ISRAEL Comments turned off

Palestinians: The Real Human Rights Violations by Bassam Tawil

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19604/palestinians-human-rights-violations

When Palestinians commit human rights violations against Palestinians, the European Union and the UN are beyond indifferent. It is only when Israel takes a decision to defend itself against terrorism that we hear their supposedly righteous cries.

The Europeans and the UN seem to be more concerned about the rights of organizations that are affiliated with terrorism than the rights of organizations that speak out against human rights violations perpetrated by Palestinians.

The PFLP, in fact, has long been a headache for Mahmoud Abbas and his Palestinian Authority (PA). That is why the closure of PFLP-affiliated organizations in the West Bank actually serves the interests of the PA: it weakens its political rivals.

Recently, even Abbas himself decided to punish the PFLP, which is part of his own Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). He cut off all funds to the organization.

While he has been accusing Israel of targeting Palestinian NGOs, he has ordered his security forces to crack down on Lawyers for Justice, an independent Palestinian group of lawyers based in Ramallah, the de facto capital of the Palestinians.

Lawyers for Justice works to support Palestinian human rights activists and political prisoners detained by the Palestinian Authority. It also monitors and documents human rights violations committed by the PA security forces.

In one of its recent reports, Lawyers for Justice revealed that the number of Palestinian political activists arrested by the PA has significantly increased, while peaceful demonstrations and assemblies were being suppressed.

It is no wonder, then, that Abbas and the Palestinian Authority are trying to get rid of Lawyers for Justice.

Palestinian leaders do not tolerate any form of criticism. They do not want to hear complaints about human rights violations committed by the Palestinian security forces. They do not want any human rights organizations that challenge them in public and demand an end to the suppression of freedoms.

The only human rights organizations Palestinian leaders want to see are those that direct their hate against Israel, or those that are affiliated with terror groups such as the PFLP, or those that focus their time and energy on defending the rights of terrorists who carry out attacks against Jews.

According to Lawyers for Justice, there is no Palestinian Authority law that prohibits lawyers in their individual capacity or within a framework of a civil company from providing free legal services. The new measure against the group is unlawful…

“This will impede its [Lawyers for Justice] work by blocking its ability to enter into contractual agreements with local or international organizations, or have a bank account. The efforts of the Palestinian Authority to hinder the human rights work of Lawyers for Justice has been ongoing for multiple years. The group has been subjected to different forms of targeted harassment [by the Palestinian Authority], including judicial harassment and defamation campaigns.” — Front Line Defenders, an Irish-based human rights organization. Global Analysis, 2022.

Without valid registration, Lawyers for Justice will not be able to access its bank accounts and could have its offices shuttered and staff arrested. — Muhannad Karajah, head of Lawyers for Justice, hrw.org. April 13, 2023.

By staying silent about the human rights violations committed by the Palestinian Authority, the UN and many Western countries are doing a terrible injustice to the Palestinians, who will continue to suffer repression and suppression under the PA while the international community, obsessed only with defaming Israel, looks the other way.

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

Three Former Presidents Launch NGO to Fly Illegal Aliens Into the U.S. By Eric Lendrum

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://amgreatness.com/2023/04/24/three-former-presidents-launch-ngo-to-fly-illegal-aliens-into-the-u-s/

Three of the five living former presidents have joined forces with American Express Global Business Travel and Welcome.US to create a non-governmental organization (NGO) that will fly illegal aliens to any desired destination in the United States.

Just The News reports that the new NGO, Miles4Migrants, was created by former Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. Welcome.US was a pre-existing NGO funded by far-left billionaire George Soros and his Open Society Foundation, originally created to provide logistical assistance to the roughly 85,000 Afghan refugees that were brought into the United States after the collapse of Afghanistan, which resulted from the disastrous U.S. withdrawal from that country.

Now, with Welcome.US teaming up with American Express for the joint effort, Miles4Migrants will raise money to provide air travel for illegal aliens from Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Ukraine, with the illegals being allowed to fly to any destination they choose.

“Donations are needed to fund the flights for newcomers to travel to the United States,” the new group’s webpage declares. “Those forced to flee often leave behind all but what they can carry, and the costs of international travel can be prohibitive.”

“Welcome Connect Travel removes the cost of travel as a barrier for both sponsors in the United States and the displaced families they are supporting through humanitarian sponsorship,” the website continues.

The Biden Administration had already been organizing covert flights to bring illegal aliens into the United States, employing CIA assets to do so. Overall, according to Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.), at least 5 million illegal aliens have entered the United States since Biden first took power in January of 2021.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Confidence in Leadership by Lawrence Kadish

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19603/confidence-building-in-leadership

Military journals report that the United States is preparing to make the Pacific island of Guam a veritable “fortress.”

One suspects no one has used that phrase since the days just before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor when the United States finally woke up to the fact that the Land of the Rising Sun had every intention of owning the Pacific. History would go on to record that our decision to fortify Guam would come too late as our isolated defenders would eventually be forced to surrender to overwhelming enemy forces. Few would survive their imprisonment.

Today, military analysts say that 21st century Guam could be overwhelmed by Chinese drones, missiles, and carrier-borne fighter-bombers to ensure that our extensive military outpost could not interfere with any potential invasion of Taiwan. It is the reason the Pentagon is racing to place resources and weaponry on that island in hopes it will deter what some believe is the inevitable Chinese attack on Taiwan.

All of this begs a larger question.

Is America’s Commander in Chief capable of responding strategically to the threats facing our nation? And even a broader question. Does he have the confidence of the American public that he is right person for the job at a time when we are witnessing an inconceivable land war in Eastern Europe and a Chinese military that is deliberating seeking to isolate our allies while engaging in provocative military activities designed to test our resolve.

The Marines have a saying, “Know your enemy.”

So, it would be instructive to review what one historic Chinese philosopher long counseled.

MEDIA Comments turned off

Cable news in chaos after 3 major departures

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

Driving the news: Shocking news broke Monday that two top cable news anchors had been fired — less than a day after NBCU CEO Jeff Shell was unexpectedly fired for an inappropriate workplace relationship.

Fox News on Monday said the network and its star primetime host Tucker Carlson “have agreed to part ways,” after more than a decade. Carlson’s last program was Friday, April 21, per the network, meaning Carlson did not get a chance to sign off to his viewers.
CNN, shortly after, announced that Don Lemon had been fired. Lemon said in a Twitter post that he was “stunned.” He said he was informed by his agent Monday morning that he had been terminated.

Drama had been encircling both Carlson and Lemon for months.

Fox’s decision to part ways with Carlson occurred just days after Fox News reached a historic 11th hour settlement with Dominion Voting Systems for over $787 million. A trove of material uncovered during pre-trial discovery implicated Carlson.

MEDIA Comments turned off

Don Lemon became ’embarrassing distraction’ for CNN, lost newsroom with endless antics: Insiders Lemon’s days had long been numbered, CNN insiders say of anchor’s firing By Joseph A. Wulfsohn , Brian Flood , David Rutz | Fox News

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://www.foxnews.com/media/don-lemon-became-embarrassing-distraction-cnn-lost-newsroom-endless-antics-insiders

Don Lemon said he was shocked at his firing by CNN Monday, but insiders say it was a long time coming for the embattled host whose 17-year tenure came to an abrupt end after months of controversies.

Just hours after what ended up being his final broadcast on the network, Lemon announced on Twitter that he had been terminated and found out through his agent. To put a stamp on what was no longer a tenable relationship, CNN essentially called one of the faces of its network a liar, saying Lemon’s account was “inaccurate.”

“When you are demoted, reprimanded and sent to manner class – and still don’t learn your lesson, the logical next step is termination,” one CNN insider told Fox News Digital. 

While things hadn’t looked bright ratings-wise for Lemon over the past several years, the beginning of the end was in February when he made misogynistic comments about Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, saying she was past her “prime” at 51 years old. Lemon was forced to issue multiple apologies and CNN boss Chris Licht, in a rare public rebuke of an employee, ordered him to take “formal training.” 

MEDICINE AND HEALTH Comments turned off

What Happened in Hospitals During Covid? By Stella Paul

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2023/04/what_happened_in_hospitals_during_covid.html

Hospitals should be places you can trust to provide comfort and healing when you’re most vulnerable. But that trust may have been shattered by brutal Covid protocols that critics claim turned many hospitals into hellscapes of systematic medical murder.

The victims’ stories have been muffled by the mainstream media, but they’re starting to break through. For one thing, lawsuits against three hospitals have been filed in California by 14 bereaved families who claim their loved ones were killed by a deadly protocol. Meanwhile, activist organizations like Protocol Kills, the FormerFedsGroup Freedom Foundation, and American Frontline Nurses are collecting and documenting stories from bereaved families about what happened to their loved ones when they entered a hospital hoping for healing and, instead, were led to bizarre and tortured deaths.

I find it heartbreaking to read their stories, which share a haunting similarity, a feeling of being trapped in a highly organized nightmare. The ritual progresses in predictable stages: first, the patient is isolated from family, who are unable to advocate for their loved one or monitor what’s happening. Next, the patient is diagnosed with Covid-19 or Covid pneumonia, even if they came to the hospital because of a broken arm. Then, they’re bullied into getting remdesivir, a highly toxic drug which killed 53 percent of Ebola patients who had the misfortune to take it. Next, according to the California lawsuit, “They are placed on a BiPap machine at a high rate, making it difficult for them to breathe. Their hands are often tied down so they can’t take the BiPap machine off their face.”

I know this is getting unbearably painful to read, but stay with me to the bitter end to memorialize the victims’ suffering.  As the patients writhe in agony, psychiatrists are brought in to diagnose them with agitation and sedate them. Now, shot up with remdesivir, sedated with drugs that make it tough to breathe against the BiPap ventilator, and strapped down in restraints, the victims are denied food and sometimes even water.  Should they try to summon help, they may find the hospital played a vicious trick on them, placing their phone and call button for the nurse out of reach. In the final stages, they are intubated and slowly die alone, left to rot into a skeletal corpse with bed sores. Is this America?

BOOKS Comments turned off

Triumph of Race Over Merit Bringing all of us down – and fast. by Bruce Bawer

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://www.frontpagemag.com/triumph-of-race-over-merit/

In The Diversity Delusion: How Race and Gender Pandering Corrupt the University and Undermine Our Culture, Heather MacDonald, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute and contributing editor of City Journal, painted a grim picture of the damage done by university administrators desperate to diversify their student bodies at all costs. Identity studies programs, MacDonald made clear, exist not only because of the desire of progressive professors to promote postmodern ideology, but also because such courses, which involve little more than complaining about purported oppression and parroting inane jargon, are far easier for underqualified students to wrap their minds around than something serious and useful. In the same way, the introduction of “critical race studies” provides a handy route through law school for black kids who’d never be able to negotiate a traditional legal curriculum.

Of course, low-achieving black and Latino applicants also get admissions preferences – which in the long term aren’t really good for them, since those for whom the bar has been lowered invariably fall behind. One of the more frustrating aspects of this rank injustice is that Asians, who effectively get punished for being smart, working hard, and earning high test scores, have a right to kick up holy hell but rarely do, while many blacks and Latinos who get special treatment – not just affirmative action, but scholarships and other benefits – can’t stop raging about racism.

The Diversity Delusion came out in 2019. On May 25 of the following year, a thug named George Floyd died during an unpleasant encounter with the Minneapolis police, and pretty soon everything MacDonald wrote about in The Diversity Delusion got even worse. Suddenly it was all about race: America had stepped into the looking glass and entered the harebrained world of Ibram X. Kendi and Robin DiAngelo, whose strange new road rules – and their dire consequences – are the subject of MacDonald’s new book, When Race Trumps Merit: How the Pursuit of Equity Sacrifices Excellence, Destroys Beauty, and Threatens Lives.

ELECTIONS, MEDIA Comments turned off

Corrupt Media Fight Election Accountability With Democrat-Manufactured Lies By: Shawn Fleetwood

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://thefederalist.com/2023/04/24/corrupt-media-fight-election-accountability-with-democrat-manufactured-lies/

Legacy media claim so-called ‘election deniers’ are constantly threatening and harassing election workers throughout the country. But the facts say otherwise.

It didn’t take long after the 2020 election for legacy media to conjure up a new smear to use against conservatives. For two years, leftists have employed the malicious term “election denier” to silence any American with legitimate concerns about the integrity of U.S. elections.

Alarmed at the grossly mismanaged election in Maricopa County, Arizona, last fall? According to the media, you’re an “election denier.” Worried about the real voter suppression that took place in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, and Harris County, Texas? You guessed it, “election denier.”

But in the lead-up to and following the 2022 midterms, media began incorporating this smear into their next phony narrative, which is that these so-called Republican “election deniers” are constantly threatening and harassing election workers throughout the country. Prior to the Nov. 8 election, for example, left-wing outlets ran hit piece after hit piece warning that Republicans were secretly plotting to disrupt local precincts on Election Day.

And while their doomsday predictions (unsurprisingly) never came true, that hasn’t stopped Democrats from attempting to convince the public there’s a widespread conspiracy of Trump supporters threatening local election officials. Within the past several weeks, NBC News and The New York Times have run exposés highlighting election officials in Virginia and Texas, respectively, who recently resigned amid confrontations with fellow Republican officials.

BOOKS, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

How Strong Is the Power of American Capitalism? By Rainer Zitelmann

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://pjmedia.com/columns/rainerzitelmann/2023/04/24/how-strong-is-the-power-of-american-capitalism-n1690018

David Brooks wrote an article on “The Power of American Capitalism” in the New York Times on April 20, 2023. As someone who wrote a book called The Power of Capitalism a few years ago, I welcome the sentiment: capitalism is stronger than ever, despite all the doomsayers. Brooks cites a report published by The Economist on American economic performance over the last three decades. Using an avalanche of evidence and data, the main thrust of the article is that far from declining, American capitalism is dominant and accelerating. Brooks cites a host of facts, including:

Back in 1990, for example, America’s gross domestic product per capita was nearly neck and neck with that of Europe and Japan. But by 2022, the U.S. had raced ahead.

In 1990, the U.S. economy accounted for 40 percent of the nominal G.D.P. of the G7 nations. By 2022, the U.S. accounted for 58 percent.

In 1990, American income per person was 24 percent higher than the income per person in Western Europe. Today, it is about 30 percent higher…

In 1990, the U.S. economy accounted for about 25 percent of global G.D.P. In 2022 it still accounted for roughly 25 percent, The Economist found.

This is good news indeed. But what should be added is that much of America’s economic growth has only been possible because of the spread of capitalism around the world in the decades from 1990 to 2020. Developments in China, in particular, where unprecedented growth has been achieved since Deng Xiaoping’s reforms began in the early 1980s, have also boosted growth in the United States. Contrary to the widespread perception in the U.S. that unequal trade with China is to blame for many of America’s woes, capitalist globalization has also significantly benefited American companies operating around the world. When countries like China, Vietnam, and India grow, it does not hurt the U.S.  America benefits too.

ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE Comments turned off

You’ll Have No Power And You Will Like It

Posted By on April 25th, 2023

https://issuesinsights.com/2023/04/25/youll-have-no-power-and-you-will-like-it/

While campaigning in 2019, Joe Biden guaranteed “we’re going to end fossil fuels.” What he didn’t say is that eliminating fossil fuels will create a troublesome scarcity of electricity. He also didn’t say that was part of the plan, even though it just might be.

Now with the power of the presidency behind him – again we ask, how could such a disastrous event happen? – Biden is just a few pages of paperwork away from forcing natural gas- and coal-fired power plants to sharply cut their greenhouse emissions. If the emission caps can’t be met, power plants will then have to adopt carbon capture technology, which is quite expensive.

Our friends at the Committee to Unleash Prosperity had an interesting response to the news.

“Ben Franklin,” they said, “is often heralded as the man who discovered the power of electricity. Joe Biden wants to be the president who abolished it.”

Output cuts that will be required under the proposed regime “are so stringent,” says the CTUP, that “fossil fuel plants – which supply around 65% of America’s power – would be technologically incapable of complying.” The only way they will be able to stay open and generating power is if Americans’ utility bills are raised “dramatically.” If not, they close, and the power they produce is gone.

The administration knows this. The administration doesn’t care. The administration, driven by the hard-left zealots that run the Democratic Party, wants the rest of us to make do with less.