plot at the Richmond, Virginia, July Fourth celebration.

“A hero citizen picked up the phone and overheard a conversation there was a mass shooting being planned here in the city of Richmond, Virginia,” Richmond Chief of Police Gerald Smith said Wednesday.

Two illegal immigrants, 52-year-old Julio Alvarado-Dubon and 38-year-old Rolman Balacarcel, were arrested and charged with being a non-U.S. citizens in possession of a gun after police uncovered a plot that the duo planned a mass shooting at Richmond’s July 4 celebration Monday.

MEDICINE AND HEALTH Comments turned off

Are the Covid mRNA Vaccines Safe? By Martin Kulldorff

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://brownstone.org/articles/are-the-covid-mrna-vaccines-safe/

A new scientific study entitled “Serious adverse events of special interest following mRNA vaccination in randomized trials” provides the best evidence yet concerning the safety of the mRNA Covid vaccines. For most vaccines in common use, benefits far outweigh risks, but that may not be the case for the mRNA covid vaccines, according to this study by Joseph Fraiman and his colleagues. It depends on your age and medical history. 

The randomized controlled clinical trial is the gold standard of scientific evidence. When regulators approved the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines for emergency use in December 2020, two randomized trials showed that the vaccines reduced symptomatic covid infection by over 90% during the first few months after the second dose. 

Pfizer and Moderna did not design the trials to evaluate long-term efficacy or the more important outcomes of preventing hospitalization, death, or transmission. 

The randomized trials did collect adverse event data, including the presence of mild symptoms (such as fever) and more serious events requiring hospitalization or leading to death. Most vaccines generate some mild adverse reactions in some people, and there were considerably more adverse such reactions after the mRNA vaccines compared to the placebo. 

That is annoying but not a major issue. We care about severe health outcomes. The key question is whether the vaccine’s efficacy outweighs the risks of severe adverse reactions.

EDUCATION Comments turned off

The Purposeful Degradation of America’s Schools Christina Villegas

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://americanmind.org/salvo/the-purposeful-degradation-of-americas-schools/

Radical ideologues fueled by billions of woke foundation dollars are destroying public education.

In the wake of school shutdowns, distance learning, and widely publicized school board battles, two trends have become increasingly difficult to conceal. The first is the failure of many of America’s primary and secondary schools to educate children competently—a failure marked by distressingly low levels of student proficiency and widening achievement gaps in core subjects like math and reading. The second is the growing prominence of radical ideology in the nation’s K-12 classrooms.

Equally disturbing is evidence that these trends are largely correlated and that an iron triangle of self-interested actors is contributing to their acceleration in school districts across the country—even those esteemed for high achievement.

Over the past decade, local school districts have proved easy targets for radical ideologues seeking to acquire cultural power. Though prolonged distance learning and draconian mandates have shaken the pre-pandemic confidence that many parents had in edu-crats to put the well-being of their children first, local districts and school boards have historically enjoyed a high level of public trust. Until recently, little attention was paid to union politics, school board decision making, classroom curriculum, or teacher training.  As a result, activists and special interest groups bankrolled by far-left foundations have inundated primary and secondary education with radical race, gender, and queer theory, usually under the guise of innocuous sounding phrases like equity-based education, culturally responsive teaching, and social and emotional learning. While children are increasingly being taught that western institutions are systemically and irredeemably racist, sexist, etc., they are not adequately learning to read or do math. The districts most vested in radical ideology often have the worst results in terms of academic achievement and racial disparities. Seattle has embraced left-wing initiatives for decades and has one of the worst black-white achievement gaps in the nation.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Governor Newsom Is Only Consistent in His Hypocrisy: John Fund

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/governor-newsom-is-only-consistent-in-his-hypocrisy/

California governor Gavin Newsom’s campaign is running ads in Florida and other states touting his state as a beacon of “freedom” on key social issues. Observers say the ads are an effort to boost his standing for a possible 2024 run for president.

Back home, Californians quip that the “freedom” Newsom seems to be most interested in is the ability to practice blatant hypocrisy without limits.

This week, news broke that the governor was vacationing in Montana despite California’s ban on state-funded travel to Montana over its alleged anti-gay policies. The governor’s office refused to reveal whether or not state-funded security accompanied the governor on his trip.

This isn’t the first example of Newsom flouting the rules. He famously violated his own indoor-dining ban in 2020, when he attended a birthday party at the deluxe French Laundry restaurant in Napa. Months later he appeared maskless at a football game where face coverings were mandatory.

Last summer, he had to pull one of his kids out of a summer day camp that did not require kids to wear masks, a violation of state policy.

EDUCATION Comments turned off

Florida’s New History Curriculum Is Pretty Great By Charles Hilu

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/floridas-new-history-curriculum-is-pretty-great/

Ron DeSantis’s state of Florida drew controversy over the Fourth of July weekend after the Miami Herald released copies of slides that the government used in civics training sessions for K–12 public-school teachers, which it partnered with Hillsdale College to create.

The slides cover reasons for the American Revolution and the philosophical underpinnings of the Constitution, while sometimes wading into contemporary debates about American government. The material is mainstream, historically accurate, and not unlike other curricula. Personally, I learned a lot of it a few years ago in high school when I took Advanced Placement U.S. History and Government & Politics. 

Overall, Florida’s syllabus is a good road map for teaching history. Most of the material is simply stating facts, and when it wades into controversy, it backs up its assertions solidly, for the most part. Nevertheless, some educators have complained that the instructional prescription was too Christian and conservative.

One of the central complaints centers on one of the presentations calling the idea that “the Founders desired strict separation of church and state and the Founders only wanted to protect freedom of worship” a misconception.

The state’s claim is certainly controversial, but it is true, nonetheless. While the Founding conception of separation of church and state protected freedom of worship, it was chiefly focused against creating an established church. The Framers did not view all public support of religion as illicit. After all, Congress held church services in the House chamber from when it first moved to Washington, D.C., until after the Civil War, with the speaker’s podium serving as the pulpit. That does not seem like an action of people who wanted religion and government in totally separate spheres.

For those who argue the contrary, the chief piece of evidence, which the Florida curriculum acknowledges, is Thomas Jefferson’s 1801 Letter to the Danbury Baptists, in which he wrote that the First Amendment creates “a wall of separation between church and state.” It is important to note the context of the letter. He was responding to a group of people who were fearful that the government would interfere with their free exercise of religion, and he was attempting to allay their concerns. In no way was he calling for the government to totally distance itself from religion. After all, he would often attend the services in the Capitol.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Don’t Let The Democrats Claim The Mantle Of Freedom

Posted By on July 8th, 2022

https://issuesinsights.com/2022/07/08/dont-let-the-democrats-claim-the-mantle-of-freedom/

Psychological projection is the act of attributing one’s unpleasant traits to someone else. Psychological deflection is a way of shifting attention away from one’s poor behavior to another person. Both are used expertly by Democrats, who don’t want the voters to catch on to their act.

We could start with any of the Democrats’ many examples of projection and deflection, but let’s focus on one of the most recent instances of a Democratic pot calling a kettle black: California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Florida television ad.

“Freedom is under attack in your state,” Newsom said in a voice a bit less croaky than his usual raspy delivery. “Your Republican leaders, they’re banning books, making it harder to vote, restricting speech in classrooms, even criminalizing women and doctors.

“I urge all of you living in Florida to join the fight or join us in California, where we still believe in freedom. Freedom of speech, freedom to choose, freedom from hate, and the freedom to love. Don’t let them take your freedom,” he finishes with a faux flourish that included a pointed finger meant to underline the sincerity the factory-made man sorely lacks.

The ad is a truly stomach-turning performance (typical of Newsom) for those who truly cherish freedom, and understand what it is – and isn’t. (It’s also filled with lies. Read this master Fisking of the governor’s tales.)

The California of Newsom, who many hope will save the Democratic Party from sinking under the Joe Biden and Kamala Harris millstones, is ranked 48th in the Cato Institute’s Freedom In The 50 States report. It’s where new prohibitions, such as bans on multiple plastic consumer goods, including single-use bags customarily given out by retailers, pop up on a regular basis, and food waste must be composted rather than thrown in garbage cans.