NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Even Biden Doesn’t Want To Talk About ‘Bidenomics’ Anymore: We Have The Receipts

Posted By on March 4th, 2024

https://issuesinsights.com/2024/03/04/even-biden-doesnt-want-to-talk-about-bidenomics-anymore/

After President Joe Biden embraced the term “Bidenomics,” he and his White House staff couldn’t get enough of it. But either Biden’s forgotten all about it, or the administration realized that it was doing no good to brag about something the public didn’t believe. Either way, the term is vanishing from use.

It was in a speech in Chicago on June 28, 2023, that Biden decided to bear-hug the term.

“I didn’t come up with the name. I really didn’t,” he said. “I didn’t realize the economists in the Wall Street Journal did.  But I’m happy to call it ‘Bidenomics.’ And guess what? Bidenomics is working.”

Biden thought he was catching a wave. The economy seemed to be turning a corner, the rate of inflation was decelerating, job growth was strong. Surely the public would come to realize that the worst was behind.

Embracing the term would make it easy, the thinking probably was, to claim credit for any good news.

And, boy, did Biden try to tie “Bidenomics” to whatever good news he could find. At least initially.

The problem was that the more Biden tried to tell the public how he’d rescued the economy, the less the public believed it. Biden’s approval rating continued to slide. His grades on his handling of the economy did likewise.

In our I&I/TIPP Poll last June – taken just before Biden started talking up Bidenomics – we asked Americans if they agreed with Biden that the economy was strong. Only 36% did so. A New York Times/Sienna poll released over the weekend finds that only 18% those surveyed think Biden’s policies have helped them personally. (That compares with 40% who say Donald Trump’s policies helped them personally.)

His numbers haven’t improved since then. The TIPP Economic Optimism Index is lower today than it was then. Just 27% now give Biden an “A” or “B” grade on handling the economy, while 53% give him a “D” or an “F.”

ELECTIONS Comments turned off

Election Countdown: Trump Surges in Swing States Amid Legal Turmoil The election is eight months away. The Democrats will not be sitting by idly. They have a country to ruin and power to maintain, and they are not going to let up on Trump. By Roger Kimball

Posted By on March 3rd, 2024

https://amgreatness.com/2024/03/03/election-countdown-trump-surges-in-swing-states-amid-legal-turmoil/

When is Jack Smith’s birthday?  Someone should give him a copy of the Justice Department’s manual with a bookmark in Section 9-85.500 “Actions that may have an impact on Election.” He and his boss, Attorney General Merrick Garland, can open their office reading group by having someone read the beginning of that passage aloud: “Federal prosecutors and agents may never select the timing of any action, including investigative steps, criminal charges, or statements, for the purpose of affecting any election or for the purpose of giving an advantage or disadvantage to any candidate or political party.”

But, of course, that is exactly what Jack Smith intended to do with his case against Donald Trump in Washington, DC.  Trump was set to go on trial March 4, the day before Super Tuesday, in what is one of the most Democratic cities in the country, in a court presided over by Tanya Chutkan, an ostentatiously Trump-hostile judge.  As Byron York noted, “Democrats envisioned a weekslong trial tying Trump down in a federal courtroom, followed by a guilty verdict from a deep-blue Washington, D.C., jury, followed by a long sentence imposed by Chutkan, followed by a move by Smith to imprison Trump pending appeal. Bingo! Trump would be behind bars by Labor Day, and Biden would cruise to victory.”

A few days ago, the Supreme Court wrecked this envisioned party by agreeing to hear Trump’s case that, as president on January 6, 2021, he enjoyed immunity from criminal prosecution.  SCOTUS agreed to expedite the case, but no one expects them to finish before the election in November.

Of course, Trump is being besieged on many other fronts.  There’s the $450 million Judge Arthur Engoron says he must pay because… because why? Oh, right, because he defrauded banks by overvaluing his assets when he made loan applications.  The banks did their own arithmetic, made the loans, and were pleased that Trump paid them back on time and in full.  So it was a fraud in which no one was defrauded, but Trump still must be fined into possible bankruptcy.  While we’re shopping for our legal friends, someone should get Engoron a large-type version of the 8th Amendment, which is brief and to the point: “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”

FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

Biden Administration Not Stopping Iran, Russia, China, the Houthis by Majid Rafizadeh

Posted By on March 3rd, 2024

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20440/biden-not-stopping-iran-houthis

What is essential to remember is that the Houthis and other proxies of Iran are in all likelihood deeply apprehensive about the prospect of their senior leadership being targeted. By refraining from targeting Houthi leaders, the United States has inadvertently emboldened the group and allowed them to act with impunity.

In recent months, the Red Sea has become a battleground for attacks by the Iran-backed Houthis of Yemen, with the Biden administration facing mounting criticism for its failure to quell the escalating violence. As the Houthi group continues to build its weapons stockpile in Yemen, supported by the Iranian regime, the urgency of the situation cannot be overstated. It is critical that the United States reevaluate its military strategy to effectively address this growing threat.

The current approach, adopted by the Biden administration, is characterized by a reluctance to directly target Houthi leadership. The administration has opted instead to focus solely on destroying weapons and equipment.

This approach, however, has proven ineffective in deterring the Houthis from launching further attacks. What is essential to remember is that the Houthis and other proxies of Iran are in all likelihood deeply apprehensive about the prospect of their senior leadership being targeted. By refraining from targeting Houthi leaders, the United States has inadvertently emboldened the group and allowed them to act with impunity.

A former US military official, who spoke to CNN on the condition of anonymity, pointed out that the current campaign against the Houthis is similar to previous failed endeavors:

“The US campaign against the Houthis appears to bear the hallmarks of many of these highly circumscribed, scrubbed campaigns of the past where we seek to avoid causing them actual pain.”

The Trump administration’s targeted killing of Qassem Soleimani, head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), for instance, resulted in cessation of Iranian harassment of the US as long Trump was in office. If one wants to induce meaningful change in the behavior of the Houthis, unfortunately decisive blows will be necessary.

Sadly, the reliance on cosmetic strikes to destroy Houthi drones and missiles is both financially unsustainable and strategically futile. Continuously expending resources on missiles, worth multi-millions dollars each, to counter far less expensive Houthi weaponry is not a dazzling long-term solution. The Biden administration would be better served targeting Houthi weapons depots and missile launchers to disrupt their military capabilities in a significant way.

Merely intensifying attacks on Houthi infrastructure, however, will not suffice. Without substantially degrading Houthi military capabilities, the recently redesignated terrorist group will continue to pose a significant threat. Therefore, it is imperative to adopt a multifaceted approach that also targets the source of the problem – Iran’s regime.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

Escalation Towards an Independent Terrorist State by Nils A. Haug

Posted By on March 3rd, 2024

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20450/independent-terrorist-state

Both US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron reveal their simplistic, and somewhat imperialist, Western approach to a complex Middle Eastern situation, irrespective of the aims and intentions of the two parties chiefly involved: the radical Islamists of Gaza and the West Bank, and the State of Israel itself.

“They [Hamas] told us in all of their statements that their charter is to destroy Israel and exterminate the Jews. Other countries have said the same thing. It’s also in the Houthis’ charter. It’s in Iran’s direct messaging. I think that when they tell you they want to kill you, you should believe that. I think that’s the lesson.” — Safra Catz, CEO of Oracle, ynetnews.com, February 24, 2024.

Realistically, the Palestinian claim to Gaza is based on tenuous grounds. Gaza is not the traditional homeland of the so-called Palestinian people. They are simply a collection of nomadic Arabs who forged that identity for political expediency. This arrangement was openly stated by the late PLO executive committee member, Zoheir Moshen, in an interview with James Dorsey for the Dutch newspaper Trouw, on March 31, 1977: “The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak about the existence of a Palestinian people since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct ‘Palestinian people’ to oppose Zionism.”

Even if a political compromise were reached over Gaza, or, the “1949 Armistice Line” as in the revised 2017 Hamas charter, the violent struggle for control over the rest of Israel, particularly the West Bank — the “heart” of Israel — will persist.

Both US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron reveal their simplistic, and somewhat imperialist, Western approach to a complex Middle Eastern situation, irrespective of the aims and intentions of the two parties chiefly involved: the radical Islamists of Gaza and the West Bank, and the State of Israel itself.

The hard truth is that for millennia, the land of Israel, whether occupied by Jacob’s tribes or others, has been the domain of countless generations of Israelites. The vast majority of Israel’s citizens, and many Jews in the diaspora, understand their rights to retain their homeland after escaping 400 years of slavery in Egypt. At its core, the debate over this tiny area of land is founded on three primary factors: spiritual, national, and political. In the result, the conviction of the majority populace is that not one square inch of the current boundaries of Eretz Yisrael (the Land of Israel) can belong to anyone who might harm them again, although people of peace are always graciously allowed to reside among them.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

POSITIVE NEWS FROM ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

Posted By on March 3rd, 2024

www.verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com

Not even a war can stop Israel building on its 75-years of success in rebuilding a Jewish State.

Israel continues to build up its basket of subsidized medical treatments, create new remedies for global diseases, discover the secret for building bigger families, and construct medical centers for rehabilitating the injured.

The latest news includes the Israeli woman who oversees the building of Israel’s missile defense system; an Israeli app that rebuilds broken speech into coherent conversation; and 30 Israeli NGOs rebuilding lives in Africa. Israeli startups are restoring the environment, while building efficient EV batteries, hydrogen-powered flying cars, and creating sustainable aviation fuel.  Michael Ordman

 

POSITIVE NEWS DURING A WAR
 
He lied to his wife to rescue survivors. On Oct 7, IDF veteran Eran Masas, from Haifa lied to his wife that he had been called up by the army. He put on a uniform, took his sidearm and drove 220km to the Gaza border. He then coordinated multiple search and rescue operations as survivors thought he was an on-duty IDF officer.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/on-oct-7-killing-grounds-a-vigilante-army-vet-inspires-grieving-us-jewish-leaders/
 
Have a nice flight! IDF reservist Itay returned to Israel on an overbooked El Al flight from Bangkok with a seat in a washroom. The other 14 washrooms also seated IDF reservists, plus 10 in the cockpit and elsewhere. Luckily, he had a pre-flight massage. Two days later he was dodging terrorist bullets in Huwara, near Nablus.
https://www.jns.org/idf-reservist-flies-home-to-fight-hamas-in-planes-washroom-seat/  
 
US mission for volunteer doctors in Israel. (TY Yanky) Israeli Doctors in America, together with the Israeli Ministry of Health and Israel’s Economic Mission to the USA – East Coast, have launched the IL-USDocAID Initiative. It brings US medical professionals to work either in Israeli hospitals or with Magen David Adom.
https://www.ilusdocaid.org/
 
1,000 hugs. Operation Hug (see here previously) has now brought over 1,000 parents from over 50 different countries to visit their children who are lone soldiers serving in the IDF. Thanks to Nefesh B’Nefesh, JNF-USA, and FIDF (Friends of the IDF).  Watch some of the recent reunions here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06D6EpiGnZU
 
Former US Envoy donated an ambulance. Former US Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt and his family donated a mini-lance (mini-ambulance) emergency response vehicle to Israel’s United Hatzalah. He requested that will be specifically driven by a female Arab volunteer and deployed in eastern neighborhoods of Jerusalem.
https://www.jns.org/wire/former-middle-east-envoy-donates-mini-ambulance-to-israeli-ems-team/
 
Displaced Israeli kids learn and play in mobile tech lab. More about the work of the charity Machshava Tova (see here previously), which uses funds from CJP in Boston to purchase computers, projectors, 3D printers, VR goggles and other equipment for children evacuated from Sderot.
https://www.israel21c.org/displaced-israeli-kids-learn-and-play-in-mobile-tech-lab/
 
Displaced boy finds 2,000-year-old coin. 11-year-old Nati Tokiyar from Kibbutz Magen was evacuated to the Dead Sea to avoid Hamas rockets from Gaza. As he was exploring the area, he found a coin of Hasmonean king and high priest Alexander Jannaeus (104-76 BCE). The Israel Antiquities Authority gave him a certificate.
https://www.i24news.tv/en/news/israel/archeology/1708520147-displaced-young-boy-finds-2-000-year-old-hasmonean-coin-in-dead-sea-area
 
We will still sing. Some 7,000 Netanya children came to the city stadium to demonstrate unity and solidarity and express their desire to see the return of the hostages kidnapped by Hamas terrorists. See other videos of adults and children displaying that Israelis will never surrender to those that hate us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlok2hsPKpU    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hptZdP_hulY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaPhvOLDXjI  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Rzq-m8_9bE
 
“I survived for a reason”. Watch an example of the incredible spirit of Israeli soldiers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6nTy72rJo0
 
 
ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS
 
110 new medications and technologies. Israel’s 2024 subsidized health basket will see an expansion of genetic testing, treatment for adult ADHD, innovative diabetes management, and new treatments for cancer and chronic and rare diseases. The 110 additions will help 317,000 more people at a cost of NIS 650 million to the State.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israels-2024-health-basket-gets-110-new-medications-and-technologies/
 
Hope for Huntington’s disease patients. Scientists at Israel’s Weizmann Institute have identified two small molecules capable, in the laboratory, of penetrating the blood-brain barrier and reducing the levels of a defective protein that causes Huntington’s disease.
https://www.jns.org/israeli-researchers-take-step-toward-cure-for-huntingtons-disease/
https://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/life-sciences/toward-treatment-huntington%E2%80%99s-disease
https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.1038/s44321-023-00020-y
 
Hi-tech medical analysis. Tel Aviv University Prof Noam Shomron digitizes human DNA and uses AI to discover genetic diseases. That’s his day job – in evenings and weekends he helps the IDF identify fallen soldiers. He explains how functional genomics and AI can help make better medical decisions.
https://www.israel21c.org/the-scientist-using-ai-to-build-a-more-resilient-society/  
 
Israeli sunshine increases fertility. Women wishing to expand their family might consider making Aliyah. Researchers at Tel Aviv University have found for the first time that exposure to the sun in women aged 30-40 can increase fertility. Their ovaries secrete more Anti-Müllerian hormone (AMH) due to higher UV levels.
https://www.aftau.org/news_item/sun-exposure-may-have-a-positive-effect-on-fertility-in-women-aged-30-40/
https://safrabio.cs.tau.ac.il/carmit_levy_exposure_to_sun_may_increase_fertility_among_women
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0039128X23001356
 
Migraine?  You’re covered. US non-profit health insurer Highmark has added, to the items covered by its insurance policies, the Nerivio Remote Electrical Neuromodulation (REN) migraine band, developed by Israel’s Theranica (see here previously). Highmark covers around 7 million people in the Pennsylvania area.
https://nocamels.com/2024/02/us-health-insurer-adds-israeli-migraine-treatment-to-coverage/
 
New rehab center. (TY Yanky) Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality has approved the construction of the Reuth TLV Rehabilitation Hospital – the largest and most advanced rehabilitation facility in Israel. It will take 7 years to build, contain 450 beds, clinics, hydrotherapy pool, hyperbaric chamber, etc., and cost some NIS 850 million.
https://www.reuth-mc.org.il/en/news-in-the-field-of-rehabilitation-a-plan-to-establish-the-largest-rehabilitation-facility-in-israel-is-underway/
 
Walk-in, walk-out surgery. Tel Aviv Sourasky (Ichilov) Medical Center has opened 10 underground operating rooms for ambulatory surgeries. Costing NIS 100 million, they are expected to shorten the waiting periods for operations that do not require general anesthetic, or pre- or post-operative overnight hospital stays.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/surgery-without-a-stay-ichilov-hospital-unveils-new-operating-rooms-to-cut-wait-times/

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

VACATION- BACK ON MARCH 3, 2024

Posted By on February 24th, 2024

ISRAEL Comments turned off

How the US Abandoned Israel under Biden by Robert Williams

Posted By on February 22nd, 2024

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20415/us-abandoned-israel

“Israel must again be a safe place for the Jewish people. And I promise you: We’re going to do everything in our power to make sure that it will be.” — US President Joe Biden, October 18, 2023.

It did not take long, however, for the Biden administration to completely turn that promise on its head. The reversal began with US demands on Israel to scale down military operations, which were already scaled down….

“Israel implemented more measures to prevent civilian casualties than any other nation in history…. Israel’s use of real phone calls to civilians in combat areas (19,734), SMS texts (64,399) and pre-recorded calls (almost 6 million) to provide instructions on evacuations is also unprecedented.” — John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute, United States Military Academy West Point, newsweek.com, January 31, 2024

The only relevant country that has apparently not been invited to the “urgent” discussions [to reward terrorists unilaterally with a soon-to-be-militarized Palestinian State] is Israel.

Biden, clearly, seems not that intent on making Israel or the Free World a safe place again. At least not if it might compromise his reelection.

“I come to Israel with a single message: You are not alone,” US President Joe Biden said right after the October 7 massacre by the terrorist organization Hamas of Israelis, Muslims, Americans, Europeans, Filipinos and Thai visitors enjoying a Saturday holiday in southern Israel. “As long as the United States stands — and we will stand forever — we will not let you ever be alone,” Biden continued.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Amy Winehouse and the fanaticism of the Israelophobes The defilement of her statue was an act of racial animus. Brendan O’Neill

Posted By on February 22nd, 2024

https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/02/20/amy-winehouse-and-the-fanaticism-of-the-israelophobes/

Not content with pillorying living Jews, now they’re coming for the dead ones. Witness the desecration of the statue of Amy Winehouse in Camden Town in London. Some lowlife covered the statue’s Star of David necklace with a Palestine sticker. Just when you thought woke anti-Semites couldn’t get any more repellent, they go and defile the likeness of one of modern Britain’s greatest cultural icons. And for one simple, chilling and sickening reason – because she was a Jew.

There have been many gross acts of Jew hate in the UK since the Hamas pogrom of 7 October. Posters of kidnapped Israeli kids have been daubed with Hitler moustaches. The word ‘Gaza’ was spraypainted outside a Holocaust library. Jews have suffered a tsunami of ‘hate incidents’. But there’s something about the posthumous racial harassment of Amy that feels especially egregious. It’s the fanaticism of it. For me, it’s the realisation that there are people in London so in thrall to Jew hate that they can’t even walk by a statue of a singer who died 13 years ago without furiously eradicating its Jewish symbols.

The violation of Amy was an act of brazen racial bigotry. It has eerie echoes of a darker past when Jewish institutions and symbols – synagogues, Jewish-owned shops, Jewish gravestones – were frequently set upon by mobs of the hateful. Yes, it’s good that the weapon in this case was a mere peelable sticker, easily removed, rather than stones or fire. But the fact that the thing is happening again, the fact we’re witnessing a return of seething intolerance for outward expressions of Jewishness, should leave us truly cold.

The shaming of Amy the Jew confirms that the line between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism is now so thin as to be virtually imperceptible. The git who put up that sticker no doubt thought he was being pro-Palestinian when in truth he was being anti-Jew. The racist probably thinks he is anti-racist. For all the defensive bleating of the activist class about their ‘anti-Zionism’ being a zillion miles from anti-Semitism, it is everyday Jews who are getting it in the neck on the back of the Israelophobic hysteria these people have whipped up since 7 October.

Indeed, long before the late Ms Winehouse had her Star of David hidden, many British Jews had taken to hiding their Jewishness. The Campaign Against Antisemitism found that 69 per cent of Britain’s Jews say they are less likely to show ‘visible signs of their Judaism’ right now. Kids at the Jewish Free School in London were given permission – for ‘security reasons’ – to remove their school blazer and tie when travelling to and from school. Some Jewish uni students have stopped wearing their kippahs after getting flak from campus leftists. Tell me – if anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism have nothing in common, why are their consequences so unnervingly similar?

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

You’re Not Imagining Food Inflation By Jim Geraghty

Posted By on February 22nd, 2024

https://www.nationalreview.com/the-morning-jolt/youre-not-imagining-food-inflation/

On the menu today: A new report in the Wall Street Journal confirms what you likely suspected — despite the Consumer Price Index numbers (CPI) getting much closer to normal, you’re still paying more to eat, whether you’re shopping at the grocery store or going out to a restaurant. In fact, Americans haven’t spent this much of their money on food since the early 1990s — a fact that is likely to widen the divide between the administration’s happy talk about the economy and Americans’ perceptions that they’re constantly being squeezed, even if they’re making more money than a few years ago. Meanwhile, to fight the rising cost of living, states are hiking the minimum wage, left and right. Hey, it’s not like that increased cost of labor could ever get passed along to consumers, right?

The ‘Shrinkflation’ Election

Have you had this experience? You read that the year-to-year numbers of the CPI indicate that inflation is largely, if not completely, beaten . . . and then you go to Trader Joe’s or your local grocery store, or you take the family out to eat, and when the bill comes you think someone has mistaken you for a much wealthier person. Did I accidentally get charged for a Lamborghini in there somewhere?

(This is where the typical Biden-defending lefty will jump in and say, “This is because you’re shopping at expensive stores and restaurants!” For what it’s worth, Trader Joe’s is less expensive than the average grocery store*. And if you want to argue that by living in northern Virginia, I’m buying food in a part of the country with a higher cost of living, fine, but the point is not that things are expensive compared to other places, it’s that things are expensive in this place compared to prices in the not-so-distant past in this place. )

Over in the Wall Street Journal, Jesse Newman and Heather Haddon lay out the numbers demonstrating that we’re not just imagining this. Americans are spending the biggest share of their income on food since 1991:

The last time Americans spent this much of their money on food, George H.W. Bush was in office, “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” was in theaters and C+C Music Factory was rocking the Billboard charts.

BOOKS Comments turned off

What Shocked Me About the Culture at Yale I grew up in foster care. I wasn’t prepared for what I found on campus. Rob Henderson

Posted By on February 22nd, 2024

https://www.persuasion.community/p/what-shocked-me-about-the-culture

There were many surreal aspects of my experience at Yale, including the opportunity to learn from high-profile professors. I took a course on Shakespeare taught by the late Harold Bloom, who has been described as “the most renowned, and arguably the most passionate, literary critic and Shakespeare scholar in America.” When I told him about my life, the 87-year-old professor gently replied, “You were forged in a fire.” I also met the psychology professor Albert Bandura—who at the time was 91 years old and died in 2021—to chat about a book he had recently written. I was surprised at how late in life many professors worked—some well into their eighties and even nineties. This was a notable difference from the aging adults I knew in my adoptive hometown of Red Bluff, Northern California, who typically looked forward to retirement and preferred not to work longer than they had to, unless it was out of financial necessity.

Before my first classes were scheduled to begin, I was sitting in the courtyard of my residential college when a young woman asked for help lifting some boxes into her dorm room. She introduced herself and told me she was a senior. I explained that this was my first semester.

“What do you think of Yale so far?” she asked.

I was embarrassed to answer. “I keep waiting for them to tell me it was a mistake that they let me in,” I said, carrying boxes up the stairs as she guided me. “Walking around, it feels like I’m dreaming.”