http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=273919 The wildly irreconcilable positions of pre-Oslo and post-Oslo Peres raise troubling questions as to the integrity of Israeli leaders. Photo: Amos Ben Gershom / GPO Ambition drove many men to become false; to have one thought locked in the breast, another ready on the tongue – Gaius Sallustius Crispus (Sallust), Roman historian and politician, […]
http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=2063 Graduation, Palestinian style It’s that time of year again. June is the month when parents across Israel scramble to find affordable and appropriate day-camps for those of their children who are too young to stay at home alone while Mommy and Daddy are at work. It’s also the period when every educational institution, from […]
http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/have-conservatives-been-bought-off-on-shariah?f=puball
Look at the disturbing articles below. Two conservative publications – Townhall and National Review – are decrying any threat to America from Shariah!
In the Townhall piece, Steve Chapman chalks up opposition to shariah to religious intolerance. He states that no one has been able to find a case in which shariah was considered in a Kansas court. However, we know from a review of a small sample of published appellate court cases performed by the Center for Security Policy that there were 50 examples in 23 states that involved conflicts between shariah and constitutional law. Shariah had been applied or formally recognized in these cases.
Matthew Schmitz goes a step further into the absurd by claiming that the anti-shariah movement endangers our national security by alienating loyal Muslim citizens and “assaulting” their religious liberty. He refers to those who want to curtail the insinuation of shariah into American courts as “anti-Muslim bigots.”
An important note: Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS reportedly gave $4 million to Grover Norquist’s group Americans for Tax Reform.
A Brief case for a Renewed Alliance of Free English-Speaking Peoples by DANIEL HANNANYou can find this online at: http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/a-brief-case-for-a-renewed-alliance-of-free-english-speaking-peoples
I’ll go to the ends of the Earth to argue against the EU. Almost literally in this instance.
But there was a particular reason why I wanted to take the battle to New Zealand. At the beginning of the year, I set myself the goal of touring the core Anglosphere nations to make the case for a renewed alliance of free English-speaking peoples.
I’ve duly harangued audiences in Ireland, the United States, Canadaand Australia.New Zealand completes the set: thanks to Oliver Hartwich and the NZ Initiative. All I now want is to get through the summer without another longhaul flight (sorry, Singapore!)
Still, I learned one thing. The Anglosphere isn’t fanciful or romantic or passé. Across the Anglophone democracies, there is a continuity of values that is immediately palpable to anyone who has travelled elsewhere: common law, representative government, private property, control of the executive by the legislature, equality before the courts, free enterprise, habeas corpus, residual rights, trial by jury, limited government. It’s especially moving to see how easily these values are embraced by people with non-British backgrounds.
http://times247.com/
Turkey aid group suspected of funding al Qaeda
Ynet News
Friday, June 15, 2012
News
Turkey aid group suspected of funding al Qaeda
Is the Istanbul-based Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH) linked to al-Qaeda? IHH director Bulent Yildirim is reportedly being investigated by Turkish authorities for allegedly creating a financial partnership with the infamous terror group. Read more…
Read more: http://times247.com/#ixzz1xrINo09K
Biden: Arab Spring a ‘democratic movement’
CNSNews.com
Thursday, June 14, 2012
News
Vice President Joe Biden, speaking at a high school commencement ceremony in Virginia on Thursday, called the Arab Spring a “democratic movement,” on the same day that the Egyptian high court nullified the Islamist majority parliament and the Egyptian military assumed control of the legislature. Read more…
Read more: http://times247.com/#ixzz1xrIZDSwv
Go West: N.D., Utah, Texas top list of business leaders
Times247
Friday, June 15, 2012
Exclusive
North Dakota, Utah, and Texas will likely be the nation’s economic leaders in the next decade, according to a report just released by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The economic study tracks the success of various economic policies at the state level by analyzing factors such as growth, exports, entrepreneurship, regulation, talent and infrastructure. Read more…
Read more: http://times247.com/#ixzz1xrIqC7Pm
The Spin Doctors of “Renewable Energy”
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/06/15/the-spin-doctors-of-renewable-energy/print/
The spin doctors of renewable energy are in overdrive. On June 11 the renewable energy establishment jointly released the UN’s annual report on financial investment in the sector (Global Energy Investment 2012) and the annual report by REN21 (Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century, a UN spinoff) which focuses on the end uses of renewable energy — how much is being used in what sectors of the economy. The double release was timed nine days prior to the UN’s coming summit on “sustainable development” entitled Rio + 20 [it’s been years since the last Rio environmental gabfest]. It is designed to push the summit–with an expected attendance of 50,000, from heads of states to run of the mill activists– to enact yet more subsidies for renewables in pursuit of the holy grail: a “green” economy.
No one expects the media or delegates to read lengthy reports. In this case a single summary report of both reports has been issued, so that it is not even necessary to read two summaries. As in the case of the UN’s International Panel on Climate Change reports, the summary is more tendentious and politically loaded than the reports on which it is based. But given that the summary is what is widely read and quoted–certainly it’s all the Rio delegates are likely to read–it carries the greatest weight. And it has a dual message. On the one hand the renewables sector is moving forward splendidly. Investment in solar has now outstripped that in wind and overall investment in renewables in 2011 grew 17% over 2010 despite the miserable economy. End uses have also grown strongly, to the point where renewables now supply 16.7% of total global energy consumption. On the other hand, there are headwinds. Those lower costs create pain on the supply side, sinking some major companies. Bottom line: the summary report quotes Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UN Environmental Programme: “This sends yet another strong signal of opportunity to world leaders and delegates meeting later this month…It is essential to continue government policies that support and nurture the sector’s growth…Otherwise the low-carbon transition could weaken just at the point when exciting cost reductions are starting to transform the economics.” A not so veiled threat here to the assemblage at Rio. Keep the subsidies coming or the green economy could collapse and it will be your fault.
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/06/15/are-american-jews-waking-up/ This week, a Gallup poll showed that President Obama’s support level among American Jews had dropped from 74 percent in 2008 to 64 percent. That drop is twice as large as the drop for any other racial or ethnic group. It still leaves two-thirds of Jews standing in support of a President who will […]
All of us have regrets in life. Some have more than others. I’ve probably shot myself in the foot more than should ever be allowed…and hurt my loving parents and others as well in the process. Sure, my “luck” was not the best, I was naive in many ways, and there were, at times, truly […]
http://www.jewishideasdaily.com/content/module/2012/6/15/main-feature/1/the-aircraft-plot/e Edward Kuznetsov lives in Jerusalem and is the author of three novels: “Prison Diary”, “Mordovian Marathon” (“both written secretly in prison and smuggled abroad”) and “Russian Romance”, all of which have been translated into many languages. In 1974, “Prison Diary” won the Gulliver Award in France, being declared the best book written by a […]
http://sarahhonig.com/2012/06/15/another-tack-whats-in-a-name/
Word is that US President Barack Obama, remarkably free from introspection and unencumbered by healthy hints of self-doubt, assiduously attributes Israeli mistrust of him to his eminently Muslim middle name. For him that encapsulates it all.
Such simplistic, one-dimensional explanations typify his neophyte missteps on the treacherous turfs of foreign policy. Obama botches things up because of his predilection for facile grand gestures, which, alas, can’t alter intricate realities. He hasn’t got an elementary handle on our Israeli outlook and is likewise unable to navigate the tempestuous Islamic sea that swirls ominously around us.
He doesn’t get us and he doesn’t get them.
Obama’s oversimplified presumptions about our perceived antipathy toward him (without stopping to consider his undisguised cold shoulder to us), are matched by oversimplified expectations that the Muslim/Arab world should cheer him. These too hinge on that eminently Muslim middle name. Being called Hussein should, in and of itself, create an affinity, make Muslims trust him and accept him as a kindred spirit.
This, of course, is every bit as simplistic as the notion that Israelis should harbor misgivings because of his name.
In both cases there’s more than latent condescension in the notion that simpleton natives can be attracted or repelled with trivial outward accoutrements. Obama, the sophisticated enchanter, can manipulate them. Whether he captivates or chides them, they, like impressionable children, will play out his expectations, complying with considerations as silly as those encapsulated in a name.
The name accounts for everything.
It explains away resentment of his policies as betokening prejudice against his extraction. It claims a special position vis-à-vis the Third World by boasting about connections unprecedented for an American leader. Obama banked on being recognized as a quasi-native son of non-Western cultures, who – with no other attributes than his African absentee father’s distant heritage and his Asian stepfather’s upbringing – could forge bonds unlike any previous White House tenant.
All this doesn’t just convey unwarranted hubris, it also – and foremost so – causes misrepresentation, misconception and distortion. It presents things as they definitely are not and it triggers dismal consequences.
By not giving Israelis and the enemies who surround them more credit, Obama does what few before him had managed as incompetently. He alienates America’s one committed comrade while earning the disrespect of all those he set out to endear with just his name and fawning flattery. Few had succeeded in doing as badly in as short a time.
