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Another Biden Bumble – He Can’t Remember the Name of His Own Defense Secretary By Stacey Lennox

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/stacey-lennox/2021/03/08/another-biden-bumble-he-cant-remember-the-name-of-his-own-defense-secretary-n1430938

President Joe Biden appears to be fumbling and bumbling with increased frequency. Despite fawning reports of how he is early to bed following a bowl of chocolate chip ice cream, he seems to have difficulty whenever he speaks after lunch. Today, even with Vice President Kamala Harris at his side, as she often is to help direct him, Biden called Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin “the (pause) former general (pause) the guy who runs that outfit over there.”

Biden could not come up with the position, Austin’s name, or the agency he leads, despite Biden having appointed Austin to head the Pentagon. Even more disturbing is that he appears to have written information in a folder and either doesn’t reference it or doesn’t know to reference it. More extended footage shows him closing the binder and leaving the podium without putting his mask on. Harris has had to remind him to do this before in keeping with the administration’s pro-mask stance.

The fact that this keeps happening is not what should bother Americans. Instead, the problem is no one in the corporate media is talking about it. In the last several weeks, Biden mangled the names of longtime Democrats in Texas and had had his live feed cut when he offered to take questions following a virtual meeting. His press secretary has had to answer questions about when he will have a solo press conference.

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Jew-Hatred’s Many Strains What the BDS movement really wants. Joseph Puder

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/03/anti-semitisms-many-strains-joseph-puder/

The collective hatred of Jews can be defined as anti-Semitism. Like the coronavirus, it has developed many mutations. Anti-Semitism is the oldest hatred, which does not seem to fade away. It is found in the liberal United Kingdom, with the likes of Rev. Stephen Sizer, a vicar in the Church of England. In 2015, he posted an article on Facebook, accusing Jews and Israel of “responsibility for the 9/11 attacks.” Sizer has joined a long history of Jew-hatred. The Catholic Church’s anti-Judaism turned to rabid anti-Semitism by Martin Luther, which laid the foundation for Hitler’s Nazi genocidal efforts against the Jews. 

In the late 1990’s, while a graduate student at Seton Hall University (a Catholic institution), I was invited by the courageous and legendary late Sister Rose Thering to attend an address to the faculty by Cardinal Edward I. Cassidy, President at the time, of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and head of the Commission of the Holy See for Religious Relations with the Jews. In his presentation, the Cardinal made a distinction between anti-Judaism and anti-Semitism. He pointed out that the Catholic Church and its followers might have been anti-Judaic in history, but posited that anti-Semitism was not part of it.  

Sister Rose, who recruited me to Seton Hall, prodded me to ask a question of the Cardinal. She was not convinced that the Cardinal’s thesis was entirely accurate, and neither was I. So, I raised my hand and when acknowledged I asked, “Your Eminence, how do you define the July 4, 1946 pogrom in Kielce, Poland, in which 42 Jewish men, women, and children, all Holocaust survivors, were murdered? Was that an example of anti-Judaism or anti-Semitism?” The Cardinal appeared rather perplexed, was silent for a moment, ending up politely avoiding my question.  

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Exposing the Media’s Protection Racket for Biden An Australian commentator ventures where American journalists don’t dare to go. Joseph Hippolito

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/03/exposing-medias-protection-racket-biden-joseph-hippolito/

Barely a month into Joe Biden’s virtual presidency, a political commentator on a major cable network said the ostensible winner of November’s election is too mentally incapacitated to serve.

What network transmitted those comments? Fox News? Newsmax? One America News? Perhaps even CNN or MSNBC? 

No. It was Sky News Australia, a conservative outlet.

And who made those comments? Cory Bernardi, a former Australian Senator from that nation’s conservative Liberal Party.

On Feb. 19, during his 5-minute commentary, Bernardi not only criticized Biden. He castigated the Democratic Party and traditional mass communications outlets in the United States for refusing to confront the issue.

“Never before has the leader of the free world been so cognitively compromised,” Bernardi said. “It’s clear to me at the least that U.S. President Joe Biden is struggling with dementia, and is clearly not up to the task he’s been sworn in to do.”

This was apparent to many during the election campaign. But such was the hatred of Donald Trump by the partisan and poisonous mainstream media, they chose not to highlight anything that may have derailed a Biden victory.  Even now, after he’s been sworn in, many of them are still refusing to speak the truth about Biden’s lack of capacity.

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Seth Simons, Comedy Cop Killing fun, one joke at a time. Bruce Bawer

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/03/seth-simons-comedy-cop-

Stand-up comedians used to have a simple rule: no subject is off-limits if the joke is funny. It was a good rule, and it made for some great comedy. The rise of the woke left represents an existential threat to that rule, and to good comedy generally. When it comes to comedy, indeed, the mantra, increasingly, is that any gag that might conceivably offend anyone, especially someone belonging to what the woke left considers a victim group, should simply not be tolerated – period. To an alarming extent, this comedy-killing mentality has been institutionalized at outfits like Netflix and Comedy Central, at some comedy clubs, and in the mainstream media generally. So it is that the comics who are most honored in such circles are dreary scolds like the Tasmanian lesbian Hannah Gadsby, whose acts are light on actual humor and heavy on identity politics. You don’t hear a lot of laughter from these people’s audiences, but you hear plenty of applause – the audience’s way of indicating approval of the comic’s values.

In this toxic atmosphere, comedians who still adhere to the no-subject-off-limits rule are rare, and the best ones – my own list would include Dave Attell, Nick DiPaolo, Jim Norton, and Doug Stanhope – seem increasingly precious. Thanks to them, at least some comedy shows are free-speech oases, keeping First Amendment values alive in the face of aggressive leftist humorlessness. But since the leftist instinct is always to censor opponents, not debate them, these top-drawer comics are an endangered species – booed by PC audiences, banned by timid club owners, and given short shrift by TV executives who are all too ready to sign up the unfunny likes of Amy Schumer, Samantha Bee, or Patton Oswalt, whose “comedy” consist salmost entirely of virtue signaling.

As if the situation weren’t bad enough, certain individuals have appointed themselves as comedy police.

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The Futility of the Great Lockdown Melodrama-Peter Murphy

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2021/03/the-futility-of-the-great-lockdown-melodrama/

Angst and composure: In the third week of March 2020, the world lost its equilibrium. It went into a collective nervous breakdown in response to the “novel” coronavirus. Only now is the world starting to recover its composure. Over-reaction dominated the mood of 2020. Government, media, political and academic classes all catastrophised. Yet reality was anything but catastrophic. In 2020 the total number of deaths attributed to COVID-19 was 0.028 per cent of the world’s population. That is smaller than the 0.031 per cent of the global population estimated as excess deaths due to the H2N2 flu virus in 1957-58.[1] In 1918-19, 1.1 to 2.75 per cent of the world’s population died from the “Spanish flu”, which targeted the young.[2] Worldwide 2.2 million persons had deaths attributed to Covid in 2020 compared to the 57 million who died from all causes in 2019.[3]

The increase in total deaths in 2020 in comparable (OECD-type) nations ranged from the negligible to the pronounced when matched against the five preceding years (Table One).

In most cases the increase that occurred was never more than a moderate fraction of the less than one per cent of the population that every year dies from all causes. It might be assumed that the varying national outcomes were the result of government action. However, there is no correlation between the levels of national morbidity in 2020 and the stringency of government restrictions and shutdowns (Table Two).

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The Mullahs’ Nuclear Weapons Game by Majid Rafizadeh

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17129/iran-nuclear-weapon-game

If the Western leaders know anything about the theocratic establishment of Iran, they would be able to see that the regime has used the Shia religion of Islam to justify repressing its population, killing, executing and sponsoring terror groups across the region.

So, what would stop the mullahs from issuing a fake religious ruling if it is going to advance their nuclear program by concealing the fact that they want both nuclear weapons and ensuring the survival of their theocracy?

“The government is empowered unilaterally to revoke any Shahri’ah agreements which it has concluded with the people when these agreements are contrary to the interest of the country or Islam.” — Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, quoted in “Iran: The Formation of Trans Identity and Possible Paths Toward the Acceptance of Greater Gender ‘Deviance'”, Berkeley Journal of Middle Eastern & Islamic Law [Vol. 9:1].

The important issue for the ruling mullahs of Iran is the survival of their dictatorship. Anything, including religion, can be used to ensure that.

The Iranian regime has acknowledged for the first time that it might pursue openly obtaining nuclear weapons.

The Iranian Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi, a close advisor to the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, pointed out recently that Iran might in fact very likely pursue that path:

“I must make it clear that if a cat is pushed into the corner, it may behave differently from a cat that walks freely. If Iran is pushed into a corner, it will not be its fault [i.e. the pursuit of nuclear weapons] but rather the fault of those pushing it.”

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Number of Migrant Children in Border Patrol Custody Triples in Two Weeks By Zachary Evans

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/number-of-migrant-children-in-border-patrol-custody-triples-in-two-weeks/

The number of migrant children detained in Border Patrol facilities has tripled over the past two weeks, amid an ongoing surge of migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

Over 3,250 migrant children are currently in Border Patrol custody, according to internal documents obtained by multiple outlets. That figure is triple the amount from two weeks ago and almost double the 1,700 children held in Border Patrol facilities as of last week.

Of those detained, over 1,360 children have been held longer than the maximum 72 hours before being transferred from Border Patrol to shelters run by the Department of Health and Human Services. However, while around 2,600 children are currently waiting for transfer, just 500 beds suitable for children are available in HHS shelters, according to the documents.

The Border Patrol transferred over 7,000 migrant children into HHS shelters last month, the highest ever recorded during the month of February.

The Biden administration moved last week to allow HHS shelters to operate at 100 percent capacity to accommodate an expected influx of migrants, despite the threat of increased coronavirus spread in the shelters. The President reportedly received a briefing warning of record numbers of child migrants at the border in the coming weeks.

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The Walls Close In on Cuomo Impeachment resolution filed. Jeffrey Lord

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://spectator.org/cuomo-resignation-impeachment/

Gov. Cuomo is in trouble. Big trouble.And he knows it.

Uh-oh.

Here’s the headline at Fox News:

New York Republicans announce Cuomo impeachment resolution: ‘We believe the time has come’

Cuomo is facing multiple allegations of sexual misconduct and a federal probe into his administration’s tally on COVID-19 deaths tied to nursing homes

The Fox story begins this way:

Republicans in the New York State Assembly on Monday announced an impeachment resolution against Gov. Andrew Cuomo, saying they believe the Democratic governor has lost “credibility and trust” and has an “inability to lead” the state of New York amid sexual harassment allegations leveled against him and investigations into his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

New York State Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay, alongside other Republicans, laid out the plan to introduce an impeachment resolution on Monday.

Gov. Cuomo insists he will not resign. He was elected, he says, not by politicians but the people of New York.

Alas for the governor, those very same people of New York elect the members of the New York state Legislature. And a lot of the members in the Legislature — alarmingly for the governor — are Democrats saying they want him out of the governor’s office.

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Bad Judgment and Biden’s Pentagon Colin Kahl is the wrong choice to be chief Defense strategist.

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.wsj.com/articles/bad-judgment-and-bidens-pentagon-11615246787?mod=opinion_lead_pos1

Another Biden nominee with a record of intemperate tweets is at risk of sinking in the Senate, and the press is comparing him to Neera Tanden, the President’s withdrawn first pick to lead the Office of Management and Budget. Yet whoever replaces Ms. Tanden is unlikely to change the trajectory of the Biden Administration’s progressive policies.

The Pentagon nomination of Colin Kahl, a dogmatic proponent of the Iran nuclear deal, is another story. A no vote in the Senate Armed Services Committee could push the Administration toward a Mideast approach that better serves America’s national interest.

President Biden has tapped Mr. Kahl for undersecretary of defense for policy, one of the most important non-cabinet jobs in the federal government. While the Secretary of Defense handles high-level defense politics, and the deputy secretary manages the department day-to-day, the undersecretary plays the leading role setting strategy—including representing the department at National Security Council deputies meetings.

Mr. Kahl’s strategic Mideast misjudgments have been pronounced. In 2015 as Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, Mr. Kahl argued for sanctions relief on Iran, declaring they “are not going to spend the vast majority of the money on guns, most of it will go to butter.” In the event, Tehran took advantage of the windfall to increase its financing for proxies in Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.

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How Do You Solve a Problem Like Korea? Pyongyang shrugs off sticks and turns up its nose at carrots. Biden has few options. By Walter Russell Mead

Posted By on March 9th, 2021

https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-korea-11615245637?mod=opinion_featst_pos1

The Journal reports that Kim Jong Un’s authorized biography is out and a Korean-language edition has been uploaded to the web. The authors are, unsurprisingly, bullish on Mr. Kim. The closing section (“Spinning the World Under the Axis of Sovereignty and Justice”) hails Mr. Kim’s summits with leaders including Donald Trump, Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin and South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in. Summing it up, the authors gush that “there has never been a time when all the world has been this focused on our people’s greatness and dignity in our 5,000-year history.”

They are not wrong. North Korea, with a gross domestic product estimated at less than $26 billion and a population of 26 million, punches well above its weight. Kim Jong Un doesn’t see himself as the crackpot leader of a failed state. He sees himself as a winner, the uncontested leader of a tiny state that by ruthless dedication has forced the greatest powers in the world to deal with it as an equal.

As another American administration struggles with the difficult and thankless task of developing a North Korea strategy, the Biden team needs to understand that even severe sanctions are unlikely to work. For years sanctions proponents have argued that if the U.S. could only get full Chinese cooperation, North Korea would have no choice but to accept some kind of denuclearization process.

This is unlikely. China, annoyed as it often is by North Korea’s unpredictable and disruptive approach to politics, would never agree to sanctions stringent enough to risk destabilizing a neighboring country. More important, the Kims are not easily swayed by economic pressure. In an effort to contain Covid, Pyongyang has voluntarily imposed an isolation on itself far more devastating than sanctions ever could be. Trade with China is down 80%. GDP is down an estimated 10%. Grain production is slated to fall one million tons below the 5.5 million tons required to feed its populace. Major factories have closed due to shortages of spare parts, and blackouts are widespread.

Despite all this, the government is signaling its determination to stand fast until the pandemic ends. Not for the first time, Pyongyang is demonstrating that it will impose massive suffering on its population to pursue its goals. Perhaps this determination would crack in the face of even direr conditions, but a mass famine did not force the regime to abandon its nuclear program in the 1990s. Sanctions alone, however severe, will not bring this country to heel.