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June 2018

MY SAY: ON FATHER’S DAY

My father Mardoqueo Isaac Salomon was born in Poland in 1905. He was a physician who obtained his medical degree in Geneva, Switzerland where he met and befriended Zeev Vladimir Jabotinsky who persuaded him to leave Europe. When he graduated from medical school, he was denied visas to Palestine and America. Desperate to leave Europe he enlisted in the Bolivian Army which needed doctors for the Chaco War with Paraguay (1932-1935). My lovely and reluctant mother followed him. They lived in military tents in snake infested jungle where he went on patrols in a muddy river on boats encircled by piranhas. He rose in the ranks, was promoted to Surgeon General, changed his name from Mordechai to its Spanish equivalent Mardoqueo and after the Chaco War he settled into a peaceful life in Bolivia where we were saved from the horrors of Europe where all our relatives – grandparents, aunts, cousins- were herded into camps and killed.

At the age of forty, he obtained visas for our family and we came to America where we took buses throughout the United States in an effort to find a place to settle. We crisscrossed cities- Omaha, Chicago, New Orleans, El Paso, Las Cruces, New Mexico, Huntington, Alabama, and finally the Bronx where he passed his medical licensing exam and he opened a medical office and practiced until he had a stroke in 1979.

My brother and I reflect on Papi on Father’s day. He was loving, but pedantic, strict and demanding. But, most of all he was brave and adventurous and unique. rsk

GOOD NEWS FROM AMAZING ISRAEL FROM MICHAEL ORDMAN

ISRAEL’S MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENTS

Developing a blood test for cancer. The Californian healthcare company GRAIL Inc is sponsoring a research program to detect cancer early, led by Hebrew University Professor Yuval Dor. The program will analyze fragmented DNA in the bloodstream that derives from tumors, to identify the type of cancer responsible.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/hebrew-university-researchers-team-up-with-us-firm-to-fight-cancer/
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3740107,00.html

Targeting cancer cells in children. Scientists at Israel’s Technion have developed a system for the selective nanoscale transport of the chemotherapeutic Dasatinib in young patients. Polymer micelles enhanced with sugar carry the chemical to cancer cells alone, thus maximizing its efficiency without harming healthy tissues.
https://www.israel21c.org/nano-system-delivers-anticancer-drugs-to-childhood-tumors/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168365918301111

$8.4 million for startups to test health software. Israel has launched an $8.4 million p.a. program that enables startups to try out their technologies with the medical data of the four health services. It is part of the National Digital Health plan (see here) which aims to make Israel a global leader in digital health technologies.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-kicks-off-plan-for-startups-to-try-out-tech-at-health-organizations/
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3740020,00.html

A new view on surgery. Israel’s Beyeonics Surgical (a subsidiary of Elbit) develops Augmented Reality (AR) visualization for surgeons. A head-mounted visor transmits real-time high-resolution imaging of the surgical area, plus patient data, directly before surgeons’ eyes. Beyeonics has just raised $11.5 million of funds.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3740165,00.html

Cells learn to overcome difficult pregnancies. Researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Hadassah Medical Center have discovered that the human body’s “natural killer” cells improve their ability to fight diseases affecting the fetus following the first pregnancy. It could lead to new fertility treatments
https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-study-paves-way-for-women-to-skip-difficulties-of-first-pregnancies/
https://www.cell.com/immunity/fulltext/S1074-7613(18)30128-6

Israel’s first female ambucycle driver. Sophie Donio from Eilat is Israel’s first female EMS ambucycle driver. She is a single working mother, a therapist and a diving instructor who gives up her free time to volunteer with United Hatzalah as an EMT first responder and rush out to save the lives of people she has never met.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/R4issLQe0wI?rel=0

A biotech hub at Hadassah. Israel’s LR Group is launching Biohouse – a $14 million network of biotech hubs, initially in Jerusalem’s Hadassah Medical Center and then at two other Israeli hospitals, plus Boston and New York. The Hadassah hub can host 40-50 medical device and digital health startups and is already 40% full.
https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3740263,00.html

Europe: Ramadan Roundup, 2018 by Soeren Kern

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/12519/ramadan-europe

In France, the government, which previously vowed to reduce foreign influences on the practice of Islam in the country, approved visas for 300 imams from Algeria and Morocco to lead Ramadan services in French mosques.

“Every message, no matter how poisonous the message is, should have the right to be expressed.” — Ahmed Aboutaleb, Mayor of Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

“The Turkish minister of foreign affairs tried to teach me a lesson about my Islamic identity. It is going too far if a foreign state, which is far away, tries to teach the mayor of Rotterdam about Dutch law and how I should apply it.” — Ahmed Aboutaleb, Mayor of Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

Muslims across Europe are marking the end of Ramadan, the Islamic holy month, which in 2018 was observed between May 17 and June 15, in accordance with the Islamic lunar calendar.

Ramadan, a major topic for public discussion in Europe this year, received considerable media coverage, a reflection of Islam’s rising influence.

Muslim leaders sought to leverage the media attention to showcase Ramadan — a time when Muslims abstain from eating and drinking between sunrise and sunset, to commemorate, according to Islamic tradition, the revelation of the Quran to Mohammed — as the peaceful nature of Islam in Europe.

European multiculturalists, normally strict enforcers of secularism when it comes to Christianity, made great efforts to draw up guidelines, issue instructions and carve out special privileges to ensure that Muslims were not offended by non-Muslims during the festival.

Death of Susanna: Anti-Semitism never goes away By Eileen F. Toplansky

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/06/death_of_susanna_antisemitism_never_goes_away.html

Having recently visited the Jewish Museum in New York City, I learned of a series of paper engravings titled “In the Eruv of Theresienstadt.”

In their diabolical way, the Nazis fooled the world concerning the ghastly concentration and extermination camps. During World War II, “small bits of information about the extreme and horrific episodes perpetrated under the Third Reich reached an unbelieving world. The Nazis needed to answer the world’s growing concern, yet they wanted to continue implementing their final solution” of exterminating the Jewish people. So the “Nazis decided to use Theresienstadt to solve the growing outside pressure. Through deceit and subterfuge, the Nazis transformed Theresienstadt into a model ghetto.”

Those who survived the horrors of the Holocaust remembered. Fritz Lederer (1878-1949), who was trained at the Weimar Academy of Fine Arts, “designed sets for theater productions in Theresienstadt” – yet another incongruity. After the war, though, he created “oppressive scenes of the camp, including the ‘The Eastern Fortress,’ ‘The Only Exit from Eruv,’ and the ‘Little Fortress’ depicting the prison where many inmates were tortured and murdered.”

The term eruv refers to the symbolic boundary established in some Jewish communities, demarcating a space considered the shared private property of all members, within which certain practices normally forbidden on the Sabbath may be performed. Lederer’s use of the term eruv in the context of Theresienstadt is laced with irony. The only way out of this eruv was by death or deportation to an extermination camp.

Soft Jihad in America By Itu Laze

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/06/soft_jihad_in_america.html

“False Identity” – the second and more explosive of two documentaries. (first part here) – unmasks ‘soft Jihad’ in America. In it, Arabic-speaking Israeli Channel 10 journalist, Zvi Yehezkeli courageously concealed his identity to expose Islam’s somewhat shocking “quiet conquest” of the U.S.

Since the August 2004 discovery of the Muslim Brotherhood’s 1991 Explanatory Memorandum and The Investigative Project’s 2012 film, Grand Deception, these documentaries have further revealed the extent of societal penetration sought or achieved by a large and growing, but secret, Islamic soft jihad army that seeks to subvert the U.S. and enfold it within a global Islamic empire.

The success of supremacist Muslims has gone unchallenged primarily since U.S. political decision-makers and media outlets refuse to publicly discuss this immense threat, let alone stop this terrifying reality.

“Da’wa is the Number 1 Weapon!” asserts an American Muslim in Belle Dale, Florida – a convert renamed Abu Bakar, and author of the book, 2064 – Islamic America. Formerly a successful U.S. corporate strategic consultant, he now levers his profession to propagate Islam.

“Why wouldn’t I take the knowledge and experience that Allah has blessed me with to advance Islam in America,” asks Abu Bakar, rhetorically. He labors together with Belle Dale Muslim Yusuf al-Muslet to transform that locale into a model Islamic town for the rest of America to follow.

Problems at the Justice Department and FBI Are Serious By Andrew C. McCarthy

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/misconduct-at-fbi-department-of-justice/

And they won’t be solved by whining about criticism.

What do you do with an FBI agent, sworn to uphold the law, who flagrantly violates the law in a rogue investigation aimed at making a name for himself by bringing down some high-profile targets?

Why . . . you promote him, of course.

At least that is the way the Justice Department answered that question in the case of David Chaves, an FBI agent who serially and lawlessly leaked grand-jury information, wiretap evidence, and other sensitive investigative intelligence to the media in his quest to make an insider-trading case against some celebrities. And when finally called on it, the Justice Department circled the wagons: proceeding with its tainted prosecution, referring the now-retired Chaves for an internal investigation that has gone exactly nowhere after nearly two years, and using legal maneuvers to block the courts and the public from scrutinizing the scope of the misconduct.

The Ethos of Law Enforcement
It has become a refrain among defenders of the FBI and Justice Department that critics are trying to destroy these vital institutions. In point of fact, these agencies are doing yeoman’s work destroying themselves — much to the chagrin of those of us who spent much of our professional lives proudly carrying out their mission.

The problem is not the existence of miscreants; they are an inevitable part of the human condition, from which no institution of any size will ever be immune. The challenge today is the ethos of law-enforcement. You see it in texts expressing disdain for lawmakers; in the above-it-all contempt for legislative oversight; in arrogant flouting of the Gang of Eight disclosure process for sensitive intelligence (because the FBI’s top-tier unilaterally decides when Bureau activities are “too sensitive” to discuss); in rogue threats to turn the government’s law-enforcement powers against Congress; and in the imperious self-perception of a would-be fourth branch of government, insulated from and unaccountable to the others — including its actual executive-branch superiors.

Yes, There Was FBI Bias By The Editors

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/inspector-general-report-reveals-fbi-bias-in-clinton-email-investigation/

There is much to admire in Justice Department inspector general Michael Horowitz’s highly anticipated report on the FBI’s Clinton-emails investigation. Horowitz’s 568-page analysis is comprehensive, fact-intensive, and cautious to a fault.

It is also, nonetheless, an incomplete exercise — it omits half the story, the Russia investigation — and it flinches from following the facts to their logical conclusion. The media and the Left are spinning the report as a vindication of the FBI from the charge of bias, when the opposite is the truth.

The IG extensively takes on numerous issues related to the decision not to charge former secretary of state Hillary Clinton for, primarily, causing the retention and transmission of classified information on the non-secure “homebrew” server system through which she improperly and systematically conducted government business. (Our Dan McLaughlin usefully catalogues the topics Horowitz addresses here.) If there is a single theme that ties the sprawling report together, however, it is bias.

Or, as the report put it, “the question of bias.” It should not really be a question, because the evidence of anti-Trump bias on the part of the agents who steered the Clinton probe — which was run out of headquarters, highly unusual for a criminal investigation — is immense. In fact, the most hair-raising section of the report, an entire chapter, is devoted to communications among several FBI officials (not just the infamous duo of Peter Strzok and Lisa Page), which overflow with abhorrence for Trump (“loathsome,” “an idiot,” “awful,” “an enormous d**che,” “f**k Trump”) and his core supporters (“retarded,” “the crazies,” one could “smell” them). More alarmingly, the agents express a determination to stop Trump from becoming president (e.g., Strzok, on being asked if Trump would become president, says “No. No he’s not. We’ll stop it”; and on being assured that his election is highly unlikely, opines that “we can’t take that risk” and that the bureau needs “an insurance policy” against him).

Despite marshaling this damning proof of bias, Horowitz spends much of his report discounting it with respect to individual investigative decisions.

Rich Tenorio:From seedling colony to Big Apple: How Jews helped shape NYC’s 350-year history New book includes highlights and dark periods of NY Jewry, from anarchist Emma Goldman, crime syndicate Murder, Inc. and Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg

https://www.timesofisrael.com/from-seedling-colony-to-big-apple-how-jews-helped-shape-nycs-350-year-history/

Chronicling the story of Jews in New York is an undertaking as tall as the Empire State Building, and as multilayered as a pastrami on rye from Katz’s Delicatessen.

But it has been achieved in “Jewish New York: The Remarkable Story of a City and a People,” by historian Deborah Dash Moore.

Published last October, the book is a collaborative effort involving Moore — the Frederick G.L. Huetwell Professor of History and Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan — and fellow scholars Jeffrey S. Gurock, Annie Polland, Howard B. Rock, Daniel Soyer and Diana L. Linden.It spans over 350 years, beginning when New York was a Dutch colony named New Amsterdam and extends through American independence and the immigration era.

The Jews who were part of the story include newspaper publisher Adolph Ochs, who revived The New York Times in the late 19th century; anarchist Emma Goldman, whose fiery rhetoric drew both supporters and opponents in the early 20th century; and CCNY graduate Dr. Jonas Salk, who battled anti-Semitism en route to discovering the polio vaccine in 1955.

JOAN SWIRSKY: THANK YOU PUNCHY

https://canadafreepress.com/article/thank-you-punchy

I remember as a young teenager going by myself to see “On the Waterfront” at the Whalley Theater in New Haven. I was so mesmerized by the performance of Marlon Brando (30-years old at the time) that it took a dozen more viewings—really, that’s how many times I saw the film, maybe more—before I realized that the greatest actors of the day—Eva Marie Saint, Karl Malden, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger—were also featured in the movie.

In the years since that spellbinding experience, I saw dozens more movies, many with tremendously talented stars and amazing performances. But Brando remained a towering icon to me, unchallenged by any of his many idolaters and competitors.

But 20 years later, in 1974, Godfather: Part II debuted, and 31-year-old Robert De Niro, playing the young godfather-to-be, Vito Corleone, hypnotized me as Brando had decades before.

In fact, I remember walking out of the theater and, like a crazy person talking out loud to myself, I said, “I’m sorry, Marlon.” In fact, at that moment, I left Marlon for Robert. Not that I still didn’t—and still do—love Brando for the artistry he has given to the world. But for me, it was De Niro all the way, in spite of the silly films he has made in recent years to keep his decadently lavish lifestyle afloat.

Antitrust Matters Matter by Linda Goudsmit

http://goudsmit.pundicity.com/21286/antitrust-matters-matter

http://goudsmit.pundicity.com http://lindagoudsmit.com

United States antitrust laws regulate the organization and conduct of business corporations on state and national levels to provide fair competition for the benefit of consumers. Why are they necessary?

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has the answer:

“Free and open markets are the foundation of a vibrant economy. Aggressive competition among sellers in an open marketplace gives consumers – both individuals and businesses – the benefits of lower prices, higher quality products and services, more choices, and greater innovation. The FTC’s competition mission is to enforce the rules of the competitive marketplace – the antitrust laws. These laws promote vigorous competition and protect consumers from anticompetitive mergers in business practices. The FTC’s Bureau of Competition, working in tandem with the Bureau of Economics, enforces the antitrust laws for the benefit of consumers.”

The Sherman Antitrust Act, passed by Congress in 1890 under President Benjamin Harrison, was the first Federal act that outlawed interstate monopolistic business practices. It is considered a landmark decision because previous laws were limited to intrastate businesses.

In 1890 Utah, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, Alaska, and Hawaii were not even states. The Transcontinental Railroad that connected the eastern United States with the Pacific coast was in its infancy. That was then, this is now. Today there are 50 states, world travel is commonplace, and antitrust matters matter to every person on Earth.

Why? What do antitrust matters have to do with me? The answer is EVERYTHING.