WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The Dispensable Mrs Merkel John O’Sullivan

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2022/01/the-dispensable-mrs-merkel/

After what seemed an eternity of farewells, Merkel finally left office on the last day of November 2021 to a chorus of acclaim from those relative few who rate non-nuclear Germany’s dependence on Russian gas nothing worth worrying about. And then there is her other great legacy — a million refugees.

In November 2015 the Economist ran an editorial that its front cover had anticipated with a picture of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the title “The Indispensable European”. “Look around Europe, and one leader stands above all the rest: Angela Merkel,” the editorial proclaimed. “Mrs Merkel has grown taller with every upheaval.” Going on to list the upheavals that had elevated her, it ended triumphantly: “…and over migration, she has boldly upheld European values, almost alone in her commitment to welcoming refugees”.

If Mrs Merkel was almost alone in welcoming refugees, that was because she had been entirely alone in inviting them into the European Union. The EU’s own rules in the Dublin Accords, designed to deter refugees from asylum shopping, stipulated they should be registered in the first EU country in which they arrived and remain there until their cases had been determined. Mrs Merkel swept all this away when she announced that the refugees would be welcome in Germany and later, when a million of them had accepted the invitation, that they should be dispersed throughout the EU. Other EU states objected. The EU migration crisis she created has still not been fully resolved.

After what seemed like an eternity of farewells, Merkel finally left office on the last day of November 2021. Did all those “upheavals” enable her to rise in the world, or vice versa?

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Here are the Dems Who Could Have Their Committee Assignments Stripped If the GOP Retakes the House Matt Vespa

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2022/01/10/revenge-is-coming-leader-mccarthy-says-these-dems-could-be-purged-from-committee-n2601661

Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has threatened to purge Reps. Eric Swalwell (D-CA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and Adam Schiff (D-CA) from their committee assignments if the GOP retakes the House in 2022. He should do it. These Democrats are some of the most annoying of the bunch—and Democrats set the precedent for this. It’s the ‘we don’t like you’ doctrine. It’s their rule. We didn’t set it. They did it thinking that they would hold onto the House majority forever. If this happens, and I hope it does—it’s entirely their fault. Elections have consequences (via Axios):

 What they’re saying: “He will not be serving there,” McCarthy said of Swalwell’s placement on the House Intelligence Committee in an interview with Breitbart.

“Ilhan Omar should not be serving on” the House Foreign Affairs Committee, McCarthy added. “Adam Schiff, he should not be serving on Intel.”

McCarthy pointed to Swalwell’s association with a Chinese spy, reported by Axios. Swalwell, who cut ties with the spy after being alerted to her activities by federal investigators, has not been accused of wrongdoing.

In the case of Omar, McCarthy quoted her 2019 remark that a pro-Israel lobbying group’s influence in Congress is “all about the Benjamins,” which was blasted by members of both parties at the time as anti-Semitic.

McCarthy also said Schiff “lied to the American public” with his support of the unverified Steele Dossier, which alleged extensive ties between former President Trump and Russia.

Democrats removed Reps. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) over weak sauce reasons. Again, they didn’t like these people. They didn’t commit any crimes. They didn’t do anything wrong, but they were removed due to a difference of opinion. We have no interest in playing the better party here. We should hit back at them in 2023. Remove the Swally, Schiff, the Squad—get rid of them all. This is your game, liberals. We’re playing too.

ISRAEL, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Jews Are Dancing. Flee, Luvvies, Flee! Timothy Cootes

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/luvvieland/2022/01/jews-are-dancing-flee-luvvies-flee/

“Israel is a backer of the Sydney Festival, having contributed $20,000 to stage a production by choreographer Ohad Naharin, and this has prompted the usual look-at-me protests by the artsy Left’s voluble wankerati. Laugh lustily at their claim that Jews in tights present a threat to their safety — yes, really — but also mourn the death of professional curiosity amongst Australia journalists.”

Quadrant readers, I should hope, will be unbothered by Tom Ballard’s absence from the Sydney Festival, as the humourless comedian, at the urging of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, has decided not to participate.

As I write, the list of withdrawals, 30 at last count, is sure to get longer and longer. At what I imagine would be the the panel discussion from hell, Yumi Stynes, Julia Banks and Louise Milligan were scheduled to bang on about the patriarchy and related themes until Stynes, also in solidarity with Palestine, pulled out. Again, for my readers, this may be the cause of amused cheer rather than annoyance.

That said, there is much in this campaign that we should find bothersome: the rebarbative manner in which it has been conducted, the pathetic non-effort by some in the media to question its claims, and what it all may foretoken for the cultural life of the country.

To recap: it came to light that Israel is among the financial supporters of the Sydney Festival, as the Israeli embassy in Australia contributed $20 000 to the staging of Decadence, a production by Israeli choreographer Ohad Naharin and the Sydney Dance Company. As expected, the news of this funding led to an outbreak of the customary insanity among left-wing academics and activists.

EDUCATION Comments turned off

Reading between the Lines in the Washington Post on Anti-Asian Discrimination in Schools By Dominic Pino

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/reading-between-the-lines-in-the-washington-post-on-anti-asian-discrimination-in-schools/

It’s barely even concealed anymore that ‘more diverse’ means ‘fewer Asians’ in the context of academics.

Northern Virginia resident Alex Godofsky tweets:

Utterly fascinating, indeed.

“TJ” here refers to Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, the Fairfax County, Va., magnet school that’s one of the best high schools in the country. Godofsky’s screenshot is from this story in the Washington Post. You’ll note that one major racial group goes unmentioned explicitly in that paragraph: Asians. Of course, Asians are mentioned implicitly by process of elimination. All percentages must add to 100. If the percentage of black students increased, the percentage of Hispanic students increased, and the percentage of white students stayed the same, then the percentage of Asian students must have declined. You don’t have to have gone to TJ to figure that one out.

It’s barely even concealed anymore that “more diverse” means “fewer Asians” in the context of academics. TJ’s new application process sounds a lot like the “holistic” process at Harvard that rated Asian students lower based on their personalities. From the Post story:

TJ adopted a “holistic review” process that asks admissions officers to weigh four “experience factors” including whether English is an applicant’s first language, whether the applicant has a disability, whether the applicant’s family qualifies for free or reduced-price meals at school and if the applicant attends a middle school that has historically sent a small number of students to TJ. Only qualified eighth-graders — those who possess a 3.5 GPA while taking certain high-level math and honors courses — can go through the “holistic” review, and must also submit a math or science problem-solving essay as well as a “Student Portrait Sheet.”

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Dr. Fauci Smears Rand Paul By David Harsanyi

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/dr-fauci-smears-rand-paul/

Nothing in Paul’s critique of Fauci calls for any violence. It calls for a mendacious government official to be fired because he’s been awful at his job.

It’s no surprise that Anthony Fauci, who believes attacks on him are “attacks on science,” is extraordinarily thin-skinned. But today, after being grilled by Senator Rand Paul over his involvement in concerted attacks on apostate scientists, Fauci deflected by noting that a man who’d threatened to kill him had been arrested a couple of weeks ago. Fauci went on to, in part, blame Paul for threats against him, claiming that Paul’s accusations “kindle the crazies,” and even pulled out a printed copy of a “Fire Fauci” headline from the senator’s website.

Is Fauci really arguing that calling for his firing — from a job he’s held since 1984 — is tantamount to inciting violence? Does that go for the Democratic Party rhetoric that motivated a Bernie Sanders fan who attempted to murder, among other Republicans, Paul on a baseball field in Alexandria in 2017? Or progressive rhetoric that motivated a mob to menace Paul and his wife on D.C.’s streets in 2020? Nothing in Paul’s critique of Fauci calls for any violence. It calls for a mendacious government official to be fired because he’s been awful at his job. Even if Paul is wrong, political discourse shouldn’t be inhibited by the prospective actions of third-party nuts. We don’t let those nuts undercut our ability to freely express our political disagreements. Those who do are usually engaged in a transparent attempt to chill speech.

CHARLOTTE'S NEWS WEB, ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Hillary Clinton 5.0? By Charles C. W. Cooke

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/hillary-clinton-5-0/

If Hillary is the Democrats’ best option in 2024, the party is in more trouble than we thought.

In today’s Wall Street Journal, Douglas E. Schoen and Andrew Stein suggest that Hillary Clinton may be gearing up for another shot at the White House:

A perfect storm in the Democratic Party is making a once-unfathomable scenario plausible: a political comeback for Hillary Clinton in 2024.

Specifically:

Several circumstances—President Biden’s low approval rating, doubts over his capacity to run for re-election at 82, Vice President Kamala Harris’s unpopularity, and the absence of another strong Democrat to lead the ticket in 2024—have created a leadership vacuum in the party, which Mrs. Clinton viably could fill.

She is already in an advantageous position to become the 2024 Democratic nominee. She is an experienced national figure who is younger than Mr. Biden and can offer a different approach from the disorganized and unpopular one the party is currently taking.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Education Secretary Cardona solicited NSBA letter comparing protesting parents to domestic terrorists: email NSBA official said controversial letter followed ‘a request by Secretary Cardona’ Peter Hasson

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/education-secretary-cardona-solicited-nsba-letter-comparing-parents-domestic-terrorists-email

FIRST ON FOX: Education Secretary Miguel Cardona solicited the much-criticized letter from the National School Boards Association that compared protesting parents to domestic terrorists, according to an email exchange reviewed by Fox News.

The email exchange indicates Cardona was more involved with the letter’s creation than previously known.

President Biden’s Department of Justice relied on the NSBA letter, which suggested using the Patriot Act against parents, in creating its own memo directing the FBI to mobilize in support of local education officials.

In the Oct. 5 email, NSBA Secretary-Treasurer Kristi Swett recounted that NSBA interim CEO Chip Slaven “told the officers he was writing a letter to provide information to the White House, from a request by Secretary Cardona.”

Previous emails had revealed that the NSBA was in contact with the White House and Justice Department in the weeks before it publicly sent the letter.

 

The emails were obtained by the parents group Parents Defending Education in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.

“Should this allegation be true, it would reveal that this administration’s pretextual war on parents came from the highest levels,” PDE President Nicole Neily told Fox News Digital.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Cop Who Killed Ashli Babbitt Was Cleared of Criminal Wrongdoing Without Interview By Paul Sperry

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2022/01/06/capitol_police_officer_w

When U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd went on “NBC Nightly News” to tell his side of shooting and killing unarmed Jan. 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt, he made a point to note he’d been investigated by several agencies and exonerated for his actions that day.

“There’s an investigative process [and] I was cleared by the DOJ [Department of Justice], and FBI and [the D.C.] Metropolitan Police,” he told NBC News anchor Lester Holt in August, adding that the Capitol Police also cleared him of wrongdoing and decided not to discipline or demote him for the shooting.

Terry Roberts, Babbitt family attorney:  “It’s astonishing how skimpy his investigative file is.”
Roberts & Wood

Ashli Babbitt: Her family calls the rushed Byrd investigation a “whitewash” and a “coverup” of misconduct by the officer.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

If you are a vaccine company executive, it’s time to slam the brakes Pfizer’s CEO Albert Bourla sees the dangers ahead, as his very carefully worded interview (worthy of close review) with CNBC yesterday shows. Alex Berenson

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/if-you-are-a-vaccine-company-executive

Remember NINJA loans?

NINJA stood for “No income, no job/assets.” Back in the mid-aughts, when the banks and not the regulators were the ones going crazy and setting the financial system on fire with free money, they were all the rage.

I remember hearing ads for them in 2006 and 2007 and thinking, this has to be a bait and switch. You cannot walk into Your Friendly MegaBank and walk out with a few hundred grand for a house with no proof you even have a job! A job seems pretty basic.

But you could. And people did. Lots of people.

Underlying this madness was a model, naturally. American housing prices had never collapsed nationally and simultaneously since at least the Depression. Therefore the models that the banks and mortgage originators used said they never would.

Therefore on a national basis the collateral – the houses – underlying the mortgages would always be fine, even if the borrowers couldn’t repay them. The lenders just needed to be in different markets to be geographically protected. Besides, the bankers were all reselling the loans and offloading the risk. They got paid up front, whether the loans were paid back or not.

It was a very good business.

Until it went bad.

FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Arabs ‘Frustrated’ With Biden’s Iran Policy by Khaled Abu Toameh

Posted By on January 11th, 2022

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18123/arabs-biden-iran-policy

The Biden administration’s position “raises a question mark about the seriousness of American efforts to save the world from Iranian threats…. The Iranian regime insists on adopting, supporting and arming terrorist entities in order to continue committing crimes and violations that destabilize the security and stability…in the region.” — Al-Yaum, Saudi Arabia, December 23, 2022.

“Iran’s interventions in neighboring countries… Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon, Bahrain and Kuwait, have become clear and tangible….” — Adnan Salman, Iraqi military expert, Azzaman, January 8, 2022.

Iran boasted that it occupies four Arab capitals: Baghdad, Beirut, Sana’a and Damascus. “The Iranians have turned these Arab capitals into bases for its armed militias, providing them with money, weapons and everything they need to assert Iran’s hegemony over the region.” —Abdel Aziz Khamis, Saudi writer and political analyst, Sky News Arabia, January 6, 2022.

“The Ansar Allah group in Yemen [the Houthis], Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Hezbollah Brigades and Sayed al-Shuhada Brigades and other gangs in Iraq, as well as other brutal gangs in the Syrian and Palestinian territories, have served as tools that allowed Tehran to interfere in the affairs of these countries and threaten others.” — Abdel Aziz Khamis, Sky News Arabia, January 6, 2022.

“What Iran is doing is tantamount to an open war against the Arabs.” — Saleh Al-Qallab, former Jordanian minister of information, Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, January 6, 2020.

“Iran is interfering in the region with the aim of dominating it…. The current Lebanese model of Iran’s hegemony through Hezbollah is the model that Iran aspires to and plans for in all the Arab countries.” — Former Kuwaiti Minister of Information and Culture Saad Bin Tefla Al-Ajami, Independentarabia.com, December 31, 2021.

The Biden administration refuses to disclose information about the negotiations that could “pose grave dangers” to the US. “The Biden administration argues that making this information available may harm American national security and reveal intelligence sources. This excuse is flimsy and weak. Here is the clear truth: the weak Biden administration is striving to reach an agreement [with Iran] at any cost to beautify its image in front of the Americans.” — Emil Amin, Egyptian writer, Al-Arabiya, January 7, 2022.

These Arabs, in short, are saying that they view Iran and the United States, and not Israel, as the major threats to their security and stability.

It now remains to be seen whether the Biden administration and the other parties negotiating with the mullahs will heed the voices coming from the Arab world — or continue to allow the mullahs to hoodwink them by having the US sanctions lifted while Tehran continues to advance its plans to obtain nuclear weapons and extend its control to more Arab countries.

Syrian-born TV host Faisal Al-Kasim recently asked his 5.9 million followers on Twitter the following: “Which is better, Israel’s reputation or Iran’s reputation in the [Middle East] region?” The result of the poll showed that 74.8% viewed Israel as having a better reputation as opposed to 25.2% in favor of Iran.