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The US Should Designate Muslim Brotherhood a Terrorist Organization by Uzay Bulut

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14296/muslim-brotherhood-terrorist-designation

The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in Egypt in 1928, is a pro-jihad, Islamist movement that has branches throughout the world and seeks to implement Islamic sharia under a global caliphate. Terrorism is only one of the methods the Brotherhood employs, and among its, goals, “democratization” has never been seen as one of them.

The Counter Extremism Project “has recorded 44 individuals and groups tied to the Muslim Brotherhood, including terrorist groups, foreign fighters, extremist propagandists, and political leaders.”

The Trump administration’s designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a terror organization would be an effective blow to pro-sharia and jihadi groups across the globe and help to bring about less violence and more stability to both the Muslim and non-Muslim worlds.

US President Donald Trump is working to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a foreign terrorist organization (FTO), the White House announced on April 30. The spokesman for Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), Omer Celik, responded by saying that if the United States designated the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization, it would “hamper democratization efforts in the Middle East and serve militant groups like Islamic State.”

The Muslim Brotherhood, however, founded in Egypt in 1928, is a pro-jihad, Islamist movement that has branches throughout the world and seeks to implement Islamic sharia under a global caliphate. Terrorism is only one of the methods the Brotherhood employs, and among its, goals, “democratization” has never been seen as one of them.

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Istanbul: ‘Everything Is Coming Up Roses’ by Burak Bekdil

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14442/istanbul-everything-is-coming-up-roses

The invincible Erdoğan took a great risk: a second loss for the man who thinks “whoever wins Istanbul wins Turkey” would mean just more than just an embarrassing mayoral loss. Comparatively speaking, the difference in votes between Imamoğlu and Erdoğan’s candidate, Yıldırım, widened within less than two months from 13,000 to nearly 800,000.

“It appears that losing Istanbul entails too many risks for the AKP for the matter to be left to its own resources. Many are convinced that if the AKP were to lose Istanbul to the opposition, after having held it – with its precursor – for 25 years, a hornet’s nest of vested interests, corruption, and abuse of power would be revealed.” — Semih Idiz, a columnist for Sigma Turkey, an Ankara-based think tank.

The more the masses start feeling the economic pressure, the more Erdoğan’s popularity will sink.

A political Islamist party that comes to power by popular vote would never leave power by popular vote. That suggestion is overwhelmingly accurate. But not always. Any Turks younger than 18 has never seen an election defeat for (former prime minister) President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. On June 23 a little-known small district mayor won Istanbul for the first time since Islamists first won Istanbul’s mayorship in 1994 – a good quarter of a century.

In fact, that was the second time Ekrem Imamoğlu won Istanbul in less than two months. “Who wins Istanbul wins Turkey,” has been Erdoğan’s dictum since 1994, when he won mayoral elections in Turkey’s biggest city (home to nearly 15% of Turkey’s 57 million voters and accounting for 31% of its GDP).

The headline on the Istanbul election, on May 27, was “Erdoğan’s Istanbul Nightmare.”

“…[S]ince his Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in 2002, [Erdoğan] has not lost a single election. Everything was coming up roses all the time. Not anymore,” he [Erdoğan] has not lost a single election. Everything was coming up roses all the time. Not anymore,” wrote this author.

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Crack-ups at the Crossroads of Intersectionality By Victor Davis Hanson

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://amgreatness.com/2019/06/23/crack-ups-at-the-crossroads-of-intersectionality/

Progressives do not see the United States as an exceptional uniter of factions and tribes into a cohesive whole—each citizen subordinating his tribal, ethnic, and religious affinities to a shared Americanism, emblemized by our national motto e pluribus unum. Instead, they prefer e uno plures: out of one nation arise many innately different and separate peoples.

Progressivism’s signature brand is now tribalism: all of us in different ways are victims of a white male Christian heterosexual patriarchy—or a current 20 percent hierarchy that past and present has supposedly oppressed anyone not like themselves. In contrast, our differences define who we are, and are not incidental to the content of our characters. The salad bowl, not the melting pot, is the new national creed. America is to be a conglomeration of competing tribal parties in the fashion of the Balkans, Rwanda, or contemporary Iraq.

How does the relative victimhood work politically? Progressive elites (oddly often white, but “woke,” males) serve as umpires who adjudicate familial spats and intersectional fractures. Like good cowboys, they ride herd, directing the squabbling and snorting flock in the right direction without losing too many strays on the way to the election booth.

Is Mayor Pete Buttigieg, recently confronted as an unwoke white guy by Black Lives Matter activists, a white male elite, or an oppressed gay male victim who feels the Christian faithful, like his former working associate Mike Pence, supposedly oppress him to the degree he cannot ever be slurred as an oppressor of others who are nonwhite, not affluent, and non-male? In this world of collective woke stereotypes, are inner-city blacks and Catholic Hispanics victims of white males like Buttigieg, or disproportionately insensitive victimizers of such gays as Buttigieg?

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5G: We’re Winning the Tech Race, But Losing the Legal Race Charles Sauer

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://issuesinsights.com/2019/06/24/5g-were-

Economic numbers can be confusing — and scary. Tax reform charged the economy up. Trade wars have added uncertainty. Unemployment is at historic lows. Oil is possibly set for a price spike.

At times like this — when optimism, pessimism, and uncertainty all coexist, it would be beneficial if the government would speak with one voice. Unfortunately, it currently seems that one hand of our government doesn’t appear to be in sync with the other. And that is causing more — and more importantly unneeded — uncertainty.

An example of this unneeded uncertainty is the government’s role in the global battle for 5G dominance.

Many elements of the Trump administration have taken strong action to support U.S. 5G leadership and to stop Huawei — seen by most as an arm of the Chinese government — from gaining control of 5G. At the same time, part of the government continues a lawsuit begun by the Obama FTC to hobble the one company that can help us maintain that leadership — even turning to Huawei to help its case.

The leader in the U.S. in 5G technology is Qualcomm. Qualcomm developed the foundational technology that enables 5G and everyone else is building upon that. Huawei in China is still behind, but they are working hard to stay close. And this lead over the rest of the world gives both Qualcomm and the U.S. an economic advantage that other countries are understandably jealous about.

President Trump made sweeping policy decisions in an attempt to defend the U.S. leadership advantage in 5G, and also protect Qualcomm. He has also made the Chinese theft of U.S. intellectual property a primary talking point of his administration’s trade talks.

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Islamist Candidate Khurrum Wahid Comes in 3rd in FL Election 1400 voters may have ignored his terror-linked background.

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/274096/islamist-candidate-khurrum-wahid-comes-3rd-fl-joe-kaufman

On June 18th, over 7300 voters in Coral Springs, Florida went to the polls in a Special Election to cast their votes for the individual they wanted as their new City Commissioner. The former Commissioner, Dan Daley, left the seat vacant, after he won his own Special Election, for Florida State House. Out of the six candidates in the Commission race, one, Khurrum Wahid, raised far more money than any of the others. But for many voters, Wahid, a terror-linked lawyer, represented a danger to society, and therefore, he was soundly rejected.

Khurrum Basir Wahid, a South Florida attorney, has made a name for himself by representing high-profile terrorists, including the most violent of al-Qaeda operatives. And while Wahid has every right to act as legal counsel to such miscreants, when viewing the rest of his terror-related and disturbing activity, it would be a grave error not to view Wahid as a threat as well.

One of Wahid’s former clients is Hafiz Khan, a Miami imam who received a 25-year prison sentence, in August 2013, for his role in shipping $50 thousand to the Pakistani Taliban for the specific goal of murdering American troops overseas. Khan was not the only individual charged in the crime. His son, Izhar, spent 20 months in a Miami federal detention center for his alleged participation in the terror financing scheme.

As stated by the US Justice Department, “Izhar is a Pakistani Taliban sympathizer who worked with [his father Hafiz] and others to collect and deliver money for the Pakistani Taliban… Izhar… provided and attempted to provide material support and resources… knowing and intending that they be used in preparation for and in carrying out… a conspiracy to murder, kidnap, and maim persons in a foreign country.”

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Prison Time for Democrat’s ‘Vicious’ Doxxing of Republicans Ex-Hassan aide Jackson Cosko gets four years for “the largest data breach in Senate history.” Matthew Vadum

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/274100/prison-time-democrats-vicious-doxxing-republicans-matthew-vadum

A Democrat U.S. Senate staffer who doxxed Republican senators during the nasty confirmation battle over Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, committing what prosecutors called “the largest data breach in Senate history,” was sentenced to four years imprisonment.

“Doxxing,” according to the U.S. Department of Justice, “is the act of gathering, by licit and illicit means, and posting on the Internet personal identifying information … and other sensitive information about an individual.”

In left-wing activist circles doxxing is emerging as an increasingly popular means of waging war on conservatives and Republicans.

Elon University computer science professor Megan Squire doxxes those associated with groups the Antifa movement deems enemies. Antifa supporter and academic Sam Lavigne participated in the publishing of the names and personal information of almost 1,600 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.

On June 19, Judge Thomas F. Hogan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, gave the custodial sentence to Jackson A. Cosko, 27, of Washington, D.C., for stealing Senate information and posting restricted information about five U.S. senators on Wikipedia, the open-source online encyclopedia. Cosko had been a computer systems administrator for U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) before the went on his computer crime spree.

“It was a rather vicious offense,” Judge Hogan told Cosko at the sentencing hearing.

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Jason Hill Video: An Ethical Defense of Zionism My deepest respect for the Jewish people — and for Jewish civilization. Jason D. Hill

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/274102/jason-hill-video-ethical-defense-zionism-jason-d-hill

In this new video, Professor Jason D. Hill delivers An Ethical Defense of Zionism, sharing his deepest respect for the Jewish people and Jewish civilization. Don’t miss it!

[And make sure to read Prof. Hill’s Open Letter to Attorney General William Barr, in which Prof. Hill declares: Disband Students for Justice in Palestine and All BDS Movements.]

About Jason D. Hill

Jason D. Hill is a professor of philosophy at DePaul University and the author of several books. His forthcoming book: We Have Overcome: An Immigrant’s Letter to the American People, will be published in July by Bombardier Books and is now available on Amazon for pre-sale order.

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Trump Vs. The Mullahs We’re running out of rounds. Bruce Thornton

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/274101/trump-vs-mullahs-bruce-thornton

In any fight, keeping your opponent off balance is critical, and telegraphing your punches is dangerous. Feints and tactical retreats are ways to avoid becoming predictable. Even threats and bravado can be used to confuse the enemy, as boxing legend Muhammed Ali proved. But eventually, you have to punch your opponent in the face hard enough to knock him flat.

Whether by design or instinct, Donald Trump’s foreign policy so far has followed this age-old strategy. He has abandoned the West’s predictable foreign-policy narrative that conflicts can be resolved with “diplomatic engagement,” “international summits,” “UN Resolutions,” “multilateral agreements,” and all the other verbal rituals for avoiding risky action while the enemy uses the time for working more mischief. His direct, blunt, sometimes wild public pronouncements blow through the understated, vapid, stylized diplo-speak of “grave concern” and “deeply troubling” that are mere verbal place-holders, ways of providing the press copy without saying anything significant. And he has dropped the pretense that thugs and fanatics deserve to be treated with the “mutual respect” due to legitimate leaders of free nations.

But two years of Trump’s using this strategy with Iran may be becoming predictable, at least to the mullahs. In the last few months, attacks on six commercial vessels in the Gulf, and now the destruction of one of our drones flying over international waters, suggest Iran believes that for all his tough talk, Trump is a typical Western leader who will not back his words with action.

Take the drone incident. Conflicting reports say that the president ordered a strike on three of Iran’s military sites, then called it off after the jets were already in the air, though the president disputes the claim that the strike was “cancelled,” but rather is “on hold.” More baffling are Trump’s reasons for holding back. He speculated that a rogue Iranian officer was “loose” and did “something stupid” not approved by the regime. That’s not likely with a military tightly controlled by the ayatollahs, who have demonstrated in the past the brutal wages of acting without their approval.

POLITICS Comments turned off

Partisan Gerrymandering: Courts Should Keep Out of the Debate By Hans A. von Spakovsky & Michael Watson

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/06/partisan-gerrymandering-supreme-court-cases-maryland-north-carolina/

Surprise: The supposedly nonpolitical bill to change how districts are drawn would … help Democrats.

For the past few years, liberals have been pushing the courts to declare that partisan redistricting — the consideration of politics when drawing the boundaries of legislative districts — violates the Constitution. In fact, we are awaiting a decision from the U.S. Supreme Court on this issue in two cases out of Maryland and North Carolina.

We hope that the Court will refuse to involve itself in the political thicket of the redistricting process. Engaging in politics does not violate the Constitution. Besides, the solution to gerrymandered districts should come from state legislatures, not the courts.

The allocation of representatives in a state legislature or in the U.S. House of Representatives is a fundamental political question that cannot be resolved without political considerations. Democrats know this, which is why they are demanding major revisions to the way elections are held for the U.S. House of Representatives in their H.R. 1 bill — major revisions they could exploit to increase their political power. Funny, they never complained about partisan redistricting that favored the Democrat party when they controlled a majority of state legislatures.

H.R. 1, the For the People Act of 2019, passed the House in March on a party-line vote. It would take away the constitutional authority of state legislatures to draw the boundaries of their congressional districts and would require states to set up supposedly “independent” redistricting commissions. The Democrats and their allies claim that this provision would ensure that congressional redistricting, when considered on a statewide basis, would not “unduly favor or disfavor any political party.”

It wouldn’t? A purportedly “independent” redistricting commission already draws congressional districts in California, and that state’s “citizens redistricting commission”—explicitly “grandfathered” by H.R. 1 — drew more unrepresentative districts than did partisan Republicans in Texas.

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The Energy Solution That Should Make Everyone Happy By Norman Rogers

Posted By on June 24th, 2019

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/06/the_energy_solution_that_should_make_everyone_happy.html

Fake science is a plague that inhibits the advance of the economy and causes vast sums to be wasted going up blind alleys.  Fake science is promoted not solely by crackpots.  Scientists are in the game, too.  If I went through the long list of fake sciences, I’d probably offend every reader.  So I won’t.  For the argument here, I need to mention only global warming, nuclear radiation, and renewable energy.  Personally, I think global warming is fake science.  But whether it is or is not fake does not matter for my argument. What I am going  to suggest will solve the global warming problem if there is one.

Nuclear radiation has been the target of a long running scare story.  Yes, a big dose will make you sick or kill you.  But the evidence is that small doses are harmless or beneficial.  This is important because society will not accept nuclear power if it is terrified of nuclear radiation, even though the radiation emitted by nuclear power plants is microscopic.  The argument for the danger of low-level radiation is demolished easily.  You only need to observe that elephants are not suffering greatly from cancer, even though they have vastly more cells that are suspectable to radiation damage.  There are scientific studies that back up the elephant story completely.

Renewable energy is a crackpot invention of the environmental Left.  Supposedly, renewable energy uses sources of energy that will not run out, anytime soon, like the sun.  Renewable energy must not emit CO2, because that might cause global warming.  But the renewable energy proselytizers can’t stick to their story.  Hydroelectricity is obviously renewable, but it is excluded because the environmental Left hates dams.  Geothermal energy, using the heat in hot rocks underground to generate electricity, is considered renewable, even though the hot rocks frequently cool because the heat is used up.  The “fuel” runs out.  Wind and solar are loved by the environmental Left, even though they are expensive and brimming with serious problems.  Nuclear is hated and not considered renewable, even though it emits no CO2, the fuel is potentially inexhaustible, and there are no noxious substances coming out of smokestacks.