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October 2019

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

I’m from the Deep State and I’m here to help by Arthur Chrenkoff

By on October 23rd, 2019

http://thedailychrenk.com/2019/10/23/im-deep-state-im-help/

It’s 2019, so it’s perhaps time to update Ronald Reagan’s famous dictum that “The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

The media and the left (but I repeat myself) have spent the past three years ridiculing the concept of the “Deep State” and those who subscribe to its existence. We have been told it’s a crazy right-wing conspiracy theory to believe that some public servants, mostly in the fields of intelligence, law enforcement and diplomacy, might cooperate in informal cabals to pursue their preferred policies regardless of who is in power and to protect their fiefdoms from oversight, interference and the executive, legislative and judicial control. To wonder whether some influential people in the federal bureaucracy, connected through a revolving door with the progressive establishment, might have contemplated preventing the election of their bete noire and his removal from office once their initial efforts proved unsuccessful invited accusation of delusion and paranoia.

This narrative is now officially old and busted. The new and hot one: the Deep State exists and it’s good.

As Michelle Cottle, member of “The New York Times” editorial board, writes in her op-ed “They Are Not The Resistance. They Are Not a Cabal. They Are Public Servants: Let us now praise these not-silent heroes”:

President Trump is right: The deep state is alive and well. But it is not the sinister, antidemocratic cabal of his fever dreams. It is, rather, a collection of patriotic public servants — career diplomats, scientists, intelligence officers and others — who, from within the bowels of this corrupt and corrupting administration, have somehow remembered that their duty is to protect the interests, not of a particular leader, but of the American people.

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ISRAEL Comments turned off

Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism What’s wrong with anti-Zionism is anti-Zionism itself. Michael Walzer ▪ Fall 2019

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/anti-zionism-and-anti-semi

Anti-Zionism is a flourishing politics today on many university campuses and on parts of the left, and the standard response from many Jewish organizations and from most of the Jews I know is to call it the newest version of anti-Semitism. But anti-Zionism is a subject in itself; it comes in many varieties, and which ones are anti-Semitic—that’s the question I want to address here. I take “Zionism” to mean a belief in the rightful existence of a Jewish state, nothing more. Anti-Zionism denies the rightfulness. My concern here is with left-wing anti-Zionism in the United States and Europe.

Most versions of anti-Zionism first appeared among the Jews. The first, and probably the oldest, takes Zionism to be a Jewish heresy. According to Orthodox doctrine, the return of the Jews to Zion and the establishment of a state will be the work of the Messiah in the days to come. Until then, Jews are required to accept their exile, defer to gentile rulers, and wait for divine deliverance. Political action is a usurpation of God’s prerogative. Zionist writers hated the passivity that this doctrine produced with such passion that they were called anti-Semites by orthodox Jews, who would never have given that name to their own rejection of the Zionist project.

“Waiting for the Messiah” has a left version, which might be called “waiting for the revolution.” Jews (and other minorities) were often told that all their problems would be solved, and could only be solved, by the triumph of the proletariat. Many Jews took this to be an expression of hostility, a refusal to recognize the urgencies of their situation. But I don’t see anti-Semitism here, only ideological rigidity and moral insensitivity.

The second Jewish version of anti-Zionism was first proclaimed by the founders of Reform Judaism in nineteenth-century Germany. There is no Jewish people, they insisted, only a community of faith—men and women of the Mosaic persuasion. Jews could be good Germans (or good citizens of any state) since they were not a nation like the other nations and did not aspire to a state of their own. Zionism was perceived as a threat to these good Germans, since it suggested that they had an allegiance elsewhere.

Many leftists have adopted this denial of Jewish peoplehood, and then they go on to claim that a Jewish state must be a religious state, something like a Catholic or Lutheran or Muslim state—political formations that no leftist could support. But Reform Jews adopted this position knowing that most of their fellow Jews didn’t share it. If the nation is a daily referendum, as Ernest Renan said, the Jews of Eastern Europe, the great majority, were voting every day for peoplehood. They weren’t all looking for a homeland in the land of Israel, but even the Bundists, who hoped for autonomy in the Tsarist empire, were Jewish nationalists.

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ISRAEL, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The Omar Affair The socialism of fools takes Washington By Michael Walzer (March 2019)

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts

“Long ago, August Bebel gave a name to left-wing anti-Semitism: “the socialism of fools.” Now the fools are in Congress.”

There are two parts to the Omar affair, and despite the furor and all the statements and counterstatements, and the tweets and countertweets, not enough has been said about either. I will deal with them in this order: first, Rep. Omar’s lies and, second, the fearfulness of her critics

1) I don’t think that Rep. Omar is a liar; she is just repeating other people’s lies. It’s possible that she believes them or, maybe, she thinks they are half-true and politically useful (and she has proven that they are politically useful). In any case, her claims are false. AIPAC, aka the Zionist lobby—actually the right-wing Zionist lobby; there are others on the left—does not control American policy in the Middle East. The organization can make a lot of noise; it has influence in Congress—though less than its leaders tell its donors—and the influence comes from the money it spends. I am sure that there are politicians in the House and Senate who never fail to answer AIPAC’s phone calls and who speak passionately about Israel when they are asked to do so. But that’s about all they do, for Congress has very little impact on what America does in the Middle East or anywhere else. Putting Omar on the House Foreign Affairs Committee is probably a good idea; she will learn how little the committee has to do with foreign affairs.

American foreign policy is made in the White House. That may be constitutionally wrong, but it’s been true for a long time. When the people elect a president who agrees with AIPAC, the organization looks very powerful. And when the people elect a president who disagrees with AIPAC, the organization is powerless. I don’t remember how AIPAC responded to Carter’s Middle East policy or to Clinton’s. In neither case was AIPAC influential, not when Israel withdrew from the Sinai and not when Rabin and Arafat shook hands on the White House lawn; its leaders were probably not consulted. But its lack of influence was most clear in the Obama years, when it disapproved of almost everything Obama did in the Middle East, from the Cairo speech to the treaty with Iran, and could do nothing to change his policies

There are indeed Zionist lobbies at work in Washington. They advocate different policies, and sometimes one or another of them gets its way, but not because of its power or its money. It finds people in office who share its ideological commitments, or it doesn’t.

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HISTORY, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The Kurds, Trump, & Forgotten Zionist History By Moshe Phillips

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.jewishpress.com/indepth/opinions/the-kurds-trump-forgotten-zionist-history/2019/10/20/

Various media outlets criticized President Trump last week for one of his defenses of his decision to remove 50 American troops who were assisting Kurdish fighters in Syria. “They didn’t help us in the Second World War,” Trump said regarding the Kurds. “They didn’t help us with Normandy, as an example.”

To rebut Trump’s argument, CNN quoted Michael Rubin from the American Enterprise Institute: “World War II was a war among states and the Kurds weren’t a state,” he said. It also quoted Henri Barkey, a Middle East expert from the Council on Foreign Relations, who said, “Just like many other people who did not have a state, [the Kurds] could not have helped the United States.”

In fact, though, both in World War I and World War II, stateless Zionist Jews lobbied and organized in the U.S., UK, Canada, Palestine, and elsewhere to form independent fighting units to fight against Germany and the Ottomans in WWI and against the Axis powers in WWII.

In WWI, first the Zion Mule Corps (650 Jewish soldiers, served at Gallipoli) and then later the Jewish Legion (5,000 Jewish solders) fought under British army command; in WWII, the Jewish Brigade (30,000 Jewish soldiers) was part of the British army.

The men agitating for and leading the Jewish soldiers in WWI and WWII were some of the most colorful and amazing individuals of the Zionist movement. That Barkey and Rubin could be expert sources for CNN and not be highly familiar with their stories is rather surprising.

The WWI Jewish fighters were led by British officer John Henry Patterson. Patterson was the most famous African lion hunter in British history. His story is told in the 1996 Val Kilmer/Michael Douglas film “The Ghost and the Darkness.” Patterson was played by Kilmer, and the movie is based on a book by Patterson. Two other books written by Patterson detail his work with Jewish soldiers and were titled With the Zionists in Gallipoli and With the Judaeans in the Palestine Campaign.

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POLITICS Comments turned off

O’Rourke Defends Comments Comparing Trump’s America to Nazi Germany By Tobias Hoonhout

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/orourke-defends-comments-comparing-trumps-america-to-nazi-germany/

Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke drew a comparison between 1930s Nazi Germany and America under the Trump administration during a Wednesday interview Wednesday with the Washington Post.

O’Rourke’s comments came after Costa pressed him over his ability to reach across the aisle to work with Republicans after making intensely disparaging comments about them on the campaign trail.

“I don’t think that speaking the truth and calling things by their right names is in any way disqualifying in being able to do work going forward. I think sooner rather than later, a majority of Americans — including Republicans — are going to see Trump for who he is, and this administration for what it’s done,” O’Rourke told the Washington Post’s Robert Costa when challenged.

“Outside of the Third Reich, give me another example of a Western leader who has called one people of one faith inherently defective, or dangerous, or disqualified from being successful in that country,” he continued. “ . . . How did a modern country, well educated, a source of innovation and ingenuity, and a source of moral leadership in the world, descend into that level of barbarity, producing a shame that lives with every single German to this day?”

O’Rourke also sparred with Meghan McCain in July over his characterization of a Trump rally in North Carolina as an “impromptu Nuremberg rally.”

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Republican lawmaker ‘destroyed’ latest impeachment inquiry witness argument: McCarthy By Charles Creitz

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.foxnews.com/media/kevin-mccarthy-claims-republican-lawmaker-destroyed-latest-trump-impeachment-inquiry-argument

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said a fellow Republican lawmaker deconstructed a key part of the latest Trump impeachment inquiry witness testimony in Tuesday’s closed-door session.

“In 90 seconds, we had John Ratcliffe destroy [acting U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bill] Taylor’s whole argument,” McCarthy said.

The questioning by Ratcliffe, a Texas Republican and member of both the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, was an important moment in the hearing, McCarthy claimed.

“We can’t really talk about it,” he said.

Ratcliffe appeared on Fox News after the testimony and said there were new details brought to light, but said nothing “worthy of impeachment.”

McCarthy added House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., is not allowing lawmakers to speak too specifically about the proceedings, in an interview Tuesday on “The Ingraham Angle.”

“Adam Schiff won’t let us talk about what happened,” he said regarding U.S. diplomat to Ukraine Bill Taylor’s closed-door hearing on Capitol Hill. “There is no quid pro quo.”

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WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Trump Lifts Sanctions On Turkey, Announces Permanent Cease-Fire In Syria Posted By Tim Hains

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/10/23/watch_live_president_trump_gives_statement_on_syria.html

President Donald Trump declared a “big success” in Syria and announced he is lifting all sanctions against Turkey during a statement from the White House on Wednesday.

“Let someone else fight over this long blood-stained sand,” the president said. “We were supposed to be there for 30 days. That was almost 10 years ago. So we’re there for 30 days, and now we’re leaving. It’s supposed to be a very quick hit, and let’s get out and it was a quick hit except they stayed for almost 10 years.”

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ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

1998 Remarks From Biden Surface After He Attacks Trump’s ‘Lynching’ Remarks Ryan Saavedra

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.dailywire.com/news/1998-remarks-from-biden-surface-after-he-attacks-trumps-lynching-remarks?utm_source=cnemail&utm_medium=email&utm_content=102319-news&utm_campaign=position3

Democrat presidential candidate Joe Biden was quick to attack President Donald Trump on Tuesday after Trump referred to impeachment as a “lynching,” which is the same term that Biden used in 1998 to describe the impeachment of then-President Bill Clinton.

“So some day, if a Democrat becomes President and the Republicans win the House, even by a tiny margin, they can impeach the President, without due process or fairness or any legal rights,” Trump tweeted. “All Republicans must remember what they are witnessing here – a lynching. But we will WIN!”

Biden responded: “Impeachment is not ‘lynching,’ it is part of our Constitution. Our country has a dark, shameful history with lynching, and to even think about making this comparison is abhorrent. It’s despicable.”

In an appearance on CNN in October 1998, however, Biden referred to the Clinton impeachment as a “partisan lynching,” saying:

Even if the President should be impeached, history is going to question whether or not this was just a partisan lynching or whether or not it was something that in fact met the standard, the very high bar, that was set by the founders as to what constituted an impeachable offense.

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MOVIES AND TELEVISION Comments turned off

COLLEGE BEHIND BARS to Air on PBS in November 2019

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.pbs.org/about/blogs/news/college-behind-bars-to-air-on-pbs-in-november-2019/

New Four-Part Documentary Series by Lynn Novick Follows Prisoners Through Rigorous College Program; Explores How Education Transforms Lives and Impacts Criminal Justice

Alfred I. duPont-Columbia and Peabody-Award winning filmmaker Lynn Novick(THE VIETNAM WAR, PROHIBITION, FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT,THE WAR) has directed and produced a new documentary series, COLLEGE BEHIND BARS, that reveals the transformative power of higher education through the experiences of incarcerated men and women, PBS announced today during the Television Critics Association Winter Press Tour. The four-hour series directed and produced by Novick and produced by longtime collaborator Sarah Botstein (THE VIETNAM WAR, PROHIBITION, THE WAR, JAZZ), will air on PBS in November 2019.

COLLEGE BEHIND BARS marks a new path for Novick, who is best known for history films directed with Ken Burns. The four-hour series, distilled from nearly 400 hours of cinéma-vérité footage, explores the lives of a dozen incarcerated men and women as they struggle to earn degrees in the Bard Prison Initiative (BPI), one of the most rigorous and effective prison education programs in the country.

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ANTI-SEMITISM Comments turned off

GREAT ADVICE FOR CELL PHONE ADDICTS

By on October 23rd, 2019

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/22/opinion/technology-shut-off.html?rref=collecti
24 Hours Without My Phone I recommend a tech shabbat. By David Leonhardt

In 2008, Tiffany Shlain’s father, Leonard, was diagnosed with brain cancer, and she began to change her use of technology when the two of them were together. “Some days he would have only one good hour,” she later wrote in the Harvard Business Review, “and I didn’t want to be distracted when I was with him, so I’d turn off my cellphone.”

Eventually, Shlain, a filmmaker, extended the idea into a full day without screen use. She called it a tech shabbat — after the Jewish day of rest — and she has written several articles and a recent book, called “24/6,” about the idea.

“The digital revolution has blurred the lines between time on and time off, and time off is disappearing,” she wrote in The Boston Globe. “As for our leisure time, we’ve created a culture in which we’re still ‘working’ while we play: needing to photograph every moment, then crafting witty posts of our ‘fun, relaxing activities’ on Instagram, then obsessively checking responses. We can barely catch our breath in the tsunami of personal and work digital input, which results in us not being truly present for any of it.”

This weekend, I gave Shlain’s idea a try — and I highly recommend it. My family and I turned off our cellphones and laptops on Friday night and didn’t turn them back on until Sunday morning. We made an exception for television: The baseball playoffs are going on, and watching a game as a family feels different from staring at an individual phone screen.

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