BOOKS Comments turned off

The Prosecutors’ Prison State Crime rates in the U.S. continue to decrease, yet we have higher incarceration rates than Russia or Cuba. So much for the land of the free. Edward P. Stringham reviews “Locked In” by John F. Pfaff.

Posted By on March 13th, 2017

Imagine if a business did not have to worry about convincing paying customers to choose its product and could stick non-customers with the bill. Bureaucracies like the Postal Service, Amtrak and the Department of Veteran Affairs have that luxury. But imagine further that the enterprise could force its services on users whether they like it or not. Law enforcement is one of the few American entities that enjoys this privilege. The U.S. now has twice as many prosecutors as it did in the 1970s—and each one now sends more than twice as many people to prison as he or she did in that period.

In the extremely important book, “Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration and How to Achieve Real Reform,” John F. Pfaff analyzes why America incarcerates more people than ever even as crime rates continue to fall. State and federal prisons jailed 200,000 Americans in the early 1970s; today they hold more than 1.5 million people. Another 700,000 are locked up in local jails. The U.S. now has higher incarceration rates than Russia or Cuba.

Product Details

Locked In: The True Causes of Mass Incarceration—and How to Achieve Real Reform
Feb 7, 2017
by John Pfaff

Mr. Pfaff, a Fordham law professor and economist, argues that the American criminal justice system defines too many offenses as deserving of jail time and that prisons often act as a revolving door. He likens incarceration to radiation treatment: Yes, it targets the disease, but it also causes a tremendous amount of collateral damage.

A 2012 Pew Survey found that 69% of Americans oppose the fact that our government jails nearly 1 out of every 100 citizens—and to read “Locked In” it’s no wonder that number is so high. For starters, although there have long been claims that higher incarceration rates are tied to the decrease in crime, Mr. Pfaff cites multiple studies showing that, at best, the effect is minuscule. Criminals who commit crimes of passion do not really weigh the prospect of having to serve time. Most criminals tend to get less violent with age, so overlong prison sentences have little effect on safety.

Incarceration for what most people consider non-crimes can have unintended consequences. When the U.S. Justice Department investigated the police in Ferguson, Mo., following the shooting death of Michael Brown by an officer in August 2014, they discovered that the city’s cops routinely threatened to jail citizens for charges as insubstantial as having an overgrown lawn. Law enforcement was used as a means of increasing revenue for city coffers through ticketing and forfeitures. The result was a severely strained relationship between the public and the police that was primed to explode. CONTINUE AT SITE

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

Crime and Immigration The U.S. needs to deport criminals, not create a new bureaucracy.

Posted By on March 13th, 2017

President Trump has made crime a big part of his immigration enforcement campaign, last month unveiling a new immigration-crime victims unit at the Justice Department. We understand the emotive political appeal, but the federal government doesn’t need a new bureaucracy given the facts about immigrant crime.

Mr. Trump highlighted the murder victims of undocumented immigrants “whose government failed them.” He’s right about that, and it’s exasperating that foreign criminals are released onto the streets only to perpetrate more violence. But there’s no evidence that immigrants commit more crimes than do native-born citizens and some to suggest they commit less.

In a newly published paper, researchers at the University at Buffalo and University of Alabama examined 200 metropolitan areas between 1970 and 2010. They found that murder, robbery, burglary and larceny rates decreased as immigration increased. A recent meta-analysis of 50 studies published between 1994 and 2014 concluded that cities with larger immigrant populations have lower crime rates.

Copious research also indicates that immigrants are less crime-prone than native-born Americans. A 2012 study observed that “foreign-born individuals exhibit remarkably low levels of involvement in crime across their lifetime,” though the second generation “caught up” to their native-born counterparts.

A 2005 analysis of 180 Chicago neighborhoods between 1995 and 2002 found that first-generation immigrants demonstrated significantly lower rates of violence than blacks and whites and that their “odds of violence are almost half those of third-generation immigrants.” At least on crime, immigrant families are assimilating too much.

The Chicago study (and some others) discovered a robust link between “concentrated immigration” and lower crime. So whites and blacks who live in communities with more immigrants are less likely to experience crime. Researchers suggest that immigrants may be less criminal because they have strong family bonds and work ethic, which is underscored by their higher labor participation rate. Immigrants washing dishes probably aren’t committing crimes in their down time.

The anecdotes Mr. Trump cites result mainly from failures in federal and local law enforcement as well as overreaching court rulings. Between 2013 and 2015, about 8,000 convicted criminals were released as a result of the Supreme Court’s Zadvydas v. Davis in 2001 that prohibited Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from indefinitely detaining immigrants.

Federal courts have also ruled that detention orders are not mandatory, and local governments can refuse to enforce them. Municipalities have even been sued for not releasing immigrants on bond. Foreign governments are often uncooperative, and the State Department could stop issuing visas to countries that don’t repatriate their criminals.

Local governments have also resisted cooperation when they believe ICE is indiscriminately rounding up undocumented immigrants. Notably, local cooperation increased when the Obama Administration prioritized removing criminal immigrants. Former ICE director Sarah Saldana told Congress last year that “more than half of previously uncooperative jurisdictions are now cooperating.”

This evidence suggests that the Trump Administration would better protect Americans by focusing on immigrants who commit serious crimes, not anyone here on an illegal document. Trying to round up everyone, or creating a needless bureaucracy, will mean fewer resources for deporting dangerous criminals.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

A Doctor to Heal the FDA Scott Gottlieb may be Trump’s most important nominee.

Posted By on March 13th, 2017

cott Gottlieb may have landed the toughest job in Washington: President Trump has selected the physician and policy expert to run the Food and Drug Administration, where a culture of control strangles innovation. An iron triangle of interest groups, the bureaucracy and the press will resist change, but Dr. Gottlieb could save lives by renovating FDA’s drug-approval processes.

Mr. Trump deserves credit for picking a pragmatist who understands the agency: Dr. Gottlieb served as a deputy commissioner at FDA during the George W. Bush Administration, and he has also worked at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. He is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and his many contributions to The Wall Street Journal include insights on doctor autonomy, drug prices, antibiotic development and more.

One of Dr. Gottlieb’s priorities will be moving generic medicines to market, and competition is the best way to reduce the price of treatments like the now infamous EpiPen. About 10% of 1,300 branded drugs “have seen patents expire but still face zero generic competition,” Dr. Gottlieb wrote in the Journal last year. “New regulations have, in many cases, made it no longer economically viable for more than one generic firm to enter the market.” Now he can roll back such arbitrary directives.

Dr. Gottlieb has also suggested that the FDA should explain its reasoning when declining to approve a drug. FDA does not release a rejection notice known as a complete response letter. The rule ostensibly exists to protect manufacturers, but the silence allows the agency and a company to peddle divergent tales about what happened. The public is left with minimal information and FDA can operate without fear of accountability.

The press is overcome with relief that President Trump didn’t pick Jim O’Neill, a Peter Thiel pal who supports making drugs available to patients after testing for safety, though not for efficacy. But that idea is far from crazy, especially for drugs that treat rare diseases when no approved options exist. Why should desperate patients have to take a sugar pill so the FDA can satisfy its demand for 100% certainty that a drug works?

Laws in 2012 and 2016 directed FDA to include patient data in reviewing such orphan drugs, but the agency has refused to modernize or rely on anything but exhaustive placebo trials. Dr. Gottlieb should make the most of this legal flexibility, though he’ll be unfairly accused of lowering standards.

Most important is that Dr. Gottlieb understands that the fundamental problem at FDA is cultural: Staff reviewers think they are the “lone bulwark standing between truth and chaos when it comes to prescribing drugs,” as he put it in a 2012 piece for National Affairs. The agency delays approvals for therapies to search for remote risks, and the cost of this method is human lives lost from excessive delays in approving new medicines.

This culture has meant “that trials continue to get longer, larger, and harder to enroll,” he wrote. The average length of a clinical trial stretched to 780 days in 2005 from 460 in 1999, and median number of procedures (such as X-rays or blood draws) on patients in trials grew to 158 from 96. To speed approvals, Dr. Gottlieb has proposed that such decisions be made by a central committee of the agency’s most senior scientists, not the same reviewers who collect and analyze the data.

Dr. Gottlieb must win Senate confirmation, and some on the left are flogging that he has consulted for pharmaceutical companies and invested in health-care ventures, which they call a fatal conflict of interest. In other words, he’s disqualified because he’s qualified.

Dr. Gottlieb will have to adhere to government ethics rules, and the irony is that if he had never worked with the industry he’d be accused of inexperience. His understanding of entrepreneurship would be a valuable addition to an FDA that has for too long pretended its decisions have no influence on research or private investment.

One last credential: Dr. Gottlieb is a cancer survivor, which means he understands the urgency of helping treatments and cures reach the patients who need them. Dr. Gottlieb can expect relentless political and bureaucratic resistance, but he also has a tremendous opportunity to unleash medical progress in this era of rapid biological discovery.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

MUST WATCH VIDEO- ISIS SHOOTS AT US HELICOPTER….EPIC RESPONSE!

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

THANKS TO E-PAL CHARLITE
ISIS Shoots At U.S. Helicopter … The Response Was EPIC!! [VIDEO] | News Today

http://warfarefootage.com/2017/03/isis-shoots-at-u-s-helicopter-the-response-was-epic-video/

http://warfarefootage.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/isis.jpg

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There has been footage uncovered of our U.S. military taking down ISIS. This is the best video of instant justice ever and I am sure you will agree that it is EPIC!

This particular video has been watched over a million times and it was taken during the evening hours. It shows ISIS shooting at a U.S. helicopter, and our military retaliated with BRUTAL force! The response to ISIS’s attack is a stark reminder of all those who put their lives on the line to keep our country safe.

Please watch and share! This video will leave you breathless!
http://warfarefootage.com/2017/03/isis-shoots-at-u-s-helicopter-the-response-was-epic-video/

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Bill Leak’s Last Testament

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

Bill Leak, a famed cartoonist in Australia, was forced to move his home and family to a secret location after being marked for death by Islamic fascists — real fascists, mind you, not the sort the sniveling Left perceives at every word of disagreement. He should have been able to count on the full weight and support of every government agency and bureaucrat. Instead, while the Prime Minister declined to utter four short words, ‘Je suis Bill Leak’, he was abandoned to the torments of the shameless Gillian Triggs and her posse of tax-funded thugs. What’s the difference between ISIS and the HRC? The former is open and honest in its vindictive contempt for all who will not toe the line. Days before he died, Bill delivered these words at the launch of his latest book, Trigger Warning. Quadrant Online reproduces them, as have other sites, because it is vital his message be as widesprad as was his humour engaging.

Quote: ‘As the senses of humour of people suffering from PC atrophy, their sensitivity to criticism becomes more and more acute until they get to the stage where everything offends them and they lose the ability to laugh entirely. For people with chronic PC, feeling offended is about as good as it gets’

I know it’s International Women’s Day so first I must apologise for not being a woman. It’s particularly regrettable that I’m not a glamorous Sudanese-Egyptian-Australian woman who wears a hijab promoting a book about what it’s like being a glamorous Sudanese-Egyptian-Australian woman who wears a hijab. If I was, this wouldn’t be the only event I’ve got lined up on my non-government funded whirlwind Trigger Warning awareness-raising tour.

When I met the great cartoonist Bill Mitchell about 34 years ago, he said, “Mate, a cartoonist only has to be funny once a day, but it’s a lot harder than you’d think.” He was right, but he had no idea how much harder it would be for me than it ever was for him.

For a start, in order for Bill Mitchell to come up with a cartoon, all he had to do was take a serious political issue, exaggerate it to the point of ridiculousness, then draw what he saw when he got there. But I can’t do that because the ideas our politicians come up with these days are utterly ridiculous to begin with. And if you’re starting at the point of absurdity, where do you go from there? I mean, what am I going to have to come up with to make teachers in the Safe Schools program look ridiculous when they actually start giving jobs to gimps? And how long do you think it will be then before some gimps’ rights campaigner accuses me of gimpophobia? It’s only a matter of time.

Another reason why the job’s so much harder now than it was for Bill Mitchell is because, unlike him, I can’t just breezily assume people are looking at my cartoons hoping to get a laugh. Ever since conceptual art supplanted transcendent art, all art has been reduced to the level of graffiti. And to people reared on postmodernism and cultural relativism who can’t tell the difference between Picasso and Banksy, I’m not a cartoonist drawing cartoons for a newspaper; I’m an artist exhibiting triggs leakhis work in a gallery that gets hundreds of thousands of visitors through the doors every day. And the work of a man like that has to be taken very seriously indeed. It has to be analysed. It has to be deconstructed. It has to be decoded by these people in a search for hidden meanings. And because art, like political activism, is a form of therapy, it’s supposed to reinforce and confirm their prejudices, not challenge them.

HOMELAND SECURITY Comments turned off

Justice Department Enlists ‘Reformed’ ISIS Fighter in Risky Deradicalization Scheme By Patrick Poole

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

The Justice Department has enlisted a former Islamic State fighter in what they say is an effort to combat radicalization.

But the program, centered around Brooklyn native Mohimanul Alam Bhuiya, is fraught with considerable risks as so-called “deradicalization” efforts around the globe have failed spectacularly, and recent high-profile cases of former terrorists-turned-therapists experiments have not ended well.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Mo, a U.S. citizen whose full name is under seal, left New York City in the summer of 2014 to join Islamic State in Syria.

Mo, now 28 years old, quickly became disillusioned, he says now. Four months in, he sent an email to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Please help me get home,” he wrote, according to court documents. “I’m fed up with this evil.”

[…]

Authorities in November 2014 deported Mo back to Brooklyn, where he pleaded guilty to two terrorism charges. He told the FBI that he acted as a building guard for Islamic State and taught other recruits how to use computer software.

Since then, Mo’s work with the U.S. government has included an unusual form of cooperation: conducting an intervention with a 15-year-old boy from Brooklyn who was posting tweets that appeared to support violence and Islamic State, also known as ISIS. The intervention so far has successfully dissuaded the teenager from joining the terrorist group.

It turns out that the Justice Department program is intended to reduce the sentences of U.S. terror supporters:

Under the new initiative, Brooklyn federal prosecutors will also use more discretion before charging someone with providing “material support” to terrorists, a broad violation that carries a maximum of 20 years in prison. Prosecutors may try to arrest some individuals on a lesser charge without the terrorism stigma, such as wire fraud.

For suspects already in custody, prosecutors will give more consideration to a shorter prison sentence in exchange for a longer period of supervised release that includes counseling or treatment.

There’s certainly no reason to question the motives of federal prosecutors backing this program, but there is evidence that calls into question their judgment.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

‘Palestinian’ Is a Fabricated Nationality By Dan Calic

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

While talk of a comprehensive Arab – Israeli peace agreement seems never ending, newly elected President Trump has described securing such an agreement as the “ultimate deal.” However there is ample reason why no deal has been struck, and why likely it will remain beyond reach.

The most important factor in reaching an agreement is both sides must want peace. However in this conflict, indisputable evidence shows only one side actually wants genuine peace and co-existence. A sober look at the facts reveals the Arab “Palestinians” have no interest in peace. In order to draw reasoned conclusions it’s also essential to separate fact from fiction.

Who’s Who?

The Arab Palestinians are in a different category than the rest of the Arab world, which consists of 22 sovereign Middle Eastern nations. They do not have the distinction of being a sovereign nation, which they feel they are entitled to. However, shouldn’t we first understand who they are, as well as their motives?

They are a mix of Jordanians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Syrian, Sudanese etc. who settled within the area known as the British Mandate of Palestine. This land encompassed 43,000 square miles and was promised to the Jews as a national homeland in the 1917 Balfour Declaration. Yet, in 1922 the British turned over 75% of it to create the nation of Transjordan, (today’s Jordan). This left roughly 25% or 11,000 square miles of land to be dealt with.

In 1947 the British decided to leave the area and turned the issue over to the United Nations, which by a 72% majority voted to partition two separate states, one Jewish and one Arab. However, the surrounding Arab nations rejected the vote and attacked the new Jewish state one day after its independence, intending to destroy it. This is all indisputable fact.

The coming storm

Regional leadership directed local Arabs living in the area to relocate temporarily, while the armies of the surrounding countries carried out their plan to destroy the UN partitioned Jewish state. Thinking they would soon be able to return and grab a huge windfall, the majority of Arabs chose to leave.

However, their destructive aspirations failed, and the tiny nation of Israel not only was reborn, it remains and flourishes.

One can only lament how different history might have been if the Arab nations chose to accept the UN partition vote. Yet they chose war and have never taken responsibility for their action. What’s worse is the nations of the world have never required it of them.

ISRAEL Comments turned off

The 100-year betrayal of Israel by the West By Ted Belman

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

One hundred years ago the British government published the Balfour Declaration which stipulated:

“His Majesty’s Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.”

In 1920, the victorious allies of World War I met in San Remo for the purpose of drawing up boundaries for their captured territories. It was decided, among other things, to put Palestine under British Mandatory rule. Thus, the Allies confirmed the pledge contained in the Balfour Declaration concerning the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine and made it a legal obligation on Britain and a legal entitlement for the Jews.

When the Palestine Mandate was drafted by the League of Nations pursuant to the San Remo Resolution, it added this important recital:

“Whereas recognition has thereby been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country.”

This addition was of great importance as it affirmed the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine, which, by the way, the Palestinian Authority (PA) and the UN today are doing their best to deny. In addition, the Jewish right to “reconstitute” their national home was recognized. Thus the Jews were in Palestine as a matter of right and not sufferance.

The Mandate provided,

“The Administration of Palestine, while ensuring that the rights and position of other sections of the population are not prejudiced, shall facilitate Jewish immigration under suitable conditions and shall encourage, in co¬operation with the Jewish agency referred to in Article 4, close settlement by Jews on the land, including State lands and waste lands not required for public purposes.“

The first betrayal of that promise and right came in 1921 before the Mandate was signed. The Arabs had rioted and Britain decided to reduce Jewish immigration to “absorptive capacity.” They told Chaim Weizmann that the mandate wouldn’t be signed if the Jews didn’t agree to delete, temporarily, the east bank of the Jordan. The Jews had no choice but to agree and the Palestine Mandate was signed in 1922. This territory amounted to 78% of what was promised to the Jews and it ultimately became Jordan. The deletion of the east bank became permanent, contrary to Article 5 which prohibited any removal of land from the Mandate.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

A Month of Islam and Multiculturalism in Britain: February 2017 by Soeren Kern

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

Muslim pupils outnumber Christian children in more than 30 church schools, including one Church of England primary school that has a “100% Muslim population.” — Sunday Times.

Six Muslim men shouted “Allahu Akbar” as they were sentenced at Sheffield Crown Court for a total of 81 years for sexually abusing two girls — including one who became pregnant at age 12 — in Rotherham.

“By 2030, one in three people will be a Muslim in the world — that is a huge population.” — Romanna Bint-Abubaker, founder of modest fashion website Haute Elan.

A Chatham House survey of more than 10,000 people from ten European countries found that an average of 55% agreed that all further migration from mainly Muslim countries should be stopped.

February 1. Jim Walker, a 71-year-old volunteer at Carnforth Station, was banned from the premises after someone complained about an alleged racist comment. Walker, who, for more than a decade, has been winding a famous clock at the station, was overheard discussing a newspaper article about young migrants entering Britain from the French port of Calais. Walker said:

“Carnforth Station Trust received a complaint from a visitor who was not happy about me speaking to somebody about the issue…. What they are doing is outrageous. It is absolutely unbelievable, it is a violation of free speech….

“I must be the only man in Carnforth who has a document saying where he can and can’t walk and all for expressing a point of view and quoting an editorial from a newspaper. Now [winding the clock] is no longer possible.”

February 1. Prime Minister Theresa May told the House of Commons that women should feel free to wear the hijab, a traditional Islamic headscarf. Several European countries have imposed bans on parts of Muslim religious dress. “What a woman wears is a woman’s choice,” May said after she was asked — on world hijab day — if she supported the right of women to wear the garment.

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Death and Destruction for Christmas Muslim Persecution of Christians, December 2016 by Raymond Ibrahim

Posted By on March 12th, 2017

“Nothing has been done by Pope Francis or the Bishop of Abu Dhabi to get me released, in spite of contact being made by my captors.” — Rev. Tom Uzhunnalil, a Catholic priest who was kidnapped on March 4, 2016 in Yemen, when Islamic terrorists raided a nursing home and killed 16 people, including several nuns and aid workers.

“Christians continue to be the most persecuted believers in the world with over 90,000 followers of Christ being killed in the last year.” — Massimo Introvigne, prominent statistician and researcher, interviewed on Vatican Radio.

As in previous years, the month of Christmas saw an uptick in Islamic attacks on Christians — much of it in the context of targeting Christmas festivities and worship.

The one that claimed the most lives took place in Egypt. On Sunday, December 11, 2016, an Islamic suicide bomber entered the St. Peter Cathedral in Cairo during mass, detonated himself, killed at least 27 worshippers, mostly women and children, and wounded nearly 70. A witness said:

“I found bodies, many of them women, lying on the pews. It was a horrible scene. I saw a headless woman being carried away. Everyone was in a state of shock. We were scooping up people’s flesh off the floor. There were children. What have they done to deserve this? I wish I had died with them instead of seeing these scenes.”

The death toll and severity of the attack (pictures and videos of the aftermath here) surpassed even the New Year’s Day bombing of an Alexandrian church in which 23 people were killed in 2011. A few weeks before the St. Peter’s bombing, a man hurled an improvised bomb at St. George Church, packed with thousands of worshippers, in Samalout. Had the bomb detonated, casualties would likely have been higher. In a separate December incident, Islamic slogans and messages of hate — including “you will die Christians” — were painted on the floor of the Virgin Mary church in Damietta.

In Germany, Anis Amri, a Muslim asylum seeker from Tunisia, seized a large truck, murdered its driver, and pushed him onto the passenger seat, then drove the truck into a Christmas market in Berlin. Twelve shoppers were killed and 65 were injured, some severely. Four days later, Amri was killed in a shootout with police near Milan. ISIS claimed responsibility despite original reports claiming the man had no ties to Islamic terror groups.