ISRAEL Comments turned off

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL COMPILED BY MICHAEL ORDMAN

Posted By on February 9th, 2020

http://verygoodnewsisrael.blogspot.com/

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Inhibiting an enzyme may cure Alzheimer’s. Israel’s ProteKt Therapeutics is developing a treatment for early stage Alzheimer’s disease. It inhibits the PKR enzyme that is over-expressed in Alzheimer’s patients and may slow or even reverse the progress of the disease. It also has potential for ALS, Huntington and Parkinson’s.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/israeli-startup-hopes-to-battle-alzheimers-with-enzyme-busting-drug/

Orphan status for pancreatic cancer treatment. (TY Atid-EDI) The European Commission has just granted Orphan drug status to the BL-8040 (Motixafortide) pancreatic cancer treatment from Israel’s BioLineRX (see here). BioLineRX can now receive benefits including EU funding, less regulation, and market exclusivity.

https://ir.biolinerx.com/news-releases/news-release-details/biolinerx-receives-orphan-drug-designation-motixafortide-bl-8040

HealthTECH World Cancer Day. Tel Aviv University represented Israel on World Cancer day as one of five European cities simultaneously broadcasting news of the latest technological developments in cancer diagnosis and treatment. The event was sponsored by the NOBEL Project, which is revolutionizing healthcare in Europe.

https://en-med.tau.ac.il/event/healthtech/world/cancer/day/2020

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sTRkSG6Zwc  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsgEkVqQF0I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBVdtmZz3WA

Sheba’s partners Berlin AI for cancer R&D. (TY Atid-EDI) Berlin’s caresyntax, has launched an R&D partnership with the ARC (Accelerate, Redesign, Collaborate) complex at Israel’s Sheba Medical Center. They will use Artificial Intelligence to develop algorithms for predicting outcomes for cancer treatment procedures.

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200107005204/en/caresyntax-ARC-Sheba-Medical-Center-Launch-Collaboration   https://caresyntax.com/news/caresyntax-sheba-medical-launch-collaboration/

US approves complete AI stroke detection package. (TY Atid-EDI) The US FDA previously approved the brain scan software from Israel’s Aidoc (Oct 2018),. It has now approved all four of Aidoc’s AI products, so its comprehensive package can quickly identify and triage both ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke in CT scans.

https://www.aidoc.com/blog/news/ai-saving-brain-fda-clears-aidocs-complete-ai-stroke-package/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OQOZedPlmY

Accelerating regenerative medicine. (TY Atid-EDI) Israel’s CollPlant is partnering with US-based 3D Systems to spur breakthroughs in regenerative medicine. It brings together top 3D-printing technology with Collprint’s bioink technology for 3D bioprinting of tissues and organs.

https://ir.collplant.com/press-releases/detail/83/3d-systems-and-collplant-biotechnologies-join-forces-to

https://www.3dsystems.com/press-releases/3d-systems-and-collplant-biotechnologies-join-forces-accelerate-breakthroughs

Space medical research with Italy. (TY WIN) Israel and Italy are to launch a satellite in March, on which medical research will be conducted in zero gravity. The mission involves Israel’s SpacePharma (see here), Israel’s Technion, Sheba hospital, the Hebrew University and the Israeli and Italian space agencies.

https://www.israelhayom.com/2020/02/06/israel-italy-eye-joint-scientific-space-venture/

https://www.jpost.com/Jpost-Tech/Israeli-scientific-experiments-to-be-performed-in-outer-space-597127

https://www.space4p.com/missions

Body on a chip. (TY David F) A team of over 50 researchers at Harvard University and Tel Aviv University (TAU) have successfully built human “organs-on-chips” that aim to speed up trials of new treatments. They have linked 10 chips together to form a “functional human Body-on-Chips platform”.

http://nocamels.com/2020/02/tau-harvard-researchers-human-body-chip-drug-response/

Microsoft Israel gives patients hope. As reported previously (Feb 2019) Microsoft’s Israeli R&D team developed the Microsoft Healthcare AI virtual medical assistant. Team leader Hadas Bitran describes the project. They are now working on the New Hope project to match patients with clinical trials around the globe.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/this-microsoft-health-assistant-bot-was-made-in-israel/

The first Hasid to graduate from Israeli med school. Dr. Yehuda Sabiner is the first Israeli-born Haredi to graduate from medical school. A member of the Gerrer Hasidic sect, Yehuda enrolled at Israel’s Technion, graduated and will intern at Israel’s Sheba Medical Center. 35 Haredim are now following in his footsteps.

https://unitedwithisrael.org/first-israeli-born-hasidic-doctor-blazes-new-trail-in-medicine/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vtf2pPywyY

POLITICS Comments turned off

Mini Mike Bloomberg thinks Americans are really stupid and lack nuance By Andrea Widburg

Posted By on February 9th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/mini_mike_bloomberg_thinks_americans_are_really_stupid_and_lack_nuance.html

Looking at the dysfunctional group of Democrat presidential candidates, Mike Bloomberg is planning, through strategically placed ads and a well-funded ground-game, to be the last man standing. His problem, though, is that he’s a bully, lacks charm and, as a recently unearthed video reveals, dislikes and disrespects the American people.

American politicians used to pretend they liked the citizens whose votes they sought. Nowadays, though, Democrat politicians limit themselves to attacking their opponents; they also attack the American voters. The most famous example is Hillary’s “deplorables” statement:

“You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right?” Clinton said. “The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic—you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up.”

Barack Obama castigated Americans as bitter-clingers and hostile xenophobes:

You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them. *** And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

John “Reporting for Duty” Kerry didn’t think much of the military:

You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Trump’s withdrawal from Syria may be a disaster . . . for Iran and Turkey By Andrea Widburg

Posted By on February 9th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/trumps_withdrawal_from_syria_may_be_a_disaster____for_iran_and_turkey.html

In December 2018, Trump ordered the withdrawal of American troops from Syria, where they’d been hard at work destroying the last military vestiges of ISIS, the one-time “JV team” that ignited a reign of terror across Iraq and Syria. The Democrat party and its lapdog media promised us that our Kurdish allies would be slaughtered and we’d be on the verge of yet another one of the many Trump initiated World Wars.

None of that happened, but it appears that two regimes hostile to American interests are at each other’s throats. And of course, it’s always preferable when one’s enemies turn their aggression towards each other.

The New York Times´ reporting from 2018 about Trump’s planned withdrawal is a good example of the concern the Democrats and the foreign policy establishment had that Trump would get America into war by getting America out of war:

In overruling his generals and civilian advisers, Mr. Trump fulfilled his frequently expressed desire to bring home American forces from a messy foreign entanglement. But his decision, conveyed via Twitter on Wednesday, plunges the administration’s Middle East strategy into disarray, rattling allies like Britain and Israel and forsaking Syria’s ethnic Kurds, who have been faithful partners in fighting the Islamic State.

POLITICS Comments turned off

Pelosi and Rumpelstiltskin By Eileen F. Toplansky

Posted By on February 9th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/02/pelosi_and_rumpelstiltskin.html

Watching Nancy Pelosi and her gang of insolent quislings, it was hard not to think of the Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale “Rumpelstiltskin.”  Power, greed, deal-making, sacrifice of children, and petulant rage are a few of the themes of this fairy tale that aptly describe the current Democrat party.

The fairy tale relates that a young woman must spin straw into gold thread because her father, a miller, foolishly boasted to the greedy king that she can.  Clearly, this is an impossible task until a “strange little man” saves the day — but at what cost?  Constantly trying to keep up with the demands of the avaricious king, the miller’s daughter accepts a bargain that entails giving up her newborn baby son if she cannot identify the “little man’s” name.  Through happenstance, she is able to counter the odious demand, and the now identified Rumpelstiltskin flies into a fit of rage.  In fact, in “his anger he stamped with his right foot so hard that it went into the ground above his knee; then he seized his left foot with both his hands in such a fury that he split in two, and there was an end of him.”

So what does an ancient fairy tale have to do with Nancy Pelosi?

For far too long, the Democrats have wheedled their way into American’s lives with sly promises and sleight-of-hand maneuvers.  Oh, a bone or two will be flung, but the depressed Baltimores, Detroits, and Clevelands never improve.  A recreational center may be built, but illegals bearing deadly intentions and drugs will not be stopped as they destroy neighborhoods.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

MASS SHOOTING THAILAND

Posted By on February 9th, 2020

Berserk Thai sergeant major is SHOT DEAD by security forces after killing his commanding officer and a fellow soldier over a financial dispute then shooting at least 19 at shopping mall while posting selfies on Facebook
Sergeant Major Jakrapanth Thomma went on a killing spree in Korat, 155 miles from Thai capital Bangkok
Thomma hijacked an army vehicle, shot an officer and soldiers, and sprayed a volley of bullets at civilians 
He’s then believed to have taken hostages at a shopping centre that Thai forces later tonight laid siege to
Rogue soldier was shot by Thai security forces after holing himself up in a basement for more than 14 hours  

HISTORY Comments turned off

My Double Life as a KGB Agent Raised in East Germany, Jack Barsky abandoned his mother, brother, wife and son to spy for the KGB. In America, he started a second family. And then it all came crashing down.Shaun Walker

Posted By on February 8th, 2020

https://getpocket.com/explore/item/i-thought-i-was-smarter-than-almost-everybody-my-double-life-as-a-kgb-agent?utm_source=pocket-newtab

On a chilly morning in December 1988, computer analyst Jack Barsky embarked on his usual morning commute to his office on Madison Avenue in Manhattan, leaving his wife and baby daughter at home in Queens. As he entered the subway, he caught sight of something startling: a daub of red paint on a metal beam. Barsky had looked for it every morning for years; it meant he had a life-changing decision to make, and fast.

Barsky knew the drill. The red paint was a warning that he was in immediate danger, that he should hurry to collect cash and emergency documents from a prearranged drop site. From there, he would cross the border into Canada and contact the Soviet consulate in Toronto. Arrangements would be made for him to leave the country. He would cease to be Jack Barsky. The American identity he had inhabited for a decade would evaporate and he would return to his former life: that of Albrecht Dittrich, a chemist and KGB agent, with a wife and seven-year-old son waiting patiently for him in East Germany.

Barsky thought of his American daughter, Chelsea: could he really leave her? And, if he didn’t, how long could he evade both the KGB and US counterintelligence?

***

On an unseasonably warm afternoon in January 2017, Barsky strides into my hotel in Atlanta, Georgia and gives me a firm handshake. At 67, he has lived a more or less ordinary life for the past three decades. But the years spent undercover were hard on him and the people close to him. Only recently has he been able to come clean about his past. His late coming out has provided an overwhelming sense of release, Barsky says. “All those years, I had a little man up here,” he says, pointing to the sandy hair swept across his scalp in a side parting. “He would constantly watch what I was saying, and stop me from going into certain territory. And then the little man got killed off, and it was like an explosion.” These days, he is a garrulous conversationalist who requires little prodding.

Barsky’s story is a timely reminder of the immense resources the Russians were willing to expend during the cold war in their bid to embed agents in enemy territory. Hacking was not an option, and casual travel between Moscow and the west was much harder. “As I’m talking about this stuff, it feels unreal,” he says of his convoluted journey from East Germany to the US. “It feels as if it wasn’t me. But it was.”

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Dems Don’t Realize How Much Impeachment Hurts Them Peter Van Buren

Posted By on February 8th, 2020

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/dems-dont-realize-how-much-impeachment-hurts-them/?utm_source=ntnlreview&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=amconswap

Would you trust the nation to the people the Democratic party has become? Because that is the question Democrats have thrust into the minds of voters. As they have said many times, this was always more about America than it was about Trump.

We are watching the pathetic ending to one of the most pathetic periods in American politics. All the smoking guns have been firing blanks.

Following one of the most childish tantrums of denial ever recorded, Democrats set about destroying the Trump presidency in its crib; a WaPo headline from January 20, 2017 – Inauguration Day itself – exclaimed “The Campaign to Impeach President Trump has Begun.” The opening gambit was going to be Emoluments, including rent paid by the Industrial & Commercial Bank of China for its space in Trump Tower in New York.

After three years, it looks like that attempt finally reached its end game, failure, one gray afternoon. On Friday the Senate brought impeachment proceedings to their effective conclusion, declaring the witnesses already called before the House were to be the last. The formal vote to acquit Trump is scheduled as an anti-climax for Wednesday.

It has been ugly and mean. Using the entire apparatus of the American intelligence community, operating fully outside the law, Democrats declared the President of the United States a Russian spy. They forced gentlemen to explain to their elderly mothers what a pee tape was. We had to hear over dinner about Trump’s sexual peccadilloes and look deeper into Stormy Daniel’s cleavage than our own political souls. They made expedient heroes out of small, dishonest men like Michael Avenatti, John Brennan, and James Comey for perceived political gain. 

Shame on you, Democrats.

HISTORY Comments turned off

The Scandalous and Pioneering Victoria Woodhull The first woman to run for president was infamous in her day.By John Strausbaugh

Posted By on February 8th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/02/victoria-woodhull-first-woman-presidential-candidate/

S he was the first woman to run for president, the first to address a congressional committee, and the first to own a brokerage on Wall Street. She was also a con artist, a gold digger, and a scandal magnet. When she ran for president in 1872, she sat out Election Day in a Manhattan jail, arrested on charges of obscenity. Victoria Woodhull was unquestionably a pioneer in women’s rights, yet her legacy is so messy and complicated that she remains an outlier in feminist history.

She was born Victoria Claflin in 1838, into a squalidly poor family in Homer, Ohio, a tiny frontier hamlet. Her sister Tennessee (called Tennie C or just Tennie) came along seven years later, and a third sister, Utica, after her. In all there were ten Claflin kids, seven of whom survived into adulthood.

Their father, Buck Claflin, was a con man who sold patent medicine as “the King of Cancers.” Their mother, Roxana, was an Evangelical Christian who spoke in tongues and ranted fire and brimstone at the neighbors. Victoria and Tennessee were still children when Buck had them out performing as spirit mediums and faith healers. Victoria was a dark, ethereal beauty, and almost spookily serious. She would claim to have visions of Jesus and Satan, and to receive advice from spirit guides who included Demosthenes, Alexander the Great, Napoleon, and Juliet. Utica and Tennie were simpler types. Utica became an alcoholic and drug addict. Tennie was blonde, bubbly, and carnal. All three would use sex to get what they needed from men. But with Victoria everything had to be taken to a higher level. She didn’t just want men to desire her and give her money; she wanted them to admire, respect, and even adore her. She’d say or do almost anything to get that from them, and she was good at it. Men didn’t just fall in love with her, they fell in worship of her.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

THE ERA OF LIMBAUGH: MATTHEW CONTINETTI

Posted By on February 8th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/02/why-rush-limbaugh-matters/

Florida governor Ron DeSantis spoke to Rush Limbaugh last fall at a gala dinner for the National Review Institute. The radio host was there to receive the William F. Buckley Jr. award. “He actually gave me one of the greatest compliments I’ve ever had,” Limbaugh told his audience the next day. “He listed five great conservatives and put me in the list.” DeSantis’s pantheon: William F. Buckley Jr., Ronald Reagan, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Limbaugh.

Good list. No media figure since Buckley has had a more lasting influence on American conservatism than Limbaugh, whose cumulative weekly audience is more than 20 million people. Since national syndication in 1988, Limbaugh has been the voice of conservatism, his three-hour program blending news, politics, and entertainment in a powerful and polarizing cocktail. His shocking announcement this week that he has advanced lung cancer, and his appearance at the State of the Union, where President Trump awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, are occasions to reflect on his impact.

It’s one thing to excel in your field. It’s another to create the field in which you excel. Conservative talk radio was local and niche before Limbaugh. He was the first to capitalize on regulatory and technological changes that allowed for national scale. The repeal of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 freed affiliates to air controversial political opinions without inviting government scrutiny. As music programming migrated to the FM spectrum, AM bandwidth welcomed talk. Listener participation was also critical. “It was not until 1982,” writes Nicole Hemmer in Messengers of the Right, “that AT&T introduced the modern direct-dial toll-free calling system that national call-in shows use.”

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Donald Trump’s Huge, Incredible, Amazing, Very Good Week By Matt Margolis

Posted By on February 8th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/trending/donald-trumps-huge-incredible-amazing-very-good-week/

Make no mistake about: President Trump has had a great week, and the Democrats had a lousy one. Not even the liberal media denies it. “Donald Trump is having a week that’s frustrating a lot of Democrats,” CNN’s Jake Tapper conceded as early as Tuesday. And he wasn’t the only one who noticed. “Democrats are reduced to hoping the president’s luck finally runs out,” wrote The Week’s Damon Linker. “It’s been a pretty good week for Donald Trump,” wrote David Graham of The Atlantic. “In fact, it’s hard to think of a better week in the Trump administration.”

“Republicans say Donald Trump had perhaps the best week of his presidency, nine months before the election. And even some Democrats privately agree with that assessment,” wrote Scott Wong of The Hill.

Should Trump be re-elected in November, it’s no stretch of the imagination to predict that many pundits will point this past week as the moment his re-election became inevitable.

Let’s review what happened this week, and why Team Trump should be celebrating.

Monday

Trump’s tremendous week was foreshadowed by the disaster that became of the Democratic Iowa caucuses. Bernie Sanders came in with momentum and all eyes were on the Hawkeye State to see who would actually emerge victorious, as the caucuses have typically predicted which candidate will ultimately win the Democratic Party’s nomination.

Instead, results were delayed… and delayed… and delayed some more. Something went wrong, horribly wrong, which was traced back to problems with an app that was developed specifically for the caucuses to report results, prompting accusations of shenanigans designed to hurt Bernie Sanders and prevent him from declaring victory Monday evening.

Results wouldn’t come in until later in the week, and reports of errors in the numbers only added fuel to the fire that the Democratic Party is run by corrupt and incompetent people.

Worse yet, turnout for the Democrat caucuses was lower than expected, matching 2016 levels, as opposed to 2008 levels. Meanwhile, Trump broke a record for the most votes for an incumbent president in the Iowa caucuses.