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March 2016

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

A few simple questions for climate fanatics By Jack Hellner

By on March 16th, 2016

President Obama, Bernie Sanders, and Hillary Clinton state that climate change is more dangerous to future generations than terrorism. They advocate destroying industries that have greatly improved our quality and length of life. I believe that the American people are entitled to some actual scientific facts instead of talking points. Here are some questions for the global warming bandwagon.

In the 1920s, scientists were warning that because of warming and the melting ice, coastal cities would soon disappear. Why were they wrong then, and why are the same warnings correct today? How did the Earth cool so much from 1945 to 1976 that the experts were warning about a disastrous ice age if rising CO2, rapidly increasing populations, industrialization, and fossil fuels cause warming?

According to UCAR (the Universal Corporation for Atmospheric Research) the temperature today is around 1.53 degrees warmer than 1880. Wouldn’t that be within the margin of error, especially since the Little Ice Age ended around 1800?

According to scientific studies, CO2 was much higher during the ice age – 2,000-8,000 parts per million vs. 400 today. If CO2 causes warming, why wasn’t the Earth warmer then than it is today?

Recently, the U.S. attorney general said the Justice Department is considering bringing legal action against people who will not go along on climate change caused by humans. Is it any wonder that scientists who are skeptics won’t speak out when their livelihood is threatened?

Shouldn’t the media do some simple research instead of just repeating the talking points that humans cause climate change?

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Plenty of Political Climate Change Sen. Whitehouse used to pretend he opposed jailing dissenters.

By on March 16th, 2016

Sheldon Whitehouse took to the Senate floor last fall to assail our coverage of his climate agenda. We had criticized his plan to use the RICO law, created to prosecute mobsters, against people who disagree with him about global warming. We also criticized George Mason University’s Jagadish Shukla, who wrote to Attorney General Loretta Lynch and other federal officials urging them to follow the Senator’s advice. New developments aren’t helping the credibility of Messrs. Shukla and Whitehouse.

In October Mr. Whitehouse denied that the RICO litigation threat—with its potential for treble damages—was intended to shut down scientific debate. The Rhode Island Democrat claimed he wants civil rather than criminal prosecutions of climate dissenters. As if bringing financial ruin on defendants accused of independent thought isn’t bad enough.

But now it looks like the campaign to silence climate dissidents could move beyond a potential civil case—and we’re not hearing a peep from Mr. Whitehouse. Attorney General Lynch told the Senate last week that her department had referred a request to prosecute climate dissent to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Specifically, it was referred to the FBI’s criminal investigative division. A Justice official says on background that this is “not an indication or recommendation of whether a matter merits investigation, but is simply a referral to an appropriate investigative authority at the Department.”

Even as Sen. Whitehouse questioned Ms. Lynch on this very matter at the hearing, he uttered no criticism. His spokesman says the Senator still doesn’t favor criminal investigations and that Mr. Whitehouse thought the FBI referral “appeared unusual for the pursuit of a civil investigation.” But if Justice does throw people in jail for scientific skepticism, the message seems to be: Don’t count on Mr. Whitehouse to defend your liberty.

While the FBI ponders whether to slap the cuffs on people who don’t believe in U.N. climate models, scientists who agree with Mr. Whitehouse are thriving beyond the dreams of most academic researchers. CONTINUE AT SITE

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POLITICS Comments turned off

Donald Trump’s Reckless Rhetoric He says he’s not responsible for the bad behavior of his supporters. That’s what liberal activists said about the looters and arsonists in Baltimore and Ferguson, Mo. Jason Riley

By on March 16th, 2016

In 1967 the liberal New Republic magazine ran an editorial titled “Blow Up the Cities.” It meant literally. The article hailed “the promise of the riots” that had been traumatizing the country’s largest population hubs.

“Terrifying as the looting, the shooting, the arson are,” wrote the editors, “they could mean a gain for the nation if, as a result, white America were shocked into looking at itself, its cities, its neglect.” The editorial concluded, “The national commitment needed to bring racial justice to the cities is unlikely until New York, Chicago or Los Angeles is brought to an indefinite standstill by a well-organized guerilla action against the white establishment.”

The 1965 race riots that started in the Watts section of Los Angeles resulted in 4,000 arrests and 34 deaths. The 1967 riots in Newark, N.J., claimed 23 lives and left 600 injured. Rioting in Detroit the same year caused 43 deaths and destroyed 2,500 businesses.

“Groping for perspective,” wrote Taylor Branch in “At Canaan’s Edge,” his civil-rights history, “a shell-shocked New York Times editorial observed that the cumulative toll from Newark and Detroit fell far beneath the Pentagon’s latest casualty report in Vietnam.” Relax, folks. Detroit was still safer than wartime Saigon.
Of course, the media’s decision to condone and encourage this violent upheaval reflected orthodox liberal thinking among civil-rights organizations, politicians and leading black activists of the period. The rioting that erupted in Washington, D.C., after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. was described by the head of the local Urban League as a “low form of communication by people who seek to get a response from society that seems to be deaf to their needs.” Harlem Congressman Adam Clayton Powell said that riots were “a necessary phase of the black revolution.” H. Rap Brown, the former Black Panther, called for “guerilla war on the honkie white man” and said that “Violence is necessary. It is as American as cherry pie.” CONTINUE AT SITE

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The African Terror Front The threat is spreading faster than Western efforts to contain it.

By on March 16th, 2016

Americans have long associated the fight against Islamist terrorism with the Middle East, as Sunday’s attack in the Turkish capital of Ankara reminds us. But that geographical horizon is also increasingly out of date. Witness the expanding grip of jihadists in Africa—and the Obama Administration’s belated but increasingly urgent attempts to fight it.

This is apparent from the March 5 air strike, by manned and unmanned U.S. planes, on an al Shabaab training camp in Somalia that killed an estimated 150 terrorists. Four days later U.S. Special Forces assisted the Somali military in taking down another Shabaab camp. In both cases Pentagon officials cited intelligence suggesting an imminent threat of attacks by the al Qaeda-allied group, whose name means “the youth.”

Ostensibly, U.S. Special Forces are in Somalia to train and assist the African Union Mission in Somalia, or Amisom, which helps Somalia’s federal government. Shabaab is a menace to all of East Africa, with outrages including the 2013 attack on the Westgate Mall in Nairobi and last year’s rampage at Kenya’s Garissa College that massacred 148 Christian students.

But Shabaab is also a menace to the West. A Shabaab member tried to kill Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard in 2010 with an ax in revenge for drawing the prophet Mohammed. Shirwa Ahmed of Minneapolis became the first known American suicide bomber when he drove a truck bomb into a Somali government compound, killing 20. An estimated 40 U.S. citizens have traveled to Somalia to join Shabaab, which has called for attacks on U.S. shopping malls. If Islamic State can radicalize the San Bernardino killers from afar, Shabaab can do the same.

Al Shabaab militants parade new recruits after arriving in Mogadishufrom their training camp south of the capital on October 21, 2010. Photo: feisal omar/Reuters

The Obama Administration has sent 300 troops to Cameroon to fight the Islamist terrorists of Boko Haram in neighboring Nigeria, and it’s an open secret that the U.S. operates a drone base in Garoua in northern Cameroon. A U.S. air strike last month near the Libyan city of Sabratha killed an Islamic State leader and 48 terrorist comrades, and the Pentagon is reported to be drawing up plans for a broader air campaign against Islamic State in Libya. CONTINUE AT SITE

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MEDIA Comments turned off

The NYT’s frontal assault on Netanyahu by Ruthie Blum

By on March 16th, 2016

It is not surprising that The New York Times launched a frontal assault on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, bemoaning what its editorial board called his “lost opportunities.” But the timing of the attack, which U.S. President Barack Obama could have written himself, is worth examining.

Not only did it appear mere days after Jeffrey Goldberg’s portrait of Obama appear in The Atlantic, but it came on the heels of a couple of notable Palestinian terrorist rampages in Israel (notable not for their being distinguishable from all the other daily stabbings, car rammings and shootings, but due to their having taken place in Petach Tikva and Tel Aviv rather than Jerusalem and the West Bank); a two-day shuttle-diplomacy visit to the region by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden; a rocket attack from Gaza; and ballistic missile tests in Iran — with an open threat to annihilate Israel engraved in Hebrew on a few of the projectiles.

Anyone who read Goldberg’s piece might have been lulled by his genuine flair for biography into ignoring the disastrous effect of Obama’s Mideast policies. And this emerged in a glowing report; one shudders to imagine how the U.S. president’s words and deeds would have been understood had they been described by an impartial raconteur and interviewer.

Though Obama, with Goldberg’s help, tried to pin his own failures on other leaders — highlighting Netanyahu’s flaws alongside those of additional counterparts who served to “disappoint” him — what emerged was a handbook on how to turn the United States of America into the world’s wimp. Obama’s mentor, “Rules for Radicals” author Saul Alinsky, could not have done a better job.

That the Times took this opportunity to publish a column blaming Netanyahu for the lack of peace with the Palestinians cannot be disconnected from the above. On the contrary, it was like an after-pill; an emergency damage-control measure to place the ball back in Israel’s court. Though Obama is on his way out, a fierce campaign for the election of his successor is underway. The Times, therefore, had to reassure American voters that it is not the Democrats who are at fault for their growing sense of international insecurity, but rather Netanyahu.

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BOOKS Comments turned off

The Feminist Mistake By Marilyn Penn

By on March 16th, 2016

When feminists fought to de-segregate all-male schools and allow women entry to the privileged world of the Ivy League, the argument was that girls were just as bright and ambitious as boys and deserved the opportunity to compete fairly in the most elite arenas. This was an argument based on women’s strength. Now we have colleges and universities acceding to feminist demands that women need special protection. Even though they have freedom to engage in sex, to visit boys’ rooms, to spend the night – they must be protected against the trauma (and alleged stigma) of facing the person they are accusing of forced sex. So the American right of the accused to challenge his accuser is subsumed under the rubric of shielding “victims of rape.” It will be interesting to see whether this rule applies in accusations of same-sex rape as well.

In the current case of Jack Montague, expelled from Yale during his senior year, the woman in question whose privacy is protected, had sex with him several times consensually but claims that on their fourth go-round, she did not give consent. After leaving his room subsequent to this “rape,” she returned and spent the night with him in his bed. A year later, she decided to report this non-consensual episode to the Title IX committee at Yale and the wheels of academic investigation and adjudication were set in motion. Each person was interrogated separately by the Yale Committee and a decision was reached based on the “preponderance of evidence,” which differs from the evidence needed for criminal convictions. A strong argument could be made that by expelling Jack Montague, he received a life sentence, losing both his place as captain of the Yale Basketball Team and his diploma from a university whose tuition now amounts to hundreds of thousands of dollars without a graduation degree.

Furthermore, Jack Montague’s name is plastered all over the media while his consenting sex partner for 3 out of 4 encounters is treated by archaic standards – as if her reputation would be ruined by divulgence of her name, her complicity or her non-consent. Or equally old-fashioned in the age of social media, that she would be further traumatized by the public gaze added to her non-consensual rape. We know of course that there have been other instances of accusations by women that have turned out to be false – the most famous being the Duke Lacrosse team affair. What does a woman have to lose by lying if her name and background are never revealed? And if the committee had found Jack Montague’s story more believable than hers, would she have been expelled for lying and/or false accusation? Or is expulsion only the burden to be borne by male students on their wider shoulders. How easily and conveniently we slip back into stereotypes of the damsel in distress when a political agenda is at stake.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Israeli rocket technology will help explorer ease onto Mars David Shamah

By on March 16th, 2016

A braking system that will let the new European-Russian ExoMars craft touch down on Red Planet without exploding comes from the Rafael defense systems firm .

Man’s latest attempt to search for life on the Red Planet has a critical blue-and-white component – a propulsion system that will gently guide the newly-launched ExoMars spacecraft to the surface of Mars when it gets ready to touch down sometime in 2018.

The craft’s propulsion system was developed by Rafael, the same company that developed, among other things, the Iron Dome missile defense system.

While known for its defense systems, Rafael is also active in the space business, specifically as the manufacturer of controllable propulsion and reaction control systems (RCS), which help “brake” the landing of satellites and missiles. This ensures that their fuel tanks do not crash into the ground as they land and ignite an explosion.

When ExoMars, launched Monday, gets to its destination, it will release a descent module called Schiaparelli which will land on Mars. During the descent phase, a heat shield will protect the payload from the severe heat flux. Parachutes, thrusters, and damping systems will reduce the speed, allowing a controlled landing on the surface of Mars.

The module’s fuel tanks are equipped with Rafael-supplied mini-rockets that will spring into action when the craft gets ready to land on the surface of Mars, according to Zvi Zuckerman, a Rafael engineer who helped develop the system. In comments to Yedioth Ahronoth, Zuckerman said that the landing “will be a dramatic moment, because if anything goes wrong, the spacecraft could explode” due to the impact of landing.

According to Zuckerman, the European Space Agency, which is sponsoring the mission along with Russian space agency Roscosmos, chose Rafael’s propulsion system for the job “because our propulsion tanks are lighter, and use cleaner fuel,” which ensures a smoother landing.

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POLITICS Comments turned off

Can We Survive the Madness?Peter O’Brien

By on March 16th, 2016

It sure seems crazy: a whole raft of candidates, a political party seemingly coming apart at the seams, vicious name-calling, violent demonstrations. One candidate, favored

by many in Washington – educated, understated, sophisticated; one of the others – old, an outsider, vilified by many in Washington, the subject of all sorts of accusations and

willing to threaten some people himself, or so it seems.

And the nation: at a turning point, ready to move into a much different future.

1824 – heck of year.

Others have already said it: there is much about what is going on this year that is reminiscent of 1824 and the election that saw John Quincy Adams become president –

with 30.9% of the popular vote and just 64% of the electoral votes needed to win the office. (Per the 12th Amendment, he was selected by Congress after no candidate achieveda majority).

So, what does that really have to do with the US today?

First, a word about getting too frustrated: participatory government is messy, because everyone gets to ‘play.’ And that’s a good thing. But it doesn’t yield clear

solutions, and it never yields candidates who are even remotely close to perfect. Ever.

George Washington was the closest we’ve had, and he was our first, and he would be the first person to tell you he wasn’t perfect. (He didn’t think himself ready for the position

and wanted to resign after two years as president…)

The only governments that yield clear answers are dictatorships. Their answers are often crystal clear. And are forced down the throats of most of the citizens.

Second, the nation has been through some serious problems and survived. This doesn’t mean we should go around seeking serious problems for no good reason. But it

does mean that the system (as defined within the Constitution) is remarkably resilient; dynamically stable as engineers say: you can put all sorts of stress on it and if you back

off, the system will self-correct. This also means that you mess with the Constitution at your peril; so, let’s not.

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BOOKS Comments turned off

President Obama Burnishes His Image On The Back of Israel By Herbert London

By on March 16th, 2016

The stabbing spree in Israel by Palestinian terrorists continues unabated. Even when an American citizen visiting Israel is killed “What me worry? President Obama” is unfazed. At this point in his presidency Obama has only one goal: burnishing his legacy.

To augment the chapters of a future history I believe he intends to accomplish what none of his predecessors could – a Middle East settlement. And he intends to achieve this lofty goal through imposition. This president will not wander through the tall weeds of negotiation and give and take. Nor is he obliged to adhere to 242, the international law that requires an exchange between Israel and the Palestinian Authority before any settlement. He intends to propose a “two state solution” to the U.N. Security Council, a body already predisposed to accept the idea.

President Obama is not likely to call on his Democratic colleagues in the House and Senate before he engages in this initiative. This is his call, yet another example of his imperial presidency. He is also likely to face almost no resistance in the United Nations where many Arab states have recognized the Palestinian Authority (PA) as a legitimate state. The irony, of course, is that the PA is to a state what a meal is to a morsel of food.

Were it not for Israeli largess, international aid and U.S. support the PA could not exist. The West Bank’s so called leader, Abu Abbas, has been serving as president for 12 years after a four year term. Corruption is rampant in every area controlled by Arab leadership. The police function – to maintain a semblance of order – is underwritten by the United States. Hamas and ISIS have penetrated underground cells in Ramallah and other areas. While a tenuous relationship exists between Jews and Arabs in the region, Israeli businesses provide many of the job opportunities for Arabs, even the most disenchanted.

Into this morass enters President Obama, or so I believe. Recognizing the futility of attempting to secure Congressional support, the president is a lone ranger using the agency of the United Nations for his agenda. Since the P5+1 deal over the Iranian nuclear program, it is clear the president has channeled foreign policy through the United Nations. It is also clear he assumes his status as commander and chief gives him, ipso facto, authority for unilateral foreign policy decisions.

Since he has already alienated Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and, considering his lame duck status, cannot experience any further political fall-out from his UN posturing, this action will be widely admired in the Arab world, perhaps even altering a widely shared negative opinion of the president. And who knows, maybe it results in deals and post-presidential speaking fees ala Bill Clinton.

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Russia Seeks to Reassure Israel After Sudden Announcement of Syria Troop Withdrawal

By on March 16th, 2016

Russian diplomats are stressing that Israel’s national security interests will not be hurt by the country’s sudden announcement of its plans to withdraw troops from Syria, which Israel’s top general admitted took him by surprise, Ynet reported Tuesday.

“We will try to ensure that this (Syria) crisis is resolved, and we will also do everything so that Israel’s national security interests are not harmed in the process,” Alexey Drobinin, Russia’s deputy ambassador to Israel, told Ynet. Russian troops have been aiding the Iran-backed regime of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad since last fall.

Russia’s goal in withdrawing much of its forces from Syria is to send a “clear message” that “it’s time to give political dialogue a chance,” Drobinin said. He added that it was still necessary to fight terror organizations like ISIS and the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front, and that Russia would continue to do so alongside a international coalition.

Drobinin also told Israel’s Army Radio, that Russia is aware of Israel’s security concerns in the region, and that the Russians “have an ongoing dialogue with the Israeli side on all levels – the military level and diplomatic level.”

After Russia’s withdrawal was announced, IDF Chief of Staff Gen. Gadi Eisenkot told members of the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee that Russian intervention had strengthened Assad’s position, and it was unclear at this point what the ramifications of the withdrawal will be. “At this stage, humility and caution are required in trying to understand the vector in which the Syrian theatre will develop with the exit of Russian forces,” he said.

In How Israel Navigated through the Hurricane of the Syrian Civil War, which was published in the March 2016 of The Tower Magazine, Jonathan Spyer highlighted aspects of Israel’s coordination with Russia regarding Syria.

It is no less important that Israel has been careful to maintain communication with the Russians, and a “deconfliction” regime appears to be in effect between Russian and Israeli air power over Syria. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, and Military Intelligence chief Herzl Halevi travelled to Moscow immediately following the Russian intervention, presumably to lay the groundwork for a channel of communication. As of now, this appears to have permitted Israel to continue to operate in the skies over Syria. Thus, while the emergence of a fledgling Russian-Iranian strategic alliance in the Middle East is surely of concern to Israel, the evidence to date suggests that the alliance by no means implies carte blanche for the Iranians to pursue all their regional goals under the umbrella of Russian air cover. On the contrary, the Russians, as the senior partner in the relationship, dictate when and to what extent cooperation takes place.

Netanyahu, according to the Times of Israel, told Russian President Vladimir Putin in “no uncertain terms” that Israel would not tolerate Tehran’s efforts to arm Israel’s enemies in the region, and that Jerusalem has taken and will continue to take action against any such attempts. The Times quoted the prime minister saying, “This is our right and also our duty.… There were no objections to our rights.… There was readiness to make sure that whatever Russia’s intentions for Syria, Russia will not be a partner in extreme actions by Iran against us.”

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