HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

Imported Chips Make America’s Security Vulnerable In response, the U.S. needs better engineering to detect sabotage and a move to more domestic production.By Adam A. Scher and Peter L. Levin

Posted By on May 26th, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/imported-chips-make-americas-security-vulnerable-11590430851?mod=opinion_lead_pos7

America’s digital infrastructure has been a crucial part of the response to the Covid-19 crisis. But what if it becomes a problem? Semiconductors underlie many things we take for granted and desperately need: telecommunications, remote industrial controls, emergency services, and transportation and fleet-management networks. If a digital catastrophe hit, Americans could lose access to electricity, water and banking. The military could be exposed. The continuity of government could be broken. The basic fabric of modern life would take years to recover.

There are three primary causes of America’s pernicious cyber vulnerability: manufacturing economics, advances in microfabrication, and new design paradigms. For the past 25 years, industry’s focus has been on compliance to behavioral specifications—on doing things right. Now it has to consider whether the chips designed at home but built overseas are doing the right things. A deliberate manipulation by a foreign enemy could be worse than a viral infection, and would dramatically reshape great-power competition.

U.S. supply chains are fragile and not secure. And no one seriously considered the possibility that factories themselves could, or would, manipulate the product to a foreign power’s advantage. But for modern devices composed of 40 billion transistors, the opportunity for mischief is tremendous. Each transistor can be in one of two states: on or off. That means the number of possible states for the most complicated processors is the inconceivably large number of 2 raised to the 40 billionth power. Checking every transistor, every possibility, for malfeasance is a hopeless task.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

Prime Minister Netanyahu in the Dock A Constitutional Contradiction Emerges in a Country Without a Constitution

Posted By on May 26th, 2020

https://www.nysun.com/editorials/prime-minister-netanyahu-in-the-dock/91145/

What a spectacle is underway in Israel, where Prime Minister Netanyahu is being prosecuted by his own government for bribery and other crimes that he was formally alleged to have committed before he was re-elected to a third term. It’s a lesson in constitutional conundrums from a country that doesn’t have a constitution — and not just because Mr. Netanyahu has entered the dock with all saddlebags flapping in the breeze.

“Netanyahu’s Defense Strategy Is to Undermine His Accuser, the State of Israel,” is the way the poser was put in Israel’s leading liberal daily, Haaretz, as the trial was getting underway. A country doesn’t have to have a constitution, it seems, for its headline writers to comprehend the implicit constitutional contradiction. Here in America, we’ve been marking the point as a special counsel pursued, in President Trump, his own boss.

In America, of course, there are ways around this problem. One would have been for President Trump to fire the prosecutor for trying to prosecute him in a way the President didn’t like. Mr. Trump was more forbearing, and merely unleashed tornados of tweets against Robert Mueller, until the prosecutor cleared him of collusion with the Russians. Another method for dealing with the predicament is impeachment. It, too, cleared Mr. Trump.

HISTORY Comments turned off

 Shavou’ot (Pentecost) guide for the perplexed, 2020 Ambassador (Ret.) Yoram Ettinger

Posted By on May 26th, 2020

1. Impact on the formation of the US

The holiday of Shavou’ot (Pentecost) commemorates the legacy of Moses – the Exodus, the Ten Commandments and the Torah (the Five Books of Moses) -which had a significant impact on the key values and achievements of the Early Pilgrims and the Founding Fathers: the US Revolution, Federalist Papers, US Constitution, the Bill of Rights, etc. 

2. The Liberty Bell  

Shavou’ot is the holiday of liberty/Exodus, as highlighted by the Biblical concept of Jubilee – the cornerstone of Biblical liberty – which is inscribed on the Liberty Bell: “Proclaim liberty upon the earth and unto all the inhabitants thereof (Leviticus 25:10).” The Liberty Bell was installed in Philadelphia in 1752, 50 years following William Penn’s Charter of Privileges, inspiring the 50 States in the union. The Biblical Jubilee is commemorated every 50 years, releasing slaves and returning land property to the original proprietors. Shavou’ot is celebrated 50 days following Passover, and Pentecost – a derivative of the Greek word for 50 – is celebrated 50 days following Easter.  According to Judaism, there are 50 gates of wisdom, studied during the 50 days between Passover and Shavou’ot.

3. The Scroll of Ruth. Honor thy mother in-law…

Shavou’ot spotlights the Scroll of Ruth, the first of the five Biblical scrolls, which are studied during five Jewish holidays: Ruth (Shavou’ot), Song of Songs (Passover), Ecclesiastes (Sukkot/Tabernacles), Book of Lamentations (the Ninth day of Av), Esther (Purim). Ruth was a Moabite Princess, the great grandmother of King David, the son of Jesse and the grandson of Ovad, who was the son of Ruth.

Ruth was a role model of loyalty to her Jewish mother in-law (“Your people are my people and your G-d is my G-d”), humility, gratitude, responsibility, reliability, respect of the fellow human beings, faith and optimism. According to the Bible, Ruth, the daughter-in-law, was better than seven sons. Ruth stuck by her mother-in-law, Naomi, during Naomi’s roughest time, when the latter lost her husband, Elimelech (a President of the Tribe of Judah), two sons and property. Just like Job, Naomi bounced back from the lowest ebb of ordeal to fulfilled hope.  Job and Naomi went through family, economic and social calamities, lost their spouses, children and financial assets; both retained confidence in G-d and reconstructed their families; both became symbols of conviction over convenience, faith-driven patience and endurance.

ISRAEL, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

J Street’s A Street Problem… by Gerald A. Honigman

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

How is it that Israel living in 9-15 mile wide area that they received as a result of UN-imposed armistice (“Auschwitz”) lines in 1949–are considered “expansionist right-wing extremists?”

How is it that JStreet cohorts condemn both those “oppressors” and President Trump for expecting/allowing the territorial compromise in the disputed territories–in which Jews have millennia of linkage–permitted via the final draft of UNSC Resolution 242 in the wake of the “67 War.

This is what the Settlement Issue is largely all about, as well as Israel’s new intent to apply sovereignty (misnamed “annexation”) to about a third of those disputed lands. Lands where Jews have lived, again, for millennia, Hebrew Prophets, preached, David was crowned King of Israel, Hebrew matriarchs and patriarchs are buried, the Maccabees led their fight against Greco-Syrian oppressors, and Jews owned land clear up to their massacres by Arabs in the 2oth century. And where the Temple itself is located. Keep in mind that these are not Brits claiming the Falkland islands over 8,000 miles away from home, the Russians in Chechnya, etc. and so forth…American Samoa? 

Check out excerpts by the chief architect of 242, Lord Caradon:

“It would have been wrong to demand Israel return to positions of June 4, 1967 … those positions were … artificial … just places where soldiers of each side happened to be on the day fighting stopped in 1948 … just armistice lines. That’s why we didn’t demand Israelis return to them”  http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/11127 .

HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

Texas: Yet Another Jihad Attack at a Naval Air Station And still no lessons learned. Robert Spencer

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/05/texas-yet-another-jihad-attack-naval-air-station-robert-spencer/

On Thursday, a 20-year-old Muslim migrant from Syria named Adam Salim Alsahli drove up to the Naval Air Station Corpus Christi in Texas and, according to CNN, “attempted to rush the security gate with a vehicle.” Then, after “security deployed a barrier to stop the vehicle,” Alsahli “exited the vehicle and opened fire…and naval security forces returned fire.” Alsahli was “neutralized,” but the threat he represents has not been neutralized at all, because of the refusal of the political and media elites to face it honestly.

Surprisingly in these times when nearly every jihad attack is written off as a manifestation of “mental illness,” the FBI immediately acknowledged that Alsahli’s attack was “terrorism-related.” As it turned out, “officials have identified various social media accounts, which initial reports indicate are likely associated with the shooter….Online postings by these accounts expressed support for ISIS and Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

What a surprise. And Alsahli’s attack came only three days after the news broke that “the gunman who killed three U.S. sailors at a military base in Florida last year repeatedly communicated with al-Qaida operatives about planning in the months leading up to the attack.” And he didn’t just communicate with them. Attorney General William Barr noted that the Florida shooter, Mohammed Alshamrani, had “significant ties to Al Qaeda and the Arabian Peninsula not only before the attack, but before he even arrived in the United States.” Like Alsahli, Alshamrani attacked a naval air base, the Naval Air Station Pensacola.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Our Season of Docile Compliance: Peter Smith

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/05/strange-times/

“Did Nero, Robespierre, Hitler, Stalin, Castro, Mao, Pol Pot or Pinochet ever dream of such power as has been ceded to our various public health officers? The dictators of old would be green with jealousy to see entire populations reduced to meek compliance without the threat of torture and death.”

Does anyone feel like me? More aggrieved and irritated at the behaviour and demeanour of politicians loosening restrictions than when they were imposing them. ‘We in our magnificence deign that you can now congregate in larger groups than two, five, or ten, provided you remain distant from each other, constantly wash your hands, sneeze into your elbows, and don’t stand up in pubs or restaurants or hang about too long. And none of that dangerous singing in church, if we ever allow you again to partake of those primitive rituals.’

Yes, m’lord and m’lady. No, m’lord and m’lady. Three bags full, m’lord, m’lady.

At the same time, I have to say that journalists who know what’s best for us run politicians a close second in the irritating-beyond-words stakes. Best not to speak about the unspeakable – public health officials. Is there any group of people more blinkered, less empathetic? Haven’t come across one.

Just opened my Weekend Australian at the op-ed page.  Gerard Henderson is there, hurrah. Then we have (to me) the insufferable PVO, Katrina Grace Kelly telling us that “home sweet work is the new normal” and Fiona Harari telling us that “keeping our distance is not natural but it’s for our own good.” Yuk!

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

“How Much is One Trillion Dollars?” Sydney Williams

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

www.swtotd.blogspot.com

Congress is tossing around trillion-dollar relief packages, as we might a car or student loan, or a loan from Aunt Sally. A trillion is a big number, difficult even to conceive. Five thousand round trips to the sun would amount to less than a trillion miles. A trillion hours is greater than 100 million years, which would take one back to the Cretaceous Period when dinosaurs roamed the earth. A stack of a trillion one-dollar bills would reach 67,866 miles into the sky. The earth contains seven and a half billion people, a big number but less than one percent of a trillion

 

Here in the land of make-believe, the Democrat-led House of Representatives just passed the $3 trillion HEROES Act. A month earlier, Congress passed, and the President signed, the $2 trillion CARES Act. Combined, that Five trillion exceeds the 2020 federal budget. It exceeds, in current dollars, what we spent to conduct World War II. “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” is an ancient adage. However, do American taxpayers fully comprehend the size of the obligation to which Congress has committed them, their children and grandchildren? Senator Everett Dirksen (1896-1969 – R-Il) is alleged to have said: “A billion here, a billion there and pretty soon you’re talking real money.” Here it is, two generations later, and we’ve upped the ante a thousand-fold. In a time of crisis, Americans should not be parsimonious, but we expect our representatives to be prudent and respectful about spending money that is not theirs. To use this money to bail out profligate states and extend already generous benefits to public employees should not be the purpose. America needs to get back to work.

Government generates no income. That is hard to believe, given the lifestyles and the prodigality with which politicians toss money around. Government takes from taxpayers, and it borrows on behalf of those same taxpayers who are legally committed to pay it back. With a median annual household income in the U.S. of $63,000, and assuming a four-person household, the proposed borrowing for COVID-19 and its economic fallout amounts to just under a year’s income for the average household. And, that $5 trillion is on top of total federal debt of $22 trillion, growing at a rate of $1 trillion a year. Unfunded pension and health benefits compound the debt problem for the American taxpayer. Depending on the discount rate one uses, unfunded liabilities approach $50 trillion. Where will the money come from? There are only three answers: one, growth in GDP, which requires free markets, rule of law and limited but sensible regulation; two, higher taxes, which inhibit economic growth, and/or three, a depreciated dollar, which will reduce future living standards.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

HOPKINS VIDEO: ANOTHER ZOMBIE HOSPITAL FOR INVISIBLE PATIENTS

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

https://jamieglazov.com/2020/05/25/hopkins-video-another-zombie-hospital-for-invis

This new Glazov Gang edition features U.K.’s valiant freedom fighter Katie Hopkins, who discusses Another Zombie Hospital for Invisible Patients, unveiling how The morbid charade ensues.

Don’t miss it!

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

The Retired U.S. Senator and Diplomat Shilling for China’s Propaganda Machine By Zachary Evans !!!????!!!!

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/05/coronavirus-china-max-baucus-shilling-for-beijing-propaganda-machine/

Max Baucus has compared President Trump to Joseph McCarthy and Adolf Hitler on Chinese state television.

  S ince the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, former U.S. ambassador to China Max Baucus has given a series of interviews to Chinese state media outlets in which he criticized the American response to the crisis in a rather provocative manner. Notably, he cast the Trump administration’s insistence on assigning blame to Beijing for the coronavirus pandemic as the rhetorical equivalent of Nazism in the 1930s and the “Red Scare” of the 1950s.

Baucus, a Democrat who also served as a U.S. senator from Montana from 1978 to 2014, first compared Trump’s attacks on Beijing to the rhetoric used by Joseph McCarthy and Adolf Hitler in a May 6 appearance on CNN. Subsequently, he became very popular with Beijing’s propagandists and has since repeated the accusation in at least four interviews with Chinese state media.

“Joe McCarthy [and] Adolf Hitler were making statements based on nationalism . . . riling people up, making people believe things that were really not true,” Baucus told the state mouthpiece Chinese Global Television Network on May 12, initially reported by the Washington Free Beacon. “The White House and some in Congress are making statements against China that are so over the top and so hypercritical, they are based not on the fact, or if they are based on fact, sheer demagoguery, and that’s what McCarthy did in the 1950s.”

The U.S. is entering “a kind of an era which is similar to Joe McCarthy” and “a little bit like Hitler in the ’30s,” Baucus told China’s state run Global Times from his home in Montana a few days earlier. “Today, people kind of like to see China get criticized, which is unfortunate, because I think, basically, the American people like the Chinese people, just like Chinese people . . . like American people.”

EDUCATION, MEDIA Comments turned off

Revisionists at it again: The ‘1619 Project’ is bad history fueled by bad motives

Posted By on May 25th, 2020

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/may/24/editorial-1619-project-bad-history-fueled-bad-moti/

Every decade or so, a new revisionist fad will captivate some small — and invariably loud — subsect of American “historians.” It happened, most memorably, in the 1960s and ‘70s as the rise of Marxist professors swept through our universities. Slowly but surely the grift was seen for what it was — bad history based on bad motives. But a good deal of damage was done, as thousands of university students were indoctrinated to interpret American history as an ongoing drama of class conflict and nothing more. We see the effects of this education playing out today.

Well, the revisionists are at it again. Similar grift, similar bad history and similar bad motives. But this time it’s worse, the long-term effect more pernicious.

Earlier this month, Nikole Hannah-Jones of The New York Times was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for commentary “For a sweeping, provocative and personal essay for the ground-breaking 1619 Project, which seeks to place the enslavement of Africans at the center of America’s story, prompting public conversation about the nation’s founding and evolution.”

At the heart of Mrs. Hannah-Jones‘ project is the explicit claim that the true history of America did not start in 1776, but in 1619, the year when the first slaves arrived to the colonies. Instead of taking our bearings from the eternal truths enshrined in the Declaration (“all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”), she argues that slavery is the lens through which all of America’s successes and failures, every single thing that defines us, good and bad, must be understood.