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POLITICS

Israel as a Partisan Issue The Democrats have ceded the Jewish State to the GOP for future political gain. Benjamin Weingarten

Following Vice President Mike Pence’s trip to Israel and the Trump administration’s late 2017 decision to relocate the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, Pew released a telling poll on American views of Israel. The headline figure from the survey: Republicans now sympathize with Israel (as opposed to the Palestinians) by a whopping 52-point margin over Democrats—79 percent to 27 percent—the greatest spread between the two parties in the last 40 years. Republicans have never been more favorably disposed toward Israel, while for Democrats, the opposite holds true.

This rift alarms much of the American Jewish political establishment, which believes that pro-Israel sentiment should remain bipartisan. Aaron David Miller of the Wilson Center writes that “the need for ‘no daylight’ between the U.S. and Israel used to be a talking point wielded by staunchly pro-Israeli supporters against Democratic and Republican presidents alike; Trump has turned it into official policy . . . [which] plays really well among mainstream Republican voters.” But the Pew survey challenges this narrative. Not just conservatives, but every group of American voters surveyed supports Israel over the Palestinians by a wide margin—with the single exception of “Liberal Democrats.”

Could it be that liberal Democrats have grown more Arabist, consistent with the growing anti-Zionist nature of the progressive movement? Does the growth in the percentage of progressives in the Democratic Party explain the declining Democratic support for Israel? Pew’s numbers limn an increasingly left-leaning Democratic Party. In 2001, only 29 percent of Democrats identified as “Liberal”; by 2017, 48 percent did. In 2001, liberal Democrats sympathized with Israel at a rate of 48 percent—11 percentage points higher than “Conservative/Moderate Democrats” at that time and a staggering 29 percentage points more sympathetic than liberals are today.

ELECTIONS ARE COMING- TEXAS – MARCH 6, 2018 PRIMARY

TEXAS- MARCH 6 PRIMARY

SENATOR TED CRUZ (R) DESERVES RE-ELECTION AND IS POISED TO WIN HANDILY

Early voting begins Feb. 20. If no candidate receives a majority of the vote in the primary, the top two vote-getters will compete in a primary runoff on May 22.

In Congress there are many primary challengers. Among incumbents Republican Representatives Louie Gohmert – District 1, Michel McCaul – District 10, Mike Conaway -District 11, Mark Thornberry -District 13, John Carter -District 31, Michael Burgess -District 26, Roger Williams- District 25, Kenny Merchant- District 24, Will Hurd – District 23, Pete Olson- District 22, Jodey Arrington- District 19, Bill Flores -District 17, Kay Granger- District 12, Ken Brady -District 8, John Culberson -District 7, John Ratcliffe District 4 deserve to win. On foreign and domestic policies they are all excellent.

And in a more perfect world Democrat Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee should retire or lose.

Elizabeth Warren Went Native Daniel J. Flynn

Elizabeth Warren looks like the love-child of Tilda Swinton and Edgar Winter. She talks like Ward Churchill, Iron Eyes Cody, and so many others who hail from the Cigar Store Indian Tribe.

“I understand that tribal membership is determined by tribes — and only by tribes,” fake Indian Warren told a conference of real Indians on Wednesday. “I never used my family tree to get a break or get ahead. I never used it to advance my career.”

Only she did.

The blue-eyed blonde listed herself as a minority in academic directories prior to obtaining employment by Harvard Law. After gaining tenure, her minority designation disappeared.

Warren now may downplay her invented ancestry’s role in obtaining employment but Harvard then boasted about it.

“Although the conventional wisdom among students and faculty is that the law school faculty includes no minority women, [then Harvard Law spokesman Mike] Chmura said professor of law Elizabeth Warren is Native American,” reported the Harvard Crimson 22 years ago.

No tribe recognizes her as one of their own and genealogy records show no evidence of even great-grandparents hailing from Native American ancestry. The record does show Warren attending a good law school, albeit the type that does not typically send on graduates to Ivy League schools to teach and does not ever send them to Harvard.

Warren graduated from Rutgers Law, which currently comes in at 62 — above Georgia State but below the University of Tennessee — in the U.S. News and World Report rankings. When I examined faculty at Harvard Law five years ago, I discovered that more than half of Harvard Law’s professors and assistant professors received their degrees from Harvard Law. Outside of specialists who obtained degrees outside of the field of law, every professor and assistant professor at the school graduated from a top-ten law school and just five graduated from a law-school in the bottom half of the top ten. Nobody from Rutgers Law besides Warren has ever received tenure from Harvard Law.

The incestuous culture of Harvard that imagines that elite minds only attend elite schools exhibits problems of its own. But clearly practice dictates that they exclusively grant tenure to those from the best of the best schools. Elizabeth Warren strikes as the sole counterexample.

Though the senior senator from Massachusetts depicts those mocking her as mocking Native Americans, she clearly mocked them in falsely portraying herself as a member of their historically-underrepresented group to obtain a job for which she did not possess the requisite qualifications. In doing so, she made a farce of affirmative action in a manner similar to the forgettable but amusing 1986 comedy, Soul Man.

The Big Dog Won’t Hunt? Some Democrats don’t want to campaign with Bill Clinton; Republicans enjoy a polling bounce. James Freeman

This column has argued that the Republican tax cut will become increasingly popular among voters and new surveys suggest that’s exactly what’s happening. Meanwhile, Democrats trying to make the case that the predations of their Hollywood sponsors amount to a reason to vote against Republicans seem to be distancing themselves from another of their predatory patrons.

Politico reports:

Democrats are looking to embrace the #MeToo moment and rally women to push back on President Donald Trump in the midterms—and they don’t want Bill Clinton anywhere near it.

In a year when the party is deploying all their other big guns and trying to appeal to precisely the kind of voters Clinton has consistently won over, an array of Democrats told POLITICO they’re keeping him on the bench. They don’t want to be seen anywhere near a man with a history of harassment allegations, as guilty as their party loyalty to him makes them feel about it.

Readers may be wondering why anyone would feel guilty about shunning Bill Clinton. But as Politico elaborates, feelings don’t really have all that much to do with 2018 campaign decision-making:

Several Democratic campaigns have already polled Clinton’s popularity in their races, weighing whether to take the risk of inviting him out. Others say they’d love to see him chip in, so long as he sticks to New York, at closed-door fundraisers for them where no photographs of them together are taken.

This suggests that Mr. Clinton could be in for some awkward moments this fall, assuming he has more capacity for embarrassment than he’s shown to date. Perhaps some Democrats have decided that appearing with Louis Farrakhan is one thing, but standing next to Mr. Clinton is quite another. Politico reports on mixed feelings about the former President:

“People are crass about it and will look to see where his numbers are,” admitted one Democratic member of Congress who is in a tough race and is anxious about going public embracing or trashing Clinton. “He’s still Bill Clinton, and he’s still a draw to certain segments of the party.”

“Depending on the audience, there will definitely be people … [who] will be uncomfortable,” said Rep. Grace Meng (D-N.Y.). But there will also “definitely be people who want to see him.”

Separately, Politico reports on its new survey which is bound to have GOP candidates feeling more comfortable:

Republicans have erased the Democratic advantage on the generic congressional ballot in a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll that, for the first time since April, also shows President Donald Trump’s approval rating equaling the percentage of voters who disapprove of his job performance. CONTINUE AT SITE

When Ellison Broke Bread With Farrakhan Brotherhood-linked congressman publicly rejected Nation of Islam — but it was all for show. Matthew Vadum

After publicly repudiating his former colleagues at the Nation of Islam, DNC deputy chairman Keith Ellison dined with the group’s notorious leader Louis Farrakhan and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in 2013, according to reports.

The jihadist-friendly Ellison, a Democrat congressman representing Minnesota, is a former co-chairman of the Communist-linked Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Although Ellison was not a senior Democratic Party official in 2013, now that his DNC post makes him much more than a fringe figure in his party, the meeting takes on a greater, darker significance for Democrats, putting them in bed with raging genocidal anti-Semites, Muslim terrorists, and other enemies of the United States.

The private Sept. 24, 2013, event at the One UN Hotel in Manhattan, across the street from the United Nations complex, was reported in the Oct. 2, 2013, issue of the Nation of Islam newspaper, Final Call. Rouhani was in New York for the 68th UN General Assembly. “The dialogue revolved around the Iranian president’s speech and how to move forward in regard to relations with the United States,” according to the newspaper. “Translators were included in the meeting to facilitate communications in English and Farsi.”

“Abdul Akbar Muhammad, international representative of the Nation of Islam, and Supreme Capt. Mustapha Farrakhan were part of the Nation of Islam delegation,” the report stated.

Spy vs. Spy? A new warning on Russian meddling and a declassified memo about Obama-era surveillance. James Freeman

As it has for most of our lifetimes, the government of Russia will once again be engaged in trying to disrupt and discredit our democracy during this fall’s elections. At a hearing today of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats warned that the Kremlin could again attempt to use technology to undermine our republic.

The fact that Vladimir Putin’s government routinely conducts such operations against freely-elected governments should not make the United States any less vigilant. The Journal reports:

“Foreign elections are critical inflection points that offer opportunities for Russia to advance its interests both overtly and covertly,” Mr. Coats told the committee during its hearing on world-wide threats facing the U.S., in prepared testimony. “The 2018 U.S. midterm elections are a potential target for Russian influence operations.”

“Influence operations, especially through cyber means, will remain a significant threat to U.S. interests as they are low-cost, relatively low-risk and deniable,” Mr. Coats said. “Russia probably will be the most capable and aggressive source of this threat in 2018.”

Mr. Coats, along with the leaders of the National Security Agency and Central Intelligence Agency, also said they had already seen evidence of Russian intentions to interfere during the 2018 elections, but declined to elaborate, citing the public nature of the hearing. They promised to update the committee in a classified session scheduled for later Tuesday.

Russia’s goal, Mr. Coats said, was to “create wedges that reduce trust and confidence in democratic processes.”

Trust and confidence in democratic processes can also be reduced if an American president uses Russia as a pretext to spy on domestic political opponents. Recent news about Obama administration surveillance of associates of Donald Trump raises important new questions.

On Monday Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) and his committee colleague Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) released a copy of a recent letter to Susan Rice, who served as national security adviser in the Obama White House. CONTINUE AT SITE

Pelosi celebrates her grandson’s racial self-hatred in marathon House speech By Thomas Lifson

It was inevitable that when speaking for 8 straight hours on the House floor, Nancy Pelosi would spout some crazy nonsense. But I was not prepared for what only can be called a depraved celebration of racial self-hatred. The muddled state of her thinking was on display when she spoke praise of her grandson wishing he were not white. Tucker Carlson (video below) captured the pathetic nature of her celebration of racial self-hatred when she said:

I’m reminded of my own grandson. He had a very close friend whose name is Antonio, is he from Guatemala. And he has beautiful, tan skin, beautiful brown eyes. And the rest. And this was such a proud day for me because when my grandson blew out the candles on his cake, they said did you make a wish? And he said yes, I made a wish.

I said what is your wish? He said I wish I had brown skin and brown eyes like Antonio. So beautiful. So beautiful. The beauty is in the mix.

Carlson’s response was appropriate, but I have some further thoughts below his.

Text via Grabien:

Was it healthy to hate yourself for the way that God made you? Nancy Pelosi thinks it is. Their delight says everything about the modern Democratic Party. Certain races are good. Others are bad. So bad that it’s considered beautiful to hate your own innate appearance and want it changed. And that Pelosi is saying one of the main reasons she supports mass immigration so America will look different and in her view better than it does now.

Now, whatever you think of that idea, it is a genuinely radical sentiment. Nobody has said anything like that on the House floor for a long time. They used to. But they don’t anymore. And for good reason. Elevating one race over another is the definition of bigotry.

ELECTIONS ARE COMING: JOHN JAMES FOR THE SENATE IN MICHIGAN

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2017/10/25/john_james_could_be_the_future_republicans_have_been_waiting_for_135352.html
John James Could Be the Future Republicans Have Been Waiting for Salena Zeto

DETROIT — John James emerges with confidence from a charter high school in the northwest side of the city that used to be an elementary school. It is a stride any parents would hope to see in their son or daughter when they graduate from this school, founded by Jalen Rose, former NBA player and member of the University of Michigan’s legendary “Fab Five” squad.

Outside the leafy campus of Jalen Rose Leadership Academy, parents wait for their children to emerge as a handful of students play on the clay basketball court. James, a member of the school’s board, has just finished a board meeting to discuss his decision to run for the Michigan Republican nomination for U.S. Senate.

He’s no Kid Rock, and that is a good thing for the Republican Party.

Yale Law School Grad Cory Booker is an Ignoramus on Citizenship Rights By Richard Baehr

New Jersey Senator Cory Booker seems to spend every waking moment either admiring his Presidential look in a mirror, or trying to move left of any of his opponents for the 2020 nomination. After the State of the Union Address Tuesday, he demonstrated a profound ignorance of the Constitution. The Stanford and Yale Law School educated Rhodes Scholar, naturally raced to the MSNBC studios after the address to express his profound displeasure.

Attacking President Trump for his divisiveness, Booker said the following:

“Then the raw meat was ugly, and then the appeals to fear-mongering, using MS-13 as a way to cast a shadow around millions of Americans who are looking for a full recognition of their citizenship rights.”

Looking for a full recognition of their citizenship rights? What rights to citizenship do ten million illegal immigrants possess — whether in the dreamer category, or any other- their parents, those who overstayed visas, whatever the explanation. The answer is they have no rights to citizenship, now or in the future, unless the Congress passes a law and the President signs it to extend an amnesty to allow these people to establish a legal status in the country, and at some point, a path to citizenship.

Booker slips up because at this point his view — supporting complete amnesty and citizenship rights, is what the Democrats are after. They want millions of new Democratic voters, more than they share any concerns about people in the shadows.

The Dems’ Farrakhan Problem If Republican lawmakers held strategy sessions with David Duke, the party would be held to account. By Jeryl Bier

Hillary Clinton tried to make Louis Farrakhan an issue when she ran against Barack Obama in 2008. The Nation of Islam leader—infamous for calling Judaism a “gutter religion”—had praised the future president as “the hope of the entire world.” In a February debate, Mrs. Clinton demanded that Mr. Obama reject Mr. Farrakhan’s support, insisting: “There’s a difference between denouncing and rejecting.” Mr. Obama obliged and added: “There’s no formal offer of help from Minister Farrakhan that would involve me rejecting it.”

Three years earlier, Mr. Obama posed for a photo with Mr. Farrakhan at a Congressional Black Caucus gathering. The photographer, journalist Askia Muhammad, told the liberal site Talking Points Memo that a CBC staffer contacted him “sort of in a panic” about the photo. “I promised and made arrangements to give the picture to Leonard Farrakhan, ” Louis Farrakhan’s son-in-law and chief of staff. But he kept a copy, which he released last week.

Mrs. Clinton might have become president had the photo come out a decade earlier. It isn’t clear from the photo to what degree Mr. Obama was associated with Mr. Farrakhan. But the Congressional Black Caucus’s association is scandalous. Its members have met with Mr. Farrakhan on at least one other occasion.

On Jan. 13-14, 2006, the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity held hearings in New Orleans and Gulfport, Miss., on the federal government’s response to Hurricane Katrina. After the New Orleans hearing, at least four CBC members headed to St. Augustine Church to meet Mr. Farrakhan, who had attended part of the hearing. CONTINUE AT SITE