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September 2020

BOOKS Comments turned off

There is something very wrong with some in the top ranks of America’s military By Andrea Widburg

By on September 10th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/09/there_is_something_very_wrong_with_some_in_the_top_ranks_of_americas_military.html

With Bob Woodward’s anti-Trump book about to be published, the media is focusing entirely on the easily debunked claim that Trump mishandled the Wuhan virus by “lying” to the American people. What the media is ignoring, however, is a much more serious claim, which is that former Secretary of Defense General James Mattis plotted to overthrow Trump and his administration. This fact, if true, supports my long-time fear about the damage Obama inflicted on the upper echelons of the Pentagon.

The Conservative Treehouse caught the Mattis item:

According to a pre-release excerpt from the Washington Post Bob Woodward writes about a discussion between General James Mattis and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats about a plot to overthrow the elected government of the United States.

[snip]

What do you call a conversation between the Defense Secretary and the head of the U.S. intelligence apparatus where they are talking about taking “collective action” to remove an elected President?  That’s called sedition…. A seditious conspiracy.

It began to be clear last October that the Obama administration (with some help from Bill Clinton’s presidency) had seeded the Pentagon with leftist generals whose allegiance was to the Deep State, to cultural leftism, and to the infamous and profitable “military industrial complex” that Eisenhower warned about in 1961.

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BOOKS Comments turned off

Even Fauci can’t tolerate Bob Woodward’s lies about Trump and COVID By Andrea Widburg

By on September 10th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/09/even_fauci_cant_tolerate_bob_woodwards_lies_about_trump_and_covid.html

A conservative friend of mine called me in some distress. Her elderly parents, who are politically conservative, are voting for Biden because they think that Trump mishandled the Wuhan virus. Democrats are targeting this demographic – aged people who still reasonably fear getting infected — which is why they’re trumpeting Bob Woodward’s claim that Trump lied about the virus and that people therefore died unnecessarily. The allegation, though, is false and needs to be debunked hard and fast.

The Democrat’s current problem is that the Wuhan virus is receding, which decreases people’s sense of panic, an emotion that Democrats have been using to help position Biden as the “safe” choice. Although people are still getting infected, they’re younger, so the mortality rate has plummeted.

When it comes to the elderly, who are the most vulnerable, states such as New York, New Jersey, Michigan, and Pennsylvania have already killed them thanks to the policy of forcibly introducing infected patients into nursing homes. Other states protected their elderly and are steadily getting better at treating them, limiting their chances of dying.

The people who are getting infected now are younger people who have almost no chance of dying from the Wuhan virus – and for those unfortunate enough to get seriously ill, again, we know better how to treat them. Additionally, it appears that the body will repair the damage that the virus causes to people’s hearts and lungs.

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MOVIES AND TELEVISION Comments turned off

The Coming Backlash to the Oscars’ Diversity Mandate By Kyle Smith

By on September 10th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/09/the-coming-backlash-to-the-oscars-diversity-mandate/

Far from appeasing the hashtag activists, the Oscars have merely announced that the quota wars have begun.

I t’s easy to make fun of the Oscars’ new set of diversity requirements: Are we going to have to watch Lieutenant Colonel Anne Hathaway tossing grenades at Jerry in the next WWI movie? In the media, the initial response has been to gush praise for this “landmark,” “watershed” moment in which the Academy Awards have mandated hiring quotas for any film that wishes to be eligible for Best Picture (but not any of the other awards).

In about ten seconds, I predict, the Left is going to be furious. “We’ve been had,” they’ll surely scream. Let’s look at the details.

In order to qualify for Best Picture consideration, films will have to meet two out of four specified criteria. The first is the showiest but also the silliest, calling for diversity in casting and themes; it’s unworkable if you’re starting, as do a great many Oscar contenders, with an established historical record. You can’t pretend that Ford v. Ferrari or The Irishman was about minorities or women or gay liberation or handicapped people. Most producers of top-quality films will simply laugh off that top-line requirement and try to hit two of the other three. Which won’t be that hard.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Standing Up for Freedom . . . By Jay Nordlinger Prague’s Mayor Zdenek Hrib

By on September 10th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/09/prague-mayor-zdenek-hrib-stands-for-freedom/

Vaclav Havel was the leading dissident in Communist Czechoslovakia, and the first president after the Fall of the Wall. All over the world, he became a byword for freedom, democracy, and human rights. There is still a Havel tradition in the Czech Republic, even if it is not the dominant one.

Havelians, if you will, traveled to Taiwan last week, in a show of support for that brave, beleaguered democracy. Communist China was very unhappy. The trip was a “despicable act,” said a Chinese foreign-ministry spokesman. The foreign minister himself, Wang Yi, said that the delegation’s leader — Milos Vystrcil, president of the Czech senate — would “pay a heavy price.”

A second foreign-ministry spokesman, however, pointed out that the Czech government had “distanced” itself from Vystrcil and his delegation. They did not “represent the government’s policy,” said the spokesman — and he was absolutely right.

The Czech president, Milos Zeman, is a warm supporter of the Chinese government, and of the Russian government as well. This shows the split in Czech society (and Europe more broadly). I will have more to say about Zeman, Xi Jinping, and Vladimir Putin in due course.

Zeman said that the senate president had engaged in a “childish provocation.” He further said that the senate president would be excluded from any further foreign-policy briefings by the government.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Seoul Cracks Down on Dissent Against North Korea Seeking accommodation, the government audits human-rights groups and seeks to outlaw speech. By Joshua Stanton and Sung-Yoon Lee

By on September 10th, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/seoul-cracks-down-on-dissent-against-north-korea-11599693108?mod=opinion_lead_pos9

South Korea is the second-greatest threat to human rights on the Korean Peninsula. President Moon Jae-in ordered a crackdown in July on activists protesting North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un’s crimes against humanity. South Korea’s national police have undertaken politically driven audits of more than 100 human-rights organizations, and the president is pushing for new laws to criminalize speech.

Mr. Moon has staked his legacy on improving relations with Pyongyang, but in practice that’s meant taking cues from its vicious dictatorship. On June 4, Kim Jong Un’s sister Kim Yo Jong denounced South Koreans who use balloons to send leaflets across the demilitarized zone. Calling them “human scum” and “mongrel dogs,” Ms. Kim demanded that Seoul “make a law to stop the farce.” Hours later, Seoul said it would ban the leaflet campaigns. Police raided activists’ offices, and the Unification Ministry, which oversees relations with North Korea, revoked the operating licenses of two organizations.

Mr. Moon has also used Korea’s illiberal “criminal defamation” law, under which truth is no defense. He has filed at least 10 defamation lawsuits, personally or through surrogates, against opponents during his political career, including three in April 2017, the month before he was elected and took office. Since then, lawmakers from his party have demanded that Google Korea take down political commentaries they deem “fake news” and used tax probes to target opponents. Police have even investigated campus posters parodying Mr. Moon’s policies.

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EDUCATION Comments turned off

Cornell faculty-student group demands racial quotas, criticizes ‘colorblind’ practices Sam Dorman

By on September 10th, 2020

https://www.foxnews.com/us/cornell-faculty-student-group-demands-racial-quotas-criticizes-colorblind-practices

The group also wants to prevent undergraduate admissions from being based on SAT/ACT scores.

Dozens of Cornell University faculty, staff, students, and alumni signed onto a letter attacking “colorblind” practices, insisting that the university institute racial quotas and recruit “clusters” of non-White individuals.

The letter, published Monday, launches into a long list of immediate and long-term demands after accusing the Ivy League university of “symbolic” efforts in response to racism.

“As an institution Cornell aspires to the highest principles of civic duty,” the letter reads. “Yet every ‘colorblind’ event, mechanism, and process at the university — from new faculty orientations to selection of endowed positions — perpetuates racial disparities and reinforces an unjust status quo.”

To remedy that, the letter proposes setting benchmarks for the proportion of trustees and faculty of color.

“Increase representation of Black faculty to 7 percent in 2025 and to 10 percent in 2030,” the demand reads.

“Increase representation of other faculty of color to 20 percent in 2025 and 25 percent in 2030, in line with the percentage of new PhDs conferred in the US. Create benchmarks for increasing BIPOC [Black, Indigenous, and People of Color] faculty in those departments and disciplines with the most severe underrepresentation.”

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Job Openings Surge by 10 Percent to 6.6 Million, Topping Expectations By Tom Ozimek

By on September 9th, 2020

https://www.theepochtimes.com/job-openings-surge-by-10-percent-to-6-6-million-topping-expectations_3493679.html

Job openings in the United States, which are a measure of labor demand, rose by 10 percent to 6.6 million in July, while the number of people quitting their jobs rose by 2.1 percent between June and July, suggesting an uptick in confidence in being able to find work.

The Labor Department’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS), released Wednesday, showed that the number of job vacancies jumped by 617,000 to 6.6 million on the last day of July, above the 6 million that economists surveyed by FactSet predicted.

Manufacturing saw a 17.9 percent surge in job openings. Industries that saw the largest increases in vacancies were retail trade (172,000), health care and social assistance (146,000), and construction (90,000). The U.S. housing market, in particular, has shown remarkable resilience amid the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) virus outbreak, with an August report from the U.S. Census Bureau (pdf) showing building permits, a predictor of future activity, rising by 18.8 percent from June to July. Housing starts, meanwhile, surged by 22.6 percent between June and July. In another sign that the economic recovery may be picking up speed, U.S. home sales rose at a record rate for a second straight month in July.

Wednesday’s JOLTS report showed that vacancies were highest in trade, transportation, and utilities (1.292 million), followed by education and health services (1.262 million), and business and professional services (1.2 million), with all three categories seeing growth from the month before.

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ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Peter Schweizer: The Biden Campaign Is Hiding Kamala Harris–Here’s Why

By on September 9th, 2020

https://www.breitbart.com/radio/2020/09/08/peter-schweizer-the-biden-campaign-is-hiding-kamala-harris-heres-why/

Joe Biden’s presidential campaign minimizes Sen. Kamala Harris’s (D-CA) public exposure due to Harris’s lack of charisma, alienation of moderate voters, and exposure of the former vice president’s weak mental and physical condition, said Peter Schweizer, author of Profiles in Corruption: Abuse of Power by America’s Progressive Elite, and senior contributor at Breitbart News.

Biden’s team explain the former vice president’s rare public appearances as a function of concerns related to the coronavirus. Schweizer noted that if Harris were to be more visible than Biden, it would undermine the ostensible rationale for Biden’s limited visibility.

Schweizer said, “I think that the Biden-Harris campaign is sort of on the horns of a dilemma, because Joe Biden has been scarce on the campaign trail. There’s all kinds of speculation why. The campaign wants to officially say it’s because they’re trying to abide by some kind of COVID restriction to limit travel. I think a lot of observers believe that it has more to do with the health of Joe Biden, [and] the fact that he’s highly vulnerable, but also there are questions about his performance when he does do speeches.”

“If Joe Biden is not out there on the campaign trail and Kamala Harris is, it highlights the fact that they don’t have a policy about campaigning [regarding COVID-19],” determined Schweizer. “It’s just they don’t want Joe Biden out on the campaign trail.”

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ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE Comments turned off

Will America’s Return To Nuclear Power Kill The Dems’ Green New Deal? Let’s Hope So

By on September 9th, 2020

https://issuesinsights.com/2020/09/09/will-americas-return-to-nuclear-power-kill-the-dems-green-new-deal-lets-hope-so/

While the media focus on the chaos in American cities and the COVID-19 shutdowns, you might have missed this good news on the energy front: The federal government just approved a new, smaller, safer nuclear power plant design, putting nuclear back on the nation’s menu of energy choices.

It might not seem like much, but until this decade, the last nuclear power plant built in the U.S. was 1977. Today, there are an estimated 96 nuclear power plants producing 20% of all our electricity and half of our non-carbon-based power.

If that sounds impressive, consider this: As recently as the 1990s, we had 116 nuclear plants. Utilities, tired of the non-stop trouble of justifying a perpetual source of clean, CO2-free energy to radical green groups and burdened by enormous regulatory costs, have been decommissioning older plants.

But late last week, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission approved a new plan for what’s called a “small modular reactor,” or SMR, designed by Portland-based NuScale Power.

Small, yes, but cheaper and safer, too. And it may be an avatar for an avalanche of new nuclear technologies in the works, including thorium and molten-salt reactors that use spent fuel, which will further cut costs and decrease reliance on fossil fuels.

Some of these are well beyond the drafting board stage.

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ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

The Right to Civil Rights By Nurit Greenger –

By on September 9th, 2020

https://newsblaze.com/usnews/education/the-right-to-civil-rights_167737/

Brooke Goldstein is The Lawfare Project‘s Founder and Executive Director. Her recent op-ed, rightly calling for, ‘The Time Is Now for a Jewish Civil Rights Movement’ prompts a broad discussion.

It is becoming rather clear that most American Jewish Organizations no longer represent, rather prevaricate, Jewish causes. They have failed American Jewry.

Jewish organizations, some in particular, founded to make sure antisemitism does not occur, failed their fundamental cause. Among several reasons, they are extremely politically correct. For years they have been operating, confronting, on campuses and in the streets of America, the ancient Jew hatred, Antisemitism. Now that is masked as hatred for the state of Israel and Zionism, increased tenfold.

Antisemitism at Stanford University

During an endorsement interview, on March 13, 2020, in front of eight members of the university’s Students of Color Coalition, a student group whose endorsement she was eagerly seeking, due to the group’s previous success in helping dozens win seats in the student senate, Molly Horwitz, 21, a junior student at Stanford University, running for the student senate alleged that she was discriminated against; she faced anti-Semitic questioning.

The lead interviewer asked her, “Given your strong Jewish identity, in the anti-divestment campaign on campus…” The question lead to questioning whether Molly’s Judaism could affect her view of boycotting and divestment from Israel. What then morphed into a contest about campus issues also a fierce discussion on identity and loyalties.

Molly said she was horrified by the question asked. ZOA (Zionist Organization of America) took the right stand and demanded that the interviewer be expelled. Other Jewish organizations were satisfied with Stanford Administration’s pat on the wrist of the accused concealed identity, thinking that if there is a next time they will expel that person.

In today’s lexicon, this is called ‘discriminatory practices.’

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