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July 2016

MY SAY: A LITTLE PERSPECTIVE ON JULY 4

I have received several friendly notes reminding me that the founding fathers whom I revere were also slave holders. They were and for the record let me state that slavery was a vile, corrupt and corrupting institution.

But when our Declaration of Independence and Constitution were drafted, what was the scene in Europe?

In England, public executions were the norm and they were conducted at lunch time so that parents and children could watch like a spectator sport.

In France, seventeen years after 1776 the Reign of Terror (September 1793 – July 1794), disregarded the motto of the Revolution “liberte, egalite, fraternite.” The “enemies of the revolution” were summarily executed and the death toll in ten months was 25,000.
In Russia, Catherine the Great (Empress 1762-1796) who has been called an”enlightened” despot she maintained a system of “serfdom”…a form of slavery whose victims lived in squalor and misery working mines and foundries and seldom lived beyond their thirties. She used them as chattel and “gifted” them to her friends and lovers.

The Right to Happiness is the Antidote to Tyranny : Daniel Greenfield

Revolutions are not unique. Some countries have revolutions all the time until revolution becomes their national sport. In banana republics the overthrow of one dictator to make way for another gives everyone a day off from work.

These revolutions, no matter how they are cloaked in the familiar rhetoric of liberty, are nothing more than tyranny by other means.

What made the American Revolution unique was that its cause was not the mere transfer of power from one ruler to another or one system to another, but a fundamental transformation of the nature of rule.

Every revolution claims to be carried out in the name of the people, but it’s never the people who end up running things.

The Declaration of Independence did more than talk about the rights of the people. It placed the people at the center of the nation and its government, not as an undifferentiated mass to be harnessed for whatever propaganda purposes they might be good for, but as individuals with hopes and dreams.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

That is not merely some bland reference to a mass of people. There is no collective here, only the individual. The greater good of independence is not some system that will meet with the approval of the mass, but that will make it possible for the individual, each individual, to live a free life, not a life lived purely for the good of the mass, but for his own sake.

In a time when government mandates what you can eat and how much of it, only one of the ways it seeks to regulate every aspect of daily life for the greater good– the declaration that started it all declares that the purpose of government is not social justice, a minimally obese population, universal tolerance or even equality. Equality is acknowledged as a fact, not as a goal.

Entebbe and a sad Fourth of July; Ruthie Blum

It was on July 4, 1976, that Yonatan Netanyahu was killed while rescuing hostages in Uganda. I did not know it then, but the bold Israeli mission would serve as a sharp turning point in my own personal history.

The Entebbe raid, as Operation Thunderbolt came to be called, not only had the entire world in awe of Israeli daring; it caused me to put the Israeli officer I met while he was visiting New York that summer on a pedestal. Exactly one year later, I was on a plane to the Jewish state with fantasies of raising lots of gorgeous babies who would grow into super-heroes whom I and everybody else would view with amazement, if not worship.

Ironically, the news of the Hollywood-like commando raid upstaged the bicentennial celebrations in the United States. Indeed, it was as though the extravagant fireworks set off in honor of America’s 200th birthday were sharing the limelight with Israel, the state that had been in existence for a mere 28 years.

The Entebbe story began exactly a week before that, on June 27, when an Air France flight from Tel Aviv to Paris via a stopover in Greece was hijacked just after takeoff from Athens by four terrorists, two Palestinian and two German. The hijackers diverted the flight, with more than 300 passengers and 12 crew members on board, to Benghazi, Libya, and then to Entebbe Airport in Uganda, where they were joined by members of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin’s military forces.

The hostages were taken into an area of the terminal, where the Jews were separated from the others — a process reminiscent of Nazi “selection.” The hijackers demanded $5 million and the release of 53 Palestinian and pro-Palestinian terrorists, the bulk of whom were being held in Israeli jails. If their demands were not met, they said, they would begin killing hostages on July 1.

On June 30, the hijackers released 48 non-Israeli, non-Jewish hostages.

Britain: Labour Party Finds Itself Innocent! by Douglas Murray

The findings of this inquiry have now been published and amazingly the Labour party has found itself innocent.

In British left-wing politics, you cannot even clear yourself of accusations of anti-Semitism without having an outbreak of it right there and then.

Readers who have followed the UK Labour party’s recent travails will be surprised to hear the results of the party’s latest inquiry into its own behaviour. After a slew of anti-Semitic comments emanated from a Member of Parliament, a number of councillors and a member of the party’s executive committee, party leader Jeremy Corbyn finally ordered an inquiry into anti-Semitism in the party. The findings of this inquiry have now been published and amazingly the Labour party has found itself innocent. But even that has not gone down without incident.

The Labour party’s anti-Semitism problem began to be exposed at the start of this year when stories of routine anti-Semitism emerged from a junior wing of the party — specifically the Oxford University Labour Club. That scandal involved a number of resignations, and revelations of the use of anti-Semitic language as routine and commonplace among Labour students at Britain’s most prestigious university. An inquiry into these events, ordered by the party and conducted by Labour’s own Baroness Royall, promptly found “no evidence” of “institutional anti-Semitism.”

Then came the scandal of Naz Shah MP, who was suspended from the party pending an investigation into messages on social media, as well as the suspension of a number of Labour councillors for posting anti-Semitic content on Facebook and other sites.

Kerosene was promptly thrown onto this smouldering fire by National Executive Committee member, Ken Livingstone. The former Mayor of London used the opportunity of an anti-Semitism row to go on the BBC and talk about which early policies of Adolf Hitler’s he thought the Jewish people had agreed. The resulting firestorm culminated in Mr Livingstone locking himself in a disabled lavatory at the BBC while journalists shouted questions about Hitler under the door. Sensing that his party was in difficult public-relations waters, Jeremy Corbyn ordered an inquiry into the Labour party’s anti-Semitism problem, and asked left-wing campaigner Shami Chakrabarti to conduct the inquiry. Chakrabarti promptly joined the Labour party and started work.

SOL SANDERS: CAESAR’S WIFE

One of the most ancient parables in Western culture is the tale of Caesar’s wife. For those who have forgotten or escaped a classical education, the story goes that after the death of his first wife in childbirth [when he also lost his son], Caesar chose to marry again. Having reached the heights of the Roman Republic as Pontifex Maximus, the elected chief priest of the state religion,

Caesar’s new wife would play a collateral role.

To acquire the necessary helpmate, Caesar turned to Pompeia, whose family like his had fought on the losing side in the Roman civil war of the 80s B.C. Following protocol for the Roman gentry, Pompeia was honored with a banquet and celebration as the “grand goddess”, a celebration attended only by women of high ranking families.
But a young male patrician named Publius Clodius, apparently in an effort to seduce Pompeia, managed to enter the charmed circle disguised as a woman,. When he was discovered, he was put on trial. But he was not convicted despite all Caesar’s efforts.

However, Caesar refused to accept the verdict He divorced Pompeia, declaring publicly that “my wife ought not even to be under suspicion.” Caesar’s call on the appearance as well as the reality of stringent morality has given rise to the daily proverb, “Caesar’s wife must be above suspicion!”

Leaving aide for the moment all the other accusations of corruption and perfidy thrown at Hillary Clinton, the fact that she is running for the highest office in the land requires the invocation of “Caesar’s law”. A corollary to Caesar’s law is that the higher an individual in public life reaches for office, the more stringent should be the requirements that he fulfill the appearance as well as the proof of incorruptibility. Public morality, even with all its inadequacies through the ages, remains the bulwark of democratic government.

There is no doubt that former Pres. Bill Clinton has further muddied the waters – whether with or without the collaboration of Attorney-General Loretta Lynch. Both as lawyers and current or former holders of high public office, would have had to know that any contact between them would be open not only to scrutiny but to condemnation. That Ms. Lynch now publicly acknowledges that it was a mistake to have met with the spouse of a subject of FBI investigation, and that she would not do it again [were she given the opportunity]. It is further complicated by the possibly Bill Clinton may become a co-defendant in the affair of the Clinton Foundation and its donors and, again, the appearance of their attempts at influence the affairs of government through the Clintons. It is more than conclusive that neither courted nor abided by Caesar’s Law.

It will take a Solomon, to invoke another icon of Western jurisprudence, to know where adequate and correct public policy now leads. As Ms. Lynch has said publicly, her meeting with Bill Clinton has cast a shadow over the whole process of investigation of Hillary Clinton’s activities. The refusal, thus far, of Ms. Lynch to exclude herself from participation in the whole investigation as a minimal step in the right direction, is incomprehensible. The Clintons’ defenders who point to the fact Ms. Lynch’s deputy is also an Obama appointee is beside the point.

Indeed, one of the first steps toward righting this sinking moral and legal ship is the appointment of a widely accepted public figure with a judicial background to take on the role of special prosecutor in this affair. Nothing less would remove it from the nest of intrigue and conflicting interest which this Administration has brought to it.

David Singer: European Union Acclaims Abbas Whilst Flogging Farage

Brexit proponent Nigel Farage has been branded a liar by the European Parliament (EUP) – but PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas can lie compulsively without the slightest EUP remonstration or rebuke.

Such hypocrisy and double standards surfaced during addresses by Abbas and Farage to the EUP within the last week. Farage told those assembled:

“The biggest problem you’ve got and the main reason the UK voted the way it did is because you have by stealth and deception, and without telling the truth to the rest of the peoples of Europe, you have imposed upon them a political union. When the people in 2005 in the Netherlands and France voted against that political union and rejected the constitution you simply ignored them and brought the Lisbon treaty in through the back door.

What happened last Thursday was a remarkable result – it was a seismic result. Not just for British politics, for European politics, but perhaps even for global politics too.”

Farage taunted the EUP Parliamentarians:

“What I’d like to see is a grownup and sensible attitude to how we negotiate a different relationship. I know that virtually none of you have never done a proper job in your lives, or worked in business, or worked in trade, or indeed ever created a job. But listen, just listen.”

Amid shouts of protest, the President of the EUP, Martin Schulz, interrupted Farage in full-flight with this rebuke:

“Mr Farage – I would say one thing to you. The fact that you’re claiming that no one has done a decent job in their life – you can’t really say that”.

Jean-Claude Juncker – President of the European Commission – put the boot into Farage amidst thunderous applause:

“You lied. You didn’t tell the truth. You fabricated reality.”

Palestinian Terrorism: why not?

http://edgar1981.blogspot.com.au/2016/07/palestinian-terrorism-why-not.html
Following the brutal murder of 13-year-old Jewish Israeli girl Hallel Yafi Ariel while she slept yesterday, today yet another Jewish family was destroyed when their car was attacked by a Palestinian terrorist.

The EU and USA could stop the terrorism immediately by simply cutting off their multi-billion dollar payments to the PA (which are used not just for incitement but also to pay the salaries of terrorists and their families). They won’t of course*. But while they refuse to provide any deterrents, I don’t understand why, for all his strong words, Netanyahu doesn’t either. All I can see – as far as the Palestinians are concerned – are incentives to keep it up.

America’s Founding Changed Human History Forever And we have no excuse for not passing on its singular importance to the next generation. By Charles C. W. Cooke

Today is my son’s first Independence Day.

He doesn’t know that, of course, because he’s only three-and-a-half months old. But my wife and I do, and we’ve attempted to mark the occasion nevertheless — in loco filius, if you will. As such, Jack will be dressed today in a special onesie (stylized picture of a milk bottle, “Come and Take It” tagline); he will wear his Old Glory sun hat; and he will be involved in all the festivities that the family has to offer. Naturally, none of this will make even the slightest bit of sense to him; as a matter of fact, today will be the same as is any other day in the life of a baby, just with more people around and a surfeit of BBQ. But you have to start somewhere, right?

Because Jack is three months old, it is acceptable for his parents to treat July Fourth as an excuse for the purchase of kitsch. But what about after that? What about when he is five? Or twelve? Or nineteen? As a native Brit, I am accustomed to the self-deprecating instincts that are the hallmark of British society, and I am acquainted, too, with the reflexive aversion to patriotism that is all-too customary in the birthplace of Western liberty. In consequence, I know that if I were to leave my son befuddled by America’s Independence Day proceedings, he would probably stay that way in perpetuity. And that would be a tremendous, unconscionable shame — a shame that, frankly, would reflect poorly on me.

Once they reach a certain age, we expect our children to know what is what. As soon as they start speaking, we begin to teach them right and wrong; once they are old enough to be trusted with responsibility, we monitor closely how it is being used; and, in a process that is hopefully never-ending, we make sure that they know as much about the world around them as they are capable of taking in. It is in pursuit of this lattermost goal that we designate national holidays. In May, we celebrate Memorial Day, lest we forget what we owe our ancestors. In January, we observe Martin Luther King Day, that we might bring to mind the most uncomfortable parts of our nation’s past. And on July Fourth we arrange an ostentatious display of patriotism, in resounding commemoration of the moment that a ragtag bunch of philosopher-king rebels set their revolutionary ideals before a candid world, and changed human history forever.

In certain quarters it is fashionable to disdain these occasions, and, in so doing, to treat the past as if it were wholly disconnected from the present. Indeed, staunch defenders of the American Founding are often told that to embrace modernity it is necessarily to jettison the antique. “Why,” it is asked, “do we celebrate these flawed men and their pieces of parchment? After all, John Adams couldn’t even have imagined Tinder.”

Though narrow, this critique is indisputably correct. John Adams could not have imagined Tinder, and I daresay that he had no conception of high-frequency trading, of synthetic fibers, or of advanced robots either. But, ultimately, that is irrelevant. The beauty of the American Founding was not that it provided a detailed roadmap that could predict the minutiae of the future in glorious perpetuity, but that it laid out for all people a set of timeless and universal ideals, the veracity and applicability of which are contingent upon neither the transient mood of the mob nor the present state of technology. Among those ideals are that “all men are created equal,” and that they “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”; that “Governments are instituted among Men” in order to “secure” their “rights”; that legitimate power derives “from the consent of the governed”; and that if any such government is seized or corrupted by tyrants, “it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.” At times, the United States has failed disastrously to live up to these principles, and, on at least one occasion, significant forces within the union have rejected them outright. But that an ideal has been violated in no way undermines its value, and it seems patently obvious to me that the country has been blessed by having had an eloquent North star to which its downtrodden could point from their moments of need.

AMEREXIT 1776

In a June 7 1776 session in the Pennsylvania State House (later Independence Hall), Richard Henry Lee of Virginia presented a resolution with the famous words: “Resolved: That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.”

On July 1, 1776, the Continental Congress reconvened, and on the following day, the Lee Resolution for independence was adopted by 12 of the 13 colonies, New York not voting. Discussions of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence resulted in some minor changes, but the spirit of the document was unchanged. The process of revision continued through all of July 3 and into the late afternoon of July 4, when the Declaration was officially adopted. Of the 13 colonies, nine voted in favor of the Declaration, two — Pennsylvania and South Carolina — voted No, Delaware was undecided and New York abstained. John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress, signed the Declaration of Independence. It is said that John Hancock’s signed his name “with a great flourish” so England’s “King George can read that without spectacles!”

Entebbe: Another reason to celebrate July 4 By Henry Oliner

On June 27, 1976, Air France Flight 139, in route from Tel Aviv to Paris, had a layover in Athens. There four terrorists, two from a German group and two from the Palestinian Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, hijacked the plane. After a stop in Benghazi, Libya, the flight continued to the airport in Entebbe, Uganda.

One hundred forty-eight non-Israeli and non-Jewish passengers were separated in a process hauntingly familiar to the hostages and were released in two separate groups. Ninety-four passengers and the 12 crew members remained. The four hijackers were joined by three more, and demands were made for the release of 40 terrorists from Israeli prisons and 13 from other incarceration.

Israel’s policy of non-negotiation with terrorists was well known, but understandably, the families of the Israeli hostages begged for Israel’s leaders to comply with the hijackers’ demands.

On July 3, four C-130 Hercules jumbo planes left Israel with 190 elite troops plus 20 non-combatants to execute the most daring rescue operation in modern history. In six amazingly short days from the hijacking, the Israeli Defense Force assembled a crack team, collected intelligence from the released hostages and the Israeli construction firm that built the airport, quickly devised a complex plan, repeatedly rehearsed the rescue to precision, and argued the risks and mechanics of the rescue. Israeli officials entered into negotiations with the terrorists to buy much needed time.

The first C-130 landed at 1:00 AM at the Entebbe airport. Imitating Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, who had visited the hostages, a black Mercedes with soldiers in blackface rolled out of the plane and toward the terminal with the hostages. As they pulled up to the terminal, the soldiers burst in, yelling in Hebrew and English for the hostages to remain on the ground. They quickly found and killed all of the hijackers and within six minutes were escorting the hostages out of the terminal to the additional planes that had just landed, precisely as planned.

Three hostages were killed in the crossfire: Jean Jacques Maimoni (19), Pasco Cohn (55), and Ida Borochovitch (56). A fourth, Dora Bloch (75), had been taken to a hospital and was killed by Ugandan soldiers after the raid. Ten hostages were wounded.

Soldiers from the additional planes engaged Ugandan soldiers, killing over thirty, and destroyed eleven Mig jets on the ground. Five soldiers were wounded, and only one was killed by a sniper in the terminal tower: Yonatan (Yoni) Netanyahu, brother of Israel’s current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

The planes took off with the soldiers and hostages 58 minutes after arrival. In spite of the wounded and the losses, the rescue force was prepared for much worse, and the operation was considered a remarkable success.