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Joe Biden preps to sell the economy — to boost his legacy and help Harris Biden is determined to convince a skeptical public that he strengthened the economy.By Adam Cancryn

Posted By on September 16th, 2024

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/09/15/joe-biden-economy-legacy-harris-00179194

Joe Biden is determined to use the waning days of his political career to overcome public skepticism and defend his economic record — both for his sake and for Kamala Harris.

The president is putting together a national campaign to persuade voters who have so far resisted his efforts to argue that his administration achieved what will one day be viewed as major economic progress, even if most voters don’t believe it because of the huge spike in prices that followed the pandemic.

He needs it for his legacy. Harris needs it to have one.

“These are epochal, economy-changing, history changing accomplishments — and instead, everybody is talking about the price of eggs,” said one adviser to the White House, granted anonymity to speak candidly on the challenge facing Biden. “It’s all personal. Every bit of it is personal.”

In swing-state speeches, White House events and a social media push, Biden plans to cast the last four years as a turning point that altered the U.S.’s trajectory and expanded benefits for a generation of voters — even if, to Biden’s frustration, most say they don’t yet feel it.

The multi-state travel in coming weeks — a mix of official and campaign events — aims to show off neighborhoods and communities where Biden believes his policies are finally making a measurable difference, while doubling as a supplement to Harris’ own stretch run to November.

The decision to spend much of Biden’s final months on his economic record reflects a bid to finally solve the paradox that’s long challenged the White House and undercut the president’s popularity: The working-class voters Biden crafted his agenda to help the most have been among the hardest to convince of its benefits.

Biden’s challenge in achieving short-term political credit isn’t helped by his unusual position as a first-term president relegated to a supporting role in a campaign that hinges on convincing voters his vice president will take the country in a new direction.

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When Kamala Actually Said Something-An Event We’re Waiting For

Posted By on September 16th, 2024

https://issuesinsights.com/2024/09/16/when-kamala-actually-said-something/

Presidential candidate Kamala Harris sat down for an interview late last week. It was the equivalent of a Friday news dump, done when most of the country was to busy otherwise to pay attention. But it did serve a purpose: Her campaign can say she’s done a solo interview, even if she, as is her practice, said nothing of substance.

The interview was with Brian Taff, news anchor at ABC’s Philadelphia affiliate. He asked five questions and the exclusive affair lasted all of 11 minutes

When the vice president asked if she had “one or two specific things” in mind for “bringing down prices and making life more affordable for people,” she came up entirely empty. For more than three painful minutes she droned on about growing up as a middle-class kid, her mother saving enough to buy their first house when she was a teenager, being raised in a hard-working neighborhood where people were “very proud of their lawn.” She never provided anything that even remotely resembled a policy proposal to tame inflation.

That was the first question. From there, the interview deteriorated further. Anyone who wants to see for themselves can watch here. But be warned: It’s overflowing with meaningless jabber, a too-practiced performance, let-me-lecture-you hand gestures – and obvious lies about her positions.

Millions have now watched the interview. If any of them vote for Harris in November, they are either hopeless ideologues or they have even less intellectual firepower than she does. If it’s not clear by now that she is an empty head who will be nothing more than the face of the Democratic Party’s oligarchy that is constantly chasing one-party rule in this country, it never will be to some Americans. That’s a sad indictment of who we’ve become.

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Hochstein and Hezbollah: Ruthie Blum

Posted By on September 16th, 2024

https://www.jns.org/hochstein-and-hezbollah/

Amos Hochstein, deputy assistant to the U.S. president and senior adviser for energy and investment, is scheduled to arrive in Israel on Monday, in yet another attempt to block Israel from defending itself against Hezbollah in Lebanon. That’s not how his boss in Washington—whoever that actually is at this point—would characterize the special envoy’s visit, of course.

No, the American administration, now led by out-of-commission figurehead Joe Biden, refers to Hochstein’s efforts as necessary to prevent an “escalation” of tensions between Hezbollah and Israel, and to keep the latter from opening up another front in the current war.

Right.

As though the dominant Iran-backed terrorists in Lebanon didn’t already declare war on Israel on Oct. 8, the day after Hamas launched an assault on the Jewish state the likes of which haven’t been seen since the Holocaust.
As if Hezbollah hasn’t been daily firing dozens of missiles and drones since then on northern Israel, large swaths of which have been evacuated of their imperiled residents.
Golan and Galilee denizens weren’t the only ones bombarded over the weekend by hostile projectiles, however. Early Sunday morning, Israelis all over the center of the country awoke to sirens and loud booms. It emerged that a surface-to-surface ballistic missile from Yemen had hit in an open area, sparking a fire in the Ben Shemen Forest, a few miles from Ben-Gurion Airport.

Naturally, the above was the subject of the weekly Cabinet meeting, which took place mere hours after the Houthis took credit for the assault, and ahead of Hochstein’s latest pointless diplomatic trip.

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POSITIVE NEWS FROM ISRAEL EVEN DURING WARTIME FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

Posted By on September 15th, 2024

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

At the site see a photo is of Israel’s Walter Bingham, the world’s oldest journalist, who celebrated his 100th birthday by skydiving over Israel.

Bravo to Walter Bingham! Nothing can match his view, but on the ground, nothing can match the stories of Israeli resilience, creativity, and contributions even during wartime delivered weekly by Michael Ordman. rsk

POSITIVE NEWS IN A WAR
 
He absorbed a bomb but didn’t give up. (TY UWI) Amichay Shindler saved his family by absorbing a bomb planted by Hamas terrorists outside the door to their safe room. Ten months and one prosthetic hand later, it is still not clear how he is alive today. His wife Avital manages a group for the wives of injured Israeli reservists.
https://www.algemeiner.com/2024/08/07/he-never-gives-up-how-one-israelis-miraculous-oct-7-survival-inspired-support-soldiers-families/
 
Soldier’s recovery and mission. (TY UWI & I24 News) Captain Israel Ben Shitrit, a reservist serving in Khan Yunis, tells his story and future plans. A Hamas terrorist hit his unit with an RPG and he was badly wounded. After three and a half months in rehabilitation, he declares that he is proud to be a Captain in the IDF.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1ivSSk2J7c
 
Wounded soldier returns to his tank. In Nov 2023 IDF tank crewman Sergeant Aharon Shmuel Bryce was severely wounded by a Hamas-fired RPG missile that hit his tank. After 10 months of surgeries, reconstructions and rehabilitation, he has returned to serve in Gaza in the very same tank that he was injured in.
https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/395922
 
Druze girl recovers after Hezbollah attack. Kai Marai, the 11-year-old Druze girl, most seriously wounded in the July 27 Hezbollah rocket attack on the Golan Heights, regained consciousness on Aug 13 surprising doctors at Haifa’s Rambam children’s hospital. Kai’s mother thanked the medical team for saving her daughter’s life.
https://www.jns.org/doctors-surprised-by-rapid-recovery-of-11-year-old-druze-girl-badly-hurt-in-hezbollah-attack/
 
Oct 7 survivor receives her medical degree. Elai Hogeg Golan awoke from a coma 51 days after Hamas terrorists firebombed her home on Oct 7. In May she received her medical degree at an emotional ceremony. She is now finishing her medical internship at Sheba Medical Center, while receiving rehabilitation treatment.
https://www.ynetnews.com/health_science/article/bjoe4ijqr
 
A nation of superheroes. Rony Ben-Zvi Elimelech is completing her doctorate at Israel’s Technion Institute. She is also a mother of two boys, ages 6 years and 16 months, and chief executive officer of Wisemama, which supports women who are combining parenthood and academic studies. Then she was called up for reserve duty.
https://ats.org/our-impact/rony-ben-zvi-elimelech-israel-is-a-nation-of-superheroes/
 
Cooking up resilience. Israel’s Technion Institute held a hackathon, attended by 140 science students, who worked with mental health experts to develop solutions to improve mental resilience. The winning team developed a technology to treat post-traumatic stress disorder through cooking, using a virtual reality headset.
https://www.technion.ac.il/en/2024/07/technology-for-mental-resilience/
 
US doctor volunteered and then made Aliyah. In Nov, cardiothoracic anesthesiologist Dr. Eugene Rapaport volunteered for two weeks at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center, treating some unique injuries and diverse patients. Then in June he realized his dream and made Aliyah through Nefesh b’Nefesh. A fascinating article.
https://www.jns.org/us-doctor-makes-aliyah-after-volunteering-to-treat-oct-7-victims/
 
Volunteers make a difference. (TY Yanky) Angie Jacobs and Naomi Frankel write about their experiences as volunteers on Kibbutzim, Moshavim, Army bases, children’s homes and more. They really made a difference.
https://www.jewishnews.co.uk/i-needed-to-make-a-difference-why-we-went-to-israel-to-volunteer/
 
Making chocolates under fire. (TY Rhoda) Rhoda’s great-niece Chana Koenig shows typical Israeli resilience by making gourmet chocolates (without preservatives) in Nahariya, northern Israel. For the last 11 months, she has endured near-incessant aerial attacks by Hezbollah from exploding UAVs and rocket fire.
https://davebender.substack.com/p/from-rockets-to-rosh-hashana-an-israeli (link in article is incorrect)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5yO41eBStU  https://www.cacaohagalil.co.il/ (link here is correct)
 
A wish comes true. Miri and her fiancé Roy are both IDF reserve officers and had to postpone their wedding several times due to the war. When they finally fixed the date, they pleaded on Instagram for help getting Miri’s paralyzed, holocaust-survivor grandfather Kim to attend. Thanks to Israel’s Wish Ambulance, he got there.
https://israfan.com/p/wish-ambulance-reunites-holocaust-survivor-at-wedding
https://www.mdais.org/en/activities/wish-ambulance
 
 
ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
Positive early results of heart repair trial. Israel’s Endospan (see here previously) shared good early news from the trial on 22 patients of its Nexus Aortic Arch Stent Graft System. The trial is being extended to 110 patients. 120,000+ patients suffer thoracic aortic arch disease every year in the USA and Europe.
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240130700861/en/Endospan-Releases-Early-TRIOMPHE-IDE-Study-Results-at-Society-of-Thoracic-Surgeons
 
Detecting high risk of pulmonary embolism. Researchers at Ben Gurion University and Israel’s Sheba Medical Center used AI to detect nearly 2,000 patients at high risk of developing a pulmonary embolism (lung blood clot). Sheba used the BGU algorithm to analyze the records of 46,000 patients who were admitted to ER.
https://nocamels.com/2024/08/sheba-study-ai-can-spot-patients-at-risk-of-pulmonary-embolism/
https://www.jmir.org/2024/1/e48595
 
Non-invasive cancer treatment. Scientists at Israel’s Technion Institute have developed a sonodynamic cancer therapy – ultrasound that targets sensitive nanoparticles accumulated in the cancerous tissue to treat deep-seated tumors. It destroys tumors without damage to healthy cells.
https://ats.org/our-impact/technion-researchers-develop-promising-treatment-for-tumors/
https://t3.technion.ac.il/technology/drug-delivery-nanoparticles/
 
Valve replacement startup gets approval & funds. Israel’s TruLeaf Medical has received approval from the Helsinki Committee to begin human trials of its minimally invasive Mitral Valve Replacement procedure. The Israel Innovation Authority awarded TruLeaf an additional NIS 1.5 million, to make a total of NIS 11.5 million.
https://www.prnewswire.com/il/news-releases/a-new-era-in-heart-surgery–israeli-biomed-company-truleaf-medicals-two-needle-sticks-procedure-for-mitral-valve-replacement-302194644.html
 
Aquatic plant is good for diabetics. An Israeli clinical trial shows that diabetics who drink a beverage with the Mankai cultivated aquatic plant after meals can reduce blood sugar levels by 20%. It confirms the results of initial tests that Israel’s Ben Gurion University scientists conducted five years ago (see here previously).
https://nocamels.com/2024/08/study-aquatic-plant-reduces-blood-sugar-in-diabetics/
 
A better fish farm. Traditional aquatics uses the wastewater from fish farms to grow hydroponic vegetables. Now scientists at Israel’s Ben Gurion University have also made use of the solid waste from fish by means of anaerobic digestion. The new system produces biogas, higher crop yields, using less energy and less water.
https://www.bgu.ac.il/en/news-and-articles/bgu-researchers-offer-proof-of-concept-for-unique-aquaponics-system/   https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0921344924003100?via%3Dihub
 
Real-time medical translator. Current and ex-students from Israel’s Technion Institute have developed CommU – a real-time language translation platform that allows doctors to converse with patients in Hebrew, English, Arabic, Russian, and most other European languages.
https://nocamels.com/2024/08/automatic-translator-breaks-language-barrier-for-doctors-patients/
https://commu.ai/
 
AI devices for the hard-of-hearing. (TY Atid-EDI) Israel’s Bettear provides Auracast-based assistive listening solutions to enhance sound experience. Its B-CASTER streamer integrates with hearing aids and cochlear implants. Other products support tour guides, teachers, entertainers, and museums.
https://www.bettear.com/solutions
 
AI contest for Parkinson’s FOG detection. Tel Aviv University researchers ran an international contest to develop an algorithm to detect “Freeze of Gait” (FOG) in Parkinson’s sufferers, using data from 100 patients. The prize of $100,000 attracted nearly 25,000 solutions from AI researchers in 83 countries.
https://english.tau.ac.il/research/fog-detection-ai  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-49027-0
 
Treating and reversing DDD. Israel’s Discure Technologies is developing an implantable bioelectronic device designed to treat and reverse degenerative disc disease (DDD). The Discure System restores fluids and nutrients to the affected discs. DDD accounts for 35% of all lower back pain, at a cost of $100 billion in the US alone.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/sjvw00d62c
https://www.hcs-capital.com/portfolio/discuretechnologies/

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Kamala’s First Solo Interview Was a Total Train Wreck Matt Margolis

Posted By on September 15th, 2024

https://pjmedia.com/matt-margolis/2024/09/14/kamalas-first-solo-interview-was-a-total-train-wreck-n4932514

On Friday, Kamala Harris finally gave her first solo interview since Joe Biden was forced out of the presidential race. It’s hard to believe it took her nearly two months finally do an interview on her own.

And yet, the interview proved exactly why she hasn’t.

Taking a page out of Barack Obama’s playbook, Kamala didn’t do an interview with a major news network, but with an ABC News affiliate in Philadelphia. Barack Obama employed this strategy in order to have more leverage over the terms of the interview, and it seems the Obama people who have joined her campaign have advised her to do the same.

So, obviously, you know that she was given a bunch of softball questions from reporter Brian Taft, and yet the short interview was a complete trainwreck.

“Talk about bringing down prices and making life more affordable for people,” Taff began. “What are one or two specific things you have in mind for that?”

“Well, I’ll start with this,” she said. “I grew up a middle-class kid. My mother raised my sister and me. She worked very hard. She was able to finally save up enough money to buy our first house when I was a teenager. I grew up in a community of hardworking people. You know, construction workers and nurses and teachers. I try to explain to some people who might not have had the same experience, but a lot of people will relate to this.”

We heard a version of this at the debate. Remember that? She sure has her lines memorized. Did she answer the question? Nope. But, wait, she wasn’t done.

You know, I grew up in a neighborhood of people who were really proud of their lawn, you know, and I was raised to believe and to know that all people deserve dignity and that we as Americans have a beautiful character. You know, we have ambitions and aspirations and dreams, but not everyone necessarily has access to the resources that can help them fuel those dreams and ambitions. So, when I talk about building an opportunity economy, it is very much with the mind of investing in the ambitions and aspirations and the incredible work ethic of the American people and creating opportunity for people, for example, to start a small business.

So, instead of answering the question, she gave us her trademark word salad instead. You literally can’t get an easier question than this. Yet, rather than offer an answer that could have included a couple of policy proposals she just defaulted to the same script she was practicing for a week for the debate.

FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

The Unbalanced Foreign Policy of the Biden-Harris Regime The current administration’s overreliance on diplomacy through the State Department, sidelining the Defense Department, has led to disastrous foreign policy failures and weakened national security.

Posted By on September 15th, 2024

https://amgreatness.com/2024/09/15/the-unbalanced-foreign-policy-of-the-biden-harris-regime/

By James E. Fanell and Bradley A. Thayer

One of the hallmarks of the Biden-Harris administration has been their obsession to have the U.S. State Department be the lead agency for all of America’s foreign policy decisions regardless of the situation. This was infamously made evident during the events surrounding the retreat from Afghanistan in August 2021, which was motivated by partisan political reasons to be able to get American troops out of the country before the 20th anniversary of the heinous attacks on 9/11.

In the months leading up to that disastrous decision, the State Department operated as the lead agency of the U.S. government, making all decisions, even after it was clear that a non-combatant evacuation operation (NEO) was going to be required. Yet, despite this reality, the Department of Defense was relegated to a subordinate position, which ultimately led to their professional advice being ignored.

The results included the deaths of 13 American military service members, hundreds of Afghani citizens killed, and thousands who had supported the U.S. during the proceeding years being displaced and their lives ruined. Strategically, the loss of our airbase at Bagram was a strategic blow to America’s ability to hold the PRC at risk from their western flank.

Americans have seen similar results from the Biden-Harris administration, which has hobbled American foreign policy by their decision to make the State Department the lead agency rather than being balanced equally with the Defense Department under the President and National Security Council.

Similarly disastrous results have occurred since that failed retreat, for instance in the failure to deter Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and their failure to provide uninterrupted assistance to our ally Israel in the face of the devilish evil that was unleashed on October 7, 2023. The same is occurring as well in the Indo-Pacific as the world watches the PRC daily threaten our national interests with assaults against our treaty ally, the Republic of the Philippines and their increasing military alliance with Russia as their two militaries threaten another treaty ally—Japan.

In each of these tinderbox areas, the Biden-Harris regime has turned America’s decision-making over to Secretary of State Antony Blinken and has openly subordinated the Department of Defense to second-tier status on critical national security issues.

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

On Truth and Lie in an Extramoral Sense The debate last week on ABC was, from one point of view, a dog’s breakfast, but, from another, it was a mesmerizing exercise in vertiginous, pseudo-Nietzschean legerdemain. By Roger Kimball

Posted By on September 15th, 2024

https://amgreatness.com/2024/09/15/on-truth-and-lie-in-an-extramoral-sense/

Students of Friedrich Nietzsche, or those who consort with such dubious people, will recognize the source of my title. It is the English version of the title Nietzsche employed for his early, unfinished essay Über Wahrheit und Lüge im aussermoralischen Sinne (1873).

The essay made a splash among pampered graduate students who endeavored to relieve the boredom of their humdrum lives with dreams of derring-do. Consider the essay’s opening:

Once upon a time, in some out of the way corner of that universe which is dispersed into numberless twinkling solar systems, there was a star upon which clever beasts invented knowing. That was the most arrogant and mendacious minute of “world history,” but nevertheless, it was only a minute. After nature had drawn a few breaths, the star cooled and congealed, and the clever beasts had to die.

Cozy, armchair nihilists just love that sort of thing.  They repeat such slogans to themselves while primping before first dates, seldom wondering why there never seems to be a second.

Cosmological angst was not Nietzsche’s only sweetmeat on offer in this essay, though. Even more popular were his epistemological-moral musings.  This is the key passage:

What then is truth? A movable host of metaphors, metonymies, and anthropomorphisms: in short, a sum of human relations which have been poetically and rhetorically intensified, transferred, and embellished, and which, after long usage, seem to a people to be fixed, canonical, and binding. Truths are illusions which we have forgotten are illusions; they are metaphors that have become worn out and have been drained of sensuous force, coins which have lost their embossing and are now considered as metal and no longer as coins.

In short, says Nietzsche, “to be truthful means to employ the usual metaphors.” From a moral perspective, he concludes, “to tell the truth” is “the duty to lie according to a fixed convention.”

Such observations are like catnip to aspiring relativists. Who knew that Kamala Harris, vice president of the United States, was a deacon in this church of cosmic futility?

Well, I am not sure that Harris herself is a paid-up member of this cynical coven. But her stage managers and stunt doubles certainly are.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

The Only Deal Hamas Wants: Israel’s Surrender by Bassam Tawil

Posted By on September 15th, 2024

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20941/hamas-deal-israel-surrender

Abandoning the border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt would enable Hamas to carry on with its decades-long practice of smuggling weapons into the enclave. It would also allow the new head of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, to escape – along with many of the hostages with whom he is thought to be surrounding himself for protection — through the tunnels into Egypt’s Sinai Desert.

The most recent statement from Hamas makes it clear that the terror group wants Israel to leave the Gaza Strip before any hostages are freed.

According to some reports, Hamas has stated that it is willing to free the hostages in stages. It undoubtedly wants to hold on to as many hostages as possible as an “insurance policy” that Israel will not resume the war against the terror group and that the terrorist group will be able to have a free hand to attack Israel in the future. This implies that a large number of the hostages remain captive in the hands of the terror group for years. It is important to note that for the past 10 years, Hamas has been holding hostage two Israeli civilians who are believed to be still alive, as well as the remains of two IDF soldiers.

Hamas is willing to fight to the last Palestinian. The terror group does not care if tens of thousands of its own people lose their lives as a result of the war it began. Its No. 1 priority is to hold on to power after the war. Hamas is evidently hoping that a ceasefire-hostage deal will help it achieve its goal of retaining control over the Gaza Strip.

If the Biden-Harris administration wants to understand the real intentions and aims of Hamas, it just needs to look at what the terror group is saying in Arabic. Hamas and its allies are saying in Arabic that the only deal they would accept is one that results in Israel raising a white flag.

If Hamas is permitted to win the war, Iran and its other terror proxies, such as Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and the Houthis, will gain confidence and feel more empowered. In addition, this will convey to Muslim Jihadis worldwide that Israel and the West are too weak to protect their people and values against Islamist terror organizations. This weakness will lead to more terrorism not only against Israel, but also the US and most Western nations.

Instead of applying pressure on Israel to end the war, the Biden-Harris administration needs to demand firmly that the Hamas murderers and rapists totally surrender, disarm, cede control over the Gaza Strip, and release all the hostages unconditionally.

All this needs urgently needs to take place before Iran breaks out its nuclear weapons and sets about attacking its oil-rich neighbors, such as the UAE and Saudi Arabia, again.

The Iran-backed Palestinian terrorist group Hamas has repeated its demand that Israel withdraw completely from the Gaza Strip in order to reach a ceasefire-hostage agreement with Israel. Hamas, in other words, is demanding that Israel lose the war so that the terrorist group can regroup, rearm and prepare for more attacks on Israel like the one it launched on October 7, 2023. In that assault, 1,200 Israelis were murdered, with many raped, tortured and burned alive. Another 240 Israelis were kidnapped to the Gaza Strip, where 101 are still being held as hostages, many of them already murdered (see here and here).

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

To Stop Hamas, Confront Qatar and Iran by Majid Rafizadeh

Posted By on September 14th, 2024

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20931/stop-hamas-qatar-iran

The Biden-Harris administration’s lifting of sanctions is what enabled Iran to profit to the tune of an estimated $100 billion, used for waging terror against Israel, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia — and the US. Just since October, Iran and its terror proxies and militias have attacked US troops in the Middle East more than 160 times, killing three and wounding more than 120…

By turning a blind eye to the actions of the Iranian regime’s while releasing roughly $100 billion to the treasury of the mullahs, the Biden-Harris administration is responsible for empowering these entities.

This week in Gaza, more deaths were reported after Israel took out a Hamas command center embedded in what used to function as a school in a “humanitarian zone.” If Hamas cares about the Palestinians and does not want them killed, why does it deliberately put its terrorist command centers in the middle of crowded “humanitarian zones”?

“He was murdered by Hamas…. And if you want the hostages home, which we all do, you have to increase the cost to Iran…. Iran is the Great Satan here. Hamas is the junior partner…. They [could not] care less about the Palestinian people.” — US Senator Lindsey Graham, referring to the murdered US-Israeli hostage, Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Fox News, September 1, 2024.

It is a clear call for the Biden-Harris administration to hold Iran accountable for the remaining hostages, and to target Iran’s oil refineries if the hostages are not immediately released.

So long as the US government continues to sit on the sidelines, the brutality and savagery of Hamas and their Iranian benefactors will only escalate. It is high time to confront Iran’s regime head-on and stop its spread of barbarity before more innocent lives are lost — above all, before the world’s “leading state sponsor of terrorism” produces nuclear weapons.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Who is running America right now? If Joe Biden isn’t fit enough to run for re-election, then how can he be fit to remain in the White House? Cory Franklin

Posted By on September 14th, 2024

https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/09/13/who-is-running-america-right-now/

Who is currently in charge in America? It’s sobering to realise that this critical question was never asked in this week’s presidential debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. After all, what question could be more important than who is running the country?

The nominal answer should be vice-president Harris’s boss, President Joe Biden. However, the Democratic Party powers-that-be have staged something of a palace coup, deeming Biden insufficiently compos mentis to be the party candidate in November’s election. At the same time, there is an unwillingness to address whether he is capable of leading the US right now.

When seen on the day after the Trump-Harris debate, Biden was wearing a Trump 2024 hat during a visit to a fire station in Pennsylvania to mark the anniversary of 9/11. Perhaps he was demonstrating a sense of humour or a nod to bipartisanship. Or quite possibly, this was another King-Lear-losing-his-faculties moment.

Over the past year, Biden’s cognitive decline has been apparent to most observers, even as it remained unmentioned by his supporters and the press – until the disastrous June debate with Trump. In February, the New York Times published a piece by a neuroscientist that assured us that ‘we’re thinking about Biden’s memory and age in the wrong way’. The message this tried to send was: ‘Don’t worry, it happens to everybody as they get older.’ Except, of course, this particular elderly man is in charge of the nuclear codes.

The evidence of Biden’s mental decline continues to mount up. Earlier this year, a special counsel found that he had retained classified government documents when he left the vice-presidency in 2017. But whereas Trump himself was charged with multiple felony accounts after he had done something similar – retaining dozens of classified files after he left office – Biden was exonerated in his particular documents case.