NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Biden’s ‘Democracy Is At Risk’ Scaremongering Puts Democracy At Risk

Posted By on November 1st, 2023

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/11/01/bidens-democracy-is-at-risk-scaremongering-puts-democracy-at-risk/

So, when Democrats talk about how “our democracy is at risk,” what they really mean is “our socialist agenda is at risk.”

Now that they can’t use COVID to scare the public into submission, Democrats – from President Joe Biden on down – are working on Plan B. Shouting “Democracy is at risk!” every chance they get.

That’s become the default line for the left. This weekend, when CBS News reporter Bill Whitaker asked Vice President Kamala Harris about the possibility of Biden dying in office, her response was: “Let me just tell you, I’m focused on the job. Our democracy is on the line, Bill. And I frankly in my head do not have time for parlor games when we have a president who is running for reelection. That’s it.”

Notice the contradiction in Harris’ statement? If we have, as she says, “a president who is running for reelection,” how is it that “our democracy is on the line”? Aren’t elections what democracy is all about?

Let’s assume that Donald Trump wins the Republican nomination. (That’s a big assumption, since the first primary is still months away and because history is replete with presumed front runners not getting the nomination.) Let’s also assume that Biden is the Democratic candidate. (Another big assumption.)

Trump and Biden will have to campaign for the presidency, as will various third-party candidates. They will travel the country making their case. The press will spend a great deal of time covering the campaigns – mostly attacking the GOP candidate.

ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

Black Lives Matter and the World’s Oldest Hatred The group’s praise for Hamas’s ‘resistance’ comes as no surprise to those paying attention. Jason Riley

Posted By on November 1st, 2023

https://www.wsj.com/articles/black-lives-matter-and-the-worlds-oldest-hatred-anti-semitism-0e0c324e?mod=opinion_lead_pos8

Many who rushed to support Black Lives Matter following the death of George Floyd—professional sports leagues, Fortune 500 companies, placard-waving suburbanites—now seem shocked at how BLM reacted to the Oct. 7 terror attack in Israel. Yet nothing could have been more predictable.

During the previous round of major violence between Israel and Hamas, in May 2021, BLM made its position clear. “Black Lives Matter stands in solidarity with Palestinians,” it tweeted. “We are a movement committed to ending settler colonialism in all forms and will continue to advocate for Palestinian liberation.”

After Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack on Israeli civilians, the same activists were just as unambiguous about which side they were taking and why. While the body count was still being tallied, BLM groups in Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington issued statements supporting Hamas’s tactics. “Their resistance must not be condemned but understood as a desperate act of self-defense,” BLM Grassroots in Los Angeles wrote on Instagram. “As a radical black organization,” the post continued, it sees “clear parallels between black and Palestinian people.” BLM Chicago tweeted an image of a Hamas paraglider with a Palestinian flag attached to his parachute and the caption “I stand with Palestine.”

Anyone surprised by this response either hasn’t been paying attention or refuses to take the activists at their word. Organizations such as BLM have done nothing to hide or sugarcoat their animosity toward Israel. In 2016, four years before Floyd was killed by police, BLM released an official platform that referred to Israel as an “apartheid state” and declared that America is “complicit in the genocide taking place against the Palestinian people.”

EDUCATION Comments turned off

Columbia faculty is at war over antisemitism: Hundreds of professors sign new letter slamming ‘appalling’ colleagues who defended students for supporting Hamas as they demand university protects Jewish students

Posted By on November 1st, 2023

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12695497/columbia-university-professors-letter-antisemitism-defend-hamas.html

By HARRIET ALEXANDER and MACKENZIE TATANANNI 

Almost 300 staff at Columbia University on Tuesday signed a letter condemning their colleagues for defending students who said Hamas’ terror attack of October 7 was justified.

They stressed that freedom of speech is vital – but that did not extend to justifying acts of terrorism.

They said they are ‘astonished’ and ‘horrified’ that anyone could condone the murders.

The Tuesday letter came 24 hours after more than 100 staff at the Ivy League college spoke out in support of the students.

The row was sparked by an October 9 statement from the Columbia chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, which saw the students praise the ‘against the odds’ terror attack – which left 1,400 Israelis dead.

‘Yesterday was an unprecedented historic moment for the Palestinians of Gaza, who tore through the wall that has been suffocating them in one of the most densely-populated areas on Earth for the past 16 years – an open-air prison blockaded by Israeli soldiers via land, air, and sea,’ they wrote.

‘Despite the odds against them, Palestinians launched a counter-offensive against their settler-colonial oppressor – which receives billions of US dollars annually in military aid and possesses one of the world’s most robust surveillance and security apparatuses.’

The statement sparked furious scenes, which have been replicated at colleges and universities across the country – roiling students and staff and seeing donors threaten to withdraw their funding. Some students who publicly defended Hamas have had their job offers rescinded. Billionaire investor Leon Cooperman has threatened to cut off donations to his alma mater over student support for Palestine.

EDUCATION Comments turned off

Higher Ed Support for Hamas Exposes Disdain for America in Top Colleges By Peter Wood

Posted By on November 1st, 2023

https://tomklingenstein.com/higher-ed-support-for-hamas-exposes-disdain-for-america-in-top-colleges/

Why are American academics and American college students so drawn to an antisemitic movement?

If you don’t like the pro-Hamas demonstrations by American college students, then you won’t like American higher education, which is the garden in which these flowers were grown.

Within hours of the atrocities committed by Hamas operatives who invaded Israel on October 7, groups of American college students had organized to express their support for the terrorists. This caught many Americans by surprise. How could college students at some of America’s best universities sympathize with the perpetrators of gruesome attacks on unarmed civilians?

The surprise, however, was not universal. Those of us who pay close attention to American higher education were well aware of the rising tide of antisemitism on many campuses, and aware as well of the anger that these institutions had honed against Israel and the sympathies they had cultivated for Palestinian radicals. College officials were likewise aware that, among the students enrolled in their institutions, a significant number are affiliated with factions that loathe Israel, support Palestinian “resistance,” and are well-organized practitioners of public protest. Some college presidents initially issued mealy-mouthed disapproval or offered criticisms of both Hamas and Israel as equally at fault. After finding their equivocations poorly received, they issued new statements that were sometimes sterner about Hamas, but often continued to chastise Israel as well.

Some college presidents did forthrightly condemn Hamas and express strong support for Israel. At the end of October, a coalition founded by 16 college presidents issued a statement titled, “We Stand Together with Israel Against Hamas.” That statement eventually collected over 100 signatories.

But the larger academic scene lacks such common sense.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Stories About ‘Waking Up from Woke’ A political realignment in three acts. Oliver Wiseman

Posted By on October 31st, 2023

https://www.thefp.com/p/waking-up-from-woke-seneca-scott-migrant-crisis?utm_campaign=email-post&r=8t06w&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

A black activist fights the progressivism he says is destroying his city. Left-wing Jews say “screw the allyship” after seeing fellow progressives cheer Hamas’s pogrom. Immigrant New Yorkers oppose the new migrants coming to New York “with the expectation they’re going to be taken care of.”

Today in The Free Press, three stories paint a picture of a larger political shift happening in America.

It is sometimes said of the pandemic that it accelerated preexisting trends: we were already living online more and more, reinventing the traditional 9 to 5, automating ever larger parts of the economy, and abandoning shopping malls. And the lockdowns simply turbocharged it all.

Might recent weeks be having a similar effect on our politics? Could outrage at the horrifying events in Israel, the global explosion of antisemitism, and the Hamas apologism on campuses and in newsrooms, crystallize into a big political upheaval? 

Yesterday, Elon Musk, responding to a Free Press story on X, said that “people are waking up from woke.” Last week, a similar argument was made by Konstantin Kisin in our pages with his essay “The Day the Delusions Died.” He wrote that “many people woke up on October 7 sympathetic to parts of woke ideology and went to bed that evening questioning how they had signed on to a worldview that had nothing to say about the mass rape and murder of innocent people by terrorists.” 

One person who has felt disenfranchised from the left for years is Seneca Scott, a black Oakland activist fighting for the future of his city. Scott is a former progressive who used to support defunding the police. But then he changed his mind. In 2020, “I realized how deep the damage was,” Scott tells David Josef Volodzko in a profile for The Free Press. Oakland’s leaders, “the people we had put in place . . . were just complete frauds.” Now Scott says he’s aiming to start a revolution in his city that will spread across the country.

MEDICINE AND HEALTH Comments turned off

Yellow Fever: Coming to the U.S.? By Joe Alton, M.D.

Posted By on October 31st, 2023

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/10/yellow_fever_coming_to_the_us.html

The 19th-century viral scourge of the U.S. South known as “yellow fever” seems to be on the brink of a resurgence. Tropical disease experts predict a return of the historically devastating disease to the U.S. 

Yellow fever is still active in Latin America and Africa, causing 30,000 deaths annually, but local outbreaks have been absent here since 1905. Other tropical diseases, however, have landed on our shores. Earlier this year, several cases of malaria turned up in Florida. Mosquitoes have recently tested positive for West Nile virus in Texas. Locally-transmitted cases of Zika, dengue, and chikungunya have also been  identified in the past few years.

WHAT IS YELLOW FEVER?

Yellow Fever is a member of the Flaviviridae family of viruses and is a known arbovirus (transmitted through the bite or sting of an insect). In this case, the culprit is a mosquito known as Aedes aegypti.

Symptoms may appear within three to six days of the virus entering the body. Some experience no symptoms, but those who do experience headache, muscle pain, and nausea/vomiting. Fortunately, in most cases, symptoms subside in three to four days. If you survive the disease, it usually means lifelong immunity.

Yellow fever has no cure, and an unlucky 15-20 percent of victims, progress to a more serious second phase shortly after an apparent recovery. These develop high fever and inflammation of the liver and kidneys. Liver malfunction leads to a condition called “jaundice,” a yellowing of the skin and eyes (hence the name “yellow fever”). Damage to the GI tract leads to vomiting black blood in late stages. At this point, a death rate of 20-60 percent due to organ failure can be expected.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

‘Gender-Affirming Care Is Dangerous. I Know Because I Helped Pioneer It.’ My country, and others, found there is no solid evidence supporting the medical transitioning of young people. Why aren’t American clinicians paying attention? By Riittakerttu Kaltiala

Posted By on October 31st, 2023

https://www.thefp.com/p/gender-affirming-care-dangerous-finland-doctor?utm_campaign=email-post&r=8t06w&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

Dr. Riittakerttu Kaltiala, 58, is a Finnish-born and trained adolescent psychiatrist, the chief psychiatrist in the department of adolescent psychiatry at Finland’s Tampere University Hospital. She treats patients, teaches medical students, and conducts research in her field—publishing more than 230 scientific articles. 

In 2011, Dr. Kaltiala was assigned a new responsibility. She was to oversee the establishment of a gender identity service for minors, making her among the first physicians in the world to head a clinic devoted to the treatment of gender-distressed young people. Since then, she has personally participated in the assessments of more than 500 such adolescents.

“Early in my medical studies, I knew I wanted to be a psychiatrist. I decided to specialize in treating adolescents because I was fascinated by the process of young people actively exploring who they are and seeking their role in the world. My patients’ adult lives are still ahead of them, so it can make a huge difference to someone’s future to help a young person who is on a destructive track to find a more favorable course. And there are great rewards in doing individual therapeutic work. 

Over the past dozen or so years there has been a dramatic development in my field. A new protocol was announced that called for the social and medical gender transition of children and teenagers who experienced gender dysphoria—that is, a discordance between one’s biological sex and an internal feeling of being a different gender. 

This condition has been described for decades, and the 1950s is seen as the beginning of the modern era of transgender medicine. During the twentieth century, and into the twenty-first, small numbers of mostly adult men with lifelong gender distress have been treated with estrogen and surgery to help them live as women. Then in recent years came new research on whether medical transition—primarily hormonal—could be done successfully on minors.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

THIS SATURDAY SAY NO TO CLOCK CHANGING

Posted By on October 31st, 2023

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/10/31/stop-the-government-mandated-clock-changing-madness-its-pointless-and

This weekend, hundreds of millions of Americans will dutifully set their clocks back one hour, convincing themselves that they’ve “gained” an hour – despite spending at least part of it resetting all their timepieces.

Americans should instead refuse to play along. Few government mandates combine such utter pointlessness and serious public health harms than the twice-a-year switch on and off Daylight Saving Time. It’s time to end the madness.

First, despite its label, “Daylight Saving Time” does not save daylight. It doesn’t even save energy. Two studies looked at energy use before and after changes in DST laws. Indiana went on daylight saving time statewide for the first time in 2006, and in 2007 when President George W. Bush’s godawful energy bill started DST three weeks earlier.

Both found no energy savings. Energy use in Indiana actually went up when it went on DST. So if switching back and forth each year doesn’t save energy, what does it do?

What is clear is that it is a real public health hazard.

A study in Health Economics found that “springing forward” causes “the suicide rate to rise by 6.25% and the death rate from suicide and substance abuse combined to increase by 6.59% directly after the time change.”

Another study published in Sleep Medicine found a significant increase in traffic fatalities on the Monday after the switch to DST, because people are sleep-deprived by having to get up an hour earlier.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

Female Battalion of IDF Eliminates 100 Terrorists Hamas’ humiliation. by Hugh Fitzgerald

Posted By on October 31st, 2023

https://www.frontpagemag.com/female-battalion-of-idf-eliminates-100-terrorists/

While many “progressive feminists” in the West, for reasons that are entirely unclear, choose to take part in pro-Palestinian demonstrations, apparently unaware of how they would fare in a society run by fanatical Muslims such as those of Hamas, the most effective feminists in the world, who have now shown conclusively that they can perform as well as men in that most masculine of undertakings — war fighting — have been defending their tiny state, Israel, against those who would destroy it. More on their feats of derring-do can be found here: “Squad of female IDF combat troops eliminated nearly 100 Hamas terrorists,” Jerusalem Post, October 23, 2023:

Only a few have had the chance to witness the extraordinary actions of the Caracal Battalion during their battle against Hamas terrorists.

Lt.-Col Or Ben-Yehuda, the commander of this unit, now recounts her experience in the southern Gaz Strip, where her battalion eliminated approximately 100 terrorists. She also has a clear message for those who question the capabilities of female fighers in the Caracal (Desert Lynx) and Tank Battalion.

As the assault on the Gaza border area began, Ben-Yehuda swiftly moved from the battalion headquarters in Nahal Raviv to a post on the Egyptian border with armored personnel carriers. Rockets were raining down, and warnings arrived regarding potential terrorist infiltration in the Shlomit and Bnei Netzer towns.

In the midst of this chaos, she received a message from Lt.-Col. Yonatan Tzur, the commander of the Nahal Brigade’s patrol battalion, who was later tragically killed in an encounter with terrorists. He reported an infiltration near Sufa and Nirim, saying, “There are several terrorists there… They’re heavily armed!”

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

How Many Hamas and Hezbollah Terrorists Have Crossed the Southern Border? “We have a continuing concern about Iranian influence, actors and Hezbollah.”Terrence P. Jeffrey

Posted By on October 31st, 2023

https://www.frontpagemag.com/how-many-hamas-and-hezbollah-terrorists-have-crossed-the-southern-border/

When then-FBI Director Robert Mueller testified in the House Judiciary Committee on May 9, 2012, Republican Rep. Elton Gallegly of California asked him about the threat of terrorists entering the United States by crossing the Southern border.

“First of all, as it relates to our Southwest border,” said Gallegly, “do you see any growing evidence of al-Qaida or any other terrorist organization working to exploit our border with the attempt of launching another terrorist attack on our own soil?”

Mueller indicated he was more concerned about Hezbollah doing that than al-Qaeda.

“As to the Southwest border and al-Qaida, we have not seen an increase of effort by al-Qaida to come across the Southwest border,” said Mueller. “On the other hand, when you open the question up to other terrorist groups, I would say that we have a continuing concern about Iranian influence, actors and Hezbollah.”

In fact, Mueller had testified in the Senate Committee on Intelligence on Feb. 16, 2005, about a Hezbollah fundraiser from Lebanon who had been discovered in Michigan. “In 2004,” Mueller said in a statement to the committee, “we had some success in uncovering individuals providing material support to Hezbollah.

“In Detroit, Mahmoud Youssef Kourani was indicted in the Eastern District of Michigan on one count of Conspiracy to Provide Material Support to Hezbollah,” Mueller said. “Kourani was already in custody for entering the country illegally through Mexico and was involved in fundraising activities on behalf of Hezbollah.”

A staff report on “9/11 and Terrorist Travel” published in 2004 by the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States provided information about a smuggler who smuggled “Lebanese nationals sympathetic to Hamas and Hezbollah into the United States.”